Re: (Fwd) Re: Cookies and Mercs

[Eli White <eliwhite@home.com>]

Poster: Eli White <eliwhite@home.com>

At 11:58 AM 2/8/99 -0500, Erika Robbins wrote:
>There's a big difference between a perception of 'hitting hard', 
>which is not dishonorable in and of itself, and a perception of 

'hitting hard' may not be dishonorable.  But it isn't necissarily nice or
desireable.  And can in fact be painful :)

I am originally from AEthelmearc, and have lived in Atlantia for 2 years.
So all that I can comment on is the differences between the two.  (and
perhaps my arguments will not go to show that Atlantia hits hard, but that
AEthelmearc hits 'light')

I did notice immediately a difference between the two as a generality.  The
basic level of calibration does appear to be higher to me here in Atlantia.
 Up to the point that I upgraded my already WELL over minimum protection
even further because I was getting tired of coming back from practices
completely black and blue.

In AEthelmearc if a blow hit hard enough THROUGH your armor that it caused
a 'black and blue' bruise, not a 'brown' one (experienced fighters will
know what I am talking about), it was seriously a major hit and would
immediately have invoked an apology and people rushing over making sure you
are ok ...

But I think one of the most telling arguments is the following:

Here, I often here people not wanting to fight heavy because: 'They can't
stand pain', 'They don't want to get hurt', etc ...

In AEthelmearc, you never heard that, and at least in my local group, there
wasn't a person there who hadn't tried on armor and faught a time or two,
alot of them decided they didn't like it, others did.  But there was never
someone who said they didn't want to get hurt.  In fact, at demos we would
often have people sign waivers and then drop them into armor and have them
start fighting right away because our slogan always was: "No, it doesn't
hurt, that's what the armor & padding is for."

Here I have never seen someone drop a demo person into armor and go full
out with them right away.

>cheating.  Big, important difference.  Someone who hits hard *and* 
>takes hard is not cheating.  Someone who takes hard, and hits hard, 
>but will tell an opponent "that felt light to me, I don't think you 
>should take that blow" may be calibrating high, but they are not 

That doesn't tend to be how it goes though, and as mentioned, won't happen
in a melee.  Most people (myself included) always defer to the person who
they hit, as that IS how the rules state it should be.  If you thought the
blow the light, but the other person insists that it was PLENTY hard
enough, and they don't feel like getting hit any harder, it's their call.

Siegfried


______________________________________________________________________
Siegfried Sebastian Faust          Incipient Barony of Highland Foorde
       Minister of Misinformation (Chronicler & Web Minister)
             http://highland-foorde.atlantia.sca.org
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