thegirlsclub

[audax]

"Still, all sorts of armour can be covered up with a tabard or surcoat. And getting out and practicing is valuable. It is easy enough to lose years and hard enough to make them up. There are more inept fighters with pretty gear than there are superior fighters who need to improve their kit, and should that become an issue, it is generally the lesser impediment.

The main thing is to avoid armour that does not work well for you - sized wrong, too heavy or ill-proportioned or underprotective. If you are fighting an element of your kit rather than your opponents, you should strive to fix or replace it."

No one said a thing about spending years getting a harness together.

One can become a good fighter wearing cheap plastic crap covered in a big muckin' tunic. You could be a champion while covered in cat piss. That isn't the point, is it? You still look like shit. MOst of the ugly armour is ugly because it is ill proportioned, sized wrong and because of this it is under protective. Because the person wearing was in a great big rush and didn't care if it was pretty and uses that at an excuse to wear crap. I for one am taking a stand against this BS. It's a bad and irresponsible mindset.

I have made the point repeatedly that it only takes a bit of effort to have a decent looking harness, not a lot of money, not alot of time and not that much skill. I can show people how to get on the field, looking good, for under $300 dollars.

One does not need to spend years getting a harness together. A couple of months, NOT YEARS. The cornerstone of a harness is the helm. I have provided an excellent resource for good helms that look right that are extremely inexpensive. One week of a part time job will pay for that.

The suggestion that there are more inept fighters with pretty kits than there are good fighters with ugly kits: I call bullshit. One look at the most recent set of Pennsic photos belies that assertion. I don't know where you got that but all it does is excuse more ugly, ill concieved armour on beginners, which is one of the biggest drawbacks for the SCA there is. We want more people to get into this, right? HOw about we make sure we look good instead of ridiculous?

Well thought out textile elements can cover a multitude of sins and that is a valid way to go. There should be an effort to make the textile elements match the intended persona of the fighter, i.e. no tabards on 9th century Persians, no surcotes on Greeks or Romans, etc. Take a moment to research the culture you intend to represent. Seriously, one hour on the Internet is all it takes. There are also these things called books.

I believe those of us with more time in the SCA have a responsiblity to guide new people towards good fitting, good looking armour and clothing. There are no excuses any more, not with the resources we have available. Looking good and fighting good are not mutually exclusive and not the exclusive realm of the wealthy and idle.

It is disrespectful to your opponents to look like ass. They have to look at you. It is disrespectful to the Game to look like ass. Every time you step on the field you represent the Game. Have some pride.

If I can do it on my income, with my time constraints and Isabella can do it on her income with her time contraints, literally anyone can do it.

NO EXCUSES. She who does more is more worthy.
_________________
Martel le Hardi
squire to Meser Lyonel Oliver Grace, fostered to Sir Gaston de Clermont
-------------------------------------------------------

The Minstrel's Champion

[Cunian]

I think you think Duke Logan looks okay. Most of his armour, legs aside is sports stuff and plastic covered by some pretty cloth. Nowhere did I say that an overall wretched appearance is okay. Pretty cloth is very useful stuff, and oversized tunics do not have to look like ass.

I may be spoiled by the looks in Atlantia. We have rules that plastic should be covered, and we have a very active and wonderful photographer, Ursus, who takes a lot of pictures of the fighters at many of our events. There is nothing like seeing that red hockey glove on your shield hand in a photo on the internet to motivate you to fix that.


Look like ass?


Look like ass?


Look like ass?


Whole lot of clothing covered armour there. Are you shocked by the horror of it all?

I'm not even picking and choosing here. This is going casually through photos from one event.

What I am saying is that we have a limited timeframe in which to learn to fight. For many of us women that timeframe becomes even more compressed by a long learning curve and time out for reproduction. Armouring, whether you do it yourself or buy it, is altogether faster and easier. I stand by my premise, and I don't think it excuses anyone looking like a ragbag or the pickle barrel that ate Pennsic.

[Ariadne]

1) I don't think people should go out and spend a bunch of money/time before they know whether they will like fighting.

2) With this discussion in mind, I had a look at the armour around me at the event yesterday and noticed some armour that looked messy. One of the people wearing said amour is newish and not all that well financed... but he would probably not be offended to be described as a stick jock, either.

3) While I was armouring up, a woman who started SCA fairly recently noticed me putting my plastic torso armour (which gets covered with a surcoat) and said "wow, I didn't know you could fight in that, I thought you needed fancy plate metal". We told her what the requirements are and she is now thinking that she might be able to do armoured combat.

4) There is a local armourer who has been using the excuse that her gorget is not ready as an excuse not to fight since before I started fighting.

