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How to Improve the North Economically?


Brandon Ice-Eyes

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Did this on Another thread but Copy and pasted here again thanks - Make sure to leave responses below :)

 

So I’ve seen a thousand off these and I’ve formed my own opinion but I want to hear how you guys would change the north. The date we’re starting at is where Ned dies before he becomes hand of the king - Robert dies and the War of the five kings break out and balon invades the north. After dealing with mace raydar and balon Greyjoy. The war of the five kings will end as it did save house stark being on the verge of extinction - with Joffrey and maegary on the throne and Tywin alive. No purple of red wedding. We shall also ignore Euron, Dany and fAegon. The north’s military is fine, they can raise up to 45000 men given enough time, though that amount is up for debate, and overall, I believe they need to improve the economy. So here’s how I would change the north and make sure to read and give your opinion down below thanks. :)

•How to get the money?

Obviously the main issue is gold. The starks aren’t poor and are fairly rich but they don’t have the gold to start really making large changes so I’m going to start this with me personally (my names chris so we will pretend I’m Chris stark so this doesn’t just end here) and I’m going to start it a year before the war of the five kings. Balons invasion was imminent, especially now Eddard stark is dead and in his lust for revenge he would invade, I would deal with this invasion but take the fight to the iron isles. Logistically speaking this would very hard and so that’s one thing I would like someone to aid me with but the main point would be taking Harras Harlaws Valyrian steel sword nightfall and dunstan drums Valyrian sword red rain. Sell these both to Tywin for 500 000 gold dragons at the very most, though he would most likely demand a lower price and with that the issue of gold is solved.

•Roads

So first things first, the roads need to be solved. As well as building new minor roads, I would add to the kings road by building a road through barrowton, to where I’m going to build a western port to the rills. Another over the white knife to white harbour where I would rebuild the wolf’s den to later give it to a stark to gain more control over white harbour and add more protection over the white knife. Build another road to the dread fort, one to deepwoodmotte and one through the last hearth to karhold.

•Food

Now food id important so I’m going to be coming up with new sources. First and foremost, at my western harbour, fishing would be very important, as lannisport has a large fishing fleet, mine shall as well. I will also exploit the shivering sea as much as possible as in the world of ice and fire book, it says the shivering sea has an absurd amount of fish. as well as building a tower house and port at the coast of the bay of seals to give to mors crow food to protect against wildling raiders and harvest seals, it’s close proximity to Skagos tho may be a problem. I’d also give farmers a lot more land, so basically I’d be hoping for  quantity over quality, and be hoping that tho the soil is hard to grow, with an abundance of land they’d make a good amount of food. (Not a farmer so don’t know the logistics) The neck has crocodiles and other creates that can only live in warm temperatures so I’d grow cranberries here and maybe rice however I’m not sure where I’d get that so rice is a maybe. Potato’s are a maybe as well as they wouldn’t have been discovered yet but at the same time I’m not sure if they are on planetos so there’re a maybe. Carrots and barley and oats as well and sheepshead hills will have more sheeps imported to help improve the wool industry. I’d also build a whaling fleet to get whale oil to sell. I’d also try and harvest salt but I’ll get into that in a bit

•The mountains and ores

There are a lot of mountains in the north from the lonely hills to the mountain clans so Im betting there’s ores in there. One thing I do want from there are salt mines. As well as trying to harvest salt from the sea due to the north humongous coast.  id also try and set up salt mines in the various different mountains. There’s also talk in one davos’ chapters of silver mines in white harbour and perhaps there modes around it which can be set up by house stark, im relying on house manderlys unwavering loyalty for them not to throw a tantrum over me taking mines in there lands. 

I’d also set up stone quarries along the stoney shore and sea dragon point

•Town and cities

so it’s absurd to me and perhaps one of the greatest plot holes that the north has no western harbour, so I would set this up. It would in the river west of barrowton and east of the rills. It would be under Ryswell control and I’d give them a few leagues of Dustin land to stop border disputes while giving Dustins a few more leagues of land to the north as well as marrying Arya to roger ryswells grandson. I’d also make this harbour called winter harbour built for opening trade in the west but also protecting the coast if not only slightly it would provide a western port that the north is in need of. Just as I’d rebuild the wolf’s den and give it to rickon to add house starks dominance in white harbour. I build a seagard-esque castle here with one of lord ryswells son have a castle in the centre of the town. The castle build by the port based off of sea hard would be given to robb. I’d also try and expand winter town into a full time booming town like this new one I made. I’d make winter town the glass making capital of Westeros by importing artisian glass making slaves and freeing to teach the crafts to the people of winter town I’d also try and have a lot of carpenters and joiners there from wood in the wolfswood but we will get into timber soon. Slowly and surely winter town would expand wrapping round winter fell in a circle and walled hopefully tho that is a maybe depending on if my plan is successful. I’d also rebuild the broken tower because my pride would not allow me to let it stay a ruin lol.

