The Armour Archive

Hey guys,

My good friend Justin is going into the SCA, and I was planning on it until recently. I turned around and resold my $800 or so of armor that I had already gotten for my 14th century kit, as I couldn't possibly afford to finish it anytime soon. I was going to back out of the SCA in favor of my historic stuff, but fighting is something that I love, and Justin and I recently started practicing harder than ever and will continue to do so. So, I might jump back into it, but with a much cheaper kit idea.

So, my question is this... We have a group about 45 minutes from us, but they aren't too terribly active as a whole. They have practice weekly, but they don't really involve themselves in the aspects of the game that we appreciate, and are more of the stick-jock types.

After seeking out aid from a group such as this in learning how to fight, would it be possible for us to go off on our own, and practice as dueling partners, for the remainder of our time in the area (we'll both likely head off to college in a couple of years, and then we'll find hunt out the locals wherever we end up!)

I'd personally like to be able to take part in the major events in Caid and wherever else I'll be able to travel, but I really don't want to have to drive weekly to practices so far from my own home.

What can we do?

-Gregory-

If you aren't doing it at an "Official" SCA practice / event, you can drive tanks at each other. What you will miss out on is the instruction and advice that the other group could provide you with, and the push to improve your fighting.

It is like trying to learn Tai Chi, or karate from a book.

Without the book.

My local fight practice is 45 minutes from my house. That is not an unreasonable distance.

I know tons of folks who commute longer distances to work each day.

Carpool with your buddy.

As far as learning from them, and then skipping out at a later point...

When you start fighting with them on a regular basis, you may find that they are more interested in the same stuff that you are interested in... or you may find that that doesn't matter anymore. Continual sparring with people will form a bond. You may not be so eager to jump ship in the longrun. Hell... or they could just turn out to be assholes...

I suggest making the drive, and seeing what happens.

BTW, if you find that you are leaning away from SCA fighting after forming half a suit of armour, that is what god created cardboard storage boxes for... put it away, don't sell it off...

Hey Dalewyn and Alcy,

Justin and I are constantly striving to fight better as we do now, and I'm sure it will be the same for the SCA. And we don't plan on doing it by ourselves. I plan on attending practices for quite some time, but am trying to put things in order ahead of time. What I'm asking is whether ot not people fight in little groups, and I suppose I'm also wondering how official practices can be formed with small groups.

I plan on getting experience by practicing officially, but am curious about what to do after a point where we think we have enough experience to train on our own. This is far from happening in the near future! Do we somehow try to get official practices in our area, and get other members to join us, or do we make it "unofficial" and just try to pop in on the official stuff as much as we can?

Dante, my friend and I really don't have the time to make the drive during most of the year. We're both students, and most of our days are filled up with lots of things, including plenty of extracurricular stuff already. So, I'm just wanting to narrow down the time we'll be expecting to make the trip to Fresno.

Thanks for the replies, gentlemen!

-Gregory-

Well then it depends how dedicated you are going to be to learning how to SCA fight, and if your willing to make sacrifices to make to their fighter practices. If you really want to get good at something you will need to make sacrifices, but thats your choice. if your not willing to make those sacrifices to get better at something why bother. Its with anything in life you want to get better at.



My 2 pfennigs worth.



Max

Gregory,

Let me offer my own prescription. I have less than a year in, so salt is required for this dish.

I am in the process of joining a household. They practice 230 miles away. My sponsor, the closest member of this house, is 130 miles away. I have a local shire practice 1 mile away. The styles of fighting are very different.

With all that, I also do WMA lessons 160 miles away once or twice a month. But we'll discount that one.

For the past few months I have practiced almost every week locally and made the trek to the house practice once a month. I also try to make it to an event with the house every month. This has allowed me to apply what I learn with the house in local practice. That application is noticable when I travel to the house practice and show definite improvement. My shire is small and we generally have only 4-6 fighters at any practice. Sometimes, it is only two of us bashing away for an hour or two . The shire allows me to practice frequently, the house allows me to learn from a larger pool. I'll be mixing in a practice a month with my sponsor at his local practice as well beginning the new year.

