on horse and using shield

[bergh]

Anyway, i was thinking that it may have been hard to use a shield when fighting on horse, im thinking on using it activily. if someone strikes you against your sword arm, it seem imposible to use a shield?

Is im totaly wrong?

I was thinking this becouse my players have all gone to the Warhammer/pick and shield combo, becouse this gives LOW ATN with lots of +st and armour penetration. and i was thinking on how to make this lethal combo somehow not as used, so i was thinking that when they fight on horse, they maybe then can use the shield for blocking on there weapon side....

I hope someday that the "may get stuck" rule is answered by Jake or Brian

[Caz]

Good point.  If the shield is regular size ("medium") or larger, it seems it would be very difficult if not impossible to protect the other side with it.
   Give defense for their weapon side with the shield an activation cost or make it altogether impossible.

[bergh]

im still hoping that i don't have to make such details yet, hope soon that Jake or Brian clears up the "may get stuck" thing on a Pick.

My problem is that when using a shield a pick is just much more uselfull then a sword......arming swords are USELESS compared to picks and warhammers

[Tash]

Perhaps I'm misunderstanding but, if a character has a medium or large shield in one hand, and a warhammer in the other, how precisely are they riding the horse????

[bergh]

he uses the hand he has under the shield...hehe...yes or the shield was attatced to the lower arm...

[Farseer415]

A horse could be controlled by neck reining, which is pretty much moving the reins left or right against the neck. This does not require a lot of movement of the sheild arm.  

  Another way is through leg pressure/leg yeilding and the shifting of body weight.  THis style is used in dressage.  In competition, you are not suppose to be able to see the movements or commands of the rider to the horse.  They are to be considered one.

In 400BC, a greek philospher named Xenohon wrote a book called "The Art of Horsemenship".  In it he stated that a horse and rider should be one.  Just like the mythical Centaur.  Xenophon is also the one you taught Alexander the Great how to ride.

Just my 2 horse sense:)

Farseer

[bergh]

anyway, it seems un realistic if you got a medium shield to be able to use it on the "weapon" side when riding?

[Andrew Mure]

When I last fought a mounted melee in TROS my GM imposed riding checks to get your opponent on your shield side. He further made things difficult for us players by having the enemies opposing these rolls by riding checks of their own to get on our weapon sides. If they got on your weapon side you could only defend with the weapons DTN or a full evade rolled against Riding skill. We were thankful most of us were using swords of one form or another.

As for the player trying to get away with saying he's controling his horse with the same arm that his shield is strapped to - tell him his shield DTN is only as high as his riding skill while he continues to do that as he is trying to do two things at once with the same arm. However if he wises up and controls the horse the way proper horse soldiers did from AD400 onwards (through the stirups), allow him to use the full shield DTN if he can pass a ride check first.

[bergh]

yes Andrew your sugjections seem fine, i will note them down.

Maybe AGAIN i have not explanien enough of what i was thinking.

I was more thinking about opponents on the ground. if the player(mounted) attacks an opponent on the ground, he can only effectivily attack him if the grounded opponent is on the Weapon side of the horse.
But what i ask then, is if not then rather unrealistic that when the grounded opponent maybe attacks back that he then can swing his shield onto the other side, should the horses head not be i the way?and generaly will he not have a hard time moving the shield into postion, now that he can't use his whole motion of his body?

I have always thinked that a "horsemans" shield was used as an "unactive" defence mechanism of the side he could not look out for when using his weapon "on the other side of the horse".

[Andrew Mure]

yes Andrew your sugjections seem fine, i will note them down.

Maybe AGAIN i have not explanien enough of what i was thinking.

I was more thinking about opponents on the ground. if the player(mounted) attacks an opponent on the ground, he can only effectivily attack him if the grounded opponent is on the Weapon side of the horse.
But what i ask then, is if not then rather unrealistic that when the grounded opponent maybe attacks back that he then can swing his shield onto the other side, should the horses head not be i the way?and generaly will he not have a hard time moving the shield into postion, now that he can't use his whole motion of his body?

