Wow, it sounds like the tournament rules for Longpoint this year are going to be brilliant. This is still subject to change of course, but we experimented with it in class this week. So don't take it as gospel. But this is looking really good.
Basically, imagine the bout going like this. First combatant to 4 points wins. When a touch occurs, the referee will give it a moment to see if there's an after-blow, then call a halt. Then a sequence of questions are given to the judges.
1. Was there a touch? Any touch at all? If so, that's a point.
2. Was it on-target? The target area is the head and torso. If so, that's an additional point.
3. Did the attack have structure? If so, an additional point. A structured attack is one where the attacker was balanced, made a clean strike, and in the case of longsword they kept both hands on the sword.
4. Did they control the weapon? This means after or during the attack, did the attacker keep the line closed or otherwise control the opponents weapon to prevent a counterattack. If they maintained control, that's an additional point.
In the event of a double-kill, the whole thing is discarded.
If there's a "revenge hit" sort of after-blow, completed in a single action after the initial hit, then one of two things happens:
1. If the initial attack scored more than one point, this negates all but one.
2. If the initial attack scored only one point, it's completely negated.
What this means is that if someone makes a completely perfect and flawless attack, they could get enough points to win in the single strike. Most hits will score 1 or 2 points, occasionally 3 if it's pretty decent. And most importantly... Those cheap one-handed leg-shots that leave you open? You can win that way, slowly, but those hits are also easily negated.
Now the actual scoring is probably going to go slightly differently. To handle disagreements of the judges, what they'll probably do is count the two judges points cumulatively. So if they both saw 2-point hits, then the attacker is awarded 4, but it will require 7 to win.
The one flaw I see is this. If someone makes a crap attack, and the after-blow is gorgeous and would be deadly if it were sharps, the best the defender can hope for is zero score for the other guy, whereas in a real fight he probably would have just won.
So anyway, all the guys at MASHS that are practicing hard on those hand snipes and leg sweeps? They might be doing themselves a disservice!
