Dragaera

Defender always wins? (Was: Re: on contradictions and such)

Tue Feb 8 13:02:00 PST 2005

On Tue, Feb 08, 2005 at 09:14:57AM -0600, Joshua Kronengold wrote:
> As a fencer, well, yes, there is.  Attacking allows you to frame the
> nature of the conflict, forcing your opponent into a specific set of
> responses (a largish set, but still smaller than those available when
> neither is attacking).  It also allows the possibility of a a mistake
> that leads to the immediate end of the conflict (ie, a hit).
 
I forgot to mention in my post that I've done some SCA-type fencing.  I was
overjoyed when I got my first real feint to work.  I faked throwing a shot
up the middle, my opponent parried, and then I threw a real shot up the
middle that hit.  I think that was my first experience against a human in
any game/sport where I feinted an attack with the intent to provoke a
*specific* response (and had it work).

Kat