[TrashMan]

http://www.thearma.org/essays/knightvs.htm

Finally, someone who really knows what they are talking about, reveals the truth about knights and samurais - their weaponry and armor, their fighting technuiques.

Finally the knights get the respect they deserved. The truth is their fighting techniques and knowledge were as deep as advanced as the fabled samurai ones, and in some cases even more advanced.

Katana is no uber sword, europeian armor was far better than is generally thought, samurais never trained with shields????

Interesting stuff...

[Nico]

Mmh, even if I kind of agree, the guy is still biaised:
he takes one full paragraph if not more to demonstrate how well european armors could protect against a katana, and then...

"So, even though Japanese armor for the most part was made up of the same quality steel as went into their weapons, European blades would likely not encounter anything especially difficult with it that they didn’t already face. "

hmmf.

Also, he keeps switching weapons for the knight. So, shield? Yeah, a shield is cool, it can bloke super well, much better than you'd think. And then a double handed sword is longer than a katana. I mean, okayyyy...

bleh, I'm editing as I read, sorry
The japanese not being used to fight against shields is bull, helml, he stated it himself, they've fought against chinese and mongols, and they were using shields ( mainly the mongols ).

[pyro-manic]

Go and read "By the Sword", by Richard Cohen. I think you'd like it if you're interested in sword combat. Being a fencer, I found it very interesting (Cohen is one as well).

EDIT: And yes, a fight between a classical knight and a kenjutsu practitioner would be far from easy to predict. The usual retarded "OMG! katanas are teh 1337!!!1" you get on the internet is frankly ridiculous, and smacks of fanboyism...

[Tiara]

First of all, we must ask where is it these two lone warriors would meet? Under what circumstances? Since the conditions of this imaginary fight could play a major factor, it can be proposed that such an encounter would best take place on a flat, firm, open field with no cover and plenty of room to maneuver.

He just killed off the entire debate by picking a flat, firm and *OPEN* field.

Although, we can’t discount physiology as a factor and this would certainly be a reasonable advantage for the European (16th century samurai armor examples are sized for men around 5’3”-5’5”, while European armor from the same period and earlier would fit men ranging from just under 6’ to about 6’5”).

So, all of a sudden he is an expert of the psyche, eh? Really, if he had a well-trained samurai in this debate, the size of his opponent wouldn't exactly matter... at all.

After this I stopped reading because the guy is either biased or just weighs the wrong things and interpets them the wrong way.

I'm not bashing the guy or anything, but his analysis is obviously flawed.

I've seen a ducumentary on this same subject on the Discovery channel. They showed in very good detail that both styles had advantages and disadvantages. They even showed 3-D fights to show what they meant. It's *impossible* to say that one is better then the other.

[Nico]

That's always been my view on the matter anyway: they're both armored dudes that hit in ways that will be painful
Anyway;, they'd be both owned by a ninja wizard.

[Styxx]

Originally posted by Nico
That's always been my view on the matter anyway: they're both armored dudes that hit in ways that will be painful

Yeah, but knights in full plate armor are orders of magnitude cooler.

Originally posted by Nico
Anyway;, they'd be both owned by a ninja wizard.

Who would in turn be owned himself by a pirate.

[Liberator]

Originally posted by Styxx
Who would in turn be owned himself by a pirate.

Who would be owned by Gaint Space Hamsters...

[Styxx]

Originally posted by Liberator
Who would be owned by Gaint Space Hamsters...

Pfft. Nothing beats pirates. Ask anyone from Volition.

[Flipside]

Since when did fighting involve hitting each other on the Armour? It's like this idea it's about bashing swords together.

European armour was a honeycomb, it was light, and tough, and Knights were extremely well trained and disciplined soldiers, but they were designed for fighting other people in tough honeycombed armour.

Most weapons used by medieval knights were designed not to stab or wound, but to crush and disable. The idea was to incapacitate your enemy, and then usually bludgeon him to death.

Samauri used scale armour, which was slightly lighter and weaker, but had the advantage of not being so easy to make 'seize up', since the scales overlapped each other. The Katana was NOT the main weapon of most Samauri anyway, they were Bowmen by preference. I've seen Katana's split bullets in half, I've seen then cut a sheet of silk in half simply by draping the silk over the blade, it's a formidable weapon. I think if it came down to a choice, I'd pick the Samauri, simply because he has higher flexibility and field of vision (let's face it, a knight without a helmet vs a Samuari would very quickly be a knight without a head vs a Samauri

[Nico]

Originally posted by Styxx


Pfft. Nothing beats pirates. Ask anyone from Volition.

yes they do.
They totally do: undead pirates

[Clave]

Tiny Plaid Ninjas!

http://www.albinoblacksheep.com/flash/plaid.php

[Flipside]

hehehehe I was just chatting to Mum on the phone, whe wants to know who would win between Ninjas and Ghurkas

Any takers?

[Flipside]

Goob! Will you please get that damn Flux capacitor out of your avatar? It's playing hell with the Forum clock

[pyro-manic]

Originally posted by Flipside
Most weapons used by medieval knights were designed not to stab or wound, but to crush and disable. The idea was to incapacitate your enemy, and then usually bludgeon him to death.

Um, not really. there are plenty of weapons designed to specifically stab and wound from Europe. The introduction of plate armour led to the development of specialized swords and (particularly) long daggers that were very narrow and very sharp, used to penetrate the vulnerable points such as the shoulders, knees and groin of plate armour suits. Swords also got longer as a result (which eventually led to the duelling rapier of Renaissance Italy and France), making stabbing attacks very useful (often more so than the stereotyped full-arm swing that is associated with European "chivalric" traditions). Yes, you could use a double-handed greatsword to smash an opponent inside their armour, but you could also stab him through a joint with a Panzerbrecher or a thrust of said greatsword. Yes, a katana will slice a man in half with a clean hit, but not through plate steel. However, a blow from a European broadsword would probably break bones even through Samurai armour. Yes, a samurai has greater speed and agility, but that is offset by the far lesser vulnerability of a European knight (who will be no slouch himself). So you can't call it at all - it's purely down to the skill of the combatants...

[Liberator]

Originally posted by Clave
Tiny Plaid Ninjas!

http://www.albinoblacksheep.com/flash/plaid.php

There's something disturbingly cute about that...

Also, everybody knows that ninjas, even undead ones, fall to the might of the Giant Space Hamsters cause they can see in the dark, I mean they are from Space...

[Styxx]

Originally posted by Nico
yes they do.
They totally do: undead pirates

But undead pirates are still pirates.

[Col. Fishguts]

Why did I know even before entering the thread that it sooner or later would involve pirates ?

[Styxx]

Originally posted by Col. Fishguts
Why did I know even before entering the thread that it sooner or later would involve pirates ?

That's because everyone knows that pirates are awesome. :arr:

[Gloriano]

Originally posted by Styxx


That's because everyone knows that pirates are awesome. :arr:

indeed...

[Tiara]

ARRR!