: Re: How to make a repeating plot "slice" not annoying In my fantasy novels, I don't want to kill anyone off, I just want to get them injured, like badly. I made up numerous believable excuses

@Sent2472441

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In real-life warfare, number of wounded normally exceeds significantly the number of fatalities. Which is good.

There is, however, far more going on when a soldier is wounded than "get him into cover". Consider field surgery under fire. Consider triage (that's when your medic needs to decide which one of several wounded soldiers he helps first). There's getting pinned down and waiting for rescue/reinforcement, and wondering whether help would arrive before your wounded friend dies. There's said wounded friend screaming in pain while you're trying to keep you both safe. And then he's not screaming any more, which is worse.

Once a wounded soldier gets evacuated to a hospital, there's his friends' concern for him: will he make it to the hospital alive? Will he recover? It can be a while before the soldiers in the field get any news, and once they do, the news might be "he's in a coma, we don't know anything more yet." It's very hard to function when you don't know whether your friend would live or die, and yet those soldiers have to.

Then there's the recovery. Consider dealing with loss of limb. Consider learning to walk again following an extended period of not being able to. Consider the loss of basic human dignity, when due to a spinal injury, for example, an injured man must lie prone for a month - bowel movements still need to happen.

Or, there are the light wounds - the lying in a hospital while your friends are out there, risking their lives, and you can't wait to get back out there, not because you crave the fighting, but because you know you're needed, and one of your comrades might get killed because you weren't there to watch his back. While at the same time, your family are all around your bed, so happy you are not right now where the fighting is, so glad you're alive.

And don't forget the mental trauma: from getting shot, from seeing your friend getting shot, from being the medic who couldn't save everyone, from walking around covered in somebody else's blood.

None of it is easy. If you describe the effects and consequences with honesty, it won't get boring, but would instead build up tension. And as you can see, there are many diverse ways you can treat injuries, so the situation need never get repetitive.

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