Well the seller has offered a refund, so hopefully all will end well.
As indicated by the title of the thread, I had my suspicions, but was hoping to get lucky.
Surprisingly, the jian was quite well made and looked almost as good in person as it did in the pictures. The fake patina was well done, though it had a glazed look that was odd. Inside the mouth was redder as apposed to the black I would expect, but looked good. The one telltale was a distinct smell off acid when I put my nose to the dragon's mouth.
Interestingly it was well balanced and felt quite lively. It was longer and lighter than originals while maintaining enough heft to feel effective. It's too bad the originals don't look this nice
Most Chinese sword breakers are quite simple with a multifaceted "nut" forming the guard and the pommel. The guard would only have given minimal protection.
Chinese sai are a very different weapon.
I have two "Chinese sai" (sometimes called "gen") of differing construction. One has a narrower guard about the size and shape of my thumb and forefinger forming the letter C. It is nicely finished with brass fittings making me think it is a more sophisticated form than the village pieces. The other is a village piece with a guard like a shallow omega. The guard is almost twice as large, and made of steel forged around the central rod. It is much heavier than the one with brass fittings. Clearly it was well designed for trapping and breaking.
Both the jian sword breakers and the gen can occasionally be found in sets of two, but singles are more common. They were stand-alone weapons, easy to conceal and carry regularly. I think the breaking function worked best when blocking an edged weapon. I doubt many swords snapped as such but the edge damage would be tremendous. Some of my breakers show nicks where they were hit by an edge. I imagine the apposing blade was not in good shape afterward.
Josh