Death Battle 5: Mister Rogers in a Bloodstained Sweater

[Delicious Taffy]

"The fight raged on for a century
Many lives were claimed, but eventually
The champion stood
The rest saw their better
Mister Rogers in a bloodstained sweater"
-Neil Cicierega, The Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny (2005)

Continuing on from the previous thread (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?557507-Death-Battle-IV-The-Source-Material-Loses).

[Traab]

Woot! marking for future.

[Dragonexx]

I think this is an interesting video.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nCN6fZZQ-cc

[Devonix]

Well enough put together video but I do disagree with it. End of the day, the animation doesn't matter, it's just for fun. They've stated it multiple times. Hell the entire reason the animation can't matter is because it's impossible for it to showcase the various ways the fight could go. This is known and stated.

[Anteros]

I didn't watch the video, but of course the animation matters. It's the only reason anyone even knows that they exist. People certainly aren't following them for their logical and unbiased reasoning.

[Devonix]

I didn't watch the video, but of course the animation matters. It's the only reason anyone even knows that they exist. People certainly aren't following them for their logical and unbiased reasoning.

Let's put it this way, it doesn't matter as part of analysis. The animation and the analysis are two separate things.

[CarpeGuitarrem]

I didn't watch the video, but of course the animation matters. It's the only reason anyone even knows that they exist. People certainly aren't following them for their logical and unbiased reasoning.
Yeah, at the end of the day, we're watching for the show that they put on, which is also why the 1-Minute Melee spinoff works.

The analysis is just an excuse for the fight.

[HolyDraconus]

If the animation doesnt matter why reference it during the breakdown of the analysis?

[Devonix]

If the animation doesnt matter why reference it during the breakdown of the analysis?

what they are animating are some things that could happen, as well as some things that are just cool to look at. End of the day the animation doesn't have any bearing on the analysis, specifically because the animation is done after they figure out who's gonna win. After that it's just trying to make it as entertaining as possible.

And you can't have an entertaining Stomp fight with the way most of the matchups pan out.

[Reddish Mage]

what they are animating are some things that could happen, as well as some things that are just cool to look at. End of the day the animation doesn't have any bearing on the analysis, specifically because the animation is done after they figure out who's gonna win. After that it's just trying to make it as entertaining as possible.

And you can't have an entertaining Stomp fight with the way most of the matchups pan out.

What Ben has said, aside from the times they have said the animation is for entertainment, is that animation is for both the "educational" purpose of showing how they think it would play out and for entertainment.

I think its pretty clear, after listening to them actually talk about what they do in the weekly "DB Cast" is that the animation is supposed to be true to the characters...mostly...However, they take liberties purely for the purpose of making the fights entertaining to watch.

So talking skull is right, the animation is meant to be true to the fight except as a defense. Nevertheless, he's wrong to criticize how they animate the fight just like when he attacks who DB chooses to fight whom.

Blue skull and other critics are arbitrarily imposing a lot of rules on web show. There's a limit to how much the internet community should expect out of a 15 minute internet production that purports to settle impossible fights between reality-breaking characters that have been inconsistently portrayed in different media. Expecting animation to be a consistent with a definitive portrayal of the character is absurd, especially as the official material doesn't itself adhere to a stringent standard.

What they won't take liberty with, and they maintain this without exception week after week, is who they say wins the fight. That they do based on their analysis of who the crew actually think actually wins in accordance with the "Death Battle rules" (which they change on occasion and only introduced in like Season 3).

There's only like four rules that are displayed briefly at the end of the battles along with the credits. The rules are things like "the characters don't know each other unless it states they do in their canon" (so almost never) or that the only personality trait they change is the character's willingness to kill (how they fight and other personality traits remain the same). Also they decided that "all official material" can be drawn from (not just canon).

Some things this thread has decided is a "rule" such as "what's said about the scope character's powers don't count" (sometimes you can point to comic panels where ridiculous things are said that are never shown) or "what other people do don't count" (sometimes weak characters beat other characters that are really really really stronger) are not among these rules. Recent fights can be pointed to to show they've been inconsistent on these sorts of things.

[Lord Raziere]

Thank you Reddish for once again stating all the problems with something as if its a defense. By all means keep convincing me that Death Battle is a bad show with your efforts to do the opposite!

[Reddish Mage]

Thank you Reddish for once again stating all the problems with something as if its a defense. By all means keep convincing me that Death Battle is a bad show with your efforts to do the opposite!

It is what it is. If you think its a bad show for being a (mostly) unauthorized web-show and for failure to achieve a definitive animated portrayal or a perfectly consistent analysis year to year you will never find a good show in this space.

[Rater202]

The amination means something when the Animation shows a character doing something they can't do.

Like Green Lantern managing to hurt Alien X with an attack that could only possibly be an insubstantial fraction of an amount of energy that Alien X literally didn't notice going off in his face.

[Devonix]

The amination means something when the Animation shows a character doing something they can't do.

Like Green Lantern managing to hurt Alien X with an attack that could only possibly be an insubstantial fraction of an amount of energy that Alien X literally didn't notice going off in his face.

I'd say that still doesn't matter. The only thing important to me in the animation is " Is it entertaining. " I separate the fights from the actual characters. I can understand if it takes you out of the video though. I'm just willing to suspend my disbelief for the fights and treat them as something separate.

To me the fights are just like watching One minute Melee it's just for fun.

[Rater202]

The animation is t=supposed to be a representation of the data.

saying Green Lantern wins based on data is one thing, but you have to show him winning in a way that makes fricking sense.

Alien X tanked the Big Bang.

a small drop taken friom 1/7 of an unknown fraction of all the energy in the universe isn't gonna do jack.

You can't just make up an ending. It has to fit the data and from my own research the animations often don't fit the data.

[Devonix]

The animation is t=supposed to be a representation of the data.

saying Green Lantern wins based on data is one thing, but you have to show him winning in a way that makes fricking sense.

Alien X tanked the Big Bang.

a small drop taken friom 1/7 of an unknown fraction of all the energy in the universe isn't gonna do jack.

You can't just make up an ending. It has to fit the data and from my own research the animations often don't fit the data.

Lets put it this way. You have the Quicksilver vs Flash fight. If you portray a realistic fight, all we'd get is two seconds of Wally or Barry sucking the speed out of Pietro and then leaving him as a statue. Fight over. They have to just do what's entertaining. And what's efficient, or realistic for these fights wouldn't be entertaining for the most part.

[Rater202]

Lets put it this way. You have the Quicksilver vs Flash fight. If you portray a realistic fight, all we'd get is two seconds of Wally or Barry sucking the speed out of Pietro and then leaving him as a statue. Fight over. They have to just do what's entertaining. And what's efficient, or realistic for these fights wouldn't be entertaining for the most part.

There's a differance between being entertaining and flat out ignoring the data.

[Reddish Mage]

Lets put it this way. You have the Quicksilver vs Flash fight. If you portray a realistic fight, all we'd get is two seconds of Wally or Barry sucking the speed out of Pietro and then leaving him as a statue. Fight over. They have to just do what's entertaining. And what's efficient, or realistic for these fights wouldn't be entertaining for the most part.

Actually, given how we see superheroes actually fight in canon stories, its pretty realistic to allow a Flash fight against an inferior speedster to be allowed to build up dramatically, and even allow that opponent a hit or two (or even a dramatic "just about to win") before the Flash just lets it rip and creams him.

What's not in keeping with the comics is that the Flash goes and straight up murders Quicksilver at this point. However, that sort of thing is explicitly a Death Battle signature that is going to happen at the end regardless of how off-character (or off-putting) it is.


There's a differance between being entertaining and flat out ignoring the data.

I don't quite get that. They've analyzed Hal as universe destroyer+ type powers and essentially unlimited will. By their analysis, if Hal wants the punch to land, it will land.

I can see someone getting worked up about the way Hal gets slowly erased out of existence. At least I get that someone with a silly sense of animation purity getting worked up at seeing some small artistic liberty. However, Hal getting a punch in? Really, you've seen comics. Anyone can get a punch in on anyone. Its not like Alien X hasn't been knocked around before.

[Rater202]

Infinite Will means jack-squat.

There is canonically a finite amount of the Green Light of Will and ocne it's gone it's gone forever.

The Greenlight of Will is 1/7th of the Emotive Energy, which is, in turn, a fraction of all the life-energy in the universe, which is, in turn, a fraction of all the energy in a finite universe.

This was a plot point in a very major Green Lantern storyline.

If literally an entire universe's worth of energy exploding in your face didn't hurt you, then a ridiculously tiny fraction of that same energy isn't going o hurt you.

The only time Alien X has ever been knocked around was by another Celestial Sapien. Another Omnipotent.

[Kato]

Thank you Reddish for once again stating all the problems with something as if its a defense. By all means keep convincing me that Death Battle is a bad show with your efforts to do the opposite!

I think DB truly is amazing in being one of the things a lot of people who really hate it apparently invest a load of time into hating it, especially considering just ignoring it would be much easier.

That's not to say it hasn't has its flaws (despite which I enjoy it) but if I disliked it as much as some of you, I'd have stopped engaging with it years ago.

[Reddish Mage]

I think DB truly is amazing in being one of the things a lot of people who really hate it apparently invest a load of time into hating it, especially considering just ignoring it would be much easier.

That's not to say it hasn't has its flaws (despite which I enjoy it) but if I disliked it as much as some of you, I'd have stopped engaging with it years ago.

It purports to be a decisive treatment of "who would win" a superhero matchup. By its very nature that is going to attract disagreement of the "nah uh my guy is better" variety.

[Keltest]

Infinite Will means jack-squat.

There is canonically a finite amount of the Green Light of Will and ocne it's gone it's gone forever.

The Greenlight of Will is 1/7th of the Emotive Energy, which is, in turn, a fraction of all the life-energy in the universe, which is, in turn, a fraction of all the energy in a finite universe.

This was a plot point in a very major Green Lantern storyline.

If literally an entire universe's worth of energy exploding in your face didn't hurt you, then a ridiculously tiny fraction of that same energy isn't going o hurt you.

The only time Alien X has ever been knocked around was by another Celestial Sapien. Another Omnipotent.

Not that I disagree with the idea that Ben was completely robbed in that fight, but technically speaking, theres nothing that says every universe has an equal amount of energy. The problem was the fact that Alien X is pretty much by definition an I Win button, not that Hal was able to do something to it in a way that it actually noticed.

[Rater202]

Not that I disagree with the idea that Ben was completely robbed in that fight, but technically speaking, theres nothing that says every universe has an equal amount of energy. The problem was the fact that Alien X is pretty much by definition an I Win button, not that Hal was able to do something to it in a way that it actually noticed.

They used Hal's apparent ability to travel through time to justify his win.

In the animation, they had him use this after Alien X turned back time to avoid a fatal wound that Hal inflicted with a spear made of Green Light and then mentioned turning back time.

The entire sequence of events is based on Hal managing to inflict a serious wound.

Which the data points say couldn't possibly happen.

[Keltest]

They used Hal's apparent ability to travel through time to justify his win.

In the animation, they had him use this after Alien X turned back time to avoid a fatal wound that Hal inflicted with a spear made of Green Light and then mentioned turning back time.

The entire sequence of events is based on Hal managing to inflict a serious wound.

Which the data points say couldn't possibly happen.

Well that makes the animation silly, but it doesn't mean Hal couldn't have done that earlier, it just means the animators thought it was cooler than Nth dimensional chess with lots of time travel that would be completely incomprehensible. The animation is just there to look cool and attract interest, not actually explain how a battle would go.

[HolyDraconus]

Well that makes the animation silly, but it doesn't mean Hal couldn't have done that earlier, it just means the animators thought it was cooler than Nth dimensional chess with lots of time travel that would be completely incomprehensible. The animation is just there to look cool and attract interest, not actually explain how a battle would go.
Eh, the whole fight was a robbery in the making. Ben has actually MORE combat experience than Hal, with multiple timelines overlapping bs among other things, other forms of power, like magic, and was stated to be up there too with his capabilities, and of course, has straight up at minimum two defenses against "cut off arm with scissors", one of which is that the device wouldn't allow it, and the other is that it STILL works even separate from his body " since the same episode that he lost his arm he was far more removed from it than a couple inches."

[Reddish Mage]

Eh, the whole fight was a robbery in the making. Ben has actually MORE combat experience than Hal, with multiple timelines overlapping bs among other things, other forms of power, like magic, and was stated to be up there too with his capabilities, and of course, has straight up at minimum two defenses against "cut off arm with scissors", one of which is that the device wouldn't allow it, and the other is that it STILL works even separate from his body " since the same episode that he lost his arm he was far more removed from it than a couple inches."

Which episode and series had Ben lose his arm?

The watch’s defense won’t let it be removed normally and there’s a fail safe where it will automatically transform him. Those are the two already mentioned (both in the DB cast which they address it).

[Man on Fire]

The animation is t=supposed to be a representation of the data.

saying Green Lantern wins based on data is one thing, but you have to show him winning in a way that makes fricking sense.

Alien X tanked the Big Bang.

a small drop taken friom 1/7 of an unknown fraction of all the energy in the universe isn't gonna do jack.

You can't just make up an ending. It has to fit the data and from my own research the animations often don't fit the data.

I will counterpoint. If this was an official Green lantern story written by Geoff Johns, considered THE Green lantern writer of the modern age...it would play exactly like this. Exactly. Up to people losing their hands, Hal Jordan damaging and tanking attacks from a godlike entity and pulling out obscure ability not seen since Silver Age to win the fight.

[Reddish Mage]

I will counterpoint. If this was an official Green lantern story written by Geoff Johns, considered THE Green lantern writer of the modern age...it would play exactly like this. Exactly. Up to people losing their hands, Hal Jordan damaging and tanking attacks from a godlike entity and pulling out obscure ability not seen since Silver Age to win the fight.

Sometimes I feel like we don't have people that actually read DC comics in this thread. Can you give us a story or two we haven't mentioned where Hal does this sort of thing?

[Prime32]

I will counterpoint. If this was an official Green lantern story written by Geoff Johns, considered THE Green lantern writer of the modern age...it would play exactly like this. Exactly. Up to people losing their hands, Hal Jordan damaging and tanking attacks from a godlike entity and pulling out obscure ability not seen since Silver Age to win the fight.And if it was an official Ben 10 story written by his writers?

[Keltest]

And if it was an official Ben 10 story written by his writers?

Then Ben and Hal would learn an important lesson about themselves and walk away as friends?

[Anteros]

Sometimes I feel like we don't have people that actually read DC comics in this thread. Can you give us a story or two we haven't mentioned where Hal does this sort of thing?

I read DC comics quite a bit and as far as I'm aware Hal is not capable of time travel, nor is he capable of fighting omnipotent beings.

I'm sure there's a story somewhere where he does it, because comics are dumb and inconsistent, but it's far from his typical depiction. He's usually a planet buster at best, and I can't think of a single story in the dozens of his arcs that I've read where he's been capable of time travel. Parralax could probably do those things, but Parralax isn't Hal. It's a being that was possessing him for a time that he explicitly got rid of. He was also the Spectre for a bit, who can ostensibly do literally anything, but that's another temporary power up that he explicitly no longer has.

[Devonix]

I read DC comics quite a bit and as far as I'm aware Hal is not capable of time travel, nor is he capable of fighting omnipotent beings.

I'm sure there's a story somewhere where he does it, because comics are dumb and inconsistent, but it's far from his typical depiction. He's usually a planet buster at best, and I can't think of a single story in the dozens of his arcs that I've read where he's been capable of time travel. Parralax could probably do those things, but Parralax isn't Hal. It's a being that was possessing him for a time that he explicitly got rid of. He was also the Spectre for a bit, who can ostensibly do literally anything, but that's another temporary power up that he explicitly no longer has.

It's comics, everyone has done everything if you look hard enough. That being said. how he was depicted in DBattle is Technically true, but I'm going to toss in that whole, " spirit of the character thing again. "

[Anteros]

It's comics, everyone has done everything if you look hard enough. That being said. how he was depicted in DBattle is Technically true, but I'm going to toss in that whole, " spirit of the character thing again. "

Believe me, you're preaching to the choir here.

[SKarious]

So, is anyone still invested enough to bet on the upcoming fight?
I'm going with Cage winning. While Falcon might have more raw power and possibly better reflexes, Cage has him beat in experience, technique and consistent wins.

[Lemmy]

There was a time GL could time-travel... At that time, he also had a weakness to wood and the color yellow. So they kept their power but not the weakness. They also assumed Hal is able to do a bunch of other things just because other GL are seen doing them (that like assuming every Sorcerer knows every spell another Sorcerer has used). Finally, their justification for Ben having his arm cut is just that a villain, at one point, wanted to do it (but never got the chance to actually try). And that's just the stuff I can think off the top of my head.

It's like the meme goes...

GvS: "I'm the most controversial and clearly biased DB match."
B10xGL: "Hold my space-beer..."

[Keltest]

There was a time GL could time-travel... At that time, he also had a weakness to wood and the color yellow. So they kept their power but not the weakness. They also assumed Hal is able to do a bunch of other things just because other GL are seen doing them (that like assuming every Sorcerer knows every spell another Sorcerer has used). Finally, their justification for Ben having his arm cut is just that a villain, at one point, wanted to do it (but never got the chance to actually try). And that's just the stuff I can think off the top of my head.

It's like the meme goes...

GvS: "I'm the most controversial and clearly biased DB match."
B10xGL: "Hold my space-beer..."
I don't think theres a lot of controversy here. That match was poorly done.

[Anteros]

Well, the most biased was definitely when they had their own character beat Tifa. The most poorly thought out was...gosh I don't even know. There's so many to choose from. Maybe Korra vs Garra?

They keep us talking about them though, even though I barely ever watch the videos anymore, which is the whole point.

[Traab]

Well, the most biased was definitely when they had their own character beat Tifa. The most poorly thought out was...gosh I don't even know. There's so many to choose from. Maybe Korra vs Garra?

They keep us talking about them though, even though I barely ever watch the videos anymore, which is the whole point.

toph versus garra I think you mean. And honestly, I think the rogue/wonder woman fight was far worse thought out. At least with flash and quicksilver they let the clearly superior combatant win. Rogue/ Wonder Woman was just as much of a stomp, but they inexplicably decided the far weaker character would win.

[Rater202]

Who won in Flash v Quicksilver?

Because that matchup happened in canon(Avengers/JLA is considered canon to both Marvel's main continuity and Post Crisis DC) and canonically, Flash wins under normal circumstances but Quicksilver wins if Flash is limited to his own inherant power(As opposed to tapping the speed force for extra juice.)

[Seppl]

Who won in Flash v Quicksilver?
Flash, by a landslide. To absolutely nobody's surprise.

[Traab]

Who won in Flash v Quicksilver?

Because that matchup happened in canon(Avengers/JLA is considered canon to both Marvel's main continuity and Post Crisis DC) and canonically, Flash wins under normal circumstances but Quicksilver wins if Flash is limited to his own inherant power(As opposed to tapping the speed force for extra juice.)

Yeah flash won easy, but they gave us a race fight first before letting the obvious no duh winner get his victory. Even with every powerup quicksilver has ever had, he just never once approached the peaks of the flash and his raw power over speed.

[HolyDraconus]

To keep things going...
Captain Falcon... cause of his car. Seriously. Cage has some powerful abilities but it was more or less stated that he doesn't scale to gods even though his powers were tailor made to combat.. excuse me.. Kombat them.

And....

Aang vs Edward? Seriously? Like if Aang doesn't outright stomp this fight I don't even. Like, I haven't read or seen Fullmetal Alchemist in years, but I'm was fairly certain that he doesn't have anything that can compete with the Avatar state Aang has. soooo.... yea.

[Rater202]

Even ignoring their previously established extreme bias towards Avatar, Aang is basically a God at full power.

The only possible way I'm seeing Aang lose is if they arbitrarily exclude one his established abillities for the sake of making the animation more entertaining at the cost of it ignoring logic and data accuracy.

[Forum Explorer]

So, is anyone still invested enough to bet on the upcoming fight?
I'm going with Cage winning. While Falcon might have more raw power and possibly better reflexes, Cage has him beat in experience, technique and consistent wins.

I haven't seen it yet, but I'm guessing Falcon wins, because raw power and better reflexes is more quantifiable, and thus more important in the eyes of the DB cast.


Darn. I mean, I like FMA, a lot. But against Aang? Ow, that's not going to go well. Ed can do some pretty amazing things, but he just lacks the brute power to win. Well that, and the Avatar will likely tear Ed's stuff apart as he makes it. Seriously, Mustang would be a better opponent, because he at least has the raw speed and lethality to maybe, maybe, take out the Avatar before he can react.

But Ed, who likes to make things out of stone, metal, and the like? Aang's earthbending can counter all of it. Ed's best chance is if he could fight indoors, but Aang can just level the building.

On that note, I do thing Ed could win with prep time/foreknowledge of Aang and what his abilities were.

[Lord Raziere]

Even ignoring their previously established extreme bias towards Avatar, Aang is basically a God at full power.

The only possible way I'm seeing Aang lose is if they arbitrarily exclude one his established abillities for the sake of making the animation more entertaining at the cost of it ignoring logic and data accuracy.

Pretty much.

Edward simply has more limitations and while he is incredibly intelligent, it simply doesn't stand up to Aang's raw power. and while Alchemy is flexible, its not as manipulable as bending which can be more freestyle and just flow from one thing to another while Edward has to clap his hands together for every single transmutation.

with no real evidence that Ed can transmute air. he mostly transmutes things that are solid, and I don't remember him transmuting liquids. and while Mustang makes fire, it isn't as flexible as Zuko's bending.

so while Ed could in theory mess with Aang's earthbending (which isn't something Aang would use that much in the first place compared to other elements) his airbending, firebending and waterbending would be harder to deal with. especially since all of Eds transmutations seem to involve touching the ground.

heck, I'd question Edward's ability to take out someone like Zahir who can just fly above whatever transmutations he can and suffocate Edward to death, and the Avatar can do far more than that. (honestly Zahir would make more sense as a match up since Zahir would be closer to his power level AND is willing to kill).

[Anteros]

Who wants to bet that the fight will end with Aang bending Ed's metal arm and leg off? Mustang would destroy Aang. He'd just kill him right at the start of the fight while Aang is still goofing off. Ed also has that potential, but he likes to play with his opponents and once Aang gets serious he doesn't have a chance. Maybe they're planning on giving him a philosopher stone to balance things out, but even if they do he just doesn't have the firepower.

[Celestia]

Edward pros: More intelligent, arguably more experienced, can transmute metal

Aang pros: Literally everything else

Seems fair.

[Traab]

Pretty much.

Edward simply has more limitations and while he is incredibly intelligent, it simply doesn't stand up to Aang's raw power. and while Alchemy is flexible, its not as manipulable as bending which can be more freestyle and just flow from one thing to another while Edward has to clap his hands together for every single transmutation.

with no real evidence that Ed can transmute air. he mostly transmutes things that are solid, and I don't remember him transmuting liquids. and while Mustang makes fire, it isn't as flexible as Zuko's bending.

so while Ed could in theory mess with Aang's earthbending (which isn't something Aang would use that much in the first place compared to other elements) his airbending, firebending and waterbending would be harder to deal with. especially since all of Eds transmutations seem to involve touching the ground.

heck, I'd question Edward's ability to take out someone like Zahir who can just fly above whatever transmutations he can and suffocate Edward to death, and the Avatar can do far more than that. (honestly Zahir would make more sense as a match up since Zahir would be closer to his power level AND is willing to kill).

We know that it is possible to transmute air, as thats how mustangs ability works. He transmutes the air into a flammable composition he ignites with a spark from his gloves or a lighter or something and can direct it wherever he wants. Now if edward has ever done that im not sure, he tends to be far more straightforward and stabby/bludgeony when it comes to dealing with combat, occasionally exploding cannonballs. But death battle does seem to enjoy basically saying everyone in the same group is capable of doing what anyone else can, like green lantern, so it wouldnt shock me if they just gave Ed the abilities of every nonhomunculi in the setting. They would kinda have to to make this remotely a workable fight.

[Forum Explorer]

You know, I just thought of who would've been a good match for Aang. Father. Someone who can use every alchemy technique, who is virtually invincible, and can wield any element he wants.

[CarpeGuitarrem]

Who wants to bet that the fight will end with Aang bending Ed's metal arm and leg off? Mustang would destroy Aang. He'd just kill him right at the start of the fight while Aang is still goofing off. Ed also has that potential, but he likes to play with his opponents and once Aang gets serious he doesn't have a chance. Maybe they're planning on giving him a philosopher stone to balance things out, but even if they do he just doesn't have the firepower.
I dunno, Aang never demonstrated any interest in or aptitude with metalbending, not even during the grownup Aang scenes we saw. I feel like it would be a stretch to give that to him, because it seems like a highly-specialized skill that only winds up being demonstrated by a child prodigy who's deeply familiar with the base element (Toph) and an elite crew of highly-trained specialists (the metalbending cops).

[Keltest]

I dunno, Aang never demonstrated any interest in or aptitude with metalbending, not even during the grownup Aang scenes we saw. I feel like it would be a stretch to give that to him, because it seems like a highly-specialized skill that only winds up being demonstrated by a child prodigy who's deeply familiar with the base element (Toph) and an elite crew of highly-trained specialists (the metalbending cops).

Its a skill he at least theoretically has access to and almost certainly has an at least academic understanding of the functionality. That gives him a better claim on it than at least a few other powers DB has handed out in their videos.

Having said that, I think its more likely they'll go with the "airbending is freaking terrifying if the wielder isn't a pacifist monk" route, since they really love to extrapolate powers and abilities characters don't normally demonstrate of have, and this way they can at least do so somewhat legitimately.

[Celestia]

I dunno, Aang never demonstrated any interest in or aptitude with metalbending, not even during the grownup Aang scenes we saw. I feel like it would be a stretch to give that to him, because it seems like a highly-specialized skill that only winds up being demonstrated by a child prodigy who's deeply familiar with the base element (Toph) and an elite crew of highly-trained specialists (the metalbending cops).
Korra was explicitly declared the first ever metalbending Avatar, implicitly saying that Aang never learned it.

[Kato]

Should I still spoiler last time? I guess...


I didn't really have any stakes in this but I'm still slightly irked by Falcon using his car as a weapon, no matter how much they are connected. It feels like cheating.
Also, maybe I'm just having a bad day because I tend to gloss over this but DB's tendency to give ridiculously accurate numbers for impossible estimates is laughable. Six digits on the estimate of the destructive force of an explosion you know hardly anything about? And what is a measure to "fill an area with electricity"? How do you even get such a number, that's not literally a thing.


Next time... Yeah, I don't see this going well.

Edward is clearly outmatched, so... maybe there is some feat he has done that actually translates to a massive amount of energy. Or they'll argue that alchemy isn't fueled by your own power but from the outside and as long as you know how to do it, you can do it? You could argue he'd be able of the same feats as Father. He's seen the truth.
But apart from that, even without metal bending or I'd argue even without avatar state, Aang surpasses Edward in almost everything, except killing intent and maybe intelligence.

[Forum Explorer]

Should I still spoiler last time? I guess...


I didn't really have any stakes in this but I'm still slightly irked by Falcon using his car as a weapon, no matter how much they are connected. It feels like cheating.
Also, maybe I'm just having a bad day because I tend to gloss over this but DB's tendency to give ridiculously accurate numbers for impossible estimates is laughable. Six digits on the estimate of the destructive force of an explosion you know hardly anything about? And what is a measure to "fill an area with electricity"? How do you even get such a number, that's not literally a thing.


Next time... Yeah, I don't see this going well.

Edward is clearly outmatched, so... maybe there is some feat he has done that actually translates to a massive amount of energy. Or they'll argue that alchemy isn't fueled by your own power but from the outside and as long as you know how to do it, you can do it? You could argue he'd be able of the same feats as Father. He's seen the truth.
But apart from that, even without metal bending or I'd argue even without avatar state, Aang surpasses Edward in almost everything, except killing intent and maybe intelligence.


Spoilers are a good idea still, it just came out on youtube afterall.
That was a stupid calculation. The car thing does feel cheap, but it's fair enough. After all, it's Captain Falcon's most iconic piece of equipment. It does put a martial artist against a freaking space ship though.

[Traab]

The thing is, I think below the avatar state, this might be closer than we think. While aang has all the elements at his command, he tends to be fairly straightforward and simplistic in his attacks, whereas ed if anything, tends to overdo things such as creating vast swarms of rock pillars to smash his target all over the place at once. Plus, ed can do everything with the exact same motion, whether its creating a barrier, or transforming a building into a giant cannon. Aangs bigger moves tend to be slower I think as it takes a lot more motion to create what he is after. With ed its clap hands, slap surface, and do whatever your imagination wants. I think what its really going to come down to though, is similar to toph versus garra, and ed is going to find everything he does coming right back at him due to avatar the last airbender being a magic system they seem to think rules supreme as they wont even let a ninja control his own possessed sand, let alone some punk alchemist crafting something and hurling it at aang.

