Got a Real-World Weapon, Armor or Tactics Question? Mk. XXVII

[The Jack]

I'm curious: Can someone answer me why eastern Asia seems to have a much stronger traditional of unarmed combat styles than other parts of the world?

Because we used guns more, we marginalized our warrior caste, and there's a big social difference between nations that progressed themselves (or only stole increments) and nations that adopted massive progress from others. The short of it is that those at the front of development tend to say 'bugger the past' whilst those who have technology thrust upon them strive to keep traditions.


Europeans largely ended nobility being a big deal 300-400 years ago, we don't care for tales of knights like the japanese care for samurai (who've only been gone for about 150 years) or the thai who had a king that gambled his country on a boxing match. So we're more distanced and we care less.

[hymer]

While we're on the subject of unarmed martial arts:

What style of unarmed fighting goes better with what body type? If you'd prefer to narrow it down, pick a martial art or a body type and match it on the other end.

[jjordan]

I'm curious: Can someone answer me why eastern Asia seems to have a much stronger traditional of unarmed combat styles than other parts of the world?
Good question and there are a lot of theories on the subject. I mostly subscribe to the idea that 'forward thinking' led to abandoning the past. But there's also the fact that in the East martial arts are also a path to physical health, so much so that martial arts masters frequently did double duty as physicians.

In the off chance that people are not aware of the rich tradition of European martial arts I'll drop a link to Wicktenauer so you can explore the material. I'm particularly fond of Fiore dei Liberi's work which integrates unarmed and armed combat in a full spectrum system. https://wiktenauer.com/

[HeadlessMermaid]

I'm afraid I don't know enough about the history or culture of other SE Asian countries to comment, nor enough about the history of Greece to say why pankration (7th Century BC) didn't persist whereas Chinese ones did.
One way to think about the continuity of martial arts (or sports) is to consider the continuity of the institutions and social spaces that foster them.


Pankration was a sport in the Olympic Games, and these stopped abruptly around 400 CE, abolished along with other practices that the Roman Empire(s), now with a new official state religion, considered pagan. They were already in decline before that.
It was performed in various gladiatorial events, but these were also abolished for the same reason, or replaced by other spectacles.
It was practised in gymnasiums, social spaces where people met, trained, gossiped, argued, flirted, and networked quite a lot - and then they'd scape all the mud off, put their clothes back on, and go about their businesses. These social spaces didn't survive late antiquity.
Earlier, pankration was used in the military training of city-states that were gobbled up by the Roman Empire, and (AFAIK) it didn't get adopted by the Roman army, or any other.

So there was simply no institution or social space left to keep it going. It did last a thousand years though (even if we can't be sure how much it changed and evolved during that time).


Because we used guns more, we marginalized our warrior caste, and there's a big social difference between nations that progressed themselves (or only stole increments) and nations that adopted massive progress from others. The short of it is that those at the front of development tend to say 'bugger the past' whilst those who have technology thrust upon them strive to keep traditions.

Europeans largely ended nobility being a big deal 300-400 years ago, we don't care for tales of knights like the japanese care for samurai (who've only been gone for about 150 years) or the thai who had a king that gambled his country on a boxing match. So we're more distanced and we care less.
...I humbly suggest you don't use first person for things you didn't actually accomplish yourself, it tends to skew one's perspective.

[Brother Oni]

Heavier than most swords but lighter than the Jian?

I think you're fundamentally mis-understading something about maces.

Sword inflict their damage via a sharp edge or point, thus they can very light and still be effective weapons. Maces inflict their damage either via their mass or through armour defeating points/beaks - since the bar mace jian has neither of the latter features, it's reliant on mass.

You can't extend a one handed bar mace jian to near the length of a Tie Jian and still expect it to have the same shape, structural integrity and effectiveness without the associated weight. Physics simply doesn't work that way.

If you compromised on the shape and went for a western bar mace, you can achieve what you want; a longer weapon without excessive weight.

https://www.windlass.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/0000946_0.jpeg

If you made your character inhumanly strong (strength/agility maxed out doesn't mean much if you don't state the game system), then you could potentially use a dan jian or dan bian with only one hand.

Edit: sorry, I mis-read the translation for the Dan Bian (it's comparable to the Dan Jian bar mace).


Europeans largely ended nobility being a big deal 300-400 years ago, we don't care for tales of knights like the japanese care for samurai (who've only been gone for about 150 years) or the thai who had a king that gambled his country on a boxing match. So we're more distanced and we care less.

The continual fixation on King Arthur, chivalry and Charlemagne will tend to disagree with you on that. There's also the British peerage system where the lowest rank is knight and still carries on to this day; meanwhile, all the samurai were effectively fired at the beginning of the Meiji period and the remnants of the Japanese peerage system was abolished in 1947.


While we're on the subject of unarmed martial arts:

What style of unarmed fighting goes better with what body type? If you'd prefer to narrow it down, pick a martial art or a body type and match it on the other end.

I find it's more mindset and personality that affects unarmed fighting preference; while a tall person may gravitate towards kicks and 'keep at a distance' fighting and a short person might like close range infighting, it's their personal preferences and learning opportunities that matter more.

As an example, I know of people of around my height (5'7") that much prefer evasive, stay at a distance fighting - I'm more of an in-fighter from both necessity (most people in my weight class are at least 4-5" taller than me) and personality.


One way to think about the continuity of martial arts (or sports) is to consider the continuity of the institutions and social spaces that foster them.

Thank you - I was thinking it was something along those lines, but didn't know how to articulate it without possibly over-emphasising the cultural tendency of continuing traditions in China and Japan.

[Shuruke]

I think you're fundamentally mis-understading something about maces.

Sword inflict their damage via a sharp edge or point, thus they can very light and still be effective weapons. Maces inflict their damage either via their mass or through armour defeating points/beaks - since the bar mace jian has neither of the latter features, it's reliant on mass.

You can't extend a one handed bar mace jian to near the length of a Tie Jian and still expect it to have the same shape, structural integrity and effectiveness without the associated weight. Physics simply doesn't work that way.

If you compromised on the shape and went for a western bar mace, you can achieve what you want; a longer weapon without excessive weight.


I'm not really misunderstanding I don't think
The Jian from my understanding was also capable of thrusts because of its point

All I am wondering is if it would be impossible to have it longer by about 12% -15%

This could probably be accomplished by making it slightly less thick

This could be done by instead of having the rod its built around being
Forte 21 mm
Middle 14 mm
Tip 10 mm
And 34 inches

All I am wondering is if
Forte 18 mm
Middle 11mm
Tip 7mm
And it being longer by a few inches

Would cause it to be unrealistic

Or in better words

Make a rapier blunt on the sides keeping its Sharpe point
Make it inches shorter
And 2 or 3 lbs heavier


If this is unrealistic ok that's all I was wondering I just dont completely understand topoc so am grasping at straws

The game would be 5e dnd
Character has 20 dex 20 str

[hymer]

I find it's more mindset and personality that affects unarmed fighting preference; while a tall person may gravitate towards kicks and 'keep at a distance' fighting and a short person might like close range infighting, it's their personal preferences and learning opportunities that matter more.
I don't doubt that you're right. But the question interests me all the same. :smallsmile:

[gkathellar]

If we make it a mix if the two it'd be shorter than rapier and slightly lighter than breaker while retaining the shape of breaker for hitting wrists etc and allow agile use like rapier?

It wouldn't work the way you're hoping. A rapier works because it is pointy. It is a weapon specifically meant for poking holes in people's organs while keeping them at a distance with a strong guard. If you take away the point, it can't do its job.

That said, there are systems of fighting with agile blunt weapons - specifically, stick-fighting systems. In the right hands, single-stick is plenty dangerous, capable of striking hard and fast enough to snap bones. What's worth noting is that stick-fighting doesn't really depend on weight, but rather on good technique and kinetic linkage. In particular, the fingers are critical, as their coordinated movement can be much quicker than that of the elbow. For this sort of technique, a heavier stick only helps so long as the cost in speed and power is less than the benefit of that weight.


While we're on the subject of unarmed martial arts:

What style of unarmed fighting goes better with what body type? If you'd prefer to narrow it down, pick a martial art or a body type and match it on the other end.

That's a huge question, but one interesting refrain you'll hear in styles with low stances is that longer legs aren't necessarily better. Bigger people run into all sorts of square-cubed issues with managing their own weight, have naturally higher centers of gravity, and may not be able to rotate their waists as quickly as someone smaller. As a long-legged guy, I'll tell you that my stances are always higher than I want them to be, and it's a constant struggle to lower them. This is even true in styles that feature a lot of kicking (in more traditional forms of Tae Kwon Do, for instance), and can be true in weapon arts as well. Conversely, longer arms are almost always better, not just for offense but for defense as well.

I knew a smaller karate master with short arms and legs, superb in sparring, who depended a lot on hitting really hard and focusing on a mix of mind-games and the single-strike aesthetic of his style. One thing he liked to emphasize was that you should punish people for blocking or attacking by making the impacts hurt the opponent as much as possible. Wasn't really an in-fighter, but rather a hit-and-run alpha striker.

[Brother Oni]

This could be done by instead of having the rod its built around being
Forte 21 mm
Middle 14 mm
Tip 10 mm
And 34 inches

All I am wondering is if
Forte 18 mm
Middle 11mm
Tip 7mm
And it being longer by a few inches

Would cause it to be unrealistic


I assume those measurements are the radii?

Let's model the Jian bar mace as a uniform truncated cone (ignoring the hilt and the middle bulge for the sake of my sanity).


V = ((pi*h)/3))*(R2 + Rr +r2)

Where h = 863.6 mm (34"), R = 21mm, r = 10mm.

This gives a volume of 679.2 cm3 and assuming it's made out of pure iron (8g/cm3), that makes it 5.4kg or 12.0lbs.


Using h = 1066.8mm (42"), R=18mm, r=7mm

This gives a volume of 557cm3 and assuming the same material, 4.5kg or 9.8lbs


Using h = 1066.8mm (38"), R=18mm, r=7mm

This gives a volume of 504cm3 and assuming the same material, 4.0kg or 8.9lbs


So it's possible to make it longer and still seem reasonable, just not at the weight you want.

Backcalculating from your desired weight of 5lb, your length of 42" and keeping the dimensions in the same proportions gives me a mace of 12mm forte and 6mm tip. Calculating the tensile strength of an iron bar is a bit beyond my knowledge of physics, but it seems very thin for a combat weapon to me.

Bringing the length back down to 38", gives me a mace of 12mm forte and 7mm tip, so not much better.


The game would be 5e dnd
Character has 20 dex 20 str

DEX has no external yardstick, but 20 STR in 5th Ed equates to being able to bench 600lbs if I'm reading it correctly. Looking at people who can bench press 600lbs, you're not having a thin lithe character.

[Draconi Redfir]

not sure if applicable to this thread buuut... i can't think of anywhere else to put it other then the "mad science and grumpy technology" subforum and idk if it'd fit there either...

Do you think the Industrial Revolution could be possible without the (Internal?) Combustion Engine?

Want to try and make a game somewhere in the mid IR with things like very basic computers, wired communication, street-lights, printing press, and working gunpowder, but i don't want things like Cars and Trains to be around yet.

figure electricity could be generated through the old means of boiling water to form steam to spin a turbine. Not sure if that counts as an External combustion engine or not though.

[Shuruke]

It wouldn't work the way you're hoping. A rapier works because it is pointy. It is a weapon specifically meant for poking holes in people's organs while keeping them at a distance with a strong guard. If you take away the point, it can't do its job.

That said, there are systems of fighting with agile blunt weapons - specifically, stick-fighting systems. In the right hands, single-stick is plenty dangerous, capable of striking hard and fast enough to snap bones. What's worth noting is that stick-fighting doesn't really depend on weight, but rather on good technique and kinetic linkage. In particular, the fingers are critical, as their coordinated movement can be much quicker than that of the elbow. For this sort of technique, a heavier stick only helps so long as the cost in speed and power is less than the benefit of that weight.
.

I understand the rapier works because it is pointy

Im not sure if I'm just not being clear or what's going on

But to make it very simple

What I have in mind would

1. Be made from a square bar like thing with that's edges aren't meant for cutting

2. Itd be thicker than a rapier but thinner than jian

3. Would be either same weight as jian despite being thinner due to being few inches longer. Or slightly lighter

4. Would come to a point like any stabby thing.

Googling rapier (I know this may not be accurate but that's why I'm here)
It says roughly 2.2 lbs and 41 inches
The Jian had said 5.3 at 34 inches

So is their any realistic way to find the halfway point between the maneuverability of rapier , being blunt along blade as it comes to point
And heavier while being shorter

[gkathellar]

not sure if applicable to this thread buuut... i can't think of anywhere else to put it other then the "mad science and grumpy technology" subforum and idk if it'd fit there either...

Do you think the Industrial Revolution could be possible without the (Internal?) Combustion Engine?

Want to try and make a game somewhere in the mid IR with things like very basic computers, wired communication, street-lights, printing press, and working gunpowder, but i don't want things like Cars and Trains to be around yet.

figure electricity could be generated through the old means of boiling water to form steam to spin a turbine. Not sure if that counts as an External combustion engine or not though.

The industrial revolution wasn't brought about by the internal combustion engine. It was brought about by vastly improved efficiency in coal-fired steam power, arguably because of weird historical circumstances involving the need for more efficient pumps to get access to underwater coal for use in heating people's homes. Steam power had been a known quantity for thousands of years, but it was generally not cost-effective. However, steam-powered pumps using coal that was already on site made sense, and as engineers made improvements to the pumps, they gradually developed steam power efficient enough to actually do things.

Virtually all non-solar power today is generated by turbines, usually via some variation on steam. Oil, coal, natural gas, and nuclear power all work on the principle of "get water hot enough to spin a turbine." So, yes, in the absence of the internal combustion engine (perhaps because of a lack of viable fuel?), most modern tech would still be possible. However, if you have turbines, you're almost certainly going to have steam locomotives. Them's the breaks.

[Brother Oni]

Googling rapier (I know this may not be accurate but that's why I'm here)
It says roughly 2.2 lbs and 41 inches
The Jian had said 5.3 at 34 inches

So is their any realistic way to find the halfway point between the maneuverability of rapier , being blunt along blade as it comes to point
And heavier while being shorter

In my opinion, not while retaining a reasonable thickness circular cross-section and your required weight for one handed use. Change the shape of the mace 'blade' and you can.

[Shuruke]

In my opinion, not while retaining a reasonable thickness circular cross-section and your required weight for one handed use. Change the shape of the mace 'blade' and you can.

Okay thanks ^.^ not trying to sound mean or anything I was just really confused on how what I kept saying kept getting interpretated weirdly.

So would it be better for it to be cylinder blade coming to a point? Kinda like a heavier cavalier rapier ?

[The Jack]

...I humbly suggest you don't use first person for things you didn't actually accomplish yourself, it tends to skew one's perspective.
The bigger problem is the ambiguity.

I don't use 'we' for accomplishment, I use 'we' for mindset.
I've moved around a lot in my life so I don't comfortably think of myself as belonging to any particular nation or cultural group.
I am however, future thinking. Part of a long tradition of people who question tradition. It's not wrong to use 'we' when thinking of like-minded people, people in your profession or hobby, or as part of a general movement.


I
The continual fixation on King Arthur, chivalry and Charlemagne will tend to disagree with you on that. There's also the British peerage system where the lowest rank is knight and still carries on to this day; meanwhile, all the samurai were effectively fired at the beginning of the Meiji period and the remnants of the Japanese peerage system was abolished in 1947.

.

A very, very tiny minority of... Britain, as I can't speak for europe, know what the hell went on with king arthur. We don't know the difference between the swords, we don't know who was on the round table, and the movies all suck ass. The average brit thinks the whole thing is humorously pompous, the best known bit is that lancelot cucked his king. King arthur's stuff's more parodied than seriously thought of; Monty Python and the wholy grail is the definitive take on the Arthurian mythos for a lot of us. Britons aren't going to be interested in HEMA from Arthur, generations have given us the conclusion that he's silly, whilst Asian veneration of historical/mythological figures is more genuine and conductive to an interest in marital arts.

as for Charlemagne... the dude's completely unknown by a lot of Europeans (probably everyone he didn't conquer).
Maybe you're hanging around the special circles (this is a DnD forum) but I don't think the average person's very into that part of history/mythology.
Something I've noticed is that Americans, Asians and Australians have an interest in areas of medieval Europe/myth that europeans don't. I'm sure people in the new worlds pine for a vivid past of their cultural roots as their own country's young, but most europeans don't look past their history classes.

As my Indian friends have put it; "Indian food, or as I call it; food" and 'temples are for tourists" (Well, that's their young-modern attitude, they've clarified that some people take it seriously)
Some things are more interesting for outsiders than they are for natives.

[Storm_Of_Snow]

not sure if applicable to this thread buuut... i can't think of anywhere else to put it other then the "mad science and grumpy technology" subforum and idk if it'd fit there either...

Do you think the Industrial Revolution could be possible without the (Internal?) Combustion Engine?

Want to try and make a game somewhere in the mid IR with things like very basic computers, wired communication, street-lights, printing press, and working gunpowder, but i don't want things like Cars and Trains to be around yet.

figure electricity could be generated through the old means of boiling water to form steam to spin a turbine. Not sure if that counts as an External combustion engine or not though.
As gkathellar said, the Industrial Revolution was brought about by steam power, not the ICE - we're really talking the mid-18th to early 19th centuries, and the ICE isn't really around until the 1820s, and only becomes viable by the late 19th century.

For the things you mention, some things are already there - there's coal gas for street lighting, plenty of gunpowder (the period basically ends with the end of the Napoleonic Wars) and the printing press is old hat. A working computer's more tricky - you could potentially have a small, pre-Babbage mechanical calculator, but nothing electronic (the materials science isn't really up to it at the time), and an electrical telegraph's equally unlikely, which means you're into signal telegraphs (what The Clacks in the Discworld noves was based on).

Another thing to remember for that mid-Revolution period is that you're pretty much in the middle of the French Revolution as well - given science and learning in that era was mainly in the realms of the nobility, there's likely French scientists who've emigrated (with varying distances ahead of the mob, which may mean they've had to abandon their work), and some who had terminal meetings with Madame Guillotine. And with the American War of Independence, the Seven Years war, skirmishes and outright conflict in the European colonies (India especially) and the Napoleonic Wars, you've got at least some of the scientists and engineers more focussed on military improvements than civilian ones.

[Draconi Redfir]

The industrial revolution wasn't brought about by the internal combustion engine. It was brought about by vastly improved efficiency in coal-fired steam power, arguably because of weird historical circumstances involving the need for more efficient pumps to get access to underwater coal for use in heating people's homes. Steam power had been a known quantity for thousands of years, but it was generally not cost-effective. However, steam-powered pumps using coal that was already on site made sense, and as engineers made improvements to the pumps, they gradually developed steam power efficient enough to actually do things.

Virtually all non-solar power today is generated by turbines, usually via some variation on steam. Oil, coal, natural gas, and nuclear power all work on the principle of "get water hot enough to spin a turbine." So, yes, in the absence of the internal combustion engine (perhaps because of a lack of viable fuel?), most modern tech would still be possible. However, if you have turbines, you're almost certainly going to have steam locomotives. Them's the breaks.


As gkathellar said, the Industrial Revolution was brought about by steam power, not the ICE - we're really talking the mid-18th to early 19th centuries, and the ICE isn't really around until the 1820s, and only becomes viable by the late 19th century.

For the things you mention, some things are already there - there's coal gas for street lighting, plenty of gunpowder (the period basically ends with the end of the Napoleonic Wars) and the printing press is old hat. A working computer's more tricky - you could potentially have a small, pre-Babbage mechanical calculator, but nothing electronic (the materials science isn't really up to it at the time), and an electrical telegraph's equally unlikely, which means you're into signal telegraphs (what The Clacks in the Discworld noves was based on).

Another thing to remember for that mid-Revolution period is that you're pretty much in the middle of the French Revolution as well - given science and learning in that era was mainly in the realms of the nobility, there's likely French scientists who've emigrated (with varying distances ahead of the mob, which may mean they've had to abandon their work), and some who had terminal meetings with Madame Guillotine. And with the American War of Independence, the Seven Years war, skirmishes and outright conflict in the European colonies (India especially) and the Napoleonic Wars, you've got at least some of the scientists and engineers more focussed on military improvements than civilian ones.

Sounds like a lack of ICE shouldn't be that big of a problem at all then, good to know. Thanks!

[Brother Oni]

Okay thanks ^.^ not trying to sound mean or anything I was just really confused on how what I kept saying kept getting interpretated weirdly.

So would it be better for it to be cylinder blade coming to a point? Kinda like a heavier cavalier rapier ?

The point I was trying to make, is that for what you want (a long, light blade that's still strong), a solid cylinder is one of the worst shapes possible, since it has a high volume to length ratio - that's just mathematics.

For example, if you look at the differences between the 5lb weight maces, there's hardly any gain in effective thickness, despite the 4" difference in blade length.

Boiling it down, if you want to keep weapon effectiveness, pick any two of: cylinder shaped blade; light; long.
You want a light and long blade, it can't be cylinder shaped. You want a long cylinder blade, it can't be light. You want a light cylinder blade, it can't be long.

In my opinion, the optimal shape for what you want is either an European bar mace or a steel I-Beam shaped mace.

[Storm Bringer]

I'm curious: Can someone answer me why eastern Asia seems to have a much stronger traditional of unarmed combat styles than other parts of the world?

I believe that one part of it is the (relative) stability of the major Asian nations meant their was less drive to innovate, and in particular less need to use firearms. Don't get me wrong, they had firearms, but they stayed in the matchlock era for at something like 150-200 years longer than everyone else (my understanding is that the Chinese troops in the Opium Wars were armed with matchlocks, in the mid 1800s, whereas their British opponents had pushed matchlocks to second line roles by 1700 or so), and thus stayed in the era where determined troops could and did force their way into melee range, and thus melee skills were still a primary consideration.

this "Asian stasis" effect, combined with the religious elements of their practice, helped to preserve their local marital art styles in a way that the cut-throat innovation and competition of the western world didn't.

The ubiquity of firearms by the mid 17th century, along with the switch to mass "quantity" army instead of the medieval "quality" army, led to a decline in wester martial arts as they stopped being practical methods of defence and became more of a rich mans hobby.


Also, theirs a element of "whats our isn't special" going on, by which I mean the practical, effective martial arts that still survived in some from in the western world, like boxing, fencing and wrestling, are often overlooked or written off as primitive, because they lack the exotic, "Eastern" semi-religious methodology with its path to enlightenment, clearly defined rank structure etc.

Then you get into the MMA style stuff with a lot of the core moves being present with cosmetic differences in styles form Latin America, western Europe and the East, simply, because the mechanics and physics of unarmed combat remain the same, and theirs only so many ways you can throw a punch or sweep a leg.

[Shuruke]

The point I was trying to make, is that for what you want (a long, light blade that's still strong), a solid cylinder is one of the worst shapes possible, since it has a high volume to length ratio - that's just mathematics.

For example, if you look at the differences between the 5lb weight maces, there's hardly any gain in effective thickness, despite the 4" difference in blade length.

Boiling it down, if you want to keep weapon effectiveness, pick any two of: cylinder shaped blade; light; long.
You want a light and long blade, it can't be cylinder shaped. You want a long cylinder blade, it can't be light. You want a light cylinder blade, it can't be long.

In my opinion, the optimal shape for what you want is either an European bar mace or a steel I-Beam shaped mace.

I'm still confused

So the typical rectangle shape of jian with a sharper tip wont work

And a like 1/2 diameter cylinder blade blade with sharp tip won't work

Then how would an x make anymore sense?

I'm just gonna admit defeat and say **** it its fantasy rpg cuz I just don't see the logic behind a 38-40 inch sword that has a rectangle blunt blade coming to a Sharp point not maling sense with physics

[Pauly]

I'm still confused

So the typical rectangle shape of jian with a sharper tip wont work

And a like 1/2 diameter cylinder blade blade with sharp tip won't work

Then how would an x make anymore sense?

I'm just gonna admit defeat and say **** it its fantasy rpg cuz I just don't see the logic behind a 38-40 inch sword that has a rectangle blunt blade coming to a Sharp point not maling sense with physics

There’s a fundamental design problem. You want a blade that has good latitudinal strength for the whacky part. You also want a blade that has good longitudinal strength for the shabby part.

If you look at European small swords, probably the most shabby weapons ever developed, they use a hollow ground triangular cross section. Which gives them fantastic rigidity for sticking the pointy bit into the other guy. However to get to make the point effective, i.e. fast and agile, the blade is super light.

If you want a good mace, it has to rely on momentum, and therefore not so good at changing direction.

If you’re building a hand weapon you can be good at whacking, good at stabbing or good at cutting. You can combine cutting and stabbing in a one handed weapon, but not whacking. In a two handed weapon you can combine all three, but typically the weapon will be more geared to cutting/stabbing (eg a halberd) or more geared to whacking (eg a poleaxe)

[Shuruke]

There’s a fundamental design problem. You want a blade that has good latitudinal strength for the whacky part. You also want a blade that has good longitudinal strength for the shabby part.

If you look at European small swords, probably the most shabby weapons ever developed, they use a hollow ground triangular cross section. Which gives them fantastic rigidity for sticking the pointy bit into the other guy. However to get to make the point effective, i.e. fast and agile, the blade is super light.

If you want a good mace, it has to rely on momentum, and therefore not so good at changing direction.

If you’re building a hand weapon you can be good at whacking, good at stabbing or good at cutting. You can combine cutting and stabbing in a one handed weapon, but not whacking. In a two handed weapon you can combine all three, but typically the weapon will be more geared to cutting/stabbing (eg a halberd) or more geared to whacking (eg a poleaxe)

Someone in a discord channel I'm in pointed out I could just use a one handed slightly modified Estoc
Blunt edges comes to a point and is heavy enough to give a decent baton like smack

[Pauly]

Someone in a discord channel I'm in pointed out I could just use a one handed slightly modified Estoc
Blunt edges comes to a point and is heavy enough to give a decent baton like smack

Estocs, as I understand them, were two handed weapons for dealing with plate armor. Whilst it is possible to get some concussive force from them, they are optimized for thrusting. Again it’s about keeping the point agile, which means a balance of mass closer to the hand.

