(techniques) Issuing an invitation

[freiman the minstrel]

Guys,

I have been learning a lot, very quickly, but there is a concept that I am simply not getting.

How do you use an "Invitation" against an opponent?

Don't get me wrong, I know how the concept works in my head. I know that you leave an irresistible opening that your opponent just can't keep themselves from attacking, preferably in a way that they don't realize they are being suckered, in order to get them into the position in which you want them. Certain techniques work pretty well if they are in one position, but are completely stupid to try when they are in another.

So, I really do KNOW how to do it. I just can't do it, and last week I realized that my sparring partners are taking it really easy on me, because they can pretty much get me into any position they want me. That was a really humbling moment for me.

So, how do I work this up? How do I improve my fundamentals so that I am not being walked around the salle like a poodle? I am becoming convinced that this is a mental thing, and once I get it down, it will translate well from art to art.

f

[Baron Eirik]

Are you trying to learn how to do it to your opponents? or to stop 'accepting' the invites they leave for you?

In both cases, to me anyway, it's a matter of pattern recognition.

"Hey! Several time when I've thrown X shot at his Y opening, he hits me!" You can test this by starting a shot into the suspect opening, but as something of a feint and see if he tries the expected shot back.

"Hm... When I close to X position, he always throws Y shot" The next step here is to see what opens when he throws that shot and hit him where his defense isn't.

Of course, you have to see these patterns in real time, while he's trying to hit you

[Dietrich von Stroheim]

I sometimes like to use invitations. It doesn't work, though, to just 'leave something open' in your stance...good fighters won't bite on that. Instead, leave it open when you are throwing a shot you can easily recover from.

Here's an example of how I like to do it:

I throw a flat snap, dropping my shield just a little to make my opponent think, 'Wow I can get him with a flat snap of my own next time he does that...I'd better be ready!'

Fight a little, then believably-telegraph another flat snap, then when he bites on it, push my swordhand across my body to parry the flat snap just above the hilt, and riposte with an offside leg shot + flat snap combo (the 'reverse crosscut')

This is just an example, there are other ways to 'safely' bait your opponent.

As to how to be able to implement it? Practice slow work, in front of a mirror (not TOO close to the mirror ), throwing the shot in conjunction with the 'invitation', and countering. And start working on it live at practice at the same time.

[Russ Mitchell]

Use an invitation not simply to draw an attack, but to draw an attack on an angle which which you can easily punish. Knowing it intellectually isn't enough -- you have to practice *specific examples* for it to click. Here's two:

Unarmed:
(Savateur) leaves front leg exposed with a stance that's a bit too wide, especially "on the recover," to draw a low-line kick. As soon as the kick's thrown, chamber that same leg and blast the hell out of the offending limb.

Armed:
Droop your sheild just a bit so there's just enough room for somebody to drive a hammer through your ear, especially on the recovery (so it looks like slop rather than intention); when they take the bait, hammer their elbow into the next zip code.

[Russ Mitchell]

(In case the response was unclear, I agree completly with Eirik that this is pattern-recognition, *not* fundamentals, but the next step up from that.)

[Kilkenny]

I am having the same problem Eirik mentioned, i.e., are you asking how not to fall for the invitation, or how to make the invitation? Or both

Obviously the answers are not the same to both questions.

Issuing invitations can be as easy as leaning a little too far forward with your shield just a bit too low. When they throw at your head, you pivot at the waist, cutting into their sword arm and raising your shield simultaneously. Easy to do, easy to fall for because it's a pretty common error.

One of my all time favorite, bread and butter moves is the "teleporting leg trick". Forward leg out too far, with too much weight on it, guard too high. When they swing for the open leg, explode off of it, pulling it back out of range while throwing at their sword side head. At worst it may lead to a leg-head trade, at best a clean kill without being touched.

Dietrich is certainly correct that it can be raised to a much higher level, where the "invitation" is a second or third level element and that at that point people are less likely to suspect that they are being trapped.

