  Fantasy
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Fantasy! It comes in all flavors and subgenres. In the realm of the imagination, boundaries become meaningless. I'll be pointing out different styles and offering advice on key elements of fantasy writing. Enjoy  --John~Ashen
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Types of Group Battle
In our writings, we are probably somewhat familiar with two individual-style battles. Duels are either formal fights between quarreling individuals or informal one-on-one fights on a battlefield. Mêlée combat is when parties of fighters are haphazardly locked in combat without much sense of fighting together as a group.
Sometimes in fantasy, though, we don't just have small parties against each other. Cities and nations have armies organized into military units. They are trained to fight together, and more importantly their tactics are directed (by officers or generals). This makes for a different flavor of action scene altogether.
Lets take a look at types of directed, group battles:
 A skirmish is a chance encounter between organized groups. Armies use highly mobile cavalry and fleet-footed scouts as skirmishers, so no one can launch a surprise attack on the main group. The most likely outcome of a skirmish is a quick combat followed by a retreat of whichever force is outnumbered.
A pitched battle is when both sides agree on a time and place to fight. Most often, two armies meet in an open field and then grind it out until one side chooses to withdraw.
An ambush is when a force chooses both time and place to assault the unsuspecting enemy. The element of surprise usually leads to a lopsided victory, since the attackers already have their orders while the defenders must figure it out on the fly.
An assault occurs when an attacker chooses the time to engage an enemy at its chosen place. Attack is at least suspected, so both armies have an initial plan on how to handle the combat. Momentum is very important in this type of battle. If the attack stalls, the attackers will probably regroup and withdraw. If they can overrun the enemy lines, the defender must retreat or surrender.
A siege is what happens when a city or fortress refuses to surrender and cannot be easily taken by a frontal assault. Usually, the attacking army surrounds the enemy position and attempts to win by attrition. This means wearing down the enemy by:
- blocking its supply lines
- depleting their food/water stores
- bombarding the defenses
- reducing their will to fight
As there is no apparent avenue of escape, sieges usually end in surrenders or last stands.
Due to popular demand, next month I'll discuss sieges in depth, including siege weapons. Probably tactics of pitched battles between armies, the month after that. |
Chapter about a pitched battle:An assault that goes verbally wrong:
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Natural Spring  comments: FYI: the oldest weapon of the US Army is the Guidon, the unit flag permanently attached to the flagpole, carried by the guidon bearer. There is a sharp point at the end of the pole, making it into a spear when necessary. The guidon bearer leads the way in parades, battles, and other activities.
sephiroth wonders: I have a question... in the swords department. About how big can you go on them? Like Cloud Strife in Final Fantasy, i thought that was awesome.
Answer: Common sense dictates that it has to be small enough to wield the sword effectively. In particular, you have to strong enough to swing it fast enough to block your opponent's sword. While a bigger blade can be an excellent offense, most swordsmen would not consider mutual mortal injuries to be an acceptable trade.
Army sabers are standardly 30-31 inches long. Samurai katanas range from 22-40 inches. Longswords extend 36-37 inches (the "Viking sword") and bastard swords reach 48 inches. The longest sword I know of is the claymore, which can get to 56 inches (4.5 feet).
In practice, a blade stops being a sword when you have to fight with it as if it were a pole.
dogfreek21 comments: As for the spear, you mentioned throwing it. You could talk a little about the lighter spear, which would be meant for throwing. I think it's interesting. The javolin.
Strange Wulf comments: In my karate class, [sticks] are simply called bo and jo. Those are the traditional Okinawan names after all. There are a lot of other ones, including the nunchuku mentioned, as well as sai, tonfa, tonbo, nukite bo... there's quite a few. If you like, I could ask my instructor for some information on them, including a bit of history.
The Okinawan weapons are simple, but deadly in the hands of a master. Even with something as simple as two sticks, anyone trained properly can easily disarm and either kill or knock out a foe.
That and they just so darn cool. =D
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Fantasy: July 05, 2006 Issue [#1135]
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