It is often said that thrusts are harder to defend than cuts. However HEMA practitioners say this isn’t true. While it requires a higher level of technique to parry a thrust, cuts can be redirected and feinted easier than thrusts. Cuts can be redirected mid swing, something that can’t be done with thrusts.

I really can’t see an effective way to combine effective stabbing and whacking in a one handed weapon. For effective whacking you want the center of mass away from the hand, but for effective stabbing you want the center of mass close to the hand. You can have some vestigial ability at X and be good at Y, or you can be pretty poor at X and pretty poor at Y. But for a one handed weapon I can’t see a way to bo good at both.

The fact that there don’t appear to be any historical weapons that fit your criteria is a good indication that whenever people have tried in the past they end up putting it in the too hard basket.

[Mabn]

Estocs, as I understand them, were two handed weapons for dealing with plate armor. Whilst it is possible to get some concussive force from them, they are optimized for thrusting. Again it’s about keeping the point agile, which means a balance of mass closer to the hand.

It is often said that thrusts are harder to defend than cuts. However HEMA practitioners say this isn’t true. While it requires a higher level of technique to parry a thrust, cuts can be redirected and feinted easier than thrusts. Cuts can be redirected mid swing, something that can’t be done with thrusts.

I really can’t see an effective way to combine effective stabbing and whacking in a one handed weapon. For effective whacking you want the center of mass away from the hand, but for effective stabbing you want the center of mass close to the hand. You can have some vestigial ability at X and be good at Y, or you can be pretty poor at X and pretty poor at Y. But for a one handed weapon I can’t see a way to bo good at both.

The fact that there don’t appear to be any historical weapons that fit your criteria is a good indication that whenever people have tried in the past they end up putting it in the too hard basket.
when you divide weapons into thrusting, cutting, and whacking, do you put chopping in with whacking or cutting? Because while an ax uses a blade, it does use a rather percussive motion to do its thing. And I have seen one handed axes with spikes on the heads which I have to assume were intended to give the option to stab someone.

[Brother Oni]

I'm still confused

So the typical rectangle shape of jian with a sharper tip wont work

And a like 1/2 diameter cylinder blade blade with sharp tip won't work

All the bar mace jian I've been modelling in my previous posts have a cylinder blade - if you wanted to model a rectangular or triangular cross section bar mace jian, it's a lot simpler mathematically.

I think I've found the mace that you got your values from: link (https://www.mandarinmansion.com/chinese-sword-breaker-jian).



Overall length: 97 cm / 34.2 inch
Blade length: 79.2 cm / 24.5 inch
Rod thickness: forte 21 mm, middle 14 mm, near tip 10 mm
Weight without scabbard: 1671 grams
Point of balance: 20.5 cm from guard

An extremely rare example of a large Chinese mace of the jiǎn (鐧) type. It is built around a long, heavy rod of square cross-section with a groove on each facet, tapering gradually into a dull point.

You've missed out the important part where it has a square cross section - this means that a truncated square prism is a better model.

Crunching the numbers gives me an approximate weight of 1586g for the blade length of 79.2cm. Given the whole weapon weighs 1671g, I'm going to keep that ratio of 1.05 to account for the other weapon furniture and its current fullers.

Extending the blade length to 38" (96.52cm) and keeping all other parameters the same, gives me an overall weapon weight of 2036g or 4.5lbs.
Extending the blade length to 42" (106.68cm) and keeping all other parameters the same, gives me an overall weapon weight of 2251g or 5lbs.

So a square cross section bar mace jian would have your dimensions, although would be a bit heavy for a one handed weapon by Mike_G's reckoning. You could probably shave more weight off by increasing the depth of the fullers (another 3mm deep fullers to all 4 sides of your 38" length blade would shave off another 436g or about 1lb), which shouldn't impact weapon integrity too much.

So a bar mace of with a square 'blade' of 38" could theoretically weigh 3.5lbs, making it on par with an estoc.

[gkathellar]

the exotic, "Eastern" semi-religious methodology with its path to enlightenment, clearly defined rank structure etc.

It’s worth noting that a lot of that is thoroughly modern, sales-pitch type of stuff. For the majority of styles, the more traditional you get, the less common any of the quasi-mysticism and rank structure becomes.

[snowblizz]

Europeans largely ended nobility being a big deal 300-400 years ago, we don't care for tales of knights like the japanese care for samurai (who've only been gone for about 150 years) or the thai who had a king that gambled his country on a boxing match. So we're more distanced and we care less.
That is patently untrue. Let's reverse 400 years. That makes it 1619. 30 Year War is running. Who are the most important people in power? Kings and nobles. What is the best thing that can happen to you if you aren't noble? Doing something noteworthy and being ennobled. It's a period of great expansion of the nobels classes really, from old feudal warriors to a service aristocracy in more solid nationstates headed by an absolute monarch.

300 years. It's 1719 and we are in the middle of one of the more intesive periods of warfare in Europe. The Spanish War of Successions has ended and we are waiting for the Seven Years War to start with some "minor" conflicts raging like the the Great Northern War. What people matters? Well nobles and royalty of course. They are the main political and miliatary leaders. Though we have an upsurge in richer bourgeoise, due to trade and industry expanding wealth is becoming less tied to owning land, the old noble indicator and for millennia the source of most wealth. Depending on where you live naturally. E.g. in the Swedish empire (which is about to go bust) this is when nobles effectively take control of the state and usher in what they've taught us is the "Freedom years" (if you start looking closer a noble oligarcy isn't very free for most non nobles though). In Great Britain it's slightly more egalitarian with quite a few richer commoners also palying roles. Regardless to be someone you have to be noble really. And if you weren't odds were you might be granted a title to make it seem more natural.

200 years. It's 1819 and we are a couple of years after the Napoleonic wars. Guess what, being noble is kinda important. They are the movers and shakers again after the upheaval of Napoleon, the Peace accords in Vienna trying to turn back the time to L'Ancienne Regieme. Plenty of "new men" around but a lot of them are slotted into terms we are familiar with, i.e. they were made nobles by Napoleon and their status is accepted as such.

100 years. The year is 1919 and we have just concluded the peace in Versailles after World War 1. Before the war the most important groups were the nobility and rich industrialists. In many cases the two groups merged, like buying into nobility by rich industrialists, because really, being a baronet was nicer than just being a steel baron. The war has decimated the continent and especially the old ways. Revolutions big and small pass through most countries and monarchies, empires and nobility and privillege are being swept away left and right. It has finally become pretty much moot if your parents could claim a line of ancestry back to the Norman conquest of England or not. Mostly. In England for one, that seems to matter still to this day based on some commentry I see from time to time.

TL:DR we're just about celebrating a century where being nobility doesn't actually and practically matter hugely to a person and their lifeprospects.

[Pauly]

when you divide weapons into thrusting, cutting, and whacking, do you put chopping in with whacking or cutting? Because while an ax uses a blade, it does use a rather percussive motion to do its thing. And I have seen one handed axes with spikes on the heads which I have to assume were intended to give the option to stab someone.

Axes are a cutting weapon.
Yes there are falchions with a spike at the end, too.

However those points are more for jabbing at an open weak spot, what I referred to as a vestigial capacity. You’re not going to do serious damage to an armed and prepared foe with that point. It’s in the realms of buttspikes and punching with quillons.

Axes have the capacity to hook around a shield, and if you have a spike on the end you can stick into the face of your opponent causing him some trouble. Maces, especially bar maces don’t have any meaningful hooking capacity.

[gkathellar]

when you divide weapons into thrusting, cutting, and whacking, do you put chopping in with whacking or cutting? Because while an ax uses a blade, it does use a rather percussive motion to do its thing. And I have seen one handed axes with spikes on the heads which I have to assume were intended to give the option to stab someone.

If you really have to do that, you call axes slashing or crushing/slashing weapons, or maybe slashing/piercing if you want to include spikes in an abstract way.

The real answer is that slashing/piercing/crushing is a grievous oversimplification, good for games but not for a discussion of reality. Given that, games should go with what feels right, which is usually slashing damage on axes, or maybe crushing/slashing if your system allows for that.

[Lvl 2 Expert]

Axes are a bit of a half way point between maces and cutting swords, they deliver a more powerful blow, though not powerful enough that they don't need a sharp edge to do optimal damage, and therefor are generally less suited for stabbing. Less suited can be better than nothing, so a point on an axe or even a mace can make sense. But they're not flashy fencing weapons, they're strike hard weapons.

[Shuruke]

Just to let everyone know I've finished the idea/ design phase of the weapon.
Not sure what it'd be called probably Frankensword

So. I stole the rectangular structure pf Jian
Stole idea of the generally stab only Estoc and the blunt edges

Put the length to 36.38 inches , and through changing dimensions in thickness and etc a its at 3.8 lbs

Stole the the 1500 estoc hunting boar tip. So instead of a normal thrusting tip it has a leaf spear (not a boar cuz I didn't like asthetics of peg.)


The end goal with this weapon wasnt to have it be hefty enough to bludgeon someone in plate or likes

But instead be a highly specialized expensive aesthetic someone could use instead of rapier and European sword breaker.

Its heavy enough for causing higher recoveey time on weapons smacked aside and can cause some mean damage to hands and etc with a smack

Thick enough to not get caught in normal European sword breakers


My only thing is I'm not sure how the weight distribution would work



Also yes estoc was mainly two handed but their is documentation of some one handed ones that were rather short but still same heftiness as a longsword
34 inches was one I saw but Idk how accurate it was

Thos seems to answer alot of the problems being had

My only thing would be generally for faster reaction weight is closer to hilt

How would u balance This weapon weight wise?
Its gonna have weight near tip from spear point .
If u pit weight balance closer to hand u could put counterweight ish thing on it by giving it a pommel
And it could look cool aestetically to have the really fancy rapier basket going down to bottom of handle where it has some weight in a symbol like pommel

Thanks for all the help

Ps. Just trying to male a realistic as possible weapon cuz indont like all the obvioisly fantasy weapons in art

[gkathellar]

Swords almost always have their weight in the hilt, with the balance point either at the guard or several inches above it (a jian has it about one handspan up the blade). The pommel should be heavy enough to strike with if you intend to do that, but not so heavy that it throws off the balance.

One thing to consider if you just want to bludgeon folks in plate is that a cruciform guard allows a sword to be reversed and used as a surprisingly effective war hammer, taking advantage of the way warhammers have a weight distribution opposite that of a sword.

[Mike_G]

Just to let everyone know I've finished the idea/ design phase of the weapon.
Not sure what it'd be called probably Frankensword

So. I stole the rectangular structure pf Jian
Stole idea of the generally stab only Estoc and the blunt edges

Put the length to 36.38 inches , and through changing dimensions in thickness and etc a its at 3.8 lbs

Stole the the 1500 estoc hunting boar tip. So instead of a normal thrusting tip it has a leaf spear (not a boar cuz I didn't like asthetics of peg.)


The end goal with this weapon wasnt to have it be hefty enough to bludgeon someone in plate or likes

But instead be a highly specialized expensive aesthetic someone could use instead of rapier and European sword breaker.

Its heavy enough for causing higher recoveey time on weapons smacked aside and can cause some mean damage to hands and etc with a smack

Thick enough to not get caught in normal European sword breakers


My only thing is I'm not sure how the weight distribution would work



Also yes estoc was mainly two handed but their is documentation of some one handed ones that were rather short but still same heftiness as a longsword
34 inches was one I saw but Idk how accurate it was

Thos seems to answer alot of the problems being had

My only thing would be generally for faster reaction weight is closer to hilt

How would u balance This weapon weight wise?
Its gonna have weight near tip from spear point .
If u pit weight balance closer to hand u could put counterweight ish thing on it by giving it a pommel
And it could look cool aestetically to have the really fancy rapier basket going down to bottom of handle where it has some weight in a symbol like pommel

Thanks for all the help

Ps. Just trying to male a realistic as possible weapon cuz indont like all the obvioisly fantasy weapons in art


OK, you are committed to this, so I won't try to stop you. I'll just go over the options and you can nudge the numbers however you want.

The more weight you move back to the pommel, the easier it will be to wield, more agile, better able to feint or recover to parry, but will lose impact strength and not strike as hard. The more weight you have at the tip, the better it will be at the striking that you want to do with it, but the less agile and slower to recover. So a leaf tip, blunt edge, with a heavy pommel will sorta work, but will be a compromise to do several things OK, but nothing really well. How you distribute the mass will depend on what you want it to be better at.

I would try really hard to keep the weight under 4 pounds, because a one hander heavier than that, especially a long one, is one you swing today and parry with tomorrow.

If you try to beat the other guy's blade, and he has a nimble rapier and avoids your beat, you probably won't be able to recover that momentum to bring the sword around to parry. It would be a good idea to pair this with a buckler or main gauche or other off hand parrying weapon

[Shuruke]

OK, you are committed to this, so I won't try to stop you. I'll just go over the options and you can nudge the numbers however you want.

The more weight you move back to the pommel, the easier it will be to wield, more agile, better able to feint or recover to parry, but will lose impact strength and not strike as hard. The more weight you have at the tip, the better it will be at the striking that you want to do with it, but the less agile and slower to recover. So a leaf tip, blunt edge, with a heavy pommel will sorta work, but will be a compromise to do several things OK, but nothing really well. How you distribute the mass will depend on what you want it to be better at.

I would try really hard to keep the weight under 4 pounds, because a one hander heavier than that, especially a long one, is one you swing today and parry with tomorrow.

If you try to beat the other guy's blade, and he has a nimble rapier and avoids your beat, you probably won't be able to recover that momentum to bring the sword around to parry. It would be a good idea to pair this with a buckler or main gauche or other off hand parrying weapon

So quick question

If the weight is mainly back at pommel. In your opinion could its blunt edges still do meaningful damage just from the extra weight along with swing

Meaningful as in fractures, maybe breaks. Something that could damage a hand enough to end a duel

The idea would be to steal the weight balance of jian which is about 8 inches from gaurd

Tbh I'd be fine with it being ok at everything and not very specialized cuz it could lead to interesting combat style

[Mike_G]

So quick question

If the weight is mainly back at pommel. In your opinion could its blunt edges still do meaningful damage just from the extra weight along with swing

Meaningful as in fractures, maybe breaks. Something that could damage a hand enough to end a duel

The idea would be to steal the weight balance of jian which is about 8 inches from gaurd

Tbh I'd be fine with it being ok at everything and not very specialized cuz it could lead to interesting combat style

Absolutely.

You don't have to hit a hand all that hard to do enough damage that the enemy will drop his sword. Blunt HEMA swords a lot lighter than that can break fingers if you aren't wearing the right gloves.

I think the biggest issue you'll have is recovering from a swing if you miss or get parried. Most really long one handed swords are thrust-centric. Sabres and sideswords/backswords and similar are generally shorter. All that weight so far out on the lever arm means a lot of momentum to stop or redirect for a parry or a feint. You can minimize that risk by using a buckler to do your parrying.

[The Jack]

That is patently untrue. .
should've specified;
*in a war context*

Nobles of course got the officer jobs (along with the emerging middle class) and got to play cavalry, but the commoners became the most effective soldiers on the battlefield, they slowly grew out of the dichtimony where well trained and well equiped nobles would slaughter the poor. The availability of armour and the advancement of guns gave everyone a similar life expectancy. The nobility got the best and worst possitions, had sword training that was more tradition than function, but their fighting capacity as individuals was mostly blunted. Martial arts that wasnt gun-centric became seen as an elite tradition that seperated the rich from the poor, and most people being poor resented that.

[gkathellar]

Nobles of course got the officer jobs (along with the emerging middle class) and got to play cavalry, but the commoners became the most effective soldiers on the battlefield, they slowly grew out of the dichtimony where well trained and well equiped nobles would slaughter the poor.

How true that dichotomy ever was depends a lot on exactly where and when you're talking about. A lot of armies were composed primarily of peasant levies, who were called up for serious fighting, not just to be cannon fodder. Besides that, well-organized, well-trained peasant and town militias were known elements in Europe and beyond.


Martial arts that wasnt gun-centric became seen as an elite tradition that seperated the rich from the poor, and most people being poor resented that.

That is a huge generalization of questionable accuracy.

A lot of older martial arts in various parts of the world emerged and persisted among the peasantry very specifically, especially styles associated with ethnic minorities, and a local fighting master's job was to keep the youth in shape and teach them self-defense. Here and there (especially South and Southeast Asia), those traditions extend into the present day.

[Mike_G]

How true that dichotomy ever was depends a lot on exactly where and when you're talking about. A lot of armies were composed primarily of peasant levies, who were called up for serious fighting, not just to be cannon fodder. Besides that, well-organized, well-trained peasant and town militias were known elements in Europe and beyond.



Yes, but there is a bigger gulf between an armored knight and a levy with a spear or bill than there is between an 18th Century cavalryman and a line infantryman or even militiaman with a musket.

Over the years, the idea of armored cavalry being the deciding arm changed and infantry gained a position of importance with cavalry being used more to exploit a breakthrough, or in light cavalry roles. By the American Civil War, cavalry was no real threat to infantry and used mostly for scouting or just mobility and did their fighting on foot.

There are always edge cases and exceptions, but overall, widespread use of firearms did democratize the battlefield.

Kipling didn't write "Two thousand pounds of education drops to a ten rupee jezail" for nothing.

[Willie the Duck]

I think we digressed as far as it matters on whether firearms made elite troops obsolete. All of this is just supporting evidence to this being why east Asian countries have more veneration for unarmed combat techniques (the claim that probably needs more of our attention).

[The Jack]

A lot of older martial arts in various parts of the world emerged and persisted among the peasantry very specifically, especially styles associated with ethnic minorities, and a local fighting master's job was to keep the youth in shape and teach them self-defense. Here and there (especially South and Southeast Asia), those traditions extend into the present day.

It's very easy to misconstrue good solid facts
A lot of martial arts originated with peasantry, but when they're exported they lose a lot of the 'poor' stigma because they're foreign and exotic. Some people think karate is classy or that boxing is for the cultured, because they're looking at it from a distance and the origins are more an interesting footnote than an actual social concern.
When you take a rich people style it's generally going to stay with the priveliged no matter where you export it to. The key thing is 'how does the other society view your nobles', which is why sword stuff's way more prominent in japan than ireland; Japan has a more reverent view of its nobility.

[gkathellar]

A lot of martial arts originated with peasantry, but when they're exported they lose a lot of the 'poor' stigma because they're foreign and exotic. Some people think karate is classy or that boxing is for the cultured, because they're looking at it from a distance and the origins are more an interesting footnote than an actual social concern.
When you take a rich people style it's generally going to stay with the priveliged no matter where you export it to. The key thing is 'how does the other society view your nobles', which is why sword stuff's way more prominent in japan than ireland; Japan has a more reverent view of its nobility.

Meanwhile, let's look at styles like Silat, older forms of Muay Thai, Kalari, Filippino systems and really most of what's practiced in China, where martial arts are only prestigious in novels and movies, but especially systems with Chinese Muslim origins. These continue to be practiced in a mostly rural, working-class context (I would be remiss in not mentioning Capoeira, which has worked overtime to dispel the perception by Brazilian authorities that it is practiced mainly by criminals). These are among the sorts of styles that were not preserved among the nobility, and generally are not preserved among the moneyed class in the present day. That is not a rule, certainly, but the point is that in big, big swathes of modern Asia this has long been the case for a lot of martial arts, and has remained the case for some.

This has started to see some change as a result of selling this stuff to kung fu tourists, and in some of the cases I've mentioned the styles have come to greater national prominence in sporting forms (Muay Thai, FMA, and Wushu, notably). And as you mention, sports like kendo and kyudo have ties to a time seen through rose-tinted glasses (though most of the koryu remain quite modest), and boxing is equally beloved by the stuffed-shirt crowd and the working classes. Hell, we can throw Olympic fencing in there for good measure.

But it's interesting that all of the examples I can think of, and that you mention, are combat sports, rather than billing themselves as strictly combative.


I think we digressed as far as it matters on whether firearms made elite troops obsolete. All of this is just supporting evidence to this being why east Asian countries have more veneration for unarmed combat techniques (the claim that probably needs more of our attention).

And I would contend that the "why" is something of a distraction, since the veneration is not especially widespread. Outside of sports and the military, the martial arts frequently remain a lower-class pursuit. Conversely, Europe and America have had plenty of love for what remains of their boxing and wrestling traditions, which as The Jack mentions, have occasionally even been considered fancy.

I would likewise contend that while modern Western martial arts have tended to become a homogeneous mass, styles from East, South, and Southeast Asia have remained largely discreet for diverse historical reasons. As a result, it appears they are more widespread in comparison, and thus more esteemed.

[Brother Oni]

The key thing is 'how does the other society view your nobles', which is why sword stuff's way more prominent in japan than ireland; Japan has a more reverent view of its nobility.

Putting it politely, that's a load of rubbish. The Japanese have the same rose tinted view of the samurai and bushido as western cultures do of knights and the code of chivalry - they just market it better as a cultural export.

If you look into more detail, it's just as ugly as you'd expect and media depicting this isn't that hard to find (the Lone Wolf and Cub manga is quite a famous one off the top of my head).

I'm also not sure why you seem to think Japan still has a current noble class - the only ones left are their royal family. All the former samurai have now been subsumed into the general populace, although the former samurai families are still fairly easy to trace through their family mon (my wife's family has one, meaning that they're former samurai - it doesn't make me nobility, even if I technically married into their family as a non-Japanese).

[The Jack]

Putting it politely, that's a load of rubbish. The Japanese have the same rose tinted view of the samurai and bushido as western cultures do of knights and the code of chivalry - they just market it better as a cultural export.

It's on a completely different scope.


I'm also not sure why you seem to think Japan still has a current noble class -

I don't.

[gkathellar]

What strikes me is that at least some of the Big Heroes of Japanese history, who get portrayed over and over in a wide variety of fictional works, are swordguys - various Sengoku period generals and warriors, the Yagyu, the Shinsengumi, Musashi, etc. That helps to give swords an outsize presence in Japanese media when compared with countries where the big much-glorified historical figures didn’t have swords. What that means seems open to interpretation, but I don’t think it’s because of a high regard for nobility so much as because they’re much-hyped folks from within the last 600 years or so.

(Tangential: it weirds me out so much that the Shinsengumi get portrayed as heroes. In my experience, the term “secret police” raises all of the red flags.)

[Yora]

The British in Africa are often portrayed as heroic, and their activities would get them tried for crimes against humanity.

Julius Caesar and Napoleon were horrible people.

To become celebrate heroes, it's not about what you do, but on whose side you are while you do it.

[Martin Greywolf]

I don't know where the idea that Japan reveres samurai that much comes from. Akira Kurosawa made several films about samurai, in all of the more influential ones, they are the villains for most of them (Ran, Rashomon), and antiheroes at best (Seven samurai). Miyazaki made a lot of influential movies, IIRC only one of them has something that looks like samurai if you maybe squint both of your eyes (Princess Mononoke's Iron city). Shonen jump's most popular series in the recent times are Naruto (samurai suddenly appear at the end as cannon fodder), One Piece (no samurai), MHA (no samurai) and Bleach (kinda samurai, mixed with western influences ande bad spelling).

Sure, there are some samurai movies and series, but it's hardly a cultural obsession.

As for why they got so popular in the west, well, Hong Kong. The reasons why movies from there caught on are many and varied, most important one of them is that their fight scenes with melee weapons or fists didn't look like ass. Look up what Conan the Barbarian movie fights looked like with Arnie, that was the best west had to offer at the time - compare it to Jackie Chan. With those movies came a bit of a cultural mania over everything eastern, especially martial arts.

I live in eastern Europe, and even I can remember karate dojos being EVERYWHERE during the 90's. Samurai specifically caught on for two main reasons. Firstly, they were relatable, feudal societies with emperors at the top and warrior caste as local rulers were immediately familiar and understandable. It's much easier to learn necessary cultural background to get a deep samurai story as opposed to deep wuxia story.

Second reason is ease of access. Not only was Japan not in communist bloc, unlike China, there were a lot of katanas lying around from WW2 - they were kinda bad, but people didin't know that. What's more, a lot of people had personally witnessed katanas still in use in WW2, and were a lot more familiar with them, as opposed to naginatas.

It's not like Japanese themselves portray their historical heroes as sword guys - Benkei is well known naginata user, Musashi's most famous duel was fought with an oar, and Nobunaga - Hideyosi - Tokugawa trio is famous as generals, not fighters. There is some reverence for the daisho there, but not as much as people generally think. And there is also reverence for bow and spear.

As for Europe not venerating knights enough... there are literally millions of people who pour considerable amounts of money into recreating their lifestyles as closely as possible. Spot the difference:

https://japan-highlightstravel.com/img/spot/120043/main_en.jpg

https://static1.squarespace.com/static/546c85abe4b0788c3e4c7b6e/t/58d13ff59f745633ea30ce01/1490108476818/rytier%2Bhercog%2Brotenstein.jpg

[snowblizz]

I don't know where the idea that Japan reveres samurai that much comes from.


Misunderstanding, wilful or not, of the inter-War era Japan.

Also, confirmation bias, we think Japanese revere samurai so we more easily see anything that looks like they do without seeing that it's probably not a lot bigger than say Ren-fairs are in Europe taken as a whole. E.g. economic development literature likes to point out some Japanese industrial conglomerates are "of samurai origin", while a similar description is totally foreign to a comparable examination of European development. I don't think Japanese spend a lot of effort thinking about Honda having some kind of past as a samurai.

In truth the average Japanese may not have more knowledge of samurai or interst than the average European has in medieval knights. We as a group here of course have a much deeper knowledge of history and naturally assume everyone else must also be interested in it.

[Brother Oni]

(Tangential: it weirds me out so much that the Shinsengumi get portrayed as heroes. In my experience, the term “secret police” raises all of the red flags.)

Might be a bit of translational error/bias - I've always heard the Shinsengumi described as a 'government security force' and Wikipedia reports them to be a 'special police group', on similar lines as US SWAT forces or the UK's Special Branch.

In my opinion, they don't quite fall under the 'secret police' category as they're very clearly and distinctly uniformed and didn't primarily engage in covert operations, aside from raids and other basic door kicking activities.


In truth the average Japanese may not have more knowledge of samurai or interst than the average European has in medieval knights. We as a group here of course have a much deeper knowledge of history and naturally assume everyone else must also be interested in it.

