Charging

[Swimmingbird]

A lot of the time people will charge at me with shields, but they start running at me from a long distance, so I can easily dodge/roll/whatever I need to to get out of the way or disable the person. In the past few weeks they have gotten wise and only began ramming at me when they get within 10-15 feet of me so I have less time, and seeing as how I use a long sword my range is also a little disabled. I do not use a shield, only a sword, and am kind of small in stature compared to the others in the realm. How should I react to this?

[Tiberius Claudius]

I'm a big guy, however when I fight red and have someone charging me I will attempt to get a shot at their shield while rolling / sidestepping to their shield side to get away from their strike, to make them stretch w/ their weapon (possible opening / get off balance), and I make sure to keep my weapon in between us to maintain my distance advantage as well as to block with.

If they particularly leave themselves open I might strike for a leg instead of the shield, but I am always moving to their weak side.

[Swimmingbird]

That's what I would usually do, but they get up close enough to where if I roll or sidestep that I'm still in their range. We play in a large field, and I don't want to constantly back up to keep them away. They don't come at me so much as to hit me with their weapon, but to hit me with their shield to throw me off balance. I can usually take out one of their legs, but in return im tumbling all over the ground from the shield hit. Usually after the shield hit they THEN pull out the weapons to hit me (which usually im don't land far away from them after the shield bash). So they don't care whether or not they lost a limb as long as they got the kill shot in. Has anyone tried jumping up at a person's shield and getting enough height to be able to hit their back? Or would that fail/be almost impossible to do?

[Caleidah]

One way to beat a shield bash is to counter bash. Doesn't have to be really hard, but enough to rock them back and cut their forward momentum.

Do not leave the ground. As soon as you're up in the air with them running at you, they'll just throw you farther. Use footwork. As they close, step on a diagonal and around them. Then you just have to finish pulling their side open and you're clear for whatever shot you want to make.

[Swimmingbird]

So in order for the diagonal stepping to be effective (in this case) it needs to be done right before the shield would have made contact with me? Seeing as how if I did it too early that gives them time to change their direction as well, but if I do it at last second, that leaves them with no time to change direction. Just confirming, please let me know if this would be the correct way to do this.

[No'Vak]

By long sword do you mean a long blue or a red sword? (class 1 or 2)?

[Swimmingbird]

Long blue, class 1

[Caleidah]

So in order for the diagonal stepping to be effective (in this case) it needs to be done right before the shield would have made contact with me? Seeing as how if I did it too early that gives them time to change their direction as well, but if I do it at last second, that leaves them with no time to change direction. Just confirming, please let me know if this would be the correct way to do this.

Generally, yeah. If you can, juke your footwork a little and get them to bite to one side before sidestepping to the other.

[Siggard]

it also helps to keep your shield real close to you. you also need to remember that every time you go in to fight someone(or someone goes in to charge at you) you most likely will die anyway...so just give it your all...this usually helps me on the field and gives me a little burst of confidence...as for side-stepping, its a little tricky to master...its really all about muscle memory and knowing where to position your feet..ya youll get nailed time and time again...but once you get it right, you will start nailing it

[Swimmingbird]

Thanks for the help, diagonal stepping is tricky, but I'm confident that I'll be able to get better at it. Also the juke works alot, it made them hesitate before they got to me which allowed me to both keep from getting hit and take out their legs. Once it didn't go well and they hit me directly in the eye though. You have any idea how awkward it is explaining I got a black eye from a sword? Lol, well thanks again, safe travels and take care

[PhotoJoe]

Stupid idea: Initiate a grapple. Tie up their weapon and use their momentum to carry them to the ground. Lacking martial arts or wrestling experience I can not imagine a way to do this while not using both of your hands, thus making it nothing more than a stalemate until one of you can get your hands on a dagger or a teammate arrives to save one of you.

[Mint]

Carry a dagger. They can be tucked conviently into one's garb or pockets, and there's something to be said about the satisfaction of shankin' the sucka who tried to charge you.

Also, I reccomend looking to some sort of internal martial art such as Tai Chi Chuan, which are all about redirecting your opponent's energy and using it against them.

[Caleidah]

it also helps to keep your shield real close to you. you also need to remember that every time you go in to fight someone(or someone goes in to charge at you) you most likely will die anyway...so just give it your all...this usually helps me on the field and gives me a little burst of confidence...as for side-stepping, its a little tricky to master...its really all about muscle memory and knowing where to position your feet..ya youll get nailed time and time again...but once you get it right, you will start nailing it

Actually, keeping your shield tight up against yourself when someone is bashing you will slow your reaction speed and make you less capable of catching or otherwise responding to their initiation. If you give yourself some space, you can get your shield into them before they hit you and potentially guide them away or, if you're strong enough, put them on their back.

