Martial Arts skill. Sword vs hand?

[splatterk]

I really hope Martial Arts are introduced soon, I look forward to bows and polearms, I want to recreate the Straw Hat Pirates from One Piece (To some degree)

[skynet464]

Isn't that going to be kinda hard, what with the game taking place IN A DESERT?

[Bruno]

Myth Busters proved you can catch a sword with your hands if you have some sort of chain mail covering your hands. Maybe add gauntlets?

[Kamos]

Heh, you can do a lot if you can catch their blade. Especially if they don't have shields.

I was always partial to fighting spear users since the shaft is so easy to grab if you've got a free hand.

[Meynolt]

1. Martial arts is a very broad term, covering pretty much all fighting styles. I.e. sword-fighting is a martial art. I'd prefer to see this skill named 'unarmed combat'.

2. I would LOVE to see some counter-attack animations. e.g. Overhead sword chop, countered with a grab and flip .

3. From a realism perspective, having a weapon would always give the fighter an edge. I'd like to see swords > unarmed, but it IS a game, and it needs to be fun to play. Perhaps if some towns required that people surrender their weapons at the gate? Then you'd want to ensure that you have at least a mediocum of unarmed skill in case someone tries to mug you.

4. For added combat complexity [i've never seen this in a game, and I don't know if it's desireable, but...], you could have skill at fighting particular weapon types. For example, I've trained for years doing karate, but it included very limited experience fighting with/against any type of weapon. I wouldn't know what to do if someone came at me with a sword. Perhaps have a defence skill + Defence vs weapon type skill, and use the average of these two values in the current combat calcs.

[Mask]

Good points. With the last one, I would argue that isn't an issue. If you train to fight at all in the Kenshi world, you are training with swords in mind. That mightn't be true of sports fighters within the Kenshi world, if any are added, of course... but still, I just think that it might make statistics a bit confusing for some players.

[1337]

3. From a realism perspective, having a weapon would always give the fighter an edge. I'd like to see swords > unarmed, but it IS a game, and it needs to be fun to play. Perhaps if some towns required that people surrender their weapons at the gate? Then you'd want to ensure that you have at least a mediocum of unarmed skill in case someone tries to mug you.

I couldn't agree more. I've done some karate when i was young (very young) and since then i've done kendo and the reach seems sooo different that i believe a sword will always have an edge over unarmed foes.

Same for staff users imo. Martial arts who use them have survived for hundreds of years, i'd believe that in the meantime they have found some ways around the most obvious grab-the-end-of the-stick tactic. eg some kind of twisting: the staff user who is grabbing the right end and has trained for years should have the edge when twisting his weapon compared to his foe who is untrained and has the wrong end in hand. But im no expert here...

This only counts comparing people of about the same level too imo. Comparing a skill1 katana user against a skill40 unarmed user would be useless/naive

[Blxz]

I've done basic staff combat. For me, someone grabbing the end of the staff can be a blessing if you are able to deal with it. Firstly, someone grabbing a moving staff barehanded is likely to hurt themselves, but if they do manage to get a hold of it you can use your leverage to full advantage. You should be able to surprise them with direction changes and if they hold on relentlessly you can actually cause them to flip themselves off balance. Finally, in a worst case scenario you can simply pull them in, drop the staff and then punch them/kick/other form of grapple.

I really can't wait for some sort of staff combat in Kenshi. The lone monk is such an appealing roleplay concept, especially with the vast open expanses offered up by kenshi in its current form.

[splatterk]

Isn't that going to be kinda hard, what with the game taking place IN A DESERT?

I never said I wanted an exact imitation, just their general combat styles

[1337]

Isn't that going to be kinda hard, what with the game taking place IN A DESERT?

I never said I wanted an exact imitation, just their general combat styles

well there's always the Alabasta Arc right

I've done basic staff combat. For me, someone grabbing the end of the staff can be a blessing if you are able to deal with it. [...]

That's what i thought, if the user has some knowledge about how to manoeuver a staff, it would be pretty stupid to actually do the thing that staff users will probably be prepared to counter eyes closed.

Same for swords: it already hurts getting hit with a bamboo sword even with armor, so just thinking about wanting to stop with your hands a metal sword swinging down seems just really naive in my opinion. Even with gauntlets, the force behind a professional swing of the blade with the intent to hurt will be enough to smash your bones to tiny little pieces

[Bruno]

Isn't that going to be kinda hard, what with the game taking place IN A DESERT?

