Open rules, community project

[Tom Reynolds]

Vincent Le Chevalier wrote:

I think that's one point that can easily side-track us.
The usefulness of sparring is to test the reconstructed techniques in a non-cooperative setting. Therefore, the primary goal of sparring is to promote and reward the use of historical techniques. Simulating real combat is one way to do it, but it does not have to be done like that. Most historical or traditional sparring systems that I'm aware of could be flagged as unrealistic by us moderns, however they endured because their pedagogical goal was fulfilled, and simulating real combat was not it.

Realistic should not even be a criteria. The question is, do the rules or lack of rules provide interesting challenges and do they force the players to display good technique?

Tom Reynolds wrote:

If you mean that an exccessive concentration on realism can sidetrack us, then of course I agree with you. Technical complexity and challenge is certainly a part of any art, including ours. But I would suggest that an excessive concentration on technical complexity and challenge can also sidetrack us. Like many others, our art is a complex, multi-faceted one which certainly has more than one goal. Concentrating on any one of those goals to the exclusion of all others is bound to result in a distorted, inaccurate view of any complex art.

Take music, for example. Not being a musician (unfortunately) I can only report second hand that I have heard of several pieces in the classical repertoire that are famous among musicians for being extraordinarily challenging to play. But while this is true, in the end what makes those pieces justly famous is that they are challenging to play AND aesthetically pleasing. Similarly, I would think that what makes a martial art great might be that it is both technically complex and challenging AND effective in real life or death combat.

Or take literary interpretation as another example. I'm aware of a long-standing argument over whether a particular literary piece can be understood by itself, or whether it is necessary to understand the biographical and historical context in which the author wrote it. That argument is not going to be resolved any time soon, as I understand it, and in fact may not be capable of being resolved conclusively.

In that sense, traditional pell work and/or sparring might very well be considered unrealistic in that they do not exactly reproduce the conditions of real combat. But they are highly realistic in that they help us understand the historical and personal context in which these skills were first developed. Just like reading the books we know Oscar Wilde read helps us understand why he wrote the way he did.

Personally, I think that it is necessary to understand the biographical and historical context of an art in order to understand that art. And I think that a fundamental part of the historical context for this (our) art was that it was developed in a time where these skills were often literally needed for survival. For that reason if no other, I think that cultivating as much combat realism as safely possible is an important part of understanding this art.

Although I will certainly agree that cultivating that realism is itself a complex and challenging task, and may take a while to complete!

Thanks for an interesting post....

[David Rawlings]

In that sense, comparing a sport fencing contest and real combat really is to compare apples and oranges. And if the goal of sparring is to simulate real combat as accurately and safely as possibIe, then I'm not sure it is possible to add a specific set of rules to sparring without fundamentally changing it's character and ultimate goal.

Hi Tom, as usual thank you:)
This is of course a fundamental problem with any kind of sparring, the best any rule set can do, is support and encourage the best martial practice to a limited degree, for example, there is no way in any sparring environ regardless of rules, that I can demonstrate Thibault's control of the opponents blade as he illustrates it in the manual. (forcing my sword through to the hilt whilst trapping your blade).

this problem will be constant in whatever you do,
so the role of sparring in competition and school, should be to show over multiple* exchanges a consistent level of skill against a non cooperative opponent.

To learn from the varied stimuli an uncooperative opponent will give and apply these to your training and apply your theory to these practical stimuli within the limits of not killing your partner:) and so on.

The role of the rules should be to support the best practices with that in mind.
*even giving multiple exchanges makes it unreal, however even by drilling this is what we are doing.

So sparring and bouting is not real combat,
drilling is not, nor is pell work,
all are ways of creating aspects of a fight without the risk.

I would say within a school you should shift the focus of bouting to address the needs of the students at the time, be that limited speed, full force, grappling to submission, knock outs allowed whatever.