[Celestia]

The thing is, I think below the avatar state, this might be closer than we think. While aang has all the elements at his command, he tends to be fairly straightforward and simplistic in his attacks, whereas ed if anything, tends to overdo things such as creating vast swarms of rock pillars to smash his target all over the place at once. Plus, ed can do everything with the exact same motion, whether its creating a barrier, or transforming a building into a giant cannon. Aangs bigger moves tend to be slower I think as it takes a lot more motion to create what he is after. With ed its clap hands, slap surface, and do whatever your imagination wants. I think what its really going to come down to though, is similar to toph versus garra, and ed is going to find everything he does coming right back at him due to avatar the last airbender being a magic system they seem to think rules supreme as they wont even let a ninja control his own possessed sand, let alone some punk alchemist crafting something and hurling it at aang.
we have seen multiple times in the show that a bender can "steal" control of bent materials. This was probably best seen in the fight between Katara and Pakku. Now, I won't get into the Garra fight as I'm unfamiliar with Naruto and whether or not he'd have some sort of magic connection to his sand that can reasonably trump Toph's will, but I will say that it is entirely fair for Aang to throw back anything Edward transmutes. Transmutation does not grant any sort of control over a thing after it is created. It's like building a computer program to do what you want and then letting it run on its own. Anyone can come along later and mess with it freely if they know how.

[Traab]

we have seen multiple times in the show that a bender can "steal" control of bent materials. This was probably best seen in the fight between Katara and Pakku. Now, I won't get into the Garra fight as I'm unfamiliar with Naruto and whether or not he'd have some sort of magic connection to his sand that can reasonably trump Toph's will, but I will say that it is entirely fair for Aang to throw back anything Edward transmutes. Transmutation does not grant any sort of control over a thing after it is created. It's like building a computer program to do what you want and then letting it run on its own. Anyone can come along later and mess with it freely if they know how.

Yes we see it multiple times, but not all the time. Why? Why isnt every bending battle one where two people are say, struggling over control of a single boulder to see who gets to hurl it at who?If aang can just control the elements no matter what, why does he spend so much of the show dodging or countering with his own attacks? I just dont want them to decide that nothing ed does matters unless he transmutes aang into a statue. Which he could actually do btw, not sure if aang has a counter for that other than "dont let him touch you" In fact, that might be how the battle goes. They face off flinging attacks at each other, aang starts to control everything ed sends, so ed goes for a direct contact human transmutation, he connects, aang starts to turn into a tree or something, then goes avatar mode and overwhelms ed.

[Alabenson]

While I do strongly suspect that this fight is going to go to Aang, I see two elements that could keep it from being a total curbstomp. The first is the fact that, if you can get past his bending, Aang isn't especially much more durable than your average 12-year-old, while Ed has endured some fairly severe injuries in the past and kept going, and DB does love heavily weighing durability in their calculations.
The second factor, and potentially something that could even give Avatar State a run for its money, is the Philosopher Stone. If DB decides to give Ed access to a stone then that could radically alter how the fight goes in his favor given the sheer extent of the power up it grants alchemists.

[Prime32]

I... have never played an F-Zero game, so take this with a grain of salt, but AFAIK there's at least three continuities they mashed together (the main games, the anime, and some games loosely based on the anime). The first has a man named Douglas Jay Falcon who's a reincarnation of a primordial god or something, and competes under his real name. The other two have a guy who uses Captain Falcon as an alias, and later passes it on to Rick Wheeler (English)/Ryu Suzaku (Japanese), with the anime version dying in the process. But the Smash Bros. version is the one people want to see in a fight, so they'd have to do some mashing anyway.

...but at the same time they took a guy with powers that make him more effective against gods, and made him fight someone who may or may not count as a god. So there's that. :smalltongue:

[Rynjin]

we have seen multiple times in the show that a bender can "steal" control of bent materials. This was probably best seen in the fight between Katara and Pakku. Now, I won't get into the Garra fight as I'm unfamiliar with Naruto and whether or not he'd have some sort of magic connection to his sand that can reasonably trump Toph's will, but I will say that it is entirely fair for Aang to throw back anything Edward transmutes. Transmutation does not grant any sort of control over a thing after it is created. It's like building a computer program to do what you want and then letting it run on its own. Anyone can come along later and mess with it freely if they know how.

Aside everything else, yes Gaara does have a magic connection to his sand that can reasonably trump Toph's will: his sand (the core amount of it in his gourd, anyway) is ambiguously sentient and absolutely loyal to him since it's basically possessed by his mom's ghost. On top of that it's saturated in his own chakra (basically his own soul as well, as one component) to the point he wields it with basically no effort as an extension of his own will (when he even has to; it responds automatically and will protect him from threats he's not even aware of). That sand is both thematically and metaphysically part of him, like an extra limb.

[Celestia]

Yes we see it multiple times, but not all the time. Why? Why isnt every bending battle one where two people are say, struggling over control of a single boulder to see who gets to hurl it at who?If aang can just control the elements no matter what, why does he spend so much of the show dodging or countering with his own attacks? I just dont want them to decide that nothing ed does matters unless he transmutes aang into a statue. Which he could actually do btw, not sure if aang has a counter for that other than "dont let him touch you" In fact, that might be how the battle goes. They face off flinging attacks at each other, aang starts to control everything ed sends, so ed goes for a direct contact human transmutation, he connects, aang starts to turn into a tree or something, then goes avatar mode and overwhelms ed.
The same reason, I suspect, why real life sword fights don't often devolve into struggling over who controls one blade.

[Reddish Mage]

toph versus garra I think you mean. And honestly, I think the rogue/wonder woman fight was far worse thought out. At least with flash and quicksilver they let the clearly superior combatant win. Rogue/ Wonder Woman was just as much of a stomp, but they inexplicably decided the far weaker character would win.

Toph vs Gaara comes up yet again, I guess this time its topical. However, I don't get your current take as I seem to recall you were once on team "Toph vs. Gaara proves DB is actually trying to troll us."

When it comes to Toph, I can't see but how she's radically overpowered for the simple reason that she's supposed to have problems with sandbending. Sure, she can do it, she was even able to hold up a giant structure that wanted to bury itself and fight off Sandcreatures at once (but couldn't hit them). She does say though that her "vision is blurry" in the sand and her attacks were not as strong fast or accurate in the desert. Gaara should be able to beat her simply by his superior sand skills (and ability to turn the rest of the ground into his special sand). However, since people disagree with me about what I have to say about Toph, so I'm thinking there's an argument to be made for her if you think she can bend sand as well as earth.

Rogue v. Wonder Woman I just haven't seen anything to tell me otherwise. They say Rogue has both Captain Marvel powers AND power stealing. In other words, she can go toe to toe with WW long enough to get a in a good drain on WW power and the corresponding power-up to herself. Even if Wonder Woman is too powerful to be drained, Rogue can get stronger until she is the strongest combatant. Seems pretty simple logic.

Gaara and Toph are tremendously mismatched but Rogue/WW fight is just on its face the correct outcome. What's the logic to saying it was wrong? Rogue got the powers in a non-canon one shot?


Edward pros: More intelligent, arguably more experienced, can transmute metal

Aang pros: Literally everything else

Seems fair.

My feeling is actually that Edward has the edge.

FMA-universe is on a completely different power-scale.

Ed is very smart and not limited to four elements, he can literally turn anything into anything else. I haven't seen the last parts of Brotherhood, but unless that series contradicts me, Ed can't transmute human flesh, nor does he have a philosopher's stone. However, as soon as he sees that Aang is limited to fire, water, air, and earth, and not complex stuff such as metal, lava, etc, he can simply deny Aang materials.

The question is how powerful they make the Avatar state. Aang himself has not done really large scale damage in this form (so Ed might have him beat comparing feat to feat). However, Aang explicitly has the powers of every other Avatar. Kyoshi created her own island with an earthquake, Korra practically became a Kaiju, and maybe there is comic book stuff to add.

So this is a fight I see going either way, but just looking at the two I'd say Ed has normal Aang beat on power, speed and smarts. Aangs only hope is the Avatar form, which may or may not work.



we have seen multiple times in the show that a bender can "steal" control of bent materials. This was probably best seen in the fight between Katara and Pakku. Now, I won't get into the Garra fight as I'm unfamiliar with Naruto and whether or not he'd have some sort of magic connection to his sand that can reasonably trump Toph's will, but I will say that it is entirely fair for Aang to throw back anything Edward transmutes. Transmutation does not grant any sort of control over a thing after it is created. It's like building a computer program to do what you want and then letting it run on its own. Anyone can come along later and mess with it freely if they know how.

For the record, yes Gaara does have a powerful magic-like connection with his sand which wasn't mentioned.

This is why I see Ed winning though, Aang can only bend things in the form of the basic four elements. If Ed figures that out (and he's smart) all he has to do is deny Aang the material to work with. Aang cannot bend his way out of a metal cage filled with poison gas.

Someone said Ed could literally transmute Aang. Haven't seen it, (and I thought human transmutation requires the philosopher stone or a human sacrifice) but if that's the case we got another trump card.

[Lord Raziere]

My feeling is actually that Edward has the edge.

FMA-universe is on a completely different power-scale.

Ed is very smart and not limited to four elements, he can literally turn anything into anything else. I haven't seen the last parts of Brotherhood, but unless that series contradicts me, Ed can't transmute human flesh, nor does he have a philosopher's stone. However, as soon as he sees that Aang is limited to fire, water, air, and earth, and not complex stuff such as metal, lava, etc, he can simply deny Aang materials.

The question is how powerful they make the Avatar state. Aang himself has not done really large scale damage in this form (so Ed might have him beat comparing feat to feat). However, Aang explicitly has the powers of every other Avatar. Kyoshi created her own island with an earthquake, Korra practically became a Kaiju, and maybe there is comic book stuff to add.

So this is a fight I see going either way, but just looking at the two I'd say Ed has normal Aang beat on power, speed and smarts. Aangs only hope is the Avatar form, which may or may not work.


For the record, yes Gaara does have a powerful magic-like connection with his sand which wasn't mentioned.

This is why I see Ed winning though, Aang can only bend things in the form of the basic four elements. If Ed figures that out (and he's smart) all he has to do is deny Aang the material to work with. Aang cannot bend his way out of a metal cage filled with poison gas.

Someone said Ed could literally transmute Aang. Haven't seen it, (and I thought human transmutation requires the philosopher stone or a human sacrifice) but if that's the case we got another trump card.

Actually, No, Edward CAN'T turn anything into anything else:


The Law of Natural Providence, which states that an object or material made of a particular substance or element can only be transmuted into another object with the same basic makeup and properties of that initial material. In other words, an object or material made mostly of water can only be transmuted into another object with the attributes of water.

This is Alchemy's second law. the lesser known part, but still, to get that steel cage he'd have to use metal to get the same amount, to get that gas he had to use air of the same amount. Edward has not been shown to transmute air.

[Seppl]

When it comes to Toph, I can't see but how she's radically overpowered for the simple reason that she's supposed to have problems with sandbending. Sure, she can do it, she was even able to hold up a giant structure that wanted to bury itself and fight off Sandcreatures at once (but couldn't hit them). She does say though that her "vision is blurry" in the sand and her attacks were not as strong fast or accurate in the desert. Gaara should be able to beat her simply by his superior sand skills (and ability to turn the rest of the ground into his special sand). However, since people disagree with me about what I have to say about Toph, so I'm thinking there's an argument to be made for her if you think she can bend sand as well as earth.She does work on her sandbending and is pretty good at it at the end of book "Fire". I think what irks people a lot more about that episode (including me) is that Gaara has just that much more raw power. He can control orders of magnitude more sand than Toph at once and could easily bury her in raw power. In almost all other Death Battles (Most notable exception: Wonder Woman vs. Rogue, which is another controversial one, though I agree with your analysis) they have raw power beat fine control. Especially if the power discrepancy is this large. Or to quote Order of the Stick: "In any battle there is always a level of force against which no tactics can succeed."

[Forum Explorer]

She does work on her sandbending and is pretty good at it at the end of book "Fire". I think what irks people a lot more about that episode (including me) is that Gaara has just that much more raw power. He can control orders of magnitude more sand than Toph at once and could easily bury her in raw power. In almost all other Death Battles (Most notable exception: Wonder Woman vs. Rogue, which is another controversial one, though I agree with your analysis) they have raw power beat fine control. Especially if the power discrepancy is this large. Or to quote Order of the Stick: "In any battle there is always a level of force against which no tactics can succeed."

Doesn't Toph reach the level of having range across an entire city or something?

[Reddish Mage]

She does work on her sandbending and is pretty good at it at the end of book "Fire". I think what irks people a lot more about that episode (including me) is that Gaara has just that much more raw power. He can control orders of magnitude more sand than Toph at once and could easily bury her in raw power. In almost all other Death Battles (Most notable exception: Wonder Woman vs. Rogue, which is another controversial one, though I agree with your analysis) they have raw power beat fine control. Especially if the power discrepancy is this large. Or to quote Order of the Stick: "In any battle there is always a level of force against which no tactics can succeed."

We should make this one of our forum's derived death battle rules:

1st Rule: If you don't see it, it doesn't count (disproved by recent death battles that refer to feats simply mentioned)

2nd Candidate: you can't derive a person's strength from other character's abilities just because that character beat them (also done in that recent Streetfighter battle)

This one might work: In any battle there is always a level of force against which no tactics can succeed...

This may work if interpreted vary narrowly: the OP character will win against the lesser character if the lesser character's advantage is pure tactics, but there are very few fights that come down to very large differences in power levels being bridged by pure tactics and not something else, like speed, some sort of special power (e.g. Rogue power stealing ability), sheer durability (DMC v Bayonetta). In any case of a large difference of power-scaling, the powerscaler will always win...with the exception of Link vs Cloud...but Cloud is interpreted as very gimped in that one, or Gaara vs. Toph but Gaara is also interpreted as being on Tophs level in that fight.

So we come down with the rule that the character that they interpreted as being overwhelmingly OP will always win against pure tactics, but that's not as useful a rule.


Actually, No, Edward CAN'T turn anything into anything else:

This is Alchemy's second law. the lesser known part, but still, to get that steel cage he'd have to use metal to get the same amount, to get that gas he had to use air of the same amount. Edward has not been shown to transmute air.

That's like saying that the laws of motion or thermodynamics are operative in DC's universe. If its true, its not very informative. Edward can transmute the ground, clothing, and any materials at hand, so he always has a lot to work with. In the anime he does some pretty wacky transmutations.

More interesting is applying comic book logic on the way alchemy works. Supposedly it relies on motions in the Earth's tectonic plates. Aang may be powerful enough to redirect those flows in Avatar form...however, Aang isn't likely to figure out how Ed's power works in this respect since that's rather obscure. However, Aang can spirit-bend and since that is more intuitive maybe Aang can close Ed's internal ability to use alchemy by spirit bending.

[Lord Raziere]

That's like saying that the laws of motion or thermodynamics are operative in DC's universe. If its true, its not very informative. Edward can transmute the ground, clothing, and any materials at hand, so he always has a lot to work with. In the anime he does some pretty wacky transmutations.

More interesting is applying comic book logic on the way alchemy works. Supposedly it relies on motions in the Earth's tectonic plates. Aang may be powerful enough to redirect those flows in Avatar form...however, Aang isn't likely to figure out how Ed's power works in this respect since that's rather obscure. However, Aang can spirit-bend and since that is more intuitive maybe Aang can close Ed's internal ability to use alchemy by spirit bending.

No, thats the canonical Second Law of Alchemy, so no, it applies.

the transmutations he does is mostly metal and earth. its explicitly said his specialty is with metal, so there is limits to his ability to transmute things. while theoretically an alchemist can transmute anything, they are in fact limited by their knowledge of chemicals and what can be transmuted into what. thats why he is called the fullmetal alchemist.

so no, your overestimating his abilities.

[Rater202]

No, thats the canonical Second Law of Alchemy, so no, it applies.

the transmutations he does is mostly metal and earth. its explicitly said his specialty is with metal, so there is limits to his ability to transmute things. while theoretically an alchemist can transmute anything, they are in fact limited by their knowledge of chemicals and what can be transmuted into what. thats why he is called the fullmetal alchemist.

so no, your overestimating his abilities.

I thought the was called the Fullmetal Alchemist becuase of his solid metal prosthetics?

(I never watched FMA, all I know about it comes from osmosis)

[Rynjin]

I thought the was called the Fullmetal Alchemist becuase of his solid metal prosthetics?

(I never watched FMA, all I know about it comes from osmosis)

He's actually called the Fullmetal Alchemist because of his sheer stubborn resolve and chutzpah, with the prosthetics being a cheeky bonus dig at Ed from the Fuhrer.

It has nothing to do with his ability set.

[Lord Raziere]

well all the transmutations that happen in the series because of Ed are metallic or earth-based, he transmutes the spear, the wrist-blade from his hand, he constantly does earth stuff, but if there is any instance of him doing water, fire or air I can't remember it. like I remember that Mustang must wear a certain specially made glove to make sure he can blast fire at people, Armstrong has certain transmutation circles just to do his one transmutation, and while Ed's circle-less transmutation is different, that doesn't mean its limitless or all-powerful. and since this is death battle, they won't see any claim that ed can do more than what he is shown to do as valid.

[Forum Explorer]

well all the transmutations that happen in the series because of Ed are metallic or earth-based, he transmutes the spear, the wrist-blade from his hand, he constantly does earth stuff, but if there is any instance of him doing water, fire or air I can't remember it. like I remember that Mustang must wear a certain specially made glove to make sure he can blast fire at people, Armstrong has certain transmutation circles just to do his one transmutation, and while Ed's circle-less transmutation is different, that doesn't mean its limitless or all-powerful. and since this is death battle, they won't see any claim that ed can do more than what he is shown to do as valid.

Transmuting Fire is apparently a really big deal, Mustang is the only person who can do it. Considering he's able to solo kill homonculi using nothing but flame alchemy, it's understandable why it's such a big deal.

As for Ed, I seem to remember him transmuting ice or water, and I think I remember him either neutralizing or creating a gas once. More importantly, he certainly can (and does) use Scar's deconstruction.

[Prime32]

I thought the was called the Fullmetal Alchemist becuase of his solid metal prosthetics?

(I never watched FMA, all I know about it comes from osmosis)
In Japanese it's Hagane no Renkinjutsu-shi (literally "Steel Alchemist"), and Fullmetal Alchemist is mostly used stylistically. "Fullmetal" is Japanese slang originating from Full Metal Jacket, which the author added because she assumed it was more common among English-speakers.

[Traab]

well all the transmutations that happen in the series because of Ed are metallic or earth-based, he transmutes the spear, the wrist-blade from his hand, he constantly does earth stuff, but if there is any instance of him doing water, fire or air I can't remember it. like I remember that Mustang must wear a certain specially made glove to make sure he can blast fire at people, Armstrong has certain transmutation circles just to do his one transmutation, and while Ed's circle-less transmutation is different, that doesn't mean its limitless or all-powerful. and since this is death battle, they won't see any claim that ed can do more than what he is shown to do as valid.

The glove is basically a combination of the alchemic circle he needs and can produce the initial spark like a stage magician with flash paper. He cut the seal into his hand and used a lighter at one point iirc. Every alchemist aside from ed has that sort of setup. A specialty they work with that they have a premade circle engraved on something like a glove to focus through. I think armstrong had it on his brass knuckles for example, kimbley had his bomb alchemic circle, so on and so forth. Eds main advantage is he isnt restricted to a single trick on the run like everyone else is so he can switch from metal, to stone, to earth, to whatever he wants to manipulate. Gives him great flexibility whereas everyone else has to make do with finding new ways to use stone spikes to defeat people, or bursts of fire. Or bombs. Too be fair, you can solve a lot of problems with any of those objects, so they are hardly crippled, but the benefit is there. As for flesh alchemy, the entire reason for the series is due to ed and his brother using it. He very much so knows how, as he is well aware of the chemical makeup of a human body and thus how to manipulate it. He just doesnt for some odd reason.

[Reddish Mage]

No, thats the canonical Second Law of Alchemy, so no, it applies.

the transmutations he does is mostly metal and earth. its explicitly said his specialty is with metal, so there is limits to his ability to transmute things. while theoretically an alchemist can transmute anything, they are in fact limited by their knowledge of chemicals and what can be transmuted into what. thats why he is called the fullmetal alchemist.

so no, your overestimating his abilities.

It's a fantastical law made to be interpreted in a comic book fashion. The writers don't really know how much volume of what thing can become another thing. Its also been interpreted to mean that if its water being transmuted whatever it makes will be watery or something, but we've seen plenty of stuff that doesn't work that way.

I recall in the original anime Ed transmutes earth to metal to bubbles or something during the field portion of his exam. He also can create a working cannon out of earth.

Ed can make metal, make walls, and make guns out of stuff that tends to be handy. His go to abilities tend to be metal and earth but its not the only thing he has done.


Transmuting Fire is apparently a really big deal, Mustang is the only person who can do it. Considering he's able to solo kill homonculi using nothing but flame alchemy, it's understandable why it's such a big deal.

As for Ed, I seem to remember him transmuting ice or water, and I think I remember him either neutralizing or creating a gas once. More importantly, he certainly can (and does) use Scar's deconstruction.

Ed does a lot a lot of different transmutations over the course of the several series and movie/manga. Admittedly, the Conquerer of Shambala is a pretty ridiculous with some of the things it allows the brothers to do. I wouldn't use it, but DB says all official material is fair game and whether or not its "contradictory" really depends on how seriously you take these comic book limits.

What Ed does during the field portion of the exam in the original series made me throw out the book in terms of what I expected of how the show would treat alchemy. By the time I finished any series it was pretty clear it could do anything with anything as long as the writers wanted it to.

[Lord Raziere]

the original anime? pffh, Reddish that thing isn't reliable at all, most of it wasn't written by the original author and was made to meet deadlines because manga wasn't fully written yet. its Brotherhood thats to be taken seriously, as its far more accurate. original anime means nothing.

[Lemmy]

the original anime? pffh, Reddish that thing isn't reliable at all, most of it wasn't written by the original author and was made to meet deadlines because manga wasn't fully written yet. its Brotherhood thats to be taken seriously, as its far more accurate. original anime means nothing.Up to the part where it reaches the point where the manga was at the time, it's actually a much better anime than Brotherhood (which intentionally rushes that same part because the producers knew 99% of the audience had already seen it).

[Forum Explorer]

the original anime? pffh, Reddish that thing isn't reliable at all, most of it wasn't written by the original author and was made to meet deadlines because manga wasn't fully written yet. its Brotherhood thats to be taken seriously, as its far more accurate. original anime means nothing.

The question is if DB will use the original anime or not. Hopefully not, but...

[Reddish Mage]

You know the images, at the very least, are always taken from all official material out there. You are also going to see from the live action movie. Whether he does an "original anime only feat" is something else, but I question whether the stuff I saw in the early anime was really contradictory with the manga.

I think Ed can transmute firearms (something Aang doesn't understand) in a regular environment, metal from the ground, and he probably doesn't need to gas Aang but it wouldn't be that much of a stretch.

I see Ed winning by surprise, by his smarts, and potentially he is superior to non-Avatar Aang in all physical attributes by virtue of the monsters Ed's successfully fought against.

[Anteros]

Didn't one of the previous Avatars break an island off of the mainland and move it out to sea? Aang has access to that level of power, so I'd imagine that's the feat they'll go with to calculate his power. No doubt with a lot of faulty assumptions along the way like always. I can't remember Ed's best feat but nothing I can recall is anywhere close to that tier of power.

I think Ed would win in a "real" fight by outsmarting Aang and taking him by surprise before Aang escalates to full power. Death battles don't go that way though. They like to have both contestants slowly escalate to full and then decide a winner from there.

[Celestia]

You know the images, at the very least, are always taken from all official material out there. You are also going to see from the live action movie. Whether he does an "original anime only feat" is something else, but I question whether the stuff I saw in the early anime was really contradictory with the manga.

I think Ed can transmute firearms (something Aang doesn't understand) in a regular environment, metal from the ground, and he probably doesn't need to gas Aang but it wouldn't be that much of a stretch.

I see Ed winning by surprise, by his smarts, and potentially he is superior to non-Avatar Aang in all physical attributes by virtue of the monsters Ed's successfully fought against.
There are certainly scenarios where Ed can win, but if you think for even a second that this battle is going to end before we see the Avatar state, then you're just not very familiar with Death Battle. In the end, the only part of the debate that really matters is, "Can Ed defeat a full-power Avatar?" I don't like his chances.

[Rater202]

There is no possible way that Edward can defeat Avatar state Aang.

And that's ignoring how flat out biased in Avatar's favor that the Toph vs Gaara battle was.

[Devonix]

There is no possible way that Edward can defeat Avatar state Aang.

And that's ignoring how flat out biased in Avatar's favor that the Toph vs Gaara battle was.

I still believe that Toph vs Gaara was far closer than people seem to think. But as long as Aang stays at range he should be able to take down Ed.

[Traab]

I still believe that Toph vs Gaara was far closer than people seem to think. But as long as Aang stays at range he should be able to take down Ed.

Based on speed alone toph should have died instantly. Its like comparing naruto to dragonball, the two universes are just on entirely different tiers of power. Narutoverse fighters get hurled through boulders and trees with trunks the size of houses on a regular basis. Their durability is absurd in comparison to avatar. The speed with which they move and fight are vastly different. Its honestly imo a flash versus quicksilver fight. Two people with similar power sets, but one is just exponentially stronger than the other. The one and only advantage toph had was the hand wave decision that she can take over his attacks, but considering his sand attacks can move supersonic, I dont think her vibration sensing would help much as she is already breathing through a new hole in her forehead.

The avatar verse is set fairly close to a normal human one for things like speed and durability. So is full metal alchemist. Setting aside magic powers, if you shoot one of the residents with a gun, they will react much like we do. So at least in base stats the two are fairly close. As far as magic systems go, both are capable of killing the other, ie a stone or metal spear to the chest will kill aang, and blades of wind, hurled boulders, and bursts of fire hitting ed will kill him too. The x factor is a combination of how much control over eds attacks they will give aang, and how ludicrous they go with avatar state. They might go the green lantern route and declare that aang can do anything a previous avatar has ever done even if he has himself never been seen doing it. Or they might stick to his actual feats. Im tempted to say they will stick to actual feats as generally they only pull that sort of transitive property when one candidate is behind the other significantly. And what we see aang do at the end of his series is pretty danged impressive on its own. Not so much reshaping the planet level impressive, but in a one on one fight, it was pretty overwhelming. But not enough to elave ed helpless unless, again, they just have aang nope everything ed tries.

[CarpeGuitarrem]

A lot of it is going to hinge on whether Aang (and I'm assuming kid Aang for this) gets into the Avatar State quickly, and whether there's a way Ed can contain that. He doesn't normally voluntarily enter the state unless he think he needs to, which relies on his threat assessment.

[Traab]

A lot of it is going to hinge on whether Aang (and I'm assuming kid Aang for this) gets into the Avatar State quickly, and whether there's a way Ed can contain that. He doesn't normally voluntarily enter the state unless he think he needs to, which relies on his threat assessment.

Nah, this is death battle, it will ramp up from basic combat to alchemy and bending to avatar state in the end. While technically it makes sense to go full power right at the start in a true death battle, its a lot less amusing to watch.

[Reddish Mage]

There are certainly scenarios where Ed can win, but if you think for even a second that this battle is going to end before we see the Avatar state, then you're just not very familiar with Death Battle. In the end, the only part of the debate that really matters is, "Can Ed defeat a full-power Avatar?" I don't like his chances.

Zuko's sister did it with one quick attack from behind.

Korra almost was defeated by poison and was severely weakened even in the Avatar state.

I'm giving the edge to Ed, because both are possibilities for him. Although, I admit neither sound like his style, he just needs to figure something out that makes the power gap irrelevant.


I still believe that Toph vs Gaara was far closer than people seem to think. But as long as Aang stays at range he should be able to take down Ed.

DB after said that Gaara may have a sandcoffin ability but, he was essentially in his own sand coffin that Toph could collapse at any time. Since they decided Toph could crush Gaara's armor all over him, the rest of the battle is easy. That's means his durability is shot.

How they figure Toph's or Gaara's speed, however, is a mystery. Kid Gaara rarely moves much since he has his sand, but it took a lot of speed for even Sasuke to damage him. Most fighters, who commonly could flash-step (I believe that is an actual ninja ability and not just an effect), couldn't even touch him.

At best, Toph knows all Gaara's attacks because the air is full of his sand, but they still should be coming at Naruto-verse super-ninja speeds.

The other thing is, even allowing Toph can manipulate Gaara's armor, she needs her whole body in proper Hun Gar style positions to do bending. Gaara just needs to keep her off balance and he's fine. I think DB will point to things that suggest bending can be done with just the hands.

I think you can make the argument for Toph (haven't heard a good one yet) but the outcome is clearly wrong upon close inspection at the least.

[Durkoala]

A lot of it is going to hinge on whether Aang (and I'm assuming kid Aang for this) gets into the Avatar State quickly, and whether there's a way Ed can contain that. He doesn't normally voluntarily enter the state unless he think he needs to, which relies on his threat assessment.

DB usually has an 'in-their-prime conglomerate' rule, where they take the strongest version of a character and any feats they've shown elsewhere that aren't explicitly stated to have been discarded from their arsenal (eg, Gaara calling his Beast), but the battle sprites are whatever they can get. Harry Potter and Toph were explicitly said to be using their feats as adults, but were represented in the animation as their child selves, for example. I expect we'll get adult Aang's feats, but child Aang's sprites.


The other thing is, even allowing Toph can manipulate Gaara's armor, she needs her whole body in proper Hun Gar style positions to do bending. Gaara just needs to keep her off balance and he's fine. I think DB will point to things that suggest bending can be done with just the hands.

I don't want to get into the question of who should have won, but at the very least Bumi, who Toph was roughly level with by the end of the show, was fully capable of performing basic Earthbending using only his head, it is possible an expert to have some control of the elements even if they're unable to strike their preferred stance.


