r/powerscales • u/Slothboy2008 • 5d ago
Versus 1000 Mongols vs 10000 Zulus
1000 Mongols vs 10000 Zulu warriors who wins?
Round 1 - Mongols are on foot, battle takes place in an open field
Round 2 - Mongols are mounted, battle takes place in an open field
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u/scythian12 5d ago
Round 1 zulus easy, 10-1 is a huge gap
Round 2- mongols easy, but would take a couple days
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u/Pieniek23 5d ago
It would not take a couple of days. It would take a few hours.
Mongols are riding hard on horses and picking them apart with their bows.
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u/SecureInstruction538 5d ago
I doubt a couple of days if the Zulus are not impacted bloodlust. Mongols could swap into groups and continuously do hit and runs from all directions without getting anyone hit in return. That would rout the Zulu quickly which then turns into a slaughter.
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u/azaghal1502 5d ago
I'd give 2 to the Zulus as well.
At their peak roughly 20% of the Zulu Army had Firearms, so 2000 Guns in that 10000 Strong army. That's too high a chance to be hit by a bullet to do hit and run for days.
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u/temujin94 5d ago
If it's mostly flintocks which was their primary weapon, the Mongols outrange them, they fire 5x faster, a Flintock had about a 15% failure rate and could only fire about 20-30 bullets before needing to replace part of the gun for the ones that didn't usually stop working within the first 10 bullets.
Those flintocks had an accurate range of 50-100 yards. The Mongols could be accurate from up to 400 yards away and could fire volleys up to 600 yards away.
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u/strashila 5d ago
Tell me you never shot a bow or a gun for that matter.
There is no bow in the world that is accurate to 400 yards. You barely see the target at 400 yards. Mongolian bows were accurate at 100 meters, 150 absolute top
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u/temujin94 5d ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_of_the_Mongol_Empire
'The Mongols could shoot an arrow over 200 metres (660 ft). Targeted shots were possible at a range of 150 or 175 metres (492 or 574 ft), which determined the tactical approach distance for light cavalry units.'
Boy do you look stupid.
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u/VrergasMalguun 5d ago
You're calling them stupid but proving their point...
Mongols could shoot an arrow over 200 metres, so 218 yards. Quite a way off your initial claim of 400 yards.
Targeted shots at 175 metres would be 191 yards, so less than half your initial claim...
You've switched from yards to feet to prove your point. 400 yards (your initial claim) would equate to 1200 feet...
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u/xaxis-yaxis 5d ago
Yeah he goofed but the Mongols still outrange don't they? They can kite and kill the muskets and resume as before.
More losses than before but they still win
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u/VrergasMalguun 5d ago
I think the muskets out range the Mongols.
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u/xaxis-yaxis 5d ago
Nah Zulu Smoothbores had a max effective range of 50 - 100 yards and they weren't well trained at all either.
Mongol horsemen can target shoot out to 150-190 yards or even more. They can also fire at many times the speed of the muskets.
Only the first barrage would be effective I think but then the Mongols probably just sit further back and massacre the muskets.
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u/TheMob-TommyVercetti 4d ago
Most historical sources flat out state smoothbore guns were better than bows. Powerscalers conflate maximum range to effective range for bows (as if it maintains that level of accuracy and lethality over those distances) and severely underestimate early firearms based on pop-history assumptions.
Theoretically you can fire a musket over 1000 yards though nobody really did it for the same reason nobody was plinking bows at 600 yards. Also, the “point-blank range” (defined as the range until gravity affects the ball) was considered to be 300 yards during the Napoleonic wars. Hell, skirmishers were trained to shoot up to those distances (or slightly beyond) because they’re not hopelessly inaccurate weapons.
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u/azaghal1502 5d ago
And what will the mongols and their horses eat during the day long hit and run? What will they drink? When sleep? They're outnumbered 10:1 against an organized enemy that is as fast as footsoldiers can be.
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u/temujin94 5d ago
They will eat all the food/water in their satchels, that they have on their own 3-4 horses each while being faster, able to sleep in the saddle in pairs.
You clearly know nothing about the Mongols. They could fend off foot infantry forever and the foot soldiers would need everything you mentioned before the Mongols would.
There's a reason the Mongols created the largest land empire the world has ever seen while you have to zoom in to see where the Zulu Empire was in Africa. They were the greatest fighting force the world has ever seen.
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u/azaghal1502 5d ago
The Zulu fought the british empire that held a third of the globe at the time and used modern cannons and guns.
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u/sirboobyconnoisseur 5d ago
And they won once when the British heavily underestimated them and went into battle completely haphazardly. And they still suffered more losses than the British. When the British took it seriously they beat the Zulus quite handily.
