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How do y'all think the Unsullied and Dothraki will perform in Westeros?


Jaenara Belarys

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1 hour ago, Aldarion said:

Well yeah, but as I said: if it is gambeson, then there is functionally no difference from what Westerosi troops (including infantry) wear.

No, cities usually grow up on trade routes. Sure, they will look for a defensible position if possible, but many cities aren't actually in that defensible positions: medieval Paris did begin as a refuge on an island, but it expanded onto plains along the river. Medieval London is located on less defensible side of the river. Ancient Mursa is in open plain with absolutely no natural defenses, and this also continued with medieval Osijek. Medieval Belgrade is also on a plain near a river. Even Rome grew into a city because it was located on a fordable part of the river - fact that there were some hills there was an accident. Zadar (ancient Iadera) is on a peninsula, but terrain there is not actually very defensible (whole area is completely flat). Vinkovci (ancient Cibalae) do have river... on one side. Remaining three sides face the open, completely flat plain.

And most of the cities Dothraki destroyed will have had no natural defensive features available to take advantage of in any case, simply due to topography of the place.

Because they are described as running with chariots. Heavy infantry does not fight in that way, because running for long distances leaves them tired, unable to fight, and out of formation. They march, and only break out in the sprint for the last few dozen paces - and most heavy infantry don't even do that. Heavy infantry also does not pursue the enemy, especially not the enemy on horse - they leave it to cavalry.

If Sarnori had had some sort of heavy infantry there, it would have stayed far back enough to see what is happening and form some sort of square or circular formation, while leaving pursuit to cavalry. In which case description of battle would have been far different from what we see - Sarnori infantry in the battle is clearly described as pursuing alongside cavalry.

And if we are really going by mythological accounts, then we also know how Dothraki fight infantry: they just charge at it while occasionally pelting it with arrows. If Sarnori had had heavy infantry, and Dothraki fought the way they did at Qohor, then Dothraki would have gotten themselves slaughtered. Even if we assume that Dothraki had somehow gotten mentally retarded in the few years between Field of Crows and attack on Qohor, heavy infantry would have been able to hold out for much longer than what description implies.

He was racking up wins, but shadowing his force had nothing to do with engaging towns. He wasn't able to take fortified cities, period. Reason why Romans shadowed his force was to prevent him from foraging and from splitting his army, not because they were afraid he would take cities. Logistics.

Phalangites when in offense had the exact same space between them as legionaries (one yard or three feet). Dense half-a-yard formation was only used for static defense. So if you think phalangites were "densely packed", well, then so were legionaries.

However, Romans never actually faced a proper phalanx outside Hannibal and maybe Pyrrhus. In Roman battles against Macedon, description shows each legionary faced two files of phalanx - which shows phalanx was using close-packed defensive formation despite being on the offense. No wonder it underperformed!

That is like saying "Roman legionaries fought so densely packed they couldn't use their weapons" because they did so few times they got surrounded.

Everything you describe Roman maniples as doing, properly drilled Macedonian phalanx was capable of doing as well. We know it was, because they actually did everything you describe. But again, Rome never actually faced properly drilled Macedonian phalanx. The closest they came to that was Hannibal and perhaps Pyrrhus.

I never said they won just by human wave tactics. But Roman strengths were logistics and engineering - especially siege engineering. In open field battles, Roman army was actually inferior to fully-arrayed Hellenistic or Iranian armies (note the "fully arrayed" here!). It was only during the Late Empire that Roman army actually becomes a force relying on tactical flexibility to win battles. Before then, anything more complex than "slow advance forward, cycle maniples" was a mark of a tactical genius rather than the way the army was designed to operate. Something like Byzantine tactical flexibility was basically nuclear science to ancient Romans.

Why crossbows? Longbows, which seem more popular than crossbows in Westeros for whatever reason, would also offer good counter to horse archers.

And considering how often archers are mentioned, it is unlikely they form a "small proportion" of Westerosi forces.

That would work if Westeros had only pikemen. But we see foot archers, and even mounted archers, in Westerosi armies. They would, if used properly, rather easily negate the ability of unarmored Dothraki to ride to wintin the range of their own bows, let alone close enough for their arrows to actually be effective against armor. Simply put, Dothraki wouldn't be able to do what they need to do to make your scenario a reality.

And we also know they only fought smartly once - and even that may have been an accident. Fact is, we do not know how Dothraki fight. On one hand, they did defeat armies and conquer cities, which would imply a degree of tactical competence - so we may well use Mongols as a benchmark. On the other hand, Mongols are clearly far more capable than Dothraki: Dothraki do not use armor, have no heavy cavalry, have no artillery except maybe siege artillery manned by slaves (a big maybe!)... which means that even if Dothraki do have brains, many of Mongol tactics simply wouldn't work because they don't have tools necessary to carry them out.

Basically, tactics wise we only have two examples of how Dothraki fight. Neither of which shows some significant degree of tactical proficiency, let alone something approaching the Mongol art of war.

They had no armor for horses, which made them highly vulnerable to horse archers. Hannibal also had twice as much cavalry as Romans did at Cannae, and Romans failed to support their cavalry with foot archers - in large part because they had no foot archers to begin with (they had only a few hundred archers at Cannae, out of an army of 80 000).

And as a matter of fact, it was heavy Iberian-Gaulish cavalry which destroyed their Roman opponents first, before going around and crushing Roman equites facing off against the Numidians. So while Roman cavalry definitely did suffer heavily against Numidian horse archers, Numidians were unable to destroy their opposing numbers by themselves. It was Hannibal's heavy cavalry which brought him victory at Cannae, not his Numidian horse archers.

As its silk itl probably be a slightly stronger gambeson

 

Usualy on the most defensible.places on trade routes and again the idea that only feudal societies know how to build and arra age defensive structures would be ridiculous esp.given the qaathi , valryrian freehold and free cities etc are/were clearly beyond westeros  in every way frome.conomy to tech. As for natural.defenses the quaathi cities are in a dessert, the valyrn city they took is said to have montains to 2 sides and a forrest to another and the wiki tv map based on grmms maps.seems to show most of the snoro cities within hills/mountins and almist all sided by rivers.

No they are said to be 'led in pursuit' of the seemingly routing dothraki. The chariots seemed to have broken the horsemem thus the rest were led in pursuit of a routing foe...historicaly where the biggest casulties are inflicted so yeah if the horsemen werent fleeing fast enough the infantry would persue too, to  slaughter.as.many as possible. The problem is there were 3 other khals formed up to surround the tall men and as for lasting.lomger we dont know how long the held out once surrounded.

Yes to stop him splitting his forces to protect his allies ,besieging more towns, burning crops to punish romans allies etc... something reinforcements could have done for him. 

No generaly the phalangites must operate closer together than the legionares nor can they form up as quickly or deal with rough terrain as well. Blocks of phalangites frontal line cannot easily wheel round and forces behind not dorectly engaged cannot easily take part in the battle..by contrast every legionary not in the front line directly engaging can be easily peeled of and instantly be poured onto gaps/flanks.

