History CombatPragmatist / Literature

** In Yoda: DarkRendezvous, this is how WeakButSkilled Padawan Scout wins an Initiate tournament. She takes advantage of a lot of things: that some of her opponents are unwilling to seriously hurt her, that she can throw things in people's faces, that ThereAintNoRule against leaving the ring or ''ducking behind the referee'', and especially the fact that in the tournament, lightsabers are turned down and won't cut through her if she grabs the blade. Notably, she never outright ''breaks'' a written rule, just unsaid ones.

* In the Young Bond series, there is a character called "Red" Kelly who teaches James Bond (yes the very same only, well, younger) that fights don't have rules. He says that " No such thing as fighting dirty, really, Jimmy. There's just fighting to win. use whatever you like, you can forget about rules..."

* In ''Literature/FateZero'', the prequel novels to the VisualNovel, FateStayNight, Kiritsugu Emiya is basically revealed to be the god of combat pragmatists, if said god was injected with extra pragmatism steroids. Rather than duel his fellow magi in spells or face them openly with his Servant, Kiritsugu prefers to use his powerful Servant as little more than a ''decoy'' in order to draw out the enemy Masters and then uses an arsenal of modern weaponry to ruthlessly murder them. During the course of his hunting spree, Kiritsugu resorts to sniping enemy masters, demolishing buildings with explosives, taking a hostage to force an enemy master to forfeit (and then has him gunned down afterwards, just to be safe), and choosing as his primary weapon a special gun specifically designed to kill magi.

* Staying with OrsonScottCard for a moment, in his novelisation of ''The Abyss'' the SEAL team leader, Coffey, is mentioned as having taken down a neighbourhood bully eight years his senior not in a straight-up street fight: rather, by going, lying in wait for the guy, and caving his head in with a cinderblock when the guy's back was turned. He then describes how Coffey tidies up, goes home, and never seeks any recognition of his act. On the other hand, Coffey is characterised as somewhere between a HeroicSociopath and a CompleteMonster.

** Overall, Garren's [[CombatPragmatism]] causes him to win the battles but lose the war - while tactics like using hostages as shields, disregarding the challenge circle, using peasant conscripts as cannon fodder, and torturing a prisoner make life a lot harder for the protagonists, they also undermine the support of his subordinates and secure popular support for [[LaResistance the resistance]].

* Corwin in the ''ChroniclesOfAmber'' is big on this. For example, in his climactic sword duel with a powerhouse foreshadowed a book earlier, Corwin runs away, rounds a corner, throws his cloak into the other man's face as he follows, then stabs the guy while he's blind.

* Sam Vimes of TerryPratchett's ''Literature/{{Discworld}}'' is a great believer in dirty fighting. His fighting style consists of using everything you have to hit anything you can. He calls it "artful". About the only time he's ever been delicate about the subject was when he was mentioning Nobby's "favorite kick" in front of ''Lady'' Sybil Ramkin.

** Also from ''{{Discworld}}'': ''"Cohen had heard of fighting fair, and had long ago decided he wanted no part of it."''

* In the ''{{Warhammer 40000}}'' ''HorusHeresy'' series:

* Lazarus Long in ''TimeEnoughForLove'' is one of these. Generally all RobertAHeinlein's "good" characters are.

-->--'''Literature/SkulduggeryPleasant: Playing With Fire'''

*** Vimes' opinion on Fantallier seems to have softened slightly by the time of ''{{Discworld/Snuff}}'', at least to the extent where he's prepared to offer the use of the rules when challenged to a duel. When they're refused, he brings this trope out ''in spades''. "Should've accepted Fantallier", indeed.

*** He also ended a battle with an all-powerful reality-warping [[{{Discworld/Sourcery}} Sourcerer]] not with magic, but with a half-brick inna sock. Granted, it was a highly ineffective weapon, but it ''did'' end the battle.

