Broadsword vs. Spear

Discussion in 'Weapons' started by little_monkey, Jul 23, 2004.

  1. whaledawg2

    whaledawg2 Runaway love machine

    I'm confident enough that I would do the marker test with you today. Footwork is important but the spearman faces a challenge he cannot beat, the fact that I can move forward faster then he can move backward. He just can't overcome that.

    And what is he going to do besides thrust? Do your realise how many feet he has to move to change the angle of attack on his thrust? no spearman is fast enough he can circle me at 6 ft range faster then I can spin.
     
  2. Cudgel

    Cudgel The name says it all

    Good points
    I will give you that.
    nd sheild and sword is the best thing to use against a spear or pole arm.
    If you can press the spearman with enough speed you will get him, and is usually the best way to get a spearman however the same owuld apply to any fight scenario.
    if you can press your oponent straight back you will get him.
    And its not taht hard to change the angle of a thrust you can chok up and use leverage. and move the butt ot eh spear to change the angle of teh thrust.
    OK and hers something else to think aoubt. Supposeing you do rush me na dare able to smother my spear with your sheild and force me to retreat what would happen if I just steeped in and and off line while stabbing you in the foot or lower leg. grante not imediatly deadly but its awfully hard to gaurd your feet with a sheild while charging or rushing.

    I am however no the best person to talk to about the spear, its not a weapon I use to often, I prefer shorter polearms like glaives or the gretesword to a spear.
     
  3. ToRNaDo LorD

    ToRNaDo LorD New Member

    ...







    Yes, I have done a fight with a sword vs. a spear, once you get in close the spearman is dead and when your far away you can block the jabs easy.
     
  4. Cudgel

    Cudgel The name says it all

    Tornado lord
    ahh but you havent said what kin of traing youve had, where you got it, who taught you, what type of rules you were using in sparring, whether the weaposn are live or padded mck ups for training. Nor di dyou stat how long you have been training as well as not supplying more supoprting info.
     
  5. cybermonk

    cybermonk New Member

    Those are good points, but what about dropping low and hitting you in the legs, or sweeping with the spear or plain turning around and running until you get tired, since the shield and sword weight more than a spear it could be somewhat a disadvantage to the shield man.
     
  6. Stolenbjorn

    Stolenbjorn Valued Member

    You forget that he can alter the angles in height pretty quick (hig-low feints) And unless you're of the same calibre as a swizz footsoldier that in a battle in the 15'th century that was run through by a lance, who after he'd been impaled grabbed the shaft and aked forwards until he was close enouth to kill his killer; you have to take into account what comes at you while closing faster than he can go backwards...

    I am a swordguy by heart myself, and I regarg myself as quite capable vs. the spear myself, but your arguments makes me think that you're either one of the best swordmen around in the world, or just plain bragging :rolleyes:

    To dismiss all the very reflected and true arguments stated so well by others above with your rather shallow coments isn't exactly swaying my oppinion one bit :rolleyes:

    So since you're beeing som bombastic, have it then!
    How long have you been fighting with a sword?
    How long have the spearwielder you've supposedly been slaying been trained with a spear?
    What swordschool/tradition are you practicing?
     
  7. whaledawg2

    whaledawg2 Runaway love machine

    I have a big chunk of wood to parry that spear with, and he can only go down quickly with it. Lifting someing 10 ft out up is not going to be that quick.

    As I said before, I like my odds much more with a shield and sword then with a spear(shielded or not).
     
  8. Cudgel

    Cudgel The name says it all

    spears are fast. really really fast.
    haveing a sheild evens teh odds somehwat but eh spear man still has the edge.
    I recall a similar therad or two or three on sword forum about swords or spears. And strangely enough all the experienced peopl would pick a spear or polearm over a sword and shield, and all the less expereinced poele picked sword and shield and made similar arguamentss that have as to why teh swordn adn sheild is better than teh spear.
    I personlly would pick a gretesword or a pollaxe or glavie/naginata but thats not the discusion at hand.
    The thrusts of spear being welding by even a moderatly profiecnt weilder are fast. I still think its interesting how knights would have singles combats using spears or pollaxes instead of sword and sheild.
     
  9. whaledawg2

    whaledawg2 Runaway love machine

    Then please enlighten me, what is the point of the sword?
     
  10. oni_sensei

    oni_sensei Valued Member

    The same as any other weapon. To kill.
     
