Hitting Light vs. Heavy Clothing

[Dyre]

I have a question that has been bugging me for a while now. There is a fighter in my realm who wears heavy garb, as in three or four layers of thick fabric. Now it seems to me that every single hit on him that I get, he calls light. I have talked to him, and he thinks that all of my hits are light(even the hits I consider hard). I have now heard other people saying that he also calls lights on their hits, so I don't think it is just me. No one else calls light on my hits except him. Now my question is, should I be hitting him harder, or should he be taking lighter hits because of his thick garb? He knows he has thick garb, but thinks that people should hit him harder. I think this is wrong because people should not need to baseball swing him to make him feel/take his hits.

How do I approach him on this? Should I just be sucking it up and hitting him harder? I don't want to have to hit him harder than everyone else just because of him wearing heavier fabric. I have been hitting him much harder lately, but have still gotten light calls from him. I'm not sure how to work with this situation. Any ideas?


EDIT:

Thank you for answering my questions! I guess my problem might be that my hits are hard enough for him(but hard enough for everyone else). I have hit tested on him, and he says that even hard is light. We have talked about the garb, and him taking lighter hits, but he is of the mind that if he can't feel it, then it doesn't count. We do have marshals on the field quite often, but when people call hits light, the marshals trust that it is. A marshal cannot judge strength, so when a person gets hit, how does the marshal know if it is too light or not?

EDIT reply to Elebrim:

Well I think part of the problem is that the marshal isn't watching that fighters specifically, or can't tell if a shot is hard enough because they are over the shoulder wrap shots most of the time. Most of the people who marshal don't actually call much, they give the fighter the benefit of the doubt most of the time(unless there are complaints about a certain fighter). I guess I will just have to mention it to anyone who marshals just to watch out for things like that.

Or maybe I should just baseball swing the guy. Its getting annoying because now he comes up to me and gloats about how my shots were too light.

[Derian]

It's kind of a gray area. On the one hand, it's absolutely up to him how hard a hit must be before he takes it.

That said, if all of the marshalls in your realm agree that his hit calibration isn't up to snuff, then he should be talked to and told to tune it down a notch.

[Kage]

Derian's got you on the right track. Get a good Marshall on the field during your regular practices. Marshalls have the power to call anyone on any shot that is missed or blatantly blown off. Have the Marshall tell him that if he wants to wear that much garb; to the point he almost doesn't feel them; he needs to take anything he feels through it. As a Marshall I wouldn't put up with it. 3 strikes your out and he would be off the field the rest of the day.

If your realm doesn't have many/any good Marshalls willing to take the time out to watch everybody, then my advice is just hit him harder; knock him on his * if you can.

[Soo Ma Tai]

Test some weapons on his back....throw the standard three, Light, Medium, and Heavy. Then tell him he should be taking anything at the medium level of striking on up. This is what we do with the people who can't seem to calibrate too well for whatever reason. I wear tons of garb, two or three layers of hakama, etc. When I get hit in the legs, if I feel the hit to my leg I will take it because of the excessive garb, even if it's pretty light, because i know if the garb wasn't there it would have been a good hit. Especially if the opponent had a 3-5 lb. sword and not a 12-24 oz. wiffle bat.

[Sir Killian]

Soo's idea about checking weapons on him is a great way to calibrate... Explain that taking hits in such a way is good and if he still feels its to light then he needs to come to national events and have his hit calibration problem fixed by a bruiser, I recommend having someone he respects talk to him in a non demeaning way and explain the problem and remedy

[Elebrim]

Thank you for answering my questions! I guess my problem might be that my hits are hard enough for him(but hard enough for everyone else). I have hit tested on him, and he says that even hard is light. We have talked about the garb, and him taking lighter hits, but he is of the mind that if he can't feel it, then it doesn't count. We do have marshals on the field quite often, but when people call hits light, the marshals trust that it is. A marshal cannot judge strength, so when a person gets hit, how does the marshal know if it is too light or not?

The herald is the ultimate arbiter on the field of what is or is not a hit. His or her call goes, period, and if the herald can clearly see something take place on the field then he can make an informed call on it. If this guy's garb is causing him to not feel shots, and it's visibly clear to the herald that other fighters really are making solid contact when they strike him, then the herald can and should call him dead - and throw him off the field if his hit taking doesn't improve.

If he's getting called dead enough by heralds, he eventually will get the hint that he needs to take the hits on his own.

[Kage]

Well I think part of the problem is that the marshal isn't watching that fighters specifically, or can't tell if a shot is hard enough because they are over the shoulder wrap shots most of the time. Most of the people who marshal don't actually call much, they give the fighter the benefit of the doubt most of the time(unless there are complaints about a certain fighter). I guess I will just have to mention it to anyone who marshals just to watch out for things like that.

Or maybe I should just baseball swing the guy. Its getting annoying because now he comes up to me and gloats about how my shots were too light.

If he is gloating over your hits being light he is being a chode. If I were you I would get a marshal involved. If I were to hear or see it as a marshal he would be done. I would throw his * off the field and force him to take every single shot I saw on him all day long when or if I decided to let him back on; and I wouldn't care if it was a graze he would be taking it. I would make it known to him as a marshal that actions like that will not be tolerated by destroying his fun for the day. And if he complained that I was being a mean marshal I would simply tell him "Don't like it. Leave." I would also tell you to baseball bat swing him in the kidneys as hard as you can every chance you saw his back. Just because it only does one point of damage doesn't mean you have to swing it one handed; put some umph into it.

Merry Christmas Dyre. I hope this gets resolved for you.