Dothraki, actually that good on the open field?

[Nocturne]

Let me start off by saying that i loved the whole battle scene, but watching a few more times (more than i care to admit) i noticed that maybe Dothraki aren't all that? What i saw:

- They took the Lannister/Reach forces by surprise.

- The later had enough time to form a shield wall, but it was spread really thin.

- Bronn says when the Dothraki charge that they are going to overrun them.

The charge actually happens, but in the parts were Drogon didn't nuke the wall, the Westerosi held their own really well. They managed to to withstand the initial charge with relative ease, and that makes me wonder, had they had enough time to have their army organised, could they have easily won if not for the dragons?

There was a single moment, that made me think though that Dothraki would actually be all that on the open field: when they jumped on their horses and starting shooting their arrows. I could see them easily winning by doing that, but charging head on randomly (they didn't keep in formation while charging) seems like a really shitty idea, when their horses are not armoured like they have in the Vale.

Thoughts?

 

[syrinx]

Yeah, they did not look formidable at all. Charge was underwhelming. Arrow shooting from horse-back useless, at best.

[Crona]

Yea, a lot of people like to quote Robert that nobody should meet the dothraki in open field.

But, I wasn't impressed, especially the dude that said the Lannisters/Tarlys can't fight

 

[elder brother jonothor dar]

The army was surprisingly well organised and disciplined.

They went from lounging around and spread too long to battle ready formation in neat lines full armoured for the most part (no helmets for the knights - all 4 of them)

+ had river to their back so flanking was harder.

Without the dragon I would probably still give it to the hoard just on the size of the two sides, but both sides would have lost heavily

[Mikkel]

The Dothraki have fought very few actual battles - they mostly raid unprotected villages and make deals with anyone who could potentially pose a challenge (because it's easier and cheaper for the latter).

They're the military equivalent of a boxer who's undefeated because he picks opponents from the Chess club at the local highschool.

[MoreOrLess]

18 minutes ago, syrinx said:

Yeah, they did not look formidable at all. Charge was underwhelming. Arrow shooting from horse-back useless, at best.

The mongols that there partly based on conquered half the world mostly via horseback archery.

In terms of "what if's" as well in this situation they knew they'd caught an enemy by supprise and that dragonfire was going to help break their lines so a very direct attack was best, you could argue against a more organised force they would use more archery from range and spend more time trying to outflank there opponents.

[goomba]

It seemed only small portions of the Dothraki horde charged head onto the shield wall in interval bursts, where as the rest of the Horde circled around the lannister shield wall and picked them off by arrows or readying a follow-up charge.

Thus it may have looked like Lannisters held their own and the shield wall was somewhat effective, but only because the entire horde didn't actually flat out charge at them head on. 

The Lannister forces were basically screwed from the start because they were sitting ducks, Each Dothraki looked like they took out atleast 3 Lannister soldiers before they themselves fell.

So yea, even without Dragons the Dothraki Horde was gonna win imo.

While it would be cool to see armor on Dothraki and their horses, it seems it probably won't make a difference since it doesn't really help their fighting style, which seems to be "furious speed", although i'd like to see atleast a Dothraki commander with some armor since quite a few horse back raiders in real history did  have armor.

The problem is Dothraki don't really have much of a civilization, so they probably can't craft much or maintain armor very well  

[Mikkel]

1 minute ago, MoreOrLess said:

The mongols that there partly based on conquered half the world mostly via horseback archery.

They're a weak copy though, they may look (a wee bit) like the mongol horde, but they lack basically all the things that made the Mongols formidable - from a sense of self-preservation, to knowledge of sieges, tactics and well... everything. Whether this is intentional or lack of knowledge on Martin's part or not I don't know (in this at least the books and show align).

[Crona]

Did GRRM, say they are modeled after mongols? I've always wondered why they compared to them

[A bowl of brown]

Always struck me as more hun-like than mongol. Whixh would make them about 800 years outdated militarily

[OldGimletEye]

Well the Dothraki will be as good as the story wants them to be, I suppose.

