Grrl Power V: Probably Not an Octopus

[lord_khaine]

So...

A) Max's Mess Dress looks like recolored M.Bison, and its awesome!
B) Perhaps a bit of Hubris from Max there. She were beaten in a 1-1 fight by Vehemence. And dont know what supers Europe, China or Afrika has.
C) Hilarious ending. It had me flat laughting.

[Kantaki]

I like Maxima's oufit.
It basically screams "surrender and be annihilated".
Especially combined with the imperious floating in the first panel.

[Rogar Demonblud]

Anvil with puppy eyes. I think I need to sit down for a moment.

[Rogar Demonblud]

Okay, now that I'm done laughing...

I don't like the outfit. It looks like something Sydney would design.

Oh, and Lord Khaine? Maxima has a pretty good idea where she stacks up. Her previous assignment looks to have been hunting down non-US supers under the guise of anti-terrorism. She makes the boast at the first press conference that there isn't someone who can challenge her (still) alive. Vehemence needed to arrange a superbrawl with dozens of participants before he could hang with her, btw. If Max had gone all out at the start, Kevin would be dead. Heck, if she'd gone for his head instead of his arm...

[lord_khaine]

Oh, and Lord Khaine? Maxima has a pretty good idea where she stacks up. Her previous assignment looks to have been hunting down non-US supers under the guise of anti-terrorism. She makes the boast at the first press conference that there isn't someone who can challenge her (still) alive. Vehemence needed to arrange a superbrawl with dozens of participants before he could hang with her, btw. If Max had gone all out at the start, Kevin would be dead. Heck, if she'd gone for his head instead of his arm...

And im explaining why Max's estimate isnt reliable.
Yes Max has been hunting Supers in the the most chaotic bits of the middle east. That gives her 0 information on Europe, China, India, well basically any other major or minor power.
And so thats why the boast was nothing more than that, a boast. Because its not something she can actually know.

As for vehemence, yeah he needed time to power up, since his ability is to scale almost unlimited.
In return that made him so strong he was able to beat both Max and her entire team. The only reason he didnt win was that he didnt bother trying to kill anyone else.
Where as for said arm shot, Max again only got that in because Sydney blinded her opponent.

[HandofShadows]

While Max hasn't met every other super in the world, she had met a large number and is more powerful than all of them, usually by magnitudes. Very powerful supers like her are rare. And if there was another one on her level it seems likely that the various intelligence services of the world would have discovered them unless they tried very hard to hide. Max has a good reason to think she's the most powerful. Even in the fight against V the only reason Max didn't kill him outright at the start was because she was holding back and that enabled V to get close. If Max had gone full power V would have been dead.

[lord_khaine]

The USA has a population of about 300 million people. Thats roughly 3% of the worlds population.
Max only has knowledge of a fraktion of those 3%, as seen by how Vehemence managed to slip completely under her radar.
What makes you think she has meet anything but a tiny fraktion of the worlds supers?

And even within Archon the exact capabilities of Max is classified. That likely does apply to the rest of their members as well.
So how do you want Archon to know how another nations supers would measure up.
Are you seriously expecting they would openly share that sort of information?
Or that the intelligence services of those countries are so incompetent, that Archon can just steal whats likely guarded better than nuklear launch codes

Lastly in the Vehemence fight. Would he have been dead?
It seemed quite as obvious Vehemence was toying with his opponents.
By the time he revealed himself he was already tougher and stronger than Stalvart, who himself are stronger than Max's baseline (before her power pool).
Strong enough to hurt Max when she is dumping the majority of her points into armor (Max's power level defined comic #258).
So no i dont think she was strong enough to kill him alone at that point.
Yes she could have killed him before he revealed himself. But dooh, thats only a step above using kryptonite bullets on Superman.

[Max_Killjoy]

330 million out of 7.8 billion is ~4.2%


Max was able to blow V's arm clean off well into the fight, after he'd soaked up a LOT of power. If she'd aimed for his head instead, he'd have been dead. It was only Max's restraint, which probably would have been skipped if she'd known how dangerous V was, that saved V's life at that moment.

