Rhaegar's strategic gaffe

[Angel Eyes]

Why did Rhaegar cross the Trident to deal with Robert Baratheon? He could have just waited for Robert to cross and Rhaegar's army has the high ground.

[Lion of the West]

Maybe he was tricked? Maybe he needed to move due to logistics? Maybe he felt he had some advantage that would turn the odds in his favor? Maybe he was fearing what his father might do if the war raged for to long?

In fact I guess that it was a non-military reason that compelled Rhaegar to engage the rebels as he did. Either he felt that as he was magically destined to win the war and so wanted a quick resolution than drawn out devastation in the realm OR, as I like to think, he feared that if the war dragged on than his father's lickspittles would poison his father's mind even further and Aerys might do something horrible to Rhaegar's family who were in Aerys' hands, either because the war dragged on or after a victory for Rhaegar. With a madman like Aerys you can't trust reason to make him hold his hand.

[Darth Sidious]

37 minutes ago, Angel Eyes said:

Why did Rhaegar cross the Trident to deal with Robert Baratheon? He could have just waited for Robert to cross and Rhaegar's army has the high ground.

Rhaegar was more chivalrous than smart.  He probably thought honor demanded that he meet Robert man-to-man on the battle field.  God hates cowards.  The honorable thing to do was to meet his foe in battle and fight with no advantages.  That kind of trash thinking. 

[hodorisfaclessman]

39 minutes ago, Angel Eyes said:

Why did Rhaegar cross the Trident to deal with Robert Baratheon? He could have just waited for Robert to cross and Rhaegar's army has the high ground.

May not have been significantly higher ground and generaly infantry like to go on the offensive so generals attack when possible  ...it can make the difference when numbers and equip etc are roughly even

He may have forseen that he had to face robert and either throught hed win or knew he had to die!

[Universal Sword Donor]

I always felt it was most likely that Rhaegar was in charge of the reserves --  a la Tywin or Roose -- and the battle was going poorly for the royalist cause. Llewyn led the Dornish flank that was routed. Barristan and Jonothor Darry were both incapacitated and they were likely leaders of specific battles/divisions at the Trident. If the leaders are getting killed or incapacitated, the army itself is not going to be in good shape.

So Rhaegar leading his men across (?) the river or to aid failing lines let him to Robert and the "duel for Lyanna."

[Moiraine Sedai]

Maybe Rhaegar was not a competent commander.  Too much was at stake to let single combat decide the outcome.  Bloodraven was better.  

[Three-Fingered Pete]

3 hours ago, Angel Eyes said:

Why did Rhaegar cross the Trident to deal with Robert Baratheon? He could have just waited for Robert to cross and Rhaegar's army has the high ground.

I think Rhaegar wanted to make sure that Robert didn't become a burnt, limbless, emotionally tortured servant of evil because we all know how that turned out.

[SFDanny]

I'd love to read Ser Barristan's thinking on their strategy. I doubt the battle's outcome is as simple as Rhaegar attacked across the Trident.

[Pikachu101]

3 hours ago, Moiraine Sedai said:

Maybe Rhaegar was not a competent commander.

I think the whole disaster that was Robert's Rebellion is proof Rhaegar is incredibly incompetent.

To answer the question Rhaegar probably thought it didn't matter who crossed because he genuinely believed fate was on his side so there's no way he could lose.  

[dmfn]

3 hours ago, Moiraine Sedai said:

Maybe Rhaegar was not a competent commander.  Too much was at stake to let single combat decide the outcome.  Bloodraven was better.  

Bloodraven lost his eye in single combat, also fighting over a woman, so no.

And there's a very short list of things we know about Rhaegar: he was handsome, he sang, he studied, and he fought. By any acount he did everything well. I don't see being defeated in single combat as incompetent.

BtB Selmy being gravely wounded is probably a good indication that the battle required every commander to be in the fight, either because they were already losing, or maybe they were winning, and were chasing Robert's forces into the river to finish them off. And Robert would then be fighting for his life, fueled by revenge and enraged at the outcome. 

It's hard to speculate, and this is one scene I really wish a POV character would think about for us. I guess it would have to be BtB. If things don't go well at Mereen (where he's outnumbered and leaving a walled city to attack, which historically wouldn't be considered a smart move, by the way) he might have some Trident flashbacks...

