Ngoma Ya Shujaa

Nature: Aggressive Origin: Ardhi ya Ustawi Flourish: Area

Ngoma Ya Shujaa is a martial arts style originating from Ustawi. It is a rhythmic, kick-based martial art focused on circular, fluid motions intended to disorient and disable the opponent. It is infamous for its wide-sweeping kicks, sometimes delivering from unorthodox positions such as handstands or even the floor. Untrained eyes would see it as an almost dance-like style, particularly its traditional forms and combat drills. However, these fluid motions are often intended to disorient and trick the practicioner's opponent, in addition to being useful to build up energy for strikes.

Due to Ngoma Ya Shujaa's wide kicks and usage of unorthodox defensive and offensive techniques, the style is supreme efficient at taking out multiple opponents at once. Because of that, its Flourish is Area.

Core Principles

There are a few key elements to those who practice Ngoma Ya Shujaa. These elements are central to the martial art's key concept: Using series of disorienting movements to deliver wide-reaching attacks.

• Dance-Like Movements: Ngoma Ya Shujaa appears almost like dancing to an untrained eye. In reality, Shujaa makes use of these movements to trick an opponent into thinking that an attack will come from one direction while its really coming from a different one.

• Sweeps: Sweeps are fairly common as a means of resolving conflict in Ngoma Ya Shujaa. The style utilizes a wide variety of sweeps for a multitude of uses. It has some incredibly wide sweeps intended to defend against multiple opponents at once. On the other hand, it has smaller, lower sweeps intended to simply sweep singular opponents off their feet.

• Overwhelm Your Opponent: Ngoma Ya Shujaa's main strategy is to just overwhelm one's opponent through repeated, disorienting attacks that confuse one's opponent. They will punish their opponent for acting defensive by using non-stop offense, while also punishing their opponent for acting aggressive by quickly dodging then counter-attacking foes with kicks or chops.

Weapons

Ngoma Ya Shujaa makes use of a few weapons that are traditional in Ardhi ya Ustawi. They have been worked into the movements and strategies of Ngoma Ya Shujaa to great effect.

• Long Staff: Ngoma Ya Shujaa users are taught how to use long staffs in combat, making use of their wide-sweeping movements to increase their range considerably. This can get particularly dangerous when making use of tornado-like spin kicking movements.

• Spears: Ngoma Ya Shujaa teaches its practicioners how to use spears in combat, both at close range and long range. Like with the long staff, users are taught how to use the spear to increase their range while also adding some lethality.

• Twin Short Sticks: Users will also learn how to utilize twin short sticks in combat, often to particularly enhance the efficiency of their counter attacks. Users will block strikes with these strikes before quickly swinging their weapons into their opponent, or following up a block with a kick of some kind.