[Forum Explorer]

330 million out of 7.8 billion is ~4.2%


Max was able to blow V's arm clean off well into the fight, after he'd soaked up a LOT of power. If she'd aimed for his head instead, he'd have been dead. It was only Max's restraint, which probably would have been skipped if she'd known how dangerous V was, that saved V's life at that moment.

To be fair, we (and V for that matter) don't know if he would've been able to regenerate from that either. But I'm actually not sure what the argument here is. Maxima is a lot stronger than base form V, but V eventually outscales her because his power lets him scale almost infinitely. And in that fight, he does outscale her and would've killed Maxima if it weren't for the intervention of Sydney and the others.

[Rogar Demonblud]

The argument is that if Max hadn't underplayed her abilities, Vehemence wouldn't have had a chance to finish powering up. If he'd lost his head instead of his arm, he wouldn't have been able to cast Regeneration, for instance.

[lord_khaine]

330 million out of 7.8 billion is ~4.2%

Yes what bit of roughly did you miss?

The argument is that if Max hadn't underplayed her abilities, Vehemence wouldn't have had a chance to finish powering up. If he'd lost his head instead of his arm, he wouldn't have been able to cast Regeneration, for instance.

I guess i forgot to comment directly on this?
Because that fight did show that Max indeed still had the power to hurt Vehemence.
It also just shows that Max lacked the ability to get such a hit in on her own. She directly says she is trying to find an opening.
But she had not found one before Sydney distract Vehemence.

I think all will agree on that Maximas "Hand of Ash" move work by dumping her entire pool, and perhaps a little more, into short range energy projection.
And so that makes her vulnerable. When she tried without a distraction Vehemence snatched her from the air.

Because what should also be pointed out, is that yes Max didnt go fully out from the start.
But at the same time neither did Vehemence. His initial plan was just to beat everyone up, then walk off into the sunset.
He only changed his tactics because as he said, Maxima was -to- violent.

[Kantaki]

I think Kevin falls into a similar category as Lung or the Hulk*- easy to take down in their base form, but near impossible once they get ramped up.

Also, strongest there is Maxima may be, but a hypothetical enemy doesn't need to be more powerful to counter her.
With the right power interaction- or in Vehemence's case set up -even a on paper "weaker" super can take down or at least disable the Goddess of Ash.



*Well, maybe not him. Might transform fast enough that sniping Banner just gets you a rage monster.

[Max_Killjoy]

To be fair, we (and V for that matter) don't know if he would've been able to regenerate from that either. But I'm actually not sure what the argument here is. Maxima is a lot stronger than base form V, but V eventually outscales her because his power lets him scale almost infinitely. And in that fight, he does outscale her and would've killed Maxima if it weren't for the intervention of Sydney and the others.

To me the scene strongly indicated that V had to consciously induce the regeneration.

Hard to do that if your brain has been reduced to subatomic particles.

[Forum Explorer]

To me the scene strongly indicated that V had to consciously induce the regeneration.

Hard to do that if your brain has been reduced to subatomic particles.

Quite possibly. But maybe Kevin could regenerate it anyways. But he certainly doesn't want to put it to the test does he?

[Ibrinar]

The argument is that if Max hadn't underplayed her abilities, Vehemence wouldn't have had a chance to finish powering up. If he'd lost his head instead of his arm, he wouldn't have been able to cast Regeneration, for instance.

Yeah but if Vehemence hadn't played around by making a super brawl, but instead caused mass violence in some other country before porting in as charged up as he can get with full intention of killing maxima (with the other supers maybe as distraction) he might well have been to strong for that from the start. Neither started with the intention of ruthlessly and efficiently going for the kill.

[lord_khaine]

To me the scene strongly indicated that V had to consciously induce the regeneration.

Hard to do that if your brain has been reduced to subatomic particles.

Very likely that would at least have been a KO, and more likely an outright fatality.

