Superman Vs. Doctor Strange

[Bartmanhomer]

This is a good battle. Superman against a powerful spellcaster. I think Superman has finally met his match. Who do you think will win? Tell me your opinion on each fighter abilities and talents.

[Razade]

Must you start every vs thread you make with "This is a good battle"? Can't we decided that? As for this, I predict Superman wins because most people are going to pull any form of Superman mostly immune to magic. Like all your other vs threads there are practically no critera to meet. Where are they fighting? Etc etc etc.

[DemonicAngel]

Superman is known to be weak to magic. Doctor Strange is Sorcerer Supreme.

Supes gets his behind handed to him unless he kills strange without Strange actually knowing they're fighting (altough with teh amount of magical protection Strange has... i'm doubtful)

[Aotrs Commander]

Technically, Superman is not vulnerable to magic, he's just not resistant to it. I.e., in D&D terms, he doesn't get Spell Resistance or anything, but he still gets all his saves and doesn't take extra damage or something.

[Bartmanhomer]

Must you start every vs thread you make with "This is a good battle"? Can't we decided that? As for this, I predict Superman wins because most people are going to pull any form of Superman mostly immune to magic. Like all your other vs threads there are practically no critera to meet. Where are they fighting? Etc etc etc.

I can't help myself. LOL!

[Traab]

If strange can live long enough, he can sim sim salabim superman to the nearest hell dimension and move on with his day. Now, CAN he live long enough against a superman going for the kill? Damned if I know. What sort of tanking feats has strange shown himself capable of? If this was a screw attack death battle thing with a slow build up then my money is on strange. If this is a full scale mortal kombat style going for the throat from GO, then I think superman takes this. I think it comes down to who takes the fight seriously first. I mean, superman sees a human and so doesnt go infinite mass punch on him. Strange sees someone who is NOT an extradimensional horror from beyond the outer gates, so he doesnt pull out his hell lord battle level feats. You dont drop a nuke to stomp on an ant, you know? But when that ant grabs your boot and hurls you across the room, you start reconsidering the nuke option.

[Tvtyrant]

I vote that they go Batman vs. Superman on each other, then they get distracted by something else and buddy five. I'm not really a Dr. Strange reader, but he is basically if Batman discovered how to be Superman. Just like Bats he is hyper intelligent and obsessive, but is much stronger. As a result he is likely to spend the fight tearing Superman apart, but he is also smart enough to realize there is no point to the conflict and end it without killing Superman.

[Dorath]

Which versions of Strange and Superman? There's a huge range for both.

[Psyren]

I vote that they go Batman vs. Superman on each other, then they get distracted by something else and buddy five.

"And now, Kal-El, I finish you off - using the greatest spell I've ever researched, and named after my dear belated mother, Martha!"

[ArlEammon]

Doctor Strange is far more powerful but Superman is far faster.

Usually my money is on Superman if it's a one on one. If it's a conflict where Doctor Strange would bother fighting at all, then Doctor Strange usually wins.

[themaque]

I've seen it several times that Superman is weak or vulnerable to Magic. Morrigan has been able to mind control him several times and magic weapons often bypass his resistances.

I agree the previous poster who said it depends on who takes this serious FIRST. Strange is the one they turn to when the Hulk goes mega-mad and they need someone to dump him in another dimension. However, superman can move faster than the human eye can follow and take him out quick if he wanted to apply that level of force.

So we really need more refined combat parameters, but rough guess I say Strange.

[The Glyphstone]

I've seen it several times that Superman is weak or vulnerable to Magic. Morrigan has been able to mind control him several times and magic weapons often bypass his resistances.

I agree the previous poster who said it depends on who takes this serious FIRST. Strange is the one they turn to when the Hulk goes mega-mad and they need someone to dump him in another dimension. However, superman can move faster than the human eye can follow and take him out quick if he wanted to apply that level of force.

So we really need more refined combat parameters, but rough guess I say Strange.

If I had to pick one, I'd expect Strange to take it seriously first, because the nature of his power means he can usually undo whatever he's done with a similar expenditure of power. Teleport someone into another dimension, you can also bring him back. Superman punching someone's face into goo is a lot harder to un-punch, so he's generally more hesitant to go all-out from the start.