But a crossover set of rules that extolls best practice but allows an armalite to beat on a selohaha, or a member of the pigs dentures or some such group and every party involved being able to know months in advance what the format of that exchange will be, to be familiar with it's workings is a good thing in my mind, it has potential to link communities...through the liberal application of bruising...YAY




I've had too much coffee:)

[David Rawlings]

Solo training has its place. David Kite is an example of someone who has done very well with just that due to lack of local training partners. But I will say that you can progress a lot faster with other people to spar and drill with.

Agreed

[David Rawlings]

Poor sparring is in my opinion worse than not sparring at all, and there's plenty of poor sparring about.

Any sparring which is festooned with rules as described here is worse than useless, in my opinion.

.

I agree poor sparring is poop, the role of rules as I say is to encourage good sparring.
If you don't make those rules clear you risk encouraging poor sparring, which I agree with you is as much use as a yoghurt crossbow.

[David Rawlings]

Any sparring which is festooned with rules as described here is worse than useless, in my opinion.

All sparring is done under at least one constraint, which is that neither contestants should get seriously hurt. If you don't add more rules to enforce a realistic behaviour on the players, you end up with an environment that will not promote the use of realistic techniques. Of course this combines with the safety equipment including modifications of the swords.

Now you can choose to add implicit rules (the honor system, for example) which hangs on the fact that all the players more or less agree about what is good but can't be bothered to write it down, but in my opinion the explicit approach taken by Dave is the way to go. If anything it makes us think about what is fundamental and what we want to use sparring for. I may not agree with everything in Dave's proposition but I agree with the spirit.

Agreed:)

[David Rawlings]

Similarly, I would think that what makes a martial art great might be that it is both technically complex and challenging AND effective in real life or death combat.

Hi Tom, good post, I would say however(in my opinion) that martial arts should be on the whole be based on simplicity, any perceived complexity being in fact the most simple/practical way to deal with a given situation.

[Tom Reynolds]

[/quote]
David Rawlings wrote:
Hi Tom, good post, I would say however(in my opinion) that martial arts should be on the whole be based on simplicity, any perceived complexity being in fact the most simple/practical way to deal with a given situation.[/quote]

Tom Reynolds wrote:

Thank you, David. And I appreciate your posts as well. This has been an entertaining and informative and constructive thread.

Yes, of course, there is perceived complexity that is really simple. But there is also perceived simplicity that is really complex. Sure, to jump the track for a moment, a fire drill or a woven basket are not as overtly complex as a laptop computer or a GPS beacon. But think of how extraordinarily difficult it must have been to think up a fire drill or a woven basket for the first time. Remember the movie "Quest for Fire," of some twenty years ago?

So, in other words, a deceptively simple looking martial arts move can still be extraordinarily difficult to learn. And there is nothing wrong with appreciating the amount of work that went into mastering that move. But I still think that appreciation of form is not the whole story of a martial art. Like just about every other human technology, a martial art has both a form and a function - in this case, the function to win combats and to stay alive. Both the form and the function need to be understood and appreciated to fully grasp the martial art.

I do think we are in agreement there. My question is how best to achieve that balanced understanding, and whether a set of explicit standardized rules is the right approach. And here, David, in all fairness I have to say that opposition to standardized rules is a hot topic in general nowadays, not necessarily exclusively because of anything you personally said. Look at the current debate over standardized testing in American schools. Lots of people are opposed to them, even violently, on the grounds that such tests do not promote real understanding of the subject so much as just understanding of the tests.

Personally I am satisfied that for the most part, the real understanding that our sources originally intended to convey was knowledge of how to fight, and possibly even kill, without being killed one's self. How do we currently develop a set of rules that measures that understanding without simply encouraging understanding just the rules themselves? And, needless to say, how do we cultivate that originally intended understanding without actually trying to kill each other?

Very, very good question. I'm not sure that anyone has any clear answers right now. Nor, in fact that anyone ever will. But I will say emphatically that even though I disagree about our community needing standardized rules, I heartily agree about it needing vigorous and civil discussions like this one. Vigorous debates and even hearty disagreements, without ad hominem attacks, are actually good for our art and our community. This thread shows it!

