How good are the unsullied?

[Nukelavee]

barding covers a lot of ranges, from mail or plate to leather.

Plus, not all warhorses got teh full coverage, and, well, armour isn't foolproof.

I could see Gregor regarding horses as expendable, and limited in use to him, so, losing one wouldn't really be as big a factor as for another knight.

[Talleyrand]

I could see Gregor regarding horses as expendable, and limited in use to him, so, losing one wouldn't really be as big a factor as for another knight.

I'm not sure, finding and buying or breeding horses of that size have got to be quite expensive. Any way there's still the point that even armoured horses won't charge into a line of spears

[Nukelavee]

Honestly, with his size, and based on a desription I remember, I don't thing Gregor could find horses that were teh right size...he just made do.

But, yeah, horses and lots of pointy things don't mix well.

[Snow White]

That's not barding, barding is full plate on the horse which would protect it from spear thrusts which mail doesn't do too well

Proper Barding is indeed (mostly) plate. But 'armor' could cover a lot of territory.

FWIW, some of the Westeros bows described seem to be analogous to the English/Welsh longbows, which can pierce plate.

[shinytoyrobots]

I suppose the point of the Unsullied is that Dany needs some kind of core of infantry. But they're not going to be able to succeed themselves, just as a Dothraki horde by itself wouldn't be able to succeed. She needs a balanced army (and her chapters regularly note her difficulties, even after she has the Unsullied, in having barely any mounted forces any more).

[Kittyhat]

Proper Barding is indeed (mostly) plate. But 'armor' could cover a lot of territory.

FWIW, some of the Westeros bows described seem to be analogous to the English/Welsh longbows, which can pierce plate.

If by "piece plate" you mean "make a little indentation and very slightly almost penetrate," then yes. If you mean "and get through the coat underneath and into the person wearing the plate," then no.

Plate is functionally arrowproof, aside from the chinks at the joints and visor and such.

[Talleyrand]

If by "piece plate" you mean "make a little indentation and very slightly almost penetrate," then yes. If you mean "and get through the coat underneath and into the person wearing the plate," then no.

Plate is functionally arrowproof, aside from the chinks at the joints and visor and such.

Like to explain how the French knights were massacred by English Archers at the Battle of Crecy? The only arrow proof armour was top of the range Milinese armour which cost a fortune

[Nine of Spades]

Like to explain how the French knights were massacred by English Archers at the Battle of Crecy? The only arrow proof armour was top of the range Milinese armour which cost a fortune

Crecy was fought on a muddy field, the english were on high ground, and heavily fortified by trenches, pits, and stakes. The French attacked in a hasty, disorganized fashion. Despite fighting from a horrible position with multiple charges, the French did manage to reach and engage the English There is no solid evidence that longbows afflicted heavy casualties on armored men. They probably did on the Genoese cossbows, but the crossbows were firing uphill, and forced into action without their pavises (tall) shields to protect them while reloading, they were forced into action by the french commanders before the shields could be brought up from baggage train. Despite this unfavorable ground, being delayed by the retreating Genoese, and the English arrow barrage the French made many charges and were even able to put pressure on one of the English wings. Obviously then a number of french causalities had to have occurred in this period. Additionaly, english skirmishers killed those who were dismounted by the english arrow rain.

At Portiers there is a gain little evidence that the longbow penetrated armor, in fact the english archers reoriented themselves to strike the horses from their more lightly protected flanks.

Agincourt was a giant mudpit. The english just had to walk up and stab the french to death. Most of the french dead were dispatched while trapped in mud.

The English success was the longbow was from fortified positions that protected them. Their primary function appeared to be to break calvary charges and disorder the attacking units. This is not a small thing, medieval combat hinges on massed, coordinated uses of force in small spaces. Preventing your opponent from using shock tactics, and breaking up their formations is making them very vulnerable to the English heavy infantry.

In battles where the English could not fortify themselves, the longbowmen were routed easily. This is a critical point. It suggests that by itself, the longbow was not enough to deter a charge. They needed to erect a physical barrier to keep themselves safe to be effective.

The general tone from multiple contemporary accounts is that in armor, arrows were not a major direct threat to your life. More lightly armored, they were probably more deadly, but even mail and linen is successful. Equally telling, is that the longbow did not radically alter the tactics of the era, in the same way that the musket did.

Keep in mind, the longbow has a rate of fire that is closer to a bolt action rifle. If it could reliably penetrate armor, its easy to think that the longbow could have wiped out massed charges easily, even when the longbow were not fortified, forcing a radical shift in tactics. Instead, unit tactics did not change.

This is not to downplay the importance of the longbow, just to point out what it was really for. It was not a weapon that killed men in armor, it was a force multiplier for for the English heavy infantry that protected them, making sure that their enemies could not make a coordinated shock attack. That doesnt mean that people werent killed by the weapon, just not in decisive numbers (unless they were lightly protected, as were the scottish in many of their defeats).

Or let me put it this way, lets say each archer has a 1 in 1000 chance of actually killing someone in armor (lucky shot). Wiki has the number of longbowmen at 7000, so, per volley against a charge, it kills 7 men in armor. The french made 16 charge attempts, and lets say the English get 4 volleys per charge. At a 1 in 1000 chance of an archers arrow killing someone that is still over 448 people in armor killed. Now those numbers are obviously not right, but the fact that we got to 448 with a 1 in 1000 chance at 4 volleys per charge, tells you that whatever the chances of killing someone in armor were, they were bad.

[Theon Greyboy]

They don't have balls. How good can they be?

