Robert’s Rebellion: The Reach

[Angel Eyes]

So the Reach, led by Mace Tyrell, spends most of Robert’s Rebellion camped outside of Storm’s End, aside from Randyll Tarly beating Robert at the Battle of Ashford, being as useful as nipples on a breastplate. This question is two-fold:

• Why didn’t Aerys proverbially (not literally) light a fire under the Reachmen to get their rosy rears in gear and kick some rebellious butt?
• Would it have made a difference against the rebels?

[Loose Bolt]

4 hours ago, Angel Eyes said:

So the Reach, led by Mace Tyrell, spends most of Robert’s Rebellion camped outside of Storm’s End, aside from Randyll Tarly beating Robert at the Battle of Ashford, being as useful as nipples on a breastplate. This question is two-fold:

• Why didn’t Aerys proverbially (not literally) light a fire under the Reachmen to get their rosy rears in gear and kick some rebellious butt?
• Would it have made a difference against the rebels?

We do not know what orders Aerys sent to Reachmen. So it is possible that they actually did what A II ordered them to do.

If Reach had been more active chances are high that some "neutrals" like Tywin L and Walder F would have joined loyalists and so rebels would have lost Riverlands and Stormlands. North and Vale might have become independent kingdoms for some time. But almost certainly Targs would have wiped out Tullys. 

[Angel Eyes]

8 hours ago, Loose Bolt said:

We do not know what orders Aerys sent to Reachmen. So it is possible that they actually did what A II ordered them to do.

If Reach had been more active chances are high that some "neutrals" like Tywin L and Walder F would have joined loyalists and so rebels would have lost Riverlands and Stormlands. North and Vale might have become independent kingdoms for some time. But almost certainly Targs would have wiped out Tullys. 

They could have easily sent at least a smaller army; Randyll beat Robert with the vanguard alone.

[Canon Claude]

10 minutes ago, Angel Eyes said:

They could have easily sent at least a smaller army; Randyll beat Robert with the vanguard alone.

Randyll also took Robert by surprise. He was still consolidating the power of the Stormlands, having just defeated three different armies and winning the survivors to his cause. Plus we can assume that even the Reach’s vanguard would have outnumbered the scattered Stormlords.

[John Suburbs]

I suspect that Aerys does not trust Mace, primarily because he has no leverage over him. He can send his KG to the Trident because they are honor-bound to obey, and with both Lewyn and Rhaegar he is holding Elia and the children as hostage. He has no way of controlling Mace and his huge army, so he sends them to SE where they won't cause him any trouble. A bad decision, yes, but this is the price of paranoia.

[Universal Sword Donor]

https://www.westeros.org/Citadel/SSM/Entry/The_Siege_of_Storms_End

[Trigger Warning]

They've already made a token effort by besieging Storm's End but they are big and strong enough to do whatever they want, what's Aerys gonna do? Declare war on them? He's a paper tiger at this point. 

[Loose Bolt]

18 hours ago, Trigger Warning said:

They've already made a token effort by besieging Storm's End but they are big and strong enough to do whatever they want, what's Aerys gonna do? Declare war on them? He's a paper tiger at this point. 

A II is known as Mad King, so it is possible that he would declare Mace as a traitor and order his execution and things could become very interesting if bounty of Mace's head would be Highgarden. Or he could promise lands and castle of HG to anyone who kills Mace.

[frenin]

On 12/2/2020 at 5:03 PM, Angel Eyes said:

They could have easily sent at least a smaller army; Randyll beat Robert with the vanguard alone.

They did. They were also were occupying the whole Stormlands, which requires armies

Mace Tyrell is mocked a lot for his failed leadership but he's never called turncloak or traitor.

[CamiloRP]

9 minutes ago, frenin said:

They did. They were also were occupying the whole Stormlands, which requires armies

Mace Tyrell is mocked a lot for his failed leadership but he's never called turncloak or traitor.

'He's stupid, not evil.' Is an age old presidential level defense.

[frenin]

7 minutes ago, CamiloRP said:

'He's stupid, not evil.' Is an age old presidential level defense.