But a few things here. Historically, light calvary didn’t do very well charging into fairly disciplined infantry. And even heavy calvary, more suited to the task, were leery of it. I mean it doesn’t seem like the Parthians just charged their heavy calvary right smack into Roman Legions, until at least those legions were broken up and a bit disorganized.

It’s true that calvary archers can make life a bit difficult for unbalanced forces. It’s also true that well balanced forces under competent commanders and can and did defeat armies made primarily up of horse archers.

I think a lot of people think of the Dothraki as being like the Mongols. But, there are a few caveats there, I think. For one, the Mongols employed pretty sophisticated tactics. There is little to support the Dothraki do that. Also, the Mongols did use heavy calvary to bludgeon their opponents usually after the opponents became disorganized and disoriented.
In the 1240s, the Mongols did maul, badly, European armies. I think the usual interpretation there is that European heavy calvary was relatively useless against Mongolian horse archers being slower and clumsier.

But, I think there are at least a couple of reasons to think that is not the correct interpretation. I’m no equine expert, but it’s my understanding that European horses of that era were actually both faster and stronger than Mongolian horses. So it’s not necessarily the case, that European heavy calvary was incapable of catching up with and engaging Mongolian horse archers. The main advantages of the Mongolian horse seem to have been 1) easier to use from a logistical point of view as they could survive off a variety of grasses, which is hugely important if you are moving over vast areas, 2) they were really maneuverable, if not out faster than their European counterparts.

Also, it seems in the 1280s the Mongolians were less successful than they had been in the 1240s. And what is also interesting is that it’s my understanding that the Hungarians actually increased the number of their heavy calvary, in response to the Mongolians, which is kind of an odd response if the simple story of knights being ineffective against Mongolian horse archers were true.

[Mikkel]

1 minute ago, OldGimletEye said:

Well the Dothraki will be as good as the story wants them to be, I suppose.

Yes, certainly. There's just no point trying to gauge their effectiveness from a historical example like the Mongols, since the similarity is skin-deep at best (I would argue even less than that).

[Lord Giggles]

I don't think this battle can be taken as a showing of what the Dothraki are truly capable of in their own right. They had every advantage it's possible to have: they caught their enemies by surprise, they had numerical superiority and they had a dragon on their side to break the shield wall of the Lannister/Tarly forces open. Given the way they attacked, namely charging headlong at a shield wall, I would guess that the Dothraki aren't as formidable as they're made out to be. They're light cavalry and light cavalry need very specific circumstances to go up against heavy infantry and win so in an open field, my bet would actually be on the Westerosi. But you never know, the Dothraki may surprise me yet.

[OldGimletEye]

I think an alternative question here might be: Damn, is the Lannister infantry that good?

I mean think about the situation here. Outnumbered, surrounded, and constantly pummeled by Dany from the air. And after seeing many of their comrades being vaporized by Dany, it would seem they didn’t break formation.

And even though the situation was hopeless they still fought.

[norwaywolf123]

2 hours ago, Nocturne said:

Let me start off by saying that i loved the whole battle scene, but watching a few more times (more than i care to admit) i noticed that maybe Dothraki aren't all that? What i saw:

- They took the Lannister/Reach forces by surprise.

- The later had enough time to form a shield wall, but it was spread really thin.

- Bronn says when the Dothraki charge that they are going to overrun them.

The charge actually happens, but in the parts were Drogon didn't nuke the wall, the Westerosi held their own really well. They managed to to withstand the initial charge with relative ease, and that makes me wonder, had they had enough time to have their army organised, could they have easily won if not for the dragons?

There was a single moment, that made me think though that Dothraki would actually be all that on the open field: when they jumped on their horses and starting shooting their arrows. I could see them easily winning by doing that, but charging head on randomly (they didn't keep in formation while charging) seems like a really shitty idea, when their horses are not armoured like they have in the Vale.

