WI some other group than Goths comes out on top

When Goths arrived in the Carpathian-Pontic region, there were lots of other groups of Dacian, Germanic and Sarmatian descent, some agriculturalists, some nomadic, some both.
Would there have been a difference for the Roman Empire and the nature of the Germanic tribal kingdoms on its territory if, instead of Goths led by Balthi and Amali, some other group emerged as leader of the loose confederacies! Gepids, Heruli, Bastarnae, Roxolani, Costoboci, Carpi, ...?
 
When Goths arrived in the Carpathian-Pontic region, there were lots of other groups of Dacian, Germanic and Sarmatian descent, some agriculturalists, some nomadic, some both.
Would there have been a difference for the Roman Empire and the nature of the Germanic tribal kingdoms on its territory if, instead of Goths led by Balthi and Amali, some other group emerged as leader of the loose confederacies! Gepids, Heruli, Bastarnae, Roxolani, Costoboci, Carpi, ...?

Not really. The ethnic formation process has barely started at the fringes of the Roman Empire, and besides names and material culture the germanic groups do not differ that much.

Maybe you could pick an eastern germanic tribe and convert it to chalcedonism, so you end up with more stable romano-germanic kingdoms on the Mediterranean, but you need a POD in the early IV century to mix some tribes and end up with orthodox goths.

But then you end up with butterflies about the treatment of settled barbarians in the empire, and it's difficult to predict anything.
 
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