How to Tell if Someone Knows Swordsmanship? (Reply to Combat Outlook)

all right folks recently i found a video posted on a channel called combat outlook about how you can tell if someone knows any real swordsmanship which is an interesting topic and i've got a few things to say about it and before i start let me just point out that even though i have some criticisms i'm not here to stir up any drama or attack anyone personally and i ask you to do the same or not do it i suppose you know what i mean in the description it says that this was originally recorded in 2015 so six years ago by now and normally i would urge caution with older content because six years is quite a time period if i look back at something that i said six years ago there's probably quite a few videos that i don't fully agree with anymore or downright disagree with or that i would phrase differently now because as you continue practicing continue learning you know your perspective changes and you know broadens and all of that in this case it says that the points are still valid so i'm assuming that they probably still agree with this at least mostly so hello all right so the audio quality is terrible so i've turned on new subtitles and these are automatic captions so they will be quite a bit off every now and then but they might still help understand some quick things to tell whether someone is yesing or not about whether they know something whether someone is bsing or not so bullshitting captains did not get that at all there are four quick things that i know about that i like to look for whenever okay so four indicators that somebody knows or doesn't know about swordsmanship first thing is actually how to handle the sword the kind the amount i like to look at the amount of respect that they treat any sword-related item that they're handed so this is obviously about safety i don't care if someone does any kind of grand gesture that they've seen in a movie or video on youtube whatever that and of itself doesn't tell you anything but what does tell you something is how safe they are being so do they control the blade you know are they aware of where the blade is do they randomly point it at people do they just wave it around and what have you are they aware of where it is in relation to their body and others so one big issue is whenever somebody is walking around with a sword and just kind of points it just imagine somebody walking around a corner holding a sword forward and then somebody else comes around the corner that they don't see and guess what now you've just impaled someone so that is a huge tell of course it may seem a bit ironic because he's holding a larp sword and that's what they're practicing with and safety is not really that much of a concern with those however it's still good to have a solid habit you know because if you if you handle something like this routinely and just mess around with it whatever and then someday you pick up a sharp sword you may have these bad habits from handling larp swords you may just you know touch the blade all willy-nilly and wrap your fingers around the edge or whatever point it like i already mentioned and so yes it is good to learn proper safety even with large swords another thing how they hold the sword yeah there are many different groups throughout history throughout time about how they would hold a certain weapon for certain scenarios technically there's no wrong answer but certain weapons need to be held certain ways in order to be used correctly okay so many different grips four different swords throughout history that is very correct there is no general universal answer how do you grip a sword which sword for example when you're looking at a side sword or especially a rapier and you see someone just grip it like this in a hammer grip that's they're most likely not trained unless they're using a side sword and they want to emphasize a cut because you can definitely cut better like this compared to having a finger over the guard however even then it's not really going to be a hammer grip as such it's more likely going to be some form of handshake grip so this is more plausible so this is this is fine um this would be the more common grip that's what you generally use with a rapier because this gives you more point control it allows you to thrust more effectively it brings everything more in line so you don't have to over extend your wrist to do that which is another thing i've made an entire video about if you see somebody thrust like this you know hyper extend their wrist and thrust like that that's bad that's actually going to likely cause wrist injury that can mess with your tendons so that is objectively wrong but i've seen some people go to the opposite extreme where they over correct and insist that a hammer grip is always wrong and that is definitely not true if you look at certain sword designs you know like this um your park bronze sword this this is a hammer grip kind of affair this large pommel here tells you that you're supposed to hold it like that it fixes your hand into a certain position you can sort of force it i mean with this one not even really you can't even really force it you would have to go so high up on it and you know finger the the sharp section of the blade that this is just this is not practical this doesn't make any sense they might have skills with using it that way because they practice but that kind of practice is not correct it's not the kind of practice that makes using the structure of the sewer efficient that's a good point i've said that before as well just because somebody has practiced a lot doesn't mean they've done it correctly or efficiently or optimally or whatever like for example before i personally joined ahima school i did a lot of this myself trying to figure things out and we did a lot of you know sparring without supervision from an experienced instructor all of that and there are certain problems with that i mean you can build up plenty of bad habits and do things sub-optimally and never know it but because you've done it so long if you've done it for many years you think that you're great at it but biomechanically you may be very much off particularly when it comes to things like footwork the other thing whether their back is straight no matter what stance or what type of swordsmanship they're doing their back is not straight that shows a lack of facts a lack of attentiveness when they're actually different well yes and no in a lot of cases that's true if you look at the general posture with a lot of swords it's typically upright but that has a particular reason that really has more to do with the footwork and he actually touches on this later in the video so there are postures that have a forward lean to them you see that in a number of manuals there is a hip hinge with different swords and that serves