Thanks again, David...

[David Rawlings]

Very, very good question. I'm not sure that anyone has any clear answers right now. Nor, in fact that anyone ever will. But I will say emphatically that even though I disagree about our community needing standardized rules, I heartily agree about it needing vigorous and civil discussions like this one. Vigorous debates and even hearty disagreements, without ad hominem attacks, are actually good for our art and our community. This thread shows it!

Thanks again, David...

although I'm coming at it from a differing perspective, I understand what you are saying.
To be honest the last paragraph sums it up for me, sometimes it's more valuable to get input from people that disagree with your standpoint but still analyse and with reserved neutrally. I think overall that's exactly what I've had here, thanks for that:)
I'll keep informing on any tweeks that get made.

[David Rawlings]

Hi chaps, a thread on another forum raised some of the development logics of the rule set as it stand so I'll post it here and hope it explains a little where we've all been going with it.
This is to do with why there is the addition of the sword hand as a target for the struck if he is struck in the off hand
Hi guys, a very valid question, it has mainly to do with skill sets and compromises.
As the fight is not a real fight to the death we want to show as much of a martial mind set as possible whilst accepting certain indefinites such as did the shot finish him, sever his sword limb, blind him render him incapable of movement? and so on will be impossible to prove.


So rather than try to enter into the debate over which shot was better we tried to develop a rule set that encourage this skill set:
strikes to targets that will have a higher potential to finish the fight immediately either:
affecting the core(head and torso).
the ability to strike(the weapon hand(s)
the ability to move(the legs)

Now here is the first compromise, that if any of these three areas that have a high potential to finish the fight immediately are hit, we are still allowing the struck to advance a step and attack.
because this helps the striker to display his higher skill set.
and to show the martial mind set that that part of the rules seeks to emulate.


the second compromise is this, the struck's choice of target.
clearly if in reality the initial strike was not good enough to stop the struck he could strike to any target.
but the rule is there to:
restrict the targets he can strike back to meaning he can't simply step and one handed release to the foot or curve a tap around to the off hand in counter.
he must in effect show a good solid strike to rob the striker of his point.


now in part this the combination of these two compromises is to make covering lines and penetrative path shots more desirable on the part of the attackers, without forcing them to be used.
desirous because if for example I single handed release to your leg, i may get a point but it tends to be a weak cut and doesn't cover the head well against a counter step should one come.
again curving your body out to flick the opponent tends to open a line that is harder to defend if they get a come back strike.
whereas an intersecting cut, take zorn for example will tend to cover the line as it cuts, making that counter cut harder to put into effect.

so those comprises are there to encourage the skill sets we want to see without forcing their use.

So eventually to the point in question, why the extra complication of the additional target for the struck if hit in the off hand, for this i will use sword and buckler for the mental picture.

If we accept that the first premise of the attack:
strikes to targets that will have a higher potential to finish the fight immediately either:
affecting the core(head and torso).
the ability to strike(the weapon hand(s)
the ability to move(the legs)

now the attacking party uses a non penetrative path shot(ie would not cut through the body or torso after), bending his body and stepping to flick a cut to the buckler arm which the other party has left stuck out, he manages to position out of distance of a non stepping counter, but so over extends his arm to get the hit that his sword arm is and should be a viable target.
(the other reason that I used the sword and buckler reference is that the attacker may well cover his head/torso line with the buckler whilst over extending, but cannot cover both arm and head/torso)
as it has not
affected the core(head and torso).
the ability to strike(the weapon hand(s)
the ability to move(the legs)

again this is a compromise but it is one as the others are designed to encourage good form in the attacker more than the struck, who is just proving the skill set of the striker.

In this case as well I hope you can see the addition of the target becomes a natural one rather than a complication.
On he whole it is about encouraging the kinds of well targeted covering shots and techniques that the majority of the community wanted to see, discouraging wide and flicky hits without forcing the competitors not to use them.


again I hope that makes sense:)

[Tom Reynolds]

Dave Rawlings wrote:

As the fight is not a real fight to the death we want to show as much of a martial mind set as possible whilst accepting certain indefinites such as did the shot finish him, sever his sword limb, blind him render him incapable of movement? and so on will be impossible to prove.

