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Rhaegar was WAY better than Robert


Emie

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Rhaegar loved his Lady Lyanna and thousands died for it.

What a great man! Using his wife as a baby making machine and since this machine couldn’t work properly anymore he needed a new one. He then found the new one in the eyes of a teen who was the only daughter of a High Lord and betrothed to another High Lord who happened to be his cousin, he decided to eloped or kidnapped her and hiding away for a year playing hide and seek while a war he had created was ranging at Westeros and costed the lives of thousands people his wives and childrens were among them.

What a great man!         

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On 11.02.2017 at 4:32 AM, Emie said:

Alright, I suppose I made this post in more of a spur of the moment day because I had been thinking about the dynamics of Robert and Lyanna and just felt very angry, so I just spurted it all out. Anyway, I guess Rhaegar wasn't a "great" person in general, but when I said he was a "better" man, I meant more of a better romantic partner for Lyanna. Robert was crude and sleeping around even while Lyanna was "kidnapped" among other things. Rhaegar on the other hand, was kind, gentle, possibly didn't sleep around and Lyanna probably felt moved by how much of a gentleman he was. I'm not surprised one bit if Lyanna decided to run away with Rhaegar. In her eyes he was a way out, otherwise she would be trapped with a man she never loved and be unhappy. 

As to some people questioning why I think Robert saw her as more of an object. Well just look at the way he talks about her, especially with how he thinks she would never object to anything he'd do. Even Ned told him he was wrong, and again, he flat out told him that he really didn't know her. "He didn't know her fire". As Ned would say. I think from everything we do know about her from the five books that are out, Lyanna would be a lot like Cersei in the sense of not taking ANY of his crap and Robert would be annoyed with that. He truly didn't know her at all to not anticipate her reactions, therefore he didn't really love her. 

And yes, Lyanna was a lot like Arya and Sansa. (Although the Sansa that's romantic is more of "early Sansa" since Sansa gets MUCH better in later books and becomes an awesome character.) 

 

 

I don't think either Robert or Rhaegar's moral worth should be judged on the degree on sentiment they had for one Northern chick. They both had bigger obligations to met, say, to their families and the kingdom (in a different era, obviously).

And I'd say they were both shitbags, as royals, husbands and fathers, but Robert didn't start a war and he actually had a wife who helped to destroy their marriage and family life, so Robert wins. Thirteen years earlier, when Robert wasn't a failure king and head of the family, and an unpleasant drunkard, but a rebel fighting in a good cause, he wins easily.

The thing about Rhaegar is, he is difficult to judge because we don't exactly know his motives. If he saw the future and fulfilled somehow needed requirements to save the world, he's a hero, even if he sacrificed thousand. If he misinterpreted a prophecy and acted recklessly, he is a loon. If he really started this mess out of love/lust, and/or could have chosen a less controversial woman to fullfill the prophecy, but decided against it based on his whim... he's a shitbag. Worse than Robert, even if more aesthetic.

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Neither Rhaegar nor Robert would have made for a competent ruler.  We already know about Robert's failings.  Let us focus on Rhaegar.  Here is the man who could have done the best for the realm but instead he chose to follow his dick and chased after a teenager.  You say it's normal for the times but it was still stupid.  He put his lust ahead of his responsibility to his family.  Both are silly men with wandering dicks.

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Most of the info we have on rhaegar is completely biased and mostly incomplete. We don't know what his motivations were for doing what he did. I believe we'll learn more in the books to come. For now, I think it it's foolish to say rhaegar was a bad man or a bad ruler for doing what he did with Lyanna. We have no idea why he did it, we don't have enough info to make these conclusions.

instead let's look at first hand recollections. Ned, a man who has every reason to hate rhaegar, thinks to himself in the brothel that rhaegar was most likely not the type to visit brothels.

barristan recalls him fondly saying he was above all, able.

we also have some stories of rhaegar as a youth. He loves music and has no interest in swords, until he reads something and determines he must be a warrior. To me this clearly speaks to his sense of duty. I doubt he read something in a book that told him he needed to be a fighter for personal gain, it was to save the realm. He reads this and immediately starts becoming one of the best swordsman in the world.

to me there is no question. Robert is just a normal guy who was good at fighting, he is not truly fit to rule. Rhaegar on the other hand would have been an ideal ruler.

