POLL: If These Badgers were in a fight, who would win

[Søren]

Where is Gulo the Savage?

[Ashleg]

He was a loser.

[Søren]

Be that as it may, I liked him. He brought a, dare I say, savagery to the position. That and he ate some people.

[Ashleg]

No no, I mean he lost the poll. Not that I think he was a loser.

[Søren]

Oh, didn't catch that. In that case, my vote goes Asmodeus.

[Delthion]

Gulo would have had my vote, and he did have my vote in the poll in which he participated.

[alexandre]

I will now poll the losers

[Ashleg]

Princess Kurda.
I couldn't understand her accent, she wasn't scary, and she didn't do anything but go on a boat with her little brother and a fox she didn't like--and that was when she wasn't busy cutting up fruit.

I was hoping that since Triss was the Queen of Marysuedom that at least something the villains did would save the book (as Brian had such a knack for writing them) but no, it didn't.
Sigh.

[Jetthebinturong]

I initially voted Ferahgo because I didn't read the poll title and he was my favourite. I've since changed my vote to Kurda.

Brian Jacques had a knack for writing villains? I disagree. Quite strongly.

[James Gryphon]

Personally, I don't see the value of going on about Redwall in particular being one-dimensional in its character portrayals, or trying to condemn it on that premise. For one thing, nobody complains about Morgoth, Sauron and the Orcs. There are plenty of other books featuring worlds that consist of gray characters, antiheroes, and antivillains, but that's not the kind of story that Mr. Jacques was inclined to tell. If you think that's the stuff that all good fiction is made of, then more power to you, I guess, but there are a lot of other people that disagree with that premise just as strongly.



I voted for Kurda, because she was pretty much useless, and died in a manner fitting that role. I was honestly baffled when three-quarters of the way through the book everybody started acting like she was some great swordsbeast. She was a pretty decent turnip-slicer; that's about it. She was an okay bully character, but a terrible major villain (getting outshone by both the snakes and Plugg Firetail).

Also, moved this topic to Character Discussion, since it is about characters and what people think of them.

[Jetthebinturong]

I don't have a problem with some villains just being evil for the sake of being evil - I love the Joker, I love Skulduggery Pleasant's Darquesse and other characters in the same vein, providing they're done well, and providing they're not every single villain in the series. Redwall's villains usually don't take the gleeful abandon in doing horrible things that you'd expect or want of a villain of that kind, they just want to be rich and feared. And most of them are carbon copies of one another.

My two favourite villains are Ungatt Trunn, the forgotten son of a warlord with something to prove, and Slagar, the vengeful maniac with a mind to rival James Moriarty. Slagar's plan was flawless, and if he weren't a character in a book he would have gotten exactly what he wanted.

[Hickory]

Dunno who voted for Graypatch, he was a great villain.

I myself voted for Korvus Skurr. As far as bird villains go, he wasn't particularly memorable and (as I'eve stated before) easily outshone by exemplary villains like General Ironbeak. Korvus didn't have anything memorable to his name, really - he ruled a subterranean kingdom of reptiles and carrion birds. Meanwhile, Ironbeak was known for his viciousness in the North and he conquered most, if not all of Redwall Abbey.

As far as the other villains on the poll go, Kurda was a letdown, and the rest were okay. (Except for Razzid. Nobody likes Razzid)

[alexandre]

Rosie, why the Grepatch vote

[Rosie Willowwater]

Oops, I thought we were doing favorite villan still. 

[James Gryphon]

I voted, but without putting as much thought into it as I could have. This is my full opinion.

At first glance, it's hard to say. Both badgers are large and strong creatures, so the room for difference can be found mainly in their armament, defenses, and mentality. Sunflash is known for carrying his mace (a large war club), and Brocktree has been alternately depicted with a sword in his story, and an axe from his appearance after death.

If the badgers are fully armored, a mace pretty clearly wins against a sword, by virtue of the steel being presumed equally good, and the club's impact damage being more useful in such a case. Against an axe, it's a case of short vs. medium-range, and the potential for the axe to possibly break the mace (which is not primarily made from metal, and seems potentially vulnerable to a bloodwrath-fueled swing with a badger battle axe). It's hard to say who would win that matchup, but I would give a slight edge to Brocktree, as he now has a range advantage and it seems the axe could at least potentially damage Sunflash's armor.

With no armor, it looks good for Brocktree. Badgers are notoriously tough, but given that their steel is famous for its durability and cutting power, I would trust that it can still hurt Sunflash to some degree. Badgers are obviously vulnerable to impact damage, though (as shown numerous times in Outcast), so neither combatant has a clear advantage in durability here.

I think the big difference in unarmored combat is in potential finesse. Sunflash never really had a mentor or training, and it shows; his strategy is basically "Get really mad and use my strength to break things". It's an all-out attack with no room for thought. I don't mean to knock his experience too much, because his fighting style usually worked for him against smaller creatures, but an equally powerful, more experienced and better trained fighter should be able to make quick work of his lack of defenses. Brocktree at least knew his father and the hares, so there's reason to suppose he had a few seasons to pick things up before he went off to do his own thing. That gives him the advantage in this fight.

So, Brocktree should have an edge in 3 out of 4 potential bouts.