Fight Club: Writing Effective Fight Scenes

[WildBoots]

Whether you write in the world of PMD, trainer-centric fic, or a niche all your own ... pokefic tends to have a lot of battles. Like, sometimes even more than fantasy and sci-fi! And they can be tricky to write. We've got so many details to consider, from type matchups to character beats to rhythm--and so much more.

I thought it would be nice to have a space to discuss in depth what makes a good fight scene, whether it's sharing an example you like, troubleshooting a passage you're working on, or discussing writing strategies.

When adding to this thread, be sure to specify whether you're looking for feedback, sharing an example, or sharing a strategy you find helpful.
⭐ For feedback: please try to keep it to 500 words or less. Feel free to describe what effect you're going for, which parts you're unsure about, or any other context you think we'd need to help you.
⭐ For examples, be sure to say where it comes from (and add links when it's a fic). Be considerate of spoilers! Use spoiler blocks and in-line spoilers where relevant. Feel free to gush about why you think it works well! (This is a really helpful way to build your own skills!)
⭐ Strategies can be any number of things! Do you have a process for drafting your scenes? Do you have a favorite place to look for action words? Do you have a guiding principle for fights in your fic? Let us know!

Keep fighting the good fight and happy writing to you all!

 

[WildBoots]

Sharing some examples today!

I don't have these books in front of me, unfortunately, so I don't have quotes, just links and some general observations.

1) The Devils by Joe Abercrombie

One thing that stood out to me is that his fights feel intense and fast, but his sentences are actually pretty long and so are the fights themselves. He's good at splitting the party to make new combinations of characters have to interact--and rely on each other in a tense situation. So even when a fight takes a chapter or two to finish, it feels snappy because every moment is driven by character interactions, and we bounce between character groups often so it feels like we never get a moment to breathe. He's also got an interesting blend of both M-rated blood and guts and also very silly, sometimes crude, humor. Like, someone might throw a punch accidentally by slipping on a banana peel but the impact of the hit might be realistically stomach-turning.

2) This Princess Kills Monsters by Ry Herman

This one is much more light-hearted with lots of silly asides and pumpkin carriages getting pulverized into goo that's stuck to the bottom of our princess's shoe for the rest of the fight. I think the author's biggest strength is writing with clarity. I was never, ever confused about what was happening in the fight or where characters were. The fights here felt especially relevant to pokefic for me because there's a squad of 12 identical "huntsmen" who each have different abilities we have to keep track of--they could just as easily be pokemon! Even though they all look alike, the author does a great job helping us parse who's who and where they all are--and why we should be worried about that.

(I borrowed both from my local library. You might be able to, too!)

 

[rimly]

the pokemon battles that stick with me are usually the ones that arent really about the battle. like the fight is happening but its expressing some other conflict underneath, like does my pokemon trust me, do i want to be the kind of trainer who wins this way, has my rival changed into someone i dont recognize anymore. that kind of thing! i think thats super fun!

without that it can turn into the DBZ problem where you get pages of move exchanges that are technically fine but dont actually advance anything. just "thunderbolt, dodge, flamethrower, dodge" until someone faints. but if the same sequence is revealing character stuff then every exchange suddenly matters a TON.

i struggle with spatial clarity in longer fights though. lose track of where everyone is, especially with multiple pokemon or terrain features. the Princess Kills Monsters example sounds really helpful here since tracking 12 similar entities with different movesets is basically a pokemon battle in structure. sometimes i need to draw out their positions to organize where characters are, but im always concerned in my own stories that the same confusion i have will not be clear enough. i dont know if anyone has any specific tips but i would appreciate it a ton!

 

[WildBoots]

100% agree that the emotional stakes of the fight are the best part!!

i struggle with spatial clarity in longer fights though. lose track of where everyone is, especially with multiple pokemon or terrain features. the Princess Kills Monsters example sounds really helpful here since tracking 12 similar entities with different movesets is basically a pokemon battle in structure. sometimes i need to draw out their positions to organize where characters are, but im always concerned in my own stories that the same confusion i have will not be clear enough. i dont know if anyone has any specific tips but i would appreciate it a ton!

