this post was submitted on 13 Jul 2026
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A Song Of Ice And Fire
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With this, it seems that we can conclude that Gwayne is some sort of ubermensch, managing to turn out decent and normal after being raised in that psycho family.
Perhaps Otto never wanted to actually usurp Rhaenyra's throne, and only did so because the "main branch" of the Hightower family ordered him to. The way Orwyle describes the correspondence, it almost sounds like Otto was a servant delivering daily progress reports to his boss.
Back in Season 1 when Otto's older brother (and Ormund's father) Hobert was alive, I seem to recall that in the one conversation we saw between them, Otto seemed to be trying to tell Hobert that Viserys was steadfast in his decision to keep Rhaenyra as heir, and Hobert was having NONE of it.
I think the answer is that Otto is just a better man/father/game player.
As a second son he had "nothing" and rose to become basically king and did a pretty solid job.
In addition his children, Alicent & Gwayne, largely obeyed their father and became good people.
Ormund however was raised to be a leader and heir. He probably saw Otto level up and thought that should have been him. He listened to his father, who was probably pleased to see Otto succeed since as the older brother he probably "guided" him into the role and could take credit. But once Ormund was in charge he wanted to be his own man and that's why he cut off correspondence.
Otto put his child on the throne (ish) as Queen Alicent and then his grandchildren on the actual throne. If Otto can do it, so can Ormund. So he's going to put "his son", Daeron, on the throne.
Putting Daeron on the throne seems to be an adjustment to the original plan, and Ormund seems to only have come up with it in response to learning that Aemond would not be bringing Vhagar.
That's a good point.
He gave his whole speech about Targaryens being weird/unnatural, and he called Daeron a Hightower.
So maybe he decided Aegon "dying" and Aemon disappearing as a sign.