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[Dwarf]

Just watched this episode on one of those nifty online video platforms, and I've got a rant.

Okay. Let's start with the viking. He didn't even have a great axe, it's more of a pole axe, the shaft's so fucking long. Even though he hit the samurai bastard with his spear, it just kinda bounces off the cheapo leather armor. LEATHER ARMOR IS FOR ELFS. Also, it tends to be pierced by long, pointy, sharp objects. Which a spear has, mounted on a shaft. But let's continue. The viking has mail. Mail is there to deflect and stop almost any slashing weapon. However, the bloody samurai's melee weapons are almost only slashing (the katana, the pole-sword thingy).
The arrogant samurai asshole speaks so highly of their elegance, and they come with a frickin' studded club. You could as well cut off a branch. Also, it is mainly viewn in mythology. So, let's play mythology and get Mjölnir... not counting how heavy the damn thing is. The piece o' wood used in the show is 35 pounds. What the hell are you going to do when you miss? The elf armor is not going to protect you.

But the whole show is dubious anyways. Typical D&D knowledge, as is shown by the viking 'long sword'. For other D&D historicians reading this, a long sword is long, so long in fact that it must be swung with both hands. If it's lighter, it's either a bastard sword or a short sword.
In the end, all I want to say: Viking should've won, the show is fun but takes a huge shit on realism.

[KaelGotDwarves]

what is this i don't even

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Seriously, bring up a theoretical battle situation online and it always goes to hell. Vikings vs. Samurai vs. Ninja vs. Knights vs. Macedonians under Alexander vs. Mongols vs. Nazis vs. Legionnaires of the Roman Empire flame war. Never fails.

[Muz]

You greatly underestimate the power of agility. A viking is much slower, especially with the heavy axe and armor. Samurais are trained for speed. And let's not forget the almost mythological Miyamoto Musashi. He could slice up some more heavily armed and armored opponents.

Although you have a good point of mail armor.. I'm not so sure how well it stands against the power of the legendary katana. I am pretty sure that a katana could slice through less armored parts of the body, like they're trained to. Katanas are extremely heavy weapons, but I've seen someone swing two of them with a lot of grace, so it's not impossible for a trained samurai to be fricking deadly scary with them.

Heh, most of these fighting shows take a shit on realism.. a katana slicing through a ballistic gel dummy which doesn't have any bones.... martial arts masters winding up 2 seconds for a punch..... right, like that works in a real life situation.

[Leafsnail]

You realise that this is just the tip of the iceberg, right?  You realise that they've also had "Taliban vs IRA"?

[Rilder]

You realise that this is just the tip of the iceberg, right?  You realise that they've also had "Taliban vs IRA"?

They also had Apaches(NO NOT THE HELICOPTER) vs Gladiators

[Dwarf]

You realise that this is just the tip of the iceberg, right?  You realise that they've also had "Taliban vs IRA"?

And fucking PIRATES vs. KNIGHTS.

[Leafsnail]

I just found the Taliban vs IRA particularly awful.  For one thing, why the hell are they fighting in a carpack?  For another thing, it really just seemed to be an excuse to show off a few random explosions.  Thirdly, how can you compare a military style terrorist group capable of taking on an army in open battle with a group that generally stuck to planting bombs and commiting crimes?

[KaelGotDwarves]

Goddamn, before this thread explodes any more I'd just like to say we should feed the people who came up with this awful show to the Taliban and IRA, and then watch those terrorist kill each other.

Frawress Victoly.

[Vester]

He had a spear and a poleaxe?

[DJ]

You greatly underestimate the power of agility. A viking is much slower, especially with the heavy axe and armor. Samurais are trained for speed. And let's not forget the almost mythological Miyamoto Musashi. He could slice up some more heavily armed and armored opponents.

Let's not forget the almost mythological berserkergang. There's no way anyone is faster than a berserking viking, as they get superhuman strength and reflexes.

[Duke 2.0]

 Oh boy. Now I have to rant about armor and local weapon evolution to combat that armor.

 Eastern countries didn't have terribly advanced armor. They did have intricate armors, but Europe dominated with armor. Thus the weapons evolved to combat that armor. The East had a lot of slashing weapons made with no real intention to take on anything harder than leather, as that was pretty much the armor they had excluding the occasional limited iron plates on some of their Great Armors, which were bulky in their own right to force the samurai to use a Yari(Spear) as opposed to a sword.
 The West had much more advanced armor, but seeing as we are using the idea of Viking as a berserker-style warrior and not the fighting merchants they were, we can assume the best he would have is chainmail. While it does carry a vulnerability to thrusting attacks, that is generally not the danger of the main samurai weapon, the Katana. If not for the maille then the Viking would be thoroughly wrecked.

 But screw all this. Just put the Samurai on a horse and give him a Yumi. Take the Viking on a ship and put him near any coast. There are too many variations to weapons and variables to wealth of the opponents to objectively judge things.

 And it's not like any of these things are done with not stereotypes of said professions.

 Edit: Note to self: Don't make simple words this early in the morning.

[userpay]

Off the top of my head doesn't samurai armor not only leather but also incorperates laquered wood and some metal for protection? Plus I would think katana's (which quite frankly I think it was the wakizashi that was typicaly used for combat situations and the katana was ornamental) were made well enough that it could deal with viking armor (I'm willing to bet the chainmail they made/plundered wasnt the best of quality). I forget but did they include ranged weapons in that episode? If they did samurais were suppose to be good archers while as I recall vikings tended towards a combo of throwing weapons and bows(depending on the individual) so the samurais might have the advantage there. I think I saw the episode but I'd need to view it again to be sure on what I recall and do some extra research.

[Jreengus]

And fucking PIRATES vs. KNIGHTS.

What the??? How does that even work? It would all depend on the pirates aim and how many preloaded pistols he's packing. There's no way what was effectively a sea thug could stand up to a fully armoured knight who has been training and fighting all his life in mellee. Put the knight on his horse and the pirate is doubly screwed. He would just get ridden over.

[Vester]

Don't forget the unreliability of the firearms at the time.

I assume.

[Duke 2.0]

 Indeed, if knights still exist as platemail-wearing warriors of nobilitythen firearms have yet to become accurate or reliable enough to be useful. Or in a pistol variety.
 Although Barbaby pirates could wreck this guy if they were on the waters.