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Robert Baratheon - Not so bad after all


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Am I the only one thinking that maybe Robert Baratheon wasn't so bad after all? Drank a lot, whored around a lot and certainly ate a lot, but the realm itself wasn't in a totally terrible state like it was afterwards under Lannister rule and post Daeny's invasion. 

Granted him being a shabby king led to the later events which ensued but I bet if you asked the people of King's landing which king they preferred, I would bet most would choose Robert. No blown up Septs, no burned cities, instead just endless feasts and tourneys.

#KingRobertwasbest

 

 

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No. You said it yourself in your post. He set it all up. He let corruption run rampant and didn't care. He knew his son was cruel yet didn't do anything to try and fix him. He ran up a massive debt until tywin lannister all but owned the crown. Even if joffrey had been an okay king and been roberts actual son robert had set up alot of trouble down the road.  Aegon the unworthy was similar to robert and it caused a massive war called the blackfyre rebellion.  It also set up massive debt and all sorts of other trouble. However after aegon died his son that took over was a very good king and then he died the first aerys became king (not dany's dad) and while he didn't pay much attention it was negated because he put in bloodraven as his hand and bloodraven was more or less king during aerys reign. Bloodraven was a master politician and tactician and was able to pull everything back together. So basically after aegon you had two really good kings who pulled through a war,disease,famine,and pulling a divided country together. If they had had two "okay kings the seven kingdoms would have fallen apart long before robert became king. Robert knowingly did the same stuff as aegon the unworthy and had a horrible heir and did nothing about it. Didn't try and help him. Also in the show robert rarely touched  cersei and she was actually interested in him at first.

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28 minutes ago, Charles Stuart said:

Am I the only one thinking that maybe Robert Baratheon wasn't so bad after all?

Well, periods of peace are always fine for the common folk. In that regard Robert was a good king. No more fights, no more ambitions, no trouble. 

On the other hand, he was a bad king because he did not control, steer and stabilize his realm, but produced massive debt and lost his actual power. So he set up the realm for the troubles to come. 

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But @snow is the man you're basically replying as if it was about him being a good father and husband. Which he was certainly not, I agree, but as a king, was he that awful ?

IIRC some maesters called Robert's reign a golden age, especially the part when Jon Arryn was his Hand of course. Just have a look at what Arryn & Robert accomplished. They rebuilt a country which suffered a massive civil war and the overthrow of the major dynasty. They dealt with Balon's rebellion with the Iron Islands ending up as a part of the Seven Kingdoms. They had a non-independent North (essentially thanks to Ned, ofc), and every region was basically fine with being a part of the Crown.

Sure, the bottom line is the massive debt he produced. Which is actually also on Littlefinger's fault (Master of the Coins), so is the poisoning of Arryn, which led to the massive chaos we knew. Littlefinger has caused way more trouble to the realm that Robert IMO.

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5 hours ago, snow is the man said:

No. You said it yourself in your post. He set it all up. He let corruption run rampant and didn't care. He knew his son was cruel yet didn't do anything to try and fix him. He ran up a massive debt until tywin lannister all but owned the crown. Even if joffrey had been an okay king and been roberts actual son robert had set up alot of trouble down the road.  Aegon the unworthy was similar to robert and it caused a massive war called the blackfyre rebellion.  It also set up massive debt and all sorts of other trouble. However after aegon died his son that took over was a very good king and then he died the first aerys became king (not dany's dad) and while he didn't pay much attention it was negated because he put in bloodraven as his hand and bloodraven was more or less king during aerys reign. Bloodraven was a master politician and tactician and was able to pull everything back together. So basically after aegon you had two really good kings who pulled through a war,disease,famine,and pulling a divided country together. If they had had two "okay kings the seven kingdoms would have fallen apart long before robert became king. Robert knowingly did the same stuff as aegon the unworthy and had a horrible heir and did nothing about it. Didn't try and help him. Also in the show robert rarely touched  cersei and she was actually interested in him at first.

Say what you will about Joffrey, he was on top of Priority One: Dany and her dragons. He wanted to be updated, and he wanted to build a standing Royal Army to deal with them. 

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I'm curious if Robert even knew of the debt at all.  Or just the Lannister part..  Maybe he just thought Tywin owed him for sticking him with his crazy wife and was hell bent on spending all Tywin's money.  Leaving Littlefinger to master of coin sure wasn't the best idea, he prolly was pulling things not even Arryn was aware off with the money. 

Also didn't Cersi tell Robert if he ever touched a hair on Joffery's head she'd slit his throat while he slept?

