User blog comment:Pygmy Hippo 2/King Leonidas vs. Genghis Khan/@comment-3189283-20181204143555

Let's see shall we

Primary Weapon

The Dory obviously has the reach advantage and deployed in a mini Spartan Phalanx it will be a difficult thing for Genghis and his men to get past. The Turko-Mongol Sabre was primarily a cavalry weapon and is pretty much restricted to use as a slashing weapon which will struggle against the Spartan’s heavy armour even with its metallurgy superiority. This is if they can even get that close and they’ll have a hard time doing that against the length of the dory.

Edge: Leonidas 

Secondary Weapon

The Xiphos is only going to be used as a back-up weapon here if the Dory gets destroyed or the Mongols get up close and its short length puts it at an instant disadvantage against either the Sabre or the Mace. The Mace is Genghis’ best melee weapon because its blunt force trauma means it will be more likely to do damage than the Sabre and will batter and bend the Aspis out of shape, if it doesn’t flat out break the user’s arm.

Edge: Genghis Khan

Ranged Weapon

Javelin obviously won’t be much use in a squad battle like this although Leonidas and co could opt to use it as a melee weapon and probably would rather than go immediately to their Xiphos because it functions similarly to how the dory would. Now that I’ve got the only nice thing I’ve said about the Javelin in eight years out of the way here’s why the bow utterly dominates. First off range, the Mongols can pelt the Spartans with arrows from a safe distance. Secondly the stopping power, the Recurve Bow would be considerably more powerful than contemporary bows Spartan soldiers would have had to deal with and while they may not piece a Phalanx it will at least do serious damage to armour and shields alike. Thirdly and stealing borrowing something Leo said on Ganzorig vs Tiberius (and yes, I am referring to a vote on a different battle from two years ago deal with it) Genghis and the Mongols would be used to drawing their bows with their upper body rather than their hips meaning they can move about while firing and get around a shield wall. So, if you needed anymore reasons why a Bow beats a Javelin well there you have it.

Edge: Genghis Khan

Armour

Big edge for Leonidas here. Mongol armour was meant to be light weight in order to increase speed and mobility and the shield is only going to get in the way of using their most effective weapon, the Bow. Leonidas’ armour protects a lot more of him and was meant to withstand heavy bombardment from enemies and the Aspis gives him good (but not perfect) protection against Genghis’ big range advantage.

Edge: Leonidas

Final Verdict

The edges might seem to suggest this battle is quite close but honestly Genghis will win this comfortably. Surprisingly this isn’t due to the almost 2,000-year technological gap between the two and more due to the fact that Leonidas and his Spartans are unused to fighting outside of a Phalanx formation. They don’t have the numbers to do a Phalanx properly and the sort of makeshift one they could make won’t be all that difficult for Genghis to work around. If they don’t try and use a shield wall, then they will have little chance against the faster moving Mongols who will have an advantage with their harder hitting melee weapons.

Genghis Khan: 4,000

Leonidas: 1,000