TV series "Battle of the Nations", episode 1

Interesting hardcore LARP, weird but exciting sport, as it seems as it is a kind of last man standing, since wearing so much armour every blow knocks you down and off course doesn’t kill you, and it’s a brawl where I would find it more interesting if a solid hit to the head or body stabs would create a winner as then there would be more Mexican standoffs, taking care to outsmart the other instead of running like it doesn’t matter how many times you get hit but are more determined to knock the other down. Funny but the setup reminds me of Russian hooligan fights, with coordinated groups with rules fighting in formations, I only hope that the Russians don’t cheat as they used to, I can’t never forget seeing Russian MMA fighters in the 90ies being beaten to a bloody pulp and win over a foreign opponent with not a scratch on his face, the only way to win was by KO or tap out as the judges would always be unfair, like in Japan, Korea and Thailand. Fairness is seldom in non westerns societies the only event that was fair has always been Shooto in Japan, they respected the fighters and let non Japanese win with no cheating. The worse was in Kyokushin with Mas Oyama threatening the judges with suicide if it was a non Japanese winner, so many outrageous decisions from judges.   

This reminds me of the old point system in Latosa Escrima with 9 points rules, 3 points for headshots and disarms, 1 for body hits as far as I can remember, the fighting arena was very small, one half step backwards you would loose a point for backing away, one half step forward and you were in the kill zone, very exciting fights as only the foolish rushed in with no care about getting hit, I only countered by faking an attack and would move my helmet a bit back and see the stick miss and counter hit with a barrage of blow to the head and get my 9 points fast. I got so used to this way of fighting that I could not adapt to the new rules with counting who hit most, as suddenly everyone didn’t care and just rushed in and started to trade blows with no plan other than hitting more than the opponent instead of trying to avoid getting hit. I never lost a fight with the 9 point system but sucked at the new “most hit rules”, some would even throw away their sticks and punch the others to get as many 1 points for punches, something that I am pretty sure no one would do in a stick fight, to throw away your weapons and chose to get hit in the head hard to trade it for punches.

That is why duelling is important and this year I will keep a score when everyone is at training, keeping a record of winners, as due to different nature of duelling vs. sparring, no one rushes in like a crazy man hell-bent on annihilation, even though I do when get hit on my knife hand to surprise the other from going from stalking to a mad AMOK! rush when the opponents guard is prefect to that kind of attack. The rules of duelling are simple a hit to the body or head and you lose, a hit to the blade arm if there is no immediate hand switch you lose or else you continue to fight with the other hand and any other hit will make you lose, a hit to the leg requires an immediate lowering on the leg that is hit and any subsequent hits is a loss, if the opponents hit each other in the same short time frame with a kill shot they both lose. To make it exciting and having something to fight for, instead of duelling for $, there will be a present in January next year for the best fighter of the year, with the usual gift for the years best amok fighter which usually is something very useful for self defence and a another gift with the text “Best fighter of the year” award as this years calendar with the “Best fighter 2013” on the cover.