•Timber and windings

so first of all timber. I would harvest slot of timber from the wolf’s wood. This is fairly obvious as the north is already doing it but I would expand it ten fold building up the timber industry and floating the timber down the white knife or the long lake then the white knife from umber lands. This is fairly obvious so I won’t expand on timber in the north. And lastly, Wildings, ever an irration. I think benjens idea of rising up lordlings wasn’t a bad idea and I would build tower houses and rise up minor lordlings and settle them. This may be hard as Ned wasn’t wrong when he said that winter coming people won’t go that far north but jojen did point out that the land was arable so who knows. As well as that I’d also lead an incursion against the wildings to burn as many villages and fields as possible to reduce there population.

With winter coming and staying for years, not sure if this is possible but it would be a start I suppose. If I’d made a mistakes or some of my ideas are pipe dreams, please leave constructive criticism below and thank you for reading. Make sure to leave your own ideas below :)

 

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First things first.  Support Roose Bolton and move forward.  Forget about the red wedding.  Roose Bolton is the son-in-law of one of the richest lords of Westeros.  That should be a good start to increased commerce and perhaps a reduction in the tolls for goods passing through the Twins.  

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6 hours ago, •Brandon Ice Eyes said:

Logistically speaking this would very hard and so that’s one thing I would like someone to aid me with but the main point would be taking Harras Harlaws Valyrian steel sword nightfall and dunstan drums Valyrian sword red rain.

Hmmmm, if this is where you start, your plans will be stillborn... the time to grab those swords was Balon's Rebellion. Now the Iron Fleet is so far beyond what the North can attain you may as well just drown all your bannermen in the sea.

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6 hours ago, Bowen 747 said:

First things first.  Support Roose Bolton and move forward.  Forget about the red wedding.  Roose Bolton is the son-in-law of one of the richest lords of Westeros.  That should be a good start to increased commerce and perhaps a reduction in the tolls for goods passing through the Twins.  

You seem to have a misconception of the scale of the Frey wealth, and of the traffic volume that passes over their bridge.

Their wealth level is likely about halfway between that of Houses Dustin and Manderly. Meaning wealthier than the Dustins, but poorer than the Manderlys by a significant margin.

So certainly not at a level that will revolutionize the North’s economy.

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5 hours ago, Silver Bullet 1985 said:

It would have been done already if there was a way.  The north is poor.  

Dunno man i mean for a start they choose to not have a western navy due to tradition. The brutal effects of yearlong  winters cant be helped but the wildling abd low level ironborn issues could be curbed to make the north more productive.

Shit if you throw morals right out the window you could send a large force of bannermen north of the wall every so often and return with slaves to sell east like a huge dothraki khal!

Theres loads of options between that and clearing back nore of the vast forredtland for arable farmland,we know for a fact eddard had plans to settle the gift ,end the king beyond the wall and fix that tower bran fell from but he never got the time :(

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16 hours ago, •Brandon Ice Eyes said:

•How to get the money?

Obviously the main issue is gold. The starks aren’t poor and are fairly rich but they don’t have the gold to start really making large changes so I’m going to start this with me personally (my names chris so we will pretend I’m Chris stark so this doesn’t just end here) and I’m going to start it a year before the war of the five kings. Balons invasion was imminent, especially now Eddard stark is dead and in his lust for revenge he would invade, I would deal with this invasion but take the fight to the iron isles. Logistically speaking this would very hard and so that’s one thing I would like someone to aid me with but the main point would be taking Harras Harlaws Valyrian steel sword nightfall and dunstan drums Valyrian sword red rain. Sell these both to Tywin for 500 000 gold dragons at the very most, though he would most likely demand a lower price and with that the issue of gold is solved.

Unless the Northern army have discovered a way to walk on water this is a complete non-starter. There is no Northern navy. 

Furthermore one one one on the Iron Islands could very well see the North beat, losing thousands in the process (shipping armies across oceans against a superior Navy could be catastrophic) as they try to land and sail away. 

Stannis won thanks to a much larger Navy, being able to control the sea took the combined might of the royal fleet, redwyne fleet and reach fleet. Robert was able to subdue the Iron Islands with the Ned, Tywin and likely other lords of Westeros. To win against a home team needs an overwhelming superiority in terms of numbers and equipment, the North on their own don't have it. 

