Assemble your retinue and join the war camp!

We will have two opposing mercenary companies camped in different areas, with a day full of skirmishes and scenarios to follow. Night raids, ransom & capture, open field battle, ambush & scouting scenarios, and more will be played out.

Fully unscripted and unscheduled. From the start of the event to the end, any engagement with the enemy is possible. 24 hours of engagement time. 

This is not a harnischfechten event, this is a combination of reenactment, milsim larp, and live action wargaming. Harnischfechten kits can work, but full harnesses are limited to one knight per team and all kits should be optimized for mobility and ease of wearing versus sheer protective value. 

We trek far out from any modern amenities and from any modern lighting or roads. Pack in what you can carry, and only carry what you need: bedroll, water bottle, weapons, and armor.

This is a closed event, subject to invite and approval, but anyone is welcome to apply: Click here for application. There will be a $75.00-$100.00 fee per attendee for the experience. 

For those of you who don’t want to sleep rough and carry in your belongings, we will also have a base camp that can be camped at.

Schedule

Friday: Arrive and Train

If you have not been to War Camp before, and you seek to join one of the primary teams, attending the training on Friday is very much a prerequisite to participation.

• 10am - Arrival to site, set up base camp 

We will set up as many communal tents as possible at Base Camp. If you are staying only at base camp, then it’s a good idea to bring a period tent. If you are staying in one of the primary camps on the trail, you do not need to use your tent on Friday night.

• 12:00pm - Skirmishing Drills with Ryan Hetchler

We will go through some shooting drills for the archers, crossbowmen, and handgonners. Target shooting, shooting on the move, and sustained shooting in pairs. LARP arrows/crossbow bolts required.

• 12:30pm - Formation Drills with Jon Eppler

We will go through Jacob de Gheyn’s pike drill and drill together how to march in formation. No armor necessary, only helmets and polearms.

• 1:30pm - Lunch

• 2:00pm - Trail Marching Practice with Brian Owens

We will load up the handcarts with water and do a practice march on the trail with the baggage train in tow. We will practice scouting principles, marching order,  ambush scenarios, and baggage train defense. Approx 2 miles round trip. No armor necessary, only helmets and polearms or bows. Wear your water costrels.

• 5:00pm - Rules Debrief and Mock Combat Practice

We will debrief the rules and do some mock combats to get everyone used to the format of fighting for the event. We will go over casualties, ransom, rallying, and surrender. We will run as many permutations as we can, for about an hour, in order to stress test and familiarize everyone with as many eventualities as possible. Helmets and gloves are the only armor needed, but you can put on more if you’d like.

• 6:30pm - Dinner

Saturday: Begin Exercise

• 5:30am - Wake Up

Wake up, get ready, and pack up your bedroll from the night before. Any camp items used the previous night must be struck and packed. 

• 6:30am - Stand-To & Troop Inspection

Be in kit before dawn. Present yourselves to the company captain for troop inspection and payment. 

• 7:00am - Breakfast & Final Preparations

Eat breakfast at camp, and make sure carts are loaded and personal gear is prepared. Both teams should be ready to roll out.

• 7:30am - Sunrise, Group 1 Departs

One of the two groups will set out on the trail, to be determined by the company captain. One team is given a 1-hour headstart so that they can make headway along the trail and both teams aren’t encountering each other while marching.

• 8:30am - Group 2 Departs, EXERCISE BEGINS

The second group will depart on the trail, and both teams are given an hour to make their headway along the trail and get to their campsites. The exercise begins. No scheduled time-outs or activities for 24 hours.

Sunday: End Exercise, Pack Up & Leave

• 9:00am - ENDEX

The exercise is over, both teams should break down their camps and make the journey back towards base camp.

• 11:30pm - Lunch, Debrief, and Scoring

Once we have packed up our carts and made it back to base camp, we will all eat a hearty lunch together and debrief what happened, as well as tally up our victory conditions to determine the overall winning team of the event.

