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Post by Deleted on Jul 14, 2007 18:12:32 GMT
I finally decided to get on the You Tube bandwagon with this new digital camera (DXG) I bought for $50 from ecost.com Great bargain but it eats batteries like crazy.
The first vid is of me, in red armor, with sword and shield fighting a two-swordman. I find two weapon-men to be very dangerous because they can attack from two directions simultaneously. They have twice the offense but they are very vulnerable to thrusts. This particular one in the video is vulnerable to vertical strikes because of his defense stance.
My strategy is to get on him and kill him as quickly as possible. This is in recognition of the fact that you has twice the offense and can throw twice as many shots at me increasing his chance of success. It is necessary for me to keep him busy all the time and on the defense.
Here we have me again with Sword and Shield fighting a polearm. My stratagy here is also very aggressive. I need to get close to him and pin his weapon down with my shiled so I can hit him with my sword. The most dangerous part for me the initial attack were he can hit me with his longer weapon but I can't hit him. I try to cross that threshhold as fast as possible and get into a range where I can hit him and he has difficulty hitting me.
Here we have some sword & shield vs sword $ shield. Here the fighting is a little tougher with goth sides having good deffence and the target areas are smaller and harder to reach. The whole stratagy is getting around the other shield.
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Post by Deleted on Jul 20, 2007 5:05:45 GMT
Some new vids from this weeks practice.
Shield fighting. I tightened up my shield defense since last time. My opponent played a good defensive game too. The result was very few successful hits by either of us. (and that is a good thing!)
Polearm. I fought a far more skilled opponent this past week. My opponent did an excellent job of maintaining distance and keeping me out of my range. I don't know how this guy was able to run backward so fast.
In the first two exchanges he took my head. Then one of the knights training me came out and advised me that he was running backwards in circles and that I was following him in his tracks in the same arch. I was advised to try and anticipate his direction and cut him off in a more direct line in order to close the distance. It worked like a charm and I was able to close in.
Two-sword.
This guy upped his game from the last time I fought him by maintaining better distance and not letting me close in so easily. He used his two-weapon form to try and misdirect me and attack from different directions.
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Post by Matt993f.o.d on Oct 11, 2007 12:44:05 GMT
AMAZING vids, Tsafa. +1
I found myself screaming 'GO FOR HIS LEGS'! With the shield versus two-sword vid.
Great performance!
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Post by Deleted on Oct 11, 2007 15:58:36 GMT
lol, who where you rooting for? Shield or two-sword?
That two-sword guy has a technique of squatting and using his basket-hilts to block his upper legs. He is also a master at running backwards in circles to maintain distance. We can't hit each other below the knee because with the force we hit the thin lower leg might break. I have some new vids from last night that I will upload to You Tube and post later today.
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Post by Matt993f.o.d on Oct 11, 2007 16:19:22 GMT
I was rooting for Mr. Shield. That was you, I presume?
The speed at which the two of you were striking must really take it out of you, carrying swords and all. What sort of armour were you wearing?
Its a real shame that leg hits are out for safety reasons, as I am sure that the legs would be a good target on the real battlefield. Its just one of those things.
I think my favourite vid overall was sword+shield v sword+shield. It made for tenser viewing when the two fighters were evenly matched in terms of tools.
Who would you say won the fight, in this case? Or was it all in the name of practice?
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Post by Deleted on Oct 11, 2007 21:52:08 GMT
Here are three vids from last nights practice. I have switched to black leather body armor and a shiny aluminum shield.
The first is against a big 6'3" 250 lbs polearmsman. This is a different guy then in the earlier vids. He does an excellent job of maintaining distance and not letting me get close in and working him with my wraps while pinning his weapon with my shield. If you don't have a shield you need to be good at fighting while running backward.
Next we have my shield vs a two swordsman. This is a different guy then you saw in the other vids. He also plays an excellent distance game. He uses a good technique of drawing my attention to one weapon and then trying to hit me with the other. I got a few hits on him with some vertical shots that went straight down between his two blades to his head. I also found a flaw in my shield technique from studying my own video. I noticed that I am holding my shield so that it is completely horizontal. I need to point the forward corner up so it better blocks those incoming horizontal snaps.
Next we have the same guy as before now fighting with a buckler. My tactic here is to hit him repeatedly low and then after the third or forth shot go high. I also did that in reverse. Fighting with the bucker is the opposite of fighting with a large shield. A large shield should be keep close to your body and moved as little as possible. With a buckler you have to punch-block. I have the same flaw here in that I am holding the shield too horizontal rather then pointing the corner up.
I should mention that holding the shield horizontal under you neck can work too, if you use the sword to block you head. Currently I don't use that method, so I need to adjust the shield. Pointing the corner up, exposes my upper leg a little more but it is easier to drop the shield to block the leg then raise it against gravity to block the head. Hence it is preferable to hold the shield in a high guard. Another option for blocking the leg is to squat a little into incoming leg shots. That will lower your body and cover the leg.
