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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Imperialus" data-source="post: 68127" data-attributes="member: 893">very true Wyvern.  In fact a well equiped knight with a significant amount of money invested in warfare would typically have a small baggage train following him around consisting of no less than 4 horses.  There was his warhorse naturally which was actually the single most expencive peice of equipment he owned, oftentimes costing twice as much as his armour depending on the stock it was bred from, a regular rideing horse for himeself, a rideing horse for his squire and a pack horse oftentimes hauling a cart containing his armour, his squires armour, his barding, most his weapons includeing spares, some form of shelter, food, and some equipment to make minor repairs.  Knights were expected to be largely self sufficant.  If traveling as part of a large force they could sometimes rely on smiths in the employ of their lord to help them out with a peice of fautly or damaged equipment but for the most part they were expected to take care of themselves.  Part of this was simply because they knew their own armour better than anyone else, and since it was very rare for two suits to be identical, and many armies had a myeriad of differet styles a blacksmith who is experianced in dealing with Gothic armour in a German army could well do some damage to a suit of Millanise armour a nobelman had gotten imported from Italy.Since the strength comment was broached again I figure I'll comment on it.  It is important to realize that a knight typically was not that big or strong even when compared to his contempories.  In fact the pesant levies were oftentimes bigger and stronger simply because they had grown up working on farms doing heavy manual labour.  I'm not saying that knights were out of shape or weaklings but the idea of an olympic weightlifter encased in steel is a myth.  As a matter of fact, Henry the VIII was known far and wide as a gient, and he was 6'3" and weighed about 190 lbs, no gient by today's standards that's for sure.  This is because of the weapons used.  There is no way, no matter how strong you are that you are going to punch through a 18 gauge brestplate or pauldon with a sword.  In fact you are more likely to chip or shatter your blade if you hit with sufficant force.  Remember most european blades were made from a very high carbon steel, which allowed for a fantastic edge, even better than moderen stainless steel but were very brittle.   When two knights started beating on each other they would usually try and use the tip of their blade to find an opening in the armour and stab through it.  That doesn't require so much strength as it does dextarity and experiance.  It takes a lot of practice to learn how to wear armour well, and different suits need to be worn in different ways.  I remember the first few times I did I was in pain by the end of the day.  I expect your discomfort was caused more by inexeperiance than any physical shortcomeings.You should check out that first site that Aaron posted and explore around the whole site.  I've used it before and it has some facinateing tidbits on the fighting styles used by european soldiers.</blockquote>

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