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Weapon Format Opponent skill 60% Fencing time 200 ms

The FIE defines fencing time only as “the time required to perform one simple fencing action” (t.8) and never gives it a number — yet t.88, t.103.2, t.89.4.d and t.106.4.e all decide priority by it. This slider is that missing number. Move it and watch touches change hands.

Scoring box latch 300.0 ms

Every FIE lockout is a value with a tolerance, so a whole band of settings passes inspection. This slider moves your box anywhere inside its weapon’s legal band. Touches that land inside the band are marked as undetermined by the rules.

Where every number came from

Provenance of the 68 constants in the engine: 49 documented / 1 derived / 2 calibrated / 16 reconstructed, of 68. Two primary documents were read in full: the FIE Technical Rules (August 2026, cited t.n) and the FIE Material Rules (August 2026, including Annexe B, the description of the electrical apparatus, cited m.n / Annexe B).

The apparatus — FIE Material Rules, Annexe B

constant	value	article
foil lockout	300 ms ± 25 ms	Annexe B A(a).6
foil break of contact	14 ms ± 1 ms	Annexe B A(b).1
épée — must register a double below	40 ms	Annexe B B(b)
épée — must register one hit above	50 ms	Annexe B B(b)
épée contact time	2–10 ms	Annexe B B(c)
sabre lockout	170 ms ± 10 ms	Annexe B C(a).8
sabre contact time	0.1–1 ms	Annexe B C(b).1

Two figures you will see quoted everywhere are not in the FIE rules: an épée lockout of 45 ms (the book gives a 40 ms / 50 ms band and calls the gap “the tolerance allowed”), and a sabre lockout of 120 ms (the book says 170 ms ± 10 ms, and said so in the December 2018 and December 2025 editions too). This game uses the book.

The piste — Technical Rules t.17–t.19

constant	value	article
length	14 m, tolerance 0.04 m	t.18.2
combat area width	1.5 m	t.18.1
on-guard lines	2 m from the centre	t.19.2
rear limit lines	7 m from the centre	t.19.3
warning zone	last 2 m	t.19.4
lateral penalty	1 m back	t.35.1

The August 2026 book says the combat area is 1.50 m wide, full stop. The December 2017 book said “from 1.50 metres to 2 metres wide”; the widely quoted range is out of date.

The weapons — Material Rules m.6–m.23

	foil	épée	sabre
maximum total length	110 cm	110 cm	105 cm
maximum blade length	90 cm	90 cm	88 cm
maximum mass, ready for use	500 g	770 g	500 g
tip pressure to register	> 500 g	> 750 g	—

The bout — Technical Rules t.37–t.41, t.124

constant	value	article
pool bout	5 hits / 180 s	t.38
direct elimination	15 hits / 3 × 180 s	t.39.1, t.40.1
rest between periods	60 s	t.39.2
sabre — first DE period also ends at	8 hits	t.39.1
tie at time	extra 60 s, lots drawn first	t.38.2.b, t.40.3
non-combativity	60 s without a hit	t.124

How to fence, and what this is

Controls

`←` `A`	retreat	`→` `D`	advance
`W` `↑`	extend the arm — hold it and you take the point in line (t.15)	`Space`	lunge
`S` `↓`	parry, in the line selected below	`F`	flèche — forbidden at sabre (t.101.5)
`1`–`4`	choose your line: it is both where you aim and where you parry	`C` / `P` / `R`	camera / pause / new bout

Extending the arm before you move your feet is what makes your action an attack (t.83.2.a). Step forward with a bent arm and it is only a preparation — your opponent’s simple attack will take priority over it (t.83.2.d, t.84.3).

The three weapons are three different games

Foil. Target: the trunk only (t.77.1). A hit anywhere else lights a white lamp, and a white lamp stops the phrase and annuls any subsequent hit (t.78). Right of way applies. Lockout 300 ms.
Épée. Target: the whole body, clothing and equipment included (t.91). There is no right of way at all — if both lamps light, a hit is scored against each fencer (t.92). The apparatus must call a double below 40 ms and a single above 50 ms.
Sabre. Target: everything above the hip bones (t.97.1); a cut to the leg registers nothing at all (t.98). Cuts count with the edge, the flat and the back of the blade (t.96.2). Right of way applies, plus a deadline foil does not have: the hit must arrive by the time the front foot lands (t.101.3). Lockout 170 ms.

Three places the published rules do not decide the answer

These are not simplifications. They are gaps in the codification, found by reading the books, and the game shows you where it had to choose.

“Fencing time” has no number. t.8 reads, in full: “Fencing time is the time required to perform one simple fencing action.” Nothing else in either book quantifies it, and yet t.88, t.103.2, t.89.4.d and t.106.4.e all award touches by it. The value is a slider in Settings because it is a choice, not a fact.
Every lockout has a legal band. Foil is 300 ms ± 25, sabre 170 ms ± 10, and épée is written as two thresholds with the gap between them called “the tolerance allowed”. For an interval inside the band, two boxes that both pass FIE inspection can light differently, and the rules do not say which is right. The game marks those touches.
Épée, direct elimination, 14–14, double hit. t.38.1.b covers the pool case at 4–4 (“Any double hit will not be counted”). t.39 and t.40, which govern DE bouts, have no equivalent sentence, and t.92 would make the score 15–15 — a result t.40 does not provide for. Searching the August 2026 Technical, Material and Organisation rules for “14-14”, “double hit”, “double defeat” and “deciding hit” turns up nothing that settles it. This game follows the pool rule by analogy and labels the exchange as unruled.

A fourth thing the rules leave to a person, and which this game therefore does not pretend to decide: t.89.2 and t.106.1 define a simultaneous action as “simultaneous conception and execution”, a statement about two fencers’ intentions. There is no measurable window in the books. The engine uses 50 ms and says so. Likewise t.35.3 (crossing the side of the piste “to avoid being hit”) and t.89.6 / t.106.5 (“unable to judge clearly on which side the fault lies”) are referee judgements; the engine implements the consequences but never guesses the intent.

What is faithful and what is mine

Faithful, from the documents: the piste and its five lines, all three target areas, the three lockout windows and their tolerances, contact times, tip pressures and travels, weapon lengths and masses, the pool and DE formats, the sabre eight-hit first period, the rear-limit and lateral-boundary penalties, non-combativity, the flèche ban at sabre, the foible/forte third of the blade, and the lettered priority cases of t.89 and t.106.

Mine, and labelled RECONSTRUCTED in the engine: every timing and dimension of the human body — lunge duration and reach, step speed and length, arm-extension time, parry window, reaction latency, the stance, the proportions of the figures — plus the four-parry line scheme, the chance that a parry in the wrong line deflects a point onto a non-valid surface, and the opponent’s tactics. The FIE specifies the equipment and the clock; it does not specify the athlete.

Not a simulation of a real bout. One fencer here is you at a keyboard, and a real phrase is continuous, three-dimensional and judged by a person. Treat the referee panel as a reading of the articles, not as a ruling.

Credits

Fencing is a sport, not a product; nobody owns it. The rules quoted here are the Fédération Internationale d’Escrime’s Rules for Competitions — Book 1, Technical Rules and Book 3, Material Rules, both in their August 2026 editions, published by the FIE (founded 1913, Lausanne). This game is an independent reimplementation written from those published documents. It is not affiliated with, endorsed by or connected to the FIE, and no FIE text, image or mark is reproduced here beyond short article references and the short quotations needed to say where a number came from. Full provenance is in Sources and in CREDITS.txt.

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