Got a Real-World Weapon or Armor Question? Mk. IV

[Fhaolan]

Being that I cannot contribute meaningfully to a discussion of military strategy... I will pull a weird weapon out of my hat and explain it's use. :smallbiggrin:

This (http://www.horse-round.com/_images/gallery/weaponry/P1010008.jpg) is a stabbing axe. Typically 15th century, usually northern Europe, it is unusual in that it is an axe specifically designed to be used from horseback. The concept is that you ride down your target, stab them in the face, and let the axe twist around as you pass, pulling the axe out of the target and bringing the axe up to chop down on the next target. This maneuver shows up again in later periods with cavalry sabre work. However, the axe is considerably heavier than a sabre and more suited to dealing with metal helms.

This particular stabbing axe is a reproduction I purchased from Three Brothers Productions (formerly K&K Art), a medieval reproduction manufacturer in the Czech Republic. It's heavier than the historical examples I've been able to find, and the metal used is dead soft, but for stage combat purposes it's a reasonable piece. Apparantly K&K Art no longer make this model though.

[Subotei]

Patton is over rated as a commander. He didn't take up his command in Europe until the real fighting in the American sector of Normandy was reaching its conclusion - thanks to Bradley, who was probably the best Allied commander in the theatre. The 'slow' phase corresponded to most of the heavy resistance of the Germans in the Bocage country, which was suited to defence. Most of the allied commanders could've engineered a breakout of the kind Patton did (though, OK - probably slower) once German resistance was crumbling and they were into better territory. Patton took a lot of real estate in Brittany but failed to take any of the key defended objectives like the west coast ports, many of which remained in German hands until the end of the war. Also, as has been pointed out, he struggled to make headway against determined defenders at Metz. This suggests he was more a pursuit specialist and motivator rather than a fighting general.

I don't think its fair to call Bradley or Montgomery butchers. Both the British and American forces struggled against the Germans in the good defensive countryside of Normandy, but for different reasons. Both British and American armour were poorly equipped to face modern German tanks. As a rule (there were exceptions) British infantry were of better quality and more experienced, but were poorly led by commanders who were trying to avoid casualties and as a consequence did not push home their attacks. American infantry were of poorer quality, but were pushed with greater force by their commanders to achieve their goals. Had Montgomery pushed his British and Canadian sub-commanders with the same vigour Bradly pushed the Americans, many allied casualties could've been avoided, by bringing the fighting to a swifter conclusion.

[Raum]

I agree, Bradley was one of the best allied commanders of the war. I'm not sure I agree Montgomery wasn't a butcher though, he seemed to treat men much the same as any other supply...a resource to be used.

@ Fhaolan, Nice axe, do you have any pictures of historical pieces? It does seem a bit awkward for the use you describe though...awfully point heavy to hold in one hand horizontally to stab with the point. Or did I misunderstand your description?

[Stephen_E]

@ Fhaolan, Nice axe, do you have any pictures of historical pieces? It does seem a bit awkward for the use you describe though...awfully point heavy to hold in one hand horizontally to stab with the point. Or did I misunderstand your description?

He did say it was heavier than the historical peices.

Fhaolan, do you know anything about the Badiche. The picture I saw of it in some RPG book was of a large axe blade on haft the length of a short spear.
IIRC (and it was sometime ago) it was supposedly used in middle/Northern Europe in mid/late feudal times.

Thanks
Stephen

[Stephen_E]

Patton is over rated as a commander. He didn't take up his command in Europe until the real fighting in the American sector of Normandy was reaching its conclusion - thanks to Bradley, who was probably the best Allied commander in the theatre. The 'slow' phase corresponded to most of the heavy resistance of the Germans in the Bocage country, which was suited to defence. Most of the allied commanders could've engineered a breakout of the kind Patton did (though, OK - probably slower) once German resistance was crumbling and they were into better territory. Patton took a lot of real estate in Brittany but failed to take any of the key defended objectives like the west coast ports, many of which remained in German hands until the end of the war. Also, as has been pointed out, he struggled to make headway against determined defenders at Metz. This suggests he was more a pursuit specialist and motivator rather than a fighting general.


That's the difference Re: Rommel for me. While he was a more than capable pursuit general, when sent off he smashed key defended objectives as well as moved fast taking the territory.

I hate to sound like a Nazi fanboy, but one advantage the Germans did seem to have is that they had more commanders with a understanding of both combined arms and mobility who were both in a posistion to use that knowledge and given equipment that worked with it (their AFVs were more general use, compared to say the British who went if for specific purpose tanks).

Stephen

[Wehrkind]

Yea, Rommel definitely was one of the real modern (more modern at least) generals of the war, having wrote the book on tank warfare.
I refer to Bradley and Monty as butchers precisely because their slow, cautious set piece advances ground up a lot of men in order to avoid any possible risk. Essentially, their desire to avoid risk caused more casualties because they believed if they took it slow and steady they could eliminate ALL risk. It's a common mistake in all human endeavor that we can be 100% safe if we just are careful enough. The Battle of the Bulge demonstrates why this is not correct. While Patton was not the end all be all commander, he did seem to understand what to do with victory once he had it, as opposed to letting the opportunity for greater gains slip away. It seems to me that Bradley and Monty spent a lot of human lives on tactical victory without capitalizing on that for a greater strategic victory, prefering to take it slow and allowing the Germans to recover from the blow they had been dealt.
Without pursuit, a victory only assures a rematch down the road against the same enemies.

[Stephen_E]

Without pursuit, a victory only assures a rematch down the road against the same enemies.

Often true, but equally true is that many a victory has been thrown away by a reckless pursuit.

A couple of examples that spring to mind.

War of Roses. one flank broke and the opposing flank and Cav haired off inpursuit. Eventaully rallied and came charging back to destroy the remaining enemies. By the time they were back the battle has swivveled and they charged back into the rear of their own side, which did still have the edge until that moment, and broke their own side giving the battle, and essentailly the war, to the opposition.

Unknown war. One side broke and started to flee. The pursuers chased the most disorganised/fastest moving runners. The more organised retreating formations went "hold on. We outnumber what's left". Stopped. Turned around and charged back inot the field taking it from the remenants. Since in this case holding the field WAS the important bit, they won, despite losing the battle.

Basically the pursuit is good for killing the opposition, but winning the war is rarely about killing the opposition (if it was the Germans won. They killed more people) it about defeating the opposition. Sometimes that is the pursuit, sometimes it isn't.

Patton is a very debated general. He was indeed a dashing and agggressive General. I haven't looked at his performance closely, but I'm aware that just how good he is is strongly debated. To some extent the Allies suffered by have very few Generals who performed that well, thus we have our competent Generals, and our specalist Generals promoted as greater than their actual ability, and then shot down of the pedastals they've been put on. Mpntegomery and Patton are the 2 European Generals who particuly suffer from this. Quite possibly the best British General was a man who went by the nickname "Slim", but since he did his work on the SE Asian ground front he's been largely ignored. It's like medals. To get a medal, it's not enough to perform with valour, you must perform with valour where others can see you. For Generals it also helps if you either heavily self-promote (ala Montgomery, Patton and MacArthur?-Philippines fame) or ben genuinly liked and admired as a person (Rommel, and the "Slim" character - not enough to frontline him, but helped him get beyond the footnotes).

Stephen

[Mike_G]

I think you mean General Slim, who commanded the forces in the Burma theater.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Slim

His largely Indian army crushed the Japanese forces and drove them from India and Burma, effectively rolling up the Japanese west flank while the US and Australian forces advanced from the east in the Pacific.

[Wehrkind]

Often true, but equally true is that many a victory has been thrown away by a reckless pursuit.

A couple of examples that spring to mind.

War of Roses. one flank broke and the opposing flank and Cav haired off inpursuit. Eventaully rallied and came charging back to destroy the remaining enemies. By the time they were back the battle has swivveled and they charged back into the rear of their own side, which did still have the edge until that moment, and broke their own side giving the battle, and essentailly the war, to the opposition.

Unknown war. One side broke and started to flee. The pursuers chased the most disorganised/fastest moving runners. The more organised retreating formations went "hold on. We outnumber what's left". Stopped. Turned around and charged back inot the field taking it from the remenants. Since in this case holding the field WAS the important bit, they won, despite losing the battle.

Yes, it definitely can be over used. Caution is also a good thing, except when it is over done. My point is that knowing when to do both is what marks a good general; going too far to either extreme is what gets you.



Basically the pursuit is good for killing the opposition, but winning the war is rarely about killing the opposition (if it was the Germans won. They killed more people) it about defeating the opposition. Sometimes that is the pursuit, sometimes it isn't. It is not good just for killing, but capturing and driving the enemy. The idea is usually to keep them from rallying and returning to the fight, but keeping them off balance until they run out of places to go and must surrender. Effectively this takes away much of the defender's advantages of prepared sites and positions, as they never get the chance to sit and prepare them.
Patton's army also captured many more men than it killed. Huge numbers surrendered when surrounded and cut off.
War is not about killing but removing your enemy's ability to resist. Killing is one way of doing this, but capturing their army is just as effective. Keeping their army moving also is effective towards this end, as they are not resisting, and giving ground, and if they do stop they are as new to the area as you are, and thus lose many defensive advantages.

[Fhaolan]

@ Fhaolan, Nice axe, do you have any pictures of historical pieces? It does seem a bit awkward for the use you describe though...awfully point heavy to hold in one hand horizontally to stab with the point. Or did I misunderstand your description?

Unfortunately, no, I don't have any pictures of the pieces I've seen. I'm sure I've got line drawings in one of my reference books, but I'm having difficulty finding that particular book. This is not a common, or easily found, weapon which is why I pulled it out of the hat. :smallsmile:

It is extremely heavy, compared to the ones I've seen in museums. When any of the other people in my combat troupe try to use it, they always switch to two-handed work with it, but the shaft is far too short for it to be an effective two-handed weapon, and the curve in the shaft throws them off. I can use it one-handed, because I've figured out the trick. You hold it half-way up the shaft, with the shaft just under your forearm. That keeps the axe nice and steady for the stabbing. Remember you're using the horse's momentum, and not actually thrusting forward with the axe. Then, as the axe rotates around, you let it slide through your hand until it's near the end of the shaft, then hold firm and pull it out and over. This tires your arm out fast, so you'll probably only deal with one or two passes like this before you decide to just leave the axe in the head of one of your targets and draw a sword. These things only seemed to used in Northern Europe over a very short period of time, so I doubt they were very popular. Basically, people figured out that there *had* to be an better way right fast. :smallsmile:

Stephen_E: Bardiche, the cleaver on a stick. Quite literally. Bardiches have large, heavy, cleaver-like blades, mounted at two points to the shaft so that the blade projects beyond the staff to provide a thrusting point. Bardiches tend to have very short staves, tall enough that the top of the staff sits at about shoulder level when the butt is on the ground. Bardiches with long staves tend to have much smaller blades, and are technically called Voulges. I've heard that in the early days of gunpowder, bardiches were used by musketeers. They would stab the sharpened butt of the bardiche into the ground, and use the blade & staff to steady the musket.

[Dervag]

Montgomery was the commander for Nth Africa/Eastern Med, not just the Pursuit at El Alemein. Auchinleck was the commander for the entire Middle East/Persia. They could decide broadstroke strategy, but they simply didn't/shouldn't be operating at the tactical/field operations level, which is where pursuits largely occur.You misunderstand. The failure to pursue was on the operational/strategic level. Montgomery did not drive his aggressive commanders forward against Rommel, and tended to keep the entire advance of Eighth Army (which, as a whole, was part of his responsibility rather than that of his subordinates).

Montgomery chose not to stay close on Rommel's heels. In hindsight, it was a mistake. In foresight, it may not have been much of a mistake, but in my opinion it limits Montgomery's quality by showing that he did not know how to take advantage of a victory on the operational/strategic level.


For the Germans halting the advance after the disintergration of the French front and allowing the Dunkirk evacuation to occurThere's a catch. The Germans still weren't sure that the troops around Dunkirk were as disorganized as they hoped. If the Germans had pushed their panzer divisions into the Dunkirk pocket, they would have been targets for air and naval support from English airfields and the Channel, and any troops capable of putting up a fight around the pocket would have been well placed to grind up the panzers.

Those panzer divisions were not readily replaceable. German tank manufacture was pretty slow, and they'd lost a lot of tanks in the French campaign already. If they took even more losses attacking the Dunkirk pocket, they might not have enough panzers left to deal with the bulk of the French Army (which was still around in southern France), or to deal with Russia next year.


Not taking a weak MaltaHere, neither the Germans nor the Italians had the capacity to launch a large-scale airlift or sealift attack against Malta, making capture of the island difficult. Moreover, as long as the Italians and Germans looked to be winning in North Africa, Malta was irrelevant on its own.


Yea, Rommel definitely was one of the real modern (more modern at least) generals of the war, having wrote the book on tank warfare.Well, I'd argue that Guderian wrote the book, and Rommel wrote the appendix.


I refer to Bradley and Monty as butchers precisely because their slow, cautious set piece advances ground up a lot of men in order to avoid any possible risk.As opposed to a commander who launches a rapid, incautious attack that fails and wrecks the entire army?

There are times and places where set piece attacks are the best solution or the only solution. There are times and places to fight a mobile pursuit battle. But when dealing with a skilled counterpuncher like Rommel or when fighting in close terrain like the Normandy bocage, set-piece attacks present the only reliable chance of winning the battle.


It seems to me that Bradley and Monty spent a lot of human lives on tactical victory without capitalizing on that for a greater strategic victory, prefering to take it slow and allowing the Germans to recover from the blow they had been dealt.
Without pursuit, a victory only assures a rematch down the road against the same enemies.I can see your argument about Montgomery, but how do you justify extending it to Bradley?


War is not about killing but removing your enemy's ability to resist. Killing is one way of doing this, but capturing their army is just as effective. Keeping their army moving also is effective towards this end, as they are not resisting, and giving ground, and if they do stop they are as new to the area as you are, and thus lose many defensive advantages.The problem is that sooner or later, if you carry out your pursuit long enough you will fetch up against a tough defensible obstacle or a place where the enemy has prepared a strong defense from troops moved in from elsewhere. You also have to know what to do then, and Patton didn't. Patton wasn't good at winning set-piece engagements any more than Montgomery was good at mobile engagements.

[Reltzik]

The following is more of an "effective tactics" question than a weapons and armor question. It arose in a description of a hypothetical army in this forum -- I think it should work, but I wanted to ask the experts.

How effective would packs of trained attack dogs be in breaking/holding off cavalry? Assume DnD-ish tech levels -- just before gunpowder -- and that the army using the dogs wears pungent foliage for identification purposes, giving the dogs the scent so that the dogs know who's an ally. As an alternative, how effective would these dogs have been around 1000 AD? 600 AD? Finally, for the real history buffs here, how effective were the dog-trainers of those time periods?

[Stephen_E]

You misunderstand. The failure to pursue was on the operational/strategic level. Montgomery did not drive his aggressive commanders forward against Rommel, and tended to keep the entire advance of Eighth Army (which, as a whole, was part of his responsibility rather than that of his subordinates).

Montgomery chose not to stay close on Rommel's heels. In hindsight, it was a mistake. In foresight, it may not have been much of a mistake, but in my opinion it limits Montgomery's quality by showing that he did not know how to take advantage of a victory on the operational/strategic level..

Point taken, but then I've never claimed that Montgomery was more than competent.:smallsmile:



Quote:
For the Germans halting the advance after the disintergration of the French front and allowing the Dunkirk evacuation to occur


There's a catch. The Germans still weren't sure that the troops around Dunkirk were as disorganized as they hoped. If the Germans had pushed their panzer divisions into the Dunkirk pocket, they would have been targets for air and naval support from English airfields and the Channel, and any troops capable of putting up a fight around the pocket would have been well placed to grind up the panzers.

Those panzer divisions were not readily replaceable. German tank manufacture was pretty slow, and they'd lost a lot of tanks in the French campaign already. If they took even more losses attacking the Dunkirk pocket, they might not have enough panzers left to deal with the bulk of the French Army (which was still around in southern France), or to deal with Russia next year.

The divisions closing on Dunkirk were largely undamaged from the figures I once saw. The British air to ground attack ability was pretty dismal at the time as well. I really think you overstate the threat. Nonetheless my 3 examples were all of "this won't matter that much" on the day that came back to haunt them big time.

Quote:
Not taking a weak Malta


Here, neither the Germans nor the Italians had the capacity to launch a large-scale airlift or sealift attack against Malta, making capture of the island difficult. Moreover, as long as the Italians and Germans looked to be winning in North Africa, Malta was irrelevant on its own.



See my previous comment.

[Wehrkind]

Bradley continuously pulled supplies away from Patton's sweeping flanking maneuvers in the European campaign, halting him while the Germans skittered out of his grasp. We see Patton stuck for want of supplies, but rarely do we hear Bradley lamenting not being able to drive Germans before him in a faster manner.
While I agree that set piece battles are often necessary, and sometimes desirable, I think that Bradley and Monty had a tendancy to err in their favor, desiring too much safety and caution, and by extension giving much of the same to the Germans. While it is possible to lose many troops in an abush off of a feigned retreat, it is a general's job to recognize such situations, and get the best reward for the risk. Typically situations of little to no risk are guaranteed to be a loss in the long run.

[Subotei]

You misunderstand. The failure to pursue was on the operational/strategic level. Montgomery did not drive his aggressive commanders forward against Rommel, and tended to keep the entire advance of Eighth Army (which, as a whole, was part of his responsibility rather than that of his subordinates).

Montgomery chose not to stay close on Rommel's heels. In hindsight, it was a mistake. In foresight, it may not have been much of a mistake, but in my opinion it limits Montgomery's quality by showing that he did not know how to take advantage of a victory on the operational/strategic level.


There is also the political angle to consider: the British needed a clear victory for political/morale reasons - they'd been fighting for 3 years with precious little to show in the way of success. Montgomery wasn't going to risk the win he'd had by over extending himself, given Rommel a chance to counter attack - he knew what happend to British commanders who lost.


There are times and places where set piece attacks are the best solution or the only solution. There are times and places to fight a mobile pursuit battle. But when dealing with a skilled counterpuncher like Rommel or when fighting in close terrain like the Normandy bocage, set-piece attacks present the only reliable chance of winning the battle.

I agree - looking at the facts Monty was never going to achieve a fast breakthrough or flanking manoever on the British front. Against the British, at the height of the fighting, the Germans deployed 14 divisions, 6 of them armoured; against the American front they deployed 11 divisions, only 2 of which were armoured. Against large armoured forces in good defensive country, set piece attacks were really the only option available. The only criticism of Monty in Normandy that holds up, other than his boastful nature, which got him into trouble when the troops underperformed, was his lack of drive to push the attacks he did make home, but this is explained by the British wish to avoid heavy casulties. A false economy which backfired.

[Dervag]

Point taken, but then I've never claimed that Montgomery was more than competent.:smallsmile:

The divisions closing on Dunkirk were largely undamaged from the figures I once saw. The British air to ground attack ability was pretty dismal at the time as well. I really think you overstate the threat. Nonetheless my 3 examples were all of "this won't matter that much" on the day that came back to haunt them big time.Even so, the Germans lost a lot of tanks during the 1940 offensive. They might well have lost a lot more if they'd tried too hard to press the Dunkirk pocket.


Re: Malta... See my previous comment.All I'm saying is that they had a fairly compelling strategic reason not to attack Malta at the time, seeing as how they didn't actually have anything effective to attack Malta with.

[Sundog]

The following is more of an "effective tactics" question than a weapons and armor question. It arose in a description of a hypothetical army in this forum -- I think it should work, but I wanted to ask the experts.

How effective would packs of trained attack dogs be in breaking/holding off cavalry? Assume DnD-ish tech levels -- just before gunpowder -- and that the army using the dogs wears pungent foliage for identification purposes, giving the dogs the scent so that the dogs know who's an ally. As an alternative, how effective would these dogs have been around 1000 AD? 600 AD? Finally, for the real history buffs here, how effective were the dog-trainers of those time periods?

War dogs were used on occasion by ancient miltaries, but rarely. There are a number of reasons for this:

1: A dog is inferior to an armed and armored human. While you'll have some terror and shock effects, any reasonable infantry will see off a dog pack without much difficulty.

2: Cavalry is faster than dogs. Over any sort of distance, cavalry will outpace dogs easily; only very heavily laden horses won't, and then you're talking someone who's basically a knight. In that case, the knight will just kill the dogs who go after his mount. You MIGHT disrupt a charge, but that's unlikely - more likely, the horsemen will just ride straight over your dog pack. Even if it works, you've just lost a bunch of expensive dogs in a one-shot maneuver.

3: Dogs aren't very smart. Unless you have the holders right up close to give orders, they'll probably just find a nice place to curl up and have a snooze. Even if you have them trained to attack and kill humans, they still need to know WHEN to attack.

So, your opponent is going to attack those handlers if he can.

Training dogs is an old, old skill, one humans have no doubt been practicing since before the start of recorded history. Getting them to attack a specific target isn't hard. But the simple fact is, in a set-piece battle, dogs just aren't that useful.

Skirmishing is another matter, of course. Small numbers of humans can be overwhelmed by dogs. Which is the purpose war dogs have been traditionally used for (besides guarding things).

[Dervag]

Right.

Remember, humans were able to domesticate dogs not least because an armed human can reliably beat a dog in a fight. A man with a club has a very good chance of defeating any but the biggest and toughest of dogs; a man with a sword and even light body armor is almost guaranteed to do so.

[Winterking]

Another problem, particularly with using attack dogs against cavalry, is that for most of their evolution, one of the primary threats to horses was dogs/wolves/canine-types, and so they are, as a species, used to dog attack. Among other things, a horse's hoof will crush the skull of any dog that has the misfortune to be within kicking distance. Trained warhorses would be more fearsome, even before you take into account their riders.
Generally, in a charge, the cavalry would ride right over your attack dogs, trampling them into the dust.

[Matthew]

Hmmn. I'm none too sure about this. Horses, even trained War Horses, tend to avoid trampling things. However, I just don't think Attack Dogs posed a significant enough threat to have a significant impact on warfare. Persuading them to effectively attack a Cavalry Charge sounds like a disaster, I suspect they would just run imbetween, away or get incidently trampled.

Saying that, Dogs did sometimes travel with armies, though they were mainly used for hunting or sport (if they weren't strays). Hard to say, really.

Fhaolan: That is an interesting looking Axe. I have never seen one like that before and would probably have passed it off as a 'Fantasy Axe'. Well, now I know better, though it would be nice to have some source material.

Incidently, Wikipedia has a short article and nice picture of a Bardiche (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bardiche). It's completely unsourced, though, and has no discussion. Still, it seems reasonably accurate.

[Uraseshade]

I'm talking to a friend of mine about melee and semi-melee weapons right now. He wants me to forge him a dual-edged (not bladed, edged) katana and a naginata with a 9' pole. His girlfriend has a hundred-some year old Hitori Hanzo original katana that's been in her family for about 37 years. And I have my own list of weapons.

Armored/clawed gauntlets (I can't say what they're called for... clan secrecy... sorry)
two 1' daggers with ridges near the handel (for gripping another blade)
two 2' katana
one or two 3' katana

I need to discuss materials.

Everything's going to be SOME kind of titanium, what I need to know is carbide or not?

Specifically I need to know whether or not titanium carbide plating can take a blow--and, in the case of a blade, GIVE a blow--better than normal titanium.

Also, would carbon-fibers laced throughout the blade strengthen it?

And I also need a kind of fabric or some other highly flaxible material that can resist being cut. (I need to be able to grab a blade)

As I hinted at, I am going to be forging weapons. Not for a living, but for personal and clan use.

Pre-post edit: I asked my dad... so I know now that carbon-fiber lacing in the blade would be ineffective and KEVLAR *SHOULD* be strong enough to grab the blade of even a katana...

Now all I need to know is TITANIUM OR TITANIUM-CARBIDE?!

[Norsesmithy]

Well Titanium of any reasonable purity is pretty soft. It has lots of tensile strength for its weight, but compared to most other metals it acts kind of like rubber.

Titanium carbide, however, trades purity and tensile strength for hardness, resulting in a somewhat brittle composition.

Neither is very good for bladed weaponry (fine for tools, bad for weapons).

Combine this with how difficult titanium is to work (have to cast, forge, or weld titanium in pure argon, as it is highly reactive when hot) and you have a real loser for the purposes you describe.

Despite the advances in materials technology, carbon steel remains the best choice for a bladed weapon, unless you have access to a foundary and hundreds of thousands of dollars in specialized production equipment, in which case Tungsten Nickel Steel is probably the best, but it is likely too difficult for anything but a highly experienced specialist to work with.

