Why I hate the western martial arts community

[Don Coyote]

Ah, well very good then we are in agreement Though personally I still find the slightly earlier weapon style far superior (spada di longa/spada di lato/espada ropera) ie the cut and thrust style as opposed to the focused thrust of the later rapier style.

Hence the bird spit commentary.
Also,

That there is no fight perfect without both blow and thrust

HA! To be fair that injury was due to an opponent being a complete prick and throwing a blind shot around a corner. He was aiming for the guy on the other side of me and didn't realize I was there... it never should have happened.

However, I have seen bruises in the fencing lists that rivaled some of the best smacks the armored guys have shown off

Still it does show up much force a flexible rapier with a bird blunt on the tip can deliver.

[Bebek Sincap Ratatosk]

Ah, well very good then we are in agreement Though personally I still find the slightly earlier weapon style far superior (spada di longa/spada di lato/espada ropera) ie the cut and thrust style as opposed to the focused thrust of the later rapier style.

Hence the bird spit commentary.
Also,

That there is no fight perfect without both blow and thrust

Yeah, Silver gets a lot of flack, but I really dig some of his stuff.

HA! To be fair that injury was due to an opponent being a complete prick and throwing a blind shot around a corner. He was aiming for the guy on the other side of me and didn't realize I was there... it never should have happened.

However, I have seen bruises in the fencing lists that rivaled some of the best smacks the armored guys have shown off

Still it does show up much force a flexible rapier with a bird blunt on the tip can deliver.

True enough! Doesn't hurt that it was an Easterner on the other side of the weapon...

[Don Coyote]

Ah, well very good then we are in agreement Though personally I still find the slightly earlier weapon style far superior (spada di longa/spada di lato/espada ropera) ie the cut and thrust style as opposed to the focused thrust of the later rapier style.

Hence the bird spit commentary.
Also,

That there is no fight perfect without both blow and thrust

Yeah, Silver gets a lot of flack, but I really dig some of his stuff.

Wait what....people don't like Silver?

HA! To be fair that injury was due to an opponent being a complete prick and throwing a blind shot around a corner. He was aiming for the guy on the other side of me and didn't realize I was there... it never should have happened.

However, I have seen bruises in the fencing lists that rivaled some of the best smacks the armored guys have shown off

Still it does show up much force a flexible rapier with a bird blunt on the tip can deliver.

True enough! Doesn't hurt that it was an Easterner on the other side of the weapon...

At one point I knew what that meant, the East is known for being very very positive pressure in rapier?

[Igor]

So I don't know anything about WMA, but apparently Neal Stephenson does. (Must have got into it while writing the Baroque Trilogy)

Anyway, he's writing some kind of collaborative internet novel based on a lot of WMA swordfighting stuff called the Mongoliad.

There's just one scene up at the moment, and it's a fight scene. So I figured you guys might like it.

[Don Coyote]

So I don't know anything about WMA, but apparently Neal Stephenson does. (Must have got into it while writing the Baroque Trilogy)

Anyway, he's writing some kind of collaborative internet novel based on a lot of WMA swordfighting stuff called the Mongoliad.

There's just one scene up at the moment, and it's a fight scene. So I figured you guys might like it.

Some dude in a partial plate transitional harness fighting what sounds like a samurai in armor using bloßfechten techniques in a fight that is presumably to the death.

[Bebek Sincap Ratatosk]

Ah, well very good then we are in agreement Though personally I still find the slightly earlier weapon style far superior (spada di longa/spada di lato/espada ropera) ie the cut and thrust style as opposed to the focused thrust of the later rapier style.

Hence the bird spit commentary.
Also,

That there is no fight perfect without both blow and thrust

Yeah, Silver gets a lot of flack, but I really dig some of his stuff.

Wait what....people don't like Silver?

I think it depends... Silver was pretty dismissive of many of the European styles, so I think there's a bit of offense taken by those that are focused on a specific school from the Continent

HA! To be fair that injury was due to an opponent being a complete prick and throwing a blind shot around a corner. He was aiming for the guy on the other side of me and didn't realize I was there... it never should have happened.

However, I have seen bruises in the fencing lists that rivaled some of the best smacks the armored guys have shown off

Still it does show up much force a flexible rapier with a bird blunt on the tip can deliver.

True enough! Doesn't hurt that it was an Easterner on the other side of the weapon...

At one point I knew what that meant, the East is known for being very very positive pressure in rapier?

[/quote]

I wouldn't say its necessarily The East... but once competition at Pennsic starts it seems that some of them tend to be more focused on winning the bout, than winning it safely.

Not counting Suu and the General, of course  

[Don Coyote]

I think it depends... Silver was pretty dismissive of many of the European styles, so I think there's a bit of offense taken by those that are focused on a specific school from the Continent

The irony about Silver's giant rant in book form is the things he hated about rapier fencing are the things that all those books on rapier fencing say don't do.

I wouldn't say its necessarily The East... but once competition at Pennsic starts it seems that some of them tend to be more focused on winning the bout, than winning it safely.

Not counting Suu and the General, of course  

That is why I was never a big participant in tournaments when I was active in the SCA. I am more concerned with the Art than winning. Would rather lose a tournament than injure someone, especially since the SCA is supposed to be one big happy family of outcasts from Mundania.

[Bebek Sincap Ratatosk]

I think it depends... Silver was pretty dismissive of many of the European styles, so I think there's a bit of offense taken by those that are focused on a specific school from the Continent

The irony about Silver's giant rant in book form is the things he hated about rapier fencing are the things that all those books on rapier fencing say don't do.

I wouldn't say its necessarily The East... but once competition at Pennsic starts it seems that some of them tend to be more focused on winning the bout, than winning it safely.

