Who would win? My bet is on the Legionary, but not without some big losses. Berserkers terrefied people, and they were friggin' insane.:eek:

If the Roman army could beat the celtic and germanic berserker liek troops, the celtic ones in particuler being close to a carbon copy with a differen language of viking berserkers, I see no reason why the scandanavians would pose anymore trouble, when the Vikings were bested by even the Byzantien army when in its more crappy incarnations.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berserker_(viking)

I dunno, man. The Berserkers do have some good qualities about them...

that article up top shows that the Romans fougth German berserkers, and obviouslly won far more times then lost, for byt he time the germ,anic hordes came into the empire, the German armies were more along the lines of a feudal army then the tribal warbands of old; and the entire descrition fo berserkers goes hand in hand with that of the traditional celtic fanatic, even right down to the halluncinagenic mushrooms

Dicipline is always superior to rage and berserkergang.

In a pitched battle the Roman Legions would definately win. The Romans were far better armoured than the Berserkers, and the Vikings relied on surprise attacks/raids to gain an advantage over their enemy. The Roman weaponry was far superior in strength compared to the Berserkers'.

Well depends on the attacker, as a Berserker is 6.2.1 and a Legionary is 3.3.1. So both would have a fairly good change of winning unless the opponent is on a mountain or something.





:joke:

Berserkers/vikings, like the celts, were a hero society. Battles were not fought as one unit, it was each man trying to out do his comrades in glory.
Battles between Irish tribes were sometimes settled between the champion of each group challenging the others champion. That one fight sometimes dictated who won or lost the battle. The gauls are documented as well as coming foward in the battle field and challenging one on one battles with the romans.

Boudicca's revolt, were 100,000 men were slaughtered by a 10,000 strong Roman legion in a line of wedged formation, is a fine example of tactics over brute force and numbers.

The british celts were so eagar to draw individual glory out of the battle that they ended up pushing their front line into the roman wedges were they couldn'd swing thier large swords.
The Romans pushed steadly foward stabbing with thier small swords behind shields as an organised unit and cut them to peices.

Depends on the numbers of each i suppose.

Edit:
And Xen, it doesnt say much about these Germanic berserkers, im not sure we can assume they are exactly the same

One of the most famous examples of Berzerker combat was at the battle of Stamford Bridge in 1066. After Hardrada's army was surprised by Harold Godwinson's assault, a single Norse berzerker held the bridge for the best part of an hour. The English threw everything they had at him, but he just hacked their assaults apart.

Eventually, in a wondefully typical example of Saxon sneaky pragmatism, the English hid a man in a coracle which they floated downstream. As it passed under the bridge, he leaped up with a spear and impaled the berzerker up the arsehole.

:lol:

Brave as he was, i'm sure he didn't want that carved on his gravestone.

Depends on the numbers of each i suppose.

Edit:
And Xen, it doesnt say much about these Germanic berserkers, im not sure we can assume they are exactly the same


before we go in to how similer they were 9which was exteme, in any case). tell me how they might have been different ;)

I admit,t hat its fa rmore likelly that the Germans woudl be more accustomed to using sowqrds on a larger scale than axes, and perhaps woudl have been more accustomed to armouring themselves, but other then that, their is precious little difference between the two; after all, they are both sprouts from the same mother-culture

Why there is a clear difference between the two Xen....The viking ones are clearly cooler :groucho:.

But seriously maybe the viking ones might be more familiar with using ships >> ummmm yea. Ok fine! There probably wasnt much difference at all!

I think the only way the vikings would win is if the legions didnt want to fight crazy people and half of the formation ran away....but i think the Berserkers would have tried to avoid the legions in the first place as they were raiders.

heh; legions who men ran away didnt last long; the Romans would kill thier own troops if they did such a thing; thats oen fo the ways roman installed disiplin; by making ones's troops fear and respect thier commenders more then they feared and hated the enemy.

:lol:

Brave as he was, i'm sure he didn't want that carved on his gravestone.
:lol: Indeed
"Here lies Yorik the Brave,
He lived well, fought hard,
and died of a spear in the a**"

Not exactly how you'd want to be remembered....
The moral of the story is: Spears are the ultimate weapon.
:spear:

heh; legions who men ran away didnt last long; the Romans would kill thier own troops if they did such a thing; thats oen fo the ways roman installed disiplin; by making ones's troops fear and respect thier commenders more then they feared and hated the enemy.

Actually the punishment was decimation... one out of 10 of the members of the offending units is but to the sword... I'm sure if I know romans and vikings, then the romans would aknonlege the superior fighting skills of the enemy and hole themselves up in a well defended fortress and the vikings would attack it for sure... and get their butts kicked