At its very height under alexander as the infantry moved forward and put pressure on the enemy he would choose where to strike with the companion cavalry which was the decisive arm..excellent forces but once commited  alexander himself.was not easily free to be reached (for obvious reasons)  and command unlike a roman commander who wouldnt be near front lines except in exceptional circumstances nor did its jr officers need instruction to peel of their non front line troops to exploit gaps.

 

Longbows.will be a good counter but again we know these would be well paid elite forces (3 times.regular infantry salary of i recall from the english) thus be a small % of the force, theyl also be behind pikemen and if the dothraki are concentrating  their force on arc firing at single blocks at a time most will be avoiding incomki g.fire not aiming at the closer riding horsemen....also they will be largely arc firing themselves due to being behind pikemen+.shields thus vs moving targets wont be highly accurate.

 

 So we have heard of them fight twice , a knight living among them says they do well in westeros  , a.warrior king (robert)  fears what they could do if well.led and we know somehow they took various fortifified cities and to add to it all they apparently have armour piercing sabres ...againw el.gavebto see what grmm does with them if they even do come to.westeros but of they do ot seems they have the potential to do well.

 

Nope it was the numidians killing them 

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On 10/30/2022 at 10:50 PM, astarkchoice said:

Usualy on the most defensible.places on trade routes and again the idea that only feudal societies know how to build and arra age defensive structures would be ridiculous esp.given the qaathi , valryrian freehold and free cities etc are/were clearly beyond westeros  in every way frome.conomy to tech. As for natural.defenses the quaathi cities are in a dessert, the valyrn city they took is said to have montains to 2 sides and a forrest to another and the wiki tv map based on grmms maps.seems to show most of the snoro cities within hills/mountins and almist all sided by rivers.

 

"Defensible place" and "trade route" are, for the most part, mutually exclusive. Market has to be accessible, first and foremost. That usually precludes it from being defensible.

Valyrian Freehold, sure, but the rest? Unlikely. And you are, again, completely missing the point: it is not about fortifications themselves, but the system. Fortified cities combined with many varied-size forts is far better than massive city fortifications and then nothing, which is what we mostly see in Essos.

On 10/30/2022 at 10:50 PM, astarkchoice said:

No they are said to be 'led in pursuit' of the seemingly routing dothraki. The chariots seemed to have broken the horsemem thus the rest were led in pursuit of a routing foe...historicaly where the biggest casulties are inflicted so yeah if the horsemen werent fleeing fast enough the infantry would persue too, to  slaughter.as.many as possible. The problem is there were 3 other khals formed up to surround the tall men and as for lasting.lomger we dont know how long the held out once surrounded.

 

Dothraki lost a khal there. You don't loose a khal in a faked retreat. In fact, losing a khal would be more than enough to turn a faked rout into real one.

And the infantry did pursue, in fact they are described as running. That is why I am so certain Sarnori had lightly-equipped infantry.

On 10/30/2022 at 10:50 PM, astarkchoice said:

Yes to stop him splitting his forces to protect his allies ,besieging more towns, burning crops to punish romans allies etc... something reinforcements could have done for him. 

 

And if reinforcements had made it to Italy, there would have been no need to keep Roman armies in Spain. So situation will not have changed much: if anything, you would have gotten the Napoleon situation where Romans wipe out Carthaginian armies not commanded by Hannibal one by one. And Romans would have had time to do it. In fact, something like that is what happened to Hasdrubal: he got destroyed attempting to join up with Hannibal.

Hannibal lost the war because he was unable to take cities. Regardless of whatever else you think may have led to Hannibal's defeat, it was Hannibal's inability to take cities which created conditions necessary for him to be defeated.

On 10/30/2022 at 10:50 PM, astarkchoice said:

No generaly the phalangites must operate closer together than the legionares nor can they form up as quickly or deal with rough terrain as well. Blocks of phalangites frontal line cannot easily wheel round and forces behind not dorectly engaged cannot easily take part in the battle..by contrast every legionary not in the front line directly engaging can be easily peeled of and instantly be poured onto gaps/flanks.

 

Macedonian phalanx had exact same distance between its phalangites as Roman legion had between its legionaries (three feet), and was (during Philip and Alexander's time at least) fully capable of complex maneuvers, developments, envelopments and dealing with complex terrain. Not entirely as capable as Roman legions, perhaps, due to basic tactical / maneuver block being larger (256 men in Macedonian syntagma vs 120 men in Republican maniple), but certainly far more mobile than whatever ridicule of a phalanx you have in mind here. It is true however that phalanx was less able to deal with rough terrain than the legion.

As a matter of fact, Macedonian armies were (during heyday) far more reliant on mobility than Roman legion. Romans simply arrayed themselves in three lines, marched forwards and then relied on their stubborness and individual initative to carry the day. But triplex acies was extremely vulnerable to flank attacks. Quincux was in fact designed to deal with spear phalanx:

But that simply wouldn't work against a pike phalanx.

And medieval pike squares were far more mobile than phalanx, as well as having eliminated most of phalanx' vulnerabilities. These things can do by themselves basically everything phalanx needed support troops to do: take offense, beat back flanking attacks, fight in forests... "easily wheel round and forces behind not dorectly engaged cannot easily take part in the battle" is precisely what Alexander's phalangites and medieval pikemen regularly did. And pike units regularly fought in uneven terrain, and were fairly successful at it (Swiss being the most obvious, but far from the only, example).

There are two main reasons why Romans triumphed over phalanx, and neither have to do with weapons:

  • First, they never faced actual Macedonian phalanx. After Alexander and his immediate successors, warfare in Greece largely regressed back to pre-Phillipian model of hoplite phalanx with no supporting units and no maneuver elements - except now they used pikes instead of spears. Even Pyrrhus and Hannibal, while coming very close, never actually matched the tactical flexibility of Alexandrian phalanx due to various other limitations (such as Hannibal's need to rely on allies). And against those two, legions lost every single battle (but still won the war).
  • Second, Roman soldiers were trained to take individual initiative. Yes, Roman victories relied on phalanx not being properly employed and a fair bit of luck... but also the fact that Roman soldiers fought as individuals. If a crack in a phalanx appeared, Romans were able to feed soldiers piecemeal into such a crack and thus exploit it. This could only work because, again, they never faced a proper phalanx (rodeleros were based on Roman legions, and see what happened when they went up against proper pike blocks... hint: guys with swords got slaughtered), but was absolutely necessary for Romans to win.

But if you compare Westerosi soldiers to the Unsullied... Westerosi troops will have advantage in formation fighting due to being trained in using pikes as opposed to the Unsullied who use spears. They will also have advantage in that they will be able to take individual initiative, which is precisely the thing that Unsullied training is aimed at suppressing, and will also have the advantage in individual combat due to not being eunuchs (plus maybe also having superior weapons and armor, depending on what exactly Unsullied will be using by the time they get to Westeros). In short: Unsullied cannot win if they fight as a phalanx, and cannot win if they fight as a Roman legion.

