History Main / NormalFishinaTinyPond

** "[[Franchise/DragonBall Hercule Satan]] [[Recap/DeathBattleS02E28HerculeSatanVsDanHibiki vs.]] [[Franchise/StreetFighter Dan Hibiki]]": [[spoiler:This is the reason Hercule wins. They're both a joke compared to everyone around them in their home franchises, but "everyone around them" is a vastly different spectrum for Hercule than it is for Dan. Dan is a bad martial artist; Hercule a ''good'' martial artist in a world with guys who can casually blow up planets]].

* In the alternate-history WWII of ''ComicBook/{{Uber}}'', this trope is in play with the various classes of superhumans. Normal humans are completely outclassed by the lowest class of superhuman, a tank-man; a single enhanced human is impervious to bullets and can tear a person apart bare-handed. However, the tank-men are themselves outclassed by the higher levels of Übers: at the Second Battle of Kursk, ninety tank-men attack a single Battleship-class Über. Eighty-one of them are disabled, and the Battleship loses an arm. As the war goes on, it is increasingly fought only between the most powerful Übers.

** As [[Characters/MarvelComicsVenom Venom]], [[Characters/MarvelComicsEddieBrock Eddie Brock]] never fared that well when he branched out and fought other heroes (Characters/{{Darkhawk}}, Daredevil, ComicBook/IronMan, ComicBook/{{Quasar}}, etc.) besides Spider-Man, who he was a nightmare for due to being more powerful, knowing his secret identity, and being immune to his Spider Sense. ''The Amazing Spider-Man'' #317 includes a scene where Eddie visits an oblivious Aunt May as a means of intimidating Pete into no longer asking for help from any of his superfriends like the Fantastic Four, making it clear that if Pete won't keep their feud just between the two of them, then he won't either. Averted during his stints as Toxin and Anti-Venom, where he can kick a lot of ass. [[Characters/MarvelComicsMacGargan Mac Gargan]] and [[Characters/MarvelComicsFlashThompson Flash Thompson]] also never ran into this problem, presumably because they already were an experienced supervillain and soldier, respectively. In his second stint as Venom, he has so far not really run into this problem, presumably owing to the Symbiote being more powerful and Brock being more experienced.

* ''Literature/HomeroomsAndHallPasses'': In his native realm of [[StockFantasySetting Bríandalör]], Albiorix is a textbook SquishyWizard: he is much weaker than the rest of his party and is considered a poor fighter. But Bríandalör is a relatively harsh environment; when Albiorix is transported to a setting similar to the 21st-century U.S., he turns out to be surprisingly fit compared to the more pampered inhabitants of that realm.

*** "The Day the Earth Stood Stupid" has something similar with Fry, where he's revealed to be the only one immune to the Brainspawn's intellect-draining (it's a unique genetic abnormality caused by the fact that Fry [[MyOwnGrampa became his own grandfather]] during a time travel adventure in the 1940's). Fry is quite dim, but compared to the drooling simpletons of the rest of humanity, he's the only one who can save the world.

* One episode of ''Series/BuckRogersInTheTwentyFifthCentury'' features a assassin with super strength due to his homeworld having different environmental conditions compared to most human-adapted worlds. He was, in fact, a cripple by his own people's standards, and decided to make a better life for himself off-world rather than get a job as a librarian.

Compare LikeADuckTakesToWater where the individuals transplanted have some unique gifts or knowledge, and NotRareOverThere when it comes to resources. This one is just a normal guy or person in their universe, but is special in another. FishOutOfWater goes hand-in-hand with this trope. This is a staple of comic book alien supers, whose "powers" consist primarily of "being a member of their species" on a planet where the dominant species isn't as powerful, whereas on their homeworld they would be considered merely a BadassNormal. {{Invoked|Trope}} for SummonEverymanHero. See also ThoseWereOnlyTheirScouts. Contrast OutsideContextProblem. Compare and contrast MightyWhitey. LargeRunt is a SisterTrope purely about physical size, not general ability.

* The T-800 series Terminator from the ''Franchise/{{Terminator}}'' franchise is a mass-produced infiltration unit that, while dangerous, the human resistance fighters of the post-apocalyptic future have grown adept at detecting and destroying. But in the decades ''[[TimeTravel before]]'' Judgment Day, where there's no such thing as a "phased plasma rifle in the 40-watt range," just a single Terminator is a [[NighInvulnerability Nigh-Invulnerable]] ImplacableMan that in the [[Film/TheTerminator first movie]] marches effortlessly through an entire police station and murders 17 armed officers without even slowing down.

* ''Film/TheWomanKing'': One of the pillars of Oyo dominance in the region is their cavalry. In Eurasia, cavalry has been a vital fixture of warfare for centuries, but in sub-Saharan Africa many tribes simply do not have the breeding base nor horsemanship expertise to field them. The Oyo trade slaves for European muskets and horses and their cavalry wouldn't even be particularly impressive compared to the cavalry common in Europe at the time, but the fact they ''have'' cavalry gives them a large martial advantage over all their neighbours.

* It's the Basic premise of the ''Literature/SixteenThirtyTwo'' series. An unremarkable Appalachian town is sent back in time nearly 400 years. This goes about as smoothly as one would expect.

* Felix Cortez from ''Literature/ClearAndPresentDanger'' is a borderline example. A Cuban intelligence agent now employed by Colombia's [[TheCartel Medellin Cartel]], he's surrounded, to his chagrin, by drug lords who aren't exactly stupid, but are still far below what he as a KGB-trained officer is capable of. This helps him to play the drug lords against each other with an eye to eventually taking over the entire Cartel himself, which he very nearly succeeds at (and would have if not for the intervention of Jack Ryan and John Clark). Downplayed in that his American enemies admit that he's a very ''good'' spy, a capable enemy not only for untrained drug dealers but even for his fellow intelligence professionals.

* ''VideoGame/WeHappyFew'' takes place in a town where almost everyone is constantly taking a drug called "Joy", which makes you a hallucinating 'happy drunk' in normal effect, or drives you to paranoid schizophrenia if your body reacts badly. Anyone who voluntarily stops taking their Joy (called "Downers") therefore becomes a OneManArmy {{manipulative|Bastard}} {{Stealth Expert}}s by comparison, simply with their natural capacities of lying, rational thought and motor skills. One character even jokingly asks if Arthur is a Downer after witnessing him fix a machine that had baffled an entire Joy-fueled engineering team. It's not that they're particularly clever or tough, but when faced with forgetful and delusional citizens or rambling and flighty madmen, pretty much anyone could fight and sneak their way through the dystopian town. [[spoiler:Even minor character Prudence Holmes, whose corpse is found literally ''minutes'' away from the end of Arthur's campaign, having expired in the Motilene Mines.]]

* ''WesternAnimation/BigMouth'': Jessi is portrayed as one of the top students at Bridgeton Middle School (the actual top spot goes to Missy), but when her mother relocates the two of them to New York City itself, she's transferred to Darlington Pierce, an all-girls private school that turns out to be light years ahead of Bridgeton, to the point that Jessi can't even answer any of the questions. This is one of several factors that ends up plunging her into a depression.

-->-- '''Desiderius Erasmus,''' Dutch Philosopher (1466-1536), and paraphrased by many others

A character who, in their own reality/universe, is fairly normal, if not underpowered. They'd be a {{Mook|s}} or RedShirt back home, or someone fairly low key. Or maybe back home they're weak because [[OvershadowedByAwesome they have to measure up to god-level opponents]] or {{Eldritch Abomination}}s. Whatever the reason, they're not considered strong.

* ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyXIV'' has Blanstyr in the Armorer storyline, who's such a perfectionist in the smithing world that he drives out most potential recruits and is constantly at odds with guildmaster H'naanza over it. It isn't until the player character comes along that he realizes he actually has a ways to go to call himself the best armorer in Eorzea. The other expansions serve to show that while he might be the best armorer in Limsa Lominsa, he's considered a small fry to the rest of the armorer world.

* Downers in ''VideoGame/WeHappyFew'' aren't inebriated on Joy like Wellies or driven insane by it like Wastrels, effectively turning them into OneManArmy {{manipulative|Bastard}} {{Stealth Expert}}s by comparison. One character even jokingly asks if Arthur is a Downer after witnessing him figure out how to fix a machine that had an entire engineering team baffled by it. It's not that they're particularly clever or skilled, but when faced with forgetful citizens obsessed with self-delusion or rambling paranoid schizophrenics pretty much anyone could fight and sneak their way through the dystopian Wellington Wells. [[spoiler:Even minor character Prudence Holmes, whose corpse is found literally ''minutes'' away from the end of Arthur's campaign having expired in the Motilene Mines.]]

** The titular Invincible is among the most powerful beings on the planet, able to have a game of catch with his dad throwing the ball across the planet. Unfortunately by the standards of Viltrumites he is an untrained teenager and far below his father. Brutally showcased when he fights Omni-Man when he realizes his true mission on Earth. Mark is hit hard enough to cause natural disasters and at one point forced into the way of an incoming train. He is as powerless to escape his father's grasp as the bystanders are to get bloodily gibbed by his inhuman durability.
** Season 2 shows that many Viltrumites don't advance their skills and strengths past what they naturally have after they purged themselves of half their population. Invincible is nearly able to win a fight with one and Omni-Man is nearly able to kill three even after Invincible's slipups result in him taking a few hits covering for him. Considering that nothing other than another Viltrumite is able to hold their own against them they don't see the need to improve any further.

* [[AnimeAndManga/NormalFishInATinyPond Anime and Manga]]

