Thread: Guide to buying a workable sword?

Originally Posted by HamburgO

Statistically, your chance of surviving a close-range encounter with a gun-wielding attacker is about 35% - facing an edged weapon attack, this goes down to about 15%... But hey, don't take my word for it - participate in some good force-on-force training and see what happens !

Unless you happen to train in an actual knife fighting art such as FMA, most defense drills against knife attacks rely on the attacker not being very good or overenthusiastic. The odds of surviving an actual attack are very poor.

Originally Posted by Bruno

Unless you happen to train in an actual knife fighting art such as FMA, most defense drills against knife attacks rely on the attacker not being very good or overenthusiastic. The odds of surviving an actual attack are very poor.

I do not know how it's elsewhere but of what i know about most typical knife fighting here (actually i've seen two back years ago) they almost never end in killing somebody. In many cases there are no even serious damages.
Traditionally there were just two dudes who started arguing about this or that. As they couldn't find any solution, it was time to start wrestling. And if they still couldn't decide the winner, it was time to take the knifes. Usually it was enough to make the opponent give up, not to kill him. Shook hands and that's about it. Of course things sometimes went wrong and the opponent died, but usually they were either accidents or then there really was intent to kill. That is a what traditional knife fighting here is. Maybe that is what my great uncle really meant as he said that people do not know how to use knife. The intent is not to kill but to make the opponent stop on what he is doing. Sometimes a threat or tiny cut is enough.

Kitchen knife is still most common tool on homicide here, but i do not see them as knife fights. Drunken people lose their temper and sense and within a second they just grab the first thing they got in their hands and hit the opponent without any idea what they just did.
It is the same if someone attacks me with a knife (or any weapon for that matter). Very very unlikely here. But theorically: if he is about to rob me then killing doesn't make any sense. The attacker only makes it worse for himself. Actually i do not remember where anyone would have been killed in a street robbery. Such things surely must have happened but maybe the last time was about 10 years ago or so.

Of course it is different if someone really wanted to kill me (why? There are no angry husbands that i know). Getting stabbed/shot behind is not an actual knife fight either.

I agree that firearms are probably more effective than knives, but making unnecessary harm is more likely with hand gun. No matter how skilled you are with the gun, you need to know yourself and how to react the right way in panic and in surprising, stressing and chaotic situation. It is easy to overreact, act incorrectly and do something you cannot make undone later. With the knife you have few seconds more time to think and even to run away.

Originally Posted by Sailor

I do not know how it's elsewhere but of what i know about most typical knife fighting here (actually i've seen two back years ago) they almost never end in killing somebody. In many cases there are no even serious damages.
Traditionally there were just two dudes who started arguing about this or that. As they couldn't find any solution, it was time to start wrestling. And if they still couldn't decide the winner, it was time to take the knifes. Usually it was enough to make the opponent give up, not to kill him. Shook hands and that's about it. Of course things sometimes went wrong and the opponent died, but usually they were either accidents or then there really was intent to kill. That is a what traditional knife fighting here is. Maybe that is what my great uncle really meant as he said that people do not know how to use knife. The intent is not to kill but to make the opponent stop on what he is doing. Sometimes a threat or tiny cut is enough.

Kitchen knife is still most common tool on homicide here, but i do not see them as knife fights. Drunken people lose their temper and sense and within a second they just grab the first thing they got in their hands and hit the opponent without any idea what they just did.
It is the same if someone attacks me with a knife (or any weapon for that matter). Very very unlikely here. But theorically: if he is about to rob me then killing doesn't make any sense. The attacker only makes it worse for himself. Actually i do not remember where anyone would have been killed in a street robbery. Such things surely must have happened but maybe the last time was about 10 years ago or so.

Of course it is different if someone really wanted to kill me (why? There are no angry husbands that i know). Getting stabbed/shot behind is not an actual knife fight either.

I agree that firearms are probably more effective than knives, but making unnecessary harm is more likely with hand gun. No matter how skilled you are with the gun, you need to know yourself and how to react the right way in panic and in surprising, stressing and chaotic situation. It is easy to overreact, act incorrectly and do something you cannot make undone later. With the knife you have few seconds more time to think and even to run away.

