Did Renly even need to declare himself King?

[Angel Eyes]

6 minutes ago, Morte said:

I mean, it's not like he is a very kind or even just leader for his men, or a good husband or father. I find it very hard to believe that Stannis can actually manage to get people to follow him. And he must know this, so a Great Council would have been his best bet, if he wanted justice. But he doesn't, does he?

Nobody thinks of a Great Council except for Catelyn, and Renly just laughs off the idea.

[Morte]

7 minutes ago, Angel Eyes said:

Nobody thinks of a Great Council except for Catelyn, and Renly just laughs off the idea.

We were talking about what would have been able to accomplish for Stannis if he would have acted much sooner, just after Robert's death, before everybody declared themselves kings.

[frenin]

1 minute ago, Morte said:

We were talking about what would have been able to accomplish for Stannis if he would have acted much sooner, just after Robert's death, before everybody declared themselves kings.

Tbf a Great Council is only done when there is no clear heir. With the incest out, Stannis was Robert's heir.

[Tywin Manderly]

4 minutes ago, frenin said:

Tbf a Great Council is only done when there is no clear heir. With the incest out, Stannis was Robert's heir.

Actually there is no heir at all because Robert, who established a new royal dynasty, did not have any legitimate children due to the twincest. The Iron Throne is therefore vacant and totally up for grabs. 

A would not work to solve the issue since the claimants to the Iron Throne are willing, and to various degrees able, to back their claim up with military force.

[Lord Varys]

36 minutes ago, Morte said:

At least they are closer in age than Daenerys and Drogo, and know each other since they were in their teen (granted, Loras still is  ). Of course, this doesn't solve anything in regard of their relationship, as it is strange that Lord Tyrell would send his son (at age 10-12) to squire for a boy of 15-17 - who may have been knighted, but is not really someone known for his knightly skills (that's the difference with Robb and his squires), like - at all. But well, this had to be one of Lord Puffish's ideas.

Well, squiring with a brother of the king would be a great honor, so I don't fault Mace for that if it truly was his idea. But Renly could also have seen Loras while visiting Highgarden for a tourney or something along those lines, offering to take the boy in.

And to be sure - we don't know when Renly started to realize that he was gay/act on his sexual desires. Could be that nobody (or at least not the Tyrells) knew about his sexuality by the time Loras became his squire.

The point of the Dany-Drogo comparison is that Daenerys Targaryen thinks she loved/was in love with Khal Drogo despite the fact that this man bought, abused, and raped her - meaning that without good information we cannot be sure that Loras Tyrell's love for Renly is something that just developed consensually. It is very unlikely he went through the same shit as Dany, but it is not impossible that Renly nudged him in the right direction here and there. Of course that's just one of many possibilities but one of the more ugly ones.

And this comes from the fact that Loras was Renly's squire and thus at his mercy. There relationship did not develop as something among equals. He could have made both Renly and Loras squires to another man when they discovered whatever feelings they had for each other - like Daeron Targaryen and Jeremy Norridge who both served as squires at Highgarden when they met and fell in love with each other.

This knight-squire thing we get with Renly-Loras smells somewhat like a teacher-pupil relationship and is thus not exactly an ideal thing. Especially since we have no idea when it started. When Loras was 11, 12, 13, 14, or 15? No idea, really. Considering the depth of Loras' love it could have gone on for quite some time, possibly years.

36 minutes ago, Morte said:

And I find this strange, and while I get it, that Stannis is a "self-righteous hypocrite", or as you said "a whiny child who cannot even admit that to himself", I don't get his hate toward his brothers. And watching Robert and Ned being murdered (and he could not have said for sure that his younger brother would manage to survive KL), because - what? Because they were bff? Because Robert was more loved? Really?

