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  1. - Top - End - #31
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    Default Re: Consistently Underestimated super-characters

    Quote Originally Posted by Rodin View Post
    Mineta from My Hero Academia.

    He's very much a joke character - short, cowardly, and the class pervert. He's basically just there to be the butt of jokes, usually the girls beating him up for perving on them. Even his Quirk is a joke, being just about the weakest perk in the main class. When he demonstrates his quirk (pulling purple balls off his head that are super adhesive) Asui asks in shock why he's trying to be a Hero with the Quirk and personality that he has.

    ...Except he also has a better track record than many of the students in his class. His Quirk was instrumental to Midoriya's group beating the villains in the first season, he lands a hit on Midoriya's team with one of his purple balls during the cavalry battle, and during the end of year exams he was the only student to beat a teacher in 1v1 combat. His Quirk is weak individually but it's a great combo weapon and he's quite inventive with how he uses it.

    Little dude doesn't get enough credit when he's keeping up with supers who are both in better shape physically and have better superpowers than he does.
    It's an incredibly strong quirk. He's a hero, heroes need to capture villains. His quirk is the best enemy restraining quirk shown in the series, as if you include filler, not even all Might can break out of it.
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  2. - Top - End - #32
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    Default Re: Consistently Underestimated super-characters

    Quote Originally Posted by Psyren View Post
    Definitely Ant-Man. Used to its potential, Pym's technology can easily reach S-Tier power levels, as we saw in DELETED. But the man himself is routinely treated as comic relief even by the other characters in his universe.
    Of course, he is always fated to shoot himself in the foot in some fashion, so I would pose an alternative...Ray Palmer. All of the shrink and the terrible options it offers, none of the crazy.

    I'd also put forward The Flash. For the average person who knew him from Superfriends or Justice League or even casual readers of DC Comics not featuring Flash, it was a cool power set but still distant from the fan favorites or those viewed as "powerful". Many readers here, particularly after Flashpoint, understand better...but I bet if a "rank the Justice League" survey went out to a large group of the general public that knew the characters in any capacity I suspect he'd end up below Superman, Batman, Green Lantern and probably Wonder Woman. Not to devolve into a "Vs" thread, but I think he beats all four at once.

    On the Marvel side I always thought the Purple Man was always under appreciated...I guess mostly because I only ever seemed to see him set against street-level heroes.

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    Last edited by Mordar; 2021-08-31 at 09:10 PM.
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  3. - Top - End - #33
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    I do like what I read one time (secondhand quote)- that Hank Pym is a mad scientist trying to be a superhero. It really kinda fits- if you look at his life's story, there are some serious Dr. Frankenstein overtones to it, what with the self-experimentation and Ultron and all that mess.

    And the Purple Man tends to be set up against street-level types because, like Mesmero, he's got an incredibly binary power- he either wins immediately or goes squish immediately against higher-tier opponents, although he had an interesting... battle..? against Nate Grey back in his X-Man days- grabbed control, somewhat to Nate's shock, since his power was pheromone based rather than psionic, so all of Nate's rather formidable defenses did nothing. Then he bragged about it being pheromone based, Nate used his TK to filter out the pheromones he had been breathing in, and Kilgrave went squish.

    An interesting case would have to be the Blue and Gold team, Blue Beetle and Booster Gold. Booster's troubles are sort of self-inflicted, what with the whole 'greatest hero you've never heard of' thing he's got going on to keep time travellers from inflicting SID on baby Booster, but Beetle is good- very, very good, to the point that Batman trusts him as his backup without a second thought, and Guy Gardner, who rarely has a good word to say about much of anyone, thinks Beetle is smarter than Batman- and yet nobody really takes him seriously, in-universe or out.

    Firestorm is an odd case, since he basically has to be written as being a bit on the incompetent side, because the dude's a walking deus ex machina- he can turn anything inorganic into anything else, or just fry it outright with nuclear death rays, along with flight and phasing powers (the phasing I never entirely understood, to be honest- it doesn't exactly match the rest of his powerset), and the whole nuclear death ray thing is considered to be at minimum 'fry South America off the map' level by the Secret Six, so, uhm, yeah.

    Flash has gotten a bit more respect lately from fans and authors- Wally especially, once he started 'mainlining the Speed Force' could also play deus ex machina relatively easily. Crazy stunts like a race between Wally and Barry being mistaken for the Source (i.e. the DCU version of God...) show that yeah, you don't screw with the Flash.
    Times being what they are, the stars aligning and the End of All Things barely registered as background noise.

    At a bit of a loss as to what to do next, and with bills to pay, a certain Elder Thing has taken up bartending.

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  4. - Top - End - #34
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    Quote Originally Posted by TeChameleon View Post
    I do like what I read one time (secondhand quote)- that Hank Pym is a mad scientist trying to be a superhero. It really kinda fits- if you look at his life's story, there are some serious Dr. Frankenstein overtones to it, what with the self-experimentation and Ultron and all that mess.

