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Robert Baratheon uses a war hammer. Was that a common weapon for a high born knight?

Not uncommon, especially later on when plate armor got really really good. If you can’t cut through armor with your sword, then hitting someone really really hard at a single point and trying to buckle the armor or at the very least break some bones is a good idea. 

But I do want to point out, warhammers are a lot smaller IRL than in fantasy genre works. Let’s take Robert Baratheon’s replica for example:

While this is very visually impressive, it’s highly impractical. That giant face distributes the force of a blow across a pretty wide area, which is the opposite of what you want. It’s also a two-handed weapon, which makes it even heavier than it needs to be, and makes it quite difficult to use from horseback.

Here’s what a real warhammer from medieval Europe looks like:

Not that different from something you might find in your toolbox, or at the very least in a climbing supply store. It’s got a small head, because you want to concentrate the force of the blow into as small an area as you can, and it’s also got a pick head as well, because once you’ve knocked your opponent down, it’s easier to try to puncture their armor and really cause some damage. And it’s one-handed, because you need the other hand free for reins, a shield, etc. And it’s not that heavy, so you can keep swinging it all day long. 

But considering Robert took the Throne based on his grandmother Rhaelle otherwise why not Ned/Jon/Holster, wouldn’t descendants of Egg’s sisters be the next legal heirs? Or the Hightowers, Martells, Penroses, Velayrons etc

To clarify: Robert took the Iron Throne because the rebel alliance acclaimed him King before the Battle of the Trident and then carried that claim to victory at the Trident and King’s Landing. They chose him for a couple reasons – he was charismatic, he had some Targaryen blood, there was the whole symbolism of Rhaegar’s abduction of Lyanna – but they weren’t required to. 

And once he’s on the throne, the terms of the next legal heir shift to his relatives. Hence Stannis being next in line if Robert has no kids. 

Could you explain the proximity arguments for the Estermonts and Florents, please? Why does marrying a family member into the royal family give you a claim on the throne? And if the Estermonts and Florents have a claim through proximity (presumably from their marriages to Steffon and Stannis), shouldn’t Cersei also have a (better) claim through her marriage to Robert?

So here’s my way of thinking, and there’s no reason necessarily to think it’s better than anyone else’s (thinking of @nobodysuspectsthebutterfly, @goodqueenaly, and @warsofasoiaf here):

If what matters is who the closest blood kin of the king is, then the Florents are kin to Princess Shireen and inlaws to Stannis (if you accept that Stannis and Shireen were the lawful kings/heirs to the Iron Throne). Next most recently, the Estermonts are kin to Robert, Stannis, and Renly through Cassana Estermont, regardless of how you see the succession going from that point on. After that, the Targaryens are kin to Robert, Stannis, Renly through Rhaelle Targaryen,  as well as to all previous kings. 

Cersei’s blood relationship to Robert Baratheon is much more distant than any of those, going back 90 years Gowen Baratheon and Tya Lannister, but even then that pairing died without successful issue, and 120 years ago when an unnamed Baratheon woman married a male Lannister and had issue. It’s highly unclear whether Cersei has any blood connection to Robert.

Now, there is an argument that she’s the mother of Joffrey and Tommen, but…A. their parentage and kingship was publicly put in question and Cersei has already admitted to incest in one case, and B. claims rarely go up the generations in that way, and C. even if the Lannister branch was chosen, Targaryen and Great Council precedent would suggest that a male cousin rather than Cersei herself, would inherit. 

So it looks like in the show that Daenerys will take King’s Landing from Cersei (maybe Euron gets involved somehow). But the conventional wisdom for TWOW has been that Aegon will take King’s Landing from the Lannister-Tyrell regime (how Myrcella and Tommen die would still be up in the air). So is Aegon’s excision from the show indicative of how he’s ultimately unimportant? Because in the show there’s no opposing candidate for a second Dance and Dany will steamroll everyone in her path.

I don’t think it’s so much ultimately unimportant as unimportant to Benioff and Weiss, who are being rather radical in chopping out material so that they can skip to the end.  

So is Rickon really just a shaggy dog story in the books given his fate in the show? I’ve always felt that the Davos-goes-to-Skagos-and-retrieves-Rickon plan seems too convenient to work as intended. Wyman Manderly is going to die (either from his recent wounds or being killed by Stannis before he can reveal his true colors). And doesn’t it seem just a little farfetched that Wex followed the group across half of the North without being observed or sensed even once, then waltzed into WH?

No, I think it’s that Rickon is five, so he’s not going to accomplish anything himself. So the show decided they could kill him off without changing the plot that much. 

Could Rickon really have lifted an old rusted iron sword from the crypts? Aren’t they really heavy?

This is a fantasy/genre/movie misconception. 

image

Swords are not heavy, contrary to every D&D equipment section ever, because IRL they are relatively thin pieces of metal meant to cut things. Even the heaviest swords, those giant two-hand swords that people used to hack through pike formations and cut the legs off of horses, weigh less than 7 pounds. Your average sword weighs more like 2.5-3.5 pounds. Rickon Stark could certainly lift one.

Control would be a different issue. Having held my fair share of swords when I was a kid, it wasn’t difficult to lift one, but it was very difficult to use in an effective fashion, both because kids don’t have great hand-eye coordination to begin with, nor do they have the proper leverage due to their height, weight, length of arms, etc. 

So I would imagine Rickon would find said sword very unwieldy. He would be dragging it along the ground, it would catch and snag on everything, he would probably drop it a lot, and any swings would go wildly off course and quite likely cause him to fall over.

This may be my most nerdy post ever.  

About some of your doubts concerning the HBO show’s finale: given the results of Cersei’s last play (i.e. everyone else is dead), isn’t there enough of a political vacuum for Cersei to realistically be able to seize the throne without facing too much official protest about it? There is basically no credible claimant yet. The entire Baratheon/Lannister/Tyrell succession is extinct. Wouldn’t Cersei be the closest KL has to some semblance of political continuity? It is suicidal, yes, but right now?

As for a vacuum, in the city itself, there’s no one left to oppose her on the Small Council, the Sparrows are leaderless, and Cersei does have some guardsmen. But without any shred of popular legitimacy, all it takes is one good riot to bring it all tumbling down. 

And for outside the city, the Florents are the closest in proximity, followed by the Estermonts, followeed by the Targaryens themselves. Lannisters are way too remote. 

But as to continuity…the attraction of continuity is stability, security, and predictability. Cersei offers none of those things; she’s basically Aerys the Third. If allying with the Lannisters through a dynastic marriage, the closest form of alliance there is in Westeros, brings you death by wildfire, there’s literally no upside to being on her side, and no downside to opposing her because she’s going to kill you anyway. 

Dany’s arrival makes all this moot anyway. She’s got the two biggest Targaryen loyalists on her side, in the show anyway she’s got an ironclad claim to both the Targaryen succession and the Baratheon succession, she’s got an enormous army, and she’s got dragons.