Battle of the Goldroad

"Enough with the clever plans."

- Daenerys Targaryen

The Battle of Tumbleton is an engagement in Daenerys Targaryen's invasion of Westeros in which Daenerys Targaryen's Dothraki horde ambushed the combined Lannister-Tarly field army and supply train as it was returning east to King's Landing after successfully sacking Highgarden. It was the first time that Daenerys committed one of her powerful dragons to battle, personally riding her mount Drogon into combat.

Prelude
Tumbleton is a natural choke point for any army advancing up the Roseroad from Highgarden in the southwest to King's Landing in the northeast - located in the northeastern corner of The Reach, amidst hills and cliffs around the source of the Mander River. While the Mander flows southwest, a short distance farther east is the Blackwater Rush, which itself flows east to the sea, with King's Landing at its mouth. The Roseroad passes Tumbleton to the south, almost reaching the sea, until it reaches the southern bank of the Blackwater's mouth - at which point an army needs to cross the river to reach King's Landing on the northern side.

Due to its strategic location, the last major hurdle for an army heading east on the Roseroad to King's Landing, Tumbleton has thus seen a number of major battles throughout history, notably the first and second battles of Tumbleton, which were fought during the Dance of the Dragons - and both of which involved dragons burning out entire armies. A similar battle occurred at the Field of Fire during Aegon Targaryen's conquest of the Seven Kingdoms of Westeros some 129 years before the Dance of the Dragons.

After the Fall of Highgarden, the bulk of the remaining Lannister army advanced east led by Ser Jaime Lannister, along with Lord Randyll Tarly commanding the formidable forces of House Tarly. The gold of House Tyrell is sent ahead to King's Landing, where Cersei intends to use it as payment of the Crown's massive debt to the Iron Bank of Braavos, possibly enabling her to take another loan and hire the Golden Company to further enforce her authority in Westeros.

Daenerys Targaryen is enraged by the fall of Highgarden and her hollow victory at Casterly Rock. Out of patience for the comparatively cautious battle plans of her Hand, Tyrion Lannister (who prioritizes keeping her safe and reducing casualties by carrying out sieges) Daenerys decides to take matters into her own hands. Despite her previous losses, she still possesses a great number of ships and the largest single fighting force in the conflict: her 100,000-strong Dothraki horde. More importantly, despite the risks to the safety of both herself and civilians, Daenerys decides it is finally time to bring her dragons into play on the battlefield. On the advice of King in the North Jon Snow, Daenerys quietly ferries her Dothraki to Westeros in a desperate gamble.

Battle
The Lannister army and wagon train continue east across a small river near cliffs and hills near the town of Tumbleton. Jaime and Bronn are then surprised to hear what sounds like distant thunder, until they realize it must be approaching cavalry. Jaime and Randyll order their soldiers to form up, which they manage to do before the enemy crests over the horizon - a massive, 100,000 strong horde of Dothraki cavalry. Since Euron Greyjoy is busy besieging the Unsullied at Casterly Rock on the west coast of Westeros, Daenerys was able to land her Dothraki on the east coast without interference. Bronn urges Jaime to leave and ride ahead to King's Landing, but Jaime insists he will not abandon his men. Bronn bluntly tells him the Dothraki will quickly overwhelm the Lannister lines and Jaime is too valuable as a commander to stay and fight, but Jaime insists that they have a chance if their shield-wall holds.

At that moment, they hear a roar not heard on the battlefields of Westeros in over a century and a half, and look above the approaching Dothraki to see a huge adult dragon heading straight for their lines: Drogon, ridden by Daenerys Targaryen herself. Drogon outpaces the Dothraki, and at Daenerys's command "Dracarys", he blasts a torrent of fire through the Lannister ranks in a straight line from front to back, punching a hole in their formation. The highly mobile Dothraki light cavalry immediately sweep through it and wheel around to catch those parts of the Lannister lines in an enveloping move.

The Lannister-Tarly lines around Jaime and Randyll, however, manage to rally under their leadership. The Dothraki charge into the Lannister lines head-on, but meet stiff resistance as their shield wall holds firm. Though they are outnumbered, the Lannister soldiers are better armed heavy infantry, highly disciplined and battle-hardened veterans from years of war; as soon as the Dothraki are brought up short by the shield-wall, they are left vulnerable to the long spears of the heavy infantry. Dothraki horse-archers let off shots before charging into their ranks, but highly-trained Tarly archers return fire, doing as much if not more damage, as the Dothraki wear less armor.