• 1:30pm - Depart Site

Narrative

This is a war camp of the Company of the Lynx Argent. You will all be stationed here for training and for some drilling. Narrative document TBD

Required Individual Gear

Please test your gear before the event, especially your sleep system and carrying systems. Sleep on your floor or in your backyard with your bedroll, fill up your pack with the stuff you plan to carry, armor up, and go for a walk around your neighborhood. The event will not really have much of a long distance hiking element to it, but you should be prepared to hike 1-2 miles carrying/wearing your kit. We will not have space to carry any personal gear in the carts. 

• Period clothing (hose, shoes, arming doublet or tunic)

• Extra warm layers (extra wool socks, a cloak, hood, or woolen cotte)

• Armor and equipment appropriate to their role in the lance, and optimized for soldiery (open helmets, torso protection, blunt steel polearm, blunt sword or dagger)

• Way to carry a sword or sidearm 

• Water costrel/period water container

• Martebo sack/basket pack/pack frame/blanket roll/other form of carrying system

• Bedroll (wool blanket/animal skins/canvas mattress)

• Belt pouch for personal effects

• Bowl & spoon (food plan will be optimized to not need any other dishes)

Of those items, always carry these things on you (you will not be able to participate in combat without these things, so take them with you when you leave camp)

• Helmet

• Gauntlets or leather gloves

• Water costrel (you must always have access to water)

• Coin purse (you must be able to ransom yourself in case you lose combat)

Provided Team Gear

• Toiletries kit (baby wipes, toilet paper, hand sanitizer, soap, small wooden bucket for washing or camp chores)

• First Aid Kit

• Fire kit (flint & steel, lighter, tinder bundle, candle lantern, pillar candle, oil, rags & wire for torches)

• Tents enough for everyone (probably two or three small tents per team, this can be a basic tarp for a lean-to, but it should fit in a cart and its poles should either be collapsible or improvised on-site)

• 2 handcarts/wagons/wheelbarrows (for the tents, food, and camp supplies, rather than personal gear)

• Food supplies (bread, dry goods, sausage, fruits, ideally optimizing the meal plans for one-pot meals which save on dishwashing)

• Cooking supplies (cauldron, frying pan, spatula, ladle, knife, cutting board)

• Strongbox (with gold/silver/copper coinage, plus important papers)

• Water barrel (there will be several extra water caches around the site, but each team will have its own water supply)

What Not To Bring

• NO camp furniture, beds, tables, or chairs. Space in carts will be very limited, if some space is available it may be possible to bring a small amount of camp furniture but that should not be the expectation. 

• NO long tent poles that can’t be fit in the cart or easily carried

• NO fully enclosed heavy helmets

• NO sharp swords or polearms

• NO synthetic swords 

• NO modern backpacks

Equipment Loadouts

Our teams will be structured with 14 people each, so that there can be three individual lances per team plus two officers, allowing us to divide up our fighting forces and focus on separate tasks.

Officers

Captain

• Military commander of the company, wearing half armor and bearer of the Company’s banner

• This role is a pre-selected officer, not available for application.

• Half armor (cuirass & mail, greaves or pauldrons, gauntlets)

• Open faced helmet (sallet/kettle hat/open faced bascinet)

• Banner, sword, and dagger

• In command of the Company.

• Wages: 3s 4d per day

Quartermaster

• In charge of the administrative and intelligence functions of the lance, carries the lance banner and ledger, and has access to the strongbox.

• This role is a pre-selected officer, not available for application.

• Open faced helmet (sallet/kettle hat/open faced bascinet)

• Half armor (cuirass & mail, greaves or pauldrons, gauntlets)

• Polearm (pollaxe, billhook, halberd), sword & dagger

• Wages: 2s per day

Man-at-Arms

• Wearing full armor and filling the chief place in the front lines, while also commanding his heavy infantry line.

