Worst plan ever made in the saga ?

[Terrorthatflapsinthenight9]

2 minutes ago, C.T. Phipps said:

I feel like Rhaegar had plans to deal with the consequences of cheating on his highborn Dornish wife (possibly the fact Dornish people don't necessarily expect sexual fidelity) and probably planning on some way to placate the Starks.

However, I believe that Rhaegar's entire "plan" (and I use the term loosely) went utterly off the rails when:

* His father ordered Ned and Robert put to death as well as burned Rickard as well as Brandon Stark. From that point, there was no compromise possible.

* Rhaegar almost certainly didn't think Robert would react to his fiance that he barely knew being taken would suddenly develop an all-consuming obsession with the idea they were destined lovers. Nor that Robert would vilify Rhaegar to the point of making him a sexual sadist, driving him to incredible acts of bravery/stupidity.

He took the daughter of a great house who was bethrothed to a lord of another great house, while also humiliating another one by abandonning and humiliating his Martell wife who gave him his children. 

This was a triple terrible slight that was not going to be placated properly, no matter the outcome, and a terrible and dangerous precedent that would have serious consequences on house Targaryen's image and relations with the Great Houses no matter what.

And it was also foolish of him to expect Robert or House Stark to take the news of him running with Lyanna well and do nothing about it.

[C.T. Phipps]

To be fair, the Dornish didn't turn against him.

Which is surprising.

Edited July 26, 2022 by C.T. Phipps

[Terrorthatflapsinthenight9]

9 minutes ago, C.T. Phipps said:

To be fair, the Dorn didn't turn against him.

Which is surprising.

Because Aerys had Elia and her children as hostages. Dorne wouldn't have sent a single soldier at the Trident if Aerys didn't have this leverage. 

[Angel Eyes]

19 hours ago, Terrorthatflapsinthenight9 said:

He took the daughter of a great house who was bethrothed to a lord of another great house, while also humiliating another one by abandonning and humiliating his Martell wife who gave him his children. 

This was a triple terrible slight that was not going to be placated properly, no matter the outcome, and a terrible and dangerous precedent that would have serious consequences on house Targaryen's image and relations with the Great Houses no matter what.

And it was also foolish of him to expect Robert or House Stark to take the news of him running with Lyanna well and do nothing about it.

That's something else I've wondered about; why Dorne? Surely there are less conspicuous places to hide, least of all in the land of the wife he humiliated.

[C.T. Phipps]

1 hour ago, Angel Eyes said:

That's something else I've wondered about; why Dorne? Surely there are less conspicuous places to hide, least of all in the land of the wife he humiliated.

It depends on how furious his wife was. As we've seen, Dornish have some strange values by comparison.

[Terrorthatflapsinthenight9]

3 hours ago, Angel Eyes said:

That's something else I've wondered about; why Dorne? Surely there are less conspicuous places to hide, least of all in the land of the wife he humiliated.

Maybe Arthur Dayne was the one who told and advised him about the Tower of Joy. 

 

[Terrorthatflapsinthenight9]

I am surprised that no one brought up Aegon IV The Unworthy's plan of conquering Dorne, by using mechanical "dragons" which produced jets of wildifire made by the Alchemists Guild. 

He managed to burn hundreds of the men operating them, a quarter of the Kingswood and the "dragons" themselves with this brilliant plan. 

[Angel Eyes]

1 hour ago, Terrorthatflapsinthenight9 said:

I am surprised that no one brought up Aegon IV The Unworthy's plan of conquering Dorne, by using mechanical "dragons" which produced jets of wildifire made by the Alchemists Guild. 

He managed to burn hundreds of the men operating them, a quarter of the Kingswood and the "dragons" themselves with this brilliant plan. 

I mentioned it in the Worst Military Strategist thread.

[EggBlue]

2 hours ago, Terrorthatflapsinthenight9 said:

I am surprised that no one brought up Aegon IV The Unworthy's plan of conquering Dorne, by using mechanical "dragons" which produced jets of wildifire made by the Alchemists Guild. 

He managed to burn hundreds of the men operating them, a quarter of the Kingswood and the "dragons" themselves with this brilliant plan. 

that was definitely stupid but I still think Rhaegar's plan must have been worse ... after all , he basically destroyed his dynasty even without showing up for the most part! that is unless we are completely mistaken about what he actually did 

[C.T. Phipps]

1 hour ago, EggBlue said:

that was definitely stupid but I still think Rhaegar's plan must have been worse ... after all , he basically destroyed his dynasty even without showing up for the most part! that is unless we are completely mistaken about what he actually did 

To be fair, much of that is Aerys fault.

 

[Takiedevushkikakzvezdy]

4 hours ago, Terrorthatflapsinthenight9 said:

I am surprised that no one brought up Aegon IV The Unworthy's plan of conquering Dorne, by using mechanical "dragons" which produced jets of wildifire made by the Alchemists Guild. 

I wonder if the Alchemists started it all by showing him these cool new machines they've come up with.

[Terrorthatflapsinthenight9]

15 hours ago, Takiedevushkikakzvezdy said:

I wonder if the Alchemists started it all by showing him these cool new machines they've come up with.

I think he was the one who commissionned these machines in the first place. 

[C.T. Phipps]

15 hours ago, Takiedevushkikakzvezdy said:

I wonder if the Alchemists started it all by showing him these cool new machines they've come up with.

I wonder what would have happened if he'd convinced them to make them of metal.

