Roman Legionaire/Medieval Knight

Iwasfrozen

Ok so my Friend and I where drinking and began argueing over the strangest thing, who would win in a fight between a Roman Legionaire or a Dismounted Medieval Knight ?
Which of course seemed to me like the perfect After Hours thread.

To make it simple here are the rules:
No gunpowder for knights.
Legionaires may throw their pila.
The knight is equipped with an Escutcheon and standered Longsword.
Legionaires are equipped with the Fulham style Gladius, a Scutum and two Pila.
Armour is Gothic plate armour for the Knight and Lorica segmentata for the Legionaire.

So what do you think ?

Obviously a Stone age Caveman.

Kernel

Ask Tony Robinson aka Baldrick.

thomond2006

You've been playing too much Total War.

dlofnep

Makikomi would kicked the utter tripe out of both of them. I would have the leftovers.

No idea what either is in terms of their abilities. I guess, the toughest and most combat saavy of the two.

Aodan83

I don't think knights had gun powder any way.

My name is URL

Syphillis will kill both of 'em

Saibh

A gladiator would probably beat both of them.

minidazzler

The Roman Legions were fantastic but were only that good because of how well trained and organised as units. They would have been good on their own, but what was their best asset was their Discipline and their will to succeed because of the rewards when they did eventually retire.

The Knights were Cocky and Cavalry are more of a Recce force anyway. They move too slowly when dismounted due to heavy armour and their maneuverability was shot.

So using this Logic I think it would be the legionaire who wins.

But It only if it was a POST Marius Reforms Legionaire.

Iwasfrozen

minidazzler wrote: »

But It only if it was a POST Marius Reforms Legionaire.

Of course, a pre Marius Reform Legionaire wouldn't have had Lorica segmentata.

thomond2006 wrote:

You've been playing too much Total War.

lol, That's how all this started.

Give them Coke and Hookers and theres just Loving not Fighting.

Beanstalk

hear ye, hear ye...

I sayest the fair knight. ye olde roman legionaire wouldst have been unable to pierce the brave knights escutcheon with the pila, on point (hah) of the head been made of soft metal so that it couldst not have been used again.

Methinks, forsasmuch as I darest say it, ye olde legionaire would have been cleft in twain by the noble knights longsword e're he reach the fine knight with his short sword *snort*.

NOW BRING ME SOME ALE, WENCH!

Dyr

Legionaire=part of a larger unit, loser
Knight= Walking tank, winner
Bambi=unimpressed by someone dropping terms like "pila" and thinking that they're all that and a bag chips

Iwasfrozen

Bambi wrote: »

Legionaire=part of a larger unit, loser
Knight= Walking tank, winner
Bambi=unimpressed by someone dropping terms like "pila" and thinking that they're all that and a bag chips

What's wrong with the word Pila ?
And all the other terms where provided by wikipedia.

Beanstalk

Bambi wrote: »

Legionaire=part of a larger unit, loser
Knight= Walking tank, winner
Bambi=unimpressed by someone dropping terms like "pila" and thinking that they're all that and a bag chips

Ah come on, you're not making a pila sense....

MikeC101

If the armour is Gothic plate, I assume we're talking late Medieval.

One on one - Medieval Knight - no question about it. Vastly superiour armour, and despite common misconceptions about the weight or lack of mobility of medieval armour (completely incorrect, and proven so in modern tests) every bit as mobile, and in training all their life for one purpose.

An Fear Aniar

The knight would win because of better armour, the Roman miles had bare legs and arms, afaik?

.

Iwasfrozen

An Fear Aniar wrote: »

The knight would win because of better armour, the Roman miles had bare legs and arms, afaik?

.

True he did, but he had a huge scutum, that offered alot of protection.

Aodan83

Iwasfrozen wrote: »

True he did, but he had a huge scrotum, that offered alot of protection.

That just offers a larger target. There's gonna come a pouint where it's just going to slow him down.

Iwasfrozen

Aodan83 wrote: »

That just offers a larger target. There's gonna come a pouint where it's just going to slow him down.

That's hard to say, while yes the shield will slow the Roman down his armour is alot more flexible and not as heavy.
What's more the Roman has the ranged advantage due to his two pilum so it is the knight that needs speed.

m5ex9oqjawdg2i

A Roman Legionaire was thought to fight in a group, Medieval Knights would not depend on a group as much.

