About the war elephants' mahout thing. I've been wondering if those guys, in the case they didn't wear much in the way of armour, could lie flat on the neck of the 'phant and make themselves really small targets when they didn't specifically need to sit up for some reason (a helmet would probably defend most of what was left exposed to most enemies) ? Not that I knew jack all about how one goes about "mahouting" the big animals mind you, but it would make sense if one assumes they more or less never wore much armour. Body armour would after all mess with the flexibility needed to do that, and a type heavy enough to be of genuine use would probably cause some top-heaviness and balance problem; armoured cavalrymen had to deal with that too, and unlike horsemen people sitting on the necks of elephants can't start using saddles and such to help out...