Avoiding being led around the salle.. Eirik is quite right, pattern recognition is key. But, the trick here is to learn to look at the next move in the pattern sequence. Look, his leg is extended and open! I should hit it! If I swing at his leg, what can he do to me? Oh, look, he's all wound up for that headshot if I swing for his leg... let's see if I'm right, I'll feint for the leg.

It is a chess game, and setting traps is part of it, reading traps is part of it, seeing multiple steps into the sequence is a Big part of it.

In practice, spend some time specifically working on seeing what options the other fellow has from point A, then work on ways of testing their responses to see which options they favor. It can be great fun to recognize a trap and reverse it by "falling for their trap" as a means of trapping them.

Any time you know what the other fighter will do before they do it is a time for you to take advantage of them. If you know the trap and trigger it by choice, then you know what they are going to do next and should be able to turn that to your advantage.

Some time spent exploring traps is time well invested.

[Count Johnathan]

If the shot looks blatantly open pay attention to the position they are holding their sword. If they are tensing up or pulled back ready to fire most likely they are baiting you. Working on your speed doing pell work might help you to get fast enough to hit them anyway which means their plan backfired and you can simply hit the open target before they can react. Also pay attention to the moments when they seem to counter you and what shot they throw. Combine your attack to the open target with a simultaneous block where they normally strike you.

Practice practice practice. Record those practices and watch what shots they set you up with and learn to counter those setups with pre planned defense or aggressive combinations to force them out of their comfort zone. If they expect you are just going to throw a single shot at the target they present to you that is exactly what they want so throw three or more consecutive shots to force them out of the habit of presenting targets to you that they can easily block and counter.

I prefer to ignore peoples defense anyway and focus on creating the openings I want with feints and combos. I'm pretty fast (or I was anyway ) and rarely got caught with setup shots like that but I think mostly it is because I simply ignored whatever they were trying to do and forced the openings I wanted them to show me. Make them fight YOUR fight instead of fighting the fight they want from you.


Good luck and have fun

[Russ Mitchell]

I disagree with Kilkenny to an extent: in my opinion the way to learn how not to fall for traps, is practice setting and executing your own. In doing so, you're also practicing rapid adjustment to your opponent's actions with a plan. That's by and large how you avoid traps, too -- by giving him what he wants, and then SCREWING him with your response when he tries to punish you for doing so. "He wants A, and I've got C in reserve to hurt his B bad."

[Kel Rekuta]

Aside from the excellent advice you have been offered already, I would urge you to develop absolute control of your measure: know exactly how far you are from a beating and be certain to stay just outside that at all times when offering open lines of approach.

If you want to bait a hook, you must be sure the line is appropriate to what you want to catch.

[Nissan Maxima]

The bait has to wiggle like a real worm.

[maxntropy]

In practice, spend some time specifically working on seeing what options the other fellow has from point A, then work on ways of testing their responses to see which options they favor.

I believe the best way to recognize option shots available to your opponent is to intentionally train yourself to know the options available to yourself.

If you break your bio-mechanics into component parts such that you know what options (basically changes in direction and momentum) are available to you at each component of each shot... then you will hardwire an understanding of options into your brain and thus reverse-engineer your pattern recognition.

It is extremely hard to be able to immediately recognize options available to opponents if you are not intimately aware of the options available to yourself in the same circumstance.

My $.02.

Max VH

[Garick]

Freiman,

This may be outdated, as it is some time since I fought with you, but if you are fighting similarly to our last encounter, the issue is not one of fundamentals, but rather of being very solidly drilled and locked in the fundamentals, particularly in your footwork and in your body mechanics requiring certain footwork for certain shots/combinations. You tend(ed) to let your feet get flat as you push into a blow and have few options as your feet and body are committed to a textbook version of your shot.

If this is still accurate, you need to work on getting up on the balls of your feet, and moving more lightly. This will enable you to change your mind more fluidly and quickly, which would both allow your invitations to look more natural and flow into attacks better, and keep you from being "walked around the salle." For a good example of what this should feel like, do some sword and buckler slow work with Duke Gerhard.

