71 replies to this topic

[ckal]

I think there is a case to be made that during his reign, Robert Baratheon was, at least to an extent, a good king. Although it is easy to make a case for the other side as well.

This is not about whether or not he was a good person, but a good king.



Pros:
- Realm was largely at peace for his entire reign, and when a rebellion arose he crushed it and went back to peace times
- Seemed to be just, and even kind at times (pardoning some who supported Targaryens for example)
- As far as I remember, the people seemed fine with him, at least didn't hate him



Cons:
- Bankrupt the throne with frivolous and over the top spending on tournaments and other things, although it brought joy and merriment to the realm
- Didn't seem to care much of the time, left many matters to the small council and on occasion ignored their advice
- Many people regarded him as a drunk and foolish


I've just listed out the first few things that came to mind for each side, and I'm not arguing in this original post one way or the other. Feel free to expand and go into more details and give your opinion!

[7V3N]

Overall, he had potential. But Lyanna's death crushed him. If she was his queen, I think she would have kept him in line. He was a good man and with Robert Aryn as his Hand and Lyanna his queen, they would not need to appease the Lannisters at every step.

I think is Lyanna lived and willingly married him, then the answer would be yes. But since she ended up dead, it is unfortunately a no.

[The King in the South]

Most of his Pro's were thanks to Jon Arryn or Stannis, but he appointed them, so I'm not sure how to rank him on those areas.

The Shadow Fox, on 18 April 2012 - 06:55 PM, said:

Overall, he had potential. But Lyanna's death crushed him. If she was his queen, I think she would have kept him in line. He was a good man and with Robert Aryn as his Hand and Lyanna his queen, they would not need to appease the Lannisters at every step.

I think is Lyanna lived and willingly married him, then the answer would be yes. But since she ended up dead, it is unfortunately a no.

That's certainly open for debate. Adultery, abuse, laziness, negligence, attempted murder, etc; Dunno how much of those the average good man does. (And he was doing several of these long before Lyanna's death.)

[Apple Martini]

I think most of Robert's "pros" were actually due to Jon Arryn, Stannis and, God help me, maybe even Littlefinger. The guys who, you know, did the actual governing.

[Completely Headless Ned]

The realm was at peace, but if you believe that Aegon is real, then i don't think that peace would have lasted a lot longer. plus you had a lot of people who are untrustworthy and out for their own good instead of the good of the realm. I think if he cared more then some of this mess would have been snuffed out.

[Chalkius Stark]

There was peace, people could make a living, and he wasn't overly harsh. Sure, he had advisors, but so would any king. He's a better king than Joffrey or Aerys at any rate. And he ruled better than Cersei does as Queen Regent.

[Jem]

Robert Baratheon's guide to being a good king...

Step one - hire yourself a good Hand
Step two - hire yourself a good small council
Step three - sit back and let your Hand and small council deal with everything while you drink and eat and whore like it's 1999.

Robert was a good king in that he mainly kept out of the way while people who knew what they were doing did all the hard work.

[Tumnas the Torpid]

In my opinion, Robert was a terrible king.  Through a combination of battlefield prowess and success, charismatic personality, and a fig-leaf blood claim, Robert was capable of being King, and so as long as he sat the Iron Throne the realm was mostly at peace...

...But while he sat that throne he beggared the realm, and did nothing to resolve the contradictions inherent in his coronation.  The North, Vale, the River and the Stormlands fought his war, but Lord Tywin took King's Landing and effectively kept it when his daughter wed the King.  Robert ignored all the signs of trouble brewing behind his tourneys and hunts and feasts and orgies, ensuring that peace would end when he died (and his cult of personality died with him).

[nara]

Yes, there was peace and prosperity, but Robert also managed to put the realm very seriously in debt to the Lannisters.  He was a very short-term thinker.  If he had lived, I think that Westeros would have had a recession eventually due to the debt and heavy spending.  I think that if Robert had been married to Lyanna, not a whole lot would have changed.  He thought he loved her, but how well could he have really known her with her at Winterfell and him in the Eyrie?  IIRC, there is a part where Ned and Lyanna discuss Robert's suitability as a husband and she has doubts about him.  There would have been a honeymoon period but he would have fooled around eventually

My theory is that if they had gotten married, she might be the one who ended up having an affair with Jaime!  Without the Cersei business, he's very attractive and has some of the same qualities as Rhaegar (sense of duty, defending the weak--like Tyrion and Brienne in the bear pit, etc.)  Robert is not the devoted husband type.  Now, she probably would not have deliberately had Jaime's children instead of Rhaegar's, but it might have happened by accident.

