MCU Super Soldiers vs the following……….

[Postmania]

OP says no rescue from Rohan.

Yeah as Big said I meant Theoden's charge from within the keep.

Not sure why he held them back for so long once they got so close to ending things tbh, he'd have to use them at some point

[Nik Hasta]

Yeah as Big said I meant Theoden's charge from within the keep.

Not sure why he held them back for so long once they got so close to ending things tbh, he'd have to use them at some point

Ah, forgot where Theoden was.

That charge, looking at it, wasn't going to end well. They had repelled and cut down a large number of those who had breached the perimeter but they were heading toward a literal sea of opponents. Had Gandalf not turned up when he did, they would have definitely died.

It was real "one last stab at an unstoppable tide of hate," sort of stuff.



As to the scenario itself, I don't know how good all of these dudes are as some of these guys, like the additional Winter Soldiers, are entirely featless beyond "meant to be Bucky with no metal arm," which itself is like "ambiguously below Steve + metal arm," since Cap beat Bucky when he had guns, knives and the arm /and/ Steve was trying to stop the helicarrier and protect the disk thing while fighting and he still ended up breaking his arm and choking him out, I'm dubious to how "super" these featless soldiers could be felt to be.

In any case, and there's 20 of them. It's not unreasonable to assume that they are going to murder any Uruk Hai in single combat. The issue is that they can't be everywhere at once and, if they get mobbed, they are going to go down. So, as with pretty much any siege, this comes down to if they can hold the walls. I think those who come with guns would be best served working as snipers to take down the bomb orcs and the trolls for as long as they have ammunition. Though there's obviously a very tight limit to how many bullets and weapons they might be carrying here..

This isn't not possible. It's a hard grind for sure and kind of requires the super soldiers to play perfect, if the walls are breached then not even they can reasonably halt a swarm situation.

[Sharpandpointies]

This came out longer than I thought.

Seeing a lot of movie discussion, when the OP mentions nothing of the sort. ^_^ Defaults to canon.

Ergo, no elves from Lóthlorien here.

It's important to consider that against infantry, a mounted charge is absolutely devastating unless the infantry has the kind of gear/setup necessary to hold against it...and then it's slightly less devastating.

Book canon, the Uruk-hai had been doing quite well. They get their rams up to the gates, and start hammering away without anyone stopping them. They get over the walls. They blow up the culvert and start a beachhead. This is honestly fantastic in siege warfare, and the only reason they don't succeed is we have super-fighters like Aragorn and Gimli breaking their attempts, not ordinary soldiers (which does lead to the question of 'how effective would the Super Soldiers be in this situation? Answer is 'probably pretty effective').

They even blow down the gates completely at dawn.

So Théodan has someone blow the horn to call his charge, which the Uruk-hai hadn't expected. Now, it's important to note that Théodan admits they're all going to die in this charge - he just doesn't want to die cowering in the Hornburg. So the charge - unsurprisingly, this is cavalry again - shoves the Uruk-hai back, killing a load of them. Then it bogs down. However, this is when Gandalf shows up BEHIND the Uruk-hai with Erkenbrand and a thousand men on foot, putting Saruman's army in one of classically THE worst possible situations: caught between cavalry and infantry, and (worse) needing to go uphill if they want to try to break through the infantry. At this point, their formation is broken from the charge and they can't get it back because they're basically stuck between hammer and anvil. And it's very much a surprise.

And even worse, they're further demoralized because hey, where'd that entire forest of dark, rage-filled trees come from? (It's the Huorns, who snuck in overnight)

So, they fall apart and then what normally happens to a numerically superior force that falls apart between two enemy forces, happens (ie, massacre). A whack of them flee into the forest...which doesn't really allow them to regroup, because squish squish, huorns stomp.

Here, can the supersoldiers make a difference?

Aragorn, Éomer, and Gimli were three reasons why things didn't go to hell for the defenders so much more quickly. They killed the orcs at the ram, they fought off the orcs on the walls, they held back the breach in the culvert. Without them, I feel the Uruk-Hai would have succeeded before Gandalf arrived (yes, I do feel that Uruk-hai are, all things being equal, physically superior to bog-standard humans due to how well they do in the siege before Hero-types show up to stop them. Uruk-hai on foot against cavalry is not 'all things being equal').

