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馃敧 Backstabbing Questions 馃敧 (i need even more help! 馃啒)


icebrand

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13 hours ago, Shiningbrow said:

And don't forget the priority rules... Which I imagine would have had a significant impact, since your opponent was successfully parrying. Riposte for the win!!!

Yes, but this is a completely different can of worms.

12 hours ago, Susimetsa said:

Historically, you actively defend with pretty much every sword type - only a fool would not do so. Longsword techniques have guards where combatants hold their swords in positions where they block most lines of attack and can quickly move to protect another when needed (when your opponent switches to another guard - changing their sword position and opening themselves a new set of attack lines - you change your guard to match to block as many of those new lines of attack as you can). Thus, you need feints to make your opponent move their sword away from the area you want to attack.

Completely true.

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20 hours ago, Susimetsa said:

Historically, you actively defend with pretty much every sword type - only a fool would not do so. Longsword techniques have guards where combatants hold their swords in positions where they block most lines of attack and can quickly move to protect another when needed (when your opponent switches to another guard - changing their sword position and opening themselves a new set of attack lines - you change your guard to match to block as many of those new lines of attack as you can). Thus, you need feints to make your opponent move their sword away from the area you want to attack.

This is perhaps even more pronounced with the rapier (and rapier + another weapon) styles, where the guard of the rapier became a shield in its own right - when you hold a sword with a complex hilt (swept hilt, shell guard, bell guard, ring guard) at arm's length towards your opponent, both the angle of the blade and the hilt block a decent number of lines of attack. The tiny shield used with the rapier (a buckler) was also held at an arm's length towards the enemy - which effectively protects from as many lines of attack as a larger shield held closer to the body would. Because of these considerations of lines and angles, many fencing masters stressed that one must learn one鈥檚 letters before attempting to learn fencing, as one needed to understand and take advantage of circles, lines and angles.

While true, you wouldn't be doing this in mass melee combat... And I'm sure a Berserked Dark Troll Zorak Zorani won't care fiddly squat for your letters.

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12 hours ago, Shiningbrow said:

While true, you wouldn't be doing this in mass melee combat... And I'm sure a Berserked Dark Troll Zorak Zorani won't care fiddly squat for your letters.

True. For mass melee combat, you rely on basic drills, shields, morale and formations. What a single soldier lacks in fighting skills is made up by the protection offered by the formation. And, or course, everyone is basically cannon fodder in those situations - we are not talking about individual heroes anymore. It is a mass against mass.

For fantastical creatures possessing the strength of 10 men or more, like trolls, all bets are off. Your hero would benefit from the knowledge of angles etc., of course, because they would then be able to assess the reach etc. of the troll - and trolls have a way of telegraphing their moves which would also help in dodging them - but you would not want to stand in formation in front of one of them. You want to have room around to you dodge and backtrack and attack when necessary.

Mind you, the above paragraph is pure supposition as there are no historical examples to draw from, aside from perhaps war elephants, but I know very little of them or how they were taken down - if they were.

Edited by Susimetsa
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