Knights Are Useless In War

So the knights I'm referring to are those heavy steel-plated guys walking around with their armor cavalry. I'm not referring to heavy cavalries, like those Polish Hussar. Although knights means the social hierarchy status in medieval ages, I don't know what else to fucking call them so fuck it.
First thing first, They're fucking useless, i don't get why people put them in novels making them like a moving fucking tank or whatever. I mean Even if you romanticizes them, its only common sense to think if they're even practical. Since the time they're useful for a heavy charge, is negligible.
Honestly, I've carried in full gear because i'm a legionnaire. And yes its heavy however the difference between the two is like one being fuck in the ass while running while the other is simply being kick in the ass. I may carry like 30 kilo on my back plus body armor and famas however i'm still able to march quite smoothly even if its killing me. Those knights, They have weights all over their body meaning that they have to exert more muscles in certain areas to move, such as leg. (Potentially up to 50kilos) There's a huge difference, but is that all? Now they can barely move and when they do, they can passed out. Those helmets they're wearing, it can definitely save them if they get swung at. But you can't fucking breathe in that, those usually only have a small hole for the eyes and mouth. Its basically like having a gas mask with a dick down your throat. So now you're heavy encumber and squirming around on the ground trying to get your helmet off because you can't breathe. Then when you do, which is literally impossible, you can't even get up. When you do used your sword, which you can barely display any swordmanship since you're fighting like a damn disable person. Most of the time, you just lay on the ground grasping for air while the enemy fresh and ready simply stab a spot where there's no protection. Like this battle, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Agincourt
Knights were fucking useless.

 

First off.
Watch this documentary.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/ancient/secrets-shining-knight.html

Second.
Calling knight geek @seriouslynope .

Third.
uhhhhh stuff.

 

peasants/conscripted soldiers couldn't afford armor, fullknight armor was mainly for cerimonial guards or for the safety of nobleman at the back against stray arrows.
and as a matter of fact, most calvary wasn't used for full assault charges but to root retreating troops and flanking

 

Ummm you do know knights in armor were not fighting on foot. Their role was to charge enemy ranks and pierce through while the rest of army was attacking disorganized ranks. Like in that Agincourt battle the whole point of cavalry is to be mobile. If knights are stopped in hostile ranks or their horses got shot they yes they are pretty much dead meat. So there is no need for endurance since knights did not stay and fight if they could. They pierced through. Since they were expensive elite there were not that many of them.

 

Knights are usually on horseback, and I cant remember where but it was said the armor they wear in battle is lighter.

 

Everyone knows that while Knights are toted as the powerful warrior of the battlefield, they will always fall short of the German Panzer.

 

100 knights wearing 30 kg steel armor each, Now imagine the 3 tonnes of metal charging towards you at around 40-50 kmph on horse back ! Doesn't matter if there are a thousand of you, the sheer momentum of the knight's charge can make anyone piss their pants.

 

You dare look down on the one-knight-stand?

 

True however the chances of them ever charging is the thing. If they can find a plain field without the slightly terrain problem then yes. But i seriously doubt it.

 

So much BS assumptions, that I can't bother to go through everything one by one.

 

Wow. A brilliant analysis there man. Are you an idiot? Metalworking back then was way harder and had to be done by hand. Also, metal was harder to mine and way more expensive. If heavy armor was worthless, it never would have been used. The Battle of Agincourt was certainly an embarrassing defeat for knights but it was only possible because they were so overconfident after generations of armor being unstoppable. War was way different in the old days. Two sides would show up, set up camps, and launch attacks in waves until one side lost. A knight would bring his armor with him, and one or more squires would help him put it on in his tent. Then he would match a few yards to reach the battlefield. If he wasn't riding a horse, that is. They were fully capable of swinging their weapons, and they were impervious to most attacks. It didn't matter if they were slower than unarmored opponents because it was a battle. Both sides had to fight, and a knight could just keep moving and attacking until he hit an enemy.

