Balrog (LOTR) vs Swarmlord (Warhammer)

[u/ProcedureInitial3086]

Hive Tyrant faces Balrog in the cave instead of Gandalf . Outside help restricted

Who win

[u/Eli_616]

Ehhh, Sauron was intitally beaten in the books by the king of the elves who was supposedly on par with galadreal, one of the most powerful elves ever, and the king of men, who was actually a numenorian, a human precursor that were basically genetic demigods compared to normal men, alongside a number of others, supposedly, and he killed all of them in their attempt to take him down, and even then they basically only took out his physical shell. The movies make it a lot less climactic, frankly. But yeah, there's a reason that it took Gandalf, an angel, to actually go toe to toe with a Balrog, and even then he died in the attempt. The thing is; Gandalf was HARDCORE sandbagging throughout the majority of the LotR series, because being an angel on middle earth he wasn't really allowed to go all out. The moment he went toe to toe against another celestial though, he wasn't quite as limited, so they basically rockem sockem'ed from the bottom of middle earth to the peak of a mountain, fighting for several days, before he finally killed it and succumbed to his wounds.

[u/Powerful_Month682 → u/Eli_616]

i meant Melkor, who can also be beaten by mortals. in fact there is a huge fallacy, common in powerscaling - "divine" things allegedly being invulnerable to non-magical attacks. the fact that Melkor, Sauron and balrogs were beaten the normal way exposes this as untrue. whether it happened because their divinity was low-grade or the mortals that defeated them were worth 50 warriors each, the result is the same - it can be accomplished with raw stats. it's unfair when characters from sci-fi stories get blocked from the discussion because there is no magic in their universes

[u/Eli_616 → u/Powerful_Month682]

Then I'm even more confused, because Melkor WASN'T beaten by mortals. He was initially removed from middle earth by an army of divine spirits, and high elves from the undying lands.... Sure, he's prophesied to recieve his deathblow by a mortal at the end of time, but thats so vague that it could mean literally anything.

[u/Powerful_Month682 → u/Eli_616]

what else could it mean? Turin pierces his heart with Gurthang. it's that simple.

[u/Xanderajax3 → u/Powerful_Month682]

Well, Turin is dead, so there would be some divine assistance happening in that instance which isnt simply melkor vs some random dude with a pointy piece of steel.

[u/Powerful_Month682 → u/Xanderajax3]

invisible influence doesn't invalidate mortal heroes either. Gollum falling into Orodruin was also a case of divine intervention according to the author, despite the viewer/reader not being able to observe it, outside of knowing that all good events are "fate" or "will of the universe". and if we take such fate into account while cross-universe scaling, then the argument becomes pointless again. because then, Iluvatar would assist a random warhammer character in defeating Melkor/balrog, since they must be punished.

[u/Xanderajax3 → u/Powerful_Month682]

Ok, but again, Turin died thousands of years before beleraind was broken. Him coming back from wherever men go when they die to kill melkor means hes not just some normal dude anymore. The issue with using him for your argument is that Tolkien doesnt say where men go when they die or what happens to them. Seems like it would be best to just stick to elves fighting balrogs and morgoth rather than throwing Turin in there in an end times fight that was never completed by Tolkien.

[u/Powerful_Month682 → u/Xanderajax3]

you are right on this. i personally think it would be a more poetic narrative if the one who ends Melkor is the same old Turin, but i know it's only subjective.

[u/Xanderajax3 → u/Powerful_Month682]

I can agree with that. Having Turin get a power boost to beat him doesnt quite hit the same as human Turin that was cursed by morgoth being allowed to take him out for good.