On 10/30/2022 at 10:50 PM, astarkchoice said:

At its very height under alexander as the infantry moved forward and put pressure on the enemy he would choose where to strike with the companion cavalry which was the decisive arm..excellent forces but once commited  alexander himself.was not easily free to be reached (for obvious reasons)  and command unlike a roman commander who wouldnt be near front lines except in exceptional circumstances nor did its jr officers need instruction to peel of their non front line troops to exploit gaps.

 

Alexander's phalanx had entire second phalanx behind it, whose entire purpose was to seal off any gaps in the main phalanx as well as to exploit opportunities as they rose. In other words, those weaknesses which Romans exploited against the phalanx... simply didn't exist in Alexander's case.

And Roman commanders often were at front lines. In fact, they did precisely what Alexander did: observe the battle and then lead the reserves at a key point.

On 10/30/2022 at 10:50 PM, astarkchoice said:

Longbows.will be a good counter but again we know these would be well paid elite forces (3 times.regular infantry salary of i recall from the english) thus be a small % of the force, theyl also be behind pikemen and if the dothraki are concentrating  their force on arc firing at single blocks at a time most will be avoiding incomki g.fire not aiming at the closer riding horsemen....also they will be largely arc firing themselves due to being behind pikemen+.shields thus vs moving targets wont be highly accurate.

 

Longbowmen in 100 Years War were paid about 20% more than the common infantry, and half as much as a mounted man at arms. Crossbowman was paid some 20% more than the longbowman.

And English managed to have 80% of their armies comprised of longbowmen at some point, so you cannot say that just because a type of troops is slightly more expensive than other type of troops, it will be automatically less common... some Byzantine themes were comprised entirely of cavalry, and Croatian army in early 15th century was almost entirely cavalry force, despite even light cavalry being expensive compared to infantry.

Dothraki will be significantly outranged by longbowmen, and again cavalry cannot have as dense formation as infantry. Historically, even slingers were a good counter to horse archers, and these require much more space and thus looser formations than archers do. So it makes no sense to assume that Dothraki will be somehow able to counter foot archers.

On 10/30/2022 at 10:50 PM, astarkchoice said:

 So we have heard of them fight twice , a knight living among them says they do well in westeros  , a.warrior king (robert)  fears what they could do if well.led and we know somehow they took various fortifified cities and to add to it all they apparently have armour piercing sabres ...againw el.gavebto see what grmm does with them if they even do come to.westeros but of they do ot seems they have the potential to do well.

 

It is certainly possible that GRRM will make them do well in Westeros, it is just that there is no logical reason why they would actually do well. So either Dothraki will be completely incongruous with what we have seen so far, or else we will have a massive logical hole.

Or, which is also possible, Dothraki are actually much like Spartans were in the antiquity - they have a terrifying reputation, but the moment they face a real army, that reputation will get shattered. Frankly, considering both the logical and historical reasons as well as several details in the books, latter is much more likely. Events of Daznak's pit actually suggest that:

After the beast fights came a mock battle, pitting six men on foot against six horsemen, the former armed with shields and longswords, the latter with Dothraki arakhs. The mock knights were clad in mail hauberks, whilst the mock Dothraki wore no armor. At first the riders seemed to have the advantage, riding down two of their foes and slashing the ear from a third, but then the surviving knights began to attack the horses, and one by one the riders were unmounted and slain, to Jhiqui’s great disgust. “That was no true khalasar,” she said.

Or maybe George will completely revamp and retcon the Dothraki and make them into actual Mongols. Regardless, it does appear that he has realized the Dothraki, as portrayed until now, are absolutely no threat to Westeros.

On 10/30/2022 at 10:50 PM, astarkchoice said:

Nope it was the numidians killing them 

That is just a myth. All accounts I have been able to find state that it was Celtic-Iberian heavy cavalry which destroyed Roman equites, not horse archers. This is just what I managed to find by 5-second Google search:

http://www.historyisnowmagazine.com/blog/2022/9/3/the-216bc-battle-of-cannae-an-un-cannae-defeat#.Y2GYAnbMJPY=

Paullus’ and Varro’s army blundered forward, intent on smashing through the weak Carthaginian center. While this drama played out in the center, the Roman and Carthaginian cavalry engaged in a heated melee on the flanks. The cavalry situation was less in Rome’s favor. On the Roman right, Hannibal’s allied Celtic cavalry beat the Roman cavalry on that side, and forced the Romans to flee. Meanwhile, on the Roman left, the Roman cavalry managed to hold off Hannibal’s Numidian cavalry. But the Roman left soon broke and fled when the victorious Celtic cavalry, abandoning their pursuit of the Roman right’s horsemen, turned against the Roman left’s cavalry (Keppie, 26). Thus, the Roman cavalry on either flank were beaten and driven off, leaving the Carthaginian cavalry unopposed.

So it was heavy cavalry which decided the battle for Hannibal, not horse archers.

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On 6/14/2022 at 1:53 PM, alcibiades the futa said:

Historically too light cavalry has generally outperformed heavy cavalry, even in europe they had to eventually ditch knights in armor for lighter more mobile and also ranged cavalry. Against mouted archers western armies had performed very poorly untill crossbows and gunpowder came along. Most people are drawing historical parallels from mongol invasion of europe which is good but a better comparison would be crusades and especially in battles against seljuks and mamelukes, which were mostly composed of mounted archers. Now they were armored and had more importantly shields but horse archers were the undisputed mvps during crusades so much so that even crusaders generally employed turcopoles and mouted archers to counter muslims.

Light cavalry (especially missile cavalry) are useful, but I don't think it's fair to say that they wholly superseded heavy cavalry on the battlefield. One of the factors in the Crusades, which is less applicable to Westeros (outside Dorne) is the climate. Heavily-armoured knights with destriers struggle in that heat with an inconsistent water supply, so light cavalry are more useful. But in northern and western Europe, light cavalry don't take off in the same way (outside Spain, which again has a lot of desert). And even in the Middle East, the arrival of knights was a major shock to the local military system: the knights often performed well on the battlefield when they could actually reach it in numbers and in good order.

Western armies did adopt missile cavalry but they did so by giving their existing heavy cavalry pistols. The standard cavalryman of the 1540s to the early 17th century was functionally a knight with a couple of guns. The armour did tail off after the 16th century, but that wasn't because "light cavalry were superior", it was because gunpowder had rendered effective armour so expensive relative to the protection it provided that it wasn't worth armouring them much beyond helmet and breastplate. Armoured heavy cavalry of this type remained in use and remained effective well into the 19th century.