[Isabella E]

Well, I think there is a lot of stuff to comment on, but here's my take on it.

There's nothing wrong with being new, and getting on the field in whatever you can get together as long as it's SAFE, so you can see whether you really want to do it or not. But once that decision is made, I see a lot of people make a lot of excuses for why they are still wearing loaner armor or ill fitting hand me down uglies 6 months later or whatever arbitrary time frame that works. I am all for just covering it up as a bare minimum. My brother spiffed up his brand new guy out of his period kit with a decent tunic, an aventai, leg wraps and oculars he made for his spun top himself with a jig saw and a dremel. He already looks better than guys I know who've been fighting for YEARS.

I am big on do it yourself projects that don't require a great deal of knowledge or skill. I wouldn't expect a new fighter to be able to make knee cops or a helm, but stuff like CoP's, cuisses and vambraces are pretty simple if you make sure you plan and pattern before you go chopping up your preciously purchased leather. Most people can find some extra time here and there. I don't buy a lack of time as an excuse. I am gone from home 3 days a week. When I get home I am still a mom and a wife, have friends to spend time with, run a side business making banners, take the kids to swimming lessons, go to the gym, AND find a few hours here and there to pound some rivets.

I don't expect a new fighter to come out onto the field looking like a snapshot from history, but I think there's a lot of room for improvement and it just hasn't been important in SCA culture until recently and still isn't in a lot of places. The idea that you must spend huge amounts of money to look decent is one of those SCA myths that persists even when there's lots of people trying to tell people otherwise, kind of like 'purple is reserved for royalty' or historical belly dancers really wore these halter top things!
_________________
It's not the most powerful animal that survives. It's the most efficient. -Georges St-Pierre
http://windyvalleybanners.blogspot.com/

[freiman the minstrel]

This one's tough.

But I believe this is a discussion about relative importance.

I firmly believe that the true test is on the field. I believe that a person should get on the field as quickly and as cheaply as possible, because a day in training can never, ever be replaced. Once it's gone, it's gone. Putting off training because "I haven't got my armor together" is simply an excuse. It is self destructive, and it can harm your things that you really, really want to preserve.

But I also believe that a lot of people stop improving their kits once they are at the acceptable minimum level of accuracy of reenactment, and to me, that tastes like satan's unwashed bunions.

In regards to established folks that have already met those minimums and begun training, I completely agree with Audax's statements.

There are no excuses. If you want to be a knight, look like one.

And yes, in the first picture, the fellow indeed does look like ass, by Drachenwald standards. The two lovers in the background save the picture for me from the recycle bin. The hockey gloves in his left hand certainly make the fellow look like ass. I want my knights to actually have visible armor, thank you.

Cloth cover ups say "I can be an acceptable peasant, and nothing more is required."

Bamos, as usual, looks awesome, but I could do with some visible mail on the body. In Drachenwald, we would have some.

In the third picture, the fellow is wearing knees and a gorget, but other than that, he isn't really armored, is he? Very attractive man, though, and he does look cool.

And in the fourth picture, three out of eight guys have any visible armor beyond helms, baskethilts, and the occasional gauntlet. Where is the armor?

Cloth coverups are not an indication of a man at arms. Cloth is an indication of a man with money or a man with a dedicated (or desperate) girlfriend.

But, this is not a correct response to what Audax was saying. She is saying that we should actually be wearing armor.

She is talking about the moment when a fighter says "this is good enough, I don't need to do any more."

I, for one, appreciate her "No compromises" approach to things.

Put some armor on, Guys.

f
_________________
Surf less, fight more

[audax]

[audax]

[audax]

Isabella and freiman get it.
_________________
Martel le Hardi
squire to Meser Lyonel Oliver Grace, fostered to Sir Gaston de Clermont
-------------------------------------------------------

The Minstrel's Champion

[Isabella E]

Personally I think there's a big happy medium that gets ignored for some reason. People seem to balk at the idea of placing any kind of judgment on anyone else, so that there's no standards at all. Then when somebody goes to raise the bar just a little to a level that isn't even worth arguing about, it causes a huge debate because nobody wants to have to change or be told what to do. So nobody tries at all in most cases. (The recent covered plastic controversy) When someone says something like Ariadne heard from someone, it points to a huge failure of SCA culture in that we don't even do a good job of educating people about the activities in our own organization. I'm sure everybody probably knows at least one guy who went out and spent a fortune on poorly made armor that he's probably not even using years later. One guy in my local group spent several thousand dollars on a suit of 'italian plate' from some armor in Italy and it's completely useless for SCA combat. It's not his fault he bought the wrong stuff, he just didn't know any better.

