Smaug vs. Balrog - Who would win?

[The Marquis de Leech]

7 minutes ago, Werthead said:

Balrog. Dragons are considered highly dangerous, but ultimately defeatable by men. Balrogs are only defeated by Maia or High Elves at the very height of their power and abilities.

While I think Smaug vs Durin's Bane comes down to circumstances, I'd back Ancalagon the Black over Gothmog.

[Werthead]

Let's put it this way:

Balrogs: demonic entities from before the dawn of time, Maia spirits in the service of (essentially) the Devil. They only get killed by other Maia or the most powerful of the High Elves (immortal warriors who have lived for thousands of years). The two times we see a Balrog get killed by a High Elf, the elf dies as well and it was a bit of a fluke involving a magic fountain and a massive plummeting fall. The Balrogs also killed Fëanor without losing any of their number, and he was hardcore.

Dragons: big fire-breathing worms who humans and half-humans (albeit helped by magical sky-chariot) kill on a semi-routine basis and were hunted to extinction by humans and elves.

Ancalagon was hardcore, sure, but a bit of an outlier (Glaurung and Smaug hardly went down as hard) in power.

It's also worth remembering that Gothmog was originally conceived as the son of Morgoth. Although that was later changed, the idea of the Balrogs as powerful demons whose power derived from Morgoth remained intact. Dragons were not given that level of power.

In addition, there were shit-tons of dragons and only seven Balrogs, which meant they accomplished quite a lot with limited numbers. And the Balrogs flew on the backs of dragons, because dragons were subservient to them.

In final conclusion, Balrogs > Dragons. Although maybe Ancalagon could have taken a Balrog if the Balrog had a hangover and Ancalagon was on a tremendously good day.

[The Marquis de Leech]

1 hour ago, Werthead said:

Let's put it this way:

Balrogs: demonic entities from before the dawn of time, Maia spirits in the service of (essentially) the Devil. They only get killed by other Maia or the most powerful of the High Elves (immortal warriors who have lived for thousands of years). The two times we see a Balrog get killed by a High Elf, the elf dies as well and it was a bit of a fluke involving a magic fountain and a massive plummeting fall. The Balrogs also killed Fëanor without losing any of their number, and he was hardcore.

Dragons: big fire-breathing worms who humans and half-humans (albeit helped by magical sky-chariot) kill on a semi-routine basis and were hunted to extinction by humans and elves.

Ancalagon was hardcore, sure, but a bit of an outlier (Glaurung and Smaug hardly went down as hard) in power.

It's also worth remembering that Gothmog was originally conceived as the son of Morgoth. Although that was later changed, the idea of the Balrogs as powerful demons whose power derived from Morgoth remained intact. Dragons were not given that level of power.

In addition, there were shit-tons of dragons and only seven Balrogs, which meant they accomplished quite a lot with limited numbers. And the Balrogs flew on the backs of dragons, because dragons were subservient to them.

In final conclusion, Balrogs > Dragons. Although maybe Ancalagon could have taken a Balrog if the Balrog had a hangover and Ancalagon was on a tremendously good day.

(1) You are playing merry hell with the timeline here. The Ecthelion/Gothmog fountain scene, the Glorfindel falls to his death scene, and the Balrogs ride dragons scene are all from the earliest version of the mythology. It is true that Tolkien never got around to revising that particular story, but if you're citing that, I'd also point out that Tuor kills five of the buggers by himself, and that Turgon's warriors kill forty more. It just isn't possible to gel the "seven Balrogs" line with the earlier mythos.

(2) We don't actually know what dragons are in Tolkien's world. Ignoring the mechanical critters of the 1916 version, Glaurung is the only dragon to appear up until the War of Wrath - his appearance in earlier battles is a cause for note in the way the Balrogs aren't.  

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

What was Ungoliant?  Was she maiar?  Or a dark version of Bombidial?

[Werthead]

22 minutes ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

What was Ungoliant?  Was she maiar?  Or a dark version of Bombidial?