To be sure, we don't know anything about Stannis' feelings towards Renly as such. It might be that he only started to hate him when he started to call himself king. But one can guess that he also started to loath him because he was Lord of Storm's End. The brother Stannis truly could not stand was Robert because he was jealous of all his accomplishments and because he felt he was better than him on the morality or conduct level - Stannis doesn't visit brothels, Stannis is just, Stannis doesn't give himself to drinking and gluttony, etc.

How much of a whiny child Stannis is we figure out only in ADwD when the bare mentioning of Robert causes him to go into a paragraph long diatribe - when all Asha was doing was to reference Stannis' famous brother and suggested that some of his strategies might work for them, too. Nobody wanted to compare Stannis to Robert there, or ridicule Stannis by pointing out what a great guy Robert was compared to the poor excuse of a king and general Stannis is. But that's how Stannis interprets such remarks. About two years after Robert's death he is still not over the issues he had with him.

36 minutes ago, Morte said:

And not calling out earlier to the realm is just plain stupid.

Yeah, either we are to believe Stannis is a moron or the author dropped the ball there. And I think it was the latter. Which is somewhat of a pattern with those Baratheon brothers.

36 minutes ago, Morte said:

I mean, it's not like he is a very kind or even just leader for his men, or a good husband or father. I find it very hard to believe that Stannis can actually manage to get people to follow him. And he must know this, so a Great Council would have been his best bet, if he wanted justice. But he doesn't, does he?

If he wanted justice and if he didn't want the throne for himself as he constantly claims. He could have had the moral authority to convene a Great Council by revealing what he believed he know about Cersei's children while at the same making it clear he would not press his own claim to the Iron Throne but was merely offering himself as the host or moderator of such a gathering.

He could have even reached out to the Targaryens to have them at the council, too. If he didn't want to be king and didn't want Renly or Cersei's children to rule, either, offering the throne to Viserys III or Daenerys could have been an option as well. It could also have helped to do justice for the atrocities one in Robert's name during the Rebellion.

But as is pretty much evident Stannis always wanted the throne for himself. And while we don't know what led him to believe Cersei's children weren't Robert's we cannot even pretend he has good reason to believe this to be the case. Perhaps he just wants to believe that because he wants the throne? We don't know whether his desire for the throne or his 'knowledge about Cersei's children' was there first.

[frenin]

40 minutes ago, Tywin Manderly said:

Actually there is no heir at all because Robert, who established a new royal dynasty, did not have any legitimate children due to the twincest. The Iron Throne is therefore vacant and totally up for grabs. 

A would not work to solve the issue since the claimants to the Iron Throne are willing, and to various degrees able, to back their claim up with military force.

Hmmm there is an heir, Robert heir is his brother, his dynasty is Stannis's. Dynastied rise and fall but the sucesión remains the same.

There is a reason why people say that either Stannis or Robert's children are his true heirs. 

[mormont]

1 hour ago, Morte said:

We were talking about what would have been able to accomplish for Stannis if he would have acted much sooner, just after Robert's death, before everybody declared themselves kings.

In Stannis' defence, he can call for a Great Council all he likes, but without very strong proof, the nobles who make up that Council will just scratch their heads and wonder when old Stannis went completely round the bend.

Stannis flees to Dragonstone (and stays there) because he has no proof. He's waiting and watching developments. He should have reached out to Ned. He can be fairly criticised for that. But he had no way of acting against the Lannisters openly, and that includes a Great Council.

[Tywin Manderly]

36 minutes ago, frenin said:

Hmmm there is an heir, Robert heir is his brother, his dynasty is Stannis's. Dynastied rise and fall but the sucesión remains the same.

Stannis would only be Robert's heir if it had been Steffon Baratheon who had won the Iron Throne by right of conquest. 

36 minutes ago, frenin said:

There is a reason why people say that either Stannis or Robert's children are his true heirs. 

Very much so. For the smallfolk it is believing in Robert's propaganda about the Targ Blood in his veins, spread at his behest to smooth over the inconvenient truth of his accession to the Iron Throne as well as boost his legitimacy a bit; for the nobility it is interests. 