If you think of it in your own situation, it would be the same thing if you committed yourselves to a similar routine. Just once a month with the organized practice and you can test yourselves, maintain a SCA legal framework to your play and learn a few new techniques to go home and practice with each other. Some of them likely travel and are adding to their repetoire too. Perhaps, you could even entice another friend or two to join you and increase the variety in your informal play. Throwing in the occasional tourney or melee event and you have a very rounded training regimen without alot of travelling.

Seriously, you can only watch your friend from the front and he can only see the same. It takes a third to see the fullness of the technique that could spare you an injury. Even when you progress to a point where you feel you aren't learning from the organized practice, chances are they have experiences between them that will benefit you.

I would suggest if you decide to try to start an official practice down the road you speak with your local group. I suggested differently a few weeks ago (ignorance is not bliss) and wound up learning a whole lot about how awful my foot tastes. If you've gotten to the point you aren't learning much more, you should explore being a deputy marshall at that point and organizing an additional practice site. I would think we all want more people to play with and your local group likely does too.

Again, this is just what I do, how I interpret your situation as it relates to mine, what I've read recently in other posts and what I've learned from conversations and organized practices. I offer this opinion with several grains of salt. I wish you luck in whatever you choose to do.

I pray I've been of some help, and haven't offended in any way,

Joachim
Probationer, Bloodguard
Shire of Anglespur, EK

Greetings,

I live in a small shire here in the east. Our local group can field the largest number of heavy fighters in the whole shire, and we can field about 7 if EVERYONE comes out. Believe me, its small. and it wasnt' always this way. We used to be smaller. I can remember a lot of practices where it was just me and one other person.

Now, the danger(and I have seen and experienced this first hand) with practicing just with you buddy is, stagnation. You will come to know each others style so well that you will develop habits to be able to beat that other person. And other parts of your style will get lazy, becuase you don't need them. This is a real danger. Without a fresh view and the experience fighting new people(at least new to you) your fighting will get to a level and you won't progress. If can be done to get past it, but it doesn't happen easily. If you have a group within an hour, go practice with them as much as you can. This is not to say you can't practice with your friend in between times! By all means, the more time you spend in armour fighting the more you will learn. Everytime I put on my armour I learn something new. But getting that experience with other fighters is irreplacable. You will be the better fighter for it.

I learned to fight from reading. Did this make me a good fighter the first day on the field. No, I was just as crappy as everyone else.(well maybe not quite so much) But it did give me a basis to start on, so that when my instructor said, try this, I could say, hey I know that one, so thats how you throw that properly. And I got better quickly. Even just thinking about fighting helps, much of my improvment has been simple to examine and think about my own fighting, rather than fight better fighters.(most of which seem to be a long ways away for me)

Anyway, hope this is a help. PM me if you want.

In Service,
Llywelyn

Perhaps you could try to make a big deal out of it once a month with the other group.

"Yeah we can make it once a month - so make sure to have as many fighters available for us to practice with"

Maybe the group you are traveling to see will get the 'special' feeling and put forth a bit more effort for you and your friend.

I thought I might chime in.

The thing that I think we need to know is what you and your buddy would like to acheive. It isn't always possible to know that, but if you do, it helps a lot.

Do you want to be a great tourney fighter? I mean, do you want to compete at the very highest levels and win against the very best that the society has to offer?

Do you want to be able to answer challenges, and to meet people on the field of honor?

Do you like the social aspects of the SCA and want to participate in the fighting part because that is waht the SCA is about?

Do you want to learn exactly how a sword was used in the down and dirty business end of things?

Do you want to be part of a fearsome Tribe/Company/Clan/Unit/whatever?

Do you want to be the fiercest mofo in the melee and rule the war field?