    And the Purple Man tends to be set up against street-level types because, like Mesmero, he's got an incredibly binary power- he either wins immediately or goes squish immediately against higher-tier opponents, although he had an interesting... battle..? against Nate Grey back in his X-Man days- grabbed control, somewhat to Nate's shock, since his power was pheromone based rather than psionic, so all of Nate's rather formidable defenses did nothing. Then he bragged about it being pheromone based, Nate used his TK to filter out the pheromones he had been breathing in, and Kilgrave went squish.

    An interesting case would have to be the Blue and Gold team, Blue Beetle and Booster Gold. Booster's troubles are sort of self-inflicted, what with the whole 'greatest hero you've never heard of' thing he's got going on to keep time travellers from inflicting SID on baby Booster, but Beetle is good- very, very good, to the point that Batman trusts him as his backup without a second thought, and Guy Gardner, who rarely has a good word to say about much of anyone, thinks Beetle is smarter than Batman- and yet nobody really takes him seriously, in-universe or out.

    Firestorm is an odd case, since he basically has to be written as being a bit on the incompetent side, because the dude's a walking deus ex machina- he can turn anything inorganic into anything else, or just fry it outright with nuclear death rays, along with flight and phasing powers (the phasing I never entirely understood, to be honest- it doesn't exactly match the rest of his powerset), and the whole nuclear death ray thing is considered to be at minimum 'fry South America off the map' level by the Secret Six, so, uhm, yeah.

    Flash has gotten a bit more respect lately from fans and authors- Wally especially, once he started 'mainlining the Speed Force' could also play deus ex machina relatively easily. Crazy stunts like a race between Wally and Barry being mistaken for the Source (i.e. the DCU version of God...) show that yeah, you don't screw with the Flash.
    Firestorm chooses to uses his powers only on inorganic stuff. He's fully capable of turning a human being into a block of potassium nitrate
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  5. - Top - End - #35
    Eldritch Horror in the Playground Moderator
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    Default Re: Consistently Underestimated super-characters

    Are characters like Flash and Firestorm consistently underestimated, or is it just that writing them to the theoretical max of their powers would obliterate any semblance of coherence to the universe even more than usual?

  6. - Top - End - #36
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    Speaking of One Piece, I've seen some people underestimate how crazy the characters are due to the age of sail aesthetic. Specifically, early series Luffy is a lot more absurd than you'd think from basic concept of "pirate with rubberman powers".

    To wit:

    He's shrugging off gunfire and a spiked metal club to the head basically from the start. Nevermind one-punching a huge sea monster.

    In Usopp's introduction arc, he shrugs off a direct hit to the head from a bladed chakram. In the same arc, he also fights an opponent moving faster than the human eye can follow and strikes that opponent down by instinct.

    In Sanji's introduction arc, he punches barefist through spiked steel plate armor - the same armor a moment earlier was shown to shrug off point-blank shot from a handcannon.

    In Rogue Town, he's hit by lightning when on the execution platform and is none worse for the wear.

    In Arlong Park, he catches the blade of a sawblade sword between his fingers and breaks it to pieces by squeezing hard.

    These all foreshadow his (even more absurd) feats of strength and durability when the series proceeds to Grand Line and beyond. Yet I still sometimes people go "well he's only immune to bludgeoning damage, just cut him LOL". People tried and failed to cut him before he even had explicit Haki. Dude legit had bones harder and tougher than steel from the first volume onward. Swordsmen in the series only pose a threat to him because they are equally absurd.

  7. - Top - End - #37
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    Quote Originally Posted by Taevyr View Post
    in Injustice, he single-handedly broke out every superhero and -villain locked up in the Regime's prison at the bottom of the Mariana Trench by knocking out the flash by "infiltrating his windpipe", pretending to be the Flash in a meeting with Cyborg to "discuss potential points of entry for Plastic-man" and thus being told by Cy where he could access the prison, and then infiltrating the place. When the dome was pierced by Sinestro, he sealed it with himself and still got away once everyone else had left.
    I remember in the same comic. When he was gonna break out his son by talking to superman nicely, the injustic league? was on high alert. They were genuinely terrified on what he can do. When Sinestro questioned his powers, they just told him to stay alert.

  8. - Top - End - #38
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    Quote Originally Posted by Vahnavoi View Post
    In Usopp's introduction arc, he shrugs off a direct hit to the head from a bladed chakram.
    This is a really low key way of saying he catches that chakram out of the air with his teeth and shatters it by biting down.