It's also debatable whether the Dothraki are actually missile cavalry. They look enough like the Mongols or similar that we assume they fight in a similar way, but looking at that Devereux article, the actual textual information suggests their principal weapon is the sword, rather than the bow. That implies that, while manoeuvrable, they nevertheless prefer to engage in melee combat over ranged combat, and with two sets of cavalry charging at each other I would back the heavies every time.

At their first major battle against the Sarnori, the Dothraki vanguard was destroyed by chariots. That's the sort of thing that shouldn't be happening to an elite cavalry force, certainly not a Mongol/Hun-type horse-archer-based army.

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On 11/1/2022 at 10:19 PM, Aldarion said:

"Defensible place" and "trade route" are, for the most part, mutually exclusive. Market has to be accessible, first and foremost. That usually precludes it from being defensible.

Valyrian Freehold, sure, but the rest? Unlikely. And you are, again, completely missing the point: it is not about fortifications themselves, but the system. Fortified cities combined with many varied-size forts is far better than massive city fortifications and then nothing, which is what we mostly see in Essos.

Dothraki lost a khal there. You don't loose a khal in a faked retreat. In fact, losing a khal would be more than enough to turn a faked rout into real one.

And the infantry did pursue, in fact they are described as running. That is why I am so certain Sarnori had lightly-equipped infantry.

And if reinforcements had made it to Italy, there would have been no need to keep Roman armies in Spain. So situation will not have changed much: if anything, you would have gotten the Napoleon situation where Romans wipe out Carthaginian armies not commanded by Hannibal one by one. And Romans would have had time to do it. In fact, something like that is what happened to Hasdrubal: he got destroyed attempting to join up with Hannibal.

Hannibal lost the war because he was unable to take cities. Regardless of whatever else you think may have led to Hannibal's defeat, it was Hannibal's inability to take cities which created conditions necessary for him to be defeated.

Macedonian phalanx had exact same distance between its phalangites as Roman legion had between its legionaries (three feet), and was (during Philip and Alexander's time at least) fully capable of complex maneuvers, developments, envelopments and dealing with complex terrain. Not entirely as capable as Roman legions, perhaps, due to basic tactical / maneuver block being larger (256 men in Macedonian syntagma vs 120 men in Republican maniple), but certainly far more mobile than whatever ridicule of a phalanx you have in mind here. It is true however that phalanx was less able to deal with rough terrain than the legion.

As a matter of fact, Macedonian armies were (during heyday) far more reliant on mobility than Roman legion. Romans simply arrayed themselves in three lines, marched forwards and then relied on their stubborness and individual initative to carry the day. But triplex acies was extremely vulnerable to flank attacks. Quincux was in fact designed to deal with spear phalanx:

But that simply wouldn't work against a pike phalanx.

And medieval pike squares were far more mobile than phalanx, as well as having eliminated most of phalanx' vulnerabilities. These things can do by themselves basically everything phalanx needed support troops to do: take offense, beat back flanking attacks, fight in forests... "easily wheel round and forces behind not dorectly engaged cannot easily take part in the battle" is precisely what Alexander's phalangites and medieval pikemen regularly did. And pike units regularly fought in uneven terrain, and were fairly successful at it (Swiss being the most obvious, but far from the only, example).

There are two main reasons why Romans triumphed over phalanx, and neither have to do with weapons:

  • First, they never faced actual Macedonian phalanx. After Alexander and his immediate successors, warfare in Greece largely regressed back to pre-Phillipian model of hoplite phalanx with no supporting units and no maneuver elements - except now they used pikes instead of spears. Even Pyrrhus and Hannibal, while coming very close, never actually matched the tactical flexibility of Alexandrian phalanx due to various other limitations (such as Hannibal's need to rely on allies). And against those two, legions lost every single battle (but still won the war).
  • Second, Roman soldiers were trained to take individual initiative. Yes, Roman victories relied on phalanx not being properly employed and a fair bit of luck... but also the fact that Roman soldiers fought as individuals. If a crack in a phalanx appeared, Romans were able to feed soldiers piecemeal into such a crack and thus exploit it. This could only work because, again, they never faced a proper phalanx (rodeleros were based on Roman legions, and see what happened when they went up against proper pike blocks... hint: guys with swords got slaughtered), but was absolutely necessary for Romans to win.

But if you compare Westerosi soldiers to the Unsullied... Westerosi troops will have advantage in formation fighting due to being trained in using pikes as opposed to the Unsullied who use spears. They will also have advantage in that they will be able to take individual initiative, which is precisely the thing that Unsullied training is aimed at suppressing, and will also have the advantage in individual combat due to not being eunuchs (plus maybe also having superior weapons and armor, depending on what exactly Unsullied will be using by the time they get to Westeros). In short: Unsullied cannot win if they fight as a phalanx, and cannot win if they fight as a Roman legion.

Alexander's phalanx had entire second phalanx behind it, whose entire purpose was to seal off any gaps in the main phalanx as well as to exploit opportunities as they rose. In other words, those weaknesses which Romans exploited against the phalanx... simply didn't exist in Alexander's case.

And Roman commanders often were at front lines. In fact, they did precisely what Alexander did: observe the battle and then lead the reserves at a key point.

Longbowmen in 100 Years War were paid about 20% more than the common infantry, and half as much as a mounted man at arms. Crossbowman was paid some 20% more than the longbowman.

And English managed to have 80% of their armies comprised of longbowmen at some point, so you cannot say that just because a type of troops is slightly more expensive than other type of troops, it will be automatically less common... some Byzantine themes were comprised entirely of cavalry, and Croatian army in early 15th century was almost entirely cavalry force, despite even light cavalry being expensive compared to infantry.

Dothraki will be significantly outranged by longbowmen, and again cavalry cannot have as dense formation as infantry. Historically, even slingers were a good counter to horse archers, and these require much more space and thus looser formations than archers do. So it makes no sense to assume that Dothraki will be somehow able to counter foot archers.

It is certainly possible that GRRM will make them do well in Westeros, it is just that there is no logical reason why they would actually do well. So either Dothraki will be completely incongruous with what we have seen so far, or else we will have a massive logical hole.

Or, which is also possible, Dothraki are actually much like Spartans were in the antiquity - they have a terrifying reputation, but the moment they face a real army, that reputation will get shattered. Frankly, considering both the logical and historical reasons as well as several details in the books, latter is much more likely. Events of Daznak's pit actually suggest that:

After the beast fights came a mock battle, pitting six men on foot against six horsemen, the former armed with shields and longswords, the latter with Dothraki arakhs. The mock knights were clad in mail hauberks, whilst the mock Dothraki wore no armor. At first the riders seemed to have the advantage, riding down two of their foes and slashing the ear from a third, but then the surviving knights began to attack the horses, and one by one the riders were unmounted and slain, to Jhiqui’s great disgust. “That was no true khalasar,” she said.

Or maybe George will completely revamp and retcon the Dothraki and make them into actual Mongols. Regardless, it does appear that he has realized the Dothraki, as portrayed until now, are absolutely no threat to Westeros.