All of these things are perfectly good reasons for learning to fight, but each requires it's own approach to things. It isn't necessary, but knowing where you want to go can help a whole lot.

frieman

For what its worth, my local shire for all practical purposes is dead. So in order to make a practice or hit a meeting I have to drive about 70 miles. For Meridies, thats a serious drive--Meridians never travel--well I wont say that--a LOT of them dont. But being part of a local group IMHO is important. There are aspects of the culture you can not get without local involvment.

Just my 2 cents worth

Tim

Its great that you really want to get better and you are going to stay in when you get to college.

Its a drag that you have a group within 45 mins and they are of, shall we say, less than compatable personalities. With this bit of information, I must advise that it is important for you to get better but it is also important for you play the game and have fun. If its no fun why do it? My advice is to find a group that you learn with AND have fun with. Good luck in college!

Hello folks,

Thank you for all of the replies. I'm not sure if Justin checks into this particular forum on the archive, but I'll tell him about the thread, so he can see everyone's opinions, as well. I now realize just how important it is to get some diversity in our opposition, and that fighting eachother constantly might harm our overall skill, while we just practice against eachother's techniques!

I'll try to make the effort to make it out to official practices a couple of times a month. There's a group about an hour and a half from us (Bakersfield, CA) that attended a faire I was at the other week. They looked like they were having lots of fun, and had some really solid veterans in the group, as well as newer fighters. Their own group and the Nordwache group (in Fresno) both concentrate more on fighting, while lacking the discipline in looking or acting right at the same time.

Being an avid reenactor, above and beyond being a fighter, these are not the types of groups I eventually see myself hanging out with a lot. But, they wil certainly do for the learning process!

A bit more on what I personally want to achieve as a member. I want to have fun, period. I want to be able to look accurate, teach people about historic aspects of my own kit(s?) and also be able to fight along side the people who I meet out on the field!

I don't expect to be very good, anytime soon. That takes time. I'll likely change my expectation of the SCA after a period of time, and I'm assuming I'll get more serious about becoming better after I've comfortably moved into the environment. For now, I just want to get introduced, and learn how to do things well enough to get a bit of action!

Cheers!

-Gregory-

Gregory,

It's almost 1 in the morning and I have to do a presentation tomorrow so please excuse me if I only type some short and maybe incoherrent stuff. That said, I just cannot stay away from this topic!

My background:
- Started a new SCA group five years ago. On the fighting side, I had me, a duffle bag with my armour and a brand new Middle Kingdom authorization card.
- In year 1 I fought 3 times (2 events, 1 practice) but I didn't drop it.
- In year 2 I had the first fighter from our group authorize and we started regular practices.
- Today we're 5 authorized fighters and 3 that are on the way (but serious).
- So, yes, it can be done. But it's a lot of hard work.


Key things:

Mentoring: I'd recommend you work with several people from the nearest group. Maybe you ask all of them to give you an introduction to the basics. The key questions for you are "who seems to explain things in a way I really understand" and "do I feel this particular style suits me". Then ask the person with the best "fit" whether he/she would be willing to work with you on a regular basis. My experience is that it is much more effective to stick with one teacher only for quite some time. This at least gives you a foundation (you might change teachers/styles later) while going from one person to another can be very confusing (been there, done that ...) Try to make 1 to 2 practices a month - and ensure that your "mentor" is there. Keep email/phone contact in between. Agree upon training tasks for your and report on them. Share your experiences/challenges/learnings.

Analysis: I've started to do video analysis in our group. Just today while travelling on business I used my laptop to go through some fights frame by frame to finally figure out why one of my "boys" kills me with a certain shot all the time. Seriously: If done with concentration and a little care (don't be too ambitious) this can help a lot. I'd recommend to go for a digital camera if you can get one. Also focus and work on one thing at the time, i.e. I worked on my stance after analyzing tapes in spring, combinations in summer and so on.

Literature: As you cannot draw much from other people's direct experience go for the written sources that are available (i.e. Duke Paul's manual or the very good articles at swordmaiden.com). Also, some WMA books provide very good training advice. I love my old downloaded AEMMA manual for that ...