The Lannister army holds their line for a time, but their enemy has the advantage of weight in numbers, and the tide turns slowly against them as the Dothraki begin leaping off their horses directly into the melee. For a moment it looks like Jaime might at least be able to force the Dothraki to a standstill - but then Daenerys wheels out of the air again, devastating the Lannister formations. No longer trying to punch perpendicular holes through their lines, she simply flies Drogon parallel to the shield-wall formation, targeting the rearguard and the supply convoy. Men are flash-burned into nothing but ash which crumbles to the touch, or cooked alive in their own superheated armor as they struggled to rip it off, dousing themselves in the river. Most of the wagons of grain are wiped out by Drogon's fire, the horses pulling them fleeing in all directions and adding to the confusion. Nonetheless, Jaime manages to rally his remaining forces a second time, desperately taking command of a group of surviving Lannister and Tarly archers and directing them to concentrate their fire at the dragon: Drogon might not be vulnerable to common arrow fire, but his rider is. If they can manage to kill Daenerys herself, who has risked appearing in open battle, the entire war could end in a day, no matter their losses. Daenerys sees the attack coming, however, and banks Drogon up so the arrow volley harmlessly bounces off the armored scales on his belly. He then blasts the archer formations with fire. Jaime avoids the flames and is surrounded by enemies, but he manages to carve a path through the Dothraki with his Valyrian steel sword Widow's Wail to try to reach safety. He nearly gets attacked by a Dothraki from behind at one point, but Dickon Tarly kills the Dothraki first, saving him. Even then all is not lost; Jaime commands Bronn to reach Qyburn's anti-dragon scorpion-bolt launcher (as Jaime cannot fire it one-handed). Reluctantly, Bronn fights his way back, killing several Dothraki until one cuts off his horse's leg and sends him sprawling, losing his large bag of gold in the process. Bronn continues to fight his way back on foot, chased by the same Dothraki warrior, who follows him into the wagon he was looking for, just in time to stare down the business-end of the loaded scorpion that Bronn fires into him, flinging him twenty feet and pinning his corpse to another wagon. Bronn reloads the scorpion as fast as he can (which is meant to be crewed by a team of men), spots the dragon in the distance, and fires, but misses. Daenerys is startled by the scorpion-bolt flying a few feet from her head, scans the battlefield, and spots Bronn on the scorpion as he reloads.

Daenerys then leads Drogon on a direct charge, diving straight down at Bronn on the scorpion launcher, who waits for her to approach close enough that he hopefully won't miss but before she is right on top of him. He fires another shot, this time hitting Drogon's right shoulder. The mighty dragon lets out an awful screech of pain and collapses in shock, helplessly dropping into a free-fall from hundreds of feet in the air. The surviving Lannister soldiers cheer, only for Drogon and Daenerys to re-gain their balance seconds before they would have fatally struck the ground. The enraged dragon hovers for a moment, then angrily sends a fire-blast at the scorpion, destroying it a split second after Bronn jumps out of the way to safety. The dragon's armored scales are so tough that the scorpion bolt (despite having been tested successfully on the skull of Balerion the Black Dread) only managed to cause a minor wound, probably due to the greater range and vertical position of the shot. Grounded by his flesh wound, Drogon howls in pain and fury, smashing apart the remains of the scorpion with his tail. Daenerys dismounts and struggles to remove the scorpion bolt. By this point, the devastation caused by the dragon and the sheer number of Dothraki have totally overwhelmed the Lannister lines, and with the scorpion destroyed, their last hope is gone and the battle turns into an utter rout and massacre. The Dothraki pursue the fleeing Westerosi soldiers, ruthlessly slaughtering anyone they can catch. Tyrion Lannister views the battle from the distance of a nearby hill, along with the Dothraki commander Qhono, who remarks that Tyrion's people can't fight. Tyrion looks gravely on the battlefield, realizing that these are in fact his own countrymen from the Westerlands and House Lannister being massacred. Many burning and dying men rush to the river to try to extinguish the flames. Jaime, however, sees that Daenerys is grounded and immobilized, and realizes he still has one chance; if he can kill Daenerys, even now, he can end her invasion. Tyrion notices Jaime, and, realizing what he is thinking, mutters, "Flee, you idiot." Jaime grabs a spear and charges his horse across the flaming battlefield to make a death-run for Daenerys as she tends to her dragon. Tyrion swears under his breath, calling his brother a "fucking idiot", angry that he's going to get himself killed.