I hear you. That's kind of the old school way your Grandpa was talking about, when using a knife didn't have to mean a fight to the death. I have been in two situations like that myself. Unfortunately, this has changed nowadays. Two countries with the most homicides per capita in the world are Venezuela and South Africa - and edged weapons are used to kill more than firearms in both countries. According to FBI statistics from 2010, also in the USA, firearms are used in approximately 30%, and edged weapons in 43% of homicides. Without knowing the statistics, I'm pretty sure that in the UK, Germany, or France, homicide would be more likely by knife than gun - matter of fact, the UK has completely and explicitly outlawed civilian carry of anything resembling a knife for that reason, and Germany is not far behind. It's strange to me how these governments, as violence becomes more and more of an issue, react by disarming the citizenry - the bad guys don't really care about the law, and the good (or at least law-abiding) people are left without many legal means of defense.

Anyway, glad to hear that things are still calm in Finland - as long as there is not too much vodka involved... Based on my time in northern Germany, I tend to try and keep my distance from drunks, but especially drunk Scandinavians, they'll go all Viking on you !!

Originally Posted by HamburgO

- matter of fact, the UK has completely and explicitly outlawed civilian carry of anything resembling a knife for that reason, and Germany is not far behind. It's strange to me how these governments, as violence becomes more and more of an issue, react by disarming the citizenry - the bad guys don't really care about the law

The intention is not to disarm the citizens, simply the criminals. Provided you have lawful excuse, e.g. you need the knife for your work, there is no problem.
Just don't go for a night out on the town carrying one. The idea is to be able jail people that carry them when the only reason they do so is to inflict injury.
The thing is, too many people use them for attack, not defence. Most knife victims don't even realise they have been stabbed, they think they've been punched, usually they don't even see the knife. No 'knife-fight' in that sense takes place.
Very rarely a burglar will get fatally stabbed by a householder, and in two recent cases in the UK, no charges were brought against the householder.

Originally Posted by welshwizard

The intention is not to disarm the citizens, simply the criminals. Provided you have lawful excuse, e.g. you need the knife for your work, there is no problem.
Just don't go for a night out on the town carrying one. The idea is to be able jail people that carry them when the only reason they do so is to inflict injury.
The thing is, too many people use them for attack, not defence. Most knife victims don't even realise they have been stabbed, they think they've been punched, usually they don't even see the knife. No 'knife-fight' in that sense takes place.
Very rarely a burglar will get fatally stabbed by a householder, and in two recent cases in the UK, no charges were brought against the householder.

I do not live in your country, so truly no disrespect intended, but intention of the law (written and enforced by legislators who live far above street level) and outcome are very often two different things. I would submit that self-defense and weapons law in the UK and other European countries actually favor the criminal element - their chance of encountering effective resistance in their nefarious activities from law-abiding citizens is extremely minimal. I have several English friends in London and Manchester who feel that the possible need for self-defense should be a lawful reason for a law-abiding citizen to go armed - unfortunately, that is no longer the case. As to the effectivity of the law: Consider the example of the UK 1997 Firearms Act. Between 1998 and 2006, gun-related injuries, albeit most of them non-fatal, increased by 110% in England and Wales*, indicating that in spite of the ban on firearms, more firearms were being used in the commission of crimes than prior to the ban. I'm going to go out on a limb here and speculate that you'll see a similar development with edged weapons over the next few years...

*Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_pol...ction_Act_2006

Originally Posted by EisenFaust

Paul Chen makes decent swords at various price points - they are chinese I believe but made well.

It depends on what you want to accomplish, and honestly how much money you are willing to spend. I will agree with EisenFaust, Paul Chen/Hanwei makes a good product, with prices ranging from the low hundreds to a few thousand for a folded piece.

I remember a similar thread a while back that degenerated very quickly, although I seem to recall the biggest points of contention being the use of the term "Japanese sword" and country of origin, rather than overall quality.

