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Eddard Stark as a king?


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What if Eddard Stark had claimed the throne after finding Jaime sitting on it. Let's say Robert and Jon Arryn had allowed it. I really like Eddard, but I think his reign would end shortly. The reign would start in a very bad way if he had sent Jaime to the wall, beheaded Gregor and Armory Loch for the dead children and made Tywin answer for crimes his man made in Kings landing and not taken Cersei as wife. He was too good and honorable man to rule such a corrupted kingdom.


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It would have been a huge civil war with his only hopes of immediate allegiance or aid was the dornish with the immediate justice he gave them. Cercei telling him he should have declared himself always seemed like a foolish notion to me. The only way to hold iron throne is to have the support and ned just didn't have the support.

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Well... Eddard would've sent many to the wall, including Jaime and probably Tywin too. He would've behead Clegane and Lorch himself. His small council would consist of very different people, which I think would've led to a much longer and more fruitful reign. But, it would be much more boring realm than the one during Robert's reign that hurled the realm into a bottomless pit of debt. That's assuming that nobody assassinates him, which there's a pretty good chance of. I don't think that he would have had a master of whispers and it certainly wouldn't be Varys which would leave the throne blind to the little things. The danger for him would grow because Ned always felt a responsibility to the common folk as well as the nobility, and since you can't make everyone happy, he would take the pragmatic approach and favor the common folk that don't really have any power. This of course would piss off the most powerful of the realm after seeing their prosperity shrink, throwing them into the horribly uncomfortable life of semi luxury lol. So when you have unhappy lords, you risk your life, and that's something that I think that Ned would underestimate. THOUGHTS?



Great thread BTW


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Varys would die, LF would still be Master of Coin probably, Jon Arryn would still probably die due to Lysa, but that's about it probably. It would be a pretty boring realm. Lannisters and The Reach might rebel at somepoint though.


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Lots of Westeros would not support him. You'd probably have the Reach joining with the West against him. Those are two mostly untapped forces against the war battered coalition of the Stormlands, North, Vale and Riverlands, if indeed all those regions seek to back him. Dorne... I don't know where they'd stand.



Basically, I think the civil war would continue/mold into a new civil war. No way would Tywin like a Stark on the IT, especially if his men get punished. Tywin waves some gold/marriage opportunities in front of Mace Tyrell, and voila, you get the Lannister-Tyrell alliance 15 years early.


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His main problem is hes just married to cat and as yet has no sons so the north is heirless and leaderless as he rules

Do we know whether or not Benjen was a brother of the NW at that point? I think he'd be a capable enough Lord, he seemed to do a fine job as First Ranger other than, presumably, running into the Others and dying or getting wighted.

Varys would die, LF would still be Master of Coin probably, Jon Arryn would still probably die due to Lysa, but that's about it probably. It would be a pretty boring realm. Lannisters and The Reach might rebel at somepoint though.

I'm not entirely sure Jon Arryn would die, given that no one is really sure what LF's game is; everyone has their guesses, but the people who just dismiss any larger aim with "hurf durf he's an opportunist who just wants to cause chaos and gain power!" are I think being very short-sighted. He may be working for Braavos and/or the Iron Bank, he may be working for some faction in the supernatural level game or just the international power players conspiracy, but we don't really know what his endgame is, and I think Ned as king could change a lot.

Obviously, Jon Arryn's death was a means to the end of getting the Lannisters and Starks to fight with each other, not because of his knowledge of the incest per se, but that was the pretext LF used to make the Starks think the Lannisters did it, and I don't think that's available if Ned is king. Whether or not Cersei marries Robert or not and whether or not Jaime lives and stays a Kingsguard if so, there's probably not going to be an opportunity for them to be incestuous, and it doesn't actually matter much if they are, because Cersei isn't Queen and her children aren't in line for the throne.

The interesting variables to me in this situation are Renly and Stannis, because they won't be getting Storm's End or Dragonstone most likely, but we know they still both are very ambitious men. I think anyone plotting to destabilize the realm would probably try to turn Robert and his family against the Starks by some means; maybe by getting Stannis and Renly to try and team up and convince Robert to claim the throne. Maybe they just kill off Robert, since he'd be even more likely to drink himself into an early grave if he was stuck in the Stormlands and couldn't abuse the treasury and Kingship to have Robert's Happy Fun Time Booze'n'Wenches'n'Tourneys Pity Party Sad Sack Parade. I think in that case, you'd actually see Tywin/Lannisters and Stannis team up. I doubt Stannis marries Selyse if Robert isn't king, so Tywin might offer him Cersei. Renly/Margaery probably goes down the same way, with it basically being Renly/Loras that everyone pretends otherwise, but Renly and Stannis more or less getting along and aiding each other, because they'd be more dependent on one another for support. Renly might put off his "I'm the most charming, I get to be King!" crap until there's actually been a Baratheon dynasty to begin with.

