Saber Forum

I have finaly gotten my first Double Green Bladed saber,what are some of the Basics in it's usage,i.e spinning,fighting?

Check out the video section of the forum, there's a few staff vids. I have one showing off my Dark Initiate V2 / Phantom Initiate v2 wielding....it's freestyle but it might help get you started.

thanks for the help! :)

...this guy has a whole bunch of vids...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=85tgaloF-dQ# (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=85tgaloF-dQ#)

This looks like a decent one but it's hard to tell with no sound. (I'm at work)

I did notice however, that he grabbed the blade of his poorly made lightsaber replica :P

That brings up a good point I never though of though, that Bo fighting and staff-saber fighting are actually very different for that reason, you could only grab an actual lightsaber staff by the middle, limiting the available moves/grips.... unless you want to burn your hands off. 

Most of the traditional Bo staff work /I've/ been exposed to (Okinawan Kobudo) wouldn't work with a saber, since it uses the whole length of the Bo for many of the moves. You could adapt some of the moves, but not many. It's actually why I have doubts about the effectiveness of a saber staff for combat in place of simply using two sabers. The point of a Bo is the reach, and since you're limited only to the middle section, you lose much of that.

While I agree with Dark Lord Prodscidior about the reach of the Bo being limited by the hilt of the saberstaff, I myself try to make up for that a bit with the 36" blades.  Still ridiculous amount of reach, and plenty of surface area to manipulate the weapon. 

Something that I have noticed to be a bit more difficult than the reach factor is not making contact with myself while using the Saberstaff in around the back maneuvers, and over the shoulder, etc.  This is quite tricky to learn to avoid, but with patience, all things are possible.

I highly advocate the saberstaff.  It's flash and diversity are wonderful additions to any saber duel, and to master the saberstaff is no simple endeavor, thus, much practice is needed, and we all obviously have the time for that...

As for the original question, I think that Bo Staff videos and Tri-sectional staff videos are probably going to be the most useful.  I particularly enjoy the tri-sectional staff concepts because you are working with a section of the weapon in the very center almost all of the time, and that is extremely useful for saberstaff basics.

Ahh.  Saberstaffs.  Thanks for posting this!

i agree re: using the length of the staff in traditional martial arts, like Shaolin "earth-shattering" staff, one uses the whole length of the weapon.  i would say use the above series of videos for spinning ideas and such, but possibly not for hand positioning. also, his bo is much shorter than a lightsaber staff we would be using. i like to move my hands around on the hilt to maximize reach whenever possible, and a longer hilt helps. with 36 inch blades, you're effectively looking at an apparent weapon length of 48 inches while gripping both hands on one section or the other.  just as Lord Eyece says, mind your second blade!

See, I actually like my Yari better than a staff saber because I can make extension attacks that let me use the whole length of the weapon to my advantage. I guess the most important thing I can tell people is not to think of the staff as two separate blades, but a whole piece. I think Darth Bane was told something like this in the book "Path of Destruction."

the staff is one weapon, and thinking of it that way definitely makes it easier to get around as an opponent of one. it also makes it a tad easier to wield, if you think of yourself as a single saber wielder with options.  i'm playing around with a long handled saber, that my students seem to enjoy.

Since I prefer initiate blades on my full length staffs I tend to use them like the Yari.

On a possibly related sidenote, Donatello was my favorite ninja turtle. 




(used to pull the pole for hangars out of my closet, pretend I was him and whoop imaginary butt in the backyard lol)

I can't be alone in this^ right?

Nope, you aren't.

I did the same thing but with I think it was... Warriors of Virtue?

Anyways I wound up trying to use the closet rod to do pull ups and I broke it. lol

they don't make those things like they used to. er. ever. did. :)

Yep, they did make them stronger, but it was a long time ago, far, far, away.   I used to swing from mine :o

I would recommend getting some short stick/tanbo/escrime training to get the basics down and used to dealing with the limited gripping length. Most linear weapon fighting stem from this weapon and most techniques are rolled over to longer weapons (hanbo/jo , bo, pole arms) with some minor changes for the added length.       
  

I am with you on both accounts.  Leonardo was a close second though, but Donatello's mind and weapon always fascinated me.

On a weird side idea, if you want to get a feel for things, per se, try taping the midsection of a staff the width of a saberstaff grip, so about 24.5 inches for a Phantom/Phantasm, and then the overall length of the staff would be whatever your measurements of preference would be.  Since I only have the Phantom, my saberstaff is 90.5" obviously with the 36" blades (UEHG for what it's worth).  It would be 82.5" with the 32" blades, and 66.5" with the initiate blades.

Then, you can just try out the area of the handle with your spins and see if it suits you.  I think I am going to do this with an initiate's measurements to see what I think with the three various blade sizes...

funny you mention that taping a staff thing....i was going to do that..but found out my oldest has beat me to it.  lmao