How do I subvert the tropes of a train heist?

Make the railroad do the heavy lifting

This will sound weird, but the "train heist" tropes you are talking about are predicated on assumptions that are rather inconsistent with how railroads move goods. In particular, freight railroads are basically jumbo package delivery systems, with much more in common with a mail or parcel delivery service than anything else. (Stuff that moves in unit train volumes is an exception to this rule, but not one your protagonist has to trouble herself with.)

With this in mind, we can ask ourselves "why go through all the pain of trying to rob the delivery truck, when your protagonist can simply get their quarry delivered to their proverbial doorstep instead?" Your description of them as a "guile heroine" sounds precisely suited to social engineering attacks on the people and systems responsible for determining how cars are routed through the network. Once she gets the system to misroute the target car to her, then she can simply collect the goods in broad daylight, and very few witnesses would be any bit the wiser to what just happened. (Of course, repeating this runs the risk that the lost-car desk catches up to her scheme, as the cars in question would be reported to the railroad's lost-and-found, basically.)

There is also the option of getting the car to be routed as a bad order car, either through physical sabotage (of the target railcar) or information warfare. This has the potential to defeat even the heaviest of armed security due to the dilemma it poses for the crew: either delay the shipment by days to chase a broken-down (or "broken-down") railcar to a shop, or leave the car behind in order to get the rest of the shipment to its destination in a timely fashion.

posted over 5 years ago

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Shalvenay‭

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You didn't say whether the train itself has to be a train. That is, maybe one or more of the following design points of a "train" could be subverted:

• The heroine has to perform the heist on a specific train (thanks @Amadeus for highlighting this one!). If that train goes by un-heisted, the heist has failed. ...Or has it?

• Trains move on fixed courses and schedules. Our heroine knows exactly where the train is going to be, and when; and where it's going after that; and exactly how much time she has to perform each stage of the heist. ...Or does she?

• Trains are fragile. If the train is derailed, everyone on board stands a good chance of dying. (This is why historically "train derailment" is up there with "treason" as a capital crime.) Even going around a curve too fast might be enough to wreck the train. The heroine must take precautions to make sure the train remains controlled at all times. ...Or must she?

• Trains are deadly juggernauts. Vice versa, if a train hits someone on the tracks, it'll kill them. For both this reason and the preceding one, the engineer will be on the lookout for people or obstacles ahead, and if there's someone on the tracks or trying to flag down the train, the engineer will stop the train. ...Or will he?

• Trains are long. The heroine might be messing around in the baggage car for several minutes before anyone notices. For either the heroine or her antagonist to get from the front of the train to the back of the train will also take several minutes. ...Or will it?

• Similar to the above: trains are linear. If you're trying to get from the caboose to the engine, and I'm in the middle, you have to go through me. ...Or do you?

Linearity is already popularly subverted via the "heroine runs along the roof of the train" trope. I've never seen "heroine crawls along the bottom of the train" (probably for good reason) or "heroine moves sideways onto a train passing parallel to this one and then moves back." I've also never seen "train is really a big circle with no start or end so there are two ways to get anywhere" or "train is really two-dimensional" (cars spammed out either horizontally or vertically, take your pick).

• Trains are easy to navigate. Because they're linear, there's only two exits from each car, and it's never unclear which is the "forward" exit and which is the "rear" exit. ...Or is it?

posted over 5 years ago

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Quuxplusone‭

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TLDR: She gets on the wrong train and through her actions it stops. As she discovers it's the wrong train, it turns out that the right train has come down the tracks behind it and must stop.

[Here's my original, probably-too-much-detail answer...]

How about, the heroine is tricked by the bad guy and boards the wrong train, sure that it is the correct train.

After a series of adventures she manages to get into the engine, locking everyone else out. Unfortunately, modern trains are way more complicated than she thought, and instead of stopping the train she ends up accelerating the train to dangerous speeds, roaring through crossings and switches, causing accidents that destroy some of the railroad infrastructure.

The engineer and a railroad security guard are trying to break into the engine to stop the train, and she frustrates them in various ways, while desperately trying to figure out how to stop the train. They have lost contact with central control (due to the infrastructure destruction) and after some random switches don't know where they are.

Cut to the target train where the bad guy is smug about his security has worked perfectly and no one knows the actual train he's on.

Cut to the heroine, where the engineer and security officer finally break into the engine and stop the train. As it comes to a stop, she sneaks out of the engine and starts running, to get away from her mostly-failed mission.

Just then, the real train with the bad guy comes around the bend and sees the now-stopped train directly in front of them. They slam on the brakes and the bad guy assumes that somehow the heroine figured out the correct train and has succeeded in stopping it, so begins to escape the train. The train comes to a halt inches away from the stopped train, and the bad guy jumps off of the train and lands at the feet of the police who are searching for the "terrorist" who hijacked the other train. They recognize the bad guy and take him away, leaving his McGuffin behind for the heroine to pick up.

posted over 5 years ago

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Wayne‭

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Stripped of all the self-aware, meta jargon, the problem is that your hero isn't well suited to a big, action-packed showdown --she's more likely to win with her wits than her fists. Given that, I'd lead the reader to expect the big, action packed showdown, allow her to be physically overpowered, and only then reveal that she's already anticipated this outcome, and secretly solved it in advance using her wits. (Bonus points if her physical defeat is an essential part of her ultimate strategic victory!) The Sting is a good example of this kind of reversal. You'll have to work hard, however, if you want to play fair with your readers on this one --The Sting is only semi-successful from that point of view.

