HEMA triathlon

[admin]

As highlighted by the recent threads on sport fencing and kendo, what works best in a competition with particular rules, safety gear and weapon simulators is not always what would work best in a real fight with real weapons. Even down to the way we strike or score points. A cut requires a certain type of movement with a certain portion of the blade to work, and thrusts needs to be extracted before the weapon can be used to defend or attack again. A slight wound to an extremity could seriously hinder a fighter (injured hand or blood in eyes) or it may have no noticeable effect until after the fight (pain hidden by adrenaline for example, or slow bleed).

Sporting systems evolved from combat arts seem, to me, to have boiled down all the complexity of martial arts into a few measurable skills and they tend to test those particular skills in a more or less artificial situation (ie. Removed from more or less of the martial realities). Different sports tend to measure these skills in different measures, dependent on the particular rules and equipment, so that someone who is a top level epeeist might never make a top level kendoka or sport sabruer.

So we come to HEMA. It seems to me that HEMA people by their very definition are keen to avoid some or all of these pitfalls – to try and make our competitions keep as closely to martial realities as is reasonably possible. That’s not to say that our competitions are simulations of duels – they never can be and we accept that they are only measuring certain skills, just like other martial art-derived sports. But I think what is really important to most HEMA people is that we feel our competitions are retaining as many martially important elements as possible, and primarily measuring what we see as the most important martial qualities. It is reasoning like this that has seen the ‘after blow’ rule widely adopted – to cut down on suicidal sniping for points and encourage a good recovery after an attack, also to discourage people stopping when being hit and teaching them to keep fighting even if wounded.

Now, if our ultimate aim is to test as rounded a skill set as possible, then what would people think of running a competition which had more than one type of competition to establish overall scores – a triathlon or pentathlon for example? Just off the cuff, say a longsword competition where there was a one-on-one fencing round with feders, a cutting and thrusting effectiveness round, and multiple-opponent or mis-matched attacker round, where the contestants would be scored cumulatively?

I am sure this would be fun, but do people think it would be worthwhile in a useful way?

[admin]

p.s. I am not the first person to suggest this, but I am not sure it has ever actually been done at a large event.

[Keith P. Myers]

I think its a good idea! In the shooting world that are several "3 gun competitions" in which competitors shoot the handgun, rifle, and shotgun. I think it would be cool to have a "3 weapon competition" with Longsword, Dussack/Messer, and grappling.

Keith

[John H]

It sounds like fun, not sure of the practicality and popularity of such an event.

and "Triathlon" seems dependent on each person’s focus I guess, as I first thought of Rapier, Saber, Longsword… Single handed thruster, single handed cutter, and two hander.

[Motley]

I got the impression that Matt was suggesting all one weapon, so for example Longsword. But tests of different things with it that all go to the final score.

So:

free tournament
test cut
multiopponent

That all get added together, kind of like a skating long and short form.

[Monster Zero]

I think its a good idea! In the shooting world that are several "3 gun competitions" in which competitors shoot the handgun, rifle, and shotgun. I think it would be cool to have a "3 weapon competition" with Longsword, Dussack/Messer, and grappling.

Keith

I would suggest expanding this to:

Staff/Spear
Longsword
Sword and Buckler
Rapier
Dussack/Messer
Singlestick
Dagger
Pugilism
Grappling

I think this would effectively cover the main skill areas covered by HEMA. It also represents all ranges H2H combat ranges from long range through to extreme close-range.
I think this

[bigdummy]

I'd like to see sparring with two different weapons, plus cutting. I think that would be cool.

And hard!

Probably need to do the pools on one day and the finals on the next. Maybe do it every couple of years instead of every year. and maybe invitational.

BD

[Gordon L]

I think the idea of multiple rulesets per weapon per competition is a good one.

Multi-weapon/multi-skill events also sound like fun.

Of course, with epée and the like, you can fit 8 fighting areas into a 33m x 18m hall, and that allows for three-figure entry lists, and multiple rounds of pools, followed by DE. (For instance, I've DT'd competition weekends with 6 weapons events, entries of 200 to 250 fencers, and most people entering two events. And fitted them into a 33m x 36m hall)

The practicalities of fitting enough triple-ruleset longsword fights into a given hall over one weekend might be difficult.

It would then make sense to standardise the ruleset for a season, and have local and regional qualifying events, (and even national and continental qualifying events) with winners going through to the next round, and then ultimately the final.

The 3 rulesets for the longsword could then be altered to another, different, 3 for the following year, to stop people being able to game the ruleset the same ways two years running.

[Dan]

I'd love to see something based on the melee's in medieval tornaments. Rather than a straight one on one duel, or multiple opponent, multiple combatants, with a variety of weapons allowed, elimination (might be a difficulty in having enough judges to call "deaths") and every man for himself.

On one hand.. it has the variety of opponents expected from realistical battle, and the chaos of never being quite sure where an attack will come from.

On the other.. it guarantees constant betrayal by what might have been an ally a moment ago, not quite so realistic.

[admin]

Welcome to the forum, Dan.

I'd love to see something based on the melee's in medieval tornaments. Rather than a straight one on one duel, or multiple opponent, multiple combatants, with a variety of weapons allowed, elimination (might be a difficulty in having enough judges to call "deaths") and every man for himself.

We do have such things at some HEMA events, though normally in teams rather than as a load of individuals all trying to 'kill' each other - at FightCamp we have this every year for example. The things is that, as you say, it is next to impossible to judge. So you have to limit yourselves to a sort of honour-based self-evaluation and trust people to be honest about when they have been hit... which means it is not very practical to make into a truly competitive system.

One thing to clarify though - these melee games (as we call them) are only a sort of game. At most they resemble a civilian street skirmish.