The last words of a Dothraki Khal leading a charge against them.

[Hnim]

Like to explain how the French knights were massacred by English Archers at the Battle of Crecy? The only arrow proof armour was top of the range Milinese armour which cost a fortune

This is in fact historical myth. Much of the early English victories were primarily caused by idiotic impetuousness by the French knights, such as trampling over their own Genoese crossbowmen at Crecy. Agincourt was a success because of the mud. If you want to see an example of English Longbow vs French Knight look at the battle of Patay. Bodkin arrows were not extremely effective against plate, tahey were in general used to kill the horses under the knights. Getting unhorsed at a full charge can generally result in a broken neck.

[Elrick]

Better than anyone else.

Sam(and I don't think he was the only one) pissed himself when the Others attacked. The U. don't have to worry about that, because they aren't scared of anything.

They also don't feel the cold, which can be a good thing, or a very bad one. Cold is a signal that the Others are near, but if you can't feel cold, well, let's just hope they have good scouts, or they'll be ambushed by the Others.

Thats actually very bad. It means that they wont be able to feel frost bite or know when they're freezing to death. As far as the others go they can feel even less than the unsullied and I am skeptical how well that potion works when it comes to fear. Maybe against mortals but when it comes to something supernatural... we'll see I guess.

[Snow White]

If by "piece plate" you mean "make a little indentation and very slightly almost penetrate," then yes. If you mean "and get through the coat underneath and into the person wearing the plate," then no.

Plate is functionally arrowproof, aside from the chinks at the joints and visor and such.

Hrm. A little more research (i.e., Wikipedia) seems to bear this out.

I'm skeptical of the claims that mail is effective (it doesn't seem to do very well against thrusting weapons in general) but well-maintained steel plate does seem to be largely arrow "proof" at distances over point blank range.

I do note, however, that even minimal penetration can be debilitating if multiplied, and that horses in full barding are still less protected than an armored man.

[Kimera757]

Would the Roman discipline be as effective against armored knights as it was against unwashed, fur-clad primitives?

I wonder.

At the Battle of Adrianople, the Imperial Roman Legions were defeated by German "primitive" mounted warriors (the precursors to knights).

I think the Unsullied aren't flexible. They're good at some kinds of fighting, but they'd move pretty slowly with their long spears, so they'd be murdered by archers (especially horse archers). They're disciplined enough to fight off knight charges with those spears though; even peasants armed with pikes have been knights in some battles (like the Battle of Golden/Silver Spurs).

Edit: Didn't realize this was nine pages. Someone probably said this already. Sorry.

[Snow White]

I think the Unsullied aren't flexible. They're good at some kinds of fighting, but they'd move pretty slowly with their long spears...

Do we know exactly what kind of spears the Unsullied are trained with?

[Xenophon]

Bodkin arrows were not extremely effective against plate, tahey were in general used to kill the horses under the knights. Getting unhorsed at a full charge can generally result in a broken neck.

Yeah, there's an episode focusing on the longbow in the TV-series Weapons that Made Britain (I recommend checking it out if you like that sort of thing, it's actually quite good). Mike Loades (the host) goes over the battle of Crecy in a fair bit of detail, and the point he stresses most is how deadly massed archers would be against horses. According to his tests, the longbow could pierce lower-quality plate at close range, but what he says would have been most effective at Crecy were the arrows hitting the horses legs. In the show, he spends a day training ~10 guys to use longbows, then has them fire volleys targets shaped like knights on horseback, and he points out that you'd likely get a crippling shot in that would bring the horse down before the knight could reach your position.

[Snowy89]

Yeah, there's an episode focusing on the longbow in the TV-series Weapons that Made Britain (I recommend checking it out if you like that sort of thing, it's actually quite good). Mike Loades (the host) goes over the battle of Crecy in a fair bit of detail, and the point he stresses most is how deadly massed archers would be against horses. According to his tests, the longbow could pierce lower-quality plate at close range, but what he says would have been most effective at Crecy were the arrows hitting the horses legs. In the show, he spends a day training ~10 guys to use longbows, then has them fire volleys targets shaped like knights on horseback, and he points out that you'd likely get a crippling shot in that would bring the horse down before the knight could reach your position.

Yeah great series, here's the longbow episode on youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UPskCGVAsCU

At the Battle of Adrianople, the Imperial Roman Legions were defeated by German "primitive" mounted warriors (the precursors to knights).

They

The romans lost exactly because they lost their cohesion, the expection was on both sides that the romans would win, maybe not kill a lot but they would rout the Goths after which they could impose their will on them in negotiations.

[Talleyrand]

Do we know exactly what kind of spears the Unsullied are trained with?

They are trained to fight with a shield, sword and the three spears. which is

- Long spear

- Throwing spear

-Short spear

[zmflavius]

They are trained to fight with a shield, sword and the three spears. which is

- Long spear

- Throwing spear

-Short spear

Is this confirmed?

[iheartseverus]

Is this confirmed?

This, from Wiki:

They begin their training at five years old, training from dawn until dusk until they have mastered their shortsword, shield and three spears.

[MyDogIsNamedDanerys]

This, from Wiki:

They begin their training at five years old, training from dawn until dusk until they have mastered their shortsword, shield and three spears.

Do we think there's a difference between "pike" and "long spear"? I would interpret them as being basically the same thing but I'm no expert in historical weapondry.

I am a bit surprised that The Unsullied were never trained in Archery. But Archers can be reasonably effective even if poorly trained if massed appropriately. Plus, they are highly trained and physically fit, so they would out shoot a typical conscript in Westeros to be sure.