A DiFFERENT KiND oF HEMA TOURNAMENT
We wanted to create a tournament that we’d enjoy competing in! We have tried to make Ecky Thump! as accessible as possible to everyone including people taking their first steps into steel HEMA tournaments, with scoring that is specifically designed to encourage fencing in a less aggressive manner and to reward fencers for trying things other tournament systems aren’t necessarily able to fully reward.
At Ecky Thump! We stood on the back of Colin Fieldhouse’s excellent rules for his Kings of the North tournament, and we’ve worked closely with Colin to expand it sideways to incorporate other weapons and systems. Our aim is to make this a friendly and inclusive event suitable for beginners and experienced fencers alike.

EPiSODE #3 – 30th Aug 2025 10:00 – York Railway Institute, York, YO24 1AD
DiFFERENT WEAPON CATEGORiES
To encourage variety and expansion of skills, we don’t limit our categories to just one type of weapon, but instead to three distinct periods of history so you have the opportunity to fence with or against other weapons from that era, even changing your choices between bouts if you wish, in fact, we actively encourage it. You will even be awarded points for doing so!
And, because all the categories will be on at different times, you don’t even need to choose which you prefer because we’ve made sure it’s possible to enter all three.
MEDiEVAL
- Longsword
- Federschwert
- Messer
- Arming Sword
- Off-Hand Buckler
RENAiSSANCE
- Dussack
- Rapier
- Sidesword (Single or Dual)
- Off-Hand Parrying Dagger
- Off-Hand Buckler
- Off-Hand Cloak
REVOLUTiON
- Basket Hilted Sword
- Sabre
- Spadroon
- Colichemarde
- Smallsword
A DiFFERENT SCORING SYSTEM
1. To better simulate the fear and preservation of your life and limbs that fighting a real fight with sharp swords would give you, instead of awarding points for how many times you kill your opponent, you will be fencing to preserve your own lives instead.
2. Each competitor is given a certain number of “lives”, and the first one to lose five or more in a match is declared the loser, the lives you lose are deducted throughout all of your bouts so the winners will be those with the most lives left at the end of all their bouts.
3. You can earn extra points by swapping weapons! In theory, if you fight safely and mix things up between bouts you may even finish with more lives than you started with. If those aren’t bragging rights worth striving for we don’t know what are.