So twenty supersoldiers could easily cover the same issues, with some left over. And when the orcs blow the gate at dawn, it's feasible for them to hang on long enough to get everyone in the Hornburg, then retreat to the Horburg.

Do I think that twenty supersoldiers with limited ammunition, facing guys who DO have bows and are willing to sleet arrows at them Anti-Boromir style if the supersoldiers start trying to defend an area as big as the gates long-term, facing the numbers that the Uruk-hai had (with the Dunlendings as well, let's not forget them), are going to make a difference such that without Erkenbrand and Gandalf the defenders can win?

*wiggles hand* Surprisingly, yes!

For starters, again, this isn't movie-canon - I don't see that anywhere in the OP. That means...the Huorns still turn up *ta-dah* (OP didn't mention them). This is bad for Uruk-hai morale, even if the forest doesn't straight-up attack them (I honestly can see it waiting for the night again, then as stealthily as a forest can be, basically overrunning orkish positions... ).

Number two, the numbers aren't QUITE as bad as one thinks. There are 3000 defenders plus 20 supersoldiers. Saruman's army is 'only' 10 000 or so strong in the books. Gimli, himself, absolutely murders something like 50 Uruk-hai in the conflict, I imagine the supersoldiers will do a lot better. I feel the defenders can at least hold the Hornburg.

The problem is food and water, for them.

For the Uruk-hai, the problem is the Huorns.

It comes down to 'Can/will the Uruk-hai deal with the Huorns?' (ie, keep throwing fire into this mysterious forest until it goes up in flames) If they do, I feel they win - the Supersoldiers can HOLD the Hornburg, I'm thinking, but they can't break the siege and we're into classic 'wait until they collapse from exhaustion/lack of food' situation. If they don't do something about the Huorns, or if the Huorns can move quickly (I...think maybe? Can't really remember Edit: *checks* why yes, they manage a decent clip) things get ugly fast.

My feeling? The Supersoldiers allow the Rohirrim to hold out a whole lot more easily than Aragorn and Gimli did, the Huorns show up, the Uruk-hai get horribly murdered. Maybe they take the Huorns with them (there are a LOT of Uruk-hai, edit: they have explosives and such, buuuut...there are a lot of Huorns, also), but even if they somehow do, the siege will be completely broken.

Mileage may vary. ^_^

[Sharpandpointies]

Ah, forgot where Theoden was.

That charge, looking at it, wasn't going to end well. They had repelled and cut down a large number of those who had breached the perimeter but they were heading toward a literal sea of opponents. Had Gandalf not turned up when he did, they would have definitely died.

It was real "one last stab at an unstoppable tide of hate," sort of stuff.

This pretty much nails how it goes in the books, as well. They know they're going to die (most likely), they're just....unwilling to die huddled in the Hornburg after a long, painful siege.

[Nik Hasta]

This pretty much nails how it goes in the books, as well. They know they're going to die (most likely), they're just....unwilling to die huddled in the Hornburg after a long, painful siege.

Edited my post to add a few thoughts on the scenario itself.

It's not impossible but it's a hard fight for them and the lack of feats on the majority of the super soldiers is a bit of a negative.

[Sharpandpointies]

Edited my post to add a few thoughts on the scenario itself.

It's not impossible but it's a hard fight for them and the lack of feats on the majority of the super soldiers is a bit of a negative.

Absolutely, though I would question 'majority'.

We do have feats for a chunk of them (Bucky and the other Supersoldiers from Falcon and Winter Soldier did get a fair chunk of feats for tossing around normals like toys and fighting against people who toss around normals like toys, as meh as the show itself turned out to be). And - this is important - the defenders STILL have all of the people they had (including Aragorn, Gimli, Éomer) in this situation. Now, those guys did a good job of sealing breaches and preventing the gates from getting knocked down all on their own, and they didn't have the Supersoldiers and their weapons on their side.

Also, book canon there are no trolls. ^_^ It's Uruk-hai, some half-orcs, and Dunlendings (human).

Still figuring that this bunch can easily hold (since it's the original group + them) long enough for the Huorns to show (which the original group did anyway, until dawn at least).

[Nik Hasta]

Sort of mentally assumed that Aragorn and co were absent for some reason.

