Dragaera

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

Tue Feb 8 13:46:53 PST 2005

--- Joshua Kronengold <mneme at io.com> wrote:

> Donna writes:
> >From: "Joshua Kronengold" <mneme at io.com> writes:
> >>Interesting.  Traditionally, in fencing (pre-electric), specific
> >>judges are assigned to watch specific fencers, and cannot call points
> >>on the other fencer, so there may be less of this effect."
> >This is definitely true.  I did think that was one of the cooler parts
> about
> >tournament fencing.  One judge watches the back of one fencer, another
> judge
> >watches the front, and then two judges for the other fencer and one in
> the
> >middle.
> 
> The one in the middle is a "director", fwiw -- they only get half a
> point (or is it one and a half?  Not enough to override both judges,
> in any case) for judging whether attacks are valid, but have full
> discression on the conduct of the bout and right of way (priority).
> 
> >guy gets poked, you raise your hand.  It wouldn't work quite as well in
> a
> >karate tournament because the competitors get to move around so much.
> 
> Actually, I've done judging at a rapier tournament that was modeled
> off of classical rules (ie, pre-electric fencing), and it worked ok --
> the judges needed to move a bit to stay to the back of "their"
> fencers, but could usually manage ok.

Sounds a lot like epee.

Jerry Friedman used to watch a lot of fencing matches.



		
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