Introduction to Heavy Red

(By Derath)

## Introduction

Choosing Heavy Red as a primary style is a hard road (And I think that’s an understatement). It’s by far one of the hardest styles to get good with. Although once you’ve pushed into footman level skill with a heavy red, it’s actually not very difficult to become ‘great’ with a red. It’s a strange learning curve that every experienced red fighter will agree with me on. I think the best way to start an introduction is to list some strengths and weaknesses of the style.

### Strengths

* Most dominant style of two handed sword if used properly
* Best styled red for maximizing shield breaking
* Most powerful weapon style capable of breaking through most other styles’ defenses
* Strong combat range

### Weaknesses

* Very susceptible to archer fire and pike suppression
* Difficult weapon to maneuver when being rushed
* Probably the slowest weapons in Antioch
* In duels, skilled shields can be incredibly overwhelming

## Picking a Weapon Style

So if you’re not too deterred by the promise of a difficult road, we’ll get into some less obvious details:

When I think of heavy reds in Modern Antioch, I really only consider two weapons to fall into this category: The Nodachi and the Kelv. While the difference between the two isn’t quite as vast as we’d like to make it seem at times, each weapon does perform better in certain areas. Here’s a brief description:

**Nodachi** – Nodachis are thinner, smaller, and shorter variants of Kelvs. They are naturally quicker and easier to maneuver in closer quarters. They can struggle in the line to actually reach the enemy shields in certain situations. *(Now understand when I say ‘struggle’ I only mean by comparison to a Kelv or pole reds. The bottom line is: if you’re skilled you won’t even notice it!)*

**Kelv** – Kelvs are iconic Antioch weapons and are more focused on power and range. They are longer, heavier, and sturdier than Nodachis. Kelvs have an easy time hacking people from a formidable range while maintaining a safe distance. Kelvs struggle in close quarters and are naturally slower than a Nodachi counterpart.

I used to believe that in a duel a Nodachi had a weapon advantage over a Kelv, but the more I experiment with the new generation weapons, I see there is no advantage either way. It’s all personal choice!

> So if you like to fight a bit closer and be a bit faster: Pick a Nodachi!
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> If you like to stay back and hack away and be a bit stronger: Pick a Kelv!
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## General Tips

*(For now these tips make the assumption you aren’t just stuck in the line. We will talk about what to do in a line later)*

When you decide to ‘primary’ as a heavy red you’re going to have to get some concepts down before you attempt to best other’s primary style. You’re biggest focus is going to be how to up your defensive game with a weapon that should be slower than everyone else’s.

1. **Footwork** - The main way skilled fighters overcome this obstacle is focusing on footwork. Sadly the luxury of being sure footed and planted is not reserved for heavy red. If you are fighting: You better be moving around! With footwork you make their charges and/or retaliations less threatening because they struggle to reach you. Your ultimate goal is to kite them around while your hack and chop them down. The best heavy red users are often judged on their footwork over their sword work. Your sword is usually longer than your enemies, abuse that fact.
2. **Armor** – Armor can be one of the most powerful tools for a heavy red user. A simple chain vest offers up an amazing amount of protection for no restriction. The most common weapons on the field are blue weapons and giving yourself the option to tank a shot can be incredibly game breaking. If you don’t have a chainmail vest, I suggest you get yourself to forges!
	1. Alternatively because of the new armor-tier system the gosuko styled armors will take this passive advantage and double it!
3. **Swing with purpose** – A big problem with new fighters is they try to emulate flashy moves they’ve seen somewhere. Limiting your swings to purpose driven attacks is something you’ll want to get into the habit of doing very quickly. Your weapon is slow by comparison to just about everyone else’s *(and just because it’s strong **does** **not** mean that smaller weapons can’t stop it)*. When you swing you’ll need to have already formulated in your mind why you’re making such an attack. If you’re not sure: You’re doing it wrong!
4. **Fight styles you struggle with** – So many fighters get so caught up on weapon advantage tables that it’s silly! Refusing to fight someone because you just assume you’ll lose is the product of a permanent scrub. Nobody in the world can help you get better if you don’t even try. Everyone loses… a lot! It’s part of developing your skill. If you’re afraid of getting beat then you’re accepting **stagnation**.

