Would uruks be the ultimate weapon in a pre-gunpowder military?

Tolkien autism about "muh evil weak" aside:
>great physical strength
>ability to use heavier armor and weapons
>literally bestial fury and brutality in combat
>high pain threshold and survivability
>contempt for one's own "life"
>absolute obedience to one's master
>terrifying look that demoralizes enemies

If not for the "plot armor" - the humans, elves and dwarves (not to mention the hobbits) of Middle-earth would not have a single chance of survival.

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  1. 11 months ago
    Anonymous

    Only the movie version.

  2. 11 months ago
    Anonymous

    Forgot to mention:
    >excellent vision in the dark

    • 11 months ago
      Anonymous

      Literally the gamebreaker right here. Nightvision would make any medieval or non gunpowder army

      [...]
      [...]
      [...]
      OP seems to be talking about the films, where they are Superhuman for whatever reason.
      Now a great deal of their strengths (technology, organization, undying loyalty) seem to come from Saruman, as in the films the Mordor Uruk Hai are even more moronic than the Orcs.
      But in general a super-strength army that can cross hundreds of miles with no resupply at a non stop day and night sprint, and fight in pitch darkness, and can be raised from literally nothing, no industry, no forges, nothing, to an army of tens of thousands inside a year or two, would be completely unbeatable for most of history. Add in Saruman's technology and brainwashing and they'd walk over any army they encountered until the 1900s.

      Night vision alone is an absurd advantage, an almost unbeatable advantage until we ourselves devised night vision. You cant even fathom how hard it would be to coordinate a pre-modern force at night.

      >Night vision alone is an absurd advantage, an almost unbeatable advantage
      This

  3. 11 months ago
    Anonymous

    Humans are resilient and creative and when faced with something that seems to pose a threat like this they would almost certainly advance rapidly in military capabilities to deal with the problem. It's like warhammer fantasy: cannons would be normal sized except monsters exist so they needed to be designed to match the real threat in front of them. Uruks would eventually see the same thing I guess, unless they rushed humanity down before they could innovate.

  4. 11 months ago
    Anonymous

    They're a bunch of child soldiers with brief training led by an armchair general who lives in a literal ivory tower, plot armor wasn't required to beat them.

  5. 11 months ago
    Anonymous

    Physically Uruks aren't that OP tbh. Remember that regular orcs are puny little shits who might slit a humans throat when he's sleeping or overwhelm humans with numbers but size wise they're closer to Hobbits than humans. Book Uruks are way taller than Orcs, yes, but that just means they are *almost* human size.

  6. 11 months ago
    Anonymous

    They seem like they'd shoot guns by jabbing with each shot overhead like it's a spear.

    • 11 months ago
      Anonymous

      https://i.imgur.com/cQeTcqC.jpg

      Tolkien autism about "muh evil weak" aside:
      >great physical strength
      >ability to use heavier armor and weapons
      >literally bestial fury and brutality in combat
      >high pain threshold and survivability
      >contempt for one's own "life"
      >absolute obedience to one's master
      >terrifying look that demoralizes enemies

      If not for the "plot armor" - the humans, elves and dwarves (not to mention the hobbits) of Middle-earth would not have a single chance of survival.

      Humans are resilient and creative and when faced with something that seems to pose a threat like this they would almost certainly advance rapidly in military capabilities to deal with the problem. It's like warhammer fantasy: cannons would be normal sized except monsters exist so they needed to be designed to match the real threat in front of them. Uruks would eventually see the same thing I guess, unless they rushed humanity down before they could innovate.

      Physically Uruks aren't that OP tbh. Remember that regular orcs are puny little shits who might slit a humans throat when he's sleeping or overwhelm humans with numbers but size wise they're closer to Hobbits than humans. Book Uruks are way taller than Orcs, yes, but that just means they are *almost* human size.

      OP seems to be talking about the films, where they are Superhuman for whatever reason.
      Now a great deal of their strengths (technology, organization, undying loyalty) seem to come from Saruman, as in the films the Mordor Uruk Hai are even more moronic than the Orcs.
      But in general a super-strength army that can cross hundreds of miles with no resupply at a non stop day and night sprint, and fight in pitch darkness, and can be raised from literally nothing, no industry, no forges, nothing, to an army of tens of thousands inside a year or two, would be completely unbeatable for most of history. Add in Saruman's technology and brainwashing and they'd walk over any army they encountered until the 1900s.