Also Kevlar is noticable weak against cutting forces, a simple knife can defeat Class III kevlar armour, and that stuff is supposed to be proof of highpowered rifles at point blank range.

For grabbing a blade I would recomend leather backed by maille (leather on the outside, perhaps another layer of leather inside the maille) or articulated plate gauntlets, perhaps with a leather false palm outside the articulated plates.

From my experience, I can tell you that forging a blade is a far more involved process than it seems when you are still all pencil and paper.

What do you intend to use as a fuel to heat the metal?

[SpiderBrigade]

From my experience, I can tell you that forging a blade is a far more involved process than it seems when you are still all pencil and paper.

What do you intend to use as a fuel to heat the metal?He may not be free to answer that question for reasons of clan secrecy, Norsesmithy.

[Norsesmithy]

He may not be free to answer that question for reasons of clan secrecy, Norsesmithy.
Now Now, just because his story is unlikely in the extreme dosen't give us the right to point out its silliness right away, let us wait untill we have trapped him in a contradiction or three.



Oops, did I say that aloud?

[Joran]

Also Kevlar is noticable weak against cutting forces, a simple knife can defeat Class III kevlar armour, and that stuff is supposed to be proof of highpowered rifles at point blank range.

I was under the impression that Kevlar, since it's weaved, is weak against piercing attacks, like a knife or an ice pick. Against a slashing attack, like a sword, since it covers a much wider area, I thought that the kevlar would be proof against that.

Of course, I could be wrong. Would ceramic plates, like the ones that they place in combat vests, help mitigate it as well? (although I wonder how flexible/comfortable they would be in gloves)

[Mike_G]

Also Kevlar is noticable weak against cutting forces, a simple knife can defeat Class III kevlar armour, and that stuff is supposed to be proof of highpowered rifles at point blank range.



Kevlar won't stop a high powered rifle round at close range. Some vests with ceramic plates will stop such a round, assuming it hits the plate, but a typical assault rifle or machine gun round will pierce Kevlar at quite some distance. Kevlar is great against fragments, fine against pistol rounds, and the plates will stop rifle rounds, but you'd need a vest with so many layers it would look like a mattress strapped to you to stop a high powered rifle round at point blank range with just Kevlar.

Here's some test shooting against Kevlar helmets. Note that pistol rounds pretty much all fail to penetrate, but the rifle rounds go in one side, through the water jug the helmet is on, and out the other side.

http://www.theboxotruth.com/docs/bot29.htm

Kevlar is tough to cut. It can be pierced, but I think a kevlar glove would protect you fairly well from grabbing a blade.

[Norsesmithy]

Huh, the more you know.

[Exarch]

While Kevlar does not provide adequent protection against rifles, the U.S. military is having body armor capable of dealing with rounds up to 7.62x39mm. I don't think it was tested on the 7.62x51mm, but they did place it ontop of a grenade and the blast only succeeded in shredding the front...the layer of scales (for lack of a better word) were completely unharmed, so the body would have been as well, on the exterior at least.

I don't know if any watches Future Weapons on television here in the States, but that's where I found it. It's been named "Dragon Skin" or some such thing. Apparently there's lots of scientists who read up on mythology, go figure. The vest is actually no bigger than the current vest and is relatively light weight.

Here's a link to a source on it.
http://www.pinnaclearmor.com/body-armor/dragon-skin.php

Edit: I too thought Kevlar could take a cut or chop action without much difficulty, but it'd be the stabbing action from a knife that would defeat Kevlar. I can't be scientific about it, but it's something about having such a small point of impact and the Kevlar can't handle it.

[Mike_G]

While Kevlar does not provide adequent protection against rifles, the U.S. military is having body armor capable of dealing with rounds up to 7.62x39mm. I don't think it was tested on the 7.62x51mm, but they did place it ontop of a grenade and the blast only succeeded in shredding the front...the layer of scales (for lack of a better word) were completely unharmed, so the body would have been as well, on the exterior at least.

I don't know if any watches Future Weapons on television here in the States, but that's where I found it. It's been named "Dragon Skin" or some such thing. Apparently there's lots of scientists who read up on mythology, go figure. The vest is actually no bigger than the current vest and is relatively light weight.

Here's a link to a source on it.
http://www.pinnaclearmor.com/body-armor/dragon-skin.php

Edit: I too thought Kevlar could take a cut or chop action without much difficulty, but it'd be the stabbing action from a knife that would defeat Kevlar. I can't be scientific about it, but it's something about having such a small point of impact and the Kevlar can't handle it.

As far as I know, the Army Procurement dept has not ok'd Dragonskin, preferring the current armor. I haven't seen the Army's results, but I know that the general in charge is a member of the board of the current armor, so...there ya go.

I've seen the company propaganda on Dragon Skin, and it looks good, but whataya expect?

The "scales" in Dragonskin, or plates in the current armor, will stop 7.62 rounds. The Kevlar componet won't. That's all I was saying, in reply to the poster who said Kevlar could stop rifle rounds at close range.

[Adlan]

Kevlar consists of fibres of very tough fabric, woven together to form a lattice work. small Bullets and shrapnel get caught by the weave, spreading the impact over a large area, meaning the projectile loses energy, and is stopped. Larger or specially designed bullets still spread the energy across the weave, but retain enough to penetrate the wearer. Knife's and stabbing blades slip between the weave, bypassing the armour completly.

At least, this is my understanding. I haven't a clue how stab proof vests work.

[Annarrkkii]

I'm running a high-level monk who wields kamas. As such, I thought I'd check out the YouTube universe, and I found this (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vylxg4h3sTU). It SEEMS authentic, but around the 6th minute, some of the moves seem to become... suspicious.

Anyone care to confirm or contest this video?

EDIT: It has some similar videos linking on the right, which are likewise suspect.

[Matthew]

Seems plausible to me. What you have to remember about Martial Arts training is that like any non lethal training it can only prepare people to a certain degree. It may look unlikely or questionable because the moves are prepared in advance. The importance and effectiveness of this sort of training only really becomes apparent when it is applied to a 'live' combat, which we should all be fortunate to avoid.

[Wehrkind]

In reference to horses and dogs, horses love stepping on dogs. It's kind of funny to watch (unless it is your dog) in a way, as for some reason dogs love barking at horses.
I recall my dog (small terrier at the time) running around my grandmother's horses as they grazed, annoying the devil out of them, and they would attempt to kick him and step on him while hardly even slowing down their eating. Until he got to close or really annoyed one, and it would take after him a bit.
My immediate family used to have horses, and one in particular would chase dogs that wandered into the pasture. Granted, our horses always struck me as oddly aggressive (one used to eat my hair, and they always got out), but every horse owner I have known has a few stories about how their dog learned the hard way to leave the horses alone, or at least get out of the way quickly.
There was a great picture on 4Chan the other day of a horse chasing a dog, only both the horses forelegs were up making it look like a tyranid or hydralick. I wonder if I saved it...

[Norsesmithy]

A couple years ago a story came out of California about a girl who was riding horse up in the mountains and a Cougar attacked her and her horse, and the horse killed it.

[Neon Knight]

Hey, I was wondering:

How does one use a Cossack Shashka? I've heard there was a specific cutting motion used, but can't find it for the life of me.

[Matthew]

Try Shashka (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shashka). No idea about the validity of the technique described there in relation to the particular design of the Shashka, but it seems plausible, since it is pretty much a standard sword technique, as far as I can see.

Wehrind: Horses stomp dogs instinctively? Interesting. Is that a problem for Horse and Hound type hunts?

[Dervag]

Don't they normally keep the hounds well in front of the horses for that kind of hunt?

[Matthew]

Dunno, never been on one. I have seen images of dogs swarming around the horses prior to the hunt, though, I think... but memory is an unreliable thing!

[Norsesmithy]

The local huntsmen run through my farm every once and a while, and it seems that the houndsmen's horses are specially trained and socialized with the dogs, and that the dogs are kept away from the other horses, pobabaly just as much to prevent the hounds from dammaging the horses as vice versa. A pack of dogs on the hunt, even one supposedly controlled by people is a dangerous thing, if they happen upon dogs not part of their group they often tear them to peices.

My dogs are much larger than the Foxhounds the local huntsmen use, but when one got into a fight with a small part of the pack that got separated and made its way up by my house, one that got into a fight nearly died (145 lb Malamute, Shiloh Shepard, St. Bernard, Wolf mix, now dead of old age), even though he was nearly 2.5 times the weight of each of the (5) dogs he fought (he killed 2, my dad accidentally killed another while breaking up the fight using a pickaxe handle). They also can run deer down if they get off the trail of artificial fox sent the prerunners lay down. Being a houndsman for a Hunt is hard work, and kinda high stakes.

[Wehrkind]

Yea, that they train the dogs to stay away from the horses, and the horses to ignore the dogs, was going to be my guess, though I don't know anyone who hunts with hound and horse. Everyone I know in "hunt and saddle clubs" do very little hunting, and much more "tricks with horses and jumps." They looked at me wierd when I suggested they use a lance to accomplish things *sigh*

I also don't know where the line is between "instinctive" and "seems like the thing to do" when it comes to horses, ie. whether some horses are less irritable towards horses than others, or if they do it whether they think about it or not. They definitely like to do so though.
I kind of feel silly, I was just talking to my dad on IM and forgot to ask him. Next time I see some members of my family with reliable information on the subject, I will see. Probably will be a few months though.

[Dhavaer]

As far as I know, the Army Procurement dept has not ok'd Dragonskin, preferring the current armor. I haven't seen the Army's results, but I know that the general in charge is a member of the board of the current armor, so...there ya go.

I've seen the company propaganda on Dragon Skin, and it looks good, but whataya expect?

The "scales" in Dragonskin, or plates in the current armor, will stop 7.62 rounds. The Kevlar componet won't. That's all I was saying, in reply to the poster who said Kevlar could stop rifle rounds at close range.

I understand the issue with DragonSkin is a higher maintenance requirement rather than a quality problem.

[Dervag]

I understand the issue with DragonSkin is a higher maintenance requirement rather than a quality problem.Oh, so this is a 'cost effectiveness' issue...

...like McNamara's decision not to chrome-plate the firing chamber of the M-16.

That kind of decision.

[Fhaolan]

I'm running a high-level monk who wields kamas. As such, I thought I'd check out the YouTube universe, and I found this (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vylxg4h3sTU). It SEEMS authentic, but around the 6th minute, some of the moves seem to become... suspicious.

Anyone care to confirm or contest this video?

EDIT: It has some similar videos linking on the right, which are likewise suspect.

You have to realize that these are 'katas', not actual combat maneuvers. The videos are explicitely labeled as katas, so they're not false advertiseing. Katas are training exercises. If you manage to pull one off in actual combat, more power to you, but katas rely on your 'opponent' never defending, feinting, or doing anything they would actually be trying to do.

[Dervag]

On the other hand, katas are supposed to give you a sort of mental menu of options that give you a model on which you could, theoretically, base combat maneuvers.

They're also supposed to help you get very comfortable with the way your weapon(s) move so that you'll be able to make basic types of attack with little difficulty.

[Cyborg Pirate]

On the other hand, katas are supposed to give you a sort of mental menu of options that give you a model on which you could, theoretically, base combat maneuvers.

They're also supposed to help you get very comfortable with the way your weapon(s) move so that you'll be able to make basic types of attack with little difficulty.

Very simple kata's do help you, but it doesn't hold true for elaborate ones.

The problem is that once in combat, long strings of moves just won't work. It's about distance control and creating openings once in a fight, and there's simply just no place for what elaborate kata's try to teach you. During a fight, you have to think you and decide upon your strategy on the spot, and base it on your analysis of your opponent, i.e. you're busy improvising on your feet during a real fight.




I've just encountered personally that just teaching kata's to prepare yourself for fighting doesn't work. Just three weeks ago, a girlfriend of mines invited me to join her and her sister for a tryout at her kempo training. One reason she invited me was that she was jumping for a chance to get to spar with me, and so we planned to spar after the training.

The training was pretty nice, and all went great, until she and I did sparring at the end of the training. It was then that I found out that their definition of sparring was to try out techniques and sequences on each other.

It was a bit of a surprise to her when I got into position and then immediatly started keeping check of the distance between us. She asked, and I explained that that was how I was trained and how I sparred (just the basic soft-hit type of sparring), and she was intrigued by it and wanted to try it too. So we went at it and... well, it didn't work out for her at all. The all-technique and all-kata method of training she followed left her completely unprepared for "real" fighting. Soon, others of her school who had been watching wanted to try too and... well, none of em could handle themselves there and then.


I didn't expect to see it there that day, but it definatly hammered home the fact that just kata and technique training won't do you much good outside of personal fitness and self-defense vs creepy (but non-fighty) men.

[Norsesmithy]

Oh, they don't actually hunt, killing things is unfasionable, they have a rider drag a coonskin soaked in fox urine through a predetermined course, and "Hunt" that.

[Annarrkkii]

I sympathize completely. I can count on one hand the number of times I've been able to pull off a textbook move, no matter how many variations the coach showed it to me. However, I was referring more to even the basics of some of those katas. I see no reason to hold a kama upside-down. As a disclaimer, I have never touched a real kama, seen one fought with, or, in fact, seen much of any use of martial arts weapons, aside from staff-fighting and spear thrusting.

And Jet Li movies, but those don't count.

[Dhavaer]

d20 Future Tech describes a Charge Pistol's mechanism:

Charge weapons replace gunpowder and other chemical explosives with electrochemical propellant, ignited with a short but massive shock to the cartridge (rather than the old fashioned firing pin). The propellant converts to white-hot plasma with a smoother, more powerful expansion than gunpowder, resulting in a slug with a considerably higher muzzle velocity.

Ignoring the chemistry, what would the higher muzzle velocity do to the weapon? I'm guessing better armour penetration, better range, but lesser damaging ability against unarmoured targets due to overpenetration. I don't know much about guns, though.

[Cyborg Pirate]

I sympathize completely. I can count on one hand the number of times I've been able to pull off a textbook move, no matter how many variations the coach showed it to me. However, I was referring more to even the basics of some of those katas. I see no reason to hold a kama upside-down. As a disclaimer, I have never touched a real kama, seen one fought with, or, in fact, seen much of any use of martial arts weapons, aside from staff-fighting and spear thrusting.

And Jet Li movies, but those don't count.

It's very hard to say with the kama for me, I have no first hand experience with them and I'm not aware of any historical documents on their use. Best you can do for now I think is to look at it with the mind-set: "if the move/position/grip looks pointless/overcomplicated, it probably is"



Ignoring the chemistry, what would the higher muzzle velocity do to the weapon? I'm guessing better armour penetration, better range, but lesser damaging ability against unarmoured targets due to overpenetration. I don't know much about guns, though.

My knowledge on guns is limited to theory only, but it seems that you've caught all the points. There would also be an increase in recoil ofcourse.

The weapon itself tho, sounds like a good way to kill yourself. Fired by massive shock to the cartridge? Yikes.

[Mike_G]

d20 Future Tech describes a Charge Pistol's mechanism:


Ignoring the chemistry, what would the higher muzzle velocity do to the weapon? I'm guessing better armour penetration, better range, but lesser damaging ability against unarmoured targets due to overpenetration. I don't know much about guns, though.

A high velocity round creates a pressure wave in front of it, and a vacuum behind it, doing bad things to tissue. This is called cavitation, and is very bad for an unarmored body. This is one reason that a high powered round, like a rifle bullet, creates a much worse wound than a similar caliber/diameter pistol round. A .38 revolver round is wider than a 30-06, rifle round, but the rifle will do much more awful things to tissue and organs since it's moving so much faster.

Also, higher velocity rounds are more accurate, since they go further before significant drop, so you get better accuracy at range.

[Wehrkind]

Yea, Katas are funny things. Sometimes they get you practiced in doing certain moves so well that you do them without thinking (worked for me a few times). Sometimes they get you expecting a certain string of manuevers to be correct, only to find that your opponant didn't follow your "combo" and then you realize you are SOL. (I had a similar experience with my ex who was a black belt. She said I was "cheating" when I parried her kick and picked her up.)
I think katas can be useful, but they tend to lead down the dangerous path towards "art" instead of "martial", and can get you in trouble there by. I usually practice short combinations, usually a sequence of 3-5 attacks off an assumed block, so that I can throw shots quickly and accurately without thinking about it. I don't really think more moves in a row is sensible, but rather having a repitoire of 10-20 combinations you can throw easily for various situations is desirable. Granted, I use sword and shield, not fists too often, so your mileage may vary.


In relation to guns, muzzle velocity is your friend. If your wrist can take the recoil, faster is always better. It is much better to use a hollow point or soft lead wad cutter round if you are worried about over penetration than to try and neck back over penetration. Alternately, a larger caliber bullet with help offset any over penetration.

[Wehrkind]

Actually, the muzzle velocity bit reminds me of a neat round. Ever see a .17? It is a necked down .22 long rifle cartridge. It zips out of the rifle at ridiculous speeds (ours clocked at 2000fps, but we are not certain our meter was accurate on that) and is nearly all frangible material, so when it hits it shatters and rips things up. Great for shooting ground hogs and the like since it fires flat for about 100-200 yards, though it loses velocity very quickly after that.

I was thinking that would make a really nice in house weapon, since it has very little penetration, and you could put a mess of rounds into it, and shoot many of them at a time accurately. I won't be trading in my .45 any time soon, especially since a human rib would likely stop the bullets dead, but if you could make a 3-5 shot burst model, that would be a gut wound to remember.

[Zincorium]

Actually, the muzzle velocity bit reminds me of a neat round. Ever see a .17? It is a necked down .22 long rifle cartridge. It zips out of the rifle at ridiculous speeds (ours clocked at 2000fps, but we are not certain our meter was accurate on that) and is nearly all frangible material, so when it hits it shatters and rips things up. Great for shooting ground hogs and the like since it fires flat for about 100-200 yards, though it loses velocity very quickly after that.

I was thinking that would make a really nice in house weapon, since it has very little penetration, and you could put a mess of rounds into it, and shoot many of them at a time accurately. I won't be trading in my .45 any time soon, especially since a human rib would likely stop the bullets dead, but if you could make a 3-5 shot burst model, that would be a gut wound to remember.

The 5.7 round that the P90 is based around is pretty much that last concept in action: very small, light, incredibly fast bullets coming in groups towards the target. I've heard a lot of very, very mixed things about it, so I'll hold off on any opinion. The main problem with any round in the house is that if it has enough penetration to reach a person's vital organs reliably, it will go right through most drywall. A lighter bullet will lose a lot of speed going through, however, so it will be less likely to kill someone on the other side than, say, a shotgun slug, which due to it's size and weight needs much less speed to kill someone.

The light weight tends to reduce the distance any light, fast round can be used at since if the velocity drops too much from wind resistance the round won't do much. Barrel length is a major factor as well, a 20' barrel will propel the 5.56 round to very usable velocities, out of a much shorter barrel, I think the M4 is 14.5', a much larger portion of the expanding gas just makes noise and light without helping speed up the bullet. I think one of the main things with the charge weapon was that it was supposed to add more energy to the round over a shorter barrel length, which would improve the ballistics of a pistol especially.

[Wehrkind]

My thought Zincorum was that the frangible ammo would break apart upon impacting/passing through the first layer of sheetrock, and exit in bits. Those bits then would either stick in the sheetrock on the other side of the wall, or if it did penetrate, have so little KE that they would be hard pressed to break skin.

I will have to get some sheet rock and test this theory next time I visit my parents...

[Zincorium]

My thought Zincorum was that the frangible ammo would break apart upon impacting/passing through the first layer of sheetrock, and exit in bits. Those bits then would either stick in the sheetrock on the other side of the wall, or if it did penetrate, have so little KE that they would be hard pressed to break skin.

I will have to get some sheet rock and test this theory next time I visit my parents...

Definitely do so yourself using the rounds you're thinking of, the Box 'o Truth website did a lot of testing with sheetrock, and the results weren't all that promising. You may get better results, but realize that it takes a good bit of penetration to be useful as an anti-human round, and that same penetration is what makes it dangerous.

http://www.theboxotruth.com/docs/bot1.htm

[Wehrkind]

That is pretty cool Zinc. Just about as I expected, though the bit about the hollow points not expanding in the wood was shocking.

My thoughts with the .17 are based on what it does in ballistics gel and animals. In the gel, you can see it go in, then fragment, making like a orange or grapefruit sized area that is lacerated to hell. In a groundhog say, it doesn't exit at all, all the bits staying inside. Pidgeons just sort of explode, so hard to say there. Squirrels it rips up but doesn't seem to exit, though those are tough little buggers, so it probably doesn't act as a good example.

That Box of Truth is a great idea though. I am definitely making one of those for home use. I should get some bits of various other materials too, just to try it out. I know my AK will go through cinder blocks, sometimes so cleanly it doesn't even crack them, but I am really curious about what some other pieces of our arsenal can do to some things....

[Baalzebub]

I have a pair of Kamas (I made them myself) I know how to use them because a friend teached me, but it all has been very basic practice... i wanted to know what is the name of the martial art that uses this weapons and where can I find info on how to learn it.

[Sundog]

Charge guns (or to be more accurate Electro-Thermal Charge or ETC Guns) have been experimented with a couple of times. The same team that evaluated the Gyrojet concept for the US military in the 1970s took a look at both ETC and Magnetic Accelerators. There was also a "concept evaluation" by Colt in the '90s.

We can't do the electrical storage densities required right now; that's flat. But they also found another problem.

Lead and copper-jacketed rounds are getting close to their stress limits with the more high-powered conventional rounds. Increase muzzle velocities significantly, and you'll be forced to use steel-jackets, with a concomitant increase in wear on the lands and grooves of your rifling, and decreased barrel life. You also require a reinforced firing chamber, increasing overall firearm weight.

Neither study foresaw any significant advantage to outweigh the negatives.

[Wehrkind]

Hmm now that is some interesting information... Thank you Sundog, that is going to give me a pile of sci-fi thinking to do...

[Zincorium]

Charge guns (or to be more accurate Electro-Thermal Charge or ETC Guns) have been experimented with a couple of times. The same team that evaluated the Gyrojet concept for the US military in the 1970s took a look at both ETC and Magnetic Accelerators. There was also a "concept evaluation" by Colt in the '90s.

We can't do the electrical storage densities required right now; that's flat. But they also found another problem.

Lead and copper-jacketed rounds are getting close to their stress limits with the more high-powered conventional rounds. Increase muzzle velocities significantly, and you'll be forced to use steel-jackets, with a concomitant increase in wear on the lands and grooves of your rifling, and decreased barrel life. You also require a reinforced firing chamber, increasing overall firearm weight.

Neither study foresaw any significant advantage to outweigh the negatives.

Hm. That is a lot of problems to overcome before that gets off the ground, but less likely things have occurred before. Of course, no military has even switched over to caseless ammunition due to it's drawbacks and the supply issues it would cause, so I highly doubt we'll see anyone fielding ETC in our lifetimes.

As far as wear, teflon coating, which were much maligned years ago as 'cop killer' bullets, should reduce the wear caused by steel jacketed bullets, which are currently in use in many countries, as would polygonal rifling due to the way it contacts the bullet as it's traveling through. Still, it would get expensive to replace, as well as manufacture in the first place. Scandium alloy for the firing chamber is also an engineering fix that proves impractical when you factor in cost.

Not sure as far as what's in the pipeline as far as capacitor technologies, possibly nothing, but technologies to make batteries significantly smaller and more powerful are starting to come out of the wood work. Oddly, that's one of the major issues preventing rail guns from finding a place among our troops. I don't think rail guns will ever be used as infantry weapons, but as tank guns or anti-material rifles they might find some use once the technology finally matures, if ever.

[Cyborg Pirate]

Hm. That is a lot of problems to overcome before that gets off the ground, but less likely things have occurred before. Of course, no military has even switched over to caseless ammunition due to it's drawbacks and the supply issues it would cause, so I highly doubt we'll see anyone fielding ETC in our lifetimes.

oooh, May I ask, what are the issues with caseless ammunition? (I'm working on a sci-fi setting too)

[Zincorium]

oooh, May I ask, what are the issues with caseless ammunition? (I'm working on a sci-fi setting too)

Right now? I'll list the ones I know of, keep in mind that these are mostly based off the G11, which although ahead of it's time is somewhat dated. Voere (sp?) created a much different caseless round, which I believe is still produced in very small numbers.

The solid propellant that replaces gunpowder is very prone to damage and thereafter not working because of it's lack of a solid coating, a cased round can still function after getting dropped on a hard surface several times, the current mixture for caseless tends to chip and crack under stress.