That is just a myth. All accounts I have been able to find state that it was Celtic-Iberian heavy cavalry which destroyed Roman equites, not horse archers. This is just what I managed to find by 5-second Google search:

http://www.historyisnowmagazine.com/blog/2022/9/3/the-216bc-battle-of-cannae-an-un-cannae-defeat#.Y2GYAnbMJPY=

Paullus’ and Varro’s army blundered forward, intent on smashing through the weak Carthaginian center. While this drama played out in the center, the Roman and Carthaginian cavalry engaged in a heated melee on the flanks. The cavalry situation was less in Rome’s favor. On the Roman right, Hannibal’s allied Celtic cavalry beat the Roman cavalry on that side, and forced the Romans to flee. Meanwhile, on the Roman left, the Roman cavalry managed to hold off Hannibal’s Numidian cavalry. But the Roman left soon broke and fled when the victorious Celtic cavalry, abandoning their pursuit of the Roman right’s horsemen, turned against the Roman left’s cavalry (Keppie, 26). Thus, the Roman cavalry on either flank were beaten and driven off, leaving the Carthaginian cavalry unopposed.

So it was heavy cavalry which decided the b

 

attle for Hannibal, not horse archers.

Theres nothing to suggest these cultures didnt have a full defensive structures too as well as better defensive buildingwork.

The chariots which went 1st  seek out high ranking warriors and officers and khals  seemingly lead from the front....high ranking officers fall in battles even when things go to plan, it happens esp if a culture where said leaders arent supposed to hide behind their men.

Yes they persue...infantry persue retreating forces  its what happens when the enemy routs ! both heavy and light will historicaly  follow a breaking foe in battles.

That assumes every non hannibal led force HAD to lose   plus loses in spain literaly reduced the massive reinforcements he was going to get from carthages half assed senate, the fact is spain was cartgages main exonomic and military asset by far ...its loss ended a war that could have been won or lost at dozens of differeing points. The enormous gains hannibals family had made in spain were pretty much was the only  reason carthage was back at romes 'weight class ' again after the 1st war.

Actualy as polybius pointed out the phalangites had on adverage half the space the legionares had when engaged,alexander and his fathers phalanx largely differed only in its combined arms approache with the vunerable.phalangites being protected by regular (and elite) hoplites, allied cavalry  slingers,.archers and alexanders addition of savage light infantry too. The sucessors relying instead on longer spears and numbers rather than flexibility

The phalanx of alexanders time was manueverable yes but by sheer virtue of the sarissa it simply cannot  form up or have men peeled away from blocks to form up as quicky as a legion, the row of men must be arranged and spears must be lowered and a wall formed ...by contrast the legionare is always ready. The phalngites in any phalanx wall at the midlde and back forming extra depth with sarissa up are vunerable close whereas no legionary is....they can take individual initiative whereas the phalangite must be part of a formed wall to be effective due to the unweildy huge spear! Even a 2nd block of them behind one block cant save the 1st block once legionaries are among them and hacking at close quarters.

Alexander stayed with his companion cavalry to make the deciding charge of the battles, for all the focus on  the phalanx it just put pressure on the enemy to slowly push them back  with casulties  but  it was his elite cavalry that he took into gaps to shatter the enemy that decided things BUT once committed obviously he was unable.to command further...by contrast a legions commander was expected to be away from.the danger and reserves led by other officers

Pikemen in early to mid medieval times as in grmms world we see are backed by regualar spearmen, and other infantry though the rise of the elite pikemen (who themselves carried swords and did mix other forces in for protection) in fact the bulk of the  infantry in westeros seem.to be the mixed bag one would expect , the pikemen move easily over  rough territory confident their less encumbered collegues can protect them 

The unsullied are utterly.loyal that doesnt mean they cant show initiative, in fact we know their comicaly hard training requires initative to steal , climb mountains alone  in the night , respond to  a differnet name called out  every day  ..they have their own closely guarded  religion and pick greyworm as their natural leader. As for vs.westerosi infantry they lack better armour (but are wearing some) , the reach of.pikes to get past and physical.strenght but we can assume their drilled to freakish levels at forming up into various formations , fighting as a a unit and will be exceptionaly skilled as individuals.

Again it remains to be seen if the 3 spears are pikelike long spears mixed with regular spears and various throwing spears of various types

 

The english were an exception , the westerosi forces will have archers.but few.of their foot.will  be them or are described as such. They will be in denser formation but thats not a great thing either given most longbow  archery will be arc firing not direct aiming (as opposed to the crossbowmen who who must aim due to the slower reload speeds) 

So for them to be practical the longbowmen  must arc fire behind packed infantry  squares  at moving spread out groups while possibly recieving larger volumes of arced  fire back  from.various angles  , the crossbowmen to be effective will be  right up next to the pikemen behind shields/pallets to aim at those who ride closer to  actualy aim at the pikemen etc.

The numidians werent horse archers they were javelin carriying unarmoured cavalry and yes they slaughtered armoured roman cavalry regualrly

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On 11/3/2022 at 3:17 PM, astarkchoice said:

Theres nothing to suggest these cultures didnt have a full defensive structures too as well as better defensive buildingwork.

 

There is nothing to suggest they did. There is however something that suggests they didn't: they didn't have feudalism.

On 11/3/2022 at 3:17 PM, astarkchoice said:

The chariots which went 1st  seek out high ranking warriors and officers and khals  seemingly lead from the front....high ranking officers fall in battles even when things go to plan, it happens esp if a culture where said leaders arent supposed to hide behind their men.

 

Chariots were outdated the moment somebody invented a saddle. In fact, they were outdated the moment horses became large enough for soldiers to ride... so the fact that Sarnori were using chariots in the first place shows that their cavalry (and thus cavalry and anti-cavalry tactics) could not have been that good.

80 000 Dothraki destroyed a Sarnori host of 120 000? Good for them. Considering how battle is described, you could have had 20 000 Westerosi knights and do even better.

On 11/3/2022 at 3:17 PM, astarkchoice said:

Yes they persue...infantry persue retreating forces  its what happens when the enemy routs ! both heavy and light will historicaly  follow a breaking foe in battles.

 

Heavy infantry will not run in a way as described. At best they run when deploying (e.g. Athenian hoplites at Marathon) and sometimes when advancing to contact (e.g. Swiss pikemen), but that is a short sprint over a distance of no more than a hundred meters. Chasing after retreating forces was a job for cavalry, or, alternatively, light infantry.

In fact, Dio directly states that heavy infantry does not pursue retreating enemy (though in this case the enemy is not routed):

Quote

Both cavalry and yiloi\ attacked him [Cornificius] from a distance, not daring to come to close quarters, and proved exceedingly troublesome to him; for they would not only attack whenever opportunity offered but would also quickly retreat again, whereas his men, being heavy-armed, could not pursue them in any case owing to the weight of their armour, and moreover were endeavouring to protect the unarmed men who had been saved from the fleet. Consequently, they were suffering many injuries and could inflict none in return; for, in case they made a rush upon any of them, they would put them to flight, to be sure, but being unable to carry their pursuit to the end, they would find themselves in a worse plight during their retreat, since by their sortie they would become isolated

Cases where heavy infantry did pursue in such a manner was basically a heavy infantry versus heavy infantry clash in which neither side had supporting cavalry.