[Graf Hans]

I think that the preceding descriptions have been quite good, but there is another facet of an invitation - asking your opponent to move into a place or position that is really a bad idea for them. I like to let an opponent see an opening my my defense that requires a step or other large body motion to capitalize on, only to find that when they have spent the time and energy to move all they did was allow me to make a smaller motion inside their larger one...meaning I am launching my next shot while they are still trying to move into the target zone.

my $.02, and probably sounds just as weird as the rest of my fighting...

H

[Kilkenny]

To Russ and Max:

Setting traps may or may not help a person to recognize when the other guy is setting a trap. Depends on how well a person processes information - and how they process it, not just how well. Not everyone is good at recognizing what they are seeing when it is presented in an unfamiliar form, i.e., if someone tries the teleporting leg trick on me, I recognize instantly what they are doing, but another person might not recognize an opponent using their favorite trap on them so readily.

It is important to understand how your own mechanics work, so that you know what you can do from any given position (and, I think more importantly, so that you can improvise on the fly). Knowing what you can do can be beneficial in recognizing the other guy's options - but it can also get you into trouble when the other guy turns out to be able to do some things you cannot do. For example, guys who swing a hammer all the time can pull off shots that people without mutant forearms cannot throw. I learned a lesson about that, complete with bruised ribs, a very long time ago

It's important to know what you can and cannot do. It's also important to get a good read on what your opponent can and cannot do, on what their intentions are, on how deep their intentions go. You really do need to recognize what your opponent is doing, whether you intend to push them to a place where you can hit them (as Johnathan described) or pull them to a place where you can hit them, or just hit them. They are your partner in the dance and you've got to work with them.

[Russ Mitchell]

Absolutely true -- in my experience coaching fighters, it's the best tool I've found for teaching "second-intention brain." I think your second paragraph is foundational to all of that: while you learn about "mutants" from experience, if you don't know all your own mechanical options, then at the very best, your fighter's never graduating from "kicking superficial ass."

If you've got regular dance partners, para 3 is stupid-important. If you travel a lot, that's going to fade a bit in significance compared to working the geometries, imho.

[Kilkenny]

Absolutely true -- in my experience coaching fighters, it's the best tool I've found for teaching "second-intention brain." I think your second paragraph is foundational to all of that: while you learn about "mutants" from experience, if you don't know all your own mechanical options, then at the very best, your fighter's never graduating from "kicking superficial ass."

If you've got regular dance partners, para 3 is stupid-important. If you travel a lot, that's going to fade a bit in significance compared to working the geometries, imho.

Interesting. I see my ability to read opponents (and it happens at a subconscious level, I really cannot tell you what I do or how) as a tremendous part of my success. To my mind, it becomes more important with travel and unfamiliar opponents, rather than less. Making the right read lets you know how to go about working the elements of the fight, from range to timing to geometry.

Of course, sometimes you zig when you should have zagged and you look like Manny Pacquiao in his latest fight

[Russ Mitchell]

Better man than me. I can get a good grok of a guy's physical capability with a pass or two, but intentions are opaque for me.

[Russ Mitchell]

::grinning out loud::

My old coach said:

"Pain is your friend, despair your mistress." It's absolutely true. Unless you embrace both the pain and your raging inability to learn the technique, you don't get very far (I never *did* learn how to jump and do three front snap kicks before putting a foot down, but savate, as you may have heard, is mildly insane). Your friend's post indicated that you may be really flatfooted -- can you waltz, or move with a lighter body?

[Kilkenny]

Better man than me. I can get a good grok of a guy's physical capability with a pass or two, but intentions are opaque for me.

Just different. And like I think I said, I can't tell you how I do it, it's a subconscious thing.
We all bring our different talents to the game- the challenge is to adapt to the challenge

[Dietrich von Stroheim]

Just different. And like I think I said, I can't tell you how I do it, it's a subconscious thing.
We all bring our different talents to the game- the challenge is to adapt to the challenge

Agreed. I think of the ability to assess your opponent and read his actions as one of the Universal Principles of Fighting that applies regardless of what combat sport you are playing. Right up there with timing, range, tempo, etc.

It is a skill that everyone can develop, but it is really hard to teach.