Varys, Illyrio, GC and the "Plan"

[astarkchoice]

47 minutes ago, frenin said:

The problem with this deliver is that it's one sided, Drogo never alludes to it (and he has zero reason to) and makes it plain that neither he nor his army are going to cross the poisoned waters.

With that context, it seems strange that Drogo would ever agree to that, why would he?

Maybe he was simply going to raise an slave army from the ashes of his conquests but i very much doubt heever agreed for a single Dothraki to go to Westeros.

 

Drogo knows Viserys is Dany's brother (thus a part of Drogo's family), under normal circumstances, he has little reason to send him off.

 

 

This right here is what is clearly.the logical conclusion

Dothraki wont cross the open sea and the logistics of getting them.across.with their multiple.horses per warrior would be huge! No free city would be dumb enough to throe open their gated either so theyd need a neutral natural harbour to depart from...and thats before we talk resistance at  sea by the likes of stannis!!

Theres the fact drogo isnt gonna abandon a large part of his hard won force for a long time  , the fact even  if orderded bloodriders wont obey viserys for long as hes 0 charisma as a.leader. It goes agaisnt their culture too they follow strength and viserys doesnt have that,minus drogo theyd start to do their own thing

Now that said drogo is a man of his word thus probably HAS promised forces, through mistranslation or just assumption viserys has assumed drogo would just lend him some.men! We see drogo has a vast khalassar that takes up most of the dothraki thus hes probably sweeping up most of the slave selling profits as well as huge pay offs from terrified cities...hel have serious cash to buy forces in no time

We know in essos theres plenty of forces to buy from niche missle troops(the slingers and crossbowmen at mereens 2nd siege), slave troops of varying quality , unsullied  and so many sellswords that the golden company is  a viable org (so the disputed land wars must involves 10s of.thousands  for each of the 3 sides!!) And sellsails...all plenty to build an army for a spoilt beggar king with

[astarkchoice]

22 minutes ago, frenin said:

Daily reminder that Varys' web is strong in KL, not so strong elsewhere.

Varys does not run a police state like Bloodraven did, he does not have "100 eyes and one".

True but hes had like decades to slowly put together whos secretly loves those platinium haired sobs!!  In kl esp  hed had a good idea which of the nearby crownland lords will be pro faegon( we know from briennes chapter many of the outer hillbilly crownland minor lords and knights like them) and hel have some spies working in the rest of the 7 kingdoms...unlike most of his spywork this will have been a long term info gathering project.

[frenin]

7 minutes ago, astarkchoice said:

True but hes had like decades to slowly put together whos secretly loves those platinium haired sobs!!  In kl esp  hed had a good idea which of the nearby crownland lords will be pro faegon( we know from briennes chapter many of the outer hillbilly crownland minor lords and knights like them) and hel have some spies working in the rest of the 7 kingdoms...unlike most of his spywork this will have been a long term info gathering project.

He clearly has a nest in the Crownland, maybe an ear or two in the Riverlands and it's imperative that he knows where the Reach blows (and even there i think it's limited) but he sure as hell has no way to predict how most lords of the Vale, North, Iron Islands, even Dragonstone. The Stormlords ofc would back Robert so they are inmaterial.

And that's way too much lords.

He had no way of knowing what Lysa was doing (literally saying she's beyond his reach), he did not know what Stannis was doing, he has never mentioned the Westerlands and the North and Iron Islands are too distant.

There are simply too many regions he can't reliably predict their moves, too many variables.

Ofc, none of this would matter if he got the Baratheons to self implode, but if they could get their shit together before they were ready (say, if Jon Arryn isn't murdered and tells the court the twincest)... the goal suddenly becomes unattainable.

 

[astarkchoice]

49 minutes ago, frenin said:

He clearly has a nest in the Crownland, maybe an ear or two in the Riverlands and it's imperative that he knows where the Reach blows (and even there i think it's limited) but he sure as hell has no way to predict how most lords of the Vale, North, Iron Islands, even Dragonstone. The Stormlords ofc would back Robert so they are inmaterial.

And that's way too much lords.

He had no way of knowing what Lysa was doing (literally saying she's beyond his reach), he did not know what Stannis was doing, he has never mentioned the Westerlands and the North and Iron Islands are too distant.

There are simply too many regions he can't reliably predict their moves, too many variables.

