My work-in-progress fantasy novel has reached a point where a fortified city is being held siege by an army of rather large, rather scary Blacksmiths. It's nowhere near as well-fleshed-out a world as high fantasy, and it relies on a great deal of magic as a plot-propeller--meaning I have had people create magical weapons before. Like all weapons, however, these 'magically-created' weapons are not entirely dependable, and are to be taken, by all accounts, as no different from normal, forged weaponry. (I consider this to be a nuance that makes the prose colourful, though of course the consequences of making these weapons + the energy that is required to maintain them will affect the course of events in the novel.)
My problem is that I have little to no idea what comprises a battle scene--the rules that govern it, the methods of attack and whatnot. I don't really know where to start looking, and the sources I've found are either intensely vague or immensely complex, so I wouldn't mind a nudge in the right direction at all!
Besides that, what sort of tropes should I avoid while writing these scenes? Are there any tips for balancing internal conflict while scanning the broader scene at large, that of the battlefield? I'm writing in third-person omniscient, but my focus tends to centre largely on the main character and his surroundings, so I'm worried I will either A] narrow the scene down to a degree where it is impossible to tell what is happening, or B] make the writing dry in an attempt to capture the visuals of the actual action.
Should I have my character interact with the surroundings more? Be thrown into the frontline so he gets to see more? I don't want to stretch the scene out too much, but writing battle scenes has always fascinated me and it is something I would like to incorporate--even if I end up lightly skimming over the scene before the main plot continues. (The main character will eventually leave the scene of battle, so its consequences will not be discussed until later on in the story, although I know that the effects of this battle will probably be more important than writing the scene itself.)
tl;dr: help me write a battle scene, bruvs.
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