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56 minutes ago, Aegon VII said:

Rhaegar on the other hand would have been an ideal ruler.

Based on what? The fact that he wasn't visiting brothels, liked books and played sad music?

He reads this and immediately starts becoming one of the best swordsman in the world.

Do you have any proof about this? Because the only time he was teasted he died.

barristan recalls him fondly saying he was above all, able.

Barri also told that Robert was a good man.

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4 hours ago, Jon's Queen Consort said:

Based on what? The fact that he wasn't visiting brothels, liked books and played sad music?

No for the points I mentioned as well as others. 

all our primary sources on rhaegar (except Roberts) paint him in a good light, both close friends and enemies ( we would expect Ned to be his mortal enemy after everything that happened). He comes across something in his books that leads him to believe he must be a warrior and immediately begins training in the yard. This is the epitome of a person fulfilling their duty to the realm. Rhaegar likes reading and playing music and never loved swordplay, yet he practices diligently to become a greats swordsman out of his sense of duty. You may not draw as many conclusions from him suddenly determining he must be a warrior, but I do.  Furthermore we have all his interactions with jonconn that also paint him as a great man. Shitty leaders don't have their subordinates love them so much they fall in love with them. They also usually aren't universally loved by the people like rhaegar was.

4 hours ago, Jon's Queen Consort said:

Do you have any proof about this? Because the only time he was teasted he died.

You question how good of a swordsman he was because he lost the only fight we saw him in, In which he was fighting against, arguably the best warrior alive. I also weigh in other things such as his past tourney history. I know sword is different than joust but ones skill in each is going to be highly correlated and he won the harrenhal joust.

 Also we have the fact that he was fighting Robert one on one at all. Royalty is always the most protected, for rhaegar to be taking on Robert shows that rhaegar and his followers believed it would be a contest and not a slaughter. 

Really we have nothing to suggest he wasn't one of the best swordsmanship in the world. Selmys comment about all it takes is a slip of the foot suggests that he viewed rhaegar as an equal, if not better fighter than Robert. 

 We should pretty much expect any targ who puts in the effort to be one of the best living swordsman at any given time. You could almost extend that to all the great houses. Anyone from a great house who is devoted to training will most likely be one of the best swordsman around eg Loras 

4 hours ago, Jon's Queen Consort said:

Barri also told that Robert was a good man.

I'd be interested to revisit the quotes in which Selmy says this versus when he's talking about rhaegar. We already know the man Robert is as we get to see him ourselves, so the only point of your last statement would be to suggest Selmy is not a reliable source on these matters. While I agree he's not reliable On some topics, I have to think he is one of if not the most reliable living source when it comes to this subject matter. He deeply respects and admires rhaegar, do you get the sense he felt the same way towards Robert?

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32 minutes ago, Aegon VII said:

all our primary sources on rhaegar

You mean Barri who is biased and also saud that Robert was a good man. Jorah who never knew him, Ned who said that he didn't went to brothels, Jon Con who was in love with him and Cersei who is Cersei. 

32 minutes ago, Aegon VII said:

This is the epitome of a person fulfilling their duty to the realm.

Which was his duty to the realm? To elople with Lyanna and create a war that cost the lives of thousands of people?

32 minutes ago, Aegon VII said:

Really we have nothing to suggest he wasn't one of the best swordsmanship in the world

How about the fact that he have never fought? He have never been tested in order to prove how good he was. But maybe I am wrong please show me when Rhaegar was tested at real fighting and not training?

32 minutes ago, Aegon VII said:

I'd be interested to revisit the quotes in which Selmy says this versus when he's talking about rhaegar. We already know the man Robert is as we get to see him ourselves, so the only point of your last statement would be to suggest Selmy is not a reliable source on these matters. While I agree he's not reliable On some topics, I have to think he is one of if not the most reliable living source when it comes to this subject matter. He deeply respects and admires rhaegar, do you get the sense he felt the same way towards Robert?