Originally Posted by HamburgO

I do not live in your country, so truly no disrespect intended, but intention of the law (written and enforced by legislators who live far above street level) and outcome are very often two different things. I would submit that self-defense and weapons law in the UK and other European countries actually favor the criminal element - their chance of encountering effective resistance in their nefarious activities from law-abiding citizens is extremely minimal. I have several English friends in London and Manchester who feel that the possible need for self-defense should be a lawful reason for a law-abiding citizen to go armed - unfortunately, that is no longer the case. As to the effectivity of the law: Consider the example of the UK 1997 Firearms Act. Between 1998 and 2006, gun-related injuries, albeit most of them non-fatal, increased by 110% in England and Wales*, indicating that in spite of the ban on firearms, more firearms were being used in the commission of crimes than prior to the ban. I'm going to go out on a limb here and speculate that you'll see a similar development with edged weapons over the next few years...

*Source: Gun politics in the United Kingdom - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Making knife carrying illegal here hasn't changed the amount of violence done with knifes. Law had no effect. As i said, most people do not see knife as a weapon of attack or defense. In most cases (over 90%) knife related violence happens indoors and usually between family members or friends. Or maybe the law had some effect after all because traditional knife fighting isn't so 'popular' these days. Not that it ever was but back when i was young, hearing about such things wasn't any big deal. Boys will be boys, people thought.

Hand guns aren't the topic here, but tells something that just like knifes, about 90% of all violence done with firearms happen by their legal owners with legal guns. Almost always between people who already know each other. Family members and friends. Carrying a gun is illegal and even getting a license these days for a gun is very difficult (excluding rifles used for hunting). That works here. If people were allowed to carry guns then i cannot even imagine how much trouble that would make.
Now do not get me wrong: I have no intent to provoke. It works here, but if i lived somewhere where carrying guns is more liberal then i would probably think the other way. But now i think that banning weapons from civilians is absolutely good thing. I know many cops and all think the same. Even cops have no right to carry gun when off duty.
I have a handgun (Glock 17) of my own and even carry it at work every now and then, but i wouldn't ever imagine taking it to my home.
But as said, world isn't the same everywhere. Things that work there, might be different elsewhere sometimes.

Sailor what do you do for a living?

Originally Posted by Sailor

Making knife carrying illegal here hasn't changed the amount of violence done with knifes. Law had no effect. As i said, most people do not see knife as a weapon of attack or defense. In most cases (over 90%) knife related violence happens indoors and usually between family members or friends. Or maybe the law had some effect after all because traditional knife fighting isn't so 'popular' these days. Not that it ever was but back when i was young, hearing about such things wasn't any big deal. Boys will be boys, people thought.

Hand guns aren't the topic here, but tells something that just like knifes, about 90% of all violence done with firearms happen by their legal owners with legal guns. Almost always between people who already know each other. Family members and friends. Carrying a gun is illegal and even getting a license these days for a gun is very difficult (excluding rifles used for hunting). That works here. If people were allowed to carry guns then i cannot even imagine how much trouble that would make.
Now do not get me wrong: I have no intent to provoke. It works here, but if i lived somewhere where carrying guns is more liberal then i would probably think the other way. But now i think that banning weapons from civilians is absolutely good thing. I know many cops and all think the same. Even cops have no right to carry gun when off duty.
I have a handgun (Glock 17) of my own and even carry it at work every now and then, but i wouldn't ever imagine taking it to my home.
But as said, world isn't the same everywhere. Things that work there, might be different elsewhere sometimes.

Living here in the sill pretty wild west of the US, I carry a gun and a blade every day, and train a lot with both. I also work private security, most recently in Central America, so my view on these issues is probably slightly twisted

Finally, I'll be moving to Germany next year, and shall have to seriously reconsider my personal security strategy there. As you say, the good news is that there are certainly less arms on the street to deal with than in the US...

Originally Posted by sidmind

Sailor what do you do for a living?

I'm in the military. About last 10 years in the navy and before that i worked, or served as you say, 10 years in the army. 3 deployments in my career.