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8 hours ago, Charles Stuart said:

Am I the only one thinking that maybe Robert Baratheon wasn't so bad after all? Drank a lot, whored around a lot and certainly ate a lot, but the realm itself wasn't in a totally terrible state like it was afterwards under Lannister rule and post Daeny's invasion. 

Granted him being a shabby king led to the later events which ensued but I bet if you asked the people of King's landing which king they preferred, I would bet most would choose Robert. No blown up Septs, no burned cities, instead just endless feasts and tourneys.

#KingRobertwasbest

 

 

Not sure if you've seen, I said the same almost a week ago. 

Everyone we know was corrupted because of the Iron Throne, it's almost like the Ring from the LotR. But Robert resisted it, probably through drinking a lot.

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1 hour ago, Bradam said:

 

Also didn't Cersi tell Robert if he ever touched a hair on Joffery's head she'd slit his throat while he slept?

I don't remember that, but once he said he isn't giving up the crown because he was afraid of letting Joffrey run the things;

''I have dreamed of giving up the crown. Take ship for the Free Cities with my horse and my hammer, spend my time warring and whoring, that's what I was made for. The sellsword king, how the singers would love me. You know what stops me? The thought of Joffrey on the throne, with Cersei standing behind him whispering in his ear. My son. How could I have made a son like that, Ned?''

He realizes that Joffrey is a huge threat, but still can't get rid of him because of Cersei I guess.

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12 hours ago, Ser Glendon Fireball said:

But @snow is the man you're basically replying as if it was about him being a good father and husband. Which he was certainly not, I agree, but as a king, was he that awful ?

IIRC some maesters called Robert's reign a golden age, especially the part when Jon Arryn was his Hand of course. Just have a look at what Arryn & Robert accomplished. They rebuilt a country which suffered a massive civil war and the overthrow of the major dynasty. They dealt with Balon's rebellion with the Iron Islands ending up as a part of the Seven Kingdoms. They had a non-independent North (essentially thanks to Ned, ofc), and every region was basically fine with being a part of the Crown.

Sure, the bottom line is the massive debt he produced. Which is actually also on Littlefinger's fault (Master of the Coins), so is the poisoning of Arryn, which led to the massive chaos we knew. Littlefinger has caused way more trouble to the realm that Robert IMO.

Okay picture it this way. You had a president who set up a house of cards. While he was in charge everything was great on the surface. However just underneath it's completly rotten. The economy is about to fall and the divisions that he caused started to fester until nothing gets done and everyone hates eachother and every system that can fix things or keep them in check has been chipped away until it is just a sign on an empty building.  So when the next guy comes in it all crashes and everyone looks at the last guy who caused it and sees a time of prosperity.

Also I was only pointing out cersei because she is one of the people he failed to keep in check. And joffrey wasn't just his son (to him and everyone who didn't know about cersei and jaime's creepy relationship) he was also the heir. You see in the books and such that rob is loosely tutored by his father in the ways of ruling. Rob was going to be lord of winterfell and eventually warden of the north. Joffrey was going to be the king of all of westeros and robert didn't try to teach him anything about ruling or have someone teach him. Since his son would be heir it was part of his job as king. And while little finger has caused more trouble he did so much because robert did nothing. When jon arryn tried to get robert to do anything he wouldn't and he would just side with whoever made him do less.  Stannis who tried to bring some order to it was ignored and often ridiculed by his brother (though some of his ideas were a bit out there). Think of it this way. robert was supposed to guard the kingdom and instead eat and ignored the wolves..or lions tearing it apart.

 

Robert did so well because he was a war hero and everybody thought of him that way even when he sunk to being so fat he couldn't wear armor and would get winded just walking.

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4 hours ago, Erkan12 said:

Not sure if you've seen, I said the same almost a week ago. 

Everyone we know was corrupted because of the Iron Throne, it's almost like the Ring from the LotR. But Robert resisted it, probably through drinking a lot.

Not really. Look who had taken the throne. Robert was a drunk and slept with everything that moved even before he became king. Aerys was always a bit off. I can't remember if it said it in the show but in the books sir barriston selmy said in a polite way that aerys had had some episodes when he was younger but he was charming and people ignored it. So it just got worse as he got older and yes the pressure from the throne didn't help. Joffrey was a little psycho even before he became king. Now tommen is the best example. He was still young and he got walked all over but I think you would have seen him come back as weak but capable of keeping the peace if it had been under any normal circumstance.

 

After him came cersei who was a cruel evil person from far earlier. Dany commited her attrocity before she took the throne.  I think the pressure and power that came with the throne just added to what a person had already. 

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5 hours ago, Bittersweet Distractor said:

Compared to Aerys and Joffery, and inept Tommen yes he was.