For lack of another explanation, yes, Ungoliant was probably a Maia spirit.

[The Marquis de Leech]

20 minutes ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

What was Ungoliant?  Was she maiar?  Or a dark version of Bombidial?

Depends.

Early on, she's basically her own thing, a primordial spirit of night:

Mayhap she was bred of mists and darkness on the confines of the Shadowy Seas, in that utter dark that came between the overthrow of the Lamps and the kindling of the Trees… but more like she has always been. 

Tolkien later seemed to have moved in the direction of the Maia explanation:

The Eldar knew not whence she came; but some have said that in ages long before she descended from the darkness that lies about Arda, when Melkor first looked down in envy upon the Kingdom of Manwë, and that in the beginning she was one of those that he corrupted to his service. But she had disowned her Master, desiring to be mistress of her own lust, taking all things to herself to feed her emptiness…

Even the later version keeps an element of ambiguity about her though. We know there are weird little puzzles that don't fit into the simple Maiar basket - Goldberry, the Nameless Things.

[Happy Ent]

20 hours ago, Calibandar said:

And Bashrag would not be an apt comparison for a Balrog, […]

Bashrag are trolls.

[Lord Varys]

30 minutes ago, Werthead said:

For lack of another explanation, yes, Ungoliant was probably a Maia spirit.

Ungoliant was most likely an Ainu, at least in all the later version where she is no longer an incarnation of the primordial night. However, she would never have been a Maia because that name is only reserved for the servants of the Valar, and Ungoliant never was one of them. She is more an Ainu comparable in strength and power to the Valar but never got around to become one of the Powers of the Earth (for obvious reasons).

On 13.5.2017 at 1:36 PM, Let's Get Kraken said:

@RBPL Do we know if Gandalf was wearing his own ring of power when he fought Durin's Bane?

He did, but Narly is completely irrelevant because the Three Rings weren't weapons. Perhaps Narya stabilized his body long enough so that it could live through the ordeal it went (he should have died when he fell into the chasm, and he clearly had no access to food or water during his long ascent from the deep or the clothes to survive the cold at the top of the mountain). In the end it seems that both the Balrog and Gandalf fought in shapes as closely resembling their bodiless appearances as they could possibly get to while there were still incarnated.

As to dragons:

Glaurung seems to be either an Ainu or an evil offspring of some Ainur in Morgoth's service. He is referred to as being possessed by an evil spirit and is even referred to as a demon, once. And Ancalagon and the other flying dragons had the power to throw back the armies from Valinor commanded by Eonwe. That shows that dragons were serious business. The body of a Balrog (or any other Ainu aside from, perhaps, the shapes of the Valar) could easily enough be devoured by a dragon or consumed by its flames.

And while this doesn't mean the Balrog is destroyed it would be still unable to continue the fight.

But the problem with this kind of thing is that the Balrogs began as demons of relatively minor power until they reached, in theory, a power level close to that of Sauron or Morgoth itself. In earlier Silmarillion versions Glaurung commands armies consisting of Balrogs but later on Tolkien says there should only be three or seven Balrogs in total. That has never been realized in the stories, though.

Thus such a question is what kind of Balrog we are talking about. The one from the LT are ridiculously weak. The Balrog of Moria and the Balrogs guarding Melkor's person who attacked the standard of Manwe and were slain by Manwe himself are an entirely different category.

The chances that many Balrogs would have been killed during a rewritten version of 'The Fall of Gondolin' are pretty low. There is a strong hint that Ecthelion would have still killed Gothmog but it is not very likely that Tuor or even Glorfindel would have been facing any real Balrogs in combat. Perhaps some lesser demons, Ainur in Orc-shape (who also existed) or some other dangerous creatures but not those Balrogs who were down to either three or seven individuals.

[Jo498]

This reminds me of the Usenet 20 years ago. rec.arts.books.tolkien (or whatever). The main points have already been made. The balrogs in the earliest writings are slightly more than cannon fodder and are slain by the dozens. Later on they become far more powerful. But there are also good reasons to assume that dragons are possessed by maia spirits. Certainly Glaurung seems demonic in his abilities.

