Nah, they had whacking great codpieces!
"Oh, you're highness, is that your codpiece, or are you just glad to see me?"
One does not go into battle without proper armor.
There is actually a DC comics villain named Codpiece:
"He was told that he wasn't big enough in High School, and though the girl who said it meant his height, he thought she meant his...penis. Due to an inferiority complex about the size of his weiner, he created a suit with a codpiece weapon system and became a supervillain. He primarily robbed banks.
He was eventually stopped when
Coagula, who was wearing a frog mask due to not having a costume when she came across his crime spree, got him to lower his guard and used her powers to dissolve his codpiece multi-weapon."
You know, I think recoil would be a major problem.