100 Minutes War

Oww!

One hundred minutes war! It should be called 100 minutes of Hell!

Actually, I had a great time. Really great fighting. For those who haven’t been. 100 minutes is simply a 100 minute resurrection battle with no terrain or hard points. Every time I’ve been it’s been fought on a flat field, like an athletic field. Last two times they held it at a high school, which was great this year as it was the coldest day so far this season (around 31 with a wind chill of 19), and we got to use the locker room to shower and change. Nice locker room too: it was one of those big suburban high schools with lots of money for stuff like that.

As battles like that always go, this one ended up a long skirmish line that moved back and forth between the resurrection points, but basically stayed in the same place. The teams are chosen in a rather fun way. They hold a speed tourney for the unbelted fighters. The two finalists get to pick teams, the winner going first. They pick by unit not by individual fighter. The teams ended up being basically northern region vs. southern region, and our team was pretty good, with Blood Guard, Von Halstern, Serpentius, ICOD, and Wetlands all being on our side. They had VDK, Loch Leven, and the rest of the Northern Region Army.

A battle like this is all about fun and doing great heroic deeds. You kill, you get killed, you resurrect, you get back in line. Usually you fight the same people over and over, but unlike, say, the woods battle at Pennsic, when the action is spread out and you can’t see what’s going on beyond the trees, this is just two lines of people swinging sticks, nobody is trying to “win”, and there’s lots of opportunity for charges and individual fights because commanders aren’t trying to outthink each other.

I fought they whole war with the five and a half foot polearm. This is probably the worst weapon for a battle like that. If I get in a duel with a knight with a seven-foot pollearm. I’m at a distinct disadvantage. Spears are right out. If I get in a press I have almost no defense. In order to kill a shieldman I practically have to be within his range. Boy! It was fun! I killed a bunch of guys, died about as often. I killed Balfar once and Edward Gray of Loch Leven once, but each of them killed me three or four times. I killed Richard Blackmore and Tamaltach (Isn’t that Tamaltach—I think that’s right) as well. He, by the way, was wearing my armor—flat ring shirt, hidden legs and arms, wrong helmet though: I want the Norman helmet, not the Frisian one.

I got hit in the left upper arm, like twelve times. Ok, maybe not that many. Ten. Ow! It looks like I’ve been doing tricep work for months just on that one side.

Pickups were few but fun. I fought with the sword and buckler at the beginning and it was fun. Federach was doing an number on my right leg. I fought later with Jarrod’s kite again and that was a blast. This time instead of fighting the unbelts and BAT with it I was fighting Richard Blackmoore and Ron. I think I beat Richard six out of seven fights. He said my defense was really good (natch). I fought well against Ron too. Mostly I’m still figuring it out though, so I can’t say what’s working and what isn’t.