Drills: Teamwork

2v1

2v1 is exactly what it sounds like. two on one. This is not meant to be a fun drill for the one person and it's meant to teach all 3 people different things. For the set of two the idea is to avoid getting hit at all, it's a chance to sync teamwork as well as work on your timing for attack and defense. Generally speaking if one person is swinging then the other person is probably blocking and vice versa. As the person who is alone your goal is to find some way to avoid fighting both enemies at the same time. Take a leg, get one of them to run in front of the other, shift sideways so only one of them can swing at you, etc. Do whatever it is you can do to avoid two people swinging at you at the same time. If you take the drill seriously and do it this way it's much harder then it sounds.

No Soren Left Behind

There was once a fighter I knew names Soren. His basic decision making during a fight looked like, run at the enemy from the side and hope to kill them all. Whenever this failed he died, but because it was all he did periodically he'd succeed. I made this drill to try to convince him to work with his teammates. The battle plays as normal, but as soon as a member of your team dies, then the whole team is wiped out. You can do this in a team vs team, or you can do it with small groups. It teaches a group of people to work together, be safe, and cover one another because each person's survival is intrinsically tied to everyone else on their team. I've typically done this when everyone is using melee weapons, and haven't tried this with polearms and archers, so I'm not sure how that particular setup would work.

5 Minutes In Hell

5 minutes in hell is a drill that you modify depending on the relevant skill levels of the people involved. But the bottom line is to keep the person "in hell" under continuous, bad odds, combat for 5 straight minutes. It ends either when they run out the timer or when they can't actually stand anymore. If a person has to stop and breathe then they're done. If for any reason they can't continuously fight then it's time for them to call it quits. Back when I ran a unit I'd arbitrate over the person fighting and call done for them if they happened to run out of gas. The basic idea is that it's a 2v1, the goal of the pair is to not allow either person to die. There is one of two variations. In the harder composition you make it so that in order to get rid of the pair the person who is up has to kill both of them WITHOUT dying (simul's do nothing). In the kinder version anyone the person up kills without dying is sent back into the line. Depending on level of skill of the person who is up, you can either change it to 1v1's if they're relatively new or you can change it to 1v3's or 1v4's depending on how good they are. The idea is to make it a challenge regardless of the level of skill of the person who is currently up so that they're having to work on it. The record that I know of is Kazi running it as a 1v5 in order to get at least a little bit tired. That man is nuts. For most people 1v2 or 1v3 is plenty. The goal of fighting continuously is that it will bring out your subconscious, learned movements in a way that just fighting idly won't. Since the goal is intensity it can also bring out a person's killer instinct or push them to fight in a way they didn't know they were able to. TLDR; I love this drill.

Sneak

Sneak is... perhaps not the best designed drill. The idea behind it was to punish a team for allowing themselves to be flanked. It's actual execution is sort of 50/50. This is a team battle. At the start of the battle each team decides who their sneak is, a person designated as potentially the flanker. The sneak is known to the person running the battle but NOT to the enemy team. This means that theoretically you don't want to let anyone get behind your line. The sneak has the ability to shout out "sneak" when they call this anyone that they are looking at who has their back turned to them within 15 feet dies, INSTANTLY. The exception is if someone is shadowing them. In order to call sneak they must be behind the enemy team and not being babysit so that theoretically they could run in and back everyone. While the idea is simple in theory the actual execution of "who would be in range to be backed" is somewhat tenuous. Experiment with this and see if you can find a cleaner range/rules. Still, something possibly worth mentioning. It is potentially quite fun.

Drills: etc

The Closing Drill

The closing drill is a sparring session between two people. One person (the instructor) is given a longer weapon. The trainee is given a shorter weapon. You can start with longer and shorter length blues, or you can go right to a red weapon vs a blue weapon as this guarantees a significant amount of reach even in the case when each combatant's natural reach is offset. The match is a first blood competition. The goal of the trainee is to use aggressive footwork to close the gap between themselves and the instructor. Ideally the instructor forces the trainee to block on their way in, taking shots at their legs and torso at the instructors maximum reach. The goal for the trainee is to carefully choose when to engage and then to move directly AT the person with the longer weapon, (many people will dodge around to the side instead of going for a direct engage, I do not know why this is).

