Editing Katanas are Underpowered in d20 (section)

= Explanation for all this shit =
This was originally posted either by a [[weeaboo]] who thinks that katanas are the best weapons in existence, or a [[troll]] who has masterfully baited us all. Probably the former, tho. While the post holds a number of truths (a katana is quite sharp, but so is a scimitar), most of it is bullshit that relies on mysticism and Orientalism rather than a sound understanding of material science. Sit back and allow us to dissect it for you:

'''''<blockquote>I should know what I'm talking about. I myself commissioned a genuine katana in Japan for 2,400,000 Yen (that's about $20,000) and have been practicing with it for almost 2 years now.</blockquote>'''''

Having an expensive sword and two years of training does not make you an expert. Especially when Samurai caste members often trained from the moment they could hold a sword. Also, consider the fact that even the highest quality, authentic katanas can be commissioned for well under $20000, with prices [http://www.ejapaneseswords.com/swordsforsale.html usually ranging] in the "mere" thousands of dollars.

'''''<blockquote>I can even cut slabs of solid steel with my katana.</blockquote>'''''

Swords can't cut slabs of solid iron, let alone steel, and katanas are no different. Katanas have rather thick cross-sections and as such have to push aside more metal to get to the squishy bits, making them worse at penetrating armor. This is basic physics: for cutting through things you want as much power in one spot instead of having a massive cutting blade. On that note, every time you see a YouTube video that shows a rifle firing bullets at a katana only to have the bullets cleaved in half, please use your goddamn common sense and think of the reason rifle bullets shatter themselves upon hitting water when fired into a pool. The short answer is the bullets themselves have so much momentum of course they are going to shatter themselves on impact, and against a relatively thin thing like a katana the shattering will be in a cleaving form. It has been proven you can repeat the same scenario with a bullet and a [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Qy-Be2cDGQ butter knife].

Tl;dr: Unless you're the [[Juggernaut]] (bitch) or [[Berserk|Guts]], you probably ain't cutting through any shit that's harder than flesh and bone with a katana. Even then, you may well end up ruining the blade in short order.

'''''<blockquote>Japanese smiths spend years working on a single katana and fold it up to a million times to produce the finest blades known to mankind.</blockquote>'''''

While the "years" is potentially true (though often highly romanticized; this is usually the case for honor weapons, which are made in limited numbers for the elite samurai caste-members instead of the actual samurai fighting troops), the "million" folds is bullshit. What's more, this is a '''disadvantage''' more than anything, because if a weapon took that much effort to make then having it mass-produced for entire armies is out of the question. While the metal can be folded many times, doing so a million times does not do all that much compared to doing about 20 times. (What's actually going on is the sword has a million ''layers''; folding the sword 20 times gets you 2^20 layers). It's like you're making [[meatbread]], and you're making the end result more awesome by kneading the bread mix for eight weeks. The folding technique is to divide the carbon equally through the metal of the blade; otherwise you end up with metal that's got impurities all over the place. Japanese iron ore is traditionally rather shitty with its carbon content, so if they ''didn't'' do this the katana would not even meet the minimal durability requirements of a practical weapon. This means the folding technique is a '''necessary bother''' rather than some kind of super special awesome secret upgrade. Incidentally, while it is true that Japanese swordsmiths started folding around 1000 AD—having learned the technique from the Chinese—the Celts had been doing it since 700 BC, two millennia earlier. The [[Vikings]] had mastered this technique as well, having allegedly learned it from various Central Asian civilizations, which eventually culminated in the creation of the exquisite Ulfberht swords. By around 1000 AD, Europeans no longer bothered with it, due to improved steel quality, greater knowledge of metallurgy (importantly including how to remove impurities), and the use of the blast furnace which allowed production of large batches of steel. Final twist: literally folding steel a million times will "burn out" all the carbon and leave you with wrought iron; better to fold steel about ten or twenty times so you can keep that lovely carbon.

Another critically important factor that weeaboos tend to ignore is geography/geology.  See, the vast majority of iron working cultures lived in tectonically stable areas; this means that most iron comes in the form of "veins", large concentrations of the base metal that is comparatively easy to smelt for further use.  In contrast, Japan was and still is tectonically unstable, with substantially higher levels of earthquakes and (admittedly minor) volcanic activity.  Except for a VERY small number of locations, most of the iron in Japan comes in the form of "iron sand", pulverized and stirred up by Mother Nature twerking like an idiot.  Thus, while the iron in Japan was frequently of decent or better quality, making a sword out of it usually required a shitload more work just to gather up all of that sand and make it stick together into one coherent object that wouldn't just fall apart.  This is also the primary reason why katanas usually had a comparatively soft metal core surrounded by a much harder metal edge; in addition to making a better weapon, it's logistically easier in this context to have a bunch of different sources providing whatever iron is available, instead of waiting around on one single source to get enough shit together.

