Minas Tirith vs King's Landing vs Solitude (armies)

Hi everyone, this is part 1 of a Lord of the Rings vs Game of Thrones vs Skyrim battle series I'm planning on doing. Hopefully it'll go well! The battle is as follows; these three cities will muster as many men as they can within the realm of possibility (eg Minas Tirith cannot recruit Orcs, but probably could call Rohan for aid) to fight the other two. Individuals can be taken into account as well, but the winner is the army left standing at the end. It is up to you to work out how many men each army could get and how strong they'd be. Oh, and in the case of Game of Thrones we are using the version at the end of season 4 of the TV series, just after Tywin has died and Tyrion and Varys have left, so no extra spoilers for non-book readers please :) Hopefully this'll go ok and if you can explain why the army would win too that'd be great. Thanks for help in advance and for reading! :)

Bump

If Westeros can be untied under KL then that could be interesting.

A united Westeros would crush Minas Tirith and Rohan, they can only muster around 35,000 men IIRC. Westeros can get around 500,000.

@rogueshadow: that's exactly what I was thinking.....

I don't know much about Skyrim though

@cregan_stark: Oh, my bad, I read the untied as united. I've played Skyrim but I'm not as knowledgeable on it as I am in LOTR and ASOIAF :/. From what I recall, the entirety of Skyrim would be more suitable to combat Westeros than Solitude alone.

I think the riders of rohan are needed to give LotR a chance. They are versatile and give them a leg up. Unfortunately in the movie minas tirith soldiers were anything but spectacular. Now are they allowed help from gimli aragorn and legolas and gandalf? Theoden and eomer and eowyn be a big help for rohan. Which chararcters can be allowed? Technically boromir is from there too

@rogueshadow: yeah I worded that wrong

@nerdchore: anyone who you think would be there within reason should be allowed :) I see no reason why any of the characters you listed couldn't be feasibly called for aid

@masteraction: then LotR is a big contender. Theoden eomer and eowyn with rohan is great. But adding aragkrn gimli and legolas is icing on the cake. And gandalf is the cherry. Westeros will have a hard time with that. Skyrim will be a big contender though solitude might not be enough in its own.

@masteraction:

Bit late to the party (with a mere 2 year delay, if I might add!) but here goes:

Now, hypothetically Middle-Earth is best suited to win this dispute for various reasons (variety of races, weapons, magic, etc). Now, while I say this - pay heed that I do not in any way discredit Westeros or Tamriel in any way. I am a huge admirer of both Professor Tolkien's and George Martin's works, while counting TES series as my all-time favourite games of all time (been a fan since Morrowind). As a person who loves nothing more than to bury his head in lore and books, I found this question quite interesting as it steered a lot of inner debate within myself.

On one hand, theoretically King's Landing (and the surrounding Crownlands) can muster up pretty much the whole of Westeros, since all the Great Houses are sworn to uphold the King's Justice (which is to say, the King's Law and Justification whose first and foremost rule is that the Lord/Lady swears fealty to the King/Queen and will offer his armies and banners when summoned, which is basically the typical Feudal system of the Middle-Ages). On theory! The political reality of the world of "A song of Ice and Fire" however are quite complex, as we all know, and often times the Lords and Ladies of the Great Houses will find different ways to excuse themselves of fulfilling that agreement (for various reasons, such as: revolts, not liking the King/Queen, bad harvest years, wanting to remain neutral in wars and etc, etc, etc). In fact, the last time that the Realm was united was under King Robert I Baratheon, commonly known as the Usurper by the (legally) still actual ruling dynasty-in-exile - the Targaryens. While during the Greyjoy Rebellion (which in it's own had good cause - the Greyjoys, much like the Great Houses of the North and technically - all of the Realm, had not sworn their oath of fealty to House Baratheon but to the Dragon Lords before them), King Robert's host composed of pretty much most of Westeros, excluding the Iron Isles of course which were in rebellion. That host alone, was of tremendous size and the variety of different warriors, fighters and types of arms and armour was quite vivid - for example, the warriors of Dorne are quite different from the fighters of the North. However, since that event (which takes place around 9 or 10 years before the events of "A Game of Thrones" or the first season of the TV series), no one has united the Realm's many different folds into one Royal Army and the Realm remains fractured in the many wars that came after Robert and Ned Stark's deaths at the end of book/season one.