 

Well, they were indeed walking tanks. Some research claimed that the bodkin arrows used in Agincourt actually couldn't penetrate French plate armour, the only thing they could do was deliver lucky shots at the joints. After all, bodkin arrows were invented to penetrate chain mails, not plate mails. But if you're firing 6000 arrows at full-plated knights, at least 60 arrows would've hit the undefended joints, even at 1% critical hit chance. The real reason for the results of Agincourt was because the battlefield rained and the ground was soggy, also because of the landscape itself. Agincourt looked flat, but it wasn't flat at all. At several locations, there were steep climbs, which prevented the fully armoured knights from ascending or descending, forcing them to either go around the height difference or try to scale the muddy landscape, fully armoured.

As for encumbrance, I'd agree it was really heavy even if we're talking about battle plates instead of tournament plates. Plus, the view in the helmet was so constricting, I would have to constantly move my head to see someone coming at me from the sides or the back. Metatron said knights would've trained to avoid backstabs, but I don't believe that at all. How could you avoid backstabs when your view is only around 90 degrees of whichever direction your head is facing? Add to the fact that your whole head is inside a tin can, how would you be able to tell where that muffled footstep sound is from in the first place?

 

you're thinking of jousting armor.... sure jousting armor was like 40 kg and you couldn't really move but that wasn't the point of them, the point of them was that you were able to take a blunt lance to the chest without dying as it was a sport and you generally want to beat your opponent not kill their ass.

a normal full plate that looks like

Spoiler: this

weighs about 25-30 kg at most and is very flexible i have seen people do rock climbing and summersaults in such suits. sure you wont be able to take a lance to the chest but they were pretty damned good at keeping you alive.

 

This thread is weird.

Knights were low level nobility, land holders. When they did fight it was always on horse back.

This thread is some sort of bizarre mismatch of fictional romaniticization of knights as warriors and confusing ceremonial armor with combat armor.

 

not to mention most of the time peasents were conscripted with no experience in war, no good equipment and then were made to stand against knight charges you mentioned.

 

The thing is, it's pretty heavy BUT the weight is distributed over the entire body. You still retain almost (if not all) of your movabilty.

As earlier mentioned you can still do rockclimbing and stuff like that. I have even seen a movie where a dude in fullplate was doing acrobatics...

 

I'm not devalueing steel plated armor you imbecile, i'm saying that you can't fight basically in those armor. Fighting in those type of condition wearing 50kilos is practically impossible, nobody in the world military could do so easily. They may swing and kill a few but if they're lucky. If you can wear that type of armor and still be able to fight for hours on end then i have nothing to say for a superhuman like you...

 

except for the fact that tests have been made, and your movement with the standard knight armor is not actually that bad, while it enables you to pretty much ignore swords

 

Ki

At Agincourt french knights wore best armour available at time - which was tempered carbon steel, by the way. Arrows were expendables, always made from cheapest materials, especially those supplied-by-his-majesty army crap. People with basic mechanics knowledge can already guess from there, that even super-elastic bow will not do more than barely dent the armour in such conditions. There are some calculations about kinetic force etc, but tempered steel is DAMN good at spreading out the shock - like modern vests, actually. So yeah, only very unfortunate knights died from arrows.
And no, they had no real issues with field of view. People tend to forget that helmets had visors with quick release buttons, and quite often helmets were taken off after the first lance charge (there are tons of stories about noses and ears chopped off - surprise). lances broke, helmets off, and on with hand weapons.

And no, knights didn't fight "alone". Each actually had a squad with him. Squires (young knights), militia etc. So it was more like a small unit around well armoured commander.
People weren't really dumb back then, ya know.

 

Err, if that's true then they're are pretty damn impressive. But i don't think I could fight for a hour swinging a sword in that gear, you would be too worn down. Afterall, battle lasted for hours at a time back then. Useful being a heavy infantry.