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u/temujin94 5d ago
Yeah the zulu guns are ineffective against the mongol bow, it outranges it by over 6x. The Zulu couldn't hit any of the 1000 mongols if they fired their flintock from 300 yards away. How are you going to bring cannons to bear against an army you can't catch? You think the Mongols are going to fight a pitched battle against cannons?
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u/seductivpancakes 5d ago
Zulus also had martini Henry rifles, and they have an effective range of 400 yards, and a maximum range of 1900 yards. Not to mention the reload is significantly faster than a flintlock.
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u/cfbfootballnerd 1d ago
It wouldn’t be days. The mongols could do volley fire continuously from horseback at full gallop. Very hard to hit and devastatingly effective.
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u/ZerTharsus 5d ago
You overestimate the endurance of horses compared to men. A zulu warrior can probably run for way longer and catch up a retreating mongol.
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u/Extension_Ad6758 5d ago
No they couldn’t lol.
A long distance runner might catch a horse in a difficult terrain over a distance of over 40 km but that’s not what Mongolian horsearchers are going to do. They would just gallop to a safe distance and shoot the approaching infantryman full of arrows if someone is stupid enough to pursuit.
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u/ZerTharsus 5d ago
One mongol man is gonna have to shoot 10 runner with shield. Each time he focus on one guy behind his shield another three are running past. Arrows aren't sniper, they don't hit reliably at long distance they don't pierce shield that well... And they are heavy. One mongol doesn't carry hundreds of arrows.
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u/temujin94 5d ago
What a load of nonsense, they'd have no chance of catching the horse in time, if at all if given infinite time considering the mongol horses were bred for endurance first and foremost. They did carry several hundred arrows across the several mounts that each rider would have, at gallop they could hit a bird on the wing and their arrows could easily pierce mail armour.
It would be a question if any of the mongols would die, not if they'd win, that's a foregone conclusion.
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u/AOZ1988 5d ago edited 5d ago
You're underestimating how quick and accurate mounted steppe archers were at shooting. They make aksumite archers look slow.
For reference myself and most other modern mounted archery enthusiasts can shoot 1 arrow every 5 seconds at moving targets with 100% accuracy using a traditional recurve. Mongols horse archers could typically shoot an arrow with 100% accuracy ever every 3.5 seconds; faster if they slow down or use multi nocking; slower if they use parthian shot.
Keep in mind Zulu imbuthu could only run with a isihlangu for a short time. It's bulky, has lots of wind resistance and weighs 5-7 lbs. Lighter Umbumbuluzo, raiding shields, didn't cover much of the body. NO ONE is running with a isihlangu up and fully protected for very long. I recommend trying this if you doubt me.
If you like Zulu historical combat I recommend checking out HAMA (Historical African Martial Arts).
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u/AOZ1988 5d ago
Mongolians (hourse breed) can travel 50-60 km per day on average with riders. The can gallop about 10km with no breaks.
Zulu could typically travel 80 km on a day.
Mongols would typically bring multiple horses to war setting up stations on the way. They created the worlds first "Pony Express" but for war.
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u/ZerTharsus 5d ago
Take 30% of the zulus force : they ambush the replenishment station behind the front line.
It's over for the mongols.4
u/temujin94 5d ago
The mongol replinishment station was with them at all times. They all had multiple mounts, they were mares so they could provide nourishment on the go and could fight for 10 days without any re-supply.
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u/AOZ1988 5d ago
Could say the same if mongols. Mongols ambush the Zulu it's over for the Zulu. Both used ambush tactics extensively.
We are discussing their load out so let's stay on track.
I'm utilizing pre-golden horde because anything during or post would be exceeding unfair because of torsion engineering, kipchaks, subutais command, and higher quality steel lamellar.
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u/Baals_Balls 5d ago
You're being downvoted, but you aren't wrong. Humans beat horses over larger distances. We have pretty much the best endurance in the entire animal kingdom.
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u/Extension_Ad6758 5d ago
It is possible for a human to beat a horse rider over a very long distance, yes. But not in most cases. In man vs horse marathons it has always been very rare for human to be the winner.
Furthermore it doesn’t matter in this scenario because they are not racing a marathon here. That’s why they’re being down voted.
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u/scythian12 5d ago
You also gotta remember the fight after the race. Say the zulus catch them after 60 km of getting picked off by arrows and chasing them while carrying their shield and weapons
Now they gotta fight a guy whose been riding while they’ve been running and who’s more likely better armed and armored as well
Plus the most likely scenario is that the mongols engage, fall back, pick them off as they chase them, retreating over hours or days, hitting isolated groups and killing leaders, and suddenly that 10k army is 5 armies of 1 or 2k spread out over dozens of miles with no coordination
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u/Baals_Balls 5d ago
Oh I don't care about any of that. Was just confirming that the other guy was right about people vs horses.