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Post by Matt993f.o.d on Oct 12, 2007 12:39:11 GMT
Looks like you put the mighty Smitey on buckler boy
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Post by Deleted on Oct 12, 2007 18:29:23 GMT
Buckler is a hard form to fight with. You have to have really fast hands and fast feet similar to when fighting with other non-shield forms. When he switched from two-sword to buckler, he gained little additional defense (he was blocking just fine with his second sword before) and lost 50% of his offense. One advantage is that always blocking with you weapon can be very hard on your wrists. The also Buckler gives additional range of motion in attacks and better visibility vs a full-size shield.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 18, 2007 7:22:55 GMT
Here is a vid from last nights practice. Throughout the whole night I was working on a grip-squeezing technique to fire the sword more efficiently which I discuss in one of the other threads. You can read the details of the technique here:
/index.cgi?board=swordtraining&action=display&thread=1192604317
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Post by Deleted on Oct 18, 2007 7:37:30 GMT
You should try some live steel combat sometime if you haven't already, it is alot harder than what you are doing here and the way you guys are swinging those swords i would guess they are about half the weight of a steel sword. I know for experience that alot of strikes you guys are doing would wrench shoulders and sprain wrists. You guys also have a tendency to flick your weapons rather than solid cuts. Interesting to watch though, keep up the good work.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 18, 2007 8:51:45 GMT
I am a member of NYHFA. We do live steel drills every Sat. The NYHFA is the NY chapter of Tobler's WMA school.
The Sword I am using in the vid is almost exactly 3 lbs. It is balanced exactly to my Windlass Classic Medieval sword and has all the same handling characteristics. My shield is about 8.5 lbs. My armor is about 40 lbs. The sword swinging you see is combinations that are made possible by proper body mechanics and without which we would not be able to move the sword from one combination to another and make good solid hits that can be felt through the armor. All the shots originate from the hips. Some styles stress the hips more then others. In this practice I am working on my hand-snap which I described in another thread. It emphasizes the hips less but it still originates from there.
Normally you will see 2 or 3 shot combinations and then we have to reset ourselves to a guard because form breaks down with every additional combination. Each combination builds upon the prior one. Only the very best fighters can throw 5 or 6 shot combinations and still be effective offensively and defensively.
The typical drilling and half-speed fighting that is done in my WMA practice is just the starting point here. We drill these combinations over and over hundreds of times on pells and we also do half speed fights. When you actually fight another equally skilled fighter it is not so easy to pull off what you practice in drills. It is one thing to learn techniques, it is another to execute them in a fight. It gets harder if you get someone, like me, in front of you who will continuously use his shield to stop your weapon in an awkward position and prevent you from returning to a good guard. We have all read the fight books and we know what people are suppose to do. Part of fighting is keeping your opponent from doing what he wants to do. So if you see one of us get sloppy, it is because the other did something intentionally to foul him up.
Mind you, there is plenty of room for improvement. The purpose of these videos is for me to find see my errors and fix them. I made 3 major errors in this fight. At 0:13 sec, my right foot fell in front of my shield. This exposed the whole right side of my body to my opponent. The right foot should not step out unless I am so close to him that my shield is on his body and I am wrapping my sword to the back of his head, back or leg. If I am that close he can't hit my exposed side. At 0:21 I made the same error again. The reason this is happening is because I am overextending my reach and coming off balance. In both cases my opponent failed to take advantage of my exposed body, that is his error. At 2:07 I have dropped the top corner of my shield so that it is no longer covering my head (most likely cause my arm is tired). I should immediately move my sword in front of my face so it is covering my head and fight from that guard. Again my opponent failed to capitalize on my error. That is his error.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 18, 2007 14:28:12 GMT
Tsafa: i didn't mean any offense by what i said i was merely pointing out what i have observed in my group and what i observed from your videos. I guess the other thing is that with your rattan swords or whatever you don't have the same psychological disadvantages as facing real steel no matter how blunt. I can see the proper mechanics, we use different mechanics in our sparring sessions, but each to their own, right? I enjoy watching this kind of thing, we never move at this kind of speed because we use steel, but would be interesting to wail on an opponent with rattan. Very cool, would love to see some of your live steel combat and see where we differ.
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Post by Matt993f.o.d on Oct 18, 2007 16:03:47 GMT
I thought what Tsafa is doing IS live steel combat. Isnt it?
Can you tell me what the difference is? After all, he is using a steel sword.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 18, 2007 18:27:11 GMT
Steel swords are not used for real sparring in this organization. We use use rattan-wood sword wasters that have a minimum of a 1.25 inch round diameter. The purpose of this is that the force of the impact is spread out and you are less likely to break a bone. A steel blunt still has enough of an edge so that it can break bone if used with full force and speed. Live steel drilling is usually done out of range or at slow speed. You often target the other person's weapon rather then the man depending on the exercise.
