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Edited by Mrph1 on Jul 29th 2024 at 3:09:00 PM
What exactly?
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Evo Wanda was also an emotional mess to the point where Magneto had to retroactively give her a happy childhood so she would stop coming after him. Good times.
The question of who beats who in a fight is not just power and fighting skill, but also luck, willingness to fight, surprise factor, mental stability, and health.
edited 17th Jun '16 8:53:16 AM by flameboy21th
Non Indicative Username![]()
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I'm re-watching Evolution for the first time in years and her debut episode is as good as I remember. I think the writers had Magneto mindrape her because they realized they had made her far too powerful and also far too willing to use all that power.
"Scarlet Witch OP plz nerf."
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and
This is perfectly true, like the Pokemon example earlier. Rock Paper Scissors powers are interesting.
However, some fights are just simple, no matter how skilled one opponent is. Take this swordsman for instance. He's very skilled.
Unless the power disparity is completely ridiculous like Hawkeye vs. Thanos, then no, there's still plenty of wiggle room in the writing.
In the history of comics I'm sure just about everyone has been beaten by everyone.
Eh. This isn't a video game. Comic power levels are something people love to debate over but it's ultimately meaningless.
edited 17th Jun '16 9:05:03 AM by comicwriter
Also quite frankly, a weaker opponent managing to overcome a more powerful one is nothing new. It's something called an underdog story, and those have been around as long as fiction has.
Part of the fun in Civil War was watching the unique and clever ways the combatants used their skills or abilities to compensate.
You do not do your characters' any favors by damaging their reputation. A superhero and especially a supervillain live and die based on their rep. Take someone like Galactus. You NEED Galactus to be intimidating. You NEED readers to think any story where the Big G is involved is going to be of cosmic level significance because it's goddam Galactus.
Yet, because every writer wants to write a Galactus story, yet by his very nature Galactus must lose in almost any situation, his reputation is ruined. You have soiled your character and broken the immersion that is the lifeblood of storytelling. If I don't buy Galactus as the be-all and end-all, then he is an utter failure and the writer is an utter failure.
Hulk is obviously not Galactus but he has a rep. "The Strongest There Is."
I guess just add an addendum. Hulk strongest there is except puny human with an A on his head.
Squirrel Girl friendshipped Galactus into defeat, there really isn't much to trying to establish hard and fast power level rules and assume they work all the time when there are so many factors to consider. They're fun little thought experiments for considering what characters would do in certain situations and what would lead up to it and not much else.
The Blog The ArtReally? Just look at this:
Not sure if I buy that immersion is "the lifeblood of storytelling". There are other ways to tell a story.
Oh God! Natural light!Quite.
Black Panther putting the Silver Surfer in an arm bar is considered one of the stupidest points in his character history.
Conversely, Spider-Man besting the Juggernaut through a combination of skill, intelligence, and determination is hailed as one of his all-time greatest moments.
Any character can beat any character; what makes the story interesting is the how.
edited 17th Jun '16 9:33:42 AM by TobiasDrake
My Tumblr. Currently side-by-side liveblogging Digimon Adventure, sub vs dub.![]()
The point of the scene was supposed to be that the Surfer let that happen because he wanted to hear what the FF had to say, but it was very poorly conveyed by the dialogue and art.
Per the writer:
edited 17th Jun '16 9:40:26 AM by comicwriter
"Not sure if I buy that immersion is "the lifeblood of storytelling". There are other ways to tell a story."
If the story hasn't immersed me and made me empathize with these characters so I want them to win and avoid harm, so that the very idea of seeing them hurt or killed makes me feel dread, it's not doing a very good job.
Yes, we all know Status Quo Is God. It's one of the primary banes of comic books. But a good writer can at least make you forget that, even if your beloved character dies, they'll just come back eventually.
"Conversely, Spider-Man besting the Juggernaut through a combination of skill, intelligence, and determination is hailed as one of his all-time greatest moments."
And Spiderman beating a goddam Herald of Galactus is such bullshit that it's a rule on a website that such things should be ignored for how dumb they are and not taken into account when factoring in Spidey's strength.
edited 17th Jun '16 9:43:57 AM by Nikkolas
The other thing with power level debates is people tend to exaggerate what raw stats actually mean. There were some Spidey fans who were angry at Civil War because he got beaten up by Cap and punched by Ant-Man, which they claimed was impossible because Peter's Spider-Sense should have allowed him to dodge it. That makes me wonder if those people had ever actually read a comic or watched the prior Spider-Man movies or shows, because that is not how his Sense works at all.
Neither of those were surprises to him. He knew Cap and Ant-Man were there. He was actively fighting them. His Spider-Sense just gives him an early warning that danger is about to happen to him.
My Tumblr. Currently side-by-side liveblogging Digimon Adventure, sub vs dub.Comic book writing has a lot of problems and admittedly "this character was able to beat this character despite it being questionable as hell" is one that does pop up. It's basically what led to "Batgod" and other nonsense like that.
i don't usually pay much attention to power level debates otherwise though, for the most part I find them uninteresting.
Jon Watts talks about the diversity of the Homecoming cast
. I like that he pointed out it's rather simple because that's what New York actually looks like.