• Fully armored except for one or two pieces (maybe ditch the shoulders, maybe ditch the mail–should still have arm & leg armor)

• This role is a pre-selected officer, not available for application.

• Open faced helmet with partial neck protection (sallet & bevor/barbute/open faced bascinet & aventail)

• Pollaxe, sword, and dagger

• In command of the Man at Arms’s Lance: two Footmen and one Valet.

• Wages: 3s per day

Sergeant

• Half-armored infantry troop also able to lead their own lance.

• This role is a pre-selected officer, not available for application.

• Open faced helmet (sallet/kettle helm/open faced bascinet)

• Half armor (cuirass & mail, greaves or pauldrons, gauntlets)

• Polearm (pollaxe, billhook, halberd), sword, and dagger

• In command of the Sergeant’s Lance: two Footmen and a Valet.

• Wages: 1s per day

Ventenar

• Semi-armored archer that leads the archers' lance

• This role is a pre-selected officer, not available for application.

• Open faced helmet (sallet/kettle helm/open faced bascinet)

• Half armor (cuirass or brigandine & mail, greaves or pauldrons, leather gloves)

• Bow (draw weight 25lbs and under), crossbow, or handgonne

• Quiver (With 12 LARP arrows/bolts) or powder horn

• Longsword, dagger

• In command of the Archers' Lance: two Yeomen and a Valet.

• Wages: 1s 6d per day

Soldiers

Yeoman (2 per team)

• Lightly armored ranged unit suitable for a variety of scouting roles.

• Open faced helmet (sallet/kettle hat/open faced bascinet/cervelliere)

• Torso protection optional (mail, brigandine, or simple breastplate only)

• Leather gloves

• Bow (draw weight 25lbs and under), crossbow, or handgonne

• Quiver (With 12 LARP arrows/bolts) or powder horn

• Arming sword and/or buckler, dagger

• Wages: 6d per day

Footman (4 per team)

• Lightly armored infantry spearmen suitable for a variety of roles.

• Open faced helmet (sallet/kettle hat/open faced bascinet/cervelliere)

• Torso protection optional (mail, brigandine, or simple breastplate only)

• Leather gloves or gauntlets

• Spear, sword, and dagger

• Wages: 4d per day

Valet (3 per team)

• Pulls handcarts, helps squire, and only joins combat if necessary. Unarmored except for helmet. Wears a shield with a guige strap just in case of combat. 

• Poor levy open faced helmet (sallet/kettle hat/cervelliere)

• No armor

• Shield, sword, & dagger

• Wages: 2d per day

Coin & Valuables

Each team will have a small strongbox, managed by the quartermaster, which contains their coin and documents (such as letters, contracts, maps, and a ledger). 

Currency valuation is as follows: 

Gold coins are shillings, silver coins are sixpence (half a shilling), and bronze coins are pennies. There are twelve pence in a shilling, and twenty shillings in a pound. Each person is contracted to receive their wage once per day, not including any bonuses or shares of loot or ransom. Each person will start with an extra day's wages.

The quartermaster or the knight may reward bonuses or extra wages for specific tasks, but everyone should be paid their wage once at the beginning of each day. Everyone should receive an additional day’s pay at the start of the exercise, so they have something to actually ransom themselves with.

When you get injured, your opponent can take your money or can try to ransom you back to your team if they want more money than you have on you. Ransom cannot be in the form of equipment, weapons, or armor. If you rob someone of their belongings, the only thing you can take is their money. NO STEALING ANYONE’S ACTUAL BELONGINGS!

The primary use for money is as ransom/bartering tokens and as a scoring mechanism.

Factions

There will be four factions in the game. 

Gold Company will have fourteen people, full hardcore experience, all hardcore people. They are against Gold Lance and the Brigands, but are neutral towards the Villagers.