[Darth Ultron]

In general Doctor Strange would win this. A 'simple' Crimson Bands of Cyttrak and Superman is done. It does not matter that Superman has stupid powers like drop kicking galaxies as strength does not matter vs magic.

And assuming that they had any preparation time, Dr. Strange could discover Supermans stupid vulnerability to kryponite and use it against him. After all if Batman, and others can figure it out, anyone can.

Though this is one of the questions with no real answer. It would really depend on the writer, and whatever the people in charge wanted. So if it's all pro-DC, then Superman will just sneeze and defeat Dr. Strange and everyone else in the universe. Pro-marvel has Dr. Strange wining, of course.

[The Glyphstone]

In general Doctor Strange would win this. A 'simple' Crimson Bands of Cyttrak and Superman is done. It does not matter that Superman has stupid powers like drop kicking galaxies as strength does not matter vs magic.

And assuming that they had any preparation time, Dr. Strange could discover Supermans stupid vulnerability to kryponite and use it against him. After all if Batman, and others can figure it out, anyone can.

Though this is one of the questions with no real answer. It would really depend on the writer, and whatever the people in charge wanted. So if it's all pro-DC, then Superman will just sneeze and defeat Dr. Strange and everyone else in the universe. Pro-marvel has Dr. Strange wining, of course.

The thing is, it's not Superman's speed that makes him a threat to Strange, it's his speed; even golden-age Superman can move at faster-than-light speeds without straining himself. Strange still has to actually cast his spells, and if Supes lands that lethal punch before Strange can get the words out, he wins. But Superman has to decide to go lethal for that to happen, and it's rare for him to do so against an enemy he hasn't already tried to disable non-lethally.

[Mato]

So I think most of this has been discussed in the Superman vs D&D wizard thread. The key difference here is that one was impossibly generic and unnamed wizard that may or may not have been optimized or worthy of any mention used a couple specific D&D spells and won, but now we're talking about the most powerful wizard in all of existence who regular exceeds matches Eternity's power levels.

For an example, Dr Strange countered and won against a five infinity gem using Adam Warlock. Dr Strange was able to instantly teleport through time and space, prevent his memories from being altered, side step reality revisions, and temporally match the energy output of "all power and energy that ever has or will exist" while providing his own soul based attack to win. Because in the marvel universe, even with all the power, knowledge, and time in a universe augmenting the ability to rewrite reality as you see fit still won't even put you close to the top ranked beings. And Superman has none of those.

[Drascin]

I think that, as people have mentioned, this is essentially rocket tag. Whoever goes in serious first wins. Strange can't defend fast enough to stop Superman if he really comes at him with superspeed on, and Superman can't really defend against Strange if he pulls out the big spell guns.

Well, unless we're talking latest Doc Strange. That guy is kind of an idiot and probably gets punted. But Classic Superman vs Classic Strange, yeah, I'm calling rocket tag.

[Mato]

I think that, as people have mentioned, this is essentially rocket tag.I feel like you are ignoring how Superman rarely uses hyper speeds and involuntarily holds back in order to empower him to make the point that if you're fast enough to can win anything.

And your point, if you're fast enough to can win anything, doesn't even favor Superman. Dr Strange can sense threats access dimensions so before you even started shoving the characters together to fight Dr Strange was already ready for it. By using projection clones whatever Superman attempts to attack isn't even Dr Strange either. And Strange's shields are more than proficient at blocking anything Superman can throw at him anyway. Like a Cosmic Power imbued Nova, a female Human Torch can could heat up to be hotter than the sun without it, couldn't even damage Dr Strange's mansion from the inside so I'm pretty sure Dr Strange's toaster could tank Superman's eye beams without burning any bread. And even if you still cling to Superman wins, Dr Strange was imbued with a curse long ago that allows him to resurrect himself as a vampire. It's not something he would ever want to do, but if you're ignoring the character of Superman then it's fair game to ignore the character of Dr Strange too. And then Dr Strange goes back in time before all of this started and very politely reminds you that "going first" is a very subjective term.