So going with the earlier versions, dragons are rarer and more powerful than balrogs. In the later versions it seems a fairly open question as they are both rare and very powerful. But even in the published Silmarilion the appearance of Glaurung and then Ancalagon and the winged dragons are described as "upgrades" and horribly devastating new weapons whereas the balrogs had been around all the time without such a decisive impact. 

I doubt that Durin's Bane fits either narrative well: If there were only 7 or a dozen balrogs they would all have had major positions in Morgoth's army/empire in the first Age and there should have been some lore or account of them. Certainly an unaccounted for nameless balrog possibly at large in the 2nd age should have been some concern of Elrond and others. So it seems strange that it/he/she hides for ages in Moria without anyone even suspecting anything. OTOH a single of the "weakish balrogs" of the Fall of Gondolin would hardly be able to wipe out a whole dwarven kingdom and be a match for Gandalf.

[Happy Ent]

24 minutes ago, Jo498 said:

This reminds me of the Usenet 20 years ago. rec.arts.books.tolkien (or whatever)

rec.religion.wingless-balrogs

[The Marquis de Leech]

BTW, on the Ancalagon front, recall that he broke Thangorodrim when he fell. Even if you ignore the idea that Thangorodrim was 35000 feet high (based off a drawing of Tolkien's - personally I doubt it was to scale), this means that Ancalagon was truly colossal. Durin's Bane broke the side of the mountain, not the mountain itself.

[The Marquis de Leech]

On 2017-5-16 at 0:44 AM, Happy Ent said:

rec.religion.wingless-balrogs

You're preaching to the converted.

[The hairy bear]

Thinking about this matter has made me wonder... isn't Durin's Bane a little bit of a coward? He fled after the War of Wrath instead of fighting to death as most of his colleagues, he hid under a Mountain for some thousand years, he did nothing when Morgoth's old lieutenant warred against Eregion (which was just besides his hiding place), he only killed dwarves that delved too deep into Moria but never ventured outside (he didn't even helped the orcs at the battle of Azanulbizar that was taking place at the gates of Moria), and he didn't put himself at Sauron's service when the Dark Lord was in Dol Guldur (again, very close to his hiding place).

Also, Ainur in earthly form have been repeatedly hurt in Tolkien's world: not only the lord of the balrogs was slain by an elf, but there's also Saruman being killed by Grima, Sauron being defeated by Elendil and Morgoth himself being severely scarred by Fingolfin in single combat.

All this makes me think that perhaps Durin's Bane is not as powerful as many seem to believe. Or that he was, but lost a lot of his power when Morgoth was imprisoned. Otherwise, one would expect him to settle a small kingdom for himself and try to get revenge from the ones that caused the downfall of his old master.

So I guess I'm in the Smaug camp.

 

 

[The Marquis de Leech]

There's also the point about whether Durin's Bane actually recognised Sauron's authority (if it did, it is indeed very odd that it stayed put in a backwater).

Along those lines - any ideas on what would have happened if the Balrog knocked Gandalf off the bridge, killed the Fellowship, and found itself in possession of the One Ring?

[House Balstroko]

On 12/05/2017 at 3:21 AM, polishgenius said:

Anomander Rake.

 

On 12/05/2017 at 3:37 AM, redeagl said:

Angry Icarium

Oh please!!! It's all about Kruppe's mule.

[Lord Varys]

10 hours ago, The hairy bear said:

Thinking about this matter has made me wonder... isn't Durin's Bane a little bit of a coward? He fled after the War of Wrath instead of fighting to death as most of his colleagues, he hid under a Mountain for some thousand years, he did nothing when Morgoth's old lieutenant warred against Eregion (which was just besides his hiding place), he only killed dwarves that delved too deep into Moria but never ventured outside (he didn't even helped the orcs at the battle of Azanulbizar that was taking place at the gates of Moria), and he didn't put himself at Sauron's service when the Dark Lord was in Dol Guldur (again, very close to his hiding place).

