Hua Shan 7 days

[Dirt]

I'll never understand why people are so biased against Wang Chongyang.

[tape]

I'll never understand why people are so biased against Wang Chongyang.

It's because many use logic to deduce his level; whether that leads to a valid deduction is up the reader to decide.

The typical Wang Chongyang naysayer probably thinks something along the lines of this:

1. Wang Chongyang was definitely superior to the Greats 20 years before LOCH began.
2. He is marginally superior to them due to the fact that it took 7 days and nights in order to "decide a victor". (first logical induction some disagree with)
3. The Greats all are narrated to have improved tremendously, to the point that almost all of them thought they were now the best in the world. (until they saw the other Greats in action).
4. A tremendous improvement is enough to overcome the marginal superiority that Wang Chongyang had over them.
5. It is popular opinion that as one gets older, the stronger their martial arts becomes due to the plethora of SOM (Strong Old Men) like Wuyazi, Sweeper Monk, Zhang Sanfeng, etc.
6. In another 40 years that ROCH takes place, it is almost inconceivable that they still have not hit Wang Chongyang's level 60 years previously, when he was only marginally superior to them.

[tape]

Also, with the removal of the fact that Hong Qi Gong did not master his Dragon Palms during the first Huashan tournament, I am leaning towards author intent implying that Wang is still on the same level as the Greats til the day they die. I don't think it makes logical sense and is a bit contradictory with some of the other facts portrayed, but author intent trumps it in this circumstance.

But yeah, that's why people rate Wang lower.

[Dirt]

The 2nd Hua Shan tournament should give an indication on how the fights were done. In order to be fair, everybody should have taken turns fighting one another to ensure that everyone was on equal footing, whether stamina wise or if someone got injured fighting someone else. Taking turns can take up many days.

As an example, on the first day:

OYF versus DZX
WCY versus HYS

HQ does not fight.

2nd day:

OYF versus HQ
WCY versus DZX

HYS does not fight.

3rd day:

DZX versus HYS
WCY versus HQ

OYF does not fight.

4th day:

HYS versus HQ
WCY versus OYF

DZX does not fight.

5th day:

DZX versus HQ
HYS versus OYF

WCY does not fight.

Everybody get's to fight everybody on equal footing. And the other 2 days, they could have discussed martial arts. Or, given the closeness in martial arts between East, West, South and North, it could have taken more than a day for each of those fighters to defeat one another; WCY defeats his opponent easily but he (and his opponent) still has to sit around and wait for the other fight to finish.

The fight could have taken 7 days because WCY was playing by the rules and Hua Shan Tournament wasn't just about defeating him, the other Greats had to fight and defeat each other; didn't OYF and HQ fight each other for days on top of the snowy mountain with Yang Guo? Given author intent in what Jin Yong made changes to in 3rd edition, WCY should be way up further than most people ever give him credit for.

[Dirt]

Does anybody have the passage where it says that it took WCY (specifically) 7 days to defeat the other Greats? I think people are making an incorrect assumption on the whole tournament. There's a difference between the 1st Hua Shan took 7 days versus it took WCY 7 days to defeat the other Greats during the 1st Hua Shan.

[tape]

I'll just reply to your other post here since this is a new topic.

There wasn't much on the Huashan tournament except that it was a martial arts competition that took 7 days, where they agreed/admitted in the end that Wang Chongyang was the best in the world.

Consider that the other Greats were not ranked #2,#3,#4,#5, so it's unlikely that they were fighting amongst each other for anything but first. Hong Qi Gong told Guo Jing and Huang Rong that him and Huang Yaoshi proved slightly inferior to Yideng, yet there is no ranking. I don't think they cared about fighting each other for second to be honest, and #1 is all that mattered. Once WCY proved his dominance, the tournament would likely be over.

Look at the second Huashan tournament when Huang Yaoshi went over the 300 stance limit. Once it happened, he turned around to leave because he thought he lost. I don't see why his behavior would be too much different in the first tournament; once he lost definitively to Wang Chongyang (or anyone else for that matter) he would turn around and leave as he has no claim to #1 anymore.

