Why are crusader knights heavily armoured in S&S army lists?

[samwardesq]

Wondering why knights in the Late Crusader list in S&S are 'heavily armoured' since this list covers 12- 13th C, and, since from my reading horse barding (necessary for this armour rating) was rare for European knights even by the end of this time period.
If this is not the right forum, please advise if there is a better place I can direct this question.
Regards, Sam

[grahambriggs]

I imagine because the list author thought they were heavily armoured when compared to most Saracen armoured cavalry and archery? i.e. to give the best result against historic match ups. There are accounts I think of crusader knights returning looking like porcupines but only lighly wounded by the enemy arrows.

[RobKhan]

This is something that always puzzled me, but thought..."it's only a game and historical matchups usually sort things out" But in an open game running WOTR or 100 yrs war knights ,for example, I would feel a little ripped off vis a vis the 11th to 13th Century Knights.

Robkhan

[grahambriggs]

This is something that always puzzled me, but thought..."it's only a game and historical matchups usually sort things out" But in an open game running WOTR or 100 yrs war knights ,for example, I would feel a little ripped off vis a vis the 11th to 13th Century Knights.

Robkhan

Though your 1346 Crecy 100YW knights are less heavily armoured than later knights. If you want to model time travelling, have the earlier knights as armoured. Why feel ripped off in an open game? If you're playing in an open game you have to accept some anachronism, or have a hideously complex POA system (kneecops; 0.05 points per base. 0.1 armour POA).

Of course, if time travelling did occur, then the crusader knights would quickly buy the newer armour - in the same way that Aztecs used as many Spanish swords as they could get.

[samwardesq]

This is something that always puzzled me, but thought..."it's only a game and historical matchups usually sort things out" But in an open game running WOTR or 100 yrs war knights ,for example, I would feel a little ripped off vis a vis the 11th to 13th Century Knights.

Robkhan

I agree totally,
I LOVE this rules set, and understand that an unavoidable consequence of covering such an immense span of history with such an elegantly simple set of armour classes (as we are discussing here) is that they (the armour classes) become somewhat relative, by time period.
Of course in a non-competition games, players can make whatever modifications to the lists that they mutually agree.
Personally, I think that a helm and mailed-up knight on an unarmoured horse should remain as 'armoured', since that would give the correct vulnerability to archery, to which barding used by later ('heavily armoured' knights) was partly a response.

[pyruse]

This is something that always puzzled me, but thought..."it's only a game and historical matchups usually sort things out" But in an open game running WOTR or 100 yrs war knights ,for example, I would feel a little ripped off vis a vis the 11th to 13th Century Knights.

Robkhan

Why would you feel 'ripped off'? They have paid exactly the same points for their heavily armoured knights as you.
If they got them cheaper you would have a point, but they don't, so all is fair. If the classification gives the right result against historical opponents, then it is the right one.

Whether it is historical for 11th and 13th century knights to be classified the same is a different question, and the answer is 'obviously not' since they are two centuries apart.
If you don't like that, then don't play out of period matchups.