Can Aegon I conquer Europe in the 15th century?

[Three-Fingered Pete]

5 minutes ago, Legitimate_Bastard said:

Lots of potential chow in that general vicinity.

 

Yeah, but would you want your three best assets to go off alone to hunt in (possibly) hostile territory?

[Eddard Waters]

I would like to note that the cannons of the time period were quite primitive and imprecise.

Also Dragonfire + Blackpowder = boom

The political dynamics of Europe is much more complicated then that of Westeros, so I'm not sure how aegon would try to deal with it.

[Legitimate_Bastard]

3 minutes ago, Three-Fingered Pete said:

 

Yeah, but would you want your three best assets to go off alone to hunt in (possibly) hostile territory?

I suppose not - but where in Europe would there not be potentially hostile forces around? Maybe have better luck going after seals etc. up north somewhere where populations are lower.

Makes me wonder about the skills of dragons in hunting underwater prey.

Quite off topic though

[Three-Fingered Pete]

4 minutes ago, Legitimate_Bastard said:

I suppose not - but where in Europe would there not be potentially hostile forces around? Maybe have better luck going after seals etc. up north somewhere where populations are lower.

Makes me wonder about the skills of dragons in hunting underwater prey.

 

Well, if they campaign European style, everyone goes home for the winter anyway, so they would need a safe haven to return to every year while hopefully holding on to what they took the previous year.

Probably pretty good if they can mange to get up enough speed underwater to exit and get airborne again. (The abomination shows them hunting in the sea off of Dragonstone)

[broken one]

6 hours ago, Alarich II said:

And in 1428, the Hussite army counted 3000 handheld guns alone , and about 300 light and 60 big cannons. The main driver was the Hundred Years War which sped up military innovation a a lot. And Aegon had only 3 dragons. Also the use of Byzantine Fire is not competely new to Europeans, so the shock and awe effect might be less than hoped.

seems much depends on the very moment they land and how long the campaign would take. I guess the use of byzantine fire was obscure to masses in Europe and some humble pump would be nothing compared to dragon's breath. XV century cannon, no matter how advanced, was not a bazooka, the need for propping up and all that stuff. Not sure if it was even capable of shooting at sharp angles (think about the chaotic ignition). Unless its not a mortar, but hitting a dragon with a mortar....

I think if Targs might fail, it would be because of logistics, 'Conventional' troops are necessary to occupy a land. But I'am not so sure about all that stuff with Satan. If the incestuous twins  served some good story, maybe the holy writ could be reinterpreted

[ninewinter]

12 hours ago, Three-Fingered Pete said:

 

If Hannibal could tie Rome up for years with grit and a handful of elephants, I think that the Targaryens could make a go of it. While gunpowder and artillery would be a good defense, early 15th century cannons were cumbersome and not terribly mobile and infantry wandering about with lit matches were already a huge hazard in that era.  Add in flying flame throwers and I think that the use of gunpowder would not be a boon to the Europeans until they killed the dragons.

Two easy defenses against gunpowder usage: Attack when it's raining, attack at night. Even simply flying in and attacking the enemy from behind would work since they wouldn't have time to adjust their forces to respond quickly enough.

If the Targaryens knew what they were facing and planned for it, they'd have a shot at it.

Agree. Gunpowder only becomes really very effective by the late 15th century and early 16th. The Targaryens, if they could rally enough support and gather enough material could very much acquire a good bunch of territory wherever they landed. Good point on someone who mentioned they should head on the pope. Not because I necessarily wanted to put the pope naked but as much as dissuade any "crusade" like movement being formed up which might be dangerous. I imagined some sort of branding for Aegon I as the Anti Christ, and that would be very bad for his popularity. 

