[The interminable debate] Overhand v underhand spear usage

[Rad]

It would be the other way around, they've already got much higher stats than any other levy spearman. So the early should drop, if we change anything.

I wasnt aiming at increasing the attack of the late levy. To me it doesnt matter if you lower the attack of the early levy, or increase the attack of the late levy, what matters is that late levies have a higher attack than the early ones.

P.S. I am not a fan of overhand grip. I have a spear at home, and using it overhand just doesnt feel right. The plus side is more power in the thrust , and that a second rank of soldiers can project their spears over the first rank.

The minus... you get less reach because you have to hold the spear more down the middle to balance it, it is more tiring for the arm, less control, speed and accuracy, your arm is more exposed, and because your attacks are more powerful and less controlled, your spear can get stuck, which is a bad thing to happen.

The cons far outweigh the pros.

[QuintusSertorius]

I wasnt aiming at increasing the attack of the late levy. To me it doesnt matter if you lower the attack of the early levy, or increase the attack of the late levy, what matters is that late levies have a higher attack than the early ones.

P.S. I am not a fan of overhand grip. I have a spear at home, and using it overhand just doesnt feel right. The plus side is more power in the thrust , and that a second rank of soldiers can project their spears over the first rank.

The minus... you get less reach because you have to hold the spear more down the middle to balance it, it is more tiring for the arm, less control, speed and accuracy, your arm is more exposed, and because your attacks are more powerful and less controlled, your spear can get stuck, which is a bad thing to happen.

The cons far outweigh the pros.

Does your spear have a counterweight? Do you have a big shield to fight behind?

[excubitor]

there are numerus depictions of hoplites fighting with overhand style











there are also depictions of hoplites fighting underarm,it seems that they are out of formation chasing defeated foes like in the first or dueling.

[Rad]

Who are these guys? Hoplites. Where are they? In formation. How do they hold their weapons? Undearm.

[excubitor]

they are marching not fighting.

[cowrecked]

It seems to me that the added fatigue of holding a spear overhand should be taken into consideration. You simply waste more energy holding the damn thing up, if you're doing that for an hour or two, than if you hold it underarm at your side.

[z3n]

Came across this on the teams internal forum, here's a post by a member the team completely agreed with.

Keep in mind they never necessarily expected these to be posted on a forum for the public to read. So while they were presenting some evidence (among themselves as trusted peers) they no doubt never expected this to be presented to the public.

When it comes to spears, there are a lot of factors to consider. We see both in art, of course, but according to an article by Connolly, the ratio of overhand:underhand is something like 7:3. And certainly there are advantages to both. But if we can only use one animation for your standard spear, then the overhand is undoubtedly better.
http://imgur.com/fSJbwSD


1. Overhand can be used in a tight formation. Here is a fantastic vase painting which highlights what can go wrong with an underhanded grip. But the overhand allows the back of the spear to go over the head of the row behind you without injuring anyone.
http://imgur.com/GbtQUMg


2. There are – I think – two articles that use force plates to measure the energy behind the overhand, underhand, and underhand/high-elbow. The overhand is the fastest and most powerful with the best economy of movement of the arm. The high-elbow hold being a distant third in power and speed. The high-elbow is also a very uncomfortable grip to maintain. I have an image capture of the Connolly chart, but the article itself is expensive so I'm going off what I found at the RAT fora.


3. Shields are very big. The aspis is actually huge and you don't get a good idea of its size until you see one in real life. The same goes for a thureos. Using a spear overhand means you can cover yourself with your shield and strike over it, to the sides, or even down at someone's feet by simply dropping your arm. To use an underhanded grip and to get a good extension of your arm, you have to displace your shield to the left or swing it open (as depicted in art), which means you expose at least your shoulder if not most of your body when you attack.


4. I own the parts for a spear. The pole alone is 7 feet and when I get it tapered I'll be able to attach the head piece and butt piece. It will be weighted so that the balance of the spear is a little back from the center, but not by much. Weapons need to be an optimal weight to be used well: for example most swords don't weigh more than 1 kg and usually less. You can shift the center of balance by increasing the weight of the butt spike, but you get a diminishing return with increased weight of the whole weapon. Balance is exceedingly important for a good weapon and its effective use. Without it, you spend more energy fighting the weapon than you do the opponent.


5. Using a spear underhand and holding it further back doesn't really help. You lose that point of balance. It becomes very easy for an opponent to just move your spear out of line. Recovering is very difficult. Think leverage and points of control. You have more reach, but you're not effective with it.


