Can't disagree with anything in the two posts above, with the possible exception of Earnur's retreat from the Witch King. I read Earnur's flight as actually due to his horse, in fact it is said:
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...Earnur would have withstood him; but his horse could not endure that onslaught, and it swerved and bore him far away before he could master it.
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As we seea few years later when he goes to take the challenge of the WK, Earnur was brave to the point of being foolhardy, so one would not have expected him to flee willingly.
But as you say, the Nazgul mission at Weathertop was to retrieve the Ring, so a battle with Gandalf was not really to their advantage here.
On the subject of Gandalf again, I am also struck by some remarks by Aragorn as they are entering Moria that suggest that perhaps Gandalf had been up to more than we know in the past
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Do not be afraid! I have been with him on many a journey, if never on one so dark; and there are tales of Rivendell of greater deeds of his than any that I have seen.
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