Problem is of course, that Vehemence is to fast and to strong for that.
Max tried to do so, got snatched out of the air, and assumedly forced to instantly dump points into armor before her ribs gave in.

Yeah but if Vehemence hadn't played around by making a super brawl, but instead caused mass violence in some other country before porting in as charged up as he can get with full intention of killing maxima (with the other supers maybe as distraction) he might well have been to strong for that from the start. Neither started with the intention of ruthlessly and efficiently going for the kill.

He doesnt even need to cause it directly. Sadly the middle east is a hellhole of civil war.
Heck he doesnt even need to leave the country. By all accounts USA is an extremely violent place, with regular mass violence and riots.
Anyway, yeah the part about not initially going for a kill does swing both ways.

[Max_Killjoy]

Very likely that would at least have been a KO, and more likely an outright fatality.

Problem is of course, that Vehemence is to fast and to strong for that.
Max tried to do so, got snatched out of the air, and assumedly forced to instantly dump points into armor before her ribs gave in.

Evidently V was not fast or strong enough to prevent it.

https://grrlpowercomic.com/archives/...-super-powers/

If -- at that moment, not after -- Maxima had blown his head off instead of his arm... fight over.

[Traab]

Very likely that would at least have been a KO, and more likely an outright fatality.

Problem is of course, that Vehemence is to fast and to strong for that.
Max tried to do so, got snatched out of the air, and assumedly forced to instantly dump points into armor before her ribs gave in.



He doesnt even need to cause it directly. Sadly the middle east is a hellhole of civil war.
Heck he doesnt even need to leave the country. By all accounts USA is an extremely violent place, with regular mass violence and riots.
Anyway, yeah the part about not initially going for a kill does swing both ways.

Yeah no, maybe once every few decades we see the level of violence you are talking about in america, angry protests arent going to ramp vehemence up to maxima killing levels. Maybe something like the rodney king riots would be enough? I dunno. We tend to have very few open battles in the streets. Any other bits of violence tend to be rather short lived affairs that would be kinda hard to take advantage of, or get enough from to power up. Remember he needed a 30 man royal rumble filled with people capable of altering the landscape with their powers or leveling buildings as collateral just to get him to the point where he could more or less let himself be a punching bag to finish powering up enough to fight max. Nothing short of military action could even come close to that. As for being too fast, meh, its hard to judge as he lost the arm due to surprise giving max the opening, while max lost the head shot due to surprise from him regenerating. Same reason max didnt dodge the fear vomit at the bank from sydney.

[Keltest]

Yeah no, maybe once every few decades we see the level of violence you are talking about in america, angry protests arent going to ramp vehemence up to maxima killing levels. Maybe something like the rodney king riots would be enough? I dunno. We tend to have very few open battles in the streets. Any other bits of violence tend to be rather short lived affairs that would be kinda hard to take advantage of, or get enough from to power up. Remember he needed a 30 man royal rumble filled with people capable of altering the landscape with their powers or leveling buildings as collateral just to get him to the point where he could more or less let himself be a punching bag to finish powering up enough to fight max. Nothing short of military action could even come close to that. As for being too fast, meh, its hard to judge as he lost the arm due to surprise giving max the opening, while max lost the head shot due to surprise from him regenerating. Same reason max didnt dodge the fear vomit at the bank from sydney.

Given his aura of pointless violence, pretty much any remotely heated event is going to become a riot when V shows up to them.

[Traab]

Given his aura of pointless violence, pretty much any remotely heated event is going to become a riot when V shows up to them.

Maybe, but even then it costs him power to use it, so he needs to be creating a high enough level of violence to justify the cost of the aura. Again, 30 terrain altering supers crotch kicking each other is a lot more violence than what a group of normies can really do. I imagine the further he spreads his aura the more it costs him power wise. This was pretty much the best plan for getting as big a charge as he could from what we know of how his power works. Yeah he can trigger soccer riots and such, but he flat out states he has never gotten this powered up before so clearly regular human violence isnt useful for a sneak attack sniper kill on maxima.

