Beating the march with a stuttering retreat

[drippingwet]

There are of course many ways to beat the march - PIL, AIP, sweeping parry etc. But against a good marcher, these tactics just don't seem reliable enough. Try to parry and you miss. Try for PIL on prep and its unclear in the ref's mind. Try for AIP and the marcher picks up on body signals and finishes with RoW. However, if you can pause as you retreat, get the marcher to commit, retreat and then take over RoW, this seems the safest option.

1. Is this what stuttering retreats are - pauses after each step back?

2. Wouldn't a stuttering retreat be even better with body feints and abortive attacks to add even more realism and therefore encourage the opponent to finish? And vary this with parry riposte after getting the opponent to commit by pausing and feinting?

3. Would you have to pause for longer against more experienced marchers?

[LordTofuDog-jnr]

I was trying to do a broken retreat with body feinting the other day at my club, it was working with the lower level fencers but not with the better ones. Of course I'm not the perfect fencer myself so that would be part of the reason.

[drippingwet]

How effective/often is it used?

[noodle]

a simple body check works wonders.

it works like this: you retreat, they advance, you shift your weight forward and kind of do a little jump at them between retreats, and continue. this works nicely because the marcher thinks you're going to attack into their preparation somehow and so they go to their backup (or initial, whichever) plan (parrying, finishing). you, meanwhile, are still retreating out of the way of this, and can then initiate the new action as they have possibly ended theirs. have to be super convincing, though

[drippingwet]

So the only difference between a body feint and a body check is a tiny little jump?

[Madmartigan]

The best footwork pattern to beat the march: Retreats combination with forward half-step or appel. For example: one slow, two fast retreats then half-step forward (then repeat the pattern immediately.) 3 fast retreats + half-step + 2 fast + half-step (then repeat.) Keep in mind that you will want to keep the distance closer, take away marcher's comfort zone. Then find good timing to strike with couter attack or false attack- parry ripose. Peter Joppich does this defensive pattern extremely well.

[achilleus]

I'm not sure what you mean by the term stuttering retreat never heard applied to fencing before.

Body feints work wonders.

The real issue, however is how to stop the march.

Well, with the new timing changes things are gonna be different, but as of last year, and on old boxes, the way to stop the march is to do one of two things:

1) Make the attacker finish

2) Make the attacker hesitate

3) Counter with only one light

4) Attack in Prep

These can be done with footwork and bladework actions used in combination.
For example, your being threatened on the march, and you show a four parry with a slight hesitation in your retreat. The marcher, if they see the invite, will take it as a sign to finish in an obviously different line (most likely the shoulder). This allows you to take the step back, make the correct parry and riposte.

The other option to make the attacker hesitate involves breaking the distance (outrunning your opponent backward), using line, counterattacks, and body feints to disrupt their rythym.

Remember in a 15 touch, you can give up a point to set up future touches.

For example, early in the bout, the marcher starts, and you counter into their marching attack. Touch against. On the next touch or too, your marcher will more likely believe and react to the false counterattack. It works to devestating effect if every couple of touches you make the real counter, then the opponent will often think, 'I can do it. I know I can.' And they will keep falling for the false counter.

As for an effective counter, well, that involves great footwork and timing. It can also be useful to have great closeouts and body control to avoid the point.

The attack in prep works if you can get the marcher believe that you are only going backwards and looking for the parry. It makes the marcher take bigger steps, make bigger preparations, and thus easier to make a obvious touch in their preparation.