astarkchoice

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!

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.

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

-no he didnt he says that to reasure the golden company and as a threat to worry robert with (and get lords talking thus varys can hear who would bend the knee and whod resist) as ned correctly points out a dothraki khalssar crossing the narrow sea is ridiculous..and thats unopposed are we forgetting that hard bastard stannis batatheon has the royal fleet (150) sitting in the way and can call on much much more of needs be! By the time a navy capable of bringing a 10k+ khalassar across the sea is ready (assuming robert doesnt order a strike 1st) the whole of westeros navies would be ready! -not at the sort of scale needed, a 10k or more force hired for long period is beyond his means. The golde company is with him for their return home....wealthy as he is he couldnt actualy afford to hire them himself for any significant time. - nope a letter reaches jorah letting him know robert has made it publicly known, ilyrios letters dont move faster than anyone elses. The winseller may have been either a professinal assasin or more likely literaly just a wineseller who hears of the bounty and tried to claim it. Hes have easily gotten.away with it too if not for jorah and no a lordship is an incredibly lucrative prize for any ordinary person, def enough to try and kill for!

Yes LF pushing the wot5k made them react as did danys advebtures. Overall the critical pieces are there..varys knows who will back a targ monarch and who wont ,hes been spymaster long enough and now has all the kingdom talking about one , hel 'verify ' the new aegon is legit and finaly he can also kill critical KL people at will thanks to the secret tunnels and escape with ease! Meanwhile on the other side of the sea the golden company is ready to do what they were made for ...to go home and have all their westerosi officers restored from exile to lords under faegon,ilyrio has prepped him to be a good competent leader, we know one triarch is paid up by ilyrio and the other 2 are elephants thus probably know him through trade contacts. Hes got 3 ships packed to the brim with rare items to bribe or buy extra things they need. Visery, dany and drogo where always a extra peices to distract and possibly use!

Yep agreed He also begged viserys not to go with her, he wanted him to stay in pentos where he could survive and remain a useful piece. We know robert made this an open contract , known across the sea through all his lords. We also know jorah only suceeds in saving dany as ilyrio warns him to be on guard (no one is comming at a khaleesi with a weapon so its gotta be posion) had he not been there it would have just looked like a natural death of a frail pregnant woman ...common for the time. On top of that had it suceeded robert probably woulda added viserys to the list too guven how well his open contract on dany worked

To be fair i think any help.from from drogo was always a bonus not to be expected. The threat (rightly dismissed by ned) was just designed as a smokescreen to keep them blind to all else in essos plus get lords taking about targs so varys could find out which were still loyal. Drogo id say was planning to give viserys an army as promised but one of sellswords paid by profits from mass slave sales! Robert offering an open bounty and the failed assasination prob hanged his(drogos) mind . That probably wasnt in varys or ilyris original plan either as we hear the pair alone before that saying they need more time.

I dont think drogo had any intention of travelling to westeros until dany was amsot posioned He.did promise viserys an army ....but hes unlikely to allow such a worm.control of a large section of his men (not would they follow viserys) so.a sellsword army seems to fit

Agreed it sorta fits that theyd tell the golden company what they wanna hear Saying 10-50k dothraki will be backing you sorta sounds better than what seems like their actual plan of '' you boys sit tight my bestie the eunuch spymaster will stir up civil war so the current regime bleeds its strength, varys will also felt out all the genuine targ loyalists in westeros by then and on his way out the door will use secret passages to assasinate every competent member of the current regime leadership....then wel invade '' So overall they probably meant to get probably dorne, the golden company , hopefully most of the reach, various scattered targ loyalist houses that varys little birds have confirmed are genuinely on their side and they have bought the loyalty of one new triarch in volantis ,have at least 3-4 ships full of rare exotic goods to try and bribe the other 2 triarchs to throw volantis might into the fray (or buy extra sellswords /sellsails and assasins if that doesnt seem likely) and finaly whatever drogo would have given them (probably not his own men but likely bought 10-20k extra sellswords/slave troops to fulfil his word of giving him an army) bought with slaves and tribute.