And when we look at actual chariot-using societies, infantry in these cultures had - at best - helmet and shield, but no armor (Hittites, Egyptians). Oftentimes, they did not even have a shield.

Also, today's Dothraki rely on reputation, rather than actual fighting. We don't even know if they have kept up the (not very high) standards of the ancient Dothraki. They certainly don't seem to have sacked any cities ever since conquest of the Sarnori.

On 11/3/2022 at 3:17 PM, astarkchoice said:

That assumes every non hannibal led force HAD to lose   plus loses in spain literaly reduced the massive reinforcements he was going to get from carthages half assed senate, the fact is spain was cartgages main exonomic and military asset by far ...its loss ended a war that could have been won or lost at dozens of differeing points. The enormous gains hannibals family had made in spain were pretty much was the only  reason carthage was back at romes 'weight class ' again after the 1st war.

 

No, it does not. Romans had secure bases in their fortified cities. This means that even if they lost a battle, they could retreat, regroup and try again. Or simply refuse battle and harass Hannibal's army, cutting off supplies.

Regardless of whether Spain remained or not, Hannibal himself had to rely on supplies he could either receive by sea, or forage in Italy itself. But he could not receive anything by sea because he was not able to take ports (they were fortified), and he could not reliably forage because foraging parties would get destroyed by Romans (that is what Cunctator did). As a result, Hannibal ended up being rendered impotent, irrelevant and isolated in southern Italy once Romans stopped trying to have a direct headbutting contest with him.

Sure, loss of Spain hurt Carthage enormously and it did remove it as a major power - but it had no direct relevance to Hannibal's campaign, which had already stalled and effectively failed before Rome had conquered Spain.

On 11/3/2022 at 3:17 PM, astarkchoice said:

Actualy as polybius pointed out the phalangites had on adverage half the space the legionares had when engaged,alexander and his fathers phalanx largely differed only in its combined arms approache with the vunerable.phalangites being protected by regular (and elite) hoplites, allied cavalry  slingers,.archers and alexanders addition of savage light infantry too. The sucessors relying instead on longer spears and numbers rather than flexibility

 

Polybius is writing specifically about the phalanx which actually faced Roman legions, which has no relation to the phalanx as used by Alexander. Alexander's phalangites typically operated at the same 3 feet spacing as Roman legionaries did, and could perform complex maneuvers - honestly, opening and closing ranks was the least complex of maneuvers they did.

But some time after Alexander, warfare in Greece reverted back to old hoplite warfare, except with pikes. There were no cavalry, no light infantry, no archers, and only a tightly packed phalanx incapable of maneuver or offensive action.

Phalanxes Romans defeated have absolutely nothing to do with phalanx of Alexander, much less with medieval pike formations. You are correct that the biggest difference was the presence of supporting arms in Alexander's army, but even phalanx itself was different. Alexander's phalanx had pike formations that were aggressive, flexible and capable of complex maneuvers. Successor phalanxes just... weren't. And one of major reasons was that distance you mentioned: phalangites in late Macedonian phalanx were much more densely packed than Alexander's phalangites, and this robbed the formation of much of its mobility.

On 11/3/2022 at 3:17 PM, astarkchoice said:

The phalanx of alexanders time was manueverable yes but by sheer virtue of the sarissa it simply cannot  form up or have men peeled away from blocks to form up as quicky as a legion, the row of men must be arranged and spears must be lowered and a wall formed ...by contrast the legionare is always ready. The phalngites in any phalanx wall at the midlde and back forming extra depth with sarissa up are vunerable close whereas no legionary is....they can take individual initiative whereas the phalangite must be part of a formed wall to be effective due to the unweildy huge spear! Even a 2nd block of them behind one block cant save the 1st block once legionaries are among them and hacking at close quarters.

 

That does not actually take all that much time. Pikes would be kept vertical while maneuvering, and only lowered while everybody was in position. As for how quickly formation would be ready, that would only make a difference in case of ambush - and we know that phalangites actually carried swords and short spears while on march, whereas pikes were carried in the baggage train.

What would give Roman legion somewhat better mobility is the fact that Roman centuria is smaller numerically than phalangite syntagma. But medieval pike squares were usually of similar size to centurias, so against pikemen, Romans wouldn't have that advantage (for reference, centuria was 100 men in a 10x10 formation, then reduced to 80 (10x8) and then to 60 (10x6); Macedonian syntagma was 256 men (16x16), and medieval pike square was typically 100 men (10x10)).

Yes, Roman legionary would have an advantage up close... but to get up close, formation has to get disrupted first.

On 11/3/2022 at 3:17 PM, astarkchoice said:

Alexander stayed with his companion cavalry to make the deciding charge of the battles, for all the focus on  the phalanx it just put pressure on the enemy to slowly push them back  with casulties  but  it was his elite cavalry that he took into gaps to shatter the enemy that decided things BUT once committed obviously he was unable.to command further...by contrast a legions commander was expected to be away from.the danger and reserves led by other officers

 

Once troops are committed to battle, pulling them back is basically impossible. That is why more advanced armies (Macedonian phalanx, Roman legion) always had reserve behind the main line. And that reserve was usually directly commanded by commander and committed at a crucial point of battle.

So not that much difference. And while I cannot speak for every single Roman commander, Caesar at least fought in person very often.

On 11/3/2022 at 3:17 PM, astarkchoice said:

Pikemen in early to mid medieval times as in grmms world we see are backed by regualar spearmen, and other infantry though the rise of the elite pikemen (who themselves carried swords and did mix other forces in for protection) in fact the bulk of the  infantry in westeros seem.to be the mixed bag one would expect , the pikemen move easily over  rough territory confident their less encumbered collegues can protect them 

 

Historically, and I have already explained this a few times, the main reason why pikemen were supported by other units was to win push of the pike: in other words, to have something to tilt the balance of battle once pikemen became tied up with each other. These could be shield-and-sword troops (e.g. Spanish rodeleros), troops with two-handed swords (e.g. Landsknecht zweihander wielders), or just men-at-arms with pollaxes.

We see Westerosi pikemen moving across and fighting on a rough ground without losing formation, so that is obviously not something you can rely on.

On 11/3/2022 at 3:17 PM, astarkchoice said:

The unsullied are utterly.loyal that doesnt mean they cant show initiative, in fact we know their comicaly hard training requires initative to steal , climb mountains alone  in the night , respond to  a differnet name called out  every day  ..they have their own closely guarded  religion and pick greyworm as their natural leader. As for vs.westerosi infantry they lack better armour (but are wearing some) , the reach of.pikes to get past and physical.strenght but we can assume their drilled to freakish levels at forming up into various formations , fighting as a a unit and will be exceptionaly skilled as individuals.