From my experience, it's about on par - I know more about the details of Japanese history (primarily the Sengoku and the Bakumatsu eras) than my wife, although she knows more about the popular culture elements (the enduring popularity of Hijikata Toshizo, Kondo Isami and Okita Soji of the Shinsengumi for example).

[Willie the Duck]

As for why they got so popular in the west, well, Hong Kong.
...
Second reason is ease of access. Not only was Japan not in communist bloc, unlike China, there were a lot of katanas lying around from WW2 - they were kinda bad, but people didin't know that. What's more, a lot of people had personally witnessed katanas still in use in WW2, and were a lot more familiar with them, as opposed to naginatas.

Combo-ing off these two thoughts, a lot of the reason why Japanese-specific obsession (samurai, ninjas, karate vs. kung fu, katanas, etc.) was a whole bunch of 19 year old soldiers from every Western country and walk of life stationed in Japan or passing through Japan on their way to Korea/Vietnam/etc.

[hymer]

What are the downsides to a bullpup design? I'm assuming there has to be some, oreveryone would be developing rifles/carbines for military use along those lines.

[Max_Killjoy]

What are the downsides to a bullpup design? I'm assuming there has to be some, oreveryone would be developing rifles/carbines for military use along those lines.

I've read assertions that some of them are harder to aim and operate from a prone position.

[Willie the Duck]

What are the downsides to a bullpup design? I'm assuming there has to be some, oreveryone would be developing rifles/carbines for military use along those lines.

The reduced length is the primary advantage (so extra useful for carbines, but overall usually a plus). The prevailing issues being mostly that shell eject happens inside shooter's armspace (making it hard to make ambidextrous versions without additional engineering), more complex or worse trigger assemblies, and slight backwards balance (repeated fire will tend to skew upwards). Also you are putting your ear a lot closer to the action (noise issue, plus getting more wallop from any weapon fail), reducing the distance from your eye to the end of the barrel (with all the aiming issues that entails), and the like.

Edit: Wikipedia also points out that it reduces the space saved by having a collapsible stock, which seems strange because that space is mostly the space that is taken off the total gun length. Also that that space is sometimes used in other weapons to hold things like cleaning kits, which, again, is a complaint that a space-saver saves space :smallyuk:.

[Khedrac]

What are the downsides to a bullpup design? I'm assuming there has to be some, oreveryone would be developing rifles/carbines for military use along those lines.

The main downside is that it seems to be very hard to make it work reliably.

The British Army switched from the SLR (a very highly regarded conventional rifle) to the bullpup SA80 in about 1985 - since there there have been a lot of complaints about problems (some probably fictional) and though I beleive it is now a good weapon, it took years to get there - years after it went into service.

For example - one problem is that the ejeciton port is level with the operator's cheek - in fact the cheek pad can go in from either side which adjusts the rifle to left or right-handed shooting. This means that the ejeciton gases are still very close to the operator's face (even though they are going the other way) which has its downsides. Add in the stories that the cheek pad reacted with the standard issue camoflage paint at the time...

In short it is a nice concept but very hard to get right.

[Gnoman]

Reloading can be more awkward with a bullpup, although training can mitigate this.

There are also issues with manufacture and maintenance because of the way the internal parts have to be positioned.

[Clistenes]

Reloading can be more awkward with a bullpup, although training can mitigate this.

There are also issues with manufacture and maintenance because of the way the internal parts have to be positioned.

What I find strange is nobody seems to ever have developed a bullpup elephant gun; all are twin-barrelled (more expensive) or bolt action (slower). As for automatic high caliber hunting weapons, I think they illegal in most countries...

You would think that, for a weapon whose main requirements are stopping power and speed, bullpup would prove popular...

[The Jack]

I wouldn't like the large calibre rounds going off even closer to my body. Plus with those kind of guns you need a heavier and more sturdy barrel/ reciever, which i cant imaginr would be good for the complex/unfortunate bulpup trigger mechanism.

On elephant guns, the idea is that they're 'sporting'. Hunting semi/full auto is often considered bad form. Kill with a single measured shot, not four.

[Kiero]

One very real and pretty much insurmountable problem that bullpup rifles have: they're rubbish for attaching bayonets to. Shorter overall frame means shorter spear when you fix your blade to it. That might seem a terribly niche or even anachronistic application for a rifle, but it isn't.

The Royal Marines and some others have been in recent bayonet charges, but they'd have been better served in that circumstance with something longer than an SA80.

[The Jack]

It totally is. Bayonets make for more intimidating guards and that's about it. If you were to try and bayonet someone with a bulpup, the reach issue isn't; they arent likely dumb enough to use a bayonet too so you don't need that reach advantage over them.

[Gnoman]

What I find strange is nobody seems to ever have developed a bullpup elephant gun; all are twin-barrelled (more expensive) or bolt action (slower). As for automatic high caliber hunting weapons, I think they illegal in most countries...

You would think that, for a weapon whose main requirements are stopping power and speed, bullpup would prove popular...

There's little reason to do so, and many reasons not to. Large game rifles are designed for extremely powerful cartridges. Such cartridges are rarely suitable for semi-automatic usage, because they would need an extremely robust action to cycle. More to the point, ejecting such a cartridge that close to your face would be hazardous, especially with a bullpup. That's why double-barreled guns are preferred for the use - easy to make robust, but they allow for an extremely rapid second shot if you only wound the animal with the first one and it decides to take you with it.


In many ways, the bullpup is a solution in search of a problem. You get a shorter overall length with a longer barrel, but the difference isn't that critical. Compared to an M4 carbine, for example, the SA80 saves only 3" in overall length, and has 6" more barrel length. 3" isn't enough to make it that much handier in confined spaces, and the extra barrel only gains about 60 extra m/s with the same cartridge. That isn't nothing, but it isn't enough to make a significant difference. With such slight benefits, any drawbacks loom large.

[Pauly]

The real reason dangerous game rifles are often double barrel is the you have two independent firing mechanisms. If for any reason your first shot didn’t work your second was immediately available. Which is kind of a useful thing if you have an angry tiger or Cape buffalo inbound.
These cartridges aren’t designed for taking long range shots. They’re meant to be used at distances of less than 50 yards in most cases. If you read any of Jim corbett’s books you’ll see that he stalked man eating tigers on foot to within 10 yards before taking a shot. At times because of circumstances it was even closer.
As for the energy. The .500 nitro express, which is middle of the road for these types of cartridges has 7,930 J of energy with factory loads. For comparison a lot of bull pups use 556 NATO which generates 1,755 J of energy.

As for the bull pups being unreliable, they have been reliable in service except for the SA80 which was a horrible design badly made. Bloke on the Range and Forgotten Weapons have videos about this weapon-like object. Don’t lump all bullpups as being the same as the runt of the litter.

[Brother Oni]

As for the bull pups being unreliable, they have been reliable in service except for the SA80 which was a horrible design badly made. Bloke on the Range and Forgotten Weapons have videos about this weapon-like object. Don’t lump all bullpups as being the same as the runt of the litter.

The L85A1 was the problem child - after they fixed all the faults, the L85A2 is a good weapon.

[Max_Killjoy]

It totally is. Bayonets make for more intimidating guards and that's about it. If you were to try and bayonet someone with a bulpup, the reach issue isn't; they arent likely dumb enough to use a bayonet too so you don't need that reach advantage over them.

A USMC unit used a bayonet attack on insurgents to fight their way out of a bad situation in Iraq in the occupation after Gulf War II.

[Mr Beer]

Bayonets can be useful in close quarters fighting, its definitely a niche use because, you know, putting a bunch of rounds into someone is usually better than trying to stab them but I believe it comes up occasionally.

[Brother Oni]

Bayonets can be useful in close quarters fighting, its definitely a niche use because, you know, putting a bunch of rounds into someone is usually better than trying to stab them but I believe it comes up occasionally.

Fixing bayonets and going into CQB is excellent for forcing people out of cover. In Afghanistan, the Taliban were known to hide in poppy fields, so any patrol through such environments typically involved fixing bayonets.

In CQB and urban environments especially there's always the chance that you could be caught reloading, so being able to stab someone with the weapon in your hand is always useful. It's also a way of emphasizing to personnel that '[redacted] is about to get real' and getting them psychologically prepared for some very intense fighting.

https://i.redd.it/q3ctt3ufmc111.jpg

[hymer]

https://i.redd.it/q3ctt3ufmc111.jpg
Both guns I see in that picture are bullpups, and one has a bayonet fixed, so... Not really a drawback of the bullpup design? Or what would you say?

[Vinyadan]

The bullpup vs normal length weapon when using a bayonet thing reminds me of that talk we had some time ago about rifle and bayonet length, with bayonets becoming as long as swords to compensate for shorter barrels and give a (mostly psychological) edge to the soldier. In practice, I suspect it doesn't come up often enough to be a real issue.

However, looking at that photograph, I have to ask: can he fire his weapon, with the bayonet plugged in?

Also, does the fact that the other soldier has a grenade launcher impact his choice not to plug the bayonet in?

[gkathellar]

The bullpup vs normal length weapon when using a bayonet thing reminds me of that talk we had some time ago about rifle and bayonet length, with bayonets becoming as long as swords to compensate for shorter barrels and give a (mostly psychological) edge to the soldier.

One of the draws of that discussion was that militaries fixated on the idea of ever-longer bayonets and to an almost pathological degree, up to and including really stupid fighting techniques for maximizing reach at the cost of everything else. Then WWI happened and that stopped.

However, we shouldn't take that to be an indicator that reach is undesirable or useless. For spears in single combat, longer is only better up to a point (no pun intended), but a bullpup cuts off well before you reach that upper limit on useful length.

[Kiero]

Fixing bayonets and going into CQB is excellent for forcing people out of cover. In Afghanistan, the Taliban were known to hide in poppy fields, so any patrol through such environments typically involved fixing bayonets.

In CQB and urban environments especially there's always the chance that you could be caught reloading, so being able to stab someone with the weapon in your hand is always useful. It's also a way of emphasizing to personnel that '[redacted] is about to get real' and getting them psychologically prepared for some very intense fighting.

https://i.redd.it/q3ctt3ufmc111.jpg

Precisely. Modern armed forces rediscovering the value of the bayonet charge in counter-insurgency and urban warfare reminds me of the way air forces in the Vietnam era rediscovered the value of dogfighting in air-to-air engagements. Up close and personal never becomes "obsolete".


Both guns I see in that picture are bullpups, and one has a bayonet fixed, so... Not really a drawback of the bullpup design? Or what would you say?

Look how long it is, standing up parallel to the kneeling Marine. That's not a "spear" that's barely the length of an assegai, and one you lose most of the length of which because of where you grip it.


The bullpup vs normal length weapon when using a bayonet thing reminds me of that talk we had some time ago about rifle and bayonet length, with bayonets becoming as long as swords to compensate for shorter barrels and give a (mostly psychological) edge to the soldier. In practice, I suspect it doesn't come up often enough to be a real issue.

Your suspicion would be wrong, given it's come up enough times to be pivotal when it did.


However, looking at that photograph, I have to ask: can he fire his weapon, with the bayonet plugged in?

Also, does the fact that the other soldier has a grenade launcher impact his choice not to plug the bayonet in?

The handle of the bayonet is hollow, which allows the muzzle to shoot past it when fixed:

http://www.deactivated-guns.co.uk/images/sa80_bayonet/sa80_bayonet_3.jpg

We're several centuries past the days of the plug bayonet.

[hymer]

Look how long it is, standing up parallel to the kneeling Marine. That's not a "spear" that's barely the length of an assegai, and one you lose most of the length of which because of where you grip it.
Maybe if you encounter someone armed with an assegai, you could find some other way to engage them? I'm guessing the times they fixed bayonets and charged in the past two-three decades, they weren't up against a spearhedge, or for that matter anyone wielding bayonets. Not knowing the details, I can't be sure, but the idea seemed to be more to frighten people with a determined display of advancing in force, blade-on-a-stick first, rather than actually fighting it out. The actual length of the stick is secondary. Am I wrong?

[gkathellar]

Maybe if you encounter someone armed with an assegai, you could find some other way to engage them? I'm guessing the times they fixed bayonets and charged in the past two-three decades, they weren't up against a spearhedge, or for that matter anyone wielding bayonets. Not knowing the details, I can't be sure, but the idea seemed to be more to frighten people with a determined display of advancing in force, blade-on-a-stick first, rather than actually fighting it out. The actual length of the stick is secondary. Am I wrong?

Even if the intent is to frighten, sometimes that will fail, and when it does, you need to be able to back it up with real force. Worst of all, if your opponent knows you can't do that, you will always fail. Intimidation is a feint, to borrow a fencing concept: not a bluff, but rather the threat of a real attack that demands a response.

It is true that extremely long spears are not especially valuable outside of a hedge, but when we discuss bayonets we're usually not talking about extremely long spears. In the range of lengths that bayonets usually operate in, length is still of great value in sticking the other guy before he can stick you - and once you shorten the thing enough, you'd be better off just breaking out your knife skills. Even with relatively short modern rifles, that longer haft provides some reach, and is advantageous for reasons of leverage and defense.

[hymer]

Even if the intent is to frighten, sometimes that will fail, and when it does, you need to be able to back it up with real force.
Are we talking on completely opposite sides of the field? :smallconfused: This is a bayonet, affixed to a bullpup rifle designed at the earliest in the late 1970s. If you fail to frighten someone with it, you can still shoot them, right? If you're not willing to do that, you don't attempt the manoeuvre in the first place. If you are completely unable to fire your weapon, it would be an extremely unusual situation where your commander orders you to fix bayonets and charge. Or am I wrong?


In the range of lengths that bayonets usually operate in, length is still of great value in sticking the other guy before he can stick you - and once you shorten the thing enough, you'd be better off just breaking out your knife skills. Even with relatively short modern rifles, that longer haft provides some reach, and is advantageous for reasons of leverage and defense.
How often does bayonet vs bayonet hand-to-hand combat occur in the real world? Or versus spears? I get that you want to issue your troops with bayonets and teach them how to use them. But you're doing that so this isn't a gap in capability your opponents can take advantage of. Or am I wrong?

The advantages you seem to be talking about here come across to me as pretty much academic compared to the advantages of a lighter, more manageable weapon.

[Kiero]

Are we talking on completely opposite sides of the field? :smallconfused: This is a bayonet, affixed to a bullpup rifle designed at the earliest in the late 1970s. If you fail to frighten someone with it, you can still shoot them, right? If you're not willing to do that, you don't attempt the manoeuvre in the first place. If you are completely unable to fire your weapon, it would be an extremely unusual situation where your commander orders you to fix bayonets and charge. Or am I wrong?

A number of the recent instances have been because the troops in question have literally run out of ammunition. They've been engaged in a complex environment for hours and used everything up. The whole point of a backup is that it should be viable; so short a weapon is questionably so.

Others where the surprise element of actually charging home won the engagement (https://www.wearethemighty.com/articles/these-british-troops-launched-a-proper-angry-bayonet-charge-during-the-iraq-war).


They ran across 600 feet of open ground toward the entrenched enemy. Once on top of the Mahdi fighters, the British bayoneted 20 of the militia. Fierce hand-to-hand combat followed for five hours. The Queen's men suffered only three injuries.

Not merely waving them around hoping to make the other guy flee.

[hymer]

Judging by the pictures, those troops were armed with bullpup rifles. Am I wrong?

Edit: And they're wearing armour, right? Though it's the modern equivalent, it'll still stop someone's stab from a bayonet. Effective armour changes the equation, reducing the importance of a reach advantage.

[Vinyadan]

It also was the first time since 1982 that British soldiers did that.

And, from what I have seen, the unit uses a bullpup gun. So I guess it works just as well.

To make my point clearer, what I am saying is that bayonet charges are edge cases, and a weapon's effectiveness should not be measured by how long a shaft it would be for a bayonet.

The other fact is that, in the few descriptions I have read of bayonet charges in recent times, the other side was not using bayonets mounted on their guns. So the length problem of having a longer or shorter shaft than the other has never come up, which makes it a possible, if unheard of, edge case in what already is an edge case scenario. Unless the fear is that of ending up with a weapon so short, your shaft is shorter than your enemy's effective arm reach.

[Kiero]

Unless the fear is that of ending up with a weapon so short, your shaft is shorter than your enemy's effective arm reach.

Look how long the SA80 is with a bayonet attached. It's questionable that it is much longer than your arm reach.

[gkathellar]

Actually, come to think of it, do soldiers using a bullpup with a bayonet adjust their grip to control the weapon from the back? Because if so, the end result would be pretty similar to a conventional gun.

[Kiero]

Actually, come to think of it, do soldiers using a bullpup with a bayonet adjust their grip to control the weapon from the back? Because if so, the end result would be pretty similar to a conventional gun.

From what I gather, British army doctrine is that you keep your finger on the trigger, with the stock tucked tight under your elbow, so you retain the option of firing.

By contrast, this is a Chinese soldier drilling with bayonet:

https://www.thefirearmblog.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2008/03/bayonets-and-bullpups.jpg

[gkathellar]

That thrust makes intuitive sense to me, possibly because it's a very spear-like motion and that's what I'm familiar with - long haft supplying leverage, power, and defense. Maybe we're looking at this from the wrong perspective by thinking of spears? Is there some other weapon that makes for a better comparison?

[Brother Oni]

However, we shouldn't take that to be an indicator that reach is undesirable or useless. For spears in single combat, longer is only better up to a point (no pun intended), but a bullpup cuts off well before you reach that upper limit on useful length.

It's worth bearing in mind that with bayonets fitted, the L85A2 is longer than the M4 (~110cm vs ~93cm), despite both weapons being about the same length (78.5cm and 75.6cm respectively) due to how the the bayonets are fitted:

http://i.imgur.com/4JPgMrn.jpg
http://quarterbore.com/images/ars_w_m9s.jpg

Note that the bayonet on the Chinese rifle in Kiero's post, is fitted much like the M4's, giving it a shorter effective range.


The bullpup vs normal length weapon when using a bayonet thing reminds me of that talk we had some time ago about rifle and bayonet length, with bayonets becoming as long as swords to compensate for shorter barrels and give a (mostly psychological) edge to the soldier. In practice, I suspect it doesn't come up often enough to be a real issue.

I think it should be remembered that bayonets are a secondary option on a modern battle rifle - we're adding stabbing capability to something that primarily shoots the enemy, not adding shooting capability to something that primarily stabs the enemy.
In my opinion, being able to get your muzzle on target is far more important than how long your weapon is for stabbing people.

About the only time a bayonet length comes up in modern combat is historical as former Rifle regiments still call it 'fixing swords' rather than 'fixing bayonets' due to their history of using longer sword bayonets on their shorter Baker Rifle during the Napoleonic Wars. Their longer sword bayonets were issued solely so that they could take up square formation with their Brown Bess wielding comrades and not present a weak spot for incoming cavalry.

Since cavalry charges aren't much of a threat these days, this is no longer an issue (unless you count the US military's habit of referring to MBTs as 'heavy cavalry', in which case I don't think a couple of inches on a bayonet will help! :smalltongue:).

[Durkoala]

This is for a short story I'm trying to write, not a game, but this was the best place I could think to ask this.

How well would having a photographic memory* help in a fight if you could perfectly remember how your opponent moves during the fight?

For what it's worth the user is a military-trained and appropriatly fit woman breaking into the house of a reasonably in shape man whose only experience in a fight is self-defence classes and athletics at best. She wants to capture him, he wants her out and away from his family.

*It's more of a fictional depiction of an photographic memory than an attempt at looking at the real condition. Magic and/or nanobots are involved.

I have tendency to forget to come back to things I post in this thread, so thanks in advance for any help!

[hymer]

How well would having a photographic memory* help in a fight if you could perfectly remember how your opponent moves during the fight?
I don't know, but I'll tell you anyway: It wouldn't help much or at all in the same fight. After all, you would probably remember the fight pretty precisely by the time it ended if you were fully cognizant throughout.
But it could be useful if you face the same opponent at a later date. It could be like a boxer studying their opponent's fights up to a bout. But even that has its limitations if you don't know what to look for, and what to take as a key component of their style, and what is simply a tactic used in that particular circumstance. Is the opponent more or less tired than in the previous fight? They might move differently, try different things. How about injuries? Environment? Maybe they've learned some new tricks?
Another thing is how quickly can you process this extra information. If you have a speeded up brain, you could make analyses of what you have learned in a fight on the fly. But then, such a capability is itself probably more useful in a fight than the eidetic memory. It's not the recall of the flicker of the eyes to your nose the instance before launching a punch, but simply the flicker telling you something's about to happen - act fast.

[gkathellar]

This is for a short story I'm trying to write, not a game, but this was the best place I could think to ask this.

How well would having a photographic memory* help in a fight if you could perfectly remember how your opponent moves during the fight?

For what it's worth the user is a military-trained and appropriatly fit woman breaking into the house of a reasonably in shape man whose only experience in a fight is self-defence classes and athletics at best. She wants to capture him, he wants her out and away from his family.

*It's more of a fictional depiction of an photographic memory than an attempt at looking at the real condition. Magic and/or nanobots are involved.

I have tendency to forget to come back to things I post in this thread, so thanks in advance for any help!

That's hard to guess at, but I'd suggest that the effect would be minimal at most. In general, a skilled fighter already makes minor adjustments pretty rapidly as they internalize information like reach, timing, expected combinations, etc. The additional information from having perfect recall might help speed that process along a little bit, but I doubt it'd make a huge difference. Good tacticians in real life do try to break down their opponent over the course of an engagement, but in general the difficulty arises not from an inability to recall how the opponent moves, but rather from not having seen it yet in the first place. Beyond that, if her opponent really isn't all that skilled, there's only so much to remember.

Where I could imagine perfect recall being pretty useful to a fighter is while preparing for a rematch with a skilled opponent, since the person with it would be able to psych themselves up with a really accurate vision of what they were about to go up against.

[ExLibrisMortis]

I think eidetic memory is more about having continued (conscious) access to the "raw (sensory) data", so to speak, than any ability to draw useful conclusions from said data. In other words: having eidetic memory is pretty much useless in itself, but it can be useful whenever your on-the-spot assessment of the data (or your storing of the data in some processed form--all sensory data is subject to loads of processing before you become conscious of it) turns out to be inaccurate at a later time (and you realize that it is). An enhanced ability to review/compare/audit memories might count as a required secondary power, in this case.

[The Jack]

Are huge crews neccessary for huge ships? Particularly when it comes to sci fi, it just seems they are puting more people in ships than they need too.

[Brother Oni]

How well would having a photographic memory* help in a fight if you could perfectly remember how your opponent moves during the fight?

For what it's worth the user is a military-trained and appropriatly fit woman breaking into the house of a reasonably in shape man whose only experience in a fight is self-defence classes and athletics at best. She wants to capture him, he wants her out and away from his family.

In my opinion for your situation, any advantage is limited but somewhat mitigated by her training. I assume that by 'military training', you mean some sort of commando or other target capturing training?

Since he's not properly trained, a lot of his actions will be rote, so she would know what he would do if he remembers to do it - the flip side of being poorly trained is that they're unpredictable in remembering/applying that training.

In my opinion, if she's breaking in, then he shouldn't see her coming; sneak up, taser to the back, hands in restraints behind his back, bag over his head then he's bundled out of the house and into the boot of car within 2 minutes.
Depending on the time of day and how confident she is, she could just ring the doorbell and taser him as he answers the door.

Either way, done realisitically, her photographic memory is of limited use unless she's only got a couple seconds to memorise the floorplans of his house or something similar.


In all other situations, I agree with the other posters here. Just because you remember how a technique was performed, doesn't mean you comprehend why it's done that way, not to mention you can only work off what you've seen. If you've him pull his rear hand to behind his body and out of your line of sight, is it because it's part of of a technique/strategy or is he reaching for a concealed weapon?


Are huge crews neccessary for huge ships? Particularly when it comes to sci fi, it just seems they are puting more people in ships than they need too.

Large crews to cover multiple shifts around the clock, plus redundancy in case of casualties on military ships.

Don't forget all the support functions - cooks, laundry, medical, etc.

[Kiero]

Are huge crews neccessary for huge ships? Particularly when it comes to sci fi, it just seems they are puting more people in ships than they need too.

Surely it depends entirely on how much AI/robots can do, and how much human redundancy you need just in case they don't work for some reason?

[Pauly]

This is for a short story I'm trying to write, not a game, but this was the best place I could think to ask this.

How well would having a photographic memory* help in a fight if you could perfectly remember how your opponent moves during the fight?

For what it's worth the user is a military-trained and appropriatly fit woman breaking into the house of a reasonably in shape man whose only experience in a fight is self-defence classes and athletics at best. She wants to capture him, he wants her out and away from his family.

*It's more of a fictional depiction of an photographic memory than an attempt at looking at the real condition. Magic and/or nanobots are involved.

I have tendency to forget to come back to things I post in this thread, so thanks in advance for any help!

It would depend if you hero had seen their opponent fight before, or had seen someone use that style of fighting.

If someone was untrained or used a technique foreign to their memory then the eidetic memory is a a hindrance because it’s putting non useful data into the data feed.

Memory is only useful when it comes to dealing with things you’ve encountered before, or are substantially the same as the previous encounter ps.

[Telok]

Are huge crews neccessary for huge ships? Particularly when it comes to sci fi, it just seems they are puting more people in ships than they need too.

So this (http://www.researcheratlarge.com/Ships/Drawings/BOGP.html) is a link to schematics of some of the WWII ships. Of particular interest will the the USS Iowa, which I'm using since I chopped it up and remixed it to make a large spaceship so I'm somewhat familiar with it's bits.

It has a bakery, both a dental office and a dental workshop, an x-ray machine room, a legal office, snack bar, tailor, barber, and a pharmacy. It has these things because it has to be self sufficient for relatively long periods of time. They all require more crew.

For sci-fi it's all going to depend on how much automation is available, how reliable the automation is, and if the ship is expected to be capable of extended actions and self repair. In theory you could fully automate a ship, automate the repair functions, and set it free in grand berserker (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berserker_(novel_series)) style.

[Clistenes]

So this (http://www.researcheratlarge.com/Ships/Drawings/BOGP.html) is a link to schematics of some of the WWII ships. Of particular interest will the the USS Iowa, which I'm using since I chopped it up and remixed it to make a large spaceship so I'm somewhat familiar with it's bits.

