Referee guidelines

This section is created after judges trainings to promote judging consistency. It is primarily aimed at referees of the tournament. However, participants are encouraged to read this part as well to understand better how the decisions will be made.

Doubles and afterblow tempo.

Double is assigned when the second strike was already moving forward at the time of the first strike. Afterblow is assigned when the second strike started immediately or almost immediately after the first strike.

Afterblow is awarded if the second attack:

  • begins as a single continuous fencing response to the first hit,
  • without interruption, hesitation, or preparation,
  • and without requiring a new tactical decision by the fencer.

Late hit (not an afterblow) is assigned if the second attack:

  • requires a visible pause,
  • requires a preparatory step or reset, or
  • includes a new tactical action (feint, beat, disengage, wind, or re-aiming).

Stike qualification.

We prefer CLEAN over STRONG cuts: even light touch should be counted, if it moved clean, without interruotion. If you do not qualify the strike, you should be ready to explain the reason, from the following:

  • flat
  • tip scratch (if the cut connected just with the tip, and slid off)
  • low travel distance

Thrust should make a contact and either bend the blade, or displace the target area. Exception: trhusts that slid off after contact, especially from the mask, are valid.

In case you have doubts about QUALIFICATION or AREA, prefer awarding the most points:

  • if you are not sure about the quality, then you should award the points
  • if you are not sure 1 or 2 points (shoulder, waist area etc.), give 2 points.

It is for 2 reasons: to NOT motivate hard hitting, and to have more consistent decisions.

Strike through the parry.

A strike through a parry is valid if the attacking blade:

  • passes through the weak part of the opponent’s blade, or
  • slides along the parrying blade and reaches the target with continuity.

Contact through a buckler is not considered a strike through, as the buckler has no weak part. If the buckler contacts the blade after the strike has already landed, the strike is valid.

Excessive force.

To promote safer fencing, we want to pay attention to the potentially dangerous actions, but not discourage participants from proper execution of technical actions.

In particular, the cards for the excessive force should be given:

  • if the force applied by the participant is obviously higher than it is required for the correct and fast execution of the technique. This means, that if the strength of the cut comes as a neccessity from the position or speed, it is NORMAL. But if the fencer does slower powerful swings, or adds the force with body and hips where it is not necessray, it SHOULD be penalized
  • if the behavior of the fencer is intimidating to the point when it threatens the opponents. The participants should be afraid of getting hit because they will lose points, not because they will get hurt. So if someone swings (even without actually striking) in obviously intimidating manner, it is worth penalising.
  • if the fighter loses control over the actions: bumps with the body into the opponent, spams multiple strikes, especially if it is visible that he does not aim properly, and the directions are random.

On the other hand, if the strike is strong, but it could not be made lighter without compromising on the technique efficiency, it should not be considered “excessive force”. For example: cuts from hanging guard, thrust with fleche, which may look scary, but the force is necessary rather than excessive.

There is no such thing as “verbal warning”

Yellow cards do not affect the results (even the points are awarded), so they act INSTEAD of verbal warning. They are cumulative, and act through the whole category.

If you see that the situation is close to rules violation (but NOT A VIOLATION YET), it is good to mention this to the fighters BEFORE the violation actually happened, but if it has already happened, it’s a card.

When giving a yellow/red card, specify which category does it fall into (protocol violation, self-endangerment, danger to the opponent, severe misconducts), because they stack in each category independently.

Fighters can acknowledge hits to themselves and discard their own hits.

But the solution is always on the main judge, be especially cautious in situation when fighters discard the strikes, for example to avoid being doubled out.

This is not a challenge! So even if you do not agree with the fighters, they do not lose their right to challenge.

When calling participants

In Sword&Buckler category, name the sword type they are using (i.e “Red: arming sword, Blue: sidesword) to pay attention to the scoring rules.

Controlled/stopped attacks

If the fencer deliberately slows/stops attack that obviously would be effective otherwise, it should be considered valid.