Some upgrades to work on a more historical kit are plain expensive. Mail is one of them. I would LOVE to be able to buy a hauberk of even light weight ring mesh or something so that my look creeps further towards a historical presentation but it's just really expensive for me right now. If budget is a concern for someone I think it's a lot easier and more reasonable to focus on upgrading piece by piece with stuff that's easier to make yourself and doesn't cost a ton in materials. The 14th century is a great time period imo for showing how someone with a budget can still create a decent historical kit because of the many styles of armor, not all of them being plate. There's a lot of room for doing cheaper splinted limb armor or gamboised cuisses with hidden, rigid protection. Or wearing a decent jupon to achieve a particular look. It's harder with some times and places but I'd rather see someone wear a really nice cloth covering appropriate to their persona than a cheap piece of fabric just thrown over the head.
_________________
It's not the most powerful animal that survives. It's the most efficient. -Georges St-Pierre
http://windyvalleybanners.blogspot.com/

[Cunian]

@Audax - I was responding largely to earlier posts which you did not include in this thread. When a beginner makes something which she says is functional but ugly and which she plans to attempt to do better on when able, I see no justification for going on about toxic waste or stir-fried poo.

I then said, "Still, all sorts of armour can be covered up with a tabard or surcoat..." at which point you leapt in talking about cat piss and shit. So I don't really really see that you have a leg to stand on demanding respect and good grace. I did respond with irritation and rudeness in the next post because at that point I was pretty angry with your attitude. But I wanted to show you some pretty normal kits of the variety I was thinking of. They aren't necessarily paragons or anything, but they are not evocative of cat piss or shit.

If men are as inept as women, why are there thirty odd female knights and about a thousand male knights. I choose to believe that - statistically speaking - women have a longer road. Otherwise, my only option seems to be to believe that we are, by and large, undedicated dabblers. And - no - I'm not talking 6 mos. (Wasn't it you who were talking about decades in the thread about watching videos?) Certainly having children sets one back, even if not necessarily far back. It is no excuse to look crappy on the field, but then - I NEVER advocated looking crappy on the field in the long term. I just advocated getting out and practicing and covering up ugly or replacing it in a reasonable timeframe as one was able. I want to see women fighting, and I want to see them fighting well. That means I want to see them at practice week after week after week, and if they have to use field-expedient armour at some point to do that, I'll cope.

I'm a moderate person. I believe in compromise. Yep - I even settle. I appreciate trying to influence others, but I react badly to intolerance, and I think going too hard on novices is counterproductive. I think people do best when they are inspired to meet and exceed their own dreams, and I don't really see how browbeating accomplishes that.

@Isabella - I think you're right about the great and practical middle ground. You always have some people digging in their heels at doing anything new and other people going rabid about how everyone must conform to their standards on their particular pet peeve. I really think evolution and expectations work pretty well. Drachenwald looks beautiful because they have a lot of people with great kits and high expectations, so no one would think of going out with uncovered barrel plastic there.

[Isabella E]

I think there is a middle ground of carrot and stick that you should try for if you want to get people to do stuff. Telling people they can do better can work really well if they're receptive and you apply some positive reinforcement and teach them how to do what you would like, but if all someone hears is negative all the time it will turn most people off to what you're trying to say.

To be honest it kind of bums my fluffy side out to see us get away from the positive and start fighting with each other.
_________________
It's not the most powerful animal that survives. It's the most efficient. -Georges St-Pierre
http://windyvalleybanners.blogspot.com/

[audax]

I'm really pissed right now so I'm going to hold off responding til I'm not angry anymore.
_________________
Martel le Hardi
squire to Meser Lyonel Oliver Grace, fostered to Sir Gaston de Clermont
-------------------------------------------------------

The Minstrel's Champion

[Ariadne]

[Hakon]

Freiman, I agree with a lot of what you say but this I have to take issue with.

[Cunian]

Sorry to bum the fluffy side. I guess there are moments I fail the "tend and befriend" paradigm. (Actually, there are plenty of those moments. )

I have a passion for fighting. It is novel to me, and I've never done anything with martial arts or anything. If - to get a great fight - I had to get up at 2:30 am and wear dark victory armour, I'd suck it up and do it. I like making armour and researching stuff. I independently had one of the first sets of lamellar in the known world, coincident with Cariodoc's. But - for me - it is primarily a means to an end - and given a choice I will fight every day of the week, skimp on the armouring and hold my various bits together with string and tape. (Luckily, there are always a few hours in the day, and the either/or choice doesn't actually come up.) It may be, Audax, that with your martial arts background, the unique thing about the SCA is the armour and the history, thus your passion for that being right and your disgust when it is not given primacy. Dunno. It was just a thought that occurred to me.