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N.v.P.: The Ultimate Showdown (argumentive paper thingy) |
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N.v.P.: The Ultimate Showdown
Warriors of all sorts have marked the way of history since the beginning of time. In a few years back however a wide spread debate ensued over the internet into a world swept phenomenon about two certain classes of fighters, and what would happen if they ever pitched combat between each other. In other words, “Who would win in a fight; Pirates or Ninjas?” Since March of 2002, the topic of a staged fight between these fighters escalated in online forums, blogs, comics, and even became the subject of many overly dramatic full length film series posted on YouTube. Even though these two groups of classic fighters would have never met through the course of history, the spread of imagination from the populi online has made this a controversial debate for the sum of 6 years now. Looking into historical based stories and ideas though, a Pirate would win in a fight against a Ninja.
In any fight between two candidates, there’s a specific things you need to compare between the two before you can place a bet on which one will overcome the other; Fighting styles, weaponry, and skills with using one’s surroundings.
Ninja’s originated out of China, before the style of siege and espionage traveled to Japan. These assassins were widely used under Oda Nobunaga in the mid fourteenth century. “The ability to enter into a castle by means of stealth, and launch a surprise attack on the inhabitants, causing confusion within while the main army storms the castle from without. Typically the ninja party would scale the walls of a castle under the cover of night, then start lighting everything in sight on fire. They would not wear black, but rather, wear the costume of the castle defenders, making it difficult to tell friend from foe, and so make it seem like there is a rebellion within the ranks. Once chaos reigns inside the castle, the army lays siege on its walls from without.” (Nepstad, par 18 ) This fighting tactic was the first major style of gorilla warfare in Japan, and they were widely feared over the region. Also, many times these spies would spend years abroad learning some form of the martial arts in honing their skills to become highly trained killers.
Pirates however had been around far longer than Nobunaga’s time. Recorded as early as a time of 13th century BC, nautical sea faring thieves, had spread to be a worldwide phenomenon of by the 1500s. Pirates were known for their cruelty and ruthlessness that often made these men carry a legion to creatures close to demons. Pillaging, rape, murder, and thievery were a few things among list that Pirates were known for during raids on the Caribbean. What’s not more commonly known was that Pirates, or at least their captains, were incredibly smart. Having to deal with the daily toll of life on the high seas, pirates had to be quick on their toes in order to survive; weathering out hurricanes and dealing with shortages of both food and water over long periods of time are two examples for any sailing group from the 1600s. In order to survive these conditions of this life style, one had to be able to adapt, and pirates were best known for this, in both their survival and their ability to work as a team between a captain and his crew.
In their styles of movement, Ninja’s worked in subtle groups of assassins designated under one warlord in futile Japan in order to silently take out one regime over another. Pirates moved however mostly in crews of thirty or more cold hearted killers. In a first raid, the ground crew would row across an open port in the cover of night. Once ashore, they would send a signal to the ship to have the rest of the crew open fire on the town to cause a layer of panic in the streets. The thieves used this cover of madness to get into treasuries, stores, valuable documentation, and goods before most of the town’s guards ever showed up, and left quickly with the booty in hand. Because of which, fear and swift force were their greatest assets that a Pirate had to his advantage in these sea side raids. Though known for moving through an enemy territory with great speed, Ninja caused no such wide spread fear into the hearts of hundreds of innocent civilians. The only people they really caused to cast a glance over their shoulders were the bureaucrats and leaders of Japan from being murdered while they had their back turned.
In weaponry both groups most commonly used two basis of a display of swordsmanship, and short range weaponry. For their swords, Ninja used one-edged straight swords known as a Katana. They roughly were anywhere from three to five feet in length, and a common weapon used in Kendo, or the Japanese form of fencing. The swords themselves were best used with applying the length of a blade to induce a speed of a strike, so the weapon was most efficient for throwing offensive horizontal slashes at an opposite. The type of blade that was used most by Pirates was a Cutlass; a two to three foot long, broad saber that could be both used for stabbing and slashing opposites. Theses shorter swords allow more movement for their wielders making them more light weight and an asset for speed and a shear form of force.
In short range though, Ninja used small throwing stars, called Shuriken, and throwing daggers, known as Kunai. The two were small portable blades that could be easily thrown, with training, to an average range of fifteen to twenty five feet. These blades, many times, were also heavily coated with a type of poison that could kill a human in a matter of days if their victim managed to somehow escape. Depending on the type of armor their target was wearing however, they had to strike open skin in order for the poison to work its way through a man’s blood stream, and a moving target was often a hard thing to hit.
The number one asset that a Pirate would have in his arsenal however would probably be his pistol. Guns had been used in the business of piracy as early since the late 1300s. These guns ran on a gun powder projectile system that could only have an accuracy rating of 60% firing and wounding a target, and even that would have had to place them within a distance of twenty or so feet. “The pistol might take a while to reload and probably isn’t that accurate, but it’s still a… pistol with massive recoil.” (Eoco, par 6).
The short range weapon still would have put a Pirate at a high advantaged over a Ninja, because guns themselves didn’t make their way over into Japan widely until the late 1700s. Even in those years, guns were a hard machine to come by in Japan’s Futile Era, which lasted up until the mid 1800s. Not many people even knew of the guns existence in the world because of Japan’s isolation of being an island in the middle of the Pacific coast line, when explorers didn’t have much interest in going any father east then India. Historically given, if you took a Ninja and a Pirate from the 1600s and gave a gun to each of them, the Pirate would already have the common knowledge to fire at the other with the damned thing, while the other would be still wondering if this machine was some form of higher magic.
Some things to think about each class of fight though are facts like a Pirate would not have carried around 300lb cannon in his back pockets, and contrary to popular belief, Ninja cannot fly. Such facts are easily forgotten to the lore and myths of these two groups of fighters, and these facts are sometimes cast aside to the stories that we find them so highly in. However, between silent one-man force that relies more on stealth and surprise in attack, and a group of forceful adaptable men who worked together as a team, I’d have to put my money on the team of rouges. In a one on one fight, a Ninja would lose that field of surprise if such an open fight occurred, and the chances of him being shot on sight was fairly high. In short, Pirates win.
-Work Cited-
Eoco. “A Serious and Unnecessary look at Pirates v. Ninjas.” Sarcastic Gamer. March 25 2008. Sarcastic Gamer LLC. <http://sarcasticgamer.com/wp/index.php/2008/03/a-serious-and-unecessary-look-at-pirates-v-ninjas.html >.
Nepstad, Peter. “Ninja.” The Illuminated Lantern. June 01, 2001. <http://www.illuminatedlantern.com/cinema/archives/ninja.php June 01, 2001>.
 AquilisNoctis · Wed Oct 08, 2008 @ 07:01pm · 2 Comments |
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