I have always thinked that a "horsemans" shield was used as an "unactive" defence mechanism of the side he could not look out for when using his weapon "on the other side of the horse".

Generally I agree with you Bergh on most of these points. What I will say though, is that certain exceptional horsemen cultures such as the Mongols and the Saracens (and their descendents occasionally still do) performed tasks of similiar difficulty from horseback. The much vaulted 'parthian shot' for instance, involves the rider turning 180 degrees in the saddle and shooting an arrow at an enemy his horse is galloping away from, whilst retaining control of his mount.

What I advise then is in such an occasion where you believe a manoverve on horseback is particularly difficult impose a riding check, adding modifiers and extra successes needed depending on how hard you believe the action is. Considering such actions usually test the animal's abilities as well as the rider's 'animal training' might also be a factor. Finally you impose pretty unpleasent penalties on characters who fluff these rolls particularly badly - running the risk of being chucked by the horse will make people think very hard about what they do whilst mounted.

I think 'Of Beasts and Men' looks into mounted combat in more detail.

[bergh]

yes ofcouse its possible to do with the correct test and if he is prepered.

What im talking about if more if the character on horse is in one of the two situations.

1. In the middle of a fight with multiple opponents on both sides of the combat, the character on horse would proberly just use his shield against opponent on the shield side and weapon on the "weapon" side to parry opponents from this side.

i think it would unfair if he freely could shift the shield to either side freely.

2. on a charge head on!, if a mounted players charge a pike armed opponent, then would the opponent not try to aim at the "weapon side", and remeber that i jousting the shield was used non-active.

Anyway i have no clues what is right, but it seem to me by all the movies and such (i know bad exampels), that a horsemans shield was more or less just used at a non-active diffensive your left side, and that this allowed you to both control you horse along with fighting with your weapon.

doing 3 things at a time: ie. fighting with your weapon, controling the horse and at the same time control the shield activily seems impossible, becouse you must think, that when fighting on ground with shield, your opponent is IN FRONT of you, on horse back, (not using lance), your opponent is position on your right side, when you hit hit, and therefor you need to turn your head to that side, and there for leaving your shield side "blind", also why a shield is nice to have on this "blind" side.

anyway im not trying to argue against what you are saying, im just trying to clearfi monuted combat in a system as detailed as TRoS, and therefor i just wanna hear if i had been thinking wrong.

[Valamir]

Brian, I agree.  It is not likely that a mounted warrior with a shield on his left arm can defend against attacks coming from the right side.  In fact, so not likely, that I think its entirely reasonable to just say "no".

However, keep in mind that there is ALOT of movement going on in combat.  Combat (even mounted combat) is not going to be static two guys hacking at each other.

The guy with the shield is going to be trying to maneuver to present his shield to the enemy to defend and maneuver to present his weapon to the enemy to attack.

These maneuvers are automatically going on in the game and are part and parcel of the movement requirement in combat.  Unlike a miniatures game which assumes that just because the figure is attacking the non shield hex side that the defender gets no shield bonus, TROS recognizes that real combats are not little freeze framed move/attack, move/attack exercizes.


So, given that a) trying to defend with the shield and attack with the weapon is exactly what all mounted fighters are going to be trying; and b) that this IS more complicated on horse back than on foot (as you rightly point out) here's what I would do:

Call for a Terrain Roll using the characters Riding Skill as the Target Number.  If successful, yes they can block with the shield.  If not, no they can't.

Pretty simple, straight forward, doesn't require lots of subjectivity, and pretty much uses existing rules.

[Lance D. Allen]

If Ralph's suggestion doesn't seem penalty enough for you, you could limit the number of successes on the combat roll by the number of successes on the riding roll. For instance.. If I roll against my riding skill, and get 3 successes, then when I roll my block skill, any successes above 3 are not counted. This will make it so that the poor horseman who can reliably get 1 success due to having lots of AG will still be limited by his riding skills, but opens up the range for the proficient horseman.

[bergh]

hmmm i like the idea that if a person in trained in shield use on horse should have an advantage. yes, yes.........