Ofc, none of this would matter if he got the Baratheons to self implode, but if they could get their shit together before they were ready (say, if Jon Arryn isn't murdered and tells the court the twincest)... the goal suddenly becomes unattainable.

 

Agreed  id say his 'little birds' in essos and around kl are active climbing into windows, eavesdropping and copying documents esp if near the secret corridors etc  , outside that we see he,cersei and LF employ regular bog standard spies to watch each other .....probably unemployed untrained  peasants paid to watch and follow just.

Now hes probably got a few of those in many major cities  (even the freys managed to quickly cover white harbour with so many ears manderly needed to meet davos in secret) and bribing the odd unhappy/greedy servant cant be too hard.

In kl due to the 3 brothers baretheon and many lannisters + lordly  entourages  he probably had.good intel on westerlands and stormlamds, crownlands too just by being soo closeby.

Dorne he probably doesnt bother with..they are a lock for faegon, the ironborn will be  drinking in harbours worldwide so hearing rumours and talk of them wont be too hard but nailing down more substantial facts will be trickey

The reach and riverlands  being vast and heavily.populated will be easier to infiltrate but the north and vale not so much given distance and being so insular in places .....esp as the vale is lfs territory  and hes probably got it well locked down for counter intel!!!

Now i agree its simply too vast and too many variables for him tk know what every lords will do when faegon lands but hes had decades to feel out rumours,/whispers and  at least try to find those who would definetly or potentialy back a targ revival.  etc 

And yeah its said someome got stannis looking into the baratheon hair thing....an agent of varys id assume!

Edited April 24 by astarkchoice

[GZ Bloodraven]

9 hours ago, chrisdaw said:

They care about her now obviously because she's got dragons and an army.

No but the only value of having a Dothraki army is for Viserys to invade Westeros, right? Except he gets himself killed, and now it's Dany who will be invading Westeros. So they set up two separate invasions with two separate armies. Or the Dothraki one was just a weird side project? 

As for the dragons, it doesn't seem like they expected the eggs to hatch, but then why give them away to her? 

I agree they don't care much about Viserys or Dany, but they spent a lot of cards on them and it doesn't make a ton of sense why unless they were supposed to be part of the Aegon plan. 

[Frey family reunion]

Is it possible that they thought Robert would be stupid enough to cross the Narrow Sea to face Drogo?

[frenin]

1 hour ago, astarkchoice said:

Now hes probably got a few of those in many major cities  (even the freys managed to quickly cover white harbour with so many ears manderly needed to meet davos in secret) and bribing the odd unhappy/greedy servant cant be too hard

I don't think he really does or if he has it gets him info he wouldn't have gotten otherwise. (And in Manderly's case he could tell very easily he was being spied on, which kinda defeats the purpose)

The major cities are ruled either by rebels (Robert, Wyman, Tywin) or by people doing their own thing (Hightower).

Wyman and Tywin are staunch rebels, Hightower has been reading witchcraft books for more than a decade and washing his hands off politics.

There are sure enough other Reach lords he could have spied on but the most powerful seemed tied to Renly or Mace (which isn't really difficult to discover anyway).

The Stormlords are staunch rebels, this much JonCon could tell even after leaving the country for a decade and a half. 

Tywin held the West in check. 

So honestly, the most info he could gather would be Riverlands and Reach Lords.

Doesn't really leave much.

 

 

[chrisdaw]

4 hours ago, GZ Bloodraven said:

No but the only value of having a Dothraki army is for Viserys to invade Westeros, right?

For Aegon, for Illyrio and Varys'  it's all for Aegon. Viserys is just the placeholder at the time to try and get Drogo moving in the right direction.

Aegon is valuable, to Varys he's the purpose built future perfect king, and with Illyrio the text establishes there's a personal connection driving his efforts and we are invited to speculate on its exact nature.

[astarkchoice]

7 hours ago, frenin said:

I don't think he really does or if he has it gets him info he wouldn't have gotten otherwise. (And in Manderly's case he could tell very easily he was being spied on, which kinda defeats the purpose)

The major cities are ruled either by rebels (Robert, Wyman, Tywin) or by people doing their own thing (Hightower).

Wyman and Tywin are staunch rebels, Hightower has been reading witchcraft books for more than a decade and washing his hands off politics.

