Annotated 46-19
As I’ve mentioned before, Flo and I sometimes disagreed about when to use anticlimax in an action set piece. In this case, however, we were of one mind. For one thing, two arena action set pieces in a row would’ve probably felt overlong at this point. Far better to let one of them become a sort of lighthearted parody of the other. Those reaction faces in the bottom row are great, but my favorite is Gravedust’s himself, where he’s kinda, “Oh, gods, even I didn’t think he was going to embarrass himself this much, it’s not like I can give him a mulligan, but this is kind of sad, really. I’m sorry, everyone.”
For another, the seeming anticlimax to this fight is actually a huge payoff to what Flo was planting as early as Chapter 3: the idea that Gravedust was secretly jacked under all those robes, and we’d never know that until we saw him without them since he spent most of his time archering or mysticizing. (Anyone remember how easily he snapped Sting’s neck?) The badass dialogue in panel 2 is yet another new side of him, shaped by his time in a troupe of professional buttkickers.
The FB text for this installment was a reference to our swimsuit specials, which I’m going to get around to sharing with you after this chapter. For Magda, this feels more like an Axemas special.
You don’t become that skilled with a bow without having some serious arm strength.
Very true. Though amusingly, fantasy games like what this comic was largely based on have twisted that fact around. It’s widely thought that archers are all about being slender and agile and that swords are for the heavy muscular guys, when reality is the exact opposite.
Now, surely you need some strength, depending on the strength of your bow, So the English longbow-men would need to have been pretty strong. But I’d suspect that while the quick-fire school of archery would still provide plenty of exercise, it should also favour agility.
Swords, on the other hand, afaik, used to be either very short or quite heavy in ancient times, and only became long, slender and light later on.
I’m more familiar with this type of sword [*]:
https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schlachtschwertierer#/media/Datei:Hornsche_Schlachtschwertierer.jpg
I held a replica once, and just carrying one of those monsters is a workout, let alone wielding it (effectively).
Of course, those swords became purely ceremonial/ornamental weapons not much later, but most fantasy stories seem to assume some mixture of medieval/ancient technology (i.e. older than what was used to create the swords in that picture) so the image of very muscular sword-fighters still makes sense to me. Also, anyone wearing chain mail would need to be really well trained, not to mention plate mail. So the stereotypical sword-wielding knight in shiny armor must have been either just for show very strong.
[*] some background, sadly only in German: https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schlachtschwertierer
Honestly, most swords weren’t That heavy(still a bit heavy, their still hunks of metal after all) and even still most were meant to be(and thus weighted to be) pretty maneuverable and quick(you should see the movements of people who know what they are doing). There of course are exceptions such as those swords you showed but they are pushing the limits before we start moving into debatably a polearm
This is more a rule-of-thumb bit rather than a serious historical bit, but:
In war, swords have generally had two primary uses. The first was a show of rank, with officers and nobles generally being the only people allowed to carry swords most of the time for various reasons. The second was to stab at enemies through some form of shield wall, whether actual shields or a phalanx of polearms or such. When used to actually try to kill enemy soldiers, they were very close-quarters weapons that had to be fairly small and fast. Most of the time, larger weapons of war were spears and polearms, not massive two-handed swords.
So yes, in general, swords were meant to be quick and agile weapons. There are exceptions, but it’s rare in the extreme that these exceptions were ever truly practical weapons of war. Bows, by contrast, really do require a lot of upper body strength if you want to loose your arrows at a good distance from the target and still have enough force to penetrate and damage. That’s true whether you’re hunting game or fighting a war.
In general, anyone who practices HEMA will tell you that most combat swords did not exceed 2kg – and that is the weightiest ones. My friends practice with zweihanders, and usually range on the 1.7 – 1.8 kgs, while the lightest ones – “roperas” and “estoques”, tend to be on the 1.1-1.4kg
There are always exceptions but in general you don’t want your sword to be too heavy to not be usable, nor too light to not have any power behind. Even bronze age swords tended to be on the light one: the fabled sword of gujian -bronze age short double edged sword – weighted 0.8 kg and iberian falcatas -late bronze to early iron age single edged sword axe – tended to be under 1kg.