'''''<blockquote>Katanas are thrice as sharp as European swords and thrice as hard for that matter too.</blockquote>'''''

The problem with metal is that the harder the metal is, the more brittle it is, as less ductility means less opportunity for the blade to distribute the force it suffers while striking, via deformation. Thus, since all the striking force is concentrated on that single point alone, with no way to even it out, it's more likely that the metal's integrity will fail to a point where it will simply shatter. It's kind of like punching window glass, which like hard metal is brittle and not ductile, repeatedly; the glass will eventually shatter due to similar reasons.

A hard blade maintains a sharp edge but chips easily, whereas a soft edge is less sharp but is easier to repair and is overall less brittle. You do not want a sword that is made from very hard metal: the moment you strike something or someone you risk having your sword snap in half, meaning you're screwed. You do not want a very soft sword either: it would pretty much fold in half upon striking a target. Some swords are made to utilize this aspect, and refrain from use STRIKING motions but rather slicing nicks. Even when laminating (layering) the metals you use, you get a weapon that can be of very high quality, but not as extreme as "three times as hard/sharp." Unless you are a [[wizard]], this simply is not possible.

To their credit, the Japanese made use of these qualities by making blades with comparatively thick, softer metal cores surrounded by a thin, very hard metal edge.  Any strike that was deeper than a nicking cut would transfer most of the impact to the soft core, reducing the chances of breaking the edge.  That being said, the blades were still somewhat fragile; any blade-to-blade contact would likely snap or permanently deform the sword, which is why kendo and other Japanese sword styles teach you to PARRY, not block, with the SIDE of the blade.  Furthermore, this technique of using different types and qualities of iron in the same weapon was not at all unique to the Japanese.

Additional consideration: you know what's way sharper than any metal blade? A blade made of glass. They're the go-to choice for cutting ultra-thin anatomical sections for microscopes. But glass isn't used for weapons because it's so brittle. This illustrates the logical extension of the above point, i.e. the sharper you get, the more delicate you get.

There's also another problem with this sentence; namely, the implication that European swords were inadequate. This is actually a misconception derived from the fact that most medieval European swords to survive ''were never intended for battlefield combat in the first place'' (ceremonial and display pieces are more likely to survive since they're meant to be preserved rather than used, while practice swords were generally kept in storage when not in use), so of course they wouldn't be very useful in a real fight. Close analysis of surviving battle swords reveals that they were generally well-balanced and sharp, perfectly suitable for use as weapons of war.

'''''<blockquote>Anything a longsword can cut through, a katana can cut through better. I'm pretty sure a katana could easily bisect a knight wearing full plate with a simple vertical slash.</blockquote>'''''

Unless you have arms like Zangief from Street Fighter or happen to be dæmonically possessed by a [[Chaos|malevolent entity]], you're not going to slice a fully armored [[knight]] in half. Even a heavy battle axe, which is designed for chopping through armor using its massive weight and blade, cannot hope to do this. It will penetrate the plate armor and give the wearer a serious wound with the right amount of force and momentum, but it won't cleave right through the knight in question. Granted, you might slice an arm or a head off with some precision and good momentum since armor on the limbs and neck are usually thinner, or only protected by their mail vests, and the flesh and bone around those parts there are neither as thick nor as dense as the ones found on a torso, but that's about as much dismemberment you get. The same for the katana.

Knights had this tendency to fight from horseback: the footmen were high-paid commoners. You and your two-handed sword don't have the reach nor chopping power. Also, while samurai also fought on horseback, much like knights, they tended to brandish their spears, polearms, and bows first and only resorted to their swords in a duel between enemy leaders or as a sidearm if they happen to lose their long pointy sticks, much like knights. And this is all assuming we're not taking guns into account; by the time katanas were widespread throughout the samurai, black powder firearms were less than a century away.

Even then, you're not going to cut a fully-armored knight in half: disregarding the objections from the guy himself you simply cannot cut through armor like that. This is not you being a pussy: this is physics. Even if you could force your body to move with enough speed and strength to do so you'd probably break your arms or catch fire or something from the strain/energy involved. If you are facing with someone in full plate you'd be better served with a war pick, a hammer or another weapon designed to pierce or otherwise circumvent the armor through brute force. Plate armor is good at keeping swords away—it's what it was designed for. It is true that katanas could cut through Japanese armors, but that is less the quality of the sword and more about the armor being made of leather in a lamellar pattern.

And lastly, the myth of a single masterwork sword cutting suits of armor in half can be found in '''every steel-working civilization the world over,''' not just Japan.  

