The combination of scale armour on both man and beast makes these noble warriors formidable indeed. Their lance and sword are at the command of the Parthian clans.

Elite
Disciplined
Hardy

The Pahlavân-î Grîvpânvar are nobles from the highest level of cataphracts that the Pahlava have to draw on. The elite of the clan host form this armoured fist that represents one of the most powerful armoured cavalry the world has ever seen. They deploy in the heaviest armour available and use the kontos as their primary shock weapon. Armoured in iron lamellar corselets, covered by a leather tabard, laminated leg and arm guards and with iron shining from the scale horse barding, these are truly men of iron, in bright armour for horse and man. The horse bearing such loads must be both large and strong, and both the Parthians and Achaemenid Persians bred just such horses, the Nisaean breed of Persia.

Historical evidence suggests that the Parthian, heavily-armoured Pahlavân-î Grîvpânvar were, at least partially, a product of military influence from the Central Asian steppes which had inherited the armoured cavalry traditions of the Massagetae and the late Achaemenid Persians. Their name derives from the Pahlavi griwban "neck-guard", a helmet armour guard, from whence "Grivpan" warrior. In the 3rd century AD, the Romans would begin to deploy such cavalry calling them clibanarii, the name thought to derive from griwbanwar or griva-pana-bara.