Honestly, I think improving in that area is a good measurable goal! 🎉 I feel like I’m always improving there too, but I can try to offer a little advice. (Maybe someone else will also come in with a different perspective!)

On managing large groups:
In the examples I shared, I think both Abercrombie and Herman use the same trick: they don’t require us to care about more than 1-3 characters at a time. Abercrombie breaks them into pairs and cuts between all his pairs. Herman uses 11/12 huntsmen as scenery most of the time, and only the one the protagonist is in love with truly matters. No one can actually keep track of 12 characters in a fight at once.

Similarly, your characters can probably only manage what’s within a few feet of them in a fight. (Especially because our event horizon, how far ahead we can think and plan, shrinks when we’re full of adrenaline! That’s part of why people describe getting tunnel vision during a crisis.) No matter how much scene-setting you do ahead of time, your characters (and readers!) will be best able to follow what’s right in front of them. That makes simple, clear prepositions crucial!

I’ll drop in some snippets from my fic that i think do that well. But! This is a space of learning so posting them here means they’re open to concrit too.

‼️ Spoilers for CD 12??
But also this content has been out for like 5 years so

Spoiler: Snippets

And there she was, cutting towards him through the crowd.

This comes after several paragraphs of looking around the crowd. This creates suddenness, but also tells us where she is in relation to him: coming towards him. We’re not trying to picture every bit of the crowd, just letting it be a blur.

The crowd had already pulled far ahead of them, into the trees. He'd lose sight of them soon.

Establishing where the key object (the crowd) is in relation to him but, more importantly, establishing a cost or concern: if he doesn’t act quickly, they’ll be out of sight. We don’t need a precise location to understand what out of sight means.

Mark glanced from one side to the other, the masked faces of his teammates melting into one red blur. Below, the cops were standing at attention, a mass of gray and black riot armor, tinted pinkish through his solrock's light screen.

Establishing what’s right next to him and then what’s farther away. The fight hasn’t started yet so he’s still able to plan around things that aren’t close yet but will be.

A split second later, a grating and rumbling signaled the start of the rockslide, and he smiled. Behind them, the protesters cried out in surprise and leapt away from the crumbling wall, even as the tyrantrum swung around to shield them with its body. Stone chunks tumbled down the mountainside until the dust hung so thickly Mark could no longer see the falling rock, only feel the earth's trembling.

Finally, the mountain stilled and the dust began to settle, revealing the silhouette of a cop car half-buried under rubble. The second fishtailed over loose rock, skidding to a stop just shy of ramming the other. Boulders and rock fragments covered the access road, heaped high as the tyrantrum's back; above, a jagged gash ran up the rock face, exposing bands of gold, copper, and even green.

There’s a lot of detail here, again because this fight hasn’t started in earnest yet and things are still slow, but I’ve bolded the words that I think establish where the various players are.

The gap between his team and the protesters shrank, and then he found himself facing open air instead of a teammate.

Introducing suddenness out of a vaguely defined crowd again, but this time to reveal what isn’t nearby even though it should be. Oops!

Rand hoisted Mark up. The second he was on his feet again, the darmanitan let go to swing at an approaching machoke.

Earlier in the setup and the fight, Mark is thinking like a general and looking far out ahead of him, watching what’s affecting other people. Now, things are falling to shit and everything is in his face. There were no spatial cues for the machoke—it’s just suddenly approaching and within swinging distance—because he can’t take it all in anymore. No more planning, just reacting to the closest problem. There’s no need to establish where anyone else is or what’s around him because it’s totally lost to him.

In short, I’d say I use words that describe where things are in relation to the POV character. It’s never a list and it’s never every single detail, just relational directions connected with cause/effect and how it threatens key characters.

Curious if other folks have strategies!