Armoury of Antiquity: Questions regarding archaic arms and armor

[Verjigorm]

Ok, so here's a few of them, mainly influenced by my intention to run a mideval fantasy game set in the 11th and 12th centuries. These questions have cropped up due to my examination of the byzantines, and how to model their mounted soldiers, such as cataphracts. This mainly comes to deal with maille armor.

1) Mail and layering. The Mail Coif is a "helmet" in gurps. However, it is not "concealable as or under clothing", which restricts anyone wearing one to wearing a coif and a cloth cap. This is directly at odds with a vast body of evidence that demands the coif be worn under a skull cap, or even another helmet. I cite as the foremost of this: the Bayeuax tapestry.

The byzantine cavalry, especially in an elite, well equipped formation(suchs as the Scholae, Optimates or Excuborites) would wear a complete suit of chainmail(sometimes double maill!), and over that, wear a chestpiece of lamellar(Small plates joined together into a coat). This is either Lorica Segmenta type armor, or Scale. It's of note that having a suit of mail with a lorica segmenta gives one a DR 9 vs. impaling. It's also of note that a man with ST 13 and a longspear in bothhands has an impaling damage of 1d+3. A longspear used in both hands is the common weapon for the enemies a cavalryman in the byzantine army would face.

2) Weight. A byzantine cataphract would go into battle, wearing 86lbs of armor(105 if the hauberk is double-maille), carrying a kontos(longspear), thrusting broadsword, mace, light buckler, composite bow and a paltry 30 arrows has 22lbs more of arms. His horse will be covered in full, or partial chain/scale barding weighing 73lbs. Riding equipment will be another 42 lbs. If we assume a ST 11 cataphract, 170 is a decent weight for the rider. This totals 393lbs.

393 lbs is a heavy load for a cavalry horse(ST22) and a Heavy Warhorse(ST24). Most animals will nto willingly carry a weight greater than moderate encumberance. What should be done? It should be noted that the heavy cataphract, as compared to lighter, regular cavalry were slower, and charged at the trot, rather than canter or gallop. This would seem to work for the cataphracts, giving them a move of 2/5 with heavy warhorses, and 3/6 with cavalry horses.

Would this mean that the horses of most cavalry are just willing to carry heavier burdens than a normal horse?

[Easterner9504]

Go with what your research shows is right.

War horses were bred for size, the slightly later Western horses were massive and easily carried the weight, see photos, note hoof/leg size.

http://www.classicalfencing.com/horsetraining.php

[DanHoward]

Originally Posted by Easterner9504

Go with what your research shows is right.

War horses were bred for size, the slightly later Western horses were massive and easily carried the weight, see photos, note hoof/leg size.

http://www.classicalfencing.com/horsetraining.php

Warhorses were bred for speed, intelligence and endurance. The largest destriers were rarely over 16 hands. The closest modern equivalant might be a hunter or endurance horse. Today's huge draft horses have nothing to do with medieval warhorses. They were bred much later when roads improved for pulling carriages.

A 14 hand horse would have no problems bearing the weight of a fully armoured knight. The best book on the subject is Andrew Ayton's "Knights and Warhorses: Military Service and the English Aristocracy under Edward III"

[Verjigorm]

Next: The Net of Spears, alternatively known as a Shield. Viking warriors sometimes referred to their shields as "net of spears", and there have been theories suggested that some preferred to use rimless shields, on the idea that a blade would become lodged within the shield, and then be wrenched away.

Would it be within reason to create a technique, regarding the use of the shield in such a way? I'm thinking a manuever similar parrying a natural attack, and dealing damage with it. Perhaps after a successful block, the defender may attempt a shield roll at a penelty(perhaps -4?), and then disarm his opponent.

In addition, has anyone a credible source on this, and the origins of a german dueling weapon know as a "hat". No, not like you wear on your head. This weapon is suppousedly a metal boss that one holds i nthe hand, similar to the central boss man shields possess. There are suppousedly spikes or somesuch, to allow for improved disarming.