[frenin]

14 minutes ago, Tywin Manderly said:

Stannis would only be Robert's heir if it had been Steffon Baratheon who had won the Iron Throne by right of conquest. 

Hmmm I'm honestly don't know where are you getting this.

Robert gets the Throne and automatically Stannis becomes an heir because of that, that's one of the reasons he got Dragonstone.

 

 

17 minutes ago, Tywin Manderly said:

Very much so. For the smallfolk it is believing in Robert's propaganda about the Targ Blood in his veins, spread at his behest to smooth over the inconvenient truth of his accession to the Iron Throne as well as boost his legitimacy a bit; for the nobility it is interests. 

What interests?? Succesion is the same in every context. 

[Tywin Manderly]

1 hour ago, frenin said:

Robert gets the Throne and automatically Stannis becomes an heir because of that, that's one of the reasons he got Dragonstone.

By winning Robert's Rebellion, Robert Baratheon became the founder a new royal dynasty by right of conquest. Only the legitimate descendants of a founder of a royal dynasty can inherit a throne. Stannis is a sibling of Robert and therefore not an heir to the Iron Throne. 

The castle and island of Dragonstone were indeed given to Stannis, aye, but not the title Prince of Dragonstone, which signifies heirship to the Iron Throne. Stannis was created a mere Lord of Dragonstone. Stannis was actually not too happy with this grant, because he wanted Storm's End since its lands and incomes and other resources are much larger than those of Dragonstone.

1 hour ago, frenin said:

What interests?? Succesion is the same in every context. 

Keeping your lands, titles and incomes. If the Iron Throne is vacant there is a succession crisis with uncertainty beyond belief. You never know who is going to end up on the throne. This new king will also have to reward his supporters with lands and titles, and that may be very well be at your expense if you end up on the losing side. 

[Jasta11]

I doubt it was absolutely needed, but for him it certainly was a good option. It solidifies his support base, because the Tyrells (or at least Mace) want Marge to be queen, and if they can't give her to Robert, why, dashing young Renly serves the purpose just as well if not better. 

And for him, well, it's good to be the king and all that. Plus it means he doesn't have to worry about who he has to sit on the throne once he ousts the Lannisters.

[frenin]

1 minute ago, Tywin Manderly said:

By winning Robert's Rebellion, Robert Baratheon became the founder a new royal dynasty by right of conquest. Only the legitimate descendants of a founder of a royal dynasty can inherit a throne. Stannis is a sibling of Robert and therefore not an heir to the Iron Throne. 

From where are you getting this?? Stannis is very much an heir to the Iron Throne.  There is zero reason the Lannisters would want to keep the charade if everyone could sit his ass on the Throne.

 

 

3 minutes ago, Tywin Manderly said:

The castle and island of Dragonstone were indeed given to Stannis, aye, but not the title Prince of Dragonstone, which signifies heirship to the Iron Throne. Stannis was created a mere Lord of Dragonstone. Stannis was actually not too happy with this grant, because he wanted Storm's End since its lands and incomes and other resources are much larger than those of Dragonstone

Prince of Dragonstone means heir apparent and Robert would have children of his own, why name him heir apparent??

Martin himself makes clear that Stannis was being marked as Robert's heir at the time.

 

 

6 minutes ago, Tywin Manderly said:

Keeping your lands, titles and incomes. If the Iron Throne is vacant there is a succession crisis with uncertainty beyond belief. You never know who is going to end up on the throne. This new king will also have to reward his supporters with lands and titles, and that may be very well be at your expense if you end up on the losing side. 

Then don't choose sides and stay out of it. 

[Tywin Manderly]

15 minutes ago, frenin said:

From where are you getting this?? Stannis is very much an heir to the Iron Throne.  There is zero reason the Lannisters would want to keep the charade if everyone could sit his ass on the Throne.

