(ASoIaF) Young Robert Baratheon vs Gregor Clegane

[Anarchist]

Robert Baratheon in his prime, armor, War Hammer and all vs The Mountain that rides, also in full gear of course. Who takes it?

[grampagen]

By presentation I'm inclined to favour Robert. Even as a king in peacetime he's still pretty strong, IIRC he drunkenly shoved Jaime in full plate around and almost took him off his feet.

Equipment wise, full gear pits Robert with a warhammer vs Gregor with a greatsword. While the Mountain is bigger and stronger, he's not exactly precise to target gaps in the armor, and as Sandor demonstrated it is possible to parry him even while he's in an unspeakable rage. Robert has been reported to have killed Rhaegar by caving his his breastplate with his hammer, showing he's not only no slouch in the strength department either, but has a weapon that's less inhibited by armor.

This is, of course, discounted both starting on horseback with lances, say. We might presume Robert is proficient, but we actually see Gregor kill a guy, so he wins by default.

Though really, by dint of having feats that are quantifiable by eyewitnesses and not just the lore, this is unfortunately a no-contest since Robert doesn't have many of those.

[Beadle]

Do we think Oberyn Martell would beat Robert? Because he would clearly have beaten the Mountain had it not been quite so personal and wanting to see Clegane confess.

(Of course this is purely going off TV presentation rather than books, because… lazy.)

[grampagen]

Do we think Oberyn Martell would beat Robert? Because he would clearly have beaten the Mountain had it not been quite so personal and wanting to see Clegane confess.

(Of course this is purely going off TV presentation rather than books, because… lazy.)

I think that's more of a style-makes-fights kind of thing. He did press his reach advantage with the spear, and cheated with the poison so he did all but win. I think it's worth noting that while Oberyn did have a helmet, it was open without a visor, so the Mountain punched his face in.

Against Robert, eh...who knows, really? Lore has him as a badass, but his main feat is beating a guy whose best feats were in tournament jousts (Rhaegar). Robert's smaller than the Mountain, but he'd similarly need one hit, probably would have a similar result I'd wager, but again, Oberyn has better (read: existent) feats.

[Dark Soul # 7]

By presentation I'm inclined to favour Robert. Even as a king in peacetime he's still pretty strong, IIRC he drunkenly shoved Jaime in full plate around and almost took him off his feet.

Equipment wise, full gear pits Robert with a warhammer vs Gregor with a greatsword. While the Mountain is bigger and stronger, he's not exactly precise to target gaps in the armor, and as Sandor demonstrated it is possible to parry him even while he's in an unspeakable rage. Robert has been reported to have killed Rhaegar by caving his his breastplate with his hammer, showing he's not only no slouch in the strength department either, but has a weapon that's less inhibited by armor.

This is, of course, discounted both starting on horseback with lances, say. We might presume Robert is proficient, but we actually see Gregor kill a guy, so he wins by default.

Though really, by dint of having feats that are quantifiable by eyewitnesses and not just the lore, this is unfortunately a no-contest since Robert doesn't have many of those.

This pretty much covers it.

Gregor has actual quantifiable feats of being horribly dangerous in combat. With young Robert on the other hand we're told because all his feats happened in the past. Winning a climactic final one on one fight with the badass dude that you think kidnapped your beloved is certainly a cool story, but not great for feats when nothing is shown.

[Iron_Twister]

Yeah, Bob Baratheon was always described as in his prime an utter badass that honestly excelled at problems where violence is the best solution by multiple characters, even his own detractors, but right....He kinda doesn't have any actual feats outside the backstory and hearsay to really support, especially when his current self was way past his prime...Then you know, he died.

[Ptrvc]

By presentation I'm inclined to favour Robert. Even as a king in peacetime he's still pretty strong, IIRC he drunkenly shoved Jaime in full plate around and almost took him off his feet.

Equipment wise, full gear pits Robert with a warhammer vs Gregor with a greatsword. While the Mountain is bigger and stronger, he's not exactly precise to target gaps in the armor, and as Sandor demonstrated it is possible to parry him even while he's in an unspeakable rage. Robert has been reported to have killed Rhaegar by caving his his breastplate with his hammer, showing he's not only no slouch in the strength department either, but has a weapon that's less inhibited by armor.

This is, of course, discounted both starting on horseback with lances, say. We might presume Robert is proficient, but we actually see Gregor kill a guy, so he wins by default.

Though really, by dint of having feats that are quantifiable by eyewitnesses and not just the lore, this is unfortunately a no-contest since Robert doesn't have many of those.

Parrying an attack from a stronger opponent in a sword fight is totally possible if you know what your doing particularly if thatan is swinging wildly and especially simple if the strong man is using one hand and you're using two (Gregor is described as using a two-handed sword in one hand from what I can remember in the books).

Similarly a spear or any other polearm is pretty much objectively a better weapon than a sword, with the sword only winning out on certain situations such as enclosed spaces, sieges where the attacking party needs to climb etc. The main reason swords were so highly regarded is because they are sidearms. They can be worn, you can always have one belted to your side and it was often socially acceptable to do so, where carrying a spear about might not be. Like how we perceive pistols and rifles today.

Lastly, both Sandor and Oberyn got the best of Gregor (till the end for Oberyn) but that's with a heavy one sided prep on both sides. Sandor is himself a huge dude and had been training most of his life to bridge the strength gap between him and his brother with skill so he could kill him. Oberyn had similarly been planning and devising a strategy to kill Gregor for over a decade.

Now Robert doesn't have a lot of feats. But even aged, out of shape, and drugged he still managed to power through and kill a boar after being gored and he did decidedly crush Rhaegar who was a well regarded duelist himself.

Weapon load out plate armor, and a shield counter the advantages a spear gives allowing Robert to close into Oberyn range where he can smash him with his warhammer which is hard to Parry from a stronger man, or close to grapple where again Robert will have a massive advantage, if not as much as Gregor had.

This is all assuming we throw out Eddard's description of how heavy Robert's warhammer was in his prime. If we don't than Robert is blatantly superhuman.

[grampagen]

All good points, Ptrvc. Some of your points regarding spears vs swords reminded me of this Lindybeige video:



The sparring demos are as amusing as they are enlightening.

[Ptrvc]

As Matt and Lindy mention in the video this isn't a perfect test, but I think it points to the superiority if the spear or another polearm in most situations.

Part of the problem with testing and training with a polearm is that in even the least lethal most basic version, staffs, hit too hard to be used with any kind of earnest particularly when striking the head. If you try to cut weight or add flexibility to the staff to compensate you end up with something that's no longer a reasonable analogue for the real thing.

I've thought that maybe a juggernaut style helmet where the impact would be redirected from the head and neck to the shoulders might help, but even if it did a bad hit to the joints would be crippling, and HEMA is ultimately an enthusiasts hobby, not a professional sport, so I don't think many would be willing to risk that kind of damage, myself included.

[StupidMoniker]

All good points, Ptrvc. Some of your points regarding spears vs swords reminded me of this Lindybeige video:



The sparring demos are as amusing as they are enlightening.

Also, this is only with spear, which is pretty much the peasant's polearm. Swap the spear out for a halberd, bill, or glaive (or more exotic weapon like a glaive-guisarme) and the problems increase (mostly because armor becomes a less effective counter). Not that this has anything to do with the original question, because no one in ASOIAF uses any of those weapons, AFAIK. Certainly, neither Gregor nor Robert use any pole weapons.