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Hi, I wrote a fight scene mostly to prove to myself that I could. The catch is that I had so many ideas and so much fun that what was supposed to be a simple test writing exercise turned into a 4k words long fight scene and a desire to write a proper fanfic around it. I'd like for someone to read over the fight scene and give me some constructive criticism (structure, phrasing, anything else as I'm not a native english speaker). Also, I deviate a fair bit from changeling lore and completely ignore their "reformed" version (I haven't actually reached that part in the show yet and I personally dislike the redesign).

- Name of fanfic (very wip): Do you have enough love?

- Genre: Gore (as per the teen definition of the tag, might be inching in the mature near the end of the fight I'm not sure where the barrier is), Dark, Thriller (hopefully, I trying to write a tense fight scene)

The above tags are only for the fight scene, not necessarily the planned fic as a whole, I still need to work out a broader story there.

- Word count: 4039 words, as per google doc

- Synopsis: The fight is set roughly two years after the failed invasion of Canterlot, after which Chrysalis ordered the changelings to try to integrate into pony society before going into hiding (or dying) herself. The main character is a changeling named Double. She has been hiding in Ponyville for a few months before the fight and she has recently grown to care about her new friends and thus has been feeling guilty about feeding off of them without their knowledge. She has been avoiding contact with her friends, thus leaving her in a weakened state as, suddenly, Fluttershy is thrown at high speed past her by a Blueblood hopped up on the alicorn amulet. What is actually written is the fight that ensues as Double needs to leverage every last drop of her strength to delay Blueblood as long as possible until the princesses arrive.

- Request: I showed this fight scene thing to a couple of my friends, and they all said it was good without having any criticisms. This is what I'm looking for here: Is it actually decent (as my first serious attempt at writing, I'm not going for good yet), what is good about it, what isn't good about it (whether that's a bad writing thing, or something that doesn't quite work in the context of what I've written)

Finally: Here is the story

So one of the problems here to me is tautology there are long strings of he him her herself to close together in some paragraphs. I do like some of the changes you made to changeling lore in your story but I feel like you should add that in addition to feeding off love they wither away when exposed to enough hate. There wasn't many mistakes that I wanted to note out besides the occasional spelling error which I want to note that I edit for two other people who aren't native English speakers and you grammar and wording are rather good. But it's this part ((((She jumped to the side and with a powerful pump of her wings, she threw herself at him, letting the blast land behind her. Just before reaching Blueblood, she stuck her left foreleg down, jamming it into the ground. The sudden shift in momentum flipped her over and her hind leg came crashing down onto Blueblood's head.

Blueblood conjured a shield at the very last moment, barely blocking the changeling's strike. She bent forwards and struck his face twice, reaching just under the conjured barrier. She let herself roll )))))).
So there is a lot of repeated phrases that make the scene lesser like at the last moment the scene I've parenthesised I've sat here for a bit trying to Invision how she could flip mid air slam her hind leg on blue bloods shield and then cuts to her striking him in the face there's a in-between missing here or I'm missing something overall it's a alright fight scene. As a side note I think it's funny I just finished the first chapter of my story and it involves a minor fight scene in it with the alicorn amulet except mine is very short and involves Trixie

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long strings of he him her herself to close together in some paragraphs

That's from me trying to avoid lavender unicorn syndrome but it seems to have backfired, I'm not quite sure how to balance physically describing a character, using their pronouns, or going by their name.

I've sat here for a bit trying to Invision how she could flip mid air slam her hind leg on blue bloods shield and then cuts to her striking him in the face

You have a point, I think that's something I went back on to change later and didn't actually read how it changed the positioning. It was mean to be that she's going at high speed near ish the ground, sticks her foreleg into the ground acting like a lever and a pivot point and transferring her horizontal moment into a vertical downward strike with the back of her hoof (hence her flipping over). But yeah, there's a missing transition between that and her being back on her hooves and punching him. I'll keep it as is for now, but that's something to revise when I give this another go.

If you end up later in need of a editor I may be able to help later thanks for showing me that syndrome I was unaware that it existed

It's pretty good. The repeated use of pronouns don't bother me much, since a lot of people just resort to that to avoid LUS. Overall it is not a distraction, but if you want to ease up on the pronouns, you can 'hide' their repeated use by exploring more details and adding in descriptions, or using that technique with their proper names outright.

For example;

Applejack put her hooves down and she rushed to Fluttershy, pulling her away from the prince.

"A-Applejack?" Fluttershy whimpered as she held on to her.

"Y-... Sorry Flutters, the shield's not down yet." Double whispered, taking in the friendly love Fluttershy had for the earth pony while she could. "Ah'll keep you safe until it is, ah promised."

Fluttershy whimpered again and she nodded. "Thank you." The love stopped.

Becomes;

Double, in the Element of Honesty's visage, planted her hooves down firmly and rushed to Fluttershy, pulling the pegasus close as her assailant's magical hold faded from her.

"A-Applejack?" Fluttershy whimpered as she held on to the pony she assumed to be one of her dear friends.

"Aagh... Sorry, Flutters, the prince's dome is still up... We ain't out of the woods yet," Double whispered before letting slip a insect's chatter for her exhaustion. But before her charge could realize it and steel herself, the changeling took what small chance she had to siphon the dear platonic love Fluttershy held for the farmer. "Ah'll keep you safe 'til the very second it comes down--ah promise."

Though she whimpered upon learning her protector's true nature, Fluttershy sighed a brief relief and nodded, knowing she was in good hooves. "Thank you," she returned, offering genuine gratitude to Double herself, before the meek mare shut the proverbial tap off.

The major flaw with this workflow is the word count, which tends to be very wordy. But IMO, it is possible to find a good flow of the scene that swims between nuances interspersed between varying lengths of sentences. So even when you have a scene that take place over several thousand words, infusing it with a flow of narrative and nuance can still make for an entertaining read.

Personally, I have a 6k long scene in this long term project of mine where Rarity outwits and puts the beat down on RD. Another scene where a changeling character experiences absolute personal trauma is 9k words long. And I think my longest one involves one of the main characters walking from the station at Ponyville to Golden Oaks while the mayor spouts exposition and describes the winter hellscape the town finds itself in, which is a little over 10k long.

If you're willing to buckle up and suss out the details, it can be rewarding. Maybe the process will even bring some details to your attention that you would want to explore or develop. But in addition to making wordy stories, this workflow also takes some time to go through. So it becomes a matter of balance on what goals or criteria you've set out for the story, and how long or much further you want to work on it.

So, yeah. Apart from the points Deathofaking already mentioned, such as the LUS avoidance syndrome (which isn't too much of a bother) and some unclear choreography, you've done a pretty good job. And don't worry about your English. You're already more than decent.

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