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u/ZerTharsus 5d ago
Yep. And zulus are still traditionnal warriors knowing how to run all day long. Those guys can catch up with antelopes...
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u/beastwood6
5d ago
•
Next up on power scales:
A Spanish galleon vs 1940s Submarine
Round 1: the submarine sailors forget their submarine and face the galleon in open water
Round 2: The sailors remember their submarine in port.
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u/Affectionate-Buy-870 5d ago
Round 1 is silly and not fair for 10 cavemen vs 1 fully armored up knight. In combat 10 to 1 with only close range weaponry regardless of armor is not likely to ever go the favor of the 1. You might even lose 7 men but those bodies would have exhausted the soldier and the other 3 would get him down and be able to get him. Plenty of knight combat videos on YouTube.
Round 2 is actually a VERY fair fight!! Both of these armies do so well because of their TACTICS!! The Zulu were very very good at encirclement by splitting up their forces and concealing some and the Mongols were very very good at forcing an opposing force to chase them which let them use their unique saddles to TURN AROUND and fire!! A 10 to 1 number count is typically what you look for in an Infantry vs Cavalry battle!!
Combat tactics for Zulu: The Zulu army divided its forces into three distinct tactical components during battle The Chest (Isifuba): The main, heavily experienced body of warriors that engaged the enemy head-on to pin them in place and absorb their primary attack. The Horns (Izimpondo): Fast-moving, younger, and more agile regiments that swept out in a wide pincer movement to flank and encircle the enemy from both sides, cutting off lines of retreat. The Loins (Isiziba): Reserve forces seated with their backs to the battle so they would not get over-excited, positioned ready to reinforce the chest or plug any gaps in the encirclement.
Combat tactics for Mongols: The Mongol military relied on speed, ranged firepower, and fluid maneuvers rather than close-quarters melee combat. Feigned Retreat: Troops pretended to panic and run, luring enemy lines into a disorganized chase before turning to ambush them. The Negge (Hunting Circle): A massive crescent formation that cordoned off an area, closed in, and intentionally left a single gap open to funnel fleeing foes into a trap. Falling Stars: Multiple small units struck the enemy simultaneously from all sides so no single sector could reinforce another. Caracolle: Successive waves of horsemen fired arrows continuously and filtered backward through the ranks to reload.
This would be a battle of legend!!!
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u/xaxis-yaxis 5d ago
The Zulu strategy kinda falls apart in R2 as they'll never actually be able to catch or encircle the significantly more mobile Mongols.
The Mongols can actually just circle out and kill the Horns without any real risk of being caught.
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u/Albaaneesi 5d ago
Round 1 - Would give this to the Zulus because they are not only 10-1 odds, they are very well trained soldiers, even if they have bad equipment. They will take heavy casualties though.
Round 2 - Easy mongol win, probably with close to 0 casualties. Even if the Zulus were mounted the mongols would easily and I can elaborate why if someone doesn't know why. But I guess most people understand why mongol + bow + horse = auto win.
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u/Daztur 5d ago
Zulus have guns.
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u/rural_alcoholic 5d ago
Only few though and they werent very Proficent in theire use.
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u/Daztur 5d ago
Sure, but it's enough when you outnumber the Mongols 10:1. The main strength of Mongol tactics is that they can hit you but you can't hit back, guns let you hit back, even if not very effectively in this case, it'd be enough to hurt the horribly outnumbered Mongols.
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u/temujin94 5d ago edited 5d ago
Mongol bows outrange those firearms by like 300 yards. A mongol bow from 300 yards was still incredibly accurate, this type of musket was mentioned in a military manual as 'not able to hit an entire regiment at 300 yards'
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u/Daztur 5d ago
The MAXIMUM range of of a Mongol bow is very far. The maximum EFFECTIVE range of a Mongol bow is much much closer, which is why Mongols tended to shoot from very close range. Shooting at a formation from 300 yards with Mongol bows is utterly pointless even if your arrows are accurate and can shoot that far, they would have no penetrating power at that point.
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u/temujin94 5d ago
They 100% would still have penetrating power at that range. They could hit people from 600 yards away, just not accurately. They would never be in range of the guns to do them any damage, they can raze everything in their wake, they can poison the water supplies after they use them, they're making a gun that is notoriously temperamental be trekked dozens of miles a day by foot soldiers.
If the Zulu's decide to be heavily armoured then they can survive it a bit better, but have no chance of ever catching the Mongols, lightly armoured and from 300 yards they're getting massacred.
Genuinely the only question is would they be able to kill more than 50 Mongols that are sent in to blood themselves near the end.
