RoP has been getting better and better for me, while HotD I may give one more episode before I give up on it. What RoP does well, IMO, is to give me a character with a clear motivation, and then put an obstacle in their way to see how they react. Yes there is a larger overarching storyline (that I am only barely familiar with due to the LotR movies) but that doesn't get in the way of enjoying the smaller conflicts that arise every scene or episode. It's basic set-up and pay-off storytelling that is keeping me interested from moment to moment. I can easily think of a dozen unique smaller scenes in the first four episodes that had small conflicts built and resolved. In rooting for the characters to overcome their momentary hardship, it becomes easier to care about the bigger goals.
HotD on the other hand has lots of things happening with the big plot, but it feels almost like I'm watching a historical re-enactment. Things happen, but I don't understand why characters came to the decisions they did or feel any emotional impact from it, it's just what happened. And that is the biggest thing that HotD is missing compared to the early seasons of GoT. And I didn't have a big issue with those things dropping out in later seasons because I was already so invested in the individual characters that the shorthand they were playing with still worked for me. In HotD, none of that groundwork has been put on screen.