There would be no panic the bizzare chain of events you describe wouldnt cause a bank run nor are they even the only bank there! Yes they and all the kthers can take the hit, the faith has a bigger part of the debt ans they write it off like nothing Not everyone no...but a super wealthy merchant with ties to khals , triachs and golden company and his best friend who runs the 2nd best spy network on planetos of course theyl look into !!! You can literaly see the coins of free cities on the wiki, clearly not all gold or silver dude My point was there isnt a huge difference, if pentos could openly buy and sell slaves itd be a boost in some ways (slave prices would prob fall mind) but not a giant state altering economic shift Theres 0 reason the gold would all disapear or that the iron bank have all the gold/silver/precious stones in bravos , or that there isnt vsst amounts of other currencies give they are arguably THE naval trade superpower and again theres other banks too...soo many flaws with this idea man Nope varys wants to put faegon on the throne at any price thus isnt a do gooder in the slightest !!! part of his plan is allowing ilyrio to bebmaster of coin and thus enrich himself Lotta .ifs sorta have to happen there

To be fair i think drogo had 0 interest in putting part of his hard won force under an idiot like viserys, bloodriders wouldnt follow him. He was probably gonna intimidate cities for loot and mass slave sell until he can give viserys like 10-20k sellswords

-one debt loss one time wont sink a bank , as no one else is escaping paying the same way nor will merchants and buisness not still need loans and accounts etc. People will still need to borrow money and even then jsut becsuse say one guy borrows from a mafioso and escaped into thin air doesnt mean everyone can do the same -none of those institutions would fall due to their debt..shit kevan casualy says the lannisters may pay off the whole thing themselves. -no we clearly hear arya listening in to faceless men reporting worldwide events, aryas training even as an acolyte is to discover 3 secrets per day and jacen we know goes to oldtown to recover a mysterious key...they watch world events of note carefully and clearly have their own agenda, theres 0 way theyd allow a vast secret org that can easily be infiltrated by them exist without scrutinty. -nope theres many other free cities with non precious metal coins and AGAIN as with all pre modern currency itd be backed with gold etc The ib and bravos would be more insulated to the collapse of slavery as one is a non slave orientated economy and the other a bank with vast diverse portfolio -righr but its already at a point where everyone who wsnts slaves has as many as they need..its not a market in pentos with a vast untapped ceiling -again the ib wouldnt fall also the currency is backed by gold , theres many other banks and as a multi cultural city theres vast amounts of other currencies floating around too as well as precious metals stones and goods before we talk direct bartering. The navy will still sail as they can still be paid in numerous other ways from other free city coinage to gold etc -theres multiple ones with bigger navies and their economies are fine. The piddling iron throne is one of the most powerful positons in all planetos and master of coin is a licence for a very wealthy merchant lile ilyrio to move up to lannister,hightower, tyrell , yi ti wealth levels etc -no hes providing cash and orphans..varys is the one teaching them spycraft -that make 0 sense..if varys and LF were on the same team for ilyrio having them work together would be far more productive to the goal u think they have. -master of coin as lf shows when used right is a licence to ger filthy rich -but you have stated he got in touch with lf as a boy and knew hed be master of coin somehow!

That part is sorta true yes but overall the 2 of them are operating very murky or limited info on each other..both are shadowboxing with spywork well vs each other. Neither will know the full extent of the others plans (esp.varys with lf as petyr has no one to consult with when he wants to make a move he jsut does) With regards sansa he can guess esp if hes seen the boat but probably hasnt gathered any paperwork or heard convos to be able to link the purple wedding to him or olenna (who we saw herself kept herself outside and a musican playing to ensure secrecy when she needed to talk !!)

No i think while varys and LF people all watched each other but neither knows their darkest secrets otherwise theyd have destroyed each other (cersei plays the game too but clumsily, we are told stannis was put on the track by somone probably linked to one of these 2) The issue is for varys is LF spends much of his time in his new brothels and whorehouses so probably few secret tunnels for his 'littlebirds' to eavesdrop with ( and kids would stand out there anyway) he plays the game well and has varys people watched as much as possible (and vice versa) and if varys birds do get any of his paperwork its as tyrion says all a mess of investments of the taxes...youdneed a complete ledger to find somethig to bring him down with if anything. His dalliances with lysa are as we see are rare and he doesnt write her much either and finaly he has no master or allies to awner to.......thus there never will be incriminating conversations for littlebirds to eavesdrop on or letters ti intercept/copy , his plans are all in his head and he hes got no reason to share!! Flipside is same goes for varys. He has lfs people watched as much as possible to help cancel all that spy b.s out but he himself often goes by disguise and secret passageways and pathways so is hard to track ! He isnt visting lfs brothels to spill his guts to some whore or get drunk and talk. His little birds who make up the bulk of his spy network we wre told are kids and ilyrio seems to suggest mutilated to be mutes too!! He takes great pains to hide his meetings with his one ally/ partner too. Somw of his finances come straight from ilyrio so he has a seperate non state source of funds that LF cant examine too

This Plus again ilyrio has stated his end goal and it makes sense, his natural son placed on the throne with everyone else thinking hes a legit targ and not a blackfyre , with himself in a position to be even wealtheir as master of coin (and be close to and protect his boy) with his best pal varys backing them up. The boy having been preppd by the finest tutors money can buy to be a good king!