Also, even if he jumped into the middle of an active warzone, how far away is his violence energy absorbing ability still functioning? The fight took place in a mid sized parking lot for the most part, so its possible that even if the total violence of say, an armored division tearing through a battlefield would match the super brawl, he wouldnt get as much out of it because anything more than a block away from him might as well not exist as far as his powerup goes.

[Forum Explorer]

Maybe, but even then it costs him power to use it, so he needs to be creating a high enough level of violence to justify the cost of the aura. Again, 30 terrain altering supers crotch kicking each other is a lot more violence than what a group of normies can really do. I imagine the further he spreads his aura the more it costs him power wise. This was pretty much the best plan for getting as big a charge as he could from what we know of how his power works. Yeah he can trigger soccer riots and such, but he flat out states he has never gotten this powered up before so clearly regular human violence isnt useful for a sneak attack sniper kill on maxima.

Also, even if he jumped into the middle of an active warzone, how far away is his violence energy absorbing ability still functioning? The fight took place in a mid sized parking lot for the most part, so its possible that even if the total violence of say, an armored division tearing through a battlefield would match the super brawl, he wouldnt get as much out of it because anything more than a block away from him might as well not exist as far as his powerup goes.

It's worth noting that V was both amplifying violence and holding people back. He didn't want anyone to die after all. Not until Maxima raised the stakes to that level anyways. So he could potentially get a lot more power over a greater distance if he didn't hold people back. Or maybe not. Who knows? Even if V is planned to come back into the story eventually, it's going to be a very very long time til we see him.

[Traab]

You know, its a tangent, and one im sure we have talked about before, but he really would have made a decent addition to the good guy cast. I mean, we recruited freaking jabberwocky to the cast, but vehemence while loving a good fight (math says hi) doesnt actually seek to kill anyone, and as you said, was making sure the body count stayed at zero right till max went for the kill herself. Even his "Everyone fight everyone else" aura attack didnt happen until he realized he had to finish maxima off if he wanted to live a long healthy life. So clearly the dude has some ethics, pretty good ones considering his entire power set revolves around violence and yet he seems an overall decent dude. His evilest act is his "Sure, lets go get into a fight!" aura. Which seemed to be more of a subliminal message than outright mind control in severity. And also likely backfired by triggering maxima and her goddess of ash routine on his arm.

[Dragonus45]

You know, its a tangent, and one im sure we have talked about before, but he really would have made a decent addition to the good guy cast. I mean, we recruited freaking jabberwocky to the cast, but vehemence while loving a good fight (math says hi) doesnt actually seek to kill anyone, and as you said, was making sure the body count stayed at zero right till max went for the kill herself. Even his "Everyone fight everyone else" aura attack didnt happen until he realized he had to finish maxima off if he wanted to live a long healthy life. So clearly the dude has some ethics, pretty good ones considering his entire power set revolves around violence and yet he seems an overall decent dude. His evilest act is his "Sure, lets go get into a fight!" aura. Which seemed to be more of a subliminal message than outright mind control in severity. And also likely backfired by triggering maxima and her goddess of ash routine on his arm.

Yea I think we will eventually see some fight where he gets let off the leash and sent in against some big angry invading army of space aliens or something, and then gets jobbed.

[DataNinja]

You know, its a tangent, and one im sure we have talked about before, but he really would have made a decent addition to the good guy cast. I mean, we recruited freaking jabberwocky to the cast, but vehemence while loving a good fight (math says hi) doesnt actually seek to kill anyone, and as you said, was making sure the body count stayed at zero right till max went for the kill herself. Even his "Everyone fight everyone else" aura attack didnt happen until he realized he had to finish maxima off if he wanted to live a long healthy life. So clearly the dude has some ethics, pretty good ones considering his entire power set revolves around violence and yet he seems an overall decent dude. His evilest act is his "Sure, lets go get into a fight!" aura. Which seemed to be more of a subliminal message than outright mind control in severity. And also likely backfired by triggering maxima and her goddess of ash routine on his arm.