Zuko's sister did it with one quick attack from behind.
Oh, really? :smallamused:

[Keltest]

Zuko's sister did it with one quick attack from behind.

Korra almost was defeated by poison and was severely weakened even in the Avatar state.

I'm giving the edge to Ed, because both are possibilities for him. Although, I admit neither sound like his style, he just needs to figure something out that makes the power gap irrelevant.



DB after said that Gaara may have a sandcoffin ability but, he was essentially in his own sand coffin that Toph could collapse at any time. Since they decided Toph could crush Gaara's armor all over him, the rest of the battle is easy. That's means his durability is shot.

How they figure Toph's or Gaara's speed, however, is a mystery. Kid Gaara rarely moves much since he has his sand, but it took a lot of speed for even Sasuke to damage him. Most fighters, who commonly could flash-step (I believe that is an actual ninja ability and not just an effect), couldn't even touch him.

At best, Toph knows all Gaara's attacks because the air is full of his sand, but they still should be coming at Naruto-verse super-ninja speeds.

The other thing is, even allowing Toph can manipulate Gaara's armor, she needs her whole body in proper Hun Gar style positions to do bending. Gaara just needs to keep her off balance and he's fine. I think DB will point to things that suggest bending can be done with just the hands.

I think you can make the argument for Toph (haven't heard a good one yet) but the outcome is clearly wrong upon close inspection at the least.

Bumi was capable of bending with just the muscles in his face, so its at least theoretically possible to bend while off balance or dodging.

[Forum Explorer]

DB after said that Gaara may have a sandcoffin ability but, he was essentially in his own sand coffin that Toph could collapse at any time. Since they decided Toph could crush Gaara's armor all over him, the rest of the battle is easy. That's means his durability is shot.

How they figure Toph's or Gaara's speed, however, is a mystery. Kid Gaara rarely moves much since he has his sand, but it took a lot of speed for even Sasuke to damage him. Most fighters, who commonly could flash-step (I believe that is an actual ninja ability and not just an effect), couldn't even touch him.

At best, Toph knows all Gaara's attacks because the air is full of his sand, but they still should be coming at Naruto-verse super-ninja speeds.

The other thing is, even allowing Toph can manipulate Gaara's armor, she needs her whole body in proper Hun Gar style positions to do bending. Gaara just needs to keep her off balance and he's fine. I think DB will point to things that suggest bending can be done with just the hands.

I think you can make the argument for Toph (haven't heard a good one yet) but the outcome is clearly wrong upon close inspection at the least.

I don't think we ever see Gaara move that quickly, or attack that quickly though. Gaara certainly reacts at ninja speeds but his attacks go more the route of overwhelming power to make them hard to evade, or the fact that they just keep chasing their target. When someone does end up going too fast for him to catch, he doesn't go faster to compensate, he just increases the space he hits, until there is no place for his target to dodge.

But that would be useless against Toph. Of course if Gaara switched to fighting like a regular ninja he would win easily, but can he even do that?

[Rynjin]

They might go the green lantern route and declare that aang can do anything a previous avatar has ever done even if he has himself never been seen doing it.

I mean, to be fair, unlike Green Lantern this is an explicit property of Avatars. It's the whole purpose of the Avatar State specifically, it draws on the power AND KNOWLEDGE of all previous avatars. Anything one Avatar has ever done, a subsequent one can do while in the Avatar State (and can learn to do outside of it).


I don't think we ever see Gaara move that quickly, or attack that quickly though. Gaara certainly reacts at ninja speeds but his attacks go more the route of overwhelming power to make them hard to evade, or the fact that they just keep chasing their target. When someone does end up going too fast for him to catch, he doesn't go faster to compensate, he just increases the space he hits, until there is no place for his target to dodge.

But that would be useless against Toph. Of course if Gaara switched to fighting like a regular ninja he would win easily, but can he even do that?

Yes, he can. Though to be fair he sucks at it early in, and even relatively late in the series, so for most of the franchise Toph could probably beat him up in a straight fight, no powers. Apparently by the time Bort rolls around he's on par with Naruto and Sasuke and all that though, but Bort is...Bort.

Though it should be noted that even before that, he DOES have the speed of a pretty solid ninja, about the average for their ilk. So you can kind "fake it" against mere mortals. Like the vampires from Buffy; it only looks like martial arts because they move so damn fast, when they're really just kind of flailing at you. Even the slower ninjas move about as fast as a car overland, maybe a bit faster, and with perfect maneuvering in combat distances that's nothing to sneeze at. And he's not one of the slowest ones by any means.

[Forum Explorer]

Yes, he can. Though to be fair he sucks at it early in, and even relatively late in the series, so for most of the franchise Toph could probably beat him up in a straight fight, no powers. Apparently by the time Bort rolls around he's on par with Naruto and Sasuke and all that though, but Bort is...Bort.

Though it should be noted that even before that, he DOES have the speed of a pretty solid ninja, about the average for their ilk. So you can kind "fake it" against mere mortals. Like the vampires from Buffy; it only looks like martial arts because they move so damn fast, when they're really just kind of flailing at you. Even the slower ninjas move about as fast as a car overland, maybe a bit faster, and with perfect maneuvering in combat distances that's nothing to sneeze at. And he's not one of the slowest ones by any means.

Well, I really don't know the capabilities of Toph that well, so maybe Gaara could just punch her to death then.

[Kitten Champion]

The major issue with the Gaara v. Toph fight is the declaration that Toph can bend Gaara's sand. I mean, you can go over the feats and I agree with Traab that Naruto is simply a higher scale universe and Gaara's in the top tier of that, but deciding Toph can bend Gaara's sand is an entirely arbitrary decision to trump one magic system over the other despite the fact that on a simple 1-to-1 level Gaara's capacity in wielding his supernatural force is higher than Toph's capacity to wield her supernatural force.

They made it out to be that if Toph can "see" Gaara floating in the air then she'd just win, like that was the only question as to whether she was the victor or not.

Edit: Which is the same issue with the Rogue/Wonder Woman fight. They simplified it down to the "she doesn't wear pants" as the supposedly clever "you activated my trap card"-style conclusion.

[CarpeGuitarrem]

DB usually has an 'in-their-prime conglomerate' rule, where they take the strongest version of a character and any feats they've shown elsewhere that aren't explicitly stated to have been discarded from their arsenal (eg, Gaara calling his Beast), but the battle sprites are whatever they can get. Harry Potter and Toph were explicitly said to be using their feats as adults, but were represented in the animation as their child selves, for example. I expect we'll get adult Aang's feats, but child Aang's sprites.

Good point; so Aang won't be struggling to get into the Avatar State, which makes things a lot easier for him. A LOT easier.

I wonder if Aang's desire to avoid fights will get overwritten as per the "compunction against killing removed" rule. Because if he goes to chi-bend Edward's "bending" away, he'll be off-guard because Alchemy doesn't work like that.

This is a tangent, but I think it would be cool if DB moved to a sort of Rashomon format, where they pace the episode so that it plays out multiple possible outcomes for the fight, leaving viewers to decide. I'm guessing viewers would get cranky for the lack of a "definitive" answer, but it would often mean a more honest and more nuanced take on the fight. Because really, most fights aren't 100% slanted in favor of one side, and even if a fight is heavily favored, say 30/70, that's still a third of the time that the favored side loses.

[Rater202]

The major issue with the Gaara v. Toph fight is the declaration that Toph can bend Gaara's sand. I mean, you can go over the feats and I agree with Traab that Naruto is simply a higher scale universe and Gaara's in the top tier of that, but deciding Toph can bend Gaara's sand is an entirely arbitrary decision to trump one magic system over the other despite the fact that on a simple 1-to-1 level Gaara's capacity in wielding his supernatural force is higher than Toph's capacity to wield her supernatural force.

They made it out to be that if Toph can "see" Gaara floating in the air then she'd just win, like that was the only question as to whether she was the victor or not.

Edit: Which is the same issue with the Rogue/Wonder Woman fight. They simplified it down to the "she doesn't wear pants" as the supposedly clever "you activated my trap card"-style conclusion.

To further expand on this.

"I can use my spiritual energy and mantis style kung fu to control the earth."

"This sand is specially infused with the mixture of my soul energy and my life energy, treated with the blood of the hundreds of people I killed in my psycho phase which combined make it effortless for me to control, and it is literally possessed by my mom's ghost and her will to protect me from everything and she can use it to do so even if Im not aware that something is happening."

Does the first person being able to steal the second person's stuff make any sense?

[Keltest]

To further expand on this.

"I can use my spiritual energy and mantis style kung fu to control the earth."

"This sand is specially infused with the mixture of my soul energy and my life energy, treated with the blood of the hundreds of people I killed in my psycho phase which combined make it effortless for me to control, and it is literally possessed by my mom's ghost and her will to protect me from everything and she can use it to do so even if Im not aware that something is happening."

Does the first person being able to steal the second person's stuff make any sense?

As somebody who has no horse in that particular race, this sounds a lot like declaring that one person's magic should trump another person's magic because reasons. I could fluff up Toph's earthbending a lot too if I felt like it, but at the end of the day, the source of the control is only relevant as much as it could potentially be used to determine some kind of power level, and I haven't really seen anybody do that kind of comparison for this fight.

[Forum Explorer]

To further expand on this.

"I can use my spiritual energy and mantis style kung fu to control the earth."

"This sand is specially infused with the mixture of my soul energy and my life energy, treated with the blood of the hundreds of people I killed in my psycho phase which combined make it effortless for me to control, and it is literally possessed by my mom's ghost and her will to protect me from everything and she can use it to do so even if Im not aware that something is happening."

Does the first person being able to steal the second person's stuff make any sense?

Yes it does. In as much that either control makes any sort of sense.

Admittedly, it would also make perfect sense for it to not work either.

Or to put it another way,

Toph can control any sand, earth, or metal. If it comes out of the ground she can manipulate it. And with the ability to make elaborate structures, and the precision to land precise blows. She is used to fighting people who can bend the same elements as her, and she can affect their control to the point where she was the best duelists at the age of what? 11?

Gaara can only really control sand, or sand like materials. He's only once fought people who can mess with his control. He often doesn't consciously control the sand that acts as his defense. Indeed, he has so little control over it, it will even block self inflicted injuries.

I'd say it makes a lot of sense that the first person can steal the second person's stuff. When I put it like that.


EDIT: Actually looking at a compilation video of Toph's best bending feats, I'd say Toph outclasses Gaara when it comes to skill. Gaara would win on reaction time. They seem pretty close when it comes to raw power, but Toph can harden the sand just as fast as Gaara could break it down, and well she doesn't need to break it down to keep attacking. As for Gaara's speed, well, I don't think we've ever seen Gaara move much at all, and his sand's speed doesn't look to be all that fast. If anything, it's slower than some of Toph's attacks.

[Rater202]

As somebody who has no horse in that particular race, this sounds a lot like declaring that one person's magic should trump another person's magic because reasons.

Yes, this is what Space Battles did.

I'm explaining why Toph taking Gaara's sand away from him and killing him with it doesn't make sense--it's not inert dirt, it's literally infused with his chakra--which is, as stated, equal parts life force and soul juice--and literally possessed by his mom's ghost.

Even ignoring the radical differance in power that bends in Gaara's favor, the sand is basically an extension of Gaara himself with a secondary control point(Ghost Mom) thats sole priority is preventing Gaara from getting hurt.

Taking control of Gaara's sand, let alone hurting him with it, is logically impossible: If he doesn't want his personal sand to move, it doesn't move.

Toph controlling his sand is not only an arbitrary handwave, but it's also one that makes no god-damn sense in context.

[Keltest]

Yes, this is what Space Battles did.

I'm explaining why Toph taking Gaara's sand away from him and killing him with it doesn't make sense--it's not inert dirt, it's literally infused with his chakra--which is, as stated, equal parts life force and soul juice--and literally possessed by his mom's ghost.

Even ignoring the radical differance in power that bends in Gaara's favor, the sand is basically an extension of Gaara himself with a secondary control point(Ghost Mom) thats sole priority is preventing Gaara from getting hurt.

Taking control of Gaara's sand, let alone hurting him with it, is logically impossible: If he doesn't want his personal sand to move, it doesn't move.

Toph controlling his sand is not only an arbitrary handwave, but it's also one that makes no god-damn sense in context.

I mean, bloodbending is totally a thing in Avatar, so theres absolutely precedent for bending to override control of one's self. As I recall, taking LoK into account, it can start to do some really freaky subtle things beyond just body puppetry, if youre good at it.

[Rater202]

I mean, bloodbending is totally a thing in Avatar, so theres absolutely precedent for bending to override control of one's self. As I recall, taking LoK into account, it can start to do some really freaky subtle things beyond just body puppetry, if youre good at it.

Toph isn't a Water bendier so she can't do that and 2: Toph isn't a Spirit Bender either so there's no reason to believe that she can manipulate Life Force, Soul energy, or someone's ghost.

[Rynjin]

Gaara can only really control sand, or sand like materials. He's only once fought people who can mess with his control. He often doesn't consciously control the sand that acts as his defense. Indeed, he has so little control over it, it will even block self inflicted injuries.

The man has enough fine control to create a clone indistinguishable from his original form that can move, act, and talk, He can also create tendrils that seamlessly destroy rocks and minerals into a fine grit he can then control afterward, and form fully functional eyes out of sand that have perfect, real time vision of his surroundings. If you put it THAT way trumps anything anyone does in the entire Avatar franchise in terms of fine control. The automatic defense is an augmentation of his control, not a replacement.

The bolded part is also not quite incorrect. Gaara also has Magnet Release (control over metal), though uses it very rarely.


As for Gaara's speed, well, I don't think we've ever seen Gaara move much at all, and his sand's speed doesn't look to be all that fast. If anything, it's slower than some of Toph's attacks.

Gaara's sand is fast enough to intercept an attack in progress, from across the room, of a man who was at the point in time considered the fastest living ninja in the world. As of the end of the series he is "only" the third fastest in history, just shy of Naruto himself and the guy who could literally teleport. While exact numbers are hard to come by, he was fast enough the Sharingan couldn't track him (and it makes most people look like they move in slow motion) and could dodge hitscan attacks.

[Forum Explorer]

The man has enough fine control to create a clone indistinguishable from his original form that can move, act, and talk, He can also create tendrils that seamlessly destroy rocks and minerals into a fine grit he can then control afterward, and form fully functional eyes out of sand that have perfect, real time vision of his surroundings. If you put it THAT way trumps anything anyone does in the entire Avatar franchise in terms of fine control. The automatic defense is an augmentation of his control, not a replacement.

The bolded part is also not quite incorrect. Gaara also has Magnet Release (control over metal), though uses it very rarely.



Gaara's sand is fast enough to intercept an attack in progress, from across the room, of a man who was at the point in time considered the fastest living ninja in the world. As of the end of the series he is "only" the third fastest in history, just shy of Naruto himself and the guy who could literally teleport. While exact numbers are hard to come by, he was fast enough the Sharingan couldn't track him (and it makes most people look like they move in slow motion) and could dodge hitscan attacks.

The clone thing would be impressive if it didn't seem like pretty much every single ninja could do that. (I know not literally every ninja can, but it is a very common technique). Well that, and the clones are easily defeated with a single blow. The eye thing is true, I had forgotten about that. That is very impressive.

The only time I remember him using it was to control iron (or gold?) dust. That's why I put it under sand like materials. Does he ever use it to control stuff like Kunai?

Are you talking about when he fought Sasuke? Because a) Sasuke wasn't moving all that fast in that fight. and b) Sasuke's attacks had to go over a distance of maybe a dozen meters, while Gaara's sand had to move less than a meter.

But really, I've never been impressed by the fights in Naruto. They are so boring, (and the tendency to have flash backs right in the middle of them does not help!), so I'll admit I've got a bias against Naruto when it comes to how powerful they are. This does make it pretty difficult to do research on Gaara, because oh my goodness it's so bloody boring! Even running them at double speed, it still takes forever for anything to happen.

[Rynjin]

Are you talking about when he fought Sasuke? Because a) Sasuke wasn't moving all that fast in that fight. and b) Sasuke's attacks had to go over a distance of maybe a dozen meters, while Gaara's sand had to move less than a meter.

I'm talking post-timeskip, Raikage (aforementioned fastest guy) vs Sasuke (maybe 2nd fastest living guy at the time?).


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZimTz7Thnzg

Last 20 seconds or so.


But really, I've never been impressed by the fights in Naruto. They are so boring, (and the tendency to have flash backs right in the middle of them does not help!), so I'll admit I've got a bias against Naruto when it comes to how powerful they are. This does make it pretty difficult to do research on Gaara, because oh my goodness it's so bloody boring! Even running them at double speed, it still takes forever for anything to happen.

Naruto has some of the best choreographed fights in any Shonen out there, so I can't really gel with your mindset. Maybe if your only exposure is the anime, which has a lot of filler both in-episode and in general.

[Forum Explorer]

I'm talking post-timeskip, Raikage (aforementioned fastest guy) vs Sasuke (maybe 2nd fastest living guy at the time?).


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZimTz7Thnzg

Last 20 seconds or so.



Naruto has some of the best choreographed fights in any Shonen out there, so I can't really gel with your mindset. Maybe if your only exposure is the anime, which has a lot of filler both in-episode and in general.

The off screen interception, which makes it really hard to give it a full calculation. Not to mention Naruto's really bad habit of slowing things down without any indication that they are actually slowing things down.

I would disagree. I've actually swapped between the anime and the manga. Now, mind you, it wasn't the choreography that made me lose my temper with the story, it was the incessant flash backs. I can't remember which flash back pushed me over the edge. It might've been the one right after Obito's flashback.

EDIT: Though Choreography wise, I'd put Naruto below FMA, Fate/Stay Night, Fate/Stay Zero, My Hero Academia, or hmm, well most of anything I've actually watched/read. It beats DBZ I guess.

[Prime32]

Yes it does. In as much that either control makes any sort of sense.

Admittedly, it would also make perfect sense for it to not work either.

Or to put it another way,

Toph can control any sand, earth, or metal. If it comes out of the ground she can manipulate it. And with the ability to make elaborate structures, and the precision to land precise blows. She is used to fighting people who can bend the same elements as her, and she can affect their control to the point where she was the best duelists at the age of what? 11?

Gaara can only really control sand, or sand like materials. He's only once fought people who can mess with his control. He often doesn't consciously control the sand that acts as his defense. Indeed, he has so little control over it, it will even block self inflicted injuries.

I'd say it makes a lot of sense that the first person can steal the second person's stuff. When I put it like that.
Gaara can control Earth, Wind and Lightning. These are skills which any ninja can learn, though most people cap at one or two. The Earth element includes control of sand, and Gaara lives in a desert where using it this way is common.

Separate from this, Gaara is capable of the Magnet Release, an "advanced element" combining the Earth and Wind elements. This isn't something people can normally learn - it requires either a rare bloodline, or being bound to one of nine powerful spirits Avatar-style, and Gaara fits both categories. Advanced elements are capable of overwhelming basic elements - e.g. advanced Fire creates black flames that burn even fire. Because Gaara uses Magnet Release to control his sand (and sometimes metal), it overrides sand control based on Earth powers - even as an untrained child Gaara was able to defend himself from sand-controlling assassins effortlessly. The other side of this is that Magnet Release is cancelled out by lightning... but while this works on teen Gaara, adult Gaara's sand is easily tanking attacks from the most powerful lightning-users in history.

Separate from this, his sand is also haunted by his mother's ghost, making it further resistant to control.

Madara Uchiha, memetically known as one of the most stupidly overpowered characters in fiction, praises Gaara's sand for remaining unaffected when he negates the attacks of other top-level fighters in the setting, calling it truly worthy of its title "The Ultimate Defence".


EDIT: Actually looking at a compilation video of Toph's best bending feats, I'd say Toph outclasses Gaara when it comes to skill. Gaara would win on reaction time. They seem pretty close when it comes to raw power, but Toph can harden the sand just as fast as Gaara could break it down, and well she doesn't need to break it down to keep attacking. As for Gaara's speed, well, I don't think we've ever seen Gaara move much at all, and his sand's speed doesn't look to be all that fast. If anything, it's slower than some of Toph's attacks.Gaara can use the basic "move so fast you seem to teleport" ninja technique, and he's a good enough martial artist to mentor others, he just prefers to hang back and be patient. By the end of the series, his sand is fast enough to block lightning and gaze attacks after they're fired.

[Reddish Mage]

Nah, this is death battle, it will ramp up from basic combat to alchemy and bending to avatar state in the end. While technically it makes sense to go full power right at the start in a true death battle, its a lot less amusing to watch.

There’s another reason other than “its death battle” and every fight has to ramp up like it does in...most every dramatic fight scene you ever watched or read.

Both Aang and Edward are not the type to go directly for the finish. In fact, neither would kill the other except that DB changes that part of the character. The two fight in a way that’s consistent with how they fight in their own media.

Aang will not immediately enter the Avatar state, but Ed will not go straight for the kill either. The fight will ramp up gradually. Any differences in strength, speed, etc may appear but even when the combatants are greatly outmatched (as in Flash v. Quicksilver or Lucy v. Carnage) it will not look like a total curve stomp until it the final part of the fight.


As of the end of the series he is "only" the third fastest in history, just shy of Naruto himself and the guy who could literally teleport. While exact numbers are hard to come by, he was fast enough the Sharingan couldn't track him (and it makes most people look like they move in slow motion) and could dodge hitscan attacks.

If we’re talking the actual fight between Gaara and Toph we are going back a ways. Naruto was still on-going and end-shippuden Gaara was not a thing. There is no question that Gaara as of the end of Naruto Shippuden would totally curve-stomp Toph, as that version shows the entire range of ninja martial arts and tricks, including speed, and lots of new special abilities (although he doesn’t have the Shukaku anymore).

Kid-Gaara though, he just sort of stands there and relies on his sand manipulation. Gaara of the Sand Waterfall doesn’t use and is canonically is weak on taijitsu abilities (he later trains them up).

I don’t think there’s any question post-ninja war Gaara beats any version of Toph, especially granny Toph. In fact, that version of Gaara would beat also Aang hands down and maybe also Ichigo. What we were dealing with though, was an earlier version of Gaara.

Of course, FMA have now both have had their full run. We are going with Ed after fully realizing his alchemy together with all the techniques he picked up. He’ll be fighting a composite Aang with all his adult abilities (but both will probably look like kids).

FMA isn’t Naruto level of silliness though, I say Ed will beat Aang based on Aang’s weakness to being surprised or denied material to bend, but Avatar Aang has the clear advantage in pure destructive power.

[Prime32]

If we’re talking the actual fight between Gaara and Toph we are going back a ways. Naruto was still on-going and end-shippuden Gaara was not a thing. There is no question that Gaara as of the end of Naruto Shippuden would totally curve-stomp Toph, as that version shows the entire range of ninja martial arts and tricks, including speed, and lots of new special abilities (although he doesn’t have the Shukaku anymore).

Kid-Gaara though, he just sort of stands there and relies on his sand manipulation. Gaara of the Sand Waterfall doesn’t use and is canonically is weak on taijitsu abilities (he later trains them up).

I don’t think there’s any question post-ninja war Gaara beats any version of Toph, especially granny Toph. In fact, that version of Gaara would beat also Aang hands down and maybe also Ichigo. What we were dealing with though, was an earlier version of Gaara.
Toph vs Gaara aired three months after the final chapter of Naruto.

[Seppl]

FMA isn’t Naruto level of silliness though, I say Ed will beat Aang based on Aang’s weakness to being surprised or denied material to bend, but Avatar Aang has the clear advantage in pure destructive power.It would have to be an instant kill, though. The Avatar State has been repeatedly shown to trigger automatically as an emergency defense, even if the Avatar is unconscious or while the Avatar is actively resisting it.

[Rynjin]

The off screen interception, which makes it really hard to give it a full calculation. Not to mention Naruto's really bad habit of slowing things down without any indication that they are actually slowing things down.

I would disagree. I've actually swapped between the anime and the manga. Now, mind you, it wasn't the choreography that made me lose my temper with the story, it was the incessant flash backs. I can't remember which flash back pushed me over the edge. It might've been the one right after Obito's flashback.

EDIT: Though Choreography wise, I'd put Naruto below FMA, Fate/Stay Night, Fate/Stay Zero, My Hero Academia, or hmm, well most of anything I've actually watched/read. It beats DBZ I guess.

I love MHA, but its fights are mostly spectacle and strategy, not choreography. Same with FMA, and I won't touch on Fate since the entire extended franchise gave me such a headache when I tried to find an entry point I just wrote it off entirely.

Naruto in its climactic fights generally has movie level choreography, move by move mapped out in point/counterpoint attacks and defenses in both the manga and anime. This is a credit even most people who hate the series give it, with this being commonly recognized as one of the better ones, and one of only a few times the flashbacks actually enhance the fight (since they don't interrupt it):


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hcbJ6wbGQbA

Nothing in MHA matches that except maybe the fight with Stain, at least as far as the anime has gotten (I decided to be anime-only for MHA).

Similarly good fights: Gaara vs Lee, Naruto and Sasuke's two major fights (one pre-timeskip, the other at the very end of the series), and the (abridged) version of the fight between Sakura/Chiyo and Sasori, which is marred by too many dialogue breaks otherwise.

Edit: Posted the wrong version of the video.

[Traab]

Im not talking about garras physical speed when im talking speed, im talking speed of his attacks which can intercept attacks moving so fast a human sized object cant even be SEEN and it still gets blocked, to the linked video of the raikage where he is literally blocking an attack by one of the fastest ninja on earth by reacting in time to spotting the fact that landing that hit would be suicide and sending in his sand to stop it. That is just utterly absurd on both reaction time and attack speed. Narutoverse is literally superhuman in every aspect. Avatar is not. Avatar people are more or less bog standard humans with the ability to control elements.

And yes, the fluff behind his personal sand explains exactly why toph shouldnt be able to take control of his sand. At the very least not his personal supply that defends him automatically. But even if she COULD that still doesnt change the simple truth. She has no ability to detect an attack coming in at supersonic speeds, and react in time to block/dodge/control it before it perforates her. Vibrations can only travel at the speed of sound, his attacks frequently move faster than that. She is dead before she knows an attack is coming. She doesnt have the ability to detect an attack incoming that fast or do anything about it even if she did detect it.

[Reddish Mage]

Toph vs Gaara aired three months after the final chapter of Naruto.

In English? I rewatched the video now and it has images of Gaara from the ninja war although not the end of the ninja war.

Still, given all the material out, its clear that Gaara was superior to Toph at the time in speed and power, unless Toph doesn’t need her arms to bend and can kill Gaara in his armor at anytime it just...doesn’t....make...sense.


It would have to be an instant kill, though. The Avatar State has been repeatedly shown to trigger automatically as an emergency defense, even if the Avatar is unconscious or while the Avatar is actively resisting it.

Not always. Recall lots of previous Avatars died untimely deaths. If the Avatar dies in Avatar form the death is canonically the end of the Avatar state.

Still, I’m taking it as a given Aang will show off the Avatar state. Probably on purpose rather than as any sort of defense.

Aang nearly got killed by Azula after entering the fully realized Avatar state. Only the spirit water brought him back. In the avatar state, Aang is said to be at his “most powerful” but also, his “most vulnerable.”

Despite his power, Aang can totally be killed in the Avatar state.

[Forum Explorer]

I love MHA, but its fights are mostly spectacle and strategy, not choreography. Same with FMA, and I won't touch on Fate since the entire extended franchise gave me such a headache when I tried to find an entry point I just wrote it off entirely.

Naruto in its climactic fights generally has movie level choreography, move by move mapped out in point/counterpoint attacks and defenses in both the manga and anime. This is a credit even most people who hate the series give it, with this being commonly recognized as one of the better ones, and one of only a few times the flashbacks actually enhance the fight (since they don't interrupt it):


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hcbJ6wbGQbA

Nothing in MHA matches that except maybe the fight with Stain, at least as far as the anime has gotten (I decided to be anime-only for MHA).

Similarly good fights: Gaara vs Lee, Naruto and Sasuke's two major fights (one pre-timeskip, the other at the very end of the series), and the (abridged) version of the fight between Sakura/Chiyo and Sasori, which is marred by too many dialogue breaks otherwise.

Edit: Posted the wrong version of the video.

That was a really good fight.

My problem with so many of Naruto's fights is how...little impact the blows have. The characters will take blow after blow and there will be massive explosions, and they'll still be fighting. Which is really exacerbated by how long the fight scenes are. Like this fight:

Sasuke vs Naruto final battle (https://youtu.be/ZvgNY_nIWiE)

It's a good 20 some minutes of explosions, punches, and so on. They go from punching each other across the valley to being exhausted to punching each other across the valley again, to one final blow that they of course slam directly into each other's attacks.

Vs my all time favorite fight scene:

Kirei Kotomine vs Kirisugu Emiya (https://youtu.be/FBmRl4q8Gl0)

The fight is 5 minutes long, and each person actually takes damage. They get hurt, and them being hurt visibly impacts their fight. And it's so quick and punchy that the impact of each blow is exaggerated rather than diminished.

[Keltest]

Toph isn't a Water bendier so she can't do that and 2: Toph isn't a Spirit Bender either so there's no reason to believe that she can manipulate Life Force, Soul energy, or someone's ghost.

No, but she can manipulate and control sand. The point was to establish that being alive, or having a soul or whatever doesnt inherently make you immune to bending.

[Rynjin]

That was a really good fight.