      Night vision alone is an absurd advantage, an almost unbeatable advantage until we ourselves devised night vision. You cant even fathom how hard it would be to coordinate a pre-modern force at night.

      • 11 months ago
        Anonymous

        except for the part where they have zero combat experience and collapse like the tactical house of cards they are when exposed to battle
        they're also not brainwashed, Saruman lost control of his entire army fricking up his approach, the minute they had a looting opportunity

        an army that literally cannot stop itself from disintegrating into a disorganized band of looters is worth frickall

        • 11 months ago
          Anonymous

          >except for the part where they have zero combat experience and collapse like the tactical house of cards they are when exposed to battle
          They were taking casualties as if exposed to rifle fire from a completely unexpected force, for an entire night and unflinchingly held rank and pressed on with a complicated battle plan involving coordinating attacking the gate with the ram, the high wall with the super-ladders, the Hornburg with the regular ladders and bombs. They spun on a heel to bring their formation to bear on Eomer charging down a cliff at them, and only started to falter under Gandalf's sun-blast that was visibly causing them to steam and blinded them. Then, being hit with a line of impossibly strong super-cavalry lead by said wizard, and only then, did they retreat in a fairly organized way into the million giant tree monsters waiting for them outside.

          Movie Uruks follow Saruman's orders to the letter, even when they barely understand them. They marched day and night shoulder to shoulder in unison, they were absurdly orderly, they were like robots that made roaring noises.

          • 11 months ago
            Anonymous

            except for the part where the gate attack with the ram and all instances of the ladders were a complete shitshow of a frickup

            they're the definition of a parade army

            • 11 months ago
              Anonymous

              You're just making shit up. The gate, the bombs, both sets of ladders, shifting of formation, use of the ballistas, maintaining cohesion, they were absurd in their organization, to the point where its actually somewhat distracting.

              Their discipline sucks hard. They can't even get along with orcs from another garrison/tribe. It will be incredibly difficult to control a whole army of such apes. If there is no constant supervision of a certain Satan-tier Dark Lord over them, there will always be a chance that they themselves will kill each other.

              The only time Saruman's Uruks killed orcs was when said orcs disobeyed Saruman's orders.

              • 11 months ago
                Anonymous

                the ladders and gate were a complete failure of an operation that only achieved heavy casualties on their behalf with nothing to show for

                if not for the explosives, the Uruk-Hai would have starved to death before the walls

              • 11 months ago
                Anonymous

                >the ladders and gate were a complete failure of an operation that only achieved heavy casualties on their behalf with nothing to show for
                I disagree, they allowed the uruk hai to scale the walls and put pressure on the Elven archers at the wall who would have killed a lot more of the uruka hai otherwise since the only weapon that would have reached them were their crossbows.
                And the larger ladders allowed them to scale onto the keep and bypass most of the outer defenses.

              • 11 months ago
                Anonymous

                >the ladders and gate were a complete failure of an operation that only achieved heavy casualties on their behalf with nothing to show for
                moron, how long do you think it takes to storm a castle? Much less a movie castle with walls like the great wall of China and archers pinpoint lethal from a quarter mile away?

                Once the ladders first connected the walls were never free of Uruks, and both ladder attacks lead directly to not only storming the keep faster but even being able to set off the mines at all.
                The ram was breaking through the outer gate within minutes, and was only delayed by two superhumans that can kill dozens of warriors by themselves easily leaping out of nowhere and attacking them, and even then they only delayed them a couple of minutes.

                In fact that's the story of most of the battle. Everything the Uruks tried went off without a hitch with the exception of very brief delays caused by three men who can solo entire platoons.

              • 11 months ago
                Anonymous

                >The ram was breaking through the outer gate within minutes
                The ram? As in singular? Did you forget the part where they were trying to batter the gate down, found their ram was fricking useless, and then went and called for Grond? Brilliant strategy, that.

              • 11 months ago
                Anonymous

                He is talking about the Battle of the Hornburg.Grond only appeared during the Siege of Minas Tirith.