The other really interesting variable in this situation is Jon Snow. I definitely think Catelyn would be even worse to Jon in the event that her children were royalty. As it is the books, her grudge is basically personal and a form of displacement; she clearly feels betrayed and hurt by Ned, but can't deal with it directly and dumps all her bitterness and resentment onto Jon. No one's scheming to mess with the inheritance of Winterfell before the war, and he's not a threat to Robb's claim or any of her other children, just because no one would want to back him and he wouldn't be a useful pawn. It's the North and no one gives a shit. If there's a Stark dynasty in the Seven Kingdoms, on the other hand, suddenly that changes, even ignoring the R+L=J aspect. He's a useful tool for those who want to claim the throne under both "versions" of his paternity.

It would be iunteresting to see Jon's feelings in a situation where, for example, he grows up at Winterfell, raised by Benjen, because of Cat's insistence, while the other Stark kids grow up in KL and don't really know Winterfell or the North at all. In that situation, if he doesn't have any reason to know and love his siblings or Ned, if Winterfell is awarded to Bran, I don't think he's necessarily just throw a tantrum and go to the Wall. Jon's clearly on some level bitter, resentful, and unhappy about his situation in the books, it's just that he's a good person and he loves his family (Cat doesn't count) and that counteracts it. I think under different circumstances, he'd probably grow up to be a lot more like Stannis, and like the Jon who first comes to the Wall and thinks he's better than everyone and is bitter and angry all the time. Benjen could only counteract so much.

Of course, this is all supposing the Tower of Joy goes down in roughly the same way if Ned becomes King, which is probably supposing a lot. He just as easily might end up raised by Arthur Dayne and company, down in Dorne or what have you. Maybe even he, Viserys, and Dany grow up together, which would be really interesting, especially if Vierys's terribleness isn't entirely due to circumstance but a large part of who he is as a person.

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Well... Eddard would've sent many to the wall, including Jaime and probably Tywin too. He would've behead Clegane and Lorch himself. His small council would consist of very different people, which I think would've led to a much longer and more fruitful reign. But, it would be much more boring realm than the one during Robert's reign that hurled the realm into a bottomless pit of debt. That's assuming that nobody assassinates him, which there's a pretty good chance of. I don't think that he would have had a master of whispers and it certainly wouldn't be Varys which would leave the throne blind to the little things. The danger for him would grow because Ned always felt a responsibility to the common folk as well as the nobility, and since you can't make everyone happy, he would take the pragmatic approach and favor the common folk that don't really have any power. This of course would piss off the most powerful of the realm after seeing their prosperity shrink, throwing them into the horribly uncomfortable life of semi luxury lol. So when you have unhappy lords, you risk your life, and that's something that I think that Ned would underestimate. THOUGHTS?

Great thread BTW

Thanks! What does other thinks would Eddard had sent Tywin to the wall?

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Perpetual war.

The Lannisters and Tyrell's likely ally, Dorne uses the chaos to essentially seperate, and probably an earlier version of the FM rears it's head when faced with a king who defies the 'true religion'. Cracks in Ned/Robert friendship are probably exacerbated, and Jon Arryn is forced into another tough choice.

Fwiw, Ned makes a better King than Hand, but it's just not a winning hand to play.

Jon Arryn really ought to have been the choice, but at the time no one knew he'd produce a direct heir.

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If you are not going to be a worshipper of the seven and rule the seven kingdoms you better have dragons.

/thread

This is the problem with any Northerner becoming King or Queen. Even the Dornish, who are culturally very different, mostly worship the Seven.

There had never been a king who worshipped the Old Gods, and the only queen who did may have been Egg's Betha Blackwood, although I'm not sure to what extent the Blackwoods in her day kept the traditions of the North (we know Bloodraven did at least).

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The Lannisters and Tyrell's likely ally,

Why do you think that Tyrells would ally with Lannisters? Lannisters have nothing to offer to Tyrells and we know that Tyrells do nothing unless they would benefit from it.

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Why do you think that Tyrells would ally with Lannisters? Lannisters have nothing to offer to Tyrells and we know that Tyrells do nothing unless they would benefit from it.

The enemy of my enemy.

If the 2 most powerful kingdoms are enemies of the brand new IT, it would only be blind luck if they don't happen to notice the fact that power is there for the taking. They can offer each other a share in the throne.

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