How might we subvert the plate armour trope?

I didn't ask if it's any good at keeping me alive. But will it help me stay combat effective?

>plate armour trope

>tfw you like impractical/form-over-function armor designs as much as practical/historical designs
>tfw spergs make too big a deal over boobplate

It renders you nigh immune to swords and arrows. Not getting stabbed certainly keeps you more combat effective than 'skirmishing' in leather or whatever.

Plate over textile padding provides incredible resistance to (relatively) low speed kinetic weaponry. An enormous amount of the energy is dispersed into the armor, and even that which CAN pierce it will normally be slowed down enough that the padding stops any considerable force from reaching the man inside. There are accounts of knights in plate walking around the battlefield looking like pincushions from the arrows which had managed to breach their armor but failed to maintain the energy to get through what was essentially just clothing underneath. Even with weapons specifically designed to hurt people in rigid armor, that is, picks, warhammers and the like, you're better off getting hit with the armor than without.

>plate armor
>a fucking trope

How do we subvert the "trope" trope?

>plate armour trope

I think he's trying to bait us by pretending to be stupid, but he's too stupid to do it effectively.

>arrows
Genuinely curious, what about an arrow with a narrow head fired from a longbow? Would that have enough clout to punch through, assuming it hit square in the breastplate?

We throw these at people

It's a decorative status symbol, but the weapons of the time has made each suit more art, than armor.

Depends. Arrows are generally a better option than swords, if only because they can put out a lot of force from a good distance

>How do we subvert the "trope" trope?

Realize that everything is a trope.
Subvert everything.

Depends on the weight of the bow, the length of the archer's draw, the armor itself, and perhaps most importantly the range.

Historically, heavy draw bows could be used to pierce plate armor. However, the act of doing so eliminates so much of the kinetic energy that it can do no real damage to the person inside.

>narrow head
It breaks

It'll go through the breastplate, but that takes so much energy that the padding underneath is enough to stop it from harming you. It was not unheard of for fully armed knights to have 20 or more arrows lodged in their breastplate after a day's battle.

Nothing stops you making a set of bronze plate armour other than cost.

When plate armour was mature even a point blank shot dead straight on the chest won't cause injury even if it penetrates because it just gets stopped by the padding underneath.

Knights who were killed/injured in battles like Agincourt just fell victim to statistics. Thousands of arrows fired at hundreds of men, something finds a gap or a weak point eventually.

I think OP is trying to get at the fact what, whenever armor appears in fantasy or pseudo-historical settings, it's so often this mess of plates, when true plate armor was only used for two centuries or so, which is roughly the same amount of time that chainmail was the main type of armor around.

We're talking warcraft-type armor here, I think.

At very close range, it will possibly penetrate the breastplate, but it is unlikely to cause harm or even penetrate the padding underneath. What is much more dangerous is hitting thinner parts on the limbs and joints or the arrow finding purchase on some surface on your visor or, God help you, going through an eye slit if it's wide enough. This is unlikely if it's one asshole shooting at you, but if a bunch of people are, the odds start to become unpleasant.

There's a good interview with Tobias Capwell, curator of the Arms and Armor collection at the Wallace Collection on YouTube about this stuff.

Thanks very much for the information guys!

There was at least one late 1400s veteran commander who suggested dropping the crossbows for guns in that function in units that were supposed to ride up to lanciers and shoot them in the chest and head from maybe four meters away.

Bows aren't even in that race.

Yeah, but I think Bronze full-plate sounds like a cool twist on it.

Besides, wouldn't it be quite heavy compared to steel plate?

I would strongly recommend fact checking everything posted at you.

No trouble. It is often hard to believe just how good full-plate was at the not-dying thing.

People just bitch on the internet. If you're trolled online, you are killed.

How flexible was full plate for movement and dodging?

Surprisingly good. It depends on the exact variety, but it tends to be about 50 pounds distributed over your body.

There are videos of people doing cartwheels and stuff in it, and while that's a bit silly, they certainly weren't the bulky things everyone imagines them to be.

youtube.com/watch?v=5hlIUrd7d1Q

I wish people would link this video around more like they used to.

>Fantastic material that is better at cutting then to holding shape (Not sure how it supposed to work)
>Overabundance of mages whose attacks you should be dodging
>Game set before invention of plate armour

Knights pretty much had full range on movement in everything but their fingers (because armor and fine motor control will never mesh).

That said the added weight distributed across your body is going to make you slower and tire you out quicker. Not 'walking glacier' type slow, but with less fine control of your movement since your dealing with the added inertia of the armor.

