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(Notice the subject line left out letters I did not like)

Martial Arts that are set based are still technique based because the set is an isolation of elements within the pre-existing techniques of the system. In the end they all amount to methods of training but what exactly are you training? Some people will reply quickly that you are training your basics and that is correct but those basics belong to a particular martial art method are held to certain standards we call the principles but it may help to consider them keys to reaching your full potential.

In the end you can take a part of a form or a part of a technique and you can create all sort of excellent ways to develop it with or without resistance, with or without partners and I dont see anything wrong with that. The misunderstanding lays in the very design of most martial arts. The techniques that are taught are often for the purpose of teaching and ingraining particular methods they are teaching models and not single word answers to thousands of different questions.

For example in the technique Grasping Sparrows Tail (Lanquewei) is comprised of a number of smaller techniques which can be broken down further into some of the Taiji basics but these can be broken down further into ways of moving according to that martial arts particular principles. When most Taiji students learn this technique it looks fairly ineffective for fighting a fully resistant attacker. Even after they learn the meaning of the moves within the technique it still looks very limited in application. When they drill it in Push Hands they think cool and it fools some people but you still got street fighter types going how the heck is this going to work on someone trying to punch my brain out my arse!

At last they persist in the study of the particular martial art, patiently accepting the guidance of the seniors and instructor and ingraining the correct internals of the art. At last the faithful day comes when the skill manifests its self within the student maybe during sparring or maybe in a self-defense situation but they figure out that the technique was only a direction the teacher pointed for them to walk so that they can reach the same skills the teacher reached by going down that path. If instead the student says screw this worthless technique and runs off to study 10 other martial arts each for a week well you can guess what skill that type of student is going to reach.