[7V3N]

The King in the South, on 18 April 2012 - 07:01 PM, said:

That's certainly open for debate. Adultery, abuse, laziness, negligence, attempted murder, etc; Dunno how much of those the average good man does. (And he was doing several of these long before Lyanna's death.)

I think these were due to Lyanna's death though. In Ned's memories, Robert was a guy who always brought a smile to his face. Whenever Ned despises King Robert, he compares him to how different he was when they were younger. Robert was always a bit of a player, but I think even Ned says he thinks it would stop if he married Lyanna. Even when the Targ children were presented to him, I think he approved because he hated the Targs so much for "stealing" Lyanna.

[ckal]

It does seem like a lot of his success can be attributed to his small council, but as several of you said, he needed to be able to let them do that as well. That seemed to be easy for him though, since we all know there were several things he far preferred to do than be a king.


Interesting point about Lyanna as well. Who knows if that were to have happened if everything would have turned out spectacular. I imagine he wouldn't be doing nearly as much of the drinking and whoring if she was around either. Also as you said his loathing of the Lannisters would be far less intense as well, if at all.

Edited by ckal, 18 April 2012 - 07:27 PM.

[Qhorin Halfhand and Yoren]

Some additional issues.

* He failed to get a trueborn heir to the throne, which caused the war following his death. Yes his wife has responsibility for that but the way he treated her also played a role for her decision to not give him true born heir.
* He was completely delusional about his own capabilities and his stupidity was practically suicidal, first by wanting to take part in the melee, secondly becoming extremely drunk while hunting, not accepting any help while going against the boar.
* He has allowed his wife to practically surround Kings landing and himself with Lannisters.
* The terrible way he treated his brother Stannis, one of the men who value duty. That made the likes of Stannis less likely to risk their selves for the likes of Robert and it was Robert needlessly making angry one of his brothers who helped in the war, which is ungrateful and unwise.
* When Ned arrives he does not give him the support he needs and when a crisis erupts he goes hunting.
* Gets the kingdom highly indebted to Lannisters
* He does not send the Kingslayer to take the black. Which Kingslayer makes Joffrey and the other kids who are not true heirs to the throne, and came pretty close to killing Robert in at least one occasion. The later being what matters. Basically, someone who has failed his duty at being a bodyguard in the most spectacular fashion should not be kept around. They are not trustworthy and can be dangerous, as he was. If not forcing Jaime to take the black, at the very least Robert could have tried releasing him from his vows which Tywin would have liked although it would be a sort of controversial decision. Perhaps that would have been wiser politically than forcing upon him the NW duty.

Edited by Qhorin Halfhand and Yoren, 18 April 2012 - 07:42 PM.

[Sylvan Fox]

The Shadow Fox, on 18 April 2012 - 07:26 PM, said:

I think these were due to Lyanna's death though. In Ned's memories, Robert was a guy who always brought a smile to his face. Whenever Ned despises King Robert, he compares him to how different he was when they were younger. Robert was always a bit of a player, but I think even Ned says he thinks it would stop if he married Lyanna. Even when the Targ children were presented to him, I think he approved because he hated the Targs so much for "stealing" Lyanna.

I thought Ned had said just the opposite? That even though Robert loved Lyanna, he probably would have still been the way he was before?

He might have kept it in check a little better, and it would have helped to have a wife who isn't a total ***** (Ladies have to do a lot of the money-handling... What about queens? They're all trained in keeping up with figures and stuff, since they start as ladies, so they must do something)

[Red Raven]

Quote

I think these were due to Lyanna's death though.

Mostly, yes, though Lyanna knew that Robert wasn't a man who would keep to one bed.  She didn't love him - I got the impression she didn't even like him a whole lot - and, after years of being treated like he was just being put up with, he might have still sunk into the rest of those bad habits anyway.

Good:  he pardoned Barristan Selmy and others those who were loyal
Bad:  he didn't do much to raise the next generation of rulers.  He should have tried to be nicer to Cersei early in the marriage - I think she would have been loving toward him, or at least much nicer if he had treated her well - and spent more dad time with Joffrey.

Edited by Red Raven, 18 April 2012 - 07:35 PM.

[nara]

Qhorin Halfhand and Yoren, on 18 April 2012 - 07:30 PM, said:

* He failed to get an heir to the throne, which caused the war following his death. Yes his wife has  responsibility for that but the way he treated her also played a role.
* He was completely delusional about his own capabilities and his stupidity was practical suicidal, first by wanting to take part in the melee, secondly becoming extremely drunk while hunting, not accepting any help while going against the boar.