Many of the french were using shitty armor
They walked through a swamp while getting hit over and over again, maximizing the odds of taking a serious wound
A huge number of them still made it through to the melee, to exhausted to win the fight but more or less unharmed until that point

Mail was the 'main' armour for much longer than plate.

The Greeks had plates for every body part but it was so expensive and heavy that it was very rarely actually seen in battle.

You would need more weight for the same protection as a mature hardened steel plate harness yes. But then, this all depends on if bronze plate is common enough to force the development of anti-armour weapons which is unlikely. If all you have are spears and swords it does not have to be so thick.

You can run, climb ladders and do cartwheels and is usually just as flexible as the man inside it. It seriously increases how fast you tire out though.

I love you guys, plate is much more noisy than what I expected though.

How did knights fight cold terrain in full plate? Are capes enough for that?

OK, I get this. But would it really help against something adventurers tend to deal with, like bears?

>How did knights fight cold terrain in full plate?
Typically they just didn't. Wars were often put on hold during the winter because running an army in the cold seasons is a pain in the fucking ass for everyone involved.

Well you have full body padding underneath so none of your skin is touching metal and they would also have a cloak/cape.

In a battle it can actually help you, overheating is one of the biggest problems with plate. On occasion during a long battle people actually passed out with heat exhaustion even while snow was falling.

Padding

A lot of people severely underestimate how effective plate armour was towards the end. If we're assuming top of the line plate armour from the peak of the armorer's art, you're more or less invulnerable to anything below grossly powerful crossbows (we're talking around 4 digit draw weight here, at medium to short range, and assuming you get a clean, centre mass hit that doesn't skid off). When it comes to melee weapons, you can shrug off anything anyone can throw at you one-handed, which leaves high-impact two handed weapons like pollaxes or the fluke side of halberds.

Forensic anthropological examination of remains of people killed in battle who are assumed to have worn a lot of armour very often show signs of damage mostly to the head/face and nowhere else. Why? Because killing a guy in late medieval full plate was most easily accomplished by knocking him over and pulling his helmet off or stabbing him through the visor.
Actually killing him by making holes in the armour was very difficult to accomplish with anything short of a gun.

Even a very high-poundage warbow is very unlikely to accomplish anything at all, and any penetration of the plate armour is unlikely to be deep enough to actually cause a significant injury.

Keep in mind that plate armour is rigid, this means that as long as it's not deformed by the impact of a blow, the force of the blow is transferred to the load bearing points of the armour, not into the body. Getting a heavy hit on the breastplate is like getting shoved, not getting punched. (chain mail, as an example, is flexible, so a strong enough blow might still break bones or cause heavy bruising even through the padding) Also, top of the line armour had compression joints, meaning a lot of the "weak points" eventually ended up being protected by plate as well.

Full-plate tends to get rather warm, as you're talking about a person in an enclosed space wearing a lot of thick padding exercising. The real worry is overheating when its too hot.

Time for me to learn some actual facts about armor and warfare. Thanks for the tips

>How did knights fight cold terrain in full plate?
The padding, armor, collections of large groups, and effort of fighting would typically keep you warm enough (not that it would nullify the cold).

If it's cold enough that you and yours would suffer for it the same goes for the enemy, so then it becomes a matter of picking your battles rather than bundling up against the cold.

Summer's actually far more of a problem for full armor suits.

>fantasy or pseudo-historical settings, it's so often this mess of plates

Armor was also historically a mess of plates though?
Usually riveted to fabric or leather, which gives us the "studded leather" trope.

...

The fact is that none but the English bothered with bows even when English longbowmen could make a good living as mercenaries, and that serious money was being thrown at replacing crossbows with guns. Veeky Forums might be all over the place with details, but plate armor was a pretty big deal and remained a pretty big deal until shifts in military doctrines made it uneconomical.

Also, before anyone mentions Crecy or Agincourt again, the French were utter morons and generally kept with that tradition in later battles. At Verneuil the French opened with their cavalry fucking the longbowmen into the ground without even losing momentum, but then their mercenaries rode off to plunder and the French managed to lose the pitched battle against John of Bedford, his old mum and whatever English infantry hadn't fled the field.

Probably less, but still not useless. Assuming we're talking a large bear, it gas enough raw strength that it could Stoll probably cause severe injury, though the plate armor would certainly help at dispersing some of the blows. Not having to worry about its claws is helpful as well.