Caseless rounds are significantly lighter than their cased counterparts, but tend to be very bulky. They also have a very odd balance, since the bullet is much denser than the propellant and must be located towards the front of the cartridge.

The lack of ejection, which is the main benefit, can also become a serious problem if the round misfires. Last I checked, the H&K G11 which is the only military design caseless rifle around, has to be mostly disassembled in that eventuality, which is simply unacceptable in a infantry weapon. The current mixture also leaves behind a good bit of waste behind, which can jam up the weapon or remain hot enough to cause rounds to ignite before the gun properly loads them. Again, unacceptable in an infantry weapon.

ALL of these problems could most likely be solved with a few more decades of testing, but with the G11, which was a good design for more than just it's caseless ammo, getting snubbed so thoroughly, it's probably not going to get done.

Mostly, it's a supply issue. The US has millions of guns which use the 5.56 and 7.62 ammo, and large stockpiles of it. Other countries are in similar situations. Replacing it all wholly, with no intermediate stage possible, would be a logistical nightmare, and nobody wants to put their final stamp on it without a good, solid reason to use caseless ammo and a proven design.

As for my own personal recommendations for a fictional replacement, I'd suggest a long, all tungsten bullet surrounded by a stiff and heat resistant sabot, over or behind which is a resilient, probably gel-like propellant that flashes very rapidly into plasma when an electrical arc is passed through it (doesn't exist that I know of, but certainly not impossible). The barrel would have an artificial diamond coating over toughened ceramics to be resistant to the wear of the bullet's passage and the heat of the expanded plasma, which is actually fairly reasonable in cost for a setting more than ten or twenty years in the future.

[Cyborg Pirate]

Very interesting. I had figured some of the problems, but forgot completely about things like indeed a round misfiring. Much thanks!

I'll probably pop in again this weekend with a whole list of questions I still need to ask :D

[AMX]

Right now? I'll list the ones I know of, keep in mind that these are mostly based off the G11, which although ahead of it's time is somewhat dated. Voere (sp?) created a much different caseless round, which I believe is still produced in very small numbers.
Strictly speaking, it was created by Usel and licensed to Voere, but who cares about such details...

The solid propellant that replaces gunpowder is very prone to damage and thereafter not working because of it's lack of a solid coating, a cased round can still function after getting dropped on a hard surface several times, the current mixture for caseless tends to chip and crack under stress.
AFAIK, that tidbit was outdated even before the G11 got axed - it dates back to the earliest part of development, when they were litterally using pressed gunpowder.
Anyway, cased ammunition can get dented, which will make it completely useless; while a caseless round may still work despite some chipping.

Caseless rounds are significantly lighter than their cased counterparts, but tend to be very bulky.Now that's just utter nonsense; caseless is usually smaller than equivalent cased ammunition.
They also have a very odd balance, since the bullet is much denser than the propellant and must be located towards the front of the cartridge.So what?


The lack of ejection, which is the main benefit, can also become a serious problem if the round misfires. Last I checked, the H&K G11 which is the only military design caseless rifle around, has to be mostly disassembled in that eventuality, which is simply unacceptable in a infantry weapon.That directly contradicts my information (i.e., the G11 has an unloading port at the bottom; if a round doesn't fire, you simply work the action the same way you do upon loading, and the unspent cartridge drops out).
(FTR, the Voere ammunition has an extraction groove much like cased rimless ammunition; there has been "non-extractable" Usel ammo, but that was strictly experimental)
The current mixture also leaves behind a good bit of waste behind, which can jam up the weapon or remain hot enough to cause rounds to ignite before the gun properly loads them. Again, unacceptable in an infantry weapon.Maybe on the "jam" part, but the "current" high ignition temperature propellant used in the final G11 variants didn't produce any premature ignitions (preventing "cook off" was, after all, the whole point in developing the HITP).
(Usel uses normal NC with a wax surface coating; no idea how clean that burns, or how prone it is to cook-off.)

I agree with the rest of your points.

[Mike_G]

Maybe on the "jam" part, but the "current" high ignition temperature propellant used in the final G11 variants didn't produce any premature ignitions (preventing "cook off" was, after all, the whole point in developing the HITP).
(Usel uses normal NC with a wax surface coating; no idea how clean that burns, or how prone it is to cook-off.)


The "jam" part is the big problem. Infantry hate weapons we don't trust. It took the M16 20 years ro regain any credibilty after the inital problems with jamming when it was rushed into service in Vietnam.

We accept that the enemy will try to kill us. We get very resentful when we feel our own government is trying to kill us by giving us weapons that stop working in the middle of a firefight.

A friend of mine who works in the defense industry, (Ruger, then Genral Dynamics for years, now at Sig) siad the big issue that doens't seem to have a fix is the accumulating of residue from propellant in the closed chamber. This requires very frequent maintenance, or it jams. Frequent maintenance is difficult in combat conditions, and you can burn a lot of rounds in a fight, especially with automatic weapons, and espcially if caseless ammo weight lets you carry more. This is a perfect recipe for jammed rifles.

Caseless rounds are a neat idea, but they don't offer all that much advantage for the host of problems they have. Maybe twenty years down the road, when the bugs are worked out.

[Dervag]

Mostly, it's a supply issue. The US has millions of guns which use the 5.56 and 7.62 ammo, and large stockpiles of it. Other countries are in similar situations. Replacing it all wholly, with no intermediate stage possible, would be a logistical nightmare, and nobody wants to put their final stamp on it without a good, solid reason to use caseless ammo and a proven design.Definitely true. However, we have made major ammo shifts several times. For instance, if I recall 5.56 mm rounds were pretty much unused in military weapons until the M-16 came out. Granted that they worked on the same proven design concept that everyone's been using since the Dreyse needle gun, but the point remains the same.


Anyway, cased ammunition can get dented, which will make it completely useless; while a caseless round may still work despite some chipping.But denting a cased round is hard because the cased cartridge is coated in metal. Whereas chipping a caseless round is easy, because it isn't.

Also, once you chip an explosive charge its behavior is no longer predictable. It may work normally. It may work wildly inaccurately. It may form a shaped charge and blow a hole in the side of the firing chamber. You can't know.

[WhiteHarness]

I gotta say...

This thread was a lot more fun when it was about ancient/medieval/renaissance arms and armour instead of modern firearms...

[Cyborg Pirate]

I gotta say...

This thread was a lot more fun when it was about ancient/medieval/renaissance arms and armour instead of modern firearms...

This thread ain't about fun. It's about sharing knowledge.

[Norsesmithy]

Though it is much more fun when it deviates towards the area of your particular expertise so you can be the teacher, not the student, isn't it.

Oh well, I like to read it anyways.

[Swordguy]

I gotta say...

This thread was a lot more fun when it was about ancient/medieval/renaissance arms and armour instead of modern firearms...

No freaking kidding. I like guns and all, but older stuff is my preference. That's why I haven't posted in a while. Nothing much to contribute.

.................................................. ..............................................

So...who would win in a brawl? Why? For purposes of comparison, assume it's daylight, there's level, clear ground, and nobody is mounted. If an environmental factor would give an edge to one person, assume that it's neutral.

Aztec Pipiltin circa 1400 (mācuahuitl [obsidian sword], shield, atlatl and, say, 6 darts and Ichcahuipilli [quilted armor])

Samurai circa 1400 (o-yoroi and katana)

Germanic Knight circa 1400 (Cherbourg plate and choice of either a war sword or an arming sword and heater shield)

African Sofa of the Mali Empire circa 1400 (Shield and Tamba [stabbing spear] and 4-in-1 chain mail)

Chinese Ming Dynasty soldier circa 1400 (Lamellar armor, round wooden shield and Dao (broadsword))

Japanese Iga ninja circa 1400 (light 6-in-1 chain mail, ninja-to, 2 metsubushi [smoke bombs])

Moorish warrior circa 1400 (lamellar torso armor and round helm, shamshir - while I know this sword became popular in the 1500's I can't find any data for earlier Moorish weapons offhand, so let's assume, shall we?)

Sperm that would someday be Chuck Norris circa 1400 (gotta make it fair - and I can't think of a good 8th candidate)

[Raum]

Heh, one of the things I like about this thread is the coverage of every era from prehistory through futuristic. That and it's grounding in reality. :)

[Golthur]

Definitely the sperm-that-will-be-Chuck-Norris.

Hands down :wink:

[Norsesmithy]

The Pipiltin should be carring an atlatl and about a dozen darts as well.


If he is I put my money down as such: I pick the Germanic Knight to win, the Pipiltin to place, and the Mali Sofa to show.

An Atlatl dart can penetrate more than an inch and a half of oak planking at signifigant range, and would likely only be resisted by the cherburg and the O-yoroi. The lamela would probably resist the darts enough to save your life, but then you are going into battle against a man with a giant bladed club with restricted movement caused your wounds.

Then it becomes a battle of mobility vs protection.


Many of the swordsmen would be able to wreck the Pipiltin's sheild, but how many would survive his attack unscathed? Forgeting the cutting edges, a macuahuitl is still a formiable mace. A 3 to 4 foot wooden club with stone inserts, probably weighing up to 4 pounds, it will certainly ruin your day. The flexible armors (lamellar, mail, ect) wouldn't be able to completely resist the crushing power of the Maucuahuitl, and that is bad for the squishy people inside of them. The hard armors, Cherbourg plate and O-yoroi, would protect better, but the joints would be vulnerable to distortion, and the o-yoroi's unsupported helmet would cause problems if struck.


However, the Pipiltin is only wearing quilted cloth armour, and that means that if he can't stagger you right off the go, he is in trouble.

I think his darts would allow him to overcome the Sofa, the Moor, the Iga, and the Ming, and that his sheild and maucuahuitl give him an edge on the Samurai, but that the German's supported helmet would allow him to gut the Pipiltin.

The Sofa's spear and sheild gives him a reach and warding advantage on the Samurai, Moor, Ming, and Iga, but his armour isn't good enough to resist an atlatl dart, and the German's armour and Warsword helps to put away the reach advantage.

The German is the winner here, he is the Abrams tank of this fight, he can hit hard and over a decent gap with the warsword, which also is a potent tool in a grapple or infighting, and he can also count on is armour to absorb most blows, with the Maucuahuitl and the Tamba being the potentially most dangerous.

Without a ranged weapon, the Iga's smokebombs are of little use (other guy can just walk away from smoke).

Also in before NINJA TO drama.

[Swordguy]

Damnation. I forgot the dart thrower. Right. Consider that post edited.

I'll put my own analysis in once some more people have chimed in.

[Om]

Definitely true. However, we have made major ammo shifts several times.Not that I'm disagreeing with you, but just to note that these calibre shifts were generally due to the development/emergence of a new class of weapon. For examples the 7.62 was adapted as standard by the Soviets when they made the switch to the AK. By the same token the 5.56 NATO was the result of the same move towards assault rifles.

[Dervag]

Not that I'm disagreeing with you, but just to note that these calibre shifts were generally due to the development/emergence of a new class of weapon. For examples the 7.62 was adapted as standard by the Soviets when they made the switch to the AK. By the same token the 5.56 NATO was the result of the same move towards assault rifles.Yes. You're absolutely right.

However, if we make the decision to shift to a new weapon, then the shift in ammo type is certainly justified, which is my point. So if anyone ever works the bugs out of caseless ammo, it might well be worth it to design a new weapon type to use the new caseless ammo.


So...who would win in a brawl? Why?
[the contestants:]
Aztec Pipiltin circa 1400 (mācuahuitl [obsidian sword], shield, atlatl and, say, 6 darts and Ichcahuipilli [quilted armor])
Samurai circa 1400 (o-yoroi and katana)
Germanic Knight circa 1400 (Cherbourg plate and choice of either a war sword or an arming sword and heater shield)
African Sofa of the Mali Empire circa 1400 (Shield and Tamba [stabbing spear] and 4-in-1 chain mail)
Chinese Ming Dynasty soldier circa 1400 (Lamellar armor, round wooden shield and Dao (broadsword))
Japanese Iga ninja circa 1400 (light 6-in-1 chain mail, ninja-to, 2 metsubushi [smoke bombs])
Moorish warrior circa 1400 (lamellar torso armor and round helm, shamshir - while I know this sword became popular in the 1500's I can't find any data for earlier Moorish weapons offhand, so let's assume, shall we?)

If I had to pick the one person most likely to survive, it would be the ninja. This is not because ninjas are awesome; it is because ninjas are awesome and trained to retreat from fights they can't win. The ninja is wearing light, flexible armor, and a weapon unsuitable for killing well-armored opponents. To hurt any of his enemies he has to get into sword range, where he is at a disadvantage against most of the other warriors, who are all better armored and mostly better equipped to kill an armored man than he is.

So the ninja will retreat and report to his boss that one samurai and a bunch of alien, strangely equipped warriors have just appeared out of nowhere and started attacking each other. Therefore, he survives the battle.

The second most likely survivor is the German knight, because he's got the best armor and possibly (I don't know) the best weapon for breaking his enemy's armor. The only guy out there who can match his protection level is the samurai, and the samurai's boxy o-yoroi is much clumsier than his comparatively well-designed plate.

The third most likely survivor is the samurai, again because of his armor. The samurai's problem is that he brought the wrong weapon to this fight. He neglected to bring his composite bow or his naginata, the weapons that a samurai would normally use to kill armored opponents. Instead, he is armed only with a katana. The katana is extremely sharp and fairly well suited to cleaving a lightly armored enemy like the ninja or the Aztec warrior. But if he tries to use it against the medium-armored enemies or the knight, he'll probably end up chipping, blunting, or breaking his sword blade because the katana is also very brittle.

His second problem is that he's probably never fought an enemy with a shield before. Shields are not a major part of Japanese warfare. Therefore, he won't know how to handle shields very well, which may lead him to make serious mistakes.

His third problem is that his armor is awkward and not well-shaped to the human form, as well as being made of iron rather than of steel. But it should still protect him against most of his opponents' blows, which is what he needs.

So the samurai has a good chance of surviving the battle because his armor protects him, but only if he does not charge into the thick of things immediately... which, being samurai, he's probably likely to do. Maybe he shouldn't be in such a high place after all.

In the middle of the field at fourth place, we have the Aztec. This is because he's the only guy who remembered to bring a ranged weapon. He might have trouble putting his atlatl darts through the armor of the knight and samurai- after all, those armors were designed to keep out arrows from fairly strong bows. But the others are likely to be meat on the table as long as he can keep the distance open.

His cotton armor is a liability, but not as big as you might expect. The Aztecs' idea of 'cotton armor' was very different from the lightweight cloth that we associate with cotton in the modern world. It was a very tightly woven, multilayered fabric that could actually protect you from a club with spiky bits in it.

The Aztec warrior's greatest liability is the fact that his weapon isn't made of steel. He's going to have problems inflicting crippling injury on opponents with helmets and armor of their own. Most of the brittle obsidian flakes that make up the edge of his weapon will break off as soon as they hit armor or a shield. He'll find it very difficult to hurt some of his enemies in hand-to-hand after his darts are expended or once they close with him.

Moreover, he's never even seen steel before, so he won't know how tough it is to break until he's in the thick of melee.

Below this point, we have the Chinese, Moorish, and Malian warriors. At this point, it's hard for me to call.

The Malian's spear is probably best suited for killing the Aztec warrior, because it pierces rather than trying to chop through the thick cotton batting. Moreover, he may be able to use the spear to keep his opponents at a distance.

The Moor, armed with Spanish steel, has a relatively good chance. However, between the pipiltin's darts and the heavy armor on the knight and samurai, he's in a lot of trouble.

The Ming soldier is probably a match for the Malian Sofa or the Moor, but unless his lamellar armor is stronger than I think, he's going to have problems taking on the samurai or the knight.

[Cyborg Pirate]

Yes. You're absolutely right.

However, if we make the decision to shift to a new weapon, then the shift in ammo type is certainly justified, which is my point. So if anyone ever works the bugs out of caseless ammo, it might well be worth it to design a new weapon type to use the new caseless ammo.



If I had to pick the one person most likely to survive, it would be the ninja. This is not because ninjas are awesome; it is because ninjas are awesome and trained to retreat from fights they can't win. The ninja is wearing light, flexible armor, and a weapon unsuitable for killing well-armored opponents. To hurt any of his enemies he has to get into sword range, where he is at a disadvantage against most of the other warriors, who are all better armored and mostly better equipped to kill an armored man than he is.

So the ninja will retreat and report to his boss that one samurai and a bunch of alien, strangely equipped warriors have just appeared out of nowhere and started attacking each other. Therefore, he survives the battle.

The second most likely survivor is the German knight, because he's got the best armor and possibly (I don't know) the best weapon for breaking his enemy's armor. The only guy out there who can match his protection level is the samurai, and the samurai's boxy o-yoroi is much clumsier than his comparatively well-designed plate.

The third most likely survivor is the samurai, again because of his armor. The samurai's problem is that he brought the wrong weapon to this fight. He neglected to bring his composite bow or his naginata, the weapons that a samurai would normally use to kill armored opponents. Instead, he is armed only with a katana. The katana is extremely sharp and fairly well suited to cleaving a lightly armored enemy like the ninja or the Aztec warrior. But if he tries to use it against the medium-armored enemies or the knight, he'll probably end up chipping, blunting, or breaking his sword blade because the katana is also very brittle.

His second problem is that he's probably never fought an enemy with a shield before. Shields are not a major part of Japanese warfare. Therefore, he won't know how to handle shields very well, which may lead him to make serious mistakes.

His third problem is that his armor is awkward and not well-shaped to the human form, as well as being made of iron rather than of steel. But it should still protect him against most of his opponents' blows, which is what he needs.

So the samurai has a good chance of surviving the battle because his armor protects him, but only if he does not charge into the thick of things immediately... which, being samurai, he's probably likely to do. Maybe he shouldn't be in such a high place after all.

In the middle of the field at fourth place, we have the Aztec. This is because he's the only guy who remembered to bring a ranged weapon. He might have trouble putting his atlatl darts through the armor of the knight and samurai- after all, those armors were designed to keep out arrows from fairly strong bows. But the others are likely to be meat on the table as long as he can keep the distance open.

His cotton armor is a liability, but not as big as you might expect. The Aztecs' idea of 'cotton armor' was very different from the lightweight cloth that we associate with cotton in the modern world. It was a very tightly woven, multilayered fabric that could actually protect you from a club with spiky bits in it.

The Aztec warrior's greatest liability is the fact that his weapon isn't made of steel. He's going to have problems inflicting crippling injury on opponents with helmets and armor of their own. Most of the brittle obsidian flakes that make up the edge of his weapon will break off as soon as they hit armor or a shield. He'll find it very difficult to hurt some of his enemies in hand-to-hand after his darts are expended or once they close with him.

Moreover, he's never even seen steel before, so he won't know how tough it is to break until he's in the thick of melee.

Below this point, we have the Chinese, Moorish, and Malian warriors. At this point, it's hard for me to call.

The Malian's spear is probably best suited for killing the Aztec warrior, because it pierces rather than trying to chop through the thick cotton batting. Moreover, he may be able to use the spear to keep his opponents at a distance.

The Moor, armed with Spanish steel, has a relatively good chance. However, between the pipiltin's darts and the heavy armor on the knight and samurai, he's in a lot of trouble.

The Ming soldier is probably a match for the Malian Sofa or the Moor, but unless his lamellar armor is stronger than I think, he's going to have problems taking on the samurai or the knight.



Have to fully agree here.

Spectators wondering why samurai armour would be clumsy: The samurai is wearing o-yoroi which is designed to give full protection while on horseback, and is not designed for fighting on foot.

Poor sammy :smallfrown: he brought the wrong armour and wrong weapon to the fight. His only chance is to go for the grapple.


Oh, just realised. I think some samurai Would have some experience with shields. There is at least one piece of artwork depicting a footsoldier (but not a samurai) with what looks like a small shield, there's the fighting with the mongols, and there's the samurai's invasion of Korea later on.


And ofcourse, the sperm that would one day be Chuck Norris would just fly in and round-house... euh... not kick... euh... eh... round... house... .... tail? Round-house tail everybody? :smalleek:

[Fhaolan]

Actually, I'm going to go against the flow here, but only slightly. I think any one of these people could win the fight. It's all down to which one will be able to adapt to countering the alien fighting styles first. Each one of these people fights in a completely different manner, and is used to be up against people who fight in a similar manner to themselves. Plus, you're going to have a serious psychological warfare going on here. The Samurai's armor is going to look demonic to most of the fighters, throwing them off quite a bit. The rest are going to have similar, if not quite so obvious issues, as their appearances will be so alien to each other that they aren't going to register as human at first.

The Germanic Knight and the Samurai have serious advantages, as they're the most heavily armored plus their armor is almost completely alien to any of the rest of the fighters (and each other). The rest are going to have to do some fast learning to figure out his weak points before they bull through them. If the Knight was later period with Maximilian-style armor, there'd be no contest at all.

The rest of them all have armor that is sufficiently similar to armor found in their own cultures that that won't be an issue. Except for the Pipiltin, who will never have run into lamillar or maille before.

The weapons are reasonably equivalent, especially if you allow them to have 'mastercraft' equivalents. ie, the best available in their cultures.

It's really going to boil down to whether the mobility people can figure out how to take down the heavy armors before the heavy armors catch them.

[Pilum]

This has probably been answered before, but WHY no Japanese shields? They were clearly known in the rest of Asia, and even granted that there's an argument for samurai deriving from horse archers (for whom a shield is obviously an encumbrance), why not at least the infantry shield? Were Japanese bows so weak, or the native armour at least sufficient at stopping them, that there was no need to evolve the shield?

I can see that the katana is ultimately a two-handed weapon that can be used single handed which goes some way to an explanation, but as the katana's status as a primary weapon comes from more peaceful times (or so I'm given to understand), I'd have expected a block of spears to find a great use for at least bucklers...

[Raum]

I think the avoidance of shields was largely a cultural choice. The "ideal" samurai was taught from an early age to commit his entire effort to whatever task his lord assigned. Up to and including tasks which might cause his death. So picking up a shield when you were told to attack probably wasn't an option...it's not offensive minded enough.

[SpiderBrigade]

Raum, didn't that particular philosophy of combat only evolve very much after the tactics of Japanese warfare were already pretty set? I don't think even early Japanese used shields, when the samurai weren't even samurai yet. And that does seem odd, since horse archery was a big element in combat, and a shield for your peasant spearmen would seem like a great idea.

[Raum]

Afraid I'm not enough of a Japanophile to know all the history, I've only read the eras that interested me. But your point that the system of combat evolved is kind of what I was getting at. The combat style didn't evolve in a vacuum any more than the culture did. The seeds of samurai philosophy were (had to have been) part of the culture long before the philosophy was codified.

[Matthew]

I have seen the occasional Shield in an early Japanese context before, but it appears to have been a rarity. Never had a satisfactory answer as to the whys and wherefores.

[SpiderBrigade]

Afraid I'm not enough of a Japanophile to know all the history, I've only read the eras that interested me. But your point that the system of combat evolved is kind of what I was getting at. The combat style didn't evolve in a vacuum any more than the culture did. The seeds of samurai philosophy were (had to have been) part of the culture long before the philosophy was codified.
Well, you do have a good point there. On the other hand it seems to me that a philosophy that kept you from using a tactic (shields, say) wouldn't last long if that was an effective tactic - the people willing to use shields would tend to win out. For instance when guns were introduced and put in the hands of peasant armies, it certainly took the focus of combat away from honorable single combat. But guns were used, because they worked. To me that suggests that there's some other factor (which I, too, am not really enough of an ancient-japan buff to think of) which made shields not really that great of a tactic anyway, allowing them to be shunned.

edit: actually, here's a proposition: from what I remember, archery in early japanese warfare (I mean Nara, Heian, or earlier) was mostly about mounted archers, rather than the mass infantry archery that one saw in the west. So the tactic of hiding beneath a shield while the enemy rained arrows down upon your formation wouldn't really work, because it was less of a mass barrage, and more about hit-and-run with horses. And that early, shieldless model of combat just stuck. Maybe?

[Raum]

I agree, culture wouldn't be the only reason. I didn't mean to characterize it as such. As for other potential reasons, I mostly have questions. What resources did they have cheaply available? I understand they had problems getting consistently good steel (hence the repeated folding technique of sword smithing), did they also have constraints around what woods were available? Specifically hardwoods for shields. What about terrain? I've never been to Japan so don't know, but were the areas prone to being battle sites easily maneuverable for a shield formation? A flooded rice paddy might cause problems...where were the battles fought?

[Dervag]

Actually, I'm going to go against the flow here, but only slightly. I think any one of these people could win the fight. It's all down to which one will be able to adapt to countering the alien fighting styles first.The German knight will recognize the Moor; the Moor will probably recognize the African and the knight. The Chinese and Japanese fighters will definitely recognize each other.