The Lannisters have to keep up the Baratheon charade because they are impopular and do not have the power to conquer - and subsequently hold on to - the Iron Throne by themselves, hence the Lannister-Tyrell Alliance.  

And without the Stark-Tully-Arryn-Baratheon Alliance, Robert Baratheon wouldn't have won the Iron Throne. But yes, any claimant can win the Iron Throne with sufficiently large military and myth-building resources as well as cleverly making use of the societal fault lines in the Seven Kingdoms.

 

16 minutes ago, frenin said:

Prince of Dragonstone means heir apparent and Robert would have children of his own, why name him heir apparent??

Viserys named Dany Princess of Dragonstone while she merely was his heir presumptive, and he also was young enough to have children of his own.

50 minutes ago, frenin said:

Martin himself makes clear that Stannis was being marked as Robert's heir at the time.

Stannis indeed was Robert's heir to Storm's End, until Bob decided to screw Stannis over and give Storm's End to Renly. 

 

55 minutes ago, frenin said:

Then don't choose sides and stay out of it. 

That carries the significant risk of incurring the wrath of the victor, and as a consequence being taken to the cleaners by him. 

[frenin]

1 minute ago, Tywin Manderly said:

The Lannisters have to keep up the Baratheon charade because they are impopular and do not have the power to conquer - and subsequently hold on to - the Iron Throne by themselves, hence the Lannister-Tyrell Alliance.  

The Lannister-Tyrell alliance can be done the same with Joffrey Lannister, there is no reason to use Robert's name if it was not relevant.

 

 

3 minutes ago, Tywin Manderly said:

And without the Stark-Tully-Arryn-Baratheon Alliance, Robert Baratheon wouldn't have won the Iron Throne. But yes, any claimant can win the Iron Throne with sufficiently large military and myth-building resources as well as cleverly making use of the societal fault lines in the Seven Kingdoms.

And without dragons there would be none, but glad that you agree that Stannis is the heir.

 

 

5 minutes ago, Tywin Manderly said:

Viserys named Dany Princess of Dragonstone while she merely was his heir presumptive, and he also was young enough to have children of his own.

With whom?? Viserys was kind of a special case.

 

 

5 minutes ago, Tywin Manderly said:

Stannis indeed was Robert's heir to Storm's End, until Bob decided to screw Stannis over and give Storm's End to Renly. 

He wasn't and Martin said heir to the Throne.

 

 

6 minutes ago, Tywin Manderly said:

That carries the significant risk of incurring the wrath of the victor, and as a consequence being taken to the cleaners by him. 

We see people staying out of wars everytime and they are not punished. The Vale are very much coveted right now.

[Lord Varys]

19 minutes ago, mormont said:

In Stannis' defence, he can call for a Great Council all he likes, but without very strong proof, the nobles who make up that Council will just scratch their heads and wonder when old Stannis went completely round the bend.

Stannis flees to Dragonstone (and stays there) because he has no proof. He's waiting and watching developments. He should have reached out to Ned. He can be fairly criticised for that. But he had no way of acting against the Lannisters openly, and that includes a Great Council.

There seems to be an internal contradiction there. If Stannis doesn't have enough evidence to convince the lords of a Great Council - for which there isn't any evidence - then it stands to reason that he also doesn't have enough evidence to convince the same lords - or some of them - to back his claim in a violent rebellion against King Joffrey.

Yet Stannis starts the latter despite the fact that he really has no good chance to win a war.

He certainly could have reached out to his brother Renly, to Robb Stark, to Lysa Arryn, to Mace Tyrell and Doran Martell to try to convince them of what happened. And if he didn't want to be king and refused to put forth his own claim in a Great Council this would have added a lot of weight to his claims about the parentage of Cersei's children - even more so in light of the deaths of Jon Arryn, Robert Baratheon, and the imprisonment of Eddard Stark.