One on one? A medievil knight would slaughter the roman legionaire...

If the armour is Gothic plate, I assume we're talking late Medieval.

One on one - Medieval Knight - no question about it. Vastly superiour armour, and despite common misconceptions about the weight or lack of mobility of medieval armour (completely incorrect, and proven so in modern tests) every bit as mobile, and in training all their life for one purpose.

This is bull... The armour dramatically decreased the knights mobility.

The weapons are also completely differant, Romans kicked ass in close quater combat. The knights used large weapons.

Knights would win hands down

MikeC101

Iwasfrozen wrote: »

True he did, but he had a huge scutum, that offered alot of protection.

Given the longer reach of the longsword versus a gladius, I doubt it would be enough.

To be honest, it's a ridiculous comparison for so many reasons, I mean are we assuming the two are of equal skill (for whatever value of skill we're assigning).

Plus, surely if the Roman soldier was superior, their tactics / equipment would have surely been adopted in the middle ages? The best medieval commanders were well versed in the strategic works of previous generals - Epitoma rei militaris by Vegetius was a popular study guide for medieval generals.

Perhaps a case could be made for an Alexander era pike army versus a medieval army, or a hoplites versus knights scenario.

MikeC101

Iwasfrozen wrote: »

That's hard to say, while yes the shield will slow the Roman down his armour is alot more flexible and not as heavy.
What's more the Roman has the ranged advantage due to his two pilum so it is the knight that needs speed.

A pilum is not going to penetrate Gothic armour. Simply won't happen.

MikeC101

Mauricio Unkempt Schoolmarm wrote: »

This is bull... The armour dramatically decreased the knights mobility.

Try checking out some modern reconstructions - wearing replica armour testers were almost just as mobile, to the extent of being able to perform cartwheels in them.

Try wearing it, you'd be surprised how little it affects you. The bigger issue for me would be heat exhaustion, on a sunny / warm day.

Cianos

imo a knights armour is more for protection from arrows and other missile/long range weaponry. The sterner the armour would have been, the more it would have slowed down the knight himself. Up close, agility is always more beneficial. With one good blow, the attacker has a great advantage. And an agile legionnaire is way more likely to land this blow, and the stronger the armour of the knight, the more likely it is that the legionnaire can use his better agility and faster hand to take this initiative in combat.

javaboy

The knight should normally win unless the legionnaire rolls a 6 in which case he gets double hit points or he's previously fortified his position.

Crann na Beatha

This post has been deleted.

K4t

The Spartan.

m5ex9oqjawdg2i

MikeC101 wrote: »

Try checking out some modern reconstructions - wearing replica armour testers were almost just as mobile, to the extent of being able to perform cartwheels in them.

Try wearing it, you'd be surprised how little it affects you. The bigger issue for me would be heat exhaustion, on a sunny / warm day.

Oh but I have... it is heavy and very difficult to move in. Doing cartwheels? /facepalm. The modern reconstructions which you have witnessed were not legit I am afraid. The point of the armor was to take as little damage as possible.

MikeC101

Mauricio Unkempt Schoolmarm wrote: »

Oh but I have... it is heavy and very difficult to move in. Doing cartwheels? /facepalm. The modern reconstructions which you have witnessed were not legit I am afraid. The point of the armor was to take as little damage as possible.

Surprising - I've worn it also, and cartwheels are as easy as when I'm unarmoured. Honestly - no issue with cartwheels whatsoever, and I'm surprised you take issue with so simple a manouver.

Have you genuinely worn proper reproduction plate? If so I'm honestly shocked by your claims. for me the biggest issue was the water loss / heat gain over a period of time.

But please, feel free to "/facepalm" all you wish. After all "facepalm" is known as the ultimate historical verification.

Anyway, absolutely the point of the armour is to take as little damage as possible - but why this translates to "as heavy as possible" rather than as "cleverly angled as possible" - but where to start debunking...

"A full suit of medieval plate is thought to have weighed little more than 60 lb (27 kg), on average lighter than the equipment often carried by today's armies which averages at around 90 pounds"

" It should be remembered that an armoured knight would be trained to wear armour from his teens, and would likely develop the technique and endurance needed to comfortably run, crawl, climb ladders, as well as mount and dismount his horse without recourse to a crane (a myth probably originating from an English music hall comedy of the 1830s, and popularised in Mark Twain's A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court)."

