I was thinking.

Why is it that Far Madding is such a problem for channelers? I mean the Borderlanders are there, confident that Rand will have to enter the city in order to meet them and essentially be helpless while doing so. And infact Rand becomes so angry at the whole thing in TGS that he nearly uses the CK to blow up the entire army.

But it occurred to me to wonder, why. I mean is there not a very simple and easy way of dealing with the problem.

We know that Weaves and channeling do work inside FM. It is just that you cannot connect to the one power inside the effect of the guardian. But you can channel in the city if you have a well, or if you channel into the city from outside the effect of the guardian. That is why Rand's rain of fire would have worked. He was outside the guardians effect when he was planning on attacking the army, and could connect to the OP. Any weaves he directed inside would not have been disrupted.

The thing is, the OP-neutralising effect is not a natural phenomena like in a stedding. It is caused by a complex ter'angreal. A ter'angreal that presumably is rather unique and delicate piece of work since there are no others like it. A ter'angreal that is presumably not made of cuendillar since I expect this would have been mentioned when the thing was described in WH.

So why is it then, that a channeler could not do something to destroy the guardian and therefore remove the OP-neutralising effect entirely. Rand for example was in the city several days. Presumably he must have known more or less where the guardian was located. Why is it, that he did not just channel a bar of fire from the sky (from outside the guardian) and direct it straight at where the guardian is located, destroying it. I doubt he really needs even the CK for that. Heck, he could just lift a big rock in the air, move it over the the city/guardian and let it drop. CRASH, one less guardian.

He could then have marched into the now defenseless city and confronted the borderlanders in complete safety. With the CK (and after TGS groups of asha'man) there is little the borderlander army or the AS with them can do.

Or why not just send Nynaeve under invisibility to the guardian with her well, and have her blast it to bits. Rand could then travel into the city the moment the guardian was down with large groups of asha'man and take over.

Heck, now that I think of it, if you can channel inside the city from outside, why not just open a gateway where the guardian is located, slicing it to pieces and destroying it that way. Easy.

FM really should not be the big problem that it is. If in the next book, Rand stupidly enters FM without taking care of the guardian, I will be very annoyed.