Rescuing roles

[みさあき]

Posting this here like I did on Serebii to get more feedback.

you know how in say Mario and in Sonic the Hedgehog where they have the damsel in distress? And they can write how they got captured and everything? Down to the rescuing.

In my story that I was doing (the one about Giratina and Hydreigon), I wanted to first, when Giratina and Hydreigon met in the middle of their meeting, the arch villain Ghetsis/Geechesu captures Hydreigon with his machine, which requires someone to save her (which is Giratina before Haxorus or Garchomp can get there).

Then toawrds the end, Geechesu comes back and kidnaps Giratina herself. Which requires Hydreigon to dash to her rescue.

How do you make a damsel situation interesting in a fanfic? Like will it help of I said WHY Ghetisis wanted to take Hydreigon etc? (he does that in every idea of mine so that he can lure Haxorus in his clutches.. ultimately everyone else as well so he can beat them). Or does it help if Hydreigon or Giratina when captured put up a struggle? (it's a claw like machine so yeah)

What can I do to make this intresting other than, Ghetisis took X character.

Oh and logically, can Hydreigon or Giratina be kidnapped?

 

[Drakon]

Why not? As shown in the anime, machines can pose a serious threat to even Legendaries.

I think a more interesting idea would be to make one of the rescuers have to pair-up with another pokémon or even a trainer.

It would also be more interesting if there was a big struggle between the victim and machine. My suggestion is to make the machine something akin to a fighter jet (like Zero's plane from the Giratina movie) and have them engage in a dogfight.

 

[LightningTopaz]

Like I said on Serebii, remember Peach in Super Mario Bros.? Have your capturee try to help the hero like she helps Mario.

 

[Data_Error]

I've never had to write a sequence like this, but if I did, I'd take from one of the more interesting "rescue" sequences that I've seen in fiction - while the escaped party is breaking into the enemy base, the captives were mounting an escape at the same time. The two met up in a sort of catwalks area and escaped together from there. Possibly more interesting would be if the two missed each other entirely - by the time the rescuers came and caught the character in charge, they would have found that the others had just escaped. A more technologically-inclined character could take over the building controls, be it from the inside or the outside, and unlock the appropriate doors, mess with cameras/turrets/alarms, send out false announcements, etc. Many times, there's a large assault going on outside that doubles as a diversion. Anything that allows the captive a degree of freedom to fight his/her way out tends to be more interesting than a "captured princess" scenario and is infinitely better at maintaining the captured character's credibility.

There are all sorts of ways to make the standard jailbreak operation unique and interesting.

 

[Kayi Rowling]

Depends on your objective with the story entirely (that is, the end result).

Is it a rescue romance? Is it a journey that helps in self-discovery for one or more of the involved parties?

Is it supposed to subvert a normal rescue story? Does it play it straight?

Is the kidnapper an anti-villain? Is the rescuer an anti-hero? Is the rescuee/kidnappee important for something else with more transcendence?

Does the rescuer have help? Does the kidnapper have help?

...etc., basically. I haven't done a rescue story as of this day, and it's not a genre I particularly enjoy reading of (though playing is good), so I don't have much support to offer, aside from the base questions I posed.

 

[Gama]

I think you should, of course, include WHY Ghetsis wants to kidnap Hydreigon, even if it is a quick thing.

I think LT and Chromas' ideas are great because it's thinking about things in terms of realism. If you are kidnapped and you want to escape, what are you going to do? You're going to do EVERYTHING within your power to escape.

Another important thing to remember is that the escape attempt and the rescue attempt are very likely to be entirely uncoordinated. They have the same ultimate goal so they're likely to aid each other in the long run but in the short term they could actually hinder one another. For example, what if Giratina is coming into Ghetsis' castle through air ducts and Hydreigon, in an attempt to distract Ghetsis and escape, had somehow blocked off all of the air ducts? This would mean that both Pokemon would have to adapt their plan as they realised the other one was also scheming.

I think plans going off course and having to be adapted makes things more interesting. Also, it may sound obvious and a bit clichéd but barely avoided failure is always VERY exciting. The more you make it seem like it is impossible for the good guys to succeed, the better. As long as it's realistic when they actually do succeed, of course. If you make it so there's a 100% chance of the villain being successful and then he's not, it can be a little unsatisfactory. A fine line to tread, I suppose =P

 

[みさあき]

However, Hydreigon doesn't make any effort to escape in my stories because she knows that Haxorus is going to dash to her rescue. She's very dependent on Haxorus.

 

[Gama]

However, Hydreigon doesn't make any effort to escape in my stories because she knows that Haxorus is going to dash to her rescue. She's very dependent on Haxorus.

Well perhaps in that case she tries to do all that she can to ensure that Haxorus can save her as easily as possible? For instance, try and lead Ghetsis away from the places that she suspects Haxorus is going to break into the castle and generally cause disruption wherever possible, that sort of thing?