J T wrote:
Wed, Apr 27, 2005, 10:06pm (EDT-1) (Avraham) says:
Well, speaking as a guy who has been fighting for 22 years, plywood
wouldn't hold up at all. snip
My Gods, I'm getting sucked back in the group, I post, then see a
thread, and post a response. Aaach.
Speaking as a guy who ain't about to go around letting people beat
on me without trying to give them some serious damage in return, I never
figured anyone would wear them to get beat on in. Personally, before I
would run around letting people beat on me, I'd make myself some real
armour, including a "real" helmet, out of good quality steel, stuff able
to take repeated hits from a real sword, and hold up.
While steel plate armor has its advantages, it's also heavy and unless it's
very carefully crafted it impedes your motion. If you're not both in very
good condition and practiced at performing acrobatics in armor, once they
get you down you're done for.
A good, fitted suit of plate armor today costs thousands of dollars. Making
it yourself might be an interesting exercise, but if you get to where you
can make some that you can actually fight in you may find that you can make
more as an armorer than you do in your day job. Bear in mind that if it's
not fitted right it can damage you all by itself when it takes a blow.
And I think you'll find that lamellar armor works very nicely. The Samurai
certainly seemed to think so. The plastic plates would be a viable
substitute for boiled leather lamellae IMO, and boiled leather was
surprisingly effective against "real swords".
By the way, don't assume that the bokken is not a "real sword". How many
swordmasters with steel swords did Musashi kill with one?
Even better,
would be standing back with a trusty catapult, and buckets of hot sand.
Hehehe
JOAT
A highbrow is a person educated beyond his intelligence.
- Brander Matthews
--
--John
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(was jclarke at eye bee em dot net)