The Armour Archive

Kilkenny

Yeah Mil-Lance is pretty much on it. The ones from revival leather are pretty cheap. I have 2 sets they work great. I have to get another set with vibrams for all the indoor fighting up North. Otherwise you'll have to pretty much tear em apart and re build em. hey look at the bright side, at least ...

Kilkenny

Odo and Kilkenny are both peers of some sort, right? Did you ever notice how it's often the SCA higher-ups, that is those with arguably the greatest emotional investment in the game, who act as its primary apologists, defending it, warts and all, and striving to keep it from growing beyond what it ...

Kilkenny

Brookswift, Ask me at the next practice. I also specialize in glaive vs S&S. I must disagree somewhat with the other expressed opinion that one must be massive to succeed inside with a pole weapon. I'm now about 6'1 and 240, but when I won the Western crown with glaive, I was only about 210. Viscou...

Kilkenny

A couple of us were talking about exceptions and rare occurences in the Medieval era last night, and how in the SCA we often get many more examples of something that might have been a unique piece or action during the Middle Ages, and how common things often don't get replicated at all. In particul...

Kilkenny

...Then I charge. Well, as I charged, I saw him brace. Not run, brace.... Yep, I LOVE that. There is NOTHING in the rules that says a pole fighter must accept a charge. Nothing like bouncing a SS fighter that thinks you will back up when you just stand there. Done it plenty of times to skinnier, fa...

Kilkenny

well, you see, with a polearm in the SCA, you're just not allowed to use up close defenses. i've heard the rule being called "no quarterstaffing", but basically, if you have a spear or other long weapon, at close range you have to either butt spike your opponent or swing the butt at them. i've done...

Kilkenny

I've read Mr. Hand's article in Spada on the use of shields (or at least an article, I don't know if he has published more than one at this point) and was not readily sold on what he was proposing. For one thing, I understood him to be extrapolating from Talhoffer's "hewing and thrusting shields" w...

Kilkenny

Given the following constraints, what would you do for the most effective workout possible to further SCA fighting? Time: 35-40 minutes, five days a week Space: an empty gym (15 laps around the gym equals one mile) Equipment: basketball and hoops one stationary exercise bike several 20# medicine ba...

Kilkenny

It's a morbid question, I know. However, armor was designed to protect from weapons and prevent vitals from being damaged. So my question is this, where is the human body vulnurable. For example: The inner thigh has the femoral artery, which would cause someone to bleed out very quickly. The throat...

Kilkenny

Ok, here goes. I have decided to try and play with the local SCA group to myself as I fancy giving it a go and seeing what it is all about. I have found out about the next practise in the next fortnight and know I can make it. I am currently enquiring about the availability of loaner gear and the l...

Kilkenny

[quote="Jost von Aichstadt Ah - Stephen is a non-sca western martial arts guy based in Australia who's been studying (among other things) shield use. I've corresponded with him on and off over the decades, and he's a pretty thorough researcher, and (I'm told by others) a fair swordsman. He makes a d...

Kilkenny

OK, so the sword I've been using is gettin' a bit mushy, I'm thinkin' it's about time to send it to the old swords' retirement pell and build a new one. My first session on the pell with it and I start to notice how FREAKIN' heavy it is. I pull out another blank originally cut from the same stave, ...

Kilkenny

Oh, yikes! I know what a stencil is! It's just the fact that most artists with his skill don't use them, as far as I could imagine. Mckron here has posted other work, David, I'm sure you've noticed. If you didn't notice, I don't think they make stencils for Gothic armor. I'm just doubting that he u...

Kilkenny

The correction is not to attempt to convert the league to baseball, but to correct those who misrepresent what is being played. I don't believe it is a misrepresentation. One of the most influential people in my early SCA career was Polidor Haroldsson, knight, laurel, pelican, baron of the court, a...

Kilkenny

Tennis shoes..... I just don't really understand how people can fight in tennis shoes. I mean. I don't fight in period footwear. (Though I am working on figuring out how to put steel toes into some more period looking boots, no I don't think I will wear sabatons, I tried them once and just couldnt ...

Kilkenny

I have come to the conclusion....that you can't please everybody. Last night I was talking to some people in the AA chat room. I showed them pics of my old kit, and then showed them pics of the kit that is being built for me. While some people thought it was a great improvement, others called it "b...

Kilkenny

(EDIT: Intended use is SCA) I've been wanting to make a somewhat good looking bare-wood viking round lately... and I've been contemplating edge ideas. I don't want to cover it with leather or hose, or anything like that. And, I don't want to cover it all with fiberglass or canvas... I want it simpl...

Kilkenny

Gavin... What if several members of your slowpitch team regularly tell the people in the stands that your playing full out baseball. And assume that the folks in the stands are visiting from Sweden or the Congo (edit: and speak English). The correction is not to attempt to convert the league to bas...