[[folder:Fan Works]]
* In ''Fanfic/ASpecialKindOfMagic'', Naofumi is indicated to be an average sorcerer in the MCU, but this still puts him above all the other heroes by a lot, due to all the weird things that happen in the MCU.
* ''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/13559523/1/The-Rise-of-the-Enclave The Rise of the Enclave]]'' sees the Farsight Enclaves from ''TabletopGame/Warhammer40000'' get transported into the ''Franchise/MassEffect'' universe. By the standards of ''40k'', the Farsight Enclaves are one of the weakest factions in the galaxy, being a small [[RenegadeSplinterFaction splinter group]] of the Tau Empire (arguably the least powerful of the major factions). However, in the ''ME'' universe, the Farsight Enclaves quickly become one of the galaxy's major players with their technology and warships being far beyond anything the Citadel Council has.
* This is [[PlayedForLaughs hilariously]] shown in ''WebVideo/DragonBallZAbridged'''s "Cell vs" shorts. Various characters such as [[Manga/YuYuHakusho Yusuke Urameshi]] and [[Anime/PokemonTheSeries Ash Ketchum]] show up to try their hand in the Cell Games. The results are predictable. [[UnderestimatingBadassery Mostly.]]
* In ''Fanfic/MyBravePonyStarfleetMagic'', [[TerribleTrio Dementia, Mysterious and Rep-Stallion]] have lost to Starfleet several times. So, they travel to Equestria. Since the story is a HateFic, the Equestrians are portrayed as too weak to fight back and get enslaved, making Equestria the tiny pond.
** ''Fanfic/FallOfStarfleetRebirthOfFriendship'' inverts this. The villainous trio are now the normal fish in a huge pond, and the Equestrians stop them with ease.
* ''Fanfic/StormwolfAdventures'' has the vampires. They think they are the supreme race and are used to nobody being able to fight back against them. Then they meet the Jedi, who can and do cut them down en masse, and the demons, who are far more dangerous monsters.
* At the end of ''Fanfic/ThousandShinji'', [[spoiler: [[Anime/NeonGenesisEvangelion Shinji]] unleashes four Chaos Space Marines against NERV special forces. While normal for ''TabletopGame/Warhammer40000'', a Space Marine against normal humans is downright overkill]].
* ''Fanfic/AGamerInSouthBlue'': The [[Manga/OnePiece Grand Line]] may be on the same planet as the four Blues, but the power difference is easily enough to count for this trope.
** "[[GreenThumb Oaken Fist]]" Kowalik journeyed through the Grand Line twice in his life. Both trips were disasters, so he invoked this trope by using the powers and the strength that he gained to make a living in the South Blue instead.
** Protagonist Jack also counts, as his [[SuddenGameInterface Gamer]] powers have allowed him access to some techniques that only Grand Line ''elites'' can learn, like the Six Powers and Life Return.
* ''Fanfic/TheMissionStaysTheSame'': [[TabletopGame/Warhammer40000 Captain Gallardi]] starts off as an {{Elite Mook|s}} with a slightly better than average gun, and Maeteris is young for [[SpaceElves an Eldar Farseer]]. Once they arrive in the ''Franchise/MassEffect'' universe, though, Gallardi's lasgun can punch through most armor and shielding with little difficulty, and Maeteris' abilities allow her not only to see upcoming danger, but destroy multiple squads of enemies by herself.
* ''Fanfic/PlatinumPirate'': Prior to coming to the Grand Line, Lucas was under the impression that he was reasonably fit and in good shape for someone his age. But watching fighters like Sabo [[CharlesAtlasSuperpower crush boulders and cause Magnitude-like effects with their bare hands thanks to their physical training]] quickly revises Lucas's opinion of himself. After meeting up with the Revolutionaries, Lucas starts training himself to defend himself a little better.
* In ''Fanfic/ASongOfIceAndFiresThatWerentAllMyFault'', [[Literature/TheDresdenFiles Harry Dresden]] is this in the world of ''Literature/ASongOfIceAndFire''. Dresden is, in his world, a supernatural middle-weight. While he's got a lot of raw power for a human wizard, he's half a century or more from his magical prime, there's a ''lot'' that he doesn't know, his magical stamina is likewise a work in progress, and in his world, human wizards are hindered by the Laws of Magic and are nowhere ''near'' the top of the tree for raw power (doing their best work when they have time to prepare). However, he's now in a LowFantasy world where his abilities make him a fully fledged PersonOfMassDestruction - and that's before [[spoiler: his powers as [[MagicKnight the Winter Knight]] re-emerge]]. Consequently, the only thing that has a prayer of taking him on anywhere close to evenly is a full grown dragon - which, understandably, are in rather short supply when the story begins [[TheMagicComesBack (though that changes as time goes on)]].
* Inverted in ''Fanfic/SleepingWithTheGirls'' as the protagonist finds himself suddenly far more fragile in other universes due to them involving over-the-top SlapStick violence with everyone trying to give him a MegatonPunch and him just being a normal human. This trope is also played straight, though, as the protagonist comes from our world, which has no magic. Thusly, when he goes to other worlds that ''do'' have magic, he isn't hurt by magical attacks at all. He can still be hurt or killed by magical side effects, such as the heat of a fireball causing his clothes to burn or to boil water he's drinking.
* [[VillainProtagonist Darth Vulcan]] in ''Fanfic/TheRiseOfDarthVulcan'' finds himself transported to the world of [[WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic Equestria]] and sets himself up as a Villain in order to survive long enough to find a way to remove the Alicorn Amulet and return home. Due to him being a closet-geek-turned-bully that had plenty of experience playing Strategy Games, reading over the Villains' Handbook for the Do's and Don'ts of being an Evil Overlord, and [[GenreSavvy general savviness]]; [[WakeUpCallBoss he easily runs entire circles around the Princesses, Element Bearers, and the Royal Guard]] who before were used to dealing with [[CardCarryingVillain posturing villains]] like Discord and Queen Chrysalis that were easily defeated. And he does all this without incurring any fatalities on either side due to his adherence to ''ThouShallNotKill'' as a cardinal rule to his mayhem, with his only confirmed kills being [[EvilVersusEvil other Villains and their minions]]. When he makes his big escape from Canterlot after being captured as the city slowly threatens to fall off the mountain, [[ScrewThisImOuttaHere he just leaves them to their fate so he could escape]], and is called out as a monster by Princess Cadence. The trope kicks into full-gear as Darth Vulcan stops to explain to Cadence that [[HumansAreBastards his own world is filled with lying, cruel, and despicable people that do far worse things than he has done]], things which by all accounts would make Ted the closest thing to a ''saint'' in his world.
-->'''Darth Vulcan:''' ''I'm a monster? There's a thousand monsters, from least to greatest, where I come from. '''I'M NOT EVEN ON THE LIST!'''''
* ''Fanfic/TheThessalonicaLegacy'': Ramirez's ''Valkyrie'' is a Light 'Mech, bottom of the totem pole, and not even the best of that bottom-dweller pack. Without any other 'Mechs in Equestria to compete with, though, it is the absolute sovereign of the battlefield.
* In the ''Manga/RanmaOneHalf'' fanfic, ''[[http://www.fanfiction.net/s/3619431/1/Akanes_Terrible_Day Akane's Terrible Day]]'', in response to suggestions that Akane is weak, the author points out that while nowhere near Ranma's league, Akane is far stronger than most "normal" people in the setting.
* Literature/HarryPotter appears to be this in ''Fanfic/TheWizardInTheShadows'', until it is quite spectacularly established that he is crazy powerful even by Potterverse standards.
* The Nations in ''Webcomic/HetaliaAxisPowers'' come across as rather powerful beings when compared to humans in some fics, although among themselves they think each other as somewhat normal.
* Milo from ''Fanfic/HarryPotterAndTheNatural20'' isn't a particularly powerful Wizard by D&D standards, but he can pull things that the Potterverse can't, which sorta makes up for what the Potterverse wizards can do but not him. [[spoiler:On the other and substantially more frightening side of the equation, there's the witch who got sent over, strongly implied to be Bellatrix Lestrange, who is not bound by The Rules of Milo's world and stomps his old party with ease.]]
* {{Enforced|Trope}} in one ''Manga/{{Naruto}}'' fic. After the Fourth Shinobi War, Naruto is given a mission to beat the chuunin exam "like a rented mule. Like it owed him money. Like he wanted revenge." After all, when it comes to ringers, it's hard to beat an S-Rank genin.
* [[ActionGirl Tatsuki]] in ''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/3860355/1/After-The-Fairy-Tale-Ends After The Fairy Tale Ends.]]'' She's one of the strongest students at the shinigami academy and is receiving hakuda training from Soifon and Yoruichi. However, despite what she thinks, she can't take Ichigo (sneaked into the academy by his friends) in a strictly hand-to-hand fight. As Ichigo put it, "[[BadassBoast Come back when you've got a captain's haori. Matter of fact, come back when you've got a captain's haori and two friends that also have captain's haoris. No, better make that ''three'' friends, because by the time you're at that level it will take at least ''four'' captains to hold me back."]]
* In ''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/9757811/1/Gray-Morality Gray Morality,]]'' [[Franchise/TouhouProject Sakuya Izayoi]] is summoned to be [[Literature/TheFamiliarOfZero Louise's]] familiar. While Sakuya is rather powerful in Gensokyo, several characters like her mistress Remilia Scarlet are magnitudes greater than her, and most inhabitants can survive a knife to the gut. She's practically invincible in Halkeginia, especially since she's no longer restricted by the spell card battle rules.
* ''Fanfic/MassEffectClashOfCivilizations'': Many of the technologies that the [[Franchise/{{Halo}} UNSC]] take for granted, such as artificial gravity, slipspace, and crystal computational devices, are utterly amazing to the [[Franchise/MassEffect Citadel Races]], largely because they did this without any Element Zero, which was thought to be essential for the first two technologies, at least. That being said, the UNSC has no knowledge of Biotics, Mass Effect weapons, and many other advances the Citadel takes for granted.
* ''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/10240057/1/The-Light-of-Remnant The Light of Remnant]]'' establishes that the heroes and villains of ''WebAnimation/{{RWBY}}'' may be among the most powerful fighters in Remnant, but most of them are small-fry compared to the main heroes and villains of the ''Franchise/KingdomHearts'' universe. In one scene, Mercury kicks Sora in the head, and is shocked when it doesn't snap his neck or even knock him unconscious. Sora remarks that his kick is strong, but nothing compared to a kick from Larxene.
* In ''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/3665921/41/Black-Flames-Dance-In-The-Wind-Rise-of-Naruto Black Flames Dance in the Wind: Rise of Naruto,]]'' Naruto ''is'' S-rank by graduation. However, the ''weakest'' of his major enemies are also S-rank. At one point, [[TheDragon Shizaru]] beat Naruto so badly that when Yugito brought him to the hospital, the medics mistook him for a mangled corpse.
* Naruto in ''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/5965910/1/Just-A-Boy-In-A-Ninja-Mask Just A Boy in a Ninja Mask]]'' ends up in the ''Anime/SailorMoon'' world. Despite being the dead last in all aspects and rather short compared to his old classmates, in Japan he's smart enough to skip two grades on top of being taller along with far stronger and faster than any of his peers.
* ''Fanfic/TheBoysRealJustice'';
** In their world, the Seven are the top heroes and are renowned for their ([[FakeUltimateHero non-existent]]) bravery and courage. But their mediocrity becomes apparent when faced with villains from a world with more experience with superhumans.
** The Boys are also this while in Gotham City, as the criminals of Gotham had been fighting against BadassNormal heroes leagues above them for years. As a result, the Boys' operations against them are easily foiled and they are seriously hurt in the process. This eventually leads to their arrest once their luck runs out.
** Stan Edgar is a powerful and influential businessman on his Earth, but the resources of Vought pale compared to the Justice League's power, wealth, and omnipresence. Unlike Homelander, he has enough foresight to see he doesn't hold a candle to the Justice League and [[ScrewThisImOuttaHere decides to skip town]].
* In ''[[http://www.tthfanfic.org/Story-27556-2/NimbustheMariner+The+Watchman.htm The Watchman,]]'' Warren thinks that because he has magic orbs that allow him to fight a [[Series/BuffyTheVampireSlayer Slayer]] evenly, he's invincible. Unfortunately for him, Warren seriously pissed off Xander who's become Characters/{{The|Sentry}} [[PhysicalGod Sentry]]. Xander makes an example of Warren by ripping off his head, vaporizing the body, then dropping his severed head off at a local demon bar as a warning.
* In ''Fanfic/{{Emergence|RWBY}}'', [[WebAnimation/{{RWBY}} Team RWBY]] are decent fighters in their native Remnant, able to handle the average mook with ease, but still outclassed by graduated Huntsmen and those who can fight them equally. On Earth, they're virtually Goddesses of War - one character is told that should they go berserk, he has to go for the anti-tank weapons, because our standard bullets sting at best.
* ''Fanfic/BeforeTheDawn'' opens with a human Bella being abducted by the vampire Joham, who keeps her prisoner for two months as part of an attempt to breed human/vampire hybrids. Once Bella is turned by her newborn son, she manages to escape and get help from the Cullens, who join her when she returns to confront Joham and claim her son. With more vampires present, it's clear that Joham might be a terrifying monster to his human victims but he's nothing special compared to other vampires, Bella literally tearing him apart with her newborn strength, Edward and Jasper easily forcing him into submission and other vampires dismissing him as nothing during a subsequent meeting.
* In ''Fanfic/AThinVeneer'', the [[Series/BabylonFive Minbari]] have to face [[Film/StarTrekVITheUndiscoveredCountry 2293-era Starfleet and Klingon warships]]. The Minbari soon find themselves outclassed ''hard''.
* Gets even ''worse'' in ''Shielded Under the Raptor's Wings'', a fanfic with the same premise but a different interpretation of ST canon, as the Romulans gets involved too... And their older fusion-powered warships prove almost as formidable as their newer antimatter-powered ships (derived from Klingon designs) and the Klingon and Federation ships, while not having the logistic constraint caused by needing antimatter.
* ''Venus Flash'', a crossover between the ''manga'' versions of ''Manga/SailorMoon'' and ''Anime/CuteyHoney'', portrays accurately the difference in power between the members of the revived Panther Claw and Sailor Venus (who is still having troubles with her full power of the first story arc and thus is far weaker than how she would be when she finally showed up in the manga) and the Dark Kingdom, as best shown when Honey threw a nytroglicerine bottle on a strong youma's face and barely harmed it (in the manga a nytroglicerine ''spit'' had killed a Panther Claw kaijin), but surprisingly averts it with Honey herself: while her physical abilities are still far behind what the Dark Kingdom's youma have, her having modified the Airborne Element Fixing Device (the device that grants her transformation powers by rearranging atoms from air and her own body) to work with everything is a StoryBreakerPower, as she can ''disintegrate the enemy and turn them into food'' (or whatever she wants. She prefers food because her powers are recharged by eating). Sailor Venus herself was pretty scared when she saw her doing it the first time...
* In ''Fanfic/OpeningDangerousGates'', an "average" shinigami or arrancar from the ''Manga/{{Bleach}}'' universe is many times more powerful than all but the most top tier characters of ''Manga/FairyTail''.
* ''Fanfic/MassEffectHumanRevolution'': Marcus is young and weak for a roegadyn, which means he is still stronger and tougher than most other races. In his introductory chapter, he grabs a knife by the blade with his bare hand and isn't even cut.
* Happens in the remake of ''Fanfic/BattleFantasiaProject'': as soon as [[BrokenMasquerade the Veil is deactivated]], the various different magical groups get exposed to each other, with some finding themselves ''badly'' outmatched:
** Upon remembering of his encounter with [[VisualNovel/{{Tsukihime}} Altrouge Brunestud]], [[ComicBook/{{WITCH}} Phobos]], a powerful mage in his own right and a capable [[TheChessmaster Chessmaster]], [[OhCrap cries out in terror]], reveals to Kandrakar the plan that would have allowed him to sneakily take over, and ''returns to his cell'' (to be fair, once he doesn't have a whole planet supplying him with magic Phobos isn't particularly dangerous in combat even for ''ComicBook/{{WITCH}}''[='=]s standards, and it's implied the only reason he was still around was that he [[BornAgainImmortality reincarnates with all his memories every time he's killed]] and did not let himself get caught alive until the current generation of Guardians managed to get the drop on him);
** [[VisualNovel/{{Tsukihime}} Enhance]] is explicitly the ''weakest'' of the Dead Apostle Ancestors, and to fight the others he has to rely on them being {{Squishy Wizard}}s. Trhvmn Ortenrosse is a stronger Dead Apostle Ancestor, but isn't comparable in power to the top 10 (his strongest point being he's not a Squishy Wizard like most other Dead Apostle Ancestors). When they find themselves together fighting against a Nightmare Factory branch, they casually tear through their forces without even trying. Then the Nightmare Factory tries his HeroicBSOD-inducing nightmares... At which point Ortenrosse ''takes offence they tried to scare [[EvilerThanThou those who cause nightmares to the scariest things on the planet]]'', and wipes them out. Remember, neither of them is even close to be the strongest or scariest of the Dead Apostle Ancestors.
*** It's worth pointing out that when the bullet above says that most Dead Apostle Ancestors are Squishy Wizards it says it for Dead Apostle Ancestors standards: every single Dead Apostle Ancestor is [[NighInvulnerability hellishly difficult to damage for anyone who is not in their league]] thanks to their ''enormous'' magical power, and even then they have an absolutely ''ludicrous'' HealingFactor (whenever they're wounded, their Curse of Restauration turns the body back in time to just before they were wounded. The strongest the Dead Apostle or similar vampiric creature is, the greater the damage they can heal this way). The reason Enhance and Ortenrosse make the others look Squishy is that they were very physically strong to begin with before being turned, what with the former being former military and the latter being from the Greece of the Heroic Age (when ''everyone'' had an HeroicBuild and knew how to use it).
** The opening fight of the story has a powerful Nightmare Factory group facing off against [[Franchise/LyricalNanoha Nanoha Takamachi, Fate Testarossa]], [[Anime/FutariWaPrettyCure Cure Black, Cure White and Shiny Luminous]], and [[CurbStompBattle get annihilated]]. At the same time, [[Manga/SailorMoon Minako Aino]] muses that Sailor Moon at her first outing could have fought a dozen of the {{Mooks}} and won, and that she alone would have probably wiped them out.
* In ''Fanfic/HarmonyTheory'', while Rainbow Dash and the other members of the Mane Six ''are'' pretty powerful, they are still within the normal abilities of their races. Then Dash finds herself 1000 years in the future [[spoiler:(eventually followed by the others)]], where ambient magic has been reduced and much knowledge has been lost, making the inhabitants a lot weaker. For instance, Pegasi have forgotten how to walk on clouds, control the weather, can't fly very fast, and are not strong enough to fly while carrying another pony. Earth Ponies have lost a lot of their strength and speed and their connection with the earth and plant life. Unicorns have relatively weak telekinesis and can't manipulate a lot of objects at once or with fine control. The inhabitants tend to see the ponies of the past as {{Super Soldier}}s. Also, the inhabitants are MadeOfPlasticine compared to the ponies of the past. [[spoiler:When Rarity gets shot in the head, the impact of the bullet only knocks her unconscious, while everyone is shocked that it didn't make her head explode.]]
