Originally posted by Hobo Misanthropus:

you can find yourself overwhelemed and block-broken with bad timing, a state at which you take additional damage (usually resulting in an instant death)

Can you explain what you mean by that? That doesn't sound like a situation that I've ever been in, and I only use bucklers. My understanding is that the worst case if you mistime the block is that you take normal damage (as if you didn't even try to block).

Certainly missing a parry can hurt. I missed a parry against a 2* fuling last night and it hurt, but I don't think it was worse than a normal hit.