There are sure enough other Reach lords he could have spied on but the most powerful seemed tied to Renly or Mace (which isn't really difficult to discover anyway).

The Stormlords are staunch rebels, this much JonCon could tell even after leaving the country for a decade and a half. 

Tywin held the West in check. 

So honestly, the most info he could gather would be Riverlands and Reach Lords.

Doesn't really leave much.

 

 

Maybe

There would be plenty of stormlords in the entourges of renly, stannis and robert to spy on at kl, same with the lannisters being all over kl too to spy on for westerlands info.

The iron islands and north are pretty far and very cut off , limited  intel may flow from drunken ironborn in harbours in essos where varys old network would stil work.

Dorne again he and iyrio would.assume thats a lock for faegon  thus wouldnt bother much.

The reach and riverlands are westeros breadbaskets thus trade would be a constant  flow to and from them making gathering info a lot easier there. 

The vale is of course very tricky, maybe back when jonnarryn had his entourage at court but with lysa holed up wary of any strangers, lfs own spy network beggining there (its his home turf and no ome is going there willingly on foot)bar sea traders from gilltown dpin gbuisness in pentos etc tbere wont be much leaking out to him from there

[frenin]

1 hour ago, astarkchoice said:

There would be plenty of stormlords in the entourges of renly, stannis and robert to spy on at kl, same with the lannisters being all over kl too to spy on for westerlands info.

The Stormlords were very loyal to the Baratheons, they have fought for him. He doesn't need to spy on them to know that.

And the only Western nobles at court were the Lannisters, not the Brax, Leffords etc.

He doesn't need to spy, on those people to know where their loyalties would lie.

 

1 hour ago, astarkchoice said:

maybe back when jonnarryn had his entourage at court but with lysa holed up wary of any strangers

I dunno.

Jon Arryn didn't have that much people in relevant positions in the Vale to be worth spying.

It's not like he can spy daily on the Graftons or the Royces.

[astarkchoice]

3 hours ago, frenin said:

The Stormlords were very loyal to the Baratheons, they have fought for him. He doesn't need to spy on them to know that.

And the only Western nobles at court were the Lannisters, not the Brax, Leffords etc.

He doesn't need to spy, on those people to know where their loyalties would lie.

 

I dunno.

Jon Arryn didn't have that much people in relevant positions in the Vale to be worth spying.

It's not like he can spy daily on the Graftons or the Royces.

Id say more listening to them as they talk about other lords would be revealing esp when all is ablaze with talk of a targ across the water...little morsels like tyrion mentioning dary had a cellar filled with targ tapestries and bare walls would be worth noting. The rest can be weaseled out from normal spies sd

true but like renly etc hed have an entourage made up of knights from various areas in his region  and servants to bribe etc

[astarkchoice]

15 hours ago, Frey family reunion said:

Is it possible that they thought Robert would be stupid enough to cross the Narrow Sea to face Drogo?

Dont think so, robert is slow in many ways but not military 

The khalassar is too mobile  for a largely infantry force to chase and its wayy to far for logistics to work esp if they have to go deep into the dothraki sea

Edited April 25 by astarkchoice

[astarkchoice]

Ok fun  thread here 

i suppose to really flesh  out  the plan we have to remove the things varys + ilyrio didnt/couldnt have known and plan for and had to adjust on the fly    ie no knowledge of the others and the eggs are just very expensive decorations. 

Lets also  say lysa arryn chickens out of murdering ned , visery stays in pentos etc

We know somone told stannis to look into baretheon hair and hed have roped jon arryn in too. Eventualy and much slower  leading than with ned it leads  to civil war  (and possibly a massacre confrontation at court ) .Given the goldcloaks captains were in lannsiter pay, the  large force of lannister guards at court and 3 heavy hitters (jamie,hound and gregor) id assume that cersei and jamie would probably escape KL.

Ned at this stage we know sorta was stirring to go north (which many would havevheard rumours of)  and confront the king beyond the wall , minus the dostraction of robeet comming to call him hand this time he probably goes!

 

Now heres where it gets messy  for the duo's plan , thats a lotta force vs the westerlands and it leaves roberts marriage anulled and him eligible for a marriage alliance......the question would be at this stage was the plan to either hit westeros with a 1st wave under viserys (with drogos primised forces)  then when he dies (or varys crossbows him) send faegon  OR kill the lil brat and go  all in with faegon  from day 1 (assuming danys is either dead or disapeared into the dothraki sea forever) . Also theyd need to get faegon bethrothed asap to probably margery , or a martell or asha or  at a push cersei/mrycella

 

Strikes me the plan has to have a lotta improvising in built anyway!

