Xaos_Boy,
You are forgeting one thing, the charge factor. You get 5 thousand eurpean knights running full speed against 5 thousand samuria running full speed toward each other. I would put my money on the heavily armored guys, since the samuari wouldnt have time to aim for a certain body part during the confusion. After the initial rush was over, I would bet that theree would not be enough samauri left to actually win with skill.
Oh, and samauri were not always by their lord's side. They had other occupations, such as tax collectors, and the poorer were farmers. Some samuari were also the equivilent of european lords and dukes, and after they got to this point they often became lazy and genereally lost their ability with a sword, due to thier love of money and the finer things in life.Samuari did NOT commit suicide on the battle field. They belived death in battle was glorious. The suicide you are refering to, is included in the samauri code of bushido (roughly translated "way of the warrior"), and refers to when a samauri dis-honors his family. First he calls a large group to attention, then slices his stomac open. A few seconds later a felow samauri decappitates him. This is the only way a family's honor could be redeemed.On to weaponry,
longsword - can be swung fast by a strong man and would penetrate most armor.
Katana - can be wielded by almost anyone, swung fast and can penetrate most armor.
I have seen this done - If the longsword and the katana hit each other at a high rate of speed, the katana would break first. Don't tell me that all samauri did with their sword was attack, they had to defend themselves just the same aseveryone else. The japanese were accustomed to fighting other warriors with similar weapons, so they knew when their sword would break. Europeans on the other hand, were accstomed to marching into battle and winning on streanth. The Charge factor (above) would reduce the light armor and thin sword carried by the samauri to nearly useless untill the battle slowed down a little bit.
ROR_Sir_William
Sorry about my bad english.
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[This message has been edited by ROR_Sir_William (edited 07-05-2000).]