> Perhaps this is why spears aren't a very effective weapon in the SCA.
I never said that! I said that spear and shield is a bad weapon choice. I said that spears can't stand against a charge.
> In a real battle those are just the sort or targets, along with unprotected
> parts of the face, which I would expect a spearman to aim at while hiding
> as much as possible behind his shield. And the threat of being poked in
> the eye with even a sharp stick will make anyone cautious.
>
When the enemy is rushing at you full speed, you don't take time to aim at one of the bits mentioned above. You hit whatever is sticking out. The front line of the sword and shield charge all tuck behind their shields at the last minute, getting their heads out of the way of thrusts. SCA 2H spearmen have the advantage that their spears can't get stuck in the opponent's shield, so they can even push off someone if they aren't too big. Spear and Shield users don't have the 2 handed muscle to do that.
I don't believe that the restriction on these targets (especially the inside of the elbow!) make a difference in a spear line's ability to break a charge. If it were the case, spear-only units would _occasionally_ stop good unit charges. In the SCA, they don't do that.
When a determined charge goes at spearmen (either spear and shield or 2H spear) the individual spearmen have exactly ONE shot to take out the guy rushing at them before that guy is inside the spearman's point. That assumes that the spearmen aren't backing up, which commanders typically wouldn't want them to do. ("Kill stepping forward, die stepping back.") Once the swordsmen are inside the spearman's point, it is bad news for the spearmen.
Spearmen rely on shield men (with short weapons) for protection from charges in the SCA. Mike Dawson Macintosh Tech Director on severance mdawson_at_mac.com http://homepage.mac.com/mdawson Sent to you using Mac OS X - the future of Macs!
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