Or maybe the weight differential prevented that.

 

[Northern Sword]

On 7/25/2022 at 6:42 PM, C.T. Phipps said:

Doran's plan seemed badass and brilliant, welcoming Danny to Dorn.

The thing was that Dorn should have been the one doing the negotiations because, well, his son is a deconstruction of Rand Al'Thor, Garion, and other paperback fantasy heroes. "I'm a quiet bookish sort who, nevertheless, will be amazingly attractive to the beautiful princess."

No, my friend. No.

The fact he just sort of awkwardly presented the note and didn't say, "Hello, Your Highness, I am the heir of Dorne and my father would like to offer you his armies and the Seventh Kingdom to you in exchange for an offer of marriage. We're really in a good time now to reconquer the other six."

Which may not have been romantic but it's not like she's looking for that.

He doesn't quite live up to Rand "the Dragon Reborn" al'Thor. 

Love the Garion reference though ( first book series that I read )

[C.T. Phipps]

1 hour ago, Northern Sword said:

He doesn't quite live up to Rand "the Dragon Reborn" al'Thor. 

Love the Garion reference though ( first book series that I read )

Quentyn is the shy, awkward around women, slightly nerdy type of hero who eventually becomes superpowerful as well as the savior.

He just...doesn't.

Probably why he felt he could tame a dragon.

[Leonardo Abreu]

Anything related to the valyrian steel dagger is stupid.

Joffrey: I’ll secretly order the murder of my father’s best friend’s son using a dagger from his own treasure!

Catspaw: I was paid in advance and given a priceless dagger to perform a high profile and risky assassination. I’ll carry on with it instead of pocketing the money and selling the dagger!

Littlefinger: I’ll lie about the dagger being Tyrion’s and cross my fingers the Starks don’t ask around and easily discover that Bob was the owner.

Catelyn: I’ll simply kidnap the imp, nobody likes him anyway. His father seems like the forgiving type.

Tyrion: I could come clean and say the dagger was not mine, but it is much cooler to just say I never bet against my family and leave it at it.

[Angel Eyes]

8 minutes ago, Leonardo Abreu said:

Anything related to the valyrian steel dagger is stupid.

Joffrey: I’ll secretly order the murder of my father’s best friend’s son using a dagger from his own treasure!

Catspaw: I was paid in advance and given a priceless dagger to perform a high profile and risky assassination. I’ll carry on with it instead of pocketing the money and selling the dagger!

Littlefinger: I’ll lie about the dagger being Tyrion’s and cross my fingers the Starks don’t ask around and easily discover that Bob was the owner.

Catelyn: I’ll simply kidnap the imp, nobody likes him anyway. His father seems like the forgiving type.

Tyrion: I could come clean and say the dagger was not mine, but it is much cooler to just say I never bet against my family and leave it at it.

I think this is one of the rare times GRRM dropped the ball on his plots since it's so offhand when the culprit is finally fingered and everyone's forgotten about it... unless he wanted to subvert expectations by leaving certain plots unsolved because some crimes are cold cases in real life.

Plus the show is actually less stupid with Tyrion where he outright says he wouldn't have done something like that; to quote him, "what sort of imbecile arms an assassin with his own blade?"

Edited August 8, 2022 by Angel Eyes

[KingintheNorth4]

Outside of spiking Robert's wine, all of Cersei's plans.

[Craving Peaches]

Aerion Brightflame's 'plan' to turn into a dragon.

In defence of Balon's plan, I think it was more him taking a 'low risk, low reward' option of attacking the lightly defended and sparsely populated North, rather than going with the 'high risk, high reward' plan of attacking the richer and better defended Westerlands. If he attacks the rebelling North then he avoids antagonising the Iron Throne, which can challenge him at sea with the Redwyne fleet, as opposed to the North with no significant navy. He can loot and tell all his buddies he's bringing the glory days back. What's stupid about the plan is that he thought he could actually hold the North with winter coming. He doesn't have enough men or ways to supply them inland. It's not a very good plan but I don't think it's the worst.

Whoever they were trying to kill with those poisoned locusts. Unless the target was Strong Belwas after all it doesn't make sense. They must know Daenerys doesn't like that food.

[Leonardo Abreu]

14 hours ago, Angel Eyes said:

I think this is one of the rare times GRRM dropped the ball on his plots since it's so offhand when the culprit is finally fingered and everyone's forgotten about it... unless he wanted to subvert expectations by leaving certain plots unsolved because some crimes are cold cases in real life.

Plus the show is actually less stupid with Tyrion where he outright says he wouldn't have done something like that; to quote him, "what sort of imbecile arms an assassin with his own blade?"

Yes, Tyrion is the less stupid in this. But Littlefinger has to be the worst. He lied to Catelyn right in front of Varys.

Later we learn that the chaos is good for Varys plans, but Littlefinger is not a partner of his in this (unless we get surprised with this in later books). Why would Petyr drop a blatant lie in front of the Crown Master of Secrets who could very well contradict him and possibly blackmail him due to that? He almost placed his own neck in the noose and he only got away because of Varys secret agenda benefiting from that lie as well.

The worst part is that he could theoretically achieve the same result without lying so blatantly and risky. He could simply tell that he lost the dagger to Robert (truth) and that the king is very often in his cups and careless (truth), the dagger could be in within easy reach of any of the Lannisters inlaws (truth).

 

Edited August 9, 2022 by Leonardo Abreu