The peasant strikes back @the-peasant-strikes-back - Tumblr Blog

Emergency Negativity Vent

In seeing a lot of discussions on FB about HEMA that are reminding me exactly why I can't find any joy in it these days. Or at least find little in most of the community.

I mean there's the odd voice of reason, but so many that just make me facepalm.

the-peasant-strikes-back

Just fence people or get them in a chokehold with your feder.

Time on HEMA FB is a pain.

Second-half, serious shitpost: Electric Boogaloo.

Me: “the book should get released in English someday so I won’t ruin all the content within it with bad explanations. “

Also me: “Shit, I didn’t explain P.R.A.P. and it’s a great help, guess I’ll do it.”

Okay, so what is P.R.A.P. kids? No, it is not the sound you make after eating at Taco Bell you dumb-dumb. It’s from the same book as last time, so once again we’ll dive into “L’esprit de l’épée, une approche tactique et mentale” grab a beret, a baguette, a glass of wine, it’s time for some bad frenchplanations.

Fencing, be it in MOF or in HEMA, requires you to touch, stab, cut, strike, disarm, throw, pommel or whatever-your-kink-is the guy in front of you. The issue is that it’s a bit hard to touch someone from outside your distance d’attaque, so you need to close that gap, and you are not just going to stroll casually towards the opponent without a plan. In an ideal world, getting closer or getting the opponent to come closer and the way you’ll do so is already one part of your plan and if it is not, the goal is for you to consider making it a part of your plan from now on.

Or maybe you will just stroll casually towards your opponent as a part of your plan.

P.R.A.P. is what you do before the hit you are going to land, it’s the set up for the exchange, the préparation, the prep for short.

Usually when preparations were explained in fencing it was from a technical point of view, it’s nice if you want to learn how to do them but not when you are playing high speed chess with a person potentially fleche-ing at you or zwerchcoptering you into oblivion, instead the authors did the opposite, they split them in 4 categories based on what the goal of the preparation was which is a lot more practical from a tactical standpoint.

The cherry on top? They say which profiles work best with each prep.

What’s a profile in fencing you ask? Just click here for an awful explanation by yours truly.

So we have four letters in P.R.A.P. and prep, so, let’s start with the first P for Provoquer, Provoke.

Not this kind of provocation, the idea is to get the opponent to react in a predictable way by scaring them and to carry on from there to hit them, it can be from a feint with the blade (that could also be an attack), the legs or the whole body. This one is better for Conquérants and Presseurs but it’s still a decent option for Contreurs.

THIS IS NOT AN INVITATION, you are the one kicking down the door and making them panic like the little babies they are.

Let’s say you throw a very obvious zwerchau to the right while getting closer to the opponent, your opponent should parry it strongly since no one likes to eat a zwerchau for dinner, once parried you could shove their sword aside by using your crossguard against their blade and cut at them with a zwer from the left in one smooth movement. You created a threat, FORCED your opponent to react the way you wanted them to and finally struck them, hard, so hard you shattered their tiny ego, and you enjoyed it, you sadist.

That would be a provoke prep by a conquérant.

R is for Renforcer, Reinforce.

For that one, you’ll be lying to your opponent when entering distance, making them believe they have an opportunity to hit you, when actually you are just inviting them on a target. This preparation is best when used as a conquérant or a presseur. If the previous one was all about scaring the shit out of the opponent and forcing them to react in a negative way (ie: OH SHIT THERE IS A SWORD COMING MY WAY, I NEED TO PARRY QUICKLY) , this one is about giving a positive signal to the opponent so they can set themselves up for failure. That prep can be repeated to make sure they fall into the trap, that’s conditioning your opponent.

Bad invitations in a nutshell.

A very basic simple example in longsword is: get close to (or in) the distance d’action in a low guard (alber or dente di zengiaro), do a tiny probing movement and GTFO asap to go back to safety, repeat once, repeat again, the opponent should have understood by now that you are not making any real threat when advancing and that you are not covering your upper openings. The perfect oberhau/fendente is thrown at you, you can see their little self satisfied smirk behind their mask, they got you good... except you were baiting them into that one attack, simple beat with the falso (or Streychen if you are more of a Ringeck guy), come back down on the same diagonal, they should feel that one both on their mask and in their cold heart.