6. I really, really hate Lindybeige.


7. Overhand never really went away. The Bayeux tapestry shows the grip being used well beyond our time frame.


8. Your opponent probably also has a shield, which means a lot of him is covered. Unless you can get to his side, the only vulnerable parts are his face and behind the shield. You need to be able to reach over his shield to strike at the face or neck with your spear, which you simply cannot do effectively with an underhand grip.


Because of the above, I would argue that even levy troops with minimal training would tend toward using an overhand grip. Imagine the first day of your incredibly short training: Keep your shield up and in front of you and strike with your spear above the shield. Don't move the shield away from you or your dead.


Cavalry is a different matter, but if a cavalryman is using a normal length spear of about 7 to 8 feet, he would probably use an overhand grip.


1. Balance is still an issue. Because of this, the spear is unlikely to extend much beyond the horse being ridden. These aren't going to be shock cavalry. The spear is a primary weapon and you run into the same issues as infantry. If your opponent has a shield, you want to reach over it regardless of whether they are mounted or on foot. A downward strikes against infantry would be particularly effective in this case and easy to do. An underhand would mean contorting your arm. Also, the average horse of the day wasn't very many hands high, so you wouldn't be riding that much above the shield of an infantryman.


2. The development of the kontos and xyston change things by allowing a couched grip so that a charge could be made. But those aren't really close-in weapons to be used after a charge. So totally different game here despite their similarity.


So to conclude, our evidence is limited pictorially, but leans toward overhand. Based on the argument I made above, when it comes to choosing between one or the other I would stick with an overhand grip.

This is some input from a team member who was heavily into reenacting.

My personal experience with spears is from being at attacker on foot. I am an impatient fighter to some degree, and hate 'the dance' as you circle each other for a long time.


Overhand, for me, is the way to go when the spear is around your height or a bit more (I'm 6'0"). With a thureos type shield, overhand allows a range of thrusts that can be lightning fast. I think that the forearm and wrist is the most important part of overhand spear use, although the pectoral, shoulder, and upper arm of your spear arm should not be lacking either. You can snap the spear back for a feint or forward for a jab lightning fast, lower or raise it and just do everything with much more accuracy and speed and, after while, it's almost like an extension of your arm and the spear point naturally goes where your eyes are looking at without effort.


New players fall for the feints or lunges, and they instinctively raise the shield, sometimes high enough to block their eyes, and lean back away from the thrust. In the meantime you can be moving opposite their shield side and try to strike.


Experienced players generally will bend their knees to add more body coverage behind their shield, but they seldom let the shield bock their eyes. They don't lean back much, so as your body moves forward following your spear thrust they time their move towards you so get in a shot before you can move your arm back and ready another strike, if y'all can picture that.


Still, the sword is what real men use and I would swap out any spear to have a sword as my attack weapon

Although we may have mixed it to a small extent or depending on the situation if we could have.
Small note by the way...underhand/overhand have a common misconception apparently it means the hand is 'over' the spear for overhand (anotherwords underhand as most people think of it = overhand), while underhand means the hand is under the spear. I forget that myself and don't really understand it either but apparently that's how it is.

[excubitor]

It seems to me that the added fatigue of holding a spear overhand should be taken into consideration. You simply waste more energy holding the damn thing up, if you're doing that for an hour or two, than if you hold it underarm at your side.

hoplite battles didnt last that long,many times the two forces didnt even make contact,the less trained/disciplined/low morale plalanx just melted away.

[Zajuts149]

Matt Easton has some points on this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6p93xUp9GrQ

As has been said above: In formation, overhand makes more sense. Also. it is tiresome to do activities that you're not used to, but training will make you fit to the task. In basic training, we did a lot of callisthenics with our 9 lb G-3 rifles to make our arms and shoulders used to the weight.
Some years later I tried my hands as a fisherman. The first weeks, I went to bed and got up in the morning with hands that were all knotted up like claws. Then I got used to the 16-30 hour work days, and it went much smoother, lifting 120 lb cases of fish like it was nothing.
As Matt has said elsewhere: If you train for a while it gets much easier. And you can rest the spear on your shoulder if it gets heavy.
Btw. which is heavier, the shield or the spear? No matter how you hold your spear you have to hold up that shield when you're in formation. I think that will wear you out more than holding the spear in overarm.