The issue with plate armour isn't it's protective ability, it's pretty fucking awesome at that, the problem is the upkeep. Travelling in plate is impractical without support. An adventurer in plate would absolutely need a horse and someone to help them put it on and take it off. They would also need to maintain it and they would need somewhere to keep it when they're not using it because it stores like a bitch.

For an adventurer plate would be a specialized tool. It would be really hard to sneak with it in dungeons. While it does allow for a decent range of physical movement it's restrictive and heavy. It would probably suck against traps and other hindrances. However in a straight fight against physical, human sized enemies it would be fucking awesome.

Full-plate is a lot like polearms: boss at fighting but inconvient for doing anything else.

Unfortunately for fans of simulationism and plate, a lot of ttrpg adventuring parties tend not to engage in organised battles. Most adventures are more along the lines of small skirmishes, investigations and commando missions. All but the most murderhobo of murderhobo groups will be spending at least half the session not fighting.

Mercenaries are notoriously unreliable. That's why Machiavelli despised them.

>Travelling in plate is impractical without support

Similarly, tanks cannot operate without an adequate support train. Logistics is everything senpai.

This is why followers, henchmen, and hirelings were so great. I'm saddened by how they've diminished so much as a game element.

>Mercenaries are notoriously unreliable

If you pay them on time, everything will be fine.

Is it really a good tradeoff for agility?

We established that plate armour is not restrictive, but it is still some extra weight. And Newton is a cunt.

They'll switch sides if you offer them more money than the other guys, won't fight other mercenaries(Condottieri), and are harmful to populations during peacetime.

More from the same armour set as the legs.

Proofed plate.

Sure, we really could use more Renaissance-era fantasy, but you'll need pretty developed firearms if you want people to give up on tin suits, and then you'll just have everyone carrying two rapiers and three braces of pistols on their person at all times. And that one asshole with grenades.

And might abandon you if your money aren't worth it.

Who said that armors can't be both sexy and protective?

You misunderstand.
We're talking big bulky plates with massive gaps in between that fails the basic purpose of armor: to deflect.
Remember that when armor is struck, the weapon either slides off, or penetrates. Striking the chest plate here will have the blade sliding off and under the plates on the shoulder. Many of the plates on this armor in fact is guiding the initially deflected weapon into points where there is no plate.

Look at the good examples of plate posted in this thread. The armor is designed to have the blade slip off the armor without catching on anything.

The bear is faster than you. The bear can climb trees.

What are you going to use that agility for?

Not getting your head smacked off or getting disemboweled is really useful when fighting wild animals.

Against a bear? Probably. Bears are pretty fast to begin with when you get them pissed. Certainly faster than most people.

>agility

Have you seen a bear charging?

Massed fire.

But yeah, in a 1v1, the guy shooting pointblank at a man in plate won't have such a good time. But that guy holding pounds of black powder could go up in flames if he's not careful.

I dunno man, smooth curved surfaces for deflection are a rather late development.
Hell, we thought the flat-topped Great Helm was a good idea at one point.

Everything's covered up here

You could at least use a picture from something other than the highly cartoonized HotS game.

Though I feel the need to make the point that the armor Arthas uses while he's the Lich King was primarily made to hold the soul of Nehr'zhul while he was dormant in Icecrown Glacier. It's more for ceremony than protection.

If you're around here still and you've got the ideas in your head of how plate works from video games and traditional games, here's an analogy to help you get your thinking more on track with reality. Plate armor in the 1400s and later is like a modern day tank where the only ways to stop it in combat are either to climb into the hatch and kill the crew, ram it with another tank, or use a full-on cruise missile.

Shooting it with cannons or rockets won't work. They bounce off like arrows off plate.

>Remember that when armor is struck, the weapon either slides off, or penetrates

You're kinda forgetting the most common option here, hitting but not causing significant damage to armour or it's wearer.
Actually penetrating the armour requires massive amounts of force. Yes, armour deflects blows by having hard, curved surfaces that can make weapons "skid off" rather than transfer the full force of the blow to the armour, BUT, for the majority of history, the weapons had harder edges than the material of the armour they faced (most armour was not hardened to the same degree as the contemporary weapons) so even edged weapons could "bite" into the material so to speak. But even then, actually deforming or penetrating the armour was massively difficult.
Even purpose made weapons like maces or warhammers were mostly effective because they let you ring the other guys bell hard enough to wear him down and knock him over, not by actually smashing holes in the armour.

The only place where attacks either miss or penetrate is D&D.

And when you no longer need them, they become and army of extremely well armed bandits that will pillage your lands on their way to their new employer. And if they can't find new employment, they'll just go back to pillaging until you re-hire them or wage another war to stomp them out.

