Kurt Scholz wrote: |
So very small plates with good padding would reduce arrow impact most? Mail would seem somehow equivalent if you master the issue of rings not being destroyed upon impact. |
"Destroyed" how? Sure, sometimes rings broke, and sometimes an arrow could break enough rings to penetrate significantly (i.e., enough to wound or kill). This certainly doesn't seem to be the rule!
Peteris R. wrote: |
But that's the problem, isn't it - the rings get pierced more easily than plates. Which would mean that lamellar and scale are superior. |
But we don't know at all that the rings are "pierced more easily than plates"--presumably you mean the *mail* is pierced more easily? Much remaining Roman scale armor is frightfully thin, and it has to be because all the overlap means the weight adds up very quickly. Sure, you can make a scale thick enough to keep out any arrow, but make a shirt of that and it will weigh several times what an average mailshirt weighs. With the thinnest scales I've seen, you can pretty easily drive a point through any one scale, or fold it in half with 2 fingers. It relies on overlapping layers to protect, and it's already bulkier and less flexible than a comparatively protective shirt of mail.
Matthew