It has a bakery, both a dental office and a dental workshop, an x-ray machine room, a legal office, snack bar, tailor, barber, and a pharmacy. It has these things because it has to be self sufficient for relatively long periods of time. They all require more crew.

For sci-fi it's all going to depend on how much automation is available, how reliable the automation is, and if the ship is expected to be capable of extended actions and self repair. In theory you could fully automate a ship, automate the repair functions, and set it free in grand berserker (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berserker_(novel_series)) style.

By the time we are able to build huge spacecraft, a lot of the work will be done by robots, 3D printers and other machines...

[Pauly]

Are huge crews neccessary for huge ships? Particularly when it comes to sci fi, it just seems they are puting more people in ships than they need too.

This has been covered before, but it depends on automation.

For example the original HMS Dreadnaught had 100 crew active at any time it was steaming shoveling coal from one coal bunker to another. Now in any warship fuel feeding is automated.

In WWI fire control was done by hand by a specialist crew of computers, when “computer” was a job title not a machine. In WWII the job was handled by a smaller crew and a mechanical computer. Now it’s done automatically.

The question you should be asking is “what jobs cannot be automated?”. Basically that would be command, diplomacy, possibly maintenance and repair supervision, possibly piloting/navigation supervision, maybe security. A space battleship or carrier would probably be able to get by with less than 20 living crew. That is unless there was some compelling reason as to why the running of the ship and it’s drones could not or should not be highly automated.

[Martin Greywolf]

Most sci fi ships areound aren't really pure battleships, they also serve as troop transports and sometimes as carriers - after all, if you have no troops to transport, you can automate everything and literally have your ship be a gun with engines strapped to it, with a small set of crew cabins. There's even an argument for doing it to all guns and not have large platforms for gun batteries, you get more redundancy that way.

Once you have a battleship as troop transport, though, well, you need a lot of people. Modern infantry has a support to frontline ratio of something like 7:1 and it gets far worse for armor and airforce (in a harder sci fi, your space fighter drones aren't really good at atmospheric combat). That means that with 100 000 stormtroopers on board, you need space for almost a million crew, and the conditions won't be great. Automation will alieviate some of this, but probably not everything.

For actual crews, if you have robots with human-like intelligence (not necessarily sapience), you don't need them. If you don't, there need to be quite a few humans running repairs and maintenance, because the welding drone doesn't know not to weld in a room with a gas leak - AI, actual existing AI, has a lot of trouble with contextual interpretation, it can be taught to weld good, but it's a lot harder to teach it about all the outside factors that make it a bad idea to weld.

[Brother Oni]

Most sci fi ships areound aren't really pure battleships, they also serve as troop transports and sometimes as carriers - after all, if you have no troops to transport, you can automate everything and literally have your ship be a gun with engines strapped to it, with a small set of crew cabins. There's even an argument for doing it to all guns and not have large platforms for gun batteries, you get more redundancy that way.

One thing that's often overlooked when removing human crews, is that there's less need to stay within human tolerances of g-force, thus your automated gunship can be thrown through manoeuvers that would reduce the crew of a manned ship to paste (or at least induce G-LOC (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G-LOC)), significantly increasing combat performance.

The various offensive ships from the Culture series are good examples of this.



Once you have a battleship as troop transport, though, well, you need a lot of people. Modern infantry has a support to frontline ratio of something like 7:1 and it gets far worse for armor and airforce (in a harder sci fi, your space fighter drones aren't really good at atmospheric combat). That means that with 100 000 stormtroopers on board, you need space for almost a million crew, and the conditions won't be great. Automation will alieviate some of this, but probably not everything.

The T3R for air wings gets up to 15:1 on aircraft carriers - I'm not aware of any roles with a higher ratio than that.

That said, for troop carriers and assuming the entire regiment equivalent was deployed, I'd model it on something like the Israeli military (T3R of ~5:1) since the support services don't have to go very far. You'd still have to factor in the crew of the ship though and looking at modern ships, that ratio isn't great: The Albion-class amphibious assault ship (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albion-class_landing_platform_dock) has a complement of 325 and can squeeze in 710 Royal Marines, for a ratio of 1:2.2.

Crunching the numbers, 100,000 storm troopers : 500,000 logistics : 274,648 crew = 874,648 bodies on board.

Dedicated troop carriers could probably do a bit better (the RMS Queen Mary carried 15,740 troops with 943 crew during WW2 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RMS_Queen_Mary#Second_World_War) for a ratio of 1:16.7), but that comes with all the vulnerabilities it entails (they're in trouble if the enemy even so much as looks in their direction).

The numbers for this would be 100,000 storm troopers : 500,000 logistics : 35,947 crew = 635,947 bodies on board.

[The Jack]

I sorta imagined space ship battles as boom and zoom with computer calculated turrets and huge distances. Am i likely correct?

[Willie the Duck]

I sorta imagined space ship battles as boom and zoom with computer calculated turrets and huge distances. Am i likely correct?

You need to put more qualifiers on this question. Do you mean realistically? Because no one knows how such will turn out. Huge distances? Probably. Modern aerospace dogfights usually end up being most computer-assisted tussles with opponents barely within visible range. Computer calculated? Also probably (definitely if the distances are indeed huge). Turrets? Unknown. Space combat might all be lasers, or all missiles, or by firing ball bearings at each other. It depends on how things develop. For all we know, space battles might end up looking like submarine warfare, with brilliant, hot, hard to hid mother ships shrouding themselves in layers of ECM and ECCM and shaff effects to make their exact location hard to predict, playing cat and mouse and neither side daring to commit to active scanning, lest they draw fire from the autonomous drones each side has sent silently drifting about the space.

[Rerem115]

I'd read the hell out of that. Sub warfare is an underutilized genre nowadays. Besides, even if it falls under the "space is an ocean" trope, at least it comes from a history of using 3 dimensions.

[Max_Killjoy]

You need to put more qualifiers on this question. Do you mean realistically? Because no one knows how such will turn out. Huge distances? Probably. Modern aerospace dogfights usually end up being most computer-assisted tussles with opponents barely within visible range. Computer calculated? Also probably (definitely if the distances are indeed huge). Turrets? Unknown. Space combat might all be lasers, or all missiles, or by firing ball bearings at each other. It depends on how things develop. For all we know, space battles might end up looking like submarine warfare, with brilliant, hot, hard to hid mother ships shrouding themselves in layers of ECM and ECCM and shaff effects to make their exact location hard to predict, playing cat and mouse and neither side daring to commit to active scanning, lest they draw fire from the autonomous drones each side has sent silently drifting about the space.

For space combat, the "every ship is an infrared beacon" problem is a major issue. Dumping heat in a way that doesn't make you a little infrared "star" is a huge challenge. Water or air surrounding an aircraft or submarine make it easier to get ride of heat "quietly", and help obscure the heat at distance.

Waste heat for ships is such a problem that in my sci-fi setting, the species that has mastered "running cold", that has an undetermined way of doing something "spooky" with the waste heat on their ships, has a HUGE tactical advantage... they're literally the boogiemen of the setting for that fact alone, the ones you don't mess with at all. (Also they have the only instantaneous FTL, and have a weapon system that can crack black holes, "Purely defensive, mind you, those things are a menace", and are implied to have been around and made it unscathed through multiple collapses of interstellar civilization.... they're boogiemen because they "do ten impossible things before breakfast" according to even the far-future science of the setting.)

[Brother Oni]

I'd read the hell out of that. Sub warfare is an underutilized genre nowadays. Besides, even if it falls under the "space is an ocean" trope, at least it comes from a history of using 3 dimensions.

Have you seen Let's Plays of Cold Waters? It's a submarine warfare simulator set in an alternate universe where the Cold War has gone hot.

I highly recommend videos by The Mighty Jingles and Jive Turkey as they both have naval experience - Jive Turkey is a former bubblehead and has served on the subs in question.

There's plenty of criticism that neither are that good at the game, but that's because both use actual sub tactics rather than take advantage of game engine/design limitations (eg. Jive Turkey evades fishing trawlers to avoid their nets, despite fishing nets not being implemented in the game).

[Kiero]

If you can automate all sorts of ship-board functions, why wouldn't a lot of the logistical elements in the "tail" be automated as well? Depending on how sci-fi we're talking, each soldier could have their own personal AI handling a lot of the things a human pen-pusher might be doing. Back office functions are amongst the simplest tasks to automate and do so reliably too.

[gkathellar]

As has been said, no one really knows what space warfare would be like. I'm inclined to think it wouldn't look like much of anything, in part because just finding people to fight in the immediate sense would be a challenge, and in part because spaceships are likely to remain extremely fragile in the foreseeable future. The softer your sci-fi, the easier these challenges are to solve, but ...


If you can automate all sorts of ship-board functions, why wouldn't a lot of the logistical elements in the "tail" be automated as well? Depending on how sci-fi we're talking, each soldier could have their own personal AI handling a lot of the things a human pen-pusher might be doing. Back office functions are amongst the simplest tasks to automate and do so reliably too.

Eclipse Phase has an interesting take on this, in which most people have a sorta-AI called a "muse" semi-integrated with their mind, which handles a lot of mental grunt-work. A person's muse ends up running a lot of their day-to-day life.

[Brother Oni]

If you can automate all sorts of ship-board functions, why wouldn't a lot of the logistical elements in the "tail" be automated as well? Depending on how sci-fi we're talking, each soldier could have their own personal AI handling a lot of the things a human pen-pusher might be doing. Back office functions are amongst the simplest tasks to automate and do so reliably too.

I'm just calculating numbers based on our current level of automation to give a baseline. Apply percentages of automation as you see fit to reduce the tail, but bear in mind that there is a limit you can shrink it - users with a personal AI will still need tech support for that AI.

Of course you can always have AI being tech support, but that's how the machine revolution starts. :smalltongue:

[Storm_Of_Snow]

Are huge crews neccessary for huge ships? Particularly when it comes to sci fi, it just seems they are puting more people in ships than they need too.
Kind of covered in previous posts, but the most important question is - what type of ship are you talking about? If it's a freighter, you might only need a bridge and engine room crew split over two watches, with a couple of people for any cargo handling they need to do during the voyage and roles like galley, MO etc handled by off duty crew on rota. So, max out at 30 or so, even for Cape-size class vessels (especially as the more crew you have, the higher your wage bill and the lower your profits). It's not inconceivable that a space-faring vessel could have a roughly similar crew size even for something in the multi-kilometer length range - especially if you're hauling something like bulk ore that doesn't need the cargo holds to maintain atmospheric pressure.

A passenger liner? Bridge and engineering crew, chief purser, stewards and cooks, on duty medical staff, security (if only to stop passengers wandering into mechanical spaces and getting hurt), and pilots if the vessel has it's own shuttle craft.

It also really depends on the universe - Star Wars SSDs have crews in the millions IIRC, and that's not including droids, Star Trek Galaxy class are up at about 1,000 at full complement, but there's a much smaller minimal crew specified in one of the tech manuals (IIRC about 100, but I don't have the book to hand at the minute), the Andromeda Ascendant in Andromeda's got a lot of automation and a crew in single figures, ditto for the Liberator of Blake's 7, and if you include the cargo it's hauling, the Nostromo in Alien gets away with automation to look after most things and waking the 7 person crew up for anything it can't handle.

[Max_Killjoy]

I never take Star Wars numbers seriously for anything... this is the same setting that shows us manually-crewed "turbolasers" being reloaded with canisters by hand after every shot... because it "looks cool".

The crew numbers are just WW2 ship crew numbers bloated up by a rough comparison of total ship volumes, I think.

[Pauly]

Dedicated troop carriers could probably do a bit better (the RMS Queen Mary carried 15,740 troops with 943 crew during WW2 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RMS_Queen_Mary#Second_World_War) for a ratio of 1:16.7), but that comes with all the vulnerabilities it entails (they're in trouble if the enemy even so much as looks in their direction).

The Queen Mary steamed faster or as fast as torpedoes. She was sent out unescorted because the escort ships couldn’t keep up with her.

Her only vulnerability was if she steamed straight to within about 500 yards of a waiting and prepared U-boat. And she sailed on a zig-zag course away from the normal shipping channels. The Germans did sight her on several occasions but never even got close to being able to take a shot at her.

[snowblizz]

I never take Star Wars numbers seriously for anything... this is the same setting that shows us manually-crewed "turbolasers" being reloaded with canisters by hand after every shot... because it "looks cool".
Clearly they are loading in fresh new Duracell batteries after each shot.:smallbiggrin:

The crew numbers are just WW2 ship crew numbers bloated up by a rough comparison of total ship volumes, I think.

Sounds about right. Space ship combatin Star Wars being WW1 ship combat plus WW2 ship/arial combat.

[The Jack]

Red ánd green laser pointers are used for firearm targeting. I understand weapon attachments need to be extra sturdy to be on a firearm, and that green shows best, but if someone was rich and vain, would anything stop them from getting blue/purple/pink/yellow lasers. Other than yellow, red and green I've only seen quite bulky emiters.

[hymer]

Red ánd green laser pointers are used for firearm targeting. I understand weapon attachments need to be extra sturdy to be on a firearm, and that green shows best, but if someone was rich and vain, would anything stop them from getting blue/purple/pink/yellow lasers. Other than yellow, red and green I've only seen quite bulky emiters.
I've never seen or heard of laser with the visible light being yellow, but through blue and into violet and ultraviolet is certainly possible. I don't see why yellow lasers would not be an option. You just have to get the right wave lengths.
As for the properties of these lasers I'm even more shaky. I know that red and green bend differently in lenses, which may be important in a lot of tools. *shrug* I have no idea what to expect from a yellow laser.

[PhoenixPhyre]

I've never seen or heard of laser with the visible light being yellow, but through blue and into violet and ultraviolet is certainly possible. I don't see why yellow lasers would not be an option. You just have to get the right wave lengths.
As for the properties of these lasers I'm even more shaky. I know that red and green bend differently in lenses, which may be important in a lot of tools. *shrug* I have no idea what to expect from a yellow laser.

As it turns out, the wavelength (and color) of the lasers is set by the emission source. Portable lasers (for targeting) have to be semiconductor lasers (same as most commercial, non-specialty lasers out there), and those only come in a few types, listed by the makeup of the semiconductor.

GaN lasers are blue (400 nm).

InGaN lasers are in the blue-green range (400-500 nm). Likely these are the ones used in high-end laser sights.

AlGaInP or AlGaAs lasers are the classic red/IR ones (630 nm - 900 nm). These are the dirt-cheap ones used in bulk laser pointers.

All the other semiconductor lasers are in the infrared.

So you don't get vanity shades because there aren't lasers that produce them. As a note, these are also right near the peaks of the human vision response curve. That's one reason that those blue halogen headlights seem so bright--they're right near a local maximum of our response curves. Stupid trucks with high, really bright lights....:smallfurious:

As for optics, each color experiences a different index of refraction, so high-end optics designed for monochromatic light have to use different lenses. Other than that, they're very similar.

[Alexander256]

Axes are a bit of a half way point between maces and cutting swords, they deliver a more powerful blow, though not powerful enough that they don't need a sharp edge to do optimal damage, and therefor are generally less suited for stabbing. Less suited can be better than nothing, so a point on an axe or even a mace can make sense. But they're not flashy fencing weapons, they're strike hard weapons.

[Willie the Duck]

Regarding yellow lasers--I suspect that it is also harder for the eye to distinguish a yellow dot your laser pointer/scope makes as being 'my targeting point.' If a red or green dot appears on something, you can generally tell right away that it is unnatural.

[Gnoman]

Red ánd green laser pointers are used for firearm targeting. I understand weapon attachments need to be extra sturdy to be on a firearm, and that green shows best, but if someone was rich and vain, would anything stop them from getting blue/purple/pink/yellow lasers. Other than yellow, red and green I've only seen quite bulky emiters.

Red and green are used because those are the colors that the human eye can most easily distinguish in the (relatively rare) conditions that a laser is actually useful. Other colors are not impossible (although nobody's made portable semi-conductor ones yet), but would not be nearly as good for most people.

[Berenger]

Are huge crews neccessary for huge ships? Particularly when it comes to sci fi, it just seems they are puting more people in ships than they need too.

I specifically wanted large crews for my spacefaring faction in an RPG because it had a militaristic society with a large percentage of active military personnel and only got a fixed number of hulls for balancing reasons. I came up with the following justifications for higher than average crews, though I have no idea how realistic they are. Whatever realistic means in terms of sci-fi space battles, anyway.

1. A cultural distrust against systems under fully automated control, reinforced by the superior cyber-warfare capabilities of hostile factions. Some things like point defense lasers had to be automated due to required superhuman reaction times, but for offensive weapons and other critical components, they preferred to have a human supervisor somewhere in the loop as a matter of principle.

2. A higher than average number of watches (shifts). In peacetime, each warship had an additional watch to keep more personnel in training. This makes sense if a) the operational costs stem largely from from the cost of the ship as opposed to the pay of the crew, b) the faction can churn out new hulls faster than new crews during wartime and c) the design of starships isn't so claustrophobic as to making extra bodies on board a liability.

3. The faction was an empire with far-flung colonies, so there was a need for far travel and independent action during various types of missions, requiring a full medical and engineering staff and a large marine complement for boarding / peacekeeping. The ships dedicated to home system defense were more straight-up warmachines and always within reach of some stationary installation, reducing the number of required personnel.

4. Redundant redundancy systems of redundancy. It's rather stupid to win a heroic victory in space, just to succumb to slow asphyxiation afterwards because the enemy took your sole life support module with him. This multiplies maintenance and maintenance crew. Also, we ruled that automated systems were more efficent while intact but degradated faster than manned low-tech solutions when taking damage in battle.

[The Jack]

That's known. He wants to stand out/be unique and has the money for it.
The practicality of it... it doesn't matter that they're not as visible, being visible is enough, but it does matter that they work on guns without ruining the ergonomics. Can they be minaturized onto pistols or put on rifles.

The general character concept; an idiot-savant airsoft-edgelord, target shooting champion (and Monster Energy sponsored MLG toxic-gamer) is made a vampire, given big money and real guns, and still wants to persue his hobbies as an immortal blood sucker.

Vampires probably play airsoft with real guns sometimes.

But anyhow, we've got a real scary teenager with a focused set of hobbies and way too much money. He's socially awful so wants to stand out by looking cool and distinct.

Thing is I'm not an airsoft dude. But given that edgelords and tryhards seem to pop up with a cursory glance, I can work out some kind of venom/spawn-punisher outfit with the things I can find in a "price-highest to lowest- search. But tailored wear, custom accessories....

Anyone got ideas for some must-have rich-boy "operator" wankery? Gold plated guns or garish paintjobs? Sci-fi helmets, monster masks or skull balaclava? You desperately need to tell the world that you're the best and coolest with what you wear, how do you do it?

Purple lasers just seemed like a great vanity item idea.

[gkathellar]

As Berenger says, the main reason is visibility - bright red and bright green are both easy to see and unlikely to blend with things in the background. If this is a rich idiot, well ... blue LED crystals are a thing these days, so that shouldn’t be a problem.

[Willie the Duck]

Anyone got ideas for some must-have rich-boy "operator" wankery? Gold plated guns or garish paintjobs? Sci-fi helmets, monster masks or skull balaclava? You desperately need to tell the world that you're the best and coolest with what you wear, how do you do it?

How about thousands of dollars on a bunch of urban camo stuff with the skull balaclava and all that, but have it all be Vantablack (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vantablack), despite the fact that, as the only thing around that would be that dark, it's actually less good for nighttime airsoft than regular black camo?

Edit: I'm not sure that vampire airsoft players would switch to real guns. Any good paintball player will tell you that, "these aren't pretend guns, they are real paintball markers!"

[Gnoman]

That's known. He wants to stand out/be unique and has the money for it.
The practicality of it... it doesn't matter that they're not as visible, being visible is enough, but it does matter that they work on guns without ruining the ergonomics. Can they be minaturized onto pistols or put on rifles.

The general character concept; an idiot-savant airsoft-edgelord, target shooting champion (and Monster Energy sponsored MLG toxic-gamer) is made a vampire, given big money and real guns, and still wants to persue his hobbies as an immortal blood sucker.

Vampires probably play airsoft with real guns sometimes.

But anyhow, we've got a real scary teenager with a focused set of hobbies and way too much money. He's socially awful so wants to stand out by looking cool and distinct.

Thing is I'm not an airsoft dude. But given that edgelords and tryhards seem to pop up with a cursory glance, I can work out some kind of venom/spawn-punisher outfit with the things I can find in a "price-highest to lowest- search. But tailored wear, custom accessories....

Anyone got ideas for some must-have rich-boy "operator" wankery? Gold plated guns or garish paintjobs? Sci-fi helmets, monster masks or skull balaclava? You desperately need to tell the world that you're the best and coolest with what you wear, how do you do it?

Purple lasers just seemed like a great vanity item idea.

You are looking for some intersection of "tacticool" and "tactilol". Googling those will give you better info than you'll find here.

[tyckspoon]

How about thousands of dollars on a bunch of urban camo stuff with the skull balaclava and all that, but have it all be Vantablack (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vantablack), despite the fact that, as the only thing around that would be that dark, it's actually less good for nighttime airsoft than regular black camo?


Vantablack-coated gear painted with UV-fluorescent pigments in flashy metal-album cover/over-the-top tattoo/etc designs? So he's blacker than black, but under blacklight or if seen by somebody who can see in that spectrum (presumably, other vampires that have sight-enhancing gifts) you can see his Awesome Cool tigers and dragons n' stuff? Bonus if he personally can see by UV but most of his victims can't, so he can use UV lights as a kind of flare or flashbang - this spot of moving nothingness approaches you, 'lights' up the area with a blacklight strobe, and the last thing you see is the stop-motion flickering of a ghostly Death Eather mark on his helmet before he shoots you.

[rs2excelsior]

I specifically wanted large crews for my spacefaring faction in an RPG because it had a militaristic society with a large percentage of active military personnel and only got a fixed number of hulls for balancing reasons. I came up with the following justifications for higher than average crews, though I have no idea how realistic they are. Whatever realistic means in terms of sci-fi space battles, anyway.

1. A cultural distrust against systems under fully automated control, reinforced by the superior cyber-warfare capabilities of hostile factions. Some things like point defense lasers had to be automated due to required superhuman reaction times, but for offensive weapons and other critical components, they preferred to have a human supervisor somewhere in the loop as a matter of principle.

2. A higher than average number of watches (shifts). In peacetime, each warship had an additional watch to keep more personnel in training. This makes sense if a) the operational costs stem largely from from the cost of the ship as opposed to the pay of the crew, b) the faction can churn out new hulls faster than new crews during wartime and c) the design of starships isn't so claustrophobic as to making extra bodies on board a liability.

3. The faction was an empire with far-flung colonies, so there was a need for far travel and independent action during various types of missions, requiring a full medical and engineering staff and a large marine complement for boarding / peacekeeping. The ships dedicated to home system defense were more straight-up warmachines and always within reach of some stationary installation, reducing the number of required personnel.

4. Redundant redundancy systems of redundancy. It's rather stupid to win a heroic victory in space, just to succumb to slow asphyxiation afterwards because the enemy took your sole life support module with him. This multiplies maintenance and maintenance crew. Also, we ruled that automated systems were more efficent while intact but degradated faster than manned low-tech solutions when taking damage in battle.

The thing about sci-fi is that with a proper set of initial conditions and assumptions about technology, political/cultural climate, hardness level, etc. you can make a reasonable justification for most anything. If I came across a sci-fi novel that used these justifications for having pretty significant crews aboard their warships, I wouldn't bat an eye. 1, 3, and 4 are especially good points.

For a more in-depth discussion than you're likely to ever want about most topics in sci-fi, I highly recommend this site (http://www.projectrho.com/public_html/rocket/index.php). There's a page on crew roles and sizes in particular, here (http://www.projectrho.com/public_html/rocket/crew.php). Word of warning, the site focuses on super-hard sci-fi, basing things off of real-world physics and plausible technology everywhere possible. It gets somewhat technical at times (though not inaccessible to the average person, I'd say). Still, even if you're aiming for something softer, I find it a useful starting point for keeping things grounded, at least.

[Telok]

Vantablack-coated gear painted with UV-fluorescent pigments in flashy metal-album cover/over-the-top tattoo/etc designs? So he's blacker than black, but under blacklight or if seen by somebody who can see in that spectrum (presumably, other vampires that have sight-enhancing gifts) you can see his Awesome Cool tigers and dragons n' stuff? Bonus if he personally can see by UV but most of his victims can't, so he can use UV lights as a kind of flare or flashbang - this spot of moving nothingness approaches you, 'lights' up the area with a blacklight strobe, and the last thing you see is the stop-motion flickering of a ghostly Death Eather mark on his helmet before he shoots you.

I'll note that there are purple laser pointers for the same size and cost as the green ones. These also have a strong UV component to them. Specifically, I have a large sheet painted with glow-in-the-dark paint and hung on one wall of my garage because playing with this color laser pointer on the sheet is so much fun.

[The Jack]

...but have it all be Vantablack (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vantablack),
That was a fascinating read...



Vantablack-coated gear painted with UV-fluorescent pigments in flashy metal-album cover/over-the-top tattoo/etc designs? So he's blacker than black, but under blacklight or if seen by somebody who can see in that spectrum (presumably, other vampires that have sight-enhancing gifts) you can see his Awesome Cool tigers and dragons n' stuff? Bonus if he personally can see by UV but most of his victims can't, so he can use UV lights as a kind of flare or flashbang - this spot of moving nothingness approaches you, 'lights' up the area with a blacklight strobe, and the last thing you see is the stop-motion flickering of a ghostly Death Eather mark on his helmet before he shoots you.

...and this was poetry.

[Maquise]

Quick question, are there any known examples of sword hilts and fittings being decorated by blueing in the medieval time period? I'm familiar with armors getting blued, and I've seen later, Victorian-era sabers with bluing and gilding, but was wondering if it was done in the Medieval period. I know it isn't practical for the blade, due to the blue only being surface deep, but was wondering about the hilt.

[Pauly]

Quick question, are there any known examples of sword hilts and fittings being decorated by blueing in the medieval time period? I'm familiar with armors getting blued, and I've seen later, Victorian-era sabers with bluing and gilding, but was wondering if it was done in the Medieval period. I know it isn't practical for the blade, due to the blue only being surface deep, but was wondering about the hilt.