                >the ladders and gate were a complete failure of an operation that only achieved heavy casualties on their behalf with nothing to show for
                moron, how long do you think it takes to storm a castle? Much less a movie castle with walls like the great wall of China and archers pinpoint lethal from a quarter mile away?

                Once the ladders first connected the walls were never free of Uruks, and both ladder attacks lead directly to not only storming the keep faster but even being able to set off the mines at all.
                The ram was breaking through the outer gate within minutes, and was only delayed by two superhumans that can kill dozens of warriors by themselves easily leaping out of nowhere and attacking them, and even then they only delayed them a couple of minutes.

                In fact that's the story of most of the battle. Everything the Uruks tried went off without a hitch with the exception of very brief delays caused by three men who can solo entire platoons.

                >and even then they only delayed them a couple of minutes.
                Bullshit. The assault on the gate hapepned at the start of the battle and the orcs never managed to get through it, even after the deeping wall was breached.You're mixing up events from the movie and book battle.
                >"Its gates lay in ruin; but over the barricade of beams and stones within no enemy as yet had passed."
                They actually had to use Saurumans fire to breach it and they never managed to get through it since Helms reinforcements arrived and Theoden sallied out.
                >There was a roar and a blast of fire. The archway of the gate above which he had stood a moment before crumbled and crashed in smoke and dust. The barricade was scattered as if by a thunderbolt. Aragorn ran to the king’s tower.But even as the gate fell, and the Orcs about it yelled, preparing to charge, a murmur arose behind them, like a wind in the distance, and it grew to a clamour of many voices crying strange news in the dawn. The Orcs upon the Rock, hearing the rumour of dismay, wavered and looked back. And then, sudden and terrible, from the tower above, the sound of the great horn of Helm rang out.

              • 11 months ago
                Anonymous

                >Bullshit. The assault on the gate hapepned at the start of the battle and the orcs never managed to get through it, even after the deeping wall was breached.You're mixing up events from the movie and book battle.
                We're talking about the movie. The ram comes up the bridge and is already smashing the door in when Aragorn and Gimli leap across the chasm to relieve the defenders. After they leave it isnt long at all until the reinforced door is smashed down anyway.

              • 11 months ago
                Anonymous

                We're... talking about Saruman's Uruk Hai, at helms deep, you moron.

      • 11 months ago
        Anonymous

        >can be raised from literally nothing, no industry, no forges, nothing, to an army of tens of thousands inside a year or two
        That's the most ridiculous thing about it all. IIRC in the books saruman brings bunches of dunlending men and wild orc tribes under his control, with freshly bred uruks only as elites. He doesn't create the entire army from nothing, uruks (what do they eat?) and plate armor and all.

  7. 11 months ago
    Anonymous

    No, they're just plain worse than elves/numenorians/whatever at literally everything.

  8. 11 months ago
    Anonymous

    They have a night vision? I wasn't aware.

  9. 11 months ago
    Anonymous

    In movies siege equipment is always absurdly powerful, people underestimate this. Those Ballistas they had were like a hundred or a thousand times more powerful than any real world example, firing bolts the size of a man half a mile with so much force they can pick up a man at the top of a tower and carry him away into the air. Ignoring that it's impossible to do that without blowing the man to pieces you wouldn't just need a cannon for that kind of momentum, you'd need a *big* cannon.

  10. 11 months ago
    Anonymous

    Numenoreans alone can annihilate uruks

  11. 11 months ago
    Anonymous

    Their discipline sucks hard. They can't even get along with orcs from another garrison/tribe. It will be incredibly difficult to control a whole army of such apes. If there is no constant supervision of a certain Satan-tier Dark Lord over them, there will always be a chance that they themselves will kill each other.

    • 11 months ago
      Anonymous

      doesn't matter. saruman commands and they obey. they can fight amongst themselves when they're not busy, who cares

      • 11 months ago
        Anonymous

        being obedient doesn't automatically make you dangerous to enemy

        • 11 months ago
          Anonymous

          especially not when your chief is an armchair general with zero practical experience and on top of it is fond of overcomplicated plans

  12. 11 months ago
    Anonymous

    >pre-gunpowder
    frick that
    I want line infantry uruk hais
    they'd be unstoppable

  13. 11 months ago
    Anonymous

    >Would uruks be the ultimate weapon
    I think the elves have an edge over the orcs

    • 11 months ago
      Anonymous

      What does the reddit frog have to do with that?

