Hulegu Khan is also a hero. He knew how to take on the Muslim empire of his day. Sacking the Caliphate HQ of
Baghdad and wasting the Muhammedan assassin cult. What's not to like?

And that Vlad was also a real kidder. He knew how to terrify the Ottoman Turks into turning tail and retreating

http://www.ucs.mun.ca/~emiller/VladT.htm

"He [the Sultan] marched on for about five kilometers when he saw his
men impaled; the Sultan's
army came across a field with stakes, about three kilometers long and one
kilometer wide. And there were large stakes on which they could see the impaled
bodies of men, women, and children, about twenty thousand of them, as they said;
quite a spectacle for the Turks and the Sultan himself! The Sultan, in wonder,
kept saying that he could not conquer the country of a man who could do such
terrible and unnatural things, and put his power and his subjects to such use.
He also used to say that this man who did such things would be worthy of more.
And the other Turks, seeing so many people impaled,
were scared out of their wits. There were babies clinging to their mothers on
the stakes, and birds had made nests in their breasts."

The Sultan withdrew. But the war was not over. Mehmed threw his support
behind Vlad's brother
Radu, who with the support of defecting boyars and Turkish soldiers, pursued Vlad
all the way to his mountain fortress at Poenari. According to oral legends that
survive to this day in the village of Aref, near the fortress, Vlad
was able to escape into Transylvania with the help of local villagers. But he
was soon arrested near Brasov by Matthias Corvinus, who had chosen to throw his
support behind Radu, Vlad's
successor. Corvinus used as evidence letters supposedly written by Vlad
that indicated he was a traitor to the Christian cause and was plotting to
support the Turks; Romanian historians concur that these letters were forgeries
and part of a larger campaign to discredit Vlad
and justify Corvinus's actions.