[Morte]

10 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

Well, squiring with a brother of the king would be a great honor, so I don't fault Mace for that if it truly was his idea. But Renly could also have seen Loras while visiting Highgarden for a tourney or something along those lines, offering to take the boy in.

Of course it would be a great honour, and I don't fault Mace either, it's just a typical Lord-Puffish-thing.

10 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

The point of the Dany-Drogo comparison is that Daenerys Targaryen thinks she loved/was in love with Khal Drogo despite the fact that this man bought, abused, and raped her - meaning that without good information we cannot be sure that Loras Tyrell's love for Renly is something that just developed consensually. It is very unlikely he went through the same shit as Dany, but it is not impossible that Renly nudged him in the right direction here and there. Of course that's just one of many possibilities but one of the more ugly ones.

And this comes from the fact that Loras was Renly's squire and thus at his mercy. There relationship did not develop as something among equals. He could have made both Renly and Loras squires to another man when they discovered whatever feelings they had for each other - like Daeron Targaryen and Jeremy Norridge who both served as squires at Highgarden when they met and fell in love with each other.

This knight-squire thing we get with Renly-Loras smells somewhat like a teacher-pupil relationship and is thus not exactly an ideal thing. Especially since we have no idea when it started. When Loras was 11, 12, 13, 14, or 15? No idea, really. Considering the depth of Loras' love it could have gone on for quite some time, possibly years.

Yeah, I understood your point; and I do agree that a been-squires-together-setting wouldn't have the same questionable after-taste (well, the books are full of awkward relationships).

Still, if Loras is still alive we might get more information snippets.

10 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

How much of a whiny child Stannis is we figure out only in ADwD when the bare mentioning of Robert causes him to go into a paragraph long diatribe - when all Asha was doing was to reference Stannis' famous brother and suggested that some of his strategies might work for them, too. Nobody wanted to compare Stannis to Robert there, or ridicule Stannis by pointing out what a great guy Robert was compared to the poor excuse of a king and general Stannis is. But that's how Stannis interprets such remarks. About two years after Robert's death he is still not over the issues he had with him.

Good observation.

9 hours ago, mormont said:

In Stannis' defence, he can call for a Great Council all he likes, but without very strong proof, the nobles who make up that Council will just scratch their heads and wonder when old Stannis went completely round the bend.

Stannis flees to Dragonstone (and stays there) because he has no proof. He's waiting and watching developments. He should have reached out to Ned. He can be fairly criticised for that. But he had no way of acting against the Lannisters openly, and that includes a Great Council.

Just as @Lord Varys said: If his evidence is not even strong enough to call on the Great Council, how can it be strong enough to overthrow "Robert's children" in open rebellion? And Stannis knows, that he isn't exactly well liked among the people and lords of Westeros, so he can't count on winning them through charisma either. He isn't delusional about his effect on other people.

Working to get a Great Council running would have been his best bet, if he would have wanted justice (and might have even saved Ned's live),  so we end up here:

10 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

But as is pretty much evident Stannis always wanted the throne for himself. And while we don't know what led him to believe Cersei's children weren't Robert's we cannot even pretend he has good reason to believe this to be the case. Perhaps he just wants to believe that because he wants the throne? We don't know whether his desire for the throne or his 'knowledge about Cersei's children' was there first.

More than slightly offtopic:

On 5/10/2020 at 1:31 AM, Mithras said:

Quote

And it is important that the individual books refer to the civil wars, but the series title reminds us constantly that the real issue lies in the North beyond the Wall. Stannis becomes one of the few characters fully to understand that, which is why in spite of everything he is a righteous man, and not just a version of Henry VII, Tiberius or Louis XI.

