Rap Tutorials: Battling 101

Purpose of this guide is to give you the knowledge needed to win battles...some of these apply to text, some apply generally.

What is the purpose of a battle?

To prove you are better than your opponent.

How do I do that?

Usually by a combination of disses and punchlines but every battle is different...you need to take into account the setting/form of the battle. A short form battle is different to a longer lines battle, which is different to a back & forth, which is different to a topical battle.

What do you mean by differences?

Well let's ignore topicals...as that should hopefully be obvious.

Easiest way to think of it is as a boxing match. You can either win a boxing match on points (where lots of different components are considered) or you can win by KO. But, crucially, the number of rounds makes all the difference. If there were 3 rounds of 30seconds you could run in and throw absolutely everything at it & see who landed the hardest hits. In a longer battle you still want to land punches, but the difference is you will take your time in doing so.

In other words, if you're in a 64 bar text battle you are probably going to find that the regular setup/punchline is going to come off formulaic and boring after probably the first 10-15 punches. You'd probably find you'd start compromising the quality of the punches after a while too.

Conversely, if the battle is shorter...then make sure you land as much as is possible within that time span. You don't see Usain Bolt saving something for the last 10 metres, whereas Mo Farah can't win a marathon by sprinting off the line.

Ok, I need to land punches...so how do I do that effectively

Well assuming you have the fundamentals down & can throw a punch, there are a number of things you can do to maximise the damage you can do your opponent.

1. Demonstrate you are reacting to the situation you are in.

Most people will do this through "personals" (so either using a personal piece of info or a nameflip), but you can also do it via doing a wordplay on the tournament / event, using a flip (turning your opponents punch on him, proving you didn't prewrite your verse), or feeding from your opponents verse (so taking a diss like "your rhymes are shit" and then dropping a whole bunch of sick rhymes).

2. Ramp up your disses / setups.

Most people focus a lot of attention on the punch (so the end of the line) but it's really the setup that determines how strong the punch is going to be. To really make the punch sting you need to amp it up. For instance you could say something like:

"You're full of shit like a baby's diaper"

Basic punch...has a decent diss (you are full of shit) and a basic punch (compares you to something that is full of shit). Doesn't matter what you change the punch to, it's not going to make the punch land harder. E.g.

"You're full of shit like a sewage system"

There are really two ways you can make this particular example more effective, the first is to make it personal. Although the diss is generic, you could use your filler line to point out a time when your opponent was bullshitting about something...that has the effect of making the punch directly at your opponent. The other is to simply think of something that's more insulting...

3. Make your punches relevant

This ultimately comes back to the purpose of the battle...to prove you are better than your opponent. There's two ways to prove this, 1) you are a better writer/performer; 2) you are a better person

Why is this important? Because often times people get so obsessed with digging up personal information on their opponent they forget the purpose is to prove you are better than them. If battler 1 drops a funny verse written in a sharp way and battler 2 comes up with a bunch of irrelevant facts about their opponent that they don't translate into solid disses and punches then I'm voting battler 1.

E.g. "You have a disabled brother!!!" is a fact, it isn't a punch..."I'll hit you so hard you'll wish you were your disabled brother" is a basic & generic diss "I'll hit you hard", so it's delivered better than the statement of fact, but doesn't do anything to amp up your diss.

Point is, you need to think of improving the way you throw the punches. If we're going back to the boxing metaphor, if you want to win matches make sure you work on technique and how to work your punches rather than simply picking up heavier gloves or making your biceps bigger.

Hope that helps you improve your battle approach. Feel free to leave comments if you disagreed with any bits, want more explanation / examples or if you have any questions.

Will post more like this if people find them useful...