Saber Forum

  Does anybody belong to ARMA? (Association for Renaissance Martial Arts) Although their main focus is on swordfighting of the middle ages, some of the stuff they teach can, of course, be incorporated into lightsaber fighting.

Nope, never heard of that organization before.  It seems to me though, that wouldn't you need to get specially designed protective equipment, not counting the saber itself to participate with them?

Not necessarily. With what little involvement I've had with ARMA, most of what I've done is solo drills which involve going over some basic slashes and thrusts. I've also done some partner drills using wooden swords but with those you go slow so you don't need any protective gear. For the sparring that you do in ARMA, thats done with foam swords and yes you do need protective gear, but for what sparring I've done I've borrowed the gear. As it is, though, I havn't been too heavily involved with ARMA but here is their website.
http://www.thearma.org/ (http://www.thearma.org/)

I used to belong to its prior incarnation HACA (Historical Armed Combat Association).  Only basic gear we used for sparring (other than weapons) was a fencing mask, cup and a gorget that I recall, but I was working Longsword and Rapier at the time. 

Where you looking for some specific information?

Palewolf

i trained with arma for about 8 months but was kicked out of the organisation.  they definately disaprove of anything that is not the way that they do things and look down on anything that is not ARMA including lightsabers, LARP, SCA and ren faires

I've done SCA combat since '93 but no ARMA.  Like the full competitive side though it IS sport combat due to all the rules for safety.  Last 10 years it's moved more and more to less speed and harder blows.  Kinda miss the amazing moves that used to be pulled off in the middle of a fight back in the day. 

I find this funny because Lucas used what they do(partly) in developing the light saber combat. As for LARP, SCA and ren faires, they are all, basically, in the same spirit of combat.  So you can say IT IS the way they do things.   I never liked that kind of thinking. I feel true martial students are open to everything.