What kind of Hand Hoster Tully would have been ?

[Terrorthatflapsinthenight9]

What kind of Hand of the King do you think that Hoster Tully would have been, if Robert Baratheon had chosen him as his Hand after his rebellion due to Jon Arryn having declined the position, or of him being healthy by the time of Jon's death and the beggining of the series ?

What governing style do you think that Hoster would have had as Hand of the King ? How effective would he have been ? Would he have chosen the same members of the Small Council as Robert and Jon did ? If not who would he have chosen to be part of the council ?

What would have been his attitude and relations with the schemers that are Varys, Littlefinger, Renly and the Lannisters ?

[Alester Florent]

Ultimately I don't think we have enough information on Hoster to make any kind of informed guess. We know a bit about his relationship with his immediate family, and that he sided with Robert in the rebellion (though not unconditionally). There are a few hints that he was a reasonably capable lord of the Riverlands, and more ruthless than his son, but even that is getting a bit speculative.

Regarding a Hoster-led Small Council, the two spots most obviously open to change are Varys and Littlefinger. It's not entirely clear why Varys got to keep his job after the overthrow of Aerys, so if he was able to keep his position then he could probably have talked Hoster round just as he did Jon and Bob. Littlefinger is a different matter. He's Jon's protégé, but Hoster might be more suspicious of him, given his history with Lysa. It's harder to see him appointing or consenting to the appointment of LF as Master of Coin. As far as replacements go, though... hard to say. Perhaps someone from the Riverlands, but not necessarily someone we've heard of (Littlefinger would have been a very minor lord we might not have heard of had it not been for his position on the Council). Perhaps a Whent, or even a Frey.

If Jon couldn't keep the Lannisters in check then Hoster probably couldn't either. In a post-Jon environment, Hoster might be even more suspicious of the Lannisters than Ned is (rightly believing that his own lands would be the Lannisters' first target in the event of war) so events might play out similarly.

Except... it's hard to imagine that if Hoster is anything like we imagine him to be that, if put in Ned's shoes in the same developing circumstances, he would stonewall Renly's attempts at a political alliance, especially after Bob's death. He might also command enough emotional leverage over Lysa to force her to permit the Vale lords to enter the fray. Either of those developments would change the complexion of the resulting war completely.

 

Edited May 30, 2023 by Alester Florent

[The Gizzard of Oz]

Hoster would have been disastrous for the job.  He was too ambitious and too immoral.

[Curled Finger]

If nothing else he would have kept Little Finger out of Kings Landing.

[astarkchoice]

A far better one

-Hed have not allowed littlefinger around

-we know he demanded his daughters marriages before he got on board the rebellion plus we see with brynden he can be a stubborn agressve prick....in other words hed have probably stood his ground and  had frank shouting matches with robert over spending etc . He wouldnt have had the same kind fatherly approach jon arryn no doubt tried which failed. 

-hed have maybe demanded  his daughters vist more often ..having ned around  if only for a few weeks etc would also have kept robert (and the lannisters)  a bit more in line. Having jon arryn and hoster  team up to go at him in couincil sessions for a while would have done the same!

[Nevets]

We know way too little to be able to say how he would have done.  We also don't really know enough about the time between the end of the rebellion and Jon Arryn's death.  Jon Arryn was a very capable hand, so I doubt Hoster would have done better.  Jon's main problem was in not preventing expenses being higher than income.

If Hoster were Hand, Littlefinger would likely have remained in the Vale.  Not sure if that is good or bad.  I'm skeptical of the idea that Littlefinger was stealing on a grand scale; he can do very nicely perfectly legally.  So his absence might have made things worse.

Also, what you might expect doesn't happen.  By all indications, Ned had the North eating out of his hand, so success in running the kingdom should have been expected.  We saw how that turned out.  He was way out of his depth.  Hoster could be too.

By the way, I don't see any reason for him to be appointed after Arryn's death.  Robert had no ties to him, and no other reason to select him, like notable success in the Riverlands.

[SilverGhost]

If selected rather than Jon Arryn -- potentially a bad decision. Yes he keeps Littlefinger away from KL (and that would be good) but Jon Arryn's biggest success in the early period of his Handship was avoiding a Dornish Rebellion. Could be that Hoster takes a harder line and Doran isn't able to control his angry Lords and brother, which would give him the time to put into (slow) motion his master plan for revenge. 

[SeanF]

He was a more ruthless man than Hon Arryn, it seems. I expect he’d want to destroy the Targaryen line for good, and go after Viserys and Dany.