Thoughts?

 

The Dothraki did not seem to use much tactics

[Lord Giggles]

32 minutes ago, OldGimletEye said:

I think an alternative question here might be: Damn, is the Lannister infantry that good?

I mean think about the situation here. Outnumbered, surrounded, and constantly pummeled by Dany from the air. And after seeing many of their comrades being vaporized by Dany, it would seem they didn’t break formation.

And even though the situation was hopeless they still fought.

That was my impression when people started claiming that this battle proved the Dothraki were unbeatable. The real takeaway from that battle is that the Lannister troops displayed an absolutely insane amount of courage and discipline to keep fighting in that situation. Makes me wonder what the threatened punishment for retreat was if facing near certain death was preferable to it.

[snow is the man]

3 hours ago, MoreOrLess said:

The mongols that there partly based on conquered half the world mostly via horseback archery.

In terms of "what if's" as well in this situation they knew they'd caught an enemy by supprise and that dragonfire was going to help break their lines so a very direct attack was best, you could argue against a more organised force they would use more archery from range and spend more time trying to outflank there opponents.

no absoluetly not. The mongols did specialize in horseback archer and were great at it but it was not all they did. Genghis khan was an incredible general and used every new piece of tech he got from the civilazations he conquered. Whether that was siege equipment or other things. They also had more then mongols in their army by the end since the population of mongolia was very small so they had troops from all over the place by the end. Also they specialized in pretty much all horseback warfare and had infantry as well.

[snow is the man]

Personally I think the lannister infantry was amazing. They showed discipline and if dany's dragon hadn't opened up the line that the lannisters had and allowed the dothraki to charge right through and get behind the lannister soldiers I think the dothraki would have lost or won but been decimated in doing so essentially reducing dany's army to what little unsullied are left which by now is probably four thousand at most. The dothraki didn't have a good formation or work as a unit which is incredibly important in a battle and if the lannister forces hadn't been taken off guard (and been fighting a dragon) and been able to have heavy cavalry as well the dothraki would have been slaugthered.

[syrinx]

3 hours ago, MoreOrLess said:

The mongols that there partly based on conquered half the world mostly via horseback archery.

In terms of "what if's" as well in this situation they knew they'd caught an enemy by supprise and that dragonfire was going to help break their lines so a very direct attack was best, you could argue against a more organised force they would use more archery from range and spend more time trying to outflank there opponents.

My point is that horseback archery, which is supposed to be very effective, was completely useless in the show. The Dothraki just shot some arrows at a shield wall, and some arrows were shot back, the effectiveness was very similar. There was no purpose for that exchange in the dynamics of the battle, except looking cool.

[Camara]

Show-wise? Yes they are meant to be good, even Robert that never saw them knew their repuation.

Analysing their show despiction? They are overrated because they aren't actually using their strenght and are instead doing silly things.

 

The dothraki are despicted as light cavalry, horse-archers too, etc.

In real life steppe cultures generally were like this because it really suited them, they roam large open places and their light cavalry really excels at speed and mobility, with horse archers to take down enemies with no need to enter melee.

If the show or GRRM are making them the planetos mongols, they are doing it wrong like people said above.

The Mongol Empire was just not another light cavalry army. It was a real good trained army/cavalry with mixed units and real good at studying their enemies and learning from them. They had horse archers and other light cavalry yes, but also heavy cavalry, artillery, etc.

 

In the books actually we know the Dothraki are a one trick pony. They can't siege cities directly and they are too close minded in their approach, when they tried to pillage Qohor the unsullied shield walled them 12 times, they kept charging and losing, until they gave up. In real life any competent leader would give up at most after 2 tries.

 

Of course you can charge at a shield wall with horses, the momentum is too big for a human to handle, but generally when you do that you need heavy cavalry to not be a dumb kamikaze.

In any case cultures that fought horses quickly learned how to handle it by creating specialised pikemen to prevent cavalry charges to overwhelm everything.