Practices Continue to be Good

Tonight, I fought a bunch. Instead of a play-by-play, I thought I would concentrate on how I'm trying to develop my game.

*****

My game for the last while has been concentrated on cutting through my opponent's opposition. Swords in collision are an edge case that I have studied pretty thoroughly. However, in order to gain the sort of cutting thrust I want, I have to throw that cut from my wrist, from a position in which my opponent has somewhat-strong opposition. That is a useful tool, but every new tool I add to my tool-set increases the effectiveness of every other tool.

I have watched through the Academie Duello series on opposition. In this video series, Devon Boorman talks about how to perform opposition correctly. And the videos I've watched thus far are So Good.

Today, I was working to try to fight even more safely than usual. I was trying to perform opposition from the elbow, not the wrist. The problem I ran into is that whenever I applied strong opposition, my opponents would disengage. Or they would put their tip far enough below my sword that I couldn't effectively oppose. Or other things like that, which neutralize Good and Proper fencing. As such, it was possible for me to defend myself in that way, but not for me to actually stab my opponent with my current knowledge.

In order to stab my opponents, I had to revert to my tactics from about a year ago, even before the cutting-opposition that I have been using recently. This meant that I did a lot of tiny twitchy mind-games type feints. It's the sort of thing that relies on my opponent reacting to me, which some people don't do until I present an actual threat. I could probably integrate cutting opposition into the new tactics, but I'm going to need to fight a more "pure" Duello-esque fight for a while so that I can learn how to blend things in without losing the essence of these new techniques.

One thing I noticed is that this type of fighting is far, far less tiring on my wrist. This means that I was able to pull off better twitch-angle-shots when I had to. Unfortunately, this form of opposition is one that the longer-time fencers in practice seemed to be very familiar with. As such, I ended up just sort of flailing when my first or second intention didn't work, and things did not go well for me.

Really, what I need to do is binge on Academie Duello videos. I'm sure that the Duello.tv website covers what to do in their fight when someone disengages and suchlike. I could guess, but I don't want to make assumptions based on the period manuals I have read. I also need to think harder about what to do when someone has a buckler, because frikkin' bucklers. Maybe I need to actually poke their buckler to get them to think, and then proceed accordingly? It's a start.

*****

I also played around with my longsword. I stitched together a leather wrapper for the handle, and it feels so good in my hands now. There is now an integral shim to improve blade stability, and it actually stayed in place when I took the sword apart. It is so easy for me to swing it around and do horrible, terrible things with it. I don't like the color of the leather of the handle in contrast with the metal of the sword, but that thing is intended to be an atrocity which will do horrible things on the melee field at Pennsic. As such, it shouldn't be pretty. Part of me wants to put a nice splatter of red on the handle, to properly express the horrible things that this longsword is capable of.

As a minor bonus, the integral shim means I can actually fully take apart the longsword and get my extra-heavy blade for drilling back on my standard hilt. Yay!

I want to make a new longsword handle for a second, shorter longsword. This is to see if I can replicate my success with this longsword's handle. I have probably spent upwards of 20 hours on research and work to make this handle, and I would like to see if I can do it faster this time. I started from basically no knowledge or skills, which is why it took so long. This new handle will be rounded and about 10", so it can be used with almost any blade and still be within SCA rules. I will see if I actually prefer the rectangular handle, or if my love of the rectangular handle I made is just some complex form of Stockholm syndrome.

Maybe I should leather-wrap a rapier handle I own which is too thin for my hands to use comfortably. That would be a good trial for leather-wrapping a cylinder.

*****

In order to keep myself accountable, I have the following action items:

• Before next practice, I want to:
• Watch through at least another series of Academie Duello videos.
• This can just be in the background while doing another thing, like sewing or some kind of leatherworking or something.
• I have a sheath to finish for Carolingia - perhaps that?
• At home, drill more. I've been slacking lately, because work-stress.
• Drilling is a good thing to do.
• It improves my ability to stab a person.
• It is vaguely aerobic.
• Next practice, I want to:
• Fight a buckler-user if possible, because bucklers are A Problem For Me. Poke the buckler and see how they react.
• In the future, attempt to generalize reactions to poking buckler. Do all buckler users react the same way?
• Try using my rotella. Do I react the same way when someone pokes my rotella?
• Continue working on direct opposition in the method outlined by Academie Duello.
• Don't try integrating cutting-through opposition yet.
• Try not to use too many feints yet.
• Probably this will be more detailed when I walk into Thursday practice, because of the above directive regarding watching more videos.

Until next time - have fun fencing!

Violence Practices

Sunday and Monday's practices were good. This post is mostly spitballing random thoughts, because I've got no overarching sword-theory that I'm working on right now.

Sunday I ended up authorizing in long s-word. It is pretty great, and it's especially a fun form to periodically bring into melee. Speaking of melee, there was melee on Sunday! Yaaaaay.