Yes, Cersei was responsible for not giving him an heir.  But your comment made me realize that one of his biggest faults was not teaching Joffrey to become a decent man and future king.  That was his repsonsibility as a king and father...Makes me wonder if he knew or suspected the truth and was too cowardly to face it.

[Jem]

I think that Robert would not be much different if he had married Lyanna. Eventually the novelty of boffing your best friend's hot little sister would wear off and Robert's eye would start to wander. Lyanna knew it, and wasn't pleased about it. At least Cersei didn't nag him about his whores and bastards, I imagine that Lyanna would not keep quite about it. The tedium of having to sit a throne and make decisions and behave would get to Robert, he would never be able to cope with that, whoever he was married to.

Lyanna is just Robert's pie in the sky fantasy. Sure, it is easy to imagine that you would be a better person if the circumstances were different, and when those circumstances can never eventuate, well, that just gives you a handy excuse to hang your failings off.

[Qhorin Halfhand and Yoren]

nara, on 18 April 2012 - 07:34 PM, said:

Yes, Cersei was responsible for not giving him an heir.  But your comment made me realize that one of his biggest faults was not teaching Joffrey to become a decent man and future king.  That was his repsonsibility as a king and father...Makes me wonder if he knew or suspected the truth and was too cowardly to face it.

Yeah, that too. I think in regards to Joffrey other than Robert's general personality issues/ doesn't seem to be the kind who gives much of a fuck about being a parent, he recognized that the kid was very problematic and perharps Joffrey also disgusted him and he had even more incentive to stay away.  But he did fail to be any kind of a parent and it is an additional problem. An argument could be made that the fact that Joffrey was so fucked up warranted bigger attention and not less.

Edited by Qhorin Halfhand and Yoren, 18 April 2012 - 07:38 PM.

[The King in the South]

The Shadow Fox, on 18 April 2012 - 07:26 PM, said:

I think these were due to Lyanna's death though. In Ned's memories, Robert was a guy who always brought a smile to his face. Whenever Ned despises King Robert, he compares him to how different he was when they were younger. Robert was always a bit of a player, but I think even Ned says he thinks it would stop if he married Lyanna. Even when the Targ children were presented to him, I think he approved because he hated the Targs so much for "stealing" Lyanna.

I don't by this Lyanna arguement. Robert's love for her is very artificial. He hears about her getting kidnapped, but doesn't do anything until he's threatened. He has sex with every single prostitue in the Peach well "rhaegar is raping her" (his words), he doesn't bother looking for her after he takes the city, etc. She's just an excuse he uses because he's a coward at heart. Not to mention the fact that she clearly did not like him whatsoever.

[Dr. Pepper]

The peace of Robert's reign was largely a side effect of previously having had a costly (both in terms of lives and livelihood) war.  Pardoning people for siding with the opposing side seems to be the fairly common method of ending a war.  As Tywin points out, you must help those that bend the knee or else you risk people being afraid to bend the knee.

Robert was pretty hands off with his rule and he made poor appointments for the small council.  We don't know much about Jon Arryn, but we do know that Jon Arryn played a part in putting the kingdom in such severe debt.  Jon Arryn is the one who helped get LF his appointment as master of coin and further increase the debt owed to the Lannisters and the Iron Bank.  Jon Arryn is the one who facilitated the marriage alliance between the Lannisters.  Jon Arryn, despite being a respected father figure to Robert, seems to fail to adequately council Robert.  I suspect that he was not a very good hand.

Robert uses Lyanna as an excuse for all of his troubles.  It's just a crutch.  All of his troubles are because he's an incompetent ruler and any good that came, such as the peace, was merely a side effect of the end of a war.  I suspect that if he had lived, he would have been dealing with some very serious issues regarding the debt.  What would have happened when winter came around (a winter they assumed would be a long, harsh one) and they were no longer able to make payments on their debts?  It would have gotten messy.

Robert might have been awesome to party with or to roll around in a bedroll with but he was incompetent as a ruler and not a very good king.

[James Arryn]

The best I can say for him as a peacetime king (aside from being popular, which IS important) is that he (mostly) seems to have recognized his own limitations.


Just about the only non-warfare thing he seemed to put any serious effort into was replacing Jon Arryn. IMO that indicates a degree of self-awareness that we wouldn't otherwise associate with him. And it's not as easy as 'well, he did that so he could sit back and do nothing'. There were people who would allow him to do that he wouldn't have to travel the length of the realm  to get.

Hell, he could even have sent for Ned.