[Alester Florent]

19 hours ago, Nevets said:

By the way, I don't see any reason for him to be appointed after Arryn's death.  Robert had no ties to him, and no other reason to select him, like notable success in the Riverlands.

Robert probably knows him at least reasonably well, since Hoster was one of his most important supporters in the Rebellion.

After Jon's death, Ned is his first choice because he wants someone he knows and trusts in the position. If Ned says no, he'll no doubt have Cersei in his ear telling him to appoint Tywin, but there's a reason he didn't go for Tywin in the first place so if he can hold his nerve and defy her again, who does he have? He knows Stannis is unviable. His threats to appoint Jaime are, I think, intended because he knows it will needle Ned rather than being serious. Renly has potential but is inexperienced and he may think he lacks the fortitude.

A good, available non-Ned candidate, may in fact be his other brother-in-law, but it's hard to imagine that happening because nobody apart from Tywin (and Genna) ever saw Tyrion's potential before he was acting Hand. Although superficially Tyrion comes with the same problems as Tywin, if Robert actually realised how capable Tyrion was, I can see him doing it to drive Cersei up the wall: she gets a Lannister Hand like she wanted, but one she hates. Brilliant. But there's no way Bob would ever actually do it because he doesn't realise it's an option.

So, widening the field, there may be Stormlords or Vale lords who Robert has a good relationship with and would turn to next , or maybe even a Reach lord (Lord Rowan?) but if he's going outside the family I think at this point Hoster would look like an attractive option.

 

[Daena the Defiant]

18 hours ago, SeanF said:

He was a more ruthless man than Hon Arryn, it seems.  

Yes, and no - what examples do we really have about his ruthlessness? He abided the... fickle vassalship of House Frey and he pretty much allowed the never ending Bracken and Blackwood feud. I am not suggesting he would have went the Full Tywin and destroyed some of his primary bannermen, but he seems to have played a strong hand to the best of his ability in a measured way that ensured relative peace. 

I suppose you can say that forcing Lysa to drink an abortifacient was ruthless, but ..  in a feudal world, marital alliances are key, and her proven fertility in a round-about way allowed Lysa to make a FANTASTIC marriage that one would not expect for a daughter who was not exactly the maiden bride.  Honestly, the fact that Hoster was able to place his grandchildren in line to assume the rule of three of the seven kingdoms was nothing short of breathtaking.  

[Nevets]

It is also worth noting that, by the time of Arryn's death, Hoster was already in poor health and bedridden, though the severity of the illness was a closely kept secret.  This would have made it impossible for Hoster to take on the duties of the Hand, even if Robert were to offer it to him.

[SeanF]

3 hours ago, Daena the Defiant said:

Yes, and no - what examples do we really have about his ruthlessness? He abided the... fickle vassalship of House Frey and he pretty much allowed the never ending Bracken and Blackwood feud. I am not suggesting he would have went the Full Tywin and destroyed some of his primary bannermen, but he seems to have played a strong hand to the best of his ability in a measured way that ensured relative peace. 

I suppose you can say that forcing Lysa to drink an abortifacient was ruthless, but ..  in a feudal world, marital alliances are key, and her proven fertility in a round-about way allowed Lysa to make a FANTASTIC marriage that one would not expect for a daughter who was not exactly the maiden bride.  Honestly, the fact that Hoster was able to place his grandchildren in line to assume the rule of three of the seven kingdoms was nothing short of breathtaking.  

Massacring Lord Godbrook’s peasants, because he remained loyal to the Targaryens.

[illrede]

I don't see a point in making the head of House Tully Hand of the King. I think that the Tully's are the strangest of the Lords Paramount; the Riverlands is just too rich, too close. So I believe that one of the reasons the Seven Kingdoms works at all is because House Tully isn't a very effective hegemon for the Riverlands. They're a Kings Landing agent, if you wanted the Riverlands locked down tight it'd be a Blackwood or a Bracken, but then you've got a different, less desirable problem. The use to be gotten out of the Tully's is doing their level best to be in charge of the Riverlands, and that as much as can be expected of them. Why would Kings Landing risk giving Tully an exterior font of power to make it stronger in its own demense? It'd ruin everything. And what would they gain by doing it before then?

[Daena the Defiant]

On 5/30/2023 at 11:42 PM, SeanF said:

Massacring Lord Godbrook’s peasants, because he remained loyal to the Targaryens.

Hrrm.

 

I did not remember that. Interesting; yes, that is pretty fucking ruthless.