I've just read a post in another thread by Chris Grey wherein he says:
So I'm pondering the final showdown in my fantasy novel where the MC confronts the bad guy who he feels has caused him all his troubles. My MC is a bad ass fighter, but so is the bad guy, and certainly more experienced. The MC has also been starved, frozen to the brink of death, shot by an arrow, and abused and tortured in prison in the weeks before the fight. Thus, I can't have my MC win in a straight one on one, even though it must end in a one on one duel.
My plan was to have the MC pretty much defeated, and ready to eat an axe, when he manages to roll out of the way. The axe shatters on a stone and a shard of steel flies into the baddy's eye, giving the MC a chance to stab him.
The shattered axe is supposed to represent (to the baddy's tribe) that their god abandoned him, because of his past treachery.
Is this too cheesy? Too Deus ex Machina? I do like the symbolic aspects of this ending, but I'm also worried that the dagger in the boot thing is cliché.
This is the end of your book, right? The most important thing is that your ending can't be cheap.
So I'm pondering the final showdown in my fantasy novel where the MC confronts the bad guy who he feels has caused him all his troubles. My MC is a bad ass fighter, but so is the bad guy, and certainly more experienced. The MC has also been starved, frozen to the brink of death, shot by an arrow, and abused and tortured in prison in the weeks before the fight. Thus, I can't have my MC win in a straight one on one, even though it must end in a one on one duel.
My plan was to have the MC pretty much defeated, and ready to eat an axe, when he manages to roll out of the way. The axe shatters on a stone and a shard of steel flies into the baddy's eye, giving the MC a chance to stab him.
The shattered axe is supposed to represent (to the baddy's tribe) that their god abandoned him, because of his past treachery.
Is this too cheesy? Too Deus ex Machina? I do like the symbolic aspects of this ending, but I'm also worried that the dagger in the boot thing is cliché.