[ninewinter]

Personally I believe a huge chunk of France under the Mad King Charles VI is ripe for the picking. If the English under Henry V manage to conquer half of France with 12,000 army, I'm sure a 1000 Targ force with three dragons is a match against the French nobility. Considering Aegon I character of incorporating defeated enemies to his force, that 1k could swell easily to 10k. Maybe an alliance with Burgundy? Or maybe Spain is much better, strategically located in the edge of Western Europe, under King Juan II who loves poetry more than war, with Spain having much lower population than France, Aegon could win just three decisive victory and he could conquer Castile, then head on to Portugal, Granada, then to France or Italy maybe when by the time of Aenys or Maegor. 

[Nowy Tends]

Some people here have no idea of the strength of catholicism in this time… Dragons + incest, please… Aegon and his sisters could as well look like goatees with tails + horns and eat human flesh…

[broken one]

Aegon is Jesus Christ. Incest? What incest?

 

[Ser Uncle P]

6 hours ago, Nowy Tends said:

Some people here have no idea of the strength of catholicism in this time… Dragons + incest, please… Aegon and his sisters could as well look like goatees with tails + horns and eat human flesh…

Aegon could start by allying himself with the newly formed Protestant states in Germany and Switzerland. Land right in the middle of the Reformation....

[Nowy Tends]

1 hour ago, Ser Uncle P said:

Aegon could start by allying himself with the newly formed Protestant states in Germany and Switzerland. Land right in the middle of the Reformation....

We're no longer talking about 15th century, then? (Luther was born in 1483, Calvin in 1509)

And going from an island South of Cornwall to the Holy Roman Empire with a foreign army + 3 dragons would be A BIT more complicated than going from Dragonstone to the mouth of the Blackwater…

[Ser Uncle P]

36 minutes ago, Nowy Tends said:

We're no longer talking about 15th century, then? (Luther was born in 1483, Calvin in 1509)

And going from an island South of Cornwall to the Holy Roman Empire with a foreign army + 3 dragons would be A BIT more complicated than going from Dragonstone to the mouth of the Blackwater…

Oops I was mixing up my history. 2017 was the 500th anniversary of 95 theses

[Legitimate_Bastard]

10 hours ago, Nowy Tends said:

Some people here have no idea of the strength of catholicism in this time… Dragons + incest, please… Aegon and his sisters could as well look like goatees with tails + horns and eat human flesh…

I think the power of fire would change some opinions quite quickly. 

Catholicism was strong indeed, but I equate the effect of using dragons on the medieval population of Europe to the atomic bombing of Japan at the end of WW2. You cannot find me a stronger example of a die-hard faithful/fanatical population that would quite possibly have fought an invasion down to the last individual. Almost instant surrender. The worshippers of a living god turned to pacifism LMAO. 

I think that fire breathing dragons that fly would overpower the fear of the church. Every time.

[rotting sea cow]

14 hours ago, nyser1 said:

I think you are mistaking Spain of the 15th century to that of a different time period. While Castile suffered from Civil War in the middle of the 14th century, it was a regional power in the 15th. Not to mention that Aragon (not to be confused with Aragorn LotR fans) was a Mediterranean power at this point and Iberian neighbor Portugal a maritime powe

Probably. I read quite a lot about that period during a time of my life and some spanish friends told me more stuff from more obscure sources, but I've forgotten a lot. Unlike many people believe, memory is quite limited.

Nevertheless, I think the 15 century is quite late and a lot of technological advanced were ramping up. Probably, the best time for such an invasion would me just after the end of the Black Death, when most of Europe was weakened.

[Three-Fingered Pete]

10 hours ago, Nowy Tends said:

Some people here have no idea of the strength of catholicism in this time… Dragons + incest, please… Aegon and his sisters could as well look like goatees with tails + horns and eat human flesh…

 

Protestantism didn't just come out of a vacuum. People didn't suddenly hear about Martin Luther and go "Oh, hey, I never thought of that before, let's reform!". The grievances against the Church were stirring for a good while in the preceding century. Aegon and Co. would have their problems with the unnatural aspects, but:

12 minutes ago, Legitimate_Bastard said:

I think the power of fire would change some opinions quite quickly. 