* Subverted in ''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/9527774/1/The-Illusive-Emperor The Illusive Emperor.]]'' Miranda Lawson ''thinks'' that John Shepard must be the only competent member of his class to receive every single award at graduation. When she sees John duel another student, she realizes that all of the graduates are highly skilled; John's just ''that'' good.
** [[Anime/CodeGeass Britannian]] biotics in general are considerably more powerful and far more dangerous than Terran Systems Alliance ones due to the Turians culling 90% of TSA biotics. Because they can afford the losses, Britannian biotics are encouraged to experiment with their powers rather than sticking to the standard attacks other biotics use, resulting the creation of FlashStep, {{Teleportation}}, and the strongest can perform [[MythologyGag biotic artillery strikes]].
* Lampshaded in ''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/10925103/1/A-Different-First-Crewmember A Different First Crewmember]]'' when [[Manga/OnePiece Shanks]] (who is not yet a Yonkou) can use his observation haki over the entirety of the East Blue specifically because it's so weak that no one else's haki causes interference.
* Inverted in ''Fanfic/NanosuitsAndSoulMagic''. On ''Crysis'' Earth, Alcatraz was the most powerful soldier Mankind had. On Remnant, even basic Grimm mooks and {{Squishy Wizard}}s like Velvet give him a run for his money.
** Although in some ways played straight and zig-zagged, as he is stated to still be leagues above the average soldier on Remnant, and he is highly skilled and versatile, so while in some ways he is weak compared to the average Hunter, in other ways he exceeds them (can turn invisible and walk silently, has far better senses and reflexes, has a supercomputer for a brain, is still able to run faster than many Hunters, can tell when someone is lying), and it is balanced out by Aura only protecting people if they consciously raise it and keep it active (meaning he can defeat even the strongest Hunter if he manages to sneak up on them). [[spoiler:This is shown when he is able to spot an assassin, calculate the trajectory of the assassin's bullet, and knock the bullet off course within the span of four seconds, then is the only one besides [[SuperSpeed Ruby]] able to keep up with him, and is able to tell the assassin is playing dead by reading his biometrics.]]
* In ''Fanfic/ZeroNoTsukaimaSaitoTheOnmyoji'' Saito is only a newly-accredited Onmyoji. However, due to a number of different factors, he's able to go toe-to-toe with some of the most powerful and skilled Halkaginian mages.
* Downplayed in ''Fanfic/SupernovaOnePiece'' where Luffy is a large fish in a tiny pond. In the Grand Line, his logia powers and skill with [[CharlesAtlasSuperpower Rokushiki]] make him a highly dangerous fighter, but in the East Blue no one can even attack him without hurting themselves ever since he became a [[PowerOfTheSun sun man]].
* Zig-zagged in ''[[http://www.fimfiction.net/story/9689/the-memoirs-of-a-reality-jumper Memoirs of a Reality Jumper.]]'' Alex isn't anywhere near as strong as a pony, but notably has far better senses. Whereas a playful punch is actually rather painful to him and he's only as strong as Apple Bloom (a very young foal), he can tell his roof has been fixed before Rainbow Dash or Applejack can even ''see'' his house and when Twilight thinks he smells "a little sweaty", Alex absolutely reeks to his own nose..
* An odd variation comes up in ''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/8684118/1/ Clockwork and a Teacup]]'' where the [[SelfInsertFic Self-Insert]] replacing Sakura is an incredibly potent chakra sensor due to being from a universe without it. Not only is her sensor ability passive (considerably rarer than active), but her range covers over a mile with near perfect details and she can recognize roughly 90% of the village by chakra alone.
* This is a FandomSpecificPlot for ''Literature/TheRisingOfTheShieldHero'' crossovers, where Naofumi is replaced by someone who in his home universe was far stronger and more competent as a hero but had competition while he's far more formidable in Melromarc. [[ExaggeratedTrope Brought to the (il)logical extreme]] with ''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/12451409/1/The-Hero-Melromarc-Needs-and-Deserves The Hero Melromarc Needs and Deserves]]'', as [[Manga/SaintSeiya Cancer Deathmask]], in addition to be a SociopathicHero at best, [[LightningBruiser can move at the speed of light and cause enormous destruction with a punch]] among [[SuperPowerLottery his many powers]].
* The German booklet series ''Maddrax'' has the [[FishPeople hydrites]]. They are physically weaker than humans, and also not so resistant. However, they can have [[HalfHumanHybrid progeny along with humans]], which are called mendrites. Mendrites are stronger in their physical abilities than hydrites. And while, according to the standards of hydrites, they are really strong and tenacious, they are on average strong and resistant according to the standards of humans.
* Luffy and Makino in ''Fanfic/StallionOfTheLine'' end up this way to varying degrees. Both have some level of skill in the main variations of Haki along with Rokushiki while still sailing in the East Blue. Even though Makino only has enough Haki to coat her hands and only for a few seconds, and is nowhere near as skilled with Rokushiki as Luffy (or any of [=CP9=]), she's still pretty much unstoppable in the East Blue while being a decent fighter in Paradise. Luffy, on the other hand, is far more skilled with Armament Haki and Conqueror's haki (though he has little skill with Observation) on top of using all of the Rokushiki techniques with ease. All of that, on top of being a sorta reincarnation of [[Manga/RanmaOneHalf Ranma Saotome]] (and thus knowing all his techniques), makes Luffy incredibly dangerous even in Paradise, though he has to actually work for his victories.
* ''Fanfic/FatesCollide'': Before [[ButtMonkey Jaune Arc]] came along, Okita Souji was considered the weakest Saber in Chaldea Academy. She's still a master swordswoman who overwhelms Blake Belladonna in combat.
* ''Fanfic/ServiceWithASmile'':
** Huntsmen in training like Russel, Velvet, and even Pyrrha seem superhuman to civilians but veteran hunters would have no problem taking them down. Pyrrha herself notes that while she can take on an entire team in school, a veteran would easily bend her over their knee.
** Alexander Sterling is a fairly important business man in Vale, especially in the coffee industry, but to someone like Jacques Schnee, he's no more important or influential than someone selling hot dogs out of a cart. This becomes a major problem for Stirling when he unwittingly insults the Schnee name.
** Sterling's bodyguard[=/=]thug is pretty tough compared to a normal civilian, but is helpless before Velvet, Huntress in training.
* In canon, Gow gave Zuko a difficult fight until the latter broke out his firebending. In ''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/12610560/6/Avatar-Flare-of-Redemption Avatar: Flare of Redemption]]'', he's shown to be completely outclassed by an actual earthbender soldier with real combat experience.
* ''Fanfic/DekiruTheFusionHero'':
** Subverted with Katsuki Bakugo, whose ego, while big, is much more manageable than it is in canon due to his friendship with Izuku having never fallen apart. While Katsuki still thinks very highly of his Quirk, he's perfectly aware that he still has far to go and strives to be the very best he can be.
** Played straight with Shoto Todoroki. While his Quirk is still the most powerful in Class 1-A in regards to raw power, it lacks the natural versatility that his classmates' Quirks have making it unsuited to certain aspects of hero work. Then there's Izuku's [[FusionDance Human Fusion]] technique, which takes said versatility, dials it [[ExaggeratedTrope Up to Eleven]], and then combines that with the raw power of [[SuperStrength One for All]]. Needless to say, those fusions blow anything Shoto can do completely out of the water, [[BerserkButton much to his frustration]].
* ''Fanfic/ManOffTheMoon'': Emiya is mediocre for a Heroic Spirit, but that still leaves him physically unrivalled amongst the mortals of the galaxy, and even as very narrow and specialised his grasp of magic is, it still is an OutsideContextProblem.
* ''Fanfic/NeitherABirdNorAPlaneItsDeku'': Izuku Midoriya, being a CompositeCharacter with Characters/{{Superman|TheCharacter}}, one of the most overpowered characters ever created in fiction, tends to induce this among his classmates in UA.
** Subverted with Katsuki Bakugou; thanks to being ChildhoodFriends with Izuku and thus living in his shadow all their lives, he is perfectly aware of how far he still needs to go as a hero. So, while his ego is still sizable, it's mostly under control when he finally starts at UA.
** Played straight with Shouto Todoroki. As the son of the NumberTwo hero and having been bred specifically to have a Quirk that would allow him to surpass All Might, Shouto's ego has swelled significantly, much to his detriment. When he enters UA, that ego receives repeated beatings due to his classmates having high-level superpowers as well, with at least two explicitly more powerful than him[[note]]One being Izuku, other being Fumikage Tokiyama, who is bound to a Fifth Dimension RealityWarper[[/note]]. This is especially prevalent with Izuku, who outstrips Shouto without even trying. As a result, this causes him to act recklessly in numerous instances to prove himself better than Izuku and reassert his superiority.
* ''Fanfic/RWBYEpicOfRemnant'': Angra Mainyu is considered one of the weakest Servants, but on Remnant, he is very powerful by their standards. What helps Angra is that the Grimm actively supercharge his powers, making him a ManOfKryptonite to them.
* ''Fanfic/MyHeroesReborn'': Downplayed with Izuku after he awakens PastLifeMemories and abilities as "Black Leg" Sanji. Since this is a theoretical Sanji from post-''One Piece'' canon, in the Grand Line he was a "one step below uber-tier" combatant. Powerful, but not ''the'' most powerful. In ''My Hero Academia'', the only thing stopping him from curb-stomping everyone short of All Might and All For One is [[DramaPreservingHandicap Sanji's personality flaws]] (specifically, his WouldntHitAGirl tendencies) and PlotArmor.
* In crossover fanfiction ''Fanfic/PointMeAtTheSkyrim'':
** Victoria, while a powerful cape, isn't even close to being the strongest one from [[Literature/{{Worm}} her universe]]. To the inhabitants of Skyrim, her powers come across as incredible mastery of multi-casting without the use of hands, nor any apparent exhaustion.
** The reverse is also true, with Victoria finding [[VideoGame/TheElderScrollsVSkyrim Skyrim]]'s magic an ability to be freely learned and even taught in to be beyond comprehension, since she comes from a world where superpowers are given randomly by Eldritch Abominations.
* In ''Fanfic/HellsisterTrilogy'', Characters/{{Supergirl|TheCharacter}} is getting sick of getting nearly killed every week and expresses the desire to become a normal girl again, how she used to be back in her Kryptonian hometown. Characters/{{Superman|TheCharacter}} argues that they can't retire so easy like that because, even though they were average kids on Krypton, "No one on Earth can do what we can". Hence, other heroes will keep asking them for help every time some cosmic horror drops by Earth.
* ''Fanfic/TheFifthAct'': Cloud saw himself as strong but relatively normal (though part of that is SelectiveObliviousness as he's one of the strongest people in the world). In the new timeline, Cloud is considered the WorldsBestWarrior and could take on Sephiroth and win easily.
* In ''Fanfic/JusticeLeagueThunderer'', [[Characters/MarvelComicsThorOdinson Thor]] states that this is the reason he and [[Characters/MarvelComicsLoki Loki]] took Baldur on a hunting trip to Earth. Since creatures and animals on Earth are far weaker than the rest of the Nine Realms, it would be easier for Baldur to hunt them, as he was rather frail by Asgardian standards in their youth.
* In ''Fanfic/AbyssalPlain'', The Undersiders and Breakthrough are powerful cape teams, but ''far'' from the most powerful in their superhero setting. In the Abyss, their super-powers and experienced teamwork allow them to fight small armies of Others (Boogeymen) as they retreat to perceived safety, while the Others are left battered and fighting amongst each other.
* ''Fanfic/WilhuffTarkinHeroOfTheRebellion'':
** Owen Lars is actually rather well off for a moisture farmer and on his way to being considered rich, but only for Tatooine. Notably, his family is considered well off because they have enough water to spare for showers if they wished rather than rely on sonic showers.
** Jabba the Hutt basically rules Tatooine but when he tries to "collect taxes" from a relief effort, Grand Moff Tarkin has his men stripped naked and hung out to die in the desert suns to teach the Hutt a lesson.
* ''[[https://forums.spacebattles.com/threads/nubsg-the-scattering.326749/ The Scattering]]'': ''Series/BattlestarGalactica2003'' is generally regarded as low-end for starfaring, combat-heavy scifi, but they are still so far ahead of [[spoiler:1980s Earth]] that an expendable troop lander can fill this trope. Said lander is bigger than a seafaring frigate, better-armored than a battleship and capable of achieving orbit under its own power, all of which make it practically a miracle ship from the enemy's perspective.
* ''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/13538715/1/Along-Came-a-Spider Along Came a Spider]]'': Trifa is a decent fighter and armed with a knife, but against a huntsman, she's completely outclassed. Jaune manages to easily defeat her without causing a ruckus while in his pajamas and armed only with a box of cereal.
* ''Fanfic/ForEarthAndHerColonies'': By ''Franchise/{{Halo}}'' standards, a UNSC light frigate is utterly expendable, needing a numerical advantage to even have a chance against an equivalent Covenant subcapital starship. Compared to the World War II-level capabilities of ''VideoGame/KanColle'' shipgirls and their abyssal foes, her MAC is powerful enough - albeit with substantial charging time - to OneHitKill [[spoiler:a Re-class]], she's physically strong enough to shove Nagato aside, can fly on her own power, and enough food for a normal destroyer shipgirl only replenishes one Archer. Not one Archer pod, one ''missile''.
* In ''Fanfic/TheWeaverOption'' [[spoiler:Lelith Hesperax]] chose to master the sword because in the ancient Aeldari Empire her psychic potential was considered unimpressive. After her race began its decline into excess, the general psychic strength of the Aeldari lessened with each generation until [[spoiler:Lelith]] could be considered "exceptional". In essence, she's a normal fish whose pond shrank around her.
* Inverted in ''Fanfic/ANewWorldOnHerShoulders'' with Ciel. She's revealed in Chapter 2-5 to have a lot of self-worth issues about how she CantCatchUp to her teammates and she states that this is part of the issue. Had she been put on any other team, she'd have fit in great and would be able to make strong contributions to the group effort, but she ended up on the team with a [[GradeSkipper grade skipping]] prodigy, someone who has [[SuperpowerLottery one of the most powerful Semblances in the world]], and the first ever mechanical life-form capable of generating Aura.
* The Endbringers in ''Literature/{{Worm}}'' are unstoppable monsters that cannot be defeated and can only be pushed back by the strongest heroes on their world. In ''[[https://forums.spacebattles.com/threads/a-different-kind-of-justice-justice-league-worm.269713/ A Different Kind of Justice]]'', while they are a threat and kill many heroes and civilians, they are defeated and killed by the Justice League, who have contended with their kind so often that such monsters are practically a dime-a-dozen. Taylor is outright shocked and disbelieving until she's shown proof of this.
* ''Fanfic/GloriousShotgunPrincess'':
** While Exalted are not quite the ordinary people, they are still the starting level player characters in the native game. When Shepard manages to catch a Solar Exaltation, she immediately stands on a power level defying understanding in the ''Mass Effect'' setting. The only thing that stymies her is the inability to get off the planet she's stuck on after her Exaltation, as she keeps ''accidentally destroying the ships'' that Cerberus agents show up in while attempting to capture her. Surviving in the frozen wasteland with ammonia for atmosphere was a non-issue, and once she gets off the planet, her powers quickly start turning the plot of ''VideoGame/MassEffect2'' upside down.
** However, she eventually starts encountering other Exalted beings. Most of whom either were mentored in their new powers and nature or survived long enough to surpass Shepard's limited experience, requiring her to get actual training in Solar fighting arts to keep up. Among those that can counter her are the Reapers themselves, who can threaten her one on one [[spoiler:due to being Exalted themselves - they are rogue Alchemicals]].
* ''Fanfic/BoldoresandBoomsticks'': Happens on both sides of the crossover:
** Yang is the most skilled human Aura-user Riley has seen, despite only being a second-year student.
** Absol is considered to be as skilled with Aura use as veteran Huntsmen, even though she hasn't used any particularly powerful moves.
* ''Fanfic/FateKill'': As a teenage girl, Selka is considered one of the weakest members of the Heiwa tribe, whose hat is SuperStrength. Outside her tribe, she is one of the strongest people in the world, able to break stone and send people flying. Only people like Shirou, Leone, and Bulat can rival her.
* Ruby in ''Fanfic/LightDarknessAndParadox'' is just a huntress-in-training in her original world, but when she arrives in the ''Paradox'' world, most of the people around her are notably weaker than her. An exception is [[spoiler:the Queen Harpy Lucretia]], who effortlessly defeats Ruby and her friends.
* ''Fanfic/FateDxDAU'': Ritsuka Fujimaru constantly looks down on himself as a weakling and an amateur magus. This is because the only people he had to compare were Servants, who are vastly superior to humans. When he lands in the [=DxD=] world, he becomes almost unstoppable due to his fighting experience and the magecraft he does know. It helps that he has Class Cards that let him emulate Servant abilities, but even without them, he can hold his own.
* ''Fanfic/KimiNoNaIowa'' takes the basic ''VideoGame/KanColle'' conceit of warships incarnate as human(oid)s and subjects it to {{Surprisingly Realistic Outcome}}s, with this as the result - guerillas and other conventional forces resisting the abyssal invasion are straight up not having a good time. The lowliest abyssal unit, PT Imps, are based on PT boats, which aren't powerful enough to face even the weakest true warship in a direct engagement. Compared with an American in Vietnam or a Russian in Afghanistan, however, that makes them ImmuneToBullets and universally in possession of heavy weapons that will tear a tree in two, to say nothing of an ordinary man. Yet they are still so numerous as to have more in common with sailors than the ships on which they serve. The next step up the abyssals have, destroyers, are each an artillery battery unto themselves, and things only get worse for the PunyEarthlings from there. The same also applies to the shipgirls opposing them; Missouri casually remarks at one point that no amount of fancy grappling skill can let a wannabe sexual predator prevail when even a destroyer has orders of magnitude the strength of any human.
* ''Fanfic/ThereWasOnceAnAvengerFromKrypton'':