The Combat Archery Drill

The combat archery drill is 2v2 fight that consists of 2 S&B's on one side and a S&B and an archer on the other side. The goal of the side that contains the archer is to use angles, similar to how you would with a support weapon in order to get a quick kill on one of the opposing sword and board fighters. The basic layout is setting up a triangle.

Once you've got that triangle set up you've got a number of ways to set up the enemy for failure.  In the ideal situation the archer simply shoots 1 or 2 in the leg and then rotates on the remaining enemy using their sword and board fighter in order to set up a kill.  What usually happens looks more like this though.  Fighter 2 rushes the archer while fighter 1 does a slow engage on 3.

The archer then dodges to the left.  If there's an open shot on 2's shield then they take that shot.  More often then not there won't be, and so you keep an arrow trained on 2 while they blindly rush towards you.  This allows your sword and board fighter 3 to engage them sideways as they run past.

At this point the sword and board fighter 1 will often go hard on your team mate sword and board fighter 3.  In response you can shoot them as the archer, if they pop their shield open.  Hopefully, fighter 1 isn't fast enough and the fight continues.  If fighter 1 is successful in offing your teammate, fighter 3 then it's over.  If they don't then you reset to the first scenario.  If fighter one rushes the archer, then the sword and board fighter hits them in the back.  If fighter one turns to face the flank on fighter 3 then they open themselves up to being shot at by the archer.

If you do this over and over again, eventually you get the hang of it.  In the interim you'll spend a lot of time either watching your sword and board fighter get eaten by the two shields, or you'll be getting run down by the boards.  It's important to use the space around your sword and board teammate to dissuade people from engaging you.  If you do get rushed it's important to either fire quickly for the opponents legs, or to see if there's a shot on the other player as this will open them up to be more free to move.  As an archer you are engaging every enemy in sight so long as your bow is knocked.  Accuracy is obviously a big deal as you lose your ability to inflict damage every time you have to 

reload.

Drills: Arms

Chicken Wings

A pretty straightforward sparring session in which the only legal shot available for both fighters is the arm. Typically this is taught in time with teaching a person proper guard so that they are punished if/when their elbows stick out. Typically I run this as a first blood scenario. First person to snap an arm gets the win and causes both fighters to reset.

Offhand Single Blue

Fighting single blue is a pretty excellent thing to do when you have the opportunity to spar with another person because it forces you to rely on footwork as well as offensive and defensive sword work at the same time in order to win. If you swing and miss it gives the other person an opportunity and you don’t have a second hand worth of stuff to fix your mistake. Doing it with your offhand allows you to train up something that is otherwise derpy. If you’re going to do anything that requires two hands then fighting off hand single blue will improve your off hand. It’s an awful experience that you will likely hate, but this means that you’ll also be able to improve quickly.

Samurai Style

Samurai style is another drill designed to train one handed swordsmanship. The basic premise is that you start with a weapon at your side and for each time it leaves your side you may swing only once. You can block to your hearts content, but in order to strike a second time it must first return to your hip. To train speed/accuracy you do this as another first blood exercise. This can be executed with either your main hand or your off hand. Until you’ve got practice start with your main hand. Since the goal is to train accuracy it’s important that you work with a hand you are coordinated with or start slow until you’ve got the hang of it. When this goes wrong it’s two people repeatedly punching each other in the hands or throwing face shots.

Seated Combat

Similarly stupid like samurai style the goal here is to train speed and reflexes with much less focus on accuracy. You and a sparring partner sit cross legged across from each other. Set yourselves up so that both people can reach their opponents torso. Tap weapons and play by normal rules without moving your feet. First person to a torso shot or two limbs win. Rounds usually only take seconds so you can get a lot of them in quickly. The end goal is simply to increase your hand speed while removing all other variables.

Assgrinder

A melee in which the only legal shot is to a person butt. Theoretically this ought to teach people how to throw wrap shots as the only other way to score this shot is by getting behind someone. Handy for teaching field awareness as well.

Kyrian’s 12

A series of 12 shots to practice I learned from Sir Kyrian. It's likely this has been around for a long while and someone else taught it to him. In any case... there's 6 Swings, 3 stabs, 3 wraps. For the swings try to make sure that each pair of locations (IE, 1 and 2) you strike the same point on both sides of the body. Ideally you do this by using only your wrist; first swing on one side and then flip your wrist over to hit the other side. If you can't do that at first no worries, use your arm as you need to just focus on accuracy. It is more important to train for accuracy and precision then it is to do this fast or with much force. Do it slowly and accurately and then when needed you can speed it up. If you try and start doing it quickly your form will break down so when you need to execute on the movements you’ll have issues because typically the swings won’t go where you want them to.


