The importance of luck in dueling.

[Nii]

I've seen many huge threads come and go regarding dueling. Granted, noone is actually alive from back in the day, so there is only assumptions and conjecture. The general consensus is that a duel lasts less than a few seconds, with only few strikes.

What I haven't seen asked is this. How important is luck in dueling? If one of the fighters were higher skilled than the other, would they always consistently win? How about if the skill gap was smaller? How about if there was a reasonably skilled kenshi vs a sword swinging psycho? Can luck and/or determination have a large influence on the outcome of a duel?

While this might ignite heated arguments, I wanted to see all your opinions on this. How much faith would a swordsman have in their skill? Will all the skill in the world not be enough to consistently win against lesser skilled but more determined opponents?

[Josh Reyer]

How important is luck in dueling?

Difference between life and death?

[MikeWilliams]

How much faith would a swordsman have in their skill? Will all the skill in the world not be enough to consistently win against lesser skilled but more determined opponents?

I think all you need to do to answer your question is to look at how many shock upsets and quick knockouts there are in combat sports. For a recent example, google Crocop vs. Gonzaga.

I would guess that, with weapons involved, the amount of influence blind luck has on the outcome increases exponentially. Weapons are a great leveller.

Duelling must have been a mug's game.

[Kim Taylor]

You don't need to appeal to some sort of "back in the day", dueling continues to this day in the German University Fraternities, and if you do a google search on Chris Amberger or Mensur you may come up on some of his writings about it. He published a great journal called Hammerterz Forum for several years that dealt extensively with dueling.

As for luck, it depends on what you mean by luck... having a muscle cramp in the middle of a movement might be luck, slipping on a banana peel, being slower? Are these all luck? Certainly the rules of the duel will determine to a large part how much luck can play in it, outside vs. inside, etc. etc.

Similarly the rules concerning the duel will determine if a skilled vs unskilled swordsman are facing each other, as well as if a swordsman is facing a psycho.

Duels are highly, highly rules bound, and always have been regardless of our ideas about them. They are much different from a chance scuffle in a back alleyway with a robber for instance, or from a fight on a battlefield.

Once you define these things, many answers tend to fall out naturally.

Kim Taylor

[Nii]

Just to be clear, I didn't mean luck as most of you have interpreted it. How to say it clearly and concisely...

What are the chances such that a lower skilled fighter can defeat a higher skilled fighter? Do you think the higher skilled one will win no matter what? This is disregarding, differences in height, health, environment etc. Skill would be the only control variable.

I know its a bit of a blanket statement without considering many variables but its something that I haven't seen discussed before and am curious about.

[Josh Reyer]

What are the chances such that a lower skilled fighter can defeat a higher skilled fighter? Do you think the higher skilled one will win no matter what? This is disregarding, differences in height, health, environment etc. Skill would be the only control variable.

If skill is the only difference...why wouldn't the higher skilled fighter win every time?

[Chris Thompson]

Because no one is so skilled that they can never be hit. Let's say you would win 99 out of a hundred times, but we're not going to fight 100 times, we're going to fight only once. And this might be the 1 out of 100 times when I win even though you're objectively more skilled. In a duel, there is no guarantee the better swordsman will survive.

[gendzwil]

Don't have any stats to hand but from recollection a clear victory is the least likely outcome. More likely both will be injured or killed.

[MikeWilliams]

If skill is the only difference...why wouldn't the higher skilled fighter win every time?

See my example. Everyone has a puncher's chance, everyone has off days, even monkeys fall out of trees.

Skill only improves the odds, it doesn't eliminate them.

[Josh Reyer]

See my example. Everyone has a puncher's chance, everyone has off days, even monkeys fall out of trees.

Skill only improves the odds, it doesn't eliminate them.

I entirely agree, within that setting that is real life.

However, Nii seems to suggesting a rather unrealistic situation wherein essentially the only difference in odds is skill. In other words, no off days, no conditioning difference, no banana peels. No height difference, no reach, difference, no difference in raw reaction time. In other words, he's removed just about everything that leads to upsets.

Even in real life, with all those differences, marked differences in skill levels predict victory in physical skills a large percent of the time. No, it's not 100%, but it's certainly better than 99/100.

One example is sumo. Every once in a while, a young guy new to the top division will chew up the opponents near his particular rank on the banzuke, and during the final week he gets thrown against the top rankers. At the makuuchi level, there's not a lot of raw difference in strength, but there's a huge difference in skill. And the top guys defeat the up-and-comers with astounding regularity. The only way for the young guys to win is superior strength, youth, opponent's injury, or banana-peel type luck. All the things Nii wants to take out of the equation.

And I suppose another clarification is what exactly the skill level we're talking about here. I think I'm imagining a fairly large gap. Certainly, there's a point of diminishing returns for the higher skilled fellow. To be honest, I'm not exactly sure about the degree of reality Nii is intending in his hypothetical.

[paul browne]

Hi,
I am not a swordsman so I hope you don't mind me joining in here.
I recall reading somewhere, I forget where, that in the aftermath of the Napoleonic war the defeated French Officers (boo!!), who were schooled heavily in swordsmanship owing to the prevelance of duels in France, amused themselves by skewering in duels the officers of the victorious British army (Huzzar!!) who weren't so well schooled. However they didn't always have it their own way as they were occasionally beaten by a suicidal rush into close qaurters by their British opponent and then defeated. I suppose this accounts for the chances, to some degree, of the unschooled psycho.

Paul
(couldn't resist the insets, I'm from Kent and old habits die hard....and we beat them at rugby)

[Trevor Johnson]

Hi,
I am not a swordsman so I hope you don't mind me joining in here.
I recall reading somewhere, I forget where, that in the aftermath of the Napoleonic war the defeated French Officers (boo!!), who were schooled heavily in swordsmanship owing to the prevelance of duels in France, amused themselves by skewering in duels the officers of the victorious British army (Huzzar!!) who weren't so well schooled. However they didn't always have it their own way as they were occasionally beaten by a suicidal rush into close qaurters by their British opponent and then defeated. I suppose this accounts for the chances, to some degree, of the unschooled psycho.

Paul
(couldn't resist the insets, I'm from Kent and old habits die hard....and we beat them at rugby)

Might that have had something to do with the English pasttime of singlestick?

[Ken-Hawaii]

No one so far has addressed skillsets based on which weapon is being used. There's a lot of difference between an attack made with a katana versus an attack with a rapier. Yes, they can both kill you, but a relatively unskilled fencer has a significantly higher chance of doing some damage to his skilled opponent than does a relatively unskilled samurai. A rapier may leave a few holes that can bleed, but even a minor slice with a katana will allow bleeding-out within just a few minutes.

I agree completely with Gendzwil that it's most likely that both fighters will be injured or killed.

[John Lindsey]

The warrior's acknowledment of luck might have been one motivation to explore religion, in hopes of gaining an edge.

Luck can be combined. For instance, it was bad luck that you were hit by an arrow, but good luck that you hit in the arm, and not killed immediately. Then bad luck that it got infected, but good luck that the doctor was able to save you by cutting off the limb, which turns out to be bad luck because you lost an arm.

[Stefffen]

How often would someone fight on a smooth floor like in a dojo? So how often would someone fight outside where it might rain, snow, be dark or your sun in the face, slippery dirt, and small stones you could step on and be distracted. Would that be bad luck? A thousand factors I think will matter together with how grate swordsman you are. And being a grate tactical combat man I think will have something to do with those little details I listed.