** The Milky Way's local powers like [[Franchise/MarvelCinematicUniverse the Kree and Nova Corps]] are pretty powerful by Earthly standards...but the Milky Way is actually a bit of a cosmic backwater. [[WesternAnimation/StevenUniverse The Diamond Authority]] is reportedly bashing the Kree hard, for example, and even [[WesternAnimation/VoltronLegendaryDefender the Galra]] are hard-pressed to deal with Gem forces, let alone Yellow Diamond. The epilogue of ''Close Encounters of the Gem Kind'' has Moonstone note that the Kree and Novans are both in denial over how powerful the Gem Empire is, since they both like to think of themselves as the top dog in the universe. They're apparently almost entirely unaware of the even more expansive Galra, and Moonstone notes that they're going to be rather shocked when they eventually find out about how they're not even the biggest force in the local cluster.
** [[WesternAnimation/SheRaAndThePrincessesOfPower Horde Prime's]] claim of being "Emperor of the Known Universe" is put in perspective in ''Eternity in Promise'', when Allura hears of him and declares that he was just filling a gap in one of the spaces left by the Galra's universal overextension.
** [[Franchise/MassEffect Jane Shepard]] is a highly skilled warrior with advanced weaponry and a powerful biotic, skills that let her quickly rise the ranks of the bounty hunting guilds in Knowhere, and even let her catch a ''Cybertronian'' bounty, much to everyone's surprise, [[spoiler:but Verdona makes it clear to her that while she might be the "greatest warrior of all time" in her ''own'' reality, she's in a very different universe now, one where beings like Saiyans, Asgardians, etc. are running around]].
* In ''Literature/TheSilmarillion'' fanfic ''Fanfic/CaptainTinkerbell'', Maglor was a mere High Elf in the First Age, a middleweight with few martial deeds to his name. During UsefulNotes/WorldWarI (during which he meets the man who creates him, Creator/JRRTolkien), he's a borderline ImplacableMan. For example, the man next to him was blown up by a shell and Maglor kept walking, he's not affected by DeadlyGas, doesn't get trench foot, and was only laid up in the infirmary for a month after being bayoneted.
* In the one-shot fanfic [[https://www.deviantart.com/mega-poneo/art/Luea-vs-Equestria-Girls-872947051 Luea vs Equestria Girls]], [[Toys/{{Jewelpet}} Luea]] walks into the human world of ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyEquestriaGirls'' and gets transformed into her human form upon arrival. Unlike when this happened with [[WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic Twilight Sparkle]], however, Luea does not lose her magic in human form and instead gains increased physical stats and stronger magic. Luea then one-hit-KO's the defenseless Twilight with a roundhouse kick. When said kick proves so hard that Sunset Shimmer feels it, she skips the high school drama, transforms into her demonic form, and zombifies Canterlot High's entire student body which Luea then disintegrates completely by snapping her fingers. Luea then reverts to her normal form (from using up all her human form's energy), dodges the fireball Sunset throws at her, one-shots Sunset, destroys the Element of Magic, burns down Canterlot High, and forces Sunset to unwatch the entire Equestria Girls franchise by rewinding its footage out of her eyes.
* [[Franchise/HarryPotter The Wizarding World]] is seen as powerful by earthly standards, having mastered the magical arts to such finesse while hiding themselves away from the Muggles due to [[{{Masquerade}} The Statute of Secrecy]], with only a small number of Wizards being able to master the art of Wandless Magic. However once [[WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic Equestria]] comes into the equation in ''Fanfic/IfWishesWerePonies'', the Ponies showcase that not only do they have [[SufficientlyAnalyzedMagic a more comprehensive understanding of Magic]], and that the Unicorns can also cast spells without using Wands, but that they can also cast and create some advanced forms of magic such as {{Teleportation}}, WeatherManipulation, and by sheer accident: [[spoiler:[[BackFromTheDead re-souling ghosts]]]].
** [[spoiler:Speaking of ghosts, Myrtle Warrens undergoes a cultural case of this, having spent the better part of fifty years as an incorporeal unfeeling ghost [[CovertPervert spying on burgeoning couples]] and developing an inclination to various fetishes and kinks that she was privvy to. [[BackFromTheDead After she was revived]] by the [[WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic Cutie Mark Crusaders]] [[SheCleansUpNicely and given acne treatment]], Myrtle attracted so much attention [[MaleGaze that many of the male students couldn't help but be enamored by her]], enough that Fred and George Weasley both started up [[SideBet betting pools]] to determine not only [[YouNeedToGetLaid when she would finally get laid]] but which couples would end up breaking up because of her equal-opportunity flirting. When Myrtle went to spend the Winter Hols in Equestria with her new friends, she quickly learned that while her antics had been considered very lecherous in Hogwarts, her tastes were considered ''tame'' in Equestria; with the various antics displayed by the residents of Ponyville causing Myrtle to be the one to blush in profound embarrassment.]]
* [[Manga/{{Naruto}} Tenten]] is considered the most lackluster member of the Konoha 11, but when she gets transported to [[Literature/ASongOfIceAndFire Westeros]] in the crossover ''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/13470020/1/Of-Steel-and-Chakra Of Steel and Chakra]]'', she's pretty much able to demolish canon all by her lonesome. It should be noted that that Tenten was deliberately chosen ''because'' of this trope, the author stating that a competently trained shinobi could take down anyone from Westeros in a fair and not-so-fair fights. It also serves to highlight the sheer power difference between a {{Shonen|Demographic}} manga and a setting like ''Literature/ASongOfIceAndFire'' that relies on relatively more realistic physical capabilities.
* ''Fanfic/KnightOfSalem'': The fic starts with Salem losing her immortality and Grimm powers, leaving her as a normal human. A normal human from a time where every single person alive had enough magic to make them godlike to modern humans. Despite Salem being centuries out of practice and rather average even at her peak, in the modern world she is able to outmatch literally everyone she meets. Most people assume she's insane because she walks around like she owns the world and doesn't care who she offends. Jaune spends most of his time trying to keep her from getting annoyed so that she doesn't nuke whatever city they're in.
* ''Fanfic/VoyagesOfTheWildSeaHorse:'' Played with. [[Manga/RanmaOneHalf Ranma Saotome]] and his close circle are actually pretty impressive specimens in their own right, so when transported to the [[Manga/OnePiece East Blue]], their domination is quite natural. However, there are ''much'' nastier pirates, marines and other threats in the other parts of the world, especially the Grand Line.
* ''Fanfic/FearTheSuperhero'': Karasuba has spent her life, bored with being the strongest Sekirei, with no knowledge of anything else. Once she learns of the [[BrokenMasquerade moonlit world,]] she discards her plans for [[OmnicidalManiac omnicide]] and desires to travel the world with Shirou, killing the strongest things they can.
* ''Fanfic/{{Justice}}'': While Nami and Usopp are the physically weakest of the [[Manga/OnePiece Straw Hat pirates]], that still leaves them as members of one of the strongest crews in a WorldOfBadass. As such, they are leagues above the average person in the [[Franchise/DCAnimatedUniverse DCAU]], and can actually go toe-to-toe with more basic metahumans.
* [[https://archiveofourown.org/works/20562662/chapters/48812552 A Light Against The Darkness]], a crossover between ''WebAnimation/{{RWBY}}'' and ''TabletopGame/Warhammer40000'', sees the world of Remnant, where humanity is under constant siege from murderous monsters, visited by an Imperial fleet. And even among the Imperials, all of whom are familiar with dealing with threats to humanity, none feel quite as at home as the Cadians on board, who have spent all their lives perfecting the art of defending humanity from murderous monsters.
** Taken a bit further in the second non-canon omake bonus chapter, where the Imperial fleet decides to demonstrate their most effective way of dealing with these kinds of threat by effortlessly leveling the Land of Darkness, an entire continent filled with Grimm, with orbital strikes.
* Back at his home village, Bruno in ''Fanfic/WhereTheDandylionsPlay'' was feared and disliked because his gift made him out to be a HarbingerOfImpendingDoom. After moving away, the village he settled down in came to look to him with less vitriol, Bruno being able to make an honest living as a fortune-teller and patron of his own Botanica, his daughter living a relatively normal life. He was even invited to a wedding for a couple whose marriage was confirmed to be a success from one of his visions.
* Crossover fics ''Fanfic/DimensionalGateScrewover'' and its sequel, ''Fanfic/RWBYDualEclipse'' both feature this in spades:
** In the former, several demons and angels from ''Franchise/{{Disgaea}}'' found themselves transported to the world of the ''Monster Girl Encyclopedia'', and given they favor direct combat over the latter's seduction-based materials, the Disgaea people, for the most part, easily trounce any monster-girl. While both the Order and the Demon Lord think to recruit them, their offers are declined, as the Disgaea people simply want to return home. This trope turns ugly when Asagi Kurosugi, the EvilCounterpart to Asagi Asagiri, is revealed to have teamed up with a former Demon Lord, and the pair easily run roughshod over the monster-women, their combined efforts nearly killing the new Demon Lord.
** In the latter, central character Nelius Raoul is easily miles ahead of even the best Huntsman, but for the most part Nelius simply keeps to his own devices. That said, he took to heart multiple lessons about the prior story, and keeps up his training, expecting to run into another person from his side of the universe. This ends up coming true when he finds [[VideoGame/ZettaiHeroProject The Unlosing Ranger]] also on Remnant, whom also proves incredibly powerful.
* ''Fanfic/TheGhostBoyAndTheCombatants'': On his Earth, WesternAnimation/DannyPhantom is a powerful superhero. When paired against beings from other worlds, namely [[Franchise/{{Dragonball}} Lord Beerus]] and [[VideoGame/{{Darkstalkers}} Demitri Maximoff]], it's clear there's a huge gap in power that is impossible reach on his own and he's forced to rely on quick thinking in order to try and survive.
* In ''Fanfic/ThisBites'', while being tortured by Eneru, Jeremiah Cross stays DefiantToTheEnd and gives the self-proclaimed god TheReasonYouSuckSpeech about how Eneru is only powerful in Skypiea and how so many other powerful people in the Grand Line would tear him apart like the arrogant Logia-user he is.
* One minor subplot in ''Fanfic/PleaseStopEatingTheHellButterflies'' has Shiba Ganju infiltrate the Gotei 13 and destroy it from inside with his brand of chaos. Despite being a hellraising lunatic outside of the Shinigami's walls, inside them he has to compete with the level of chaos created by the ''loyal'' Shinigami trying to screw with Yamamoto and each other, as well as the actual villians. Yamamoto is neither fooled by Ganju's attempts, or impressed by what chaos he can drum up.
-->'''Yamamoto:''' This is Seireitei. If you want to be considered an "insane badass", go back to Rukongai.
* ''Fanfic/{{Intercom}}:'' In the real world, Riley Andersen is a perfectly normal 12-year old girl. But when she goes inside her Mind World through lucid dreaming, she literally has the power of a god, and can bend the world around her to her will.
* ''Fanfic/TheAmazingSpiderLuzInAcrossTheOwlVerse'':
** Luz notes that on Earth, her powers are hardly unique, let alone super special or powerful. On the Boiling Isles however, her presence is considerably ground-breaking, not least of which for being the first known human to arrive in the Demon Realm in a long time. Her spider-powers allow her to take on multiple skilled witches and defeat them with ease, not to mention a number of monsters that she struggled to face in canon. The fact that she is this in the Demon Realm isn't lost on the inhabitants of the Boiling Isles either, as a number of prominent witches begin to question the wisdom of merging realities on the Day of Unity if Luz represents merely an average superhuman for her world.
** Amity becomes a variation of this thanks to learning Marvel-based magic from Doctor Strange. While she gets a beginner book of spells and some personal tutoring from him, it's clear that she still has a long way to go before she's anywhere near his level. Despite that, the amount of human magic she does learn allows her to [[spoiler: [[BeyondTheImpossible utterly destroy Grometheus]]]], completely shrug off her mother's own magical attempts to control her, and effectively makes her one of the most powerful witches in the Boiling Isles.
* ''Fanfic/TheSoulmateTimeline'' has this come up with a few characters.
** [[VideoGame/MagiaRecordPuellaMagiMadokaMagicaSideStory Iroha]] was a fairly respectable magical girl in her home city of Takarazaki, where she was considered a veteran and rather strong. Kamihama is a completely different ecosystem however, where ''familiars'' are as strong as some of the Takarazaki Witches and there are many, many more Magical Girls who make Iroha look like a rookie in comparison. Her own raw strength, noted by Mitama to be four times that of an average Magical Girl, is actually just above cannon fodder levels in Kamihama.
** [[SerialKiller Akasuki Suzumebachi]] is strong enough to be incredibly scary and unstoppable to any regular human and clever enough to manipulate young and naive Magical Girls to be her marks into places where she can [[PeoplePuppets take control of their bodies from them]]. However any Magical Girl with either a combat experience and ability or a raw power advantage over her will manhandle her. She was unable to get anywhere against Mifuyu without Kyubey's help, got severely injured fighting Kyoko and only survived because Kyoko prioritized rescuing her young victims over double tapping her, and a freshly contracted Sayaka [[NoHoldsBarredBeatdown only doesn't maim her more because the building they were in started collapsing on them]]. Even without Sayaka sticking several swords through her, the moment Mami spotted her, Akasuki was quite aware she was dead, which very quickly became true.
* ''FanFic/HeroesOfTheNewWorld''; Izuku and Yamato are powerful in their own right (Izuku would have been his world's greatest hero had he not been TrappedInAnotherWorld), but their main base of operation is the New World, where people of their skill are a dime a dozen and the ''real'' power players are the likes of [[WorldsStrongestMan Whitebeard]] and [[BigBad Kaido]], who can smash entire fleets on their lonesome and whose very presence can cause weak-willed foes to faint in terror. Then the Germa arc sees the two hop over to the North Blue, where the most threatening pirates are small time crooks and [[SerialKiller Serial Killers]] with bounties in the low millions, and it's ''their'' turn to be at the top of the food chain for once.
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[[folder:Anime & Manga]]
* In ''Manga/SazanEyes'', Chuui looks threatening and unstoppable only because Yakumo lacks any power or Majuu. For people like Parvati, he's a minor nuisance.
* ''Manga/AngelDensetsu'' presents an inversion with Ogisu who questions whether he's lost his edge. Eventually, he realizes that he's just ended up in a school with a bunch of absurdly powerful fighters and accepts his place in the pecking order.
* The main character in ''Literature/TheAlchemistWhoSurvivedNowDreamsOfAQuietCityLife'' was a modestly above average alchemist before going into suspended animation who was barely getting by because alchemist was a fairly common career and she didn't have the business contacts needed to make it big. But between her suspended animation lasting generations and the disaster she went into suspended animation to escape making it impossible to create more alchemists in that region, when she wakes up she's literally the ''only'' alchemist around, which makes her a priceless resource for those trying to clear the local dungeons and rebuild the ruined city.
* ''Manga/{{Bakuman}}'':
** This happens with Mashiro's uncle, Nobuhiro "Taro Kawaguchi" Mashiro. When he's first introduced, his drawings are fairly cartoon-like, bordering on StylisticSuck, and he is said to have been ignorant of several manga drawing techniques. However, Kaya's father reveals that Nobuhiro was quite good at art compared to his classmates.
--->'''Mr. Miyoshi:''' [Nobuhiro] always had good ideas in his head, and got good grades in art class. He was especially talented at drawing.\\
'''Takagi:''' Whaaat!? Taro Kawaguchi was good at drawing?! No way!\\
'''Mr. Miyoshi:''' He was better than the rest of us -- a big fish in a small pond.\\
'''Mashiro:''' Yeah, my uncle told me he realized how bad he was only after he decided to become a professional manga artist.
** Ishizawa is a far cry from Mashiro's talent as an artist, although he'd like to believe the opposite is true. However, when they're both in college, it is revealed that Ishizawa has a series in Chara Kira Magazine, [[spoiler:around the same time Mashiro and Takagi's first series was canceled]], and is looked up to by the members of the manga club.
* A common problem in ''Manga/{{Beastars}}''. No matter how little a carnivore puts into their physical strength and how strong most herbivores get, the divide in strength is undisputable. This is pointed out most with the protagonist Legoshi, a gray wolf (which are pretty middle of the pack among carnivores), stronger than some predators like weasels, who are still strong enough to accidently rip a herbivore's arm clean off, but not quite as strong as bears and tigers. It regularly causes problems with his relationships with his herbivore friends and love interest the rabbit Haru. [[spoiler:All this is in spite of not eating meat, which limits his physical strength.]]
* ''Manga/{{Blame}}'' has Basic Safeguard exterminators. In the movie the basic exterminators are considered very dangerous robots, that keep the human population completely terrified, while in the Manga they are in fact low-level Mooks.
* In ''Manga/BloomIntoYou'', Touko Nanami is easily the most talented actor on the student council, which, at her request, revives an old student council tradition of putting on a stage show for the school culture festival. After the play, Touko is scouted by a theater troupe that her student council's assistant adviser and a friend of Touko's late older sister belongs to, and realizes that compared to the other members, she's just a newbie. Touko actually doesn't mind, since she'd long felt pressure to live up to her seemingly perfect sister's example. In fact, she's relieved that her colleagues don't put her on a pedestal.
* ''Manga/{{Bleach}}'': Xcution (with the exception of [[spoiler:Tsukishima]] with his StoryBreakerPower) are [[BoisterousWeakling Boisterous Weaklings]] compared to Arrancars, Menos Grande, Sternritters and the captains and lieutenants of the Gotei 13. Against normal humans and ordinary Hollows, however, they're unbelievably powerful. [[spoiler:Five captains and lieutenants of the Gotei 13 were WillfullyWeak at the time and [[CurbStompBattle Curb-Stomped]] them. The funniest part of all of this is that they wanted to destroy the Gotei 13, so it'd be a miracle if they didn't die in their ''first'' step in Soul Society had they managed to come there!]]
* {{Invoked|Trope}} by Mephisto in ''Manga/BlueExorcist'': up to this point, Rin has been facing small fry and had one major victory against the Impure King (by using the power of another demon to purify the decay). In order to make sure he understands that he's still in the kiddy pool, Mephisto resumes the "sparring" match Rin was having with Amaimon, the weakest of the 8 Kings of Hell, only this time [[IAmNotLeftHanded Amaimon burns out his human shell to show his demonic powers]].
* Discussed in ''Manga/ACentaursLife'' during the marathon; while protagonist Hime can run 100m in about 9 seconds (as fast as or faster than our own current world record holder, Usain Bolt), when she tries actually ''racing'' she's left lagging massively behind the other competitors. This is because, as the title suggests, Hime is a ''centaur,'' so while she can leave all her bipedal friends eating the dust of her hooves, compared to professional runners of her own race she's a slowpoke. Later, [[spoiler:Hime finds herself stranded in a medieval fantasy world. Except, her centaur strength, atomic-age education, and partly-horse appearance give her the skills she needs to masquerade as an angel from the heavens and take command of an entire kingdom of ordinary humans]].
* ''Literature/ACertainMagicalIndex'':