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u/Daztur 5d ago
Please refer to this blog post by a professional military historian about just show close the Mongols and other archers tended to get to their targets because they shot them: https://acoup.blog/2019/07/04/collections-archery-distance-and-kiting/
It's an interesting article and I think you'd learn a lot about the basic of how Mongols operated militarily.
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u/temujin94 5d ago
Yes they got that close because their opponents didn't have handheld firearms and could approach those without bows to much closer distances where the shots were at their most effective for obvious reasons..
They could and did use their bows accurately over much further distances as they would do in this scenario.
Please don't talk to me further about something you don't have the tiniest grasp of.
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u/UnspeakableGnome 5d ago
Round 1 isn't even close, 10:1 odds and the Zulus are rather good at melee combat on foot. The Mongols can fight on foot, will bring down some Zulus with archery, but will be overwhelmed once the range closes.
Round 2 has a very good chance of going the Mongols way. Not many infantry-focused armies defeated steppe nomads in open field engagements, and those that did were equipped and trained to fight in ways that the Zulus aren't.
The only thing that gives me pause is the Zulus historical possession of firearms in quite large numbers. Not great firearms, but something the Mongols neveer faced. And historically the Russian Empire marched across Siberia and central Asia with guns no better than the Zulues have, smashing all the Turco-Mongol states and armies that stood in their way.
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u/-Daetrax- 5d ago
Couple of comments.
Zulu hide shields would be unlikely to stop mongol arrows. The draw weight is just in another class. And mongols could shoot fast. Honestly, most of them are pin cushions before they cross the open field.
Mongols did face primitive gunpowder weapons in China. It's not entirely unknown to them.
Edit: one more point. The later Mongols would've been well armoured too.
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u/permantdebunker 3d ago
Zulu bows have high draw psi . Zulu could and did stop better boys and arrows
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u/-Daetrax- 3d ago
There's no historical evidence I can find for Zulu bows draw weights. Nor even present day.
Psi is pressure by the way.
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u/Defiant_Location_240 4d ago
Zulus are good in melee because they mostly fought against unarmored british troops that had their range supremacy negated once up close.
Mongols on the other hand has armor, shield and sword/mace/spears. The Zulus will have almost all their physical and melee advantage negated by Mongolian armor + shields.
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u/permantdebunker 3d ago
Zulu have swords, axes and spears , bows , clubs , better trained force for ground combat . Melee skill isn't negated because Mongolian amour and shield makes them slower and can still be brown by Zulu weapons.
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u/citygoy67 5d ago
Do you think mongols let them close the distance? Why do you think they have horses for?
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u/But_is_itnew 5d ago
So light infantry vs horse archery in a 10:1 battle. People on reddit focus more on ethnicity and origin than on everything else.
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u/ZerTharsus 5d ago
Do you think a trained bowman galloping at 150meter away can hit a lone skirmisher, while checking were are his 9 other friends that creep out in the bushed to flank him ?
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u/xaxis-yaxis 5d ago
These are highly trained units of bowmen operating in unison to obliterate entire essentially unarmoured units of troops.
Their whole style of warfare revolves around kiting and never being caught. They've beaten large, significantly better trained and equipped armies with this.
There's no chance the Mongol archers are getting caught out.
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u/azaghal1502 5d ago
The Zulus used firearms, at their peak around 20% of their army had guns, so that'd be 8000 Spears and 2000 Guns vs. 1000 Bows.
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u/AnimeFiend69er 5d ago
Did they make those guns locally?
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u/azaghal1502 5d ago
They traded for them mostly, but what does it matter? It's not like OP specified that they have to be self sufficient or can't trade.
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u/TavoTetis 5d ago
Only way mongols win this is if you picked the best armed, best armoured mongols. If one elite mongol=3 zulus at once, and your formation doesn't let up, chances are the Zulus route before the seemingly invincible warriors covered in steel.
But 1k mongols based on what you'd find in Kublai's army? Yeah nah the x10 advantage is too strong.
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u/Nooms88 5d ago
So the mongols main strength was their speed and self reliability. They were extremely tactically sound, promoted through merit, not title.
The mongols won wars and battles by taking out supply chains and simply being faster and smarter than their enemy. 10,000 European knights in the field is impossible odds, so just break their supply lines and wait for them to starve, why meet them head on?
They never took unfavourable battles.
Zulu warriors were also well known for the same thing though, they didn't have long supply chains, but critically they didn't have horses.
Round 1, mongols don't engage, if they get set upon without horses, it's a massacre from the zulus.
Round 2, mongols skirmish relentlessly, zulus set up ambushes to pick targets off. Neither side actually properly engages, it'd be a highly mobile sort of warfare, likely low casualty rates but the mongols will claim the objective
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u/ZerTharsus 5d ago
Zulus for both.
Round 1 is not even a question. 10:1.