## How will this style perform against others?

Here’s where the learning curve comes in. To a novice fighter, a heavy red seems to under perform in comparisons to the other styles. Many fighters fall into giving up silly excuses such as “it’s unfair! They have weapon advantage! I can’t win!” This self-defeating ideology is so toxic that I have watched our most promising fighters degrade into shattered ego warriors who barely function at a fraction of their true potential.

Simply giving up because you feel overwhelmed is exactly what a scrub does. If you are reading this: I can safely assume you don’t want to be a scrub. That being said: There are some weapon styles that you will most likely struggle with as a novice. The key to overcoming these battles comes from drilling out techniques and simply training against fighters that beat you.

As a new fighter, you may struggle against:

### **Pikes**

Pikes and spears can be overwhelming when you first fight them. While they are much less threatening in duels, they can still give you problems. The problem most new fighters have is that they stay in the spear’s ‘primary range’ and attempt to survive there. The most effective technique against pikes is relatively simple.

* **Stand in a way to bait the pike to make an unsafe approach** - There are many ways of doing this. You can stand off to an angle or far outside of normal thrusting range. The problem with standing very far back, however, is that a pike will often be able to recover before you can close the distance.
* **Get the deflection** – Important to note that if you do parry a thrust, **DO NOT BACK OFF**. If you back off you reset the fight into the pike's favor once again. *(big thing to mention here is make sure you’re not deflecting the pike into another area of your body!)*
* **Commit to the fight** – Once you've safely parried, you need to immediately rush! Once you’ve started your rush, any hesitation will get you killed! I see a lot of fighters perfectly execute the parry and rush half of the way and just stop. Pikes can recover faster than you can in most situations *(and if you know anything about the plethora of weapon styles, you’ll know that’s kind of sad because they have a SLOW recovery when rushed).*
* **Brutally assault** – The key here is to swing rapidly and aggressively at key areas of your opponent. Most good pikes will go into a defensive stance, and from there they cannot mount much of an offense.
	+ If they have a sidearm and they go for it: adjust your range of fighting! The dumbest thing you can do here is stay within arm’s reach and attempt to maneuver your big heavy sword faster than a one handed blue. When they’ve shifted from Pikeman to a pseudo-shield just pick them apart with your superior range. I find an effective technique against pikes with a side arm is: as they are going for their sidearm… Just stab them! Their defense is tailored to stop wide swings. Making a quick stab usually throws them off.

Naturally this technique requires quite a bit of practice to execute properly. But in all of my years of fighting this is still the most effective way to increase the likelihood of your survival.

Now when you fight a pike on the war line, the story is **VERY** different. In my humble opinion, you should almost all but give up on the concept of you killing an enemy pike in the line with your sword. I usually relocate and fight where there are less pikes. BUT if that is not an option I find it’s best to ‘go spear fishing’.

What this means is to watch the enemy spearman, and when they go to stab, grab the shaft of the spear and pull them into your line! It’s best to tell everyone, “I have their spear!” *(Watashi-WAAAAA!)* Usually your teammates will help you pull them into your line. It’s a sure way for a heavy red user to eliminate the pike threat.

### **Shields**

Shields should be your biggest fixation. Your worth as a heavy red is manifested in your ability to counter shields. In duels a good shield will be your first “seemingly unbeatable” match. Every new heavy red feels this way! But there are techniques that will increase your likelihood of success. And eventually you won’t feel that shields have any advantage over you (until the **elite levels** of fighting, where this dynamic shifts again to outside of your favor).

