This was an interesting read and all, but I’m not sure what sexless rock culture you’re thinking of. In simplest terms, “Rock Culture” is all about sex.

Of sex and rock…

David Lee Roth said:
You know what rock musicians are? They are hung up, neurotic, over-weight hippies with sex problems.

Camille Paglia said:
If you live in rock and roll, as I do, you see the reality of sex, of male lust and women being aroused by male lust. It attracts women. It doesn’t repel them.

And we can’t forget Gene Simmons who said:
The notion is that if you want to welcome me with open arms, I’m afraid you’re also going to have to welcome me with open legs.

-ColbyCheese

Why? Armor isn’t supposed to be comfortable- it’s supposed to be functional. Kevlar isn’t exactly peaches and cream to wear, and a suit of armor- even on a guy- is uncomfortable as hell. It’s heavy, retains heat, restricts movement, and all the layers of padding would have been uncomfortable as hell. They’d be hot, sweaty, and smelly. Not comfortable.

A woman due to different body proportions in the hips and chest would likely find armor meant for men incredibly uncomfortable as well as limiting in movement.

There’s a difference between making a suit of armor that fits the wearer, and making a suit of armor that is completely different in design just because the wearer is a woman. A suit of armor designed for my father to wear wouldn’t fit me at all- I’m taller and thinner than my father, which would make armor made for me unwearable by him, and armor made for him unwearable by me.

There are biological differences in strength between men and women. How many women could lug plate armor on them like a man could? Not many the woman would likely be slower. A woman with armor suited meaning a lot less could move far more freely and waltz around a male in plate armor.

The average person of either sex couldn’t run around in armor without getting tired. But, then, the average person doesn’t wear armor- warriors do. So, why do we care what the average person can do? We’re talking about extraordinary people. I don’t see any reason to believe that a woman like Tonya Knight couldn’t lug around armor every bit as effectively as a male could.

Most men would underestimate a female foe especially if her armor was revealing or flashy giving the woman an advantage. Also the armor could tell her foes who she was since the description would empathisize the armor.

Your claim- and correct me if I’ve got this wrong- is that a guy, in the middle of a battle, facing a foe that wants to kill him, is going to be distracted by the sight of a woman’s cleavage- even if that woman is the person trying to kill him? And that the potential for distracting a foe makes up for the lack of physical protection that armor would provide?

Really?

I’m with mythago- why in the world should we care what “real” life armor was like in worlds that are populated by characters who throw fireballs and carry and use swords that are upwards of six feet long, with one hand?

mythago, are you suggesting that most women aren’t proportioned as 46-16-28?

The two-dimensional ones on my video game posters all are! So it must be true.

On Zelda, I really liked the world in Wind Waker because they basically admitted that Saving The Princess was merely pageantry, and it felt like they were actually trying to wean us off it. Unfortunately, that didn’t sit well with players, so we got more Save the Princess crap in the next game. (And Tetra seems to be demoted from Pirate Captain to Link’s Friend in Phantom Hourglass, which is disheartening.)

By the way, Majora’s Mask is my favorite Zelda, probably partly because you don’t have to save any friggin princess to save the world. Instead, you have four giants throw away the moon. That’s real epic.

It always cracks me up when male gamers whip out the Reality Arguments to explain why they can’t stand the thought of female avatars who don’t look like they stepped out of a porn video. We’re perfectly willing to imagine people having the power to shoot fireballs from their hands, and meteor showers that kill only hostile enemies but not allies standing right next to them, and soldiers with enough hitpoints to stand up to automatic machine-gun fire, sure. And yeah, it’s fine that these games are not historically accurate, and we’re mixing up armor, weapons and battle tactics that didn’t co-exist in the real world, if they existed at all, because weapons that crackle with green fire are cool even if they’re imaginary.

But a woman wearing plate armor? A female soldier whose tits are proportional to the rest of her body? ZOMFG! YOU HAVE JUST RUINED ALL SUSPENSION OF DISBELIEF, YOU CRAZY UNREALIST!

That would just mean that there must have been practical reasons why style and customization were toned down in actual battle armor, not a lack of motivating vanity or sense of style.

Full plate armor wasn’t found on your common soldier since it was expensive to produce. It was for the nobles or the soldiers who would be paid to wear it. Such people would be the ones who were fit and had trained to wear it for years at a time. They would be the ones who wouldn’t fit the common medieval European height and weight. They would be taller and more heavy due to increased nutrition.

“historical plate armour”

Often parade armour instead of armour meant for battle.