Individual Combat?

What I've read and been trained is to get it over as quickly as possible. Evaluate your opponent and go for what looks like his weakness. Don't waste time and energy trying to be fancy.

I think we have to keep in mind as authors--and sci fi/fantasy authors in particular that we're not writing in reality. You watch movies with fancy, choreographed fights that last several minutes. In reality fights usually last only seconds. And you don't necessarily have to knock out your opponent or beat him or her senseless to win. Just kick them in the knee and run. My style of karate emphasizes low kicks. They can't be blocked and you can't see them coming. If you can't walk, you can't fight. The question is whether it would be more entertaining in your novel to have your character do a flying double kick followed by a backfist, several cartwheels and a takedown all the while bearing several bleeding wounds, than do a simple yet effective technique. I'm sure a good author could make either option work.

TheIT said:

We've got a great thread going about Battle Scenes (wonderful info - keep it coming!), but that thread is focused on larger scale battles with casts of thousands. What about individual, one-on-one combat? Does anyone have any advice on how to portray fights for those of us who've never punched someone or picked up a sword/gun/club/whatever in anger?

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It depends on what you mean...

The first meaning could be one-on-one combat in the midst of a fight, such as the main character coming face-to-face with his nemesis, or a specific opponent. A good example of this was in the movie Troy in which - even the heart of battle - Hector and Achilles found each other. Such an event, wherein the other soldiers would probably recognize the two combatants, could set up a very dramatic scene. You could describe the chaos of the moment, yet the concentration of the one opponent. Blow-by-blow descriptions could possibly be used well here, but a little summarization could go a long way, too.

The second is a strict mano e mano fight, i.e. a Traveller with a Quarterstaff comes across a Bandit Swordsman on the road. The situation dictates the response here. The Traveller then would probably be afraid something like that would happen, and thus be prepared for it. However, any time you get into a fight there is always the sense of fear, especially if you have never met your opponent. In all reality, that opponent could - and may really want to - kill you.

How to handle the scene? First of all, establish how the two opponents percieve each other. Is the Traveller reluctant to fight, but feels he must? Does the Bandit laugh at the fool with a stick? Is the Traveller cunning and calculative, searching for weaknesses such as that mud slick between them, or the noted gimp in the bandit's leg?

Secondly, fighting without emotion - such as fending off a bandit, taking out a guard, or otherwise fighting a stranger - requires a LOT of concentration. It's a thinking game. You must be quick to percieve an opponent's moves, his style, his weaknesses, etc. As said before, fights in real life only last maybe ten seconds before someone gets seriously hurt. For dramatic effect in movies and literature, however, these fights can last longer.

Which brings us to the third element: Emotion. Say your Traveller and Bandit are brothers. Totally different story here. There could be reluctance ("I don't want to fight you, brother"), caution ("I know you're quite skilled"), or perhaps anger ("You killed pa!"). These will not only set the framework for the emotional content of the scene, but also influence how they fight.


So to answer your question, again, it depends. I hope I've given you some ideas or at least answered your question in some way.

If you want to build up your character's reputation quickly, stage a fight where your character disables the opponent very quickly. I did that with one character which then cast her in a position where none of her hosts who were reluctant to have her in their city would object. She blocked the opponent's blow and twisted so that her sword cut through the wrist tendons of her opponent's blade hand on the down swing. Over in a grand total of about five seconds, if that long. And yes, I tested out the moves in slow motion with dummy blades to make sure it was not only feasible, but practical. The hardest part was relating all of that in text.

sans military or martial arts experience, two relatively experienced guys fighting can drag a fist fight out for several minutes barring any devastating knock-out punches or unusual damage, like ripping the guy's ear off. some glancing blows tends to result in a wrestling match. overmatched, the weaker of the two will wind up on the bottom getting wailed on while curled up defensively most of the time. at the same time, one country hoss landing a direct blow that breaks your nose (rather a misnomer here as the nose technically has no bones to break, but it's just an accepted phrase), can lead to reconstructive surgery and, obviously, ends the fight right then and there.

most fights are fairly sloppy affairs. people swing and just miss, which you hardly ever see in a movie, where every blow lands somewhere (except in boxing movies). people trip over a bar stool. sometimes it's just comical (like whenever i felt so compelled to fight, i'm just glad it never made it to 'america's funniest home videos'). most people *can't* fight for very long simply because they aren't in that kind of shape. seriously, try punching a bag: it won't take long before you're wheezing. shadow boxing prit near gives me a heart attack.

i've always loved seeing a guy run two hundred yards into battle carrying a broadsword and fresh and ready to fight to the death. absolute rubbish. even if you're highly motivated, imagine carrying a ten-pound piece of steel that throws off your running balance at full speed for about thirty seconds (not taking into consideration the type of shoes they had to run in and whatever constricting clothing they've got on), and see how well you perform. anyone with a lick of sense will conserve their energy better than that.

that reminds me: just because someone is strong as an ox doesn't necessarily mean they're in great shape.

just my experience there. i've seen lots of fights, liking the company of people who like to fight. what can i say? lol. granted, most of the fights are over quick, well under a minute, but not always. ask any bouncer and they'll probably tell you they'd much rather break up a fight between two guys than two women.