 

Training aimed at removing individuality means precisely that, however. And Spartan comically hard training that the Unsullied training is based on did not provide them with any sort of initiative. Or much of an advantage over your regular Greek levy hoplite.

Seeing how Unsullied are based on the Greek phalanx, and Greek phalanx did not require much skill to fight in, there is no reason to assume that training of the Unsullied is superior to that of the Westerosi levy infantry. It might be, but it also might not. It might also be inferior. We just have no way to know.

And honestly, it is hilarious how Kraznys is bragging that the Unsullied are mindless, physically weak, and fight in fashion of armies thousands of years out of date. Nevermind the fact that in the only known Westerosi vs Unsullied battle, Westerosi army wiped the floor with the Unsullied, seeing how it actually sacked Astapor.

On 11/3/2022 at 3:17 PM, astarkchoice said:

Again it remains to be seen if the 3 spears are pikelike long spears mixed with regular spears and various throwing spears of various types

 

It does, but frankly, description of how the Unsullied fight would be impossible if their standard armament were Roman-like javelins.

On 11/3/2022 at 3:17 PM, astarkchoice said:

The english were an exception , the westerosi forces will have archers.but few.of their foot.will  be them or are described as such. They will be in denser formation but thats not a great thing either given most longbow  archery will be arc firing not direct aiming (as opposed to the crossbowmen who who must aim due to the slower reload speeds) 

 

English were an exception in that 80% of their armies were archers. They were not an exception in having a lot of ranged troops:

  • Byzantine 10th century expeditionary army detailed in Praecepta consisted of 12 taxiarchies, each of 400 heavy spear infantry, 300 archers, 200 light infantry (javeliners and slingers) and 100 pikemen. Thus in total an army would have 6 000 melee infantry (spearmen and pikemen) and 6 000 ranged troops (archers, javeliners, slingers) in line infantry units. Between line units, skirmishers and reserves, army had 11 200 heavy spearmen (6 000 in taxiarchies), 4 800 archers (3 600 in line, 1 200 skirmishers), 2 400 javeliners and slingers and 1 200 pikemen. A total of 12 400 melee and 7 200 ranged infantry (so 36,7% or about 1/3 ranged infantry).
  • 15th century Burgundian lance consisted of 1 mounted man-at-arms, 1 mounted swordsman, 3 mounted archers (30 arrows and bow each), 1 foot crossbowman, 1 handgunner, 1 pikeman, 1 page (noncombatant). This means 2 mounted melee cavalry, 3 missile cavalry, 1 melee infantry and 2 missile infantry. So infantry was 1/3 of army, but missile infantry was 2/3 of infantry.
  • 15th century Spanish infantry units had 1/3 crossbowmen, 1/3 pikemen, 1/3 men-at-arms armed with close-quarters weapons. So missile infantry was about one third of infantry.
  • Black Army of Matthias Corvinus had either a fifth or a quarter of the infantry as "pushkars", meaning that at least a quarter to a third of infantry were ranged troops, seeing how he also used crossbowmen and archers because gunpowder was too expensive. Hell, Hungary kept using trebuchets throughout 15th century for that reason.
  • Hungarian diet of 1518 required 6 000 cavalry (3 000 heavy cavalry, 3 000 light cavalry) and 4 000 infantry (2 000 pikemen, 2 000 handgunners). So 50% of infantry was ranged infantry. That however was just a paper army that was never assembled, but shows what was seen as an ideal force in late 15th / early 16th century.

Overall, we see that actual medieval armies had between 1/3 and 2/3 of their infantry as ranged troops, even if we look just at 15th century armies.

We do not know how many archers an average Westerosi army has. The best are few reports of small unit action, for example Ser Harwyn taking "five knights and twenty archers". Tywin's army of 20 000 men had 5 000 heavy cavalry, 1 500 light cavalry, 2 500 heavy infantry, and unknown number of archers and pikemen. Assuming equal split, there will have been 5 000 pikemen and 5 000 archers. So archers will have been some 25% of the army and 40% of infantry.

Also, longbowmen absolutely did shoot aimed shots at flat trajectory. That is actually pretty much how English longbowmen operated, and although ballistic long-range shooting was definitely a thing, it was not expected to have any particular impact. Not against armored enemies, anyway.

On 11/3/2022 at 3:17 PM, astarkchoice said:

So for them to be practical the longbowmen  must arc fire behind packed infantry  squares  at moving spread out groups while possibly recieving larger volumes of arced  fire back  from.various angles  , the crossbowmen to be effective will be  right up next to the pikemen behind shields/pallets to aim at those who ride closer to  actualy aim at the pikemen etc.

 

Both longbowmen and crossbowmen are far more flexible than you assume them to be. It does appear that archers are usually positioned behind heavy infantry in Westeros, but that is not a necessity. There had been cases where foot archers were interspersed with heavy infantry, were positioned on infantry's flanks, or were positioned behind a line of pavises with heavy infantry behind them.

And foot archers will always manage to have greater volume of fire, from greater range, and with heavier and more deadly arrows, than horse archers will. Even using short bows, and longbows are lot more dangerous than those.

On 11/3/2022 at 3:17 PM, astarkchoice said:

The numidians werent horse archers they were javelin carriying unarmoured cavalry and yes they slaughtered armoured roman cavalry regualrly

Please show some examples with context. Because as I said: at Cannae, Numidians fought a delaying action, but it was Iberian and Gallic heavy cavalry which actually defeated the Roman equites.

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11 minutes ago, The Lord of the Crossing said:

The synergy of the Unsulled and the Dothraki khalasars will be too much for the poorly-trained forces of Westeros.

What synergy? And the forces of Westeros aren't poorly trained, in fact Westeros will have a large number of veteran soldiers from the War of the Five Kings.

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18 minutes ago, The Lord of the Crossing said:

The synergy of the Unsulled and the Dothraki khalasars will be too much for the poorly-trained forces of Westeros.  Dany's team will be able to win against anything the Westerosi can put together. 

You: *poorly trained forces of Westeros*

Actual books: *pikemen maintaining excellent formation despite rough terrain* *pikemen only breaking after a missile bombardment, head-on fight against another pike block and a heavy cavalry charge* *losing army manages to retreat in good order* *1500 cavalry routs a Wildling army numbering tens of thousands*

Yeah... one of two things is wrong here, and I don't think it is the books.

Unsullied + Dothraki would lose against the teracotta army from the Mummy.

 

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7 hours ago, Craving Peaches said:

Can't tell whether people genuinely have no reading comprehension, are being wilfully ignorant or know but don't care because it doesn't fit their agenda.

7 hours ago, Terrorthatflapsinthenight9 said:

All three at once.