And again during the second Huashan tournament against the crazy Ouyang Feng, it took hardly any time at all for Huang and Hong to admit that Ouyang Feng was the best in the world at the time. The Greats are all people that admit defeat graciously and instantaneously when they see it. If Wang was THAT much superior to them, I cannot really see it taking 7 days -- the Greats are also people that would admit that Wang Chongyang was instantly proven to be superior and they just took the time to compete amongst themselves -- but nothing like that is mentioned.

Basically I think it defies real world logic, but in the JY world it's supposed to make sense.

[Dirt]

You're assuming that all the Greats assumed that Wang Chongyang was the best and everybody only fought him. Ouyang Feng's Reverse 9 Ying obviously made him better than HYS and HQ, however, when Ouyang Feng didn't have 9 Yin, he and Hong Qi fought for a very long time and only stopped after Ouyang Feng accidently launched an attack at Huang Rong in the heat of battle. In ROCH, after Hong Qi caught up with Ouyang Feng, they fought for days.

Apart from 2nd Hua Shan, Hong Qi never admitted that Ouyang Feng was superior to him. Hong Qi kept practicing and caught up. HYS never admitted Hong Qi or Ouyang Feng was superior to him (minus the reverse 9 Yin exception), he admitted that they may have kept up with him after the 20 years. Would the Greats, in their youth, just fight one another for 100 stances and just admit defeat? I think not, especially if it were Hong Qi and Ouyang Feng during the 1st Hua Shan, their enmity was such that they would just keep fighting until there was a victor or the other 3 Greats declared it a draw.

It's perfectly plausible that the 4 direction Greats fought one another for a day perhaps more to see who was better before fighting Wang Chongyang. But, like so many people, you automatically assume that it took Wang Chongyang 7 days to fight all 4 Greats instead of it taking all 4 Greats 7 days to figure out who would fight Wang Chongyang, who by then had already mopped the floor with 3 of the Greats. Given the fact that Duan Zhixing was slightly better than HYS and Hong Qi (and that Hong Qi has always been equal to Ouyang Feng minus 2nd Hua Shan), it's only logical that the last battle was between Duan Zhixing and Wang Chongyang.

[Ian Liew]

It's perfectly plausible that the 4 direction Greats fought one another for a day perhaps more to see who was better before fighting Wang Chongyang. But, like so many people, you automatically assume that it took Wang Chongyang 7 days to fight all 4 Greats instead of it taking all 4 Greats 7 days to figure out who would fight Wang Chongyang, who by then had already mopped the floor with 3 of the Greats. Given the fact that Duan Zhixing was slightly better than HYS and Hong Qi (and that Hong Qi has always been equal to Ouyang Feng minus 2nd Hua Shan), it's only logical that the last battle was between Duan Zhixing and Wang Chongyang.

Why would they grant WCY a bye in the preliminary rounds? It sounds like they're fighting among themselves to earn the right to challenge the reigning champion or something. I would have thought that all of them either fought each other one on one at random. What tape is saying is that the greats would probably recognise that WCY was better than they were in a very short time, possibly even without having to fight, not that it took them seven days to fight him and discover that he was better. It sounds weird that 4 of them will be fighting for seven days, and WCY only fights on the last afternoon. He'll need to be recognised as the head or the king of the hill, which would defeat the purpose of the Huashan tournament anyway.

Although WCY did have the 9yin in his hands.. maybe because of that he proclaimed himself wulin mengzhu and demanded that the other four choose a victor to challenge him for 9yin?

[tape]

My point is that if Wang Chongyang mopped the floor with a Great, and the other Greats take a day to differentiate who is better, why would they even bother fighting Wang Chongyang? If he mopped the floor with someone who is at worst 95% of your ability, then he will definitely beat you just as badly. Why bother fighting for the "honor" of getting your *** kicked ?

It only takes a couple stances to judge somebody's level. From the description of how much the LOCH greats improved between the first and second tournament, and again from LOCH to ROCH, that improvement is simply too huge for Wang Chongyang to not have proved superiority within dozens of stances and also be equal to them in ROCH.

That is why it is not internally logical and Wang Chongyang gets rated lower -- but I can accept that author intention places him as their equal until ROCH.