Archaeologists find intact medieval gauntlet

No, I don't get any satisfaction crafting things in games (and that goes back to Ultima III which I was playing around the same time I started making armor).

For example right now I'm playing Diablo IV wandering around finding stuff to make more powerful weapons, and it does nothing for me. It's entirely about the physical details of making a thing with my hands.

Which is funny because I hated to play D&D with people "by hand" while I loved when the computer was the DM.

Not OP, but as a person who likes to make stuff with my hands and also enjoys video games, these are a few games with crafting mechanics I think are pretty decent:

For mobile: Stardew Valley crafting is very good. It’s simple and satisfying but still complicated enough not to be boring. Ocean is Home is a less popular game, but also has pretty good crafting although the amount of resources needed can sometimes make it a bit grind-y. But you can build a lot of stuff through crafting including walls, roof sections, etc to build a house, as well as make weapons, backpacks, and a huge myriad of other items. It’s almost like a more realistic Minecraft.

For VR: Song in the smoke has a physically realistic crafting mechanism that is both simple and satisfying. It’s very immersive without it being too labor intensive. Township Tale is also a game with realistic physical crafting mechanisms but can be a bit tedious at times (although I’ve only tried out the game a few times, so my impression could be off).

For console games: While not the typical type of crafting, I think Elder Scrolls Oblivion has a very cool method for crafting potions, enchanted items and spells. It is very customizable, and the way it is designed makes you want to play around with coming up with the best potions and spells, etc. It’s on the more complicated side of things and there is a bit of a learning curve, but the amount of possible new spells, potions and enchanted items you can craft is basically endless.

These are just examples I could think off the top of my head, but hope this gives you a bit of insight.

yes, I measured my arm (we also did clothesmaking so we had all the ingredients) although when I left the SCA I gave it to somebody similar sized. Note that the vambrace is lined with fur and leather, which allows for some adjustment for forearm thickness. It has adjustable leather straps (like a belt). You can also disassemble the piece by removing rivets, and making new rivet holes if you need to change the length/size of pieces. The rivets actually act as bearing rods to allow the elbow to articulate, it's really an impressive piece of work.

Herre's the closest example I can find, https://www.ebay.com/itm/313682162596 only $123!

If you were rich it was made to measure. If you were a poor foot soldier, then much less so.

In the Royal Navy they used to joke that the ratings' uniforms only came in 2 sizes, too big and too small.

See also:

"Before he crunched his numbers, the consensus among his fellow air force researchers was that the vast majority of pilots would be within the average range on most dimensions. After all, these pilots had already been pre-selected because they appeared to be average sized. (If you were, say, six foot seven, you would never have been recruited in the first place.) The scientists also expected that a sizable number of pilots would be within the average range on all 10 dimensions. But even Daniels was stunned when he tabulated the actual number.

Zero." https://www.thestar.com/news/insight/when-u-s-air-force-disc...

See you in 2724

I do agree with you on principles, but given those gauntlets being a pinnacle of human achievement for that time, our current pinnacles doesn't seem to last that long and the means are lost as well. Probably for the better, but quite can't tell also.

Maybe it is a creeping anxiety about losing knowledge as we stride forward and forgetting the means of recreating the things we end up with. Kind of like the Dark age of technology in WH40K.

There is a science of accelerated aging for testing products, which speeds up the process a bit at the expense of accuracy.

With the oncoming tsunami of AI we may be in the twilight of human software engineering.

And sometimes we manufacture things badly by design, in order to create planned obsolescence, and more revenue in the long term.

See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ship_of_Theseus

> See also Roman aqueducts. Slave labor or nearly free peons also probably contributed to this.

Surviving Roman infrastructure didn't just sit around for two thousand years, it has actively been maintained in that time.

You'll find that you can keep a lot of grandfather's axes around for as long as you want, as long as you keep them clean, and replace the handle and the blade regularly.

This may be survivorship bias. If you look back say to 1970. Pick any car of that era would you drive it today? Not much. It is not nearly as good or even that well built. But some of the cars of that era are very well preserved and taken care of and maybe even in better shape than when they left the factory floor.

Sometimes things are built well or kept around for whatever reason. But most of the time people slap it together and call it good enough. Then when they are done with that item it is discarded.

You can say 'look at all the stuff from the roman era that survived'. You can also say what about all the stuff that didnt? Probably most of it. But you do not see it because it is no longer there.

Ah, I'd been thinking it must be a device somehow related to manufacturing bullets (but how? was the question) -- it hadn't occurred to me that it could mean the pointy tips of bullets themselves. And thank you for the book recommendation.