[Nightsh4de]

I´m no expert but: You have to think how spears work in tandem with a shield, and how interlocking round shields provide a rest for the overhand position, for the first and second rows at least. Think about how you hold a pool queue. Thats probbaly how Hoplites did it, and why its so important to keep your shield in place.

The overhand grip gives the ability to stab downwards, forwards neck level (when rested on the shoulder) but always over the shield into the neck/face/chest. The problem is the tail of the spear, if you´re not careful you´ll hit your friends to the sides and behind you with it. Interestingly you can also easily stab to the left from this position, but not to the right, which probably explains why formations rotated to the right. Stabbing right you´ll find your neck in the way of the tail and it feels weaker (stabbing inwards vs stabbing outwards)

Also the design of helmets probably evolved to deflect spear stabs coming from above making clubs, axes and swords more useful since they aim to crush the helmet into your skull, break collarbones, dislocate shoulders etc

But then you also need to look at shield designs, if you notice, a round shield doesnt allow you to stab into the stomach (mid level thrust) because it gets in the way (especially in a shield wall) A rectangular shield does.

I think I´ve seen some shield designs that provide a buttress for underhand spear usage, even when interlocked with other shields. They look like an 8. I´d suppose they relied on the helmets and shoulder/chest armor to deflect overhand blows while they pool queued stomachs and groins from mid level.

A very haphazard comment but maybe it helps

[Slaytaninc]

Nightsh4de, I believe you're thinking of the Boetian shield with the cutouts that Lindybeige mentions above. I was browsing this issue on Historum and someone posted that video. It was countered that we've never found evidence beyond art of that shield, so to say "well the art is wrong," and then to talk about something in art is a bit of a double-standard.

The debate over the hoplite is overhand vs. "high underhand" as far as I can tell. "High underhand" has its own issues. One, it would have been hard to transition into from a lower underhand grip to a high grip when wearing a rigid curaiss, and the shield would be in the way if done in formation. Two, it leaves the armpit exposed. Another one is that tests have indicated a power disparity of 5 to 1 in favor of the overhand grip: http://www.argospress.com/jbt/articl...8-abstract.pdf

Finally, Greeks had experience with throwing javelins, using many of the same muscles. In the same way that American boys played baseball and threw a ball, throwing a javelin was a common activity, even if men of means didn't use them in war.

EDIT: Pardon me, not the best link for that particular study.

[Nightsh4de]

It was countered that we've never found evidence beyond art of that shield, so to say "well the art is wrong," and then to talk about something in art is a bit of a double-standard.

I´m just saying that for an underhand grip, that shield design could be more useful, whether that design is real or not I don´t know.

But leaving specific shield designs to one side, the main issue with the under grip, is how do you nullify a blow coming from above when you have your spear held at stomach level? you must rely on armor, hence the comment on improved helmets etc.

Honestly I´d be very nervous about locking my only free arm to my side, trusting my armor, just to get the chance for a thrust at the abdomen.

Even if you could guarantee my helmet and shoulder armour would hold perfectly, I find it hard to believe that a spear thrust to the abdomen would pierce a wall of shields plus armor. The only situation that might work is when charging, bracing the spear against the armpit, but after that, what else? I don´t think stabbing around blindly while you´re turtled up in your shield guarantees a kill as well as being able to look over the wall and stab around freely.

Just like you, overhand makes sense to me more, but who knows what fighting philosophy or technique may have been used or tried in the past. One on one, underhand may have worked because you have space to stab 180 degrees (or more!) around the right of the shield, but in a formation, you´d be hitting everyone around you with your stick if you tried that.

Depends on spacing, length of the spear, what the oponent is using, what your shield is supposed to do for you etc. But definitely for a hoplon shield, overhand in a formation is much more convincing

[Nightsh4de]

Actually it may be both! Just try the following:

Take a shield (or a pillow in my case) and a spear (my broom) and take a side stance, braced against the shield. Now hold the spear underhand, your fist hip level.

The spear is across your abdomen more or less right? Ok, now without moving your elbow or shoulder, lift your fist until the spear lies pretty much across your cheek. Rest the spear head on your shield´s edge (just like you were playing pool)

Underhand suddenly becomes overhand

Not true overhand, its more limited in range of motion but you can still stab downwards over the shield

It seems I may have misjudged, but not completely. This manouvre is not possible with interlocking round shields, only with a rectangular one and a slight space between spearmen. Actually the "wings" of the round shield are not useful if you space out a bit becuse there is dead space behind them, so you can eliminate them (and make a rectangle) making a small space through which you could move the spear around from under had to overhand completely freely

Cool to think about anyhow

[QuintusSertorius]

Men of means, if they were of a more traditional bent, would still use javelins to hunt.