I never said I wanted an exact imitation, just their general combat styles

well there's always the Alabasta Arc right

I've done basic staff combat. For me, someone grabbing the end of the staff can be a blessing if you are able to deal with it. [...]

That's what i thought, if the user has some knowledge about how to manoeuver a staff, it would be pretty stupid to actually do the thing that staff users will probably be prepared to counter eyes closed.

Same for swords: it already hurts getting hit with a bamboo sword even with armor, so just thinking about wanting to stop with your hands a metal sword swinging down seems just really naive in my opinion. Even with gauntlets, the force behind a professional swing of the blade with the intent to hurt will be enough to smash your bones to tiny little pieces

I said it could be done. I didn't say it wouldn't hurt

[Kamos]

Isn't that going to be kinda hard, what with the game taking place IN A DESERT?

I never said I wanted an exact imitation, just their general combat styles

well there's always the Alabasta Arc right

I've done basic staff combat. For me, someone grabbing the end of the staff can be a blessing if you are able to deal with it. [...]

That's what i thought, if the user has some knowledge about how to manoeuver a staff, it would be pretty stupid to actually do the thing that staff users will probably be prepared to counter eyes closed.

Same for swords: it already hurts getting hit with a bamboo sword even with armor, so just thinking about wanting to stop with your hands a metal sword swinging down seems just really naive in my opinion. Even with gauntlets, the force behind a professional swing of the blade with the intent to hurt will be enough to smash your bones to tiny little pieces

To be honest off the top of my head I would think to an armored hand wouldn't a regular sword give off less energy?
Think about it. A bamboo sword is very dense and thick not to mention blunt. The way it deals damage is more comparable to a blunt armored combatant style weapon like a morningstar I would think. Where as a sword has a very thin impact area and it's damage is focused around cutting so to an armored hand the impact would likely be lighter.

I'm not saying it would hurt it would just probably hurt less if it doesn't slice through your armor.

[1337]

I've never been hit by one, so i can't be sure

I had a katana in hand and the thing was not really as heavy as i thought (probably less than 1-2kg, but it was a modern made one so older ones should be a little heavier) but with momentum it should hurt as hell nonetheless and the bones in your hand aren't really that thick to begin with...

i think either way you are better of avoiding a sword and hoping for an opening after the swing. Even if your gauntlets are big enough to absorb most of the damage, you'll lose your momentum and you'll still be far away from a sword user who has a bigger reach when attacking

But as said above kenshi is a game, so maybe unarmed skill can be used as a backup plan in case your sword is taken when entering a neutral village, or if it breaks while fighting. But for a unarmed vs blade matchup, i'd say the minimum would be for the unarmed to have a few skill levels more than the blade skill of the opponent for it to be a fair match, that seems more realistic to me and avoids overpowering the unarmed skill.

[Scotterius]

Where as a sword has a very thin impact area and it's damage is focused around cutting so to an armored hand the impact would likely be lighter.

Just the opposite. As long as the sword has the same mass and velocity it delivers far more impact because it places the same amount of force in a much, much smaller area. Curved blades do lose a lot of their energy because they are designed to cut through the swing, and they naturally slide when they hit. I think this cutting action is what you are thinking of. When katanas strike very small hard objects the soft back of the blade flexes and can break or bend.

But ...Kenshi uses the 'katana myth', so deflecting arrows, catching swords and a fragment axe that weighs 40 pounds are really fun sounding to me.

Hey, in the interview he talked a little about martial arts.

[Kamos]

Well given the setting I did rather have curved blades in mind. Hadn't given much thought to other types.

Now that I think about it something like a broadsword would still be brutal.

[Blxz]

Celtic iron age swords (think roman republic era) tended to be heavy and could be whirled around you and used like a club. They could smash bones, shatter helmets and then cut through whatever was left under that armour (flesh often). Think a more realistic version of the plank or a longer sabre weapon in kenshi.

Katana though (plural and non plural have the same spelling) are not really impact weapons. Japanese iron sources are terrible. Low quality iron sand leads to low quality iron that needs to be folded many many times to get any real strength. Hence the characteristic look of the katana. This makes it very strong but brittle. Mr Scotterius is correct when he says they would then "bend or break" when it hit something hard. Rarely were katana used to block other katana in a classical western duel. Rather the better option is to dodge out of the way.