a very particular purpose it's a way to extend your reach or get out of harm's way without compromising your structure overall because your feet are still planted in a particular way you still have a wide solid stance your feet are not lifting off in ways they shouldn't and this can be quite useful with a dusak for example now you can get additional reach by leaning forward into the cut and when the opponent counter cuts you can lean back and because you've already you're already leaned forward and your opponent is aiming at your head torso or arms where they currently are if you now not only go back to a neutral position but even lean back and now you've created a lot of space to evade that cut what degree of straightness does the bat have when they're actually engaging when they're blocking or actually attacking at some point so what degree of straightness does the back have when they're actually attacking or defending and again a lot of cases that is true you know for a biomechanically efficient attack generally it should be upright i've pointed that out before when it comes to leg cuts in particular if you lean forward and try to reach the opponent's leg and cut low like that the problem comes if you're actually lifting off with your rear leg because now your imbalance your entire balance is completely thrown off your structure is compromised you are very vulnerable to attacks at that point in case of cuts to the leg you can do that with a hip hinge the only problem is that the most common defense against the cutter leg is stepping back and avoiding the leg and striking to the head at the same time if your head is forward and low in a position that you can't quickly escape from that is very exposed so in that situation you may not want to do that and the last thing actually that i like to look at over some of those they're doing the swordsmanship is the back foot no matter what stuff no matter what type of part that they do the back flip should always be controlled they should never you know be attacking minutes like that's that's not what you want no matter what type of attack you do yes so that is also generally true if the rear foot lifts off again like i pointed out before your balance is compromised in my earlier sparring footage you see that quite a bit that was way before i got into proper practice and there's a lot of that going on and that's what people often do by default they they try to get as much reach as possible they over extend themselves and then just kind of hover precariously on one leg without good balance plus if your rear leg lifts off that also shows that you're not actually pushing off the ground to drive your attack if you want to strike while bringing as much of your body weight and core strength into it as possible you want to push off the ground with your rear leg of course it's not supposed to be stapled to the ground you need to step after all and your heel can absolutely lift off the ground as long as the ball of your foot is still in contact and it can lift off a little bit for short periods this is more about a combination of foot placement and posture if the rear foot lifts off and you're leaning forward now you have a problem so what do i actually disagree with what do i actually have to criticize so far i've agreed with everything right well it's actually in the comments here somebody else says posing as hemo more like so the response here is by combat outlook hima has no masters of lineage essentially they read old books and treatises and then members claim to be combat experts this is something i've seen all too often if somebody sees this uh this channel here combat outlook and they see them fight with swords and they've seen them made statements about how to tell if somebody knows swordsmanship a lot of people could jump to the conclusion that oh you think you're experts but unless somebody literally says they think they're an expert or if you ask them do you consider yourself to be an expert and they answer yes unless that's the case or unless they give very strong signals that they think they're experts you don't know and you shouldn't jump to conclusions and this dismissive comment of oh they just read old books and there's no lineage and no living masters i've heard that before in fact i've made a video about this talking to my instructor kyle talley about that topic specifically and the people in short just very often make the mistake of assuming that a martial art with a lineage is way older than it actually is and that it's been unchanged the entire time which is just not true if you look at a lot of art martial arts or martial arts in general you often see there is a more recent history to that and it has gone through changes over time and it's all during a time period which it wasn't common anymore to fight with swords on the street something else ties into that which is occasionally i see people asking has you ever been in a real sword fight and you have to ask yourself what does this person mean by real sword fight if they mean full contact sparring with a fully resisting opponent then yes if they mean a an actual sword fight to the death with sharp swords nobody has like that that's a completely pointless question in some parts of the world machete fights can still possibly happen or happen in more recent times but um you won't find anybody who has fought in a real fight to the death with sharp swords unless you've been in an actual sword fight in the middle ages or renaissance or earlier what have you and survived that and you cannot claim to have been in a real sword fight i would like to say real sword combat personally i like to make the distinction between fighting and combat because there are a number of things that can be called fighting you know larp fighting can be called fighting sparring is definitely fighting there's a number of kinds of fighting that are not quote unquote for real in the sense that you're not going to end up maimed or killed whereas combat the way i use the term is higher stakes that is a quote unquote real situation where you could be maimed or killed so it's a little unfortunate that this channel is named combat outlook here's another reply that is what we're not teaching we're just sharing our outlook fair enough there's nothing wrong with that but if you're just sharing your outlook maybe you shouldn't dismiss an entire martial art that i find that a little bit strange i mean you can still say well it's your outlook it's your opinion but it's still a little bit odd to dismiss people who practice martial art based on the historical manuscripts which are written by people who were in real life combat to the death and know a lot about what actually happens that that irks me a little bit you know i mean again it's your opinion you can think whatever you want but it seems that seems a little bit