This interview dates from ASoS promotion period (July 2000). From the same interview, we also have this:

Stannis is nothing like Tiberius. Sure, Tiberius became "the saddest of men" and grew tired of the lackspits and schemers during his reign, became ruthless and didn't care much about what the literal SPQR thought of him. And yes, after the Seianus-debacle he ruled with an iron fist and quenched every true or false conspiracy (filling aerarium and fiscus by doing so). But he did offer them a return to the Republic at the beginning of his reign (Tacitus hates him for accepting the principate in the end), and also tried to give the Senate more political purpose, just to learn the hard way, that the very people who were responsible for the fall of the Republic to begin with, were no longer fit to rule, but only to scheme for their personal gain. Well, could have told him so after the death of the Gracchus' brothers.

And he might have never wanted to be princeps to begin with, and could well be imagined to happily work in his more charismatic younger brother's shadow, if Drusus would not have died in ~9 BC, as he was somewhat shy of people. The whole family-politics and becoming one of the potential heirs of Augustus did ruin his happy marriage (he had to divorce his wife to marry Julia).

From a historian perspective, if I would search for Tiberius among the characters of Westeros, I would go with a mixture of Aegon III and Viserys II.

[mormont]

6 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

There seems to be an internal contradiction there. If Stannis doesn't have enough evidence to convince the lords of a Great Council - for which there isn't any evidence - then it stands to reason that he also doesn't have enough evidence to convince the same lords - or some of them - to back his claim in a violent rebellion against King Joffrey.

Yet Stannis starts the latter despite the fact that he really has no good chance to win a war.

I may be misunderstanding the OP, but I thought the suggestion was that Stannis should have been calling a Great Council instead of sitting on Dragonstone leaving Robert and Ned to deal with the Lannisters unarmed? So different times, different options.

Of course, if the idea was to call one instead of declaring for the throne, that's not a realistic option IMO. It's already too late. Armies are gathered. The Lannisters and their allies can't possibly agree to a Great Council.

[Lord Varys]

5 hours ago, mormont said:

I may be misunderstanding the OP, but I thought the suggestion was that Stannis should have been calling a Great Council instead of sitting on Dragonstone leaving Robert and Ned to deal with the Lannisters unarmed? So different times, different options.

Of course, if the idea was to call one instead of declaring for the throne, that's not a realistic option IMO. It's already too late. Armies are gathered. The Lannisters and their allies can't possibly agree to a Great Council.

The idea is that Stannis could have tried to convene a Great Council to deal with his claims about Cersei's children and thus also the succession as soon as he learned that Robert was dead.

There certainly could have been time and opportunity enough for that in light of the fact that not exactly the entire Realm was at war yet. If the Vale, the Reach, the Stormlands, Dorne and representatives from the North and the Riverlands had shown up there and insisted that the Lannisters seize their hostilities this could have had an effect. Even if it didn't - if the assembled lords had decided to believe Stannis' claims and declared Cersei's children bastards then this would have definitely crippled the ability of the Lannisters to continue a war in the name of a 'King Joffrey'.

And as Cat later suggests they could also have called a Great Council after all the pretenders were there - she urges Stannis and Renly to do that.

But the overall issue with Stannis is both his inaction after Robert's death so that Renly can beat him in the proclamation department as well as the fact that he wants to be king himself - if he doesn't want the throne as he claims, he could give up/not push his claim or keep quiet about what he believes he knows about Cersei's children. If I did not want to be king I'd be glad that my brother produced children that come before me.

And Renly also gave Stannis an opportunity to not be king - he could have bent the knee to him if he did not want to be king. That he doesn't do any of that shows he is supposed to a character who would do everything - even the foulest of sorcery - to get what he allegedly does not want.

6 hours ago, Morte said:

More than slightly offtopic:

Stannis is nothing like Tiberius. Sure, Tiberius became "the saddest of men" and grew tired of the lackspits and schemers during his reign, became ruthless and didn't care much about what the literal SPQR thought of him. And yes, after the Seianus-debacle he ruled with an iron fist and quenched every true or false conspiracy (filling aerarium and fiscus by doing so). But he did offer them a return to the Republic at the beginning of his reign (Tacitus hates him for accepting the principate in the end), and also tried to give the Senate more political purpose, just to learn the hard way, that the very people who were responsible for the fall of the Republic to begin with, were no longer fit to rule, but only to scheme for their personal gain. Well, could have told him so after the death of the Gracchus' brothers.