writing a fight.... hm, i can't recall any extended fight that was detailed blow-for-blow. that would be rather boring to read. i follow the lead of what i've read by starting the fight off with a little description, noting anything other than 'exchanging blows' (simplified there), and describing the blows that end the fight. a sword fight where maybe five blows happen, well, i might say that, might not. probably not if those five blows aren't interesting.

attitude is important. two guys who say 'i'm gonna kick your asss' and mean it, that could be a good fight. if one of them is just frontin' for the ladies, he's gonna get beat down.

as an aside, i've always wondered how long big sword battles lasted. during the 100 year war, 10,000 men armies were large. that's a lot of soldiers. could take all day to wipe a force that size out. but, by the end of the 16th century, war was mainly powder and shot, the day of the feudal knight with a twenty foot lance was gone. i tend to think that with swords, though, even large scale battles were over in time for tea, though i've read where some would last until the next day, which i imagine was rare and there may have been extenuating circumstances.

Read Robert Howard. (Conan, etc.)

When I was young adult, I was unavoidably in several fights. At the time, I weighed at most 125 pounds. I was always up against someone bigger or heavier, usually both.

However, I was fortunate. I had enough sense to evaluate my opponents in the last few seconds before the fight began and succeeded in guessing how they'd fight. As a result, I either beat the hell out of them or ran them off. I do not have any scars or injuries to show for those fights, either.

So, the answer is yes that a smaller individual can defeat a larger opponent.

Just as a point.

Once the fight has started, if you're thinking consciously about what move to make -- you're probably slower than your opponent. Conscious thought takes time, and slows reflexes. That's what a lot of the training is about; getting your muscle memory so well attuned that when you see a blow coming at you, your body is moving to the correct block before you have to think. You'll hear fighters talk often about not having any idea that they'd made a particular shot, or deflected a blow, until after the fight, when they hash it out in talk with friends and/or opponents.

Even a fighter I know who describes himself as a thinking fighter, whose mind starts working in battle to see and recall all his opponent is doing, to catch patterns and spot weaknesses and fighting styles as Dave describes, and who can assess and analyse both performances later -- even he admits that at the moment of the fight, he's just moving.

In my experience, the fights were just too brief for much more to happen beyond the initial blows. Once I had the upper hand in a fight, reasoning returned so that I wasn't just reacting then, but it was rather moot at that point since the other guy was either down or on the run.

a squire against an experienced dark knight will be smashed in seconds, lol. imagine yourself fighting a five year old. or yourself stepping into the ring with a champion boxer. you'll be pulverized by the end of first round. okay, in about fifteen seconds, depending on how much you run around.

there's such a thing as a lucky shot. it's possible, not very probable. usually, 'lucky shots' are borne from desperation of the weaker opponent and over-confidence by the stronger.

bear in mind, too, it's been a long-standing axiom that the smaller oppenents tend to be pretty scrappy individuals and shouldn't be underestimated. this is in real life and with fist fights. pulling a sword is like pulling a gun-- don't do it unless you plan on using 'em. in a life-and-death situation, who's to say what's right and wrong? at the risk of being mortally wounded even by a completely incompetent fighter, that black knight probably won't just rush in. indeed, he'd might want to fight someone with *some* experience who thinks they can fight, thus be more predictable than someone who's never swung a sword around before and you can't predict the way they'll fight. still, it should be a totally one-sided affair barring any special occurances. so, in that example, i wouldn't have the squire able to fend off the killing machine for more than the few blows that it takes for the knight to feel his opponent's skill out. maybe the knight slips or something, which is pretty believable (you try looking out the slits in a metal helmet and see how much *you* can see, lol), which would prolong the fight.

personally, i love seeing fights where the inexperienced good guys is desperate to fend off the attacker and resorts to throwing lamps or whatever at him. the fight scene in 'f/x' was great (though ridiculous in the end where the robot thing starts fighting) and pretty much reflects what most of us would do given the idea we're not weekend bar rowdies and the killer isn't some ex-s.e.a.l. with jungle ninja skillz.

one thing i grow continually bored of is the bad guy falling backwards onto a ten inch spike conveniently sticking out of a board behind him (or a sword or a pointed gate). bah! that's just the height of lazy writing. okay, having the villain slip and break his neck as he's getting out of the tub ain't no better, but relying on these old saws to explain away how a totally outmatched dude can kill the evil bad guy with all the experience in the world is just uninspired and a great way to kill an ending. (also, having someone come up from behind and shoot the bad guy just as he's about to kill the good guy is pretty lame, too.)

ive been in fights that lasted up to an hour. what dave says is all well and good, but in an all out BRAWL not everyone is TRAINED. most of the time when it comes to blows there is a lot of grappling, and two emotions shine through--anger and desperation. a guy could grab someone and knee him in the face, the other grabs the leg knocks him to teh ground and punches him in the face, they roll mfor a few minutes alternately punching each other and kicking. they might even seperate, breathing hard, looking disheveled, wiping the blood from their mouths. around them people are screaming, girls crying, but they are just staring at each other, hating each other at that moment. finally they convince themselves that they are so pissed they could kcik that other persons *** and they go at it again.

ive been in group fights where ive got the hell beat out of me by a big dude, but im tuff like an alligator bag so i got up and found a new person to fight. id pull people off my friends and start fighting with the guy i pulled off. by the end of the night i was sitting on a park bench bloody, swollen, drinking beer from a 40oz, and laughing with teh gang as if we'd just had a great time.