Edited April 25 by astarkchoice

[frenin]

On 4/25/2023 at 12:24 PM, astarkchoice said:

Id say more listening to them as they talk about other lords would be revealing esp when all is ablaze with talk of a targ across the water...little morsels like tyrion mentioning dary had a cellar filled with targ tapestries and bare walls would be worth noting. The rest can be weaseled out from normal spies sd

true but like renly etc hed have an entourage made up of knights from various areas in his region  and servants to bribe etc

 

Tyrion told Jaime that in Darry tho. Far from Varys.

Nor can I see what useful info can he get from the obviously very Pro Baratheon Stormlords... Does he need a confirmation that the region that benefitted the most from having their overlord ascend the throne would want to keep him there?

 

On 4/25/2023 at 4:38 PM, astarkchoice said:

Given the goldcloaks captains were in lannsiter pay

They weren't.

They were bribed with the Crown's money.

Their loyalty is only put in question once Robert dies and there's a power vacuum, not whilst he's alive.

 

On 4/25/2023 at 4:38 PM, astarkchoice said:

the  large force of lannister guards at court and 3 heavy hitters (jamie,hound and gregor) id assume that cersei and jamie would probably escape

Gregor wasn't in King's Landing.

 

On 4/25/2023 at 4:38 PM, astarkchoice said:

Also theyd need to get faegon bethrothed asap to probably margery , or a martell or asha or  at a push cersei/mrycella

I don't think that's possible. The Tyrells and Renly are really chummy and he's even chummier with several other prominent Reach Lords.

Robert already holds the throne and is at head of a massive coalition, he looks like the obvious winning ticket. Aegon, Dothraki or not, is good as dead.

Cersei may or may not give heirs and the Martells aren't supporting the Lannisters and they aren't good enough on their own.

No, plan always need to pass through having Robert's coalition collapse within itself first for them to have a fighting chance.

 

Edited April 27 by frenin

[astarkchoice]

46 minutes ago, frenin said:

 

-Tyrion told Jaime that in Darry tho. Far from Varys.

Nor can I see what useful info can he get from the obviously very Pro Baratheon Stormlords... Does he need a confirmation that the region that benefitted the most from having their overlord ascend the throne would want to keep him there?

 

-They weren't.

They were bribed with the Crown's money.

Their loyalty is only put in question once Robert dies and there's a power vacuum, not whilst he's alive.

 

-Gregor wasn't in King's Landing.

 

-i don't think that's possible. The Tyrells and Renly are really chummy and he's even chummier with several other prominent Reach Lords.

Robert already holds the throne and is at head of a massive coalition, he looks like the obvious winning ticket. Aegon, Dothraki or not, is good as dead.

Cersei may or may not give heirs and the Martells aren't supporting the Lannisters and they aren't good enough on their own.

No, plan always need to pass through having Robert's coalition collapse within itself first for them to have a fighting chance.

 

-my point was that varys had a decade or so to ferret out lords like that that sre secret targ lovers

Well we dont get as much info about the stormlords as many other regions...but logicaly every region will have its grasping  frey,florent,bolton,reynes types!! Then add in the effect of mixed loyalties when you add in the golden company (see griffins roost easy fall)

-their loyalty seems to be for sale, corrupt to the very core from the head down...thats gotta be useful to the side with unlimited gold!

 

-totaly thats my point im wondering what was  next planwise !!

If varys men  truely did set stannis down the path of checking baratheon hair vs lannsiter then that still leaves quite the mismatch (westerlands vs almost evetyone) its not a massive drain on the old robert rebellion allaince strength no?  you have to wonder what else theyd planned maybe say varys crossbolting robert at the right time  or possibly following up the bribes to volantis to back the invasion etc.

Sellswords we know essos has by the thouands,.to make the golden company ,'work' within the setting there would need to be at least 30-50k extra non golden company  milling around the free cities etc

[frenin]

 

26 minutes ago, astarkchoice said:

my point was that varys had a decade or so to ferret out lords like that that sre secret targ lovers

Sure my point is that info will be extremely limited.