Jousting armour has horribly skewed our perspective on what armour actually was.

anonymous_joe

thomond2006 wrote: »

You've been playing too much Total War.

You can never play too much Total War!

MikeC101

anonymous_joe wrote: »

You can never play too much Total War!

Try telling that to your (ex) girlfriend.

(but I only need to finish this crusade - then I can save it!)

Medievalist

The legionaire would be fighting out of political loyalty, but the knight would be fighting out of pure determination. Therefore my bet would be on the knight.

m5ex9oqjawdg2i

MikeC101 wrote: »

Surprising - I've worn it also, and cartwheels are as easy as when I'm unarmoured. Honestly - no issue with cartwheels whatsoever, and I'm surprised you take issue with so simple a manouver.

Have you genuinely worn proper reproduction plate? If so I'm honestly shocked by your claims. for me the biggest issue was the water loss / heat gain over a period of time.

But please, feel free to "/facepalm" all you wish. After all "facepalm" is known as the ultimate historical verification.

Anyway, absolutely the point of the armour is to take as little damage as possible - but why this translates to "as heavy as possible" rather than as "cleverly angled as possible" - but where to start debunking...

"A full suit of medieval plate is thought to have weighed little more than 60 lb (27 kg), on average lighter than the equipment often carried by today's armies which averages at around 90 pounds"

" It should be remembered that an armoured knight would be trained to wear armour from his teens, and would likely develop the technique and endurance needed to comfortably run, crawl, climb ladders, as well as mount and dismount his horse without recourse to a crane (a myth probably originating from an English music hall comedy of the 1830s, and popularised in Mark Twain's A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court)."

Jousting armour has horribly skewed our perspective on what armour actually was.

Earlier versions of knights armour would have been a lot lighter. Chainmail. The plate armor was quite heavy. They wore gambesons under the plate armour to make it bearable.

In your calculations, you fail to state the weight of the sword which they carried (or mace, warhammer or battle axe) which was about 30 pounds, their shield and in some cases their lance... considerably heavier than what todays soldiers carry.

You also fail to see that the way our soldier carry their gear is a lot easier than carrying full plate armor. A soldiers kit is also devided up. You have your combat gear, which you will wear during expected combat, which is nowhere near 90 pounds, and the rest of the kit, such as rations, change of clothes, cooking equipment etc etc. This is not carried by all troops all the time.

As for doing cartwheels in full armor... you were not wearing proper armour... :rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes:

It seems that you are believing in myths and chinese whispers...

minidazzler

Medievalist wrote: »

The legionaire would be fighting out of political loyalty, but the knight would be fighting out of pure determination. Therefore my bet would be on the knight.

Legionaires post-Marius reforms were rarely loyal to Rome or the Senate, they were loyal to their General's if anything.

The Generals took them in, gave them clothing, training, weapons and if they survived for 20 years they got a nice piece of land off somewhere in the empire.

The Legionaires earned their place too, when they were new they were the ones on the front line, as they got older and if they survived they were moved back and rather than on the first assault line they would be maneuvering to a more ideal staging area.

As anyone reading this can probably tell, I am a big fan of Marius and his Mules. The man was a genius.

MikeC101

Mauricio Unkempt Schoolmarm wrote: »

Earlier versions of knights armour would have been a lot lighter. Chainmail. The plate armor was quite heavy. They wore gambesons under the plate armour to make it bearable.

In your calculations, you fail to state the weight of the sword which they carried (or mace, warhammer or battle axe) which was about 30 pounds, their shield and in some cases their lance... considerably heavier than what todays soldiers carry.

Good god...no offense, but I find it hard to take seriously the word of someone who believes a sword was 30 pounds. 5 pounds is the highest weight I've ever encountered (to be fair I've seen records of a 9 pound sword, but that was a ceremonial bearing sword...This is one of the bigger myths we try to overcome but surely basic physics makes it obvious And no offence intended, but "chainmail" is a "dungeons and dragons" term....anyway, some evidence on sword weights:

http://www.thearma.org/essays/weights.htm

simple physics on the weight of steel...

http://www.truefork.org/DragonPreservationSociety/Swordheavy.php

Mauricio Unkempt Schoolmarm wrote: »

As for doing cartwheels in full armor... you were not wearing proper armour... :rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes:
It seems that you are believing in myths and chinese whispers...