My problem with so many of Naruto's fights is how...little impact the blows have. The characters will take blow after blow and there will be massive explosions, and they'll still be fighting. Which is really exacerbated by how long the fight scenes are. Like this fight:

Sasuke vs Naruto final battle (https://youtu.be/ZvgNY_nIWiE)

It's a good 20 some minutes of explosions, punches, and so on. They go from punching each other across the valley to being exhausted to punching each other across the valley again, to one final blow that they of course slam directly into each other's attacks.

Vs my all time favorite fight scene:

Kirei Kotomine vs Kirisugu Emiya (https://youtu.be/FBmRl4q8Gl0)

The fight is 5 minutes long, and each person actually takes damage. They get hurt, and them being hurt visibly impacts their fight. And it's so quick and punchy that the impact of each blow is exaggerated rather than diminished.


Maybe a preference on power levels/relative durability then. Naruto's universe is pretty high on the scale in regard to physical feats in media, where from what I know of the Fate series most of the characters are roughly average (if superhumanly athletic) people with consistent powersets and a smattering of blockbuster power moves that serve as effective fight enders.

One has physical durability as a main decider, and the other one...spiritual durability might be the right term? It's one person's resolve vs another's, with an added "energy meter goes down" effect.

I like both. The fight you posted was excellent, and it reminds me of some of my other favorite series' action scenes (Darker Than Black, HunterxHunter, etc.) which are "toolbox fights". You tend to run out of options or body parts, rather than power.

But I can also appreciate fights depend on power meters, particularly with how thematically well done the final Sasuke/Naruto fight is. They work backwards, which is unique for an anime fight. They start at zero, very quickly work their way up to their biggest moves, and then just as quickly REGRESS through the different power-up modes they gained over the course of the series until they're left exactly where they were at the end of their first true clash: a final assault from their respective Signature Moves in their absolute simplest forms.

It's a fight of grit, spectacle, and theming (with some damn good hand to hand choreography) rather than raw strategy which I appreciate in a lot of series' fight scenes (like many in My Hero Academia and Gurren Lagann).

But I am unabashed Shonen Trash so I can completely ignore a lot of simplistic fight elements if it gives me the feelsies and looks good. =)

[Battleship789]

Maybe a preference on power levels/relative durability then. Naruto's universe is pretty high on the scale in regard to physical feats in media, where from what I know of the Fate series most of the characters are roughly average (if superhumanly athletic) people with consistent powersets and a smattering of blockbuster power moves that serve as effective fight enders.

One has physical durability as a main decider, and the other one...spiritual durability might be the right term? It's one person's resolve vs another's, with an added "energy meter goes down" effect.

I like both. The fight you posted was excellent, and it reminds me of some of my other favorite series' action scenes (Darker Than Black, HunterxHunter, etc.) which are "toolbox fights". You tend to run out of options or body parts, rather than power.

But I can also appreciate fights depend on power meters, particularly with how thematically well done the final Sasuke/Naruto fight is. They work backwards, which is unique for an anime fight. They start at zero, very quickly work their way up to their biggest moves, and then just as quickly REGRESS through the different power-up modes they gained over the course of the series until they're left exactly where they were at the end of their first true clash: a final assault from their respective Signature Moves in their absolute simplest forms.

It's a fight of grit, spectacle, and theming (with some damn good hand to hand choreography) rather than raw strategy which I appreciate in a lot of series' fight scenes (like many in My Hero Academia and Gurren Lagann).

But I am unabashed Shonen Trash so I can completely ignore a lot of simplistic fight elements if it gives me the feelsies and looks good. =)

Tbf, that Fate fight scene is between two humans (and relatively low power humans, in that they don't use a lot of magic, though they are good physical combatants for humans.) Most of the fights are between Servants (people from legends summoned to the modern world, like King Arthur, Gilgamesh, Hercules, Cu Chulainn, etc.), who are definitely superhuman. See this for an example of two Servants fighting (and they aren't taking it too seriously):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tGz42vpeGKk

[Traab]

No, but she can manipulate and control sand. The point was to establish that being alive, or having a soul or whatever doesnt inherently make you immune to bending.

The thing is, its not about being alive, its about how toph isnt just taking control of sand, its taking control of sand that is being actively controlled by someone else and is actually POSSESSED by the soul of another person as well. Thats just so far outside of tophs experience or avatar in general that claiming she can just take it over is silly. In addition to that, its a different source of power being used to control the elements. Magic, chakra, telekinesis, they arent the same even if they can achieve the same results, and expecting the rules of one universe to carry over to another one entirely without any evidence that such is the case is silly. It would be one thing to claim she can control sand that garra hurls at her as those are fire and forget attacks similar to how bending attacks generally work, but just declaring that one of the most powerful users of a specific element in one setting can just go to another setting and casually take control away from the most powerful user in THAT setting is dumb. It was obvious the second they said that, that they wanted toph to win because it was literally the only thing that could have worked for her. And again, it ignores all the way that even if it WAS possible, it wouldnt matter because knowing how to block a punch doesnt help when your opponent is so much faster than you, you cant even see the punches to block them.

[Rater202]

No, but she can manipulate and control sand. The point was to establish that being alive, or having a soul or whatever doesnt inherently make you immune to bending.

No.

The point is that she needs to be able to control blood, life force, soul juice, and ghosts and be more powerful that Gaara before she can reasonably be expected to take Gaara's sand away from him, let alone use it against him.

[Keltest]

No.

The point is that she needs to be able to control blood, life force, soul juice, and ghosts and be more powerful that Gaara before she can reasonably be expected to take Gaara's sand away from him, let alone use it against him.

Why? Youre arbitrarily declaring Gaara's claim to be stronger without giving any support. Theyre both basically magic, what makes his magic better? It cant just be the soul stuff, because bending works on people, who have souls.

[Devonix]

I also have never understood why Garaa's soul sand should be unbendable just because there's a spirit in it.

[Kitten Champion]

I don't think it should be unbendable because of fluff reasons, I think it should be unbendable because Gaara has demonstrated that he can produce vastly more force in manipulating sand than Toph has. In the same way the winner of a tug-of-war should be the one who demonstrates the most muscle strength, the one who keeps control of their element is that who can lift the most and move it the fastest.

Otherwise you have this fanfic-reasoning which is whatever you want, really.

[Rater202]

Why? Youre arbitrarily declaring Gaara's claim to be stronger without giving any support. Theyre both basically magic, what makes his magic better? It cant just be the soul stuff, because bending works on people, who have souls.

No.

Toph controls Earth.

Gaara is not only significantly more powerful than Toph, but his personal supply of sand isn't just sand.

It's sand... and blood. And infused with Gaara's life-force and soul-stuff(the stuff that chakra is made of.)

It's essentially an extension of his Will.

If Gaara and Toph are trying to control it at the same time, Toph's attempt should just automatically fail becuase she's controlling Sand while Gaara is controlling an extension of his own being and doing so with far more power than Toph is, meanwhile, Toph can only control part of the mass of the sand, since she lacks the ability to bend blood, souls, or life-force and that's a significant chunk of Gaara's personal sand supply.

In addition to this, Gaara's sand is literally possessed by the ghost of Gaara's mother and instilled with a desire to protect Gaara. If Gaara is not consciously controlling his sand, his mother is moving it to protect him.

In order to take Gaara's sand from him and use it against him, Toph, who is at an extreme disadvantage becuase she's only able to control like, the least important part of Gaara's personal reserves of sand, has to wretch control of it away from Gaara, who is far, far stronger than her, and make it go against the fundamental nature it gets from his mother's soul.

[Keltest]

No.

Toph controls Earth.

Gaara is not only significantly more powerful than Toph, but his personal supply of sand isn't just sand.

It's sand... and blood. And infused with Gaara's life-force and soul-stuff(the stuff that chakra is made of.)

It's essentially an extension of his Will.

If Gaara and Toph are trying to control it at the same time, Toph's attempt should just automatically fail becuase she's controlling Sand while Gaara is controlling an extension of his own being and doing so with far more power than Toph is, meanwhile, Toph can only control part of the mass of the sand, since she lacks the ability to bend blood, souls, or life-force and that's a significant chunk of Gaara's personal sand supply.

In addition to this, Gaara's sand is literally possessed by the ghost of Gaara's mother and instilled with a desire to protect Gaara. If Gaara is not consciously controlling his sand, his mother is moving it to protect him.

In order to take Gaara's sand from him and use it against him, Toph, who is at an extreme disadvantage becuase she's only able to control like, the least important part of Gaara's personal reserves of sand, has to wretch control of it away from Gaara, who is far, far stronger than her, and make it go against the fundamental nature it gets from his mother's soul.

Youre missing the point. It doesn't matter that Gaara's sand is magically possessed or whatever. bending explicitly doesn't care about that. The only argument here that's remotely relevant is the claim that Gaara's power is stronger than Toph's power, and you aren't actually backing that up with anything.

Now I'll be the first one to admit that I don't know much about Naruto, so for all I know, you could be correct, but you aren't actually supporting your assertion at all. Forget the souls, forget the possession, its all irrelevant. If that was the only thing working here, Toph would win, period, end of story, do not collect $200. Demonstrate to me that Gaara's power is stronger than Toph's.

[Devonix]

Youre missing the point. It doesn't matter that Gaara's sand is magically possessed or whatever. bending explicitly doesn't care about that. The only argument here that's remotely relevant is the claim that Gaara's power is stronger than Toph's power, and you aren't actually backing that up with anything.

Now I'll be the first one to admit that I don't know much about Naruto, so for all I know, you could be correct, but you aren't actually supporting your assertion at all. Forget the souls, forget the possession, its all irrelevant. If that was the only thing working here, Toph would win, period, end of story, do not collect $200. Demonstrate to me that Gaara's power is stronger than Toph's.

Exactly, If we're talking about how Gaara has controled a larger amount of material than Toph had controlled, that's one thing to actually use as valid. It The sand having extra stuff in it wouldn't make it any less usable in bending.

I agree that Gaara has more raw power, And any tug of war should be one by Gaara. I don't think anyone's disputing this. But if other stuff being in an element affected your ability to use said element. Then Blood bending Most Earth bending wouldn't work. because of impurities.

[Rater202]

Youre missing the point. It doesn't matter that Gaara's sand is magically possessed or whatever. bending explicitly doesn't care about that. The only argument here that's remotely relevant is the claim that Gaara's power is stronger than Toph's power, and you aren't actually backing that up with anything.[quote]

No, you're missing the point.

1:Toph controls earth and earthen impurities in metal.

Gaara's personal supply of sand is earth, blood, his chakra(which is to say, is life force and spiritual energy), and his mom's ghost. Considering the number of people he's killed and "fed" their blood to the sand, Gaara's personal supply of sand is arguably more blood than anything else.

Toph's ability to control it should innately be limited since she can only control part of what its made of.

2: The sand is not inert soil. It's not like it's a battle of will between two people over the same unrelated rock. The blood and chakra treatments on the sand are meant to make it easier for Gaara to control and less energy intesive. It is, for all intents and purposes, part of Gaara's body. An extension of his soul.

Toph is an outside party trying to seize control of what is basically an extension of Gaara's own self while Gaara himself is activly using it. In a battle of wills over an extension of one party's will, the party who actually owns the extension ofg will should automatically win.

3: In addition to being an extension of Gaara's will, the sand has a will of it's own due to being possessed by his mother's ghost and instilled with her desire to protect him no matter what.

Now, we don't know if Toph can bend living earth, I don't think living Earth is a thing in Avatar, but at the very least Gaara's sand would be actively resisting her control and moving against her to try and avoid bringing Harm to Gaara.

4: Bringing it together: Toph has an innate disadvantage when controlling Gaara's personal supply of sand, as it's mostly things that aren't earth. Gaara, meanwhile, has an innate advantage as the sand is treated in such a way as to make it an extension of his will and body. In a battle of wills, it's a three way fight between Toph, Gaara, and the ghost whose only goal is to protect Gaara so Toph would be fighting on two fronts to get control og the sand.

Toph could only win that battle of wills if her own raw power dwarfed Gaara's, and it uh... Doesn't.

[quote]Now I'll be the first one to admit that I don't know much about Naruto, so for all I know, you could be correct, but you aren't actually supporting your assertion at all. Forget the souls, forget the possession, its all irrelevant. If that was the only thing working here, Toph would win, period, end of story, do not collect $200. Demonstrate to me that Gaara's power is stronger than Toph's.I don't have to.

Other people have made the argument for me, pointing out that Naruto simply operates on a higher scale than Avatar does.

If I absolutely have to give examples though:

In the Sasuke Retrial Arc, Gaara floods a

From Early on in part II, he creates a wave of sand the size of a decently sized city. This is not his personal supply of sand. It's just sand that was kind of laying around.

He is exponentially stronger by the end of the series, to the point that his father(reanimated as an immortal zombie by a villain) assumes that the sand control he's seeing is Shukaku unrestrained. This is after Shukaku is extracted, meaning that it's all Gaara. Gaara's father has fought Shukaku several times, so he knows exactly what he's talking about.

Gaara's father uses Magnet Releases to use strong electromagnetic fields to magnetize gold dust, becuase gold dust has properties that make it superior to sand for the kind of techniques that Gaara and Shukaku use(Gaara used to be a little psycho, needed a way to keep him in line.)

Gaara is easily able to match and overpower his father's techniques which are specifically designed to overpower Gaara's own by the time they formally fight onscreen.

[Keltest]

Youre missing the point. It doesn't matter that Gaara's sand is magically possessed or whatever. bending explicitly doesn't care about that. The only argument here that's remotely relevant is the claim that Gaara's power is stronger than Toph's power, and you aren't actually backing that up with anything.

No, you're missing the point.

1:Toph controls earth and earthen impurities in metal.

Gaara's personal supply of sand is earth, blood, his chakra(which is to say, is life force and spiritual energy), and his mom's ghost. Considering the number of people he's killed and "fed" their blood to the sand, Gaara's personal supply of sand is arguably more blood than anything else.

Toph's ability to control it should innately be limited since she can only control part of what its made of.

2: The sand is not inert soil. It's not like it's a battle of will between two people over the same unrelated rock. The blood and chakra treatments on the sand are meant to make it easier for Gaara to control and less energy intesive. It is, for all intents and purposes, part of Gaara's body. An extension of his soul.

Toph is an outside party trying to seize control of what is basically an extension of Gaara's own self while Gaara himself is activly using it. In a battle of wills over an extension of one party's will, the party who actually owns the extension ofg will should automatically win.

3: In addition to being an extension of Gaara's will, the sand has a will of it's own due to being possessed by his mother's ghost and instilled with her desire to protect him no matter what.

Now, we don't know if Toph can bend living earth, I don't think living Earth is a thing in Avatar, but at the very least Gaara's sand would be actively resisting her control and moving against her to try and avoid bringing Harm to Gaara.

4: Bringing it together: Toph has an innate disadvantage when controlling Gaara's personal supply of sand, as it's mostly things that aren't earth. Gaara, meanwhile, has an innate advantage as the sand is treated in such a way as to make it an extension of his will and body. In a battle of wills, it's a three way fight between Toph, Gaara, and the ghost whose only goal is to protect Gaara so Toph would be fighting on two fronts to get control og the sand.

Toph could only win that battle of wills if her own raw power dwarfed Gaara's, and it uh... Doesn't.



Point 1: this actually supports me, not you. Toph has demonstrated an ability to control an entire object even though the object is not made entirely of her bending material. To that end, the fact that it isn't pure sand is irrelevant. At best, it would split into its component elements, with Gaara controlling a cloud of dried blood particles while Toph controls the sand.

Point 2: Just because you think that doesn't mean its true. Bending overrides personal control, period. It just does. Being a part of somebody does not protect you from bending, hence the bloodbending example.

Point 3: Same deal. Being a part of a "living" or at least intelligent entity does not protect you from bending. You can apply your own force against it, but that doesn't affect the ability of the bender to affect you, it would just damage your body from the strain. This is maybe less important to something that doesn't actually need a solid body to exist, but it isn't a point in his favor at all either.

And thus, to point 4: This is, again, just you declaring Toph to be at a disadvantage here, in spite of explicit evidence that it doesn't work that way. Toph controls the sand and Gaara has nothing that actually limits her ability to control that sand. All he can do is try and exercise his own control over it, so it comes back down to "is he stronger at controlling sand than Toph?" Which is the whole freaking point. Maybe he is. I don't even care at this point, the fight is long done. But you aren't arguing from a position of strength here because you keep insisting that specific canon powers just don't apply for some reason.

The point is, if we remove Gaara's own personal ability to control sand from the equation, Toph doesn't even notice a difference. Therefore Gaara needs to match her with his own raw power, and all the fancy external boosts to his personal sand supply don't matter because TLA went out of their way to demonstrate that bending is unaffected by those kinds of things. Its like protesting that Aang couldnt bend air that was moving through a fan first.

[Traab]

Point 1: this actually supports me, not you. Toph has demonstrated an ability to control an entire object even though the object is not made entirely of her bending material. To that end, the fact that it isn't pure sand is irrelevant. At best, it would split into its component elements, with Gaara controlling a cloud of dried blood particles while Toph controls the sand.

Point 2: Just because you think that doesn't mean its true. Bending overrides personal control, period. It just does. Being a part of somebody does not protect you from bending, hence the bloodbending example.

Point 3: Same deal. Being a part of a "living" or at least intelligent entity does not protect you from bending. You can apply your own force against it, but that doesn't affect the ability of the bender to affect you, it would just damage your body from the strain. This is maybe less important to something that doesn't actually need a solid body to exist, but it isn't a point in his favor at all either.

And thus, to point 4: This is, again, just you declaring Toph to be at a disadvantage here, in spite of explicit evidence that it doesn't work that way. Toph controls the sand and Gaara has nothing that actually limits her ability to control that sand. All he can do is try and exercise his own control over it, so it comes back down to "is he stronger at controlling sand than Toph?" Which is the whole freaking point. Maybe he is. I don't even care at this point, the fight is long done. But you aren't arguing from a position of strength here because you keep insisting that specific canon powers just don't apply for some reason.

The point is, if we remove Gaara's own personal ability to control sand from the equation, Toph doesn't even notice a difference. Therefore Gaara needs to match her with his own raw power, and all the fancy external boosts to his personal sand supply don't matter because TLA went out of their way to demonstrate that bending is unaffected by those kinds of things. Its like protesting that Aang couldnt bend air that was moving through a fan first.

Bending does not over ride personal control. At best it over rides other benders control and even then you have to be better at it. Toph has nothing that says she can take control of his sand while he is using it. They just unilaterally declared that her school of magic is more powerful than his backed by nothing. This (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YRwKc2n2U94) is a solid battle of shippuden era garra showing off his strength. This is not where he was at his peak but he is still fighting a long range battle protecting an entire city from a guy dropping everything from grenades to pocket nukes all over the place while controlling enough sand to attack this guy from lord knows what distance but an easy estimate being within a mile or two of his location. Thats an absurd amount of power and control. He is manipulating entire beaches worth of sand multiple times over for attacking on multiple angles, deflecting attacks against himself, protecting the city from bombs. Even half conscious injured and exhausted he was still able to move a city crushing mountain of sand outside city limits before collapsing. When did toph do stuff on this level?

[Reddish Mage]

No.

Toph controls Earth.

Gaara is not only significantly more powerful than Toph, but his personal supply of sand isn't just sand.

It's sand... and blood. And infused with Gaara's life-force and soul-stuff(the stuff that chakra is made of.)

It's essentially an extension of his Will.]


Point 1: ... Toph has demonstrated an ability to control an entire object even though the object is not made entirely of her bending material. To that end, the fact that it isn't pure sand is irrelevant.

Point 2: ...Bending overrides personal control, period. It just does. Being a part of somebody does not protect you from bending, hence the bloodbending example.

Point 3: Same deal. Being a part of a "living" or at least intelligent entity does not protect you from bending.

...

This is a logical way of explaining how bending works based on the evidence you give. It simply overrides anyone's will, as in blood bending. Problem is we have seen Bloodbending get overridden (https://avatar.fandom.com/wiki/Bloodbending) (scroll to the bottom of the wiki). In addition to other water benders being able to do so, the Avatar in Avatar state can defeat it, and Gaara is shown manipulating sand on a scale only the Avatar could.

Its simply not true that bending always and in all cases overrides whatever other forces are at work upon the object. Its just usually the case, probably because bending is more powerful than most of the other stuff in the Avatar-verse.


Bending does not over ride personal control. At best it over rides other benders control and even then you have to be better at it. Toph has nothing that says she can take control of his sand while he is using it. They just unilaterally declared that her school of magic is more powerful than his backed by nothing.

The nature of death battle requires that characters with powers that are unique to their own universe will interact seamlessly with another character's powers from a totally different universe. We usually don't see struggling over the same material, but when you see it, its generally one with more power that wins.

Its not like there's nothing to hang on that bending can defeat other forces on the objects, the problem is the evidence is not completely one-sided because there are examples of bending being defeated by other bending or overwhelming strength.

The thing is, all this fighting over bending should be irrelevant because Gaara should simply be at a totally different level of strength, speed, durability and skill to Toph. It's like if Bruce Lee fought the Hulk. It's like having a high school basketball team play against an NBA champion team. For a unique trick to overcome that difference it has to be something really special, and Gaara has his own tricks are all on different scale.

Upon seeing how late in Naruto they actually had access to, I can't find any reason anymore why Gaara should lose. Every scenario where Toph can eek out a victory requires minimizing or making irrelevant Gaara's own much more formidable abilities.

Sure, you can come up with reasons why Toph has an auto-win button, but you can do the same for Gaara. Gaara should be able to win with a basic attack delivered at speed Toph can't deal with (if the speed of sound operates like in our universe, she shouldn't even see it coming). Deathbattle is premised on the idea that you can smash two characters from different universe together in a confrontation, and the cast and crew expend a lot of energy saying they are honestly being fair in how they analyze the two and determine the victor. There's no proof bending simply overrides Gaara's ability to control his sand, there's certainly no evidence Toph is faster than Gaara, and everything about the two universes and the relative feats we see show that Gaara is far stronger and more durable.

Its quite clear they sell Gaara short in their analysis. The result is simply wrong.

[HolyDraconus]

This is a logical way of explaining how bending works based on the evidence you give. It simply overrides anyone's will, as in blood bending. Problem is we have seen Bloodbending get overridden (https://avatar.fandom.com/wiki/Bloodbending) (scroll to the bottom of the wiki). In addition to other water benders being able to do so, the Avatar in Avatar state can defeat it, and Gaara is shown manipulating sand on a scale only the Avatar could.

Its simply not true that bending always and in all cases overrides whatever other forces are at work upon the object. Its just usually the case, probably because bending is more powerful than most of the other stuff in the Avatar-verse.



The nature of death battle requires that characters with powers that are unique to their own universe will interact seamlessly with another character's powers from a totally different universe. We usually don't see struggling over the same material, but when you see it, its generally one with more power that wins.

Its not like there's nothing to hang on that bending can defeat other forces on the objects, the problem is the evidence is not completely one-sided because there are examples of bending being defeated by other bending or overwhelming strength.

The thing is, all this fighting over bending should be irrelevant because Gaara should simply be at a totally different level of strength, speed, durability and skill to Toph. It's like if Bruce Lee fought the Hulk. It's like having a high school basketball team play against an NBA champion team. For a unique trick to overcome that difference it has to be something really special, and Gaara has his own tricks are all on different scale.

Upon seeing how late in Naruto they actually had access to, I can't find any reason anymore why Gaara should lose. Every scenario where Toph can eek out a victory requires minimizing or making irrelevant Gaara's own much more formidable abilities.

Sure, you can come up with reasons why Toph has an auto-win button, but you can do the same for Gaara. Gaara should be able to win with a basic attack delivered at speed Toph can't deal with (if the speed of sound operates like in our universe, she shouldn't even see it coming). Deathbattle is premised on the idea that you can smash two characters from different universe together in a confrontation, and the cast and crew expend a lot of energy saying they are honestly being fair in how they analyze the two and determine the victor. There's no proof bending simply overrides Gaara's ability to control his sand, there's certainly no evidence Toph is faster than Gaara, and everything about the two universes and the relative feats we see show that Gaara is far stronger and more durable.

Its quite clear they sell Gaara short in their analysis. The result is simply wrong.
..... true. The next question becomes... was it lack of research or bias that resulted in the incorrect conclusion? Years ago, I would lean towards the former, but as the series gone on, as well as how some fights were picked initially, I'm heavily in the latter.

[Forum Explorer]

Maybe a preference on power levels/relative durability then. Naruto's universe is pretty high on the scale in regard to physical feats in media, where from what I know of the Fate series most of the characters are roughly average (if superhumanly athletic) people with consistent powersets and a smattering of blockbuster power moves that serve as effective fight enders.

One has physical durability as a main decider, and the other one...spiritual durability might be the right term? It's one person's resolve vs another's, with an added "energy meter goes down" effect.

I like both. The fight you posted was excellent, and it reminds me of some of my other favorite series' action scenes (Darker Than Black, HunterxHunter, etc.) which are "toolbox fights". You tend to run out of options or body parts, rather than power.

But I can also appreciate fights depend on power meters, particularly with how thematically well done the final Sasuke/Naruto fight is. They work backwards, which is unique for an anime fight. They start at zero, very quickly work their way up to their biggest moves, and then just as quickly REGRESS through the different power-up modes they gained over the course of the series until they're left exactly where they were at the end of their first true clash: a final assault from their respective Signature Moves in their absolute simplest forms.

It's a fight of grit, spectacle, and theming (with some damn good hand to hand choreography) rather than raw strategy which I appreciate in a lot of series' fight scenes (like many in My Hero Academia and Gurren Lagann).

But I am unabashed Shonen Trash so I can completely ignore a lot of simplistic fight elements if it gives me the feelsies and looks good. =)

It's tough to say what exactly doesn't appeal to me about Naruto's fights. Well, stuff that isn't the flashbacks. That one is obvious. But even with those removed, I often find them boring and silly. It's not just power level (though I do typically enjoy lower powered fights), I've really enjoyed Terra Toppa Gurren Lagen and Kill La Kill before, and their fights are literally ridiculous. It might be length, I'm not sure what the longest fight scene I've seen is, but it wouldn't surprise me if it belonged to Naruto. It might be characters, Naruto is good enough, but I despise Sasuke because he is just awful.

Or maybe it's just the fact that even removed, the flashbacks make the fights choppy in places where they used to be.


I don't think it should be unbendable because of fluff reasons, I think it should be unbendable because Gaara has demonstrated that he can produce vastly more force in manipulating sand than Toph has. In the same way the winner of a tug-of-war should be the one who demonstrates the most muscle strength, the one who keeps control of their element is that who can lift the most and move it the fastest.


Actually, is that true? Toph has shattered cliffs before and apparently has a range across an entire city. I mean, Toph certainly strikes with less of force, but that's because you usually don't see her kill, she tends to just trap and immobilize. But she does do big things that makes in unclear who actually has more raw power.



As for adding blood making it harder for Toph to bend, well that's not true. Wet mud is just as easy to bend as dirt is. A controlling spirit? Eh, maybe? Spirits are a thing in Avatar, but I don't know if Toph ever interacted with one. Does anyone know? We might actually have an easy answer to this question.

[Kitten Champion]

Actually, is that true? Toph has shattered cliffs before and apparently has a range across an entire city. I mean, Toph certainly strikes with less of force, but that's because you usually don't see her kill, she tends to just trap and immobilize. But she does do big things that makes in unclear who actually has more raw power.

Gaara has lifted sand enough to crush city blocks (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UkSR-ZFv9yY), created massive sand tsunamis (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V5Xiiqhp8eM) that can dwarf cliffs dozens of meters high, and held a mountain-sized meteor aloft with his sand (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HcHt2hvSKJI), and as mentioned previously projected his sand fast enough to block attacks from with the fastest characters in his universe of super-humanly fast individuals.

[Anteros]

It's tough to say what exactly doesn't appeal to me about Naruto's fights. Well, stuff that isn't the flashbacks. That one is obvious. But even with those removed, I often find them boring and silly. It's not just power level (though I do typically enjoy lower powered fights), I've really enjoyed Terra Toppa Gurren Lagen and Kill La Kill before, and their fights are literally ridiculous. It might be length, I'm not sure what the longest fight scene I've seen is, but it wouldn't surprise me if it belonged to Naruto. It might be characters, Naruto is good enough, but I despise Sasuke because he is just awful.

Or maybe it's just the fact that even removed, the flashbacks make the fights choppy in places where they used to be.



I don't like Naruto fights either. They're way too drawn out, and the constant flash backs are obnoxious. It worked fine for one or two dramatic moments, but they overuse it to the point of ridiculousness.



Actually, is that true? Toph has shattered cliffs before and apparently has a range across an entire city. I mean, Toph certainly strikes with less of force, but that's because you usually don't see her kill, she tends to just trap and immobilize. But she does do big things that makes in unclear who actually has more raw power.


Is it true that the person who can "shatter a cliff" isn't on a power scale with someone who can catch meteors or create giant, fully animated, mountain range sized sand monsters? You can't be serious. Shattering a cliff isn't even a good feat. Avalanches can be started with incredibly small amounts of force.



As for adding blood making it harder for Toph to bend, well that's not true. Wet mud is just as easy to bend as dirt is. A controlling spirit? Eh, maybe? Spirits are a thing in Avatar, but I don't know if Toph ever interacted with one. Does anyone know? We might actually have an easy answer to this question.

Well, changing the composition is explicitly what makes metal bending so difficult...so yes it's relevant.

