For number 2, I believe Tyrion is counting being tried and sentenced for the murder of Joffrey. Isn't she the one who accused him even though Tywin was overseeing the trial?

1) If he had asked for trial by combat he would have faced Arya. He knew she was an assassin trained by the Faceless Men. He saw her spar with Brienne. He knew he wouldn't have lasted two seconds. Littlefinger's forte was talking, not fighting.

3) No. But after his private meeting with Cersei I imagine Tyrion eagerly joined them for a few rounds.

@Hypnocratic Goat said:

1) If he had asked for trial by combat he would have faced Arya. He knew she was an assassin trained by the Faceless Men. He saw her spar with Brienne. He knew he wouldn't have lasted two seconds. Littlefinger's forte was talking, not fighting.

C'mon... that's not how a trial by combat works. The accused person does not fight himself, but someone else fights for him. Like I wrote above, I don't think anyone in the room would have volunteered to represent him, but he could have tried - the way Tyrion did in the Eyrie. Who know, maybe there was someone in the room who would agree for the right price?

You answered your own question - nobody in that room was going to fight for him and he knew it. No matter how much money he offered. Sansa set the whole thing up, including who was going to be in the room.

@Hypnocratic Goat said:

You answered your own question - nobody in that room was going to fight for him and he knew it. No matter how much money he offered. Sansa set the whole thing up, including who was going to be in the room.

Another possible reaso is he was probably just too unprapared to think of all possible ways out of this sudden mess. Remember they caught him offguard. He did try begging, tried to use his power as Lord of the Vale, then before he cd think of anything else his throat was slit. It happened too fast.

@Hypnocratic Goat said:

You answered your own question - nobody in that room was going to fight for him and he knew it. No matter how much money he offered. Sansa set the whole thing up, including who was going to be in the room.

Did Tyrion know for sure anyone in the Eyrie would agree to fight for him? No. He gave it a try, and it worked for him.

When you have no choice, you have nothing to lose by trying.

Did Tyrion know for sure anyone in the Eyrie would agree to fight for him? No. He gave it a try, and it worked for him.

First of all, you're talking about two different situations. Not knowing whether or not anyone will accept your offer is not the same thing as knowing that no one will accept because you realize you've been set up.

And as I said before, Littlefinger's forte is talking his way out of situations. He's always been extremely confident in his ability to manipulate and sway people.

Might he have eventually, out of pure desperation, requested trial by combat? Sure. But everything happened way too quickly for that. For all we know maybe he was starting to say "Sansa I demand the right to trial by combat!" when Arya slashed his throat.

We're dealing with two different cultures. "Trial by Combat" was part of the Knight's Landing culture and the 7-god religion. Littlefinger was stuck in the North, which had a different religion and a different attitude toward justice ( i.e. the all-knowing lord who passed sentence and carried out the executions. Technically Trial by Combat might be in the Westeros law code, but we never saw Northerners do it.

If Littlefinger had demanded it, he probably wouldn't have gotten any takers, and would have to face Arya himself. He knew how that would have ended up.

Independent question -- why all the fuss at the conference about Jon's bond with Danny? Danny could have solved the problem by releasing him from her service. Besides, Cirsei's scheme was to join the alliance and stab them in the back later -- why create a fuss earlier and raise suspicion of her intentions. ( I know that the scene was great for revealing character -- Jon, Circei, and Tryion's -- but dramatically it seemed odd)

Littlefinger was a talker and not a fighter. And, like most here have said, no way anyone in that room would fight for him. He thought he had Sansa wrapped around his little finger (pun intended-LOL) and it may have taken her a while, as she herself even alluded to, but she finally saw him for what he was.

@Strawberry Shortcake said:

2) Tyrion mentioned that Cersei tried to kill his twice. The first time was during the battle of the Blackwater, by Mandon Moore, but what was the second?

In the last episode, the gold cloaks on the beach mentioned that Cersei had a price on Tyrion's head. I took that for the second time she tried to kill him.

2) I thought was siding with Tywin at the trial and after it...ensuring he would be killed. Of course that was before Tyrion went full assassin and took Tywin out on the pooper with the crossbow.

Interesting that Sansa managed to avoid certain awkward things in the trial -- the letter got kept secret, and nobody asked why she perjured herself when originally questioned about her Aunt Lysa's death. And she diverted attention from Arya before the Assassin's guild was brought up. She WAS a good student of Littlefinger.

"C'mon... that's not how a trial by combat works. The accused person does not fight himself, but someone else fights for him."

I've seen it work different ways in different stories. One (ONCE AND FUTURE KING) said the accused was normally supposed to do his own fighting, but could hire a substitute if he had a disability. Tyrion, of course, could claim that his size was a disability on the two occasions he got in trouble.

I think some people are forgetting what happened in that battle in the Vale. Tyrion first asked for a trial by combat thinking he'd send for his brother Jaime, known (at the time) as perhaps the greatest swordsman in the realm. Then Lysa insisted that the battle had to happen right there. At that point Tyrion very quickly shifted to asking around the room. But it wasn't just pure luck that Bronn finally volunteered: Tyrion had spoken with him earlier, befriended him, and made clear that he had a good deal of money to offer anyone who helped him.