Hello there, if your a new contributor to this site and your keen to create your own What-If Death Battles then you’ve come to the right place. On this page you will learn how to find a matchup that suits you, how to create your page, how to complete your first few battles and how to improve the quality of your fights as you become a more experienced writer.

Finding the right matchup for you

1. When creating a battle, the characters should have something in common for the matchup to make sense. Characters should have at least 3 or 4 similarities between themselves for the matchup to have fairly solid connections.

2. If you are struggling to find a good matchup for a particular character, go on said character’s page and have a look to see if there is a Possible Opponents section for that character. If a character in said section has a decent number of similarities with the character you want to use and you like the matchup you can create a page containing those characters.

3. If a page’s Possible Opponents section doesn’t have any characters that you want to use or it doesn’t have a Possible Opponent section, you can ask other users on the Opponent Finder Hotline if they have any ideas on who said character could face.

Creating your page

Page Layout Example

1. If your using the Classic Editor, create the headings using the = sign for the Description, Interlude, Character Biography, Pre-DEATH BATTLE, DEATH BATTLE!, and Results sections.

2. If your using the Visual Editor, press = twice to create a header and then add the names of the different sections to each of these headers.

3. After you’ve created the page add some catergories to it, you can add catergories to the bottom of the page in the ‘Add catergory’ box however you can also add them using the Classic Editor in the ‘Add category...’ box. You can also delete any catergories you add by mistake by clicking on them in the Classic Editor and pressing the bin icon.

Completing your first few fights - Tips for newcomers

1. When writing your Description, you can write which franchises the two characters are from and then list a couple of the character’s main similarities in a fairly short and catchy statement. For Example: Shadow the Hedgehog vs. Mewtwo (Fanon Version) - Pokemon VS Sonic! In a duel between life forms created to be the most powerful, whose existence is superior? Can Mewtwo defeat the Ultimate Life Form?

2. Use different types of text for different hosts as this makes it easier to identify which host is talking about the character. Wiz’s dialogue is written in normal text while Boomstick’s is written in bold text. These types of text are often used for fan chosen hosts and if more than 2 hosts are used italic and even underlined text can be used to identify each host along with the standard types of text.

3. Include a couple of the character’s similarities in the first one or two lines of the Interlude before going on to introduce the characters themselves and the hosts. For Example: Hulk vs. Doomsday (Fanon Version) -

  • Wiz: Monsters. Titans. Behemoths. Rage incarnate. These two beasts may not be gods, but through their power, they have challenged their universes' greatest champions.
  • Boomstick: And everyone and their grandmother wants to know which of these two angry heavyweights would smash the other: Marvel's or DC's?
  • Wiz: The Incredible Hulk, the Green Goliath.
  • Boomstick: And Doomsday, the beast that killed Superman. He's Wiz, and I'm Boomstick.

4. When writing the character bios try to only cover the most important points in their backstory as it can become tedious to read about a character’s backstory if you decide to analyse it in a huge amount of detail. Boomstick’s dialogue can include swearing and mild dirty jokes or comments but any extreme sex-based comments or racist/disablist terms will not be tolerated.

5. You can use a variety of sources to help you in your research. While the best way to find out about a character’s feats and backstory is to watch, play or read the comic book, movie, video game, anime or manga they are featured in you can also read about the characters’s backstory and ablites on their specific wikis or ask permission to use Deviant Art character bios which contain specific feats for certain characters. One way of finding a DA bio for a particular character is to type in ‘X Death Battle bio’ and if a bio has been made for said character there should be a link to it. Once you’ve finished your research decide on the outcome of the fight based on the information you have gathered. If you are struggling to find enough information on a particular character then we'd recommended that you ask other users to help you with your research on the Expert on 'insert character' Hotline.

6. In the Fight section try to add some detail on why characters are fighting each other instead of just having them clash for no apparent reason. Some possible reasons for why the characters are fighting could be if one character tries to steal something from another character or if they start insulting each other. In terms of the fight length you don’t have to make it particularly long if you don’t want to. You can start from any fight length above the 500 word minimum requirement and work your way up from there if you want to improve your battle writing skills, however if you’d prefer to keep the size of fights to a particular length then that’s fine as well.

7. In the Results section do your best to justify why one character won against the other character or characters in a reasonable amount of detail. The reasons for a character’s victory could be their superior physicality, intelligence, arsenal and greater experience.