Tom Reynolds wrote:

Hi, Dave. I agree with most of what you have said here, and will only add that I think that the outcome of some shots - possibly a lot - would not be in doubt to any reasonable and/or informed observer. I have faith that the majority of the members of our community are like that, and not like the famously quarrelsome Monty Python knight who said, "only a flesh wound - I've had worse!" For someone like that, there is always a way to wriggle out of any scoring system.


Dave Rawlings wrote:

If we accept that the first premise of the attack:
strikes to targets that will have a higher potential to finish the fight immediately either:
affecting the core(head and torso).
the ability to strike(the weapon hand(s)
the ability to move(the legs)

now the attacking party uses a non penetrative path shot(ie would not cut through the body or torso after), bending his body and stepping to flick a cut to the buckler arm which the other party has left stuck out, he manages to position out of distance of a non stepping counter, but so over extends his arm to get the hit that his sword arm is and should be a viable target.

...


In this case as well I hope you can see the addition of the target becomes a natural one rather than a complication.
On he whole it is about encouraging the kinds of well targeted covering shots and techniques that the majority of the community wanted to see, discouraging wide and flicky hits without forcing the competitors not to use them.

again I hope that makes sense:)


Tom Reynolds wrote:

Yes, Dave, it does make sense. I agree with adding that target, and with your description of the first premise of the attack. But I think that how we achieve that premise is not necessarily limited to "well targeted covering shots and techniques,"

For the sake of being Socratically difficult, suppose that I am in real longsword combat facing an opponent who is a foot taller and 150 pounds heavier than me. Or, say that I am in real combat armed only with a dagger, facing someone with a longsword who is about my equivalent physically.

I'm sure there are other examples, and perhaps you or someone else can think of better ones. But my point is that I can think of combat situations where it might actually be a good tactical approach to commit "wide and flicky hits," in order to deceive my opponent as to my real abilities and encourage them to make mistakes. In some circumstances, their making mistakes might be the only chance I have of survival!


Finally (for now), Dave, let me say again that I appreciate your consistently good natured approach to this thread. As I understand it, the original goal of this thread was to propose an objective or at least consensual set of rules for deciding who wins a sparring match. The ultimate goal of this rule set is to help heal the splits in "our fractured community," as you put it in a previous post.

I couldn't agree more that it would be great to "splint our fractured community." But one reason why I disagree that standard rules are the right approach, though, is that I think our community and our understanding naturally develop dialectically. That is to say, through reasoned, rational, civil disagreement and debate. I would hate to see anything limit that debate by limiting differences of opinion.

And let me emphasize that I mean true Socratic dialectic, not social darwinist arm twisting and ad hominem attacks.

So, while I still disagree about a rule based approach, I think that discussing it like this is exactly what our community needs. Because it makes us think carefully about it. Sort of like the way that allowing students to have a cheat sheet in exams is a sneaky, underhanded, but highly effective way of getting them to study for those exams!

Thanks again for an interesting thread, Dave. I'll look forward to further entries...

[David Rawlings]

Dave Rawlings wrote:

As the fight is not a real fight to the death we want to show as much of a martial mind set as possible whilst accepting certain indefinites such as did the shot finish him, sever his sword limb, blind him render him incapable of movement? and so on will be impossible to prove.

Tom Reynolds wrote:

Hi, Dave. I agree with most of what you have said here, and will only add that I think that the outcome of some shots - possibly a lot - would not be in doubt to any reasonable and/or informed observer. I have faith that the majority of the members of our community are like that, and not like the famously quarrelsome Monty Python knight who said, "only a flesh wound - I've had worse!" For someone like that, there is always a way to wriggle out of any scoring system.