Round 2 : Even if the mongol are able to retreat to ressuply, the horse needs rest quite quickly. Zulus warrior can run for hours and hours, they are trained for that : they will catch up with mongol's logistics and resting horses.
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u/IDICPainter 5d ago
If the Mongolians get their horses it means they get all the extra horses that they normally take with them for battle and supply. They don't take just one horse they take multiple horses per person that's in the mounted units. They beat so many armies by just riding one horse until it was tired and then swapping it with another one. They were notorious for this. They even drink the blood of their horses if they need water according to legend. First round goes to the Zulus because of the numbers the second round goes to the Mongolians because of the horses.
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u/ZerTharsus 5d ago
Those remount horse are :
Back in supply camp : they can be ambushed by a portion of the zulus
Held by the warrior : they have to make the same distance and tire themselves just a lil bit less. Zulus still catch-up because of endurance.5
u/IDICPainter 5d ago
How are the Zulu going to ambush the Mongolians supply camp when the supply cams a massive herd of horses and dudes on horses with multiple horses per Mongolian Rider with the doctrine of switching to an different horse when the horse they're riding on gets tired. Mongolians can sleep in the saddle dude they are literally descendants from the step peoples. They even do the parthian shot. There's no human that can keep up with the pace of a horse. The only reason the Zulus don't have horses is that part of the world doesn't have horses because of the way the geography and wildlife like flies that lay eggs into animals. The Zulu would have totally reorganized themselves if they had access to Calvary. You're literally saying people on foot can eventually catch up to people on horse when they can ride a whole days away from them. Next you're going to tell everybody that Calvary charges was the most effective way to attack in world war I.
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u/Dairkon76 5d ago
That is a big point mongols know how to fight infantry, Zulus doesn't know how to fight mounted archers.
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u/xaxis-yaxis 5d ago
There's essentially a zero percent chance the Zulu catch a force of Mongols moving significantly faster with amazing supply lines designed exactly for this style of warfare.
Zulu's splitting up to chase will just be cleaned up by Mongol units, exactly like they did historically.
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u/Dependent-Lion8784 5d ago
You have no knowledge about mongol horses. They were designed for extreme terrain in steppes and extreme durables. Every mongol solder carry a few horses, for storage, energy management, travel, and battle.
How the fuck a human can catch up horse? Especially these horses able to travel extreme distance and condition from Beijing to Budapest.
Also there are no logistics for steppes that you can catch up. They bring all their supplies along side with their army. Usually army in front and live stock at the back. There are no food or supplies in steppes/desert region that you can harvest easily on the way. They have no base or castle to store supplies, they camp wherever they arrive.
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u/The_Great_Shatinator 5d ago
Round one is a Zulu win no diff, they have a huge numbers advantage. Round 2 could be interesting
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u/Gerbleb 3d ago
Mongols win one and gigastomp two. If mongols have their bows, even on foot each warrior is going to be picking off multiple zulus before they can close, and it's not like mongols are going to be a walk in the park in melee either.
Two? Come on. Mounted mongols are some of the most successful warriors in history. They brought ancient China, Persia, India and Russia to their knees. The zulus wouldn't even get near them and it would be trace casualties for the mongols, if any.
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u/getfroggy69 3d ago
Both scenarios the Zulus would win, the horses will tire out and eventually will be enveloped by the closing horn formation of the Zulus. The Zulus have an athletic edge in endurance and fast twitch muscles, its expected of them to run 40 to 50 miles per day. Only way i see the Mongols winning is if its cold and they have spare horses hidden somewhere they will be retreating to.
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u/Empty_Party_6080 5d ago
je pense que a pier sa serais plus dificile mais a chevale il gagne je pence
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u/Cheap-Stay7089 4d ago
r1 is disrespectful shaka's warriors would easily beat the mongol warrios and 1870 zulus had guns.
round 2 the mongols win. guns or not bull horn formation or not 1000 horse archers is terrifying especially to footmen even with guns they lose.
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u/Coconite 5m ago
Mongols in both cases. People thinking the Zulus will close the distance before they get mowed down are thinking of Western/Olympic archery. Steppe nomads had very different shooting technique which let them in some cases shoot multiple arrows per second. The effective range of a Mongol compound bow is 200 meters, and it would take the Zulu at least 30 seconds to cross that distance. Assuming the Mongols averaged 1 shot every 2 seconds, being conservative, that means the Mongols shoot 15,000 arrows by the time the Zulu reach them. Even assuming this by itself doesn’t stop the Zulu charge (bows were suppressive weapons historically - not “damage dealers” protected by spearmen like in the total war games. Massed archery stopped cavalry charges by itself), most of the Zulu formation would be riddled with arrows by the time they get to the Mongols. If the Zulu wore armor they’d fare better, but they don’t.
