One note for Gundam: Witch from Mercury that's kinda' sorta' a spoiler:
Guel is a TERRIBLE fencer. Every choice he makes in that match is wrong. The only way he could've won is if his blade recovery moved into his opponent's off-hand or shoulder which were charitably exposed.
His approach is beating his opponent's blade HEAVILY. This is a valid tactic to wear down weaker opponents, and essential for foil discipline that has right-of-way rules, but it's usually for 15-point matches that last 6 minutes. In a ONE-point match, it IMMEDIATELY sacrifices height AND distance advantages while wrecking accuracy as every heavy shot swings the blade off target and out of control. If the smaller target was disappearing behind their defense, that would be a way of wrecking the defense, but his opponent is an amateur whose reaction to being slammed on is bringing their non-dominant side forward for support. After a couple slams, he should feint and go for the newly-exposed target area. That is SO not what he does.
In WAY too deep, he attempts a traditional lunge. A traditional lunge is used to make a lightning-fast surprise attack at distance, and then allows the possibility to get back into position if it gets deflected. You can make a close lunge, but you'd better be running by your opponent in case you miss for a reset. He does not do this. He makes a traditional lunge at close range, and not only that, his previous tactics requires him to re-gather a swinging blade, and even at his strength, that telegraphs through his muscles heavily what he's about to do even to an amateur. The result is a slow strike that misses and leaves him in a full stop directly in front of his opponent. The only slight difficulty left is he's so close, the blade has to be slightly bent to tag him, which it does. Dead.
He's lucky his opponent doesn't hit hard, because a curved scratch on the stomach that stings for days is in the top 3 of worst "mistakes," which is what fencers calls bruises (With the heavy protection, if you were close enough to get one, you fucked up). Right next to getting below the waist slashed after getting tied up with the only option stabbing downwards as hard as possible, and getting hit in
the throat because it's so close, the blade has room to bend underneath the head protection.