[haereticum]

It's more than ten years since EB 1, yet this topic is still popping up. What happen to the agreement "I shall read more history" during installation?

[Rad]

Trying to look tough on the Internet, good for you!

Unless you are actually a historian, Ive probably read more history than you. Even if you are, I am not far behind.
Since there are no surviving weapon manuals for that time period, the topic is open to debate and discussion. Please tell me how that is wrong.

[+Marius+]

Trying to look tough on the Internet, good for you!

No, I am merely mocking your manner of debating.

You state the issue of a lack of proof against your interlocutors while at the same flaunting baseless arguments without any proof whatsoever.

Unless you are actually a historian, Ive probably read more history than you. Even if you are, I am not far behind.

lol

Since there are no surviving weapon manuals for that time period, the topic is open to debate and discussion. Please tell me how that is wrong.

It's not wrong, it is just misguided.

I myself dislike the overhand grip and hate the fact that my childhood image of the spear|shield is wrong, but that is irrelevant, because the evidence does not care how "clunky" and "illogical" overhand is.


The fact is that the vast majority of pictorial depictions show the overhand grip.

...and considering that those depictions are basically all we have;

Case closed.

[Rad]

No, I am merely mocking your manner of debating.

That is the preferred method of attack of the mighty Internet warriors. It is how they win Internet glory. You were trying to look tough.

You state the issue of a lack of proof against your interlocutors while at the same flaunting baseless arguments without any proof whatsoever.

I didnt do that. My arguments came from my own experience using a spear and other peoples experiences.

The fact is that the vast majority of pictorial depictions show the overhand grip.

I doubt that is a fact. I could be wrong, you could be wrong. If we went and visited every single museum containing artwork depicting spears and made a list, then it could be resolved. If you have the cash, will and time, please do.

[+Marius+]

instead of being insulting and dragging me into the mud to join their merry band, there wouldnt be a war - there would be a civilized debate.

When were you insulted?

That is the preferred method of attack of the mighty Internet warriors.

Nope.

It is how they win Internet glory.

lol

You were trying to look tough.

I didnt do that. My arguments came from my own experience using a spear and other peoples experiences.

No, your initial argument came from your own experience, read the posts you wrote after that through the discussion.

I doubt that is a fact. I could be wrong, you could be wrong. If we went and visited every single museum containing artwork depicting spears and made a list, then it could be resolved. If you have the cash, will and time, please do.

Actually, it is a fact, simply because the gap of evidence is so wide that there is not even any doubt about it.

Finding depictions of overhand grip in depictions of ancient formation fighting is quite easy as they are everywhere, while finding underhand grip depictions in formation fighting is very hard, in fact, I am not even sure if any even exist.

How about you find a couple of underhand grip formation fighting depictions?

Because all I see is overhand everywhere with a bit of underhand in standing/marching(not actually fighting) and a some in 1vs1 dueling;

https://www.google.hr/search?q=hopli...eDBvkQ_AUIBigB

[Rad]

When were you insulted?

This does not apply solely to you, but to some others as well.

Lets see... not giving a damn about my arguments was a nice start. Ignoring every good point I made and not trying the slightest to give a counterargument is insulting.

Twisting my words to make it appear that I only think that underhand is viable is the second one.
For the last damn time, I will say it. I believe that both grips were used, however I prefer underhand because of reach, speed, ease of use and accuracy.


The "witty" remark about reading more history was the last straw.

No, your initial argument came from your own experience, read the posts you wrote after that through the discussion.

Please point them out, and I will try to explain-reply whatever you think I did.

Actually, it is a fact, simply because the gap of evidence is so wide that there is not even any doubt about it.

Finding depictions of overhand grip in depictions of ancient formation fighting is quite easy as they are everywhere, while finding underhand grip depictions in formation fighting is very hard, in fact, I am not even sure if any even exist.

Do you know how much trouble I am having to construct my medieval kit? It is bad enough that there is a limited number of resources to work with, but to add to the misery, not every museum or private owner puts the material on the freaking world wide web. Googling hoplites in art or something similar is not a credible way of proving a point.