It takes such a willful amount of disregard for the source materials to argue that Toph has anywhere near Gaara's amount of power that I don't see how there's any point in talking about it any more. The people who are going to argue in Toph's favor here are already ignoring literal mountains of evidence. Pointing out more evidence for them to ignore is just a waste of everyone's time.

[Durkoala]

Point 1: this actually supports me, not you. Toph has demonstrated an ability to control an entire object even though the object is not made entirely of her bending material. To that end, the fact that it isn't pure sand is irrelevant. At best, it would split into its component elements, with Gaara controlling a cloud of dried blood particles while Toph controls the sand.

I would love to see that. Not in a way to do with death battle really, just a fight where two characters split bloodsoaked sand into seperate blood and sand and keep fighting with it.

[Seppl]

Is it true that the person who can "shatter a cliff" isn't on a power scale with someone who can catch meteors or create giant, fully animated, mountain range sized sand monsters? You can't be serious. Shattering a cliff isn't even a good feat. Avalanches can be started with incredibly small amounts of force.
Which happens to be exactly Toph's preferred style. She is a pressure point fighter, capable of beating physically vastly superior opponents through very precise application of power and better techniqe. Buuuut, yeah. I like the comparison to Bruce Lee vs. the Hulk. At some point it just does not matter how good of a fighter you are, or how clumsy the Hulk is. And Gaara is by no means a bad or clumsy fighter.

[Reddish Mage]

..... true. The next question becomes... was it lack of research or bias that resulted in the incorrect conclusion? Years ago, I would lean towards the former, but as the series gone on, as well as how some fights were picked initially, I'm heavily in the latter.

How some fights are initially picked? As in which characters get paired with whom? That sort of protest is usually reserved for people crying only that their favorite character lost: “The fight was unfair, they choose someone who was way out of my guys league.”

Also bias means many things. Bias can be unconscious or prejudicial things, like maybe the team really like certain shows or characters and want them to win.

However, if I get your drift, it sounds like is you are saying is “the way they pair people in fights is so unfair, they must WANT certain guys to lose or win.”

Let’s assume for the moment they do pick soft opponents specifically so that particular characters will win...obviously that’s a powerful argument that the winner is, in fact, the stronger character.

[Traab]

How some fights are initially picked? As in which characters get paired with whom? That sort of protest is usually reserved for people crying only that their favorite character lost: “The fight was unfair, they choose someone who was way out of my guys league.”

Also bias means many things. Bias can be unconscious or prejudicial things, like maybe the team really like certain shows or characters and want them to win.

However, if I get your drift, it sounds like is you are saying is “the way they pair people in fights is so unfair, they must WANT certain guys to lose or win.”

Let’s assume for the moment they do pick soft opponents specifically so that particular characters will win...obviously that’s a powerful argument that the winner is, in fact, the stronger character.

Fights tend to be picked from similar combatants. Sword using rpg protags so cloud and link, speedsters, so flash and quicksilver, demon sword fighting people, guts and nightmare. They try to get them in the same ballpark as well, its generally rare that the winner is obvious from the start, but it often becomes so when they break out the tale of the tape and you learn that so and so survived a black hole back in the 50s in one of his spinoff series while his opponent had a tree land on him once. The bias tends to come in when they make the judgement calls like this one, but often its clear they only make that call to try to even out the fight where its less judgement call and more "How can I boost this guy far enough to make it a fight in a way thats semi justified". Like iirc ichigo was given every boost possible combined to multiply his power levels enough that he could approach naruto and his moon buster attack surviving blah de bloo. Or as another example, link gets pretty much every awesome item in his arsenal spread across several games while cloud gets his starter gear. Its probable that with nothing but his master sword, shield, and maybe some bombs, link would have been sashimi in short order.

[Reddish Mage]

The bias tends to come in when they make the judgement calls like this one, but often its clear they only make that call to try to even out the fight ... Like iirc ichigo was given every boost possible combined to multiply his power levels enough that he could approach naruto and his moon buster attack surviving...

What you are calling “bias” looks more like they are just trying to make a fight’s outcome appear fair. They gave Ichigo every possible break explicitly in order to show its still not enough against Naruto.

You seem to be conflating the term “bias” with the term “judgment.” You can’t do any sort of superhero battle or make claims about who would win a fight without making a whole lot of judgment calls.

[Forum Explorer]

Is it true that the person who can "shatter a cliff" isn't on a power scale with someone who can catch meteors or create giant, fully animated, mountain range sized sand monsters? You can't be serious. Shattering a cliff isn't even a good feat. Avalanches can be started with incredibly small amounts of force.



Well, changing the composition is explicitly what makes metal bending so difficult...so yes it's relevant.

It takes such a willful amount of disregard for the source materials to argue that Toph has anywhere near Gaara's amount of power that I don't see how there's any point in talking about it any more. The people who are going to argue in Toph's favor here are already ignoring literal mountains of evidence. Pointing out more evidence for them to ignore is just a waste of everyone's time.

When does Gaara catch a meteorite? Or the sand monster thing, since presumably you aren't talking about him using his demon form, since he actually got a fair bit more powerful after he lost it.


Toph has no trouble with water infused mud, so I doubt blood infused sand would be all that difficult for her.

I like this conversation because apparently there is a ton of stuff I missed in that final fight scene that I didn't see since I stopped early. Ditto with Toph, except I never watched that much of Avatar. Truly though, I don't actually care about this fight, and digging up more information about Naruto is painful due to those fight scenes.

[Rynjin]

When does Gaara catch a meteorite? Or the sand monster thing, since presumably you aren't talking about him using his demon form, since he actually got a fair bit more powerful after he lost it.

I don't remember the sand monster, but the meteorite probably refers to the fight between the five Kages and Madara.

They all get manhandled, but Gaara and Tsunade get manhandled the least, as I recall.

[Anteros]

The sand monster I was referring to was his demon form. If you want to argue he was even more powerful without it, that's even more reason he should have stomped.


What you are calling “bias” looks more like they are just trying to make a fight’s outcome appear fair. They gave Ichigo every possible break explicitly in order to show its still not enough against Naruto.

You seem to be conflating the term “bias” with the term “judgment.” You can’t do any sort of superhero battle or make claims about who would win a fight without making a whole lot of judgment calls.

Which is just another example of lazy research on their part. They calculated Naruto's durability based on an opponent of his who cut the moon in half. Nevermind the fact that they can't possibly know how big the moon is in Naruto and just went with the size of ours, and nevermind the fact that he never hits Naruto with that attack...the moon in Naruto's world is hollow so the whole assumption is flawed anyway.

[Traab]

When does Gaara catch a meteorite? Or the sand monster thing, since presumably you aren't talking about him using his demon form, since he actually got a fair bit more powerful after he lost it.


Toph has no trouble with water infused mud, so I doubt blood infused sand would be all that difficult for her.

I like this conversation because apparently there is a ton of stuff I missed in that final fight scene that I didn't see since I stopped early. Ditto with Toph, except I never watched that much of Avatar. Truly though, I don't actually care about this fight, and digging up more information about Naruto is painful due to those fight scenes.

In the fight against madera, naruto and crew actually start doing good against him when he is messing around. Then he goes full rinnegan (you NEVER go full rinnegan) and summons a meteor large enough to wipe out the entire army. The iwakage flies up to it and tries to halt it by using a stone lightening jutsu several times, garra summons up this absolutely massive pillar of sand to engulf it and together they halt it in place. Of course then the second meteor full rinnegan (this is why you dont go that far) madera summons slams into the first and wipes out large portions of the army. Its kinda hard to attribute the feat to garra as it was a two man effort and we have no idea how much that spherical mountain weighed by the time garra was able to hold it up, but its still an impressive feat. Here (https://youtu.be/XiOBQlEHYLs?t=521) you go.

[Devonix]

The sand monster I was referring to was his demon form. If you want to argue he was even more powerful without it, that's even more reason he should have stomped.



Which is just another example of lazy research on their part. They calculated Naruto's durability based on an opponent of his who cut the moon in half. Nevermind the fact that they can't possibly know how big the moon is in Naruto and just went with the size of ours, and nevermind the fact that he never hits Naruto with that attack...the moon in Naruto's world is hollow so the whole assumption is flawed anyway.

Let's please not get into that hollow moon nonsense. It was bad enough in Doctor Who.

[Rater202]

The moon in Naruto is man-made.

[Devonix]

The moon in Naruto is man-made.

I'm not talking about how it's made, I'm talking about how it affects the Earth.

[Reddish Mage]

What you are calling “bias” looks more like they are just trying to make a fight’s outcome appear fair. They gave Ichigo every possible break explicitly in order to show its still not enough against Naruto.

You seem to be conflating the term “bias” with the term “judgment.” You can’t do any sort of superhero battle or make claims about who would win a fight without making a whole lot of judgment calls.

Anteros’ Response:

Which is just another example of lazy research on their part. They calculated Naruto's durability based on an opponent of his who cut the moon in half. Nevermind the fact that they can't possibly know how big the moon is in Naruto and just went with the size of ours, and nevermind the fact that he never hits Naruto with that attack...the moon in Naruto's world is hollow so the whole assumption is flawed anyway.

Were you ignoring the part at the end where I said “you need to make a whole lot of judgment calls” or do you want to say making judgment calls equate to lazy research?

They decide to scale up Ichigo only to show that Naruto is still vastly superior based on his ability to tank his opponents attacks that...have been shown to split the moon in half.

Sure you can say the moon in Naruto doesn’t resemble our moon at all (of course then the world wouldn’t have tides or temperature control but whatever).

The problem is: What’s the alternative? You can ignore the moon destroying feat and probably sell Naruto short and then measure Ichigo’s power much more modestly...and the outcome might not change. However you calculate these characters abilities, its all guess work using proxies anyway. They don’t have the characters in a lab. What we have is a collection of their feats, some of which look pretty impressive.

If you are going to make physics calculations with those feats though, you are going to have to make lots of assumptions. If you want to make your calculations based on a hollow moon, you would have to figure out how to hollow out the moon, and how that would make sense (it doesn’t, a hollowed out moon by operation of gravity should collapse and become a solid moon).

If instead, you don’t use the moon example at all as flawed, and you don’t use any example that appears “flawed” you may end up with a character without very many feats, because literally nothing these characters do with superpowers makes sense from the standpoint of real world physics.

It’s literally impossible to do these superhero battles without a lot of guesswork, rules of thumb, and the suspect comparison to how things work in our world with our physics. If you are going to insist on perfect physical accuracy in analyzing these superpowers...You will simply have a way to complain about every call they’ve ever made in every battle that has ever been fought.

[Rater202]

I'm not talking about how it's made, I'm talking about how it affects the Earth.

IT doesn't.

that's kind of the point.

The Moon in Naruto ins't a moon and doesn't behave anything like a real moon.

It's a man-made construct that Ninja-Jesus made to lock up the corpse of the monster that was born when his mom fused with a tree.

Treating it like a real moon in any capacity is silly.

[Keltest]

Is destroying the moon as a demonstration of power just a thing in Anime? What do the Japanese have against the moon? Is this secretly a message of intent?

[Lord Raziere]

Is destroying the moon as a demonstration of power just a thing in Anime? What do the Japanese have against the moon? Is this secretly a message of intent?

No.

It just happens the same reason anything like that happens in fictional media with lots of fighting.

because of rule of cool.

I'm sorry if you were attempting some sort of joke.

[Anteros]

Anteros’ Response:


Were you ignoring the part at the end where I said “you need to make a whole lot of judgment calls” or do you want to say making judgment calls equate to lazy research?

They decide to scale up Ichigo only to show that Naruto is still vastly superior based on his ability to tank his opponents attacks that...have been shown to split the moon in half.

Sure you can say the moon in Naruto doesn’t resemble our moon at all (of course then the world wouldn’t have tides or temperature control but whatever).

The problem is: What’s the alternative? You can ignore the moon destroying feat and probably sell Naruto short and then measure Ichigo’s power much more modestly...and the outcome might not change. However you calculate these characters abilities, its all guess work using proxies anyway. They don’t have the characters in a lab. What we have is a collection of their feats, some of which look pretty impressive.

If you are going to make physics calculations with those feats though, you are going to have to make lots of assumptions. If you want to make your calculations based on a hollow moon, you would have to figure out how to hollow out the moon, and how that would make sense (it doesn’t, a hollowed out moon by operation of gravity should collapse and become a solid moon).

If instead, you don’t use the moon example at all as flawed, and you don’t use any example that appears “flawed” you may end up with a character without very many feats, because literally nothing these characters do with superpowers makes sense from the standpoint of real world physics.

It’s literally impossible to do these superhero battles without a lot of guesswork, rules of thumb, and the suspect comparison to how things work in our world with our physics. If you are going to insist on perfect physical accuracy in analyzing these superpowers...You will simply have a way to complain about every call they’ve ever made in every battle that has ever been fought.

You do have to make assumptions at some points. You don't have to make assumptions that are literally contradicted by the source material like "it would take this much force to destroy the moon" when the moon in question is explicitly completely different. Especially when that one feat is so entirely out of line with everything else we've seen of the character's durability. You're saying that they "scaled Ichigo up" to give him a chance. All that means is that they inaccurately depicted both characters.

When Roshi blows up the moon in Dragonball I'm willing to handwave it as being comparable to ours. In Naruto they literally tell you it's an entirely different thing.


I'm not talking about how it's made, I'm talking about how it affects the Earth.

Look, I didn't make the stupid setting. If I had, it would probably be more internally consistent but waaay less popular and you'd have never heard of it.

[Reddish Mage]

You do have to make assumptions at some points. You don't have to make assumptions that are literally contradicted by the source material like "it would take this much force to destroy the moon" when the moon in question is explicitly completely different. Especially when that one feat is so entirely out of line with everything else we've seen of the character's durability. You're saying that they "scaled Ichigo up" to give him a chance. All that means is that they inaccurately depicted both characters.

When Roshi blows up the moon in Dragonball I'm willing to handwave it as being comparable to ours. In Naruto they literally tell you it's an entirely different thing.

Fair point. Also note, in dragonball's universe blowing up the moon puts Muten Roshi in the little league. He didn't even have to try very hard.

[Lemmy]

It's simple, really...

Rocks are the easiest thing to break in fiction. Any half-decent fighter in any media that includes even the smallest of super-powers can break concrete like it's styrofoam.

And the Moon is just a big rock.

[Reddish Mage]

It's simple, really...

Rocks are the easiest thing to break in fiction. Any half-decent fighter in any media that includes even the smallest of super-powers can break concrete like it's styrofoam.

And the Moon is just a big rock.

Rocks, concrete, bricks, big machinery, basically anything inanimate. Of course, other than breaking things, pushing things, occasionally lifting things or even disintegrating things, we got no way to measure the strength of these characters.

You can make an argument that these characters’ attributes are actually immeasurable or that any method you use to measure them is fundamentally flawed, but then there’s really no point to either Deathbattle or discussing these fights at all.

[Lord Raziere]

You can make an argument that these characters’ attributes are actually immeasurable or that any method you use to measure them is fundamentally flawed, but then there’s really no point to either Deathbattle or discussing these fights at all.

Oh good, you finally achieved enlightenment. :smalltongue: now you can continue doing this, knowing that it is pointless and that its OK for it be pointless. having fun is antithetical to having a point. you can't have both. having a point, is too serious for fun. I can't recall any time when having fun had a point, if there is someone who is capable having both at the same time I've certainly never met them and would be far more enlightened than I to somehow figure out how seriousness and fun can be the same thing, perhaps if you disagree, you can enlighten me in turn for I know nothing and clearly cannot conceive of it in my narrow frame of mind, I will not assume I know enough to disagree with anyone who says I'm wrong, because I probably am.

Please someone explain how I'm wrong, I'm clearly in need of it, this post is pointless. :smalltongue:

[SKarious]

So, I'm not very informes about FMA, so I have a question:
I understand Ed can make spikes, walls and cannons, but how does he fare in close combat?
This seems to me a bit like that Kenshiro vs JoJo fight: if Aang can get in close enought to touch (and he probably could - he's very evasive) couldn't he just spiritbend Ed's powers away?

On that matter, how accurate is Ed over range? Aang was beaten at range before by a unit of ultra-elite archers. Does Ed have any feats that compate to theirs?

[Forum Explorer]

So, I'm not very informes about FMA, so I have a question:
I understand Ed can make spikes, walls and cannons, but how does he fare in close combat?
This seems to me a bit like that Kenshiro vs JoJo fight: if Aang can get in close enought to touch (and he probably could - he's very evasive) couldn't he just spiritbend Ed's powers away?

On that matter, how accurate is Ed over range? Aang was beaten at range before by a unit of ultra-elite archers. Does Ed have any feats that compate to theirs?

Ed can deconstruct, basically destroying anything with a touch. So if he touches Aang, he wins.

Ed has literally never hit anyone with a gun, even if he has made them. Though he might've bombarded Father with cannons and stuff. So put that down as a maybe.

[Traab]

Ed can deconstruct, basically destroying anything with a touch. So if he touches Aang, he wins.

Ed has literally never hit anyone with a gun, even if he has made them. Though he might've bombarded Father with cannons and stuff. So put that down as a maybe.

Ed has done plenty of damage with say, long pillars of stone. Watch the big final showdown (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bTxgJqgbuNk) of brotherhood where he goes nuts because of Al and just proceeds to utterly pummel Father with a barrage of attacks, slices him with a hurled spear, and of course pummels him bare handed as well. Not so lucky with explosives I think. I seem to remember him forming his cannon during his "dont call me short" freakouts as a gag, and getting one blown up trying to fight mustang. But its been so long I dont even recall for sure.

[Anteros]

Ed has done plenty of damage with say, long pillars of stone. Watch the big final showdown (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bTxgJqgbuNk) of brotherhood where he goes nuts because of Al and just proceeds to utterly pummel Father with a barrage of attacks, slices him with a hurled spear, and of course pummels him bare handed as well. Not so lucky with explosives I think. I seem to remember him forming his cannon during his "dont call me short" freakouts as a gag, and getting one blown up trying to fight mustang. But its been so long I dont even recall for sure.

Ugh. That is such a terrible scene to be the climax of such an amazing anime. "Oh hey, the uber monster that is going to kill us all is finally showing weakness? Let's just stand around and hope the handicapped midget wins a fist fight instead of using our dozens of guns and amazing magical powers to help! Let's also all cheer as if he's doing something amazing and not something literally any of us could be doing!" I forgot how bad it was.

[Traab]

Ugh. That is such a terrible scene to be the climax of such an amazing anime. "Oh hey, the uber monster that is going to kill us all is finally showing weakness? Let's just stand around and hope the handicapped midget wins a fist fight instead of using our dozens of guns and amazing magical powers to help! Let's also all cheer as if he's doing something amazing and not something literally any of us could be doing!" I forgot how bad it was.

It works better when you get to enjoy the buildup. After all, everyone else already TRIED that and it failed. The soldiers unloaded enough mortars and bullets to wipe out a small army, both mustang and armstrong tried their hardest along with ed, all the rest did their part as well, then when it seemed like they were making progress and wearing him down he unleashed a massive attack that knocked everyone on their butts and impaled eds arm on the rebar and started stumbling for him. Nobody was able to get up and fight at that point, and all they could do was watch as Al sacrificed himself to heal ed, and thats when he unleashed heck on Father. I do agree it seems a bit off even with all that, but its a lot less jarring then.

[Anteros]

It works better when you get to enjoy the buildup. After all, everyone else already TRIED that and it failed. The soldiers unloaded enough mortars and bullets to wipe out a small army, both mustang and armstrong tried their hardest along with ed, all the rest did their part as well, then when it seemed like they were making progress and wearing him down he unleashed a massive attack that knocked everyone on their butts and impaled eds arm on the rebar and started stumbling for him. Nobody was able to get up and fight at that point, and all they could do was watch as Al sacrificed himself to heal ed, and thats when he unleashed heck on Father. I do agree it seems a bit off even with all that, but its a lot less jarring then.

I've seen the entire series and thought it was dumb in context as well. You can say no one could get up to fight but there are literally hundreds of completely uninjured people standing and doing nothing in the scene. It would be different if they were somehow separated, or if Ed won with a clever or unique strategy only he could have done...but he literally just kinda knocks Father around a bit and then he falls down. The series deserved a better climax.

[Forum Explorer]

I've seen the entire series and thought it was dumb in context as well. You can say no one could get up to fight but there are literally hundreds of completely uninjured people standing and doing nothing in the scene. It would be different if they were somehow separated, or if Ed won with a clever or unique strategy only he could have done...but he literally just kinda knocks Father around a bit and then he falls down. The series deserved a better climax.

Yeah, the fight against Father wasn't that good, and I think is the worst fight in the series. It's way too long, and comes off of some really excellent fights, making it feel even worse. And as you said, everyone standing there wasn't that good.

[Reddish Mage]

So I don't know about you plebs who haven't got RTs FIRST membership when it went on sale for a hot minute before the promised increase, but I know the result of this weeks DEATHBATTLE:

https://images-wixmp-ed30a86b8c4ca887773594c2.wixmp.com/f/51e4ab0d-5815-43a7-b79d-970560f8ecaa/d59wy54-1a7b429c-d92c-468a-a6b4-1147c35e6713.jpg?token=eyJ0eXAiOiJKV1QiLCJhbGciOiJ IUzI1NiJ9.eyJzdWIiOiJ1cm46YXBwOjdlMGQxODg5ODIyNjQz NzNhNWYwZDQxNWVhMGQyNmUwIiwiaXNzIjoidXJuOmFwcDo3ZT BkMTg4OTgyMjY0MzczYTVmMGQ0MTVlYTBkMjZlMCIsIm9iaiI6 W1t7InBhdGgiOiJcL2ZcLzUxZTRhYjBkLTU4MTUtNDNhNy1iNz lkLTk3MDU2MGY4ZWNhYVwvZDU5d3k1NC0xYTdiNDI5Yy1kOTJj LTQ2OGEtYTZiNC0xMTQ3YzM1ZTY3MTMuanBnIn1dXSwiYXVkIj pbInVybjpzZXJ2aWNlOmZpbGUuZG93bmxvYWQiXX0.iFaXeUqu 2Ec9BgVeUbFSd7WsQNxAuFRh9sv-F-xabC8

What a shocking turn of events!


I question the analysis of lightning dodging - the fact that Aang clearly is depicted as dodging lightning...which of course means he's faster than the speed of light....isn't consistent with anything like his other speed feats. So we come to the perennial problem of how to treat such obvious ridiculous speed feats.

I'm wondering what they mean by Edward's own lightning dodging. When and where does that occur? It happens multiple times, apparently.

[Kitten Champion]

I've always assumed in Avatar they - firebenders and Aang - dodged the lightning by feeling the change in atmosphere to sense the path the lightning would arc through before the electricity flowed through it and more importantly by reading the Bending movements of their opponents.

Otherwise they should just be dead, or move like they're in the Matrix at all times if they can move in excess of 25000 km/s.

[Lemmy]

I question the analysis of lightning dodging - the fact that Aang clearly is depicted as dodging lightning...which of course means he's faster than the speed of light....isn't consistent with anything like his other speed feats. So we come to the perennial problem of how to treat such obvious ridiculous speed feats.

I'm wondering what they mean by Edward's own lightning dodging. When and where does that occur? It happens multiple times, apparently.
Minor aside here... Lightning doesn't travel as fast as light. Not even close.

[Lord Raziere]

true, lightning doesn't travel as fast light.

it can only go about a third of light speed.

so. yes there is a distinction. but its not much of one. that still requires them to be dodging at about 220,000,000 miles per hour.

so I'm guessing, Aang because hes dodged lightning and Ed hasn't?

as for Ed.....eh......I'm not sure what they mean by Ed dodging lightning if they did refer to that. sure destructive alchemy, the deconstructive part of it has electrical aesthetics to it, but I wouldn't say its real electricity, Alchemy kind of predates the concept of electricity, so its not clear if Alchemy could pull off something to shoot lightning at people, and while lightning is plasma....you can only transmute something into plasma....if it has plasma like qualities as per the Second Law of Alchemy.

I mean FMA does have telephones so they know what electricity IS, but whether they know how achieve lightning bolts with alchemy is an entirely different matter. I certainly don't remember any use of lightning in either show, so I don't know what DB is talking about if they mentioned Ed dodging lightning, a lot of what they faced were Homunculi and their attacks were more body horror changing their skin to be diamond hard or shapeshift, or alchemists who messed with materials...

I guess Father could've thrown around lightning at some point in the Brotherhood I don't remember? If I recall, he did demonstrate some ability to make a miniature hand sized sun which implies he has the know-how and power to just....transmute air so that it condenses into a star, but I still don't specifically remember any instance of him throwing lightning around, but if there was anyone to do it, it would probably be him, since Father is most bull of the people in FMA.

[Lemmy]

I'd say there's quite a huge difference between "speed of light" and "1/3 speed of light"...

And lightning isn't plasma (it isn't even matter). It's an electrical discharge. A powerful one, which can (and does) generate plasma.

But pedantry aside, I always figured benders evaded/blocked/redirected lightning the same way people "evade" bullets: i.e.: observing the weapon, predicting the trajectory of the projectile and getting out of the way right before the trigger is pulled. Not actually dodging the freaking super-sonic projectile.

Also, lightning attacks in media seem to move rather slowly (for lightning, that is).

EDIT: I suppose, if alchemy can change the state of matter (e.g.: turn water into ice), it's theoretically possible that it can create plasma...

[Delicious Taffy]

Y'all, check this out. If I stand in an open field and walk forward a few steps, and lightning hits the spot I was just standing in but doesn't hit me, that means I dodged lightning and have FTL walking speed. It's the law.

[tyckspoon]

EDIT: I suppose, if alchemy can change the state of matter (e.g.: turn water into ice), it's theoretically possible that it can create plasma...

Assuming the alchemist understands how lightning strikes actually work/how electrical discharges propagate, I think you could do it similar to how Mustang's flames work - alchemize an ionized channel to your target, then create a charge and let the natural result take place. Cannot guarantee the speed or effectiveness of doing so, but 'throw a spark at something' should be comfortably within the hypothetical uses of alchemy. Assuming the alchemist in question is sufficiently familiar with electrical theory.

[Reddish Mage]

true, lightning doesn't travel as fast light.

it can only go about a third of light speed.

so. yes there is a distinction. but its not much of one. that still requires them to be dodging at about 220,000,000 miles per hour.

so I'm guessing, Aang because hes dodged lightning and Ed hasn't?

as for Ed.....eh......I'm not sure what they mean by Ed dodging lightning if they did refer to that. sure destructive alchemy, the deconstructive part of it has electrical aesthetics to it, but I wouldn't say its real electricity, Alchemy kind of predates the concept of electricity, so its not clear if Alchemy could pull off something to shoot lightning at people, and while lightning is plasma....you can only transmute something into plasma....if it has plasma like qualities as per the Second Law of Alchemy.

I mean FMA does have telephones so they know what electricity IS, but whether they know how achieve lightning bolts with alchemy is an entirely different matter. I certainly don't remember any use of lightning in either show, so I don't know what DB is talking about if they mentioned Ed dodging lightning, a lot of what they faced were Homunculi and their attacks were more body horror changing their skin to be diamond hard or shapeshift, or alchemists who messed with materials...

It is precisely my question as to what the lightning-like feats are in Fullmetal alchemist.

The fact that Alchemy predates electricity means precisely zilch, it also predates the notion of the periodic table and it was believed you could turn lead into gold (I'm not precisely clear on how that works in Fullmetal).

Achieving lightning seems to be in the sphere of things they should be able to do (and its been mentioned how you could do this even if you only could transmute material).

Aang is shown quite clearly dodging and redirecting lightning from Firelord Ozai, and probably others, which is also quite clearly moving at multiple-frames of animation speeds. How you want to interpret that is up to you.

Also, for the record, once you start talking about one of the characters being capable of reacting at a small-number fraction of the speed of light...it doesn't matter what the actual fraction is. Against anything not comprehensibly expressible as a fraction of the speed of light, that character will be so fast that everything else might as well be frozen.

[Lord Raziere]

It is precisely my question as to what the lightning-like feats are in Fullmetal alchemist.

The fact that Alchemy predates electricity means precisely zilch, it also predates the notion of the periodic table and it was believed you could turn lead into gold (I'm not precisely clear on how that works in Fullmetal).

Achieving lightning seems to be in the sphere of things they should be able to do (and its been mentioned how you could do this even if you only could transmute material).

Aang is shown quite clearly dodging and redirecting lightning from Firelord Ozai, and probably others, which is also quite clearly moving at multiple-frames of animation speeds. How you want to interpret that is up to you.