  9. - Top - End - #39
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    Default Re: Consistently Underestimated super-characters

    Quote Originally Posted by Taevyr View Post

    Also, he's immune to mind control due to his brain not being organic anymore, and functionally immortal due to the rest of him not being organic either.
    I remember Plastic Man being the counter to Martian Manhunter when he went simultaneously evil and immune to fire and able to do a human torch impression in the Burning Martian storyline, because PM could no sell a psychic assault that took out most of the League simultaneously, was fireproof and could also match up to MM's shapeshifting.
    Last edited by paddyfool; 2021-09-01 at 04:01 AM.

  10. - Top - End - #40
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    Quote Originally Posted by Vahnavoi View Post
    Speaking of One Piece, I've seen some people underestimate how crazy the characters are due to the age of sail aesthetic. Specifically, early series Luffy is a lot more absurd than you'd think from basic concept of "pirate with rubberman powers".

    To wit:

    He's shrugging off gunfire and a spiked metal club to the head basically from the start. Nevermind one-punching a huge sea monster.

    In Usopp's introduction arc, he shrugs off a direct hit to the head from a bladed chakram. In the same arc, he also fights an opponent moving faster than the human eye can follow and strikes that opponent down by instinct.

    In Sanji's introduction arc, he punches barefist through spiked steel plate armor - the same armor a moment earlier was shown to shrug off point-blank shot from a handcannon.

    In Rogue Town, he's hit by lightning when on the execution platform and is none worse for the wear.

    In Arlong Park, he catches the blade of a sawblade sword between his fingers and breaks it to pieces by squeezing hard.

    These all foreshadow his (even more absurd) feats of strength and durability when the series proceeds to Grand Line and beyond. Yet I still sometimes people go "well he's only immune to bludgeoning damage, just cut him LOL". People tried and failed to cut him before he even had explicit Haki. Dude legit had bones harder and tougher than steel from the first volume onward. Swordsmen in the series only pose a threat to him because they are equally absurd.
    There's a lot of much later reveals that make a lot of this make sense especially for Luffy and Sanji. They're just not standard level working from nowhere unlike Usopp or Nami.
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    Sanji is a failed generic experiment and Luffy was trained as hard as any marine in their prime as a child not to mention you see just what kind of conditions Luffy grew up in beyond Garp being an absolute monster to his grandkid. Luffy is also just outright immune to lightning because he's made of rubber which makes sense even if it's exaggerated. This has come up time and time again from Loguetown to Enel and now to Big Mom when he outright tanked through Zeus's attacks to the point even Big Mom was surprised it had no effect.

  11. - Top - End - #41
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    Default Re: Consistently Underestimated super-characters

    The Sanji point isn't relevant to his abilities; remember the whole point of that reveal is that he ISN'T special.

  12. - Top - End - #42
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    It does, especially after the last chapter.

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    Just because he didn't go full like his brothers doesn't mean the altering of his Linage Factor didn't effect him.

  13. - Top - End - #43
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    I'm waiting until Wano is done so I can binge the last half, so I wouldn't know.

  14. - Top - End - #44
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    Quote Originally Posted by Rynjin View Post
    This is a really low key way of saying he catches that chakram out of the air with his teeth and shatters it by biting down.
    Oh, did he do that too? I forgot. I don't think we're talking of the same incident. I'm referring to a page where Django's chakram hit Luffy in the back of the head, everyone was like "NOOOOO he's done for!" and then Luffy shrugged the thing off with minor cuts.

  15. - Top - End - #45
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    Quote Originally Posted by paddyfool View Post
    I remember Plastic Man being the counter to Martian Manhunter when he went simultaneously evil and immune to fire and able to do a human torch impression in the Burning Martian storyline, because PM could no sell a psychic assault that took out most of the League simultaneously, was fireproof and could also match up to MM's shapeshifting.
    The Burning Martian storyline, aye. The point was actually that he could exceed the Manhunter's shapeshifting, since PM's was pure instinct, whereas martians took a split second to read the opponent's mind to determine the optimum form. Since Plas was also immune to the mindreading, it kind of threw J'onn off his game, devil-martian or no. Even Frank Miller, who normally has no use for any superhero that doesn't have a bat-themed fursona, portrayed Plastic Man as being absurdly powerful in the Dark Knight Strikes Again (not the greatest story, I know, but eh...)
    Times being what they are, the stars aligning and the End of All Things barely registered as background noise.

    At a bit of a loss as to what to do next, and with bills to pay, a certain Elder Thing has taken up bartending.

    This is...

    The Last Call of Cthulhu

  16. - Top - End - #46
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    Quote Originally Posted by Mordar View Post
    On the Marvel side I always thought the Purple Man was always under appreciated...I guess mostly because I only ever seemed to see him set against street-level heroes.

    - M
    Have you gotten the chance to see Jessica Jones season 1? She’s admittedly a street-level hero too, but Kilgrave is the big bad for that season and he’s taken quite seriously.

