Most stories I read nowadays have very little CQC featured in detail. I'm not talking about over-the-top detail...boring detail. No, I'm referring to visually stimulating and well paced descriptions of weaponless confrontation. Most of the time it reads like:
"Bobby threw a vicious left hook that struck Mark hard on the chin."
...instead of this:
"Bobby 'knocked' Mark 'staggering with a hard left to the head [not chin], slammed a right to the body, and then dropped his hands and laughed at him.'"
-Text paraphrased from "Fighter's Fiasco" (p. 59) by Louis L'Amour
Now this is about boxing...which I do not consider a strictly tactical martial art, though it does have its advantages (and disadvantages) in that area. It still emphasizes my point.
How do you handle CQC? Detailed? Short, simple and brutal? Intricately choreographed?
Inkwell
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"The difference between a writer and someone who says they want to write is merely the width of a postage stamp."
-Anonymous
quote:
Marta’s hand, strangely configured, exploded against the side of his face, and fiery pain took Helmut's vision away.Shaking his head from the force of the blow, Helmut lurched back and quickly away from Marta. With the rough stonewall behind him he cowered, one hand partly covering his face, the other held in front and open to fend her off. Following him Marta moved slowly, warily, as if in search of danger. Her expression had changed upon seeing Helmut retreat. Now with a grin of anticipation she seemed to almost feed on his fear, and reached forward once more.
Then an enormous voice erupted behind her, "STOP THIS AT ONCE!"
A large black-haired hand covered her face. Another, equally large, wrapped entirely around Marta's thigh and the two hoisted her up, quickly sideways and around and let go.
...which in retrospect, sucks. So, any advice in the area would be appreciated.
I get what you are saying and of course my response is 100% subjective but I myself simply need to know what is going on.
Even though (myself far from a "master" which I'd never want to be) it can be really hard to figure out what the heck is going on when the writer refers to things in to much a technical manner.
I imagine its worse when someone whose never studied the MA's to read something like:
"He finished the Po Dap Puai kick with a Kimura, which came just after an oompapolata"
In fact I think if I had never seen empire s b, it would probably be easier to read and perhaps more ignition for the readers imagination to just have scene settings of an LS duel rather than a mind numbing, action slowing blow by blow description.
My Example:
"...and the black cloak of the dark lord vader swirled in a hurricane of violent and powerful strokes, his red light sabre blade like electrified blood striking down the inexperienced sabre of the son of skywalker..."
I'd much rather come across that then...
"Vader swung downward then to the left, the right foot of Luke stepping back and to the left as Vader spun 180 while luke 360'd and each sword met at 10o celsius on the friggin' ricter scale...???"
Muogin
Jim slammed Snake's head into the wall.
It wasn't enough. Snake howled, and came at him, still holding the knife, and slashed at Jim's belly. Jim jumped back, and the knife slashed only air; by that much he'd survived.
Snake grinned.
Then he lunged -- the grin was a feint -- and
[This message has been edited by wbriggs (edited June 01, 2005).]
The examples the author used made the point really well. I'll do my best to find that link.
If a character has some limb/appendage that is out of the ordinary (a hook for a hand, a claw protruding from her chest, etc) unarmed combat is not the time to introduce it.
If you start down the path of describing every little move/blow, there might be someone who will read right along and find something wrong with your description/action sequence. So, work out the action with GI Joe or Ken and Barbie.
It's amazing how little detail most people remember from a fight - adreneline can do that to you.
quote:
It's amazing how little detail most people remember from a fight - adreneline can do that to you.
Even when reading, I don't remember much from fight scenes. What makes a fight scene good or memorable is the POV character's thoughts and reactions. One or two well placed actions is all I really need. Build the adrenaline and tension and I'll fill in the rest.
If you can imagine it, then write it down, read it outloud, then change it if it doesn't sound right to you. Or even ask someone else to read it for you, ask their opinion about it.
Here's what I wrote in "Monolith's Arrival"
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James stopped in his tracks and raised his left arm and pointed it towards his opponent. A thought and an instant later, an emerald colored beam leaped from his hand and struck Tank in the chest.