Also, for the record, once you start talking about one of the characters being capable of reacting at a small-number fraction of the speed of light...it doesn't matter what the actual fraction is. Against anything not comprehensibly expressible as a fraction of the speed of light, that character will be so fast that everything else might as well be frozen.



all I'm saying is that I'm just as confused as you on the "Ed dodging lightning" feats thing. I've seen both FMAs and if Edward has demonstrated it, I don't remember it.

though after look up a few things, Father, the series antagonist could make mini-suns and fire big wave motion energy blasts from his hands. so maybe they're saying these feats are from Edward dodging from energy beams Father threw around in his final battle which might be light "enough" to qualify, but I can't find anything where Edward explicitly dodges them. I'll have to watch the episodes directly to see if Edward ever directly dodges one of those big beams, if you want to, you can also FMA: Brotherhood on Crunchyroll for free, so if you want to confirm that you can always watch....episode 62 and 63 which are episodes that Father is fought if you don't mind spoilers

yeah, agreed on the light speed point, thats kind of why I said there wasn't much of a difference. :smalltongue: near light speed is bull no matter how near the light speed and the distinction only matters to other near light-speeders.

rewatched episode 62 of FMA: Brotherhood......no indication that he can dodge lightning-like attacks and in fact shows us he gets constantly HIT by Father's force push attacks. said big beam is in fact stopped by other people shielding Edward with themselves, like his immortal dad Hohenheim or Alphonse. Father just weakens from there and gets outwitted.

so unless there is some lightning alchemist from some random episode that I've forgotten about and Ed dodges his attack there, I don't see where they are getting ed dodging lightning from, and sincerely doubt that there is, simply because FMA has a tight casting call for an anime of its kind, everyone is pretty known and serves a specific purpose with few or no extra people thrown in for no reason, and an alchemist wouldn't be some one-off rando, they'd be a big deal, especially if they could throw around lightning, since Mustang throwing around fire is a big deal, so a literal lightning fast attack would be an even bigger deal in FMA.

so no, there is no indication that Edward Elric can dodge lightning.

[Reddish Mage]

all I'm saying is that I'm just as confused as you on the "Ed dodging lightning" feats thing. I've seen both FMAs and if Edward has demonstrated it, I don't remember it.


I can't give you their analysis without spoiling Ed's speed, which we all agree is fairly important as to who the ultimate winner is (although being faster didn't help Weiss or Bayonetta). Suffice to say there's something to suggest Ed may or may not have done similar feats to Aang in the dodging department.

[Lord Raziere]

I can't give you their analysis without spoiling Ed's speed, which we all agree is fairly important as to who the ultimate winner is (although being faster didn't help Weiss or Bayonetta). Suffice to say there's something to suggest Ed may or may not have done similar feats to Aang in the dodging department.


Eeeeeh, given how lightspeed reflex analysis tends to work out in general (not just in Death Battle, but in ALL in all VS. analyses) I would not be confident in whatever reason given. such reflexes tend to be very bull given the simple fact in that the vast majority of cases if the character can move that fast on reflex they must enough energy for the reflex to be powered by, it doesn't matter how automatic it is, you can't go third of lightspeed without having the energy to go third of lightspeed. and if that person has enough energy to do that, how do they ever get tired on a human scale?

now maybe we can assume the entire world is somehow modified so that the lightning is the same but the person dodging it and all things related to that person and all things related to those are strengthened so that the person still operates on a human level at all other times, but that violates occam's razor, when its simpler to conclude that the lightning or any other attack isn't actually lightspeed/lightning speed because its magic and therefore not real lightning. this can simplify both FMA and Avatar's analyses I think, but if someone wants the more complex explanation for whatever reason, they're welcome to it.

[Reddish Mage]

... if that person has enough energy to do that, how do they ever get tired on a human scale?

...maybe we can assume the entire world is somehow modified so that the lightning is the same but the person dodging it and all things related to that person and all things related to those are strengthened so that the person still operates on a human level at all other times, but that violates occam's razor

Despite constantly calling you out on this...somehow you have it in your head that stuff like real life energy requirements to do a feat that should somehow inform our analysis of these characters that can cause explosions that rival (or exceed) nuclear blasts by waiving their hands and rearrange continents.

I honestly think you imagine there is a physics to superhero battles, as if with but minor tweaks to the laws of physics you could find these characters in the dimension next door...rather than getting there by putting our universe's laws in a blender and making some major mathematically nonsensical overhauls.

Literally everything about a a human going at relativistic speeds on their own power is wrong. You can find YouTube videos (https://alltop.com/viral/super-speed-terrible-superpower) about it. At those speeds even the air should pose enough resistance to splatter a person (much like hitting the water straight on at terminal velocity).

Superstrength? Similar problems. Recently I noted the video about how just swinging around a big sword like Cloud's would require shoulders that can handle more torque than the fastest racing car in existence. Although strong, most big sword welders are not depicted as having Hulk like strength and not as having super durability. Durability of all the supporting bones muscles and ligaments needs to be magnified far more times than muscle power to make many basic super strength feats work (like the super jump, the superhero landing and the car toss).

Real physics have long since left the building, we are going based on raw intuitions regarding how to interpret whatever the material we have in front of us is suggesting.

[Lord Raziere]

Despite constantly calling you out on this...somehow you have it in your head that stuff like real life energy requirements to do a feat that should somehow inform our analysis of these characters that can cause explosions that rival (or exceed) nuclear blasts by waiving their hands and rearrange continents.

I honestly think you imagine there is a physics to superhero battles, as if with but minor tweaks to the laws of physics you could find these characters in the dimension next door...rather than getting there by putting our universe's laws in a blender and making some major mathematically nonsensical overhauls.

Literally everything about a a human going at relativistic speeds on their own power is wrong. You can find YouTube videos (https://alltop.com/viral/super-speed-terrible-superpower) about it. At those speeds even the air should pose enough resistance to splatter a person (much like hitting the water straight on at terminal velocity).

Superstrength? Similar problems. Recently I noted the video about how just swinging around a big sword like Cloud's would require shoulders that can handle more torque than the fastest racing car in existence. Although strong, most big sword welders are not depicted as having Hulk like strength and not as having super durability. Durability of all the supporting bones muscles and ligaments needs to be magnified far more times than muscle power to make many basic super strength feats work (like the super jump, the superhero landing and the car toss).

Real physics have long since left the building, we are going based on raw intuitions regarding how to interpret whatever the material we have in front of us is suggesting.


your right. such powers WOULD require such drastic changes.

but, and here me out on this.

-we can make these powers.
-we can point out how these powers don't make sense with physics and acknowledge that
-but unless we're willing to put in a lot of time, effort and brainpower into coming up with alternate physics to explain how it all works EXACTLY without any logical inconsistency....

your point is irrelevant. its right but not relevant. the point of these worlds is to accept that yes these ridiculous things are exceptions, and that things are like reality except for that those designated parts where it isn't and we just have to accept that. thats just engaging honestly with the work. because if both the work and me acknowledge that this can't happen normally, that its an exception, we're good, we're on the same page.

thats why I take an occam's razor perspective, because otherwise we'll have to be here all year hashing out a form of alternate physics that encompasses all forms of magic, superheroes, heroism, mad science and so on in all possible realities for me to be satisfied with any explanation that encompasses all possible things like that, and nobody has time for that. mostly because such a physics has to account for literal infinite possibility to explain the clash between all the possibles realities and heroes involved.

so yes you can make that point, but unless you propose for me to start making that alternate physics to explain all possible realities of all fiction interacting with one another, I don't see what I'm supposed to do with that when its more efficient to just accept the exception and move on. there is just too much work involved.

[Reddish Mage]

My point was, when you started talking about the energy requirements of relativistic super-speed, it didn't seem relevant to anything we were analyzing at the time or to explaining how to deal with these dodging feats we see in the shows where it looks like fast stuff is moving slowly and the character is actually shown moving fast enough to dodge.

There's several ways: we can decide the fast stuff is actually slow moving, we can decide the character is moving really really fast, or that's what's being depicted is too much radical departure from the whole rest of the battle and should be discarded or narrowly applied to just incidents that exactly mirror what's going on.

I don't see how talking about energy requirements motivates anything except to bring up...yes its really is impossible for anything resembling a human, and if characters had these powers they would theoretically need a lot of other, perhaps much more useful and impressive powers, just to support the feat you just saw.

[Lord Raziere]

My point was, when you started talking about the energy requirements of relativistic super-speed, it didn't seem relevant to anything we were analyzing at the time or to explaining how to deal with these dodging feats we see in the shows where it looks like fast stuff is moving slowly and the character is actually shown moving fast enough to dodge.

There's several ways: we can decide the fast stuff is actually slow moving, we can decide the character is moving really really fast, or that's what's being depicted is too much radical departure from the whole rest of the battle and should be discarded or narrowly applied to just incidents that exactly mirror what's going on.

I don't see how talking about energy requirements motivates anything except to bring up...yes its really is impossible for anything resembling a human, and if characters had these powers they would theoretically need a lot of other, perhaps much more useful and impressive powers, just to support the feat you just saw.

Well yeah.

if fast stuff is moving slow and the character can dodge it.....the simplest explanation, is the thing isn't fast, and the character can dodge it.....because it isn't fast.

the fact that whether or not super-speed relativistic might not be actually taking place seems really relevant, but okay I'll assume that once again everyone but me is right on the internet and just shut up because you seem be really convinced that I'm somehow off topic or doing something wrong and I'm not sure what it is the problem here, so I'll just....stop. and hope that you respect that I don't want to keep having this conversation because I don't even know what your on about?

[Traab]

Ok so I just got to watch the fight. As soon as I saw ed get bullet time feats while aang got lightning feats I knew it was over. His durability gave me some hope as I dont recall any real durability feats for aang other than not dying when struck by lightning. But speed seems to be a deciding factor unless relative power/durability is too distant for it to matter.

However Seriously? This is actually an interesting fight. I admit to being shaky on both but one has fought gods and devils, the other has fought superman. One has an absurd healing ability, the other can basically burn out your soul. This could be fun.

[Forum Explorer]

To no one's surprise, Aang wins. By a landslide. Because this was a horrible mismatch. Because, you took the most powerful character from one universe, and have them fight someone who is actually kinda mediocre in their own.

This one looks interesting. Ghost Rider is pretty ridiculous, but Lobo is insane.

[Rater202]

Can Lobo regenerate from fire that's how enough to burn souls?

And no, I'm not talking the Penance stare, I'm talking the actual Hellfire. At full blast Hellfire burns souls and you don't have to be capable of penance for raw hellfire to burn your sins so if Ghost Rider is going in for the Kill, well, he can burn both flesh and souls with a flame that can not only get to "soul burning" heat on it's own but gets hotter and hotter the more sins were commited by the soul it's burning and Lobo has killed billions.

If Lobo can't regen from soul damage, then the deciding factor of the upcoming fight is if Ghost Rider can hit him with a sustained blast of Hellfire.

Of course, this is Deathbattles we're talking about. There was a point in time where Lobo automatically adapted to magic spells so I could totally see DB having Lobo get hit by a teeny bit of Hellfire targetting only his body and using that to claim he adapted and would be immune to having his soul burned by full power Hellfire on the logic that Hellfire is magic.

[Traab]

Can Lobo regenerate from fire that's how enough to burn souls?

And no, I'm not talking the Penance stare, I'm talking the actual Hellfire. At full blast Hellfire burns souls and you don't have to be capable of penance for raw hellfire to burn your sins so if Ghost Rider is going in for the Kill, well, he can burn both flesh and souls with a flame that can not only get to "soul burning" heat on it's own but gets hotter and hotter the more sins were commited by the soul it's burning and Lobo has killed billions.

If Lobo can't regen from soul damage, then the deciding factor of the upcoming fight is if Ghost Rider can hit him with a sustained blast of Hellfire.

Of course, this is Deathbattles we're talking about. There was a point in time where Lobo automatically adapted to magic spells so I could totally see DB having Lobo get hit by a teeny bit of Hellfire targetting only his body and using that to claim he adapted and would be immune to having his soul burned by full power Hellfire on the logic that Hellfire is magic.

The other option being, Ghost Rider once one shot Galactus, is lobo on par with the eater of worlds? No, therefore ghost rider wins. As they have been known to use transitive property comparisons before. Alternatively, I could see the penance stare going either way. It could floor him due to his rather sizable body count, or he could just dismiss its effects as has been known to happen from time to time.

[McNum]

The biggest issue I can see for Ghost Rider is that Lobo... can't really die. He did once, went to Hell, trashed the place, got kicked out. And, well, you can imagine why Heaven isn't an option for the guy.

So even if Ghost Rider can take him down, he also needs to make sure he doesn't just come back.

I do see this battle kind of in the Raiden vs. Wolverine kind of fight. Ghost Rider will be on the offense for most of the match. But the big question is if he has anything that can take Lobo down at all. Lobo can take most any hit, and he's likely immune to the Penance Stare since that requires you to feel guilt for your kills. That's why it worked on Galactus, he doesn't enjoy devouring worlds, but he has to.

Lobo can wear Ghost Rider down over time. Ghost Rider needs to win decisively before that. It's going to be an interesting one, I think.

[Rater202]

The biggest issue I can see for Ghost Rider is that Lobo... can't really die. He did once, went to Hell, trashed the place, got kicked out. And, well, you can imagine why Heaven isn't an option for the guy.

So even if Ghost Rider can take him down, he also needs to make sure he doesn't just come back.

I do see this battle kind of in the Raiden vs. Wolverine kind of fight. Ghost Rider will be on the offense for most of the match. But the big question is if he has anything that can take Lobo down at all. Lobo can take most any hit, and he's likely immune to the Penance Stare since that requires you to feel guilt for your kills. That's why it worked on Galactus, he doesn't enjoy devouring worlds, but he has to.

Lobo can wear Ghost Rider down over time. Ghost Rider needs to win decisively before that. It's going to be an interesting one, I think.

BEing immune to th ePenance Stare(which, incidentally, has onl happened in storylines where the author doesn't know how it's supposed to work, but whatevs) doesn't make you immune to having your soul directly incinerated with Hellfire.

Hellfire at full blast burns both physical and spiritual matter with an intensity hotter than anything that is physically possible via non-mystical means(Hellfire has canonically burned the Human Torch's body.)
Most Ghost Riders will their Hellfire to burn 'cold' so that it doesn't harm the physical body and only burns the evil parts of a soul, but if he's going for the Kill there comes the point where he's just gonna go for full matter-obliterating and soul-destroying intensity.

The Spirits of Vengence are theoretically omnipotent within the specific parameters they occupy--Robbie Reyes is an amateur Ghost Rider but he's explicitly the most powerful of the current run of the Avengers(the most powerful incarnation of the Avengers, BTW,) by a very wide margin.

It basically comes down to if Ghost Rider can hit Lobo with a big blast of Hellfire and then sustain the attack long enough to obliterate him.

Which will be no, becuase this is Death Battle and Lobo is a Detective Comcis property.

[Reddish Mage]

Ok so I just got to watch the fight. As soon as I saw ed get bullet time feats while aang got lightning feats I knew it was over. His durability gave me some hope as I dont recall any real durability feats for aang other than not dying when struck by lightning. But speed seems to be a deciding factor unless relative power/durability is too distant for it to matter.

The actual analysis was Aang won due to the enormous power difference between what Ed could do and what Aang can do in the Avatar state.

Speed was one of the contributing factors along with experience, since Aang has access to all the knowledge of all the Avatars in the Avatar state.

They say Ed's intelligence kept him in the fight, however, unlike my pre-battle analysis, you see that Ed clearly exclaim "what sort of alchemy is this!?" which means that Aang confused Ed, who thought Aang was using some form of alchemy and simply couldn't figure out that Aang was using a totally different sort of discipline and so had different abilities and limitations.

I actually feel they undersold Aang. Aang should have access to his adult level of skill and knowledge from the comics and Korra-flashbacks, since Ed was fighting at his height as well. The only chance Ed had at winning this was by intelligent fighting strategy and a surprise move. I think Ed had done so on occasion, and wanted him to do so here, but its been awhile and I'm guessing he doesn't come out with these surprise wins often enough to make that a fait accompli.



However Seriously? This is actually an interesting fight. I admit to being shaky on both but one has fought gods and devils, the other has fought superman. One has an absurd healing ability, the other can basically burn out your soul. This could be fun.

Agreed. They can do a lot of this.

[Kitten Champion]

The biggest issue I can see for Ghost Rider is that Lobo... can't really die. He did once, went to Hell, trashed the place, got kicked out. And, well, you can imagine why Heaven isn't an option for the guy.

So even if Ghost Rider can take him down, he also needs to make sure he doesn't just come back.

I do see this battle kind of in the Raiden vs. Wolverine kind of fight. Ghost Rider will be on the offense for most of the match. But the big question is if he has anything that can take Lobo down at all. Lobo can take most any hit, and he's likely immune to the Penance Stare since that requires you to feel guilt for your kills. That's why it worked on Galactus, he doesn't enjoy devouring worlds, but he has to.

Lobo can wear Ghost Rider down over time. Ghost Rider needs to win decisively before that. It's going to be an interesting one, I think.

Ah, that's the fight then. Death Battle loves those sorts of "twists" and having Ghost Rider drag him to hell and acting like it's the conclusion only to having him escape feels like the kind of thing they'd animate.

[Forum Explorer]

BEing immune to th ePenance Stare(which, incidentally, has onl happened in storylines where the author doesn't know how it's supposed to work, but whatevs) doesn't make you immune to having your soul directly incinerated with Hellfire.

Hellfire at full blast burns both physical and spiritual matter with an intensity hotter than anything that is physically possible via non-mystical means(Hellfire has canonically burned the Human Torch's body.)
Most Ghost Riders will their Hellfire to burn 'cold' so that it doesn't harm the physical body and only burns the evil parts of a soul, but if he's going for the Kill there comes the point where he's just gonna go for full matter-obliterating and soul-destroying intensity.

The Spirits of Vengence are theoretically omnipotent within the specific parameters they occupy--Robbie Reyes is an amateur Ghost Rider but he's explicitly the most powerful of the current run of the Avengers(the most powerful incarnation of the Avengers, BTW,) by a very wide margin.

It basically comes down to if Ghost Rider can hit Lobo with a big blast of Hellfire and then sustain the attack long enough to obliterate him.

Which will be no, becuase this is Death Battle and Lobo is a Detective Comcis property.

Considering Lobo has taken on hell and won, I don't think Hellfire would be all that big of a deal for him. Lobo is pretty much immortal, on multiple levels.

[Rater202]

Considering Lobo has taken on hell and won, I don't think Hellfire would be all that big of a deal for him. Lobo is pretty much immortal, on multiple levels.

That assumes that DC Hell and MArvel Hell are the same.

From what I can put together, Hellfire in DC is just regular fire conjured with Demonic Magic. It can burn hot. Hot enough that Etrigan's fire-breath can even hurt superman(though that might be from it being magic, which Superman has no special resistance to), but it doesn't seem to have the same soul buring properties of Marvel's Hellfire.

Which makes sense. While having more souls in your hell-realm is considered prestigious among Marvel's Demons, in DC Hell human souls are literally both the primary currency and the primary material with which goods are manufactured. I don't see Hell's economy functioning very well if a common substance/reaction/demonic power could be used to destroy it utterly.

Hell, it seems, is the one place where the Marvel Universe's power level is higher than the DC Universes.

[Lemmy]

Thinking about Aang vs Ed...

While it wouldn't have changed the match's final result, we know for a fact that lightning created by bending is way slower than normal lightning... Because we can compare its speed to that of other things that move at the same time. e.g.: In that very same shot, we can compare the lightning speed to Aang's falling speed. Not to mention, of course, things like Zuko jumping inf front of Azula's lightning to protect Katara.

And let's not forget that while a lightning's return stroke can indeed move at about 1/3 the speed of light, the step leader (i.e.: the initial discharge that goes from the cloud to the ground, which I'd assume is the part you gotta dodge before it's too late) only moves at about 10% that speed... i.e.: Around 1/30 the speed of light (still pretty damn fast, of course).

So... Yeah... While I agree with the result, the "Aang can react to/move faster than lightning" is complete BS... As anyone with half a brain cell can tell.

[SKarious]

So, the battle of the badass bikers begins.
I have very limited knowledge on both combatants, so I would appreciate fixing any errors I may write here.

From what I know of Lobo, the Main Man's practically unkillable. Seriously, he has a regen factor on par with Wolverine (they even battled in one crossover event, though Wolvy won that battle).
Other than that, he's extremely experienced, being a bounty hunter.

Another question: How does the Penance Stare work? Does it work on immoral beings? I think I remember some scene in the hilarious live-action movies where Blaze tries the Stare on the Devil's son, and gets laughed at. I'm pretty sure Lobo is as immoral as they come and has never felt a smidge of regret in his life. The guy wiped out his entire species, I believe.

What were Ghost Rider's major victories and failures?

[Reddish Mage]

While it wouldn't have changed the match's final result, we know for a fact that lightning created by bending is way slower than normal lightning... Because we can compare its speed to that of other things that move at the same time. e.g.: In that very same shot, we can compare the lightning speed to Aang's falling speed. Not to mention, of course, things like Zuko jumping inf front of Azula's lightning to protect Katara.

It’s not that far-fetched to say lightning moves at our lightning speed. We’ve all agreed that, unless given reason to think otherwise, stuff in the fictional universe work the way it does in ours. Animation, because of the limitations and techniques of the medium, is going to depict stuff as moving in increments of 1/24 of a second.

This will show some silly results, like how Star Wars blaster bolts always take 3/24s of a second to reach its target regardless of the distance (because every shot will be shown at the origin, target, and one intermediate). Jedi reflexes are supposed to be so fast only because they see into the future, but if blasters were that slow they wouldn’t need such a fanciful explanation.

If lightning really moved as slow as it did, in some cases it moves slower than the fireballs its supposedly meant to be a superior replacement for.

Note too, lightning doesn’t even move at a constant speed in the animation. They are especially generous at giving multiple panels for lightning bolts and showing Aang as doing gymnastics around them during the Ozai fight. Most other fights it was not so generous. That could mean Aang really is that much faster than everyone else, or that they just didn’t care to depict lightning accurately or both.

Since this is a Deathbattle, its also a question of what Ed’s reaction time is. He dodges a bullet, but are we able to derive that he moved in bullet time?

Is not the simplest explanation that, forget the illustrations, lightning and bullets move at their real world speeds and both of these characters simply anticipated the attacks and moved within normal human speeds?

[Traab]

So, the battle of the badass bikers begins.
I have very limited knowledge on both combatants, so I would appreciate fixing any errors I may write here.

From what I know of Lobo, the Main Man's practically unkillable. Seriously, he has a regen factor on par with Wolverine (they even battled in one crossover event, though Wolvy won that battle).
Other than that, he's extremely experienced, being a bounty hunter.

Another question: How does the Penance Stare work? Does it work on immoral beings? I think I remember some scene in the hilarious live-action movies where Blaze tries the Stare on the Devil's son, and gets laughed at. I'm pretty sure Lobo is as immoral as they come and has never felt a smidge of regret in his life. The guy wiped out his entire species, I believe.

What were Ghost Rider's major victories and failures?



Most major victory was likely galactus, im not sure where he ranks on the power scale compared to various versions of the devil ghost riders have fought at one point or another so i will go with that. As for penance stare, I THINK the way it acts is it makes you feel all the pain and suffering you have ever caused, so while the son of the devil being a souless monster may not be effected, lobo has a soul, so he probably would to one extent or another. As for regen, hellfire can burn not just bodies, but souls. So it seems to me that it would suffice for the "can he kill lobo" question. Now will he be strong enough, fast enough, tough enough to land a killing blow? That I cant say. While lobo has traded blows with superman, one of supermans biggest traits is holding back as much of his strength as possible to avoid atomizing anything he touches. So we cant just go "Omg, superman is infinite strong, therefore lobo is infinite tough"

[Rater202]

So, the battle of the badass bikers begins.
I have very limited knowledge on both combatants, so I would appreciate fixing any errors I may write here.

From what I know of Lobo, the Main Man's practically unkillable. Seriously, he has a regen factor on par with Wolverine (they even battled in one crossover event, though Wolvy won that battle).
Other than that, he's extremely experienced, being a bounty hunter.

Another question: How does the Penance Stare work? Does it work on immoral beings? I think I remember some scene in the hilarious live-action movies where Blaze tries the Stare on the Devil's son, and gets laughed at. I'm pretty sure Lobo is as immoral as they come and has never felt a smidge of regret in his life. The guy wiped out his entire species, I believe.

What were Ghost Rider's major victories and failures?



it didn't work on Blackheart because Blackheart didn't have a soul--note at the end of the movie when he absorbed a hundred wicked souls that it was extra effective.

The penance stare works by forcing you to experience all the sins you've commited--which is to say, all of the pain be it physical, emotional, or spiritual that you have ever deliberately inflicted or that had been inflicted as a consequence of your own selfish or malicious actions while at the same time burning that sensation into your very soul so that you don't forget it.

It's called the Penance Stare becuase it's meant to force you to repent.

There are only a handful of defenses.

1: Not having a soul to burn in the first place.

2: Being utterly incapable of remorse, as a tool meant to force penance, it just flat out doesn't work if penance is impossible. It's not enough to be a mere sociopath. You have to be gleeful in your deliberate non-repentance.

3: If you've already repented for your sins, the stare is significantly less effective: You see this in the current Avengers run in the comics: A Hellhound working for a vampiric Soldier uses a spell to take control of Robbie Reyes and force him to fight the other Avengers: Captain Marvel gets stared and feels the pain she inflicted on the innocent as a result of her irrational behavior leading up to and during Civil War II, but she already felt bad about that so really all it did was piss her off.

If Lobo is genuinely incapable of remorse, the stare won't work...

But Ghost Rider could just use Hellfire to obliterate his soul the hard way.

[CarpeGuitarrem]

Lobo pretty much seems like the poster child for a character with a gleeful lack of remorse.

[Lemmy]

Is not the simplest explanation that, forget the illustrations, lightning and bullets move at their real world speeds and both of these characters simply anticipated the attacks and moved within normal human speeds?
Of course. I said that myself... But this is DB. Being pseudo-scientific is all they do.

(Besides, even if the lightning is limited by the frame rate, so is Aang's fall! So it still counts! :smallbiggrin:)

But, yeah, even ignoring that... Aang is never seen moving at anything even close to the speed required to the dodge actual lightning. During the siege of Ba Sing Sei (or whatever it's called), we see him get as fast as he can with his little airball to get as high as possible before falling and pushing a pointy rock into a giant train. That speed is probably close to the fastest he can move... And I highly doubt it's even close to breaking the speed of sound.

In physical attributes, Ed probably got him beat... But still, it wouldn't matter. Avatar state is Avatar state, after all...

[Traab]

Lobo pretty much seems like the poster child for a character with a gleeful lack of remorse.

The thing is, he isnt totally amoral, he has fought for good as well as evil in his career,
Lobo has built his reputation as one of the most fearsome bounty hunters in the known universe, but deep down he does have a heart of gold, even if he tends to care a lot more about his beloved space dolphins than he does actual people. I think that it would work on him to at least some extent.

[Lemmy]

it didn't work on Blackheart because Blackheart didn't have a soul--note at the end of the movie when he absorbed a hundred wicked souls that it was extra effective.

The penance stare works by forcing you to experience all the sins you've commited--which is to say, all of the pain be it physical, emotional, or spiritual that you have ever deliberately inflicted or that had been inflicted as a consequence of your own selfish or malicious actions while at the same time burning that sensation into your very soul so that you don't forget it.

It's called the Penance Stare becuase it's meant to force you to repent.

There are only a handful of defenses.

1: Not having a soul to burn in the first place.

2: Being utterly incapable of remorse, as a tool meant to force penance, it just flat out doesn't work if penance is impossible. It's not enough to be a mere sociopath. You have to be gleeful in your deliberate non-repentance.

3: If you've already repented for your sins, the stare is significantly less effective: You see this in the current Avengers run in the comics: A Hellhound working for a vampiric Soldier uses a spell to take control of Robbie Reyes and force him to fight the other Avengers: Captain Marvel gets stared and feels the pain she inflicted on the innocent as a result of her irrational behavior leading up to and during Civil War II, but she already felt bad about that so really all it did was piss her off.

If Lobo is genuinely incapable of remorse, the stare won't work...

But Ghost Rider could just use Hellfire to obliterate his soul the hard way.

I'll also add that 2 and 3 were basically one-shot things made up on the spot as an easy twist... But, unfortunately, that kind of nonsense still counts for DB.

The main thing is that while insanely difficult, it's possible to kill Lobo. His "can regenerate from a single cell" shtick is super inconsistent even by comics standards. He's being killed by decapitation and, IIRC, by being crushed to death by heavy objects (and multiple times by incineration, which shouldn't be a problem for GR). GR, OTOH, when fully using Azazel's powers, can even beat World-breaker Hulk... Not only that, but even dying doesn't take GR's powers away. Past GR not only keep their power in hell/heaven, but are even capable of resurrecting themselves by simply escaping back the the material plane (the reason GRs don't leave heaven is because, well... It's heaven. Who would you want to leave?).

Lobo has strength comparable to Superman... Whether that's enough to kill GR is debatable, however, as generally speaking, only great mystical/occult powers seem able to cause any lasting damage to a GR using anything more than whatever tiny percentage of power GRs can are usually able to wield.

[Traab]

I just wanted to include the strength comparable with superman thing is really dicey. As I said earlier, superman is well known for restricting his power according to whoever he is fighting. After all, he could easily reduce to a red mist anyone below planet breaking levels without putting a real effort into it. So we cant just leave it at "traded blows with superman" Because BANE once traded blows with superman. It didnt last long, but bane also didnt explode into bloody Venom soaked mist either so clearly superman was either holding back or bane has infinite durability. We have to see a physical attack he lands on something and what it does. Like, can he punch over a building? A mountain? Did he hip check a moon to crash into a planet?

[Anteros]

I don't know where you got that quote that Lobo has a heart of gold but I really don't think it's accurate. He canonically genocided his own race. His last appearance was him trying to murder his own daughter for basically no reason. He's fought for the good guys sometimes, but that's just because he's an equal-opportunity monster.

Sure, comics are inconsistent and I'm sure there's a Lobo story somewhere where the expresses regret...which will be enough for Death Battle's dubious standards...but it's hardly the way he's normally depicted.