** Touma himself acknowledges that his [[AntiMagic Imagine]] [[PowerNullifier Breaker]] is useless if there are no superpowered beings around. In Academy City or the Magic Side, he's practically unbeatable. Faced with average street thugs or gunmen, and he's just a regular guy who can street fight.
** The Misaka clones are an inversion. They were designed to fight Accelerator, to push him to the impossible Level 6. Their fights with him, no matter how many of them there were or what tricks they tried, generally lasted a few minutes until Accelerator got bored and instantly killed them. But Accelerator is the strongest esper in Academy City and one of the strongest individuals in the world. Against anyone ''else'', the Sisters are basically {{Super Soldier}}s. They have advanced combat training backed up by very real combat experience, along with the [[ShockAndAwe electromaster power]] that is perfect for manipulating machines. Individual Sisters repeatedly prove to be excellent combatants, and ''teams'' of them can outmatch elite black-ops hit squads.
* ''Anime/CyberpunkEdgerunners'': David Martinez's physiology gives him greater tolerance to cybernetic implants than the average person, letting him use a military grade [[SuperSpeed Sandevistan]] with minimal side effects. He believes this makes him one in a million, and he quickly gains reputation as an edgerunner and attracts unwanted attention from Arasaka [[spoiler:for their [[MiniMecha cyberskeleton]] project]] thanks to his heightened tolerance. However, he isn't unique. [[spoiler:He was just one of multiple prospects on Arasaka's list. And even his high tolerance is just that: tolerance. Eventually, [[CyberneticsEatYourSoul his heavy augmenting catches up with him and he teeters on the edge of cyberpsychosis]] even ''before'' he ends up installing the cyberskeleton. And when he squares up with [[FullConversionCyborg Adam Smasher]], an '''actual''' one in a million, [[HopelessBossFight Adam beats David down without breaking a sweat]] and tears the cyberskeleton to pieces, all while [[TheReasonYouSuckSpeech mocking David for thinking he was "special"]]. And just as a nail in the coffin, Adam Smasher casually makes use of his own Sandevistan, and when questioned dismisses it as "[[UniquenessDecay a rudimentary implant]]"]].
* ''Manga/DeathNote'': Among Shinigami, Ryuk is actually mid- to low-ranked. However, he's still a being that can kill any human by writing their name in the Death Note, no matter how manipulative or intelligent they are, [[spoiler:including the protagonist Light, whom he eventually kills out of boredom]].
* ''Anime/DevilmanCrybaby'': {{Implied|Trope}} with {{Satan}}. While far and away the most powerful being on earth to the point where not even Akira can defeat him in combat [[spoiler: and dies trying]], he's still outclassed completely when the PowersThatBe show up. [[spoiler:While he never gets his rematch with [[EldritchAbomination God]] and [[AngelicAbomination the angels]] due to having crossed the DespairEventHorizon, their ability to destroy and recreate the earth is far beyond anything he displays. Furthermore, given how he looks identical to said angels apart from lacking their HolyHalo, Satan probably wasn't even [[TheParagonAlwaysRebels a fallen paragon]], just one [[SmallNameBigEgo single malcontent out of negligible importance among countless thousands of Heaven's denizens]].]]
* In ''Manga/TheDisappearanceOfNagatoYukiChan'', Ryoko Asakura is one of the best students at North High, but she finds herself unable to answer a math question that her peers at Koyoen Academy are studying at the same time, since the latter is a prep school that covers more material.
* ''Franchise/DragonBall'': A persistent theme in the franchise is characters discovering they're in this trope and then ascending past it by pushing beyond their limits.
** Goku is this for his entire childhood and teenage years; he's strong enough to resist bullets and it takes three arcs for him to encounter villains who can actually kill him in General Blue, a powerful psychic, and Tao Pai-Pai, who was just straight-up more powerful. His first serious opponent is Piccolo Daimao, an embodiment of evil, making them both the strongest beings on the planet. But as it turns out, this is because they're from alien species [[PunyEarthlings that are naturally much, much stronger than humans]]. By the standards of their own species, Goku was weak for a [[BloodKnight Saiyan]] and Piccolo average for a Namekian, while both were weak compared to the average intergalactic warrior (though in Piccolo's case, he is technically still half of who he really is at this point and is actually a Super Namekian, having large amounts of combat potential). But this is only temporary, as within two years [[MyKungFuIsStrongerThanYours they are both far stronger than anyone of their kind has EVER been]].
** Raditz is as weak as a [[TheGoomba Saibaman]], but on Earth, he easily pulls off a BulletCatch against a shotgun-wielding farmer and is powerful enough to curb-stomp both Goku and Piccolo, the two strongest beings on the planet, simultaneously, forcing Goku to pull off a HeroicSacrifice to take him down. In fact, when they discover that Vegeta and Nappa consider Raditz a pathetic weakling compared to them, the Z-Fighters are in disbelief.
** This gets a humorous nod in the Buu Saga when Babidi's minion Pui-Pui has the environment of his room changed to resemble his home planet, thinking the heroes will be crushed by its gravity, which is 10 times greater than Earth's. Unfortunately for the poor sod, Vegeta ''also'' comes from a 10G planet, and everyone in the room regularly trains in conditions of far more than that: Vegeta trains in 500x gravity, and Goku had been training at 100x a decade prior.
** A filler episode of the anime has Krillin, Tien, Yamcha, and Chiaotzu train at Kami's Lookout against magic simulations of a pair of Saiyans called Brocco and Pumpkin ([[DubNameChange Shorty and Scarface in the English dub]]). In Kami's own words, [[ThoseWereOnlyTheirScouts they are among the weakest of their kind]], but still strong enough to easily beat those who at that time were the four strongest humans.
* In ''Anime/GargantiaOnTheVerdurousPlanet'', Ledo is an [[RedShirt ordinary soldier]] among his peers, piloting a mass-produced {{Real Robot|Genre}}. Until he finds himself stranded on a long forgotten, far less advanced Earth. It's no surprise every time he fights the local hostiles with his [[SuperRobotGenre mecha]], it ends up being a CurbStompBattle.
* In ''Literature/{{Gate}}'', the JSDF's weaponry consisting mostly of Cold War era technology, is not particularly advanced, but the medieval inhabitants beyond the Gate are [[CurbStompBattle powerless to resist them]], despite having a UsefulNotes/TheRomanEmpire-like level of technology and access to flying troops. The first thing that gives the technologically-advanced forces trouble is a giant-ass red dragon who can outmaneuver fighter jets and ends up having to be [[spoiler:killed by essentially a magic-powered coilgun]].
* In ''Anime/GirlsUndPanzer'', Miho Nishizumi, the main character, comes from a [[BadassFamily family that has long been in the practice of tankery]], and feels inferior to her mother and her sister. When she transfers to Oarai, a school that had no tank program until it started it up the year it arrived [[spoiler:in an attempt to avoid being closed down permanently]], she's immediately sought after to join the tankery group, and soon becomes the commander. [[JerkAss Erika]], a former schoolmate of Miho's, comments that it must be a weak school if Miho became its commander, referencing this trope.
* ''Literature/GoblinSlayer'': The titular hero is presented as an unparalleled goblin exterminator to the point he attained [[FantasticRankSystem Silver Ranking]] due to killing them by the ''thousands'' since he trained and prepared himself his whole life for this single purpose. With that said, when it comes to fighting anything else other than goblins he is ''hilariously'' inept, since he suffers a bad case of CripplingOverspecialization. This trope equally applies to the goblins he fights since they represent a very terrifying threat for villagers and rookie adventurers, and yet they are {{cannon fodder}} compared to the larger threats faced by high level adventurers -- which speaks something [[CrapsackWorld truly bleak]] about this [[DarkFantasy setting]]. It's for this reason that the Goblin Slayer isn't taken seriously as an adventurer, since he is perceived as nothing more than ''pest control'' in their eyes. However, this belief only applies to rookies to minimally experienced adventurers; true veterans of the frontier are just as aware of how heinous the goblins are, the problem is that the pay for clearing out a goblin nest or rescuing a woman from one is completely disproportionate to the risk involved. As such, the other silver-ranked adventurers instead see Goblin Slayer as straight up crazy for doing nothing but goblin quests.
* This concept is the only reason the first arc of ''Literature/HighSchoolDXD'' appears to have any stakes at all. [[StarterVillain Raynare]] fancies herself a schemer with a plan to endear herself to the leader of the Fallen Angels, when the truth is she's a StupidEvil bully leading a low-level scout squad and if Rias hadn't held her team back to let Issei [[ThisIsSomethingHesGotToDoHimself reclaim his pride]] any one of them could have torn her apart.
* The anime of ''Manga/{{Inuyasha}}'' has the Noh-Mask, a malicious {{youkai}}, who is striding through the city in modern times, seeking the fragments of the holy jewel. He makes catastrophic damages, and kills several humans. No one can stop him until Inuyasha comes and fights him. If the Noh-Mask had not already had a jewel splinter, it would have been only slightly stronger than the lower youkais, who [[BigBad Naraku]] used as {{mooks}}.
* ''Anime/IsekaiQuartet:'' The series makes it clear, for some of its gags, that part of the reason why the cast of ''Literature/Overlord2012'' below is so overpowered in their own series comes to that the world they've been transported to has very low power levels in comparison to their own. Placed around the characters from the other series featured however, and they find themselves encountering fair matches like [[Literature/TheSagaOfTanyaTheEvil Tanya]], characters that can handle their strength like [[Literature/TheRisingOfTheShieldHero Naofumi]], and some that have the means to counter them like, of all people, '''''[[Literature/KonoSuba Aqua]]'''''. And then there's [[Literature/ReZero Reinhard]].
* It is discussed with Wiene from ''Literature/IsItWrongToTryToPickUpGirlsInADungeon''. Because she's a benevolent monster, Bell and his party take her to the surface. However, they do not know what to do with her then, because other people would not accept her. Liliruca finally suggests simply taking her into the wild, because there she would have nothing to fear from the other monsters. The monsters get stronger the deeper they go into the dungeon, and the monsters on the surface are so weak that even ordinary people can handle them. While Wiene would be quite a weakling on the middle dungeon levels compared to the other monsters, she is absolutely invincible on the surface.
* The title character of ''Manga/JacoTheGalacticPatrolman'' is way stronger than any human, easily lifting weights of multiple tonnes, casually jumping at enormous heights and running at incredible speeds, and killing a giant ship-sinking shark with ''one punch '''underwater''''', but flat-out admits that the aliens who have sent one of their own to attack Earth are way stronger, and that he can kill the invader only if he's still a child. [[spoiler:As this is a StealthPrequel of ''Manga/DragonBall'' and the invader is Goku, this shouldn't surprise anyone.]]
* Koga from ''[[Manga/KenganAshura Kengan Omega]]'' is a gifted martial artist who is able to single-handedly take down entire dojos in his local area, and [[VictoryIsBoring grows dissatisfied]] with how weak his opponents are. After finding the Kengan Association, however, he realizes that he'd barely qualify as the bottom of the barrel among that circle, much less stand beside the top-level fighters.
* Done repeatedly in ''Manga/KenichiTheMightiestDisciple'': Tsukuba and Daimonji are powerful for a high school Karate club, but in Kisara's gang they're a mook and a ''perspective mook'' respectively and easily outclassed by the Technique Trio, Shiratori, and especially Kisara herself. As for Kisara's gang it's one of various sub-gangs of Ragnarok and not even the strongest (that being implied to be the Valkyries), though Kisara, as one of the Eight Fists, is one of the strongest... And completely outclassed by the leader Odin, who, among ki-using martial artists, only rates as a Disciple and (at least at the start) not really that strong. And then there's Experts and the various ranks of Masters...
** One key moment is Kenichi's misadventure with Furukawa, a knife-wielding member of Kisara's gang: during the first encounter Kenichi was scared off, but when they met again after Kenichi received basic training from the weapon expert of Ryozanpaku he couldn't help but ''give him advice on the correct hold''.
* ''Manga/TheLegendOfZeldaAkiraHimekawa'': In the adaptation of ''[[VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaTheMinishCap The Minish Cap]]'', the chicken-sized Cuccoos are enough of a threat to the tiny Minish that Librari is considered a hero for being able to take down one of them.
* Ginta from ''Manga/{{MAR}}'' is a relatively normal boy in his home universe. However, when he comes to MÄR, he's considered super-strong because of the difference in gravity and atmospheric oxygen concentration. Which does not explain his ability to punch through stone barriers though, unless MÄR is also a world of cardboard.
* Kanna from ''Manga/MissKobayashisDragonMaid''. By dragon standards she's just a young child, but on Earth she's one of the strongest beings in the world. The sheer scope of the power difference between the two worlds comes up when she and Tohru are "roughhousing" (in a manner that wouldn't look out of place in ''Manga/DragonBallZ'') and they tell Kobayashi that they were fighting at a ''human'' level (that is, at the level of the average human from '''their''' world).
* ''Manga/MyHeroAcademia:'' As a child, [[TheRival Bakugo]]'s powerful Quirk won him constant praise and made him a big-headed bully to those whom he saw as weaker, particularly the [[UnSorcerer Quirkless]] [[TheProtagonist Izuku Midoriya]]. He also stood out among his peers at what he called a "crappy public school," as the only one with a shot at getting into UA. Upon arriving at [[SuperheroSchool UA]] he's still acknowledged as being very powerful, but everybody in his class ''also'' has very strong (or at least [[WeakButSkilled useful]]) Quirks, and his bad attitude makes him mocked rather than feared. Meanwhile Izuku [[SuperEmpowering has acquired a Quirk of his own]], [[HourglassPlot and everybody likes him]] due to his kind, heroic personality.
* ''Manga/{{Naruto}}'':
** Naruto and Sasuke had pretty much established themselves as pretty strong genin... until Haku showed up, seemingly killed Zabuza with a flick of the wrist, and disappeared without a second notice. When they try to fight him again, Haku reveals he had been holding back (and holds back through the ''entire'' fight). The only challenge he gets is from Naruto's first use of Kurama's chakra. And even then, it's only because Haku doesn't go in for the kill he's taking a beating. This becomes even more apparent when Orochimaru and the other major villages are introduced, and it takes a LOT of training from Naruto to catch up to Gaara or Neji in Part I and surpass the latter. By the tail end of Part II, though, Naruto and Sasuke are quite clearly among the strongest ninja in the world.
** Likewise, Sakura is praised for her chakra control; but as she learns during the Chuunin Exam, most of the participants have roughly as good (if not better) control and are far superior to her in every other aspect.
** Jiraiya, and to an extent the other Sannin, (Orochimaru and Tsunade) are large fish in a normal pond, being incredibly strong ninja in their own right, but they only managed to get into a draw against someone like Hanzo in their prime (this was back when they were a team), and then there are those like [[AlwaysABiggerFish Nagato]] (who easily annihilated Hanzo). Jiraiya's final thoughts are to compare himself to a frog in a well that has made it to the ocean (referencing a Japanese proverb similar to this trope). Granted, being ninja, power isn't always the thing. Nagato mentions that had Jiraiya been aware of his capabilities, he would've most likely lost, implying only the element of surprise allowed him to beat Jiraiya despite having more abilities.
* ''Manga/OnePiece'':
** This comes up several times, where characters are hyped up as the strongest in wherever the story is taking place in at the time, only to be [[TheWorfEffect Worfed]] by a more worldly, and therefore more powerful, fighter. Zoro had this happen to himself in his "[[CurbStompBattle epic duel]]" with Mihawk at the Baratie; despite being the most infamous swordsman and bounty hunter in the East Blue, Mihawk makes short work of him.
--->'''Mihawk:''' You may have a reputation, but you're still just a bunny. [...] You're a little frog, croaking in your puddle. Time you learned how big the world is.
** This was called back to after Zoro trained under Mihawk during the timeskip. His first "serious opponent", a DrunkenMaster octopus swordsman, bragged about being the strongest swordsman in Fishman Island. Zoro kept calling him a frog until the swordsman was sufficiently incensed, at which point Zoro stated he was bragging like a frog in a well, unaware of the world.
** Mihawk's presence in the story itself, when he effortlessly defeats not only Zoro, but Don Krieg, one of the strongest pirates in East Blue, also references this. By the time the protagonists head for the Grand Line, they are the strongest pirate crew in East Blue. But East Blue is by far the weakest of the seas both in terms of its pirates and marines, and so opposition only increased from here.
** Speaking of Don Krieg, he was really fearsome for the East Blue (though his bounty comes mostly from having the largest pirate armada in said sea), but next to nothing in the Grand Line, as he had to turn tail and return to East Blue after Mihawk decimated ''his entire fleet'' on the seventh day. He even had the audacity of calling himself "the strongest man on Earth", while said title rightfully belongs to Whitebeard ([[spoiler:before his death, and later Kaido]]).
** Luffy himself runs up against this obstacle in both powers and experience. The majority of his opponents in the East Blue were overall less familiar with Devil Fruit users and so Luffy tended to win more easily compared to many of his later opponents on the Grand Line. On the Grand Line itself, Devil Fruits themselves tend to be more frequent and varied, making Luffy's own [[RubberMan Gomu Gomu Fruit]] look more mundane and weak (at least until Luffy trains it more).
** Pretty much the New Fishman Pirates in their entirety. They take over Fishman Island (and even that requires them to beef up on Energy Steroids), but the Straw Hats easily defeat them. It's telling that the ArcVillain was defeated by the aforementioned Zoro with ''one slash''. '''Underwater'''[[note]]Fishmen have their strength increased ten times while underwater[[/note]]. Before Luffy even had the chance to fight the guy himself. Once that happened, it was fairly obvious how the rest of the arc was going to go for the antagonists.
** Arlong was one of the elite members of Fisher Tiger's crew, but not necessarily all that powerful compared to the rest of the Grand Line (and even some of his former crew), especially when he loses to [[spoiler:Vice-Admiral Borsalino (future Marine Admiral Kizaru)]]. However, when he arrived in East Blue, he was able to conquer multiple islands unopposed. As it turns out, he was deliberately invoking this trope; Arlong flat-out knew he had no chance of making his ambitions a reality in the Grand Line, so he ran off and tried to achieve them in East Blue instead. Because of this, it's implied he got ''weaker'' due to the lack of sufficient opposition, as the moment his crew and him were faced with such opposition for the first time in years, they went down ''hard''.
** Bellamy the Hyena had the largest bounty in the area he had made base at, and was all too happy to gloat about it and [[MuggingTheMonster taunt and rough up the Straw Hats]] because they didn't want any trouble. When he sees Luffy's newest bounty come in, he panics a little before convincing himself the bounty's a fake. When Luffy picks a fight, [[TranquilFury seething with pure fury]] over Bellamy roughing up their new friend Montblanc Cricket and ransacking his house, Bellamy accepts and goes through a long charge up with his Devil Fruit that makes him so fast he can't be seen...[[CurbStompBattle then Luffy sends him through the docks in one strike.]]
** Many [[{{Intangibility}} Logia users]] can see the first half of the Grand Line as their very large "tiny pond", as any person or crew who survives in the latter half is going to be trained in Haki, [[KiManipulation Ki Attacks]] which nullify the advantage of becoming one's element and allows them to sustain damage.
*** Downplayed with "[[AGodAmI God]]" [[ShockAndAwe Eneru]]. He is much stronger than anybody on the Sky Islands, and he has an almost unbeatable Devil Fruit power, even explicitly referred to as possessing '''virtual invincibility'''. In fact, Luffy only defeats him because [[LogicalWeakness his rubber body cannot conduct electricity]], and his [[KiManipulation Haki]] allows him to [[CombatClairvoyance predict his opponents' moves]]. The general consensus is that he is one of the strongest characters in the series. However, Luffy comments that while Eneru may be a PhysicalGod in the sky, on the Blue Sea there are so many strong guys that Eneru would look like a weakling if he ever went down there, since Haki is so prevalent on the open sea.
*** [[SuperSmoke Captain Smoker]] qualified before the TimeSkip. While he was certainly badass, he was also a [[{{Intangibility}} Logia user]] stationed in the weakest sea then later in the first half of the Grand Line. Neither sea has many (or any for the East Blue) people even capable of touching him, let alone fighting him. However, when [[TheDreaded "The World's Most Wanted Man"]] Dragon the Revolutionary came to town, he made Smoker quake in his boots without even doing anything to him.
*** When New World pirate [[ButtMonkey Pekoms]], whose Devil Fruit power is a lowly turtle Zoan [[note]]With rare exceptions like mythical beasts, Zoans are generally regarded as the weakest Devil Fruit users, and herbivorous Zoans are the weakest of all[[/note]] {{curb stomp|Battle}}s swamp Logia Caribou, he gives the advice that Logias who rely exclusively on their Devil Fruit will die quickly in the New World.
*** The above is driven home later on with the ArcVillain Caesar Clown, a Logia-type who has control over all types of chemical gas, including poisonous ones. Pre-time skip, he would have been one of the most dangerous opponents the Straw Hats faced ''period'', but with Luffy coming out of two years of training (not to mention bringing an AcquiredPoisonImmunity and [[KryptoniteFactor Haki]] to the table), he looks like an utter chump once forced into a straight fight.
* ''Webcomic/OnePunchMan'':