Not counting Suu and the General, of course  

That is why I was never a big participant in tournaments when I was active in the SCA. I am more concerned with the Art than winning. Would rather lose a tournament than injure someone, especially since the SCA is supposed to be one big happy family of outcasts from Mundania.

I find that to be the case 99 events out of 100, but for some reason Pennsic in the last few years has lead to all sorts of calibration issues. Maybe its just my perception but I think it happened around the time that Rapier began to get their own war points. I know that both the Middle and East pushed for Armored combatants to take up rapier so they could be fielded for the rapier war point melees and some of the issues I've seen as a marshal appear to be things that are 100% cool for armored and 100% dangerous for rapier.

Two years ago I called hold on a guy that butt  rapped an opponent. I mean that's not even a blow that would count for damage, but it definitely caused the guy some pain. Myself, I've sworn off of the fort melee at Pennsic which seems to be the most problematic (jamming 100 people in a gate scenario with actual steel is a high risk of turning messy). I haven't fought at Pennsic since my injury and next year I may just stick with tournaments and 1/1 sparring.

Though, I have been taking the WMA classes which have been pretty damned good. Last year I took a two week course on Morazzo longsword and Joko Stretto by Scott from Darkwood Armory... very good stuff. Also a bit of horse mounted technique (they have wooden horses on wheels for practice/class stuff). I also got to take a short class in Elizabethan Boxing which was fascinating.

There seems to be both schools of WMA at Pennsic these days... a lot of the normal SCA guy who knows barely enough to be dangerous. However there are also  guys like Scott Wilson and Tom Leoni are teaching some serious WMA stuff... and there's no 'sparring' only practice, discussion and drills. I was impressed.

[Don Coyote]

And here is something I love about WMA, well some of them.
http://www.lulu.com/items/volume_66/7630000/7630004/2/print/DSS_Fechtbuch_9-6-2009_Rotated.pdf

[Richter]

Some folks in the SCA play a great game, teach, encourage and include anyone else who is interested.  They're the examples I look to, and have earned the title Sir / Master / Mistress.  (Few would ever claim that title that title though.)

People in the SCA, especially in the martial sports, seem to forget that they're playing a GAME.  Higher percentage under those who go by "Duke"

I've a few WMA folks / groups, but they are not as much focused on the "martial" aspects, and not as big on playing with the techniques, or seeing how and when they work at speed.  I've also met a few folks who are energetic as hell and a lot of fun to play with.

[Suu]

.

Meh. Belt degrees mean you know patterns.

Colored belt degrees just means you showed up when I did TKD, the only belts they did real testing for were black belts (which is why you see so many black stripes)

TKD has a terrible rep in this area, probably not helped by the fact the South Korean govt wants it to become the MOST POPULAR MARTIAL ART EPHAR! and so turns a blind eye to idiots teaching mall karate and giving out belts like candy.

The WTF are the ones to go to for Olympic style Tae Kwon Do, if that's your thing.  The ITF are the ones to go to for a more traditional take on Tae Kwon Do (more emphasis on upper body techniques than the WTF style, though still plenty of insanely useless kicking going on.  No-one is ever going to use the Upper Reverse Turning Kick in self-defense, and if they do, they deserve to have that leg broken.  Fortunately, most teachers seem to realize it's just some thing on the cirriculum, and punish anyone who actually uses it in sparring sessions).  Everyone else, as far as I can see, peddles pure crap.

Colored belts were an excuse for my instructor to beat the shit out of me even more, I even failed my blue stripe test. I hate that buy-a-belt shit that's going on now. It took me 8 years to get my damn black belt in TaeKwonDo, not 3. AND I went to a primarily WTF school (though we did a fair share of ITF stuff).

[Triple Zero]

I took about five or six lessons of Ju-Jitsu a little while ago, then I had to take a break cause it became too stressful for me (stupid fucking burnout, I was actually hyperventilating near the end of the last two lessons).

But I did learn that backwards turnaround kick (whatever it was called), and it was surprisingly powerful. Something in the way you position your legs and tendons (I think) that causes some kind of spring-action to occur and I hit the sparring cushion with a crapload of power.

Of course, not a hair on my head thinking about using that in any sort of real fight, well, not without a shitload of further practice anyway (and even then), cause basically you're spinning around and that'll leave you open to all sorts of nasty shit if your opponent isn't using both his hands to hold a sparring cushion :-P

Nah but even then, I did learn some useful shit. Nothing specific or particular, just the practice of being close to people trying to hit you.

Still, in a fight, I'm gonna run

Also, the falling practice was seriously useful. Except I didn't get enough practice to get very much out of that, but apparently, if you get it down, you can fall on concrete without bruises. That sounds pretty useful, even outside of combat situations eh!

I hope that I feel up to continuing the lessons soon, though.

[Don Coyote]

You learned a spinning back kick from Jujitsu?

Maybe I am not so smart, but I thought Jujitsu is primarily a grappling art. One that didn't have that sexy bs you see from TKD or karate.

[Triple Zero]

I dunno if it was a spinning back kick. I forgot how it went exactly, but basically you'd make a half turn, which would put tension on your leg and then when going back it put extra force on the kick.

And yeah, nearly all of the stuff we learned was about grappling, or rolling and falling etc.

The kick was just one single thing I learned that surprised me in the power it generated.

I picked ju-jitsu for the simple reason that, after asking around (also on this board), it would be a type of martial art that actually teaches techniques that are useful in real life situations. I'm not really a type to go for the competition/game element in sports. When I started running, I noticed that indeed if I trained a couple of times a week I could get myself in pretty good shape (always thought I wasnt cut out for that before), so then I figured I should try to use this new found ability for something useful apart from being able to run for quite a while

[Don Coyote]

http://www.mauriziomaltese.it/isam/armato.htm