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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Drifter Bob" data-source="post: 1673113" data-attributes="member: 17723">Lacking the funds currently to afford full harness (by which he means plate armor) I have not yet had the experience.  However, while an arming sword is unlikely to pierce plate armor, you can adequately defend yourself with a sword and shield against a polearm, that is my point.  Also, the armor does not make you utterly inulnerable to the impact.The armor is somewhat of a seperate issue, but against full harness I'd leave my arming sword sheathed and either use a war hammer if I had one, or close to grapple and fight with my dagger if I didn't.  The shield will help you do just that without being struck by the polearm first.We were discussing Maximillian gothic harness I believe, which was certainly never mass produced.  The 'munitions' armor that was mass produced often did not cover the entiree body, it was usually so-called three quarters plate (or sometimes less) which usually left at least the lower legs, backs of thighs, and often faces uprotected.  It was also usually thinner and poorer metal and not as effective against penetration by high energy missiles such as heavy  crossbows (armbrust(?) in Germany)Munition armor is also said to be much clumsier and heavier than the custom made Milanese or German harness.So the mass produced armor isn't quite as good, it's certainly not as good as Maximillian plate!.That said, there isn't perfect balance obviously.  If you can afford it, on the open battlefield, a pole arm or two handed sword are excellent weapons and full harness is ideal protection.  On the other hand, an 8 foot Bill is pretty useless inside a confined space in a building, and plate armor, while not anywhere near as clumsy as often portrayed in the media, is hardly ideal kit for exploring underground caverns.These issues are reflected in our rules.It's true that military tactics are often different from individual fighting tactics, but it can't be denied that relativley poorly equipped Swiss and Bohemian peasants, (and others from Flanders to Scotland) did routinely make short work of the best armed knights both in very small and very large scale engagements, and it cannot fairly be said that they always relied on ambush or attack from behind.The later success of the German Landsknecht speaks volumes of the effectiveness of well trained infantry into the late Renaissance...DB</blockquote>

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