Two teeth knocked out and a bloody face for the public.

[New Zealand Norsemen]

TWO TEETH KNOCKED OUT AND A BLOODY FACE FOR THE PUBLIC.YES A VERY UNFORTUNATE ACCIDENT OF THE LIKES WE WISH TO NEVER SEE AGAIN.IN MY VIEW THIS IS EXACTLY THE DANGER IN DIFFERENT PERIODS FIGHTING EACH OTHER.I STRONGLY BELIEVE ARMOUR AND WEPONS EVOLVE TOGETHER AND ARMOUR OF ONE PART OF TIME WILL NOT PROTECT FROM WEPONS OF ANOTHER.THIS IS NOT AN EXCUSE JUST A PERSONAL POINT OF VIEW

[allfiredup]

i belive your onto a good thing.

unless we have a standard level of saftey equiptment .

e.g full face vs full face

open face vs open face

or similar armour like viking vs man at arms with kettle helm and gamby,

but not a viking vs a man in full plate armour, it just doesnt work for me.

this is my opinion

this has got nothing to do with headblow or non headblow combat.

[Njal]

Herr Allfiredup,

You are correct, I like what you say. Mixing periods is not cool for either the public viewing or for us participants. And just like Herstjóri Bledyn said armour and weapons match the period.

Within the New Zealand Norsemen we have an extremely safe record in regards to injuries. In fact internally (as in only just us NZN, guest not included because they are not us)we have had no serious injuries. Other than hands and fingers getting split on those wearing only leather gloves and the odd bruised elbow. I put it down to the fact that so much time is spent trying to whack the other guy in the head we don't target legs therefore NZN don't all use leg protection. We don't allow open face helms though so that is the wayoff. We have had three broken ribs though during some wrestling and unarmed training, but that was done by a shoulder thumping into a chest.

[Vorschlag]

So there are people who actually want to do something closer to actual re-enactment then, excellent.

[Joel of Old]

Agreeing with Njal and firedup, it is a poor display for the public to see mixed historical periods squaring off against each other. And for safety reasons bare clad Celts should not run at Segmentata Armoured Romans (however cool it may look) unless rehearsed of course.

But with regards to gatherings where mixed period fighting is just going to happen, then a standard of armour must be there for line battles, where emotions run high and the smell of a collapsing flank can make you do some crazy things. I do not think it is appropriate for someone to run around a line battle with anything less than chain on the body (with padding underneath, Norsemen armour is good aswell) re-inforced gloves (learned that the hard way both giving (apologies Kath) and receiving (you know who you are)), and some sort of metal helm.


Let alone tourney fighting. Competition and steel, there's a great cocktail!

Maybe tourneys should not be organised into categories of weapons but into armour categories. That way each warrior will be acutely aware of what is acceptable force.

I believe that if it's head blow, nothing less than SCA standard helms should be allowed.

You can lose control, but you can't lose your helm... unless someones borrowed it.

[Fungus]

I was at Taupo and enjoyed the combat even after I got a sword in my helmet I have 15th centery plate so I carry alot of steel about but things still happen(we dont play tidly winks)My head hit was sorted out to my liking and I know there was no bad feeling ether side.
But going into head blow combat with out a full face helmet( or helm with an avontale as the Auckland Norse do) is not a good idea.
The combatint who got his teeth broken was warned about having an open face on the feild as he walked on but he did any way.
I look forward to fighting the norse guys at taupo and if Im slow because of my armour all the better to those who fight me and I know the guys from the Naki are looking forward to it to.
I have no problem fighting different periods.

[wuzzle]

So much for the safety of headblow combat

Ok so far I have found (in my very limited experiance)
head blow combat is safe and in most circamstances
makes fighters safer as the blows formed are thought out rather than
blindly fired in as I have seen from non head blow time and time
again
what I want to know is who was the captain of the indivigual injured
at the taupo tournament and why the person was fighting head blow
if they had little or no experiance at it (aka looking up+open face helm)
were was the marshal?
This is were things get dangerous NOT the style of fighting!
And surly some thought needs to go into making sure combatents are
capable of the style of fighting?
and are big enough to just watch if they cannot fight in the style
or feel they are not experianced enough to participate
It is easy to lay blame but lets make sure of were the blame truly
lays first!

(note as I was not at the event myself I am coming from a point of
listining to the thoughts of those who were, and the imediate verbal reactions they emparted upon coming back from the tourny)
that of shock that the person was allowed to fight h/blow and was
on the feild anyway and with an open lid
I am surprised he didn`t just smack himself out on his car
when he got there to save others the bother of doing it for him!

[Nathan]

I was watching a video on youtube of one of the Gulf Wars and noticed that all SCA fighters entering the field had to have thier Authorisation card on them - no card no play. Perhaps this could be something that could be looked at for us?

Since most of the various forms of combat are based on one clubs form or another when a fighter has met the requirements of the style they are issue a permit. this way when a group organises combat only those sificantly skilled in that form may compeate, if you want to hurry up and train. And yes I realise that there is distance involved but that does not mean that a club cannot make someone else their agent.

Obviously I have not gone into all aspects of this idea but it is that, an idea. My only thought is that this could be one way of ensuring newbys and others have that correct level of training for the field that they wish to participate in - if you want to do more then train more.

My 2cents less tax, fuel surcharges, kiwisaver contributions and govt theft.


Nathan Smith
Schwertbruden aus Livonia

[Carl]

Am I the only to notice that no one is mentioning the fact that callum rode the whole length of the lists with large amounts of blood running down the front of his breast plate after he caught a lance tip in the chin.

or does this not count?

the injuries witnessed by the crowd, though nasty and regrettable, were no worse than you would see at a rugby game or even a boxing match.

I see it like this, we were using steel weapons that are obstensibly weapons of war, designed with no purpose other than killing and the worst that happened was a couple of teeth knocked out.

I dont wat to use the phrse "storm in a tea cup" but i do feel we are be labouring the incident a bit.

[Callum]

[Patch]

[griff]

wuzzel in regards to your question about who was his club captain? the individual that was hit in the gob is not affiliated with anyone anymore as far as i know. but i do know that he is experianced in head blow combat and has been on the scene for a no# of years. he also knows our style of fighting as he has fought with and against us many times. He knows the deal, metal swinging open face potential accident. a mouth gaurd would have been a ggod idea though.

and fungus it was your helm not a sword (te he)

[conal]

"Blaming the Victims"

So we've established what the guy who got hit did wrong.

And where the marshall's got it wrong.

So that leaves...

[Fungus]

No griff I could see the blade with both my eyes horizontaly as it cut into the bribge of my nose.

[griff]

no not blaming the victim
as i said "potential accident" accident being the word.
if i remember rightly this ACCIDENT happened in the small pen we had set up to back of the encampment, it was a self marshall type affair as it was not planned combat as such.