Granted, the combat styles are alien, but most of these guys (except the Aztec pipiltin) are fighting with sword and some form of armor. If, say, a German knight is attacked by an armored African warrior with a spear, he's not going to freeze up because the African warrior looks funny. And vice versa. These guys may not recognize the faces, but they'll definitely recognize the threat. Since they're all presumably well trained, they will probably react to the threat accordingly.


Each one of these people fights in a completely different manner, and is used to be up against people who fight in a similar manner to themselves. Plus, you're going to have a serious psychological warfare going on here. The Samurai's armor is going to look demonic to most of the fighters, throwing them off quite a bit.Hard to say. Many societies included features in their armor design to make them look intimidating. It's hard to say whether that actually works against hardened warriors.

Also, if we assume that these guys don't just get teleported into sword range of each other (that is, that they approach from some distance), then they will have time for the initial shock to pass off before fighting. Since the shocks are going to be more or less in parallel, they cancel out.


The Germanic Knight and the Samurai have serious advantages, as they're the most heavily armored plus their armor is almost completely alien to any of the rest of the fighters (and each other).This is important. Most of the warriors have no experience dealing with plate armor of any type.


The weapons are reasonably equivalent, especially if you allow them to have 'mastercraft' equivalents. ie, the best available in their cultures.With the exception that the Aztec warrior's weapon is essentially a club because the obsidian bits will break the first time he hits a piece of steel armor with them.


This has probably been answered before, but WHY no Japanese shields? They were clearly known in the rest of Asia, and even granted that there's an argument for samurai deriving from horse archers (for whom a shield is obviously an encumbrance), why not at least the infantry shield?Hard to say. At a guess, it's just that their combat styles evolved from horse archers, as you say. Most cultures that develop in relative isolation seem to 'miss' a few technologies that seem obvious and important in hindsight. For example, the Aztecs never did invent wheeled carts; the Europeans inexplicably failed to invent the moldboard plow, costing enormous numbers of man-hours for many centuries until they managed to 'borrow' the idea from China... and the Japanese appear to have never made much use of shields.


Were Japanese bows so weak, or the native armour at least sufficient at stopping them, that there was no need to evolve the shield?Japanese bows were made from mulberry wood. They could only penetrate samurai armor from close range.

Possibly the reason that foot soldiers didn't have shields is that nobody bothered to come up with fighting styles for foot soldiers. Similarly, in medieval Europe very few tacticians actually sat down and thought about ways that a group of footmen could defeat a cavalry force. Therefore, techniques like the pike phalanx took a long time to be reinvented.

[Adlan]

I have seen modern japanese longbows made of a bamboo composite, claiming to be historical. They had the laquer and bowyer's with skill to do it, but does anyone know if they did?

Has anyone used a Japanese Bow? As far as I know, Samurai are the only people to have used a longbow from horse back, resulting it being an asymetric shape, which to my mind makes it much harder to use, but not having tried it, I can't tell.

[Shadow of the Sun]

The Mongols used shortbows with serious power- about a 150 pound draw, I believe. I may be wrong, of course.

Also, the Mayans with their atlatls could do a lot of damage. The killed quite a few Spanish settlers with it- I think they could get it to go through plate mail, but don't quote me.

[Matthew]

As far as I know, Bamboo Composite is the most common and historical form of the Yumi (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_bow). We have had this discussiona few times before and I remember linking to quite a number of Yumi articles. The 'average pull' of the Japanese War Bow is as open to question as that of the English War Bow (or, indeed, that of the Mongol War Bow or any other type of Bow; in order to use a Bow with a 150 lb Pull, you have to be able to draw 150 lbs, by the by...), as is the protection offered by their Body Armour against Yumi (Bow), Yari (Spear) or Tachi / Katana (Sword).

Dervag:
As early as the Battle of Hastings it was obvious what kind of Infantry formation repelled Cavalry (i.e. a solid one). The onus was really on the other side (i.e. how do we break up that Infantry formation?). The Japanese were aware of Shield technology and they used Pavises for set piece battles. They just chose not to make use of Weapon and Shield fighting.

Raum:
Most of Japan is made up of mountainous terrain, but the most contested areas tended to be the flat lands (for obvious reasons). As far as I can tell, there was plenty of opportunity for them to develop Shields (though I don't know what kind of wood was available) and they may have even used them in combat during the first millenium AD (along with straight, double edged Swords), but for some reason hand held Shields were not prominent.

[Edit] Ah here's Bug-a-Boo's post about this:

http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?p=988769&highlight=Yumi#post988769

and here's the articles I was thinking of:

Yumi Wikipedia Article (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yumi)
Long Article (http://www.fightingarts.com/reading/article.php?id=393)
Short Article (http://ejmas.com/jcs/jcsart_denig_0301.htm)
Short History (http://www.taots.co.uk/content/view/19/28/)
Possible Asymmetrical Explanation (http://eclay.netwiz.net/translat/kyudo.htm)
Shinto and Kyudo (http://www.atarn.org/japanese/shinto.htm)

Note that, according to that third article, Japanese Archers carried individual Shields to set up as pallisades... they are quite different from what I had imagined.

[Were-Sandwich]

The latest Cityscape WE describes a 'weighted cloak' as a concealed weapon. Its a cloak with lead weights sewn alon the hem, used as a bluhnt instrument. My questions are twofold:
1)Would this be a feasible weapon
2)How would you use it? I assume you can't just twirl round with the cloak on your back and get people with it that way, but would you have to bunch it up in your hand, or what?

[Fhaolan]

Weighted cloaks and capes actually were used in the rapier dueling period. They are a defensive 'weapon', used to entangle (or simply deflect) a rapier.

Basically, rapier (and smallsword) combat is all about tiny movements and fractions of a second. A normal cloak wrapped around your arm makes it effectively immune to slashes. You deflect incoming thrusts, push and pull cuts, etc. with your cloak-wrapped arm, giving you those extra fractions of a second to get your own attacks in. If you have the cloak loose in your hand, you can also snap the cloak out as a distraction, or attempt to hit your opponent's eyes. more likely, you drape the edge of the cload on top of your opponent's rapier, the weight pushing the thrust off target. Again, all so you have those extra fractions of a second to make your attack. If you're really, really good, or your opponent's rapier is far too fancy, you might be able to snag some of the projections of the hand-guard, rendering his weapon useless for even longer.

Weighted cloaks were simply better at the snapping, and draping. If you go to a fabric store now-a-days and ask for curtain weights, you'll see the amount of weight normally used for weighted cloaks. Not really that much. More than that, and it's not a cloak anymore, it's a clumsy non-lethal flail.

Also, a weighted cloak is only slightly concealable. If you know what you're looking for (and any professional tailor, seamstress, or duelist will know), it's pretty obvious when someone is wearing a weighted cloak. It moves different.

Now, moving right along, I have heard of someone attaching razor blades along the bottom edge of a cloak, and doing a sort of dancing, spinning attack. I've not seen it myself, but my first reaction to that is: Too tricky for it's own good. Unless you hit an important surface vein, it's going to be painful and distracting, but not a realy lethal attack.

[Adlan]

Not to mention, while you impersonate a whirling dervish, your opponent will be free to move back, and then counterattack.

[Sundog]

Re: Japanese shields, I have a suspicion choice of weapon might be factor here. The Samurai seems to have developed from a mounted archer, as others have posited, and the weapons he grew into are also primarily two-handed - the Naginata, Bow and various types of long sword. (Yes, I am aware that a two-weapon style using both Katana and Wakizashi exsted - but I am also aware that it was developed fairly late and was never overly popular.)

Simultaneously, the Ashigaru were generally equipped with the Japanese stabbing spear (which requires two hands for effective use), a footman's bow or in later years, an Arquebus (ditto).

None of these weapons make a good mate to a shield. It probably became a self-reinforcing pattern - my weapon doesn't support a shield, so I don't use a shield, so I don't make a weapon that supports a shield, so my weapon doesn't support a shield.

[Matthew]

Sure, but Mounted Archers often carried Small Shields...

[Norsesmithy]

The Mongols used shortbows with serious power- about a 150 pound draw, I believe. I may be wrong, of course.

Also, the Mayans with their atlatls could do a lot of damage. The killed quite a few Spanish settlers with it- I think they could get it to go through plate mail, but don't quote me.
There were many stories in which the spanish described the atlatl peicing plate, but they are of dubious accuracy, and were generally considered embelishments to explain losses better atributed to arrogance and poor tactics. Similar to claims that a Maucuahuitl decapataing a horse.

The Conquistadors were known to go into battle in just their padded under-armour because the plate was stifling in the Mesoamerican heat, contrary to direct orders from their superiors. So I think that the Conquistidors were just covering their tail ends in front of their bosses.

As for the Mongol Bow, I think you would call that a composite longbow, instead of a short bow. Contrary to the PHB illustration, a composite longbow has to be smaller than a longbow, or it would not be useable on horseback. The amount of draw is debatable, but I think 120 lbs or so wouldn't be unreasonable, especially with a Hunnic thumb draw.

[Adlan]

An archer, training everyday, would soon be able to draw 120lb weight or more. Not to mention their longdraw length. Mongol Bows are very nasty, Although a Horn and Sinew Bow needs a dry enviroment, A friend of mine took one out in the fog and ruined it, I belive this contributed to their failure to over run all of continental europe.

[WhiteHarness]

I know of no accounts of Aztec/Maya weapons piercing plate. All the passages in Bernal Diaz, De Soto, Cabeza de Vaca, and others make references to local weapons piercing mail (in one case, the chronicler records that an arrow slipped off the backplate to pierce the mail skirt beneath), or simply to "armas defensivas." In fact, at least one of those accounts specifically states that "plate of Milan" was sufficient to stop anything the Indians could throw at the Spaniards.

Still, contrary to the popular image of the Conquistador, few Spaniards wore plate in the New World, and of those who did, plenty switched to quilted cloth, as it was better suited to the environment.

[Baalzebub]

I posted this a while ago, but I lost the page... Anyone knows the name of the martial art that uses the Kama?

[Thiel]

I'm fairly certain that it's used in Karate.

[Were-Sandwich]

I posted this a while ago, but I lost the page... Anyone knows the name of the martial art that uses the Kama?
Kobujutsu(sp?). It also uses Sai, Quarterstaff, Jo-staff, nunchucku, siangham, katar and others.

[Dorni]

The Kama can be incoperated into several Kempo techniques, but the technique is not dependent on the presence of a Kama.

To the extent of my knowledge, a Kama has no martial art that builds a tree around it, but does have a series of forms for the weapon itself. Also, like many smaller weapons, by leaving one hand free it can be held while performing martial art techniques with other limbs.

[Dervag]

Also, the Mayans with their atlatls could do a lot of damage. The killed quite a few Spanish settlers with it-Well, even a thrown spear will kill a guy who isn't wearing armor. That isn't much of a test.

I think they could get it to go through plate mail, but don't quote me.I very much doubt that they could do it with a stone tipped weapon, though. Stone doesn't penetrate metal very well; it tends to shatter. Wood just doesn't get through.


Dervag:
As early as the Battle of Hastings it was obvious what kind of Infantry formation repelled Cavalry (i.e. a solid one).At Hastings, the factor that repelled the cavalry was as much a matter of terrain (the Saxon foot was on top of a ridge) as it was the tightness of their formation.

What I mean is that until the advent of pike phalanxes and crossbows, none of the 'mainstream' European armies developed a tactical system that could reliably repel a cavalry attack. Now, even if the method had been lost, pike phalanxes were an ancient technique. So if you're just looking at raw physical technology, the fact that there weren't blocks of pikemen marching all over Europe by the year 1100 is more or less inexplicable.

To understand what was happening and why nobody got around to reinventing the pike phalanx, you have to look at the social factors and the question of who, exactly, was leading the army.


The Japanese were aware of Shield technology and they used Pavises for set piece battles.A pavis isn't quite the same thing as what we're referring to as a shield, though; it's more like a relatively portable piece of siege equipment. So certainly the Japanese were familiar with the idea of having a big piece of sturdy wood between you and the enemy. But by appearances, they were not familiar with the idea of carrying a smaller piece of sturdy wood around with you to block weapon blows on the battlefield.


They just chose not to make use of Weapon and Shield fighting.Absolutely. It's almost inconceivable that they hadn't even heard of shields. It's more likely that on the rare occasions when Japanese warriors encountered some enemy that used a shield, they shrugged it off as being a bizarre and pointless way to fight.

However, the fact that they did so is quite remarkable, considering that pretty much every other fighting culture that used infantry to any extent made at least some use of shields in their fighting style.


Most of Japan is made up of mountainous terrain, but the most contested areas tended to be the flat lands (for obvious reasons). As far as I can tell, there was plenty of opportunity for them to develop ShieldsDefinitely. Under similar circumstances, the Greeks invented the original phalanx (to most effectively contest the flat land around the enemy city state where the enemy grew their crops).


and they may have even used them in combat during the first millenium AD (along with straight, double edged Swords), but for some reason hand held Shields were not prominent.So what changed?

[Wehrkind]

My guess as to the explanation of the absence of the phalanx for some 1100 years in Europe was the sound thrashing that syle of fighting took at the hands of the Roman legion, the subsequent Romanization of Europe and surrounding lands, as well as the fighting styles of those Europeans before the Romans came to town. Perhaps if Alexander had conquered the West instead of the East we would have seen Hellenistic fighting becoming the standard as we did after his death in the sucessor states of the east. But the "barbarians" of Europe fought in somewhat less than organized bands with fighters focused on winning glory and kills, which does no lend itself to a phalanx. Later we see the rise of more formation based fighting with the shield wall, based more off Roman style shield and sword formations than the phalanx. After the ascension of cavalry tactics, it would seem that there was indeed little thought about infantry as anything other than fodder, missile troops or the anchor to a line. Foot troops emulated cavalry in their equipment as they could afford it, and it would be my guess that seeing the usefulness of the lance, tacticians eventually figured it had to be useful for a footman somehow, if not on an individual basis.
Still, my previous posts about the lack of offensive power projection in a phalanx still holds, in that it took the shift from the melee weapon being the killer to the missile (musket) being the killing element to make a defensive formation like the phalanx important again.

In the "who would win" scenario, I think the Aztec has a much lower chance than people give him credit for. Missile weapon aside, a 4 pound club is a remarkably poor weapon against any sort of armor. I have been hit with 4 pound clubs by some very large men, and even in leather scale and steel helmet, did not suffer permanant damage, and in most cases was able to follow up immediately. Only a few times have I been staggered, and that even on only some of the occaisions I was unable to intervene in the blow at all.

[Baalzebub]

The Kama can be incoperated into several Kempo techniques, but the technique is not dependent on the presence of a Kama.

To the extent of my knowledge, a Kama has no martial art that builds a tree around it, but does have a series of forms for the weapon itself. Also, like many smaller weapons, by leaving one hand free it can be held while performing martial art techniques with other limbs.

Yeah, though they are made to be used in pairs, they can be pretty usefull when combined with, for example, Tae Kwon Do kicks. Use a kama in one hand for defense.

Do you know the name of the kamas that do not have the blade on them?

[Swordguy]

Do you know the name of the kamas that do not have the blade on them?

Sticks................

[Baalzebub]

Sticks................

lol

Yeah, I know, but there's a jap name (i think) for those sticks. :smalltongue:

[Tweekinator]

I have a armor/shield question: Do shields in ancient cultures generally predate armor or is it vice versa?

[Swordguy]

I have a armor/shield question: Do shields in ancient cultures generally predate armor or is it vice versa?

Define "armor". The earliest neolithic clothing was hide, and it could double as armor. This certainly predated the shield (though probably not the spear/sharp stick).

[Tweekinator]

I'm going to go ahead and define armor as "garb worn specifically for protection against attacks".

[Mr Croup]

lol

Yeah, I know, but there's a Japanese name (i think) for those sticks. :smalltongue:

Fixed the (hopefully unintentional) derogatory word. On topic, I think you're thinking of either a jo or hanbo.

[SpiderBrigade]

I dont see how either one of those could really be described as a "kama without a blade," but I guess they do fit the requirement of "Japanese name for a stick used in martial arts."

Thus, @ Baalzebub: are you just looking for a stick-shaped weapon? Why would you describe that as a kama with no blade, rather than just as a staff? Or are you looking for something that has qualities in common with a kama, possibly a weapon that has the kama-like "hook" part, only it isn't sharp?

[Lapak]

He's thinking of a tonfa (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tonfa), maybe?

[Mr Croup]

Yeah, I was just thinking of weapons that are reasonably close to the length of a kama's haft.

[Mike_G]

I'm going to go ahead and define armor as "garb worn specifically for protection against attacks".


I'm not real sure, since warfare predates written records, but shields were used by several cultures that didn't make much use of armor. They certainly predated metal armor, and were simpler to make than metal rmor or even reinforced leather armor.

The Zulu used shields but no real body armor, as did the Native Americans. The Egyptians did have some armor, but there arre many representations of soldiers with shields but no armor. How much of this is accurate and how much is artistic licese, I'm not sure, but it's certainly possible that some troops, maybe even just peasant levies, were issued with a weapon and shield, but no real armor.

[Tweekinator]

I'm not real sure, since warfare predates written records, but shields were used by several cultures that didn't make much use of armor. They certainly predated metal armor, and were simpler to make than metal rmor or even reinforced leather armor.

The Zulu used shields but no real body armor, as did the Native Americans. The Egyptians did have some armor, but there arre many representations of soldiers with shields but no armor. How much of this is accurate and how much is artistic licese, I'm not sure, but it's certainly possible that some troops, maybe even just peasant levies, were issued with a weapon and shield, but no real armor.

Thank you; that was what I thought. Now, to carry the argument to my friend!

[Baalzebub]

I dont see how either one of those could really be described as a "kama without a blade," but I guess they do fit the requirement of "Japanese name for a stick used in martial arts."

Thus, @ Baalzebub: are you just looking for a stick-shaped weapon? Why would you describe that as a kama with no blade, rather than just as a staff? Or are you looking for something that has qualities in common with a kama, possibly a weapon that has the kama-like "hook" part, only it isn't sharp?

Yeah, it's a stick shaped weapon. Like the Ni-cho Tan-Bo, but smaller. I just don't remember the name of the weapon (the funny thing is, I have a pair of those things, I even know how to use them. And I don't know how are they called)

Oh! and I love to use Tonfa's too. They are very effective against most weapons.

[Tyrael]

Quick question, what was the historical weight and size of mauls or warhammers?

[Cyborg Pirate]

Quick question, what was the historical weight and size of mauls or warhammers?

2-3 pounds, give or take.

Historical mauls are non-existant. Historical warhammers are surprisingly light.

[Mike_G]

Historical mauls are non-existant.


Oh, they exist, they were just never intended as weapons.

As a tool for driving stakes, they were probably like a 6 pound sledge. Unless you were very desperate, it would be a poor choice for a weapon. Unless your opponent were looking the other way or tied up, you'd have a heck of a time connecting with one.

[Cyborg Pirate]

Oh, they exist, they were just never intended as weapons.

Well yeah ofcourse. I just meant that they never existed as offensive hand to hand weapons designed for combat use :smalltongue:

The samurai seemed to have utilised a maul for bashing down doors during urban attacks.

[SpiderBrigade]

Historical mauls are non-existant. Historical warhammers are surprisingly light.
Well, historical mauls used as weapons. They certainly existed as tools AFAIK.

Edit: rely on this board to provide a simu-ninja.

[Wehrkind]

I second that mauls make terrible weapons. Warhammers though, those are fun. Pollaxes, those are just the bee's knees. Except smashy.

[Norsesmithy]

I will nth the call that a maul is typically considered a poor weapon, but remind the board that most of the French knights killed at Agincourt were probably killed by archers weilding mallets that were designed to drive stakes into the ground to form a defensive barrier (IE sledge hammers)

[Raum]

Well, per Jehan de Wavrin's account, "...the English archers, seeing the vanguard thus shaken, issued from behind their stockade, threw away their bows and quivers, then took their swords, hatchets, mallets, axes, falcon-beaks and other weapons, and, pushing into the places where they saw these breaches, struck down and killed these Frenchmen without mercy..." So it's probably a bit of an overstatement to say most were killed by mallets or mauls. Additionally, the mallets were used against a disorganized, demoralized, and largely injured mob. So even if all the archers had used a mallet, it wasn't being used as a combat weapon so much as a weapon of execution. Contemporary observers did state more French were killed as prisoners than in battle.

[Wehrkind]

Yea, I was thinking of some use to that end as I hit "Submit". Essentially they are really good if your opponant is very immobile or not going to hit back, preferably both. Getting into or out of the effective reach of the weapon is too easy given how slow it is to move, and that same weight makes it awkward to block with since once you get it moving changing the angles are tough. If it had more reach it might be better, but then it would weigh too much, and you would have to lighten the head to make it functional. Then you have a pollaxe...

I suppose I could see a tremendously strong person using a maul in combat in a loose sort of fight, where it was more lots of individual fights instead of rank and file formation where crushing one person and leaving yourself exposed means you get stabbed by his buddies to either side. Still, for the other 95% of us, no good :)

[Norsesmithy]

Perhaps that was an over statement, but I could hardly imagine a more perfect situation to use a giant hammer to attack people than the french at Agincourt, up to their knees in mud, pressed too close together to be able to properly swing a sword, and in heavy armour that would give very good protection against a sword or bowshot.

I think I would've picked a maul had I participated.

[Dervag]

Later we see the rise of more formation based fighting with the shield wall, based more off Roman style shield and sword formations than the phalanx. After the ascension of cavalry tactics, it would seem that there was indeed little thought about infantry as anything other than fodder, missile troops or the anchor to a line. Foot troops emulated cavalry in their equipment as they could afford it,Now this is exactly the point I've been talking about.

Until the late Middle Ages, very few Europeans actually sat down and devised new infantry tactical schemes. Thus, the pike phalanx was not reinvented. For that matter, even medieval shield walls were at best imitations of the old Republican legions. No one even bothered to reinvent the techniques that their own predecessors had used to make infantry effective on the very ground they were now walking.

This is not because medieval people were stupid or blind, because they weren't. It was because, as you note, everyone was thinking in terms of cavalry weapons. Effective weapons were weapons a cavalryman could use; a weapon that a cavalryman could not use was, by definition, ineffective. And since infantry couldn't use the best cavalry weapons very well, infantry were also, by definition, ineffective.

The same problem in reverse explains why it took the ancients so long to invent the stirrup. Stirrups are cavalry weapons that have absolutely no use whatsoever in an infantry fight. If your civilization defines 'effective weapons' as weapons that infantrymen can use and benefit from, they'll never invent cavalry-only weapons such as the stirrup or the Norman kite shield.

Similarly, in the modern world, the US military tends to ignore or downplay the potential of certain kinds of weapons (such as ground-attack planes, recoilless cannon, and unmanned aerial vehicles) because they don't fit into its tactical scheme.

The basic problem remains the same: not all weapons fit into a given tactical concept, and weapons that don't fit into your preferred concept usually don't get as much attention. This is why various European armies were still coming up with new improved versions of the cavalry saber in the early 20th century despite the fact that semiautomatic pistols made a saber almost totally useless.


Still, my previous posts about the lack of offensive power projection in a phalanx still holds, in that it took the shift from the melee weapon being the killer to the missile (musket) being the killing element to make a defensive formation like the phalanx important againHuh? The Swiss were using pike phalanxes well before the invention of the musket, and pre-arquebus missile weapons were never very effective at defeating a pike phalanx. There was a period when Swiss mercenaries were one of the dominant force on the European battlefield.


In the "who would win" scenario, I think the Aztec has a much lower chance than people give him credit for. Missile weapon aside, a 4 pound club is a remarkably poor weapon against any sort of armor.This is why I rated him below the two heavily armored fighters. I figure that if he stands off he can outrun most of the other guys, and that because he has his atlatl and javelins he can probably kill the light-armored guys if they go after him. But he's practically helpless against the heavily armored guys, so unless someone else gets lucky and kills them for him he's pretty much out of luck.


So it's probably a bit of an overstatement to say most were killed by mallets or mauls. Additionally, the mallets were used against a disorganized, demoralized, and largely injured mob. So even if all the archers had used a mallet, it wasn't being used as a combat weapon so much as a weapon of execution.Right. By the time the muddy, exhausted, demoralized French knights managed to wade through the fire of the longbowmen (which probably caused relatively few fatalities, but almost certainly caused a lot of injuries) and the stakes, they were getting clumped up in a big crowd. Many of them had no space to raise their weapons because the knights in the front couldn't filter forward fast enough to take the pressure of the main body of the crowd.