I love how he isn't reliable when he said someone good for Robert but he is reliable when he said something good about Rhaegar.

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Rhaegar was a bit mad, naive and selfish for taking Lyanna. What did he think was going to happen?

Robert did what needed to be done concerning the Targaryens. What's worse a few deaths or thousands? All Targaryens would have had to be killed to prevent what is currently happening.

Yes Robert was a drunken fool who enjoyed whoring around but i wouldn't say he was cruel. 

 

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On 2/19/2017 at 8:39 AM, Jon's Queen Consort said:

You mean Barri who is biased and also saud that Robert was a good man. Jorah who never knew him, Ned who said that he didn't went to brothels, Jon Con who was in love with him and Cersei who is Cersei. 

Selmy might be biased but that does not invalidate his statements. Everyone in the series is biased. You look at the lack of evidence as evidence against Rhaegar being a good ruler. This is not the case, we simply don't have much info about Rhaegar to begin with. In the same way we don't have many examples of him fighting to tell us how good of a fighter he is. We need to examine the little information we have and extrapolate from it.

Let's start with Selmy and take his statements for what their worth.

It was his failures that haunted him at night, though. Jaehaerys, Aerys, Robert. Three dead kings. Rhaegar, who would have been a finer king than any of them.

"Able. That above all. Determined, deliberate, dutiful, single-minded".

"Your Grace," said Whitebeard, "the Prince of Dragonstone was a most puissant warrior, but . . . "

Next we have Jorah

Your brother Rhaegar was the last dragon

"Rhaegar fought valiantly, Rhaegar fought nobly, Rhaegar fought honorably. And Rhaegar died."

Swords win battles," Ser Jorah said bluntly. "And Prince Rhaegar knew how to use one."

Really the only person who doesn't like Rhaegar is Robert, even Cersei still likes him deep down, even though she hates him for rejecting her.

Cersei

"By night the prince played his silver harp and made her weep. When she had been presented to him, Cersei had almost drowned in the depths of his sad purple eyes. He has been wounded, she recalled thinking, but I will mend his hurt when we are wed. Next to Rhaegar, even her beautiful Jaime had seemed no more than a callow boy."

"Aurane Waters seemed as bored as Cersei by all this prattle about septons. Seen up close, his hair was more silvery than gold, and his eyes were grey-green where Prince Rhaegar’s had been purple. Even so, the resemblance... She wondered if Waters would shave his beard for her."

And Robert hates him for almost certainly incorrect reasons

"And Rhaegar ... how many times do you think he raped your sister? How many hundreds of times? I will kill every Targaryen I can get my hands on, until they are as dead as their dragons, and then I will piss on their graves."

 

On 2/19/2017 at 8:39 AM, Jon's Queen Consort said:

Which was his duty to the realm? To elople with Lyanna and create a war that cost the lives of thousands of people?

 Do you really not understand what I am referring to or are you just trying to be cute? Rhaegar liked music and reading and has no interest in swordplay. He comes across something in his readings and suddenly declares,

"I will require sword and armor. It seems I must be a warrior.’".

There is nothing about this that suggests he starts training to be a warrior for any selfish reason whatsoever. He never enjoyed it and now he is saying he MUST be a warrior. This is a duty he is fulfilling. Most likely because he believes he is TPTWP and must now save the realm.

On 2/19/2017 at 8:39 AM, Jon's Queen Consort said:

How about the fact that he have never fought? He have never been tested in order to prove how good he was. But maybe I am wrong please show me when Rhaegar was tested at real fighting and not training?

Again you are saying Rhaegar was bad at something because we don't have much evidence to the contrary, when the fact of the matter is, we don't have much text on him period. Everything we do have suggests he was an extremely capable warrior. We know he is an excellent Jouster based on his multiple tourney wins. We have no reason to think he would be a better jouster than swordsman. Futhermore he was confident enough to seek out Robert on the battlefield to fight one on one, the fight lasts for some times and Rhaegar injures Robert pretty badly.

