06-03-2012, 01:23 PM
I got very mixed impressions.
The march itself is great, really gets the blood pumping. The "feel" of it is awesome. And then there's the God Emperor, Domitian, who can fill the square with his insane rant without any mike and speakers. I love this insane rant, I love how it makes me want to hurl pilum into British faces. As the Emperor he is totally awesome.
But... the standards of kit are mediocre and not getting better. I have noticed a grand total of 0 improvement since Chester 2011 and at times it does resemble a set of Hollywood movie, not a reenactment event.
- bracers, bracers everywhere! The leather Hollywood bracers on milites, on optiones, on officers. People who command and who should be setting the kit standards have those bloody Russel Crowe bracers.
- medieval chainmail hauberks worn as hamata. 8 or 10mm rings, clenched and not riveted, clearly in shape of medieval chain shirts. And this (again) even on the officers! Something between 50 and 75% of chain mails looked like this.
- chainmail (even the accurate one) worn as decoration, as a prop and not an armour. Worn directly on tunics so that it simply stops making any sense whatsoever. Maybe there were some people who actually wore chain on proper padding (and I don't mean paper-thin cow hide), but I haven't seen any.
- subarmalis out of wild dreams of a Hollywood set artist. Some absolutely Xena-fantasy pteruges (including officers with thin pitiful half-circles cut out of cowhide) on them. Cowhide everywhere, patterned after American movies. Decorations without any source or reference, just made up after a consultation with a goat and a camel. After the march and around the camp those would be worn without armour to strut out the fantasy stuff.
- a guy with modern running white socks in his caligae!
- Brits with medieval bags, XVIIc dirks, XXc faux wineskins. A Brit in a tank-top!
- Medieval and larp bags dangling of the balteus militaris, they were everywhere you looked. Those and female purse-sized bags.
- scale armours made with scales the size of surfing boards. Where is this coming from? Some of them looked like dragon slayers.
Add to this the general level of disregard for the kit. The segs were tied in such a sloppy way that you could insert a shovel into the gaps on the backs and fronts. The shoulder-blade plates routinely caught under the trunk plates, there wrong overlaps all over the place. It was raining yet the gear was not oiled and no one used the sagum. This is what it's for! It , along with olive oil, protects your bloody armour when it rains so then you don't have to spend 3h with sandpaper. I assume people are helped into their gear by their friends, yet those friends will not tie and check the back segments properly? The group leaders do not give a damn how their soldiers look for the parade? Please, do get your act together.
The march itself is great, really gets the blood pumping. The "feel" of it is awesome. And then there's the God Emperor, Domitian, who can fill the square with his insane rant without any mike and speakers. I love this insane rant, I love how it makes me want to hurl pilum into British faces. As the Emperor he is totally awesome.
But... the standards of kit are mediocre and not getting better. I have noticed a grand total of 0 improvement since Chester 2011 and at times it does resemble a set of Hollywood movie, not a reenactment event.
- bracers, bracers everywhere! The leather Hollywood bracers on milites, on optiones, on officers. People who command and who should be setting the kit standards have those bloody Russel Crowe bracers.
- medieval chainmail hauberks worn as hamata. 8 or 10mm rings, clenched and not riveted, clearly in shape of medieval chain shirts. And this (again) even on the officers! Something between 50 and 75% of chain mails looked like this.
- chainmail (even the accurate one) worn as decoration, as a prop and not an armour. Worn directly on tunics so that it simply stops making any sense whatsoever. Maybe there were some people who actually wore chain on proper padding (and I don't mean paper-thin cow hide), but I haven't seen any.
- subarmalis out of wild dreams of a Hollywood set artist. Some absolutely Xena-fantasy pteruges (including officers with thin pitiful half-circles cut out of cowhide) on them. Cowhide everywhere, patterned after American movies. Decorations without any source or reference, just made up after a consultation with a goat and a camel. After the march and around the camp those would be worn without armour to strut out the fantasy stuff.
- a guy with modern running white socks in his caligae!
- Brits with medieval bags, XVIIc dirks, XXc faux wineskins. A Brit in a tank-top!
- Medieval and larp bags dangling of the balteus militaris, they were everywhere you looked. Those and female purse-sized bags.
- scale armours made with scales the size of surfing boards. Where is this coming from? Some of them looked like dragon slayers.
Add to this the general level of disregard for the kit. The segs were tied in such a sloppy way that you could insert a shovel into the gaps on the backs and fronts. The shoulder-blade plates routinely caught under the trunk plates, there wrong overlaps all over the place. It was raining yet the gear was not oiled and no one used the sagum. This is what it's for! It , along with olive oil, protects your bloody armour when it rains so then you don't have to spend 3h with sandpaper. I assume people are helped into their gear by their friends, yet those friends will not tie and check the back segments properly? The group leaders do not give a damn how their soldiers look for the parade? Please, do get your act together.
