quality:corruption
Combat

Lightly armed and armoured fighters, such as the retiarius, would tire less rapidly than their heavily armed opponents; most bouts would have lasted 10 to 15 minutes, or 20 minutes at most. In late Republican munera, between 10 and 13 matches could have been fought on one day; this assumes one match at a time in the course of an afternoon.

Spectators preferred to watch highly skilled, well matched ordinarii with complementary fighting styles; these were the most costly to train and to hire. A general melee of several, lower-skilled gladiators was far less costly, but also less popular. Even among the ordinarii, match winners might have to fight a new, well-rested opponent, either a tertiarius ("third choice gladiator") by prearrangement; or a "substitute" gladiator (suppositicius) who fought at the whim of the editor as an unadvertised, unexpected "extra". This yielded two combats for the cost of three gladiators, rather than four; such contests were prolonged, and in some cases, more bloody. Most were probably of poor quality, but the emperor Caracalla chose to test a notably skilled and successful fighter named Bato against first one supposicitius, whom he beat, and then another, who killed him. At the opposite level of the profession, a gladiator reluctant to confront his opponent might be whipped, or goaded with hot irons, until he engaged through sheer desperation.

Combats between experienced, well trained gladiators demonstrated a considerable degree of stagecraft. Among the cognoscenti, bravado and skill in combat were esteemed over mere hacking and bloodshed; some gladiators made their careers and reputation from bloodless victories. Suetonius describes an exceptional munus by Nero, in which no-one was killed, "not even noxii (enemies of the state)."

Trained gladiators were expected to observe professional rules of combat. Most matches employed a senior referee (summa rudis) and an assistant, shown in mosaics with long staffs (rudes) to caution or separate opponents at some crucial point in the match. Referees were usually retired gladiators whose decisions, judgement and discretion were, for the most part, respected; they could stop bouts entirely, or pause them to allow the combatants rest, refreshment and a rub-down.

Ludi and munera were accompanied by music, played as interludes, or building to a "frenzied crescendo" during combats, perhaps to heighten the suspense during a gladiator's appeal; blows may have been accompanied by trumpet-blasts. The Zliten mosaic in Libya (circa 80–100 AD) shows musicians playing an accompaniment to provincial games (with gladiators, bestiarii, or venatores and prisoners attacked by beasts). Their instruments are a long straight trumpet (tubicen), a large curved horn (Cornu) and a water organ (hydraulis). Similar representations (musicians, gladiators and bestiari) are found on a tomb relief in Pompeii.