For Lobo feats...he's done more than traded blows with Supes. He's straight up beaten him to a pulp in the past...although normal depictions put Supes way higher. He's outright overpowered Supergirl and Captain Marvel in the past. He once crushed an entire city into the size of an almond and ate it (don't ask me how that works, I don't write comics).

In physicals I think he's far above Ghost Rider. I think it comes down to if the Penance Stare works. Otherwise I don't know if Ghost Rider has anything that would even damage Lobo, and I doubt he could land it if he did.

[Rynjin]

I don't know much about Lobo. Supposedly he blew up his own home planet from what I know, but I'm not sure if that's "punched planet to death", "set off some doomsday weapon", something else, or just a flat lie.

[Reddish Mage]

Sure, comics are inconsistent and I'm sure there's a Lobo story somewhere where the expresses regret...which will be enough for Death Battle's dubious standards...but it's hardly the way he's normally depicted.

I mainly question whether standards for putting comicbook characters from different franchises in a fight to the death can be anything other than dubious. The ideas people have suggested on this forum as better alternatives usually boils down to

Theory 1 "my reading is the obvious one,"

Theory 2 "go by the typical* portrayal" (*the typical portrayal is undefined by it likely comes down to Theory 1)

Theory 3 "follow my proposed rule" (which is really screwy)

Theory 4 do what everyone else does and have an internet popularity contest (in which case there would be no point to the show)

[Traab]

I don't know where you got that quote that Lobo has a heart of gold but I really don't think it's accurate. He canonically genocided his own race. His last appearance was him trying to murder his own daughter for basically no reason. He's fought for the good guys sometimes, but that's just because he's an equal-opportunity monster.

Sure, comics are inconsistent and I'm sure there's a Lobo story somewhere where the expresses regret...which will be enough for Death Battle's dubious standards...but it's hardly the way he's normally depicted.

For Lobo feats...he's done more than traded blows with Supes. He's straight up beaten him to a pulp in the past...although normal depictions put Supes way higher. He's outright overpowered Supergirl and Captain Marvel in the past. He once crushed an entire city into the size of an almond and ate it (don't ask me how that works, I don't write comics).

In physicals I think he's far above Ghost Rider. I think it comes down to if the Penance Stare works. Otherwise I don't know if Ghost Rider has anything that would even damage Lobo, and I doubt he could land it if he did.

I pulled up a link to the space dolphin thing. Here. (https://dc.fandom.com/wiki/Space_Dolphins) Oh and as someone asked, he poisoned his planet, he didnt punch the world to pieces or gun down the population, he basically unleashed a plague that killed everything but him.

[Anteros]

I mainly question whether standards for putting comicbook characters from different franchises in a fight to the death can be anything other than dubious. The ideas people have suggested on this forum as better alternatives usually boils down to

Theory 1 "my reading is the obvious one,"

Theory 2 "go by the typical* portrayal" (*the typical portrayal is undefined by it likely comes down to Theory 1)

Theory 3 "follow my proposed rule" (which is really screwy)

Theory 4 do what everyone else does and have an internet popularity contest (in which case there would be no point to the show)

Or the most common theory I've actually seen which is "go with the way the character is always portrayed and dismiss obviously ridiculous outliers that clearly contradict everything else we've ever seen the character do.

[CarpeGuitarrem]

Frankly, the only way you could really get a "fair" evaluation is by using a jury system. You can't use one set of standards and have it work equally well for every conceivable fight. Rather, you have to trust in human judgment and common sense to a degree. Really, the fairest form of this would be if you had two hosts who presented their arguments for the strengths/weaknesses of each combatant, and then had a panel of judges vote based on that. Heck, you could even have a gradual reveal of the votes play out during an animatic of the fight.

[Reddish Mage]

Or the most common theory I've actually seen which is "go with the way the character is always portrayed and dismiss obviously ridiculous outliers that clearly contradict everything else we've ever seen the character do.

“The way the character is always portrayed” is clearly clearly Theory 2 “the typical portrayal” on steroids.

In other words after five iterations of the thread, some are willfully ignoring that these characters have been treated differently by their different authors, have varying capabilities from situation to situation, and are depicted differently in different media, including comics, cartoons, video games, live action movies and so on.

Which comes down to theory 1, everyone should view the character my way.

There is obviously no other way.


Frankly, the only way you could really get a "fair" evaluation is by using a jury system. You can't use one set of standards and have it work equally well for every conceivable fight. Rather, you have to trust in human judgment and common sense to a degree. Really, the fairest form of this would be if you had two hosts who presented their arguments for the strengths/weaknesses of each combatant, and then had a panel of judges vote based on that. Heck, you could even have a gradual reveal of the votes play out during an animatic of the fight.

The very opposite extreme...the popularity contest, here in the form of a picking out a jury to decide after having two hosts present a case.

Your rationale is. There is no proper standards, and so no way to justify a decision based on analysis, so the only way is to have it decided by a vote.

DB actually does this weekly on the DB Cast and has started allowing popular voting on DBX. Resulting in Gohan beating Superboy in the recent DBX (over Ben’s objections).

I’m not actually sure how they open the voting and whether it matters how the hosts argue it on the DB Cast (usually the DB crew and popular polll agree but not always and I’m not sure if vote close or opens prior to the live stream).

The jury system, and the notion of having each side arguing their case before them, invokes the English court system (a panel of judges could be something else). That suggests having rules for evidence, a structured trial, and prior to that, a process of selecting the jury and ensuring they are not biased or unduly influenced by external factors. Typically, the jury has to come to a unanimous decision, a simple majority vote means the jury doesn’t actually have to try to come to any sort of consensus and dissect the evidence.

Of course, in the real world, there is a process of appeals, and lawyers who argue badly can be disbarred, sanctioned, or sued (and sometimes a new trial granted). Also, there is a presumption of an actual reality on which to base decisions off of, and an actual set of laws and case precedent that limit a juries decision (or judges) to simply the facts that are disputable and prevent things like a murder conviction where the victim is still walking around. This is supposed to lead to a system where juries accurately come to reliable and fair decisions.

Since you have stated there can be no rules and no basis in reality, a “jury” is basically just a fancy way of doing a poll. Its a poll within a show format where the show runners self selects a small penal each show to decide the outcome the way a bunch of reality TV shows do it now.

I fail to see how this is a “fair” way of picking winners, and I doubt it would produce results anymore accurate to what we have, a group of guys who do the same show every few weeks and pick the winner on their own analysis.

On the other hand we’ve just had two people put in for saying DB is wrong for precisely opposite reasons. One says the characters abilities are “always” obvious. The other that its so unclear the only way to do it is by a vote.

After five threads, we are doing well at figuring this thing out.

[Lord Raziere]

Ok then how would you do it, reddish? you have lots of criticism, tell us your own ideas and point of view of how to do it if you have such a strong informed opinion on taking apart other ways of doing it.

[Devonix]

A big problem with Ghost Rider is that a lot of Writers flat out don't understand how the Penance Stare works. The most apt comparison is the Empathy gun from Hitchikers guide to the galaxy. The stare makes you feel what your victims felt from their point of view. It doesn't matter if you've made peace with it or if you normally lack empathy. Because it procs off of what your victim felt not your own capacity to feel.

Also a lot of this is going to depend on Which Ghost Rider they use. I'd say the best would be Noble Kale.

[Reddish Mage]

Ok then how would you do it, reddish? you have lots of criticism, tell us your own ideas and point of view of how to do it if you have such a strong informed opinion on taking apart other ways of doing it.

I'm not suggesting another way of doing it. I'm saying Deathbattle is absolutely fine for doing what they do, how they do it. Regardless of whether they get some matches wrong or not.

Those that think the answer is always obvious, are just inserting their own biases (if not gaslighting). The other systems suggested have largely suggested rules that are manifestly unworkable, or just go back to some form of the internet popularity contest.

I'd be perfectly for a show that brought on a bunch of guests to decide which character would win a versus after hearing from representatives of both sides, with accompanying video clips and images of course. It would be quite a different show, without the fully-animated fight that people often go to Deathbattle for, and each party would be contesting each other's analysis of the characters, rather than getting an objective analysis that purports to conclusively lay out the characters "weapon, armor and skills."

However, if I were going for the most irrefutable analysis, I'd probably use the wiki, open-source coding model and get as many people to contribute analysis as possible, forming the rules through collaboration and consensus. It'd be more than mere voting, it'd be a community of actively participants thinking about how best to evaluate the characters and then pit these characters against each other.

However, that's not a webshow format at all, but a wiki collaboration format. Also, given how collaborative and production the discussion has been on here, I'm not sure we'll get anywhere.

Oh here's a Fanon wiki for deathbattles (https://deathbattlefanon.fandom.com/wiki/The_Presence_VS_The_One-Above-All) in precisely the format I suggested. This one imagines who will win in the ultimate fight to the finish by DC's and Marvel's god-stand ins: The Presence vs. The One Above All.

Looks promising.


A big problem with Ghost Rider is that a lot of Writers flat out don't understand how the Penance Stare works. The most apt comparison is the Empathy gun from Hitchikers guide to the galaxy. The stare makes you feel what your victims felt from their point of view. It doesn't matter if you've made peace with it or if you normally lack empathy. Because it procs off of what your victim felt not your own capacity to feel.

Also a lot of this is going to depend on Which Ghost Rider they use. I'd say the best would be Noble Kale.

If "a lot of writers" (by which I take it to mean the official writers of the character) don't "understand" the character and as a result the character's abilities radically change...are we supposed to just dismiss those canonical uses of the power and what the character said or did?

The comics or other material can always explicitly disavow what an earlier comic said happened and put in its own definition. In the absence of that, you are overruling the official editors, publisher, writer, and the character itself to put in your own interpretation.

Also, honest question, how is a being itself incapable of feeling, supposed to feel its victim's feeling?

[CarpeGuitarrem]

Erm. A jury is hardly the same as a popular poll. A jury is A: a selected panel gathered for that purpose, B: a deliberately smaller group than a popular vote. In this case, it makes the most sense to curate the people who are listening to the case and making a judgment.

I also never said there could be no rules, but rather that there's no single standard that fits every argument, which means you need to find a way to apply the rules of common sense. Which is the point of a jury.

[Lord Raziere]

I'm not suggesting another way of doing it. I'm saying Deathbattle is absolutely fine for doing what they do, how they do it. Regardless of whether they get some matches wrong or not.

While the point of the thread, that is missing the point of the current discussion I think. I think we can deviate a little from pure DB related things here until we decide to get back to the matter of Death Battle.


Erm. A jury is hardly the same as a popular poll. A jury is A: a selected panel gathered for that purpose, B: a deliberately smaller group than a popular vote. In this case, it makes the most sense to curate the people who are listening to the case and making a judgment.

I also never said there could be no rules, but rather that there's no single standard that fits every argument, which means you need to find a way to apply the rules of common sense. Which is the point of a jury.

To make it even more unbiased, perhaps the people assessing how powerful a character is, shouldn't be the people arguing whether they'd win. like the assessors shouldn't be the advocates. the problem with that is I don't know how you could find someone unbiased in assessing a character, because the very act of viewing a character is apart of the entertainment of the character.

[Reddish Mage]

I also never said there could be no rules, but rather that there's no single standard that fits every argument, which means you need to find a way to apply the rules of common sense. Which is the point of a jury.

How do you apply the rules of common sense, if these characters, by their nature, do things quite out of line with anything that is within common experience?

For example, the Flash is said to be able to react to phenomena at reaction times that only theoretical mathematicians, physicists and other people that work very small numbers would know by name. The Flash is also able to go many times light speed. He is able to perceive sight and sound at those speeds and function normally in a world where everything is pretty much frozen. How then, do we explain the fact that a guy with an ordinary boomerang, a guy with a fancy gun, and other ordinary humans have regularly gotten the better of him with traps and other phenomena.

The answer to questions like these are the key to telling us how Flash would preform in a Deathbattle. If you put him up against someone like, say Black Panther (who beat Batman, who beat the Flash), or say someone like Doctor Strange, the Flash may or may not win depending on how you interpret how he uses that speed in combat.

The Flash is hardly a special case. Characters (including both participants in the latest DB) are depicted as being regular humans in most ways, but it turns out they have truly absurd durability when you look at the hits they have tanked.What do we do if say Goku were to face, say Naruto, would Naruto get the jump on him (because Goku is so easy to surprise), or not, because Naruto doesn't actually use surprise tactics. Also, if so could Naruto score a killing blow? Perhaps someone who was more ninja like (I'm drawing a blank on Naruto characters) could? Or could they, because Goku has at various times seemed to be truly immune to attacks below DBZ planet-busting absurdity level, and at other times he gets run through by a laser.

Also, is plot armor in effect for some characters? If so, does the versus match remove it? Does what other's have done or have had done to them within the character's franchise serve as an example of what the character can do? If so when?

Common sense tends to go awry in these cases, and to be very vulnerable to how a question is framed.

[Rynjin]

Most of the Sharingan users could probably beat Goku (particularly Itachi and super especially Shisui); guy's an absolute chump when it comes to fighting illusions, especially where his go to trick of "sense energy to find the real one" doesn't work on Genjutsu, since in D&D terms they're Phantasms, not Glamers or Patterns.

[Lord Raziere]

Most of the Sharingan users could probably beat Goku (particularly Itachi and super especially Shisui); guy's an absolute chump when it comes to fighting illusions, especially where his go to trick of "sense energy to find the real one" doesn't work on Genjutsu, since in D&D terms they're Phantasms, not Glamers or Patterns.

hm, considering that I play Skyrim with mods that allow me to play a Kamehameha spell and all the Sharigan powers, I can say that the Tsukuyomi and Amaterasu are more consistently useful abilities than the Kamehameha, because Tsukuyomi is essentially a long paralyze spell where I can then easily kill the foe with a sword or something, and the Amaterasu just instantly sets something I target on black fire but the Kamehameha spell has a long charge up, drains mana fast and is a bit hard to aim even though its great for killing dragons when I can fire it off, the skyrim Amaterasu can do that as well without making me stand in place and the Tsukuyomi can be applied to far more foes.

often times, its simply not practical to use the skyrim Kamehameha at all.

so by that metric, is true that Sharingans users do have the better tools for winning a fight. Hit though can stop time and that generally is an even better tool to win fights at least in skyrim. it doesn't matter how much health your foe has if you can stab them to death before time resumes, and even modded spell for pausing or slowing time for three seconds gives you a big advantage in skyrim.

I know its ridiculous to compare the strength of these techniques based upon how a game engine does them, but thats just where my thoughts went and my observations on using the abilities in some simulated way.

[Man on Fire]

Sometimes I feel like we don't have people that actually read DC comics in this thread. Can you give us a story or two we haven't mentioned where Hal does this sort of thing?

Guess who wrote that comic where Hal Jordan out-willpowers personification of Willpower that DB used?

Also, regarding the next time battle
I'm actually annoyed they used Lobo. Ghost Rider vs Etrigan the Demon is one of the most popular and well-known VS Topics when it comes to Marvel vs DC. These characters have much more in common than "uses a bike". It really feels like they picked Lobo because he might lose to Penance Stare (while Etrigan is the guy who has shown he can play around DC's equivalent of God's Wrath, the Spectre), and DC had been on too much of a winning streak. I think Hal Jordan vs Ben 10 was also set up to make a DC character lose but it backfired.

What's more is that this irritates me because after using Rider they may decide put Etrigan against Hellboy and that will be so one-sided it will be just cruel, seeing how Mingola intentionally doesn't allow his character to reach same power levels as Rider and Demon to keep him more relatable.

This of course reaches back to my worry that Death Battle may in future pass on another well-requested and iconic Marvel vs DC matchup of X-23 vs Cassandra Cain and instead put Damian Wayne in Cass' place because he is more popular, nevermind that would be hialriously one-sided fight, basically a young adult unkillable woman delivering no-hold-barred beatdown to a 13-yo. I mean it's not like Etrigan doesn't have more media than Cass

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=anfj5dGgJlg&ab_channel=12345678weeds

[Devonix]

If "a lot of writers" (by which I take it to mean the official writers of the character) don't "understand" the character and as a result the character's abilities radically change...are we supposed to just dismiss those canonical uses of the power and what the character said or did?

The comics or other material can always explicitly disavow what an earlier comic said happened and put in its own definition. In the absence of that, you are overruling the official editors, publisher, writer, and the character itself to put in your own interpretation.

Also, honest question, how is a being itself incapable of feeling, supposed to feel its victim's feeling?[/QUOTE]

Oh I know that, it's up to the writers to decide what an ability does. It's just that it was presented as one thing and it it usually stays constant except when it's changed for someone to have Ghost Rider Job to. Every time it works it's described as you Experiencing it from their point of view. Feeling how and what they felt.

And every time it fails, it's changed to You feeling guilt over what you've done. It's only ever treated differently from the first when a writer wants it to fail. It's always the same when it works, but always changed when it doesn't.

As for how a character that can't feel. The Stare doesn't give you the ability to feel. It give you your victim's ability to feel. If you murder a child, you experience the murder from the point of view of being a child who is being murdered. If you shoot shoot or beat up a hardened criminal, well it's not going to be as effective against you because your victim is able to process what you did to them more easily.

Who you harmed changes how the stare affects you.

[HandofShadows]

What's more is that this irritates me because after using Rider they may decide put Etrigan against Hellboy and that will be so one-sided it will be just cruel, seeing how Mingola intentionally doesn't allow his character to reach same power levels as Rider and Demon to keep him more relatable.[/SPOILER]

Did you read "Hellboy in Hell"? Hellboy basically says "screw it" goes full demon power. He then kills the rulers of hell, ALL of them. They didn't stand a snowball's chance in ...er... well there was no way the demons of hell could even slow him down much. Hellboy took on both Leviathan and Behemoth at the same time and wiped the floor with them. Hellboy does break off his horns and give up that power, but it's still there.

I don't think that a normal Hellboy vs Etrigan would be as one sided as you think. Hellboy is immune to hellfire and while he doesn't use much magic, he always has a ton of magical trinkets around and minor Holy artifacts as well. Stuff Etrigan is highly vulnerable to (And Hellboy might be a Saint :smallconfused: ). Etrigan is stronger and faster, but we don't know what the Right Hand of Doom would do to him if Hellboy connected with it.

[HolyDraconus]

Did you read "Hellboy in Hell"? Hellboy basically says "screw it" goes full demon power. He then kills the rulers of hell, ALL of them. They didn't stand a snowball's chance in ...er... well there was no way the demons of hell could even slow him down much. Hellboy took on both Leviathan and Behemoth at the same time and wiped the floor with them. Hellboy does break off his horns and give up that power, but it's still there.

I don't think that a normal Hellboy vs Etrigan would be as one sided as you think. Hellboy is immune to hellfire and while he doesn't use much magic, he always has a ton of magical trinkets around and minor Holy artifacts as well. Stuff Etrigan is highly vulnerable to (And Hellboy might be a Saint :smallconfused: ). Etrigan is stronger and faster, but we don't know what the Right Hand of Doom would do to him if Hellboy connected with it.

Isn't Hellboy like the legit King of England since hes a direct descendant of Arthur? Thru Modred?

[HandofShadows]

Isn't Hellboy like the legit King of England since hes a direct descendant of Arthur? Thru Modred?

I think it's to Arthur himself. Can't remember. (edit) The Hellboy wiki lists Hellboy as a direct descendant of Arthur.

[Man on Fire]

This, amusingly, makes him fighting Etrigan sorta make sense since Etrigan is bound ot Jason Blood, who hails from Camelot himself.

In last Death Battlecast, they posted a link to an official submission form (https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdLOlKAHrl0y0BYppKsxS9XP5B3HREj8pqdOK73vx_E TpNVVg/viewform) for battles you want to see. I ended up submitting 10 or so, list below if anyone wants to discuss whenever these suggestions are a good idea and would make a good fight or not


Alex Armstrong vs Steven Armstrong (Fullmetal ALchemist vs Metal Gear)
Alucard vs Blade (Castlevania vs Marvel)
Arya Stark vs Hit-Girl (Game of Thrones vs Kick-Ass)
Asuka Kazama vs Sakura Kasugano (Tekken vs Street Fighter)
Cassandra Cain vs X-23 (Batman vs X-Men)
Dio Brando vs Nox (JoJo'S Bizarre Adventure vs Wakfu)
Gordon Freeman vs Isaac Clarke (Half-Life vs Dead Space)
Harley Quinn vs Jinx (Batman vs League of Legends)
Harry Dresden vs John Constantine (Dresden Files vs DC Comics)
Moriggan vs Yennefer (Dragon Age vs the Witcher)
Ragnar Lothbork vs Thorkell the Tall (Vikings vs Vinland Saga)
Rayne vs Seras Victoria (Bloodrayne vs Hellsing)

[CarpeGuitarrem]

Ayyyy Vinland Saga representation! Although I'm pretty sure Thorkell is an unfair match for anyone resembling a historical-level Viking, like. The dude slices through soldiers like a knife through hot, gory butter.

[Kitten Champion]

Alucard vs Blade (Castlevania vs Marvel)

I was playing through Symphony of the Night recently and, unbidden, the thought I had was Alucard vs. Morbius. Since apparently the Morbius' movie is next year and the whole SEO synergy thing. Though now Blade's going to be a thing again too, so, either way.



Arya Stark vs Hit-Girl (Game of Thrones vs Kick-Ass)

That works thematically pretty well, but as a battle would be kind of one-sided for Hit-Girl. Like, that battle should go "Hit-Girl pulls out an assault rifle, pulls trigger, blood splatter, The End".

[CarpeGuitarrem]

I think it depends on how many covert shenanigans are possible. If Arya can catch her off-guard with a timely Faceless disguise and get close enough to render the gun not an option, she has a chance.

[Lord Raziere]

Harry Dresden Vs. John Constantine? :smallfrown:

*looks up Constantine* I'm comparing the two....and while Harry is the one thats more optimized for a straight up fight, with his blasting magic, better physical fitness, the Winter Knight mantle, and so on, Constantine seems to have a bunch of hax tricks and this luck ability and such that I'm not sure
what the true implications of are, but its DC so I'm sure its hax because he lives in the same universe as freaking Superman and Dream of the Endless. so I'm sure that they'd give the win to Constantine, its the only one I'm vaguely interested in seeing, if only to get more people hearing about Harry Dresden, even if he loses.

but then again DB is all about those straight up fights, and Constantine seems to be more of a con-artist planning type who tries to avoid fights as much as possible so Harry might win if only because Constantine would be trying to play the wrong game or at least playing with the wrong tools

[Kitten Champion]

I think it depends on how many covert shenanigans are possible. If Arya can catch her off-guard with a timely Faceless disguise and get close enough to render the gun not an option, she has a chance.

Yeah, you'd need to give Arya generous circumstances up front for that to be possible.

Arya's just not from a sufficiently advanced civilization to deal with modern firearms in terms of her equipment, her tactics, and just general experience in being able to act under gunfire. While Hit-Girl is capable and experienced enough to not make any obvious mistakes, as opposed to some faceless mook with a gun in the same situation. That's without getting Hit-Girl's martial arts training, or that she'd be wearing Kevlar which is pretty resistant against bladed weapons as well.

[Reddish Mage]

Harry Dresden Vs. John Constantine? :smallfrown:

*looks up Constantine* I'm comparing the two....and while Harry is the one thats more optimized for a straight up fight, with his blasting magic, better physical fitness, the Winter Knight mantle, and so on, Constantine seems to have a bunch of hax tricks and this luck ability and such that I'm not sure
what the true implications of are, but its DC so I'm sure its hax because he lives in the same universe as freaking Superman and Dream of the Endless. so I'm sure that they'd give the win to Constantine, its the only one I'm vaguely interested in seeing, if only to get more people hearing about Harry Dresden, even if he loses.

but then again DB is all about those straight up fights, and Constantine seems to be more of a con-artist planning type who tries to avoid fights as much as possible so Harry might win if only because Constantine would be trying to play the wrong game or at least playing with the wrong tools

Constantine seems to be an interesting one because he’s a DC/Vertigo character that doesn’t do a lot of straight up fighting. But then he’s in the DC universe...when he does throw down he throws down hard.

Constantine can outright destroy powerful magical beings, perform mass mind control, time travel, and the dozens of other powerful things reality warping sorcerers do in the DC universe. From what I an gather there may be an argument he is superior to and should scale to Zatanna.

He has tanked absurdly deadly magics, has dodged bullets, and done other stuff suggesting fantastic attribute...although his body (except for rare occasions) is that of a normal human.


He can also summon powerful allies but that part DB isn’t consistent with what they’d let in. The rule was articulated that a third party has to be part of one’s “arsenal” to participate.

Dresden has done some extremely potent things and may tend towards viewing things that are extraordinarily destructive...but Constantine may just be another example that the DC is full of characters that are just nuts on the power scale...because he fought some of them and won.

[Lord Raziere]

Constantine seems to be an interesting one because he’s a DC/Vertigo character that doesn’t do a lot of straight up fighting. But then he’s in the DC universe...when he does throw down he throws down hard.

Constantine can outright destroy powerful magical beings, perform mass mind control, time travel, and the dozens of other powerful things reality warping sorcerers do in the DC universe. From what I an gather there may be an argument he is superior to and should scale to Zatanna.

He has tanked absurdly deadly magics, has dodged bullets, and done other stuff suggesting fantastic attribute...although his body (except for rare occasions) is that of a normal human.


I KNEW IT! I freaking knew it, stupid DC and their ridiculous cosmology. what the heck even is this cosmology (https://static.comicvine.com/uploads/scale_super/11130/111302904/5475262-multiversity_map_2400_53ee6b4c22d9a9.11031355.jpg) , theres like 50 worlds here and there, eight planes above that, something about this rainbow being a membrane and then The Source and Destiny of the Endless, and then I read how people actually try to explain this and its all 5th dimensional this and that, endless dimensions, megaverses,dark megaverses, infinite multiverses in an omniverse, something about hypertime, limbo, monitor sphere, and so on.

its kind of a problem when your cosmology seems to resemble a vast excuse to come up with as many different synonyms for parallel universes as possible on the low level and an excuse to break the fourth wall and be meta on the higher level. how many godlike beings do you really need? its like some elaborate set up so someone can make anything they can imagine happen as long as they mutter the right cosmobabble.

and its not even consistent, so much of it is illogical and subject to change and expansion. the DC Universe is a nonsense fractal.

[Anteros]

I KNEW IT! I freaking knew it, stupid DC and their ridiculous cosmology. what the heck even is this cosmology (https://static.comicvine.com/uploads/scale_super/11130/111302904/5475262-multiversity_map_2400_53ee6b4c22d9a9.11031355.jpg) , theres like 50 worlds here and there, eight planes above that, something about this rainbow being a membrane and then The Source and Destiny of the Endless, and then I read how people actually try to explain this and its all 5th dimensional this and that, endless dimensions, megaverses,dark megaverses, infinite multiverses in an omniverse, something about hypertime, limbo, monitor sphere, and so on.

its kind of a problem when your cosmology seems to resemble a vast excuse to come up with as many different synonyms for parallel universes as possible on the low level and an excuse to break the fourth wall and be meta on the higher level. how many godlike beings do you really need? its like some elaborate set up so someone can make anything they can imagine happen as long as they mutter the right cosmobabble.

and its not even consistent, so much of it is illogical and subject to change and expansion. the DC Universe is a nonsense fractal.

I mean, you're not wrong that it's ridiculous, but it's just a comic. It's hardly even the most ridiculous thing in this thread. No reason to let it upset you.

[Lord Raziere]

I mean, you're not wrong that it's ridiculous, but it's just a comic. It's hardly even the most ridiculous thing in this thread. No reason to let it upset you.

I exaggerating a little for effect, let me have my passions.

but I disagree on anything being more ridiculous than the DC cosmology after trying to look up things trying to explain the DC cosmology. I have not read a single setting or cosmology more nonsensical or more needlessly complex in my entire life.

[Anteros]

I exaggerating a little for effect, let me have my passions.

but I disagree on anything being more ridiculous than the DC cosmology after trying to look up things trying to explain the DC cosmology. I have not read a single setting or cosmology more nonsensical or more needlessly complex in my entire life.

Well, if you think that's bad, don't forget that it constantly changes based on whatever story they're currently telling wants it to be.

[Lord Raziere]

Well, if you think that's bad, don't forget that it constantly changes based on whatever story they're currently telling wants it to be.

I'm not. the reddit topic I found discussing it said exactly that. when I say its a nonsense fractal, I do not use exaggeration. cause see, no matter how high or small you go, it doesn't make sense, and since it changes its nonsense over time, that nonsense fractal extends into the fourth dimension of time. since the medium is flat however, I'm not sure if the fractal extends to the 3rd dimension of depth though.

therefore, the best summation of DC universe metaphysics is that its Calvinball. there is a whole bunch of complex nonsense that seems important, but in practice its Calvinball. thats why its so powerful, it literally has built itself into something that doesn't care about being consistent in the least, and made an entire cosmology to do nothing but be a constantly changing cosmobabble as to why. it makes other cosmologies look well-designed by comparison.

Its basically the embodiment of everything that wins these things: Longevity and Flexibility. no wonder people call for consistency so much with this kind of nonsense coming from no consistency at all.

[Traab]

Constantine seems to be an interesting one because he’s a DC/Vertigo character that doesn’t do a lot of straight up fighting. But then he’s in the DC universe...when he does throw down he throws down hard.

Constantine can outright destroy powerful magical beings, perform mass mind control, time travel, and the dozens of other powerful things reality warping sorcerers do in the DC universe. From what I an gather there may be an argument he is superior to and should scale to Zatanna.