* {{Lois McMaster Bujold}}'s other series has Cazaril, an experienced soldier who is a decent swordsman but notes on many occasions that swordfighting is not nearly as useful as dirty fighting, which he is also good at.

* In JohnCWright's ''Literature/{{War of the Dreaming}}'', we have the HandicappedBadass Peter Waylock, who is very much the Unfettered when it comes to fighting:

* Corwin in the ''{{Chronicles of Amber}}'' is big on this. For example, in his climactic sword duel with a powerhouse foreshadowed a book earlier, Corwin runs away, rounds a corner, throws his cloak into the other man's face as he follows, then stabs the guy while he's blind.

** In DanAbnett's ''Horus Rising'', Loken defeats Lucius in a practice sword fight by [[TalkToTheFist punching him]]; Lucius's still smarting over it in {{Graham McNeill}}'s ''Fulgrim''.

* In the ''{{Sword of Truth}}'' series, Kahlan learns about how the Mud People once slaughtered a vastly larger tribe simply by killing them everywhere except on the battlefields. In their homes, in their privies, in their beds, everywhere. Later, when confronting an army of D'Haran rebels who have sided with the Imperial Order, she puts these lessons to work. To start with, she poisons a cart of liquor and leaves it to be found by the enemy officers. Later, she leads a night raid into the enemy camp...[[MemeticMutation naked, like the Celts]], and butchers several of the officers remaining. This trend continues as she has her army made particular emphasis on killing physicians and other non-combatants, as killing one of them is as good as killing dozens of other soldiers who could no longer be healed by them. By the end, she has led an army of recruits to victory against a battle-hardened veteran force ten times its size.

-->''"He thought more of [[{{WeirdAlEffect}} Bernardo del Carpio]] because at [[Literature/TheSongOfRoland Roncesvalles ]] he slew [[{{NighInvulnerable}} Roland]] in spite of [[{{AWizardDidIt}} enchantments]], availing himself of the artifice of Hercules when he strangled Antaeus the son of Terra in his arms. "''

* In RobertEHoward's "Beyond the Black River", ConanTheBarbarian, with no shame, [[FriendOrFoe deceives a Pict into coming close enough to be killed]].

* In the DaleBrown novel ''Executive Intent'', the Chinese are this in their attack on Mogadishu. Some guy firing on their troops from a building? Most forces would try to storm the building and get into risky room clearing. Screw that. They level the whole damn building. Doesn't matter if you're a militiaman/pirate/gangster or really just a civilian - you make the mistake of gathering in a group that could be remotely construed as a regrouping squad, they'll mow you all down and let Chairman Mao sort out the dead.

* Ender in ''Literature/EndersGame'' explains to an enemy that real soldiers don't play fair; they do whatever it takes to keep themselves alive. Ender doesn't just win; he annihilates. If he's kicking someone's ass, they won't have an ass left to be kicked when he's done. This is true from the time he's six years old and fighting bullies in the schoolyard.

** The the flashbacks of ''Caine Black Knife'', Caine describes how most armchair tacticians give advice like "Other things being equal, the advantage lies with the longer weapon" or "Other things being equal, the fighter who strikes first wins" or "Other things being equal, a big man beats a small man." He then proceeds to kill an opponent twice his size, him using a knife and the [[OurOrcsAreDifferent ogrillo]] using a spear, after the grill strikes first.

* Kirth Gersen from JackVance's ''Literature/TheDemonPrinces'' cycle. At one point during a BloodSport, he and one other player face off against TheDragon. Gersen has a number of cheating options available. What does he do? Make a deal with the other player to split the prize, and team up.

* Kirth Gersen from JackVance's ''DemonPrinces'' cycle. At one point during a BloodSport, he and one other player face off against TheDragon. Gersen has a number of cheating options available. What does he do? Make a deal with the other player to split the prize, and team up.