-even somehow of he could collapse the ironbank (again someone has already pojbted out they arent he major owners of westeros debt) then other banks would fill the gap , theres at least one in every free city and one in oldtown. Hes also not the only rich trader. -the facless men watch everything of note thered 0 way they havent infiltrated the only other major spy network and one that hasnt got magic thus is helpless to stop them...so yeah they will have infiltrated ilyrio and varys networks. -again no multiple free cities use non precious metals as their coins and even then as this is medieval times all currency would be gold etc backed dude, even modern currency didnt abandon that til the 1900s!! And again bravos and the ib will be far more insulated than the other free cities and smaller banks and traders -much greater volume isnt gonna be a huge differenc eas theres slaves everywhere with the rich -we have already covered thats not how economies work nor would pentos overcome the huge advantages bravos already has plus the other free cities (did we forget about them?) ...ie if the dollar failed to nothing tommorow it wouldnt alter u.s dominace of the seas or stop trade -again theres other free cities with navies and theres 0.way ilyrio could have predicted volantis sending its fleet to mereen -no he doesnt know the spy game as well as the actual spy he finances, thats varys world not his -they se constantly spying and monitering each other as we see in book 1, if they were in the same team that be hugely wasteful -hes specificaly says hel be master of coin and faegon king....a plan that makes wayy more sense than yours , actual verifiable power and a virtual licence to get superrich! As oppsed to somehow collapse one bank over a debt they dont fully own and hope that other existing banks dont like money and refuse to fill the gaps!! -almost none of those are in lfs hands nor could they have lredicted sansa would be the remaining stark

Agreed On reflection through its to be expected......once westeros lost the military dominance that dragons bring it was inevitable the free cities would start to meddle more across the sea

Agreed but the biggest bank and the economy least dependant on slaves (bravos) would be the ones to weather the fianacial storm best.

Ilyrio could not in a million years have predicted dany would wage a sucessful war on slavery though..we are told time and again she does things hes not expecting! If slavery is abolished then the free city thats done without and is already a more modern capitalistic economy(bravos) will be best placed to take advantage thus the IB will take a hit and also a boost..if anything the dozens of smaller banks in the slavery dependant free cities (soon to have slave uprisings too) are far more likely to fold than the IB at all.

Hes not a rich as the other banks nor is he set up as a bank thus he cannot fill that gap as well as other banks or the 100s of other rich traders , not that the IB will collapse anyway nor would the faceless men (whos spy network will have easily penetrated vary abd ilyrios) allow such a plot to get as far. Erm virtualy every free city has its own currency nor does the collapse of the biggest bank in bravos collapse its economy to nothing !!! goods and services will still be traded and even if bravos currency was somehow now default due to IB collapse theres at least a dozen other currencies flowing around to trade in anyway before we talk gold, silver, precious stones , rare goods or straight bartering!!! Erm pentos IS trading in slaves, doing it openly doesnt add a giant amount more to their economy nor can bravos giant almaot unfair advantage at sea be nulified by anything and shit even if they went the way of valyria theres still all the other free cities!!! Volantis giant navy and harbour would fill most of that gap not a mid level player like pentos!! Ned wasnt political player nor did he have a vast army of spies, ilyrio and varys came up together with varys being the spylord and ilyrio the moneyman not the otherway round!! Its also be stupid to have varys and lf expending so much energy competing if they both had the same ally Huh? Why would a rich merchant want to run the economy of a the 7 kingdoms....is that a serious question!!! Theres no such laws agaisnt insider trading back then so that alone! Ilyrios chief export is described as cheesmonger so if he drops the tax on that alone and/or increases it on rivals hed be swimming in gold. Thats one port (white harbour is the maderlys who awnser to boltons ) even then valetown isnt fully his nor did you that include the ports or oldtown or lannisport or the iron islands , arbour etc nor was control any of that (bar maybe valetown) predictable from lfs standing as young man!!

