ardias014 said:
Um guys, you are aware the katana is also a thrusting weapon, right? n a duel it is debatable that a rapier would win, but on a battle field a rapier would be worth next to shit compared to a katana or any other blade for that matter. I would like to see someone take a rapier against a pike or yari formation and see how they fared.
Also demoman_chaos, the bow was initially the main weapon for samurai, but it didn't remain so. Also a katana is not useless against a spear wall. When confronting a spear wall you have to knock pike and spears out of the way, which a rapier cannot do, this is why weapons like the zweihander were used in pike formations in Europe.
You do realize it's pointless to bring other weapons into the debate, the rapier and katana were designed to be used in two totally different styles of war. The rapier on the battlefield was a backup weapon for shot and pike formations, a katana would be equally useless against a musket firing line backed up by pike and bayonet. History actually supports this one as the Japanese armies got utterly wrecked by even basic firearms, so asking the rapier to perform against naginatas and whole formations is the height of pointlessness as you might as well start bringing in the other associated weapons of the time period.
This is part of the problem right here though, some rapiers are indeed large enough to parry spears and some are even heavier than the average katana, rapier is a very broad term and covers a lot of different styles of swords, they were actually used to counter pikemen in some cases which is pretty much the European equivalent to a naginata. In the early rennaissance the weapons that would be called rapiers were also used as heavy plate armor piercing weapons on occasion.
That's why this entire debate is pointless, there's too many variables to make an informed decision. The relative skill of the combatants will make a huge difference just to start. Even then we have to decide on what types of katana and rapier we are talking about here, there are a few different katana designs, and a metric crapton of rapier designs, some wildly different from each other. A foil would be useless in a real fight to the death, but in a sporting match, can leverage it's speed and size to score hits. The heaviest of rapiers are bigger tougher and longer than your average katana as they were made to parry and deflect musket bayonets and pike weapons, in this case you get a much slower but also more powerful weapon. Past that, there's also the fact that in a fight to the death scenario the rapier was designed to be one handed so the other hand could carry a weapon too, typically a buckler or dagger, or even another rapier, and later in the renaissance the rapier was typically coupled with a single shot pistol in the other hand. That alone is a point against this whole stupid debate since you start out handicapping the rapier wielder who is using a weapon designed to free up a hand so another weapon or shield can be put in it in a real combat scenario.
Of course even past all that, these weapons weren't designed in a vacuum, in real combat these were both support weapons meant to back up the fighter's main weapons. the samurai typically riding on horseback with a bow, also carrying a spear of some type, and decked out in fairly heavy bamboo armor. The rapier wielder would have generally had a gun of some sort as well as some type of armor depending on what they were actually trying to defend against, and any ranking officer at the time likely would be carrying multiple single or double shot pistols on them as well. Sport scenarios aren't great to compare to these situations either because sport fencing and kendo tend to involve moves a real combatant would never go for as quickly because of the dire risk to their life, a real combat scenario would more likely turn into a wrestling match or both combatants fighting really dirty with each other.
The whole conversation does a disservice to the historical situation that made these two weapons what they were for their time period, you would be much better served arguing for outcomes in a modern competition scenario, as people have already posted videos, the rule and restriction heavy sport arena makes these debates at least marginally plausible.