Also, Ainur in earthly form have been repeatedly hurt in Tolkien's world: not only the lord of the balrogs was slain by an elf, but there's also Saruman being killed by Grima, Sauron being defeated by Elendil and Morgoth himself being severely scarred by Fingolfin in single combat.

All this makes me think that perhaps Durin's Bane is not as powerful as many seem to believe. Or that he was, but lost a lot of his power when Morgoth was imprisoned. Otherwise, one would expect him to settle a small kingdom for himself and try to get revenge from the ones that caused the downfall of his old master.

So I guess I'm in the Smaug camp.

The Balrogs are spirits of fire and destruction, not pedantic bureaucrats of power like Sauron.

There is no reason to assume that a Balrog would want to rule a kingdom, or rule anything, really. The Balrogs also stayed put while Melkor was in Aman, and they only returned with a vengeance when Morgoth was in mortal danger (them driving away Ungoliant is also a sign that they were very powerful indeed, at least as a collective force). That suggests that they basically lacked agency in Melkor's absence. In that sense the actions of Durin's Bane make perfect sense. The dwarves woke him, and he was pissed and killed them. Afterwards he went back to sleep, most likely, and only woke again occasionally, most likely the last time when the Balin and his gang tried to reclaim Moria.

Sauron ended up ruling the lesser of Morgoth's creatures, but not the Balrogs, and not the dragons.

The Balrogs also seem to less 'earth-bound' than, say, Sauron or the Istari. The Balrog literally burns and can transform his shape into that slimy snake thing, only to burst again into flames on the mountain top. Sauron is pretty hot in his terrible Dark Lord shape back when he fights Gil-galad and Elendil but nothing indicates that he could change his shape the way the Balrog could.

[Lord Varys]

9 hours ago, Roose Boltons Pet Leech said:

Along those lines - any ideas on what would have happened if the Balrog knocked Gandalf off the bridge, killed the Fellowship, and found itself in possession of the One Ring?

Pretty much nothing. There is no reason to believe a Balrog would be interested in the kind of power the One Ring could offer.

Perhaps the Balrog could even have destroyed the Ring. We don't know how hot the inner fire of such a spirit can burn.

[The hairy bear]

13 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

The Balrogs are spirits of fire and destruction, not pedantic bureaucrats of power like Sauron.

I'm not sure about that. The other individual Balrog we know about, Gothmog, had the title of "Marshall of the Hosts" and "High captain of Angband". He is the commander of the surprise attack at Gondolin. And during the Nirnaeth Arnoediad, he captured Hurin instead of killing him, "and dragged him to Angband with mockery".

All this does not indicate "mindless forces of nature" to me, but autonomous capability for planning, commanding and pursue their goals.

23 hours ago, Let's Get Kraken said:

Maybe Durin's Bane wasn't the most proactive agent of darkness, but idk if coward is the right word. Otherwise it would be a little strange for it to confront Gandalf, one of the few beings in Middle Earth that would be capable of destroying it. Probably more lazy than cowardly.

Fair enough. Still, rabbits are known to attack snakes that delve into his lair. And while the elves of the third age may be a shadow of their first age counterparts, Durin's Bane may also be a shadow of his former lord Gothmog. So if Ecthelion killed Gothmog, couldn't Durin's Bane be slain if he tried to descend to Lorien or Rivendell? I wouldn't discard the possibility.

[Lord Varys]

12 hours ago, Let's Get Kraken said:

If, according to Gandalf, Ancalagon the Black couldn't have harmed the One Ring, I doubt Durin's Bane would have been able to.

Gandalf isn't exactly an expert in ringlore. And dragonfire isn't the same type of fire the Balrogs use. They might originally have been spirits of the same type as Arien. And I'm pretty sure the sun could have destroyed the One Ring, too.

24 minutes ago, The hairy bear said:

I'm not sure about that. The other individual Balrog we know about, Gothmog, had the title of "Marshall of the Hosts" and "High captain of Angband". He is the commander of the surprise attack at Gondolin. And during the Nirnaeth Arnoediad, he captured Hurin instead of killing him, "and dragged him to Angband with mockery".