We ended up doing a bunch of line drills, primarily. Line drills are hard to do, but we need to do them to get better at the melees. The particular focus of this one was in rolling lines. There were two lines, and one person to the side. People were expected to fight some, and then eventually the person to the side would choose a line and start rolling it. Before the side-person starts moving, all hits are called out but not taken. Afterwards, shots are called normally.

I liked the drill because the incentives were very similar to normal melee line incentives. Eventually I started fighting more conservatively, because I realized that if someone has their tip close to me when the line starts rolling, I will die. I started hanging back in my guard and waiting to either catch the roll or assist the roll, which is pretty much how zippered lines normally go in melee. We weren't practicing the creation of internal flanks, but that wasn't the point of the drill.

I feel like I did pretty well both at rolling lines and at stopping the roll when it began. It was pointed out that my chosen stance was kind of gaming things by accident, so maybe next time I start farther back or in a less offensive stance.

*****

Near the end of practice, I had a realization about the way I throw thrusts. In general when I'm fighting for keeps, I set myself with my hand forward and my blade to the far outside line. If my opponent commits to taking my blade, I perform a hilt-first disengage and stab them in the gut. If my opponent stays in guard, I try to do a thrust with false-edge leading. This is much more effective because of the particular way I hold my sword. This thrust should cut through the weak of my opponent's sword, thereby foiling any counterattack and their parry at the same time.

I have previously had trouble with people who hold their sword particularly far out. I have since realized that I can actually angle the cut so that my tip creates a curve, instead of a line. Instead of going from the outside line through my opponent's sword to stab them, I can cut a different path with my sword. This path goes from the outside line, to my blade being almost vertical, on to thrusting into my opponent's body.

This preserves the defensive and offensive properties, but lets me apply opposition at a much more advantageous spot. It's pretty cool, and I still need to explore all of the possibilities therein. I have managed to surprise more than one person with it at this point, though when doing this I need to be prepared to move forward more than I normally would with a false-edge-opposition-cutting-thrust. This is because this new method takes a bit longer, and also weirdly it can be initiated from farther away. This is because the normal counter for false-edge-opposition-cutting-thrust is having one's arm extended very far, such that pushing through the weak of the blade would put my sword to the other side of my opponent's body, but not in a place I can thrust.

Maybe I should add a passing step or something. Also, my hilt sort of goes in front of my eyes and it's hard for me to eyeball if I have touched my opponent yet. Maybe I need to drill responding to the tactile sensation of thrusts?

*****

Monday practice was kind of full of derp. It was probably useful in some holistic way, but there were just so many moments of weird things. I spent most of the practice working the new cutting thrust described above, or fighting single, or fighting shorter-than-usual sword.

I started drilling with a dude, but bailed on the drill when I realized that we were drilling things that I deeply and explicitly don't want to do in my particular game. Namely, I don't want first-intention dagger defenses to be a thing for me, with a few exceptions. Defense always starts with the sword in some way. Either the sword parries, or it beats, or it serves to zone-block and limit my opponent's options. I am very aware of how easy it can be to trick someone's dagger into doing the wrong things, and my game is very sword-primary.

My lack of ability to care about drills if they are neither historical nor My Thing leaves me somewhat hesitant about the non-historical classes of KWAR next week, but I'm sure it will be fun regardless.

The other violence was pretty good, I guess? I fought most of the people I have been learning a lot from fighting recently. There were many derp moments, regardless.

I think that the number of pre-loaded intentions in my violence macro needs to depend very heavily on the weight, agility, and tip-heaviness of the weapon of my opponent.

I also pulled of some pretty sweet Spanish-ish stuff. I need to remember to ask experienced diestros about the situation I keep getting into, where I hilt-parry my opponent and lever them around from the inside line to the extremely low outside line with my bottom quillon. It usually turns out somewhere between okay and good for me, but something feels weird about doing it in a Spanish game.

I have continued to try to pull off my reverse-giarata against both right and left-handed opponents. That entire sub-game seems more effective against left-handed opponents, but it's okay against right-handed opponents. It usually doesn't get me dead, but I'm not sure how to make it land on my opponent. I think people tend to see a situation that they are not used to, then they prepare to back off. Or they don't commit their thrusts hard enough. Perhaps developing my false-edge cutting thrust from the inside line with the wrist angled would make my life better. Perhaps I should try that with a giarata-step, or a rightwards-diagonal lunge? Who knows.

I need to explicitly work on fighting opponents who have more reach than me. That means using a 37-inch sword and fighting someone with a 45-inch or 42-inch sword.

*****

In conclusion, I've got nothing.

Sliding Steps and the Nine Hand and Blade Positions

So I was sick yesterday, which meant I couldn't go to practice. It was terribly sad. As such, I wish to organize some thoughts for next practice. These are several concepts I have come to understand from Sebastien Romagnan's Destreza text. I probably don't understand them as well as I could, but learning is the process of refining understanding. An important step in refinement, for me, is writing things down. As such, I have written them here.