He has tanked absurdly deadly magics, has dodged bullets, and done other stuff suggesting fantastic attribute...although his body (except for rare occasions) is that of a normal human.


He can also summon powerful allies but that part DB isn’t consistent with what they’d let in. The rule was articulated that a third party has to be part of one’s “arsenal” to participate.

Dresden has done some extremely potent things and may tend towards viewing things that are extraordinarily destructive...but Constantine may just be another example that the DC is full of characters that are just nuts on the power scale...because he fought some of them and won.

You know, with the summoning allies thing, that could get messy rather fast. Dresden can also summon demons, he can call on the fae up to and including the various queens, knights, or even the wildfae like the erlking or oberron, though its generally a very very bad idea unless he has a good plot up his sleeves. But also, he has Bob. A ludicrously powerful google search engine for all things magical that once almost killed HIM when he accidentally unlocked its lethal potential. And finally, I say, GIVE HIM SUE! I wanna see constantine react to a zombie trex being ridden into battle. lol Sure he has probably seen worse but thats the sort of thing that grabs your attention.

But yeah, in the end its probably constantine who would win because dc comics are utterly broken. I dont even know what sort of feats he can pull off as I never read his comics, ive just heard of him and the gist of what he does. But again, dc comics, therefore absurdity.

[Dragonus45]

In the Hellblazer comics proper Constantine’s strongest technique was always, sacrifice random nearby friend to dodge trouble! Something he wouldn’t have in a death battle. And in an straight up fight Harry fights just as dirty as John does. The main issue here onstage differences between magic in both settings meaning Dresden has well defined abilities with clear limitations and Constantine does not.

[Reddish Mage]

In the Hellblazer comics proper Constantine’s strongest technique was always, sacrifice random nearby friend to dodge trouble! Something he wouldn’t have in a death battle. And in an straight up fight Harry fights just as dirty as John does. The main issue here onstage differences between magic in both settings meaning Dresden has well defined abilities with clear limitations and Constantine does not.

I completely agree. Dresden is more often than not shown as a highly lethal wizard with very destructive magics. That is just not (usually) Constantine’s style. However, Constantine can use magic to do all sorts of things Dresden cannot.

I’d note that its a D&D truism that the blaster mage is the weakest of wizards. The best spells are save or suck, those that redirect the enemy or control the entire battlefield, summon allies far more powerful than your entire team, or simply don’t allow a saving throw.

Constantine does a lot more in the realm of the really broken magic...and boy is his magic broken. Also, when he does use blaster magic, its on a scale greater than Dresden’s.

To point out the difference in scale: The Winter Knight’s superpowers doesn’t even rank in the DC universe. Constantine is recognized as one of the most powerful wizards in a universe that includes Doctor Fate, Zatanna, and countless other reality warpering entities like Nightmare Nurse. Constantine can (and does) even summon these.

I’m afraid Dresden simply isn’t a DC universe level wizard.

[Dragonus45]

To be fair part of the problem is that Harry refuses to actually draw upon the Winter Mantle for anything but the most shallow uses. Although even at full power it’s more a weakness then a str. Constantine would never miss a chance to nail him with iron and then Harry is totally out of the fight.

[Reddish Mage]

How would Constantine know how to nail Dresden with iron?

Would it be his precog, or intelligence, or his vast knowledge, or he just can intuit the type of magic and Fairie magic works the same way in DC?

I wouldn’t count on Constantine knowing the weakness from background knowledge, since a DB rule is the two don’t know anything about other unless they do in canon (strictly construed, I don’t think it’s actually happened). He doesn’t need it though. Constantine can win this one in every which way, by speed (cause those comicreaction times are crazy, and Constantine has dodged bullets and beams and such), by intelligent strategy, by trickery, by sheer power, even sheer luck (Constantine has luck powers as the embodiment of The Fool).

There will never be a Dresden battle however because Harry Dresden hasn’t appeared in enough media. If he did fight Constantine is way too much for him, the more interesting battle is Harry Dresden vs Harry Potter.

[Keltest]

How would Constantine know how to nail Dresden with iron?

Would it be his precog, or intelligence, or his vast knowledge, or he just can intuit the type of magic and Fairie magic works the same way in DC?

I wouldn’t count on Constantine knowing the weakness from background knowledge, since a DB rule is the two don’t know anything about other unless they do in canon (strictly construed, I don’t think it’s actually happened). He doesn’t need it though. Constantine can win this one in every which way, by speed (cause those comicreaction times are crazy, and Constantine has dodged bullets and beams and such), by intelligent strategy, by trickery, by sheer power, even sheer luck (Constantine has luck powers as the embodiment of The Fool).

There will never be a Dresden battle however because Harry Dresden hasn’t appeared in enough media. If he did fight Constantine is way too much for him, the more interesting battle is Harry Dresden vs Harry Potter.

Dresden wins that fight easily. Potter is scrappy in a fight, but Dresden's evocations are simply better suited for combat than Potter's spells are. Plus, if it comes down to it, Dresden will just pull out his revolver and shoot Potter.

[Lord Raziere]

Dresden wins that fight easily. Potter is scrappy in a fight, but Dresden's evocations are simply better suited for combat than Potter's spells are. Plus, if it comes down to it, Dresden will just pull out his revolver and shoot Potter.

yea even with avada kedavra, word of god says gun out speeds wands every time, so while potter is going "avad-" BANG! Dresden shoots him before he can finish the incantation.

[Durkoala]

yea even with avada kedavra, word of god says gun out speeds wands every time, so while potter is going "avad-" BANG! Dresden shoots him before he can finish the incantation.

No it doesn't. Nobody to my knowledge has managed to produce an actual source for the 'quote' that a shotgun farmer outdoes a Potter-wizard in every way, and it's a personal peeve that people keep putting 'facts' into HP under the guise of 'Rowling said it', so I'm sorry if I come off as a bit testy.

[Lord Raziere]

No it doesn't. Nobody to my knowledge has managed to produce an actual source for the 'quote' that a shotgun farmer outdoes a Potter-wizard in every way, and it's a personal peeve that people keep putting 'facts' into HP under the guise of 'Rowling said it', so I'm sorry if I come off as a bit testy.

okay, whatever dude, but we don't need word of god, we just need logic:
potter wand needs incantation and complex wand waving.
gun just needs to pull trigger

one is much simpler than the other, dresden has tons of combat experience getting attacked by people out of nowhere, and he has both spell and pop-culture knowledge up the wazoo, even if he doesn't know potter magic exists, he knows that Avada Kedavra are words that are nonsense enough to be used as incantations in his own magic system and basically mean death, so he'd react fast enough thinking that Potters incantation is a death curse from his own system of magic and needs to disrupt it before he can get it off, so....Potter dead no matter what.

[SKarious]

So, just to note a few things about Potter. (I feel like it's already been said, so please feel free to correct me)
+ Potter has good enough reflexes to catch a small flying evasive ball, while flying in a different direction and dodging several homing(?), bigger balls targeted directly at him. Not to mention eyesight keen enough to locate that orb from across a playing field. He also knows about guns while Dresden doesn't know much about Potterverse magic.
+ Going by the movies, many spells are just "point and shoot" - without need for special wand movements.
+ Also, Many spells could be cast silently. While we don't know if the Killing Curse could be, other lethal spells could definitely be. (For example that spell that lifts and hangs the target in the air).
+ Not to mention, there is not much time to do anything after hearing the words of the Killing Curse. There is no known surefire way to block, dodge, or avoid it. (Other than being Harry Potter in a very special set of circumstances).

I'm sure Dresden has many tricks, and would love to hear about hem. But those are my main concerns.

[tyckspoon]

+ Not to mention, there is not much time to do anything after hearing the words of the Killing Curse. There is no known surefire way to block, dodge, or avoid it. (Other than being Harry Potter in a very special set of circumstances).


Putting a sufficiently bulky physical object in the way will do it, and AFAIK it's always been depicted as a beam or dart without tracking/homing capabilities, so you could presumably dodge it in the same way one can dodge bullets - which is to say track where the wand is pointing and don't be there when they actually launch the spell/pull the trigger. Theoretically if you had good enough reflexes/could cast fast enough/had something like a Contingency effect you could teleport out of the way of it. The 'unblockability' has only been depicted in regards to magical effects - it'll rip through most magical barriers, which is only a major problem defending against it if you are convinced that a Harry Potter-type Protego shield is the only magic defense you need.

[Lord Raziere]

Well, technically Dresden was once a ghost, so that version of Dresden and can posses Potter and make him strangle himself, so that version of Dresden is already immune to avada kedavra. can't kill whats already dead.

also I exclusively use the book versions of Potter. so movies don't count. have to say the incantation.

also in Dresdenverse, Harry's a Warden so he is likely to be sent to track down a new wizard in his world and kill them early before they start misusing their power, so the most likely scenario where they meet is Dresden killing Potter when he is eleven at the Dursleys.

while Potter is limited to his school and such, so its more likely for Dresden to get the drop on HIM, since Dresden can travel anywhere for his magical private eye job.

Edit: also is Avada Kedavra really that unstoppable if Potter himself keeps countering it with Expelliarmus? all that spell is supposed to is disarm someone of their wand, so can't you just counter it with a magical blast rather than a shield? also they keep using avada kedavra at REALLY close ranges, when a gun can kill someone from farther away than that, thats the entire point of having a ranged weapon, so lacking evidence that avada kedavra is actually good at range, its safe to assume that guns win anyways because you can shoot from farther.

[Durkoala]

So, just to note a few things about Potter. (I feel like it's already been said, so please feel free to correct me)
Just touching up on some of these points:

+ Potter has good enough reflexes to catch a small flying evasive ball, while flying in a different direction and dodging several homing(?), bigger balls targeted directly at him. Not to mention eyesight keen enough to locate that orb from across a playing field. He also knows about guns while Dresden doesn't know much about Potterverse magic.
Pretty much, yes. Harry's Firebolt broom is advertised in the third book as being able to go from 0-150 MPH in ten seconds. Whether its top speed is even faster isn't stated, but Quidditch is played at extremely fast speeds... and then in the fifth book (ie, after two years experience riding that broom), Bellatrix Lestrange utterly dominates Harry in their duel, casting spells so fast he can barely react to them. By the sixth (or maybe the seventh, I can't really remember off the top of my head) book, Harry's able to fight her equally, so he's on that kind of level too.


+ Also, Many spells could be cast silently. While we don't know if the Killing Curse could be, other lethal spells could definitely be. (For example that spell that lifts and hangs the target in the air).
There's nothing to say that the killing curse can't be cast silently, but I don't feel like Potter would use it as his opening move, even in Death Battle. The wiki also says that Potter's not very good at nonverbal magic, although I have some doubts on that.


+ Not to mention, there is not much time to do anything after hearing the words of the Killing Curse. There is no known surefire way to block, dodge, or avoid it. (Other than being Harry Potter in a very special set of circumstances).
Tyckspoon covers most of this: there's a few ways to avoid the killing curse, although they mostly boil down to dodging and/or having a heavy object take the attack instead. Most of the cover that Dumbledore and Harry actually use is blown to bits when it gets hit, but I don't think it's clear if this is a property of Avada Kedavra or if it's just because Voldemort's strong enough that even his failed spells make things explode.

That said, I feel like it would be very out of character for Potter to lead with the killing curse. Even if we go by the DB relaxing of characters' aversion to killing, Potter's had a lot of character moments about how he won't kill people if he can avoid it (he does at one point imply that he might be OK with killing in self-defence, but that never gets tested*). He'd probably go with Expelliarmus, which tbf has most of the problems that AK does, or a shield charm (which can probably block bullets), as Potter does know what a gun is and the basics of how it works.

*He's OK with letting Umbridge and the centaurs get abandoned to an agressive enemy, but there also wasn't really anything he could have done at the time if he wanted to save them.

I'm sure Dresden has many tricks, and would love to hear about them. But those are my main concerns.

To be honest, I feel like Dresden probably has the edge in this fight. I don't know much about the Dresden files, but Potterverse wizards tend to fall behind other settings in raw power, and at the very least Dresden is a big man who knows how to handle himself in a physical fight.

EDIT:

Edit: also is Avada Kedavra really that unstoppable if Potter himself keeps countering it with Expelliarmus? all that spell is supposed to is disarm someone of their wand, so can't you just counter it with a magical blast rather than a shield? also they keep using avada kedavra at REALLY close ranges, when a gun can kill someone from farther away than that, thats the entire point of having a ranged weapon, so lacking evidence that avada kedavra is actually good at range, its safe to assume that guns win anyways because you can shoot from farther.

Potter surviving the killing curse is due to his mother, Voldemort and Dumbledore invoking (Unintentionally, in the case of the first two) ancient, poorly understood magic that dwarfs anything a regular Potter wizard can do. Harry can only outright block the killing curse thanks to shenanigans involving the wands he and Voldemort were using at the times it happened: it's something that nobody else in the world could have done (except for that one time, when one other person briefly could have)

[Dragonus45]

How would Constantine know how to nail Dresden with iron?

Would it be his precog, or intelligence, or his vast knowledge, or he just can intuit the type of magic and Fairie magic works the same way in DC?

The power of iron to screw with the fae is consistent across both settings, and even in the series where he isn’t suffering from huge DC power creep Constantine’s real strength is knowledge and quick the moment thinking. Identifying Dresden in up to his ears in fairy magic and doing something basic like use iron to counter it is a given. The hard part might be getting it past Harry’s extensive protections.

[Reddish Mage]

Well, technically Dresden was once a ghost, so that version of Dresden and can posses Potter and make him strangle himself, so that version of Dresden is already immune to avada kedavra. can't kill whats already dead.

also I exclusively use the book versions of Potter. so movies don't count. have to say the incantation.

also in Dresdenverse, Harry's a Warden so he is likely to be sent to track down a new wizard in his world and kill them early before they start misusing their power, so the most likely scenario where they meet is Dresden killing Potter when he is eleven at the Dursleys.

Ghosts are not immune to magic, and anyway that is a middle book and Dresden is way past it.

The movie doesn't contradict the book. Harry Potter studied silent magic from Snape in book six. While the killing curse can't be cast silently, virtually any other spell, including the stunning spell counts.

Dresden hunting down Harry when he's 11 without magic because you decided that's the scenario and HP just pops into Dresdens world at that age :smallconfused:


The power of iron to screw with the fae is consistent across both settings, and even in the series where he isn’t suffering from huge DC power creep Constantine’s real strength is knowledge and quick the moment thinking. Identifying Dresden in up to his ears in fairy magic and doing something basic like use iron to counter it is a given. The hard part might be getting it past Harry’s extensive protections.

The problem here is that real world (purported) fae magic, Dresden's fae magic, and DC fae magic are three very different things. I totally get that its tempting to have Dresden's magic be familiar to Constantine because he's so knowledgable about everything (of course Dresden is also supposed to be pretty knowledgable...), but the two come from different universes.

Its entirely plausible Constantine should find Dresden's magic unusual and vice-versa. I'm not sure the reverse is as plausible.

[Keltest]

I feel like people are overstating Potter's reflexes here. He's a decent combatant, but he isn't going to dodge a bullet, and even if he is theoretically aware of what guns are and what they can do, he doesn't have an actual practical experience in a gunfight, whereas Dresden has lots of experience fighting other wizards shooting bad spells at him.

I would also suggest that Dresden's defenses are more powerful than Potter's. When he creates a shield, he creates a literal multi-spectrum barrier. For all intents and purposes, he's holding a wall in front of him. I don't know that it would block the killing curse, but it would almost certainly deflect anything short of that.

[Man on Fire]

Harry Dresden Vs. John Constantine? :smallfrown:

*looks up Constantine* I'm comparing the two....and while Harry is the one thats more optimized for a straight up fight, with his blasting magic, better physical fitness, the Winter Knight mantle, and so on, Constantine seems to have a bunch of hax tricks and this luck ability and such that I'm not sure
what the true implications of are, but its DC so I'm sure its hax because he lives in the same universe as freaking Superman and Dream of the Endless. so I'm sure that they'd give the win to Constantine, its the only one I'm vaguely interested in seeing, if only to get more people hearing about Harry Dresden, even if he loses.

but then again DB is all about those straight up fights, and Constantine seems to be more of a con-artist planning type who tries to avoid fights as much as possible so Harry might win if only because Constantine would be trying to play the wrong game or at least playing with the wrong tools

Dresden has done some extremely potent things and may tend towards viewing things that are extraordinarily destructive...but Constantine may just be another example that the DC is full of characters that are just nuts on the power scale...because he fought some of them and won.

One of the things to remember about John is that he will have much fewer feats that are impressive due to scaling with the rest of DC Universe since he for most of his career kept to his corner in Vertigo. And I believe that Harry may have an advantage due to the fact John preffers trickery and hax over outright combat prowess, the question is merely if he can power through whatever John manages to cook for him.


Ayyyy Vinland Saga representation! Although I'm pretty sure Thorkell is an unfair match for anyone resembling a historical-level Viking, like. The dude slices through soldiers like a knife through hot, gory butter.

That works thematically pretty well, but as a battle would be kind of one-sided for Hit-Girl. Like, that battle should go "Hit-Girl pulls out an assault rifle, pulls trigger, blood splatter, The End".

Heh, maybe Arya vs Thorfinn was a better idea, but I did not think of it before now :smallredface:
Would probably need a better opponnent for Thorkell as well, any suggestions?


I was playing through Symphony of the Night recently and, unbidden, the thought I had was Alucard vs. Morbius. Since apparently the Morbius' movie is next year and the whole SEO synergy thing. Though now Blade's going to be a thing again too, so, either way.



I KNEW IT! I freaking knew it, stupid DC and their ridiculous cosmology. what the heck even is this cosmology (https://static.comicvine.com/uploads/scale_super/11130/111302904/5475262-multiversity_map_2400_53ee6b4c22d9a9.11031355.jpg) , theres like 50 worlds here and there, eight planes above that, something about this rainbow being a membrane and then The Source and Destiny of the Endless, and then I read how people actually try to explain this and its all 5th dimensional this and that, endless dimensions, megaverses,dark megaverses, infinite multiverses in an omniverse, something about hypertime, limbo, monitor sphere, and so on.

its kind of a problem when your cosmology seems to resemble a vast excuse to come up with as many different synonyms for parallel universes as possible on the low level and an excuse to break the fourth wall and be meta on the higher level. how many godlike beings do you really need? its like some elaborate set up so someone can make anything they can imagine happen as long as they mutter the right cosmobabble.

and its not even consistent, so much of it is illogical and subject to change and expansion. the DC Universe is a nonsense fractal.

Normal people reacting to DC Cosmology always bring me joy.


I exaggerating a little for effect, let me have my passions.

but I disagree on anything being more ridiculous than the DC cosmology after trying to look up things trying to explain the DC cosmology. I have not read a single setting or cosmology more nonsensical or more needlessly complex in my entire life.

I'm not. the reddit topic I found discussing it said exactly that. when I say its a nonsense fractal, I do not use exaggeration. cause see, no matter how high or small you go, it doesn't make sense, and since it changes its nonsense over time, that nonsense fractal extends into the fourth dimension of time. since the medium is flat however, I'm not sure if the fractal extends to the 3rd dimension of depth though.

therefore, the best summation of DC universe metaphysics is that its Calvinball. there is a whole bunch of complex nonsense that seems important, but in practice its Calvinball. thats why its so powerful, it literally has built itself into something that doesn't care about being consistent in the least, and made an entire cosmology to do nothing but be a constantly changing cosmobabble as to why. it makes other cosmologies look well-designed by comparison.

Its basically the embodiment of everything that wins these things: Longevity and Flexibility. no wonder people call for consistency so much with this kind of nonsense coming from no consistency at all.

I think in that regard DC is a lot like real-life mythologies in that it has grew from absorbing together pieces of previously unrelated tales and then try to fit them together all while growing and adding new tales to the mix at the same time.

[Reddish Mage]

One of the things to remember about John is that he will have much fewer feats that are impressive due to scaling with the rest of DC Universe since he for most of his career kept to his corner in Vertigo. And I believe that Harry may have an advantage due to the fact John preffers trickery and hax over outright combat prowess, the question is merely if he can power through whatever John manages to cook for him

The problem is that Constantine hasn't spent the entirety of his existence in a little corner of Vertigo (I question if they really stuck to keeping his limits even within Hellblazer). Constantine has participated in the big events and recently in Justice League Dark, where he is one of the most powerful members (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Justice_League_Dark#Members) (again alongside Zatanna).

Look at the members of JLD. Any one of them could straight up overpower Dresden...yet Constantine is definitely one of the leaders of that group, and not a Batman sort of leader, a leader as in he could out power and out contribute almost all of them.


I think in that regard DC is a lot like real-life mythologies in that it has grew from absorbing together pieces of previously unrelated tales and then try to fit them together all while growing and adding new tales to the mix at the same time.

Its more like DC arose as a set of completely novel tales of the entirely new and modern genre of the superhero...then when they looked for inspiration for new tales they spent a weekend going through mythology, took what they wanted, mostly big names and the most recognizable objects and tropes, and left the rest behind.

I exaggerate, but only slightly.

[Forum Explorer]

Harry Dresden has some pretty awesome feats as well. Stuff like

1. Pulverizing hundreds of vampires with a single spell.

2. Dropping a car on someone.

3. Burning multiple buildings to the ground.

4. Launching an invincible werewolf through multiple buildings and then blinding, deafening, and hobbling it with a drop of it's blood.

5. Commanding an army of ghosts to attack the lair of a necromancer.

6. For physio therapy, Mab tried to assassinate him once a day until he was better. Everything from pillow over the face, to piranhas in the shower. And one ticking crocodile. Cumulating in her opening fire at a short range with an automatic shotgun while a Malk (a giant fae cat) attacked him from the side. From surprise. So yeah, reaction time wise, he outclasses Harry Potter hard.

And that's before you get into how much he's limited by the Laws of Magic. Remove the whole Thou Shall Not Kill thing, and he can do stuff like flash freeze you with a word, crush you with his telekentic rings, invade your mind and order you to kill yourself, or summon an army of super zombies (they can tear a car apart in seconds).

So yeah, Harry Dresden would utterly destroy Harry Potter. John Constantine is a maybe, but likely not, because DC is should be spelled BS.

[deuterio12]

From surprise. So yeah, reaction time wise, he outclasses Harry Potter hard.

Dunno about that, does Dresden regularly does 3D-flying at 150 mph for hours while there's even faster flying homing rocks trying to crush you and you need to spot and catch a tiny ball flying at about the same speed?

Because Harry Potter does that kind of stuff for sport.



And that's before you get into how much he's limited by the Laws of Magic. Remove the whole Thou Shall Not Kill thing, and he can do stuff like flash freeze you with a word, crush you with his telekentic rings,

Insta-kill spells are a thing Harry Potter had to deal with since he was literally a baby.



invade your mind and order you to kill yourself,

Harry knows about magic mind control too, he's used it himself.



or summon an army of super zombies (they can tear a car apart in seconds).


Like D&D wizards, Harry Potter can just fly out of reach and laugh at any opponents that are limited to 2D movement. Dresden would have better odds of success throwing cotton candy than summoning anything that can only crawl in the dirt. :smallamused:

[Lord Raziere]

Dunno about that, does Dresden regularly does 3D-flying at 150 mph for hours while there's even faster flying homing rocks trying to crush you and you need to spot and catch a tiny ball flying at about the same speed?

Because Harry Potter does that kind of stuff for sport.


Insta-kill spells are a thing Harry Potter had to deal with since he was literally a baby.


Harry knows about magic mind control too, he's used it himself.



Like D&D wizards, Harry Potter can just fly out of reach and laugh at any opponents that are limited to 2D movement. Dresden would have better odds of success throwing cotton candy than summoning anything that can only crawl in the dirt. :smallamused:

Does Harry Potter regularly fight vampires and fae who can outspeed any human to the point where they blur through the air as they move? because Dresden does that to SURVIVE. and thats not counting the fact that Harry Dresden has fought Naagloshi, an evil creature explicitly said to be so powerful that only Faerie Queens and gods are more powerful, and their physical speed, strength and durability is through the roof.

No its something plot magic that only works and never again has had to deal with once while a baby cries.

and failed. his Occlumency was never that good.

Dresden also has power over the wind and gravity. he could simply make Potter fall to the ground hard. splat.

[Rynjin]

Insta-kill spells are a thing Harry Potter had to deal with since he was literally a baby.

He is partially resistant to the insta-kill spells of one (1) specific wizard in the entirety of his setting.



Harry knows about magic mind control too, he's used it himself.

He's used it, but he explicitly sucks diseased moose wang (to borrow Harry Dresden's own phrasing) at fighting against it, so that's kind of a wash. There's two entire books with subplots of him trying to learn resistance to mind reading/control and he ends that subplot just as terrible at it as when he started.


Like D&D wizards, Harry Potter can just fly out of reach and laugh at any opponents that are limited to 2D movement. Dresden would have better odds of success throwing cotton candy than summoning anything that can only crawl in the dirt. :smallamused:

Potter cannot fly; Potter's broom can fly. This is an important distinction when facing an opponent who can combust matter or similarly do things to bork that means to flight.

I like both book series' but Dresden's series is more hardcore when it comes to combat.

It's also weird that nobody that I've seen has mentioned Potter's biggest flaw yet: he needs a wand to do magic. An object he is easily disarmed of. Dresden meanwhile needs no such accoutrements. His staff, blasting rod, and other magic items HELP, certainly, but are not a requirement.

And all other things being equal, Harry Potter is a an athletic 18 year old that stands somewhere in the 5' 8-10" range with no particular fighting skill, while Harry Dresden is a 6' 9" behemoth of a man who is proficient at several forms of martial arts. Even discounting the Winter Mantle, a legitimate way this fight could go is Dresden disarms Potter of his wand and then proceeds to beat the everloving **** out of the poor boy with his mammoth meat hooks.

[Anteros]

Harry Dresden has some pretty awesome feats as well. Stuff like

1. Pulverizing hundreds of vampires with a single spell.

2. Dropping a car on someone.

3. Burning multiple buildings to the ground.

4. Launching an invincible werewolf through multiple buildings and then blinding, deafening, and hobbling it with a drop of it's blood.

5. Commanding an army of ghosts to attack the lair of a necromancer.

6. For physio therapy, Mab tried to assassinate him once a day until he was better. Everything from pillow over the face, to piranhas in the shower. And one ticking crocodile. Cumulating in her opening fire at a short range with an automatic shotgun while a Malk (a giant fae cat) attacked him from the side. From surprise. So yeah, reaction time wise, he outclasses Harry Potter hard.

And that's before you get into how much he's limited by the Laws of Magic. Remove the whole Thou Shall Not Kill thing, and he can do stuff like flash freeze you with a word, crush you with his telekentic rings, invade your mind and order you to kill yourself, or summon an army of super zombies (they can tear a car apart in seconds).

So yeah, Harry Dresden would utterly destroy Harry Potter. John Constantine is a maybe, but likely not, because DC is should be spelled BS.

Constantine isn't a maybe in any sense of the word. Dresden's feats involve tossing cars. Constantine has overpowered Superman and the Phantom Stranger. It's not even a contest. Maybe if they ever finish up Dresden's books so he can continue his power creep he'd have a small chance.

[Forum Explorer]

Dunno about that, does Dresden regularly does 3D-flying at 150 mph for hours while there's even faster flying homing rocks trying to crush you and you need to spot and catch a tiny ball flying at about the same speed?

Because Harry Potter does that kind of stuff for sport.


Insta-kill spells are a thing Harry Potter had to deal with since he was literally a baby.


Harry knows about magic mind control too, he's used it himself.



Like D&D wizards, Harry Potter can just fly out of reach and laugh at any opponents that are limited to 2D movement. Dresden would have better odds of success throwing cotton candy than summoning anything that can only crawl in the dirt. :smallamused:

Guess what? Bullets are still faster. By a lot. So much so that Harry's reaction time is pathetic in comparison. That's the reason the whole 'Muggle with a gun' thing happened. Because, regardless of what Rowling has or hasn't said, it's true. Bullets move so fast that by the time you could flick your wrist, you've already been shot. The human body cannot keep up with bullets. And Harry Potter has never done anything that suggests he is an exception to that.

Against one singular opponent who had the exact weirdness to allow Harry to live. If anyone else had cast the Killing Curse at him, he would've died. Had Voldemort used any other lethal spell, he would've died. Or a knife. Or his snake. The point is, the ability to survive what is actually a really mediocre instant kill spell, from a highly specific individual, in highly specific circumstances, hardly points to his ability to survive being frozen inside out.

He also sucks at it. Really really badly. It's a canonical weakness of his, and Dresden has actually been extensively trained in it, both on the offense and defense. To the point where he could literally eject Harry's soul from his body and wear his flesh like a suit.

Nah, Dresden could just focus all the gravity from a couple hundred meters to Harry's skull and watch him go splat. Or you know, just shoot him. He has a gun, and is a pretty good shot. And if he really needs to, it would be pretty trival for him to steal a sniper rifle or the like.


Constantine isn't a maybe in any sense of the word. Dresden's feats involve tossing cars. Constantine has overpowered Superman and the Phantom Stranger. It's not even a contest. Maybe if they ever finish up Dresden's books so he can continue his power creep he'd have a small chance.

It's a maybe in the sense that I'm only familiar with Constantine through that one movie of his. :smalltongue:

[Rynjin]

I've read all the 80s and 90s Hellblazer comics myself, and the Constantine of that era would probably lose a fist fight to the aforementioned Harry Potter, much less a magical duel. He must have gotten some serious power creep in the 00s.