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What are the stats for a standard katana?
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<blockquote data-quote="Amal Shukup" data-source="post: 1660168" data-attributes="member: 6291"><p>Absolutely. Pretty much any well made sword can (with the appropriate technique) cut, chop, hack or punch through bone. Plenty of archaeological and documentary evidence to this effect. </p><p></p><p>Incidentally, I am firmly in the Katana = MW Bastard Sword camp. And frankly, I've seen some pretty crappy katanas (even 'real' ones - lots of assembly line junk produced for the Japanese military up through WWII), so the 'MW' bit is fairly subjective...</p><p></p><p>But sharp? Oh yeah... Couple of anecdotes:</p><p></p><p style="margin-left: 20px"><strong>1.</strong> Many moons ago, I had the opportunity to practice Tameshigiri (as part of studying Iaido) - wherin cuts are made using a 'live' sword against a tightly rolled bamboo and reeds mounted on a vertical stake. This supposedly approximates the 'difficulty' of removing a head (I have been so told, no direct knowledge obviously).</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">It was surprisingly easy. Sure, my technique was flawed (cut was wavy, indicating poor blade control) but that 'head' was absolutely severed... Our instructor made it look REAL easy (he was annoying that way).</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"><strong>2.</strong> I've personally met an Iaido practitioner (at a workshop back in 1989 or so) who had managed to (fairly slowly) push a foot and a half of his instructor's 'live' blade through his left forearm during a demonstration (Tsuka-ate form, I believe). Oops. Didn't feel the resistance or pain until it was well and truly in there. Finally notices it, and as might be expected, passes out.</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">I've seen the scar. Er, Scars. They're pretty impressive...</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">The funny bit of the story as I heard it was the reaction of the elderly instructor: who, greatly agitated and making little 'oh! oh!' sounds, rushes out to the slumped student, very carefully removes the sword from the arm, wipes it off with a cloth, rubs it down with clove oil, and starts tapping it with the little bag of powdered rock (whatever it's called) used to absorb excess oil and contaminants...</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">(In fairness, I'm given to understand that the weapon in question was both quite old and grotesquely valuable. But hello? Bleeding to death over here?)</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">At any rate, about this point he notices his rapidly exsanguinating student. Again with the 'oh! oh!' sounds, and rapidly improvizes a tourniquet with his obi... No harm, no foul <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile :)" data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /></p><p></p><p>At any rate, vaunted sharpness and all, the Katana is just another weapon: Fairly strong on the offense - particularly the cut (although that linear 'whacking' motion seen in a lot of sport kendo won't cut bread), somewhat fickle on the thrust, reasonably fast. But overall, not much more effective in its context than a basket-hilted broadsword, a gladius, or even a nice aluminum baseball bat are in theirs.</p><p></p><p>As for the 'miraculous' properties of Japanese steel? Mostly really good PR: Damascene steel and Indian 'wootz' was just as good and typically started with better raw steel. The differentiated tempering of a katana is cool, but makes for a finicky weapon - you can fubar a katana real easy if you 'ding' the monouchi (the cutting surface near the tip), which is very sharp but terribly brittle. YMMV</p><p></p><p>A'Mal</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Amal Shukup, post: 1660168, member: 6291"] Absolutely. Pretty much any well made sword can (with the appropriate technique) cut, chop, hack or punch through bone. Plenty of archaeological and documentary evidence to this effect. Incidentally, I am firmly in the Katana = MW Bastard Sword camp. And frankly, I've seen some pretty crappy katanas (even 'real' ones - lots of assembly line junk produced for the Japanese military up through WWII), so the 'MW' bit is fairly subjective... But sharp? Oh yeah... Couple of anecdotes: [INDENT][B]1.[/B] Many moons ago, I had the opportunity to practice Tameshigiri (as part of studying Iaido) - wherin cuts are made using a 'live' sword against a tightly rolled bamboo and reeds mounted on a vertical stake. This supposedly approximates the 'difficulty' of removing a head (I have been so told, no direct knowledge obviously). It was surprisingly easy. Sure, my technique was flawed (cut was wavy, indicating poor blade control) but that 'head' was absolutely severed... Our instructor made it look REAL easy (he was annoying that way). [B]2.[/B] I've personally met an Iaido practitioner (at a workshop back in 1989 or so) who had managed to (fairly slowly) push a foot and a half of his instructor's 'live' blade through his left forearm during a demonstration (Tsuka-ate form, I believe). Oops. Didn't feel the resistance or pain until it was well and truly in there. Finally notices it, and as might be expected, passes out. I've seen the scar. Er, Scars. They're pretty impressive... The funny bit of the story as I heard it was the reaction of the elderly instructor: who, greatly agitated and making little 'oh! oh!' sounds, rushes out to the slumped student, very carefully removes the sword from the arm, wipes it off with a cloth, rubs it down with clove oil, and starts tapping it with the little bag of powdered rock (whatever it's called) used to absorb excess oil and contaminants... (In fairness, I'm given to understand that the weapon in question was both quite old and grotesquely valuable. But hello? Bleeding to death over here?) At any rate, about this point he notices his rapidly exsanguinating student. Again with the 'oh! oh!' sounds, and rapidly improvizes a tourniquet with his obi... No harm, no foul :)[/INDENT] At any rate, vaunted sharpness and all, the Katana is just another weapon: Fairly strong on the offense - particularly the cut (although that linear 'whacking' motion seen in a lot of sport kendo won't cut bread), somewhat fickle on the thrust, reasonably fast. But overall, not much more effective in its context than a basket-hilted broadsword, a gladius, or even a nice aluminum baseball bat are in theirs. As for the 'miraculous' properties of Japanese steel? Mostly really good PR: Damascene steel and Indian 'wootz' was just as good and typically started with better raw steel. The differentiated tempering of a katana is cool, but makes for a finicky weapon - you can fubar a katana real easy if you 'ding' the monouchi (the cutting surface near the tip), which is very sharp but terribly brittle. YMMV A'Mal [/QUOTE]
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What are the stats for a standard katana?
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