 

 

16 hours ago, •Brandon Ice Eyes said:

•Roads

So first things first, the roads need to be solved. As well as building new minor roads, I would add to the kings road by building a road through barrowton, to where I’m going to build a western port to the rills. Another over the white knife to white harbour where I would rebuild the wolf’s den to later give it to a stark to gain more control over white harbour and add more protection over the white knife. Build another road to the dread fort, one to deepwoodmotte and one through the last hearth to karhold.

Are you under the impression that not a single Lord Stark or king of the North has not wanted to do this? 

The north is huge and is has a low population density, it does not have the resources to do this. Notice how the clock tower in the capital is a ruin, excess funds are likely swallowed up by the need to survive winter or help the watch. 

 

16 hours ago, •Brandon Ice Eyes said:

 

•Town and cities

so it’s absurd to me and perhaps one of the greatest plot holes

I don't think you understand what plot hole means. There is a clear reason why there is not one, the cost to build, maintain and defend is likely more than the profit that such a port would cover.

 

16 hours ago, •Brandon Ice Eyes said:

 

that the north has no western harbour, so I would set this up. 

There is a clear reason for this, it is not cost effective. The East harbour is in close proximity  to the free cities, a steady stream of ships sailing nearby. There is little reason for any of the trade from the free cities, Dorne, Kings Landing, the Vale, Essos, Ibben to make a journey to the west coast of the North.  There is nothing there that would give reason for the months of extra travel and the danger of the ironborn, not unless they drastically lowered the price of their timber. 

The Westerlands and Reach are cash rich, with gold and grain giving  them the ability to fund and maintain navies, the North does not have that. And with an already major port on the east coast there is simply no need. 

 

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5 hours ago, Bernie Mac said:

 

Unless the Northern army have discovered a way to walk on water this is a complete non-starter. There is no Northern navy. 

Furthermore one one one on the Iron Islands could very well see the North beat, losing thousands in the process (shipping armies across oceans against a superior Navy could be catastrophic) as they try to land and sail away. 

Stannis won thanks to a much larger Navy, being able to control the sea took the combined might of the royal fleet, redwyne fleet and reach fleet. Robert was able to subdue the Iron Islands with the Ned, Tywin and likely other lords of Westeros. To win against a home team needs an overwhelming superiority in terms of numbers and equipment, the North on their own don't have it. 

 

 

Are you under the impression that not a single Lord Stark or king of the North has not wanted to do this? 

The north is huge and is has a low population density, it does not have the resources to do this. Notice how the clock tower in the capital is a ruin, excess funds are likely swallowed up by the need to survive winter or help the watch. 

 

I don't think you understand what plot hole means. There is a clear reason why there is not one, the cost to build, maintain and defend is likely more than the profit that such a port would cover.

 

There is a clear reason for this, it is not cost effective. The East harbour is in close proximity  to the free cities, a steady stream of ships sailing nearby. There is little reason for any of the trade from the free cities, Dorne, Kings Landing, the Vale, Essos, Ibben to make a journey to the west coast of the North.  There is nothing there that would give reason for the months of extra travel and the danger of the ironborn, not unless they drastically lowered the price of their timber. 

The Westerlands and Reach are cash rich, with gold and grain giving  them the ability to fund and maintain navies, the North does not have that. And with an already major port on the east coast there is simply no need. 

 

Ah you make fair points but what about a journey to the jade sea to become rich? It’d be long and brutal and potentially pointless as you may die in the journey but if you survived as the sea snake did, you’d be rich?

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How to get the money? - I believe there's a silver mines in the north and white harbor is minting them, it's just a speculation it felt right to me, North is absurdly large so it's impossible that a land that large is empty, They can get money from trade as well. there's so much resources in the north, their resources reserves is probably richer than the reach or westerlands.

Roads - building new roads needs money, King's road is enough for now.

Food - Lands in north is good, even jojen mentioned this and this was in the gift, lands south of the gift are richer as well the only problem I see is winter and manpower, they have so many lands but Northmen population are so small, few decades of peace and better farming technology will end their food shortages, but for now, importing food is their only option.

The mountains and ores - mountain clans are loyal to the starks so there's no problem about them, about the ores silver, iron, bronze and other ore reserves at the mountains, they can be discovered in the future, North is large, and are more focused on food problem than ores.

Timber and windings -They can only export timber to Braavos since it's expensive there, but so far no other free cities or kingdoms have a problem in them, there's plenty of timber in westeros. 

 

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12 hours ago, Bernie Mac said:

The north is huge and is has a low population density, it does not have the resources to do this. Notice how the clock tower in the capital is a ruin, excess funds are likely swallowed up by the need to survive winter or help the watch. 

