Reddit reviews Battle Gaming: The New American Sport

Good book for soft-weapon construction:

https://www.amazon.com/Battle-Gaming-New-American-Sport/dp/0984483403/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=david+graham+battlegaming&qid=1554827085&s=gateway&sr=8-1-spell

Focus on safety first!

The structure of Amtgard is known as "Battle Game". Amtgard was included in the book "Battle Gaming: The New American Sport" by David W Graham due to it's origin and founding. I haven't reread Lizzie Starks book "Leaving Mundania" in a couple years, but I believe there it is also classified as a Battle Game. I'm in the process of checking. The larpwiki entry classifies Amtgard as both a larp and a battlegame.

Acora: Sounds like you want to enjoy the sport of Medieval Combat Sports without the overhead the roleplaying. When you say you are looking for a durable product and have been looking at Edhellen (now known as Forged Foam), I am assuming you are looking at their full contact weapon line. These weapons are designed for full combat battle gaming such as Belegart, and Dagorhir. These battle gaming groups have LARP aspects but tend to focus more on the medieval combat sport.

I recommend for sizing your sword that you want a weapon that when you swing your arm down it will not strike the ground. This way you can make low sweeping movements as part of your swordsmanship. I am a bit shorter than you and personally favor a LB-S-2608 (which they actually do not market anymore). I might suggest you try the LB-S-2806 (Long Broad Sword).

As for using the swords, you can swing freely with them but I recommend only touch thrusting. They are pretty stiff on the ends. As for learning different basic attacks, I suggest the book Battle Gaming: The New American Sport”. It has a good outline of basic fighting styles with this type of weapon.