Plate Armor - It isn't really that heavy!

[Norm]

just an addition

I have worked for a jousting troupe for a bit a couple of years ago, and we did use plate armor.

Yes, it is heavy, BUT a physically fit indivudual who has the armor crafted to fit them it is not as cumbersome as you would think. You can still move about freely and such. It does take stamina to continuously fight in it. Any D&D character that would be wearing platemail should be considered an athlete.

Someone mentioned something about platemail being rare. From all my years of research that is false. Pltaemail WAS something that all armorers had "ready-made" They had shops filled with different size pieces. Platemail is very simple to make plainly. It doesnt take that much time to make plain suit. It was common for a smith to rough out two to three complete suits per day.
More ornamental, or decorative pieces was a totally different story.

Hope that helps any.

- Norm

 

[Tsyr]

Not strong and dexterous enough Tsyr?

Dexterous enough, not strong enough though, no. I probably have like a 9 or 10 in strength, if you wanted to talk DnD terms. Never actualy done the math based on what I can lift, though...

 

[AmerginLiath]

Re: just an addition

Someone mentioned something about platemail being rare. From all my years of research that is false. Pltaemail WAS something that all armorers had "ready-made" They had shops filled with different size pieces. Platemail is very simple to make plainly. It doesnt take that much time to make plain suit. It was common for a smith to rough out two to three complete suits per day.

Yeah -- the key being that the different pieces fit -- often many pieces were made and different premade pieces were chosen to piece-together a well-fitting suit -- that seems to have been Tsyr's problem (the suit being off-fit in places)...

You don't just get a premade suit in size X, you get a size X set of pauldrons, with size Y breastplate and backplate, and size Z vambraces and guards...

 

[clockworkjoe]

fun fact!

Based on descriptions of an average knight's daily diet, it is estimated that a knight would eat somewhere between 20,000 to 30,000 calories A DAY.

The more you know!

 

[Aaron L]

Thats the way I've always had it done in my games. Size "x" gauntlets, vambraces, breastplates, etc. For everything up to full plate, that is.

 

[Imperialus]

it also depends on the style of armour. For example Gothic plate, while it had great upper body movement (I can touch my toes and meet my hands behind my back wearing this one suit Rob owns) is exceptionally difficult to walk in simply because of the 14+ inch sabbatons. If you want to walk around you end up doing a penguin impression since you have to walk on your heels. It didn't matter though since the german knights were rarely seen off of a horse. By contrast Millanese plate (Italian plate from the same time period) had rounded sabbatons that fit much more closely over your foot. Remember armourers kept the primary role of their purchacers very much in mind when designing a suit. Therefore in D&D if you were to purchace a suit of full plate chances are your armourer would design it with dungon hacking in mind and chances are it would work very well in that regard.

As for stock armour yes it did exsist but not in the form of a full suit. It was still beyond the means of most pesants called up to fight and the only soldiers you would see wearing it were typically Livry soldiers, professional soldiers and bodyguards in the employ of a specific nobleman. However because it was stock armour and they wanted to afford them as much freedom of movement as possible it typically consisted of a breastplate and upper arm guards that reached to just above the elbow. A heavy leather buffcoat was usually worn underneath to protect the lower arms along with guantlets. The head was usually protected by either an open faced Barbutte, a Kettle Hat or a Sallet depending on where you were and what style whoever equiped you prefered... When all is said and done I would probably equaite the D&D brestplate to 15th century "stock" armour.

PS... Throughout the entire above post I am assumeing that it is the mid 15th century and therefore the "hight" of plate armour, or the point where it reached it's highest levels of refinement before gunpowder began to take over the battlefield.

 

[Rashak Mani]

As a former fencing student I can only say that light padded armor we used made us sweat quite a lot...especially the helmet. Using a Plate Mail armour was a sure way to get dehydrated extra fast...

Weel it goes to show how much respect must be given to the people who actually used this stuff. Only a really dedicated warrior would have the physical conditions to wear Plate and fight well.

Read Michael Crichtons book: Timeline for some good fiction on this kind of discussion. They were a very fit...

 

[Imperialus]

A friend of mine was wearing a suit of 17th century english civil war currassar armour (basically this http://www.varmouries.com/cuir_01.html ) once that was finished in gunblack in 35 degrees celceus. We were doing a demonstration and he ended up dropping from heat exaustion. I was just about ready to pass out myself and I was wearing a cavelier harness with a pot helm, about 1/3rd the total metal.

I can honestly say the single most comferterable suit I wore when it came to heat had to be the Roman Lorica Segmentata. Breazy, just like a kilt. Only downside was all the weight was on my shoulders which got painful after a few hours.

All things concidered though full plate armour doesn't get too bad heat wise, as long as you make sure you drink lots of water. If there is a bit of a breaze it helps alot since air passes through the suit quite easally.

P.S. The suit of armour that Rob has up on his site there happens to be one of the ones that I hate the most. He finished the entire thing with gun blue, which though it was historically accurate I think is really ugly.

 

[Rashak Mani]

Christ that really looks uncomfortable to use...

One can imagine the effect of sleeping in armor like and wonder why some players still try to do it !!

 

[Imperialus]

They are comferterable enough to use. You're right though you can't sleep in them though and you usually end up with a few bruses on your shoulders and back after wearing it all day.