Rhaegar's strategic gaffe

[The hairy bear]

54 minutes ago, Bael's Bastard said:

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.

A warhammer blow in the chest is not a quick way to die. As I understand it, the cause of death would be a myocardial contusion, and it may take some painful hours before death.

With this in mind, one can picture Rhaegar receiving the dying blow, dismounting/falling from the horse, agonizing a little bit, and crying Lyanna's name, before finally sinking to his knees in the river and dying.

[Trigger Warning]

1 hour ago, Bael's Bastard said:

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.

 

Although it's entirely possible that the visions showed it accurately I'd still take it with a grain of salt that anything seen in the House of the Undying might not be an accurate look into the past and instead just a representation. 

[Bael's Bastard]

21 minutes ago, The hairy bear said:

A warhammer blow in the chest is not a quick way to die. As I understand it, the cause of death would be a myocardial contusion, and it may take some painful hours before death.

With this in mind, one can picture Rhaegar receiving the dying blow, dismounting/falling from the horse, agonizing a little bit, and crying Lyanna's name, before finally sinking to his knees in the river and dying.

That is possible, as we don't know for sure. Just saying that the theory that one or both dismounted is based at least in part on the fact that a dying figure that is clearly meant to be Rhaegar is depicted as sinking to his knees. Obviously it is speculation, which there is considerable room for considering the gaps in our knowledge.

[Bael's Bastard]

5 minutes ago, Trigger Warning said:

Although it's entirely possible that the visions showed it accurately I'd still take it with a grain of salt that anything seen in the House of the Undying might not be an accurate look into the past and instead just a representation. 

It seems no less accurate or more of a representation than other looks into the past, and much different than the representations of events such as the war of the five kings or red wedding. It doesn't prove that Rhaegar and/or Robert dismounted, but it opens up the possibility that they did.

[John Suburbs]

Pretty much everything is confusing about the Trident:

The rebel army decamps Riverrun about two weeks after the wedding, and then "Nine moons had waxed and waned, and Robb has been born in Riverrun while his father still warred in the south." So it's hard to tell from this whether Robb was born before or after the sack of KL, but it certainly seems like he was born before the ToJ, since this was the end of Ned's warring. From this, I can see a good five-month gap at least between the wedding and the Trident. So why on earth would Ned and Robert set up at the Trident and simply wait month after month to give Rhaegar time to assemble his army? Why not strike out for KL immediately and put an end to it?

One thought is that they were worried about Tywin, who at best would have his army at the GT or maybe Deep Den on the Gold Road. But this is leagues away from the Trident, so they would have ample warning should Tywin take the field.

Another odd thing is that the World Book apparently puts the Battle of Ashford after the wedding at RR, not before. Everything else in the war is recorded in sequence, except for Ashford if indeed it did take place after Summerhall and before the Battle of the Bells. If Ashford is later than we think, this would at least give the rebel army something to do in those intervening months, and it would make sense to try to prevent the Tyrell army from reaching Storm's End. But then, every story about the siege of SS says that it went on for more than a year, even though the war itself lasted "close to a year."

So something is not right here. If we have nine months between Robb's conception and his birth sometime around the sack or the ToJ, then what was Robert's already battle-tested army doing for the five or six months that it apparently saw no action, all while the loyalists are putting their army together?

 

[Eli Cross]

On 8/5/2018 at 3:58 PM, SFDanny said:

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.

No, but Barristan liked Rhaegar.  His opinion will be biased in that regard.  Barristan is also heavily into the knightly honor code.  So Barristan would set sound battle strategy aside because he would personally approve of Rhaegar's decision to meet Robert in battle.  In my opinion, Rhaegar's little sister is a better general than he was.  She will not make this kind of stupid mistake just for honor.  When she fights a battle she is in it to win.  She doesn't mess around.  I loved the way she handled the masters of Astapor.  I was like, wow, when she sent Belwas to face Ozzie.  Barristan and Rhaegar are burdened with the honor code of the Andal knights.  

[Dorian Martell's son]

13 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. 

Nope

21 minutes ago, Bael's Bastard said:

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.

The author has kept most everything related to that fight deliberately obfuscated for dramatic purposes.  The theory is based on dialogue from Jorah about Rhaegar being honorable and then dying and another bit with him saying that an honorable warrior would have dismounted when fighting an unhorsed opponent

[Arthur Peres]

I lot of things do not make sense in Robert's Rebellion. Like Aerys losing the war and still "lefting a treasury flowing with gold".

[Moiraine Sedai]

On 8/5/2018 at 6:52 PM, Pikachu101 said:

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.  

He thought he had a Ruby decorated plot armor. 

 

[Pikachu101]

1 hour ago, Moiraine Sedai said:

He thought he had a Ruby decorated plot armor. 

 

It's a joke but I think he genuinely believed the gods had fashioned him just that. It would also explain why Lyanna was left to bleed to death and why his other kids had very little protection, in Rhaegar's mind the three heads can't die because they have divine protection. 