Blueing was invented in the Victorian era, by Whitworth or Armstrong iirc.

Before that your options were
- Gilding (gold)
- Blacking - similar to what you see on cast iron frypans today.
- inlay. Silver, gems
- polishing - lots of elbow grease

[HeadlessMermaid]

Blueing was invented in the Victorian era, by Whitworth or Armstrong iirc.

Before that your options were
- Gilding (gold)
- Blacking - similar to what you see on cast iron frypans today.
- inlay. Silver, gems
- polishing - lots of elbow grease
Also niello (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Niello). The most elaborate niello decorations are ~18th century or later, I see them a lot in sword and dagger hilts/scabbards from the Caucasus and thereabouts (expanding to Russian, Ottoman, and Persian weapons). But in simpler forms they go way back and pop up in many many places, in Europe, Asia, and Africa. Medieval niello is definitely a thing. And depending on how exactly you define niello, it may date from the Bronze Age, and apply even to blades (albeit ceremonial ones).

[fusilier]

Blueing was invented in the Victorian era, by Whitworth or Armstrong iirc.

Before that your options were
- Gilding (gold)
- Blacking - similar to what you see on cast iron frypans today.
- inlay. Silver, gems
- polishing - lots of elbow grease

Browning/bluing had been used on firearms since at least the 18th century, if not earlier. Although there are claims that even by the time of the American Civil War it was weak and wore off quickly. I believe there were different ways of accomplishing this, and perhaps the modern techniques (Armstrong, Whitworth) were developed in the 19th century.

I've heard of oil treatments being used on metals from the Renaissance period (probably earlier) to brown them, although I don't think that created a very dark brown.

I believe there are heat treatments that can blue steel, that were used in the Medieval period and later.

I don't really know the details, but I know that there were techniques for browning and bluing steel/iron before the Victorian era.

[Maquise]

Blueing was invented in the Victorian era, by Whitworth or Armstrong iirc.

Before that your options were
- Gilding (gold)
- Blacking - similar to what you see on cast iron frypans today.
- inlay. Silver, gems
- polishing - lots of elbow grease

As far as I know, blueing dates back to the 15th Century, if not earlier. I've seen it referenced as such here: https://youtu.be/rdI6PoJXmZg?t=672 As well as several blued Gothic suits of armor recreated in museums.

[Pauly]

As far as I know, blueing dates back to the 15th Century, if not earlier. I've seen it referenced as such here: https://youtu.be/rdI6PoJXmZg?t=672 As well as several blued Gothic suits of armor recreated in museums.

I see where I went astray.

Whitworth discovered s practical way to do blueing on an industrial scale. It wasn’t practical for any large scale application previously

[snowblizz]

I know it isn't practical for the blade, due to the blue only being surface deep, but was wondering about the hilt.

It's not really practical for the hilt either. You want hilts to have a good grip and a smooth metal finish isn't very conductive to that. That is one reason you'll find a lot of organic material used in hiltconstruction.

[Martin Greywolf]

The short answer to bluing is, we don't know. There are very few swords left from especially medieval periods, and those of them that still have their surface finish intact enough to determine how it looked are fewer still. There are also issues of museums altering the artifacts in question - any bluing or lack of it you may find could well be a modern alteration.

We know it wasn't done for the high end swords. Bluing is a neat process, but it creates a thin layer of oxides to protect the steel, and that can be scratched away with use, and more importantly, can't really be decorated further. Gold plating was preferred.

https://i.pinimg.com/originals/9d/07/24/9d0724023dd2c4810fb4bbf594a73396.jpg

There's also the issue that, over time, as you occassionally splip in oiling the steel, it will develop a patina that is a sort of natural bluing (rust bluing is just that with some additional steps):

http://www.fioredeiliberi.org/antique-swords-uk/for-sale/1853-20/3.JPG

So, if bluing was done, it was most likely on mid-price-range swords, and few if any of those survive. It was not really representative if we believe manuscripts, though, swords in those are usually painted with silver, which originally shone like a somewhat polished surface - it's only now that the manuscript silver oxidized that we see blue or black swords in them.

[Lemmy]

I have a few questions about old-timey (medieval/renaissance) blacksmiths.

- Other than the heat and possibly getting cut by accident, what other occupational hazards were part of their work?
- What did they use to protect their faces/eyes?
- Was there a risk to their hearing? If so, did they use any sort of equipment or precaution to protect against it?

[The Jack]

Rather than a bayonet and making your gun into a spear-like weapon, would making a good, wholesome warhammer out of your rifle be feasible?

Obviously, shooting someone's better for armour piercing and a bayonet is an easier weapon, I'm more inquiring as to if structurally this would work.

[Willie the Duck]

Rather than a bayonet and making your gun into a spear-like weapon, would making a good, wholesome warhammer out of your rifle be feasible?

Obviously, shooting someone's better for armour piercing and a bayonet is an easier weapon, I'm more inquiring as to if structurally this would work.

Yes, combination (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Combination_weapons) weapons were indeed a thing. There were even warhammer (https://myarmoury.com/feature_spot_combo.php)ones specifically (about half-way down, search for 'Warhammer with wheel-lock').

[The Jack]

Yes, combination (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Combination_weapons) weapons were indeed a thing. There were even warhammer (https://myarmoury.com/feature_spot_combo.php)ones specifically (about half-way down, search for 'Warhammer with wheel-lock').

Sorry I should've clarified, I meant for more modern rifles. Say a warhammer AR-15. one one hand they're made of better material, on the other hand they're generally not as stocky in design. Anything in the era of smokeless powder's good, though I suppose rifles like the K98k might be more in line with the old, stocky build stuff.

I mean, you could make a rifle from the ground up to be a warhammer,that's not in question, but could you do it with minimal new parts on an existing platform?

[Willie the Duck]

Hmmm. Good question. As a general rule, gun design disfavors doing things which might increase jam frequency (of which I have to assume using a rifle as the haft of an impact weapon would consider to be the case). OTOH, bayonets exist and are not immune to this effect. I'm going to say 'probably' with the primary factor for why bayonets have always been the preferred version of this would be a combination of reach and the low amount of opponents so thoroughly armored as to make spearlike weapons ineffective. If you ever had a just-post-modern era where full body armor (both bullet and knife-resilient) was in vogue, I am sure there would be a shift back to armor-defeating weapons like warhammers.

[Mike_G]

Sorry I should've clarified, I meant for more modern rifles. Say a warhammer AR-15. one one hand they're made of better material, on the other hand they're generally not as stocky in design. Anything in the era of smokeless powder's good, though I suppose rifles like the K98k might be more in line with the old, stocky build stuff.

I mean, you could make a rifle from the ground up to be a warhammer,that's not in question, but could you do it with minimal new parts on an existing platform?

I don't think there are any for modern-ish rifles. Not saying people didn't swing rifles like clubs, but the more advanced the rifle, the worse a club it makes.

I wouldn't want to swing my AR-15 like a hammer and then hope it works afterwards. Modern rifles are a lot more complex and not nearly as heavy and robust as, say, a Brown Bess. Yes, a bayonet thrust puts some stress on the rifle, but not like using it like a hammer would.

Things about the bayonet.

It is a good deterrent to cavalry, striking a nice compromise by combining the function of pike and shot so that every infantryman can shoot and still fend off the cavalry. This is not something a warhammer would do as well.

It can be used without changing your grip much from using the rifle as God intended, to shoot people. So if you are shooting and suddenly need to stab a guy, the bayonet is already pointing the right way. You don't need to change your grip or wind up for a swing. Just thrust the rifle forward.

It's good for keeping the enemy from grabbing your rifle. This is something people don't appreciate enough. I think that's a huge advantage to fixing your bayonet for CQB. This works better with a bladed bayonet and not a spike bayonet, but either one is a deterrent.

So I think a warhammer rifle would be overall worse than a bayonet.

[Brother Oni]

I have a few questions about old-timey (medieval/renaissance) blacksmiths.

- Other than the heat and possibly getting cut by accident, what other occupational hazards were part of their work?
- What did they use to protect their faces/eyes?
- Was there a risk to their hearing? If so, did they use any sort of equipment or precaution to protect against it?

Depending on the materials they were working with, poisoning from metal fumes was quite common. Arsenical bronzes (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arsenical_bronze) was obsolete by the period you're asking about, but blacksmiths making those often went mad or died young.

Wire pulling was often a high risk activity; starting with a heated billet of metal, a blacksmith pulled it through increasingly smaller holes (gauges) until the desired thickness was obtained. Since you're working with heated metal under great tension, homogeneity of your metal was of great importance, else it could snap at a weak spot, causing injury or death.

RSI was common, along with nerve damage in the hands/arms from repeated impacts.

Carbon dioxide/monoxide poisoning was also not unknown, especially in winter; you're working with a large hot fire in an enclosed space. Of note is that there was a recommendation not to make apprentices sleep in the same room as the forge.

Similarly damp coal was bad due to the increased smoke generation, with the particles getting into your lungs and causing all sorts of COPD related illnesses.

With regard to protective gear, a smock and gloves were about it, although the smock was more to protect their clothes. Eye and hearing protection was virtually unknown, so tinnitus and eye/face injuries were common - many guilds had statues for charitable work in the community, including old and sick members of their guild which included those injured on the job.

I've found reference to trade manuals and medical treatises that discuss the hazards of metalworking; essentially what we would call an occupational health manual today. I've found a pdf of one published in 1520 in Augsberg (link (https://epub.ub.uni-muenchen.de/11778/1/Cim._104.pdf)); my medieval German is nicht sehr gut, but it might be of interest to our German speaking playgrounders.

[jjordan]

I have a few questions about old-timey (medieval/renaissance) blacksmiths.

- Other than the heat and possibly getting cut by accident, what other occupational hazards were part of their work?
- What did they use to protect their faces/eyes?
- Was there a risk to their hearing? If so, did they use any sort of equipment or precaution to protect against it?
If you worked with horses you stood a good chance of getting kicked or bitten. Oxen couldn't be shoed while standing and had to be lifted up off the ground in harnesses, so you were working around a ton of suspended, and sometimes irate, bovine.

[Pauly]

Rather than a bayonet and making your gun into a spear-like weapon, would making a good, wholesome warhammer out of your rifle be feasible?

Obviously, shooting someone's better for armour piercing and a bayonet is an easier weapon, I'm more inquiring as to if structurally this would work.

Bashing people with the buttstock has been done ever since guns were small enough to swing. English even adopted “Pistol whipping” as a common term, which tells you just how common it is/was.

[Willie the Duck]

Depending on the materials they were working with, poisoning from metal fumes was quite common. Arsenical bronzes (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arsenical_bronze) was obsolete by the period you're asking about, but blacksmiths making those often went mad or died young.

Even without poisonous metals, a lot of working with hot gas can be a serious problem. My understanding of the original Chinese blast furnaces for steel also had workers who mostly died around 30.

[fusilier]

I don't think there are any for modern-ish rifles. Not saying people didn't swing rifles like clubs, but the more advanced the rifle, the worse a club it makes.

I wouldn't want to swing my AR-15 like a hammer and then hope it works afterwards. Modern rifles are a lot more complex and not nearly as heavy and robust as, say, a Brown Bess. Yes, a bayonet thrust puts some stress on the rifle, but not like using it like a hammer would.

To add a little to this -- Old military rifles with a full length wood stock, usually make much better clubs. The shape of the stocks of some early muskets seem to have been specifically designed for clubbing.

Some modern rifles even have trouble with providing good bayonet mounts, due to other factors of the weapon's design. (Although I suspect I'm thinking of the Johnson rifle, which dates to WW2).

[fusilier]

Similarly damp coal was bad due to the increased smoke generation, with the particles getting into your lungs and causing all sorts of COPD related illnesses.

I know a blacksmith who died of lung cancer. I believe he used coal (sometimes coke).

[Pauly]

In addition to the above, there are more mundane injuries blacksmithing would lead to.

I doubt many blacksmiths retired with all 10 fingers complete.

Lifting and carrying heavy metal all day would lead to a variety of low back problems.

Swinging heavy hammers and repeated impacts could lead to rotator cuff (shoulder) injuries.

[rs2excelsior]

Does anyone have any books they'd recommend about warfare in the Thirty Years' War and similar timeframes (Dutch War of Independence/Eighty Years' War, English Civil War, etc)? Specifically things like combat tactics, organization, and how armies were recruited/paid/etc? I've been doing a bit of digging and it seems like a rather interesting time period, with what is basically the regimental system in its infancy and the various experiments on how to best utilize both shock and fire power. On the army recruitment side it seems like the line between "proper" national armies and outright mercenaries was rather blurry as well.

[snowblizz]

Does anyone have any books they'd recommend about warfare in the Thirty Years' War and similar timeframes (Dutch War of Independence/Eighty Years' War, English Civil War, etc)? Specifically things like combat tactics, organization, and how armies were recruited/paid/etc? I've been doing a bit of digging and it seems like a rather interesting time period, with what is basically the regimental system in its infancy and the various experiments on how to best utilize both shock and fire power. On the army recruitment side it seems like the line between "proper" national armies and outright mercenaries was rather blurry as well.

Depends on language. I'd recommend starting out with some Osprey books, they've expanded the selection a lot in recent years for the period (relatively speaking, I still think there are more specific books on buttons of Napoleonic war regiemtns than the entire period). One problem is that in English they only really cover the ECW and that was somewhat distinct. Good look finding anything about the 80 years war in english, it only features as a "well this is where they got ideas" in introductions.

Osprey does a Pike and shotte tactics book also. It's in Englsih a very narrowly studied period, again see ECW, and the rest of it features mostly in specific treaties of the 30YW in general or specific battles. Everyone* loves Gustavus Adolphus (or Gustav II Adolf) but that also means books are maybe a tad too strong on the propaganda.


*except Papists, but who cares what those think:smalltongue:

[Kiero]

Does anyone have any books they'd recommend about warfare in the Thirty Years' War and similar timeframes (Dutch War of Independence/Eighty Years' War, English Civil War, etc)? Specifically things like combat tactics, organization, and how armies were recruited/paid/etc? I've been doing a bit of digging and it seems like a rather interesting time period, with what is basically the regimental system in its infancy and the various experiments on how to best utilize both shock and fire power. On the army recruitment side it seems like the line between "proper" national armies and outright mercenaries was rather blurry as well.

A lot of the period is pre-logistics, before the likes of Gustavus Adolphus came along and put serious thought to how you recruit, train, feed and pay large armies. Many soldiers weren't volunteers, and provisioning (never mind pay) was haphazard to say the least.

One thing to prepare yourself for reading into the Thirty Years War: it was pretty horrible, even by the usual standards of warfare. A third of Germany's population was wiped out as armies roved back and forth across the principalities, there were no "rules of engagement" recognised by the combatants.

[Max_Killjoy]

A lot of the period is pre-logistics, before the likes of Gustavus Adolphus came along and put serious thought to how you recruit, train, feed and pay large armies. Many soldiers weren't volunteers, and provisioning (never mind pay) was haphazard to say the least.

One thing to prepare yourself for reading into the Thirty Years War: it was pretty horrible, even by the usual standards of warfare. A third of Germany's population was wiped out as armies roved back and forth across the principalities, there were no "rules of engagement" recognized by the combatants.

Famine and disease became major issues as well.

[Pauly]

Does anyone have any books they'd recommend about warfare in the Thirty Years' War and similar timeframes (Dutch War of Independence/Eighty Years' War, English Civil War, etc)? Specifically things like combat tactics, organization, and how armies were recruited/paid/etc? I've been doing a bit of digging and it seems like a rather interesting time period, with what is basically the regimental system in its infancy and the various experiments on how to best utilize both shock and fire power. On the army recruitment side it seems like the line between "proper" national armies and outright mercenaries was rather blurry as well.

There is a lot of really good information available on the ECW in English. It’s been studied for a long time.

However compared to fighting in the continent the armies were tiny and mostly poorly drilled. Also because of the internecine nature of the campaigns the early fighting was a tad shambolic.

One point to keep in mind is that no-one really knows how pike blocks fought. Re-enactors have found that if the pike blocks lower pikes and charge each other that the first 4 ranks on both sides die immediately and then you have a brawl as people fight over the top of the bodies. Since this doesn’t accord with historical accounts people are fairly convinced this didn’t happen IRL. However what they actually did is a subject of a lot of debate.

[Clistenes]

There is a lot of really good information available on the ECW in English. It’s been studied for a long time.

However compared to fighting in the continent the armies were tiny and mostly poorly drilled. Also because of the internecine nature of the campaigns the early fighting was a tad shambolic.

One point to keep in mind is that no-one really knows how pike blocks fought. Re-enactors have found that if the pike blocks lower pikes and charge each other that the first 4 ranks on both sides die immediately and then you have a brawl as people fight over the top of the bodies. Since this doesn’t accord with historical accounts people are fairly convinced this didn’t happen IRL. However what they actually did is a subject of a lot of debate.

People don't want to die, so they didn't charge into each other... it seems they stopped and tried to stab each other's faces while the bravest men crawled under the pikes with swords and shields and tried to fight the enemy up close...

It seems firearms were in charge of the offense, while pikes were mostly defensive. As you have said, a pike block charge would be terrifying, but once you have pikes on both sides, they tend to slow down because they don't want to impale themselves.

I would like to read about battles between Hellenistic period armies, when sarissa-armed phallanxes clashed with each other... I can't remember any mention of phallanx clashes degenerating into brawls like the one you describe, so I guess they slowed down and tried to stab each other from afar too...

[rs2excelsior]

Depends on language. I'd recommend starting out with some Osprey books, they've expanded the selection a lot in recent years for the period (relatively speaking, I still think there are more specific books on buttons of Napoleonic war regiemtns than the entire period). One problem is that in English they only really cover the ECW and that was somewhat distinct. Good look finding anything about the 80 years war in english, it only features as a "well this is where they got ideas" in introductions.

Osprey does a Pike and shotte tactics book also. It's in Englsih a very narrowly studied period, again see ECW, and the rest of it features mostly in specific treaties of the 30YW in general or specific battles. Everyone* loves Gustavus Adolphus (or Gustav II Adolf) but that also means books are maybe a tad too strong on the propaganda.


*except Papists, but who cares what those think:smalltongue:

As for language, English preferably. I don't think my grasp of German would be good enough to go for a scholarly book in that language, although it would probably be good practice :smalltongue:

I'll see about some of those Osprey books, especially the one on pike and shot tactics.


A lot of the period is pre-logistics, before the likes of Gustavus Adolphus came along and put serious thought to how you recruit, train, feed and pay large armies. Many soldiers weren't volunteers, and provisioning (never mind pay) was haphazard to say the least.

That's one reason I'm interested in that side of things--learning just how they handled recruitment, supply, and pay (for the latter two a big part of the answer is "take everything you can from the local civilians," I know) without modern systems in place that most people take for granted. It's an interesting transitional period for me.


There is a lot of really good information available on the ECW in English. It’s been studied for a long time.

However compared to fighting in the continent the armies were tiny and mostly poorly drilled. Also because of the internecine nature of the campaigns the early fighting was a tad shambolic.

One point to keep in mind is that no-one really knows how pike blocks fought. Re-enactors have found that if the pike blocks lower pikes and charge each other that the first 4 ranks on both sides die immediately and then you have a brawl as people fight over the top of the bodies. Since this doesn’t accord with historical accounts people are fairly convinced this didn’t happen IRL. However what they actually did is a subject of a lot of debate.


People don't want to die, so they didn't charge into each other... it seems they stopped and tried to stab each other's faces while the bravest men crawled under the pikes with swords and shields and tried to fight the enemy up close...

It seems firearms were in charge of the offense, while pikes were mostly defensive. As you have said, a pike block charge would be terrifying, but once you have pikes on both sides, they tend to slow down because they don't want to impale themselves.

I would like to read about battles between Hellenistic period armies, when sarissa-armed phallanxes clashed with each other... I can't remember any mention of phallanx clashes degenerating into brawls like the one you describe, so I guess they slowed down and tried to stab each other from afar too...

I've heard that, that pike-blocks would "fence" with each other, sitting basically just far enough that a thrust could hit the enemy front line. Then again, I've heard it argued that the period descriptions and artwork of pike warfare don't reflect that, and do show pike blocks charging home.


There's a book I checked out from my university's library a while back titled "The Anatomy of Victory: Battle Tactics, 1689-1763" by Brent Nosworthy that I enjoyed. It discussed the evolution from pike and shot tactics to linear musket tactics. Something along those lines but toward a bit earlier period. Just thought since I was looking for recommendations I'd throw one out myself if anyone was interested.

[Grek]

Suppose we have a world with Napoleonic-era technology and society, but which occasionally has people fighting in D&D-style dungeons/underground cave systems for various reasons. What sort of tactics make sense in that situation? What weapons would/could someone bring to such a fight? How does this change as the number of people involved (one person vs five people vs a hundred people vs five thousand people on each side?) or the wealth of the combatants (an ordinary foot soldier vs a rich noble officer) are altered? More generally, what do depictions of early 1800s often get wrong? What's the biggest mistake that I'm likely to make trying to speculate about a fantasy setting with that technology level? What sort of things are a must-consider, or even a must-include to match the character and tactics of the era?

[Storm_Of_Snow]

For the first part, the closest real world version would be undermining defensive fortifications to blow them up, and countermining (although this last is more WW1-era.)

Essentially, you're into very close quarters weapons - knives, clubs, weaponised mining tools (picks, hammers, axes etc), knuckle dusters/punch daggers and so on, but long weapons like officers sabres would be difficult to use and may be parade ground only for subterreanen-duty regiments - something more like a Machete or a Wakizashi-length blade would be more suitable.

For firearms, Officers may carry a couple of pistols - possibly with bayonets, and blunderbusses (or things like Nock's Volley Gun) might be used.

[rs2excelsior]

The musket and bayonet would still probably be the primary weapon, regardless of the size of the group involved. It gives you quite a bit of versatility--you have a firearm, a spear, and a club all in one--and it's pretty easy to train people to use it. That said, I can see some variations. Shorter, carbine-length muskets would probably be common, with longer sword bayonets. These were already in use for light infantry and artillery crews in the Napoleonic era, and would be handier in close quarters. Weapons like the Baker Rifle were also shorter, but rifles in this era fired a round ball that was wadded tightly to the barrel, which made the weapon a bit slower to fire, especially after repeated shots had fouled the barrel--the difference would be small, but the accuracy you gain isn't worth as much in this kind of situation (incidentally this is why Napoleon never adopted a rifle for his light infantry like the British did with their Rifle Regiments, he felt the rate of fire was more important). As Storm of Snow mentioned, weapons like blunderbusses or volley guns might be more common, but keep in mind that most of these can't really mount a bayonet. Soldiers might also carry melee weapons, like short swords, axes, clubs, etc.--if you go with a short dragoon musket your short sword might also serve as your bayonet. Check out the weapons of Napoleon's pioneers--they would probably be well suited to this kind of thing. Come to think of it, Marines would probably be rather at home--narrow areas, short ranges, etc. The wealth of the combatants is probably just going to determine how fancy their gear is. By the Napoleonic era most foot soldiers didn't provide their own equipment anymore.

Tactics would be similar, though without being able to deploy large battle lines, of course. You could fire a volley then close in, taking advantage of the disruption caused from the shot. Or you could, with a deep enough formation, have a rank fire then go to the rear to reload, keeping up fairly constant fire while falling back. Or do it the other way, moving the rear rank to the front to fire. Whatever happens, encountering the enemy at close range means quick, aggressive, decisive action is going to be more important than careful planning or detailed tactics. Cavalry is going to be a non-issue when underground, so maintaining close formations is somewhat less important (I still doubt you'd see people abandoning lines completely). NCOs are going to be more important, since small, flexible units are key, instead of large field battalions.

--

As far as what most depictions get wrong: linear tactics were universal not because no one had thought of anything better, but because they work. The smoothbore musket had an effective range of 75-100 yards and an effective rate of fire of three rounds a minute. Foot soldiers were not as thoroughly trained as modern soldiers--modern soldiers are expected to have some degree of individual initiative; Napoleonic soldiers were expected to follow orders. Well drilled troops who could move together and keep their cool over fire would maintain their ability to deliver effective fire, assault an enemy position, or resist an assault. A unit that lost its cohesion under fire would have trouble even moving in the same direction, much less fighting. Loose-order infantry had their place, but their role was limited to harassment and screening.

Most movies get the bayonet completely wrong. The bayonet was in vogue in the Napoleonic wars, and the short range/low rate of fire of muskets did mean that determined soldiers could deliver a volley, receive the enemy's fire, and then cover the distance between them before the enemy could reload, but movies show every battle devolving into chaotic melees with both forces intermixed. In reality bayonets caused very few casualties--it was more common for one side to break and run before contact, or after a very brief melee, and keeping in lines was absolutely critical. Presenting a solid wall of bayonets was much more effective than a bunch of people charging around like lunatics.

Cavalry was also a major reason for infantry to maintain formation. When charged by cavalry, infantry units that held formation (square was the general response to threat from cavalry) would come off fairly well; infantry units that broke and ran would be cut down. I can't remember the battle, but one British brigade which was charged in the flank by cavalry suffered wildly different causalties--the nearer battalions suffered upwards of 80% casualties, while the ones that were further away and had time to form square reported 5-10%. Cavalry would rarely charge good order infantry--they would be committed to attack an exposed flank or infantry that was already wavering.

Artillery was quite important, and could blunt an enemy attack or shake a defender's morale and formation. The pyrotechnics you see in movies, with an explosion happening at the target's feet and 4-8 people flying off into the air, isn't really accurate. Most Napoleonic artillery fired solid shot, basically giant musket balls. They'd often be aimed so as to hit the ground and skip up through an enemy formation. Exploding shot was around but not commonly used yet, and would be aimed to explode over the heads of an enemy formation at their feet. Canister or grapeshot was used against infantry at close range, turning cannons into giant shotguns, but if the target is that close to your artillery usually something is going wrong.

Hopefully this is helpful, not just incoherent ramblings :smallsmile:

[The Jack]

Pistols, blunderbuss, carbines, one handed melee weapons . Ear protection

I'd go with 'sword in one hand, pistol in the other' a lot. a belt of pistols with it. You essentiaĺly want to reduce numbers and then engage.

