Actually, Behold, it's my understanding that ninja were primarily spies, and secondarily assassins. I should have mentioned that earlier. therefore, it was their job to gather intelligence and report it back to their commander/payer. The Ninja unarmed combat style is actually rather inefficient as far as a fighting style goes, and it's not especially complex. no weapons = deep shikakka. they would only fight if given no other recourse whatsoever because they were trained to firstly not be caught and secondly to run like hell when they were.

I shoulda mentioned this earlier. my bad.

but, samurai have a hugely efficient sword style. It's quite something to stand there while a master swordsman leaps at you at full speed waiting for the very last possible instant to dodge and counter. if you move too soon, he will change his attack to follow you and you will die. if you move too late, you will die. If you move too fast, you'll be too far away to strike back and you will die. if you move too slow, you will die.

there's a lot of dying implied there. good thing boken just give ya a good bruise instead of lopping off your arm. dying is generally seen as detrimental to one's health and well-being.

the "dodging by a paper's breadth" principle is one of the reasons Ninja were so effective against Samurai. toss the equivelant of pepper spray in your opponent's eyes, introduce him to your tanto, kick him as he's down and run like hell. Ninja's weapon style.