[No'Vak]

it also helps to keep your shield real close to you. you also need to remember that every time you go in to fight someone(or someone goes in to charge at you) you most likely will die anyway...so just give it your all...this usually helps me on the field and gives me a little burst of confidence...as for side-stepping, its a little tricky to master...its really all about muscle memory and knowing where to position your feet..ya youll get nailed time and time again...but once you get it right, you will start nailing it

Actually, keeping your shield tight up against yourself when someone is bashing you will slow your reaction speed and make you less capable of catching or otherwise responding to their initiation. If you give yourself some space, you can get your shield into them before they hit you and potentially guide them away or, if you're strong enough, put them on their back.

Take Sir Kyrian's aggressive shieldwork class.

Oh and try bracing your weapon arm behind your shield or edging their shield hard when they charge.

[PhotoJoe]

Take Sir Kyrian's aggressive shieldwork class.

Oh and try bracing your weapon arm behind your shield or edging their shield hard when they charge.

I do not use a shield, only a sword . . .

Well intended but not applicable here.

He does have a free hand.

[PhotoJoe]

it also helps to keep your shield real close to you.

Hey Siggy baby, he's not using a shield. Did you read the OP?

[No'Vak]

Use a shield.

[Siggard]

i was implying that its a good idea to use a shield

[Tiercel]

A lot of the time people will charge at me with shields, but they start running at me from a long distance, so I can easily dodge/roll/whatever I need to to get out of the way or disable the person. In the past few weeks they have gotten wise and only began ramming at me when they get within 10-15 feet of me so I have less time, and seeing as how I use a long sword my range is also a little disabled. I do not use a shield, only a sword, and am kind of small in stature compared to the others in the realm. How should I react to this?

They're using the correct technique to target your weapon set- they're getting in close where you cannot defend and pressing the advantage. To win: don't let them do that.

Run. Guard while you run. Put yourself in a better position to do damage- whether to your immediate opponent or one of their teammates. If you need to defend your ground, then force your opponent to open themselves up in exchange for confronting you. Position yourself so they must make themselves vulnerable to your teammates in order to slam into you. If you don't have teammates to protect, keep running to their flank, forcing them to lose momentum as they re-orient to engage you. Don't allow them to get three steps in a straight line.

What if you simply cannot outmaneuver them? Be dangerous. If someone is leading with a sword, I'll stuff it with my weapon and grab at the pommel with my free hand, then take their arm or torso while they are locked up. It sounds like your opponents are keeping their weapons tucked away. Grabbing a shield and yanking it * the moment you swing for their shoulder or back works well, particularly if your opponent is accustomed to people dependent on their shields for defense. Knocking you to the ground won't be so great if you slaughter them in the process. Can you fight with either hand yet? If not, learn. Be able to evade left or evade right and still be able to take a swing.

Stupid idea: Initiate a grapple. Tie up their weapon and use their momentum to carry them to the ground. Lacking martial arts or wrestling experience I can not imagine a way to do this while not using both of your hands, thus making it nothing more than a stalemate until one of you can get your hands on a dagger or a teammate arrives to save one of you.

It's free hand vs their sword hand, and your sword vs. their shield. This means you can strike at them and they cannot strike at you unless they break your grapple. You have the one-sided advantage until they get their weapon free or ditch their shield.

[Swimmingbird]

Thanks for the ideas and techniques. I do not use a shield because I am to be leader soon, and from how I've watched my leader, he gains a lot of respect from not using a shield and just a sword as I do. As for most situations, it is usually a FFA fight that is going on. The reason why I am trying to learn not so much as to run is because of that very reason. We have a bit of players in the realm I am in, and will more then likely run into another shield. I have to learn to confront it full on, whether it be diagonal stepping or rolling or w/e it may be. I do like the idea of moving to their flanks as they charge at me to make them lose some of their force and speed. Most of the players who do use shields are very VERY reliant on them. I will definately grapple their sword hands a lot more, to be honest i do not know why I didn't think of that Thanks for all the help, until next time we talk, safe travels and take care. Not so sure on the shield yanking, might end up bad and break someone's arm, and I wouldn't be able to do practice again if I did that

[Caleidah]

Swimmingbird, all of this advice is (mostly) coming from experienced fighters.

I will tell you this:
1) You will not command more respect for fighting single blue on the field unless you can annihilate people like that.
2) Unless you twist the shield at an uncomfortable angle (meaning that you're wrenching their arm beyond the natural angle) you'll not break it. I promise.

So I wish you the best of luck in your endeavor and hope that you don't get steamrolled too badly as you're trying to learn.