* **Footwork** – Hey we talked about this before! This is where it is most important! **If you stand still any scrub shield will make short work of you**. But if you can learn to maneuver yourself in a way so that the shield cannot generate enough momentum to overwhelm you: you give yourself just enough time to make enough swings to cut them down. Your sword outranges them in an insane way and you can always get at least one swing off on them before they can reach you, so when you are mobile you can possibly get 4+ swings in. If you can manage to do that without taking damage, the battle is yours!
* **Hit Location** – Heavy red have a unique ability over the other weapons, sometimes they can break defenses. So if you fixate your shots to be on the edge of the shield, there is a very real possibility you will not only deliver a solid shield hit but actually break through and hit their body too! Many chops I’ve made on the tops of shields actually broke their defenses and hit the enemy’s shoulder, effectively killing them in one swing. The harder you swing the more shock you can deliver to a shield (this slows their advance). But this section would seem too obvious if I didn’t tell you to watch the enemy’s legs as well. Many shields don’t guard their legs when they charge. So if you notice it; it’s best to take advantage of it. If the shield can’t rush you down they are truly helpless against you.
* **Block** – There are going to be many times that you can’t kite a shield fast enough to freely swing at them without suffering some kind of damage. So what you need to be prepared for is the inevitable shots a shield will deliver to you. There are many styles of blocking you can employ (and I won’t bore you going over every kind!), but the important thing to remember is as you are blocking the enemy, you **NEED** to side step out of the situation to mount the rest of your offense. You want to be nowhere near their sword when you fight a shield because they will absolutely kill you before you can swing.

In a line shields are much less threatening. They can’t really contest your offense and if they do charge you: they will more than likely be instantly sniped by your line. The big thing to remember is to only come out to swing when it’s safe. When the situation begins to become unsafe, just tuck back into your line!

Your focus on the line as a heavy red is the shield not the person. What that means is once you’ve broken the shield, move on! They are of no concern to you anymore. The line needs you to break every other shield there, so don’t waste any time!

### **Ranged Fighters**

Sadly there isn’t a whole lot you can do versus a ranged fighter. In a duel its best to rush them as fast as you can and make last second dodges to their fire. It’s absolutely not a for sure thing but if you stand around and play passively, they will undoubtedly kill you.

In the line you’ll want to make sure you know where archers are before you start your shield breaking process. Keep an eye out for them because they will be seeking you out! Paying attention to your entire surroundings instead of using tunnel vision on shields will keep you alive. If the fire is so suppressive that you can’t even move out, look for javelins, and gather ammo for your side’s archer. Don’t just go inactive! Play support for the minute. Every minute you stand around is a minute you could have been helping your team win.

### **Pole Reds**

Pole reds are only threatening if they use them as if they were pikes. Refer to the pike section to figure that out. If they use it to swing, you have a pretty massive advantage because their swings are so slow and limited. I won’t insult your intelligence; I know you can handle this situation!

In a line there isn’t much of a difference from pikes aside from the fact that you can’t drag them across the line. If they are breaking shields, don’t be afraid to intercept their weapon with yours to disrupt that kind of devastation. Like a pike you should almost all but give up on killing them with your sword.

You have a natural advantage over most other styles, just don’t get caught in a position where they can hard stop your sword and rush you down. With fast fighters it’s often best to take away their legs and then unleash hell!

## Your Job in the Line

**Stay Active! Don’t be timid!**

1. Break shields (once shield is broken: **MOVE ON**)
2. Support your team when breaking shields is not an option (gather ammo, block enemy red swings, grab enemy spears, throw javelins/rocks at high priority targets, etc.)
3. Be aware of pikes and archers

Positioning is a big deal as well. Think about where you’re needed most. A quick glance over the different situations in the line should tell you exactly where you need to go. Don’t forget at the end of the day you are at the mercy of your shield wall, so pay attention to their needs. As we’ve discussed in the introduction to war document, be a team player!

*This is an introduction. Further detailed scenarios will appear in intermediate/advanced reports.*