[Archers] Pennsic

[Holly Gibbons]

Dear beloved Archer-Devotees of the list:

A couple of clarifications, if I may.

(1) When I say the "back 40" behind the trailers, I mean way back in the area 
where there are about 40 trailers, not right behind the archery tents where 
there are two trailers. Which area did you try to use before, Janyn?

(2) The need to restrict the sheer number of archers is not just an issue of 
target-life. I am sorry if I left that impression. A novelty populace shoot open 
to every archer at Pennsic is WAY beyond the scope of what any of us can handle 
in terms of time and effort. There is already a populace shoot: in place at 
Pennsic -- it is the war points targets. I am interested in seeing a 
challenging, difficult shoot for a kingdom/individual championship separate from 
that.

This may well be the point at which all our discussions fall apart, as Dealla 
says they have in the past - - we all have a different vision of what this shoot 
should look like and we all apparently have a different vision of what the very 
purpose of this shoot is. 


To reiterate: I am interested in working for those Atlantian Archers who are 
shut out of the championship shoot because the East only takes 7 of us - - when 
we all know Atlantia has enough fine archers to field a team of 30 ourselves 
(and win it all.) I want to see an expert-level individual and kingdom 
championship shoot that is completely outside the realm of the war, of the war 
points, of the East/Mid monopoly of archery at Pennsic. 


Somehow the numbers have to be imited - - I just threw out royal rounds as a 
non-political, non-subjective measure. You could say bowmen and above, you could 
say top 20 who are at Pennsic....whatever. Just make it objective.

When I was an Archer or a Marksman, it was enough to shoot the populace points 
at Pennsic and a couple of novelty shoots. I had no expectation or need of being 
on a champions team. But now I see what is really happening: our very, very top 
archers in Atlantia are not "chosen" for the East's team. It is degrading and 
demoralizing and leads many fine archers to avoid Pennsic altogether. This is 
not right!

So I am driven to correct this wrong. I'm really not looking for a way to add to 
my work load before OR at Pennsic, believe me. 


Nuala of Needwood Forest


 



________________________________
From: Janyn Fletcher <janynfletcher at comcast.net>
To: Holly Gibbons <holly0920 at yahoo.com>; archers at seahorse.atlantia.sca.org
Sent: Wed, October 27, 2010 7:10:51 PM
Subject: RE: [Archers] Pennsic


Two things here….
 
I must have missed the part about beginners, I would say if they are not 
welcomed we should not even hold this. I typically help around 20-40 beginners 
every year at Pennsic, and it is one of my loves. It is very rewarding to see 
them have fun and shoot and also be saved from the “grilling” that the East 
marshal’s love to impose on them.
 
Secondly, the area behind the marshal’s tent with the trailers is where I have 
asked for the last 2 years to have re-arranged to accommodate more room for 
other things. Was met with great resistance and that was that, hoping the new 
blood at least gives us a chance!
 
From:archers-bounces at seahorse.atlantia.sca.org 
[mailto:archers-bounces at seahorse.atlantia.sca.org] On Behalf Of Holly Gibbons
Sent: Wednesday, October 27, 2010 6:46 PM
To: archers at seahorse.atlantia.sca.org
Subject: Re: [Archers] Pennsic
 
Dear Comrades-in-Bows:
 
Wow! SO many good ideas. Thank you Rowan for your boosterism, thank you Mika for 
your endless and extremely helpful wisdom, thank you Janyn and Bright Hills, for 
always being ready to work, thank you all archers for taking this on, thank you 
Lorelei, Fearless Leader.
 
I agree with Mika on the back 40. It was only a vain hope to get the whole 
range. There's plenty of room back around the trailers to have 10 or 12 stations 
if they'll let us. As to targets, we don't usually use butts except for warmups 
and folks can do that on the regular range. My standing targets are all foam and 
cardboard and strap to rebar. Because of this I would have to say that I don't 
think you can have every archer at Pennsic shoot this thing - - how many of us 
are there? The targets might not last 1000 shots each. You can also have a 
limited # of shots to preserve targets. Like Reynard's shoots with one arrow per 
target. If you shoot 8 arrows per archer and there are 100 archers, you 
definitely have a target-falling-apart problem. I adore Luce's ground snakes, 
but 800 shots?
 
So while I agree that elitism is not what we want here, I would vote that the 
shoot be restricted to bowmen and above. The targets are going to be difficult, 
arrows will be lost, and we will have lots of archers to get through the shoot. 
I am not really interested in running a gigantic event for everyone, as fun as 
that would be: I am interested in having an expert-level kingdom/individual 
known world championship that is completely ouside the Pennsic war stuff.
 
As to individuals, kingdoms, averages, etc. Listen, if we let Mika's score be 
the average for his Kingdom, this competition is already over! So I think you 
all shoot for an individual score and then you can sum the best 10 scores (or 
pick 5 or another number) for each kingdom for the kingdom competition. So Mika, 
you might have to drag out some more westerners to shoot with you! And BTW, the 
day we pick has to be a day that does NOT have combat archery going on   :)
  
(One last thought on the back 40  - - you would probably have to shut down the 
"youth" (I know it's not called that anymore, but you know what I mean) range to 
fully utilize the back field behind it. Just a caution. You'd need that space 
and I don't think there's 100 yards but my memory for the space isn't great.)
 
If those of you out there can get the politics under control, I volunteer to run 
the advertising and be the shoot/target coordinator. I know we can count on lots 
of good targets from Atlantian archers. I agree with Lorelei about this being a 
lot of work, but many hands make light work, that's why Jonathas' idea of 
everyone just bringing and being responsible for one target is so brilliant. I 
don't think we need two days. Set up in the am, shoot, take down. Again, we will 
not be able to handle an unlimited number of archers without giving up too much 
of our Pennsic time.
 
{An aside: It's sad that all that effort making targets and setting up a big 
shoot already goes into the champs competition and then we cannot use it for 
this shoot - - but the politics are unsurmountable, I guess. But really, the 
very nicest thing for the Mid/East Pandas to do would be to let "Atlantia and 
other Kingdoms" have a third champs team of their own - - something we have 
heard here has been tried unsuccessfully before. Last summer only 7 Atlantians 
got to shoot while 28 Easters did. Therein the rub. Do those guys have any idea 
how much deep, profound unhappiness this policy causes for Atlantian Archers, 
all of us? I find it so hard to believe that they really want all this bad karma 
swirling around the champs shoot every year when a solution is right beofre 
them. If we had our own team, with 35 archers on it, as each the Mid and East 
do, there would be more than enough happy, happy Atlantian archers!}
   
I'm getting all worked up. Time to go shoot. ps: See you at Holiday Faire, 
Lorelei!
 
Nuala of Needwood Forest
Geoffrey of Needwood Forest


      
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