All this does not indicate "mindless forces of nature" to me, but autonomous capability for planning, commanding and pursue their goals.

Gothmog had a name. The other Balrogs don't (aside from that one guy from the Lays who may just have been Gothmog using a different name). And Tolkien isn't even sure whether Durin's Bane could speak (check his comments on the Ackerman outline).

But in general Balrogs acting as commanders and general in campaign for destruction and mayhem still isn't the same as building something. Sauron was not all about destruction. He was about order and oppression, something the Balrogs clearly aren't. At least as far as we know.

Melkor united both those aspects in his persona. He was about this weird ultimate destruction thing (which doesn't make a lot of sense) as well as order and the like.

24 minutes ago, The hairy bear said:

Fair enough. Still, rabbits are known to attack snakes that delve into his lair. And while the elves of the third age may be a shadow of their first age counterparts, Durin's Bane may also be a shadow of his former lord Gothmog. So if Ecthelion killed Gothmog, couldn't Durin's Bane be slain if he tried to descend to Lorien or Rivendell. I wouldn't discard the possibility.

There is a hint that Ecthelion was still supposed to slay Gothmog in the abandoned rewrite of the Gondolin tale. However, considering that Fingolfin could injure Morgoth it is not that far-fetched that a powerful Elda could actually slay a powerful incarnated Ainu of about the same strength as Sauron. Especially if we assume that Gothmog already lost his body once or twice in the past. Those Balrogs who attacked the standard of Manwe during the Battle of the Powers and were slain by him, personally, did lose their visible bodies at least once. And one assumes Gothmog was amongst those, especially if there were only seven Balrogs in total.

My personal take on this is that if we go with the seven Balrogs concept, then the only Balrogs killed in the First Age would be Gothmog slain by Ecthelion, piercing his body with the spike on his helmet (which is still there in the new version of the Gondolin story in UT) and drowning him in the fountain (one could also speculate that it was Ulmo's power in the water that helped kill him), and, perhaps, the Balrog Glorfindel killed in the mountains (although it could also be a different creature, in his last writings Tolkien calls this thing 'a demon').

That would then leave five Balrogs for the War of Wrath. But then, perhaps Gothmog and the Glorfindel-Balrog returned. While Morgoth still ruled Beleriand he should have been able to help his servants to recreate their bodies more quickly, and they could both have been killed in the War of Wrath later on. We know precious little details about that war, anyway, and almost nothing about how Tolkien envisioned it later in life.

[Lord Varys]

22 minutes ago, Let's Get Kraken said:

Well first of all, Gandalf kind of is an expert on ringlore. It's a major part of his whole purpose in Middle Earth.

Gandalf wears a Ring of Power but he himself admits that he deferred to Saruman in the matter of ringlore. The Rings of Power were made in Eregion, by Sauron, Celebrimbor, and the other elven-smiths. Saruman was once a Maia of Aule, as was Sauron, originally. But even Saruman had to investigate this matter in Middle-earth. A Maia of Lórien - which Gandalf was - wouldn't be an expert on ringlore.

22 minutes ago, Let's Get Kraken said:

And even if Balrog fire is different than dragonfire, it's never even implied that Balrogs could destroy rings of power. Gandalf says that even Ancalagon wouldn't have been able to destroy the One Ring because of how much of his own power Sauron poured into it. I would be very surprised if Durin's Bane could bring more heat than Ancalagon.

Well, I don't know. Was Ancalagon such a huge threat because of the heat of his fire or his enormous size? We don't know. And we don't how hot the fire of the Balrogs burns.

22 minutes ago, Let's Get Kraken said:

The Sun is not something that anyone in Middle Earth would ever have had access to, so idk what the point of bringing that up is.

The point is that Arien, the spirit that controls and burns in the sun seems to be a fire spirit akin to the Balrogs. She most certainly could consume the One Ring. And if she can, the Balrogs could, too, perhaps.