The lesson is not that mauls made an effective weapon. The lesson is that the French knights were so vulnerable and defeated at this point that you could literally wander up to them with a club and kill them. The ones killed by mauls were literally unable to defend themselves against sledgehammer blows that they could easily see coming.

[Wehrkind]

Now this is exactly the point I've been talking about.
I aim to please. Mostly myself, but hey, a little collateral dama...er pleasure is acceptable.



Huh? The Swiss were using pike phalanxes well before the invention of the musket, and pre-arquebus missile weapons were never very effective at defeating a pike phalanx. There was a period when Swiss mercenaries were one of the dominant force on the European battlefield.
Yea, but they were not important everywhere until later. The Swiss were a very small minority of fighters, limited to only those who lived in Switzerland, and while they gained great fame, it took a while for their style to really catch on until a French king was downed by gun and pike. That was my point, that they existed and were used, but not important.


This is why I rated him below the two heavily armored fighters. I figure that if he stands off he can outrun most of the other guys, and that because he has his atlatl and javelins he can probably kill the light-armored guys if they go after him. But he's practically helpless against the heavily armored guys, so unless someone else gets lucky and kills them for him he's pretty much out of luck.
I don't know, I am not convinced of the effectiveness of sub-sonic missiles in single combat like this, particularly ones fired from an atlatl or hand. Shield work really well for stopping missiles, and if you can see the guy loading his stick then winding up and throwing, I think you will have time to dodge or block with whatever shield you have at least a bit. And throwing on the run is really hard, since at some point you have to stop your momentum, turn then throw, then turn and run again.

[Adlan]

I'm no expert, (thats why i'm reading this thread ;) ), but is the use of English heavy infantry comparable to the use of a phalanxs? a group of soldiers useing polearms in tight formation? I'm think hundred years war - war of the roses era for this.

[Renrik]

The english tactics in the 100 years war seemed to revolve around dismounted men-at-arms with pikes holding the line while the archers fired. They used it to great effect at several battles, most famously Agincourt.

[Swordguy]

I'm no expert, (thats why i'm reading this thread ;) ), but is the use of English heavy infantry comparable to the use of a phalanxs? a group of soldiers useing polearms in tight formation? I'm think hundred years war - war of the roses era for this.

It's not as tight as you think. The vast majority of polearms of the period seem to work best when swung. This requires space, thus loosening the formation.

The greek phalanx had exclusively thrusting weapons, which means the space required by each person was considerably less - thus a tighter formation.

[Dervag]

Yea, but they were not important everywhere until later. The Swiss were a very small minority of fighters, limited to only those who lived in Switzerland, and while they gained great fame, it took a while for their style to really catch on until a French king was downed by gun and pike. That was my point, that they existed and were used, but not important.I'm not so sure they they weren't important. Granted, other nations didn't start emulating the Swiss tactics until the need to screen arquebusiers arose in the early 1500s. But the existence of effective Swiss pike blocks indicates that the Swiss had at least reinvented the pike phalanx, and that the concept of infantry forces that could reliably defeat cavalry was now back on the board.


I don't know, I am not convinced of the effectiveness of sub-sonic missiles in single combat like this, particularly ones fired from an atlatl or hand. Shield work really well for stopping missiles, and if you can see the guy loading his stick then winding up and throwing, I think you will have time to dodge or block with whatever shield you have at least a bit.I understand your argument, and it makes a lot of sense. The only reason I consider the Aztec's javelins to be a potential factor is that the other combatants are all distracted by each other, so if he can stay out of the fray he may get 'free shots' at his opponents' backs or otherwise take advantage of the distraction.

And throwing on the run is really hard, since at some point you have to stop your momentum, turn then throw, then turn and run again.True. I figured that the Aztec guy might be able to stay out of the melee while the other combatants were forced to respond to each other, rather than just being able to keep running away and take occasional potshots at his pursuers.

[Matthew]

After the ascension of cavalry tactics, it would seem that there was indeed little thought about infantry as anything other than fodder, missile troops or the anchor to a line. Foot troops emulated cavalry in their equipment as they could afford it, and it would be my guess that seeing the usefulness of the lance, tacticians eventually figured it had to be useful for a footman somehow, if not on an individual basis.
Still, my previous posts about the lack of offensive power projection in a phalanx still holds, in that it took the shift from the melee weapon being the killer to the missile (musket) being the killing element to make a defensive formation like the phalanx important again.


Now this is exactly the point I've been talking about.

Until the late Middle Ages, very few Europeans actually sat down and devised new infantry tactical schemes. Thus, the pike phalanx was not reinvented. For that matter, even medieval shield walls were at best imitations of the old Republican legions. No one even bothered to reinvent the techniques that their own predecessors had used to make infantry effective on the very ground they were now walking.

This is not because medieval people were stupid or blind, because they weren't. It was because, as you note, everyone was thinking in terms of cavalry weapons. Effective weapons were weapons a cavalryman could use; a weapon that a cavalryman could not use was, by definition, ineffective. And since infantry couldn't use the best cavalry weapons very well, infantry were also, by definition, ineffective.

The same problem in reverse explains why it took the ancients so long to invent the stirrup. Stirrups are cavalry weapons that have absolutely no use whatsoever in an infantry fight. If your civilization defines 'effective weapons' as weapons that infantrymen can use and benefit from, they'll never invent cavalry-only weapons such as the stirrup or the Norman kite shield.

This is a very old school view of Cavalry and Infantry interaction over the Ancient and Medieval period, but it is no longer the dominant view.

The reason the Ancients never invented the Stirrup was because they didn't need to. The Roman Cavalry Saddle was more than capable of allowing the rider to deliver a powerful blow without dislodging him. The stirrup was a refinement of cavalry tactics that allowed for the couching of the lance, not a revolution.

The idea that there was an age of Infantry, followed by an age of Cavalry, followed by an age of Infantry just isn't borne out. Cavalry to Infantry ratios remain fairly consistant in Western Europe, something like 7:1 to 12:1, depending on the instance. The armies of Charlemagne, for instance, were heavily reliant on Infantry and Infantry tactics.

The majority of Medieval combat took the form of sieges and raiding. The latter lends itself better to Cavalry, that is true, but the former is almost entirely the domain of Infantry (whether dismounted Knights or Foot Retainers). It was also not unheard of for Knights to willingly dismount before battle to fight as Infantry.

Europeans didn't need to devise new Infantry tactical ideas, because they already knew how to use them and use them well. Even if they had no training or experience, they had access to theoretical works, such as Vegetius.

To be clear, I am not seeking to reverse the generalisation that is being made here, because frankly generalisation is very dangerous, which is rather my point. If we are going to discuss the role of Infantry in post Roman early to late Medieval Warfare, we need to avoid generalisation and look towards specific instances.

[Swordguy]

This is a very old school view of Cavalry and Infantry interaction over the Ancient and Medieval period, but it is no longer the dominant view.

...

To be clear, I am not seeking to reverse the generalisation that is being made here, because frankly generalisation is very dangerous, which is rather my point. If we are going to discuss the role of Infantry in post Roman early to late Medieval Warfare, we need to avoid generalisation and look towards specific instances.

And then form new generalizations based on the specific instances.

:biggrin:

[Wehrkind]

Matthew: It is worth keeping in mind though that changes in the thinker's prefered methods of combat are what often drive changes, while those left out tend to crawl along until noticed.

For instance, and completely out of epoc, car makers have been able to make SUVs for many years before they became "the" car to make. Scale up a stationwagon, convert the bed and cap of a truck, whatever. For some reason though, they never got made. That reason is that the prevailing wisdom of the time was that "the American people want X" where X was not an SUV.
Similar is the use of military tactics, particularly in an age where information and communication are not as ubiquitous and simple as today. If every noble and lord (those commanding armies) were of the opinion that heavy calvalry was the way to crack formations, and the infantry was just there to hold the line and mop up after the cavalry did their thing, then one can see how there is going to be a lot less concern about how the lord's foot retainers fight (the only ones outfitted in a fairly uniform manner) and almost no concern to how the levies and other semi to non professional fighters do their thing. We see this with the Romans, who could easily have fielded heavily armored cavalry that matched their infantry legions at any time, but never really got into the heavy cavalry business until their experiences in the middle east when it was sharply demonstrated how effective horse archers and heavy cavalry could be.

In business we call it "organizational culture" where people tend to think alike after a while, and new ideas that are outside the box *cringe* often don't get seen until a complete outsider comes along and forces people to rethink completely what they are doing. These clashes of culture usually occur when two very different approaches meet for the first time, as with the Romans, where both sides are forced to adapt to something they never considered before. They also occur when new technologies get applied to an old situation, like tanks in WW1 breaking trench lines, arial bombardment, accurate and fast loading rifles etc.

Anyway, as it relates to this, I do not suspect that any formation that relies as heavily on training and team work (as well as everyone having the same weapon) as a pike phalanx is really feasible without a semi-professional army that trains together (such as a Greek city state's farmers) or better trained proffessional troops. It is just too unforgiving of being out of position or not maintaining tight cohesion to allow any random two hundred men to form effectively.

Edit: I neglected to make clear: I am not saying that cavalry was used more or less, but rather that it's role changed. Specifically, it went from being a harrassing and light flanking force under the Romans, to being more heavily armored and considered the main killing arm in the medieval period, then being somewhat more of a harrassment/pusuit and mobile fire base during the last centuries of it's use (on a sliding scale for the last bit of course). I didn't mean to say that horses suddenly appeared out of no where, but rather their use and purpose changed as the thinker's of the time changed their perceptions on the "best way" to fight.

[Matthew]

I wouldn't even be inclined to argue that the role of the Cavalry changed over much from the Ancient to Medieval period. The Ancient Gallic Horse Man was very similarly equipped to an early Medieval Horse Man and the Cavalry has an often decisive role in Ancient Battles from Alexander through to Hannibal, to Pompey, etc...

[Wehrkind]

The anchient Gallic NOBLE horseman was, yes. Armor and arms didn't change a great deal from Caesar to probably William the Conquerer or so. However to say that all the cavalry was uniformly equiped with mail and shield and spear would be to put it at a level of equipment very high for the time period.
You bring up Alexander, who is a very good example of the sudden "Holy cow, cavalry rocks!" notion that hadn't really come up with the Greeks up to that time. He was one of the first to truly make a combined arms approach that favored using pikes to hold the enemy still while the cav. tore a hole. Horses were very popular in the eastern Mediteranian for almost ever, but then we are talking about European armaments, not eastern.
I don't know about Pompey making use of Cavalry outside of the norm for Romans, though he was in command of areas of the world known for their horsemen, so I suppose it is not surprising.
Still, to say the Romans thought of cavalry as they thought of heavy infantry is untenable, and it would seem that for a good while after in Europe this remained the case.

[Matthew]

Well, actually we know how the Roman Cavalry was equipped in the late third century BC, because Polybius tells us about it and compares it to the light equipment of former times. A Greek Spear and Shield, some sort of Body Armour (most likely Mail, according to most interpretations) and presumably a Sword. This is hardly surprising, since anybody able to afford to maintain a horse is likely to be also able to afford reasonable arms and armour.

Polybius, Book Six



The cavalry is divided also into ten parts or troops. In each of these, three captains first are chosen; who afterwards appoint three other officers to conduct the rear. The first of the captains commands the whole troop. The other two hold the rank and office of decurions; and all of them are called by that name. In the absence of the first captain, the next in order takes the entire command. The manner in which these troops are armed is at this time the same as that of the Greeks. But anciently it was very different. For, first, they wore no armor upon their bodies; but were covered, in the time of action, with only an undergarment. In this method, they were able indeed to descend from their horses, or leap up again upon them, with greater quickness and facility; but, as they were almost naked, they were too much exposed to danger in all those engagements. The spears also that were in use among them in former times were, in a double respect, very unfit for service. First, as they were of a slender make, and always trembled in the hand, it not only was extremely difficult to direct them with exactness towards the destined mark; but very frequently, even before their points had reached the enemy, the greatest part of them were shaken into pieces by the bare motion of the horses. Add to this, that these spears, not being armed with iron at the lowest end, were formed to strike only with the point, and, when they were broken by this stroke, were afterwards incapable of any farther use.
Their buckler was made of the hide of an ox, and in form was not unlike to those globular dishes which are used in sacrifices. But this was also of too infirm a texture for defense; and, as it was at first not very capable of service, it afterwards became wholly useless, when the substance of it had been softened and relaxed by rain. The Romans, therefore, having observed these defects, soon changed their weapons for the armor of the Greeks. For the Grecian spear, which is firm and stable, not only serves to make the first stroke with the point in just direction and with sure effect; but, with the help of the iron at the opposite end, may, when turned, be employed against the enemy with equal steadiness and force. In the same manner also the Grecian shields, being strong in texture, and capable of being held in a fixed position, are alike serviceable both for attack and for defense. These advantages were soon perceived, and the arms adopted by the cavalry. For the Romans, above all other people, are excellent in admitting foreign customs that are preferable to their own.


A better translation can be found here:

http://www.yorku.ca/inpar/polybius_six.pdf

Now, I am not saying that all Ancient Cavalry was equipped in this way, indeed, we know that the Romans used various types of cavalry, but what I am saying is that such Cavalry was available and in significant numbers [In the theoretical case provided by Polybius of two Legions and its Allies: 9,000 Roman Foot, 9,000 Latin Foot, 600 Roman Horse and 1,800 Latin Horse].

I do think you are laying too much emphasis on the change in Cavalry Tactics between the Ancient and Medieval periods. If we look at Hannibal and the Romans we can see that Cavalry could be used decisively and was a significant part of the army. At Cannae, Hannibal's Cavalry (of which he had something like 8,000 in addition to his 40,000 Infantry) sees off the Roman Cavalry before returning to hit the Infantry in the rear and at Zama we see Scipio do the exact same thing (whose Army was made up of something like 34,000 Infantry and 9,000 Cavalry).

Even if we were to ignore the pre Imperial period and look only to the Imperial we know that Cataphracti were deployed by Hadrian and we can see fully armoured Scythians on Trajan's Column in addition to Mail clad, Shield, Spear and Sword bearing Roman Cavalry. We're looking at around 1,000 years of 'Heavy Cavalry' from Trajan to Hastings, so long as we consider that to mean Mail, Shield and Spear.
What I am not saying is that Heavy Cavalry was more important than Heavy Infantry or considered so in the Republican and Early Imperial period. Combined Arms was the order of the day. The key advantage of Roman Infantry (and, indeed, of Infantry in general) was its flexability and potential to be used on any terrain and in siege works. However, when it comes to pitched and open battles, Cavalry is indispensible and the Romans knew this to be the case. Its primary role was to see off the enemy Cavalry, before being used to hit the enemy Infantry in the flanks and rear.
What is important about this is that it is exactly the same tactic for Cavalry that was used in the Medieval period. Cavalry is not used in difficult terrain and almost never attacks Infantry head on (and if it does it is usually destroyed).
Which brings us back to the original point of debate, which was with regard to the state of Medieval Infantry (a very broad category to discuss).

Personally, I do not think that Pike Phalanxes are much better than Shield and Spear Walls for repelling Cavalry attacks (in both cases, the Cavalry is looking at destruction if it charges head on and when used attacks the flanks and rear). It seems to me that the chief benefit of a Phalanx is not its capacity to deal with Cavalry (which is significant), but it's capacity to deal with Infantry (in particular the Shield and Spear Wall type Infantry).

What would be helpful here, I think, is to propose definitions for what constitutes Light and Heavy Cavalry or even Light and Heavy Infantry. Is it a function of their equipment? Is it a function of their use? Is it a combination of the two? Can some types of cavalry be used as both?

It's an open area for discussion.

[Edit] It is worth mentioning that it was largely the absence of stirrups that led historians to conclude that Ancient Cavalry was mostly used for skirmishing and 'light' duties, rather than any evidence for Ancient Cavalry Tactics. Since the demonstration of the effectiveness of the horned Roman Military Saddle, this perception has been largely overturned and we are increasingly able to see that Unstirruped Ancient Cavalry was capable of the almost exactl the same feats as Stirruped Medieval Cavalry (with the notable exception of the Couched Lance).
Of course, saying that they were capable and providing evidence for them doing so are two different things. In terms of visual evidence, it is very interesting that the Bayeux Tapestry actually shows *very* few couched lances (something like one, I think) compared to those held 'over arm' (either for thrusting or for throwing). These images are pretty much identical to Ancient representations of Cavalry, which could mean one of two things: either very little had changed over more than a thousand years of warfare with regard to cavalry or that the artists were using ancient visual references. Both are possible, but I tend to favour the former, since the trend afterwards is to nearly always depict couched lances.

Wehrkind: If you have access to Jstor I can point you to a good article about this.

[Pilum]

What would be helpful here, I think, is to propose definitions for what constitutes Light and Heavy Cavalry or even Light and Heavy Infantry. Is it a function of their equipment? Is it a function of their use? Is it a combination of the two? Can some types of cavalry be used as both?

Personally I'd divide it into a mix of the two, with an element of circular feedback. That is - heavily armed and armoured, you're Shock, and if you're Shock you need to be heavily armed and armoured. If you're not you're light. The Parthians provide the most dramatic contrast here. As for Medium cavalry, maybe something like the Roman model, and maybe others? Carrying javelins, but willing to close hand to hand (though probably not the frontal charge into unbroken infantry!)
BUT:
Especially in the Ancient period, more so for infantry, it can get a bit blurred. Take the stereotypical Gallic/German warrior, sword/spear and shield, perhaps a throwing weapon, if he's lucky a helmet or some light body armour - yet they fought in a dense formation. The 'classic' (post-) Augustan Roman auxiliary is equipped to a standard only barbarian nobles could routinely aspire to, yet they're the Roman "light" infantry. This is creeping into economics and industrial-logistical capacities now, of course.

[Dervag]

Personally I'd divide it into a mix of the two, with an element of circular feedback. That is - heavily armed and armoured, you're Shock, and if you're Shock you need to be heavily armed and armoured. If you're not you're light. The Parthians provide the most dramatic contrast here.What some of us are saying is that this circular feedback process extends to tactics. If you're Shock, you come up with better tactics for shocking. If you think that the role of cavalry is shock, then you come up with better ways to deliver shock with cavalry. You probably do not spend time and money coming up with ways to make infantry resistant to cavalry shocks, or to make infantry capable of delivering the shock that is supposedto be the cavalry's job.

That isn't absolute, of course, but I think it helps to explain why various nations settled for what appear to be inefficient force mixtures while other nations developed better ones.

For instance, why didn't Europeans develop effective horse archers?* You can make arguments that the Europeans couldn't make reliable composite bows in a wet climate and therefore couldn't pack enough power into a horseman's bow to be effective; but why didn't Europeans use their own, lighter bows from horseback? Clearly they had examples of horse archers from outside Europe.

Please understand that this is a general comment. There were almost certainly some Europeans who mastered horse archery, but it did not become one of the dominant weapons in the European horse mix as it was for the Arabs, Turks, and Mongols.

The question seems hard to answer in a way that doesn't insult the intelligence of medieval Europeans. Answers like "the upper class thought using ranged weapons was dishonorable" strongly imply that the European military elite would keep using a suboptimal weapons mix for centuries, through many major wars, because of a cultural idiosyncracy. This goes against real-world experience. Normally, an army adopts new weapons eventually, if they prove effective.

I would argue that a large part of the answer comes from this kind of circular thinking. European cavalry tactics evolved from those of the Goths, whose cavalry were shock-oriented. Over time, European cavalrymen kept coming up with better ways to deliver shock- couched lances, better armor, and so on.

It would have taken a very unusual European cavalryman to think "hey, maybe my entire concept of how to fight from horseback is flawed; maybe I should instead invest in a stout bow and shoot arrows at the enemy from long range, using my superior speed to avoid hand-to-hand combat." Especially since it wasn't immediately obvious (even in hindsight) that this is a better way to fight from horseback; it's just a different way to fight from horseback.

So in a sense, we can imagine various fighting styles lying on separate but parallel 'tech trees'. It's much more natural and usually easier to keep improving your weapons and tactics by following one tech tree (such as shock-oriented heavy cavalry) than to branch out into a completely different tree (such as Mongol-style horse archery).

[Wehrkind]

Dervag and Pilum hit my point on the head. In the anchient period in Europe it seems that the cavalry was meant to keep the flanks cleared and chase around skirmishers early in the battle, then if successful hit the enemy in the rear or chase fleeing troops. In the medieval it seems more like they were considered shock troops, made to punch holes in the enemy lines for infantry to pour into. It does not seem that the Romans looked at cavalry in the shock sense that later knights and concurrent cataphractoi were.

[Dervag]

Europe got its first introduction to shock cavalry at Adrianople, when the Goths rode right over a Roman army, killing a Roman emperor in the process. After that, the Eastern Roman Empire did start developing its own heavy cavalry (the aforementioned cataphracts).

The other European cultures, on the other hand, developed shock cavalry as a direct descent from the shock cavalry of the Goths.

[Pilum]

It does not seem that the Romans looked at cavalry in the shock sense that later knights and concurrent cataphractoi were.
Not until the later Empire. But there wasn't really a tradition of what you could call heavy cavalry in Europe up to then. At most you have the mailed noble horseman, but that pales to the Eastern clibanarii and cataphracts - and they certainly gave the Romans some nasty experiences. But to use Dervag's post, this could be to the greater use of archery there. If there are plenty of missiles flying around, you need more armour to survive, we can see this happening plainly in the Middle Ages in the progression from the long mail coat on the Bayeaux Tapestry through to the full plate suit. With a few exceptions, missile fire was not a large part of ancient Western warfare as far as I can tell, certainly not to the extent it would become.

Personally, I would incline towards a combination of the Heroic ethos combined (more practically) with some very dense terrain. Given how often Gauls, Germans and Britons are described as launching ambushes onto marching columns, I feel it's easy to forget just how much Western Europe has been cleared of forests and such over the years. The javelin and (especially in Britain) the sling were maybe simply more practical than the bow - the bow is known, Vercingetorix is described as scouring Gaul for archers to face Caesar, but it doesn't seem popular.

As for the Medieval period and western mounted archery, this is probably due to inertia, the historically high cost of western horses compared to the east locking out the lower classes of society for whom shooting IS important and the need for glory caused by the lingering Heroic impulse leading to the furious first charge to earn your name and your fortune (with ransoms and such), so there's no time to shoot. Further, there's an element of practicality. Even the Byzantines eventually specialised their cataphracts into the heavily-armoured 'lancers' and lighter (comparatively!) archers, so there must be a tipping point at which an armoured man can't use a bow effectively - and indeed even in the East as a whole not all cataphracts did so.

This has been longer and not as clear as I would have liked, but it'll do for now :smallwink: Might come back later and see if I can tidy it up a bit.

[edit] I think you're slightly overstating Adrianople there Dervag. The Gothic cavalry were certainly more 'tooled' than the Roman, but when infantry who've marched all day and not rested or eaten and who are already in a stiff fight are charged in the flanks and rear because their surprised and outnumbered cavalry support have (yet again!) legged it, there's not usually any reason to look for further explanations of the defeat ;) Besides, heavier cavalry types had been present in Roman armies (though again, more so in the East) for some time earlier. Constantine is mentioned as fighting against them in the civil war, I think.

[Dhavaer]

How long does it take to 'turn on' a battle tank from a cold start?

[Om]

How long does it take to 'turn on' a battle tank from a cold start?Don't quote me on this but I believe that the Abrams takes approx 5-10 minutes to warm up the engine. But I'd need someone to confirm.

[Matthew]

[edit] I think you're slightly overstating Adrianople there Dervag. The Gothic cavalry were certainly more 'tooled' than the Roman, but when infantry who've marched all day and not rested or eaten and who are already in a stiff fight are charged in the flanks and rear because their surprised and outnumbered cavalry support have (yet again!) legged it, there's not usually any reason to look for further explanations of the defeat ;) Besides, heavier cavalry types had been present in Roman armies (though again, more so in the East) for some time earlier. Constantine is mentioned as fighting against them in the civil war, I think.

Just a bit. That's the very epitomy of the 'old school' Cavalry approach. Oman, I believe, is the main proponent of the view, but it has been completely subsumed over the last few decades. At the very least, Crassus encountered 'shock tactics' in the first century Bc, but it is quite clear that the Romans were familiar with it long before and long after that.

What we really need to do is come up with specific examples about what we are talking about. The Horse Bow Man is a case in point. I think Pilum makes an interesting point about avialable terrain, but it should also be remembered that Mounted Cross Bow Man were not exactly unusual in the Medieval period and that Charlemagnes's ordinances indicate that a Horse Man was expected to bring both Bow and Spear, though whether that actually happened is an entirely different matter.