As well, some of these concepts seem like they would be interesting and useful to people.

*****

Destreza has a particular type of sliding step. The front foot takes a step forwards similar to a lunge. The back foot comes up to meet it, and then the back foot goes back out. The two feet meeting allows one to gain a couple more inches of reach, without over-extending and falling forwards. The back foot does not touch the ground, but instead continues elsewhere. As well, the instant of feet meeting allows you to decide whether your back foot continues into a passing step or returns out of measure.

The red circle is you, the black circles are where your feet go.

This is in the order specified by the green numbers.

The slide really does create additional reach. It's pretty sweet. I want to start integrating it into my standard Italian-ish game. For some time I actually did by accident, because I was preparing a second lunge in order to catch people who reacted by moving backwards quickly. I am unsure why I stopped - perhaps because passing steps took the theoretical place that preparing a redouble took? Either way, it's time to introduce this into my game.

*****

Secondly, I think I have come to understand better the idea of Spanish-style bladework. As described by Romagnan (whose book I suggest you acquire if you find these concepts interesting), there are a set of nine positions and a set of three distances-from-the-center. They end up forming three cylinders  (or cones, depending on how you think of it) - a two-foot-diameter one, a four-foot-diameter one, and a six-foot-diameter one. I don't personally believe that the number of feet is exact here. It seems like it would suffice it to say that there is the small, medium, and large cylinder/cone/pyramid/whatever shape you want to call it.

Your hand can be in any of these positions, and the tip of your sword can be in any of these positions. This image is to be imagined as looking at your opponent. The 1 position is to be imagined as as having your arm extended straight at them, with no bend in your elbow and your sword pointing outwards. The 2 position is your tip or hand being level with or in line with their head.

Wheeeeee swords.

If nothing else, this is a useful framework for defining blade positions. It lets you understand where you are in relation to your opponent's weapon - an understanding sorely lacking in the traditional Italian one-two-three-four shorthand we generally use. Additionally, the position of your top quillon is defined in the same way.

As an example, Capoferro's guard in third places your hand at 6, your tip at either 1 or 2, and your top quillon at 2. Probably in the 4-foot cylinder/circle/pyramid.

Giganti's bastard guard for the outside line in terza-quarta places your hand at either 5 or 6, and your tip at 9. Also your top quillon in 9.

It would be a super-interesting exercise to annotate an Italian manual with this notation.

*****

This becomes weird when there is a significant height difference. As I understand things, this is what a side-view of two people of radically different height doing late-period Destreza would look like.

That short figure's leg-to-torso ratio is way different from what I intended there.

I could also be completely wrong about this.

Note that the cylinders are tilted, such that each fighter's 1 line (not drawn - it goes along their arms) is pointing at the other's shoulder. This is all well and good when it's another Diestro that you're fighting. But extending your arm like that just gives your opponent your tip, especially if you have a long sword. Even if you attempt an atajo. This is something I have experienced in drilling at home.

Several throwaway mentions of lowering your arm occur in various texts. For example, if I remember correctly, Thibault advises that you lower your arm if you are fighting in constricted circumstances, such as in a tunnel or some such. So I wonder if it would be useful to consider the 1-line to connect your respective elbows, rather than your shoulders. This would mean we could do things in two ways. We can either tilt down from our shoulders or we can lower our elbow to the same level as our opponent's elbow.

An example of lowering from the shoulder, to create a line between elbows.

I totally forgot to label the 2 and 6 lines.

Also I drew the Italian's sword.

Note that the cylinders are angled downwards from the Diestro, and the Italian's hand is on the inner 6 line.

...the Diestro's hand is supposed to be on the 1 line, not the inner 6 line.

An example of lowering from the elbow.

I drew the Italian's sword. It seems much less complex than the above.

Note that the cylinders are straight and parallel to the ground, here.

Perhaps neither of these is correct, but I have had trouble making the Destreza things work on Italians in the past, so I am interested to try these things. It is fully possible that the answer exists in Romagnan's book and I missed it. Or even that it is in another book that I have read fully or partially, and I just missed it. Or perhaps it's one of those ill-explored territories in fencing.

This doesn't at all take into account the fact that the ideal Atajo is accomplished with a 60º/120º angle between the blades.

This is a very abstract image of an arm, a hand, and a sword from each person.

The person on the right is taking the sword of the person on the left in an atajo.

But yeah. It's hard to take your opponent's sword in an atajo if they are already at an angle like Italian guards tend to be.

*****

So, in summation, there are a few things that I want to try on Thursday at practice.

• Sliding steps to gain extra range and to be able to move more freely.
• Different guards against Italians, to understand how Destreza concepts can be used in an Italian fight.
• Trying to understand Destreza concepts better in general.

Yay violence! I hope that this entry was educational, or at least interesting. This post does not cover nearly all of the things in Sebastien Romagnan's book. It only covers the things I am finding most interesting at this current moment in time. Have good fencing, everybody~~~!