Swords and stuff

[Schadenfreude]

One of these guys . . ..

 

[StevenYoo]

just fightin people with light or no armor?

rapier and dagger

 

[Schadenfreude]

Btw, if you're looking for Katana that's of reasonable construction, you should give this guy's stuff a try - apparently for the price, his quality in his swords is unbeatable . . .. (can't find the article where I found this . . ..)

Some additional reads:

- Sword construction

- Main site

- Authentic Chinese swords

Okay - before I come off as some kind of authority - on weapons I have little to no experience - I'm more of a "hands-on" guy myself (i.e. I do only hand-to-hand), but it's an interesting read nontheless . . ..

 

[Gyrene]

Akimbo Wakizashis. I've been training with those for about 3 years now. Long enough to have decent reach, light enough to be wielded quickly, and strong enough not to be broken by a larger sword. I'm halfway to my goal of having the Wakizashis made by the Kanemoto family. Wonderfully designed hamon . Katanas are nice, but they're not as light as many of you think. I trained exclusively with them for about a year. The Japanese have perfected the art of swordmaking, and they did so back in the early 12th century. Oh, and Walleye, don't be telling stories about your sword adventures, we've already been through this once before.

 

[Siddhartha]

Originally posted by: Amorphus
Just a question -

In your opinion, what culture makes the best swords, or what type of sword is the best sword out there? What sword would you choose in a life-or-death fight (assume you're good with any sword in the world. )?

I like the Japanese katanas myself. I wouldn't use the second edge if there was one on a sword anyways, and the build quality on those things is great.

Then again, for purely decorative purposes... IIRC, there used to be a 7-piece (or maybe 9? or more, I forget) titanium sword you could buy, all parts fit together perfectly. the pommel could be taken out from the hilt to reveal a dagger, I thought that was cool. I forget what the name of the sword was, and back when I could, and I checked, I think I found that the guy stopped making them. iunno.

I vote for either Calad Bolg or Andúril.

 

[Gyrene]

Originally posted by: Jehovah
Btw, if you're looking for Katana that's of reasonable construction, you should give this guy's stuff a try - apparently for the price, his quality in his swords is unbeatable . . .. (can't find the article where I found this . . ..)

Some additional reads:

- Sword construction

- Main site

- Authentic Chinese swords

Okay - before I come off as some kind of authority - on weapons I have little to no experience - I'm more of a "hands-on" guy myself (i.e. I do only hand-to-hand), but it's an interesting read nontheless . . ..

No offense intended toward you, but, HAHAHAHAHAHA, Paul Chen's swords are most definately not of reasonable construction. They're brittle, lack polish, and are balanced completely wrong. As I said, no offense intended toward you. I'm a sword snob.

 

[isaacmacdonald]

Originally posted by: Jehovah
Btw, if you're looking for Katana that's of reasonable construction, you should give this guy's stuff a try - apparently for the price, his quality in his swords is unbeatable . . .. (can't find the article where I found this . . ..)

Some additional reads:

- Sword construction

- Main site

- Authentic Chinese swords

Okay - before I come off as some kind of authority - on weapons I have little to no experience - I'm more of a "hands-on" guy myself (i.e. I do only hand-to-hand), but it's an interesting read nontheless . . ..

thank for the link, great read-

 

[Schadenfreude]

Originally posted by: dtyn

Originally posted by: Jehovah
Btw, if you're looking for Katana that's of reasonable construction, you should give this guy's stuff a try - apparently for the price, his quality in his swords is unbeatable . . .. (can't find the article where I found this . . ..)

Some additional reads:

- Sword construction

- Main site

- Authentic Chinese swords

Okay - before I come off as some kind of authority - on weapons I have little to no experience - I'm more of a "hands-on" guy myself (i.e. I do only hand-to-hand), but it's an interesting read nontheless . . ..

No offense intended toward you, but, HAHAHAHAHAHA, Paul Chen's swords are most definately not of reasonable construction. They're brittle, lack polish, and are balanced completely wrong. As I said, no offense intended toward you. I'm a sword snob.

Well, I know, and like I said, I'm a sword n00b and I should do more research - but what's better for the price (not demeaning/challenging you in any possible way, but it'd be nice to know)?

 

[xenocyd3]

2 pieces of wood :evil:

 

[Martin]

Glamdring or Narsil

 

[Zugzwang152]

lightsaber > anything metal. just don't activate it when it's pointing at you :Q

 

[tennisflip]

Since I'm only trained in foil fencing I'm going with the foil... even though it wouldn't last 2 seconds against anything other than another foil.

 

[Schadenfreude]

Originally posted by: xenocyd3
2 pieces of wood :evil:

Y'know, Miyamoto Musashi (factual character - nicknamed "Sword Saint" in Japan - considered one of, if not the, best swordsman in the history of Japanese swordsmanship) killed his archrival with a bokken (read: wooden sword) that he carved out of a wooden oar . . ..

 

[Actaeon]

One of these...

 

[whaleskinrug]

Originally posted by: Michael
I'm curious as to how many people in this thread have actually used a sword and have any idea how they work and what the advantages and disadvantages are?

