Why they’re necessary, why I don’t like them, why we’re doing a terrible job with them, and what we can do better.

Look, I’m not a huge fan of the fencing that happens in tournaments. That doesn’t mean I think Sport HEMA is bad. Tournaments build community and let’s face it, we’re all nerds to one degree or another and we need real-life community. Tournaments give us a place to meet, share ideas, look at gear, test ourselves and our way of fighting against other regions to see what holds up, and generally judge each other (along with actually judging each other). These opportunities are vital to HEMA. Without pressure tests, we can slip into McDojo-ism like Artax sinking into the swamp and we all know practitioners, in life or online, who suffer from never actually having to fight anyone. In this way HEMA is a bit like the origin story of MMA: it gives us a chance to really fight and to see what works just in a much less obnoxious format. This is key. HEMA needs its sport version, but we’re missing an opportunity to push it, to really explore possibilities in our get-togethers.

I came into HEMA from other martial arts, along with sport fencing, many years ago (too many). Back then there were many different tournament styles: continuous fencing, Longpoint-style rules, SoCal rules, Swordfish etc. This was all right, it at least gave you options. Each ruleset gave you the opportunity to optimize for certain actions and to “game” the format. Even still, I don’t think we pushed it far enough. I think I know why.

Many of us, myself included, came to HEMA because modern sport fencing is only vaguely related to a martial art. It can feel like tag with car antennas (those used to be a thing, look it up). So we wanted swords, real swords, safe ones. Then we needed armor. Then we needed rules of engagement, but they couldn’t be the same as fencing, so we made different sets. Unfortunately, that’s where the problems started. We still used essentially the same event format as Olympic fencing. It has advantages: it’s there, it works, it’s fun, many of us came up in it. But like Olympic fencing, the more we compete with each other, the more standardized the rules have to get. Otherwise who’s to say who’s better at what? We look to HEMA Ratings (and I love HEMA Ratings; that’s a rough job to do for free). But to make it work, we have to compare apples to apples. Again, our tournaments get narrower; we slip ever deeper into the swamp.

There is good news, though. I’ll try to pull us out, though that analogy may be a little on-the-nose, and I don’t see a luck dragon appearing to solve anything. I digress. In this blog Have a page called Recipes where I’m going to drop more tournament formats. You’ll be able to use these, some you should just use for training games others might be legit, Some will be dumb. I’m not your dad; I’m not going to loom over you and make you change. But I want you to look. Pick one. Challenge yourself; challenge your school. Take the opportunity to unspecialize and get back to HEMA, not just Olympic fencing with bigger swords. If we wanted to do that, that game already exists.