I said outright I do not fault her as a character for that (only Jordan for writing it that way. ) - Edit 2
Before modification by Joel at 19/01/2013 08:09:17 PM
She could have had 100 seasoned veterans and they would have easily fallen to the Shaido... her kidnapping cannot be held against her in the least. You think she should have been hiding in a hole to prevent anything bad from happening to her?
If she had had 100, say, Borderlander regulars, or other Aiel, she probably would at least have had a decent chance to escape. A hundred teenaged Cairhienin nobles playing at being Aiel, however, were useless; she might as well have ridden out alone. Yet, and once again, I do not blame her for her kidnapping; it WAS nonetheless the ultimate cause of Hoppers eternal death (by design, though that was not Sammael and Greandel intended result.) Faile is not responsible nor accountable for that, because she is a fictional character with limited knowledge and even less prescience.
Jordan, however, is not similarly excused by ignorance or unintended consequences: Hopper, like Bela, died because he DELIBERATELY created a loveable and blameless character integral to the narrative just so he could twist a knife it the readers gut by gratuitously torturing and killing said character. Unlike with Rolan and Bela, I do not fault Faile personally for Hoppers eternal death, but he is brutally and permanently killed for the sole purpose of adding color to and advancing her narrative and Perrins, which makes them both that much more infuriating. It is kind of like how Fain hates the ta'veren because he knows getting at them was the sole reason the DO ripped him apart and remade him, destroying him in the process.