Saws have different kinds of teeth. I don’t know their proper names, so I’ll make some up.
Chisels: Looks like a row of small chisels being pushed one after the other over the bottom of the cut. Used for ripping saws.
Knives: Looks like a row of small knives being run alternating along the left and right sides of the cut. Used to sever fibres for cross-cut.
Scrapers: Looks like a hook being dragged along the bottom of the cut to pick out the fibres severed by the knives. Used for cross cut.
Mostly useless: Looks like two rows of spikes running alternately along the sides of the blade. Easy to make and looks cool. Cuts almost nothing.
Reason I say this is because the nice kit a fellow I knew had spent good money on a couple of years ago came with a neat-o folding saw that had the mostly useless tooth pattern. It looked good, but it his energetic sawing efforts did nothing. The points grooved themselves into the bone/cartilage and then it glided along on the inter-tooth area.
So check out the teeth. If it doesn’t have either a chisel pattern, or a combined knife/scraper set it may disappoint you.
+1 on the sharp hatchet. I forged one up years ago out of a 16oz hammer and part of a leaf spring that slices up meat and bone disturbingly well.
2 thwacks. Sternum cut.
3 thwacks. Pelvis cut.
30 seconds to go down the middle of the spine.
So...much...blood.
Makes it harder to suspend disbelief when watching the cheesy movie sword fights. They just don’t capture the ringing clank of steel on bone, or the rippling jerk of structural severance.
And it’s handy for general wood-play. The cross handle allows a degree of edge control impossible to achieve with a knife.