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Which canonically Aegon and Maegor did without too much pushback. And breaking the power of the Faith as an institution instead of as a religion is a matter different from ideology. Not really. The Targs kept dragons long enough to get inertia on their side. They kept "ruling" so long as it...

Which is precisely my point. All the Targs needed under Aegon was for the lords to pay lip service and be at least nominally loyal. If a top level lord was willing to play ball then great, they were welcomed in and basically left to keep doing whatever they wanted with a change in title and no...

Which is my point. Aegon never took steps to establish any of the infrastructure of rule; including things like spy networks. Hell, it was up to Visenya to create a personal bodyguard (the Kingsguard) because Aegon apparently didn't give a fuck. The "tech" disparity between Aegon and everyone...

Except he could. So long as he had enough forces to ensure the Targs personal security, Dragons were basically all he needed. Field and army and the Black Dread will just reenact the Fields of Fire. Attempt to resist and its another Harrenhal. The Iron Isles? The Ironborn had zero friends and...

The issue is that before the Conquest, there was relatively little reason for the kind of interaction we are discussing. The Vale was utterly secure (save from the North doing some poaching of the Three Sisters, maybe) and also unable to project power thanks to having the Greenfork in the way...

There is basically zero realistic way to build a canal network in/through the Riverlands pre-Conquest. Remember that the Riverlands was always basically the afterthought and the battlefield for everyone else. It's where the Vale, North, and Westerlands fought whenever they had a dispute. It's...

No one can even pretend to give an honest prediction. How insane he was before is an open question. The more interesting question is what happens if he dies and Rhaegar becomes King then instead.

The crown should absolutely create a professional, standing, army. Push the Crownlands borders to the Harrenhall-Darry line, secure all of the viable crossing points of the Blackwater and Trident, and fortify that line and the Crownlands become incredibly secure. Armies don't cross rivers in...

Using the Unsullied would be worse unless you take the Daenerys approach, and that has its own issues. Simply being known as someone who uses slaves is political suicide for any Lord and would make you an enemy of both the Faith and the Old Gods. If the throne wants a proper standing army...

That would be a horrid idea. The Blackfyres are utterly hated in Westeros and are seen as, rightly, responsible for something like five major civil wars in their attempts to steal a throne they had no claim to. The benefits of the Golden Company are entirely outweighed by the political and...

So little things that people seem to miss, like how massively huge Westeros is. The distance from Kings Landing to Oldtown? About the same as from Paris to Ukraine; or DC to Kansas City. Transit times, outside of magical HBO teleporting armies, should be measured in months. Especially for...

Hmm, I want to see a fic where Jon or Ser Davos points out that Jon Snow was crowned King in the North as Jon Snow and that as a bastard he is not part of House Stark when Daenerys says her line about the Starks swearing fealty.

The Dragons died out because the Targaryen's forgot that the basis for their power was Fire and Blood. Rhaenyra failing to burn Old Town to ash as the opening move of the Dance is the stupidest thing the dynasty ever did. Right up there with Aegon 1 allying with the Faith over the First Men and...

Depends. The first question is whether or not they get dragons, the second is what cadet branches. The Vale, Iron Isles, and Step Stones are the places you really want loyal Targaryen houses (if they have Dragons). With Dragons, the Eyrie becomes utterly impossible to lose and provides the...

Which is basically just meta Gary Stu issues. "Oh, we will just remove all of the big things that actually matter in the end." is really iffy. There is a difference between Jaime getting away with his idiocy (which really was one of the weakest parts of the series) and Cersei using authority...

Then timing really works against you. The White Walkers and Daenerys push hard against Robb being able to be anything but a warlord constantly at war, and wars that he can't win. I mean nothing going on in Westeros is going to have any impact on what Daenerys is up to, and she is going to land...

Except not really. If the North actually wants independence, it has been within their grasp since the Targaryen's lost their dragons. A blocking force at Moat Cailin, especially once it has been properly rebuilt, and it becomes basically impossible for even the combined might of the rest of the...

The Vale actually had a fairly substantial minority of First Men in it. And yeah, it will basically be a civil war but dragons and a willingness to use them along with both Valyrian and First Men forces (courtesy of the North) provide a relatively secure power base to build from. I mean step...

So a fic idea. An insert into the younger brother of Aegon the Conqueror, born in place of Rhaenys. SI takes the daughter of Torrhen Stark as his wife and the Vale as his province (killing off the Arryns). This is done for a great many reasons, but the biggest one is to ensure a war with the...

Well that's true post dragons. But with Dragons, you actually could keep something like a reasonably unified Westeros.