** This is [[ArrogantKungFuGuy Suiryu's]] problem and the source of his pride. He's legitimately strong and would fit into the lower ranks of S-Class perfectly, but he's limited his worldview to what he sees in the tournament ring. Fighting only people much weaker than him has blinded him to just how many monsters and heroes out there are stronger than him. He finally understands this once he fights the Dragon-level [[GeniusBruiser Gouketsu]] and realizes that for all his strength, [[PunchPunchPunchUhOh he can't make the monster even blink]] (for context, "Dragon" threats are among the most powerful monsters in the world and only surpassed by "God"-level ones. Even monsters on the rank below it, "Demon", are dangerous enough that even a low-ranked S-Class Hero can lose).
** Done repeatedly with the various classes of the Hero Association, as promotion in the class above is obtained by surpassing the results of the current number one... Who for their own reasons remains in the class willingly:
*** #1 C-class Hero Mumen Rider is brave, effective, and generous, and has long earned a promotion in the B-class, but refuses the promotion because he knows he's not cut for the kind of opponents B-class Heroes are expected to face.
*** Fubuki and her posse are the top-ranked B-class heroes, and she thinks she's being extremely generous in deigning to invite [[ComicallyInvincibleHero Saitama]] into her group. Then when she goes to see him, she sees him hanging out with S-Classes who defer to him (like Genos) and has a small moment of panic. In fact, Fubuki herself is well aware of this. She's strong enough that she could easily be an A-Rank hero, but she believes she isn't strong enough to beat the top-ranked A-Class Hero, Sweet Mask (who himself is strong enough to be S-Class), and her {{Pride}} won't let her be second-best, so she stays at B-Class.
*** Sweet Mask himself stays in the A-Rank even though he could be S-Class because he considers himself to be a {{Threshold Guardian|s}} of sorts for other Heroes hoping to become S-Class, as he does not want them to make the S-Class look bad.
** While she can't possibly be promoted, Tatsumaki, who is treated by the association as the strongest member of the S-class, fits the trope as well: her telekinetic powers are ''immense'', to the point that when an alien warship tried to bombard the area she was in she casually stopped all their projectiles and sent them back much faster, but even she is outclassed by the #1 S-Class hero Blast, Garou at his apex, and especially Saitama.
** The S-class itself is the result of this trope: when the Hero Association was founded, they only had C, B, and A-classes; but then a number of heroes proved themselves vastly superior to even the A-class, despite doing things at their own pace and not caring about recognition like the heroes in the other classes, who even with team-ups among themselves could not be as strong as them. Seeing their sheer power and skills, each of them comparable to a military division, and thinking it'd harder to secure talent otherwise, the Hero Association created the S-class just for them.
* ''Literature/Overlord2012'':
** This applies to [[VillainProtagonist Momonga]] upon his arrival to the New World. In YGGDRASIL, the MMO he was transported from, Momonga was one of hundreds if not ''thousands'' of players to reach the level 100 cap, and his current build was designed more for roleplaying than for [=PvP=] purposes (although he does have more than twice the standard maximum amount of spells thanks to a PrestigeClass). Once he shows up in the New World, he finds the level cap is ''much'' lower, to the point where [[TheArchmage Momonga]] can get by disguised as a warrior because his strength stat is so high, even managing to [[spoiler:hug someone to death with one arm]]. His wide suite of instant-death spells, normally too weak to be effective against players, turn out to be incredibly overpowered for the New World as well, which is what gave him the idea to do reconnaissance as a warrior to draw less attention.
** The trope gets more complicated when it's revealed Momonga was in control of a top ten guild from YGGDRASIL, which has possession of the most [[GameBreaker World]]-[[InfinityPlusOneSword Class]] [[GameChanger Items.]] In fact, Momonga renames himself to the guild's name because it was so famous in YGGDRASIL that ''ANYONE'' who played it should immediately recognize it. Momonga was also an excellent strategist who led his guild on several DefeatingTheUndefeatable quests without suffering a single loss, and regularly defeated much stronger opponents in [=PvP=] because of his intricate knowledge of game mechanics... plus a few hundred dollars in [[BribingYourWayToVictory cash items.]] Momonga, however, never rests on his laurels and spends much of the series trying to expand his power base in preparation for future foes. Of course, as the story goes on, it becomes obvious nothing short of the most powerful god-like denizens of this world, other YGGDRASIL players, or his own [=NPCs=] suddenly going rogue on him would ever be worth actually using those various advantages on.
** The {{Light Novel|s}} goes into further detail via PowerLevels, showing that even Nazarick's guardians and lesser [=NPCs=] are about one-and-a-half times the level of most heroes and legendary adventurers.
** Magic is divided into ten tiers. Most New World humans cannot learn anything higher than 3rd-tier magic due to their low level cap. The 4th-tier is very rare and the expectation for the hand-picked students of [[TheArchmage Fluder Paradyne]], and 5th-tier being the domain of legendary heroes. The only living person even known to cast 6th-tier magic is Paradyne himself, with 7th-tier magic requiring city-wide rituals and 10th-tier magic being entirely hypothetical. For the serious Yggdrasil [=PvPer=] such as Momonga, magic below the 8th-tier was broadly considered ''too weak'' for any real combat. Momonga can cheerfully cast spells of 10th-tier and above, and many times he obliterates the opposition by overestimating them and breaking out the big guns.
** In short: Imagine starting a NewGamePlus with an epic-level ''TabletopGame/DungeonsAndDragons'' character, gear, loot, levels and all ([=DnD=] being a strong influence on the world's mechanics).
* ''Anime/PokemonTheSeries'':
** Ash's Charizard is, for most of Kanto, the Orange Islands and the first part of Johto, the strongest Pokémon on Ash's team. Then they come across Charicific Valley, which houses the strongest Charizard on the planet. Charizard learns the hard way that he isn't nearly top-class within his own species, and decides to stay in the valley to train. He then averts it increasingly during every following appearance, growing visibly larger and more powerful and, by the time of the Battle Frontier season, he can throw down with legendary Pokémon.
** The original head writer's personal notes and bible of the series, ''Literature/PocketMonstersTheAnimation'', has this in play. Pallet Town, Masara Town in Japanese, is named after Masara Oak, the most skilled trainer to ever have come out of Pallet Town. The town was renamed in his honor, he had a statue placed for him in the center of town, and his grandsons became the town's mayor, postmaster, and famous Professor/local eccentric scientist. His ranking out of ten thousand: ''921''. The conflict between the higher executives' vision and the vision of Shudo, said head writer, never did get to a point of addressing if Ash or Gary ever ranked higher than 921, and if such the town would have been renamed Ashburg or Garyville.
*** Although it's notable ''Literature/PocketMonstersTheAnimation'' breaches ''heavily'' into alternate continuity, as well as being [[SlidingScaleOfIdealismVersusCynicism far more cynical than the anime,]] basically to the point of deconstruction. Among massive changes are Pallet Town's visible poverty and criminal problems, Gym Leaders losing their license after ''any'' 4 consecutive losses to challengers, and Gym Leaders bribing challengers to not lose (greatly contradicting how Misty's sisters basically gave up badges without any worry), Brock's father not appearing, and his siblings having various fathers, Ash never getting a Bulbasaur, Charmander and Squirtle. So it's doubtful how canonical to the anime concepts in the ''Literature/PocketMonstersTheAnimation'' light novels are, if at all, especially seeing Takeshi Shudo himself used Charmander/Charmeleon/Charizard in multiple episodes and movies he directly wrote. So the revelation of the strongest trainer to ever come out of Pallet Town being quite weak in the grand scale just seems to be another part of the light novel being more cynical and deconstructive toward the anime and the franchise.
* ''Manga/RurouniKenshin'': Saito points this out in regards to Sanosuke, stating that while his abilities may make him one of the strongest fighters in Tokyo, he doesn't match up to either him or Kenshin (who are some of the strongest fighters in Japan due to their experiences in the Bakumatsu). It's eventually subverted, as Sanosuke becomes strong enough to hold his own even if he's not quite as powerful.
* Hawk from ''Manga/TheSevenDeadlySins'' is a creature from purgatory. He is not particularly strong, but very resilient. Two holy knights cannot injure him with their attacks. When Meliodas and Ban get into purgatory much later in the story, they meet Hawk's brother. His species is very weak compared to the other creatures of Purgatory.
** The first saga of the series featured monstrous looking demons that were either red or gray. It was an uphill battle for the heroes to defeat even one of them. When the gate to purgatory is opened later, the heroes quickly realize that these two demon species are absolute weaklings compared to the other demons.
* In the first ''Literature/{{Slayers}}'' feature film, Lina and Naga keep running into people claiming to be the Xth Strongest Man on Mipross Island. Since Lina and Naga aren't from Mipross Island, they keep taking them out with casual ease, with the most notable incident being when Lina takes advantage of the fact that the 8th, 7th and 5th Strongest Men on Mipross Island are standing next to each other to take them all out with a single fireball.
* In ''Literature/SoImASpiderSoWhat'', the reincarnators aside from Kumoko are all born with thousands of skill points to spend, where most children in the world are born with none. Rather than another perk given to them by Evil God D, this is the result of [[spoiler:the System having exhausted the souls trapped on this planet. The reincarnators have "fresh" souls with plenty of energy for the System to mold into new skills]]. And the reason why Kumoko has so few? [[spoiler:Because while she is a "fresh" soul too, her soul is that of a simple spider with her "memories" being implanted by Evil God D [[UpliftedAnimal that gave her sapience]].]] They grow much faster than natives in ability, but again, this is only because the natives have already been wrung dry. Anything or anyone old enough to have survived to the present is far beyond Shun, TheHero, and anyone out there with a similarly "fresh" soul that has trained harder also completely outclasses him.
** Initially, Kumoko has to fight against a giant snake that turns out to be her most powerful enemy to date, to the point that she only manages to defeat him with a combination of strategy and luck. When Kumoko accidentally falls into the second-lowest layer of Great Elro Labyrinth, it turns out that the same snake is treated like a normal Mob.
* This trope is half the primary joke of ''Literature/SupposeAKidFromTheLastDungeonBooniesMovedToAStarterTown''. Lloyd Belladonna is the weakest man in the village of Kunlun, and knows it. But when he leaves his small mountain town and moves to the big city, it turns out that he's only weak by the standards of Kunlun. In RPG terms, he's level 60 and thinks he's weak because everyone he grew up with has already reached level 75 or higher, and now lives in a place where the previous strongest man in town was level 10. The other half of the primary joke is that he honestly doesn't understand this, and thinks that the incredible feats he's able to pull off from being so overpowered for the area are just routine tasks, to the amazement of everyone else who sees him.
* In ''Anime/TenchiMuyoWarOnGeminar'', Kenshi Masaki says he was a weakling and idiot compared to his more famous brother Tenchi and Tenchi's UnwantedHarem...which is true given that some of them are {{Physical God}}s. On the planet Geminar, Kenchi's strength, speed, and skills are vastly superior to most of the people there. He can casually lift a concrete slab with one hand that two workers couldn't budge.
* In ''Manga/{{Toriko}}'', the chapter that introduced the Four Beast explained that some of the Human World's most dangerous beasts are merely the ones who were too weak to compete in the Gourmet World. The text then mentions that the Four Beast is an exception, since it came to the Human World because it preferred to eat humans.
* In ''Manga/TheUselessSenpaiAndTheTalentedKouhai'', Tsukioka, the eponymous taleted kouhai, is a downplayed case of this. She's a talented basketball player, but Ochiai, the useless senpai, remarks that their school's team is rather weak, so Tsukioka stands out all the more easily.
* ''Anime/YashahimePrincessHalfDemon'' has Towa. Towa is a half-demon who grew up in the modern age, in which, for unknown reasons, there are no more demons and half-demons. Stronger than a human could ever be, she had to promise Sota, her adoptive father, that she would never use her true strength against an ordinary person. But even if she is very reserved, she is still extremely strong, so she could defeat a whole group of gangsters without even having to make an effort. [[MundaneUtility She has also collected a lot of sports trophies]]. When she travels through the magic tree into feudal times, she is no longer so impressive there. Of course, Towa is one of the strongest characters there, too, but in a world where there are many superhumanly strong persons, she is just a lot less outstanding.
* ''Franchise/YuGiOh'':
** ''Anime/YuGiOh'' A filler episode had a guy in the arcade named Johnny Steps getting angry because Tea was [[CurbStompBattle handing his ass to him]] in a dancing game. He got aggressive because of this, and eventually [[MuggingTheMonster challenged Yugi to a duel]], with predictable results. When he complains about how easy Tea had it, being talented, she points out that the difference between them is this trope. While the guy gave up once he faced the bigger world and found out his limits, Tea was aware she had to grow, and instead of giving up, took her failures as a motivation to grow and a way to see her shortcomings.
** ''Anime/YuGiOhGX'' gradually deconstructs this with Kaiser. In Season One, Kaiser is considered the best duelist at Duel Academia, to the point that dueling him is itself considered a privilege. As a result, Kaiser had no one to challenge him as a duelist, and thus he never had any need or reason to evolve his deck or change up his strategies. He also never needed to learn how to deal with failure, and it's this point in particular that sends him spiraling off the deep end in Season Two, when he becomes a professional duelist and subsequently finds himself on a losing streak for the first time in his life. The deconstruction continues more subtly in later seasons. (Hell) Kaiser never actually loses the attitude he got in Duel Academia. Even though he becomes a more powerful duelist, it's mostly because he gets a forbidden deck, but unlike the other duelists he doesn't keep curating it but just swaps for that one and keeps it, looking not for growth but for a perfect, final duel. He got big in the new pond, and settled. This lead his deck to actively revolt against him to the point of ''physically hurting and almost killing him'' because they wanted to keep growing. On the other hand his brother Sho, who didn't have the same raw talent, but learned to challenge himself, manages to create an evolved version of that deck and surpass him.
** ''Anime/YuGiOhArcV'': The Academia Pirate Captain has a deck that's practically unbeatable if his opponent is from the Xyz, Synchro, or Standard Dimensions, but essentially worthless against anyone from his own dimension. His SignatureMon is a Fusion Monster that has the effect to prevent all summons from the hand, but if there's a monster with 1000 or more ATK on the field, it's destroyed. [[TheHero Yuya]] at first attempts to make it self-destruct by raising its attack points with action cards, but is unsuccessful. He's about to lose when Sora intervenes, and is flabbergasted that his friends are having so much trouble with the Pirate Captain. Sora proceeds to Fusion Summon (which is a summon from the Extra Deck) using monsters from his hand, therefore bypassing the Captain's lockdown strategy and causing his ace to self-destruct.
* ''Manga/YuYuHakusho'': [[RandomPowerRanking C- and B-class]] demons, for the standards of the demonic world, are simple middle class demons. But being the strongest demons that can cross the Kekkai barrier, means that they are the most dangerous threats that can be found in the human world. (Not counting Sensui.) Yusuke is shocked when he learns that [[NighInvulnerability Toguro]] was only in the B-Class.
* In ''Manga/{{Zipang}},'' a Japanese Aegis destroyer gets sucked back in time to [=WW2=]. In our time, an Aegis destroyer is merely a small part of the war machine. In [=WW2=], it's powerful enough even by itself that it can change the course of the war. Similar to ''Film/TheFinalCountdown'', the key moral question is whether it should.
[[/folder]]