For the sake of being Socratically difficult, suppose that I am in real longsword combat facing an opponent who is a foot taller and 150 pounds heavier than me. Or, say that I am in real combat armed only with a dagger, facing someone with a longsword who is about my equivalent physically.

I'm sure there are other examples, and perhaps you or someone else can think of better ones. But my point is that I can think of combat situations where it might actually be a good tactical approach to commit "wide and flicky hits," in order to deceive my opponent as to my real abilities and encourage them to make mistakes. In some circumstances, their making mistakes might be the only chance I have of survival!

absolutely so you understand why I was unwilling to yield to requests to remove those shots through rules.

Dave Rawlings wrote:


Finally (for now), Dave, let me say again that I appreciate your consistently good natured approach to this thread. As I understand it, the original goal of this thread was to propose an objective or at least consensual set of rules for deciding who wins a sparring match. The ultimate goal of this rule set is to help heal the splits in "our fractured community," as you put it in a previous post.

I couldn't agree more that it would be great to "splint our fractured community." But one reason why I disagree that standard rules are the right approach, though, is that I think our community and our understanding naturally develop dialectically. That is to say, through reasoned, rational, civil disagreement and debate. I would hate to see anything limit that debate by limiting differences of opinion.
So, while I still disagree about a rule based approach, I think that discussing it like this is exactly what our community needs. Because it makes us think carefully about it. Sort of like the way that allowing students to have a cheat sheet in exams is a sneaky, underhanded, but highly effective way of getting them to study for those exams!

Thanks again for an interesting thread, Dave. I'll look forward to further entries...

A pleasure, it can never be THE way to heal rifts, but it is a part of the bridge. It is not a debate about THE way to spar either, it's for open tournaments, such as you may see in Germany in the summer next year.
I don't think we should decide on THE way to spar generally as I feel this should change to the results required on the day, again a pleasure, I'm really enjoying the insight you are bringing to the debate.

[David Rawlings]

and by the way I agree with a lot of what you just said

[Chris Ouellet]

And if the goal of sparring is to simulate real combat as accurately and safely as possibIe, then I'm not sure it is possible to add a specific set of rules to sparring without fundamentally changing it's character and ultimate goal.

Hey Tom, you misunderstand me, when I say sparring is "a game" it's in the most general possible sense of the term. I'm a strong advocate of a small *very small* number of rules as evidenced by my the 2nd post in this thread.
Think of flight simulators that soldier use to train for war, they are a "game", the soldiers themselves refer to it that way (I know for a fact). It is not war, it will never completely replicate war, but it's damn essential and you learn a lot.

It's very important in my experience that people approach sparing as a game, with the same mindset that you would a flight simulator. If you approach sparring as if it were war, and you've trained to execute war technique, then loss of control can and will surface in the heat of combat as war technique comes naturally and obviously that's a real danger.

In this sense the first goal of sparring should be that everyone walks out intact (2 eyes, 2 ears, same brain, etc..) and the secondary goal is the accurate representation of combat. It's a game, like a flight simulator, not war.

[Chris Ouellet]

Dave, can you please post the full up-to-date rules?

Have you considered chalking the weapons? If you apply chalk to the cutting edges then you can readily distinguish areas struck.

[Jaron Bernstein]

Dave, can you please post the full up-to-date rules?

Have you considered chalking the weapons? If you apply chalk to the cutting edges then you can readily distinguish areas struck.

I doubt if chalk would help. I recently had the chance to spar (i.e. "get thrashed by" ) John C. and Aaron P.. It was videotaped. I threw what I thought at the time was a good krump at Aaron. On reviewing the tape it was clearly more of a close blade placement (which would have left a chalk mark) than anything that would have done real damage. This is exactly the sort of thing that would be a "contested" call in a ranked and scored event.

I am all for holding events with classes and lots of time alloted to open freeplay (with Dave's suggested rules even used as a guideline). It is just that ranking and scoring has the potential to turn a "contested" call from a friendly learning opportunity into something that can generate ill will I don't like to see among those trying to revive this Art.