From:	Kevin White <kevw@*****.CO.UK>
Subject:	Re: Martial Arts
Date:	Mon, 19 May 1997 09:56:03 +0100

[ Rolling out the MA soap box and stepping up with sheaf of paper and
finger poised for action... :)]

David Buehrer said on 17:25/18 May 97...

> Here's an idea. Complete martial styles are more complete and can deal
> with a variety of situations/attacks. Concentrated and Specialized martial
> styles focus on a fewer number of maneuvers, sacrificing defensive
> capability for a higher skill. So, if a character concentrates or
> specialize they get that number of dice for offense, but only as many dice
> as they have in their general skill for defense. If a PC takes Martial
> Arts (Specialized) 8 they also have Martial Arts 4. If they attack they
> get 8 dice. If they are attacked they get 4 dice to defend.

Unfortuately this falls on it's face when you start talking about the
likes of Aikido. This style is, in the main, not taught as a
confrontational style (i.e. no, or very few, offensive manouvers).

Gurth wrote:
>
> Like I said before, I'm not a martial artists, but it appears to me like
> if you train in a certain style, you also get to defend against that same
> style.

This is true in as much as you become aware of the flaws or holes in
certain styles. As an exaple I will cite Tae Kwon Do. This is mainly
taught in Britain for competitin use and in most of the competitions
legs are not considered valid targets. Hence if you can determine that
someone is using Tae Kwon Do a leg sweep would be a good tactical
manoeuver (not that I'm saying it would always work), especially when
you also consider that Tae Kwon Do empasises a lot of high kicks.


> For example, if a style doesn't really teach kicks but only punches, then
> anyone knowing that style at 6 will have the general skill (4 dice) to
> defend against a kick but the concentration (6 dice) to defend against a
> punch.

Sorry but this does not follow. Most martial arts teach a fairly similar
set of basic blocks. These can be applied to an incoming attack
regradless of the attacks form (obviously this is a bit of a
generalisation, I for one wouldn't try to block a sword or a bullet). To
extend Gurths example, if a style concentrates on kicks you can still
block punches because most attacks come in approximately the same way.


Diamond