[Dervag]

I think you're slightly overstating Adrianople there Dervag. The Gothic cavalry were certainly more 'tooled' than the Roman, but when infantry who've marched all day and not rested or eaten and who are already in a stiff fight are charged in the flanks and rear because their surprised and outnumbered cavalry support have (yet again!) legged it, there's not usually any reason to look for further explanations of the defeat ;) Besides, heavier cavalry types had been present in Roman armies (though again, more so in the East) for some time earlier. Constantine is mentioned as fighting against them in the civil war, I think.I know I exaggerate. But Adrianople was one of the critical battles in the history of Western military thinking. It was to heavy cavalry tactics what the German blitzkriegs of Poland and France were to combined arms. It proved the concept even to nations that didn't use the concept beforehand.

After Adrianople, everyone who could afford it and who came from the Germanic/Roman combat background wanted their heavy shock cavalry. In and of itself, this doesn't prove that heavy shock cavalry were superior to other weapon systems (like heavy legion-style infantry). After all, everyone wanted elephants after Alexander the Great lost a battle in India to an army with elephants, even though elephants weren't very cost-effective. But at Adrianople, heavy shock cavalry did exactly what they were designed to do, and did it so well that it convinced everyone watching that heavy shock cavalry were supremely effective. It took something like a thousand years for the spell cast by the lancers at Adrianople to wear off.


Just a bit. That's the very epitomy of the 'old school' Cavalry approach. Oman, I believe, is the main proponent of the view, but it has been completely subsumed over the last few decades. At the very least, Crassus encountered 'shock tactics' in the first century Bc, but it is quite clear that the Romans were familiar with it long before and long after that.I did overstate my case to some degree, but there's a core of truth to it. Heavy shock cavalry certainly existed before the Goths at Adrianople. But until Adrianople, they were only one of several ways to use cavalry in the European mindset. After Adrianople, Europeans tended to judge their cavalry by grading their effectiveness as heavy shock cavalry.


but it should also be remembered that Mounted Cross Bow Man were not exactly unusual in the Medieval periodDid they fire from horseback, or fight as dragoons?

[Adlan]

I belive, from the fact that they had crossbows capable of being drawn in the saddle, that they fought from the saddle. But my only source is a cauge memory of seeing much lighter 'horse' cross bows in a museum.

Edit: by much lighter, I mean much lighter than infantry crossbows and areleblasts I have seen, more in the range of 50 than 250lb.

[Fhaolan]

They had hunting crossbows that could be drawn and loosed from the saddle, as well as pellet crossbows and lots of other strange variations, but I don't know if they were used militarily.

[Altair_the_Vexed]

Sorry if its been asked before, but...

Broad sword / long sword: what's the difference? Also: sabres / scimitars - how are they different?

What do they look like? Who used them? How might one wield them? What advantages might they convey?

[Raum]

Sword names such as long sword & broad sword are inexact at best and controversial at worst. Depending on era, culture, and translation they may be used to mean anything from a single type of sword to a generic term for a broad type of swords. The Oakeshott typology (http://www.algonet.se/%7Eenda/oakeshott_eng.htm) is more exact.

That said, there is usually some agreement on general characteristics. For example, a sabre usually has a thinner blade than a scimitar and may or may not have a basket hilt. Both are usually single edged and curved. The scimitar's center of balance is farther forward than a sabre's which makes usage slightly different.

[Swordguy]

Sorry if its been asked before, but...

Broad sword / long sword: what's the difference? Also: sabres / scimitars - how are they different?

What do they look like? Who used them? How might one wield them? What advantages might they convey?

That's a really broad question. If you don't mind, I'll cover the longsword/broadsword part and leave the sabre/scimitar for someone else.

A "broadsword" is a misnomer. It's a term applied by Victorian museum curators to pretty much any type of Medieval sword, but most especially the arming sword and the longsword. It can also be used to apply specifically to a family of 17th-19th century double-edge basket hilted swords (but that's not what everyone thinks about when they hear "broadsword"). In addition, the Chinese Dao is often translated as "broad sword", as a differentiation from the thinner swords found in the region. I think what you want to talk about is the "arming sword", the standard cruxiform hilted crusader's weapon that everyone associates with the armored knight.

A longsword is a European weapon used from around 1200-1550. It tends to have a cruciform hilt, a 1.5 to two-handed grip, and a straight, double-edged blade of more than 35" in length. Annoyingly, sword terms are somewhat generic, and more than one term can often be used for a single sword. A "longsword" can concieveably cover anything from a hand and a half sword to a greatsword to a true two-handed sword in historical texts. If you use it, the Oakeshott system has what most would term a "longsword" under type XIIa and XIIIa, (early versions of the longsword), and definite matchs in types XVIa, XVII, XIIIb, and XX. (If you look up "Oakeshott Typology" on wikipedia, it should help).

As an additional point: Gary Gygax didn't know what the hell he was talking about when he made D&D. Don't believe D&D arms and equipment tables for pretty much anything.

As for using the weapons, I could go on for a VERY long time. Do you want information about using them in or out of armor? With other weeapons or without? Against what opponenets? Be aware that all of these things matter greatly. There are specific, codified systems for fighting with these weapons (just like the Asian Martial Arts) that were written down as early as the 1100s (MS I.33 - arming sword and buckler, unarmored).

[Fhaolan]

Sorry if its been asked before, but...

Broad sword / long sword: what's the difference? Also: sabres / scimitars - how are they different?

What do they look like? Who used them? How might one wield them? What advantages might they convey?

Okay, before I start, here's the issue: Weapon nomenclature is very twitchy. These names mean different things to different people. There is no one over-arching authority that defines the nomenclature. So, there's is usually a dozen or so different definitions. Add to this that most of the terms that we use for nomenclature are simply words from different languages for 'sword'. So, for many of these weapons the difference is cultural and linguistic, not necessarily mechanical.

A longsword, to many 'experts', is a relatively light two-handed sword with a long, narrow blade. Depending on who you ask, this category might also include what some call hand-and-a-half or bastard swords. Some experts don't acknowledge the bastard sword category, as an example of how nomeclature is so twitchy. If you are sufficiently skilled, and strong, it is technically possible to wield a longsword one-handed, but it's not something the average person will be able to pull off, and it's really not that good of an idea.

The term broadsword came about late-period in Europe to differentiate between old-fashioned one-handed wide-bladed swords versus the more 'modern' cut-and-thrusts and rapiers. Before that, they were just called 'swords'. The most common use of the term broadsword is applied to the basket-hilted broadsword of Scotland, sometimes called a claymore. [Note, the term claymore is another of those 'another word for sword' issues, and has been applied to at least three different forms of sword. This is not a case of a term being misapplied, because the term was in use at the time the different swords were in use. The name migrated to different swords depending on which one was the one in use at the time.]

The terms sabre and scimitar both include so many different blade shapes and sizes that they are almost meaningless for nomenclature. For example, the term sabre effectively means a 'cavalry sword', so any sword used by a horseman could technically be a sabre. It doesn't matter what the size or shape of the blade. To illustrate this, the Patton Sabre has a perfectly straight blade, but because it was designed to be a cavalry sword, it is correctly termed a sabre.

Scimitar is one of those cases when it's really just another language's word for 'sword'. There is not much difference between a scimitar and a sabre, except that the term scimitar includes some weapons with much larger blades than normally allowed within the sabre category. There are two-handed scimitars (used primarily for ceremonies or executions), while there are no two-handed sabres to my knowledge.

[Subotei]

I know I exaggerate. But Adrianople was one of the critical battles in the history of Western military thinking. It was to heavy cavalry tactics what the German blitzkriegs of Poland and France were to combined arms. It proved the concept even to nations that didn't use the concept beforehand.

After Adrianople, everyone who could afford it and who came from the Germanic/Roman combat background wanted their heavy shock cavalry. In and of itself, this doesn't prove that heavy shock cavalry were superior to other weapon systems (like heavy legion-style infantry). After all, everyone wanted elephants after Alexander the Great lost a battle in India to an army with elephants, even though elephants weren't very cost-effective. But at Adrianople, heavy shock cavalry did exactly what they were designed to do, and did it so well that it convinced everyone watching that heavy shock cavalry were supremely effective. It took something like a thousand years for the spell cast by the lancers at Adrianople to wear off.

I did overstate my case to some degree, but there's a core of truth to it. Heavy shock cavalry certainly existed before the Goths at Adrianople. But until Adrianople, they were only one of several ways to use cavalry in the European mindset. After Adrianople, Europeans tended to judge their cavalry by grading their effectiveness as heavy shock cavalry.


Sources I've read indicate that the Goths did not have much cavalry at Adrianople, and the battle was essentially infantry vs infantry, with cavalry used in its traditional scouting/skirmishing/pursuit role. The Gothic cavalry may have achieved tactical surprise, which is always good for cavalry to have, due to their 'late arrival' to battle.

Adrianople is really another case of poor leadership, with the Romans hungry, tired and out of formation when they started the battle. The poor handling of the Roman cavalry allowed them to be cut off from their infanty, who were then surrounded, turning a defeat into a slaughter. However there doesn't seem to be much evidence of substantial qualitative or quantitative superiority in the Gothic cavalry vs the Roman cavalry during the battle.

I'm of the opinion the shift in emphasis from infantry to cavalry, was more to do with the end of Roman power in the west (and the disappearance of the Roman army's influence there), and its replacement by what are essentially small warring cliques of Noble/elite warriors. Being rich these would tend to be well armoured and mounted (which was ever the case with rich men, even back to the time of the Roman Republic), while pressed or part time levies would serve (in the main) as the necessary foot troops. Such levies would never have the time or training to achieve the level of expertise to match a typical professional, full time Roman legion, even if someone had the expertise or inclination to train them.

I doubt whether this 'change' in emphasis actually made much difference to the proportion of cavalry to infantry in an army over the early medieval period. This would have more to do with the quality and quantity of horses available, which all other factors being equal, would not change hugely from Roman times I expect. The increased effectiveness of cavalry available, being professional and well equipped, compared to the generally poor infantry training and equipment, could explain the change in emphasis.

[Hades]

Did they fire from horseback, or fight as dragoons?

While it may not be indicative of more than isolated instances, Talhoffer finishes off his 1467 fechtbuch with several plates (267-270) that show how a mounted man armed with a crossbow should behave when approached by a lancer. I'm sure someone else can speak to the existance(or lack thereof) of battlefield units of mounted crossbowmen.

[msgZ28]

What exactly is a dragoon? What makes them different enough to rate a different name than other similar troops? I have always wondered this, and the recent talk has brought it back to the top of my head.

[Hades]

Dragoon: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dragoon

Essentially, a foot soldier that uses a horse to get from battlefield to battlefield, and from place to place on the battlefield.

[firechicago]

Similarly, in medieval Europe very few tacticians actually sat down and thought about ways that a group of footmen could defeat a cavalry force. Therefore, techniques like the pike phalanx took a long time to be reinvented.

Sorry to drag the topic of conversation back two pages and a week, but I have to weigh in on this.

I think the idea that pike and shot tactics were somehow a rediscovery of ancient phalanx tactics is a gross oversimplification of both. Both of them involved standing in tight formations with pointy bits at the end of very long sticks, there the similarity ends.

The ancient phalanx was primarily a shock tactic. Phalanxes were deployed in long lines. They marched until they crashed into each other, and then sat in those lines trying to stab each other until one side panicked and fled. Light infantry (peltasts, archers, slingers etc.) were strictly secondary. They were scouts and tried to use their missiles to break up the enemy formation or harass the flanks, but when push came to shove they sat aside and let the big boys get to work. Cavalry was more useful, because its mobility meant that it could, if left unmolested by enemy skirmishers and cavalry, flank the enemy phalanx and rout it.Still, cavalry was useless against a phalanx that wasn't already engaged by enemy infantry. The long spears would make shish-ka-bobs of the horses long before they got within striking distance with their own spears. Cavalry was generally regarded as inferior to infantry in a stand-up fight, the only advantage was its tactical mobility. The main purpose of the phalanx was to defeat the other guy's phalanx before he could get his cavalry around to your rear.

Pike and shot, on the other hand, was centered around the idea of protecting light infantry (i.e. musketeers) from the enemy cavalry and heavy infantry. By the late 15th century muskets could reliably penetrate armor at maybe 100 yards (they weren't accurate at that range, but that's what volley fire is for) and field artillery was coming into it's own. Pike was deployed in large squares (makes flanking by cavalry irrelevant) and placed between the enemy cavalry and your artillery. Muskets were interspersed so that you could march up to an enemy, decimate him with musket and artillery fire and then have your musketeers retreat to the center of the square while the pikemen closed ranks if the enemy infantry or cavalry got too close for comfort. Pike squares occasionally crashed into each other but this was usually either to take advantage of an opportunity (e.g. ambushing an unprepared enemy or falling on a fleeing enemy) or out of desperation (e.g. when his musketeers are doing better than yours and it's a choice between charging and retreating.)

Ultimately I'd argue that what you'd find in, say an English army raised to repel Viking raiders (i.e. a bunch of men armed with large shields and spears about 2m long, wearing solid helmets and mail hauberks and fighting in an organized formation known as a shield-wall, where each man protected his neighbors with his shield and was trained to fight in line) is a lot more similar to a Greek phalanx (i.e. a bunch of men armed with large shields and spears about 3-5m long, wearing solid helmets and solid breastplates and fighting in an organized formation known as a phalanx, where each man protected his neighbors with his shield and was trained to fight in line) than anything you'd find on a 15th or 16th century battlefield.

[Matthew]

Firechicago, you are confusing the Hoplite Phalanx (Spear length somewhere between six and nine feet) with the Macedonian Sarissa type Phalanx (Spear length somewhere between twelve and twenty four feet). Many of your basic points stand, but you have to be aware that we do not absolutely know how such formations tactically operated. All we have are theories about how they may have done. Some favour lengthy 'pushing matches', others short, but bloody, confrontations. There is evidence to support both views and it is a hotly debated subject (like most 'exact' details of Ancient and Medieval Military History).

I'm with Subotei concerning Adrianople. The Gothic Cavalry thing is an old and largely discredited (but interesting) theory. I think it originated with Oman, but it could have been earlier. I'm not sure who debunked it, but Goldsworthy talks about it.

[firechicago]

Matthew,

I'm aware of the difference, but I view the Sarissa phalanx as more of a refinement of the Hoplite concept than a completely new weapon system. It's designed to accomplish the same aims (smashing the enemy heavy infantry) it just does it better by using longer reach and higher velocity. Besides, the armies of Alexander, where the Sarissa saw it's greatest success, were superior as much because of the prowess of the companion cavalry as because of the success of the Sarissa as opposed to the earlier Hoplites (who had their own notable successes against Eastern armies).

And of course, all of this is based on sketchy accounts by potentially unreliable narrators, but that's history for you.

[Matthew]

Well, that is one way of looking at it. It's not one that I would agree with, though, because there are fundemental differences in the purposes of those two formations. The Companion Foot was part of the same mechanism as the Companion Horse. The Hoplite Phalanx, on the other hand, does not seem to have been anywhere near as closely connected with other unit types (least of all Cavalry).

On the other hand, it might be possible to argue that later versions of the the Macedonian Phalanx were intended to operate independently of Cavalry, certainly Polybius makes no mention of such interdependence. Similarly, the Hoplite Phalanx continued to operate in conjunction wth combined arms forces and in conjunction with the Macedonian Phalanx.

I would consider the Macedonian Phalanx to be rooted in the Hoplite Phalanx experience and a development from it, but I wouldn't consider it a refinement, basically because the two types of Infantry continued to operate together and we also know that the Macedonian Phalanx was not a fixed unit type (i.e. Alexander's foot Companions could apparently operate as a Pike Phalanx or as a Spear Phalanx as required and as equipped; indeed, there is an argument that suggests that the Pike Phalanx was used considerably less than the Spear Phalanx).

[firechicago]

Matthew,

I defer to your knowledge of the Sarissa, most of my knowledge of ancient Greek warfare is derived from a close reading of Thucydides, who was unequivocally pre-Sarissa. We could argue until doomsday over the semantic issue of whether the Sarissa tactics were a refinement or a genuinely new tactic (much like the argument upthread about whether the arrangements for provisions made by the crusaders deserve the name of logistics) but I think we agree that the ultimate purpose of both tactics was to shatter the enemy formation with shock attacks and force him into a rout or, failing that, hold him still long enough for your cavalry to drive the enemy cavalry and skirmishers off the field and then come crashing down on his rear.

The contrast I was drawing was with pike and shot tactics, where the shock power of charging pikes is entirely secondary. The purpose of the pike in these tactics is

a)to protect missile troops from enemy attack while they destroy the enemy from a comfortable distance

b) to provide an obstacle between enemy cavalry and your own field artillery

c) to provide a menacing enough force in the field to force the enemy to mass his troops, making them vulnerable to your muskets and field artillery

d) only lastly to take advantage of the chaos caused by a b and c, and drive the enemy from the field (and it's worth noting that a disciplined cavalry force is just as good at c and d)

[Wehrkind]

Firechicago: Your description of the use is (sort of) agreeable to me, but this is one of those cases of different peoples using the same formation for different ends.
It is true that the Greeks used the hoplite as their "killing arm" of their military, and that later pike and shot tactics used the muskets to kill primarily. The problem with calling the hoplites "shock" infantry is that they are not, at all. They were not used to break up enemy formations, cause panic or disorganization, or really anything other than grinding through the enemy while, and this is key, staying alive with your buddies. The phalanx is a very slow and methodical formation, and does not lend itself to what we describe as shock tactics, but rather defensive and general heavy infantry roles of "You can not kill me before I kill you if you stand and fight."

Thus, the main difference between the two eras was what else was being used. The Greeks simply did not have anything better to kill with than spears (slings and arrows were good, but not great vs. heavy infantry with large shields). As a result, what were normally very defense oriented troops became the leading edge of fighting, moving into contact relatively slowly, and grinding each other till one broke. Compare to the mobility of the Roman Legions who favored a shield wall approach which was looser. (Remember that a phalanx of spears is much closer quarters than anyone using a sword or axe.)

[Dhavaer]

How long does it take to 'turn on' a battle tank from a cold start?

Still looking for a confirmation on this question.

[Exarch]

Dhavaer, I'll ask my brother as soon as he calls from Iraq. I don't think it's very long, because I have been told tales of the tankers turning on their beasts in the middle of winter nights to give some infantrymen look outs some warmth. So maybe...3-5 minutes at the most.

Just to note, the Wikipedia is a little inaccurate in terms of the beast's speed, according to him at least. Cruise speed is about 40-45 last I recall.

[Dervag]

Dragoon: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dragoon
Essentially, a foot soldier that uses a horse to get from battlefield to battlefield, and from place to place on the battlefield.Since they didn't fight on horseback, they were very different as enemies than cavalry. But since they rode on the operational and strategic levels, they were very different from infantry, too.


Sorry to drag the topic of conversation back two pages and a week, but I have to weigh in on this.

I think the idea that pike and shot tactics were somehow a rediscovery of ancient phalanx tactics is a gross oversimplification of both. Both of them involved standing in tight formations with pointy bits at the end of very long sticks, there the similarity ends.OK, I know. I'm not saying they were the same, though the Swiss pike block bore considerable resemblance to the Hellenistic sarissa blocks.

However, the fact remains that medievals didn't use either ancient or modern style pike blocks until the Swiss developed the technique. I'm arguing that the reason they didn't was a lack of attention to infantry tactics, until the invention of powerful weapons that could not be used as effectively from horseback (the longbow and crossbow at first and the musket at last).

I don't mean that the pikemen of 1500 were a reincarnation of the phalanxes of 350 or 250 BC. I mean that the essence of the concept (that a big, thick formation of spear-toting infantry could reliably see off cavalry and melee-armed infantrymen) was similar. Since this concept already existed before the Swiss introduced it to the High Middle Ages, I call it a reinvention.

[Hades]

Since they didn't fight on horseback, they were very different as enemies than cavalry. But since they rode on the operational and strategic levels, they were very different from infantry, too.


I recall something to the effect that dragoons or similar troops were often very effective as raiders during the American Civil War, with the increased mobility of the horse and the "staying power" of the infantryman.

[Joran]

I think the idea that pike and shot tactics were somehow a rediscovery of ancient phalanx tactics is a gross oversimplification of both. Both of them involved standing in tight formations with pointy bits at the end of very long sticks, there the similarity ends.

I was under the impression that the Spanish Tercios were a direct response to the French use of heavy calvary and Swiss Pike. Basically, the theory goes that Spain could never produce pike that were on the level of Swiss Pike. They could however intersperse troops with gunpowder weapons to fire at the opposing side, while the pike were engaged, thus negating the skill advantage of the Swiss.

So, I would argue that the pike and shot were response to the rediscovery of ancient pike formations.

[Sundog]

I recall something to the effect that dragoons or similar troops were often very effective as raiders during the American Civil War, with the increased mobility of the horse and the "staying power" of the infantryman.

By the time of the US Civil War the dramatic "Cavalry Charge" of previous eras was largely a thing of the past. Remants of it would last until WWI (I believe the charge by the Australian Light Horse at Beersheba was the last successful cavalry charge - ironically, by a Dragoon unit), but no one saw it as being an effective tactic anymore. While the occasional charge by cavalry raiders would be conducted against light opposition, US and Confederate Cavalry fought any large scale engagement as Dragoons.

[Hades]

By the time of the US Civil War the dramatic "Cavalry Charge" of previous eras was largely a thing of the past. Remants of it would last until WWI (I believe the charge by the Australian Light Horse at Beersheba was the last successful cavalry charge - ironically, by a Dragoon unit), but no one saw it as being an effective tactic anymore. While the occasional charge by cavalry raiders would be conducted against light opposition, US and Confederate Cavalry fought any large scale engagement as Dragoons.

I was not, in fact, attempting to say that they acted as a cavalry charge, rather that the increased mobility afforded by the horse would allow dragoons to appear in areas where they would be otherwise unexpected. I apologize if my post made it sound as if they were engaging in pure Cavalry tactics.

[Mike_G]

The names of units types tend to be misleading after a certian point. Tactics change quiockly in the face of reality, but traditions hang on much longer.

"Dragoons" were originally mounted infantry, and named because of the type of carbine the carried. But many Dragoon regiments in the Britsih Army functioned as pure cavalry. The Charge of the Light Brigade involved a few Dragoon regiments as well as Lancers and Hussars.

Names die hard. The US 10th Cav regiment (Black Horse) still kept the nickname loing after they lost the horses and were no longer a segregated unit.

Likewise, many Cossak units weren't made up of ethnic Cossaks after a certain point in history.

[Sundog]

I was not, in fact, attempting to say that they acted as a cavalry charge, rather that the increased mobility afforded by the horse would allow dragoons to appear in areas where they would be otherwise unexpected. I apologize if my post made it sound as if they were engaging in pure Cavalry tactics.

Ah, I don't think I was quite clear. What I meant was that US and Confederate "Cavalry" units should better be thought of as Dragoons than as true Cavalry during the Civil War. While at the beginning of that conflict the cavalryman was more lightly armed than his footslogger counterpart, there was very little difference between them by the end of it.

[Matthew]

Firechicago: Your description of the use is (sort of) agreeable to me, but this is one of those cases of different peoples using the same formation for different ends.
It is true that the Greeks used the hoplite as their "killing arm" of their military, and that later pike and shot tactics used the muskets to kill primarily. The problem with calling the hoplites "shock" infantry is that they are not, at all. They were not used to break up enemy formations, cause panic or disorganization, or really anything other than grinding through the enemy while, and this is key, staying alive with your buddies. The phalanx is a very slow and methodical formation, and does not lend itself to what we describe as shock tactics, but rather defensive and general heavy infantry roles of "You can not kill me before I kill you if you stand and fight."

Well, as I said before, this is a matter of considerable debate. We don't understand at all the nitty gritty of what went on during Ancient Battles. We do have the description of Xenephon that implies that Hoplites charged one another, which may or may not have been the case. Many historians subscribe to the 'Shock Tactic' view, but not all. It's pretty much impossible to come to a definite conclusion because of sparce, but conflicting, evidence. There are some good papers around about this sort of thing, though, which are good reading (I haven't time to locate them at the moment, but I will when I have a moment).


Thus, the main difference between the two eras was what else was being used. The Greeks simply did not have anything better to kill with than spears (slings and arrows were good, but not great vs. heavy infantry with large shields). As a result, what were normally very defense oriented troops became the leading edge of fighting, moving into contact relatively slowly, and grinding each other till one broke. Compare to the mobility of the Roman Legions who favored a shield wall approach which was looser. (Remember that a phalanx of spears is much closer quarters than anyone using a sword or axe.)