[No'Vak]

Thanks for the ideas and techniques. I do not use a shield because I am to be leader soon, and from how I've watched my leader, he gains a lot of respect from not using a shield and just a sword as I do. As for most situations, it is usually a FFA fight that is going on. The reason why I am trying to learn not so much as to run is because of that very reason. We have a bit of players in the realm I am in, and will more then likely run into another shield. I have to learn to confront it full on, whether it be diagonal stepping or rolling or w/e it may be. I do like the idea of moving to their flanks as they charge at me to make them lose some of their force and speed. Most of the players who do use shields are very VERY reliant on them. I will definately grapple their sword hands a lot more, to be honest i do not know why I didn't think of that Thanks for all the help, until next time we talk, safe travels and take care. Not so sure on the shield yanking, might end up bad and break someone's arm, and I wouldn't be able to do practice again if I did that

You'll demand a **** more respect when you can decimate someone sword and board rather than die by getting charged by shieldmen.

Its hard to only fight single blue and win against a lot of people. Use a shield half the time it'll make you better.

[Arrakis]

Long blue, class 1

Don't use this. There is no good reason to fight this way in Belegarth. Either go ahead and make one 48.1" so it can be really deadly (shield breakers, blows through armor, etc.) or cut it down to <38" so you can get up to reasonable one-handed speed.

[Phlebas]

i'm tactically understimulated at the moment, so here we go. part of the difficulty here is misapprehension of what this charging is. We're sort of preconditioned to think of charging as charging for effect- like a bull, or someone trying to tackle. In those cases, the person charging is at full speed or still accelerating at the moment of contact. That's not really what's going on here. What this is falls more into the category of marching attack- putting tempo pressure on you in order to force the timing of striking distance. A marching attack is effective because the attacker can slow, speed up, or change direction in order to adjust the timing of the engagement. The main goal of the defender is to spoil this control.

Bad options:

1. Continuous retreat. This is instinctively tempting, but disastrous. When retreating against a marching attack, the typical reaction is to retreat at or near the speed the attacker is coming forward. This turns the situation effectively into two fighters standing their ground or slowly coming together, except that one person is defending. The fighter with the longer reach has several advantages in this situation.

2. Stand your ground. This leaves all the control to the attacker, and so the defender has to entirely rely on being able to read the attack. Marching attacks also usually involves lots of feints- the attacker wiggles the weapon and can variously speed up and slow down to feint commitment. Makes it difficult to read and solve passively.

3. Waiting then sidestep/rolling/lateral movement. This instinct comes from that initial misapprehension. If the other person were really charging, this would be a good option. They are not. Their actual intention is to come to a stop right in front of you. They're already decelerating hard at the moment when you would sidestep. Foam weapons have a minimal weight commitment. There is some advantage in causing retargeting by sidestepping, but it's about the same as for a normal engagement.

Somewhat better:

4. Advance one step as the attacker is coming into range. The advantage here is that at the critical moment things accelerate for the attacker. They have to launch an attack sooner than expected. If you have previous knowledge of their favorite/instinctive swing, that's probably what they will fire. Still, this is happening when they are likely paying the most attention to you, so depending on your timing/telegraphing, it will not be that surprising.

5. Retreat one or two steps, fast, as the attacker is about to swing. Done properly, this making their attack fall short or causes them to lengthen/slow/re-evaluate. In general, makes it easier to deal with.

More better:

6. Feign continuous retreat, sudden stop. This starts to return some control to the defender. Moving backwards continously makes the attacker comfortable and gives them some commitment. Stopping gives the advantages of option 4, with the additional advantage of being able to choose the moment. The biggest mistake with this one is when people think this is what they're doing, but in reality they're just retreating and stopping when they realize they can't get away, which is just about the worst thing to do.

7. Instant forward movement at the start of their charge. Sort of like a counter-charge. Has to be done from very large distance, or it becomes a weaker version of 4, where the attacker has more time to adjust. Instead, what you're hoping for is the attacker to slow or abandon the charge, expecting a typical defensive engagement. You can then either give them this, or stop/retreat and make them start their charge again. Stopping and starting is tiring for them, and thus good for you. If they continue and you continue at speed that's going to turn into an uncontrollable situation. Not my thing but if you're outclassed or into chaos it might work.

8. 7, stop, then engage. The goal being they start to charge, slow/stop when they you're coming to them, then they start accelerating again thinking you're not, and then you're there while they're still getting up to speed. Tricky, but you get all the goodness of an opponent coming towards you while not actually prepared.

best, of course, is a combination of all of the above, with the general goal being to cause stutters, hesitation, exhaustion, and to regain control.