This, plus serious lack of historical knowledge and/or understanding.

1) Lack of reading comprehension - everybody gets hung up over few peasants in Westerosi forces and ignores what those forces actually do when in battle.

2) Willfull ignorance - "I like Daenerys and want her to win, so obviously she will have the most badass army in existence".

3) Agenda - same as above, but intentional.

4) Lack of historical knowledge - "Horse archer armies were very successful, Dothraki are horse archers and thus Dothraki will be very successful". Meanwhile, actual horse archer armies: *CATAPHRACTS*.

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  • 1 month later...

The Unsullied also, evidently, can only truly work on a flat or even terrain that allow them to do their military formations and shield walls. 

They would be in a difficult position in moutains or in a dense forest with hills. 

Westerosi forces could possibly pull a scenario à la Teutoburg in one of these scenarios. 

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9 hours ago, Terrorthatflapsinthenight9 said:

The Unsullied also, evidently, can only truly work on a flat or even terrain that allow them to do their military formations and shield walls. 

They would be in a difficult position in moutains or in a dense forest with hills. 

Westerosi forces could possibly pull a scenario à la Teutoburg in one of these scenarios. 

The ambush part of that works yes but if the forrest is that densely wooded then the other side cant form up either

Then you have 2 groups.of infantry going agaisnt each other ina formless melee in the woods .......the westerosi have a wider variety of weapons, better armour and testosterone/strength  vs the unsullied who will be much better individual skillwise (having endured stupidly intense training from birth) , insane pain reistance, 0 fear (their robot like obedience would prob be a bit unsettling) ,  and of course  stamina levels way  wayyyyy beyond what their testosteroneless.bodies should actualy have!!! 

The deciding factor there would be  numbers which  favour the westerosi  as even the crownlands has more infantry than dany has

 

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22 minutes ago, Rondo said:

The two Targaryen armies combined are too potent for anything in Westeros to stop them.  

Tell me, Rondo, do you look at all the replies above where people use logic, reason and knowledge of history to show why this would not be the case? Do you disagree? Do you just ignore it because it would make things harder for Daenerys?

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4 hours ago, astarkchoice said:

The ambush part of that works yes but if the forrest is that densely wooded then the other side cant form up either

Then you have 2 groups.of infantry going agaisnt each other ina formless melee in the woods .......the westerosi have a wider variety of weapons, better armour and testosterone/strength  vs the unsullied who will be much better individual skillwise (having endured stupidly intense training from birth) , insane pain reistance, 0 fear (their robot like obedience would prob be a bit unsettling) ,  and of course  stamina levels way  wayyyyy beyond what their testosteroneless.bodies should actualy have!!! 

The deciding factor there would be  numbers which  favour the westerosi  as even the crownlands has more infantry than dany has

 

Actually, it is not even certain that the Unsullied have better individual skills. In fact, point was made specifically that the Unsullied do not fight as individuals. And that "stupidly intense training" seems to be aimed more at instilling obedience than any kind of martial skill. Kinda like Spartans, who got walked all over by Macedonians and later didn't even try to fight against the Romans.

Robot like obedience would also be a significant disadvantage in any kind of irregular battle such as fighting in heavily wooded terrain. There is a reason why Romans trained their legionaries to be capable of taking individual initiative.

2 hours ago, astarkchoice said:

2?

Maybe he means Daenerys' army + Golden Company? Latter most likely is the best army in the book, pound-for-pound... but it lacks the poundage of the Westerosi armies, so Westeros would still win by attrition. Also, lack of cavalry may be a major disadvantage for the Golden Company, so even being better "pound for pound" compared to Westerosi armies is not actually certain.

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5 hours ago, astarkchoice said:

The ambush part of that works yes but if the forrest is that densely wooded then the other side cant form up either

Then you have 2 groups.of infantry going agaisnt each other ina formless melee in the woods .......the westerosi have a wider variety of weapons, better armour and testosterone/strength  vs the unsullied who will be much better individual skillwise (having endured stupidly intense training from birth) , insane pain reistance, 0 fear (their robot like obedience would prob be a bit unsettling) ,  and of course  stamina levels way  wayyyyy beyond what their testosteroneless.bodies should actualy have!!! 

The deciding factor there would be  numbers which  favour the westerosi  as even the crownlands has more infantry than dany has

 

I wouldn't be so sure about the Unsullied having better skills in 1v1, they are trained mostly to fight as an single corp, far less for battles where they have to fight individually and against foes that are stronger and better protected than them. 

Also their robot like obedience is more of a handicap than an advantage in such situations, as the capacity to think for yourself and take initiatives in unexpected situations is a vital quality in moments where things don't go according to plan.

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55 minutes ago, Aldarion said:

Actually, it is not even certain that the Unsullied have better individual skills. In fact, point was made specifically that the Unsullied do not fight as individuals. And that "stupidly intense training" seems to be aimed more at instilling obedience than any kind of martial skill. Kinda like Spartans, who got walked all over by Macedonians and later didn't even try to fight against the Romans.

Robot like obedience would also be a significant disadvantage in any kind of irregular battle such as fighting in heavily wooded terrain. There is a reason why Romans trained their legionaries to be capable of taking individual initiative.

Maybe he means Daenerys' army + Golden Company? Latter most likely is the best army in the book, pound-for-pound... but it lacks the poundage of the Westerosi armies, so Westeros would still win by attrition. Also, lack of cavalry may be a major disadvantage for the Golden Company, so even being better "pound for pound" compared to Westerosi armies is not actually certain.

No it clearly say each one becomes a master of the sword , shield and 3 spears training from dawn to dusk ..they probably drill religiously as units too but no " others may be larger or faster but few will.equal their skill.with sword ,shield or spear"  so yeah they will at least be exceptionally skilled fighters whonsomehow also have modern athlete like stamina despite no testosterone!

Side note spartans allowed themselves to fall behind in tactics and numbers of actual spartans. Their troopers were super elite by any standard but  a society that doesnt allow change or much freedom of thought is doomed to stagnate and thus fade as a military power too

The unsullied are trained to be obedient and stripped of individuality as people yes  ( to a lesser extend so are all modern troops) but that doesnt mean they cant use intiative as troops far from it  , in fact their training seems to involve both brutality and needing to use their own thinking.....every single day they must respond to a new name and keep up with a new task or be culled, they must climb mountains at night (a lot of personal judgement would need to be exercised there) they must steal a child from a mother (requiring a touch of sneakyness) and despite how brutal the training is they  must keep a puppy alive and well to be strangled in one year. They instantly selected grey worm as leader so they clearly can think for themselves

Yeah but the golden company technicaly  arent a targ force they are blackfyre :)

Cavalry wise they are light but elephants can def make up.for that if used right, their smell alone upsets horses

But yeah too small a force overall hence varys causing chaos and possible 'friends in the reach' as back up ......on top.of all the loyal dragon men in the crownlsnds we learn of in briennes pov

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