But don't be fooled, if you get hit with a rattan sword were you have no armor, you will jump up and down in pain. I took a hit during another fight last night just under my right arm near the pit were I have no armor. It stung like hell and I have a massive black and blue there today. I also took another shot to the top of my forearm where I have no armor. No bruise, but it hurt like a semprini last night.
People are able to manipulate the length, weight and balance of their rattan swords to resemble different kinds of swords.
Bloodwraith, no offense taken. I just wanted to spell out what is being displayed in the vid. Not just in response to your comment but for the benefit of other people viewing that may not have seen prior posts explaining what they are seeing.
Matt, I practice in a number of different organizations that use different weapon simulators and have different safeties in place. This way I am able to roundout my training.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 18, 2007 18:40:51 GMT
Nice videos tsafa.It is a pity that probably I won't have a chance to fight with you.You are certainly a demanding opponent.We use steel in our group but I have some experience with wooden swords.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 18, 2007 18:45:45 GMT
Where do you live Elchon?
Glad you enjoyed the vid.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 18, 2007 18:49:04 GMT
I live in Poland.There is lots of water between us...
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Post by Deleted on Oct 20, 2007 3:55:15 GMT
Tsafa: in my group there is no aiming for the weapon, you go for the other guy as hard and fast as you can as long as you can stop the weapon so you don't hit with too much force. My weapons of choice are either a two handed axe, spear, two one handed axes or axe and shield. With a two handed axe i have both an axe and a staff in one weapon and with the two axes, one is bearded for hooking my enemies shield and the other is a striking weapon, although both strike nicely. I don't think i need to point out the benefits of spear or axe and shield. Our group is also period accurate, i noticed that your group doesn't seem to go by a certain period. I really enjoy watching the vids you put up and look forward to seeing more
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Post by Deleted on Oct 20, 2007 8:09:45 GMT
Bloodwraith, if you can get a cheap digital camare I would love to see some of your fighting too.
My group covers a large period from Prehistoric Celts and Ancient Greeks to the 15th century. It spans the globe durring that period so we have some Africans and Indians too. For the purpose of calibration and targeting, we are all assumed to be in leather armor or mail hulberks with openface helmets. No one is considered to be in plate, even if they are. So the fighting style is pre 14 th century.
One difference between our two groups is that the strikes have to hit with force. That does change the dynamics because we have to use various methods to generate that force. Its not easy when you are tired. I have landed plenty of shots that were rejected as insufficient because I used bad technique.
I also do rapier fencing and WMA that has a much lighter calibration. The WMA in my group is non-competative but we do halfspeed sparring. That means if we did ever meet I would be able to control my weapon and fight to your standards. I have practiced with groups such as yours that do some real sparring with blunts and little armor. I always wear full armor and guantlets, I can't risk injury that would interupt my training schedule. Sounds weird, but that is how I think of it. The downside is that people with less armor have a better range of movement. I need to adjust my armor if I am to fight competivly with a two-handed weapon in those groups, where the hands need to stay close together. In my present SCA armor, I use the gaive sometimes with longsword techniques. My glaive is 7.5 feet long (over 2 meters), and allows me to space my hands over two feet apart and move comfortably in my present armor.
Axe and shield is an awesome combo. I love to use it in melees. I use the hook to trap spears and polearms while the spearman behind me gets a thrust to the face.
I have not got around to training with a two-handed axe or spear. I would love to hear about your fighting experiances. You really should take some vid and start a thread with some insights.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 20, 2007 10:56:37 GMT
Tsafa: we are actually quite well armour, gambeson, chain mail, llamelar (one guy who is a rus has full llamelar). I'm still working on getting my kit together properly, learning how to make a mail shirt and whatever. I haven't done any two handed axe in the actual group yet but i have done some with one of my house mates who is also into it. Waiting for my funds to sort themselves out then i will start gathering. My character is a varangian guard from byzantium, he favours gambeson and half llamelar. His weapons of choice i already labelled. I also understand the training schedule thing, because i train very heavily so that i can work up the strength and whatnot so i can keep up with the guys in the group. I am fairly new to the group and am having to unlearn things i already know. We have to hit hard enough to "score" but not so hard we do serious damage. My house mate was training against my mate and they were using axe handles and lets just say even a light hit with an axe handle does damage, even without a blade attached. Hopefully my fiance will bring her camera to next training and i will take some short video I would love to see a picture of your glaive as i personally love long weapons after i get my first character done i will be branching out into an italian with a bardiche This bardiche hopefully www.manningimperial.com/item.php?item_id=402&g_id=1&c_id=58and the two handed axe i want is this one www.manningimperial.com/item.php?item_id=325&g_id=1&c_id=13i am waiting to hear whether or not the steel is of the right grade for reenactment. Hope that helps
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