 ts all about the violence. So sayeth Count
Daffyd. Heavy weapons combat is about the need for
violence, both the application of and the distribution
of.Fighter practice tonight was
unusual. The cool weather allowed everyone a lot of
excess energy I think. I know that recent stresses
in work, the northern regional mailing list, and
confusion regarding the date of fighter
practice made it hard for me to get into practice at
first. Gilyan commented that it looked like
everyone was out fighting really seriously. Not sure why,
but I think the subconscious stress of the week
translated into my fighting. Angus even came up
once and asked if I was "OK". I was like
"Yeah, why?" and he just said it looked like I
was mad. I wasn't but I wonder why I appeared that
way.
I was late to practice, and most
everyone was in armour by the time I got in.
Gunhilda and Oxlade were fighting while I put on
armour. Angus and I warmed up with some mace and
shield. It was unusual enough for us to get some
practical use out of it. However, we are both very
much used to our sword lengths, and there was a lot of Whiff
shots tonight.
After that Ivo came out and I fought
with him some. Ivo has a big ole Ansteorran war
door (2x4) and its really hard to get around. There were
a couple of nice kills I got, but that shield is
tough. I still was not really into the fights
though. I was moving and fighting, but the joy and
thrill just wasn't there. It wasn't really until I
got in a bunch of fights with Oxlade that I started to
feel the joy.
Oxlade and I had a bunch of fun
fights. My new fighting style requires lots of
lateral movement and combinations to be truly effective,
and Oxlades style counteract each other
effectively. Oxlade has a tight controlled
counter-punching style. So I would dance (well as
much as a fat man can) around and throwing shots, while
Oxlade would be turning blocking and throwing back slot
shots, rips, and the occasional wrap. All in all it
was like an violent chess match. Fairly enjoyable
really.
I took a break, and Ox and Ivo got some
fights in, then I switched back in and got some
more fights in. Once again, felt like I was
fighting "OK", but just was not hitting the
"Turbo mode" switch that makes the fights extra
enjoyable.
Finally, I took a break, and Ox went
out and got a last round in with Ivo. Ox's sword
(which was swwwwweeeeeet) lost its lanyard and he
borrowed mine that I traded Wiggen for. Well they
have this big ole drawn out knock down shield bash fight,
and in the end Ox fires this ferocious shot that I though
was just going to crush Ivo. I hear this
CRACK and I see about the last six inches of my
sword broken off and hanging from the splinters of the
sword. So we decided that was it for the night.
I had a talk with Gilyan and we started
discussing fighting and what it was about. I made
some comments about how I like the fighting to look, and
she said
"Aha, so its not about the
violence," says she. "Its about how the fight
looks."
"Well, no.", I reply.
"Its about the application of violence. The
application of violence should be controlled, for that is
when it reaches maximum effectiveness. The engine
of an automobile is a violent place, with thousands of
explosions happening per second. Yet, the
harnessing of that violence is a thing of
beauty. "
Btw, my paragraph is a condensed
version of all the discussion we had. Sort of the
Reader's Digest Version.
We left the conversation there, but
I've thought more about it. Fighting is about
violence, but a Tasmanian devil style of violence is in
general a wasteful one. Just from watching Bugs
Bunny, who's well timed clever violence would outperform
the raw violence of his opponents, one can see that the
goal is in the precision application of violence to
accomplish the goal desired.
Oh well, gonna leave it there.
Except for these pictures of my sword:
(click to blow up)
and the
close up (also click to see larger version):
Ld. Jean
Paul de Sens
|