"What the --? The train is stopping? But that's impossible."
"Not at all. You see, you were fighting to win. I was fighting to keep you distracted."

The reason this should work is that you've done the work to establish your hero as a master strategist. So the seeming action ending will seem like a cheat to the reader --as indeed it did to you, the author. Then when you reveal the action ending was just a sham, it should feel right to the reader, in a very satisfying way, if you've done the work.

posted over 5 years ago

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Chris Sunami‭

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Don't touch the train itself

This might not be what you're looking for, but something to consider anyway.

Remember that a train isn't an autonomous vehicle controlled by the driver alone. So have the action take place in a signal box and/or signalling control centre. The MC can fight for control of signalling and switching; this fight could be physical, psychological or even cybercriminal, depending on the story setting.

For an example of this approach (though planned, heist-style, rather than haphazard as your MC seems to be), I recommend viewing The Train (1964). The early parts involve taking control of the train via its control structure, and it later switches to the conventional form of the trope, with fighting on and around the vehicle itself.

posted over 5 years ago

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Toby Speight‭

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Random thoughts

• The old disconnect the cars trick, but the protagonist is on the wrong section. They see their objective slowing down and dropping away from them as they speed off. Realizing they can't just jump, they disconnect another section of train. But the train is now on a flat plain and the first section was on a hill. Now they've stopped, but their objective is coming down the hill at them! (vary the speed according to plot armor).
• Protag boards the train and finally has the dramatic confrontation with their nemesis, just as the train goes into a long tunnel. Overly dramatic lines are punctuated with awkward "I'm over here" statements etc.
• Juxtapose "dramatic train heist" with "boring commute" and the monotony of actual train travel. Board the train with flair and then spend four hours reading the same magazine while you wait for the train to reach junction x.
• Protag chases the train. Villain snarls at engineer to make her go faster. Engineer protests that it can't go any faster or it'll blow. It blows. The train rolls to a stop.
• There are people stuck on the tracks! The protag has to make the heart rending choice between saving their own child's life or killing a whole class of irritating armchair philosophers.

posted over 5 years ago

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SteveCav‭

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She could first.

1. Buy a ticket
2. Steal a ticket
3. Forge a ticket
4. Get a ticket under another name.
5. If its a steam engine, get on while its refueling water.

After that it depends what she is after.

A shipment of gold.

Sneak back to where the gold is and decouple just the train car with the gold on it. Preferable at night when her activities are harder to see, and more people are a sleep.

The passengers.

1. The pick pocket
2. Knock every one out with a harmless oderless, if possible, gas (chloroform, not odorless). Go through and freely steel their stuff, and leave without any one noticing anything besides being robbed.(of course).

The train.

Use knock out gas in the middle of no where, stop the train yourself. Drag all the unconscious passengers and staff off the train in the middle of no where. Then leave without them.

posted over 5 years ago

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cybernard‭

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I think the tropes are galloping horse, convenient boarding point, leaping from horse to train (and horse then veering off), a harrowing dangerous trip across the top of the train to get to the engine (perhaps almost falling off, perhaps with a gunfight or fistfight), holding the conductor at gunpoint to stop the train, or while the MC stops it himself. In the city or with a modern train, throw in a tunnel so the MC has to duck or lose his head. Also a convenient way to dispatch an opponent with his back to the tunnel.

The second part of the trope is the heist works; I've seen that subverted at least once (the train was decoy, the actual treasure went by another route).

Subvert the trope by making something the opposite of the trope.

No galloping horse: I've seen helicoptering onto a train. You could use something besides a horse (or the modern equivalent, a motorcycle or car).

No convenient boarding point: The hero can't figure out how to get ON the damn train. This might lead to a comic series of figuring that out (fail fail succeed), but probably doesn't fit your plot of boarding a specific train.

I've seen the harrowing trip to the engine subverted: MC boards on the caboose in disguise as a train employee, then just walks through cars to the front.

I've seen stopping the train subverted: MC pulls a pin to disconnect all the cars from the train, they coast to a stop while the engine races ahead. (I wonder if this is physically possible on a moving train, but ... liberties of fiction.)

You could subvert the trope with a plot twist: The train is an hour late, the conductor tells the hero he got stopped and robbed four hours out of the station. The gentleman that took it said if a woman tries to rob me, he will see her in San Francisco.

You could subvert the trope by blocking the track with something highly visible, so the conductor stops the train voluntarily out of caution. Maybe she tricks the conductor into stopping the train.

She could actually derail the train (dynamite the track).

posted over 5 years ago

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Amadeus‭

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