At any rate, only one person in the story has ever said anything bad about Rhaegar, and that's Robert. Any other character only has good opinions of him, even Ned. At the end he was solely motivated by fulfilling prophecy, and for all we know, he did what he did to save the fucking world.

[Giant Ice Spider]

Reminder: this is Rhaegar's first battle. Ever.

Arthur Dayne commanded against the Kingswood Brotherwood; Grandison, Cafferen, and Fell commanded at Summerhall; Tarly (shut up Mace you idiot) commanded at Ashford; Mace commanded at Storm's End (though that wasn't exactly a battle); and Connington commanded at Stoney Sept. And though we don't know who the commander of the royalists was at Gulltown, I bloody well doubt it was Rhaegar (since he was on honeymoon).

Now, I hear you say, Robb Stark never fought a battle before the Whispering Wood, but Robb was a tactical genius (he's basically the Hannibal of ASOIAF). While Rhaegarr may not have been an idiot (he was certainly well-read), his lack of experience when fighting against men like Ned Stark, Robert Baratheon, Hoster Tully, and Jon Arryn would show.

[Dorian Martell's son]

10 hours ago, Angel Eyes said:

Why did Rhaegar cross the Trident to deal with Robert Baratheon? He could have just waited for Robert to cross and Rhaegar's army has the high ground.

Both armies could have been trying to force the crossing. He seems to have met Bob's van at the river. Single combat also happened due to Rhaegar and Bob's honor. The prince was a better rider than Bob and most likely had Bob unhorsed and basically beat, but rather than trampling him, Rhaegar probably dismounted out of honor, but Bob was much better off of a horse and the rest is history

[Universal Sword Donor]

2 minutes ago, Dorian Martell's son said:

Both armies could have been trying to force the crossing. He seems to have met Bob's van at the river. Single combat also happened due to Rhaegar and Bob's honor. The prince was a better rider than Bob and most likely had Bob unhorsed and basically beat, but rather than trampling him, Rhaegar probably dismounted out of honor, but Bob was much better off of a horse and the rest is history

Ned said they fought on horseback. It wasn't a joust -- Bob was not great at those -- it was akin to a melee. We really won't even know what happened but this one is not likely. All the crown leaders were injured for a reason.

[Dorian Martell's son]

25 minutes ago, Universal Sword Donor said:

Ned said they fought on horseback. 

they did. The theory goes that After fighting horsed, bob was injured and unhorsed and prince Whitey, rather than doing the expedient thing  and trampling bob with his horse, He did the honorable thing and dismounted and got killed.  

[Trigger Warning]

6 minutes ago, Dorian Martell's son said:

they did. The theory goes that After fighting horsed, bob was injured and unhorsed and prince Whitey, rather than doing the expedient thing  and trampling bob with his horse, He did the honorable thing and dismounted and got killed.  

 

This seems like something that would have been so historically iconic that it would have been explicitly mentioned in the text by now. 

[Universal Sword Donor]

55 minutes ago, Dorian Martell's son said:

they did. The theory goes that After fighting horsed, bob was injured and unhorsed and prince Whitey, rather than doing the expedient thing  and trampling bob with his horse, He did the honorable thing and dismounted and got killed.  

Yeah that's a theory. We have Ned saying they fought on horseback. You'd think Ned would have mentioned something as notable as his friend, the best warrior in the realm and 1/2 of Nedbert, being unhorsed by Rhaegar. Whatever Jorah lends to this theory's credence, Ned prevents.

[Ylath's Snout]

From a tactical point of view this makes might be onto something

13 hours ago, Universal Sword Donor said:

I always felt it was most likely that Rhaegar was in charge of the reserves --  a la Tywin or Roose -- and the battle was going poorly for the royalist cause. Llewyn led the Dornish flank that was routed. Barristan and Jonothor Darry were both incapacitated and they were likely leaders of specific battles/divisions at the Trident. If the leaders are getting killed or incapacitated, the army itself is not going to be in good shape.

I really don't think that anyone on Rhaegar's side would want him to be leading from the front right away. Several other commanders getting taken out forcing the prince to take to the front to stabilize the line could deffenetly be what happened.