On 2/19/2017 at 8:39 AM, Jon's Queen Consort said:

I love how he isn't reliable when he said someone good for Robert but he is reliable when he said something good about Rhaegar.

Lets revisit what I said,

I'd be interested to revisit the quotes in which Selmy says this versus when he's talking about rhaegar. We already know the man Robert is as we get to see him ourselves, so the only point of your last statement would be to suggest Selmy is not a reliable source on these matters. While I agree he's not reliable On some topics, I have to think he is one of if not the most reliable living source when it comes to this subject matter. He deeply respects and admires rhaegar, do you get the sense he felt the same way towards Robert?

I never suggest he's reliable when supporting my side and unreliable when supporting yours. Your the one throwing out the fact that Selmy said Robert was good. This is irrelevant, we know Robert wasn't good. The only reason you have to bring it up in this discussion is to try to discredit Selmy's statements that support my argument of Rhaegar being a good ruler and fighter. I concede he is unreliable at times (mainly I'm thinking of his recollection of Ashara) but I still think there is a lot of info we can get from his perception of Rhaegar and Robert.

I then ask that we examine Selmy's statements more closely in order to see if he is credible as I believe his statements are mostly credible when examing Rhaegar. He even rejects Dany calling him a warrior without peer,

"A warrior without peer . . . those are fine words, Your Grace, but words win no battles."

When you take these first hand accounts of Rhaegar combined with how he was loved and admired by the common man I have to think this is a subject that's not up for debate. Rhaegar is way better than Robert, period.

 

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10 hours ago, Aegon VII said:

against Rhaegar being a good ruler.

Rhaegar wasn't a good ruler because he never ruled. 

10 hours ago, Aegon VII said:

There is nothing about this that suggests he starts training to be a warrior for any selfish reason whatsoever

I never said that he did. I said that his duty to the realm was forgotten once he saw Lyanna.

10 hours ago, Aegon VII said:

Everything we do have suggests he was an extremely capable warrior.

 In order for someone to be a good warrior has to fight at a war or at least fight. As far as we know Rhaegar had fought only once and he died. However we know that he was a good jouster but that doesn't make him a good warrior, fights make someone a fighter tourneys make someone a tourney knight, its not the same.

10 hours ago, Aegon VII said:

the fight lasts for some times and Rhaegar injures Robert pretty badly.

Robert was also injured before the battle after fighting for a year. So Rhaegar went against an already weakened opponent and still end up dead.

10 hours ago, Aegon VII said:

we know Robert wasn't good

That is your opinion and not a fact.

10 hours ago, Aegon VII said:

Rhaegar being a good ruler

When and where Rhaegar ruled in order to be a good ruler?

10 hours ago, Aegon VII said:

Rhaegar being a good ruler and fighter

When and where Rhaegar fought in order to be a good fighter?

10 hours ago, Aegon VII said:

he was loved and admired by the common man

The common men also liked Aerys and Tywin. Also let's not forget how people still like Robert and fight for his Realm.

10 hours ago, Aegon VII said:

Rhaegar is way better than Robert, period.

Again that is your opinion and not a fact.

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On 2/19/2017 at 4:10 AM, Aegon VII said:

Most of the info we have on rhaegar is completely biased and mostly incomplete. We don't know what his motivations were for doing what he did. I believe we'll learn more in the books to come. For now, I think it it's foolish to say rhaegar was a bad man or a bad ruler for doing what he did with Lyanna. We have no idea why he did it, we don't have enough info to make these conclusions.

instead let's look at first hand recollections. Ned, a man who has every reason to hate rhaegar, thinks to himself in the brothel that rhaegar was most likely not the type to visit brothels.

barristan recalls him fondly saying he was above all, able.

we also have some stories of rhaegar as a youth. He loves music and has no interest in swords, until he reads something and determines he must be a warrior. To me this clearly speaks to his sense of duty. I doubt he read something in a book that told him he needed to be a fighter for personal gain, it was to save the realm. He reads this and immediately starts becoming one of the best swordsman in the world.

to me there is no question. Robert is just a normal guy who was good at fighting, he is not truly fit to rule. Rhaegar on the other hand would have been an ideal ruler.