** On the contrary, the P-39 Airacobra was deemed average at best in the Pacific theater against the more maneuverable [=A5M=] Zero, mediocre if not useless in the Western theater because of its lack of performance at higher altitudes (where German bombers and fighters were)... but the Soviets really loved it in the Eastern front (where it excelled at the low altitudes of local dogfights and was enough sturdy for the harsh environment, particularly compared to the majority of local aircraft which were initially obsolete).

** Back in UsefulNotes/{{the Golden Age|OfComicBooks}} the ultimate source of his powers was that he had [[HeavyWorlder the body of a man meant to live on a high-gravity world]] like Krypton while actually living on the relatively low-gravity world of Earth.

** One story in UsefulNotes/{{the Silver Age|of Comic Books}} had [[Characters/SupermanJimmyOlsen Jimmy Olsen]] go to another world, where the low gravity meant he had the equivalent of Superman-level abilities.

* ''Anime/CyberpunkEdgerunners'': David Martinez's physiology gives him greater tolerance to cybernetic implants than the average person, letting him use a military grade [[SuperSpeed Sandevistan]] with minimal side effects. He believes this makes him one in a million, and he quickly gains reputation as an edgerunner and attracts unwanted attention from Arasaka [[spoiler:for their [[MiniMecha cyberskeleton]] project]] thanks to his heightened tolerance. However, he isn't unique. [[spoiler:He was just one of multiple prospects on Arasaka's list. And even his high tolerance is just that: tolerance. Eventually, [[CyberneticsEatYourSoul his heavy augmenting catches up with him and he teeters on the edge of cyberpsychosis]] even ''before'' he ends up installing the cyberskeleton. And when he squares up with [[LivingLegend Adam Smasher]], an '''actual''' [[FullConversionCyborg one in a million]], [[HopelessBossFight Adam beats David down without breaking a sweat]] and tears the cyberskeleton to pieces, all while [[TheReasonYouSuckSpeech mocking David for thinking he was "special"]]. And just as a nail in the coffin, Adam Smasher casually makes use of his own Sandevistan, and when questioned dismisses it as "[[UniquenessDecay a rudimentary implant]]"]].

