Comments by "Seven Proxies" (@sevenproxies4255) on "Nodachi VS Spears" video.

I remember seeing one of Skallagrims videos where he tried cutting the shaft of a historocally accurate spear. It took a good couple of whacks on a stationary spear, planted in the ground and he didn't actually "cut" it off, but rather made the wood crack/splinter. I think the reason why a lot of people believe that you can cut the shaft of a polearm or staff is because their experience with wood is usually with thin rods of pine or spruce (usually in the form of broom handles and the like). Now while pine and spruce is perfectly fine for mundane carpentry and as building material, it doesn't come anywhere near ash or oak. It's sort of like comparing aluminium to steel if we were to use metals as an example. A good analogy would be to look at a wood baseball bat. You'd have trouble cutting it even with an axe while it's lying on the ground, let alone someone wielding it, swining it around and in arms that will flex upon impact. That said, I don't know if I would completely discourage the tactic of hitting your opponents spear. Not with the goal of breaking the spear of course, but in order to break his guard. If he has a tight grip on his spear at any one point and you strike it with sufficient force, you could force him off balance. If his grip is too loose, then you might manage to disarm him. Hitting his spear to get the spear tip out of the way while closing the distance would also be beneficial to you since he'll have trouble employing the spear if you're basically in his face and the speartip is far behind you.
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