Officially, this thread even has a pusdo-answer. In the Superman & Fantastic Four crossover Superman becomes convinced Galactus destroyed Krypton and flies out to beat him, Galactus subdues him and turns Superman into a herald, Reeds jogs Superman's memory, and a Cosmic Power imbued Superman gets whooped by Galactus a second time. Superman still thinks they, as in learning he needs to team up with the Four to win, still needs to beat him but Reeds talks him out of it, reveals Galactus didn't blow up Krypton, and the status quo is returned.

And Dr Strange curbstomped Galactus to the point of passed out on the ground and dying with a snap of his fingers. Dr Strange > Galactus > Cosmic Superman by the official universes.

[The Glyphstone]

Squirrel Girl also beat Galactus. The Transitive Property of Butt-Whooping isn't something that can be properly applied in a superhero universe, because the winner is highly dependent on the writer and which book the fight is taking place in, not to mention side considerations like Worfing established 'tough guys', and the generally inconsistent nature of comics continuity overall.

You're still fixated on the can/will dichotomy. Can a single-minded bloodthirsty clone-copy with all of Superman's powers and abilities but none of his psychological or personality traits punch Strange at 500x the speed of light before he can so much as think the first syllable of a spell? Yes. Will Superman, the Last Son of Krypton, Ka-El, Clark Kent of Earth do that? No.

[Darth Ultron]

The thing is, it's not Superman's speed that makes him a threat to Strange, it's his speed; even golden-age Superman can move at faster-than-light speeds without straining himself.

I thought Superman was slower then that? He is slower then the Flash, right? I though Superman was only ''faster then a bullet'', so like what 500 mph, not quite ''light speed''.

[BWR]

Isn't lightspeed 'faster than a speeding bullet'?
And in many cases being very FTL is still far slower than the Flash.

[The Glyphstone]

I thought Superman was slower then that? He is slower then the Flash, right? I though Superman was only ''faster then a bullet'', so like what 500 mph, not quite ''light speed''.

He was 'faster than a bullet' back in the 40's with Action Comics, along with 'stronger than a locomotive' and 'able to leap tall buildings'. He's undergone just a little power creep since then.

[Traab]

Squirrel Girl also beat Galactus. The Transitive Property of Butt-Whooping isn't something that can be properly applied in a superhero universe, because the winner is highly dependent on the writer and which book the fight is taking place in, not to mention side considerations like Worfing established 'tough guys', and the generally inconsistent nature of comics continuity overall.

You're still fixated on the can/will dichotomy. Can a single-minded bloodthirsty clone-copy with all of Superman's powers and abilities but none of his psychological or personality traits punch Strange at 500x the speed of light before he can so much as think the first syllable of a spell? Yes. Will Superman, the Last Son of Krypton, Ka-El, Clark Kent of Earth do that? No.

So has ghost rider. Really, galactus is there to job for heroes on a regular basis. And as for characters, keep in mind the standard death battle assumption has to be that each participant is going for the kill. Otherwise virtually any battle with a hero ends in non death. Of course this gets complicated because of watching things like Death Battle, where each combatant has to slowly ramp up to their peak before going for the kill, otherwise half the fights would last a few seconds tops.

[The Glyphstone]

There is no real 'standard' battle parameters, that's the problem. Of course a 'death battle' is going to end in death, that's sort of in the name, but not all versus matches have to be to the death. If the OP doesn't state one way or the other, it remains a valid question and may result in two valid results of the fight.

[Traab]

There is no real 'standard' battle parameters, that's the problem. Of course a 'death battle' is going to end in death, that's sort of in the name, but not all versus matches have to be to the death. If the OP doesn't state one way or the other, it remains a valid question and may result in two valid results of the fight.

I suppose, but generally I assume its a death battle unless otherwise stated. Like the green lanterns versus warhammer or whatever. And in the case of a fight to the death you cant just say, "Well it would be out of character for him to go full out or to go for the kill" because that defeats the entire point. Now if we want to make it a "Both comic characters have reason to fight each other and wont stop till someone wins. Both act in character aside from being determined to fight." That makes for an interesting setup. If neither has advance knowledge of the other, I honestly am not sure. I think strange would win because superman historically has a lot of trouble with spell casters and strange is pretty much THE spell caster.