Technique training: You can do a lot through technique exercices, pell work and such. Actually, one knight who was kind enough to help me with training related questions told me that he had gone through an extened time without a local fighter practice, compensating it with individual training at home - and that was not too long before he got elevated.

Hope this helps - and good luck!

William

Well, I have to chime in her, being that I am from the "Stick Jock Nordwache Barony" you so put down. The big problem that we have is that we are all spread out ourselves. I am here in Lemoore, about 45 mins South of Fresno. We have 4-6 fighters here in Lemoore, and the rest are in Fresno. I have trouble driving 45 mins up to practice, but I do. Is Lemoore any closer to you? If so, we are going to start having a local practice down here. We also have a few fighters down in Visilia (SP?). We were holding a weekly practice down there, and that was a happy middle for all to attend. I'm not sure what gave you the "bad taste" in your mouth about our Barony but we're reallly not that bad. We have some pretty good fighters down here. Some of Caid's Kings have come from our little barony, Duke Guy of Castle Kirk, Sir Joseph of Silver Oak, Duke Fransic of Silver Oak. Sir Sphen (SP?), Sir Kolfina, and many others do travel on a occasion up here and attend practice.
We are the farthest part of Caid that we you can get. We are a rough and tumble group, but with great people. Any and all would love to help you get in the game. Lord Cedric of Silver Oak is always open to host Armour days at his shop, as is Sir Fransic. When it comes to armour, we are pretty much self contained, seeing how we all make our own armour, from the Helms to the Greaves. The expierence level here is great. There is such a good learning pool to grow from.
To sum it up, give your local Barony another shot. Show up to a practice, put names to faces, and have a good time. We will be attending the WinterMist Tourney this weekend down in Bakersfield, would that be an option? http://groups.yahoo.com/group/baronyofnordwache/

-Lord Charles de Grey of Bloody Moon
Squire to Count Fransic

William,

Thanks for the "analysis" as I'll call it;) Very interesting to get your perspective on that situation!

Smitty,

I didn't mean to bash Nordwache. I liked the fighters I met, and they seemed to really be appreciative of the sport. Heck, you might have even been there? It's just that I didn't run into anyone that I met at one of the tournaments I attended in Fresno who really seemed to have taken lots of time researching a very historic kit. I suppose that because I'm a historic reenactor, I'm rather partial to people who appreciate similar aspects of the game, and just didn't get that feel when I was at the event. I'll admit, it was the only one I attended, but there were about a dozen fighters there.

I appreciated the enthusiasm and the environment as a whole, but just don't think I'd function as I want to be able to, over a long-term period. Please, don't take offense, it's just my personal taste, coming into play here!

I hope to get to meet you sometime, soon! Visalia is about 20 minutes from my own home, and would be much easier to get to! Do you guys still go down there, much? To be precise, we're from Dinuba, dunno' if you know where that is. East of Kingsburg and Reedley, North of Visalia and Southeast of Fresno. We're "central" in the Central Valley!

Bakersfield wouldn't be an option for this weekend. Justin and I have four choir performances between Saturday and Sunday, at random times, as well as a Christmas parade to attend (and perform at in band and myself as a spectator!)

As for armor making and such, Justin and I are pretty good at being creative, and I'm working on developing a good, semi-inexpensive ($1000 or so, max) historic outfit to wear on the field. I'm not sure about what it will be, yet! I definitely won't jump into something like the 14th century kit I was planning before. It was going to be upwards of $3,000 once completed!

Cheers!

-Gregory-

Gregory J. Liebau wrote:
{freiman's big snip}

A bit more on what I personally want to achieve as a member. I want to have fun, period. I want to be able to look accurate, teach people about historic aspects of my own kit(s?) and also be able to fight along side the people who I meet out on the field!