People is usually confused because of two factors: the parade swords (ornamented swords meant to be put on display or worn at a parade) tended to be fairly heavy (twice or thrice the normal weight). And people usually handle replicas based on either parade swords or based on totally ludicrous concepts. These replicas/fantasy swords tend to be excessively heavy.
So in real life the priorities would be CON, then DEX, then STR for handling swords. You want CON to not get winded too fast, then lots of reflexes (because the armor may stop a glancing blow, but not a full one), then raw power (is always useful). In fact my friends probably would tell you that INT (quick thinking and strategy) is better than STR, but they’re duelists, so of course they will :D
Nice description, and I had no idea that even older swords were that light. Always thought that only happened in later centuries when metallurgy improved enough to allow things like rapiers.
But since you mention armor: I know the heaviest armor was used exclusively for tournaments, or to show off, much like ornamental swords. I think heavy plate mail would also have been reserved for mounted knights, who probably became close to immobile if they ever got knocked off their horses, which in turn were heavy duty horses, not elegantly-jumping-over-fences horses (I think that’s the technical term, right?), and those people would have swords only as a back-up weapon in case they got dismounted and or their lance broke or something.
…but what kind of armor would someone have worn for whom a sword was the primary weapon? I imagine that while wearing e.g. chain mail, STR would still be an important stat, and a kg more or less on a sword wouldn’t make that much of a difference.
The idea that a knight in full harness would be immobile is also a misconception. There’s not a lot that can be done about the total mass a full-body suit of steel will have (20-40% of the wearer’s mass, maybe more for jousting plate), but the thing is that it’s unbelievably well distributed. Unlike a backpack, it doesn’t affect where your center of mass is or how you need to move your joints, only how much force that takes. And since putting that force on your bones instead of your muscles is something most humans learn to do by age four, it’s a -2 DEX at most, even for the really heavy stuff.
If you’re able to jump more than an inch off the ground, you’re able to stand up with twice your weight, distributed that way. A massive backpack or duffel bag only makes things hard because it changes how you balance.
I’ve always loved this page…Someone who’s all mouth being made to eat their words is always satisfying, but when they didn’t realize they were all mouth, it’s even better.
This page legitimately just shows up in my mind every few months apropos of nothing.
It is one of the most satisfying moments in any comic I have ever read
That’s great to know.
I’m amazed that in a warrior culture such as the Savasi Iver managed to fake it for so long without being challenged.
With the way Gravedust phrases things on the page before, it seems being challenged for leadership in this way is not a Savasi tradition, but a troll one. Gravedust caught Iver in a logical trap: “You are saying you want to lead the World’s Rebellion, and you’re legitimising their laws, so now by those laws I can challenge you!”
One of my top five favorite scenes in this story.
Seriously, how did Iver think this was going to go? I mean, I get that he probably assumed bringing a knife to a wrestling match was a winning move, but it’s kind of underhanded. Did he think the other dwarves would continue to respect him after he deliberately stabbed an unarmed combatant?
I am sure he assumed he could diplomacy check high enough convince them this is just proof of how stupid the old ways (and the mystics) are and what matters is that the smart and prepared lives and yadda yadda.
He’s silver-tongued his way here and put them in this dire situation to begin with. That trio of pregnant ladies don’t seem displeased with carrying the seed of this “obviously” power-hungry, amoral individual, for example.
Both Harky and Penk are about to use weapons in their challenge, so clearly a weapon of choice is allowed in a Tectonicus-sanctioned battle for supremacy. Iver offered him a chance at a weapon and Gravedust declined…plus Gravedust is the one challenging Iver.
So I think it would be defensible.
I should have brought his bow and just shot him in mid-jump :)
I’ve wondered about this. Well, first, weapons are clearly allowed. Gravedust merely chose to decline having one.
But Iver is THAT pathetic? My thoughts:
I assume Iver assumed Gravedust is old and slow and would be relatively easy to nick with a poisoned blade, which proved very incorrect. Iver probably also believed himself to be faster and more skilled than he actually is – hasn’t been challenged by anybody for a long time, I’d guess. He didn’t imagine he could lose with the odds seemingly stacked so heavily in his favor, but he miscalculated in multiple ways. Past that, he has no pain tolerance, and apparently hasn’t been in a fight since he was a child so instinctively responded like a child, I guess?
PTerry’s Cohen the Barbarian, anyone? Another old guy constantly underrated until he has his foot on your throat.