* ''Anime/CyberpunkEdgerunners'': David Martinez's physiology gives him greater tolerance to cybernetic implants than the average person, letting him use a military grade [[SuperSpeed Sandevistan]] with minimal side effects. He believes this makes him one in a million, and he quickly gains reputation as an edgerunner and attracts unwanted attention from Arasaka [[spoiler:for their [[MiniMecha cyberskeleton]] project]] thanks to his heightened tolerance. However, he isn't unique. [[spoiler:He was just one of multiple prospects on Arasaka's list. And even his high tolerance is just that: tolerance. Eventually, [[CyberneticsEatYourSoul his heavy augmenting catches up with him and he teeters on the edge of cyberpsychosis]] even ''before'' he ends up installing the cyberskeleton. And when he squares up with [[LivingLegend Adam Smasher]], an '''actual''' one in a million, [[HopelessBossFight Adam beats David down without breaking a sweat]] and tears the cyberskeleton to pieces, all while [[TheReasonYouSuckSpeech mocking David for thinking he was "special"]]. And just as a nail in the coffin, Adam Smasher casually makes use of his own Sandevistan, and when questioned dismisses it as "[[UniquenessDecay a rudimentary implant]]"]].

* ''WesternAnimation/InsideJob2021'': Brett is TheGenericGuy among his super genius, alien and mutated peers in Cognito. That still means he is fairly smart and often the most mentally adjusted in the group. Also, played for laughs in ''Buzzkill'', where when fighting the rogues on the moon Brett is a heavy worlder in comparison and sends them flying easily.

** "[[Franchise/DragonBall Hercule Satan]] [[Recap/DeathBattleS02E28HerculeSatanVsDanHibiki vs.]] [[Franchise/StreetFighter Dan Hibiki]]": [[spoiler:This is the reason Hercule wins: Dan is a joke because he's a bad martial artist ''period'' while Hercule is a joke because he's a ''good ''martial artist in a world with guys who can casually blow up planets]].
** "WesternAnimation/StevenUniverse [[Recap/DeathBattleS08E07StevenUniverseVsStarButterfly vs.]] [[WesternAnimation/StarVsTheForcesOfEvil Star Butterfly]]": While Steven is the single strongest being in his home series, [[spoiler:Star proves ''that'' much more powerful than him that he couldn't win. [[WesternAnimation/StevenUniverseFuture At full power]], he struggles to adjust to a peaceful world where there's nothing left for him to fight and ultimately ''becomes'' his own show's FinalBoss. This puts Steven at a disadvantage against Star, who has always had something to fight until the final credits of her own show]].
** "[[ComicBook/{{Invincible}} Omni-Man]] [[Recap/DeathBattleS09E05OmniManVSHomelander vs.]] [[ComicBook/TheBoys Homelander]]" manages to show exactly how ''outclassed'' [[spoiler:Homelander really is against Omni-Man, though for some additional context: Homelander is from a setting [[LikeRealityUnlessNoted that is somewhat like the real world]] where aside from the occasional Supe; Homelander only had to fight against [[{{Muggles}} powerless humans]] armed with just guns and explosives, and as such [[UnskilledButStrong he didn't have any real reason to train or better himself]]. Omni-Man however, comes from a more [[StandardSuperheroSetting classical superhero setting]] [[TwentyMinutesIntoTheFuture that has slightly-higher tech available]] and is filled with plenty of {{Mad Scientist}}s, {{Alien Inva|sion}}ders, {{Kaiju}}, and [[EldritchAbomination Ancient Horrors]] in it for the superheroes of his setting to fight against; along with the fact that Omni-Man himself is a [[HadToBeSharp Vil]][[ProudWarriorRaceGuy trum]][[TheSocialDarwinist ite]]: A member of a galaxy-spanning empire that is [[ReallySevenHundredYearsOld well over a thousand years old]], [[TaughtByExperience and saw plenty of fights that had really tested his mettle]]: enough that Omni-Man saw no other choice [[StrongAndSkilled but to hone his skills to stay on top and survive]]]].
** "[[WesternAnimation/RickAndMorty Rick Sanchez]] [[Recap/DeathBattleS10E14RickSanchezVSTheDoctor vs.]] [[Series/DoctorWho The Doctor]]" notes that Rick rarely has to actually compete with someone his intellectual equal or superior [[spoiler:due to the Council of Ricks' Central Finite Curve preventing Rick from going to a universe where he's ''not'' the smartest person]], and tends to fare poorly when he ''does''. This [[spoiler:puts Rick at a disadvantage against the Doctor, who is not only smarter but has several millennia of experience over him and the tools needed to counter his tech]].

*** Which is driven home later on with the ArcVillain Caesar Clown, a Logia-type who has control over all types of chemical gas, including poisons. Pre-time skip, he would have been one of the most dangerous opponents the Straw Hats faced ''period'', but with Luffy coming out of two years of training (not to mention bringing an AcquiredPoisonImmunity and [[KryptoniteFactor Haki]] to the table), he looks like an utter chump once forced into a straight fight.

* In the [[Manga/TheLegendOfZeldaAkiraHimekawa manga adaptation]] of ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaTheMinishCap'', to the tiny Minish, the chicken-sized Cuccoos are enough of a threat that Librari is considered a hero for being able to take down one of them.

* In ''Fanfic/ASongOfIceAndFiresThatWerentAllMyFault'', [[Literature/TheDresdenFiles Harry Dresden]] is this in the world of ''Literature/ASongOfIceAndFire''. Dresden is, in his world, a supernatural middle-weight. While he's got a lot of raw power for a human wizard, he's half a century or more from his magical prime, there's a ''lot'' that he doesn't know, his magical stamina is likewise a work in progress, and in his world, human wizards are hindered by the Laws of Magic and are nowhere ''near'' the top of the tree for raw power (they tend to do their best work when they have time to prepare). However, he's now in a LowFantasy world where his abilities make him a fully fledged PersonOfMassDestruction - and that's before [[spoiler: his powers as [[LightningBruiser the Winter Knight]] re-emerge, and make him a MagicKnight]]. Consequently, the only thing that has a prayer of taking him on anywhere close to evenly is a full grown dragon - which, understandably, are in rather short supply when the story begins [[TheMagicComesBack (though that changes as time goes on)]].

* [[VillainProtagonist Darth Vulcan]] in ''Fanfic/TheRiseOfDarthVulcan'' finds himself transported to the world of [[WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic Equestria]] and sets himself up as a Villain in order to survive long enough to find a way to remove the Alicorn Amulet from him and return home again. Due to him being a closet-geek-turned-bully that had plenty of experience playing Strategy Games, reading over the Villains' Handbook for the Do's and Don'ts of being an Evil Overlord, and [[GenreSavvy general savviness]]: [[WakeUpCallBoss he easily runs entire circles around the Princesses, Element Bearers, and the Royal Guard]] who before were only used to dealing with [[CardCarryingVillain posturing villains]] like Discord and Queen Chrysalis that were easily defeated. And he does all this without incurring any fatalities on either side due to his adherence to ''ThouShallNotKill'' as a cardinal rule to his mayhem, with the only actual people that Darth Vulcan had confirmed to have killed were [[EvilVersusEvil other Villains and their minions.]] When he makes his big escape from Canterlot after being captured as the city slowly threatens to fall off the mountain because of Luna's actions in trying to catch him, [[ScrewThisImOuttaHere he just leaves them to their fate so he could escape]], and was called out on this by Princess Cadence who referred to him as a Monster. The trope kicks into full-gear as Darth Vulcan stops to explain to Cadence that [[HumansAreBastards his own world is filled with lying, cruel, and despicable people that do far worse things than he has done]], things which by all accounts would make Ted the closest thing to a ''saint'' in his world.

** Cloud is leagues stronger then the regular mooks and easily impresses the local members of Avalanche with his strength and talk of being a First-Class SOLDIER. Yet further in the game, it is not hard to notice that he isn't terribly impressive when put up against even the Third Class SOLDIER mooks. In story, he needs help just to fight one of the Turks and is caught with ease by a couple of them. [[spoiler:It turns out that he didn't make SOLDIER at all and his strength largely comes from being one of Hojo's science experiments with Sephiroth's cells to replicate his Reunion theory.]] Later in the game, he averts this and is considered one of the strongest people on the planet and the only hope to defeat Sephiroth. ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyVIIRemake'' averts this. As part of the AdaptationalBadass upgrades to the story, the party defeats more impressive enemies and bosses than those which appeared in the same parts in the original game. In the same vein, the boss of chapter 4 in ''Remake'' is Roche, a 3rd class SOLDIER; and Reno, who is fought earlier and in the boss battle corresponding to the one in the original game has Rude for backup, still nearly gets beaten.

** While she can't possibly be promoted (excluding #1 S-Class hero Blast, who doesn't show himself in public) Tatsumaki, who is treated by the association as the strongest member of the S-class, fits the trope as well: her telekinetic powers are ''immense'', to the point that when an alien warship tried to bombard the area she was in she casually stopped all their projectiles and sent them back much faster, but even she is outclassed by Lord Boros, Garou at his apex, and especially Saitama.