That’s a reinforce prep by a presseur.

“Believe in my Dente di Zengiaro which believes in you.” Daddy Fiore Dei Libera Me From Hell, in the Ms Getty Lagann.

The next one is pretty close, it’s aspirer, suck-in, and for this episode of frenchsplaining let’s call it Entice. The idea is similar to reinforce but this time you want the opponent to close the distance and to parry riposte or punish them as soon as they get in. When reinforce is best for presseurs and conquérants, entice works best for contreurs and blindeurs.

Our actual example for entice. I will not apologise, suffer with me.

White hairpin (on the left) waits for her opponent grey sweater (on the right) to get to her distance d’action in a low guard with no piste left behind her, effectively letting the tallest fighter close the gap between them, before she finishes extending her arm for the kabedon, white hairpin seizes her hand, spins her around, pins her against the wall and savagely hugs her, melting her opponent’s heart in the process.

That’s a good little contreuse right here making some textbook enticement, grey sweater didn’t stand a chance.

Hold on Peasant™ , why did you pick entice instead of attra-? Shush!

Let’s carry on for our last prep. The best of the best. The wildest of the wildests. The weirdest of the weirdos. Our lord and saviour, P.

Last P is Perturber, disturb, and for this frenchsplaining session we’ll use Puzzle.

That one is the simplest to explain. It works well for every profiles but it’s a lot easier for a blindeur, the goal is to shatter the psyche of the opponent, to break the rhythm, to make the game unreadable, to shock the opponent, create a breach and many other things.

If I had to sum it up in one sentence, it would be:

DO SOME WEIRD SHIT BRO!

If I had to give one example, it would be from Tea Kew, great instructor, even greater braid that breaks the space time continuum, if you see him give a workshop at an event, attend it, it’s great or it’s going to be great, if you can spar with him, even better, that way you get to experience what I’m going to tell you first hand.

You are fencing and at one point, he changes stance and just casually strolls into distance with his sword in longpoint towards you. It doesn’t make any sense to you when fencing, most of the time this kind of situation will make you go “WHAT?” you’ll either pause and ponder on what to do and he’ll hit you or you’ll try to beat his blade aside and he’ll void the beat and hit you anyway.

That’s a puzzling prep made with a Presseur mindset.

D I S T U R B I N G

That’s the four prep categories for you. Provoke, Reinforce, Entice, Puzzle. P.R.E.P., (instead of P.R.A.P.) that way dumb swedes wearing green fencing jackets will stop making fart jokes. XOXO Daniel.

If you do HEMA and your system is lacking a tactical framework, don’t hesitate to pick some frog DNA in modern fencing, “le jeu de l’épée” is quite easy to transpose to other things, the four profiles can be made to work with anything, same with P.R.E.P., just like using the OODA loop, if it helps you understand concepts in the source, do it.

If you do sport fencing and you are still reading this garbage, congrats, maybe you saw some things you already knew or maybe you’ll ask your coach what he thinks about it.

I’ve opened “Asks” so don’t hesitate to bother me.

And maybe you expected a nice conclusion but I don’t have one.

#hema #l'esprit de l'epee #fencing #Modern fencing #epee #hema shitpost #Historical European martial arts #Modern Olympic Fencing #longsword #and everything else

Fiore Emblem.

#fire emblem #hema #hema shitpost

Half serious shitpost about blindeurs.

Quick joke explanation below, grab your baguettes, your berets and an épée for a quick explanation:

So, there is this really good book about the tactical element of épée in sport fencing called “L’esprit de l’épée, une approche tactique et mentale” which is giving you a tactical framework for épée fencing.

Okay, cool, but you are a HEMA shitposter, why should I care?