Red Company will have fourteen people, full hardcore experience, all hardcore people. They are against Black Lance and the Brigands, but are neutral towards the Villagers.

Base Camp will have as many people as they want, running a support role. Some non-combatants will be villagers, and some combatants will be guards. 

Guards - there will be a few combatants available for mercenary work and for guarding the supply wagons. These can be the people who aren’t quite ready for fighting in the main lances but still want a part-time combatant role. They are not “always-on” like the other teams, instead they have a specific military role within a time slot. This makes it perfect for someone to have a chance to take off their armor, rest at base camp, and adjust their pace as needed.

Villagers are just noncombatants, but they will also be cooks, merchants, etc.

Brigands will be a small OPFOR team of just three people. They can harass everyone equally.

Supply Deliveries

There will be a supply wagon to each team at pre designated times from Base Camp. Base Camp guards will be charged to protect the supply wagons between each camp. This mechanic will be explained in greater detail at the event.

Mock Combat Rules

Lynx Accords Addendum III

For events with a strong living history/reenactment flair where modern safety precautions are impractical or where historically less-protective kits are allowed or encouraged (such as public living history demos, tactical wargames, or gentle-natured low-gear fencing), we have devised this “Mock” Combat Ruleset. The objective of this ruleset is not to accurately simulate an armored or unarmored martial arts bout in full protective gear, where one side is seeking to win over the other via pure objective skill, but instead the goal of the Mock Combat Ruleset is to reduce the intensity and target areas to enable people to participate in open-faced helmets and in a wide range of historical soldiers’ kits, from a peasant levy with a rope hat and a spear, to a handgonner with a kettle hat and a breastplate, to a fully armored man-at-arms with an open-faced sallet.

All Mock Combats will be very similar to  European reenactment style fighting, and all participants must be vetted and comfortable with no-gear sparring. HEMA techniques are encouraged where the intensity guidelines are not exceeded.

Mock Combat Equipment Requirements

The bare minimum gear requirement for Mock Combat will be an open-faced steel helmet that covers the top of the head and a pair of sturdy leather gloves. All soldiers’ kits, from archers to handgunners to billmen and men-at-arms, should have at least this level of kit–a helmet on their head to protect them from downward blows (intentional or accidental), and leather gloves (or steel gauntlets) to protect against abrasions or incidental contact.

Types of allowed/suggested open-faced helmets:

• Kettle hats/cabassets/eisenhuts

• Sallets (pretty much any kind, visored or unvisored)

• Cervellieres/skullcaps (cannot be hidden)

• Barbutes/celatas

• Open-faced bascinets (with or without aventails)

Types of helmets that are allowed but are not recommended except for heavier armor configurations:

• Great bascinets

• Great helms

• Close helmets

• Close sallets

• Klappvisor bascinets

• Visored bascinets

• Visored armets

Types of hand protection that are allowed

• Leather gloves

• Leather gloves with a hand rondel

• Mail gloves or mittens

• Demigauntlets

• Fingered or mitten gauntlets

Mock Combat Weapon Requirements

All weapons will be blunt steel, and rubber tips are not necessary but are still allowed. Swords and daggers should be worn in a scabbard or frog. No sharp weapons may be worn at all, at any time, including eating knives. All steel polearms must have their tips radiused to the width of a dime or larger, or rolled/spatulated.

Steel Polearms

All of our weapons will be steel, including polearms such as billhooks, pollaxes, and halberds. Safety with polearms is super important, so their use is relegated to more trusted attendees (such as officers etc). 

• All steel polearms must have their tips and projections radiused to the width of a dime or larger, or rolled/spatulated.

• All steel polearms must have their edges filed and free of burrs.

• Use steel polearms primarily as hooking and binding implements. Strikes with steel polearms should be light and primarily to the armored areas. Strikes to armored areas with steel polearms will count as valid strikes.

• Completely unprotected areas should not be struck with polearms, but thrusts are allowed.