Explosives of course. Grenades for breaching and clearing as if the war was modern.

Breastplates, perhaps with some mail. You're going to be in a lot of cqb underground, and you're also likely doing an elite few vs many in. The breastplate might even stop a gun, but a helmet would be good for the cave.

[Maquise]

Would black powder be feasible underground at all? I would imagine breathable air would quickly become a problem in subterranean warfare, even before taking smoke into account.

[Gnoman]

Would black powder be feasible underground at all? I would imagine breathable air would quickly become a problem in subterranean warfare, even before taking smoke into account.

Black powder smoke is unpleasant, and probably isn't good to breathe in over time, but the smoke you'd get from underground skirmishing would probably be less than you'd get in a firing line on a still day. Black powder pistols and carbines were fired indoors fairly often in some sieges, so I doubt underground would be prohibitive.


As for language, English preferably. I don't think my grasp of German would be good enough to go for a scholarly book in that language, although it would probably be good practice :smalltongue:


One of the regulars over on Something Awful's milhist thread is a 30YW scholar. According to him, there are very few non-German sources to work with, and he had to learn German to study at more than a Wikipedia level.

[rs2excelsior]

Breastplates, perhaps with some mail. You're going to be in a lot of cqb underground, and you're also likely doing an elite few vs many in. The breastplate might even stop a gun, but a helmet would be good for the cave.

I'd be inclined to say that a breastplate thick enough to turn musket balls at close quarters is probably more weight and expense than it's worth, and for melee a good sword bayonet so you can keep your enemy at distance is just as effective. By the Napoleonic era there was very little armor still in use (I believe French Cuirassers were about the only ones who still wore armor, and it was usually front plate only). That said, this depends a lot on the circumstances. Marching entire brigades of foot into a tunnel system to clear it? Probably not issuing them armor. Sending in small, specialized, well-trained teams? Maybe so.



One of the regulars over on Something Awful's milhist thread is a 30YW scholar. According to him, there are very few non-German sources to work with, and he had to learn German to study at more than a Wikipedia level.

Dang, I figured there would at least be a bit out there. All the more reason for me to knock the rust off my German, I guess.

[Clistenes]

I'd be inclined to say that a breastplate thick enough to turn musket balls at close quarters is probably more weight and expense than it's worth, and for melee a good sword bayonet so you can keep your enemy at distance is just as effective. By the Napoleonic era there was very little armor still in use (I believe French Cuirassers were about the only ones who still wore armor, and it was usually front plate only). That said, this depends a lot on the circumstances. Marching entire brigades of foot into a tunnel system to clear it? Probably not issuing them armor. Sending in small, specialized, well-trained teams? Maybe so.

Armor would be very useful in close combat. There isn't time to reload if you bump into enemies while exploring a narrow corridor, there isn't enough space to allow the guys behind you to come to the front and start firing, and the enemy would be so close that neither they nor you are likely to miss a shoot... so your best strategy would probably be to shoot everything you have while sprinting towards them and try to start a melee...

Suicidal, maybe, but the other options are worse... I guess you could lie down after firing and let the guy after you shoot his weapon, but sooner or later everybody will have discharged their weapons, and the survivors will have to get up and start stabbing each other...

I think I have heard something about soldiers using some sort of thick pavis-like shield against pistol shoots while fighting in tunnels...

[Lemmy]

Thank all of you for your replies to my question about the hazards of blacksmith work. It was really helpful.

[rrgg]

Does anyone have any books they'd recommend about warfare in the Thirty Years' War and similar timeframes (Dutch War of Independence/Eighty Years' War, English Civil War, etc)? Specifically things like combat tactics, organization, and how armies were recruited/paid/etc? I've been doing a bit of digging and it seems like a rather interesting time period, with what is basically the regimental system in its infancy and the various experiments on how to best utilize both shock and fire power. On the army recruitment side it seems like the line between "proper" national armies and outright mercenaries was rather blurry as well.

Osprey's Pike and Shot Tactics 1590-1660 i think is still a pretty good overview, though it perhaps leans a bit too heavily into the "slow, clumsy spanish tercios" narrative.

Eduard Wagner's European Weapons and Warfare 1618-1648 also isn't super academic but again provides a very good overview of a wide variety of different subjects as well as being completely chock full of very good illustrations.

You might also try Guthrie's The Later thirty Years War, Parker's The Army of Flanders and the Spanish Road, and Tallett's European Warfare 1350-1750 are all very good.

For the development of warfare in england in particular I'd highly recommend Fissel's English Warfare 1511-1642 as well as Elizabethan Military Science by Henry Jason Webb.

Also, if your interested you could try browsing https://quod.lib.umich.edu/e/eebogroup/ which has a lot of english treatises and manuals from the period, some with complete transcriptions online though some you might need to try logging in through your college.

Also you can find a full preview of Sir James Turner's Pallas Armata. And though he wasn't writing until 1670, he had experience from both the 30 years war and the English Civil Wars. The first two sections talk about the Greeks and Romans, but if you skip to the third section he has a long series of interesting essays explaining his thoughts on various aspects of modern warfare.

https://books.google.com/books?id=0m9nAAAAcAAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false


Regarding "Push of pike" i think a lot of the confusion just comes from the fact that what warfare usually looked like changed quite a bit over this period. A lot of people tend to have in mind illustrations such as This one by Hans Holbein the younger (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Battle_Scene,_by_Hans_Holbein_the_Younger.jpg ) which tend come from around the early 16th century. Its around the Italian Wars period that swiss pike tactics were rapidly spreading in popularity, firearms were still generally less effective and used by a much smaller proportion of troops on the field, and it was much more common to see massive pike collumns clash in a long, drawn out period of pike fencing and/or brutal melee.

At the end of the 16th century however the ratio of firearms to pikes among infantry was already usually 1:1 or greater, armor was becoming less common and pike tactics were starting to shift from the massive swiss pike columns/pike squares to breaking them up into many much smaller, shallower battalions only 10-6 ranks deep. By this point writers and treatises tend be stating that by far most battlefield casualties were now typically caused by small arms and that it had become very rare for pikemen to actually clash with each other before the fight had already been decided from a distance. They still considered the pike an extremely important weapon for being able to take and hold ground, but when pike charges did occur they couldn't risk staying in melee for very long or preferred to avoid it entirel and were more likely to behave like later bayonet charges, i.e. either the defenders lose their nerve and start to run away or the attackers have second thoughts and abort the attack before actually coming into contact.

[The Jack]

How competent are militias in the USA generally, as military forces? A few videos suggest they're fairly inept as a military force. I understand the barriers for entry are low and kids or some morbidly obese man who just joined are gonna drag them down, but from what limited stuff I've seen poor fitness and improper gun handling are rampant among the elders who should know better. The top teir seems pretty low.

[Max_Killjoy]

How competent are militias in the USA generally, as military forces? A few videos suggest they're fairly inept as a military force. I understand the barriers for entry are low and kids or some morbidly obese man who just joined are gonna drag them down, but from what limited stuff I've seen poor fitness and improper gun handling are rampant among the elders who should know better. The top tier seems pretty low.

Highly variable, but with a lot of the issues you note.

[snowblizz]

For the first part, the closest real world version would be undermining defensive fortifications to blow them up, and countermining (although this last is more WW1-era.)

Not at all.

Look no further than the Siege of Vienna. Extra Credits History doing a special on it and ep 2 is Tunnel War: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XxOufHD_Nxw

[Kiero]

Armor would be very useful in close combat. There isn't time to reload if you bump into enemies while exploring a narrow corridor, there isn't enough space to allow the guys behind you to come to the front and start firing, and the enemy would be so close that neither they nor you are likely to miss a shoot... so your best strategy would probably be to shoot everything you have while sprinting towards them and try to start a melee...

Suicidal, maybe, but the other options are worse... I guess you could lie down after firing and let the guy after you shoot his weapon, but sooner or later everybody will have discharged their weapons, and the survivors will have to get up and start stabbing each other...

I think I have heard something about soldiers using some sort of thick pavis-like shield against pistol shoots while fighting in tunnels...

Agreed, just because armour is redundant on the battlefield when cannon balls or muskets are going to go right through it regardless, doesn't mean in the specific scenario of close-quarters tunnel fighting it doesn't have a value. Especially once everyone has fired their prepared load, or if no one had time to get firearms up before they closed into a press.

Depending on the era/influences, a buff coat might be more practical for melee combat than a back and breast cuirass, simply because it offers more coverage.

[Clistenes]

About tunnel fighting... When preparing to fight in the dark, the soldiers from the Spanish Tercios would put their white linen shirts over their armor as a tabard of sorts, so they could easily tell friend from foe with just a bit of light...

[Storm_Of_Snow]

Would black powder be feasible underground at all? I would imagine breathable air would quickly become a problem in subterranean warfare, even before taking smoke into account.
I did think about grenades (which were a thing, but more like the ubiquitous cartoon bomb), but there's more chance of bringing the entire geology down on your head than doing any damge to the enemy.

For armour, I was considering what's effectively heavy cast iron riot shields - incredibly unwieldly and very tiring to move, but if you're looking to hold a tunnel, a few abreast with supporting troops firing over the top or through shooting holes might make something that's almost impossible to break without bringing in something like a light artillery piece.


Not at all.

Look no further than the Siege of Vienna. Extra Credits History doing a special on it and ep 2 is Tunnel War: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XxOufHD_Nxw
Closest chronologically of the three I could find is 1683, which isn't really Napoleonic era. For the period in question, most sieges were trying to reduce the walls enough to force a surrender or allow an assault, while trying to do it quickly enough to take it before relieving forces could interfere, and offensive sapping is a much more time consuming activity - possibly the only time it made sense was when the British army over-wintered in 1810-1811 protected by the Torres Vedras lines, and to be honest, I don't know whether the geology there makes undermining practicable.

[rs2excelsior]

rrgg: Lots of stuff there that looks good, thanks! I'll definitely do some digging into those.

RE armor in Napoleonic tunnel fighting: I'm not saying armor wouldn't be useful. But I do think whether the cost could outweigh the usefulness, depending on the exact situation. I'm looking at it like historical participants in the Napoleonic Wars suddenly being called upon to do tunnel fighting. In that case, no one is really making large numbers of breastplates anymore, and if you're looking to send larger forces in I can definitely see the armies deciding it would be cheaper to just replace the losses. With smaller forces, especially more highly-trained ones, the math changes. It also changes if this kind of tunnel fighting has been common for an extended period of time--armor might have never fallen out of use among the forces specialized for it, and the infrastructure to make large numbers of sets of armor would still be in place, keeping the cost down.

Also, it depends how often that kind of tunnel fighting actually happens. I remember discussions here about soldiers cutting their pikes shorter or dropping pieces of armor on the march to reduce the weight they have to carry around, even though it increases the chance of them being killed or injured in combat.

[Clistenes]

Closest chronologically of the three I could find is 1683, which isn't really Napoleonic era. For the period in question, most sieges were trying to reduce the walls enough to force a surrender or allow an assault, while trying to do it quickly enough to take it before relieving forces could interfere, and offensive sapping is a much more time consuming activity - possibly the only time it made sense was when the British army over-wintered in 1810-1811 protected by the Torres Vedras lines, and to be honest, I don't know whether the geology there makes undermining practicable.

For what I have read, in Western Europe, during the Napoleonic Era, once the walls were breached, if the attacking army had a great enough numerical advantage, the besieged city would almost always negotiate a surrender before the actual assault happened...

As a matter of fact, the one time the defenders mounted a desperate defense, forcing the assaulting army to fight a bloody battle in every street, with heavy casualties on both sides, the attacking soldiers were so angry they wanted to kill the defending army to the last man... from their point of view, the defenders had broken the implicit rules by forcing a bloody battle when their side had already lost... (I don't remember the name of the city, I will have to look around for it...).


rrgg: Lots of stuff there that looks good, thanks! I'll definitely do some digging into those.

RE armor in Napoleonic tunnel fighting: I'm not saying armor wouldn't be useful. But I do think whether the cost could outweigh the usefulness, depending on the exact situation. I'm looking at it like historical participants in the Napoleonic Wars suddenly being called upon to do tunnel fighting. In that case, no one is really making large numbers of breastplates anymore, and if you're looking to send larger forces in I can definitely see the armies deciding it would be cheaper to just replace the losses. With smaller forces, especially more highly-trained ones, the math changes. It also changes if this kind of tunnel fighting has been common for an extended period of time--armor might have never fallen out of use among the forces specialized for it, and the infrastructure to make large numbers of sets of armor would still be in place, keeping the cost down.

Also, it depends how often that kind of tunnel fighting actually happens. I remember discussions here about soldiers cutting their pikes shorter or dropping pieces of armor on the march to reduce the weight they have to carry around, even though it increases the chance of them being killed or injured in combat.

Well, obviously, if you don't have armor at hand, you can't use it, period.

But we lack context... for all we know, in @Grek's setting people fight underground all the time and they have kept using armor for that reason...

[The Jack]

Armour techniques were extremely good before it fell out of fashion. With napoleonic improvements in trade, industry and metalurgy I'm confident they could re-armour themselves relatively quickly.

[rrgg]

Anyways, regarding tunnel fighting. I'm less familiar with the napoleonic era but yeah going back one or two centuries earlier fighting underground in tunnels was extremely common. Once mines dug underground could be filled with barrels of gunpowder instead of having to rely on burning pig fat or whatever they became much more dangerous and the defenders had to become much more proactive when it came to digging countermines, gathering intelligence, and trying to intercept the enemy's tunnels.

During the 1587 siege of Sluys in particular the English and Dutch defenders were apparently able to find a number of really old cellars beneath the walls which they were able to use as staging points to intercept Spanish mining attempts. Between all the mines and countermines being dug they soon turned a complex interconnected network of tunnels which saw almost constant underground skirmishing around the clock. From Sir roger Williams's account:

". . . afterwards we kept the Towne eighteene daies, the enemie being lodged in our port, rampier, and breach, aboue three hundred paces, in the which time the Enemie passed through the port sixe paces to beate our Trenches within: wee kept our Fort vntill wee were made saultable more than our Troupes could guard, vnles wee would quite the Towne: being mined, wee countermined them, in the which wee fought hourelie for the space of nine daies with Sword, Target and Pistols: at our breach, port, and rampiet of the Towne wee fought daylie with pikes, short weapons and stones, besides our shot for the said space of eighteene daies."

when it comes to the late 16th century in particular there are a couple of other writers which mention the sword, pistol, and ("pistol-proof") target (probably with armor being worn as well if it could be afforded) as generally being the most useful weapons for fighting in mines. A pike might be somewhat useful mixed in with other weapon types so long as you don't have to go around a corner and there were other short weapons that could be used such as a 5-6 foot long bill or halberd or a two-handed sword, but they still weren't quite as easy to use in confined spaces as the sword and target.

As flintlock pistols became more reliable and cheaper i think the use of shields and armor declined underground as well and the focus became more on shooting the enemy first or else running away. Or remember that even when you don't have a real machine gun so long as you have several soldiers with firearms and some coordination you can still have sort of a machine gun in order to lay down covering fire where you need it. Shields or armor needed to be pretty heavy to reliably stop firearms at such close ranges and even then there were still all sorts of potential counters to watch out for, for instance even if you have a pistol-proof shield and breastplate they aren't necessarily going to save you if one of the enemies brought a full-sized musket underground or if one of them is carrying an overcharged pistol loaded with a steel ball instead of lead. Or if they are able to fire hailshot into your exposed limbs or eyes or if they throw a grenade and you have trouble running away in time because of your heavy shield and armor. There's also the fact that armor still has the potential to wear you out or reduce your speed at inopportune moments, limit your ability to do manual labor if you're one of the ones who's responsible for expanding the tunnels, and depending on the nature of the tunnels in question might still limit your mobility in tight spaces anyways

There's a legend from one of the sieges of Vienna (I've completely forgotten whether it was the 1529 siege or the 1683 siege) that the defenders luckily stumbled across an ottoman mine they were looking for when it had already been completed, was filled with gunpowder, and was already lit, so had to have a really skinny soldier very quickly squeeze through the hole they had created in order to put the fuse out in time.

[Clistenes]

For what I have read, in Western Europe, during the Napoleonic Era, once the walls were breached, if the attacking army had a great enough numerical advantage, the besieged city would almost always negotiate a surrender before the actual assault happened...

As a matter of fact, the one time the defenders mounted a desperate defense, forcing the assaulting army to fight a bloody battle in every street, with heavy casualties on both sides, the attacking soldiers were so angry they wanted to kill the defending army to the last man... from their point of view, the defenders had broken the implicit rules by forcing a bloody battle when their side had already lost... (I don't remember the name of the city, I will have to look around for it...).


I think it was the Siege of Badajoz, in 1812...

Ironically, the British and Portuguese army were besieging a Spanish city occupied by invading French troops, so technically speaking, the attacking army were allies of the Spanish civilians inside... but when the city was assaulted, the British soldiers took revenge... on the Spanish civilians, raping the women, killing the men and looting and burning the city...

With friends like those, who needs enemies...?

[Kiero]

I think it was the Siege of Badajoz, in 1812...

Ironically, the British and Portuguese army were besieging a Spanish city occupied by invading French troops, so technically speaking, the attacking army were allies of the Spanish civilians inside... but when the city was assaulted, the British soldiers took revenge... on the Spanish civilians, raping the women, killing the men and looting and burning the city...

With friends like those, who needs enemies...?

That was the almost universal experience of sieges across all time; if the city surrendered without a fight, they might get respectful treatment. But if they resisted, the moment "the rams touched the wall" (to use the Roman variation on the term), they could expect only a sack if the besiegers got in.

[Grek]

For the tunnel fighting scenario, assume a world where naturally occurring tunnels are much more common (due to the introduction of several species burrowing megafauna); where mining is easier (certain species of said megafauna can be domesticated); where underground areas are economically important (certain agricultural and industrial products can only be produced deep underground); and where the particulars of magic make it strategically valuable for a military to maintain both underground bunkers and extremely tall towers (in addition to the other limitations, scrying cannot view areas of greater altitude than the caster, while teleportation cannot reach areas of greater depth). As a result, most military campaigns involve some fighting in/over underground tunnels and any equipment that would be especially helpful for that can be assumed available.

[a_flemish_guy]

Does anyone have any books they'd recommend about warfare in the Thirty Years' War and similar timeframes (Dutch War of Independence/Eighty Years' War, English Civil War, etc)? Specifically things like combat tactics, organization, and how armies were recruited/paid/etc? I've been doing a bit of digging and it seems like a rather interesting time period, with what is basically the regimental system in its infancy and the various experiments on how to best utilize both shock and fire power. On the army recruitment side it seems like the line between "proper" national armies and outright mercenaries was rather blurry as well.

prior to all of this the spanish tercio (a block of combined pikeman and musketeers) was king on the battlefield
personally I'd look at maurice of nassau who made that block into more lines and gustavas adolphus who did away with the pikeman in order to create line tactics which would be relatively unchanged untill the napoleonic era

[snowblizz]

and gustavas adolphus who did away with the pikeman in order to create line tactics which would be relatively unchanged untill the napoleonic era

That's way off. The Swedish armies of the 30YW were always pike and shot. The ratio declined through the period, in all armies, but it tended to not go too low (I remember numbers of 3:2 and 1:1 but right now can't rcall which way), and they would always try and increase it. It was just hard to get people to be pikemen.

But it never even got close "linear tactics". We are actually into the 1700s when the last pikes disappear in regular armies.

[gkathellar]

On that note, how late were pikes and spears employed regularly in shipboard combat?

[snowblizz]

On that note, how late were pikes and spears employed regularly in shipboard combat?

I want to say something like Master and Commander had them* and IIRC that was fairly hisorically accurate. So probably into the early 1800s. Pikes at sea ofc was more like spears than pikes on land.

* I remember a scene from a ship combat with a bunch of guys in an impromptu pike block who get grenaded. If it's not from M&C I can't vouch for the accuracy. Though am fairly sure it was M&C since I can't remember any other recent ship movie, (pirates of the carribean don't count), unless it was in Cuththroat island in which case forget it

[Storm Bringer]

On that note, how late were pikes and spears employed regularly in shipboard combat?

apparently, boarding pikes were about until at least the ACW era some capacity.

basically, they were using spear type weapons In boarding actions for as long as a boarding action was a realistic preposition.

[Kiero]

Boarding pikes (which are basically spears) were used until around 1875.

[The Jack]

If you are wearing your average IV rated armour plate, and are hit by a 30-06 round perpendicular to it, how messed up are you going to get from the force trauma, in relative terms (so I can extrapolate game terms and what'd occur when some durable freak wears armour)

And how dead'd you be if shot by .375 or .338 lapua magnum? Is it possible that armour would make it worse, as the impact could do more harm than clean penetration?

[Gnoman]

And how dead'd you be if shot by .375 or .338 lapua magnum? Is it possible that armour would make it worse, as the impact could do more harm than clean penetration?

No. There are no situations where the armor plate will make the gunshot worse. I don't think a level IV plate would necessarily stop those rounds (Level IV is specced to stop an AP round from a .30-06 or 7.62 NATO round, which are about half as powerful as the two magnum rounds), but you would take less damage from the plate than the bullet.

[The Jack]

I picked those rounds because they maybe are bigger than what IV is rated for. Although Maybe 30.06 AP might be superior to a .338 lapua magnum hollow point (the .338 does deliver aprox 50% more energy from the muzzle)

[Brother Oni]

I picked those rounds because they maybe are bigger than what IV is rated for. Although Maybe 30.06 AP might be superior to a .338 lapua magnum hollow point (the .338 does deliver aprox 50% more energy from the muzzle)

The hollowpoint ammunition would be less likely to penetrate through the armour though as it's designed to dump all its energy into the first thing it connects with and mushroom out.

If you're trying to penetrate armour, the 30.06 AP would be superior to pretty much any small arms hollowpoint ammunition.

[The Jack]

So on reading further

Hollow points are a bit of an outlier and most rounds are FMJ, LRN or something more solid. AP rounds are specialised FMJ rounds.

So, how much more effective are AP rounds generally in penetration compared to regular FMJs and is power sacrificed from other areas\/ (I'd assume the round's just more expensive to make). Does the AP property scale fairly proportionately with the size of the round?


I've kinda worked it in world of darkness terms
30-06=12 dice (6)
.338=14 dice (7)
.50 = 16 dice (8)
Additional successes to hit increase the dice and so 1-3 extra damage can be expected. 7 is an instant kill.
So, in this -totally acurate- scheme, IV armour should be perhaps 14 dice in the 'should comfortably take a 30-06 most of the time'... but I don't know how AP rounds would figure into it. I included the .50 damages because I don't want to accidentally make IV .50 proof.

(Bonus: anybody got a reasonable idea for a hollow point modifier?)

[Gnoman]

If you want good data, there is a simple solution.

Go here (http://www.warehouse23.com/products/gurps-high-tech-2). Buy GURPS High Tech. They've spent years working out exactly how to model this sort of thing. You'll have to use judgement in converting it into your system of choice, but even with a conversion factor it will be more accurate than whatever you come up with.

[Martin Greywolf]

On that note, how late were pikes and spears employed regularly in shipboard combat?

As far as I know, pikes were never used, they are simply too long to be used effectively. Last battle with ships specifically geared towards boarding was Lepanto in 1571 - there is a couple of paintings and frescoes made shortly after it happened, and pikes are nowhere to be seen.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/6c/Battle_of_Lepanto_by_Martin_Rota.jpg

Boarding pikes do exist, but if you look them up, you'll see that they are about the length of a short spear. As for latest instance of it, I could find British P-1894 pattern - total length 168 cm. That means they were still being made and issued in 1894, but for how long I cannot tell. My best gues is they got ditched after WW1, definitely after WW2, this is a time when proper automatic weapons start to dominate what few boarding actions still happen.

Churchill did give an order during WW2 to arm everyone in armed forces with a weapon, even if it is a pike or mace, but those were meant as a desperation weapons if the Seelowe happened, and therefore never actually used. Especially since Sten production ramped up.

[Malphegor]

Is there any evidence for the Welsh ballhook? I swear this was a real thing I read about once, that in Wales at some point there was a tradition of cutting off of unmentionables from fallen soldiers with a sickle-like device, as keepsakes/trophies from battles, and even the rumours that the Welsh did this gave them a bit of a psychological edge because 'oh god if I die they'll mutilate me'

However, for the life of me I can't find any verifiable source or record of it being a real thing.

[Vinyadan]

Is there any evidence for the Welsh ballhook? I swear this was a real thing I read about once, that in Wales at some point there was a tradition of cutting off of unmentionables from fallen soldiers with a sickle-like device, as keepsakes/trophies from battles, and even the rumours that the Welsh did this gave them a bit of a psychological edge because 'oh god if I die they'll mutilate me'

However, for the life of me I can't find any verifiable source or record of it being a real thing.

The Annales Henrici Quarti (page 341) (http://lollardsociety.org/pdfs/Johannis_de_Trokelowe.pdf) report that, after the battle of of Bryn Glas in 1402, Welsh women castrated the corpses of dead English soldiers, put the bullocks in their faces, and cut their noses and stuffed them up their butts. It's a story that is retold or hinted at in the following centuries, among others by Shakespeare in Henry IV, part I. Literature hints to the possibility that it was an English fabrication. I also am fairly sure that I have read something similar about the war in Vietnam.


I have noticed some interesting paintings. One is from 1480-1495, near Bergamo, and has Death using a gun
(https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a8/Clusone%2C_Oratorio_dei_Disciplini_01.JPG).

The other one is a well known tomb of a Samnite warrior (http://www.machestoria.altervista.org/images/Dipinto-su-tomba-Sannita.jpg) from IV century BC Paestum, and now in a museum. I thought it represented a banner, but I did some research, and, as it turns out, it actually represents booty, possibly from a duel: a multicoloured tunic and a leather and bronze belt, suspended to two javelins. Then I wondered how actual insignia must have looked like, and we likely have something preserved: a bronze cockerel (http://www.sanniti.info/sanimage/gallo01.jpg) (Southern Italic people used metal animals on a pole as standards). Picking up dead people's belts is an important theme in the Aeneid, now that I think about it.

[Kiero]

Those belts were a very specifically Oscan/Samnite thing. Even when they were fully assimilated into the Roman legions, legionaries of Samnite origin still wore them with all their other standard Roman gear.