[Alexis-something-Rose]

I know Edmure said that Rhaegar tried to cross the Trident, but it seems to me that both armies may have been trying to do the same thing. The victor tells the story. 

Robert was also in the waters of the Trident fighting. He didn't get there magically. And Ned must have been somewhere in the rear when Robert won his duel. 

And if the rebel forces were not seeking to cross the Trident, then Robert ending up in the middle of the river may mean that he was the one who sought Rhaegar out.

In any case. Everything that went well for the loyalist forces in the Battle of Redgrass Field went wrong for them during the Battle of the Trident. 

[Big P]

7 hours ago, Arthur Peres said:

I lot of things do not make sense in Robert's Rebellion. Like Aerys losing the war and still "lefting a treasury flowing with gold".

Maybe he was cheap.  He didn't spend what he needed to win the war.  

[Bael's Bastard]

20 hours ago, Widow's Watch said:

I know Edmure said that Rhaegar tried to cross the Trident, but it seems to me that both armies may have been trying to do the same thing. The victor tells the story. 

Robert was also in the waters of the Trident fighting. He didn't get there magically. And Ned must have been somewhere in the rear when Robert won his duel. 

And if the rebel forces were not seeking to cross the Trident, then Robert ending up in the middle of the river may mean that he was the one who sought Rhaegar out.

In any case. Everything that went well for the loyalist forces in the Battle of Redgrass Field went wrong for them during the Battle of the Trident. 

Yeah, I don't really get the impression that the royalist loss at the Trident is attributed to Rhaegar's supposed attempt to cross the Trident. He and Robert both appear to have found each other in the river, and Robert's defeat of Rhaegar appears to have caused many of Rhaegar's men to throw down their weapons and flee. It probably could have gone either way.

[Alexis-something-Rose]

1 hour ago, Bael's Bastard said:

Yeah, I don't really get the impression that the royalist loss at the Trident is attributed to Rhaegar's supposed attempt to cross the Trident. He and Robert both appear to have found each other in the river, and Robert's defeat of Rhaegar appears to have caused many of Rhaegar's men to throw down their weapons and flee. It probably could have gone either way.

And we know it was a close call for Robert too. He was severely wounded. It was a matter of landing the killing blow and Robert is the one who did that in the end. The fight seems to have been evenly matched for a while. 

I think that if there had been some massive strategic blunder on the royalists part, that it might have been stated in the World Book, especially if we have a character in the books mentioning it. 

[Ylath's Snout]

1 hour ago, Widow's Watch said:

And we know it was a close call for Robert too. He was severely wounded. It was a matter of landing the killing blow and Robert is the one who did that in the end. The fight seems to have been evenly matched for a while.

Ehh, seems to me like Bobby brought the right weapon to the fight.

Warhammers were the one of the premer anti-armor weapons of the high medieval era that Westeros seems to be stuck in. Sure swords can be used to kill a combatant in full plate but you need to go for weak-points or (ironically) grab the sword by the blade, look it up it totally was a thing, and use the cross-guard like a improvised warhammer.

Whereas warhammers are design to either puncture plate or transfer a lot of kinetic energy in a small area to cause blunt-force trauma despite the plate and padding.

[hodorisfaclessman]

13 hours ago, Bael's Bastard said:

Yeah, I don't really get the impression that the royalist loss at the Trident is attributed to Rhaegar's supposed attempt to cross the Trident. He and Robert both appear to have found each other in the river, and Robert's defeat of Rhaegar appears to have caused many of Rhaegar's men to throw down their weapons and flee. It probably could have gone either way.

To be fair it prov woulda went the other way if hed left a few less kingsguard with his stark wife 

[hodorisfaclessman]

On 8/7/2018 at 5:53 PM, Arthur Peres said:

I lot of things do not make sense in Robert's Rebellion. Like Aerys losing the war and still "lefting a treasury flowing with gold".

He clearly spent only the extra needed for putting forces in the field for the short length of the war no reason to assume the treasury would be badly hit esp as aerys wasnt the type to be generous and let the treasury empty (having tywin as hand  probably  have meant all loans repayed to state promptly and no one skimping or sliding on taxes owed!)

Its assumed it was full then robert emptied it prob due to a mix of things 

-his need to be personaly  liked and make the realm stable probably had him.hand out tax breaks/reductions that would make  even the most right wing person blush....shit i wouldnt be suprised if he told his bestie ned that the north could forget taxes while hes alive

-spending like a drunken sailor on huge costly tourneys  and his own personal daily binges of women ,fine food and wine etc

-a drawn out naval war (far far more expensive than a land one) with greyjoys 

-wife and kids  with expensive tastes and frequent huge tourneys drawing all the rich lords all the time may also  have inflated prices of the very  luxury goods  at kl  they splurged on all the time.