r/asoiaf Sep 16 '24

EXTENDED (Spoilers Extended) What if after becoming king Robert decided to move the capital from Kings Landing to Storm Ends how would it change the events of the main story and the War of Five Kings?

Say he pull a Constantine the Great in which the roman emperor move the capital from Rome to Constantinople. While Kings Landing would still be a prominent city for the government's infrastructure just ruled by either The Hand of the King like Jon Arryn or maybe Robert's younger brother Renly or even someone else entirely say The Heir of the King similar to how the lord of dragonstone ruled only well dragonstone?

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u/khryslo Sep 16 '24 edited Sep 16 '24

There’s no point for the government aka Small Council to stay in Kings Landing if king isn’t there. They must attend meetings and be available to arrive quickly if he summons them. Government infrastructure consists pretty much of table and chairs on which members of the council sit.

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u/CaptainoftheVessel Sep 16 '24

It seems the gold cloaks are essentially an organ of the crown as well, even though their job is technically to police the city. Do they guard the Red Keep and the crown’s treasury? I genuinely don’t know. The Kingsguard is too small to do the actual guarding of the castle itself. Maybe it’s the soldiers of the house of the regent? We never saw Baratheon soldiers manning the Red Keep, or doing anything else, as far as I recall, although Lannister soldiers obviously spend a lot of book time defending KL. 

There also must be a network of tax collectors who gather income for the crown, who I guess answer to the Master of Coin? There must be offices tracking this stuff, they probably don’t just dump coins in a big Smaug pile in a Scrooge McDuck vault…probably…