[Pauly]

The Annales Henrici Quarti (page 341) (http://lollardsociety.org/pdfs/Johannis_de_Trokelowe.pdf) report that, after the battle of of Bryn Glas in 1402, Welsh women castrated the corpses of dead English soldiers, put the bullocks in their faces, and cut their noses and stuffed them up their butts. It's a story that is retold or hinted at in the following centuries, among others by Shakespeare in Henry IV, part I. Literature hints to the possibility that it was an English fabrication. I also am fairly sure that I have read something similar about the war in Vietnam.
it.

The mutilation of genitals has a long history in warfare. It’s normally associate with either:
- A foe with a reputation for rape (beyond the accepted limits of the time/place); or
- A “barbarian” group asserting their manliness by making their opponent not men,

[The Jack]

Are swords and knives easier to fight with than hammers? Especially modern hammers with their nice grips and low price points and general legality bonus. If you didn't care about carry weight or prestige would you be at a disadvantage of you used hammers/axes against daggers and swords in an environment where people are wearing little if any armour.

and how does that gap in effectiveness change as people are less skilled to more skilled?

[Storm Bringer]

Are swords and knives easier to fight with than hammers? Especially modern hammers with their nice grips and low price points and general legality bonus. If you didn't care about carry weight or prestige would you be at a disadvantage of you used hammers/axes against daggers and swords in an environment where people are wearing little if any armour.

and how does that gap in effectiveness change as people are less skilled to more skilled?

in general, "yes".

given the choice of sword, knife or hammer, i'd go for the sword every time, then the knife, then the hammer last. the sword is a weapon of war, a tool intended for killing. Knives and hammers are tools that are capable of killing. modern hammers are also optimised for knocking nails in, not teeth out, and are very top heavy to get more power behind the head (historical war hammers, I believe, were much more wieldy and had a point of balance close to the hand). this make them slow to recover form a blow, and its one of those things were if your connect, its gonna do a lot of damage....but if you miss, a knife armed man could get two or three stabs in before your able to do anything about it.


The sword has a significant reach advantage over the average hammer as well, and can make cuts and slashes that keep the hammer wielder beyond his effective reach.

In a modern context, the police don't really care if your carrying a knife or a hammer, they treat both the same (not proof in and of itself, but highly suspicious for you to be carrying without a clear reason). If the police stop you and your carrying a knife, along with some bread, cheese, a nice salami, some plates, and a plausible story about going to the park for a picnic, they're not likely to arrest you for having said big knife. They stop you and your just randomly got a large hammer in your pocket, with no clear explanation as to why, they're much more likely to arrest or detain you.

If your looking for a tool that would be easier to justify in a modern civilian context, a decently long screwdriver is a quite effective stiletto, and somewhat less suspicious than a hammer or big knife.


in terms of skill, with unarmoured fighting, its generally the case that if both people are not caught by surprise ( as people tend to go for ambushes and other surprise attacks to try and disable the opponent before he realises hes even under attack), then both parties end up heavily wounded in very short order (hence the preference for surprise attacks). Quite a few "knife duels" have ended with both men dead, with the "winner" being the one that took longer to bleed out. This is party because of lethal stab wounds are often not very incapacitating, which leaves the stab victim free to inflict equally lethal wounds to his attacker.

Form what I have heard (mainly in the context of self defence and people carrying "defensive" knifes), being "good with a knife" isn't really much a benefit in a straight duel, or at least its not a ticket to avoiding injury.

[Vinyadan]

The mutilation of genitals has a long history in warfare. It’s normally associate with either:
- A foe with a reputation for rape (beyond the accepted limits of the time/place); or
- A “barbarian” group asserting their manliness by making their opponent not men,

There's also the fact that Welsh law used castration as an option when punishing rape. The Normans tried to use castration and blinding instead of the death penalty, possibly as an import from Northern Europe (a way to avoid becoming kinslayers), and certain regions of Wales borrowed it.

[The Jack]

Alright, what about designed for killing warhammers or heavily modified hammers? They're fast and nasty

How would I realistically differentiate them in a game system? Other than carry convenience/cost/legality/cosmetics?

How much faster are they, how huge is the advantage you get from being able to just have the dangerous bit point at the enemy all the time without needing to swing? Why should players go for the expense/legal risk of a sword over a hammer ( or axe) in terms I could make mechanical

[gkathellar]

Alright, what about designed for killing warhammers or heavily modified hammers? They're fast and nasty


The warhammer is certainly an effective weapon, but it is first and foremost a can-opener. By contrast, few things are the equal of a sword in an unarmored fight - not least because swords offer defensive options that most other weapons lack.

[Mr Beer]

Some thoughts:

People used axes and warhammers either because they couldn't afford swords or they needed them to defeat armour.

War axes and hammers don't look much like civilian tools. An inspection might not pick up a combat tomahawk in a toolbox or a home-made warhammer in the back of a van with other long handled tools. But if you're going to simply stroll around with a 3' spiked war hammer slung over your shoulder, you might be better off just buying a greatsword and have done with it.

Best way to simulate the sword advantage would start with them being better at parrying than a swung weapon.

[Pauly]

Alright, what about designed for killing warhammers or heavily modified hammers? They're fast and nasty

How would I realistically differentiate them in a game system? Other than carry convenience/cost/legality/cosmetics?

How much faster are they, how huge is the advantage you get from being able to just have the dangerous bit point at the enemy all the time without needing to swing? Why should players go for the expense/legal risk of a sword over a hammer ( or axe) in terms I could make mechanical

One of the sword’s big advantages is that it’s much easier to parry with a sword than an axe or a hammer. The extra reach also helps encourage the other guy to keep their distance. Especially as the sword is more dangerous to exposed extremities than axes or hammers because it can inflict a damaging hit with a flick of the wrist where an axe or hammer require a proper swing.
Basically the guy with sword should be harder to hit in melee due to the combination of better reach and better parrying.

Hypothetically the damage inflicted should be roughly similar, although the nature of the damage will be different. This is where armor would make a difference to the weapon’s effect. From what you’ve said previously armor doesn’t seem to be too big a thing in your setting.

[Mr Beer]

Also worth mentioning that GURPS again because this is another thing they cover.

The Basic set covers melee combat in adequate detail, though I'd probably pick some other supplements like Martial Arts and Low Tech as well if I was doing a lot of fantasy combat.

They have some pretty serious writers who've been working on a system based around simulationist combat that's over 30 years old, so I bolded the most pertinent thing Gnoman said.


If you want good data, there is a simple solution.

Go here (http://www.warehouse23.com/products/gurps-high-tech-2). Buy GURPS High Tech. They've spent years working out exactly how to model this sort of thing. You'll have to use judgement in converting it into your system of choice, but even with a conversion factor it will be more accurate than whatever you come up with.

[The Jack]

They have some pretty serious writers who've been working on a system based around simulationist combat that's over 30 years old, so I bolded the most pertinent thing Gnoman said.

They've got some less serious writers too (Cloth<leather armour in fourth)

I can mostly see what you're talking about, but a lot of it's grain of salt kind of stuff.


And from the book I'm reading... I don't really see a sword advantage.

[Mike_G]

They've got some less serious writers too (Cloth<leather armour in fourth)

I can mostly see what you're talking about, but a lot of it's grain of salt kind of stuff.


And from the book I'm reading... I don't really see a sword advantage.

Not sure what book you're reading, but swords absolutely dominate in unarmored combat.

They have more reach, they are balanced better so they are faster and easier to feint or switch between attack and defense, they are more versetile having a point and an edge.

Swords beat axes and hammers any day of the week unless you have to contend with armor.

[Pauly]

They've got some less serious writers too (Cloth<leather armour in fourth)

I can mostly see what you're talking about, but a lot of it's grain of salt kind of stuff.


And from the book I'm reading... I don't really see a sword advantage.

Cloth armor has some serious advantages over leather.
- it’s easy to repair
- it is less restrictive to wear
- it’s cheaper
- it’s lighter
- it offers similar level of protection.
- it’s a more common resource.

For example the Greeks preferred the linothorax over a leather cuirass and changed from leather armor to cloth armor in roughly 700 to 600 BC.

In history, after the invention of metal working, leather armor (in particular the buff coat) only really becomes a common thing in the 1600s when advances in agriculture meant that thick leather had become relatively abundant and cheap.

[Brother Oni]

They've got some less serious writers too (Cloth<leather armour in fourth)

Further to Pauly's points, the amount of protection given by cloth armour is entirely dependent on how many layers it has. I remember reading a tech article where a university in Thailand was researching the potential use of silk as bullet resistant armour as cheaper local alternative to kevlar - 9 layers was sufficient to stop a 9mm pistol round.


Not sure what book you're reading, but swords absolutely dominate in unarmored combat.

For what it's worth, Jackie Chan agrees with you on this, western fencing styles especially, hence why he specifically put a fight scene with a expert fencer character in Shanghai Knights (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CDt9FrVOPZk).

Edit: Holy crap, it's Aidan Gillen, better known as Petyr Baelish from Game of Thrones.

[Pauly]

Further to Pauly's points, the amount of protection given by cloth armour is entirely dependent on how many layers it has. I remember reading a tech article where a university in Thailand was researching the potential use of silk as bullet resistant armour as cheaper local alternative to kevlar - 9 layers was sufficient to stop a 9mm pistol round.



For what it's worth, Jackie Chan agrees with you on this, western fencing styles especially, hence why he specifically put a fight scene with a expert fencer character in Shanghai Knights (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CDt9FrVOPZk).

Edit: Holy crap, it's Aidan Gillen, better known as Petyr Baelish from Game of Thrones.

I get a kick out of the fact the character is named Rathbone, after Basil Rathbone who was probably the best sword fighter in Hollywood in the swashbuckling era.

https://youtu.be/nB8tiSMCwRE

https://youtu.be/q9rT7hvb6Aw

https://youtu.be/4MqmpL6X_8w

https://youtu.be/cP4J-okRXCk

Although he was the better swordsman, because he got the villain’s roles I think he only ever one on screen duel.

[gkathellar]

I get a kick out of the fact the character is named Rathbone, after Basil Rathbone who was probably the best sword fighter in Hollywood in the swashbuckling era.

https://youtu.be/nB8tiSMCwRE

https://youtu.be/q9rT7hvb6Aw

https://youtu.be/4MqmpL6X_8w

https://youtu.be/cP4J-okRXCk

Although he was the better swordsman, because he got the villain’s roles I think he only ever one on screen duel.

Am I mistaken in thinking that actual swordsmen tended to get a lot of villainous roles because they could make charming-but-ignorant actors like Flynn look better on screen? Because I feel like I've heard that somewhere.

[Max_Killjoy]

Am I mistaken in thinking that actual swordsmen tended to get a lot of villainous roles because they could make charming-but-ignorant actors like Flynn look better on screen? Because I feel like I've heard that somewhere.

See also pro wrestling...

[Pauly]

Am I mistaken in thinking that actual swordsmen tended to get a lot of villainous roles because they could make charming-but-ignorant actors like Flynn look better on screen? Because I feel like I've heard that somewhere.

I remember reading that Rathbone didn’t like duelling with Flynn because Flynn was fast and good, but not precise. Rathbone always felt it was risky. If you look at Flynn’s swordwork in Robin Hood it really is technically very good.

The most illustrative example is where Rathbone duels Ty Power in The Mark of Zorro (link again https://youtu.be/nB8tiSMCwRE)
Basil Rathbone has to go from over confident to confident to serious to worried to being bested and he shows that progression all through his fencing. Ty Power on the other hand just has to go “surprise I am an expert”.

[The Jack]

I'm talking about what I'm finding in gurps 4th edition basic set, as gurps is recomended. I'm well aware that cloth>leather, but the game's a leather>cloth system. How can one trust that?
(layering the cloth is not great either)

4th basic doesnt have anything to really seperate hammers and swords other than damage types.

[Vinyadan]

Further to Pauly's points, the amount of protection given by cloth armour is entirely dependent on how many layers it has. I remember reading a tech article where a university in Thailand was researching the potential use of silk as bullet resistant armour as cheaper local alternative to kevlar - 9 layers was sufficient to stop a 9mm pistol round.


The Mongols were big on silk armour, weren't they?

[Pauly]

The Mongols were big on silk armour, weren't they?

Wearing silk under their armor. It made it easier to extract arrows and helped stem bleeding. Kind of an automated bandage rather than armor.

[gkathellar]

Specifically, the Mongols were known to use a type of shirt made from numerous pouches of layered silk. If an arrow hit them, the barbs would snag on the silk, lessening the penetration and making it possible to remove without major surgery. It wasn't meant to deflect the arrow altogether, just to improve the odds of survival.

[Brother Oni]

The Mongols were big on silk armour, weren't they?

As others have said, a silk shirt was worn under their armour to help arrow extraction - any arrows that defeated their armour and injured them tended not to pierce/tear the silk, so afterwards, the arrow could be removed with minimal further damage by tugging on the silk carefully (especially important for broadheads).

[fusilier]

I'm talking about what I'm finding in gurps 4th edition basic set, as gurps is recomended. I'm well aware that cloth>leather, but the game's a leather>cloth system. How can one trust that?
(layering the cloth is not great either)

4th basic doesnt have anything to really seperate hammers and swords other than damage types.

I'm not too familiar with 4th ed, but:

GURPS is large and sometimes the basic book has simplified versions of rules that are fleshed out more completely in other works. It's a feature of the game that it can provide varying levels of detail. If you are limiting yourself to the basic book, you almost certainly will not be getting the detail that others here have referred to.

In the Low-Tech 3rd edition book, there are some serious differences between warhammers and swords. For one, a warhammer most be readied after each time it is used. So while it does more damage, it can only be used about half as often as a broadsword. (Also you cannot parry with a weapon that isn't readied.)

As for leather versus cloth. Low-tech again paints a more complicated picture -- keep in mind there are different types of leather armor. In addition to things like buff coats, there was hardened leather, and also padded leather coats, similar in construction to types of padded cloth armor. (Likewise, I'm sure there were different types of cloth armor) I don't know if Low-Tech goes in to that level of differentiation, although I did see different types of leather armor listed.

[The Jack]

Hypothesis;

Gambeson with Riveted mail should be excellent protection against pistol rounds and buckshot
(every damn source I find on guns vs mail is on the butted kind)
That said, I don't know where to draw the line on what bullets could make it through, and for the most part I don't know how differently plate armour would do against modern bullets

'Bullet-proofed' Cuirasses of the 17th century, with padding underneath, might be good enough to reliably protect against modern intermediate cartridges.
Armour went out of use because of full-powered rounds, the smaller stuff was introduced for a time of little to no armour)

Also does anyone have any idea as to what level of bullets a bomb suit would stop?

[Clistenes]

I'm talking about what I'm finding in gurps 4th edition basic set, as gurps is recomended. I'm well aware that cloth>leather, but the game's a leather>cloth system. How can one trust that?
(layering the cloth is not great either)

4th basic doesnt have anything to really seperate hammers and swords other than damage types.

Not all leather armor is equal, and the same goes for textile armor...

A 30 layers linen gambeson is better than an English New Model Army's simple, flexible buff coat, but a rigid leather cuirass made of several layers of thick hide like that of CuChulainn's was an improvement over textile armor (Irish warriors could add more layers of cloth, but they chose to add a leather cuirass instead...).

[Gnoman]

Hypothesis;
'Bullet-proofed' Cuirasses of the 17th century, with padding underneath, might be good enough to reliably protect against modern intermediate cartridges.
Armour went out of use because of full-powered rounds, the smaller stuff was introduced for a time of little to no armour)


Not. A. Chance.


I was able to find data on a circa 1600 breastplate that is probably pretty typical of what you're looking at. The maximum thickness is 1/4", most is not close to that.

An M1 helmet is 1/8" at maximum thickness. When the US Army switched to intermediate cartridges, the minimum performance requirement for penetration was "Guaranteed to penetrate a M1 helmet at 500 yards". The current M855 round is supposed to be able to penetrate significantly more than the original service load, and AP rounds can do even more - specifically, it is supposed to be able to penetrate a BRDM APC at combat ranges, which has armor in the 5-7mm range (1/5-1/3 of an inch, roughly).

In other words, a breastplate from the period might stop a non-AP intermediate round if the round hit it on the thickest part at long range. At shorter ranges, using AP ammo, or hitting any of the thinner parts, it won't stop a thing.

[rrgg]

Regarding swords vs axes/hammers I'd say it's not so cut and dry and depends a lot on exactly what type of sword, what type of axe, and what the fighters are experienced with. You can make an axe that is very lightweight or a sword that's very heavy, and depending on what sort of bits and bobs are attached there are a lot of different parries, hooks, and disarms you can do with an axe that you can't really do with a sword and can catch a swordsman off guard if he's not ready for it.

When it comes to game systems i tend to prefer not worrying about trying to define everything literally and instead take it on a case by case basis, i.e. "This character has an axe but for mechanics purposes do we want to classify their axe as a sword, an axe, or a hammer?


Hypothesis;

Gambeson with Riveted mail should be excellent protection against pistol rounds and buckshot
(every damn source I find on guns vs mail is on the butted kind)
That said, I don't know where to draw the line on what bullets could make it through, and for the most part I don't know how differently plate armour would do against modern bullets

'Bullet-proofed' Cuirasses of the 17th century, with padding underneath, might be good enough to reliably protect against modern intermediate cartridges.
Armour went out of use because of full-powered rounds, the smaller stuff was introduced for a time of little to no armour)

Also does anyone have any idea as to what level of bullets a bomb suit would stop?

fabric or leather armor as far as i know weren't too great at stopping bullets aside from slow moving ricochets, etc. Iron is much harder than lead which made lead bullets extremely inefficient at penetrating it already, but most of the time people would just end up stuffing their muzzleloaders with enough powder to power straight through even "proofed" armors anyways so I'm not sure padding or mail+padding on it's own would do much.

There are some late 16th c. sources which recommend avoiding mail armor in particular since bullets had a tendency to carry parts of the metal rings into the wound with them.


I don't think i would trust any 17th century armor against anything except maybe some modern pistols. Even aside from the fact that rifle rounds today tend to be jacketed instead of only lead, modern rifle bullets tend to be way better shaped for efficient penetration than a round ball.

If you're interested the Graz experiments included tests alongside two modern assault rifles and a glock: https://journals.lib.unb.ca/index.php/MCR/article/view/17669/22312

[Brother Oni]

Gambeson with Riveted mail should be excellent protection against pistol rounds and buckshot
(every damn source I find on guns vs mail is on the butted kind)
That said, I don't know where to draw the line on what bullets could make it through, and for the most part I don't know how differently plate armour would do against modern bullets


I find this highly unlikely. With larger links, buckshot could just pass straight through, leaving you only with a gambeson for effective protection. Working this out is easy - compare the calibre/gauge of your round/shot vs the internal diameter of the link - if the former is smaller or close to the latter, then it's likely to bypass the mail.

Even with smaller links, buckshot and pistol rounds will stress individual links, negating the primary protective mechanism of mail of dispersing the power of an attack over a larger area, thus stressing multiple links rather than just one.

It's telling that the primary bullet resistant protection used by the samurai during the Sengoku Jidai civil war was a rigid metal western style cuirass (nanban gusoku) or a small hand shield (tate) rather than mail (kusari gusoku).

[The Jack]

Forgive me, I'm not great with the gobely **** units, for me inches are only good for pizzas and penises, I'm googling conversion rates, but I'm reading armours of up to 0.285 inches, averaging at more than 1/5 where you're likely to get shot and, when you factor in the armour's slope, distance from the body and the padding underneath, you've got a maybe decent chance with modern steel




If you're interested the Graz experiments included tests alongside two modern assault rifles and a glock: https://journals.lib.unb.ca/index.ph...ew/17669/22312

I'm only skimming and it seems like I've gotta go down a rabbit hole of other sources, but looking at table 2, the 5.56 goes through 9mm of steel (or 3mm of steel and then 6mm behind it?) from 30ft away. Which is anywhere between 2/3rds and a little more than 1/2 of my sample breastplate.

When you pair that with padding underneath... I wouldn't trust it, but it seems like it could work.



There are some late 16th c. sources which recommend avoiding mail armor in particular since bullets had a tendency to carry parts of the metal rings into the wound with them. That's full sized rifle stuff


primary bullet resistant protection used by the samurai during the Sengoku Jidai civil war was a rigid metal western style cuirass (nanban gusoku)
They wore that for a load of reasons
-It was so much cheaper to massproduce
-It was thicker, and the japanese weren't big on wearing padded stuff under their armour
-And again, they were dealing with rifles. The mail question's about lesser guns.

[Gnoman]

Forgive me, I'm not great with the gobely **** units, for me inches are only good for pizzas and penises, I'm googling conversion rates, but I'm reading armours of up to 0.285 inches, averaging at more than 1/5 where you're likely to get shot and, when you factor in the armour's slope, distance from the body and the padding underneath, you've got a maybe decent chance with modern steel




I'm only skimming and it seems like I've gotta go down a rabbit hole of other sources, but looking at table 2, the 5.56 goes through 9mm of steel (or 3mm of steel and then 6mm behind it?) from 30ft away. Which is anywhere between 2/3rds and a little more than 1/2 of my sample breastplate.

When you pair that with padding underneath... I wouldn't trust it, but it seems like it could work.

That's full sized rifle stuff


They wore that for a load of reasons
-It was so much cheaper to massproduce
-It was thicker, and the japanese weren't big on wearing padded stuff under their armour
-And again, they were dealing with rifles. The mail question's about lesser guns.

Take a good look at the source RRRG linked. There is a handy chart. Most of the historical guns fared poorly compared to a Glock pistol in 9x19 Parabellum (which, I hasten to add, is only a medium caliber pistol round that is not optimized for penetration), with only the strongest having more penetration. Both of the modern rifles (one is a Steyr AUG in 5.56x45 (an intermediate round), the other is a FAL in full-rifle 7.62x51) absolutely dwarfed them all.

At best, the older armor will hold out a medium-caliber pistol round. It has no chance whatsoever of keeping out anything larger.

[The Jack]

You have a point.
Honestly, I'm not even sure of how to read the chart. The notations seem to contradict areas elsewhere and I don't know enough about the targets. It's mild steel?
It's not the most clear of things to at least myself.

I wish I had money for stuff like this, I'd happily apply scientific method to the shooting of expensive things.

[tyckspoon]

You have a point.
Honestly, I'm not even sure of how to read the chart. The notations seem to contradict areas elsewhere and I don't know enough about the targets. It's mild steel?
It's not the most clear of things to at least myself.


The methodology is explained in the full text - the guns were fired at a wooden target and a mild steel target. The Table 2 shows the results in the Penetration column, with depth of penetration measured in millimeters: From left to right, column PS30 is the steel target set at a distance of 30 meters, then PW30 is the wood target at 30 meters. PS100 is the steel target at 100 meters, then PW100 is the wooden target at 100 meters.

The older firearms they were testing achieved 2-4mm of penetration at short range, and mostly only 2 mm at longer range. The modern rifles they used for comparison they did not even bother to check at the shorter range, and achieved 3-4 times the penetration at the longer range. I do not see where the kind of bullet used in the modern firearms was noted, but since it wasn't really the point of the exercise they probably didn't really care.

[The Jack]

Indeed, but how thick and Mild is the steel?

[tyckspoon]

Indeed, but how thick and Mild is the steel?

A minimum of 12mm, since that's the greatest penetration they recorded? :smallconfused: Which is a little under half an inch, so markedly thicker than anything I've ever seen noted as being used in personal armor, with most items being more in the area of 3mm at the thicker sections. Do you think it would make a difference past that point? At that level you're shooting into what is functionally a solid brick of steel, as far as personal weaponry is concerned.

[rrgg]

I'm only skimming and it seems like I've gotta go down a rabbit hole of other sources, but looking at table 2, the 5.56 goes through 9mm of steel (or 3mm of steel and then 6mm behind it?) from 30ft away. Which is anywhere between 2/3rds and a little more than 1/2 of my sample breastplate.

When you pair that with padding underneath... I wouldn't trust it, but it seems like it could work.


Yeah, the article is sort of frustratingly light on exact details about the targets they were using. The actual penetration is going to vary significantly depending on the exact type of steel or the exact type of wood being hit. I mainly just use the values given to compare to each other rather than assuming they are truely representative of historic armors. It does make clear that a 5.56 round is much more efficient at penetrating modern mild steel, especially at range, than any of the historic weapons.

An important thing to keep in mind about really thick 17th century breastplates in particular is that for whatever reason by the end of the 16th century the production of steel armor in europe seems to dry up and stop completely, with everything produced after then being pretty much exclusively wrought iron (albeit perhaps more consistent and with a lower slag content than wrought iron from earlier periods).

Something else worth paying attention to are the velocities on table 1 which show just how much round bullets are slowed down at even 30 or 100 meters (kinetic energy = [1/2]mv^2). Additionally Table 2 gives the muzzle energy of each weapon, notice that even the pistols tested were capable of around double the muzzle energy of the modern glock. During the second half of the 16th century, the word "musket" typically referred to the heaviest type of small-arm which required a forked rest to shoot and fired a lead bullet often weighing around 2 ounces or so, the only weapon listed in the test which actually fits within that range would be G 358. In the 17th century the most common musket caliber shrank to a bullet weighing just 1.35 oz, which would be closer to G 284.

The article also mentions that one of the tests involved firing at part of an authentic, 16th century horse's breastplate 2.8-3.0 mm thick. At 8.5 m it was enough to stop the wheellock pistol, with the lead bullet penetrating the plate, but having so little energy left that it was caught by the linen beneath it.

Anyways remember that when it comes to smoothbore pistols from this period you're still generally talking about at least a .40 to .50 caliber bullet with potentially a lot of muzzle energy (though it might lose that energy fairly quickly at a distance).

[fusilier]

Yeah, the article is sort of frustratingly light on exact details about the targets they were using. The actual penetration is going to vary significantly depending on the exact type of steel or the exact type of wood being hit. I mainly just use the values given to compare to each other rather than assuming they are truely representative of historic armors. It does make clear that a 5.56 round is much more efficient at penetrating modern mild steel, especially at range, than any of the historic weapons.

