Balrog vs Smaug

[lawow74]

Gandalf's line to Frodo, "but there is not now any dragon left on earth in which the old fire is hot enough; nor was there ever any dragon, not even Ancalagon the Black, who could have harmed the One Ring." often made me wonder if he was dropping a hint about Smaug's age.

We'll never know exactly how old Smaug was. My guess is he originates early in the Third Age and grew powerful beyond his lesser kin, until he heard tell of the wealth of Erebor and went south to claim it for himself. If his fire was hot enough to harm the other Rings of Power, again, we'll never know. I think the quote is more meant to emphasize that even the mightiest Dragon is not on the order of Sauron and his works, as the One Ring was.

[Marxman]

Balrog obviously. Turn punch too imba.

We're talking about Street Fighter, right?

[Kulanae]

The Balrog rode dragons as steeds into battle. By the time honored pecking order......that makes Balrog more powerful than dragons.

[Alexinho]

Balrog godstomps.

It managed to kill Gandalf's vessel, who is a Maiar.

[Trassk]

Smarg has serious sex appeal, dat voice *melts butter*

[Deleted]

Did I say Gandalf didn't kill Balrog? I don't think I did.....

You said he got beat fair and square, thats not what happened, and thats what I pointed out.

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We'll never know exactly how old Smaug was. My guess is he originates early in the Third Age and grew powerful beyond his lesser kin, until he heard tell of the wealth of Erebor and went south to claim it for himself. If his fire was hot enough to harm the other Rings of Power, again, we'll never know. I think the quote is more meant to emphasize that even the mightiest Dragon is not on the order of Sauron and his works, as the One Ring was.

you have to remember that the hobbit was an isolated book. Written as a childrens story (which it is excellent as, and the travesty of the films totally fail to capture the essence of), before the LoTR and all the rest. The ring was just used as a device to tie the stories together for instance. LotR was originally supposed to be another childrens book like the hobbit...but it kind of escalated! and ended up being 9 books (later condensed down to the 3 parts we are more familiar with now).

So when it was written, smaug was just a dragon, not the end of a story set in a stupendously realised fantasy world that spans eons of history. He was just generic dragon with no history or background. So no, we'll never know how he fit into the wider world that was created later.

[Adam Jensen]

HEY HEY HEY, I for one really enjoyed the entire chapter devoted to the fate of Sam's pony.

Oh man, the chapter where Eowyn and Faramir court each other, that was RIVETING.

As in, I had to rivet my eyes open to not fall asleep.

[Deleted]

Dragons are far more powerfull than Balrogs.. Hell highborne elves like Glorfindel and Echthelion took out Balrogs in single combat. Echthelion even took out the Balrog lord Gothmog. On the other hand it took Earendil in vingilot + all the great eagles etc to take out Ancalagon the black. Dragons destroyed entire elven hosts. Glaurung wasn´t even a flying wyrm and took out Menegroth.

[Yvaelle]

Balrogs are monsters of Shadow and Fire - they are creatures largely of terror tactics - being near-invisible in their natural environment and preying upon creatures much smaller than they are - generally.

Dragons have a natural immunity to fire - so much so that Smaug swam through nearly boiling gold (2800 Celcius) - just for style points. So, unless the balrog's mastery of "Shadow" includes extradimensional void-magic or something - his abilities with Fire are pretty much null - because Dragons can apparently swim through the corona's of dying stars.

The one solid argument in the Balrog's favour is the size of the sword the Balrog was swinging - if a black arrow is enough to dislodge dragon plating - then that sword should be able to pierce or dislodge plating as well. Since the Balrog is largely an ephemeral creature - it could prove hard for Smaug to kill - being armed only with fire attacks and claw attacks himself. Gandalf has the power of white magic to banish Balrogs - Smaug has no such magical inclination.

Even still, Smaug should probably win without great effort.

[RumlyD]

I know it has been mentioned, but the songs...the endless, page after page songs...


I nearly wept with joy when in the film, Legolas says "They are singing a song for Mithrandir...but I haven't the heart to tell of it". Imagine if Jackson had included just some of them...the running time would have doubled -_-

They are part of the mode that Tolkien wrote the book in.

[Halyon]

Voting for the dragon winning, as they're immune to many forms of magic and fire...whiiich the Balrog is depending on.

[Ehrenpanzer]

Balrogs were servants of Melkor, corrupted fire-spirits of the order of the Maiar. When Gandalf said 'This foe is beyond any of you' he was not joking. Only something equivalently powerful in the supernatural heirarchy, which as a Wizard and Maiar himself Gandalf was, stood a chance. And even he fell(temporarily)after fighting it for three days and nights from the roots of the mountain to its very peak where, in his own words, he 'smote its ruin upon the mountainside'.

The question becomes 'Do Dragons rank on this level of power?' Certainly Smaug was powerful, he was described as the greatest of the firedrakes of the North still living, come down to nest within the Lonely Mountain, and having armored his soft underbelly with the gold and gems he slept upon for so long. But compared to the ancient dragons of earlier Ages, he's not so much of a much.

I think Smaug could put up a good fight, certainly, but as one of his chief weapons is fire and Balrogs ARE fire, he would be forced to come close to stand a chance of harming it. There it would be easy to melt off the underbelly armor enough to land a killing blow and lay Smaug the Golden low.

Now if we were talking about someone like Ancalagon the Black, might be a different story.

Pretty much this...

[Deleted]

Balrog ... no discussion needed

[Deleted]

(Side note; Balrogs have also changed many times in Tolkiens writings, originally creatures of fire, to eventually becoming Maiar themselves, so it is really hard to get a grasp on them).

The measure of power of a Balrog is indeed never made clear properly. There are also two different versions regarding Balrogs. One of them is that they are powerful, but not to the extend they can't be dealt with. In that scenario there are also a lot of them, hundreds or even more. These fought side by side to dragons more or less as equals. The other version is that they are immensely powerful, but there are only a few of them (7, I believe). This last version seems to have gotten more dominant.
Could it overpower a dragon? I'm not sure, because there is probably quite a range of power within the dragons as well. Plus it wouldn't be the first time something powerful by a 'lesser' being who is supposed to be lower in rank.

[Nobleshield]

Going off the books/mythos, Balrog hands down. Balrogs were no joke, they were the most powerful of Morgoth's servants. Smaug is just a dragon, and while that makes him pretty impressive in and of itself he's also pretty much one of the last dragons, and the age of dragons is well over by the time Smaug was alive. The Balrog of Moria, on the other hand, is the same creature as it was in the First and Second Ages, while Smaug maybe has been alive since the Second Age and his boasts ("I laid low the great heroes of old when I was young and tender") are pretty much dust in the wind compared to a creature that likely served the literal god of darkness in an age known only in legends by the Third Age.

Smaug's only special quality is the fact he's a dragon, impressive as that might be. He's nothing special besides the fact dragons are extremely rare by the Third Age, he's just a run of the mill average dragon it just so happens that in an age where dragons are themselves myths that makes him legendary. The Balrog on the other hand is an actual millennia-old fire demon.

[Deleted]

Balrogs are angelic creatures brought in before the creation of the world. Melkor corrupted them.
Now, having said that, Melkor also created dragons, but a balrog is a balrog, and I bet on the balrog.
God bless the silmarillion, the only TRUE bible.