I frankly don't think he'd be that reliable. He seems to be in it just to enjoy himself. While he might have personal ethics, he also probably wouldn't care to go all "stop the bad guy".

[Rogar Demonblud]

Eh, the old standby of "this is where I keep my stuff" would give Dave sufficient justification to use him. It's not like consistent characterization is a feature in this comic.

[Dragonus45]

I mean, it seems like his personal motivations, and entire shtick would fit nicely with, "Hey we have a massive superbrawl with a race of alien zombie murder bots about to happen. You in?" Sure there comes the issue of what to do with him after. But we really don't know a whole lot about his as a character so there would be space to fill in motivations for him not to betray Archon immediately after the fact.

[lord_khaine]

Evidently V was not fast or strong enough to prevent it.

https://grrlpowercomic.com/archives/...-super-powers/

If -- at that moment, not after -- Maxima had blown his head off instead of his arm... fight over.

.. yeah.. so well.. how telling do -you- think a 2 versus 1 fight is?

Because i had already covered this point. AT least once.
And pointed out that Maxima could NOT find that opening she needed. She was looking for it, when Sydney provided a distraction.
We saw it before distraction -> Max unable to get the maining blow in.
We saw it after the distraction -> Max getting caught trying to get the killing blow in.

And we directly have Max going "Bless you Sydney" before blowing the arm off.
How much more obvious does it need to be made that Maxima needed that distraction?

Eh, the old standby of "this is where I keep my stuff" would give Dave sufficient justification to use him. It's not like consistent characterization is a feature in this comic.

Except there isnt anything inconsistent about such a justification.
Vehemence has shown himself quite reasonable. He would absolutely have motivation to try and stop something that would ruin earth.
Heck, it goes straight along all the characterization already shown. All Achon had to do would be to tell him "hey.. Maxima cant handle this fight.. want a chance to show you can?"

You in?" Sure there comes the issue of what to do with him after. But we really don't know a whole lot about his as a character so there would be space to fill in motivations for him not to betray Archon immediately after the fact.

Pardon him? there is precedence for that im pretty sure.
And else there is always the presidential thing. He might need to be monitored discretely though.
But since Max is still a danger to him, then he can likely be convinced to play nice and retire as a "hero" to some random 5 star hotel.
(something that would funny enough, likely be cheaper than his current accomendation)

[Max_Killjoy]

Never mind, it's not worth going in circles when someone has already made their mind up.

[Traab]

I frankly don't think he'd be that reliable. He seems to be in it just to enjoy himself. While he might have personal ethics, he also probably wouldn't care to go all "stop the bad guy".

Thats basically Math in a nutshell. He is in it because he is bored fighting in martial arts tournaments and was promised some good fights in arcswat. He has no real interest in being a hero and saving the day, (unless it gets him ladies) He just wants a challenge. Now unlike vehemence he isnt exactly likely to turn on them at the drop of a hat but I dont think he would be either so long as he gets to engage in a little of the old ultraviolence from time to time.

[lord_khaine]

Never mind, it's not worth going in circles when someone has already made their mind up.

Nothing is going in circles, you have just so far completely failed to present an argument for, why a 2 versus 1 fight should be used as evidence of Max's superiosity

Thats basically Math in a nutshell. He is in it because he is bored fighting in martial arts tournaments and was promised some good fights in arcswat. He has no real interest in being a hero and saving the day, (unless it gets him ladies) He just wants a challenge. Now unlike vehemence he isnt exactly likely to turn on them at the drop of a hat but I dont think he would be either so long as he gets to engage in a little of the old ultraviolence from time to time.

Yeah. it would be extremely hard to find anything that would motivate Vehemence enough to turn on Archon. Especially if he is given a pardon.
I mean. He is an adult man. He has a clear mastery of his powers. And a broad contact of supers. He could likely have taken over a country if he wanted to.

But instead Archon didnt even know who he were. Give him a lifetime membership to all hockey stadiums. And a million/month in pocket money.
And im ready to bet he isnt going to be the sort of trouble that causes headlines.