An important thing to keep in mind about really thick 17th century breastplates in particular is that for whatever reason by the end of the 16th century the production of steel armor in europe seems to dry up and stop completely, with everything produced after then being pretty much exclusively wrought iron (albeit perhaps more consistent and with a lower slag content than wrought iron from earlier periods).

Something else worth paying attention to are the velocities on table 1 which show just how much round bullets are slowed down at even 30 or 100 meters (kinetic energy = [1/2]mv^2). Additionally Table 2 gives the muzzle energy of each weapon, notice that even the pistols tested were capable of around double the muzzle energy of the modern glock. During the second half of the 16th century, the word "musket" typically referred to the heaviest type of small-arm which required a forked rest to shoot and fired a lead bullet often weighing around 2 ounces or so, the only weapon listed in the test which actually fits within that range would be G 358. In the 17th century the most common musket caliber shrank to a bullet weighing just 1.35 oz, which would be closer to G 284.

The article also mentions that one of the tests involved firing at part of an authentic, 16th century horse's breastplate 2.8-3.0 mm thick. At 8.5 m it was enough to stop the wheellock pistol, with the lead bullet penetrating the plate, but having so little energy left that it was caught by the linen beneath it.

Anyways remember that when it comes to smoothbore pistols from this period you're still generally talking about at least a .40 to .50 caliber bullet with potentially a lot of muzzle energy (though it might lose that energy fairly quickly at a distance).

I suspect that the modern bullets with a hard jacket helps with armor penetration compared to a soft lead ball.

I have problems with some of the conclusions in the Graz test -- they certainly didn't load the historic weapons with the maximum possible loads -- but I think it's still interesting and useful.

[Mike_G]

Regarding swords vs axes/hammers I'd say it's not so cut and dry and depends a lot on exactly what type of sword, what type of axe, and what the fighters are experienced with. You can make an axe that is very lightweight or a sword that's very heavy, and depending on what sort of bits and bobs are attached there are a lot of different parries, hooks, and disarms you can do with an axe that you can't really do with a sword and can catch a swordsman off guard if he's not ready for it.


I'm not buying it.

In order to make an axe lighter than a sword, it would have to be a lot shorter. And it will still be balanced further from the hand, so even if it was a bit lighter, it would be less agile.

Nothing is absolute, but I would give just about any sword the advantage over just about any axe in unarmored combat, and even moreso over a hammer.

[Gnoman]

I suspect that the modern bullets with a hard jacket helps with armor penetration compared to a soft lead ball.

Not just the jacket itself, but the shape. Modern rifle rounds use pointy spitzer bullets, which are pretty much guaranteed to concentrate the force on a smaller area, aiding penetration.

[Mabn]

How was a heavily armored elephant injured? I understand that a naked elephant could be stabbed to death, But I've seen replicas of elephant armor that are very encompassing and seem to feature quite a lot of metal over quite a lot of padding. And yet, even when wearing this, war elephants were apparently injured by infantry and caused to panic on occasion. What man powered weaponry was injuring an elephant through all those protective layers? Was the armor in fact much thinner than a coat of plate despite the elephants carrying capacity allowing otherwise? Given the expense of a trained war elephant, why? Did people use dedicated armor penetrating weaponry? Given that most spikes on poll weapons don't seem long enough to get through multiple inches of metal, fabric, and skin and have enough length left for more than a bad prick, what?

[Mr Beer]

I think it would be extremely difficult to armour an elephant to the extent that determined infantry armed with long pikes couldn't inflict grievous injuries upon it.

The word 'determined' is important though.

[Vinyadan]

How was a heavily armored elephant injured? I understand that a naked elephant could be stabbed to death, But I've seen replicas of elephant armor that are very encompassing and seem to feature quite a lot of metal over quite a lot of padding. And yet, even when wearing this, war elephants were apparently injured by infantry and caused to panic on occasion. What man powered weaponry was injuring an elephant through all those protective layers? Was the armor in fact much thinner than a coat of plate despite the elephants carrying capacity allowing otherwise? Given the expense of a trained war elephant, why? Did people use dedicated armor penetrating weaponry? Given that most spikes on poll weapons don't seem long enough to get through multiple inches of metal, fabric, and skin and have enough length left for more than a bad prick, what?

Taking a look at images, shooting their eyes might do something. There is a LotR character (Duilin) that dies trying to bring the archers close enough to the oliphaunts to shoot them in the eyes.

[hymer]

Taking a look at images, shooting their eyes might do something.
Likewise looking at images, I see plenty of potential targets: Lower legs, tip of trunk, ears, and there seems to be no belly protection. Just whacking the facial armour hard with sling bullets or thrown missiles could distress the elephant through noise, pain, and fear of getting hit in the eyes, even if it causes no real physical damage. A human is probably a lot better at learning to trust their armour than an elephant.

[gkathellar]

Regarding swords vs axes/hammers I'd say it's not so cut and dry and depends a lot on exactly what type of sword, what type of axe, and what the fighters are experienced with. You can make an axe that is very lightweight or a sword that's very heavy, and depending on what sort of bits and bobs are attached there are a lot of different parries, hooks, and disarms you can do with an axe that you can't really do with a sword and can catch a swordsman off guard if he's not ready for it.

An axe can be light, sure, but to function it needs its weight distribution at the pointy end, and that intrinsically reduces the kind of maneuverability that makes swords and light polearms so good at protecting their wielders. Axes can be used defensively, and they can be used for all sorts of unusual offensive maneuvers (even though a hook sword can totally do all of those :P), but the method of use doesn't allow for the maintenance of a strong defensive perimeter in the way a sword can keep one. Once you add shields, the unique offensive options of something like an axe become more interesting, and once you and your opponent have armor, a variety of can openers start to look attractive for reasons not simply limited to their can-opening utility. But when priority #1 is to keep your weapon in between you and your opponent's weapon, there is nothing quite like a sword or polearm.

[Brother Oni]

The mail question's about lesser guns.

I really should stop putting examples in my replies. People keep on jumping on the example and ignoring the rest of the post which actually answers their question.

[Max_Killjoy]

I really should stop putting examples in my replies. People keep on jumping on the example and ignoring the rest of the post which actually answers their question.

That's the general pattern around here... same thing with any analogy. People attack the analogy instead of trying to understand the point.

[Pauly]

How was a heavily armored elephant injured? I understand that a naked elephant could be stabbed to death, But I've seen replicas of elephant armor that are very encompassing and seem to feature quite a lot of metal over quite a lot of padding. And yet, even when wearing this, war elephants were apparently injured by infantry and caused to panic on occasion. What man powered weaponry was injuring an elephant through all those protective layers? Was the armor in fact much thinner than a coat of plate despite the elephants carrying capacity allowing otherwise? Given the expense of a trained war elephant, why? Did people use dedicated armor penetrating weaponry? Given that most spikes on poll weapons don't seem long enough to get through multiple inches of metal, fabric, and skin and have enough length left for more than a bad prick, what?

Also you are forgetting that wounds can be inflicted by elephant power, not just man power. A well braced spear is something an elephant could well impale itself on.

[The Jack]

I really should stop putting examples in my replies. People keep on jumping on the example and ignoring the rest of the post which actually answers their question.

A degree of it is assuming people can read my mind or that my actions will speak for me. Causes the wife no end of stress :smallamused:

I don't think buckshot for normal shotgun sizes is small enough to get through at least the latter kinds of mail, and birdshot is birdshot.

for pistols... I woulda thought there'd be less stress compared to earlier weaponry. The round would break apart as if crashing into jagged rocks; the rounded handgun bullet would do no favours. The bullet is relatively slow and light moving against a semi flexible surface...

[Willie the Duck]

How was a heavily armored elephant injured? I understand that a naked elephant could be stabbed to death, But I've seen replicas of elephant armor that are very encompassing and seem to feature quite a lot of metal over quite a lot of padding. And yet, even when wearing this, war elephants were apparently injured by infantry and caused to panic on occasion. What man powered weaponry was injuring an elephant through all those protective layers? Was the armor in fact much thinner than a coat of plate despite the elephants carrying capacity allowing otherwise? Given the expense of a trained war elephant, why? Did people use dedicated armor penetrating weaponry? Given that most spikes on poll weapons don't seem long enough to get through multiple inches of metal, fabric, and skin and have enough length left for more than a bad prick, what?

Eyes and feet seem like things very hard to armor, but I'd have to see the armor in question to really make any kind of analysis.

Do note that a elephant can readily injure themselves if panicked. Tripping and rolling, running into immovable objects (braced spears, buildings, landscape, etc.). Anything a horse can do to themselves, an elephant can as well (if not more readily). Sticking sharp things in an elephants face and/or throwing/shooting stuff at it probably is a pretty good strategy regardless of how likely you could actually kill it with the sharp parts.

[Yora]

Do we have any numbers about how long a sea voyage from Norway to Iceland took in the middle ages? Would they always have made a stop at the Faroes, or where there express ships that did it all on one leg?

[Brother Oni]

I don't think buckshot for normal shotgun sizes is small enough to get through at least the latter kinds of mail, and birdshot is birdshot.

In that case, you're going to have to start specifying the gauge of the wire used to make the links, the link internal diameter and the weave used.



for pistols... I woulda thought there'd be less stress compared to earlier weaponry. The round would break apart as if crashing into jagged rocks; the rounded handgun bullet would do no favours. The bullet is relatively slow and light moving against a semi flexible surface...

Say you take 4mm ID, 18 gauge (1.2mm) wire links in a standard European 4-in-1 weave. From the Graz data listed by rrgg, a 9mm modern pistol round will penetrate 2mm of steel, so that thickness steel wouldn't stop it even if it were rigid armour.

Even if you use thick enough links, you have to remember that you're not testing the strength of the links, you're testing the strength of the rivets (even if you've got Roman style punched links) - as rrgg mentioned, some period manuals recommend against mail as bullets tended to carry links through into the wound.

Note that increasing the wire gauge also increases the ID by necessity, making small rounds even more likely to penetrate as either go through the gaps or the links will just strip off the outer layers of lead as the bullet/round carries straight on through - even if the round will breaks apart on striking the mail, it'll shred and the slivers can also penetrate through the gaps.

In addition, a semi flexible surface also doesn't automatically make protection better here, since it can naturally form a shot trap, so the bullet/round can't deflect off like with rigid armours.


Do we have any numbers about how long a sea voyage from Norway to Iceland took in the middle ages? Would they always have made a stop at the Faroes, or where there express ships that did it all on one leg?

I remember reading some figures regarding Viking traders and raiders for a sailing question in an earlier version of this thread. I can update when I get home and have my research links to hand.

Edit: I found this paper (https://notendur.hi.is/thv/t_t.html), which has a translation of a quote from the Icelandic Books of Settlements (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Landn%C3%A1mab%C3%B3k):

"So the wise men say, that from Stadlandet in Norway there is seven days’ sailing to Horn in the East of Iceland, but from Snæfellsnes four days’ sailing to Cape Farewell in Greenland. From Hennøya in Norway you should head always to the west to Cape Farewell in Greenland, and then you sail to the north of Shetland, so that you only see it if the sight at sea be fairly good, but to the south of the Faeroes, so that the sea is midway in the mountain slopes, but in such a way to the South of Iceland that you observe birds and whales from there. From Reykjanes in the South of Iceland there is a sea of three days to Slyne Head (?) in Ireland to the South; but from Langanes in the North of Iceland there is a sea of four days to Jan Mayen in the North at the bottom of the sea, but a day’s sailing to uninhabited land in Greenland from Kolbeinsey in the North."

The paper discusses the journey in the first line from Norway to Iceland as being very well traveled and is a distance of 530 nautical miles, so an average time of 7 days gives 76 miles per day or approx 3.2 knots on average. Based on other records and modern experiments with Viking ship replicas, an 'express' ship could be up to twice as fast, taking 3-4 days for the journey.

[Jeivar]

Since people have been talking about the gambeson I want to add a question.

I want to write a novel about an elf venturing out into human lands on a quest, not really knowing what to expect or specifically planning to get into fights, but wanting to be prepared. So the elf would bring a sword, a dagger, and a protective layer light enough to be worn daily while travelling.

When it comes to heat and weight, is a gambeson something you can wear day in and day out without suffering significantly for it?

[tyckspoon]

When it comes to heat and weight, is a gambeson something you can wear day in and day out without suffering significantly for it?

You can acclimate to it some, and proper belting/strapping helps with weight distribution, but generally I would say if your armor is comfortable to wear daily it's probably not very effective armor (absent magical/futuretech materials like mithril or 'armorweave' that can make metal armors as light and flexible as clothing or turn cloth into the equivalent of modern body armor.) For a gambeson, imagine wearing a heavy quilted blanket or thickly-stuffed winter coat. Everywhere, in all weather. You can do it, but in warm climates and strenuous activity it's not pleasant, and a gambeson built sturdily enough to serve as armor is probably even heavier and breathes less than that.

For general protection I'd look at something like maybe a coat of plate/jack of plates or chain shirt with a relatively lightweight gambeson underneath; reasonably easy to put on, doesn't make you look like you're geared up for war, solid enough protection to stand up to a fairly determined attack (unlike gambeson alone which even if it saves your life is probably going to get severely damaged in a fight with blades.)

[Mabn]

I think it would be extremely difficult to armour an elephant to the extent that determined infantry armed with long pikes couldn't inflict grievous injuries upon it.

The word 'determined' is important though.

Taking a look at images, shooting their eyes might do something. There is a LotR character (Duilin) that dies trying to bring the archers close enough to the oliphaunts to shoot them in the eyes.


Likewise looking at images, I see plenty of potential targets: Lower legs, tip of trunk, ears, and there seems to be no belly protection. Just whacking the facial armour hard with sling bullets or thrown missiles could distress the elephant through noise, pain, and fear of getting hit in the eyes, even if it causes no real physical damage. A human is probably a lot better at learning to trust their armour than an elephant.


Also you are forgetting that wounds can be inflicted by elephant power, not just man power. A well braced spear is something an elephant could well impale itself on.

Interesting. I could understand getting an eye with a lucky shot, but I am mostly exploring melee exchanges, and being either in front of an elephant to attack its eyes or bellow an elephant to attack its belly seem to be excellent ways to die. I thought I remembered standing in front of a charging elephant in dense formation, even with pikes to be absolutely suicidal because the weapons would just snap or be pushed aside by the elephant flailing its armored trunk and tusks from side to side instinctively. I had been under the impression that the best way to take down an elephant was to get out of its way and then attack it from the sides and back so it couldn't fight back or turn to face you. I suppose you could target feet that way though.


Eyes and feet seem like things very hard to armor, but I'd have to see the armor in question to really make any kind of analysis.

Do note that a elephant can readily injure themselves if panicked. Tripping and rolling, running into immovable objects (braced spears, buildings, landscape, etc.). Anything a horse can do to themselves, an elephant can as well (if not more readily). Sticking sharp things in an elephants face and/or throwing/shooting stuff at it probably is a pretty good strategy regardless of how likely you could actually kill it with the sharp parts.

Elephants are rather less likely to break their ankles going over a hole in the ground, and I question how vulnerable an animal that regularly walks through dense thickets of trees by pushing over and trampling said trees really is to impaling itself on sticks. And while a panicked elephant is certainly as much a danger to itself as everyone around it, elephants didn't seem to panic until after they were injured (baring some gimmicks with fire, animals, and animals on fire)

[Brother Oni]

(baring some gimmicks with fire, animals, and animals on fire)

Don't forget 'catapult launched animals on fire'. :smallbiggrin:

[hymer]

Interesting. I could understand getting an eye with a lucky shot, but I am mostly exploring melee exchanges
Fighting an elephant in melee is very much playing its game. If you absolutely must, then polearms are still the way to go for the most part, giving you some distance and a chance to evade if it decides to attack you. It also lets you target the rider(s).
You don't mass in front of the elephant, but let it pass through your formation. The Romans had success with this, though they probably sent skirmishers with ranged weapons to deal with the elephants after they had passed through the openings. Without ranged weapons, you're reduced to surrounding the elephant with spears, poleaxes, or whatever polearms you have. Have the troops evading and falling back where the elephant turns to, and attack wherever a target presents itself, the feet being readily available from the flanks or rear.
And just to be clear: You don't have to be underneath the elephant to attack its belly with a polearm, though a long pike with only a point and no edge would be hard to work in that manner. Most other polearms would work better for that.

In any case, the point is not so much to kill the elephant, but to get it to run away - preferably through enemy lines.

[Mabn]

Fighting an elephant in melee is very much playing its game. If you absolutely must, then polearms are still the way to go for the most part, giving you some distance and a chance to evade if it decides to attack you. It also lets you target the rider(s).
You don't mass in front of the elephant, but let it pass through your formation. The Romans had success with this, though they probably sent skirmishers with ranged weapons to deal with the elephants after they had passed through the openings. Without ranged weapons, you're reduced to surrounding the elephant with spears, poleaxes, or whatever polearms you have. Have the troops evading and falling back where the elephant turns to, and attack wherever a target presents itself, the feet being readily available from the flanks or rear.
And just to be clear: You don't have to be underneath the elephant to attack its belly with a polearm, though a long pike with only a point and no edge would be hard to work in that manner. Most other polearms would work better for that.

In any case, the point is not so much to kill the elephant, but to get it to run away - preferably through enemy lines.
That is more in line with what I thought I knew about anti-elephant tactics, but spears and axes aren't that great at penetrating through layers of metal and it seems really hard to hit the stomach of an elephant with significant force from the sides when it's wearing a heavy splint mail dress that hangs 3 or 4 feet from its side which your pole would have to lift during its strike. I can easily believe getting into melee with a heavily armed and protected elephant was unwise. It was however seemingly done, sometimes successfully, which to me is the hard to grasp part. Seems kind of like trying to stab a tank to death if that tank also had a wrecking ball in its front arc and a dozen soldiers on top of it stabbing you right back from an elevation while inside a protective box. You could take out its treads, but your much more likely to get stabbed, smashed, mangled, or run over.

[Yora]

I remember reading some figures regarding Viking traders and raiders for a sailing question in an earlier version of this thread. I can update when I get home and have my research links to hand.

Edit: I found this paper (https://notendur.hi.is/thv/t_t.html), which has a translation of a quote from the Icelandic Books of Settlements (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Landn%C3%A1mab%C3%B3k):

"So the wise men say, that from Stadlandet in Norway there is seven days’ sailing to Horn in the East of Iceland, but from Snæfellsnes four days’ sailing to Cape Farewell in Greenland. From Hennøya in Norway you should head always to the west to Cape Farewell in Greenland, and then you sail to the north of Shetland, so that you only see it if the sight at sea be fairly good, but to the south of the Faeroes, so that the sea is midway in the mountain slopes, but in such a way to the South of Iceland that you observe birds and whales from there. From Reykjanes in the South of Iceland there is a sea of three days to Slyne Head (?) in Ireland to the South; but from Langanes in the North of Iceland there is a sea of four days to Jan Mayen in the North at the bottom of the sea, but a day’s sailing to uninhabited land in Greenland from Kolbeinsey in the North."

The paper discusses the journey in the first line from Norway to Iceland as being very well traveled and is a distance of 530 nautical miles, so an average time of 7 days gives 76 miles per day or approx 3.2 knots on average. Based on other records and modern experiments with Viking ship replicas, an 'express' ship could be up to twice as fast, taking 3-4 days for the journey.

Those numbers line up really well with the map and ship speeds I have prepared for a game. As long as the ballpark estimate seems about plausible, that's good enough for me.
Thanks.

[Jeivar]

For general protection I'd look at something like maybe a coat of plate/jack of plates or chain shirt with a relatively lightweight gambeson underneath; reasonably easy to put on, doesn't make you look like you're geared up for war, solid enough protection to stand up to a fairly determined attack (unlike gambeson alone which even if it saves your life is probably going to get severely damaged in a fight with blades.)

What's a jack of plates?

[tyckspoon]

What's a jack of plates?

Pieces of metal plate (typically smaller ones, these were made from salvaging damaged large plates or when people hadn't figured out how to make and form large plate pieces yet) sewn into a shell of usually a heavy fabric like canvas or leather; overall a similar concept to lamellar and brigandine, where smaller pieces of metal are arranged in such a way as to mimic the effect of a single continguous plate. 'Jack' refers to the coverage, usually torso; I believe the word eventually turned into or at least is a close relative of the modern jacket.

[Brother Oni]

Those numbers line up really well with the map and ship speeds I have prepared for a game. As long as the ballpark estimate seems about plausible, that's good enough for me.
Thanks.

Ah if you're interested in ship speeds rather than trade routes and journey times, then I have more data from my other post: Link (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showsinglepost.php?p=22947958&postcount=585).


I know of a replica viking ship hitting 14 knots, although it wasn't the smoothest of voyages to say the least: link (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6bTkmG5b-VQ).
They go faster under sail than with oars, but if the wind isn't great they can either supplement or replace it entirely, keeping up their average speed. On average, they'd normally do 5-8 knots; the Viking Ship Museum in Denmark (https://www.vikingeskibsmuseet.dk/en/) has recovered 6 ships that had been scuttled to block a port circa 1070:


Skuldelev 1. Ocean-going trader, dated to ca. 1030. Crew: 6-8. Average speed: 5-7 kts. Top speed: 13 kts.
Skuldelev 2. Great longship, 1042. Crew: 65-70. Avg speed: 6-8 kts. Top speed: 13-17 kts.
Skuldelev 3. Coastal trader, ca. 1040. Crew: 5-8. Avg speed: 4-5 kts. Top speed: 8-10 kts.
Skuldelev 5. Small longship, ca. 1030. Crew: 30. Avg speed: 6-7 kts. Top speed: 15 kts.
Skuldelev 6. Fishing vessel, ca. 1030. Crew: 5-15. Avg speed: 4-5 kts. Top speed: 9-12 kts.

If a monk on the shore spotted the Skuldelev 2 at the horizon (~2.5 nautical miles), with its top speed and shallow draft, the vikings could have boots on the ground in as little as 9 minutes.
As the source I found said (https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/2s2cdu/roughly_how_fast_was_a_viking_longboat_able_to/), not a good day to be a monk.

[snowblizz]

When it comes to heat and weight, is a gambeson something you can wear day in and day out without suffering significantly for it?



For general protection I'd look at something like maybe a coat of plate/jack of plates or chain shirt with a relatively lightweight gambeson underneath; reasonably easy to put on, doesn't make you look like you're geared up for war, solid enough protection to stand up to a fairly determined attack (unlike gambeson alone which even if it saves your life is probably going to get severely damaged in a fight with blades.)

I'll second that suggestion of brigandine type of armour. It's something nobles (adn others) did use for personal defence for "light armour" situations. A Japanese ninja would be wearinga thin chain mail instead.

The upshoot of a brigandine type armoure is you can make it very decorative, which in turn means yiu can get away with wearing a fancy peice of clothing instead of "yeah, armoured like the michelin man". Make it a brignadine with a nicely leaf and vine pattern rivets and additional stiching and your guy is just wearing "elf clothes" instead of armour.:smallbiggrin:

Make it from rather thin plates to reduce weight and at least you'll stop opportunistic stabs and the occasional arrow.

[The Jack]

@Brother oni.
But wouldn't the links take most of the punch out for gambeson to take the hit? Like it'd go through but slow down enough that the stuff underneath could take up much of the work if it were thick enough.
Or, would a thick enough gambeson be enough on it's own given an unlucky shot?
My stats so far is that the thickest gambeson and mail would stop a bullet given a poorly angled shot, whilst a better shot would penetrate. A thinner gambeson and mail'd be defeated, but this is a system where being shot for less is almost as good as not being shot. Most people statistically survive a 9mm if I recall correctly. That said I had to run my head through trying to work out a way to get intermediate cartridges through IIIA body armour without making them more powerful to soft targets.

Other stuff
Why don't modern trauma plates curve like old armour? would it get in the way of the cheat rig too much, or is it just not neccessary with the threats they face/getting shot side-on is expected.

How much would NIJ rated IIIA armour slow down an intermediate cartridge like 5.56 nato or 7.62x39 or ? I know it's completely incapable of stopping one even at bad angles and through a reasonable amount of objects (thanks Paul Harrell) . But will it increase your chances of survival at all? (asking for humans and durable monsters)
Would .223 hollow points be as penetrative?

[snowblizz]

That is more in line with what I thought I knew about anti-elephant tactics, but spears and axes aren't that great at penetrating through layers of metal and it seems really hard to hit the stomach of an elephant with significant force from the sides when it's wearing a heavy splint mail dress that hangs 3 or 4 feet from its side which your pole would have to lift during its strike. I can easily believe getting into melee with a heavily armed and protected elephant was unwise. It was however seemingly done, sometimes successfully, which to me is the hard to grasp part. Seems kind of like trying to stab a tank to death if that tank also had a wrecking ball in its front arc and a dozen soldiers on top of it stabbing you right back from an elevation while inside a protective box. You could take out its treads, but your much more likely to get stabbed, smashed, mangled, or run over.

Funnily enough, a tank is almsot more vulnerable to close combat than ranged weapons same as an elephant, and for much the same reasons. Close in you can target vulnerabilities you simply cannot armour or protect. If you are brave enough to get in there.

There's going to be areas that open up, no matter how much you try and armour it. And I wager, most elephants were less rudimentarily armoured. The same is true for warhorses, the examples of almsot fully enclosed platermours for hores are rare compared to the wast majority of numbers of warhorses employed. Armour was never really standardised, and from a quick look at the Osprey book on warelephants, not widely used. Basically what we see remaining are the exceptional cases.

We should also keep in mind, the warelephant has a weakness. It's handler. In loose group surrounding and fighting an elephant the mahout will be a priory target. And he'll have difficulty protecting himself. Without the handler it's not going to be much use, and probably rather quickly remove itself elsewhere. Except the few cases where it stays and protects the body of it's master.

That said, much elepahnt warfare seems to have been stand-offish. You had elephants, they had elephants, and the forces mostly countered each other while the rest of the armies fought it out.

[gkathellar]

There was at least one well-known case (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eleazar_Avaran#Death), during the Maccabean rebellion, of a man spearing an elephant from underneath, killing both it and himself. It's unlikely this was the normal anti-elephant tactic, but it sheds some light on what snowblizz is saying: get close, and aim for the legs and stomach.

Scipio Africanus took a less brutal route, using loud music to scare Hannibal's elephants at the Battle of Zama, guiding them in between his columns and out of the battle with what were effectively brass band regiments.