Ophelia the Forsaken text goes here The sands and dust settled for but a moment as the Basin Lady concentrated, moving through her opponent’s mind and slowly erasing her position. This tactic had not worked well on Deimos, but perhaps that was because she had not been as thorough. The mind was a delicate organ and some were much quicker, it seemed, at recovering from her effects. Without hesitation, she shifted, watching Maren charge from while under the safety of invisibility and side-stepping the attack. The second she watched the tiger mare stumble over the rock, Ophelia jolted into action, ignoring whatever confusion her opponent must be feeling. This was exactly why the battle had been prefaced with no holds barred and they had obtained an agreement. War was neither beautiful nor fair, and Ophelia was a realist. She would be doing her charge a disservice by decreasing the potency of her actions. White teeth scraped over the orange striped crest, and Ophelia tasted the bitter tang of dirt and sweat on her tongue. The flavor stuck to her palate, clouding her sense of smell. Pride washed over her soul at her success, but she did not let the emotion stay for long. The battle would continue on, and ego would too easily tip the scales. A sharp bite pinched the skin on her haunches, and Ophelia swung them outward in a semi-circle, the nip not breaking skin but bruising beneath her white hairs. She snorted indignantly, glad that she had let go of her pride seconds before because that nip would have stung more than just her body. The pale princess focused, working on minimizing whatever damage she took in this close quarters round. She shifted her weight forward, lashing her hind hooves backward at the same time as Maren, feeling the tip of a cloven hoof land against flesh. Ophelia turned to see where, surprised that the tiger mare had done the same and musing absently that great minds do indeed think alike. A small mark on a creamy colored leg was the only indication of her hit, it seemed. She held no ill will for her opponent as her only goal today was to train. She let her hind hooves come to rest on the ground once more and then side-stepped another crash of Maren’s hooves, but she was unable to move out of the way fast enough to avoid the next onslaught. The Tiger mare’s body hit her square shoulder, now parallel to one another with Ophelia’s withers towering over Maren’s. Her opponent’s lower center of gravity knocked her off balance, and she stumbled, hooves scrambling in the sand and kicking up clouds of dirt. The pale princess coughed, trying to rid her lungs of the irksome grains as her bruised shoulder smarted from being hit. With a lowered neck from her stumble, she yelped as a single feather’s point poked at her right, red eye, and she shut it quickly, feeling tears well up to protect the tender orb. The feather caused no lasting damage, and she jerked her neck upward, trying to use her height to intimidate and avoid further attacks from troublesome head feathers. Cautiously, she opened her eye while simultaneously shoving back with her shoulder, lifting her right foreleg and smashing it downward in an attempt to scrape the flesh from her left fore-canon. Sweat clung to her heaving sides, the salty foam gathering between her legs and colliding with the sand rather miserably. She twitched her tail in irritation, hating feeling so absolutely dirty and covered in wet grime. Ophelia was not a vain creature in the least. In fact, she thought herself to be rather unattractive and strange, but she did care about feeling comfortable. The sun rising did not help the matter any as the air stilled and grew hotter – hot enough to feel as if she could not breathe. Ophelia spun away again, turning on her haunches and minding the bruise lingering on her fore-hoof. As she moved she realized that the hit to her shoulder was starting to cramp the muscles too, making every movement ache as she stepped. Swiftly, she turned her head and neck, making a quick bend with her body and lunging toward Maren with the spiraled, pearly weapon on her brow. Ophelia winced as her leg jostled when she landed, but she completed the arc of her attack by swinging her head to the side, hoping to pierce along Maren’s body. [[(741 words) (3/3) - Ophelia takes a bite on the haunches - She avoids the kick but is slammed into with right shoulder to Maren's left shoulder - A feather pokes her in the eye D: owie - She uses her height to try to shove Maren over and uses a foreleg to try to scrape Maren's canon - tries to disentangle and turns to use her horn to scrape over Maren's side]] @[Maren]

Credits: Image by Schwartze @ DA

Teaching Notes
1. I read through your battle quite a few times and still really never was able to see what Maren was doing. Why would she kick out at Ophelia twice? Did she kick out at Ophelia twice? I am going to use this part as an example since this is what confused me:

"Then, in the same chain of movements, she put her weight on her hind and swirled her body in a rear towards her opponent. While she did, Ophelia kicked out, too. Maren, being in a weird kind of body-curl and mid-rear, took a hit against her own, left leg. It stung, but it faded quickly as it was nothing compared to the red-sweating bruises on her side. Finding balance once again, she then attempted to counter-attack by slamming down her hooves into the hind-hocks of the Forsaken's;"

I guess what confused me is which set of hooves is trying to slam on Ophelia's hocks? Her hind ones? Is she trying to kick again? If her front hooves, how did she manage to get that close to Ophelia's hind end? If her hind hooves, then I would make sure to indicate that she is kicking out again and then aiming the kick lower than before. But, in your summary, you said this: "Then Maren bucks; aiming at her head,". If she was aiming at Phi's head, how did they manage to kick each other's hind legs?

Sometimes what helps me is bullet pointing my attacks and defenses to help me get through some of the confusion. For example, I can take our last few moves/counter moves like this:

--- Ophelia managed to bite Maren's back which means that they have to be close. So, since Maren is biting, that has a chance of landing. Since they are parallel but nose to tail, that means that the bite would land on her butt.
--- Ophelia kicked Maren in the back leg which means that their butts are facing each other. That means that they would be somewhat apart, so Maren hit her shoulder and put them back together again.

Bullet pointing and doing a flow chart with arrows really helps me out and get the grasp of the sequence of events.

2. "She stumbled over the rock Ophelia the Forsaken had carelessly kicked aside, for Maren had lost target. " I love this damn rock! It's really awesome that you take small details from these posts and incorporate them back. It really makes the battle seem quick paced and very rounded out.

3. A few little grammar things here and there: " girls filthy Basin-breath" should be girl's since it's possessive.

4. I was super impressed with how you distributed the damage, but I do want to add that a "6" is the highest dice roll that you can get. So when it says this....

"Damage: 1d6 rolled for a total of: 6 (6) + 6 (character's damage stat)"

That 1d6 is a 6 sided dice, so the max it can roll is a 6. This means that Ophelia dealt the maximum damage possible. Typically, I like to make sure that there is some blood/open wounds with a 6, even if I did distribute the damage. I'll leave it up to the judges to decide that part, but if I were judging this fight, that is something that I would note under the "realism" section.

5. Otherwise, AWESOME FIGHT! I love how fast paced and awesome this is. It feels very real and tangible. I also love that you incorporated more of Maren's emotion this time around. I could definitely feel how she was thinking and reaction which made this battle a pleasure to write to.

6. Please feel free to ask any questions! Even though you are posting your 3/3 next, I will write another teaching note when I post back with my closing defense.


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