Writing Research: How to Write Fight Scenes

As a writer, I'd consider my biggest weakness to be fight scenes, and I know I'm not the only one. It's one of the reasons I like to write scripts and screenplays, where you can describe the fight itself in a couple of lines, and leave the detailed scuffle up to the storyboard artists, directors and cinematographers as and when it's needed. However, as I write short stories and novels, too, it is a necessary part of what I do. So this post is a bit of a brief how to, for myself and other writers out there who struggle with this.

First of all, the basics of sentence structure. This is vital. Short, sharp sentences give the immediate feel of every impact, whereas longer, bloated sentences will drag out the action. At best, sentence structure will serve to enhance a fight scene, but at worst, it will confuse and disorient the reader.

Research is a must. To make your universe credible, it must follow it's own internal logic. If swords are used, research different types of swords and the styles of combat they are used in. If a character has trained with a specific type of weapon, improvising with a different weapon will put them at a disadvantage. If they have sustained injuries, that will also impact the fight. If magic is a force, what are the rules around it and how easy/difficult is it to wield in a combat situation?

A tavern brawl will be very different to a duel. The brawl will be chaotic, people are unlikely to be seasoned fighters, there will be little to no concept of 'fair' fighting. People might not know the initial cause, but stuck in the middle of the fray, they have no choice to fight back to escape or survive. In a duel, the fight will likely be more organised, with a form of judge ensuring some form of rules. The stakes will be more personal, and more complex than simply 'fighting to survive'.

Every fight should feel unique and different. You wouldn't repeat the same section of dialogue for no reason, so why should you write the same type of fight scene twice? What would be the point?

Different characters will respond differently to battle. The character who is willing to survive at any cost would have no qualms taking the easiest route out of a fight, even if that is to avoid it completely. The character who values personal honour over pragmatism may rush into ridiculous situations without really considering the outcome of their actions.

Do not disorient the reader. Fight scenes can easily become a blur and make it difficult to work out what exactly is going on. Many readers will skip them if they become too challenging to follow. Make sure that the fight is easy to read.

Alternatively, consider deliberately making it disorienting. Battle can be overwhelming, especially if the characters aren't trained for combat. Reflect that in the characters. Make them confused. What are the consequences? Injury? Losing a character or important item behind in the chaos?

Above all, practise. If you are aware that fight scenes are a weakness for you, go out of your way to write a few fight scenes. Writing, like any art, is a craft you hone over time and hours of practise. There's no shame in admitting that this element of your craft needs more work.

A few extra resources for additional reading:

Vary your sentence length to make your writing more interesting: A good primer on how and why to vary sentence length with some specific examples in both text and audio, talking about the musicality of the written word.
Here's how to write a damn good fight scene: More about the specifics of language used in a fight scene and specific techniques to try out.
Writing Fight Scenes: Specifically for fantasy writers, and covers a little bit of everything, including suspense and build-up before the fight has truly begun and how to develop characters through fight scenes.
5 Essential Tips for Writing Killer Fight Scenes: More about the motivations behind specific fight scenes - understanding why they are (or aren't!) necessary for your plot is the first step to tackling them.