• Strikes down upon the helmet are allowed, but must be made in a controlled manner, hitting lightly. If the strike cannot be made lightly, do not make the strike. 

Archery & Crossbows

Bows will be restricted to 25 pounds and under. Crossbows are subject to approval, but should be roughly 80 pounds and under, with a historical length power stroke of 6 inches or less. If you are bringing a bow or crossbow, you yourself must first receive a shot in the face at close range from that bow in order to use it.

Arrows should be LARP arrows with 2 inch wide padded foam tips. The ball-tipped LARP arrows as well as the cylinder-shaped LARP arrows are both allowed. Hard rubber ¾” tips are not allowed. The face is completely OFF-TARGET. Archers should be mindful not to loose arrows at full draw from point-blank range, depending on the armor their target is wearing. 

• An arrow striking brigandine, mail, or clothing counts as a valid hit. If you feel it, call it.

• Only plate armor (not brigandine) is completely immune to arrows. Imagine the arrows are shot from heavy war bows, and imagine what kinds of armor they would penetrate.

• The head and face are illegal targets, so if an arrow strikes those targets, the action will continue.

Spent arrows on the field may be briefly gathered by active troops or by casualties, but if anyone sees one on the ground they should attempt to gather it to keep it from being lost in the woods forever. There is not necessarily an obligation to return arrows to their original archer (arrows can be fired back at the opposition, or the commanders can mention arrow retrieval in their parley) but arrows should be collected if they are seen, rather than left on the ground.

Black Powder Weapons

Black powder weapons are allowed (i.e. handgonnes and arquebus) but may not be fired at point-blank range (less than 5 yards). Reasons to call a “hit” from a handgonne:

• You can see the muzzle flash

• You can tell the gonner is aiming at you

• You are nearly at point-blank range and the gonner isn’t moving any closer for safety.

• You are in a tight formation and the gonner is generally shooting into your formation–one of you should take a hit

• Black powder weapons will present a valid threat to people of any armor level

Casualties

Taking a Hit

If you are touched in an unarmored or lightly armored area, struck in the helmet with a polearm, or shot with a missile weapon in the limbs, take a hit.

When you take a hit, you become a casualty. As a casualty, do one of the following.

• Rout! Flee in panic to somewhere safe.

  • Run at least 100 paces away from the fighting. 

  • You can pretend to hide behind cover or cower in fear, but do not run off into the woods alone.

  • Maintain sightline of the engagement but do not return to it until you are called back to the field by an Officer at the end of the engagement.

• Wounded! You are incapacitated by your wounds.

  • Fall to the ground in a safe place, away from the fighting. You can kneel, sit, or lie down. But you are “wounded” and can barely move or stand on your own.

  • Pretend you are gravely wounded, shouting cries of “I’m wounded!” periodically. Mime out your injury to wherever you received the hit.

• Yield! You submit yourself to your captors. 

  • Stop fighting and cooperate until the engagement is over.

  • If your captors demand ransom, pay them your daily wage. 

  • It is your captors’ responsibility to detain you. Offer passive resistance and you may escape if you see an opportunity or have the means to resist. Treat threats as real.

As a casualty, do NOT do any of the following:

• Call out “I’m out” and stand up off the line of the engagement–you should not be on your feet if you are a casualty.

• Try to “respawn” before the end of the engagement, as decided by your Officer–at the end of the engagement the wounded and routed can rally on the Officer.

• Rout so far from the battlefield as to get lost in the woods. Maintain your sightline to the battlefield and your team.

If the hit feels questionable, depending on the circumstances and if it makes narrative sense, you may be able to do one of the following:

• Stagger back at least 8 feet, reeling in pain

• Fumble your weapon and draw your secondary

• Mime out an injury, losing use of the targeted limb

Otherwise, you should Rout, Yield, or become Wounded as above. Don’t be a hero, and acknowledge a hit to the best of your ability.