DaveKuzminski said:

If you want to build up your character's reputation quickly, stage a fight where your character disables the opponent very quickly. I did that with one character which then cast her in a position where none of her hosts who were reluctant to have her in their city would object. She blocked the opponent's blow and twisted so that her sword cut through the wrist tendons of her opponent's blade hand on the down swing. Over in a grand total of about five seconds, if that long. And yes, I tested out the moves in slow motion with dummy blades to make sure it was not only feasible, but practical. The hardest part was relating all of that in text.

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Ho ho. You just discovered hende drucken, a genuine C15th longsword technique. Well done.

I thought it might stimulate further discussion if I reprinted, verbatim and in its entirety, a description of single combat from a fantasy novel.:


"The man's blade flashed, impossibly quickly. Yet, in scarcely moving her own blade, Isolde somehow deflected the attack.
Flttt...
...hsssttt...
...hsssttt...
Blades caressed, never meeting directly, edges sliding against each other.
Clank...
Thud...
The Duke's champion lay face down on the pier separated from sword and life."



So what do you think? Anyone know the book or the author? (It was published in 1992.)

hm, not sure the book or author. isolde... wasn't she tristram's babe? i'm going to say... parke godwin... 'beloved exile'? though i know i'm wrong on this: godwin writes better than that.

I was going to say...it seems there are two ways of narrating combat:

• Evocation (as in the above example). Disadvantages: violates time, distances reader from fight, weaker sense of jeapordy.
• Blow by blow. Distadvantages: can be really boring if done badly, you have to know something about swordplay.

I think a mix of both is effective. If your protag is carving down the lesser people, you can evoke that. However, when they face off vs the bad guy, I like blow by blow, or - for extended fights - a mix of evocation and blow by blow.

It does depend on to which sub-genre the story belongs. Fantasy Romance probably would't bear a detailed narration of combat.

that example is something i'd probably not even include in a story, instead arranging it differently to where there's no description of the fight itself. 'fzzt' 'thwock' 'zzzp' all sounds a little batman/adam westy to me. is there really anything exciting about this piece of combat whatsoever? does it work for anyone? well, maybe i'm being too harsh on it. the prose itself i really like (well, the last two sentences, anyway), though the scene itself seems suppliferous.

as a model of a good action scene, i don't think this is it. were it football, the bengals might use it, but the patriots would scoff at it: if this is the author's A game, they won't be going to the superbowl this year. vince lombardi may not be rolling in his grave, though i wonder if he'd buck a little bit.

my only problem with people who know swordwork is sometimes they insert technical terms in italics as if i'm supposed to know what a *sacre bleu tuette du jour* is. hey, i'm an idiot: dumb it down for me. i find this more in non-professional writers trying to impress the reader rather than letting them know what's going on. i have a problem every time a writer says 'flange' or 'champhored' (sp) because it makes me stop to think, so maybe it's just me. whenever i use some term like, say, 'motte and bailey castle,' i try to work in a reminder for the reader what that is. sorry, a little off topic....

Agreed. My characters fight in authentic German style, but the only time you'll hear the technical terms is if/when they describe what they've done.

what happens when that authentic german style comes up against a roman soldier (or whatever)? sometimes style is all well and good as long as they're fighting people of the same style. what would d'artagnan do against a samurai? it might be comical, sloppy, and very unpretty.

if you've been trained to fight a certain way and in your first battle the enemy is fighting *differently*, i'd think that that would be very disquieting. suddenly it's like, 'oh, crap, he wasn't supposed to do that! he was supposed to move to the right, not the left! now what do i do?' just something to think about, no?

preyer said:

what happens when that authentic german style comes up against a roman soldier (or whatever)? sometimes style is all well and good as long as they're fighting people of the same style. what would d'artagnan do against a samurai? it might be comical, sloppy, and very unpretty.

if you've been trained to fight a certain way and in your first battle the enemy is fighting *differently*, i'd think that that would be very disquieting. suddenly it's like, 'oh, crap, he wasn't supposed to do that! he was supposed to move to the right, not the left! now what do i do?' just something to think about, no?

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Well, 1-1 the Medieval German kills the Roman because he outreaches him. There's a reason why, historically, longswords and big shields don't really co-exist as equipment for individual fighters.

Against a samurai... ah we've had long debates into the night on this one. We could only agree that it would be short. If the German survived the first attack, he'd probably bury the other guy.

Which is to say, German Longsword is a practical martial art rather than just a set of stereotyped moves. The principals apply no matter what the other fellow has, and the training probably included dealing with weapons other than the longsword.

The excerpt is from "The Magic of Recluce" by L. E. Modesitt.


(If you think those sound effects are annoying, try reading the whole book.)