6 Shots:

3 Stabs:

3 Wraps:

Wrist Strength Drill

Find a single blue and a round protruding object like a doorknob. Brace your elbow with your non-sword arm, to attempt to keep both your arm and elbow from moving. Next, using only your wrist, circle the protruding object in large, slow circles. The most important part is to make a perfect circle. If you find that your circle looks more like an oval or is otherwise lopsided then you need to keep going at a slow pace until those bits and pieces of your wrist muscles are built up. Once you can make a perfect (or close to it) slow circle then you can start to speed it up until the motion becomes relatively quick. Again, keeping a perfect circle using only your wrist is most important. Finally, repeat the process by shrinking the size of your circle until it’s the minimum distance possible around the shape. When I demonstrate this on a field I use a person’s outstretched arm and make circles around their fist.

Drills: Footwork

This will be my first attempt at using google draw for diagrams... so bear with my ineptitude.

Primer

I've always thought that the best way to build a fighter is from the ground up.  If a person isn't standing in the right place it doesn't matter what shots they can throw.  If a person's footwork leaves them in a place where their back is exposed, no amount of passive guard will save them.  So, I start with footwork.  It is my opinion that footwork is meant to accomplish 4 things.

1) Keep your legs from getting hit, by either keeping them out of reach or by keeping them mobile enough that you can dodge with them when they are swung at.  This means that generally speaking you should not have to ever guard your legs.  That's what footwork is for.

2) Footwork should allow you to dictate the angles of your engagement.  This means that you move in such a way that your break your opponents line (and therefore their guard) to allow you ease of access for certain shots like wrap shots.  It also means that you move in such a way that you deny your opponent equivalent strikes that would be advantageous to them by making sure they can't get a good angle on you.

3) Footwork should allow you to dictate the distance at which you fight.  See rock, paper, scissors for more on ranges and where you optimally want to be fighting.  But long story short, if you're a close range fighter footwork is what allows you to stay out of your opponents reach until you choose to close.  If you're a long range fighter footwork is what keeps your opponents away from you while you swing at them.  If you're a mid range fighter footwork is what allows you to maintain range, denying your opponent the ability to either close or escape.

4) Footwork should allow you to always maintain your balance.  This is important both for throwing shots at crazy angles without falling over, and also for absorbing hits; whether those are red swings to your shield, or a shieldsman charging you.  If you have good footwork (and your legs) you should be able to avoid being bowled over.

The basic stance that I teach is front foot lined up with your opponents centerline, back foot at approximately 45 degrees.  Front foot holds about 40% of your weight, back foot holds about 60% of your weight.  Here are the drills I use to teach that stance with the above 4 things in mind.

Reflex Training

[covers point 1]
Reflex training is pretty simple.  I get a person into the right stance and then after I've let them know I'm going to swing aim at their front foot between the knee and the ankle in a steady, evenly timed leg sweep.  I also use this as a chance to teach them about feints, occasionally faking a shot by pumping my arm without swinging.  Each time they dodge successfully, they do so by taking a step backwards.  After they've had a chance to reset into the proper stance the drill continues.  I usually repeat this drill until they dodge the majority of shots and can do so consistently.  The aim is mostly to make sure they dodge, but also to make sure they're using proper body mechanics so that between one dodge and the next their form has not degraded.  Success in this drill is determined by being able to do 5 dodges in a row without having their form get completely mangled.  Generally speaking, once a person's form gets mangled they'll stop being able to dodge in between 1 and 3 steps.

Tempo Training

[covers points 2, 3]
Tempo training is the next step up from reflex training.  It's the same drill, except that I don't give them a long time to reset their stance between one swing and the next.  The goal here is less about speed and more about matching my motion.  I'll take a step forward and take a leg sweep, causing them to have to dodge by taking a step back.  After we've both landed completely, I repeat this step, slowly increasing the speed at which I step so they have a chance to pair their motion to mine.  I find that doing it this way is a much more natural way for some people to learn how to dodge because it's not in a vacuum.  If the person is successful in this their dodge rate should be 100%, success is more dictated by their ability to match my pace.

