Allegedly, they were operating on what notes GRRM was willing to provide them--and Jon Snow's resurrection is literally something that will have to come up in the next book
If GRRM goes the same direction as the shows did in how the stories unfold - there's been fairly persistent rumours that at least in some key ways he will not - then this is correct. But, like the rest of the world, I'm still waiting for the next book...
(The vast majority of this is stuff I only know due to the fact that the negative response to the TV show was EVERYWHERE in its final season and I literally couldn't avoid it. I became conversant so I could end the conversations more quickly.)
IMO for any D&D player GoT is must-see TV. Ditto Jackson's LotR movies.
Yes, because YOU are not participating as any of those team members.
No, I'm not; particularly when I'm the DM.
But as a player, I'm quite capable of pivoting from one character to another if-when I either have to or choose to. Never mind that every now and then I'm participating in part as opposition to the team, if I'm playing a spy or assassin or whatever at the time whose agenda and that of the party are in conflict.
Do you think Mr. Guerrero Jr. is going to follow the Blue Jays avidly when he switches to a new team?
Because that's what the player is actually doing. They're actually one of the players on the team. I would expect them to pay attention to...y'know...the team they're actually ON. And if a player, say, were badly injured and had to retire, do you think they're going to be as avid a follower of that team?
I separate player and character considerably farther apart than you do, I think.
I mean, while I'm playing the character in the moment I can inhabit its thoughts, emotions, etc. without problem; but if-when that character dies I find it easy to jump to something else.
You are, as I said, making this circular. You have inserted the distance, the specific election to focus on team before any possible consideration of person. For TTRPG players, that cannot happen. You literally don't know anything at all about the team until it happens in-character. Prior to that moment, the one and only thing you know is...your character. You don't even know the world as well as you know your character.
Perhaps, though often I don't know the character that well either when it's just starting out. I'll usually have a "schtick" or personality quirk in mind to make the character unique and after that it'll develop as it develops.
As for knowing the team, the basics of that come in the first session or two once I see what everyone else is playing species-class wise and see those characters roleplayed a bit.
For this analogy to work, you would have to be following a single specific player from high school, through college, and on to them finally joining a professional team, and then, only then, deciding "actually, all I really care about is the Blue Jays."
Is that not a pretty substantial leap, to have invested so much time and effort and care into one singular player, over the course of their extensive pre-professional career....only to then instantaneously switch all of that investment to the first team they happened to join?
I don't put nearly that much effort in. What happens before the character hits the big leagues (i.e. joins the party) can be sorted out later if required; and roll-up will give me some clues through the languages it speaks, the secondary skills and-or past professions it's had, and so forth.
But the only possible thing you can focus on IS a key character, namely yours, until after a substantial amount of time has passed, at which point your character has integrated into the group. The one and only attachment you have to the world IS your character, you know that character better than you know the color of the world's sky, for goodness' sake! Unless and until you integrate into the group, the character is all you have.
This would be true if both of...
a) the character I'm playing right now is the only character I've ever had in that party or campaign and
b) we're starting out fresh in a brand new homebrew setting
...were true. 98+% of the time IME one or both is not true.
In other words, it's at best true for the first part of a new campaign's first adventure and that's it.
Most people don't play "year after year"--because campaigns don't last that long.
Hey, that ain't my fault.