odd um the thing is a lot of hema practitioners will tell you there are limitations in interpreting the manuals because you have to interpret them you cannot ask the historical masters directly what they meant but they are recreating the art not just by reading but by doing so that's why i find it a little bit strange to do sword biting with larp swords it doesn't even matter if it's larp or whatever but doing sword fighting and then dismissing others who are doing sword fighting while also doing research there's a technique showcase video as well where he does use historical techniques from the manuscripts this right here is an interpretation of a sweat or thwart cut so he clearly does it himself so i don't really understand where the apparent animosity toward hima comes from so what about the elephant in the room so to speak what most people seem to criticize combat outlook for is the use of larp swords and so this really depends on the intent what i think about it if it's people who meet up just to have a fun workout basically and uh quote unquote mess around with swords or whatever you want to call it really that's fine if you want to actually learn swordsmanship then there are definitely some drawbacks of using larp swords and larp weapons specifically axe vs sword that is axe versus short sword so this is artificial in a lot of ways so this this larp axe here weighs nothing essentially compared to a real axe especially one with such a large head you wouldn't be able to swing it like this just period plus the sword wouldn't be able to parry it this for example so he swings boom now this is out of measure even this in fact even with the super light larp actually this blows through just imagine this with a steel axe this is just you have no chance basically of defending against that but he also wouldn't be anywhere near as fast so there's a lot of artifacts in this a lot of things that would just would not happen in real life so now he's holding the axe with one hand is he gonna swing it with one hand yes that ain't happening not with a real axe in real combat so plus of course there are certain things you cannot do with larp weapons there are reasons to use them specifically you don't want to wear a bunch of protective gear because they don't hit as hard of course that's the main advantage now i do think personally they should be wearing fencing masks because the way it is i'm pretty sure they're excluding the head as a target area because if you strike somebody hard even with a larp weapon in the head it's probably not great especially if you hit the eyes you might still you know cause damage to the eyes particularly with a thrust like thrusting a larp sword into someone's face that can cause injuries um could break nose or knockout teeth things like that so i think it's still better to always wear some form of face protection at the very least so you can be more realistic with it you know because this is this does not translate to swordsmanship in real life in real combat there's a lot of flailing stumbling they don't really show that much respect or that much concern about the opponent's weapon and that's kind of the main issues that i see with that you're what you're practicing is fighting with larp weapons you're not practicing swordsmanship as such um in my opinion you need at the very least synthetic practice sorts to really do it effectively ideally steel because steel behaves differently now larp swords do bind better than synthetics because they do have some friction edge on edge specifically so that can be helpful for practicing binds but the problem is that the mass and the inertia is just completely different so you can do a lot of things with larp swords that you can't with steel swords and here by the way is an example of incorrect grip if you look at this right here this heavily over extended wrist that's a problem thing is there is some good form in this like this this cut to the leg for example you know he does not over extending himself and he recovers from it so there's nothing wrong with that this on the other hand this is again a latex sword artifact if you did this trying to grab a rapier like this probably is not going to work you need to first obtain a bind if you if the blades are crossed okay so you've obtained a bind your bones blade versus your own now you can grab that because now it's stationary and the opponent can't react to it as well if you just try to walk up to it and grab it you're probably gonna get a thrust straight through the hand yeah this particularly that just doesn't work the same way with steel you know the way just immediately whips back up you know even though historical swords are by no means slow they do have a certain amount of mass and that comes in mainly whenever you're decelerating stopping and accelerating again to change direction if you strike downward you have to decelerate all that mass to come to a stop then you have to accelerate it again which means with a sword you can't just do this you know you with larp sword you can they are so light that they don't add much beyond the weight of your arm so yeah with 300 400 grams or whatever you sure you you can do all this with a real sword that doesn't work quite the same way even a particularly light one again not trying to tell these guys what they can or cannot do or say or what have you if this is how your practice then by all means you know any kind of fun sort activity that is safe has pretty much my stamp of approval i may not be interested in it myself i may not do it like that myself but hey it's all good if you're safe if you're having fun you know if you're exercising what it's all good but when i hear someone talk about combat and swordsmanship in general while they practice with larp swords that does raise a bit of an eyebrow from me i mean if you do it in addition if you also practice with steel you know that's a different story anyway i figured this would be a good opportunity to have an open discussion about swordsmanship and how to practice it and this and that and the other so feel free to let us know your opinions in the comments uh by the way i definitely prefer this over people who do nothing but forms and never spar if you never try your techniques against a resisting opponent who doesn't put up with what you're trying then your interpretation of martial arts is going to be quite limited so obviously i take this over a certain log master any day anyway hope you found it interesting let us know what you think and thanks for watching have a good one [Music] folks [Music] you

Channel: Skallagrim

Views: 191,784

Keywords: Skall, Skallagrim, how to tell, swordsmanship, historical martial arts, larp swords, sword fighting, HEMA, opinion, outlook, sparring, combat, real or fake

Id: q4zAE8EQaW0

Length: 24min 28sec (1468 seconds)

Published: Wed Jun 02 2021