There is some evidence that certain sword masters could cut (as opposed to simply smashing) through metal armor like chainmail, but if you're that bloody good why the fuck would you waste your weapon on solid steel plate when you could strike for a weak spot like the neck or other joints?  

'''''<blockquote>Ever wonder why medieval Europe never bothered conquering Japan? That's right, they were too scared to fight the disciplined Samurai and their katanas of destruction.</blockquote>'''''

Or they were smart enough to avoid the [[Classic Blunder|classic blunder]] of fighting a land war in Asia. Remember that going to war with Japan during this time period would mean trekking across all of mainland Russia and China (which is actually '''way''' worse than it sounds; pre-modern armies relied on transporting food by boat or stealing it from the locals, and the steppes of Eurasia are generally '''very''' dry and '''very''' sparsely populated) to get to Korea, then building boats and going from there (which, as the Mongols discovered, is not a very smart idea). Not to mention the logistical nightmare or the '''reason''' anyone in Europe would want to do that. An army fights on its stomach, and imagine stretching supply lines that long, making it ever more prone to bandits and other dangers. More to the point, medieval Europe didn't know Japan existed; as far as they were concerned, the Far East was where spices, silk, and Mongols came from, and that was about it. Even if they had been aware of Japan, they were too busy dying of the plague, fighting the Muslims for the Holy Land, or fighting each other over stupid bullshit like [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avignon_Papacy where the pope should live] to be interested in leading a war of conquest against a country on the far side of the world. 

Also, when the Mongols, Chinese and Koreans were being invaded constantly by Japan, throughout centuries no less, they still easily defeated them on land through use of [[Tau|firearms]] and grenades. Back then, samurai were stupid little fucks who went in front of an army to address their origin and titles blah blah and fought with the other guy samurai with equally unnecessarily flowery armor. Samurai are the warrior equivalent of marsupials; they developed in isolation and never faced the cultural mosh-pit of Europe and Asia that would have otherwise forced them to adopt more practical methods (i.e., shields). They never had experience fighting a war like it was fought on the main continent; as soon as they came forward to address the Chinese they were laughed at and got a cannonball greeting. The men aren't there to die stupid deaths just for a romanticized line in a novel or a general to [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_K1BdDVvV9Q pin another a medal on his chest]. Because winning the war is hardly the end of it: every man standing and not reduced to a cripple or a rotting carcass is going home and resuming to be a part of your national production, especially when technology played far less roles than today in improving the overall production.

What's more, up until the late 19th and early 20th century, the majority of Japanese "invasions of the mainland" were not actually invasions at all; they were acts of piracy.  While they frequently came out the victors in the sorts of quick-and-dirty skirmishing that are the hallmarks of pirate raids, they very rarely fought anything that could actually be called a WAR against anyone from the mainland.

Plus few people know that ever since their first appearance, samurai actually are shown using huge ass bows from horseback more often than fighting up close, and if they did they often resorted to naginata (halberds) or yari (spears), with the katana being a weapon of last resort, similarly to how many European and Middle Eastern armored cavalry used lances more frequently than swords.  Aside from a few outliers like the Shimazu of the Sengoku era, the vast majority of samurai considered the katana, aside from its spiritual focus, to be just another weapon of war, and frequently not the correct tool for the task at hand.  So much for [[weeaboo|katana + samurai fanwank]].

For the samurai the katana was more of a spiritual weapon stemming from Buddhist principles: by mastering the sword one masters oneself. This creates an interesting comparison between how weapons in the West and in Japan are seen: for a knight his arming sword was but a tool, but for a samurai a katana was an extension of the self. This is mostly how it works in Japan, though: the nation is not a good example to represent all of Asia or even East Asia. Japan is as the island weirdos as the British are among European countries. Japan is a special case in Asia where militants were always in power (Shogunates). In the mainland, either money or scholarliness earned you a position in society (Imperial Examinations), as it should; a man worshiping a tool that kills would easily have been seen as a barbarous dumbass or bandit. Carrying a sword around would get you arrested for "militant attempt to raise arms to overthrow the authority" just like you would also be today if you were walking around pointing a gun at random people without provocation. And after Japan was united and the feudal age ended in the 16th century, peace-time samurai officials became more and more like modern-day office workers; they still carried at least wooden swords for signs of their office.

To further dismiss this katana/Japanese fanwank, after the entirety of the Japanese united during the Edo period, there was a marked decline of the samurai due to Japan not having strife with constant internal warfare, thus the role of the samurai (as said before) has been turned into a more political entity. And with the arrival of firearms... Furthermore, in response on the notion of "Europeans don't want to invade Japan because Samurai=Awesome!", before the First Sino–Japanese war, [[Horus Heresy|Japan has constantly tried to invade/go to war with China]], [[FAIL|but FAILING it in the process, similar to Failbaddon's "Crusades"]]. There was a reason why nobody took the Japanese seriously before 1905 (When they won the Russo-Japanese war, although this isn't saying much as Russia had jack shit military in that area and was being lead by an absolute military asshat), with the [[Eldar|Chinese mocking]]/[[Eldrad|being complete dicks to them]] [[Imperium|and the Europeans looking down at them.]]