Now, Middle-Earth's realm of Gondor is not entirely a different case altogether! The mighty realm of Gondor was once the pinnicale of the civilization of man in Arda, hailing from the lost island of Numenor the first "Gondorians" were King Elendill (the great-great-great-great-great-great-great sire of Aragorn)'s loyalists who refused to surrender to Sauron's vile manipulations that caused the Fall of Numenor and the great island's sinking at the bottom of the sea (which in on it's own is a tragic and long tale, for another time). When those faithful arrived in Middle-Earth (saved by the grace of the Gods, for remaining true and pure) they founded two kingdoms - Gondor to the South and Arnor to the North. The sister Kingdoms were one of the strongest civilizations of Middle-Earth, often trading with the Elves and Dwarves, and thus earning their loyal friendship. Of the fall of Arnor, I shall not write as it will take too much time and deter us from our debate but put simply - when we visit the realm of Gondor, which is at the end of the 3rd Era, the Kingdom is in slow decay. It's territories slowly consumed by corrupted men, like the Easterlings, the Harradrim or the Pirates/Corsairs of Umbar who all serve the Dark Lord Sauron. Still, Minas Tirith can always call upon it's mighty armies (the movies do not do them justice) and it's many allies. And not just the Rohirrim, if I might add but also the Elves of both Rivendell, Lorien and Mirkwood as well as the Dwarves of Durin's Folk that live in the great mountain cities of Erebor, the Blue Mountains, the Iron Hills and other great places. The reason why those allies do not partake in the Siege of Gondor (as shown in the "Return of the King") is because they are fighting the War in the North (Sauron had attacked not just the South) and were busy defending their own realms, Rohan was ideally free of Saruman's Uruk-Hai invasion so they could answer Gondor's call. Now - adding in the mighty dwarven fighters (who are one of the best warriors of Middle-Earth) and the elves (the other martially amazing race of Arda) in the bunch of Minas Tirith adds too much weigh in on their side. For even if outnumbered (which is debatable), the three races (elf, dwarf and man) have a unique and far more advanced way of waging war, than their enemies from Westeros. Next consider magic. King's Landing has no magic, the dragons are far east and most magic in that world happens far, far away from the capital. It does have Greek Fire (that is to say Hellfire, that green burning substance) which can seriously damage and destroy armadas or serve as primitive bomb explosions. That could be put to use, however the presence of both the Eldar (Elven) and Istari (Wizards) magic will surely find a way around it or defeat it outright.

Finally, Solitude Hold is the wild card of the bunch. First and foremost it must be said that in Tamriel, unlike Westeros where magic is slowly dying away, magicka is still widely in use by institutions such as the Mages Guild, The College of Winterhold, House Telvanni and many other organizations. Magic is far more descriptive than the one used in Prof. Tolkien's world (which is somewhat vague and ill-defined, although one feels the gravity and strength in it all the same). We have several schools of magic: Destruction, Restoration, Alteration, Illusion and Conjuration (Mysticism and a few other schools were once part of the ans amble as well), all those are dedicated in using Magic in the many various ways that it can be used. Beyond that, Tamriel (Skyrim being no exception) is a land filled with many wondrous creatures of all kind (resembling Tolkien's world far more than Martin's). Solitude is the historical capital of the province of Skyrim, a land traditionally well known for it's very good warriors, smiths and (even if it's forgotten by pretty much the end of the Second Era) - great wizards (think of the Arch-mages of Winterhold!). Skyrim, while most certainly not the most technologically advanced province of Tamriel, still holds benefits such as the lost secrets of the Dwemer (Tamriel's Dwarven culture, which is much different from the one found in LOTR) race that are slowly being rediscovered. Steam-gollems, mechanical engineering and other wonders of logic and thought are to be found throughout Skyrim (think of the Dwemer city of Markath). Having said that, Solitude has had it's waxing and waning, with periods coming and going through the Eras. Many Septim Emperors and Empresses were once High Kings of Solitude and respectively - Skyrim itself, due to Tiber Septim's half-Norden origin (discussions about the human Tiber Septim and the God Talos are just as strong now as they have been for nearly 15 years now, with some arguing that the deity Talos is made out of three humans, Tiber Septim being one of them. Other's speculate that Talos/Tiber Septim is Breton, I lean to that one mostly) - whatever the case - Solitude has been an important cite for both The Empire and Skyrim, for many, many years. Now, at the time when we visit Skyrim (the 4th Era), the province has been weakened by the Great War between the Aldmeri Dominion (curse them!) and more recently - divided by Ulfric's uprising. What this means is that Solitude might go out in this hypothetical fight first, since not all of Skyrim will march to it's defense (we're not looking at the valiant defense of Bruma, one Era ago when the Hero of Cyrodill united all the Counties of the Imperial Province in defense of the mostly Nordic city of Bruma at the northern end of the province), in fact even those Holds still loyal to the Empire (Markath, Hijalmarch, Morthal and a neutral however Empire-friendly Whiterun) would not likely rush to it's defense, due to the Dragon Crisis and the Civil War going about. To put it simply: we enter Skyrim in it's darkest age since the Merethic Era. Having said that, Solitude's cause can still give reason enough for all of Skyrim to unite (Nords are very patriotic, after all) and even Ulfric himself (he may be a near-minded, racist, bigot - but he is a fighter who loves his country, gotta give him that) might join with his "True sons of Skyrim", should that happen and should the Nords of the land be united in one army (this does include the Imperial Legion, as they are pretty much Nordic anyway and Skyrim is a part of the Empire) - then we're looking at some pretty dangerous dudes with axes, magic and lots of courage.

Once again - this is a very difficult (and fun!) topic to think about. I cannot truly say that it will be easy to determine the winner, however I am giving Minas Tirith and friends the edge here, due to advancements in most fields. The presence of the Dragonborn (who may or may not join the fight) and a potentially united Skyrim might give it some competition, however Gandalf takes the cake as he is pretty much a demi-god in his own right, plus all the other heroes of the Fellowship, Rohan and the Elven and Dwarven Realms. King's Landing, while it may have the numbers (at least against Solitude - then again, everyone can beat Solitude just in numbers) comes last in my opinion as it's armies, just like the armies of most of Martin's world (with some notable exceptions), are pretty much the typical, historical army with no real advantages, apart from good arms and armour (which all three contestants have).

Tough question!

PS: Sorry if my answer was too lengthy! I do get carried away, when asked about my favourite books/movies/tv-shows/games :D

@valentineradushev: awesome answer man! I've only just read this (after just a short time) but it was a fantastic explanation of the three worlds :)