[Steppes] Joint War Practice - Elfsea/Steppes - 12-05-2004

Wed Dec 8 12:51:23 PST 2004

The other Rapier fighters in attendance who were in armour were:

Lord Dirk the Just (Elfsea Rapier Marshal)
Lord Antonio de Tagliavera (recent transplant from the Midrealm)

Don Alaric was in attendance, but was not fighting that day.

In Service,
Rixende

On Tue, 07 Dec 2004 20:25:12 -0600, Mike <meggiddo at netzero.net> wrote:
> Heilsa,
> 
> The second official Joint War Practice was held in Veterans park over in
> Arlington. The day dawned gray and overcast with rain in the morning,
> tapering off to a light mist by 12 PM when I ventured out upon the
> trails to make my way to Veterans park. Along the way, the mist did
> indeed turned heavy, looking through the windows it seem to be
> increasing in a drizzle and then a light rain a scant 5 miles from the
> park. Upon arriving at the park - the light rain had turned back to a
> medium mist and slowly stopped.
> 
> There in the park lot of Veterans park stood - Chris, from DFT, with
> Hrafn, and Hosey. Then slowly over the course of an hour more people
> arrived and those who intended to fight don their armor. While the armor
> was being donned, the sky cleared and the sun shone down upon those who
> did not placed their trust in their local weatherman.
> 
> The old saying still holds true - "If you do not like the weather, then
> just wait awhile - it will change!"
> 
> In attendance this day:
> 
> Baron Armand Dragonetti - Elfsea baron
> 
> Sir Baron Qadi 'Abd al-Mahdi Jamal ibn Hakim - Baron of Steppes
> 
> Centurion Stella Silvana
> 
> Centurion Tomas Niallagain and his lady HL Rixende de Rouen (Seneschal
> of Elfsea) - Tomas is a squire of Sir Duncan. Lady Rixende fighting rapier.
> 
> Hrafn Olafsson - Steppes Knight Marshal
> 
> Daire da Haya - Elfsea Knight Marshal
> 
> CinaedOHosey and his children - Tori, Jon, and Nikko
> 
> Alvin and his lady - Lady Maili Donnel MacGregor - the Deputy Earl
> Marshal for Youth Combat
> 
> Chris from Dragon Fire Tor - I believe this is correct. Do not remember
> is SCA name.
> 
> Lady Allessandra di Giovanni - Steppes Equestrian Marshall - being
> escorted by Justinian, man-at-arms to the Elfsea Knight Marshal, Daire
> 
> Mike and his son Mikey
> 
> Josh
> 
> I know that there was 7 more individuals on the side lines and can not
> remember who they are.
> 
> and myself - Michael Fray
> 
> There was a number of one-on-one fights as a warm-up to the main war
> practice.
> 
> HL Rixende with Don Alaric and I believe three others were practicing
> with rapiers.
> 
> People in armor:
> Sir Mahdi, Baron Armand, Centurion Stella, Centurion Tomas, Hrafn,
> Daire, Hosey, Mike, Josh, Justinian, and Chris.
> 
> Total of 11 fighters.
> 
> Plus two youths fighting - which occurred after the Youth Marshaling
> authorization class was held by Lady Maili Donnel MacGregor.
> Justinian attended this class and missed approximately half of the heavy
> fighting. There is now one more Youth Marshal available for the future,
> I for one, applauded his decision to become one.
> 
> Children:  7
> 
> Total in attendance:  27 or at least from what I recall.
> 
> Scenarios:
> 
> 1. Do you know how to defend against a flanking maneuver?
> If you do not, then you missed the opportunity to learn how. The end
> individual is responsible in staying with the flankers and remaining
> alive. Lead these flankers away from your unit, while remaining just in
> sword reach of the flankers. The flankers must deal with this defender
> or else turn their backs on him or them, which places them between two
> groups of fighters.  The main objective here is for the defender to
> actually draw the flanker(s) away with them into the "bushes", thus
> removing them from the actually main battle. The main unit can them deal
> with what is facing them or if there is no unit threating actually go to
> help the defender who has lead the flankers away if necessary.
> 
> 2. This lead into the next scenario - How to stay alive while facing a
> superior fighter?
> In this case, Sir Mahdi and Centurion Tomas. How well and more
> importantly, how long would you be able to stay alive against fighters
> of this level? The object here is stay alive while engaging one of these
> fighters on a one-on-one fight, until help arrives. There will come a
> time when each heavy fighter will have to face a superior fighter during
> a melee battle, just the luck of the battlefield. Two units come face to
> face on the field and guess what, you see facing you on the opposing
> side is a knight. And you will have to engage him/her.  If there is an
> opportunity, then you jump out and engage this fighter yourself for a
> few seconds with your fellow fighters coming to your aid.
> 
> The actually practice for this, those of us who played football in high
> school, recognizes this method - place on individual in the center with
> all the others in a circle and as coach called out those on the outside
> would rush the one in the center.
> 
> Taking the above and applying this to heavy fighting - either Sir Mahdi
> or Centurion Tomas was in the center, with the other fighters formed a
> circle around them. Only one at a time was in the center. Remember this
> is NOT fighting to win but to stay alive against a superior fighter.
> One fighter would rush in to fight and after 5 seconds, a second fighter
> would rush to the 1st fighter aid and so until either the one that was
> in center had "killed" all or he had been killed all.
> 
> 3. Third scenario - how to form up and accomplish a column charge, such
> that when the column actually makes contact there is huge impact upon
> the target line. One problem with a lot of charges is that they come in
> burst of 200 hundred pounds at a time. Such that the target shield wall
> just has to deal with one fighter at a time.  A 2nd problem is the
> distance from the opposing shield wall that some units will call for a
> column charge, if it is too far away, then those who can run the fastest
> will strike first, with the rest of the those charging hitting at
> various times, thus allowing the opposing shield wall time to adjust and
> prepare for each of them.
> 
> The column charge - line up each fighter front to back, touching each
> other and move in lock step with each other straight into the opposing
> point of that shield wall. So that, instead of having to fend off 200
> pounds, it is now 1000 to 1500 pounds that is hitting that one point.
> 
> The last scenario - sides were divided up and a center point was
> selected as the main objective. Which ever side held the center for a
> count of ten was the winner.
> 
> The next Joint War practice will be January 2nd, 2005 at Mary Heads
> Carter park in Carrollton at 2 PM. There will be combat archery for this
> practice.
> 
> CinaedOHosey set-up the scenarios with Sir Mahdi providing additional
> instruction along the way on various issues that arose. In fact, each
> and every one of the fighters present had the opportunity to speak up
> with either a suggestion or a question or relaying actually battlefield
> experiences. Be they from within Ansteorra, Gulf Wars and even Pennsic.
> 
> Centurion Stella pointed out the word "Halt" could be misunderstood to
> be the word "Hold". And that never use the word "Hold" in other than
> what it is used for on the battlefield - which is to stop all activity
> on the field. Plus, she also stress that each individual fighter needs
> to know what the conditions are to win the either the battle and/or the
> war point.
> 
> Michael Fray
> 
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-- 
Honorable Lady Rixende de Rouen, CIM, CSM
Seneschal, Barony of Elfsea, Ansteorra
Quidam audit valde, facit valde