[Steppes] Why I'm So Excited About the Homeschool Demo! - Response from the Steppes Baronial Knight Marshal
Mike
meggiddo at netzero.net
Sun Feb 3 17:31:51 PST 2008
Heilsa,
"What we got here is... failure to communicate."
A famous quote from a movie made more than 40 years ago. How true this is!
I need to state this at the very beginning of this email - "THIS IS A
GAME" - a number of people have definitely forgotten this based upon the
various feedback that I have received on this matter.
The issue of attendance for Demos by heavy fighters have been raised by
individuals who are not heavy fighters nor are Not active with/at the
local fighter practice.
For a Demo to get off the ground, then a meeting of all groups who
should be involved - a meeting, and actually working with both the
warranted officers of the respected interests, plus the individuals of
that are active within said interests/endeavors that one wish to have
involve at any particular Demo. This needs to take place long prior to
any type of announcement is ever made either at a business meeting, a
populous, and/or by email.
This does not mean contacting everyone else outside the local fighting
community, making the announcement and then expect that the various
individuals involved in the martial activities of SCA fighting to drop
everything and rearrange their lives, and these lives are not only the
individuals - but their families as well. It is discourteous and rude,
makes no difference whether we are speaking within the SCA or outside of
it.
No one is require to do something that they do not wish to do nor agree
to do, just because they like to get into armor and have a bit of good
fun, fighting. :)
In other words, just because you make an announcement that a Demo would
be held, does not mean that anyone will come!
The lead time of 11 weeks or 3 months has been raised, while it may seem
long enough, but in reality it is not and this has to do with a number
factors. People should not assume just because that Gulf Wars is over
that there is a lull in the fighting aspects of this region and Kingdom,
or because there are only one or two events on the Kingdom calendar for
the weekend of March 28th.
This is a common mistake made by individuals who are not involved either
with actually donning armor and being a heavy fighter or coming out and
being part of the local heavy fighter practice, and needs to be
addressed here and now.
There are 2 tournament seasons here in this Kingdom of Ansteorra - the
1st starts after Gulf Wars and the ends with Steppes Warlord on Memorial
Day weekend. The 2nd starts with the Labor Day weekend event of Gothic
Wars and usually ends around/between Thanksgiving and Christmas. There
will a few events through out the summer, but the majority of
tournaments fall within the above stated time frames. This is roughly
the tournament seasons of the Kingdom of Ansteorra.
There are previous engagements/commitments both in the modern world and
within the SCA and this Kingdom known as Ansteorra that are on-going.
The weekend of March 28th is the beginning of the Spring tournament
season, with some fighters who fought at various last year's
tournaments, who became the Champion of those tournaments, are expected
to return to that very same event. This is a requirement that came into
being a couple of years ago to ensure that the Champion of the last year
tournament would be on hand. So in order to enter a tournament that is
hosted by another group, then each individual knows the responsibility
and duties of becoming that group's Champion for the coming year. In
some cases there are symbols the old Champion must surround to the new
Champion and there may or may not be a stepping down/stepping up or
changing of the Guard ceremony, so to speak involved.
These individuals know that when they have enter and win those
tournaments, thus becoming the champion for the hosting group, thus they
must return the following year to that same tournament on that same
weekend. And since 99% of the tournaments are held on Saturdays, with
Sunday being when people break camp and head for home. By attempting to
hold a Demo at the beginning of tournament season without actually
meeting and discussing this with the active heavy fighters...
One of the local and extremely active fighter did just this last year,
he won the tournament and became that group's Champion, and so he is not
available for the weekend of March 28th..
A number of fighters are in the royal entourage of TRM's (Their Royal
Majesties), who have agreed to travel with them and to assist in easing
their journeys in this Kingdom and outside of it, during their time of
wearing the crown of the Sable Star. And per the Kingdom calendar -
there are 2 separate events that TRM's will be attending, one is about 2
hours south of Steppes and the other is out of kingdom, the Trimaris
Coronation. Thus, few more active heavy fighters will be elsewhere,
including at least some local knights, I think, - this is based upon
feedback received in just speaking with the active heavy fighters.
Since Gulf Wars is a week long event, for people to attend it, they take
time off - for most it is their vacation time. If there is any left
over, then that time is budget for additional family and/or events. In
some cases, these individuals can not take additional time off in a
short interval after taking a week or more off earlier in the same
month. This applies to all who do attend Gulf Wars and I should not have
to speak on this, yet per feedback received, I having to speak about it.
There is a gathering of Knights of the known world being held that same
weekend (March 28th), which is out of Kingdom. Once again, a number of
knights are making plans to attend that gathering. So, there may not be
a large number of knights in the local area and Kingdom for this
weekend, which in addition to those who, I think, will be traveling with
TRM's.
Some fighters get one complete weekend off every 6 weeks, thus they make
plans with their families for that weekend to spend time with them and
at times they will not even attend a Sunday afternoon practice - it is
their time with their families - and I, for one will never ask them to
give up this time. There are a couple of industries that operate in this
mode.
Other fighters work Saturdays and they usually have Sundays off,
sometimes they even have to work on Sundays as well - once again, when
they able to come out, they are welcome and we are glad to see them. So
by switching the original day from Sunday to Saturday, some of these
fighters will not be able to attend that Saturday, they could have if
the original day - Sunday March 30th was still in effect. Now, even if
the date was switched...not sure if they will agree to attend, once
again this has left a bad taste with them.
To date, as the Baronial Knight Marshal, I spoken with a number of the
active heavy fighters that attend the practice, concerning their plans
and what they thought about doing a demo on that weekend. All this was
accomplish by simply meeting and talking with heavy fighters that are
active in the local area for that Saturday, March 29th.
I got a couple of maybes.
Received some answers that this individual or that individual who was
not present had already agree or fall into one of the categories that I
have listed.
I did get a number of absolute - "No". Once again, failure to actual
meet with and work with the active heavy fighters, plus switching the
day from Sunday to Saturday, resulted in those answering - No.
How many active fighters will attend?
At this point in time - I do not know.
The bottom line - this Demo has been mis-handled from the very beginning.
Now there are some fighters who only do Demos, but their knowledge of
what is actually happening at the Steppes heavy fighter practice would
be out-dated to say the least and thus would not be able to provide
up-to-date answers. They can speak on their "Back in the Day" time
frame, but not on present day, and there is a huge difference here. In
addition, there has been a couple major updates and changes in our rules
(January 2008), how up to-date these people are, I do not know.
Note - The Steppes Fighter Practice with the current active heavy
fighters in attendance, has taken a more modern and proactive approach
over the last six years.
YIS,
Lord Michael Kettering
Steppes Knight Marshal
Deb Mach wrote:
> Dear Gentles,
>
> You many have seen posts on the lists lately about the Homeschool Demo on
> Saturday March 29th in McKinney. And you may be wondering what all the hype
> is about for a "school" demo. Or wondering how this demo could possibly be
> as good a use of time and resources as a gaming demo. Since I am the
> homeschooling mom who requested the demo, as well as a relatively new member
> of the SCA, I wanted to share with you why I am so excited to do this.
>
> <snip>
> _______________________
> Steppes mailing list
> Steppes at lists.ansteorra.org
> http://lists.ansteorra.org/listinfo.cgi/steppes-ansteorra.org
>
>
>
>
More information about the Steppes
mailing list