With that in mind, neither of them used those swords as their primary battlefield weapon.

'''''<blockquote>Even in World War II, American soldiers targeted the men with the katanas first because their killing power was feared and respected.</blockquote>'''''

Or because they were the enemy leadership and killing them upset the chain of command and demoralized the troops on the ground, on top of their stubborn tendency to march before the grunts they were leading simply because it looked cooler (such things were often top priority in the Imperial Japanese Army, as it was headed by men who would make Boreale cry tears of joy). Unlike Japan, every other major power learned that fighting like pre-[[Death Korps of Krieg|World War I]] style armies were tactically outdated 3 decades ago. 

It doesn't take a history professor to know what usually happened when they started a [[WAAAGH|BANZAAAAAAIII!!!]] charge. [[Chenkov|With bayoneted rifles with no bullets and ]][[Baneblade|no armor support?]] [[Space Marines|Into the lines of the best-equipped and best-fed army in the world backed by the one of the best industries, equipped with SMGs, standard issue, semi-auto rifles, machine guns and grenades that—surprise, surprise—''don't'' explode the moment you pull the pin?]]

It should also be noted the "military katanas" issued for officers at this time weren't too far from a decorative sword given an edge and point, used more for symbolism, scaring their own soldiers, and executions than any practical use in combat.

Furthermore, the best katanas at that time were carved from railroad tracks since the fucking Chinese were blowing up '''every—single—thing''' that the Japanese were thought to get their short, grubby little hands on. These should give you a nice idea of the overall quality of said weapons (read: not very high). Further hilarity includes Chinese Dadao swords (which are like giant meat-cleavers/sabers) LOLstopping Japanese officers with katanas, and sometimes even breaking the damn katana in the process (to further give you the clue on hilarity, the Dadao itself was made from railroad tracks and it was mass produced too, meaning large amounts of Chinese soldiers and militias were equipped with one). That's not even going into the fact that Imperial Japan had the most shitty weapons compared to every other Axis force and even Allied nations. Only the Italians had debatably worse gear than the Japanese.

'''''<blockquote>So what am I saying? Katanas are simply the best sword that the world has ever seen, and thus, require better stats in the d20 system.</blockquote>'''''

They really aren't. They're not ''bad,'' indeed they're really quite good (if you're looking at one made by an actual weaponsmith, and not a troll selling crappy overpriced pot-metal to stupid weeaboos), but they're just not the end-all sharp metal stick that they are hyped to be. They were good for the local needs of the land of their origin, having only to deal with foes with light armor or overly flowery lamellar armor that folded like so much origami when not worn on a body. And we deserve a better system than [[d20]].

Katanas do deserve this, though. Both Chinese and Korean generals, their coastlines suffering from [[Dark Eldar|rampant Japanese pirate raids]], saw merit in katanas and incorporated them in their armories. But its just one weapon among many, since you're still talking to guys who have dual-stage rockets, matchlock rifles, various explosives (including rudimentary grenades and mines), flamethrowers and automatons (used in fancy courts as novelty items), so a simple sword is all "meh" to the Chinese/Koreans. It's funny because apparently there was no such thing as "hype" for them: its just a noteworthy weapon that has its uses. Little did they know some weird West-folk (and sadly, most of the populace brainwashed by Hollywood if not just anime) in the 20th century would buy into some fantasy where they would jump at the opportunity to replace entire national armories with only katanas... much to the Chinese's eternal dismay.

One last note: it should be pointed out that a) comparing a katana and an arming sword is like comparing an Imperial Plasma pistol and a T'au pulse pistol, the katana is a weapon wielded by a small elite and a symbol of status, the arming sword is a sidearm worn by everyone and their gran. The fact that the katana is not much more impressive, to say the least, just goes to show that it's not the Best Weapon EVAR its reputation suggests. Also, a bronze sword can cut through steel sheet, that is not impressive. 
[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XLWzH_1eZsc Here's a British fellow talking some more about katanas]

[https://youtu.be/w_3W1zg683A?t=357 Make sure to collect the delicious RAGE tears your weaboo no-friends are going to shed after showing them this.]

TL;DR: some guys took Samurai Jack way too seriously.

==A TWEEST==
[[Image:A_TWEEST.JPG|right|A coupling of two copypasta!]]
[[Category:Copypasta]]
[[Category:Meme]]
[[Category:Weeaboo]]