* Staying with OrsonScottCard for a moment, in his novelisation of ''The Abyss'' the SEAL team leader, Coffey, is mentioned as having taken down a neighbourhood bully eight years his senior not in a straight-up street fight: rather, by going, lying in wait for the guy, and caving his head in with a cinderblock when the guy's back was turned. He then describes how Coffey tidies up, goes home, and never seeks any recognition of his act. On the other hand, Coffey is characterised as somewhere between a HeroicSociopath and a CompleteMonster, so YourMileageMayVary on this one.

*** YourMileageMayVary on that: While Alpharius did indeed preach pragmatism, he rarely practiced it. Alpharius wanted to prove himself to his elder brothers, so his tactics were usually incredibly convoluted and elaborate purely so he could show how great his men were when they pulled it off - in one case, he held off attacking a poorly defended planet so the defenders could bolster the defenses to a huge level. He won, and told his fellow primarchs that "it would be too easy" to just attack at once. A better example would be Guilliman, who favoured efficiency (he concentrated on the boring stuff like logistics and supply, knowing it would help more towards victory than cool weapons etc) or Night Haunter, who was a completely ruthless,[[AxCrazy psychotic]] [[UtopiaJustifiesTheMeans vigilante]], who led a Legion of rapists and murderers and nuked his own homeworld.

** YourMilageMayVary on whether it was his idea or Thufir Hawat's, but Feyd took this approach to the Gladiatorial arena as well. [[spoiler:When Thufir's ''undrugged'' gladiator gave Feyd and the crowd the match of a lifetime, it turned out that Feyd had put the ceremonial poison for his bout on the ''wrong blade'', allowing him to show his cunning in front of the entire population of Harko.]]

* This shows up all the time in MercedesLackey's work, especially her ''Velgarth'' novels. Fighting instructors, as opposed to fencing masters, constantly emphasise to their students that there's no such thing as "unfair" or "dishonourable" tactics in a real fight. Fencing matches and the like are a different thing entirely.

* In JohnCWright's ''War of the Dreaming'', we have the HandicappedBadass Peter Waylock, who is very much the Unfettered when it comes to fighting:

** Marshal Atkins, from ''The Golden Age'' kills an alien saboteur by a) accelerating the spaceship they're on to fifty gees, immobilizing him; b) bathing the command deck with hard radiation, c) infecting it with nanobot poison, d) severing its spinal cord with a katana.

*** Vimes' opinion on Fantallier seems to have softened slightly by the time of ''{{Snuff}}'', at least to the extent where he's prepared to offer the use of the rules when challenged to a duel. When they're refused, he brings this trope out ''in spades''. "Should've accepted Fantallier", indeed.

** In Yoda: DarkRendezvous, this is how WeakButSkilled Padawan Scout wins a padawan tournament. She takes advantage of the fact that in the tournament, lightsabers are turned down and won't cut through her if she grabs the blade.

-->'''Skulduggery:'' "And only a moron would bring a sword to a gun fight."

-->Baron Vengeous: "...only a heathen would bring a gun to a swordfight."
-->Skulduggery: "And only a moron would bring a sword to a gun fight."

* Smilla Jaspersen from ''Smilla's Sense of Snow'' by Peter Hoeg has a history of winning against people much bigger and stronger than her. She stabs a man in the neck with a screwdriver when he tries to kidnap her, and topples a shelf onto a person she thinks is following her in the filing room of an office building. She also forces her stepmother to listen to her demands by pinching her in the crotch and bending her pinky finger all the way back. Apparently she's been this way all her life. She beat up a racist school bully much larger than her by finding out where he lived and ambushing him early in the morning, sending him to the hospital. When her father, a noted surgeon, tried to grab her and drag her home after she ran away at the age of twelve, she cut him with a scalpel she stole from the hospital she escaped from. When she is trapped on a ship with the vaguely psychopathic character Jakkelsen, she [[ImprovisedWeapon makes a weapon from a towel and a ball bearing]], and injures him badly enough that he needs medical attention. However, she is always described as a [[WaifFu petite and delicate woman]]. She is the narrator, by the way.