Just as Jaime is nearly on top of Daenerys, however, Drogon notices him amidst the chaos of the battle. Shielding Daenerys behind his head, the dragon lets out a blast of flame, but Bronn rushes over to tackle Jaime out of the way, saving him from certain death, whilst their steeds burn. They both fall into the river, where Jaime is weighed down by his armor, and sinks beneath the waters, in danger of drowning.

Aftermath
Because of Daenerys Targaryen's ambush using the Dothraki and Drogon, the Lannisters have lost a significant portion of the grain that they plundered from Highgarden which they had planned to use to feed their armies now that winter had come. However, as Daenerys burnt the grain wagons instead of capturing them, her own forces will also find themselves wanting for food. Nonetheless, the wagons with the gold had made it through the gates of King's Landing, presumably allowing Cersei Lannister to pay back a significant portion of the debts owed by the Lannister family and the Iron Throne to the Iron Bank of Braavos, as well as buying additional reinforcements. However, the Lannister host led by Ser Jaime Lannister has been smashed, dealing a crippling blow to their already heavily depleted army, which had suffered significant losses during the War of the Five Kings; moreover, Jaime himself has been separated from his remaining men, leaving them leaderless. The host of House Tarly, led by Lord Randyll Tarly, was also smashed in the ambush. The battle was by no means one sided though, as many Dothraki were also slain. Daenerys Targaryen has finally gained a firm foothold on the continent of Westeros, and with the Lannister-Tarly host shattered and on the run, her Unsullied will be able to cross eastward from Casterly Rock unhindered and regroup with the Dothraki. Furthermore, with the combined loss of the Lannister/Tarly forces and Casterly Rock, Cersei's sphere of power has essentially shrunken to solely King's Landing, the Iron Islands and whatever control she still excerts over the Riverlands; her brief conquest of the Reach has been undone in a single day.

Despite Daenerys' victory however, the battle is significant in that it proved the dragons are not invincible and that Qyburn's scorpion ballista weapons are successful in harming them- albeit, not as successfully as he and Cersei had hoped.

In the books
In the A Song of Ice and Fire novels by George R.R. Martin, an equivalent battle has not occurred. The TV show has surpassed the timeline of the books, so it is unclear if an equivalent battle will occur or not.

The battle hasn't been given an on-screen name as of Season 7's "The Spoils of War". The cast and crew simply referred to it as the "Battle of the Loot Train", the "Loot Train Attack", or "The Fury Unleashed". "Third Battle of Tumbleton" is a more formal (albeit placeholder) title for a wiki-article than "Daenerys and the Dothraki attack the Lannister army in the northern Reach", etc.

There are several indications that the battle actually takes place near Tumbleton:


 * 1 - It takes place near a river, but isn't within sight of King's Landing. Also the Roseroad enters the Kingswood as it approaches the southern bank of the Blackwater, but no woods are visible during the episode's battle.
 * 2 - Randyll Tarly says that they need to get their grain shipments across the Blackwater to King's Landing as soon as possible, so they are relatively near King's Landing, not Highgarden, but still on the southern side of the Blackwater.
 * 3 - Tumbleton is located in the hill country where the headwaters of the Mander River spring from, and historically, it has been the last major geographic obstacle for armies heading east from Highgarden to King's Landing, thus a natural choke point where enemy armies tried to cut them off. Hills and cliffs are visible in the episode's battle, and on maps, the hills which the Mander springs from are really the only elevated terrain anywhere from Highgarden to King's Landing.

If the events of Season 7 have some basis in the future novels, it is possible that George R.R. Martin meant to foreshadow this battle when he wrote his extensive history of the Dance of the Dragons, the great civil war between two rival branches of House Targaryen in which both sides had dragons. Not one but two major battles were fought with dragons at Tumbleton, explicitly to attack armies which were heading to King's Landing. During the Dance, the climactic Second Battle of Tumbleton was a massive battle royale in which all of the surviving dragons in the war fought and died, in a chaotic night-time assault illuminated by their fires, as thousands of men died in the mud and smoke around them.

On the other hand, there's still some confusion about where exactly the battle occurs, other implications being that the river it is fought near actually is the Blackwater Rush - which doesn't explain why King's Landing isn't visible, which should be on the north bank. This wiki article title is provisional and will hopefully be updated with more information given in future episodes.