gasmaster wrote:to cause the opponent to mirror your breathing pattern and then exploit it
That's interesting, care to elaborate on it.
I'll explain it as well as I understand it. I cannot really do it, maybe with total n00bs, but I am not a level where I can use this effectively, yet.
A good explanation for this, IMO, are mirroring neurons. We pick up signals all the times, consciously but especially unconsciously. So, if your opponent is not aware of his breathing, he will notice, unconsciously your breathing pattern. The mirroring neurons, who are fired in response to another human being's behaviour in order to simulate it in the brain, are probably responsible for him using the same pattern. At least that's my theory.
Now, for applications, I have seen my teacher demonstrate this both for grappling and for striking. For grappling, you can use it to bring your opponent's breathing down, to relax him so you can take advantage of his lack of strength. One way to train it, is to lay on top of your partner, stomach against stomach. Feel the breath, adjust your breath to your partner's then start to slow it. If he is not aware of this breath, he will slow down (or speed up, if you want to do the opposite).
For striking, it is quite simple from what I saw. As you punch someone, you inhale or you exhale or you hold your breath. Your opponent will likely do the same, enabling you to give different kinds of pain and affect differently your opponent, depending on your scope.
There is a similar technique used for de-escalation: as you talk to your opponent, match his speech. Then, after you made a connection to him, slowly start bringing his speech pattern down, calming him. I did not see this in over a year, so the details are a bit fuzzy. You can try it with people around you, I did but I could not concentrate on the tempo long enough to do it.
PS:
I think that this can be explained by NLP. My teacher studied it although I think that the above is a concept found in Systema.