Thanks in advance, and thanks for your earlier help.

[DouglasCole]

Originally Posted by Verjigorm

Would it be within reason to create a technique, regarding the use of the shield in such a way? I'm thinking a manuever similar parrying a natural attack, and dealing damage with it. Perhaps after a successful block, the defender may attempt a shield roll at a penelty(perhaps -4?), and then disarm his opponent.

Thanks in advance, and thanks for your earlier help.

Just allow Disarming technique (p. B230) to default to Shield; if you hit it with a -4 penalty, allow it to be bought up to Skill instead of Skill+5 like other disarms.

[The Colonel]

The 'hat' technique derives, IIRC, from the tendency from a wooden shield to fall apart when battered hard enough, leaving only the metal boss to which the handgrip was attatched - techniques were developed to defend yourself with only the boss (since the shield could come apart when it wasn't convenient to replace it) and then, as these things do, it became taught as a technique in its own right. I may be wrong, but that's the way I've heard it.

And I think GURPS lamellar ('scale mail') was known as lorica squamata by the Latins. Lorica Segmenta was the 'banded mail' of longer, horizontal strips.
For reference I think they called chainmail lorica hamata, but I can't recall the name of the leather breastplate thing...

As for leaving equipment in camp ... you would tend to leave your support gear behind in the care of your camp followers, sick and wounded. The armour and weapons you were issued (or obliged to muster with) are what is known these days as CEFO ... the stuff you need with you to be able to fight.
So yes, that is a lot of weight to be lugging about - just be thankfull they're not D&D weapons that weigh twice as they should do.

[Harleson S. Quinn]

If I were preparing to run a true-to-life campaign, facing such issues, I'd simply refer to the building materials for HP, PD, and DR, such as they are in the book, layer accordingly and create some custom kits.
While the armor was heavy, it's pretty well documented from dig-sites that there were rarely soldiers equipped with more than 80-110 pounds actually in the battles. Most other equipment was quite popularly kept in camp.
For instance, reference to Tsung Tsu's Art of War, which quotes approximately, "Scouts should note that pots hanging from tent posts and fires burning out mean maneuvers directly into battle are commencing." Camps were kept and guarded in the day simply for storing the equipment that wasn't to be directly in use at that time.

Don't be too afraid to stray from the books a bit. They are more guidelines with assumptions for basic campaigns. Follow your best intuition and see where it'll lead. Trial campaigns and house rule systems are constantly developed just for such things...

Humbly,
Harley Quinn

[smurf]

ST 24 x 3 = 345lbs
ST 22 x 3 = 290lb

Maybe they did not take everything into battle and would have been equiped according to the battle's needs.

Your riders' weight maybe wrong, You are assuming that they are of 'todays' average height and weight. They may have been 2 or 4 inches shorter and weighed less.

You could argue that the horses were stronger, just a point or two should do it:

ST 25 x 3 = 375
ST 26 x 3 = 405

BTW are you not confusing this cavalry for the 6th century version, I know Byzantium stagnated for 100s of years but some things may have changed.

[sir_pudding]

Originally Posted by Verjigorm

1) Mail and layering. The Mail Coif is a "helmet" in gurps. However, it is not "concealable as or under clothing", which restricts anyone wearing one to wearing a coif and a cloth cap. This is directly at odds with a vast body of evidence that demands the coif be worn under a skull cap, or even another helmet. I cite as the foremost of this: the Bayeuax tapestry.

A helmet is not clothing. Mail can explictly be layered under plate armor as per the layering armor rules.

Would this mean that the horses of most cavalry are just willing to carry heavier burdens than a normal horse?

Or it means that the armor weights given in the Basic Set are way too heavy for their DRs.

[Luther]

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

A helmet is not clothing. Mail can explictly be layered under plate armor as per the layering armor rules.

No, these rules give a penalty, that is silly for a mail coiff under an helmet. Kromm confirmed it's an errata: http://forums.sjgames.com/showthread.php?t=612