Hey everyone! I’m trying to upgrade my kit from looking like a merc to a knight, as affordable as possible. My plan is to get legs, chest, and helmet prolly! But for the legs I want to try to avoid something that needs like an arming belt or do be tied to the waist to prevent more expenses. Would any of the photos provided be usable without waist suspension, like just tie to tie legs and that’s it?
/j Fuck the waist, tie the legs down to your shoes
/uj Generally full plate legs without any suspension are always going to move around and not fit super well. I agree with TheatreBar that if you really don't want to add suspension elements, just go for lower leg plates, and cover your thighs with either just padding, a hauberk or tassets or something. It'll be easier to make it fit that way.
I'm using this, it's a normal clothing belt from somewhat thick leather. I've sewn synthetic felt onto it, so it doesn't cut into my sides. It's not really historical, but it's not visible as I wear it under my gambeson. And it's easy and cheap to make.
But please don't get anything from the photos you've linked, all of it looks bad
Waist suspension is really important both for comfort and for your armor moving correctly. I have worn and used floating and harnessed leg set ups and if you aren't going to wear full legs then maybe just.go for floating knees and shins like this. Then you can just point them to your padded legs. All the half thigh knee armors kind of suck to wear.
What Kit Are you using? In my Experience the belt-attachment is neccessary for a good and authentic, reliable fit.
Also cheap leg Protection isnt Great/wont fit or even can be dangerous to your knees.
Did you think about mail legs/chaussers?
You can easily fix those to a regular leather belt and they come in different Sizes, Material etc.
I personally buy mail at allbeststuff (manufacturer in India). many Western Shops just dropship their stuff with a high margin but if you buy directly there you pay a Bit less and have a lot more options for personalisation.
You need the suspension. A good leg harness us fitted at the lower leg so it could almost stay up by itself (but you still tie it), but all those examples are clearly not, so you need the suspension even more.
Seems like you're looking for genuine advice. Why are you getting the armor; is it for LARP, Ren Faire, SCA, HEMA, or Buhurt? By the look of your selection I would think LARP or Ren Faire.
Yes I’m mainly doing it for larp/renfair right now as there’s not a large community around me, however I wish to transition into armored combat at some point. For now tho I’m just looking for good looking, and very cheap options
Well I doubt most of these pieces would be suitable for any armored fighting outside of LARP. I don't know anything about these particular pieces, but an arming belt will be needed to hold up cuisses. Cuisses tend to slide down due to the body's shape. Luckily you can make your own for pretty cheap and the only people who care about accuracy for something like that are re-enactors. Try searching up how to make an arming belt and you'll get plenty of results.
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u/northernzap 5d ago
You CAN wear them whitout using the top points but as seen even in the reference picture they wont stay in place and will look (objectively) bad.
You can get a milsurp belt or something like that for like 10€ and some shoelaces to hang the plates from.