[Ansteorra-archery] Combat Archery - New Society Marshallate Ruling

[Marlin and Amanda Stout]

Paul Thorne wrote:
> Charles,
>
>    If you read through the message from the Society Marshal you will 
> note that he mentions several incidents between Gulf War, An Tir 
> Western War and finally Pennsic.  There has been a Society Wide 
> discussion going on concerning Combat Archery and the safety of the 
> blunts, although this seems like a spur of the moment decision there 
> has been a lot of background talks going on leading up to this.  We 
> are doing all we can as the Marshallate to help keep the changes down 
> and make this a safe game for all to play.  I hope this helps you 
> understand better.
>
>
> HL Jean-Paul de Calmont, CAO
> Kingdom Missile Marshal, Ansteorra

I do understand, I assure you. I just want to get all my silly questions 
out of the way so I can answer other people's silly questions...

What I'm also curious about is if there's any way we might eventually 
solve this problem without keeping the blunts bigger around. Say, by 
making the striking surface stiffer so the foam won't penetrate. For 
example, my bolts are UHMW with 3/4 inch closed-cell foam with a 1/4 in 
neoprene disc on top. The neoprene seems to give a stiffer surface to 
strike with, and help keep the foam from collapsing. At least, I haven't 
had anyone complain about my bolts poking through their helms so far.

I wonder if what we need more is some way to check the compressability 
of the foam, and the stiffness of the tip. We all know foam breaks down 
with age and abuse, and what we may have here is more of a problem of 
old ammo, not necessarily badly built ammo.  Since I wasn't at Pennsic 
or Gulf this year (dangit) , I obviously didn't see the ammo in 
question, but it's something I'm wondering about. After all, foam which 
was perfectly good when the round was built might not be as good after a 
few years (and a lot of smacking into helms, sheilds, trees, etc.)

As I've said before, as much as I dread all the work this means for my 
ammo, I'll do the refit. After all, rules are rules, and we must follow 
them. And, as a marshal I will let people know about this, and inspect 
ammo accordingly. But I can't help but wonder if there's a better 
answer; after all, if the foam on the end can break down and penetrate a 
helm, what keeps the foam on the side from doing so too? Then, in a 
couple years, we might well be right back here discussing this same 
issue all over again.

So, why not start thinking about other solutions while we implement this 
one? That's all I'm saying.

Charles