--------------

Looking at it strategically this seems to me like it might be on the monie.

16 hours ago, LionoftheWest said:

as I like to think, he feared that if the war dragged on than his father's lickspittles would poison his father's mind even further and Aerys might do something horrible to Rhaegar's family who were in Aerys' hands, either because the war dragged on or after a victory for Rhaegar. With a madman like Aerys you can't trust reason to make him hold his hand.

Considering what we know about Aerys and his plans to turn King's Landing into Aerys' Firepit there deffenetly was a source of strain coming from the home front for the loyalists. To slightly exaggerated every day risks Aerys doing something to alienate another ally or pressure a loyal lord into rebellion.

>Not to mention that Tywin is waiting in the wings. Ready to pounce on the weaker side with his fresh army of Westerlanders.

[Bael's Bastard]

On 8/5/2018 at 11:16 AM, Angel Eyes said:

Why did Rhaegar cross the Trident to deal with Robert Baratheon? He could have just waited for Robert to cross and Rhaegar's army has the high ground.

Rhaegar might not have thought time was on the side of he and his family, and might have been impatient to end the rebellion. House Targaryen was in a bad and increasingly worsening place.

Robert had secured the full support of all three of the great lords that ruled north of the Red Fork. House Targaryen had lost half the great houses of Westeros, and all the lands of Westeros north of the Red Fork with them. Robert and the combined forces of Arryn, Stark, and Tully were no doubt looking to secure the Riverlands south of the Trident, before making their way through the Crownlands to King's Landing.

House Targaryen did not have time to wait. That would not have brought the houses and lands they had lost back to them, and very well might have encouraged more houses and lands to abandon them over time. And who knows how many of the Riverlands houses south of the Red Fork were already loyal or had brought over to House Tully and the rebels, and could have approached the royalists from the west.

Not to mention the forces of Tywin and the Westerlands, which were fresh and had not made their intentions clear, after Rhaegar had convinced Aerys to send a raven to summon Tywin (whether or not Tywin received it). 

On a personal level, his unstable father had been left unsupervised in King's Landing effectively holding his wife and children hostage, while his pregnant lover was being guarded by a few Kingsguard near the borderlands of Dorne and the Stormlands.

So Rhaegar had good reason not to wait for Robert. And he apparently had good reason to believe that defeating Robert could put an end to the rebellion, or at least prove a major setback for it. Connington believed killing Robert would have put an end to the rebellion, as did Myles Toyne. And indeed, when he himself fell, many of his men threw down their weapons and fled.

Whether it is generally a bad strategy or not, I can't recall much reliable talk that crossing the river is what lost it for the royalists. Robert met Rhaegar in the river, with no apparent advantage of high ground. Rhaegar gave Robert a serious wound or wounds, but Robert was ultimately victorious. That, along with the loss of commanders Lewyn and Jonothor, and wounding of Barristan, was too much for the royalists to overcome.

[Bael's Bastard]

12 hours ago, Trigger Warning said:

This seems like something that would have been so historically iconic that it would have been explicitly mentioned in the text by now. 

It's not explicitly stated, but that one or both were on foot for the killing blow is implied by other things we are told in the text.

We know that Robert took a wound from Rhaegar that was serious enough to keep him from being capable of pursuing the remnants of Rhaegar's forces, and to delay his arrival in King's Landing.

We know that Robert and Rhaegar began the battle on horseback (AGOT: Eddard I, TWOIAF: Robert's Rebellion), but that Rhaegar sank to his knees when he was dying (ACOK: Daenerys IV), which is not likely if he hadn't already been on his feet.

However it happened, it seems likely that Rhaegar and possibly Robert were on foot when the killing blow was landed.

[Bael's Bastard]

11 hours ago, Universal Sword Donor said:

Yeah that's a theory. We have Ned saying they fought on horseback. You'd think Ned would have mentioned something as notable as his friend, the best warrior in the realm and 1/2 of Nedbert, being unhorsed by Rhaegar. Whatever Jorah lends to this theory's credence, Ned prevents.

Ned's POV says Rhaegar lay dead in the stream when Ned finally came on the scene, so it isn't clear how much Ned actually witnessed himself, or complete or first hand the account in Ned's POV is.