2 Part Question: Someone on reddit claimed that if Cat's suggestion of a GC went ahead Renly would have won by a landslide, as the WLs and Iron Islands would want the more lenient Renly over Stannis, the Reach and SLs would completely back Renly, some RLs would support Renly because of the R'hllorism, and the Vale would support Renly due to LF's influence and apparently Royce would be behind Renly due to his son. They also claimed that the Vale would turn against Stannis as despite believing

Arryn was murdered he did nothing, as this person’s train of thought is that Stannis committed treason by not telling Robert. However I think their ideas of LF influencing all the Vale is going a bit far and that a lot of Lords would prefer Stannis and see a younger brother taking power as a threat to their own right. Your thoughts?



I think I might know the Renly stan you’re talking about. I’ll take these points in order of most to least ridiculous.

The Riverlanders wouldn’t support Renly, that’s just ridiculous. They’ve acclaimed Robb as the King of the Trident! This right here suggests to me that rather than examine the evidence, the individual in question is arguing for a particular conclusion and trying to reach it.



The Westerlands aren’t going to support Renly. That much is self-evident, they’re going to deny the legitimacy of the Great Council in the first place, or support Joffrey if they can’t. If they can’t do that, they’re going to push for their own independence under the Lannisters, neither Stannis nor Renly nor Robb with power would have any reason to be magnanimous toward the Lannisters, not after the execution of Eddard and the murder of Robert. Anyone believing that the Lannisters are going to jump on Renly’s ship is fooling themselves.

The Stormlanders aren’t going to back Renly. As seen by the night meetings and how many of them go over to Stannis’s side before Renly’s corpse is cold, Renly’s entire appeal is the bandwagon effect, he has a large army and people want to join the winning side.

The Vale wouldn’t back Renly either. Littlefinger would prefer to keep the realm deadlocked, but the socially conservative Vale would not violate tradition of inheritance so blatantly and illegally. Lysa’s influence over the Vale is lessened at a Great Council setting. She can forbid anyone deploying troops, but she can’t forbid her vassals from speaking their mind at a time and place where they are explicitly brought together to speak their minds. If Stannis brings up the investigation, Catelyn is capable of bringing up the attempted assassination of Bran (which is wrong, of course but no party involved knows that), that both clears Stannis somewhat and gives further credibility to an anti-Lannister camp that could force a compromise candidate.

Thanks for the question, Classicist.

SomethingLikeALawyer, Hand of the King