Question about jousting

[Ruusunpuna]

Hey, I'm working on a mini gameproject in Unity. It's supposed to be a little jousting game.

I thought of a game mechanic where you would try to move your shield to deflect the opponents lance. But I'm a bit uncertain on how jousting really works.

In videos I've seen the knights either have a small shield as a part of their armor and they can't move it. In other ones they hold a shield that basically covers their whole torso. Is the shield supposed to be the target for your lance or could you try to hit beyond it into the opponents armor? What's the deal in jousting? I suppose there's more to it than just trying to hold the lance so that it hits in the middle of the opponent?

For my gameplay mechanic I'd like to have a smaller shield that you try to catch the opponents lance with and thus deflect it. Is this in anyway similar to real jousting? My game doesn't have breaking lances, you only try to unhorse your opponent.

I thought someone on these forums might have some knowledge so please share with me?

 

[zhuliks]

I suppose its the shield that you should be targeting. Armor wasnt cheap and lance hit would defo damage it even blunt. Purpose of jousting was to train your lance targeting I guess. Only counter measure I can imagine is trying to glance lance hit to the shield so that it just goes to the side.

Imagine this is a knight from top view facing that -> direction O\___ with a shield in left arm and lance in right, he would position his shield at an angle trying to make enemy lance to slide sideways along his shield - glance away. For it to work lance probably had to hit shields left half, because otherwise - if it hits right half, it wil push shield into the knight, turning it the other way and pushing knight off the saddle.

If you are facing the knight riding at you it would look like:
............O......__________
lance..Knight..|hit...|avoid|
..........horse...|this.|this..|
.......................\.....|...../
.........................\_.|. _/

So thats what you could use in your game - aim at inner half of enemy shield, while trying to make enemy hit your outer half of the shield

 

[Ruusunpuna]

Thanks for the reply! Yes, that's kinda what I thought. I'm not sure how deep the shield-lance collision mechanic will be since I have to finish the game in quite a short time. But I think my mechanic will be okay even if it's not 100% realistic. If I can I will maybe make the lance react differently based on where on the shield it hits. Cheers!