He'd need to have Bloodraven's level web of spies to be incredibly effective.

 

26 minutes ago, astarkchoice said:

Well we dont get as much info about the stormlords as many other regions...but logicaly every region will have its grasping  frey,florent,bolton,reynes types!! Then add in the effect of mixed loyalties when you add in the golden company (see griffins roost easy fall)

Yeah, there sure was. 

The Baratheons gave the Connigtons similar treatment the Tarbecks and Reynes received. There aren't really any grasping Lords in the West either

 

Besides that the current Connigtons have a vested interest in not becoming destitutes if JonCon returns to his lands.

Griffin Roost fell because it was both grossly undermanned and because JonCon obviously knows his lands.

That and the fact that JonCon himself realizes that he would not have dared to return to the Stormlands under more popular overlords.

 

26 minutes ago, astarkchoice said:

their loyalty seems to be for sale, corrupt to the very core from the head down...thats gotta be useful to the side with unlimited gold!

Their loyalty is up for sell if the chain of command isn't clear enough.

They knew the Lannisters had money and it still took LF promising them land to get on board and that's only with an explicitly cited power vacuum happening on stage.

 

26 minutes ago, astarkchoice said:

If varys men  truely did set stannis down the path of checking baratheon hair

Still believe Petyr did that much.

I think that Varys always had in mind to tell Robert personally, gain his trust and then literally stab him and his most immediate heirs while he's fighting the Dothraki, you can throw Viserys and the Martells here to the mix lol.

Aegon then would swoop in. With Robert and his heirs dead, even prominent rebels such as Ned would be forced to bring the Targaryens in.

It's the path to least resistance.  Then again, they could also legitimize Edric, fucking with Varys lol.

There's no such thing as a perfect plan. 

[astarkchoice]

3 hours ago, frenin said:

 

-Sure my point is that info will be extremely limited.

He'd need to have Bloodraven's level web of spies to be incredibly effective.

 

-Yeah, there sure was. 

-The Baratheons gave the Connigtons similar treatment the Tarbecks and Reynes received. There aren't really any grasping Lords in the West either

 

Besides that the current Connigtons have a vested interest in not becoming destitutes if JonCon returns to his lands.

Griffin Roost fell because it was both grossly undermanned and because JonCon obviously knows his lands.

That and the fact that JonCon himself realizes that he would not have dared to return to the Stormlands under more popular overlords.

 

-Their loyalty is up for sell if the chain of command isn't clear enough.

They knew the Lannisters had money and it still took LF promising them land to get on board and that's only with an explicitly cited power vacuum happening on stage.

 

-Still believe Petyr did that much.

I think that Varys always had in mind to tell Robert personally, gain his trust and then literally stab him and his most immediate heirs while he's fighting the Dothraki, you can throw Viserys and the Martells here to the mix lol.

Aegon then would swoop in. With Robert and his heirs dead, even prominent rebels such as Ned would be forced to bring the Targaryens in.

It's the path to least resistance.  Then again, they could also legitimize Edric, fucking with Varys lol.

There's no such thing as a perfect plan. 

-spy wise id say he had a bloodraven level.of spies, hes had decades there to work, littlebirds for KL and regular sneaks for the other areas. Given theres no NDAs back then cant be to hard to find unhappy chatty former servants/ lesser lords  either.

That said he doesnt have bloodravens magics but hes had enough time to sniff out the hidden targ loyalists.

Yes but as we see theres always backstabbers    everybody wants to climb..almost all royal civil wars in westeros have  been messy with some vassals siding vs their lords for the person they want as king

-they are corrupt greedy scumbags and im pretty sure if it kicks off in kl and ser barristan isnt  directly on duty nothing is stopping jamie killing poor robert with ease leaving cesei regent and probably instantly demading the 'real assasins' be caught... ie prob finger pointing to his brothers!

 

-varys said it had been an unnamed man in a way id always assumed was his own guy 

The baratheon vs lannister angle seemed to be varys+ilyrios whereas the much more  accelerated stark vs lannsiter conflict was all LF

 

Yeah thats what i was ponering (which would be a great way to take this thread further or a seperate thread)  just what was next step (viserys is ahead of faegon so his death would need to occur)   id say reaching out to the tyrells would be the ideal of course given the reachs insanely unbalanced vs other regions military wise!