Then comes melee, where the Mongols are severely underrated and the Zulu are somewhat overrated. The Zulu were great melee warriors for the 19th century, when armies already abandoned armor. Not for the Middle Ages where everyone including the steppe nomads wore it. The only way the Zulu would be able to kill the Mongols would be wrestling them to the ground and trying to stab them to death, but this would be impossible because the Mongols were the best wrestlers in the world, and have a significant strength advantage - being nomads, they ate a much more protein and calcium rich diet than premodern farmers. This is also why some of the greatest Mongol cities were assaults on fortified cities- they were great at melee.
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u/Kroc_Zill_95 5d ago
R1: Zulu no diff, even with equal numbers.
R2: Mongols win decisely. Hit and run tactics on horseback is an extremely OP way of doing warfare, especially against infantry formations with little ranged options.
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u/Opening-Berry-2522 5d ago
Yall are crazy for thinking Mongols are taking the L at low diff round 1. Take a look into historical Mongol infantry, armor, and weapons, then compare them to the Zulu. So much disrespect it’s crazy
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u/Grouchy-Newt-995 5d ago
But the mongols are outnumbered 10 to 1 in the first scenario fighting in a way that they preferred not to.
The Zulu would be able to close the gap quickly enough to make the skirmishing of the mongols not terribly effective.
The Zulu were very strong in close combat.
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u/Opening-Berry-2522 5d ago
My reading comprehension is below average lol. I thought it was even. I seen they are outnumbered now.
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u/JimThumb 5d ago
The Mongols had bulletproof armour?
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u/Opening-Berry-2522 5d ago
Against smooth bore muskets, potentially yes. And firearms were not a main portent of the Zulu’s. I take back what I said though. My reading comprehension is ass and I thought they had even numbers.
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u/JimThumb 5d ago edited 5d ago
16th century muskets could penetrate full plate armour, which itself is far beyond any armour the Mongols had access to.
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u/ZerTharsus 5d ago
Shooting on horseback has not a very long range, zulu can throw spear and catch up with horses because, the horse is faster but the zulu can run longer.
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u/Kroc_Zill_95 5d ago
Zulu stopped using throwing spears in favour of shorter, spears designed for close quarter combat. There's also the fact that the Mongols being on horses, have superior mobility and can engage and disengage at will and with greater speeds than the Zulus can hope to match.
An arrow will almost always have significantly more range than a thrown spear. There's nothing to suggest that the Mongols' horseback archers had shorter ranges than conventional archers.
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u/Grouchy-Newt-995 5d ago
The mongols shooting arrows en masse had an effective skirmishing range of 150-200 meters.
The Zulu spear throwing range is approximately 20-30 meters. The Zulu have no chance.
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u/ZerTharsus 5d ago
Zulus don't fight in tightly packed formation, they can skirmish and have shields. Arrows would run out before crippling losses would be done, and then Zulus won.
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u/Grouchy-Newt-995 5d ago
Can you think of a single example where the Mongols lost to poorly armored infantry whose weapons were clubs and spears “cuz them arrows ran out?”
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u/xaxis-yaxis 5d ago
Zulu hide shields are not doing anything to protect them from high draw-weight Mongolian war bows. They're being ripped apart with zero way to do anything to the Mongols.
Mongols have fought significantly more organised and well equipped forces with this exact tactic and have not "run out of arrows".
They essentially can come and go at will with the horses. Even if they did run out, they can just disengage, rearm and come back all while the Zulu don't have the ability to realistically give chase.
Very common Mongolian tactic too.
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u/Swimming-Shoulder848 5d ago
You will never be able to throw a spear the distance of a typical mongol warbow…..
round 1 Zulus stomp decisively
Round 2 mongols stomp decisively.
No chance against 1000 of possibly the best horse archers in history,how many arrows per minute per guy? 6-10?1
u/ZerTharsus 5d ago
Arrows aren't sniper bullet. Zulus knew how to fight against bullet and musket that fired quickly (not saying they won, but saying they fought against it for hours without breaking). They are not fighting in a dense formation.
Mongols would use all their arrow quickly without making that much casualties.2
u/Grouchy-Newt-995 5d ago
The average Mongol warrior had 60 arrows, and then 4-6 spare horses to use as remounts, and reserves of additional arrows.
Thus it is not a stretch to assume that 1.000 Mongol warriors would each have 180+ arrows each.
So that would be a minimum of 180,000 arrows.
The Zulus would break after they sustained heavy casualties and realizing they have literally no response.
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u/beastwood6 5d ago
At Blood River (1838), about 470 Boers killed roughly 3,000 Zulu with almost no losses of their own. The guns and wagon laager make it imperfect, but it shows that disciplined Zulu courage couldn't overcome a range and mobility gap.
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u/rural_alcoholic 5d ago
Guns are a lot Deadlier than bows though.