      • 11 months ago
        Anonymous

        Calm down, it's just a jpg, it can't hurt you

      • 11 months ago
        Anonymous

        Actually, it's the twitch toad

  14. 11 months ago
    Anonymous

    You forgot intelligent. Urukhai are as intelligent as a man and can be grown faster than radishes.

  15. 11 months ago
    Anonymous

    Not as gimped as an orc, as in: nearly as strong and effective as a man, does not a super-soldier make

    • 11 months ago
      Anonymous

      OP has obviously never read the books.He probably thinks Men-Orcs and Orc-Men are the same as Uruks.

      • 11 months ago
        Anonymous

        I'm taking about uruks. Not necessarily Isengard ones. Mordor uruks such as Shagrat and other uruks from Cirith Ungol also count.

        • 11 months ago
          Anonymous

          The Uruks in the books are not stronger than humans.They are also smaller.They are also not grown from mud but have to be bred.The humans in Saurons army performed far better than the Uruks and even Gimli did not like fighting against the Dunlendings but had no problems fighting against Sarumans orcs.
          >They turned and ran. At that moment some dozen Orcs that had lain motionless among the slain leaped to their feet, and came silently and swiftly behind. Two flung themselves to the ground at Éomer’s heels, tripped him, and in a moment they were on top of him. But a small dark figure that none had observed sprang out of the shadows and gave a hoarse shout: Baruk Khazâd! Khazâd ai-mênu! An axe swung and swept back. Two Orcs fell headless. The rest fled.Éomer struggled to his feet, even as Aragorn ran back to his aid.The postern was closed again, the iron door was barred and piled inside with stones. When all were safe within, Éomer turned: ‘I thank you, Gimli son of Glóin!’ he said. ‘I did not know that you were with us in the sortie. But oft the unbidden guest proves the best company. How came you there?’‘I followed you to shake off sleep,’ said Gimli; ‘but I looked on the hillmen and they seemed over large for me, so I sat beside a stone to see your sword-play.

  16. 11 months ago
    Anonymous

    Prehistoric modern humans fought stronger human species for centuries on equal footing. Guess who won.

  17. 11 months ago
    Anonymous

    Dragons were the only powerful creation of Morgoth, balrogs were simply fallen maia. Orcs are absolute trash that rely on numbers and tricks. The hosts of Beleriand almost defeated Morgoth while the hosts of Valinor actually did. Nümenor might have been even more powerful than Valinor but that's debatable. Sauron was powerful but he still needed thousands of years to slowly grind down the Elves of Eregion, Arnor and Gondor. His military power was nothing in comparison to the forces of the first age, his greatest and most evil success was corrupting Nümenor and bringing it to ruin. Uruk-hai are stronger orcs that are slightly shorter than the average men of the third age, their greatest strength being better courage and withstanding sunlight. It was Sauron however that created them.

  18. 11 months ago
    Anonymous

    >Dies to trees

  19. 11 months ago
    Anonymous

    To raid and pillage sure, get them to try and occupy anywhere they'll probably just rape and murder everything at some point, most likely at the same time. They'll be nothing left to occupy by the end of a month. Then again considering how Uruks are born maybe tha's the point.

  20. 11 months ago
    Anonymous

    They were still smaller and weaker than humans.Jackson just exaggerated them for the movies.

  21. 11 months ago
    Anonymous

    How long do they take to grow?
    I feel like a great advantage comes from Uruk logistics, just raise a frickton of them out of the mud and let them fight until they die.
    No need to keep feeding them after the war and no need to reduce your productive population by recruiting peasants

  22. 11 months ago
    Anonymous

    Both the books and movies spell out that Orcs, even the "super elite Uruks," would effectively never accomplish anything on their own because they're such volatile humanoid pitbulls they end up killing more of themselves than any enemy, imagine hearing your army has already suffered 50% casualties because they even managed to reach the enemy

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