I've never known an experienced fencer to lose to a newbie
Not in a ten-point bout. Very rarely in a five-point bout. I've seen it happen in one-point bouts, though.
Agreed on trying the same thing multiple times. Part of this is that fencing (whether epee fencing or the slower katana play that Musashi was talking about) is decided on the quarter-second level, a couple orders of magnitude below what you'd get even in speed chess, but I think informational effects are just as important in this case. A great deal of the metagame of martial arts depends on having the correct low-level reactions to your opponent's moves, and working memory has a lot to do with this; trying the same thing twice will prime your opponent quite strongly to respond to it a third time, no matter how strong a fencer you are. (It's possible to exploit this by trying a superficially similar move that'll defeat the expected counter, or to feint a move you previously used and go to a second-intention attack.)
Not in a ten-point bout. Very rarely in a five-point bout. I've seen it happen in one-point bouts, though.
At my club, I don't think anyone really fenced one-point bouts. Three rarely. The newbie would sometimes get points though, so if they had been fencing one point bouts, they would have had a chance. Five was the standard where I fenced, and I don't remember seeing a newbie ever win one.
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