Striking Standards 

Safety in attacking is of paramount importance. Attack safely, and interpret touches generously. If you think you’ve been hit, you’ve been hit. 

• All attacks should be pulled so that they deliver as mere touches. Heavy strikes should not be made if at all possible.

• In general, if you have to escalate the intensity in order to win, you have already lost. Don’t be a hero, don’t try to win on individual merit. 

• Fighters should not target the face or neck, even if an opponent is wearing a visor or the face appears to be a safe target. 

• Thrusts should be aimed away from the face and away from any target that might slide accidentally to the face. Imagine a “V” shape from the center of the chest up to the outer points of the clavicles; do not thrust within or above this V.

• Thrusts in particular are incredibly dangerous. When thrusting with a polearm, relax the grip on the weapon and allow it to slide in your grip. Do not “cup” or “brace” the end of the polearm.

• Strikes down upon the helmet are allowed, but must be made in a controlled manner, hitting lightly. If the strike cannot be made lightly, do not make the strike. 

• Striking polearms (such as pollaxes, billhooks, etc.) should be used primarily to hook and bind, to create an opening to strike (lightly) to the helmet. Do not attack an unarmored target with a pollaxe. Instead, aim for the helmet.

• Most attacks should be delivered from the bind with minimal rotation and speed. The bind gives the opponents feeling for what is coming next, and thus is a safer way to launch an attack.

Parley

At the end of the engagement, the senior officer of the losing side must eventually accept defeat. It is the responsibility of the losing side to give up the engagement when it is lost. If no defeat is declared then everyone will fight to the last man. If there are no officers left standing then the fight is automatically over.

The senior officer can call out “rout” “fall back” “retreat” or “stand down” to indicate their defeat. In doing so, all the troops are ordered to stand down and retire the field. Casualties can rally to their officer.

At this point, the senior officer of the victor’s side can meet with the yielding senior officer and make a parley. During a parley, the fight is off. The officers can discuss terms (allowing the archers to freely gather arrows, exchanging low-value prisoners, ransoming high-value ones, paying some sort of weregild or ransom to the other side, starting a temporary truce, etc.). After this parley is over and the terms are met, both teams should quit the field and not re-engage until visual contact is broken (or whatever terms are set out in the truce).

Capture & Prisoners

Whether you have been struck in combat or you are simply outmatched, you have the option to lay down your weapons and yield to your opponent (see “Yield!” above).

If you have not been bested in combat, but are successfully grappled, disarmed, and otherwise detained against your will so that you no longer have the means to resist, you have been Captured. Being Captured and Yielding are similar situations but one is entered willingly and one is forced. 

If someone is “Wounded” during an engagement, they can still potentially be captured before the engagement is over, but the officers should speak of that in their parley. 

Manacles or rope may be used to detain prisoners, but if the prisoner does not consent to it (real-world consent), please oblige. Tie knots loosely, and don’t try to cause anyone pain, even your prisoners. Captives must be fed, guarded, and given access to water. They can be disarmed and searched but their personal belongings may not be stolen from their person.

Real-World Consent & Safety

In the event of an actual medical emergency, each team will have a first-aid kit on hand and Base Camp will have a much more robust first-aid setup. If anyone is actually hurt, and needs medical attention, shout “MEDIC” or “ENDEX” or “HALT”. If someone is too hurt to move, they can be loaded onto a handcart and brought to base camp, or can be met at an access road.

This type of combat is supposed to be just for fun, but we realize that it is quite possible that different people may have different ideas of fun. At any time, if someone is doing something you don’t like, consent can be revoked. Just say “I do not consent to this” or something similar and they must oblige. 

If you decide that this type of fun is not your type of fun, talk with your officer. If you need to retire from the field and take a walk back to base camp, communicate that with your officer and it will be made possible.

To confirm that you have read this far, mention audentes fortuna iuvat when prompted for the “secret phrase” in the registration.