Or course there do exist heavier weapons. Larger katana (I forget their name) existed that could be used to smash. They also could break but tended not to be lovingly crafted masterpieces so were a little more expendable and more clublike. On top of that there were Naginata polearms and other sorts of weapons. (I forget where I was going with this since I took a break when writing it but lets pretend my point makes sense.)

[Mask]

Iron age swords were not club-like. They are not useful for breaking bones. For that, you use clubs and maces. And no sword can shatter any decently made helmet. It will either be sliced through (if it is made of leather or cloth or the like), or be dented.

For the Katana stuff, going to point you to the discussion which already occurred in another thread: http://www.lofigames.com/phpBB3/viewtop ... 328#p17567 http://www.lofigames.com/phpBB3/viewtop ... 328#p18002

The short version is: The Katana is the Longsword of Japan. They function, practically speaking, the same. And the poor-quality iron stuff is a myth people came up with to fight the "Katanas are awesome and cut through anything!" movement, based off the refining process used for the "Jewel Steel" Katanas are known for.

Tachi and o-dachi are just longer katanas, and were used in war (as opposed to the Katana which was a peace or secondary weapon). Their use was primarily for cutting down horses, or using them from horseback. Like all swords, they were not club-like. Polearms, particularly the yari, were the preferred weapon of samurai (along with guns--them hating guns is a misconception). Swords were secondary weapons for if you lost your spear, or they were two-handed swords with specific utilities in mind (like cutting down horses).

[Blxz]

Iron age swords were not club-like. They are not useful for breaking bones. For that, you use clubs and maces. And no sword can shatter any decently made helmet. It will either be sliced through (if it is made of leather or cloth or the like), or be dented.

You should look up some of the fairly recent research that has been done on celtic swords. Some of it is quite amazing. They made very large, heavy swords that appear to not be as useful at purely cutting. Current theories are settling on a brute force weapon that in some circumstances can shatter helmets and shields. Keep in mind this is not medieval stuff with plate armour and all that. We are talking roman era, wooden shields and basic helms possibly leather in which case it would not shatter but split.


I indeed have read some of that thread you linked and I must agree with Scotterius in that case rather than your statement.

Japanese iron is terrible for the most part. Their metal working techniques found a way around that
but it leads to certain downsides such as brittle weapons. Sharp yes. Strong, certainly. Flexible and able to withstand a solid blow, questionable. I also think you misunderstood slightly; I did not refer to katana as 'club-like'. This is a description purely applicable to a potential wielding style of celtic weapons. They did not look club-like but it is possible to use one in such a way that the results would be similar.

And your mention of Yari, I of course completely forgot to mention them, thanks for bringing them up. Yari, naginata and other similar pole-arm and spear weapons were very common among Japanese warriors (Samurai were not the only warriors for most time when Japan was actually in any sort of state of war). Teppo, a sort of basic musket were also used, as you said, and they became quite proficient at building their own. Completely superseded of course by the time that Admiral Perry and the black ships arrived.

[Mask]

Swords as clubs is a theory that has been around since Victorian times, as well as many negative ideas about armour. Where do you account these findings to? Most of what I know is from my friend who is a History Professor. No matter how heavy you make a sword, it will never be more effective for applying blunt force than a mace or club. With light armour, there isn't a need for swords to be good blunt-force implements.

You would have trouble telling Japan's iron from Europe's. If you did find a difference, it would not be one based on quality of iron. This idea was thought up to counter the argument of katana being the ultimate swords (they aren't--they're pretty much the same as European ones), I suppose--because no metallurgy analysis has found any abnormal weakness when examining Japanese iron (that's from tools and from weapons). And as I said in that thread, Japan has a pretty wealthy steel industry--there isn't anything wrong with Japanese iron.

You are alluding to the ashigaru, peasant soldiers. While spears were certainly popular among the ashigaru, they were generally the first choice of samurai as well.

[Mattk50]

Low quality iron sand leads to low quality iron that needs to be folded many many times to get any real strength. Hence the characteristic look of the katana.

eh, im fairly sure the characteristic look is due to the use of different alloys for the blade and back of the sword, causing the sword to curve back naturally when it's cooled.