Body Mechanics Training

[covers point 4]
Often a person will have trouble really understanding how to execute on the dodge.  They'll take too big a step, they'll dodge erratically, they'll dodge without then landing in the proper footwork, etc.  When I notice that they aren't learning anything from reflex training, it's time to take a step backwards and slow it down.  This is where the body mechanics training comes in.  For this drill neither person can be holding weapons.  The student crosses their arms over their chest and takes basic stance.  The teacher then takes both hands and braces them on the students shoulders.  The teacher then shoves the student with enough force to cause them to lose balance.  This should cause the student to have to take one step back.  As the teacher it's important that you don't use too little force, since this will mean that the student has to use their own momentum to step, or too much force, because then they can't land well with one step.  Generally speaking, when I go over this drill as the teacher, I let the student know that they should try to move as little as possible and brace themselves against the push I will be giving.  This push can be performed on all 4 steps that I teach.  If you are giving a person a push from the side, then simply brace both hands on one shoulder and push, causing the student to rotate.  Make sure that as the teacher whenever you perform this push you do so at a right angle relative to your student's center line (0, 90, 180, 270 degrees).

4 Steps Training

[covers point 3]
I teach 4 basic steps that I feel will give my students all the tools they need to start off with.  Since teaching this particular set of 4, I've realized there's an equivalent set of 4 steps at 45 degree angles.  Since I don't usually teach those until much later I don't include them in the basic footwork exercises.  So, onward to the first 4.

1) Step backwards.  This is performed as part of reflex, tempo and body mechanics training.  The idea here is to simulate evading an opponent swinging for your legs.  To execute this step draw the front leg backwards in a straight line, keeping it close to the ground so that it's a fast move.  The goal here is speed rather then distance.  As your front leg comes back, put your weight onto the ball (not the heel) of your back foot.  This should allow it to rotate so that when you come to a rest your stance has flipped.  If you started right foot forward, then you'll have right foot back at 45 degrees and left foot forward point directly at your opponent.

Start:

End:

2) Step forwards.  This is performed as part of tempo and body mechanics training.  The idea here is to simulate advancing on an opponent.  Same mechanics as stepping backwards just in reverse.

3) Pivot.  This is performed on it's own but can be done using body mechanics training.  The idea here is to simulate reacting to a person closing on your side.  Instead of drawing your foot back in a straight line, this goes in an arc.  Assuming your left foot is your front foot and your right foot is your back foot the idea is to spin on your front foot so that you go from 0 degrees to 90 degrees in the direction that you had your back foot.  When the pivot is completed your front foot should be pointed to the right.  The pivot can be done in both directions, so if you flip your feet you can still execute a pivot, you'll just end up facing left relative to where you started rather then to the right.

Start:

End:

4) Evade.  This is performed on it's own because it's essentially two steps that need to be executed before it's complete.  The evade happens when the foot that is forward matches the side that your opponent comes in at you from.  For instance, if your right foot is forward, then this is done when an opponent engages you from the right side.  First pivot so that your back is facing your new opponent.  This will give your legs time to get away from the perceived leg shot by rotating away from, and out of the opponents swing.  Next, spin.  After the initial leg swing as missed rotate until your front foot is facing your new opponent.  This is a tool in the toolbox.  It is the worst step you can take.  If you have time to react it's better to simply switch your feet and pivot.  But it's better to know then to not know.

Start:

First Step:

Last Step:

With A Weapon

Sweep

All of the above drills can be done with the student having a weapon in hand.  As the student steps they simply sweep the weapon in front of their legs in a slow arc.  The sword arm and arc always follows the students footsteps.  So if they're stepping in with their right foot and their sword arm is their right arm, then their leg sweep should go be a U shape which goes from right to left.  In the same setup if they're stepping backwards you throw the same leg sweep, but this time from left to right.  This isn't really about using the sword to swing.  It's more about memorizing the leg sweep.  If they move their feet to the right place then the leg sweep will land.  If they are out of range and have to bend over or reach with their arms to get it to connect then the student is doing it wrong and needs to adjust their footwork appropriately.

Snap

The other iteration that you can do is a quick snap to the opponents shoulder.  From whichever hand is the sword arm (let's do the right for an example) take a straight shot directly across into your opponents shoulder (in this case their right shoulder).  This particular maneuver is usually taught as part of the reflex or tempo training, but you could do it with any of the above drills.

Once both of these two sword techniques are learned in combination with footwork you can theoretically, close and aggress or retreat and snipe without knowing how to do anything other then stand in the right place.