And he might have never wanted to be princeps to begin with, and could well be imagined to happily work in his more charismatic younger brother's shadow, if Drusus would not have died in ~9 BC, as he was somewhat shy of people. The whole family-politics and becoming one of the potential heirs of Augustus did ruin his happy marriage (he had to divorce his wife to marry Julia).

From a historian perspective, if I would search for Tiberius among the characters of Westeros, I would go with a mixture of Aegon III and Viserys II.

I take it George means specifically the I, Claudius Tiberius there. And that is guy caught between good and bad impulses who gives into his bad nature after his brother's death and due to the constant bad influence of his mother who warps him into a man who, in the end, doesn't really want to be in power anymore. Originally, the man just wanted the love of Augustus and the love of his original wife who he wanted to keep. Stannis' stoicism is also pretty much reflected in the way Tiberius treats his soldiers - hard but fairly, etc.

Stannis, too, is torn between good and bad influences - in a sense Davos is Drusus and Melisandre/Selyse are Livia. Augustus can be seen as Robert to a point.

I'd also say that, in the end, Stannis is a bad guy who, when pushed, is going to go with the bad way to accomplish things, which is something he does because he is a cyinic at heart. One sees that with his original decision to not heed Cressen's advice, to espouse 'the red falcon' to gain the allegiance of Renly's men by killing him. We see it later when Mel's charade with the leeches gets him to seriously consider sacrificing Edric Storm (without any guarantee whatsover that this is going to result in him getting dragons or him gaining the throne or him saving people). And, of course, with his decision to leave court and Robert to Cersei's mercy, not answering Ned's letters or returning to court. That is the decision of a man who hates his brother and is jealous of the bond Ned and Robert had. He wanted to be the man Robert loved as much as Ned. Just as he wanted to be the man Robert named Hand after Jon died.

[Bernie Mac]

23 hours ago, frenin said:

Tbf a Great Council is only done when there is no clear heir. With the incest out, Stannis was Robert's heir.

In this scenario there would be no clear heir.

Unless Cersei says that all three children were bastards and can prove that, then they are still in play.

Had Robert known about 'his' children while he was still alive, he'd have more than likely legitimized Edric in the short term until he had sons of his own.

Robert's heir for the last 12 years had been Joffrey. This is precisely while a Great Council would be needed.

[Lord Varys]

2 hours ago, Bernie Mac said:

In this scenario there would be no clear heir.

Unless Cersei says that all three children were bastards and can prove that, then they are still in play.

Had Robert known about 'his' children while he was still alive, he'd have more than likely legitimized Edric in the short term until he had sons of his own.

Robert's heir for the last 12 years had been Joffrey. This is precisely while a Great Council would be needed.

Legitimizing Edric would have caused troubles, too, if Robert had intended to remarry after dealing with Cersei. He would have been by far Robert's eldest child, meaning he would have been a powerful rival to whatever children Robert may have gotten from his second wife.

I can see Robert would have legitimized both Edric and Mya on his deathbed had he known about the parentage of Cersei's children - to prevent Stannis from becoming king. Because I cannot see Robert wanting that prick to succeed him who would be, in his own way, about as bad as Joffrey and Cersei.

What gives Robert some peace on his deathbed is that he is handing the Realm to Ned. That Ned effectively becomes king and is going to right the things Robert fucked up. He would be in a rather different state of mind if Stannis would rule after him. Hence the idea that he would have rather seated Edric or Mya on the throne than Stannis. But that is conjecture.

Going with Renly would also be a good idea, but I don't think Robert would seriously consider his youngest brother and the civil war it would cause to install him on the throne even if he named him heir on his deathbed.