a post on the terrain factor

[Dylan palmer]

givin the time of yer where i live there is lots of snow and practicing in this enviroment is becoming more and more difficult. however i also feel the snow holds a great advatage to learing. more spicifically the inabillity to use proper foot work. in the snow abouthalf way to the knee. makes moving diffacult and spped is reduced as a biproduct of this. in the plowed snow it is often so slippery that making cuts without falling becomes hard. now trying to defend agaist a determend oppent in this atmoshphere makes things vary challaging indeed what are thought on practice and spparing in winter terrain and how do you feel this effects the tactiacal experaince of sworsmanship.

[Shane Smith]

We've trained in the snow in VAB on occasion and had no real problems fencing above what would be experienced in wet grass.. We've never had knee high snow to contend with though. If you can't move your feet, learn to twitch and/or read Vadi.

[TimSheetz]

Dylan,

Lots of good learning with problematic surfaces. For deep snow, as with shallow water, you have to pick your feet up out of the subastance before moving them. It really doesn't inhibit you at all once you get used to it.

Tim

[jeremy pace]

try fencing in sand.... ive tried it on a beach, in the desert, and a sand/mud bank near a lake.... all very difficult. We ended up kicking off our shoes while trying to keep eachother at bay on the latter. Mud on feet not a big deal, mud on boots and sticking to boots about 2-3inches deep not good. The hardest surface i ever fought on was in the mountains though. We were on a slope with crumbly, rocky debris. Fighting to get the high ground while sliding all over rocks..... GOOD TRAINING!

[Dylan palmer]

i also fond lifting your legs in a sort of small jump works well i was mosly trting to refer to the slippery ice and packed snow.


also i wonted to start a thread on training in odd terain.

[JeffGentry]

Hey Dylan

Doebringer say's this "Also know that when you fence with another you should step with caution and be sure in them as if you were standing on a scale and adapt accordingly if you go forward or backward as is fitting"

So remember when it is slippery you need to make sure you are stepping in a manner that when the foot going forward land's it doesn't slide out from under you "as if you were standing on a scale", maybe do some slower solo work until you feel comfortable then speed up the solo work.

Jeff

[Filip Pobran]

it would be very interesting to think about swordfights in extreme cold environment. braking the real sword becomes highly possible.


(my smith gived guarantee, or how it is written..., that my sword would not brake on clash up to -5°C)

[Lorraine Munoa]

"try fencing in sand.... ive tried it on a beach, in the desert, and a sand/mud bank near a lake.... all very difficult."

Man, Jeremy, that must have been FUN! I wish I could try out all those terrains..Around here I have two problems: One, I'm a "lone armateer" out here, so any work I do ends up being solo, and two, any time I get out even a waster people give me strange looks and usher their children away quickly. I think if I used my steel blunt in public, say at the beach, someone would call the cops. Darn California.

[jeremy pace]

Trust me its happened before! There are (were) about seven of us and we used to practice at this park where we had been told previously by the cops that it was okay so long as we werent hurting anyone....... Well, i guess it just depends on who you ask because one night we had this luitenant pull his piece on us and tell us to hit the ground. I thought we were going to die for a minute there because he was picking up our practice weapons (wooden wasters taped black) and yanking on the blades trying to "unsheath" them and we couldnt stop laughing. He demanded we show him the "trick" of unsheathing them. Very funny/dangerous night!

But what we do now is pretty simple. We go to lakes and fight in the forest if we want terrain battles. We play capture the flag and "Hunter". I always just say i am a fencing choreographer and people leave me alone. We will camp out if we really want to get away and fight in the water or on the sand. Lots of fun!