I've personally gone round and round on this. If you limit it to blades that can actually be carried on the street you'll hit a blade length limit of around 10", more or less.
There's no one answer.
The classic European answer was a long skinny double-edge dagger. You get very precise control over where the tip is, for placement on an armor's weak spot and penetrating.
Downside: limited cutting power, low utility usage.
Japanese: the Tanto was seldom a "geometric point", it usually had a belly. It was a nicely balanced package capable of cutting, stabbing and utility. It was light enough to do fairly fine point control like the dagger.
Ghurka Kukuri: an amazing weapon. Great utility knife, acceptable stabber against unarmored targets, good cutter, but the biggie was CHOPPING. Your basic overhead smash, or a chop at a limb, basic "hatchet" tricks. Not subtle, but highly effective. Some Filipino Bolos have enough heft they can do similar, but most capable of real power were outside of street-daily-carry size ranges.
"Bowie" types: heavier blade than your average "dagger" type and at least partially double-edge - usually. I consider the Mad Dog Panther the best interpretation of the Bowie concept made today. Bigger ones were usually slower, a few rivaled the Kukuris for heft.
Kerambit: An Indonesian piece with a radical forward curve, often (usually?) double-edge. It influenced what we call the "Hawksbill" blades, the Spyderco Civilian, the Szabo/Black Cloud UUK and other "forward sweep" designs smaller than a Kukuri. These can hook and trap enemy limbs, controlling their position and setting up other fun while doing damage.
So hmmm. There's plenty more classic types, but this is a start.
So...in designing my own personal fighter, I tried to combine the extra stabbing power of a double-edged blade with the overhead smash ability of a Kukuri and the "hooking" of a Kerambit. I won't repost blueprints of The Outsider yet again, EMail if you haven't seen it and are curious. Scott Evans at Edgeworks is sheathing it now, he says people who see it either hate it go absolutely nuts over it.
Photos soon, I hope.
Jim March