As I said above, the specifics of how Romans and Greeks really fought is something of a mystery. It may have been the case that the Roman Legion was more mobile than the Greek Phalanx, but we don't really know. Polybius' assessment of the chief advantage the Romans enjoyed over the Greeks was that the Legion could fight on difficult terrain, if I remember rightly.

[Hades]

Ah, I don't think I was quite clear. What I meant was that US and Confederate "Cavalry" units should better be thought of as Dragoons than as true Cavalry during the Civil War. While at the beginning of that conflict the cavalryman was more lightly armed than his footslogger counterpart, there was very little difference between them by the end of it.

Quite alright, I don't think I was being the most clear either. Ah, the joys of electronic communication!

[Mike_G]

Ah, I don't think I was quite clear. What I meant was that US and Confederate "Cavalry" units should better be thought of as Dragoons than as true Cavalry during the Civil War. While at the beginning of that conflict the cavalryman was more lightly armed than his footslogger counterpart, there was very little difference between them by the end of it.


Actually, while cavalry tended to stick to shorter arms than the rile, they were much quicker to adopt repeating weapons, like the Sharps or Henry carbines.

So, while they mauy have been less effective at long range fire, they could fire much more quickly, pour a lot of lead into an enemy formation, then mount up and move elsewhere on the field. ACW cavalry tactics stressed mobilty and quick strikes, traditonal for light cavalry. Heavy shock cavalry tactics were never used, to the best of my knowledge.

The infantry countinued to use the long rifle, almost invariably single shot, and muzzle loading for most troops, with the concept of mass and manuver with the bayonet.

[Winterking]

However, the fact remains that medievals didn't use either ancient or modern style pike blocks until the Swiss developed the technique. I'm arguing that the reason they didn't was a lack of attention to infantry tactics, until the invention of powerful weapons that could not be used as effectively from horseback (the longbow and crossbow at first and the musket at last).

I don't mean that the pikemen of 1500 were a reincarnation of the phalanxes of 350 or 250 BC. I mean that the essence of the concept (that a big, thick formation of spear-toting infantry could reliably see off cavalry and melee-armed infantrymen) was similar. Since this concept already existed before the Swiss introduced it to the High Middle Ages, I call it a reinvention.


Actually, medievals DID use pike blocks before the Swiss. The Scottish schiltron, used in the wars of independence (most famously at Falkirk, 1298, and Bannockburn, 1314) was a large block of pikemen, used to see off enemy formations of cavalry and/or infantry. The front was rounded, and often the units were held in place and protected by stakes in the ground, but the units were mobile, as Bannockburn demonstrates. Likewise, at about the same time, the Flemish used pike and polearm troops to defeat French knights at the battle of the Golden Spurs (Courtrai).

And if you look at Byzantium, they were using pikemen as part of a unified infantry formation for centuries, though pike-block-warfare reached the peak of its development in the 950s-980s. (I can go into more detail if anyone is interested).

Unless you meant that the specifically Greek style of offensive, faster moving pike blocks was not revived until the 1500s; you might be right about that, although, again, at Bannockburn and Courtrai, pikemen were effective at offensively destroying enemy cavalry.

[Dervag]

By the time of the US Civil War the dramatic "Cavalry Charge" of previous eras was largely a thing of the past. Remants of it would last until WWI (I believe the charge by the Australian Light Horse at Beersheba was the last successful cavalry charge - ironically, by a Dragoon unit),The last one I know of was that of the 21st Lancers at Omdurman (1898), and it was only dubiously successful.


but no one saw it as being an effective tactic anymore.Not necessarily. There were some generals who just couldn't get the magnetism of the charge out of their heads. Fortunately for the cavalry, such generals were usually old enough that they were no longer in direct tactical command of cavalry units and were therefore unable to order cavalry charges.


While the occasional charge by cavalry raiders would be conducted against light opposition, US and Confederate Cavalry fought any large scale engagement as Dragoons.True.


Actually, while cavalry tended to stick to shorter arms than the rile, they were much quicker to adopt repeating weapons, like the Sharps or Henry carbines.I don't know if Civil War repeaters were easier to reload from horseback, given that they weren't breech-loaders either way.

However, I think I can justly say that there were other good reasons why the cavalry would be quicker to adopt repeaters.

First of all, the main objection to the adoption of faster-firing weapons throughout the 19th and 20th centuries was that if the soldier had a higher rate of fire he wouldn't take time to aim his shots and would therefore become less effective despite the increased rate of fire. This fear was not actually achieved until the invention of assault rifles, but it was a major factor in delaying the adoption of repeaters by the infantry during the Civil War. For cavalry, this factor was less important because cavalry weren't expected to shoot as precisely. Moreover, the cavalry were already carrying multishot revolvers as their primary weapons, so the idea of adopting a multishot carbine was not as great a stretch.


The infantry countinued to use the long rifle, almost invariably single shot, and muzzle loading for most troops, with the concept of mass and manuver with the bayonet.Although the bayonet saw relatively little use. Civil War commanders occasionally ordered infantry charges (usually when they had a position that they couldn't see how to maneuver the enemy out of), but the bayonet was not generally regarded as a primary killing weapon in and of itself.


Actually, medievals DID use pike blocks before the Swiss. The Scottish schiltron... The front was rounded, and often the units were held in place and protected by stakes in the ground, but the units were mobile, as Bannockburn demonstrates... Likewise, at about the same time, the Flemish used pike and polearm troops to defeat French knights at the battle of the Golden Spurs (Courtrai).

And if you look at Byzantium, they were using pikemen as part of a unified infantry formation for centuries, though pike-block-warfare reached the peak of its development in the 950s-980s. (I can go into more detail if anyone is interested).

Unless you meant that the specifically Greek style of offensive, faster moving pike blocks was not revived until the 1500s; you might be right about that, although, again, at Bannockburn and Courtrai, pikemen were effective at offensively destroying enemy cavalry.

OK, I stand corrected.

Though the Scots and Flemish were not cavalry cultures; they retained a strong tradition of fighting on foot. This would logically make them exempt from my argument that the knight-dominated military cultures of the Middle Ages didn't work as hard to develop effective infantry tactics. Since the Scots and Flemish were not dominated by knights, they had to figure out how to counter their enemies' knights by maximizing the effectiveness of their own infantry.

As for the Byzantines, they are an exception to much of my argument too because they kept trying to use infantry effectively after most of the Germanic-descended cultures of Europe outside the Eastern Roman Empire had abandoned them.

Certainly, my general assertion about European failure to make good use of pike blocks is a mistake. However, the exceptions tend to be the very societies that we would expect to be trying to develop good infantry tactics against cavalry.

[Om]

The front was rounded, and often the units were held in place and protected by stakes in the ground, but the units were mobile, as Bannockburn demonstrates.Just to note that Falkirk demonstrates that the schiltrons were also employed in static positions where their inflexibility was severely punished.

[Sundog]

Here's the Wikipedia link for the Battle of Beersheba:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Beersheba

[Norsesmithy]

Although the bayonet saw relatively little use. Civil War commanders occasionally ordered infantry charges (usually when they had a position that they couldn't see how to maneuver the enemy out of), but the bayonet was not generally regarded as a primary killing weapon in and of itself.
Actually Bayonet charges were not so rare in the civil war (at least not if the troops were from Minnesota or Maine). Many of the covering actions, advances, or attack repulsions preformed by regiments from those states ended in hand to hand, with bayonets.

Of course they tended to take horrific causalities, but always seemed to prevail.

[Grey Robe]

I was wondering about the general use of the Naginate and any other large bladed polearms. Specifically, could they be used effectively by individuals or small groups rather than large infantry formations?

Could an individual use such a weapon against others sword wielders and the like?

Is there alternative styles that inspired the Martials Arts movie style Spear/Polearm fighting style? As it seems to be far more acrobatic and flamboyant (not exactly a surprise considering it's a movie, I know) than anything that would work in the "real world".

[Cyborg Pirate]

I was wondering about the general use of the Naginate and any other large bladed polearms. Specifically, could they be used effectively by individuals or small groups rather than large infantry formations?

Actually, large infantry groups don't really like polearms like that, they prefer long pokey ones like pikes. Small groups on the other hand love large bladed polearms.



Could an individual use such a weapon against others sword wielders and the like?

Ofcourse. With considerable advantage too.



Is there alternative styles that inspired the Martials Arts movie style Spear/Polearm fighting style? As it seems to be far more acrobatic and flamboyant (not exactly a surprise considering it's a movie, I know) than anything that would work in the "real world".

These alternative styles are called "modern martial arts". Tho in all honesty, they existed in the past too. They are the styles you get once training is used more for training-of-the-mind/keepng-people-occupied/performance/tradition etc rather then fighting battles of life and death.

[Grey Robe]

Ofcourse. With considerable advantage too.


How would this be done? Keeping distance would seem natural but how would the Naginata be used? Piercing or slashing primarily or a relatively even combination of both? Instinct would say to me that a slash with such a weapon would be too slow but that's uneducated guess-work really.

How effectively could you block with the wooden haft?

[Fhaolan]

How would this be done? Keeping distance would seem natural but how would the Naginata be used? Piercing or slashing primarily or a relatively even combination of both? Instinct would say to me that a slash with such a weapon would be too slow but that's uneducated guess-work really.

How effectively could you block with the wooden haft?

This style of polearm is very good for slashing, with push and pull cuts. Chopping and piercing, while still effective don't really fit the blade shape as well. I'm extrapolating from the shape of the blade, as I've not actually used this specific weapon. I'm more used to the heavier-bladed bardiches, and the straight-bladed glaives.

You can block very effectively with the wooden haft, as polearms tend to be made out of very tough wood. It takes a heavy chopping weapon to cut through a polearm haft, like an axe, greatsword, or one of the bigger falchions. And even then, you usually have to take several swings at it. Most people tend to think of blocking as just putting your own weapon in the way of the attack. However, in the combat systems I know there are three different 'blocks'.

The Hard Block, where you are stopping the opposing weapon completely. This can only be done when your weapon has sufficient mass and strength to resist the impact. Not recommended against weapons with significant impact like maces, axes, hammers, greatswords, etc. These weapons will often blow right through a hard block, shattering the blocking weapon or simply overwhelming your hold on the blocking weapon.

The Soft Block, where you take only part of the impact in an attempt to divert or deflect the attack. The idea is to have the attacking weapon slide down the block so it won't hit the intended target. This still relies on your ability to prevent the attack from simply blowing through your block.

The Beat-Aside, where you actually hit the attacking weapon with your own weapon to drive it in a different direction. Usually you beat aside in the same direction the attack is moving, so you use the opponent's own momentum against him. You are of course moving your body out of the way. The real idea of this one is to prevent your opponent from changing targets when his intended target moves out of the way. This is the best way of dealing with those heavy weapons mentioned previously. The way it was taught to me, the 'parry' in fencing is a subtle, minimalist form of beat-aside that allows for a 'riposte', a quick attack of your own.

[Winterking]

Having actually done some Naginata-do, I can say that the naginata is primarily a slashing weapon, although the modern art also includes sharp thrusts with the butt of the haft. Slashes don't suffer too badly from a question of speed, in part because you use the lower hand to whip the blade end forwar swiftly (basically like a lever).

The trouble with using a naginata as a piercing weapon (which I understand was sometimes done when actually fighting) is that, first, the blade is curved, and so the point is less effective at transferring force from your arms to the tip. Second, the blade was essentially a small samurai sword--well forged and very sharp, when used as a cutting weapon; stabbing with a naginata would waste that asset.

The overwhelming sense I got from naginata-do was that it always involves movement--you move forwards or back to attack or block, and all of the blocks are the beat-aside and soft-block that Fhaolan mentions. Also, the naginata is not what I would call a true reach weapon. Of the four attacking stances that I recall, only one actually results in the blade moving very far in advance of the user's body; most of the time, I would strike at the shin/torso/head of a partner standing in an adjacent five-foot square, to use d&d terminology. However, very often I only reached that adjacent square using a "five foot step" or a "move action".

So, on the whole, naginata is actually a far more effective individual or loose melee weapon, in contrast to many polearms.

[Grey Robe]

Wonderful, thanks for the info.

Last question along these lines would be how would a small group (5-6 people) be most effective using naginatas? Simply spread out a lot to give each other room to work?

[Wehrkind]

I find that using a pole arm of various types in the SCA requires a lot less room than people think, though more than a spear certainly. The reason for that is you don't really pull baseball bat type swings that are slow and cumbersome, but shots from a standard guard with the weapon in front of you. You need more of a wide cone in front of you than a circle around you to move the weapon in, though some extra room is appreciated to avoid putting your weapon's butt in your friends armpit etc.
Pole arms are pretty fun though against people without shields, though I suspect that if the shields are breakable (SCA shields are not) it is pretty fun against that too. I have given shots to shields heavy enough to make the holder's arm go numb, and been on the recieving end of shots that blew through sword, shield and then hit my head so hard it put me on one foot. So I have little trouble imagining someone being powerful enough to blow through just about any defense if they really wanted to. Lighter weapons like one handed swords and light two handers require a lot of finesse to make effective blocks as Fhaolan stated. The leverage is just too great to stop otherwise.
The speed thing isn't really an issue either, since it only comes into play as you start to miss and need to recover from an awkward angle you didn't intend, and even that isn't so bad depending on the weapon (pollaxes hurt going both ways.)

[Neon Knight]

Is it possible to kill someone with a flare gun?

[Norsesmithy]

Yes, but only at close range, and even then you are more likely to maim or injure the target.

IIRC there was a national news story a few years ago about how someone who was on a foundering sailboat accidentally shot his wife in the chest with their signal flare gun and terrible internal burns evetually killed her.

[Neon Knight]

So I take it that the harm done by a flare gun comes from the burning of the flare?

[Swordguy]

So I take it that the harm done by a flare gun comes from the burning of the flare?

Not necessarily. You could beat them to death with the butt.

You can kill someone with anything. It simply takes motivation and imagination to do so.

[Dervag]

Well, there are limits on the principle; try killing someone with an air molecule.

[Fhaolan]

Well, there are limits on the principle; try killing someone with an air molecule.

A single O2 molecule, or can I have more to work with?

Oxygen poisoning can be done with pure oxygen at high partial pressure.

A CC or so injected into an artery can be lethal. (Air embolism).

Of course, if I'm allowed to use *other* parts of 'air' other than oxygen, there are components that become lethal at far less concentrations.

:smallbiggrin:

[Norsesmithy]

So I take it that the harm done by a flare gun comes from the burning of the flare?
Not entirely, though the woman in the story burned to death internally, the flare had gotten past her ribs.

That makes it dangerous in my mind, even if you forget the burning.

[Dervag]

Hey, I used the singular 'an' for a reason.

[Adlan]

Well, there are limits on the principle; try killing someone with an air molecule.

Lock some one in an air tight room with a single air molecule. Job done.

[Thiel]

Is it possible to use a greatsword from horseback?

[SpiderBrigade]

Is it possible to use a greatsword from horseback?For certain values of "Greatsword," probably. Point being there's too much variation in what swords are called to answer this definitively :smallbiggrin:.

But I'd say for any reasonable value of "Greatsword," the answer would be no. Although of course it also depends on what you mean by "wield." Could a skilled rider hold the weapon in two hands? Yes. He could probably even swing with it. But I'm guessing it would be hideously ineffective.

[Om]

Wouldn't swinging a greatsword from horseback, and actually hitting something, actually dislodge the wielder from the impact?

[SpiderBrigade]

I wouldn't say so, these swords were really not as heavy as you think. Even the largest swords are only in the range of 6-8 pounds. The problem in horseback wielding would IMO come from the awkwardness of the swing. And you wouldn't really gain any advantage from a huge sword over, say, a cavalry saber.

[Fhaolan]

From personal experience, two-handed weapons from horseback is a non-starter. Technically, you can swing the weapon but you have a very limited range of motions due to the horse's body and especially it's head being in the way. You end up looking like you're paddling a kayak, or just pointing it like a lance. And a greatsword makes a very poor lance.

The impact of the weapon isn't important. If you get dislodged from hitting someone with a greatsword up there, you're not a good enough rider to use a lance or spear.

[Om]

I wouldn't say so, these swords were really not as heavy as you think.Its not the weight that I'm thinking of but the length and rigid nature of the sword. Unlike holding a lance, swinging a greatsword would generate quite a shuddering force on impact.

But then this is pure speculation on my part.

[Matthew]

So, since the thread died, I thought I would bring it back to it's appropriate home:


Interesting view, care to elaborate on why you think Shields are overrated? It's definitely a sticking point, so I am open to suggestions and explanations.

Part testing, part history observation. In practice, I've always found that when I see two guys these days go at each other for a mock battle, one armed with a large shield and one with a two-handed weapon, the one with the two-handed weapon always goes at it strangely carefully and then gets pasted. Shields protect a person a lot, but you've got to keep in mind that some of the protection counts for the opponent too. A shield aggressively rushed and grappled can easily be used against its wielder. Hell, simply just rushing a shield will give you all its protection, and while you can be hit by the shield, you can hit back with it too.

"medium" sized shields seem to do better, but are still not all too great. Mainly, because of the weapons you carry with a shield. They're all relatively short in terms of reach. Most two-handed weapons can stay out of reach and happily hit or poke away at the unprotected spots. Legs are a favourite. Remember, reach is not only good for hitting someone when they can't hit back. Reach is also good for hitting someone extra low or extra high while the other can only reach you with a stab to the chest. And there are many good ways to protect against a stab to the chest, less ways to protect against a hit to the ankle.

But that's the modern day observation part of it. It's ofcourse flawed because we aren't trying to kill each other. That's why half of my theory comes from looking at history, and history tells us that shields were dropped fast once armour got better. History also shows us that there were very militaristic cultures who didn't even bother with shields alltogether except for the occasional pavise for stationary arrow protection.

So, based on what I've tried out and observed, and on what history tells us, I'd say this:

Shields are good for personal protection as they can block blows and missiles, but force the wielder to fight with less reach (or too much reach if you're carrying a long pike one handed, but this has the problem of allowing the opponent a safe zone after the pike's head). In a melee, this is a disadvantage as a person with a longer weapon can exploit the weaknesses in the shield user's defense while preventing the shield user from doing the same. The two-handed weapon user doesn't sacrifice much defense for that.

Btw, forgot to mention. I disagree strongly that two-handed weapons are inferior "because they need more space". Two-handed weapons don't need any more space then one handed weapons to be deadly.

[edit] Holy.... did I write that much?

Any thoughts to be had?

Oh yeah, I also ran across this quote on the RomanArmy Forum, which I had forgotten about (it's been a long time since I read Caesar), but which I thought was an interesting image:


Accordingly our men, upon the signal being given, vigorously made an attack upon the enemy, and the enemy so suddenly and rapidly rushed forward, that there was no time for casting the javelins at them. Throwing aside [therefore] their javelins, they fought with swords hand to hand. But the Germans, according to their custom, rapidly forming a phalanx, sustained the attack of our swords. There were found very many of our soldiers who leaped upon the phalanx, and with their hands tore away the shields, and wounded the enemy from above.


Caesar, The Gallic Wars, Book 1, Chapter 52.

Quite the image.

Oh, and one last thought, apparently Mounted Archers served alongside more regular Cavalry during Henry II's invasion of Ireland (Michael Prestwich, 'Miles in Armis Strenuus: The Knight at War' in Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, 6th Ser., Vol. 5. (1995), pp. 201-220). As with the Mounted Cross Bow Men, I cannot confirm whether they regularly fought from the saddle or not, but there you go.

[Fhaolan]

Okay, where to start... where to start...

Historically, if you stick with European cultures as a basis for theorizing, the heavier the armor the less they tended to use shields. That would imply that the shield's advantages/disadvantages ratio shifts relative to the protective abilities of the body armor.

In D&D terms (because that's common terminology for a lot of us), a shield's protective ability doesn't fully 'stack' with the protective ability of the body armor. The more protective the armor is, the less protection the shield can contribute to the overal 'Armor Class'. It will eventually reach the point that the shield is providing no effective protection, and is simply weighing you down.

My personal experience with sparring in maille, then in full armor, with and without shields bears this out. There comes a point when the shield is more annoying than helpful. Especially with later-period plate where the elbow cops and gauntlet cuffs restrict the shield movement.

Now, as for weapon length when used with shields, you can use any one-handed weapon with a shield. Including the spear, which is why spear and shield was a very popular combo with the Greeks and Vikings. Good reach, good protection, and the ability to fall into shield walls with very reasonable offensive capability.

[Swordguy]

There is also the point that, as armor technology developed, weapons wielded in a single hand became insufficient to penetrate the armor. Therefore, shields were eventually dropped to allow one to carry a weapon capable of defeating the armor (which in turn forced armor to become thicker, etc.).

[tiaxrulesall]

-Does anyone know what typical viking raiders would be armed and armored with, or what the local villages of england or scotland or wherever would commonly have on hand to repel them.

-Also any info on the common usage of viking longboats would be helpful, how many men they could fit, how many they needed, how far they could go, how fast, how shallow draft, anything.

-thanks all =)

[Matthew]

Spear and Shield for most, probably also a Knife or 'Seax'. A Long Axe, Javelin or Bow would also be possible, either in addition to a Spear or as an alternative. 'Padded Armour', maybe Leather, possibly a Helmet.
Richer Vikings and their followers would have access to more expensive Body Armour, such as Mail, Scale or Lamellar, Iron Helmet and 'Viking Swords' (Masterwork Long Sword). Almost certainly they would have a secondary weapon, such as a Dagger or Short Sword (whether double or single edged.

The inhabitants of England would have had access to very similar weaponry.

A Viking Long Ship might hold anything from thirty up to three hundred, depending on the size of the ship. One hundred and twenty might be typical. They were clinker built, which meant they were fast and had a long range.

[Thiel]

how many men they could fit
On modern reproductions each crew member has 0.8 square meters to himself.


how far they could go
They did find their way to Newfoundland and some of them made it as far as the eastern part of the Mediterranean

[Fhaolan]

Matthew's pretty much covered it, but I do have to mention some odd things I've run across that I haven't managed to find supporting evidence for. Some translations of the various Viking sagas apparantly mention 'halberds' and 'catapults'. I've not actually found these translations, so I can't backtrack them to find out to what they are actually referring to.

I learned about the viking 'halberd' from a weapons catalog, so big grain of salt there. It looked a lot like the standard viking greataxe, but with a long pointed beard and mounted upside-down so the beard pointed upwards.

I learned about the viking 'catapult' from a 'how to build your own catapult' book that covered onagers, trebuchet, etc. In the very back, in an appendix, was some speculation about viking catapults. What they came up with was basically a huge one-man slingshot, using oars lashed together to provide a framework.

Again, I've not managed to find any supporting evidence for these things, but I thought they were interesting enough to mention.

[Thiel]

Another thing worth noting is that a longboat is very light compared to other crafts of similar size because it's hull is only one inch thick.
Take one of them out of the water and it becomes all wobbly.

[Dervag]

So, given that the longboats have advantages, what are their disadvantages? All engineering decisions are tradeoffs; what were Norse shipwrights trading off to build the perfect long-range infantry landing craft?

[Thiel]

A longboat isn't designed for ship to ship combat.
Also, the ship offers almost no cover for the crew.

[Swordguy]

So, given that the longboats have advantages, what are their disadvantages? All engineering decisions are tradeoffs; what were Norse shipwrights trading off to build the perfect long-range infantry landing craft?

Not all that much room for stores, little capacity to resist damage, a very high level of skill required to make one and a long production cycle, no cover for the crew from the elements.

[Dervag]

Not all that much room for stores, little capacity to resist damage, a very high level of skill required to make one and a long production cycle, no cover for the crew from the elements.I'm trying to remember how Alfred the Great countered the Viking raids. Does anyone have a clear explanation of that, or a link to such an explanation?

[Norsesmithy]

I'm trying to remember how Alfred the Great countered the Viking raids. Does anyone have a clear explanation of that, or a link to such an explanation?
He did it with guerilla raids, and kept them out with castles, but even then it wasn't completely or permanately successful.

The Vikings Alfred fought were no petty raiders, they had caputured 4/5ths of the island. He managed to confine them to 2/3rds of the country.

They were playing for keeps, and their decendents still live there today.

[Dervag]

OK, granted.

Note that I'm using the term 'Viking' deliberately, as distinct from 'Norse'. Unless I'm much mistaken, most of the Norsemen in England were in fact Vikings, operating on their own initiative to carve out whatever lands they could find.

I more or less automatically called the Vikings 'raiders,' but I should probably not do so. The actions that carved out the Danelaw were definitely not raids. In the nineteenth century they would have been called 'filibustering expeditions;' I don't know what they'd be called today.

