With the summer season closing in important information has just come down from the Society on critical changes to archery in the SCA. This change will be immediate and will impact events already scheduled for the 2017 season. Due to recent changes in federal law, the sale and use of all projectile weapons (including arrows, bolts, and sling ammunition) will be restricted in most if not all of the 50 States and parts of Canada. Primarily this restriction is meant to control use of primitive missiles outside of regulated hunting seasons and designated areas. These regulations are meant to close loop holes that allow people to carry and use weapons of this nature in populated non-hunting areas such as parks, schools, and similar places. Sadly the SCA makes use of many of these sites and to avoid legal issues must enact the following immediate changes to all SCA archery activities.

Starting in April of 2017 the SCA will be moving to non-missile archery. Members may continue to use their bows, crossbows, and slings, but will be prohibited from using any sort of ammunition during SCA approved activities. Members may carry quivers to better simulate the atmosphere of using actual ammunition but these quivers must be empty. Marshals will inspect all quivers for ammunition, and if found, this ammunition will be confiscated and the archer prohibited from participation. Use of the prop arrows (dowels with no tips, sticks, nerf ammo) is also prohibited. Additionally no archer may use the image of arrows as decoration on their gear as to avoid any confusion. This includes tattoos. In the interest of safety, archers and marshal are reminded it is never safe to dry fire a bow. Archers must release in a controlled manner. Optionally the archer may scream “twang!” or “Pew-Pew” during controlled release.

Scoring will be conducted by the range Marshal and will be based on the archer’s Royal Rounds score up to the point of the ban, how cool the archer looks when standing with his or her bow on the line, and generally how the other archers feel they might have progressed if the use of ammunition was still allowed. Bonus points are awarded if the archer has recently watched an archery-based movie such as Brave or Robin Hood (any version), however Hunger Games and the Avengers are excluded. All ties will be broken using rock-paper-scissors but marshals are reminded to follow the policy on rock-paper-scissors as set down in Society rules.

We apologize for any inconvenience this change causes, and as always, happy shooting.

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