-agreed there he talked to the golden company on his own and felt they alone would be enough too, he and dany are at 1st fillwd with delusions that all the smallfolk in westeros want them back ,how the rebels were evil traitors and viserys may remeber his proposed marriage alliance to dorne. -he promised him an army....now the dothraki fear the sea AND will not follow weak leaders which is def viserys , drogo himself cannot go and leave behimd his khalassar and im pretty sure splitting command between viseryd and a bloodrider wont work either......it strikes me drogos original plan to pay for his exotic wife is to continue to unite all the dothraki under him, sweep the lands for slaves (massive khallasar will pick up vast numbers of slaves) and intimidate walled cities into huge tributes ( again big khalasaar outside= bigger tribute) and once he had enough to simply get viserys 10k or more sellsword force and sellsails to bring them across the water = his word honoured and no dothraki forced to serve an idiot princeling or cross the posion water! -agreed but bear in mind iyrio sends dany 3 boats loaded with rare valuables which she used to try and buy unsullied so the eggs probably wont add that much to it (just as her rare crown didnt either..only 100 extra eunchs) -agreed here -yeah it really soinds like 2 allies plotting -it does just sound like hes suggesting to have ned killed , varys is waving it away as jon arryns death could be waved off as an old man dying but a fit healthy man like ned with 0 vices would be highly suspect -i think the original plan was to have viserys and the threat of the dothraki to please the golden company and get lords in westeros talking (thus varys can judge support) but keep it long term while varys slowly builds a war among the allies who overthrew the targs. The problem is plans melt in the face of reality , LF kicks off war earlier, roberts attempt on dany means drogo wants to take all his khalasar to westeros and thennlater dany wanders east etc. Even th seemingly reliable young griff attacks ahead of the adjsuted schedule they want.

Yes the general feeling is hes a fake targ but a real.blackfyre

I dont think they everr really expected the dothraki to land. Its just to make the threat of viserys seem real to both westeros and the golden company The real plan seems.to have varys causing a war somehow between the anti targ alliance(they discuss this and are overheard by arya how their plans are moving faster than expected ). The threat of viserys with a dothraki horde (and later a grieving angry khal) allows varys to hear who is pro targ and anti targ and where possible eliminate any highly effective anti targ lords at kings landing (as poor kevan was) If the dothraki come thats just a bonus but the real meat is faegon with volantis(one of their 3 leaders we hear is bought by ilyrio) backed by the golden company (who exist as a means to bring exiled westerosi lords exiles back) and of course dorne and possibly the reach vs the robert rebellion alliance badly weakened by internal war!! Add in the fact ilyrio has 3 ships filled with very stuffed with precious materials waiting for dany (she is told this fortune could buy her 1000 unsullied and her pricess gold and pearl crown 100) hints this stuff could all have bought another sellsword company or 3 Besides i dont think from drogo's pov he ever intended to put his men under a worm like viserys 50k or 10k to cross the sea they feared BUT id say he's a man of his word and would probably have used his vast khalassar to sweep villages for miles for slaves and gotten huge tributes from.cities and in no time had enough goods (ie sell the slaves) to buy viserys 10-20k sellswords to go home with!!

You posted all this theory in another thread and it was ripped to shreds. It cannot take down the Ib, if the ib did somehow fall other smaller banks would fill the buisness gaps, the ib collapsw wouldnt stop bravos trading or being a naval.superpower,pentos is already subtely trading slaves there isnt much more money to be made doing it openly,pentos is already doing as much naval trade as they possibly can handle,varys not knowing about ilyrios plans is stupid , lf working with him for 0 gain is dumb and varys working agaisnt lf if they could 10x more efffective as partners is insanely wasteful and daft ! nor can Lf Gain control of any ports as he owns no ports nor is he even master of coin anymore!! Ilyrio has already said when faegon is king he will be master of coin...that and seeing his son(or someone he adores as son) as king is his payoff!

The plan has needed adjustment but seems to have many parts Varys position, khal drogo , ilyrios saved up wealth , viserys and danys , volantis and having one ofther 3 magistrates there paid for , the golden company and faegon and varys at kl. Now later drogos kahllassar is out of the picture but danys has now 3 dragons, ser barristan comes into play as does tyrion