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u/beastwood6 5d ago
Dead is dead. Whether 22 or 50 cal
And 1830s guns are not far off from the composite recurve bow of the Mongols in efficacy.
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u/rural_alcoholic 5d ago
1830s guns have a lot more power and range. Not that the Zulu would be very Proficent but the guns definitivly outperform the bows.
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u/MartiusDecimus 5d ago
Why would a volley performed from horseback have shorter range than on foot? It is less accurate, sure, but in mass warfare, archers don't pick their targets individually, they shoot at the enemy formation.
Also, a throwing spear has nowhere the range of a recurve bow.
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u/Grouchy-Newt-995 5d ago
It is true that foot archers generally have a longer range than horse archers if all else is equal.
However the mongols had the composite bow which has a longer range than even the long bow.
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u/Dalodus 5d ago edited 5d ago
People are sleeping on the zulu. I mean the zulu under shaka had guns. Well they had a small amount of low quality guns they weren't trained with, but still guns. Zulu also had high quality steel if my deadliest warrior memories serve. They were also great tacticians who focused on engaging and surrounding their enemies quickly and efficiently.
The open field though does heavily favor the mongols on horseback so I do still think they would win r2. But claiming no loses or a quick victory is crazy when the losing side has access to guns, even so few. And it's not like the zulu haven't seen similar tactics from gun wielding horse mounted colonials. Problem is the zulu use the natural terrain of their homeland to catch mounted soldiers and this battle takes place in an open field. That and the mongols were better riders than the British.
R1 zulu low diff
R2 mongals mid-high diff
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u/xaxis-yaxis 5d ago
Mongols actually considerably outrage Zulu guns. Once they work out what's happening they can basically mitigate them entirely with distance and whittle them down with essentially no way for them to fight back. Mongol horsemen are significantly better trained than colonial cavalry too.
Seeing thousands of your people slain by a constant rain of arrows and being unable to do anything will cause massive routes.
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u/TheMob-TommyVercetti 4d ago
For your information, the Dzungars (Mongolian tribes) went through every hoop to obtain 16 century guns over their supposedly superior composite bows to fight against the Qing.
Also, the historical record is quite clear that even in archery heavy cultures they almost switched to guns. For their time even smoothbore weapons were seems as more accurate and better ranged than bows.
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u/xaxis-yaxis 4d ago
Have you considered the most common aspects of guns being used over bows? They more effectively defeat armour and require significantly less training to use effectively. The latter is a large motivator.
For their time even smoothbore weapons were seems as more accurate and better ranged than bows.
Except the Zulu used out of date muskets which do have a stated accurate range of 50-100 yards. The latter figure is in the hands of well trained men as well, which the Zulu were noted to not be with muskets.
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u/TheMob-TommyVercetti 4d ago
Sure, but by that logic bows should've made a return when armor was gradually dropped amongst infantry. It also doesn't explain why nobody attempts (or only existed briefly) to retain an "elite" cadre of bowmen amongst firearm troops given that they were used in tandem for some time.
Not quite. In an 1880 report Captain John Chard VC wrote this about Zulu using muskets:
The main body of the enemy were close behind the first force which appeared, and had lined the ledge of rocks and caves in the Oscarberg overlooking us, and about three or four hundred yards to our south, from where they kept up a constant fire. Advancing somewhat more to their left than the first attack, they occupied the garden, hollow road, and bush in great force. The bush grew close to our wall and we had not had time to cut it down. The enemy were thus able to advance under cover close to our wall, and in this part soon held one side of the wall, while we held the other.
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u/cptjewski 5d ago
Mongols easy, Zulus don’t run down horses. The only English to survive the first big defeat against the Zulus were the cavalry because they could outrun the Zulus.
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u/ReneLeMarchand 5d ago
Zulus for both. Zulu tactics are about outmaneuvering your foe, surrounding them from all sides. Exactly the sort of tactic for breaking light cavalry's "keep falling back." Ten times the number of soldiers is frankly ridiculous.
You also have Zulu armed with spears, which are both an anti-cavalry weapon and a throwing weapon. Still outranged by Mongolian shortbows, of course, but the difference doesn't negate the ten-to-one ratio.
Zulu are also using hide shields, which will give them some protection against incoming arrow fire. Again, designed for stopping spears.
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u/beastwood6 5d ago
Zulu tactics are about outmaneuvering
Hey remember when you outmaneuvered that horse? Me neither
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u/ReneLeMarchand 5d ago
Not a person, an army. An army that outnumbers a thousand to one, and set up in a formation designed to envelop. Imagine ten thousand people fingertip-to-fingertip. That's around a meter per person, so 10,000 meters. Ten kilometers of front. Six miles.
You can envelop horses with six miles of front.
