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Notes -
While your odds of tripping on the rock might be about equal, it is certainly not equally disadvantageous. If I have 90 percent chance to win and I trip, Ive lost a lot of my expected value if I can then be felled by one neck chop. If they trip and I disarm them, that was just the expected outcome anyway. They start from 10 percent so a swing like that doesn't matter very much.
Like think about playing chess against Magnus Carlsen. If I can choose between both of us being well rested or exhausted, I will choose the latter, because me playing at my best does not matter one iota if he is playing at a mediocre level. I have a much better chance if we're both exhausted precisely because the disadvantage is not symmetrical based on our starting positions and expected values.
I agree their ability to kill is inferior, I don't agree with your initial comment that seemed to mock the very idea that a girl with a bladed weapon can be a threat to an adult man. 10% chance of death or maiming is quite high, as you seem to acknowledge. I also would not want to confront an unarmed and violent adult man.
Sure, if the alternative is leaving your own kids to be attacked, then seems like a good recommendation. Doesn't seem wise for a stranger to intervene as others were suggesting unless there's imminent threat to other vulnerable people
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