  11. Cudgel

    Cudgel The name says it all

    selfdenfence??
    a back up weapon??
    the battle feild??
    unarmored and lightly armored solders?

    Im not saying teh sword is useless but onol ythat he spear has been the favored weapons of not only peasantry but also nobility
    The asord was a weapon fro use from horse back after the lances was broken or beuried in teh chest of some one. it was a back up for ehn you lost your main weapon. it owould do quite ell gaint the light armor that most common soldiers wore, it did not so good against eh armor of the nobilty.
    now mind you im talking aobut eh battle feild

    As word is good weapon from when you arent in battle and dont have to face armor and is a lot easier to carry around than a polearm.
    the sowrd was also a symbol of nobilty becuas it takes more skill to propbrly make a good sword blade than axe head or spear point.
     
  12. cybermonk

    cybermonk New Member

    I dont quite understand what brought you to ask that question but I will give it a try. The sword is a weapon and like any others has its advantages. Pretty good in close combat, allows for the use of a shield aswell and it is easy to carry around. If a battle between a spear man and a swordsman begins at close range the spear man is in trouble, however if the battle begins from long range the swordsman is at a very big disadvantage.
     
  13. Jeffrey Quinn

    Jeffrey Quinn Valued Member

    The "Broadsword" was never military weapon in China

    The weapon that is usually referred to as "broadsword" is called a 牛尾刀 (Niuwei Dao) in Mandarin, which translates as "oxtail dao". A better English translation than broadsword would be falchion, but the term isn't very well known.

    The oxtail dao first appeared around 1850, and was used strictly by peasant societies. It was a common weapon in peasant uprisings towards the end of the Qing dynasty, and there are stories of the Communist armies using it when ambushing Japanese troops in places with zero visibility such as dense forests or crops.

    However, the oxtail dao was never issued as a military weapon.

    The early Qing dynasty general Qi Jiguang had some of his troops instructed in a sword similar to what is currently called a 苗刀 (miao dao), almost identical to a Japanese Katana. According to Qi Jiguang's instructions, the swordsmen were more to support and protect soldiers using polearms such as spears & pikes, who inflicted more damage on the enemy.

    The two most common kinds of dao were historically the 柳叶刀 (Liuye Dao) or willow leaf sabre, which had a slight curve along the entire blade , and the 雁毛刀 (Yanmao Dao) or qoose quil sabre, which was mostly straight with a curve at the end.
     
  14. kiaiki

    kiaiki Valued Member

    We tried out similar challenges with naginata vs. katana (spear vs. sword). The subtle difference is that a naginata has a sword-like edge to slash with as well as a point and was very, very hard to by-pass. The most successful spear technique was not only footwork but very rapid sliding of the shaft to vary distance and mess up the swordsman's timing and distance. Eventually, a full tenkan (turn) after a deflection of the spear thrust got past the naginata blade and put the swordsman in too close to be repelled. Put simply, we worked out that deflection of a thrust followed by rapid attack keeping close to the shaft of the spear seemed to be the only way past.
    Given a choice of weapon, the katana would be my choice, but if I was equally skilled in both the naginata would be far superior due to its flexibility - a bo staff, sword and spear combined!
     
    Last edited: Sep 4, 2004
  15. Jeffrey Quinn

    Jeffrey Quinn Valued Member

    I'm enjoying this thread very much. There's been a number of good posts, especially Kurai's on page one.

    For those of you who are interested in terminology, halberd isn't really the best translation of either pudao or guandao. Unfortunately, most European weapon names have pretty much disappeared from modern English, so we are stuck with using inexact translations. The European weapon which most closely resembled Pudaos & Guandaos was called the fauchard. Diehards will only use the term halberd to translate weapons grouped under the character 戈 (ge), which originally meant dagger-axe, but later came to include weapons which were mostly spear-like, but had some kind of axe- or blade- like protrusion to the side.

    For the record, the proper name for the 关刀 (guandao) is technically the 隐月刀 (yinyue dao), which means "covering the moon" dao. I've also heard it called the 春秋刀 (chunqiu dao), which means "spring and autum" dao. I've always assumed that chunqiu refers to the Spring and Autumn Period (770 - 476 BCE), but as this is about seven centuries before General Guan's lifetime, I could be wrong. At any rate, weapons of this description didn't exist during GG's lifetime, but were developed around the same time that that legends about him started to become popular, which wasn't for a few centuries after his death. Images of General Guan holding this weapon are an anachronism.