They have the golden company ,whatever force drogo raises  by slaving and protection money (probably 10-20k more sellswords given hes not gonna out his own men under viserys  nor will they cross the narrow sea) and dorne of course.

Now we know ilyrio had built up 4 boats filled with rare items that dany was told could pay for 1k unsullied...given more timemhe probably could strech to say 8-10 boats. Now he probably wouldnt hire unsullied (too far too bizzare) but maybe as hes already bought one triarch at volantis he could bribr another to get them involved! Or just a fuckton more mercs/assasins and sellsails  from.further east!!! Id say for the golden compnay to 'work' as a concept warring in the disputed lands for one of the 3 sisters that there must be about 30k-50k  other sellswords there broken into smaller comanies available to easily  counter the GC and thats before we talk slave soliders.

Edited April 27 by astarkchoice

[frenin]

55 minutes ago, astarkchoice said:

-spy wise id say he had a bloodraven level.of spies, hes had decades there to work, littlebirds for KL and regular sneaks for the other areas. Given theres no NDAs back then cant be to hard to find unhappy chatty former servants/ lesser lords  either.

He did not, there are vast swaths of lands he had little to no access to, whilst there wasn't a high lord's hall Bloodraven did not have an agent in.

He has obviously ears in several places but that's about it. 

 

58 minutes ago, astarkchoice said:

Yes but as we see theres always backstabbers    everybody wants to climb..almost all royal civil wars in westeros have  been messy with some vassals siding vs their lords for the person they want as king

The backstabbers we see are the backstabbers we've always known about.

You're dismissing the characters' statements about the Stormlords' feelings towards Robert and Renly. The Stormlords overwhelmingly favoured the rebellion at the end of the day, why would that change now?

 

1 hour ago, astarkchoice said:

-they are corrupt greedy scumbags and im pretty sure if it kicks off in kl and ser barristan isnt  directly on duty nothing is stopping jamie killing poor robert with ease leaving cesei regent and probably instantly demading the 'real assasins' be caught... ie prob finger pointing to his brothers!

They are corrupt scumbags but nothing i've seen about them indicates they would be the kind of ones to go against central authority, sure when that authority is gone it's on but till then...

Great as Jaime is, i just don't think he being able to kill his way through the Kingsguard. But yeah, if Robert discovered the truth at a time he was alone with Jaime, then he's toast. Quite convenient tho.

 

1 hour ago, astarkchoice said:

-varys said it had been an unnamed man in a way id always assumed was his own guy 

He said anyone, from LF to him.

It's one of these threads we are unlikely to ever get an answer anyway.

 

 

1 hour ago, astarkchoice said:

Yeah thats what i was ponering (which would be a great way to take this thread further or a seperate thread)  just what was next step (viserys is ahead of faegon so his death would need to occur)   id say reaching out to the tyrells would be the ideal of course given the reachs insanely unbalanced vs other regions military wise!

I mean yeah, reaching out the Reach is a must if they are banking on having a fighting chance.

Given Renly's ties with Loras, primarily, and with the rest of the Reach Lords, i'm just wondering if it wouldn't be too late anyway.

Regardless, Renly would need to die for Aegon to safely ascend, so it's not the ultimate hurdle.

 

1 hour ago, astarkchoice said:

Now we know ilyrio had built up 4 boats filled with rare items that dany was told could pay for 1k unsullied...given more timemhe probably could strech to say 8-10 boats. Now he probably wouldnt hire unsullied (too far too bizzare) but maybe as hes already bought one triarch at volantis he could bribr another to get them involved! Or just a fuckton more mercs/assasins and sellsails  from.further east!!! Id say for the golden compnay to 'work' as a concept warring in the disputed lands for one of the 3 sisters that there must be about 30k-50k  other sellswords there broken into smaller comanies available to easily  counter the GC and thats before we talk slave soliders.

Dunno, I'm with Jorah on this one, the Golden Company is one thing. 50k foreigners armed to the teeth and invading Westeros is a foolproof way to get the Westerosi to rally round whomever is sitting on the throne at the time.

[astarkchoice]

3 hours ago, frenin said:

-He did not, there are vast swaths of lands he had little to no access to, whilst there wasn't a high lord's hall Bloodraven did not have an agent in.

He has obviously ears in several places but that's about it. 

 

-The backstabbers we see are the backstabbers we've always known about.