Michael

I've only used bokken (oak practice sword)

 

[tennisflip]

Originally posted by: Michael
I'm curious as to how many people in this thread have actually used a sword and have any idea how they work and what the advantages and disadvantages are?

Michael

I foil fence... it's basically like taking giant floppy needles and poking each other but you could do some real damage if you want to. The attacks are so fast that it's difficult to avoid unless you're armed with a foil or sabre.

 

[Michael]

I've tried foil fencing. I prefer to hit vs. poke.

In case anyone is wondering where I get my experience from, check out SCA .

I'm a Knight in the organization. Basically a "black belt".

Michael

 

[tennisflip]

Originally posted by: Michael
I've tried foil fencing. I prefer to hit vs. poke.

In case anyone is wondering where I get my experience from, check out SCA .

I'm a Knight in the organization. Basically a "black belt".

Michael

The class right after my foil lesson was called something like "heavy weapons." Basically, they used Braveheart swords and learned how to kill each other. I stayed to watch one class and they have a guy dress up in armor to see how freakin' hard it is to fight in the stuff. It was always fun seeing guys decked out with huge swords walking across campus.

 

[Giscardo]

best sword ever: Liquid Swords

 

[TechnoKid]

I hear that toledo steel is very sharp, can cut a silk hankerchief in air.

 

[tennisflip]

Sean Connery "I'll take swords for $200."
Alex "It's not swords, it's s-words."

SNL

 

[Babbles]

Originally posted by: Michael
I'm curious as to how many people in this thread have actually used a sword and have any idea how they work and what the advantages and disadvantages are?

Michael

Ditto on that, bet lot of folks say something about a katana just because they have watched one too many animes.

Originally posted by: datalink7
It was supossedly the best designed particularly in terms of balance.

The balance of a katana is way different than a western sword and I would hardly consider it balance. They are much more top heavy, however with the grip and stance you use, they then feel balance.

Also, stay away from Paul Chen's stuff. Sure it is better than a lot of that Iberia/Marto crap floating around but they are still nothing to brag about. If you want a 'real' sword that is reasonably priced, look into something like
Kris Cutlery. If you want to spend some money check out Howard Clark who does business via Bugei Trading Company.

Obviously, there is no one best sword and anybody that would use sword X for one situation, sword y for another situation, sword z for yet another is probably somebody that has never really trained with a sword. There is a reason why historically most soldiers (be they eastern or western) trained in depth with one type of sword/weapon and learned a little bit of a handful others. I am not saying that they did not have any knowledge of other sword and weapon types, but concentrated their training on only one. Anyhow, that is a point of debte for another day.

I really do not want to make fun of the SCA, but my experience down here in Texas is that it is nothing to brag about. I used to hang out with some SCAers and went to more than a few fighter practices, and with how they practiced it would not have worked in the 'real' world. Then again, I have seen some heavy weapons (or whatever they call it, been a long time) practice that was pretty brutal . . .

Anyhow, I guess it is kinda of fun to think of 'what ifs' when it comes to comparing swords but you are just making broad generalizations saying that German swords were the best, no Korean swords were the best, etc.

 

[Michael]

The SCA has its own rules that does distort the fighting a little, but any decent fighter knows it. The biggest problem is making the hands illegal targets (for safety reasons as fingers and hands are easy to break). The other problem is the one-hit = kill rule where a hard hit to the head ends the fight. Most period helmets could take quite a battering and one strike to an armored body is not likely to end it right there.

The problem with doing any sword fighting for "real" is the pile of dead bodies it would leave. Even bokkens are incredibly dangerous - they have a real edge. At least the SCA-style allows you to strike full force.

I have gone against very high-level Kendo trained people and the SCA "katana" style is much more like a real fight. I won the vast majority of the fights against Kendo trained opponents. The best is letting go of your hilt and grabbing their hilt and then striking one handed. It freaks classically trained Kendo fighters out.

Same against people with tons of fencing experience. Most use a very thin strip as their "playing field". Stepping to one side or the other is outside their experience.

I also went to a full contact karate blackbelt camp to do a demo. The sensei was very surprised how fast we could move in armor and how fast our swords were. We let him strike full furce at us and he was basically unable to do anything to us in armor. We also had longer reach than his kicks with our swords.

I noted that some one brought up Mushasi's fight using the long oar as a sword. The point of that fight wasn't that you could use an oar as a weapon. He was going against a master who's secret was using a sword longer than his opponents. Mushashi simply made a longer weapon. The Book of Five Rings has advice on that - don't rely on styles that try and push shorter or longer swords as the key. Instead, learn to fight with a sword and change your style and even your weapon depending on circumstances.

I can vouch that some of the hyperbole in films has some element of truth. I have snatched arrows out of the air and I'd even caught sword blades between my two hands and stopped blows. Typically the movies slow sword fighting down so the audience can see what happens and to build tension in the audience.

Michael

 

[Demon-Xanth]

I like the european swords because of the flexibility in thier designs and the ability to make them as decorative as you want or as simple as you want.

 

[Shelly21]

What are you talking about? It's easy to be knighted in SCA. Sure, some people actually can fight, like Duke Sir Bertram (former King of Atlantia), other people got knighted because of politics.

This one time, at Pennsic, we hang out with the King of outlands, he's really cool, because he's like the youngest king ever.



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