    I haven't come across battlefield casualty statistics in China, but in fuedal Japan, both before and after the introduction of firarms, approximately 70% of casualties were the result of projectile weapons (arrows, bullets, shrapnel fired by catapults, etc.). This remained fairly constant across a several centuries. A furthur 20% were the result of polearms. Most of the remaining 10% were evenly split between swords and stones. Most of the sword injuries occurred towards the end of battles, after all the ammunition was gone. I believe the situation in fuedal Europe was similar.

    Again, I'm not as sure of the statistics in China, but armies in feudal Japan were pretty large. I think the largest fielded in the feudal era numbered close to a quarter million. The number of swordsmanship schools at this time never numbered more than a few hundred, and during most of the fuedal era, the number was much lower, counted in the dozens. Therefore, only a very small percentage of combatants were highly skilled with the sword. The main Samurai battle skill was archery on horseback.
     
  16. Cudgel

    Cudgel The name says it all

    I prefer glaive myself to refer to the various types of curved cutting polerms.
    But as interesting as your posts have been they areally havent contributed to teh threads disscussion. So, what aer your thoughts on the actuall discusion jeffery?
     
  17. xuande

    xuande New Member

    To answer your question, the sword is better suited for combat at close quarters.

    Is the spear infallible? I think most who have responded in favor of the spear will say no and I'm no exception. They just are different weapons that have their unique strengths and weaknesses, as I've said before in this thread it depends so much on other factors. I wouldn't pick a spear over a sword in a close quarters environment, the sword would excel there. Similarly I would be putting myself at a disadvantage picking a sword (with or without shield) over the spear in an open combat area where I can fully utilize the reach of the spear.

    As for the option of the shield I would stay without, keeping a hand free to support my sword hand or to utilize for punching and grabbing work better for me. Against bigger weapons like a tiger fork, kwan do, monk spade and the like I would chose the shield since those weapons will be slower than the spear. But that is a whole different ballgame that would probably necessitate a new thread.

    Tornado Lord:

    You say you have done spear vs sword work, but I highly doubt from your comments you've done much if any spear work. Spear is far more of a finesse weapon than you give it credit for. Not all thrusts are the same, though they might look like it, the angle of the spear head, speed and positioning will affect what goes next. It is a far more complicated weapon to learn to use effectively, thus why it is considered a 1000 day weapon vs 100 for the sword.
     
  18. Bellator Manus

    Bellator Manus Warrior of the Hand

    That seems odd to me. A spear is somthething I would imagine to be more of a 100day weapon than a sword. I guess that's because I always assumed that a sword to be pretty complex.
     
  19. Cudgel

    Cudgel The name says it all

    same here I thought one of th reasons spears were so good becaseu they are vastly for easy to learn than a sword.
     
  20. xuande

    xuande New Member

    Straight sword is a 10,000 day weapon, broadsword is 100. Guess I should have clarified that. Broadswords are very straightforward in how they are used in CMA, it is a weapon that primarily relies on strength rather than finesse. It is considered a tiger weapon in how it is used, straight sword is dragon, spear is snake if that helps in visualizing how each of the weapons is primarily used.

    Most people think spear is very easy, I mean really its just a stick with a sharp end, no? Well the chinese spear utilizes the tassel quite a bit for distraction and the shape of the blade (diamond) add elements outside of just thrusting. As I've mentioned before the angle the blade goes in for the attack will determine what you can do as a followup. In fact most thursts are the diversion with the intention of cutting on the way back with the primary targets being the joints. The accuracy needed for strikes like that takes much longer to perfect than you can imagine.

    For kicks try hanging a piece of wood and see if you can consistently hit it, when that gets to be easy use rings as targets, now do that while excecuting the parry, share and thrust drill. Just that little bit will take you a good 6 months to get good at if not longer and that is just working on the accuracy there are other subtleties that take just as long to train.

    But this is for the more complicated aspects of spear. It is easier to train a low level spear than a low level broadsword, at the higher levels it flips. I guess I end up thinking more towards a proficient user of the weapon rather than a new recruit but yes spears at their most basic level are easier to learn, not to mention cheaper to manufacture.

    I'd be interested in hearing from those that have more experience with the European style weaponry in how these two play out with each other. While similar the weapons are different enough in design and use to make it a different matchup.

    My 2 1/2 cents.
     

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