Also, didn't know about no living trees stuff, which certainly helps.

[Sharpandpointies]

Sort of mentally assumed that Aragorn and co were absent for some reason.

Also, didn't know about no living trees stuff, which certainly helps.

Now, I admit that Cleric PROBABLY meant it to be movie-canon - he talks about 'no Gandalf and cavalry' and in the books, Gandalf showed up at the head of a thousand soldiers afoot.

However, it doesn't say 'Movie-Canon', nor are there pictures of movie stuff, so yeah, for fun I'm going book-canon (also because...well, feelings have been expressed ad nauseum, etc). And in the book, the Huorns sneak in during the night (they seem to be able to cloak themselves in shadows, to boot - that is shown at one point in the books), the sun comes up, and the Uruk-hai are like 'OMFG, where did that really nasty looking forest come from?'

[Huorns] nom nom nom

They're like a mobile Garroting Deep, sans Caerroil Wildwood*.

* gratuitous fantasy reference to further muddy the waters.

[Cleric of Hell’s Brigade]

Ehh, either canon (book or film) works for me.

[Sharpandpointies]

Ehh, either canon (book or film) works for me.

[Huorns] nom nom nom

[big_adventure]

They're like a mobile Garroting Deep, sans Caerroil Wildwood*.

* gratuitous fantasy reference to further muddy the waters.

Nice one! Caerroil would help, too. He DEFINITELY would have no love for Uruk-Hai, Orks, Sauron or Saruman.

[Sharpandpointies]

Nice one! Caerroil would help, too. He DEFINITELY would have no love for Uruk-Hai, Orks, Sauron or Saruman.

Oh, absolutely.

The problem is that he'd then turn around and happy-happy murder all hell out of everyone in the fortress. No Gandalf here to persuade him not to do so (and I'm KIND OF iffy that Gandalf even could).

[Caerroil Wildwood] I see humans who make fire and build homes with the desecrated skeletons of trees. I see an axe-bearer whose people burn my charges to smelt the metal they rip from the earth.

[Garroting Huorns] nom nom nom

[Caerroil] No, no, put down the Sindar. Yes, that one. With the ears. The...the pointy things on the side of its head. *exasperated* The one that smells of living trees.

[Garroting Huorns] ??? *drop Legolas and shuffle away sheepishly to continue ripping everyone else to pieces* nom nom nom

[big_adventure]

Oh, absolutely.

The problem is that he'd then turn around and happy-happy murder all hell out of everyone in the fortress. No Gandalf here to persuade him not to do so (and I'm KIND OF iffy that Gandalf even could).

[Caerroil Wildwood] I see humans who make fire and build homes with the desecrated skeletons of trees. I see an axe-bearer whose people burn my charges to smelt the metal they rip from the earth.

[Garroting Huorns] nom nom nom

[Caerroil] No, no, put down the Sindar. Yes, that one. With the ears. The...the pointy things on the side of its head. *exasperated* The one that smells of living trees.

[Garroting Huorns] ??? *drop Legolas and shuffle away sheepishly to continue ripping everyone else to pieces* nom nom nom

Yup, that pretty much tracks. He might let Aragorn live - ranger and all.

[Sharpandpointies]

Yup, that pretty much tracks. He might let Aragorn live - ranger and all.

That is an argument, of course.

For me?

Humans iz humans to CW. Now, even if Caerroil somehow notices him, Aragorn isn't an Unfettered One with lore that visibly (to anyone with the eyes to see) sets him aside from the rest of humanity (and even the Unfettered Ones traditionally STFO of Garroting Deep, unlike Morinmoss), he comes from a civilization that burned trees and forests to make an empire, and 'ranger' would probably be a word that has little meaning to Wildwood because it's only sixteen hundred years old (trees haven't even noticed the rangers, they're too new and not really doing anything to help the trees themselves). But I figure Aragorn doesn't even stand out from the pack of Rohirrm (humans with metal coats and metal pokey things all kinda look alike) - he's not a time-traveller carrying the (burnt) Staff of Law, for example - so nom nom nom. ^_^

But mileage! It may vary.

[Sharpandpointies]

...also Caerroil Wildwood doesn't need to make deals anymore, because now he has a bunch of trees that can go looking for people to kill. O_o