[Kish]

If they become sociopaths who hate each other while there's anything from a building to multiple planets between them, Strange makes himself undetectable with one spell and turns Superman's legs into Kryptonite with his second spell. Battle over.

If they become sociopaths who hate each other while they're ten feet away from each other looking at each other, whoever reacts first wins.

If they are somehow convinced that the other one needs to be stopped but retain their comic book moral codes (so nothing about the recent no-good very bad movie), the one who's used to needing to defeat physically superhuman enemies without killing them (Strange) wins, or the one who isn't used to physically easy to break foes who are dangerous as long as they're conscious hits too hard with his first punch, Strange dies, and everyone is very unhappy.

I'm largely ignoring the more Waco Kid-like applications of Superman's speed because the comic book writers forget it pretty much every time Superman fights anyone it would trivialize the fight against.

[The Glyphstone]

I suppose, but generally I assume its a death battle unless otherwise stated. Like the green lanterns versus warhammer or whatever. And in the case of a fight to the death you cant just say, "Well it would be out of character for him to go full out or to go for the kill" because that defeats the entire point. Now if we want to make it a "Both comic characters have reason to fight each other and wont stop till someone wins. Both act in character aside from being determined to fight." That makes for an interesting setup. If neither has advance knowledge of the other, I honestly am not sure. I think strange would win because superman historically has a lot of trouble with spell casters and strange is pretty much THE spell caster.

See, I generally assume the latter, unless it's a case where 'to the death' is still the go-to-default IC option for the character(s) in question. It generally makes for more interesting setups, and just feels better to me as a side effect of all my RPG playing; a character is more than just the sum of their character sheet/power feats, making (IMO) their personality and temperament just as much a component of their fighting ability as laser beam eyes or whatever.

[DotCom616]

Dr Strange's powerset varies a lot. In his WWH apprearance he tries his hardest to take down Green Scar Hulk who's "just" a physical damage hero and he fails. Superman could take this.

[paddyfool]

Yes, but WWH was frankly quite silly at times.

[Dorath]

WWH dumbed down everyone not named Hulk. High end Strange has automatic force fields that can survive supernovas, enough time to go astral or Crimson Band Superman.

[Drascin]

Dr Strange's powerset varies a lot. In his WWH apprearance he tries his hardest to take down Green Scar Hulk who's "just" a physical damage hero and he fails. Superman could take this.

Strange is subject to a LOT of fluctuation. A LOT.

Sometimes Strange is destroying worlds with a wave of his hand. And other times he's getting nearly killed by a nonpowered dude with a gun.

Such is the superhero universe, where cosmic powered heroes that shrug at supernovas can find themselves powerless to act from a properly applied Full Nelson (I don't think Norrin is EVER going to live that one down :smalltongue:).

[digiman619]

Every fight vs Superman can be answered with one question: Does Supes know that attack is coming? Because the laws of physics are barely suggestions to him, and if he knows it's coming, he can act with inexorable power and infinite speed to destroy them. This is half of why he's a boring character. The other half is that WAY TOO MANY of his writers treat him as a Jesus allegory, which was nothing like what his creators intended.

[themaque]

See, I generally assume the latter, unless it's a case where 'to the death' is still the go-to-default IC option for the character(s) in question. It generally makes for more interesting setups, and just feels better to me as a side effect of all my RPG playing; a character is more than just the sum of their character sheet/power feats, making (IMO) their personality and temperament just as much a component of their fighting ability as laser beam eyes or whatever.

I'm going to have to agree with Glyphstone on set up for such a debate. Standard should be in character not "Deathbattle rules" unless specifically spelled out. Despite it's popularity and how much I do enjoy the show, it doesn't give a good comparison for how two characters would interact if you've already started striping part of their... character.

[5a Violista]

I think they should have a knitting battle. It seems like the sort of thing that would come up in a crossover comic that was also doing a crossover with Greek mythology, where Athena went insane and challenged Earth's mightiest heroes into a knitting contest (failure would result in the sun being turned into a spider, obviously). So, in the finals to decide who would knit against Athena, Dr. Strange faced the Man of Steel.