So, within the book, there is a graph that looks a bit like this:

Fencers lie on two axis:

- défenseur <> attaquant / defender <> attacker

The attaquant being the one initiating the attack with his blade, how surprising is that? While the défenseur is reacting to it with a counter attack, a parry riposte or something along those lines with his blade, is it starting to sound familiar to vor and nach in the Liechtenauerian tradition?

- ouvreur <> fermeur / opener <> closer

The ouvreur is the one deciding from where the exchange will unfold, most of the time by closing the distance between both fencers and entering the distance d’action, does it make sense? It should not.

The distance d’action is one of two options depending on which one is the biggest, either the distance from which a fencer can attack (distance d’attaque) or the distance from which the opponent can attack (distance de danger), the tallest fencer ever with the biggest sword ever’s distance d’action will always be his distance d’attaque while for the smallest fencer with the smallest sword ever’s distance d’action will always be his distance de danger. Basically, the donut of death and bagel of opportunities in HEMA depending on where you stand.

The fermeur is a lazy bastard who is waiting for or inviting his opponent to get to the distance d’action. They will rarely go forward.

If you take those two axis and combine them, you get:

- défenseur - fermeur blindeur the tank/fortress

- défenseur - ouvreur presseur Queen - Under Pressure 2 Electric Boogaloo

- attaquant - fermeur contreur the counter-er

- attaquant - ouvreur conquérant the conqueror

Which looks like:

And you get this game of chess where you know where the opponent lies on that and try to adapt and overcome it or you end up with no fencing at all.

Contreur waiting for the Conquérant to enter his distance d’attaque, colorized, circa 2010.

You - Hold on Peasant™, so you are saying that the blindeur is a passive fencer, right?

Me - Yup.

You - So what happens when two of them fence each other?

Me- The joke I’ve been explaining since the beginning.

Thank you for coming to my Ted Talk but I don’t have a good conclusion for that one, the book should get released in English someday so I won’t ruin all the content within it with bad explanations.

#hema #hema shitpost #fencing #modern fencing #Historical European Manga & Anime #Historical European martial arts #l'esprit de l'epee #epee

When people start explaining me that the turns of the sword are a vital part of Fiore’s work.

#HEMA #HEMA shitpost #fiore dei liberi

Kept you waiting huh? PS: I actually didn’t since you regret seeing this post

#rokudou no onna-tachi #hemanime #shitposts #Armizare #fiore dei liberi #Historical European martial arts #Historical European Manga & Anime

HEMA is a kinky sport.

#hema #Historical European Manga & Anime #Historical European martial arts #fiore dei liberi #Baton #quality edits #please don't bully me nagatoro #Ijiranaide Nagatoro-san #I want Fiore senpai to sit on me #nagatoro

jhzargo

(Fiore’s still better tho)

the-peasant-strikes-back

One waifu closer to saving HEMA.

hemashoppedtreatisepics

Chapter 43, Plate XII of Académie de l'Espée, by Girard Thibault d'Anvers. The Right Angle guard of Verdadera Destreza.

jhzargo

Chainmail = Carpel tunnel syndrome

the-peasant-strikes-back

“Here is the thing, I’ll draw something for hours with lots of tiny details like and I’ll only use 3 tags to get as few people to see my stuff as possible.” I like your stuff mate, I just want to see it be popular, don’t make me:

#could #be #a #monmusu #OC #monster girl #learn to tag yo stuff #fish for reblogs #snake girl #lamia #hema #hemanime #btw reaction is from #Dungeon Meshi #longsword #brigandine #women in armor #monster musume

jhzargo

Making a character sheet of sorts

the-peasant-strikes-back

Snek.

#monster girl #HEMA #hemanime #lamia #knight

pteappic

Überlauffen

This is the text and the gloss about running-over

80 Whoever aims below, Run-over, then they become shamed.

Gloss: Note, this is when he targets the lower openings with a hew or with a thrust in the onset: you shall not displace him, rather await, such that you run-over with a hew above into the head or set-upon the point above (as stands pictured hereafter next to this)