You're dismissing the characters' statements about the Stormlords' feelings towards Robert and Renly. The Stormlords overwhelmingly favoured the rebellion at the end of the day, why would that change now?

 

-They are corrupt scumbags but nothing i've seen about them indicates they would be the kind of ones to go against central authority, sure when that authority is gone it's on but till then...

-Great as Jaime is, i just don't think he being able to kill his way through the Kingsguard. But yeah, if Robert discovered the truth at a time he was alone with Jaime, then he's toast. Quite convenient tho.

 

-He said anyone, from LF to him.

It's one of these threads we are unlikely to ever get an answer anyway.

 

 

-i  mean yeah, reaching out the Reach is a must if they are banking on having a fighting chance.

-Given Renly's ties with Loras, primarily, and with the rest of the Reach Lords, i'm just wondering if it wouldn't be too late anyway.

Regardless, Renly would need to die for Aegon to safely ascend, so it's not the ultimate hurdle.

 

-Dunno, I'm with Jorah on this one, the Golden Company is one thing. 50k foreigners armed to the teeth and invading Westeros is a foolproof way to get the Westerosi to rally round whomever is sitting on the throne at the time.

-id say its kept vauge on his exact level of reach, hes had  ample time and funding  to put spies in most areas, kl and essos obviously has his 'little.birds'  too ..spywise id bryndens magic was as much to do with his seeming all knowing.

-as we see theres literaly dozens of houses of all sizes  in every region and wealso see sometimes a loyal house will beget a disloyal heir or visa versa.

The stormlords we recall robert nedded to literaly hammer at least 3 houses into submission , now add in we dont know how many exiled sons  are comming home.with the GC to murky up loyalties!!!

-agreed  id say while.cowardly theyd move in the right circumstances...which wed assume varys would help foster!

-depends on the particular rotation and we know robert preffered to keep jamie close to him for humiliation, 2 of them varys says are cerseis creatures so would be onside and any close quarters slaughter around that period we must rememer the clegane brothers are in town, those 2 together with jamie? Forget about it!  Shit from what we've seen  of 2 handed jamie alone  unless one of the kingsguard there on the spot is selmy than robert is dead

-yeah id lean towards varys just as the other conflictl(wolf vs lion) feels like LFs doing

-they have dorne onside but would def need one more region unless the plan is to somehow make the rest attack dorne through the narrow boneways into dorne and bleed them.dry there!

-good point thats what i made this thread for man multiple heads thinking the potential avenues out...yeah id say renly as a lynchpin between the reach and stormlamds has to go....varys prob had a crossbolt  with his name on it!

-sellswords rather than savage dothraki might make it more palatable esp with a targ at the head (esp given robert has forged his legitimacy on distant targ family ties that are behind aegon in sucession)plus again unknown numbers of local assitance. If for example they get the tyrells behind them and the huge sellsword force +dorne it begins to create a political momentum of lords switching to the seemingly winning side.

But overall yeah the numbers and timing have got to be right  , lets say ned takes the northern forces north of the wall  to deal with mance as hed been planning so theyl be gone for some time , lannisters mauled  already and out of the allaliance (may be an ally for faegon)  , the riverlands,stormlands and vale left in play as well as the crownlands. Dorne+ GC plus extra mercs doesnt seem to be enough without the reach but the golden company seemed to think they have pals there!!

The ironborn are another x factor though as is the amount of secret targ loving lords , hidden tapestries to open support.

[SeanF]

WRT the rebellion, I’d say that Robert won because of his outstanding abilities as a commander, and the poor quality of loyalist leadership, not because he had a wide base of support.

The North was the only region that was united behind the rebels.  Hoster Tully, Jon Arryn, and Robert himself, all faced loyalist opposition among their vassals.

Aerys, Rhaegar, and Jon Connington had a big numerical advantage, and they threw it away.

Robert himself fears that if Viserys turns up with an army, many lords will rise in his support.  Even in victory, Robert was not powerful enough to confiscate the lands of his enemies and give them to his supporters.  The Tyrells and Martells could have kept waging war for years, against Robert.

And, by the start of AGOT, Robert has deteriorated to the point that he can barely ride a horse, let alone lead an army.

So, an Eastern invasion does mean there’s a real risk that the lords who supported the Targaryens, who retain their wealth and power, will back a restoration.

The Baratheon dynasty was always vulnerable.