[Matthew]

Hmmn. I think he was forced into Guerilla combat for a while and then defeated them in battle. Castles (Burgs, technically, there's a big problem using the nomenclature of Castle to describe these things) were definitely key to protecting against raids, in France and maybe Germany, as much as England. I don't know whether the situation was similar in Ireland. Definitely an interesting question, have to do some more research.

Fhaolan, it's interesting that you mention Viking Halberds. On the front of my copy of the Oxford Illustrated History of the Vikings (http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=nJqf8e1vHFgC&dq=Oxford+Illustrated+History+of+the+Vikings&pg=PP1&ots=W6lMDR3ljh&sig=OqbHAQVtZJ3mjYwJpDfCKKhdUHI&prev=http://www.google.co.uk/search%3Fhl%3Den%26q%3DOxford%2BIllustrated%2BHist ory%2Bof%2Bthe%2BVikings%26meta%3D&sa=X&oi=print&ct=title#PPP1,M1) there is a twelfth century manuscript illumination of several boatloads of Vikings. The very faintly discerned weapons are mainly spears, but here and there is the odd 'Long Axe', which do vaguely resemble Halberds.

The siege machine stuff, probably refers to the Siege of Paris. Edmund, no doubt, knows more about all this, but I haven't seen him around in a while.

The Wikipedia Article seems fairly stable and detailed: Alfred the Great (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alfred_the_Great)

Forgot to say, developing an effective Navy was key to protecting against raiding.

[Aramil Liadon]

The way I understand the Viking raids (not sure about permanent conquest), they just sailed in, dumped 200 armed and strong young men into village that had maybe 1000 people, tops, and proceeded to kill people before they could get armed themselves, then leave before an effective defense could be mustered. They just hit every village along the coast like that, then came back to base with a load of cash and almost no casualties. I suppose they could have just killed a whole village and rebuilt on top of it, but I don't really picture them as doing that sort of thing. Not that I would know firsthand, of course.
@v: It seems the local vernacular that I use is different to that commonly accepted. I'll just go hide in a corner and read a dictionary, shall I?
Edit: I'm back. Man, we speak all slang-like over here. Strange.

[Matthew]

Erm. Well, forgive me, but that doesn't sound like a very sophisticated understanding of what may or may not have occurred. Given that you are not just having a joke, here is a link to the Viking Wikipedia Article (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viking). Whilst it only really brushes the surface, the article and those it links to provide a basis on which to build an understanding the 'Vikings'.

[tiaxrulesall]

-Just clarifing a few points based on the forum posts and wiki article, please correct me if this is incorect.

-So the vikings and their enemies fought with spears and shields maybe axes, and were lightly armored. Only nobles or leaders would likely have metal armor or carried swords. Horned helmets were entirely a myth.

-Longships could carry many men fast and long distances up rivers, and un/load quickly, but couldn't fight at sea or carry cargo effectily, which the vikings had other ships for.

-Although famed for pillaging and raiding, the vikings aparently were mainly traders, explorers, and colonists.

-The causes of the viking age are disputed but focus on either an overpopulated homeland, or the oportunities for profit availiable in a torn and conflicted europe without centralised government or much trade.

-The viking age ended because of development of a feudal system in scandanavia, and increasingly effective and organised coastal defenses in places they would have raided.

[Om]

-Although famed for pillaging and raiding, the vikings aparently were mainly traders, explorers, and colonists.One generally led to the other. If we look at Ireland we see that the first Viking presence on the island was based entirely around raids of the rich monasteries. Within a century however permanent settlements had been laid down - originally to facilitate raids further inland but later taking on important roles as trade posts.

[Matthew]

So the vikings and their enemies fought with spears and shields maybe axes, and were lightly armored. Only nobles or leaders would likely have metal armor or carried swords. Horned helmets were entirely a myth.
Axes of all sizes would have been reasonably common, but Spears much moreso. These are not iron clad, though, you could expect to see some variety in weaponry. At least one Mace appears to be represented on the Bayeux Tapestry alongside more traditional weaponry, for instance.
Body Armour would not exactly be restricted to only Nobles or Leaders, it would depend on the wealth of any given group. A leader who could afford to, would almost certainly hand out weapons and armour to his retainers.

Longships could carry many men fast and long distances up rivers, and un/load quickly, but couldn't fight at sea or carry cargo effectily, which the vikings had other ships for.
Whilst they weren't cargo ships, the less Men they carried, the more room there would have been for loot, slaves and legitimate cargo.

Although famed for pillaging and raiding, the vikings aparently were mainly traders, explorers, and colonists.
As Om says, these things tend to go hand in hand.

The causes of the viking age are disputed but focus on either an overpopulated homeland, or the oportunities for profit availiable in a torn and conflicted europe without centralised government or much trade.
Pretty much. The causes are disputed. One idea I have heard espoused was that they were triggered by Carolingian expansion.

The viking age ended because of development of a feudal system in scandanavia, and increasingly effective and organised coastal defenses in places they would have raided.
Just as difficult as the reasons the period began are the reasons it ended. No one factor seems to have been particularly responsible.

Read Beowulf, if you can get hold of a copy and have the time.

[Fhaolan]

Horned helmets were entirely a myth.


This is where we start getting into really odd areas of historical and archeological research. Horned helms *did* exist, people have just confused time periods and areas.

Horned helms have been found in archological digs in the Nordic areas like Denmark and Scandinavia, but they appear to have been imports (or loot) from Celtic regions and are bronze age/early iron age, not the classic 'Viking' period most people think about. Given the odd proportions and balance of these helms, it's very unlikely they were meant to be worn in battle.

The Celts had this tendency towards highly decorative equipment, including helms with horns, antlers, wings, boar figureheads, etc. They were known to be some of the top metal-workers of the period, and are credited with the invention of maille shirts, and of the some styles of Roman helms. A lot of the really elaborate stuff was ceremonal, with gold and jewels and the like, and therefore was high on the list of 'good loot' for raiders.

[Wehrkind]

One really good (literature wise if not history wise) book about Alfred the Great and the Vikings is "The Last Kingdom" by Bernard Cornwall (if memory serves) (-bites a pepper-) It goes into a good bit of detail about the differences between British (well... protoBritish) culture and Norse culture through the eyes of a child captured by Norse and raised by them. Very good reading, even if you are not inclined towards historic fiction.

It was put forth to me from a grad student friend of mine who lives and breathes Norse that the raids and expansion of the Scandinavians likely stemmed from a cooling of the hemisphere, causing a reduction in arable land across the peninsula, which forced southern migration and the eventual movement and raiding as a pressure valve. Apparently ice cores support this or something... I probably started day dreaming of Imperial Legionaires slaughtering savage Norsement or something when she got to that point in the discourse. The iniquities of youth...

On shields: What Fhaolan and Sword Guy said. Shields are great for defense if your armor is not proof against most weapons, but if your body armor makes you mostly immune, why bother carrying a shield?

[levi]

So, did the Vikings have specialized cargo ships for hauling loot back from raids? Or did they just load it on the longships?

[Fhaolan]

It was put forth to me from a grad student friend of mine who lives and breathes Norse that the raids and expansion of the Scandinavians likely stemmed from a cooling of the hemisphere, causing a reduction in arable land across the peninsula, which forced southern migration and the eventual movement and raiding as a pressure valve. Apparently ice cores support this or something... I probably started day dreaming of Imperial Legionaires slaughtering savage Norsement or something when she got to that point in the discourse. The iniquities of youth...


Weirdly enough, I just heard this theory today. It was on some History or Discovery or something show that I wasn't really paying attention to as I was doing my physiotherapy exercises. Something about the Saxon/Angle/Jute migrations to England during the reign of the High King Vortigern being due to a minor continental shift that dropped the Nordic lowlands far enough to turn them into swamps.

I find anything that refers to Vortigern to be a bit suspect, though. He's connected to the Arthuran myths, which means the records about Vortigern get a bit weird in places. Vortigern became king in 420 or so, died in his castle when it burnt down in 447, then gave Ceint (Kent) to the Jutes in 449, and died again in 459. Cute trick.

[Wehrkind]

Her theory was definitely in lieu of climate change, not so much continental shifting. I only remember that because we had been talking about global warming. The conversation also spawned the slogan "Stop a Viking; burn some coal!" but we figured it was esoteric enough that no one would buy the bumpersticker.

I could see the other theory too. I can see peninsulas being unstable enough to wiggle around in such a manner, particularly if some climate change or even just jet stream change put more water into them.

[Adlan]

One theory I've heard was that a shortage (wether from over fishing or other causes) of herring, that staple of the north sea, caused people to go a viking.

[Wehrkind]

That seems a little too... focused to be the only factor. I could see it becoming a problem as farm land became less useful, forcing those living in the interior to move to the coast and fish, thus pushing fishing to it's limits with the technology of the time, but I am given to understand that they engaged in a good bit of agriculture and other farming pursuits, so its would seem that less fish would merely mean more farming.

[Thiel]

It was put forth to me from a grad student friend of mine who lives and breathes Norse that the raids and expansion of the Scandinavians likely stemmed from a cooling of the hemisphere, causing a reduction in arable land across the peninsula, which forced southern migration and the eventual movement and raiding as a pressure valve. Apparently ice cores support this or something... I probably started day dreaming of Imperial Legionaires slaughtering savage Norsement or something when she got to that point in the discourse. The iniquities of youth...

There isn't any geological evidence to support it AFAIK.
Quite the contrary actually, Norway and Sweden have been rising from the sea ever since the last ice age pushed them down. Denmark on the other hand is sinking.
And it's sinking slowly. We're talking about less than a squaremile of land per century lost to the sea.

[Om]

So what climate or geographical issue drove Rome, the Mongols or the Caliphate to expand? I can appreciate that climate change is a "hot issue" (no pun intended) at the moment but there's no need to feel compelled to apply such theories to history.

[13_CBS]

So what climate or geographical issue drove Rome, the Mongols or the Caliphate to expand? I can appreciate that climate change is a "hot issue" (no pun intended) at the moment but there's no need to feel compelled to apply such theories to history.

I was under the impression that many rulers/nations (such as Tamerlane) conquered mostly because they wanted to/ it made them feel cool. I wouldn't be surprised if the three nations you mentioned expanded not for climate reasons but for financial or egotistical reasons.

[my_evil_twin]

New question. Possibly the broadest question I've seen posted here, and for that I apologize.

What was the general character of weapons and armor in the British Isles in the 9th century AD/CE?

[Matthew]

Pretty much the same as those for the 'Viking' period, as far as can be seen. It's hard to say for sure, as the evidence is fairly sparce, but the general character of arms and armour, in broad terms, doesn't seem to change much from the late Roman period to the twelfth or thirteenth centuries. There are stylistic changes, for sure, and the level of availability probably fluctuated, but the basic mode of war seems to have been fairly consistant.

[Fhaolan]

Let's see. 9th century 'England'... Of course it wasn't called Angland until the 10th century, but let's not split hairs on this one. :smallsmile:

This is firmly into Anglo-Saxon rule. Technically there are multiple tribes, including Angles, Jutes, and Saxons, but at this point they are all collectively 'Anglo-Saxons'. The 'native' Bretons were firmly pushed out of the way into Wales and Cornwall, but even they were submitting to Anglo-Saxon rule at this point.

Anglo-Saxons were very fond of shield walls, and apparantly there was heavy use of javelins. Lots of chronicles around javelins. Shields were used offensively as well as defensively, lots of shield bashes and pushes, and according to the chronicles a lot of running full tilt at each other slaming shields together.

Swords and axes, very similar to Vikings. The Anglo-Saxons were in effect, settled Vikings, so there is very little difference between them. [Oddly enough, there is one real visual difference I know of, their tents. Anglo-Saxon tents look a lot like modern puptents, with a ridge-pole held up by a single pole on either end. The fabric is pegged down to give the tent-shape, and the poles are roped out for stability. Viking tents had an internal framework so technically you didn't need to stake them down or rope them out. Not really important, but I think it's interesting.]

As for armor, padded, leather, and maille would be the most common. I've seen references to breastplates in this time period, but I've never come across a picture or illustration so I'm not overly clear on what that actually means. Using the helms I've seen to theorize, the Anglo-Saxons tended to use smaller plates attached together rather than formed and shaped steel. This would indicate that a 'breastplate' might literally be a single plate of steel overing the chest, attached to leather or cloth, or something more like brigandine with mutiple small plates all made into one 'breastplate'.

Only the absolute richest/most powerful warriors had them.

[Adlan]

This is firmly into Anglo-Saxon rule. Technically there are multiple tribes, including Angles, Jutes, and Saxons, but at this point they are all collectively 'Anglo-Saxons'. The 'native' Bretons were firmly pushed out of the way into Wales and Cornwall, but even they were submitting to Anglo-Saxon rule at this point.

Sorry, but of nit picking here.
Culture, Native Romano-Brythonic Culture is pushed into wales and cornwall, or simply absorbed into Anglo Saxon culture, gentic studys ( See here (http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6VRT-48PV5SH-12&_coverDate=05%2F27%2F2003&_alid=339895807&_rdoc=1&_fmt=&_orig=search&_qd=1&_cdi=6243&_sort=d&view=c&_acct=C000049116&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=949111&md5=9edf5ce1c39d4139af4c01733282fa82) ) Indicate that even the most strongly Saxon/Viking Areas on mainland britain (York and Norfolk) are still 40% brythonic by Y chromosome testing. So the people were still there, and still are (I'm one of them).

back on topic.

Steel production during the Anglo-Saxon Era is entirely by bloomsbury forge, which makes good steel of any sort massivly expensive. Wrought iron would be used for most things, with a strip of steel forge welded to the edge. Swords would be Oakeshott X, and would be at best pattern welded (if we take the Sutton Who example as being one of the best). Pattern welding is the twisting of strands of iron and steal together to form a peice of metal stronger than the original wrought iron, without needing to be made entirely of steel.

[Matthew]

Yes indeed, it was not so much 'British' people that were dislocated, but their culture and language, which was gradually subsumed in 'conquered' areas. The conquered adopted the ways of the conqueror, as is fairly usual.

With regard to the steel production process, there is some controversy surrounding what was actually going on, which stems from our lack of knowledge about Ancient steel production processes and the sometimes contradictory evidence.
Pattern welding would have been the most reliable method for the production of 'good' quality swords and we know that Charlemagne forbid the sale of (presumably) these swords to the 'Northmen'. However, there is something of a grey area with regard to what role the 'Seax' may have played in all of this and what might have been the 'average' quality of any given sword.

The Anglo Saxon England (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Anglo-Saxon_England) Wikipedia Article might be a good starting point for anyone interested in the 'Dark Ages'.

[Om]

Just how common was steel in Anglo-Saxon England? I'd have thought that steel weapons would have been extremely rare due to the prohibitively high cost of the material :smallconfused:


I was under the impression that many rulers/nations (such as Tamerlane) conquered mostly because they wanted to/ it made them feel cool.And why can the same motives not be attributed to the Vikings?

My point above was simply that people tend to be far too eager to apply today's fashionable theories in circumstances where they aren't really warranted. Its possible that climate or ecological factors forced the Vikings to raid south but its also possible that they were motivated by the exact same greed that led to the establishment of every other power.

[Matthew]

Just how common was steel in Anglo-Saxon England? I'd have thought that steel weapons would have been extremely rare due to the prohibitively high cost of the material
We don't really know. It's hard to quantify something like that and there is a lot of debate as to what was and was not possible.

[Dervag]

-Although famed for pillaging and raiding, the vikings aparently were mainly traders, explorers, and colonists. My impression was that 'viking' was an activity, not a nationality.

The people who lived in Sweden, Denmark, and Norway were the 'Norsemen' (or at least that's the English name for them). Due to the factors others have described, many Norsemen had reasons to seek their fortune elsewhere. As a rule, this was a seasonal activity- the men were needed on the farms in some seasons but not in others, so they did something else that would be economically productive for the village during the off season.

Some of these Norsemen went off to trade, or went off permanently to settle in some other land (possibly by conquering it, as in England, and possibly by settling it for the first time, as in Iceland).

Others went to raid coastal communities for loot. The Norse word for what they were doing was 'viking,' which was used as a verb. A correct example of this usage would be "I went viking for my summer vacation." This was distinct from trading or colonization in the minds of the Norse, and so had its own word.

[Wehrkind]

And why can the same motives not be attributed to the Vikings?

My point above was simply that people tend to be far too eager to apply today's fashionable theories in circumstances where they aren't really warranted. Its possible that climate or ecological factors forced the Vikings to raid south but its also possible that they were motivated by the exact same greed that led to the establishment of every other power.

Because the Vikings/Norsemen didn't really do it like other folks. People used to raid their neighbors all the time, stealing things back and forth, before more centralized governments started to limit these less-than-war activities. The Norsemen however, seem to have started it up all of the sudden, and not just with neighbors, but going quite far in their attacks and colonization. That is also sort of the strange thing, they didn't just raid, or just colonize, but both. That is sort of wierd when you think about it. They didn't just take stuff and leave, like raiders. They didn't simply move an army in and take over, like conquerors. Whole populations suddenly moved to different places to live.

Now, I agree that there was certainly a good bit of prestige and personal agrandizement in the whole activity. Still, their actions seem a lot more reminiscent of the displaced barbarian tribes that were pressuring the Romans during the early centuries of the common era than folks who just wanted to swing over, take your things, and go home. That is to say, it seems a lot more like they were pushed into it by some other force.

[Matthew]

Frankish aggression, perhaps? Who knows? It's definitely a complicated problem, but the environmental explanation would only be a factor in a wider picture, I think; given the protracted character of the raids and colonisation and the establishment of (very) temporary Anglo-Scandanavian 'empires', it's hard to put it down to one thing. It's also worth noting that the 'Viking' raids are part of a longer tradition of piratical and 'colonial' activity stretching back at least to the end of Roman rule in Britain.

Viking does indeed appear to have been used more commonly as a verb, but it is also used as a noun (not necessarily to denote a culture, often simply meaning Pirate, as did Saracen at some point - now there's a word with an interesting etymology and usage!). There are at least two competing (and possibly complementary) etymologies. Current usage, in English, is mainly as a noun, but I think it is a fairly isolated usage of the term.

[Stephen_E]

There isn't any geological evidence to support it AFAIK.
Quite the contrary actually, Norway and Sweden have been rising from the sea ever since the last ice age pushed them down. Denmark on the other hand is sinking.
And it's sinking slowly. We're talking about less than a squaremile of land per century lost to the sea.

The slow rising or sinking of the land masses doesn't directly effect the climate of the regions (although it can have secondary effects). The secondary effect can be things such as the change of drainage patterns, and this can increase or decrease arable land. Note that the movement causes change, but the direction of movement is irrelevant to whether the change is good or bad for resident humans.

The concept of climate changes been the orginal basis for population shifts isn't a new idea linked to Global Warming. The idea has been considered virtually from the 1st point that it was realsied that climatic changes occurred. AFAIK it's been the primary theory for a number of population shifts. Note: We're talking about the original basis. Once a pattern of behaviour has started it can easily outlast the reason for its existance.

Re: Conquest for self-agradisation. This works with a strong central leadership. In the case of the Norse my impression was that this didn't exist, and that the raids and voyages were done on much lower ground swell basis.

Re: Frankish pressure. While not impossible, in general people tend to move towards the better envioriment or greater wealth. In both cases this would suggest any Frankish pressure should've been primarily southwards.

In short, a cold spell (or any other reason that impacted local food production) over a decade or two would be quite adequate to produce a surge in raiding and colonisation for several centuries, until circumstances changed to the point that raiding and mini-colonisation attempts became viewed as ineffective/counter-productive.

Stephen

[Uraseshade]

Well Titanium of any reasonable purity is pretty soft. It has lots of tensile strength for its weight, but compared to most other metals it acts kind of like rubber.

Titanium carbide, however, trades purity and tensile strength for hardness, resulting in a somewhat brittle composition.

Neither is very good for bladed weaponry (fine for tools, bad for weapons).

Combine this with how difficult titanium is to work (have to cast, forge, or weld titanium in pure argon, as it is highly reactive when hot) and you have a real loser for the purposes you describe.

Despite the advances in materials technology, carbon steel remains the best choice for a bladed weapon, unless you have access to a foundary and hundreds of thousands of dollars in specialized production equipment, in which case Tungsten Nickel Steel is probably the best, but it is likely too difficult for anything but a highly experienced specialist to work with.

Also Kevlar is noticable weak against cutting forces, a simple knife can defeat Class III kevlar armour, and that stuff is supposed to be proof of highpowered rifles at point blank range.

For grabbing a blade I would recomend leather backed by maille (leather on the outside, perhaps another layer of leather inside the maille) or articulated plate gauntlets, perhaps with a leather false palm outside the articulated plates.

From my experience, I can tell you that forging a blade is a far more involved process than it seems when you are still all pencil and paper.

What do you intend to use as a fuel to heat the metal?

Thanks.

And... I'm not sure... I've never bothered with that stuff but.. rocket fuel? 8D *Kidding*


He may not be free to answer that question for reasons of clan secrecy, Norsesmithy.

Yeah, that's right. If I told ya, I'd have to SHOOT ya. ...KIDDING!!!

Nah, I can't say 'cause I DUNNO lol

[Hades]

maybe Leather

I tried to comment on this earlier, but my internet has been having issues.

Anyway, I am somewhat surprised that no-one else has said anything, but I think it should be mentioned that the "maybe Leather" armour of the viking raider should more properly read "maybe magically enchanted reindeer hide armour(that could really just be enchanted normal shirts) that only exists in this one saga and never is mentioned anywhere else."

The general consensus among the armour research crowd seems to indicate that leather was rather rarely used as armour, not necesarilly due to difficulties in its use or scarcity, but rather that textile armour can be layered in such a way as to make it more efficient, if metal armour cannot be obtained.

In any case, multiple layers of woolen clothing for your typical Norseman should do quite nicely as armour.

ETA: The source for lamellar also, comes from one find only (Birka), which has, I believe, been now credited to a foreign influence, either trade or a foreign visitor. Really, stick with maille and clothes if you want to be as historically accurate as possible.

[Matthew]

It depends what people conceive of as 'Leather Armour'. I didn't want to rule it out because it as potentially used as part of the Gambeson (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gambeson). There's also the possibility that Leather Lamellar Body Armour (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lamellar_armour) was employed. Leather might also be used for helmets and limb armour. The 'maybe' was meant to relate to the dubious historic credability of its use by 'Vikings'.
The same sort of thing goes for Lamellar Armour; it would certainly not have been common, but it would be unwise not to admit the possibility. The fact that it's a 'foreign' armour type means little, since many 'Viking Swords' were also, by and large, of 'foreign' manufacture and design. As an analogue, it's worth remembering that little enough evidence survives in the archaeological and visual record for Viking use of Mail and Helmets .

[Edit]It's certainly true that Armour Researchers are increasingly moving away from Leather as a likely effective Body Armour in favour of 'Textile'.

[Hades]

True enough. I know the Scots made use of leather cotuns/gambesons, though this is somewhat later in time period

On the lamellar, it seems to farther east one goes the higher the possibility of use by "vikings." Especially with Scandinavians and Rus in the Varangian guard, connections with eastern armour and such would be possible.

I believe there has been a find of a small buddha statue somewhere in scandinavia, but it may have been some sort of joke...

[Wehrkind]

What are the reasons for the backpeddaling from leather used as armor?
It makes rather nice, low maintenance armor in my experience... though I have no personal experience with textile armor as such.

[Fhaolan]

I'm not sure why the backpedaling. I've found, in personal experience, some issues with leather-style armors but nothing that invalidates it as armor. I just don't have the time to go through all the experimentation needed to get it 'right'. :smallsmile:

I've found several different ways to harden leather for cuir-boili, but I've not been overly successful in any of them. It might just be my lack of skill in them, but I've found that even when I end up with hard leather, it either is too brittle to use as armor, or it softens while you wear it. I've tried water, oil, and wax methods. It's probably an issue of having the right combination of materials and the correct temperature, and time of exposure of the leather.

[SpiderBrigade]

I've found several different ways to harden leather for cuir-boili, but I've not been overly successful in any of them. It might just be my lack of skill in them, but I've found that even when I end up with hard leather, it either is too brittle to use as armor, or it softens while you wear it. I've tried water, oil, and wax methods. It's probably an issue of having the right combination of materials and the correct temperature, and time of exposure of the leather.It might also have to do with how the leather has been treated before the boiling process as well, although this might be something you're already taking into account.

As far as modern experience with leather armor goes, I'm not sure that it would be all that helpful in determining how practical something was in a given time period - mainly because most modern users are not in situations where people are trying to kill them through the armor. So you can learn a lot about how well the armor can be worn, how flexible it is, etc. Figuring out how well it stops an enemy from harming you is another story, I think.