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To me that says a lot(of course the genre is superhero/sci-fi)but it was the way I came up with it.
My two pence here.
-Bryan-
[This message has been edited by Monolith (edited June 01, 2005).]
I'm completely opposite, I can't write large battles much at all... I avoid it like the plague... I once started a story that needed a large scale battle... didn't finish that story yet.
But CQC... for me that's easy, simply because my first love of read shall always be comic books. My earlier writings actually were completely comic book based, taking many, many cues from Batman, the Crow, etc. Being that I too have studied many different styles of martial arts also makes it easier... basically when I write it I can visualize it... for some of the fights, I even go as far as try and act it out (I hate when the character insists on doing something difficult, I tend to get hurt).
I've even had to completely develop a style on my own just so a character can be possible. Like the one character who at the time was name the Blade (the name was kinda lame, but he was awesome)... basically, if I could think of a place to put blades on his body, they were there: boot tips, knee covers, elbows, fingers, wrist has blade shooters (air pressure devices that shot out blades when he triggered them with the position of his wrists), then there were the basic free hand blades (katanas, etc)... I went as far as developing a complete Tae Chi based style for him... back when I was still young enough to act it out, now, it would probably kill me...
In the story that I'm working on now, one of the characters was basically put into the story solely so that I can write some hand-to-hand combat scenes (because I haven't found a place for them in a while, and I miss them... and they're fun).
I think the best consensus was to use enough detail to convey the relative skill levels of your opponents, while staying as much within POV as possible. Keep in mind that different people experience CQC differently; for some, time slows down -- they see and think about every little detail. For others, the entire fight is a blur -- they may have done incredible things, but they have no clear memory of what they did or how.
The only times it seems necessary to give detailed explanation of moves is when suspension of disbelief requires it, or it is central to the POV character (which is related to the first reason). If you have a 5' 3" 19 year old defeat a 6'3" 29 year old ex Navy SEAL, I have to be able to see in my head the key points in the fight that led to that defeat. Otherwise, I won't be able to suspend my disbelief. On the other hand, if you have the SEAL win, I only need a sentence or two describing the fight -- the outcome is what I would expect.
A prime example is Heinlein's Glory Road. His MC is a veteran, and an all around tough guy. But there are a few instances in which he faces seemingly overwhelming odds and triumphs. Heinlein uses a few details of weaponry and moves early on to establish the combat expertise of the character. And then, in those instances where he fights unusual enemies, he supplies crucial details about how the MC won the fights. Otherwise, he glosses over the fighting, giving just enough info to give an idea of what happened. Hope this helps.
But, as Minister basically said, the detail of it depends on many factors involving the POV. It depends on things like, the dramaticness of the fight... if you put in a bunch of details in a fight with no degree of drama intended, then it can be confusing. Second, it depends on how much the POV knows about fighting... this makes a difference for both if the POV is the fighter of perhaps a spectator... if the spectator knows enough about fighting, the details will show it, otherwise the details should be weaker (don't say more than what the POV knows).
A good reference (not that anyone here is obsessed with OSC or anything, but...), you could look at the fights in Ender's Game, the details with Ender vs. Stilson, or with Ender vs. Bonzo...
It is a good scene though.
Inkwell
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"The difference between a writer and someone who says they want to write is merely the width of a postage stamp."
-Anonymous
I have also noticed that the descriptions of these scenes tend to follow a specific pattern: they all have very short sentences such as "Joe punched Rick in the face. Rick countered with a low kick." And so on and so forth.
Basically, a normal human head can kill with this motion. The bridge of the nose doesn't have to be broken at all, as long as the blow has enough force to dislodge the septum (an already broken nose tends to make this much easier, but it is by no means necessary). It would be iffy to do it with a palm strike (the type of blow usually associated with this method of killing) unless you were much stronger than your opponent. But a direct head to head contact blow in full earnest is far more powerful than a palm strike, the difference between a bowling ball and a bean bag.