8. It is recommended that you create a catergory for yourself which you can use to claim fights. To do this you must go onto the Classic Editor and add your username to a page you would like to claim and once you have exited the Classic Editor you will have set up your own catergory. If you would like to add a description to your catergory click on the ‘Create’ button within your catergory and this will bring you to the Classic Editor where you can add your description and a link to your userpage if you wish to.

9. If you want to make your own version of a fight that’s already been completed or has already been adopted by someone, you will need notify the other user that you are making your own version of the battle however if it has been less than a week after the other user has completed their version you will need to ask them for permission before adding your catergory to the page. For more information see this wiki’s Rules and Guidelines. Once you’ve met the criteria to make your own version of a particular fight you will need to create a tabber. To create a tabber you will need to go into the Classic Editor and type in the tabber formula above the other user's version then type in the user’s username e.g Bigthecat and put an = sign afterwards. Underneath the user’s version, type in |-| and put your username underneath it followed by the = sign you can then add in the headings for the different battle sections followed by any images you might want to include on your version of the page.

Tabber example

10. If mutiple users create Death Battle Thumbnails for your fights, it is recommended that you create a slideshow to contain them. To accomplish this type in the opening code for the slideshow followed by your preferred width of the template, then type in the names of the images underneath and put the | sign next to each of the image names to show who created them. After this add the end code underneath the image names.

Slideshow example

Improving the quality of your fights - Tips for experienced writers

1. When writing the character biographies try and have Boomstick make similar jokes to the ones he makes during the show but for a variety of different characters. For example if a character is particularly overweight, Boomstick could make a joke about his ex wife or if a character lost their parents at a young age, he could reference his dad. Also try and make the dialogue between the hosts funny as this makes the character bios more entertaining to read and prevents readers from losing interest, particularly if the bios are quite long.

2. As stated previously, try to add detail in the Pre-Fight section on why the characters are fighting you don’t have to go into a huge amount of detail, just enough to showcase the location/world in which the battle is taking place in and to show the opponents impact in intruding in said location or world.

3. When considering dialogue and character interactions, it depends on the combatants, some characters might insult each other throughout the fight or comment on their opponents power and fighting ability. If a character dosen’t speak you might want to write about what said character thinks of their opponent or how they think they can defeat said opponent. Including dialogue is important as it makes the fight more interesting and helps the reader to clearly imagine how a fight between the characters would play out, however it is equally important to not include too much dialogue as it can make the fight quite tedious and takes away from the action.

4. Make sure all the characters are represented accurately. For example, don’t have Batman start trying to mow down his opponents with a machine gun. While some writers on here prefer to not have particular fights resulting in the opponents death, if a character who usually has strong moral values ends up killing their opponent, have them do it accidentally by releasing too much of their power upon the opponent or being forced to kill them to end the fight and then having the character show remorse or regret their actions.

5. Try not to repeat too many words or adjectives, otherwise your sentences will become more dull and repetitive and readers will start to lose interest.

6. Be wary of how lengthy your fight sequences are. If you have a five-paragraph pre-fight and a two-paragraph fight, it will be considered short compared to how much you actually wrote.

7. As you become a more experienced writer try and give your fights more variety, you can do this by using characters in a number of exciting ways, the possibilities are endless if you really put your mind to it. You can also use a variety of adjectives and synonyms to enhance your writing. The more vivid your descriptions are, the more interested your readers will be.

8. Try to add a variety of different music tracks throughout the Battle starting by including the Offical Death Battle Theme - Invader in the Interlude and then adding mutiple tracks for the different characters and for the Fight section. Finally add a theme for the winning combatant in the Results section. If your struggling to find an approiate theme to use in the Fight section then feel free to ask other users on the Music Suggestion Thread if they have any ideas on which themes you could use.

9. The best fights showcase the closeness of the battle or give off the illusion of it. Even if the matchup is considered a stomp, it is more entertaining when the weaker combatant or combatants still get in some good hits and epic moments as well as them being shown to be on the verge of winning. If a matchup is quite close convincing the reader that one character is done for, then completely turning the tables can make the fight more exciting. Also showing how injured or physically drained the victor is before or after their victory is really satisfying in terms of showing how far they have to go for their triumph.

10. Try to become well versed in the commonly accepted method of VS Debating especially when writing the Results section as this gives your content more quality and generally helps it be more accurate as well.

11. If you want to ask other users to give you supportive and constructive comments on your fights so you can improve the quality of your writing, then we'd recommend using the What-If? Death Battle Appreciation Thread to accomplish this task.
