Viking vs Samurai

What Viking has going for him
Close: Great Axe
Mid range: Long Sword
Far: Spear
Special Weapon: Shield
+chain mail armour

What Samurai has going for him
Close: Katana
Mid range: Naginata (a stick with a sword on the end)
Far: Yumi (long bow)
Special Weapon: Kanabo (a big huge stick that weighs twice as much as a great axe and can smash the end off of a vikings shield)
+iron plate armour

Who wins from long distance. the viking has a spear, and the Samurai has a long bow that as demonstrated on the show is as accurate enough to shoot out an enemies eye. This is a no contest really. The Viking is using a primitive technology, it is effective if it strikes, however a Samurai who was trained as a warrior from day 1 will likely be able to dodge it, even wearing all that armour. Regardless, the Samurai can shoot out a vikings eye, both of them according to the show. additionally the Samurai can shoot the viking much further than a viking can throw a spear. In long range the Samurai wins.

If the Viking manages to get closer, in mid range and the Samurai is silly enough to use the Naginata, then the Viking wins. His sword will make mince meat of the Naginate which is 75% wood. There is not much more too it, the would be one swing and the Samurai would drop that weapon and pull out his kanata.

Close range. At this range, the Samurai would likely use his superior skill to disarm the viking of his sword, even if he did not, he would realize his sword was useless against the Vikings chain mail. Depending upon how smart the Samurai is he will live or die. If the Samurai is dumb then he will just keep trying to hit throw a shield and armour he can't penetrate.

here is where I disagree with the show. I believe in 90% of the cases the Samurai would lose. Even if the Samurai used his skill to disarm the viking of both his sword and his great axe, then the Viking would laugh because the Samurai cannot hurt him with a kanata end of story.

Now the kanabo is a great weapon, based on the show it was right that the Samurai wins. However, less then 5% of Samurais actually carried kanabos. Why? remember the average Samurai was like 5'8 and 150 pounds, does he want to carry around a 40 pound kanabo?

If a Samurai actually carried a kanabo then yes the Samurai would win. If the kanabo doesn't break the viking shield, it breaks the vikings arms just from the share weight. Wherever the kanabo hits it breaks and destroys. If a kanabo hits a great axe, the axe get stuck in the kanabo and the viking is disarmed. If the kanabo hits the long sword, the long sword goes flying. The big down side to the kanabo is that if your fighting a fast enemy (like a ninja or samurai) then the kanbo is not useful because that big swing and miss means that your dead.

Ultimately, I have to give this one to the Samuari. He can kill the Viking no contest from far, and if 1000 vikings fought 1000 samurais, assuming the samuari knew a viking was big and slow then he would bring the kanabo and the viking is done. Without the kanabo then it would be the Viking because the Samurai has no short range weapons otherwise.