Catholicism was strong indeed, but I equate the effect of using dragons on the medieval population of Europe to the atomic bombing of Japan at the end of WW2. You cannot find me a stronger example of a die-hard faithful/fanatical population that would quite possibly have fought an invasion down to the last individual. Almost instant surrender. The worshippers of a living god turned to pacifism LMAO. 

I think that fire breathing dragons that fly would overpower the fear of the church. Every time.

 

Governments are just "might makes right" made legal. There would be plenty of opportunists, sycophants and "chaos ladder climbers" to feed the Targaryen's ambitions of conquest. It's after that would present a problem if they didn't establish themselves in either a new Church or the saviors of the old one.

[Three-Fingered Pete]

5 minutes ago, rotting sea cow said:

Probably, the best time for such an invasion would me just after the end of the Black Death, when most of Europe was weakened.

 

Especially if the Targaryens could offer the newly emerging middle class peasants a fair shake in the new regime.

[Nowy Tends]

12 minutes ago, rotting sea cow said:

Nevertheless, I think the 15 century is quite late and a lot of technological advanced were ramping up. Probably, the best time for such an invasion would me just after the end of the Black Death, when most of Europe was weakened.

Probably, but it could be the double-edged sword: a popular, respected tribune could as well make the Targs or the dragons look responsible for the Black Death…

[Legitimate_Bastard]

3 minutes ago, Nowy Tends said:

Probably, but it could be the double-edged sword: a popular, respected tribune could as well make the Targs or the dragons look responsible for the Black Death…

The timing would have to be done right. 

Ultimate legitimacy could have been bought if the Targs showed up at the Battle of Hattin and routed Saladin. 

Or did something amazing in the Holy Lands "in the name of Christ/God".

He could have been a real Prester John. Or at least conducted a propaganda campaign - the nobles wouldn't dare stand against someone who could claim the title of savior of Christendom.

 

[nyser1]

9 hours ago, rotting sea cow said:

Probably. I read quite a lot about that period during a time of my life and some spanish friends told me more stuff from more obscure sources, but I've forgotten a lot. Unlike many people believe, memory is quite limited.

Nevertheless, I think the 15 century is quite late and a lot of technological advanced were ramping up. Probably, the best time for such an invasion would me just after the end of the Black Death, when most of Europe was weakened.

That would be a nice period to strike. For Western Europe I would think that from the Fall of Rome to the First Crusade would be by far the most ripened periods. Sure, the notion of statehood is still far far away. However, the First Crusade did show that the Pope's words could lead to a mass mobilization.

The chaos caused by Germanic Tribes around the the fall of Rome, their quabbling afterwards, the Ostrogothic-Byzantine wars in Italy, Viking era, Magyar invasions....not a lot of STRENGTH in any form in the West at this time.

[ninewinter]

7 hours ago, nyser1 said:

That would be a nice period to strike. For Western Europe I would think that from the Fall of Rome to the First Crusade would be by far the most ripened periods. Sure, the notion of statehood is still far far away. However, the First Crusade did show that the Pope's words could lead to a mass mobilization.

The chaos caused by Germanic Tribes around the the fall of Rome, their quabbling afterwards, the Ostrogothic-Byzantine wars in Italy, Viking era, Magyar invasions....not a lot of STRENGTH in any form in the West at this time.

Yeah, well I raise the question because the setting of the books seems like early 15th century to me as there are no prevalent gunpowder and as the story of the books is very loosely inspired on the War of Roses. But yeah correct,  500 AD Europe is so ripe after the fall of Western Rome he can conquer half of Europe in his lifetime. He can fight Clovis and I'm sure Clovis will bend the knee in a Torrhen Stark like manner. Britain is divided into dozens of petty kingdoms easy to conquer, and I'm interested if he could make an alliance of convenience with Justinian.