The greathelm was not intended to be worn in general combat. You always had a very curved skullcap or similar helmet beneath it. The greathelm was used solely for charging into melee on horseback, and discarded once you were stuck in. It's extra armor until you get into melee.

They should have made it self-discard using explosives, so you can greet the first Saracen you run into by blowing his head off with your explosively discarding helmet.

We have records of knights in plate fighting in the snow who died of heat exhaustion. I don't remember which gravesite. Plate is extremely stifling, between it, the mail, and the padding.

Scale\, lamellar, breastplates, half-plate...there are a lot of different ways you can have armor that it's about as good, but doesn't need to be the full suit of plate armor.

>mercenaries are notoriously unreliable
>machiavelli as a source
Good one.

Machiavelli despised mercenaries because they were opposite to his theories about the state. His account of the battle of Anghiara is contradicted by various modern accounts based on uncovered documents including personal accounts and other period authors that state a numerically inferior force of Swiss mercenaries decided to go and honor their contract against the invading French, and suffered some 8000 - 9000 casualties.

This was a force of 12000 - 15000 Swiss mercenaries against 30,000 men under the French. Of those 30,000, 21,000 where German mercenaries.

Before the battle, the Swiss defenders where offered 1 million ecus by the French to break their contract and desert.

Here's the deal:
even in to the great centralization of Prussia and then the Absolutism of France, mercenaries where still core. Yes, the mercenaries of the Prussians were integrated into the formal Prussian military, but at times a full 90% of their army was in fact foreigners fighting for pay rather than national reasons.
This was also true in the wars fought by Sweden.

All the shittalking mercenaries get comes from state leaders who wanted their countrymen to join the formal state army rather than leave and fight in foreign wars under a mercenary colonel.

Sources:
cambridge.org/us/academic/subjects/history/european-history-after-1450/renaissance-warrior-and-patron-reign-francis-i
cambridge.org/us/academic/subjects/history/european-history-after-1450/business-war-military-enterprise-and-military-revolution-early-modern-europe

That's basically most medieval armies though.

A lot of knights and men at arms were more or less glorified highwaymen when there wasn't an actual war on.

A lot of the first free cities were founded to protect people from local nobility.

A bit of an exaggeration. It happened, but keeping the helmet on was not a bad idea all of the time. Remember that the greathelm evolved from forms that covered just as much of the face without having a separate helmet underneath. Before the Cervelliere+ Greathelm combo people had mail coifs and helmets that slowly started to extend over more and more of the face until they reached the bucket stage.

>compression joints
Jesus Christ that's far beyond what I was expecting

that's every professional soldier, even going back to the greeks. This is not a negative statement. Behavior of soldiers varies over time, based on the conduct of the period.

they will be off fighting, or otherwise looking for a fight. This is not limited to physical combat. Many greek soldiers would go on to become statesmen.

Yeah it's pretty crazy.
Back in 62 Garre AiResearch, one of the firms trying to solve NASA's space suit problems were directed to the Tower Of London museum by the NY Met museum, to study Henry's armour. Since it was designed for foot combat, not riding, it was fully covered everywhere, including the ass and groin etc.
The Tower sent photos and data on the armour and diagrams on how the steel plates fitted together to give full coverage while staying mobile.

NASA thanked the Tower in the 70s by sending them a replica Apollo space suit to be photographed next to Henry's armour.

That's partially because for the Greeks serving as a hoplite was a civic duty. Societal pressure was half of what always kept them so tightly locked and kept them from breaking and fleeing. So they'd take off the armor after the battle's done and go back to being civilians again.

How might we subvert the humans breath trope?

>TACTICAL EXPLOSIVE HEADBUTT
>mfw Saracen dogs wish they were this holy

Gills?

...

My wizard has just found a new application or two for his magic. Finding my sides, and making this a thing.

I'm not going to lie, I kind of wish NASA gave this particular Astronaut suit a larger codpiece than the armor. Just because it's totally in character and hilarious.

A good reminder that even though people hundreds of years ago didn't know as much as us and had some strange customs, they weren't any less intelligent.

They got pretty tired of dealing with the groin while they were still testing skin-tight elastic suits.

This was actually why some celtic warriors fought naked.

They lost tho

big shocker, right?

To be fair, it was not like they choose being naked instead of being armored.

There are reasons why the longbow was only used predominantly by the English that have nothing to do with it's efficacy in war. See the attached for more details if you're interested.
Longbows weren't worse than crossbows. Used correctly they were better.