House Forrester a Merchantile? (Season 4 and Game SPOILERS)

K0t0

Am I seeing the heirarchy correctly?

GREAT HOUSE: Bolton
So the Great House is the warden of the North and it use to be the Starks because the Boltons treachery. Not all Northerners are pleased or willing to follow Bolton and I assume with the impending arrival of Stannis, a man House Stark once vouched the Iron Throne for, a divide will take place.

NOBLE HOUSES: Glover
Noble houses have a right to be a Great House but are otherwise the highest rank after the Great House/Warden? Glover being one of them and was Bolton.

MINOR HOUSES: Forrester and Whitehall
Minor Houses provide a kind of service but otherwise possess the neccessities to have a small platoon or army each? The reason I ask is to understand the dynamic better, the Northerners are a military region so it would make sense for all Houses to have soldiers but otherwise House Forrester is technically a Merchant House..is that correct?

And so for that matter:
Forrester sworn to Noble House Glover sworn to House Stark
Whitehall sworn to Noble House Bolton of whom are now the Great House, does that elevate Whitehall?

KingofGreyjoy69FV

No, it doesn't elevate Whitehill properly like that of becoming a noble house like the one you describe. In practice, things aren't exactly that way, Whitehill won't bother with not becoming a "noble house", they are a house in the north, as important as any in the end of the day. However, Whitehill was granted part or all of the Ironwood forests territory, that wasn't as automatical as you meant it would (or as I understood so). That was a will of the overlord. And the will of the overlord is the superior to any law in the game of thrones.

Considering that, with Forresters building ships and all sorts of things that require Ironwood, they certainly have an economic reference on the Ironwood reserves. I don't think that, looking in the game's background characters as well as considering their position in the Wolfswood Houses, that they have any sort of relatively big army. Is like as if Ironrath had only the security personnel, the type of men that will maintain order in the perimeters around their lands. Royland was twisted enough to believe they could fight against Ramsay Bolton's raging bulldoggy men. They don't have that estructure, and the men and women there are farmer-like (just like the WInter Town outside Winterfell).

I hope I helped somehow.

EDIT: I think that what weights in the fact of a house being noble or not is that some choices taken by a minor house lord have to be considered by the liege (Glover for example) before having its word taken to the warden. If forresters aren't submitted to glovers then it's like Stark not being submitted to Baratheon of KL, it breaks the system circle. Ok?