Sometimes writing smart characters within an action kind of story can lead to some slightly deflating moments.

Honestly, a lot of action stories, especially within the realm of fantasy, sci-fi, LitRPG, and Isekai, heavily rely on many of the characters being dumber than mulch.

I've been running across that "issue" in my own novel for a while now, since I have elves, and elves are smart. I also have human nobility, and nobility is also smart. (Arguably).

In my most recent chapter, an elven mage from the kingdom of Dulma was hired as a volunteer commander in the service of the Vatur elves. Her goal was to lead a squad of Vatur elven mages against the otherworlders. She is around 600 years old, and has been an adventurer for around 400 of those years. She is also written to be calculating, smart and composed in stressful situations.

I have been planning to have go up against one of the main characters in the story, lose and get gravely wounded, but survive by the skin of her teeth.

Then I began writing the chapter, which I will now summarize:

\- The elven army formed a defensive line at the very edge of the Silver Forest, which is the Vatur home.

\- The elven army proceeded to get around 80% of its soldiers turned into fertilizer when the otherworlders shelled them with airburst artillery shells from 50km away.

\-Mirna somehow survived along with a handful of her squad as they fled deeper into the forest.

Now, this is the part where the actual fight between her and one of the main characters was to take place. She was to hold off their advance but ultimately lose, though put up a good fight. I won't tell you how cool the fight was supposed to be because it never happened.

It might've if the guy she was supposed to fight (Colonel Clyde) wasn't a 7 foot tall bioengineered human soldier, wearing a watered down version of the power armor, and was completely immune to magic. Plus he has a gun.

She couldn't run cuz he has a gun and would shoot her. She can't fight him because he's immune to magic and has a gun. So, the only logical solution would be to surrender and pray to the gods that he would spare her. (Which he did).

It's kind of deflating, given than the original idea was for the two of them to clash, but the more I thought about it, the less sense it made. Like, who would fight someone they have such a huge disadvantage against? Especially after seeing him plough through her remaining unit with ease.

So around 500 words of awesome magic combat went poof, since it would mean that Mirna suddenly had a brainfart the size of Albuquerque and it would go completely against her character. She is supposed to be a 600 year old elf, and despite their incredible pride and ego, the elves aren't really the stupidest fantasy race out there.

This isn't the first time I've done this, where action sort of has to take a back seat because the personality and intelligence of certain characters just wouldn't allow them to act like idiots. The thing is, it kind of happens in the moment where I write or am about to write a certain scene, only to realize that there is absolutely no way to realize said scene without massively undercutting the already established personality and traits I've given to a character. I personally think this doesn't ruin the story, but it definitely deflates the action from time to time.

P.S. The post isn't really a complaint, more an observation.