I don't expect to be very good, anytime soon. That takes time. I'll likely change my expectation of the SCA after a period of time, and I'm assuming I'll get more serious about becoming better after I've comfortably moved into the environment. For now, I just want to get introduced, and learn how to do things well enough to get a bit of action!

{snip}

Alright Gregory,

My thoughts about how you can acheive this. It's free, and worth every penny you pay for it.

OK, if I am reading you correctly (and if I am not, please correct me) you want to...

*present a period appearance, and have your rig be valuable as an educational tool (even if it is less expensive than you originally wanted). You want the hundred years war period.

*be a fighter. Not necessarily a top eschelon fighter, but a fighter nonetheless.

*get involved in the SCA fighting community, and get a feel for what's going on.

*practice with your buddies.

Do I have that right?

This isn't a bad set of goals. My goal when I joined was "drink a lot and get next to girls". Yours is much better.

In order to acheive this, I think you need to first find out what the enviornment is like, and take stock of the resources available to you. This means familliarizing yourself with the people in the groups nearest you, and looking for people anywhere that might be helpful and willing.

Get every one of "Your" fighters into a legal, safe set of gear. Used gear, out of period gear, whatever. If your gear isn't sufficient to get you on the field, you aren't a fighter. You will be changing your rig later.

Get a copy of the SCA "rules of the list", "convnetions of combat" and "armor and weapons specs". Read them.

Attend your local practices, at least long enough to find out who is who.

You will be looking not just for fighters and coaches, but for folks that can help with the history aspect too. Make a list of "Laurels" and "artisans" in your area, and try to get some idea of what their area and period of specialization are. Some will be cooks, some armor makers, some will sew, some will do woodworking ect. make note of all of it, you wont know what you need to find out about until you need it. Get phone numbers and e-mail addresses.

Fight with every fighter in the area. Make a mental note of the persons you "click" with. The personal fit is more important than anything else.

Assemble a set of drills and excercises that you would like to do at whatever practice you will be setting up in your local area.

Set a day and time for the practices that everybody in your local area can attend, and that doesn't conflict with the closest established practices. Set a location that nobody has to drive home from. The day before every practice, give every one of "your" fighters a call on the phone. This is very important.

Start to assemble your "public" rig. This is the more period rig that you want as your end product. Start a notebook, and start to make plans on how to get from here to there. This is where the list of artisans starts to become important.

Start your local practices. You wont be an official practice until you have a "warranted marshal" in attendance. Non-official status is good. Spend the first few practices figuring out how you want your practices to go. After practice, have a beer or two with "your" fighters. Buy the beer, so that money isn't an issue with the other guys.

Make sure that you and "your" fighters attend at least two practices a month outside your local group. Arrange car pools. On the day before, give every fighter a phone call to make sure that they will show up. let each fighter have a turn picking the CD you listen to in the car.

Invite those fighters that you "clicked" with to attend your local practices. Don't invite all of them to the same practice. Instead, try to have one present at every practice.

Set "your" fighters a goal, like "I would like all of us to fight in the fuddy duddy tournament at this upcoming event" or "I would like to have us all authorized before april fools day". Keep your fighters focused on that goal.

Attend the event, have a good time.

Recruit new people. Repeat.

That's my personal suggestion.

It might work for you. it might not. Either way, it's free.

freiman the minstrel

Hey Freiman,

I love everything you've said! Your post has been one of the most informative to me yet, simply because you touched on lots of bases that I'd been curious about. Your idea about my goals are correct, indeed, and I thank you for the compliment about them as a whole!

The one thing that I can't do on your list is drink. Justin and I are only 17 (we can fight here at 16, but not in battles until we're 18 and of course, not until we're ready in the eyes of our area veterans!) and won't be able to legally drink beer until we're 21!

Lol!

Cheers!

-Gregory-

Sodas are a great alternative (and you can drive afterwards! )

Indeed! I actually drink too much soda, as it is, already! Lately I've been phasing it out for massive amounts of orange and apple juice, though. Now I just need to catch up on my water drinking skills;)

Cheers!

-Gregory-