The problem with a comparison of Rhaegar and Robert is that Robert lived to be a mature man while Rhaegar died in his early 20's.  The only way to really compare them would be to see what each of them was like up until the age Rhaegar died.  We know that Robert turned to drink because he was trapped in an unhappy marriage and hated the burden of being king.  We don't know how Rhaegar would have turned out if he had lived to succeed to the throne (except we know he was happy to run off with a woman who wasn't his wife when he didn't get whatever he was looking for from his marriage).

As far as comparing them as young men, we know that Robert was a charismatic leader who inspired loyalty, was a good fighter, and led from the front (think Gulltown, the Greyjoy rebellion, etc.).  He fathered a bastard before he was married.  After the disappointment of Lyanna's death, he did his duty and married Cersei.  We know Robert engaged in horrific conduct later in life, but we don't know of anything dishonorable or particularly unwise that he did before Ned became Hand (long after the age where Rhaegar had died).  Ned doesn't like the fact that Robert forgave the Lannisters for what happened during the Sack, but that was a pragmatic compromise he had to make.

Rhaegar was good with a harp and knew how to read.  He married the woman he was told to marry and had two children with her before abandoning her to the tender mercies of his mad father.  He may or may not have known that his father was roasting men alive and then brutally attacking his mother.  If he knew about it, he didn't try to do anything about it.  

He won the Tournament at Harrenhall, but like Daemon II Blackfyre, he may have cheated.  Barristan tells us that the key to knighthood is "chivalry, the code that made a knight more than any pit fighter."  So it is chivalry rather than fighting ability that, according to Barristan, makes a good knight.  And then he says "If I had been a better knight . . . if I had unhorsed the prince in that last tilt, as I unhorsed so many others, it would have been for me to choose the queen of love and beauty..."  This suggests that Barristan (and Arthur Dayne, and perhaps others) let Prince Rhaegar win that day -- if Barristan had been a "better knight," Rhaegar never would have crowned Lyanna queen of beauty.  "Of all his failures, none haunted Barristan Selmy so much as that."  

Rhaegar was old enough to fight the Kingswood Brotherhood (Jaime was old enough, and Rhaegar was several years older) but for some reason he didn't  -- even though they had attacked his wife, Princess Elia. 

There is some indication that Rhaegar may have been chasing a prophecy (or his own prophetic dreams), even though he knew that with one exception, that never turned out well for his family.  

We don't know if Rhaegar had any bastards before he married Elia.  Given his family history, it would be extremely surprising if he didn't.  Ned thinks that Rhaegar didn't frequent brothels, but that tells us nothing.  Jaime Lannister doesn't frequent brothels -- he just commits incest and treason, and breaks his kingsguard vows, with his sister, fathering bastards with her -- but Tyrion does go to brothels.  Who is more honorable?  

All in all, I think it is fair to say we don't know enough about Rhaegar to know who is "better."  

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10 minutes ago, The Twinslayer said:

This suggests that Barristan (and Arthur Dayne, and perhaps others) let Prince Rhaegar win that day

Which, letting the Prince to win, is something that we have already see in the books before hence it’s not something absurd.

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20 hours ago, Aegon VII said:

Again you are saying Rhaegar was bad at something because we don't have much evidence to the contrary, when the fact of the matter is, we don't have much text on him period. Everything we do have suggests he was an extremely capable warrior. We know he is an excellent Jouster based on his multiple tourney wins. We have no reason to think he would be a better jouster than swordsman. Futhermore he was confident enough to seek out Robert on the battlefield to fight one on one, the fight lasts for some times and Rhaegar injures Robert pretty badly.

 

 

Rhaegar managed to injure Robert because it was a horseback duel, and he was a good jouster, that being said it's not "he injured him badly" because robert sent his personal maester to barristan, it wasn´t mortally serious, at least in the canon books... 

