Some of you might know me from the channels. When I've the time, I drop in there, hang around a bit... kick some butt... get my but kicked... basically I do what a girl's got to do <g>. But a few things that I've seen and experienced make me think. There are rules in the channels. Not only in our channels, but in others as well. Rules that set up certain stipulations, or just give general hints on how to actually do a fight. Sometimes I wonder, whether these rules are even read.

There is this vague picture of Wonder Woman fighting Super Girl as an example. Folks that go for it way beyond every imaginable physical limit. Normally this is considered a no-go or must-not. Don't get me wrong here. I'm not pleading for such fights in general, but there's something deeper behind it and there are differences, which should be kept in mind.

I usually try to keep my fights as real as possible. I know that this sounds like a contradiction in itself in matters of cyber fights, but it can be done. All of you, who are into role playing like AD&D a.e. will know what I mean. In AD&D you have character stats, where certain point values stand for health or armor. In a fight you roll the dice(s) for damage points which again are evalutated with the stats of the character being attacked. We don't have this here. At times I actually wish we would have. Why? Well, if you fight in real life you know your body. You know what a certain punch or hold or throw will do to you. You can tell how exhausted or injured you might be. If two get together with similar experiences, there won't be any problem. But what if you encounter an opponent, who has never actually felt a punch to the gut? And this opponent, tho telling you that she's doubling over (or maybe not...), is right after you with a furious attack. I mean right after your punch. If you didn't get the picture yet, replace punch with something like a power bomb and you know what I mean. This makes it really hard to keep the fight on a real level. Either you throw the towel and lose the fight for the sake of reality, or you go for it. The latter will probably result in a "Wonder Woman vs. Super Girl" match. I don't mind fantasy fights. Not at all. But... you have to know beforehand, that you're up to one. You can't say "let's have a pro-style match" and then act like a female version of Darkman or like Seven of Nine. A human body does have limited capabilities in endurance, pain tolerance and strength, and borg-like implants or a process to switch off any pain perception are not invented yet.

Nonetheless there are fights which can not really be considered fantasy fights, but still have some fantasy elements. Usually these are the "no hold barred" (NHB), and the "hard core" (HC) fights, or more simple, fights in which literally anything goes.  Well, and even in a standard issue pro-style match you have some fantasy elements. Just think of a pile driver. In real life, and actually applied for real, this move could easily kill someone. In a cyber match you can be lucky if the one at the receiving end is at least out cold. The point is, that the fight should be fun. And honestly, if the fight goes within mutually agreed limits, even if those limits are beyond my real physical capabilities, I will go for it and it will be fun. The only thing that shouldn't happen at any cost, is that one fighter cranks up her endurance notch by notch on the open end "I-don't-wanna-lose-this-fight-scale". The very only one thing that is required to make such an anything goes fight fun is, that both have to be on the same level. Otherwise one will find herself drawn back and frustrated.

Another thing which I find quite irritating is the way some are dealing with the turns in a cyber fight. "Turns? What turns... ?" I almost hear some ask. Well, cyber fights are not like real fights. This rather plain and somewhat dead simple statement has to sink in. In real life, if someone runs at you, you might step out of the way in the last possible moment, to have her slam into the turnbuckle, or even a wall if you're lucky. In a cyber fight it's not that easy. A common rule is to describe your move and let your opponent describe the damage your move has done to her. So, if one says "I'm running at you and I hit you with a clothesline", you can't just say "I step out of the way, cause I saw that coming". In real life... sure, why not. You could step out of the way, or you could duck. You could even step aside only a bit, catch her arm and throw her around with her own momentum if you're good. In a cyber fight... well, that's the turn based principle. One makes a move and the other one reacts on it, and back, and forth. That's the way it is. And the move was clearily stated as "... I hit you with a clothesline". Or to be more precise: You have been hit. Period. So deal with it. It's rather annoying if a move is taken back. I've seen fighters who're dealing with this problem in a very unique way. This looks like "I run at you, throw you on your back and intertwine my legs with yours into a figure four leglock".  Hmm... what's wrong in that picture? Any ideas? Ah yes, to apply a figure four leglock you have to find a willing prey, cause this move takes time, and some sort of "passive help" from the victim. Everyone who's tried to apply such a hold in real life knows how difficult it is with a resilient opponent. So, if this is not ok, and the other way isn't either, how can we get some real life dynamics into a turn based cyber fight then? It's actually pretty simple. All you have to do is picturing the action like as if happening for real. That requires some imagination, but it actually helps. If you have difficulties to determine, how much time a certain move or hold takes (maybe because you haven't done it for real yet), go and watch wrestling videos. This will give you a feeling how much time things take, and how many steps you have to follow before a complex hold is secured. With this you will even learn how this special fave hold of yours actually looks like and where and how it inflicts the damage. Stay and flow with your turns. Split the applying process of complex holds up into reasonable parts. Instead of taking back a move, think of an appropriate counter, which lets you get hit, but still delivers some damage back. A human being's reaction time lays around 0.5 seconds. If running on adrenaline and while being fresh it can be even less. Keep that in mind and you'll get a more risky but actually more dynamic fight.

Why am I talking about all this? Well, I wanted to make clear, that we're dealing with a very delicate form of role play. We do not know how much pain our opponents can take before they start to cry or pass out. We don't really know how strong our opponents are, tho we're exchanging stats. And we don't know how skilled our opponents might be. Still we fight each other, at times even very viciously in those "anything goes" matches. The point is, that we have to be reasonable and fair to keep the fun alive in our cyber encounters.

— mareenaya

Let me know your comments on this rambling and read what others have to say.

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