I still think the best King was Jaeherys 1.

yep he was the king who got the militant faith to lay down their arms,united the kingdoms in more then just name,had the most dragons during his rule,and had a very very long time of peace. He was probably the best king we know of in the game of thrones universe.

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12 hours ago, Winter prince said:

Jon Arryn went through hell trying to keep the realm in order for Robert. 

Exactly and jon arryn was by all accounts a good and honorable man who wasn't corrupted. Yet robert seemed to ignore all his warnings and advice. If it wasn't about tourneys or killing targs he didn't want to be bothered.

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Robert has more than his hand in starting the wars.  Had he left Ned alone in the north, or had he set up a solid console loyal to him, or had he not basically ceded the crown to the Lanisters the realm would have been in tact and more likely able to deal with Daenerys. 

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17 hours ago, snow is the man said:

No. You said it yourself in your post. He set it all up. He let corruption run rampant and didn't care. He knew his son was cruel yet didn't do anything to try and fix him. He ran up a massive debt until tywin lannister all but owned the crown. Even if joffrey had been an okay king and been roberts actual son robert had set up alot of trouble down the road.  Aegon the unworthy was similar to robert and it caused a massive war called the blackfyre rebellion.  It also set up massive debt and all sorts of other trouble. However after aegon died his son that took over was a very good king and then he died the first aerys became king (not dany's dad) and while he didn't pay much attention it was negated because he put in bloodraven as his hand and bloodraven was more or less king during aerys reign. Bloodraven was a master politician and tactician and was able to pull everything back together. So basically after aegon you had two really good kings who pulled through a war,disease,famine,and pulling a divided country together. If they had had two "okay kings the seven kingdoms would have fallen apart long before robert became king. Robert knowingly did the same stuff as aegon the unworthy and had a horrible heir and did nothing about it. Didn't try and help him. Also in the show robert rarely touched  cersei and she was actually interested in him at first.

 The comparison between Aegon IV and Robert I is just.........ignorant. Sure Bobby wasn't really great king, and a pleasant person, but he was far from worst. Let's dissect your post.

He let corruption run rampant - did he really? We know he was a warrior king and his qualities was in morale boost of the troops, not statesmanship. This role was delegated to Jon Arryn alone. Jon Arryn is to blame as much as him, and it's a character praised more than anyone in the novels for his political savvy. He had 3 powergrabbing plotters in his own small council (Baelish, Varys and HIS OWN Brother).

The debt - I'm pretty sure Littlefinger embezzeled a LOT of money from the crown. We have couple of clues throughout the books, the biggest one being Tyrion not getting any sense of the books (didn't have enough time to investigate, because of Stannis approaching). 

Joffrey - did he knew his son was cruel? Apart from the cat incident what was other evidence? After the slap/punch he gave Joff, Cersei distanced all of "his" children from him and threatened to MURDED him if he does anything remotely close.

Bobby was absent king in the latter stages of his rule, he was a drunk, whoremonger, and he raped Cersei couple of times so no I do not think of him as a good person. But he was far from worst of the kings. He had very long and prosperous reign with relative peace. The collapse of his reign is on the shoulders of Littlefinger, Varys, Renly and the Lannisters, THEY STARTED THE Wot5K.

Aegon IV started Blackfyre rebellion as a giant fuck you to his own son Dareon II, just because people liked him better. He started this rebelion, which haunted the realm for generations just because he was being petty. He alienated almost every lord of Westeros by his treatment of women and feudal contracts. Wanted to start a war with Dorne, when his own son was already married into the family. I mean, come on.

Bloodraven created a police state when the Great Spring Sickness desolated Westeros. He ignored Ironborn invasion, letting Stark and Lannisters to deal with it on their own, without any official support. And he broke one of the most sacred rules/traditions of guest right, when he had Aenys Blackfyre executed the moment he showed up in KL for Great council, before promising him safe conduct. There was a nation wide paranoia surrounding Blooraven (Lord Bloodraven sees everything with his thoundseyes and one). It was actually Meakar I that had to keep Bloodraven on a leash and to keep the 7K together strong between Blackfyre rebelions.

 There is really no comparison between the two. Bobby had his own faults, but as I mentioned he was far from worst. I actually have to rank above more than half of Targaryen kings (Maegor I, Viserys I, Aegon II, Baelor I, Aegon IV, Aerys I, Aerys II).

 

To answer to this underlying question: Is Robert I Baratheon better than Daenerys? Show? Well, yes. He did not burn half the city to the ground. He did not give the order to murder any children or women, Tywin Lannister did. Was he deliberately ingorant of the fact and is it morally ambiguous? Of course. Books? I personally think Daenarys blows up KL by ACCIDENT, so this is not relevant for me.

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