A minor cut is suficient for any person not to be on a horse for a while, everytime the horse galops your cut (small as it can be) will burn, and a trident to KL ride is not a manhattan-new jersey trip... you can list an amount of stuff rhaegar did better but Robert is by far the superior warrior and commander, that's hammered in the books

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I will clarify. I have no problem conceding Robert is a better fighter. In fact I think that is his entire essence. I just think when comparing them as men the text shows us rhaegar is way better. Yes that is my opinion. And yes it's based on the very limited information we have. Robert was okay with Tywin murdering the targ children and ordered Dany killed while still a child. He left the crown millions in debt, was a glutton who flaunted having sex with whores in front of his wife's brother. Robert was an ordinary man and nothing more. Not evil, but certainly not great.

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I don't think it was necessarily only the fact that Lyanna was beautiful. It sounds typical and cliche, but every man has that woman that comes into their life and completely changes the man's way of living. Perhaps Robert saw Lyanna as that woman to come into his life and finally set him straight on the path he felt he was destined to walk and properly bring honor to the Baratheon name. Surely he didn't start an entire war because some pretty, blonde haired romantic stole his to-be-wed. Like you said in your original post, Lyanna was the type of woman that would have driven Robert crazy, with the assumption that Robert didn't see her as I previously distinguished. Perhaps there was a deeper meaning behind the sparking of Robert's Rebellion. Sure, we're told it's because Robert believed Rhaegar kidnapped Lyanna and raped her, but we'll never know whether or not that was the surface reason for everything that happened. I'm not defending Robert or vilifying Rhaeger, just simply playing devil's advocate.

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  • 1 month later...
On 2/6/2017 at 9:46 PM, Emie said:

A while back I made a post about how terrible of a person Rhaegar was for abandoning Elia and their kids and basically starting a war that killed thousands. While I'm still displeased with what he did, I actually think he was a MUCH better man than Robert. Not only was Robert a drunken womanizing moron who put his country in debt, but let's face it, he never actually loved Lyanna. I've noticed that some people like to make Robert out to be this romantic tragic hero, but was he really? Ned himself even said that Robert never really knew Lyanna. She was very intelligent, kind, funny and had a great "fire" about her as Ned would say. Lyanna is in fact the type of woman that turns Robert off. He preferred a woman who would sit pretty and keep her mouth shut while he does whatever he wants. And we all know that was not Lyanna at all. She would definitely have a thing or two to say to him about his escapades. Her fire would have driven him mad. He only "loved" her because she was physically beautiful and he would become part of the Stark family and be a brother to Ned. 

Rhaegar on the other had probably did see Lyanna's fire and was in fact truly in love with her and who she was. He saw her as a human being and not as an object, which makes him better than Robert. That among other things, he most likely would have been a very intelligent and competent ruler who obviously would have been SO much better than his mad father. 

Being King did not suit Robert, he would be a fantastic warrior, and decent commander, but he was not meant to sit a throne, and command a kingdom. True, he's a drunk, and womanizer, but this is the medieval era type thinking which was the norm. I'd prefer a womanizer, and drunk than a person who led to thousands of people dying. Robert BTW did love Lyanna, she just didn't love him, and he saw the outside, not the inside. We don't know if Rhaegar was truly in love with Lyanna, he very well could be a crazy prince obsessed with a prophecy, until we get to that point in the books, we don't know. BTW, a very competent, and intelligent ruler wouldn't become a adulterer, and plunge his soon to be kingdom in a war that left him, his wife, his children, his "love", his father, his mother dead, his best friend banished, his other best friend dead, and the Targaryen control of the 7 kingdoms vanishing. The truth lies somewhere in the middle of the two extremes of complete love and infallancy that Jon Connington views Rhaegar, and the complete loathe, and hatred that Robert Baratheon views Rhaegar. Also, calling Robert a, "drunken womanizing moron", is true, but you can also call Rhaegar a, "prophesy obsessed adulterering moron". It works both ways, both Rhaegar, and Robert have flaws, but positives too.

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