What??

[Trigger Warning]

9 hours ago, Loose Bolt said:

A II is known as Mad King, so it is possible that he would declare Mace as a traitor and order his execution and things could become very interesting if bounty of Mace's head would be Highgarden. Or he could promise lands and castle of HG to anyone who kills Mace.

I don't think it'd be that interesting, Mace would just join the rebels and Aerys' fall would come all the sooner. Mace is one of the most powerful lords in the realm, Aerys saying whoever kills him gets his lands doesn't mean much the same way it wouldn't mean much if he declared the same for each of the rebellious great lords. 

[CamiloRP]

46 minutes ago, frenin said:

What??

Just a joke, Mace being incompetent but never committing treason reminded me of an old president of my country (Not that it's comparable to Mace, or that you were defending Mace) The guy utterly destroyed the economy, the industry, job market, and during his government the police killed a record number of protesters. Yet people defend him claiming that he was just too stupid to know that all the things he did would turn out that way. To be fair tho, he was pretty stupid.

[Universal Sword Donor]

21 hours ago, frenin said:

They did. They were also were occupying the whole Stormlands, which requires armies

Mace Tyrell is mocked a lot for his failed leadership but he's never called turncloak or traitor.

Some would say he was being pragmatic. Can't say I blame Mace for doing what he did. If the castle falls, the theoretical figurehead loses his power base and the crown gains two very valuable hostages. If he fails, no one's ever taken SE as far as we know* and he's kept potential rebels from taking the field. Unless Aerys tells him specifically otherwise, there's no real reason to do anything other than besiege SE.

Rhaegar is fielding the largest army seen by the realm in 300 years and has experienced, talented commanders with him. There are definite logistical challenges to adding more soldiers to it and the upside would appear to be minimal on paper. Everyone thinks Mace is an idiot but I see a man who's played his hands nicely but conservatively.

* running off memory here and we don't know what the GC will do

[Angel Eyes]

On 12/4/2020 at 4:44 PM, Universal Sword Donor said:

Some would say he was being pragmatic. Can't say I blame Mace for doing what he did. If the castle falls, the theoretical figurehead loses his power base and the crown gains two very valuable hostages. If he fails, no one's ever taken SE as far as we know* and he's kept potential rebels from taking the field. Unless Aerys tells him specifically otherwise, there's no real reason to do anything other than besiege SE.

Rhaegar is fielding the largest army seen by the realm in 300 years and has experienced, talented commanders with him. There are definite logistical challenges to adding more soldiers to it and the upside would appear to be minimal on paper. Everyone thinks Mace is an idiot but I see a man who's played his hands nicely but conservatively.

* running off memory here and we don't know what the GC will do

And what I was asking is why didn’t Aerys light a fire under Mace (figuratively, not literally) and send a portion of his army to the Trident? How many people do you need to conduct a siege?

[frenin]

1 hour ago, Angel Eyes said:

And what I was asking is why didn’t Aerys light a fire under Mace (figuratively, not literally) and send a portion of his army to the Trident?

But Mace did send a portion of his men to the Trident.

 

Quote

Tyrell had a sizeable host, but some of his strength was with Rhaegar, certainly. Rhaegar actually outnumbered Robert on the Trident, although Robert's troops were more battle-tested. I haven't gone into the whole history of the fighting, but there was a good deal more to it than just two armies meeting on the Trident. There were a number of earlier battles, sieges, escapes, ambushes, duels, and forays, and fighting in places as farflung as the Vale and the Dornish Marches.

 

 

1 hour ago, Angel Eyes said:

How many people do you need to conduct a siege?

Given that he was also occupying the Stormlands,  I'd say a lot. And we don't even the know how many  did he have anyway.

[Universal Sword Donor]

On 12/10/2020 at 8:09 AM, Angel Eyes said:

And what I was asking is why didn’t Aerys light a fire under Mace (figuratively, not literally) and send a portion of his army to the Trident? How many people do you need to conduct a siege?

He did. GRRM confirmed it but we don't know how many. I'd guess quite a few given what we know of Rhaegar's army but we'll likely never find out