Kilkenny

I don't mean to sound like I hate the SCA; I play SCA and nothing else at this point. If someobdy isn't interested in the medieval aspects of the game, then why don't they go join one of the myriad fantasy groups out there? Nobody will pressure them to conform, and the initial investment to play is...

Kilkenny

Thank you Frieman for answering the question. This was what I was asking, people's opinions/reasons why it would be a bad/good idea. I'm actually curious, becuase I always hear about how many people we will lose if we make no visible plastic a rule. In the kingdoms that have adopted this, has there...

Kilkenny

Let me clarify my question/statement a bit. I guess what I was asking was really in regards to your first authorization. Usually your first auth you have your own kit. And I really meant visible plastic, not the use of plastic. Now I think the age old fallback on "attempt" isn't supposed to justify...

Kilkenny

brookswift wrote:the question is, who's selling these cheap simple period tunics and such for us sewing impaired people to buy?

Take a look at Thornyrose.com

Gavin

Kilkenny

I find this a strange argument. Why is that those who want the SCA to be an anything goes kind of organization see themselves as having less of an agenda than those who want the SCA to adhere to stricter sense of the medieval? Aren't BOTH trying to make the SCA what they want it to be? Or is it jus...

Kilkenny

Thank you Ernst, nice stuff. I searched around based on your input. The Brueghel painting can be seen here, though not extremely detailed: http://museoprado.mcu.es/icuadro05_octubre_2003.html The barrel seems to be on the left side forefront, but the picture is not detailed enough to see any detail...

Kilkenny

Do you know about the rotary valve engine ? That's where the "Wankel" name comes from. It's applied to an equilateral triangle with all three sides bowed outward a bit. As a shield, it's rather like a round, but with three corners. It's also completely modern, afaik, with no historic basis at all. G...

Kilkenny

An excellant place to find answers to questions like this is here: m He has a lot of training articles freely availble from his website too. I have Matt Furey's Combat conditioning book and Ross's Ultimate Guide to Warrior Fitness one. Ross's book is far far superior. argg.. burpees wearing hauberk...

Kilkenny

I dunno if I would say it would be "useless" I mean, against a mail clad oponent, a two handed swing with the "pizza paddle of doom" would probably wound the fellow, not from sharp cutting, but from blunt force trauma. It woudl be the equivilent of a heft wooden waster, which, in theory should eb a...

Kilkenny

[quote="morristh] Not that it will ever happen in its entirety, but I wonder, if the vast majority of people in the SCA switched to periodish armors--do away with the plastics and stick to metals and in recognizable forms --period patterns etc. wether a lot of the "lost" arts of using various weapon...

Kilkenny

Actually, I live in Meridies. I doubt I'd be able to get away with using spray on tool dip on my weapons. We can't have unpadded glaives but split glaives are so much safer . Are you picking up my sarcasm? But it does give me an idea. =toddles off to her silly weapon drawing board= Any particular r...

Kilkenny

Kilkenny wrote: The first fighter doesn't care how "real" his opponent looks, doesn't impact his "fun". The second fighter may be quite perturbed by how his opponent looks as appearance *is* the point of his "fun". Well, I agree with some of this. For me the problem is that the first fighter impose...

Kilkenny

I think you have to use common sence. If you were to tie the mail around the leg and try to ride you would be siting on the mail, gambeson if worn, tunic, under tunic and what if you don't have a split in the tunics like I don't. This would all be riding under the thigh. It would be most uncomforta...

Kilkenny

Obsidian is a glass. As such it has no crystaline structure, and doesnt suffer the limitation of crystaline materials (minimum angles of cleavage/fracture, minimum thickness, etc) like steel. Thus, if the angle and thickness are just right, it will break with a very thin edge. this phenomena is use...

Kilkenny

What you are describing is not grappling. It is an augmentation of our current system. I understand what you are saying and to some point agree. But I wouldn't call what you propose grappling. Grappling techniques build on each other like building blocks. One move transends into another, into anoth...

Kilkenny

Brookswift, the inside of the hand and fingers could get smacked and that is a large concern, I think. Except that they already throw those hands out there to grab the hafts of weapons. But reaching for anything else is more dangerous They also seem to think that grabbing someone's forearm is inher...

Kilkenny

[quote="InsaneIrishIF you can stick your hand out and grab me arm/sheild/weapon/leg/head/nuts etc. I should be able to hit you in that hand. Otherwise what is keeping people from leading with open palms and grabbing someone's shield and wrenching it away? <snip> Where do you draw the line? You can g...

Re: Exceptions and rare occurences

Re: Advice on SCA fighting workout?

Re: To kill a man

Re: Switching between re-enactment combat and SCA?

Re: {SCA} What Was I Thinking?!?!?

Re: Viking Round Edge Ideas?

Re: Historical mail tumbler research