I've done it, and it was proper armour. Properly distributed, full plate armour doesn't feel heavy at all. Before I researched it, and wore it I believed exactly as you do. Especially on the "30 pound sword" myth.

Medievalist

minidazzler wrote: »

The Generals took them in, gave them clothing, training, weapons and if they survived for 20 years they got a nice piece of land off somewhere in the empire.

This wasn't necessarily the case. Sulla (and others) often obstructed the granting of land to the legionaires of generals who were away from Rome for long periods of time. Legionaires and their generals may have returned home expecting a triumph when actually the political situation had changed so much in their absence that their military achievements weren't recognised. Medieval knights (non-Romans) may have had more guaranteed benefits.

bigeasyeah

Hulk Hogan,thats who would win.

javaboy

Medievalist wrote: »

This wasn't necessarily the case. Sulla (and others) often obstructed the granting of land to the legionaires of generals who were away from Rome for long periods of time. Legionaires and their generals may have returned home expecting a triumph when actually the political situation had changed so much in their absence that their military achievements weren't recognised. Medieval knights (non-Romans) may have had more guaranteed benefits.

I didn't get no parade man! Where was my parade? :mad:

In All Fairness

Assuming the knight was in his thirties, this would make the Legionaire at least five hundred years old, so I'd have to go with the younger man.

pablomakaveli

A mounted archer would kick both their arse's.

History is with me on this one too.

The persian mounted archers whooped the romans.

The mounted mongol archers whooped european knights when they invaded europe too.

I know it seems like cheating but whos going to argue with the results.

FutureTaoiseach

It would depend on whether the Romans were using a phalanx formation as the early Roman army did before it drove the Greeks out of Italy, as well as on questions like armour worne. Horses instinctively will not charge into a hedgehog of spears. On the other hand, the later Roman army did not rely on such tactics. I think the answer to your question depends on variables like the timeline we are talking about. In the 5th cenrury, the Western Roman Empire's army was made up largely of Germans who lacked loyalty to the Empire, and wore little armour because they could no longer afford it because of the partition of the Empire into East and West, with most of the revenues going to Constantinople instead of Rome/Ravenna. I think the army of Augustus and Trajan would have beaten the knights because they were Romans who had a stake in defending their territory, unlike the Germans who were given land in return for military service, further eroding the Roman treasure of taxation. Medieval knights tended not to use cavalry archers, which destroyed the legions of Crassus in Parthia.

Matt Holck

Iwasfrozen wrote: »

Ok so my Friend and I where drinking and began argueing over the strangest thing, who would win in a fight between a Roman Legionaire or a Dismounted Medieval Knight ?
Which of course seemed to me like the perfect After Hours thread.

To make it simple here are the rules:
No gunpowder for knights.
Legionaires may throw their pila.
The knight is equipped with an Escutcheon and standered Longsword.
Legionaires are equipped with the Fulham style Gladius, a Scutum and two Pila.
Armour is Gothic plate armour for the Knight and Lorica segmentata for the Legionaire.

So what do you think ?

so we each have to pilas to throw?

Medievalist

javaboy wrote: »

I didn't get no parade man! Where was my parade? :mad:

Imagine! Years away. Gallavanting around. Pila throwing. Thinking you're the next best thing since leavened bread. Come home....and nada. I'd be rightly pissed off!

Knights didn't wear skirts....they win.

An Fear Aniar

Iolar wrote: »

Terminator would pwn both;)

Predator would take out a whole legion and I bet he'd be good at jousting too.

.

Iwasfrozen

FutureTaoiseach wrote: »

It would depend on whether the Romans were using a phalanx formation as the early Roman army did before it drove the Greeks out of Italy, as well as on questions like armour worne. Horses instinctively will not charge into a hedgehog of spears. On the other hand, the later Roman army did not rely on such tactics. I think the answer to your question depends on variables like the timeline we are talking about. In the 5th cenrury, the Western Roman Empire's army was made up largely of Germans who lacked loyalty to the Empire, and wore little armour because they could no longer afford it because of the partition of the Empire into East and West, with most of the revenues going to Constantinople instead of Rome/Ravenna. I think the army of Augustus and Trajan would have beaten the knights because they were Romans who had a stake in defending their territory, unlike the Germans who were given land in return for military service, further eroding the Roman treasure of taxation. Medieval knights tended not to use cavalry archers, which destroyed the legions of Crassus in Parthia.

/Faceplam, did you even read the first post ?