Superman obviously takes advantage of his canonical Super-knitting ability, while Doctor Strange is using the best of his magical abilities to knit. They both knit for the entire day, trying to surpass each other. Sometimes it looks like Superman is ahead; other times, it looks like Doctor Strange is ahead.

Then, just before sunset something interrupts their battle. They have to fight off [insert villain-of-the-week here] and, both being exhausted from knitting all day, need to team together to survive. They realize that rather than just one person knitting, they would have a greater chance of being Earth's mightiest heroes by working together to defeat the corrupted Athena. They knit, and save the Earth. Athena accuses them of cheating, and using her godly magic turns the two heroes against each other in an all-out brawl by mind-dominating Superman (as is what usually happens).

They fight for some time, in spite of being exhausted from all that knitting.

Doctor Strange transports them both into an alternate dimension to prevent the Earth from being accidentally destroyed. They both fight each other to within an inch of life, at which point Superman finally uses his martial arts training to throw off the mind control (which also is what usually happens), but they have to continue the appearance of fighting or else Athena will realize that her mind-control has failed. So through a series of fist-exchanging, they manage to communicate to each other their plan.

Superman winds up for his most powerful punch ever, flying at immense speeds, while Doctor Strange secretly prepares a translocation magic. Just before Superman hits Strange, he translocates himself and Athena, so she gets hit and it somehow was the cure to the insanity thing she had.

Superman and Strange bid adieu. Nobody ever speaks of this incident again.

Oh, right. Almost forgot: the front cover has some weird art that has nothing to do with what happened in the comic, and had Hawkeye in a sexy chest-and-butt pose.

That's how I see a battle between the two to turn out.

[The Glyphstone]

You forgot to have Wolverine make a cameo.

[Lentrax]

Using a Greek god in such a crossover event also means Wonder Woman probably needs to show up somewhere. Probably as the one to thank Strange and Supes for curing her half-sister or something.

[ben-zayb]

Speaking of crossovers, wasn't Doctor Strangefate the most powerful being in the noncanon Amalgam-verse?

[Mato]

Speaking of crossovers, wasn't Doctor Strangefate the most powerful being in the noncanon Amalgam-verse?Amalgram is canon, at least to Marvel since they run a huge multiverse instead of rebooting their cosmetology every five years. Even the Cinematic Universe is canon and it butchers everything the comics have done, simply because it's Earth #199,999.

And Dr Strangefate (strange + professor x + dr fate) is called the most powerful being in the Amalgram universe. And the only guy he has lost to is Access. Due to Access's, well access. Currently the Amalgram universe was kicked into a pocket dimension, which I like to think is a great euphemism for the Amalgram comics line being shelved or sitting in a drawer until Marvel & DC come together again, by Dr Strange so Dr Strangefate can't be a threat to any other universe anymore.

[TeChameleon]

Minor point of order; Superman canonically has super-Weaving (MISTER Aaaanderson...) powers, not super-knitting powers.

And you really have to kind of wonder what it says about the collective psyche of the ancient Greeks, that they decided they were gonna worship the ridiculous collection of idiot douchenozzles that is the Greek pantheon...

[Traab]

Minor point of order; Superman canonically has super-Weaving (MISTER Aaaanderson...) powers, not super-knitting powers.

And you really have to kind of wonder what it says about the collective psyche of the ancient Greeks, that they decided they were gonna worship the ridiculous collection of idiot douchenozzles that is the Greek pantheon...

If they didnt worship the greek gods they would all be impregnated by golden showers and geese. At least this way it was only a few random folks. Its always best to keep on the good side of easily ticked off omnipotent beings.

[Dotafanatic]

Haha, ten times better than Batman vs Spiderman.

[Kyberwulf]

The thing about a lot of "death battles" that I seem to think. Is how would a fight go down if some kind of plot didn't step in and say, you guys are heroes and should be friends, or something randomly reminds them they shouldn't take that last step off their rails *cough* Martha *cough* That is what stops most of the fights between heroes. That means, for the most part, their personalities would remain intact.

In this one, I think Strange would win, simply because Superman is to used to hold back all the time. By the time he would realize he shouldn't be, Strange would have used something that would get Supes.