Deadly Dodging / Literature

Deadly Dodging in Literature.

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• Ciaphas Cain uses this in Cain's Last Stand when fighting three combat servitors. The one hit by the other's plasma bolt isn't taken down by it, but misidentifies its fellow as another attacker as a result of the hit.
• In one of the Conan the Barbarian books, the title character confronts the Big Bad, who throws a spear at him. Conan ducks, and the spear kills his Love Interest. While Conan rushes to her, the Big Bad gets away. Later, the Big Bad blames her death on Conan, claiming that, had Conan not dodged the spear, she would've lived.
• In the Discworld book Maskerade, Granny Weatherwax first encounters the Ghost when he uses this tactic to fight some muggers threatening her and Mrs. Plinge:
  ... when six are against one in a melee in the shadows, and especially if those six aren't used to a target that is harder to hit than a wasp, and even more so if they got all their ideas of knife fighting from other amateurs, then there's six chances in seven that they'll stab a crony and about one chance in twelve that they'll knick their own earlobe.
• In the Doctor Who Past Doctor Adventures novel The Eleventh Tiger, the Doctor does this to the Gung Fu School bully who challenges him to a duel. The Doctor first flips him onto his back using his attack as a lever, then when the bully decides to kick at the Doctor's head (a kick that he boasts shatters jars, and jars are stronger then heads) the Doctor momentarily blinds him with a reflection of light and then moves his head an inch to the left, allowing the bully's foot to crack into the wooden pole behind the Doctor's head, splintering the pole and his foot. The Doctor then tells the other students to tend to the bully's wounds. Topping this off is the fact this is the First Doctor, who looks like he's 60.
• Halo: The Fall of Reach: This is what allowed the UNSC to gain victory in the opening phase of the Battle of Sigma Octanus, when then Commander Jacob Keyes managed to do the impossible and destroy three Covenant Warships with his lone Destroyer, the UNSC Iroquois, in a maneuver famously known as "The Keyes Loop". A maneuver in which Keyes utilized the Covenant's own weaponry against them by allowing his ship to be chased by two plasma torpedoes fired by a pair of Covenant Frigates and setting a course to ram into a Covenant Destroyer. By changing course at the last possible instant, he was able to mostly avoid damage while allowing the two torpedoes to slam straight into the Destroyer. The hit from the torpedoes, along with a large volley of Archer missiles, damaged the Destroyer enough to leave it completely disabled and burning up in the atmosphere since it could not escape the planet's gravity. Keyes then swung into a slingshot orbit around Sigma Octanus and detonated a Shiva nuclear missile in between the two Frigates to take out their shields, before finishing them off with two MAC rounds and all of his remaining Archer missiles. The destruction of all three escorts forced the remaining Covenant Carrier to immediately retreat, but not before launching a small invasion force towards the planet's surface. Keyes' victory in the face of impossible odds was a massive morale boost for the military and is what got him promoted to Captain.
• In Helm, Leland de Laal discovers this by accident during his Training from Hell and begins using it intentionally.
• In The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, depressed robot Marvin is left to defend himself with no weapons against a giant killer robot. He explains this situation to the killer robot, with emphasis on the callous and unthinking humans who abandoned a little helpless robot, and this makes it so angry that it destroys a wall, and then the floor. Unfortunately, it's standing on a bridge several hundred feet above ground level.
  Marvin: What a depressingly stupid machine.
• In the first book of The Kingdom Keepers series, Finn managed to defeat a skeletal T-Rex by making it hit the tracks of Big Thunder Mountain Railroad which causes the weak frame to splinter apart.
• Percy Jackson and the Olympians: In The Titan's Curse, Percy takes the sky from Artemis, and Artemis pushes Atlas into Percy, who moves, and allows the sky to fall on Atlas.
• Rod Allbright Alien Adventures: Downplayed when Rod defends himself against a sixth-grade bully by ducking away from a punch, causing the bully to Punch a Wall and break his hand. Unfortunately, his parents decide Screw the Rules, I Have Money! and threaten a punitive lawsuit.
• Saintess Summons Skeletons: Sofia struggles to deal any damage to the infested elves on the Orbital Temple, but she does take out some of them by having them chase Pareth into danger (specifically, toward the sun) and then teleporting him back, leaving his pursuers to their fate.
• Star Wars Legends:
  • This is a space tactic known as the Ackbar Slash. It was developed in the Battle of Endor at the end of Return of the Jedi for use by large capital ships in close proximity to each other, especially when facing superior numbers; they fly right between their opponents at close range, meaning that all their own shots will hit, and any misses by their enemies will hit each other. It has been implied that the only reason it works is because it's generally suicidal and no-one is that crazy. And also because the Mon Calamari warships that constitute the bulk of Admiral Ackbar's fleet have stronger Deflector Shields and better maneuverability than most other ships of their size, giving them a better chance of avoiding enemy fire and of surviving the shots that do hit them.
  • Also notable is a trick used by fighters against capital vessels, involving having a bunch of missiles chase an allied fighter, then making a high-performance turn right next to the hostile ship. The missiles try to match the turn, but have to take wider turns due to their faster speed — and crash straight into the target.
  • There's also the A-Wing Slash, wherein a group of X-Wings head for an enemy ship, only to peel away at the last minute, drawing the TIE fighter defence cover with them — and reveal the A-Wings that were hiding in the glow from their engines. The Deadly Dodge part comes when an Imperial commander duplicates it with Preybird starfighters in place of X-Wings and proton torpedoes in place of the A-Wings.
• Villains by Necessity: Sam dodges a charging unicorn while there's a tree right behind him. The unicorn ends up with its horn stuck once Kaylana causes the tree's bark to grow closed around it. Robin then protests the villains' plan of taking advantage of the unicorn's helplessness to behead it. They don't as Valerie notes that unicorns are sacred to Good folk and they would rain down vengeance if it was killed.
• In Worm, Contessa is exceptionally good at this thanks to her particular brand of precognition.

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