Roads already exist to some extent, as John mentioned specifically to Stannis that the mountain clans were in an area with no roads, no towns, and no villages. To improve them, though, probably requires a certain amount of coin that the IT would have to provide. If Ned had bothered to leave the north, this would have been exactly the kind of boon that he could have asked from Robert. Siphon off a portion of the custom from WH and use it to improve northern infrastructure. 

As to how useful that would be, I don't really know. 

 

12 hours ago, Bernie Mac said:

I don't think you understand what plot hole means. There is a clear reason why there is not one, the cost to build, maintain and defend is likely more than the profit that such a port would cover.

A fortified fishing village and trading post with walls is probably the best they can hope for. Still not sure that without additional investment that it would result in anything. I don't even know where they would want to put that village, the rills or south of barrowton?

12 hours ago, Bernie Mac said:

There is a clear reason for this, it is not cost effective. The East harbour is in close proximity  to the free cities, a steady stream of ships sailing nearby. There is little reason for any of the trade from the free cities, Dorne, Kings Landing, the Vale, Essos, Ibben to make a journey to the west coast of the North.  There is nothing there that would give reason for the months of extra travel and the danger of the ironborn, not unless they drastically lowered the price of their timber. 

Merchants already make the trip to Oldtown, Lannisport and then Lordsport, so they are already willing to deal with the IB danger and sailing around the coast. The big issue, as previously noted, is that there isn't really much reason to make that trek father north. I'm not sure how much people crave northern wools, hide and timber. Maybe they have amber somewhere but I haven't read about it. 

12 hours ago, Bernie Mac said:

The Westerlands and Reach are cash rich, with gold and grain giving  them the ability to fund and maintain navies, the North does not have that. And with an already major port on the east coast there is simply no need. 

The north built a fleet in a year with some customs duties they kept. I'm sure they have enough money to build and maintain a small fleet, just have no need. The entire shtick on northmen is that they are super practical and don't waste money on unnecessary things.

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Winter hits the North hard. Which leads to death due to lack of resources (shelter and food) and sickness. Until the North figures out how to beat Winter and all the doom it brings.  It cannot get $$rich$$$.

Otherwise, the North has a lot of land and with a population boom. You'll see more castles, towns, businesses etc.

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8 hours ago, honorable men said:

I think the North is content with their income. But why is Vale so poor? When the Iron bank is calling in their debts it seems to hit Vale as a whole harder than other places. I may be wrong though.

The vale is well off .....neutrality did well for it

The ib is calling in debts all over westeros not just the vale 

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The roads issue isnt a biggie , the north is huge and and roadbuilding would be a huge investment for limited gain.....its still gonna take ages to get anywhere and ravens hadle communication anyway.

Maybe work on small  riverboats like in the riverlands etc to increase travel where possible

 

Wildling and to a much lesser extend ironborn raiders are the main issue ( after winter) to growth there ....curb them with say a small growing western navy and decent levels of patroling  for the wall ( say every bannerman must cycle a few 100 men there for weeks at a time or hire unsulied etc....whatever it takes to get the wallmproperly patrolled to vastly reduce rsids) that would encourage people to settle more in the vast currently more dangerous areas 

As for food id say as wildling and ib raids decrease u could clear back more woodland for arable farmland (sell wood to bravos) and as the western navy grows fishermen will feel safer to fish the west coast

 

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10 hours ago, Universal Sword Donor said:

Roads already exist to some extent,

I'm well aware of that, did you not read the post I was replying to? OP was talking about a major road network akin to the kings road connecting the major locations of the North. This has not even been attempted in the smaller, densely populated cash rich Westerlands or Reach. For it to happen first in the North is a pipe dream, not until their society advances. 

10 hours ago, Universal Sword Donor said:

 

A fortified fishing village and trading post with walls is probably the best they can hope for. Still not sure that without additional investment that it would result in anything. I don't even know where they would want to put that village, the rills or south of barrowton?

From what we know the rulers of the North were not willing to spend the same on defences on the west coast than they were on the east, they simply let people move away or defend themselves. 

Now logically there must be sensible reasons why many different rulers of the North all came to the same conclusion that the west coast was not worth the same effort as the east. Cost effectiveness seems a plausible reason, though obviously not canon.   

10 hours ago, Universal Sword Donor said:

Merchants already make the trip to Oldtown, Lannisport and then Lordsport,

Both Lannisport and Oldtown have their own navies and trade that would entice merchants. More importantly merchants don't have to pass Iron Islands to get there. It is likely not worth the risk, not when timber is a pretty common resource on Planatos. 

10 hours ago, Universal Sword Donor said:

The north built a fleet in a year with some customs duties they kept. 

Well yeah, Manderly is hell bent on revenge. He likely no longer cares about balancing the books, being willing to break into any cash reserves he has. 

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