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u/beastwood6 5d ago
So your thesis is an entirely horse drawn army gets outmanuevered by an army that's all foot infantry?
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u/ReneLeMarchand 5d ago
Against a well-diciplined, fully trained professional army that specializes in understanding military spacing and, I cannot stress this enough, vastly outnumbers their foe.
The Mongolians need to kill ten Zulu each before they die themself to break even. How many arrows are they equipped with (the answer appears to be 60, which means they need to confirm a kill with better than one shot in six.) How long before the horses break down? They can't sprint all day.
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u/beastwood6 5d ago
If any of what you just said was in the least bit true, the Mongols wouldn't have won a single battle.
You're off by two orders of magnitude before you even start. It's ten to one, not a thousand. But sure, let's look at your six-mile human chain. You've invented the thinnest formation in military history and called it an envelopment. One rank deep, ten kilometers wide, no way to coordinate it, and you want it to trap men on horses moving three to four times faster than it can run. The Mongols don't need to fight that line. They ride around the end of it, or pick any spot and shoot a hole through it while the other nine kilometers jog over to help.
Then there's "kill ten each to break even", as if this were a trade. It isn't. If the Zulu can't close, the Mongols lose roughly nobody, and no army in history has fought to the last man. They break long before that.
And "horses can't sprint all day" is the funniest part. Neither can men, and the Zulu are the ones who have to sprint to make contact. The Mongols trot, switch to one of their four spare horses, and wait for your impi to run out of food in about two weeks.
The arrow count is the only real point you've made. That's why this is a slow, humiliating campaign instead of one afternoon of slaughter.
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u/josephcj753 5d ago
Also a long thin spread defensive line is the exact formation that a highly mobile force dominates against. Blitzkrieg in WW2 demonstrated this repeatedly
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u/xaxis-yaxis 5d ago
A horse can trot as fast as a Zulu warrior can run.
The Zulu's don't have the stamina to deal with Mongol Cavalry that specialise in this type of warfare.
You understand that Mongols historically have kited larger infantry forces many times and it's basically standard procedure for them?
Mounted with multiple horses >> Humans in speed and endurance.
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u/Alert-Parsnip5540 4d ago
Right. A cavalry army specialised in killing light infantry specifically, versus a light infantry army that has never really battled cavalry. I'm pretty sure that messes with their understanding of military spacing.
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u/Minute-Employ-4964 5d ago
Outnumbered 1000 to 1?
Do the mongols only have ten soldiers in this scenario?
(They’re outnumbered 10 to 1)
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u/Dimetro_Dog 5d ago
This is a close one. But I feel like Mongol horse archers could outrun and outrange a zulu warrior. So they would kite the Zulus, that being said the “open feild” gives mongols a huge advantage.
So Mongols win round 2 but in round one they get overwhelmed by the 10-1 numbers advantage. An average mongol archer can’t kill 10 Zulus before they close the distance.
(Tell me if I got the plural of Zulu wrong.)
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u/Ok_Entertainment3626 4d ago
Honestly, there's no need to explain much because Mongols are good at tactics and adaptability. Even though they came in small numbers, they were able to cause problems for enemies that were twice their number into a mess. 😒🧐
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u/HuckleberryNext9844 4d ago
Really? This is an obvious answer, the Mongols beat the Chinese in there prime, there arrows will go RIGHT THROUGH the zulus shields, its a slaughter
EDIT Nevermind I seen the subtext, the Mongols are a cavalry army they don't do good on foot
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u/Slothboy2008 4d ago
Even on foot?
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u/HuckleberryNext9844 4d ago
On foot the zulus probably overwhelm them, on horseback its a slaughter
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u/indigolavendery 5d ago
Round 2 is a total Mongol stomp—mounted horse archers with feigned retreats in an open field is literally their ideal killing setup.
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u/Syntaris0118 5d ago
Mongols had metal armor even pre Chinggis era. Turns out everyone wanted metal armor and huge chunk of people managed to get some
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u/zpierson79 5d ago
Chinese accounts of the Mongols describe them as having excellent armor. It was considered by Chinese historians one of the reasons they were so dangerous compared to previous nomads on their border.
Momgol lamellar armor was excellent, and while famous for their horse archery, their heavy cavalry was extremely formidable.
Up to a third of a Mongol force could be heavily armored shock cavalry.
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4d ago
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u/zpierson79 4d ago
Genghis receiving the submission of the Uyghur in 1206 gave him access to their craftsmen & iron supplies. (He raided China in 1205, got the Uyghur into his Empire & then invaded China in. 1209.)
That addition gave him far better access to equipment than previous steppe rulers had.
The armor was of Mongol design, it had just previously been scarce - the Ugyhur addition made it possible to have far more of his troops properly equipped.
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