  17. - Top - End - #47
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    Quote Originally Posted by Vahnavoi View Post
    Speaking of One Piece, I've seen some people underestimate how crazy the characters are due to the age of sail aesthetic. Specifically, early series Luffy is a lot more absurd than you'd think from basic concept of "pirate with rubberman powers".

    To wit:

    He's shrugging off gunfire and a spiked metal club to the head basically from the start. Nevermind one-punching a huge sea monster.

    In Usopp's introduction arc, he shrugs off a direct hit to the head from a bladed chakram. In the same arc, he also fights an opponent moving faster than the human eye can follow and strikes that opponent down by instinct.

    In Sanji's introduction arc, he punches barefist through spiked steel plate armor - the same armor a moment earlier was shown to shrug off point-blank shot from a handcannon.

    In Rogue Town, he's hit by lightning when on the execution platform and is none worse for the wear.

    In Arlong Park, he catches the blade of a sawblade sword between his fingers and breaks it to pieces by squeezing hard.

    These all foreshadow his (even more absurd) feats of strength and durability when the series proceeds to Grand Line and beyond. Yet I still sometimes people go "well he's only immune to bludgeoning damage, just cut him LOL". People tried and failed to cut him before he even had explicit Haki. Dude legit had bones harder and tougher than steel from the first volume onward. Swordsmen in the series only pose a threat to him because they are equally absurd.

    Incorrect on the cutting thing, he's been cut and hurt by normal low tier guys. and even inanimate objects not wielded by people. Before armament Haki slashing damage 100 percent bypassed his durability.
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  18. - Top - End - #48
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    Quote Originally Posted by Rynjin View Post
    I'm waiting until Wano is done so I can binge the last half, so I wouldn't know.
    There's some extremely vague hints that he might be special that the fans have jumped on. Nothing confirmed though. I personally hope it isn't true, because it completely undermines his entire character arc if he is.

  19. - Top - End - #49
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    Quote Originally Posted by Devonix View Post
    Incorrect on the cutting thing, he's been cut and hurt by normal low tier guys. and even inanimate objects not wielded by people. Before armament Haki slashing damage 100 percent bypassed his durability.
    Name one instance of "slashing damage" from "normal low tier guys" or inanimate object causing him more severe injuries than Django's chakram to the skull.

  20. - Top - End - #50
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    Quote Originally Posted by Vahnavoi View Post
    Name one instance of "slashing damage" from "normal low tier guys" or inanimate object causing him more severe injuries than Django's chakram to the skull.
    It's an explicit plot point that he's only resistant to blunt damage due to his rubber in the early parts of the story. It just never ends up mattering because injuries to characters in One Piece only exist to make it more dramatic when they keep fighting, so they never actually hinder anyone.

  21. - Top - End - #51
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    That's so inaccurate it makes my head hurt.

  22. - Top - End - #52
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    Quote Originally Posted by Vahnavoi View Post
    That's so inaccurate it makes my head hurt.
    Then refute it. "No" is not much of an argument.

  23. - Top - End - #53
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    Default Re: Consistently Underestimated super-characters

    Do what I did and set a standard, and I'll consider it. If you don't, the relevant argument has already been made. Django's chakram not cutting through Luffy's skull is proof positive he had superhuman endurance not accountable by his rubberman powers.

  24. - Top - End - #54
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    It didn't cut his skull because he caught it with his teeth, stopping it from penetrating. Yes he's superhumanly strong, no ****. He ripped the prow off a ship and flattened people with it seconds beforehand.

    Know what the chakram did cut though? His mouth. Because he's not resistant to cutting attacks. Pretty sure there's an SBS to confirm this as well, if it being repeatedly stated in the series that he's not, and the multiple occasions he's been nicked by blades don't count for some reason.

    There's a reason Luffy typically DODGES cuts rather than blocking them.

  25. - Top - End - #55
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    Arriete from Glints Saga. Everyone treat her as a joke character, but:

    She can shadow clone herself, making her extremely hard to hit.
    She can jump into impressive heights without using magic.
    Her agility is comparable if not higher than her teammates.

  26. - Top - End - #56
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    Quote Originally Posted by Rynjin View Post
    It didn't cut his skull because he caught it with his teeth, stopping it from penetrating.
    God damn it people, you aren't talking of the same thing I am.

    Tankobon volume 4, page 153. Luffy gets directly hit in the back of his head. He takes the chakram off and walks off with a minor cut. In volume 5, page 74, he catched Captain Kuro as Kuro is slashing him across his torso, once again surviving with minor cuts.

    If that's not proof of beyond human durability against slashing attacks, what is?
    Last edited by Vahnavoi; 2021-09-02 at 08:37 AM.

  27. - Top - End - #57
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    Quote Originally Posted by Vahnavoi View Post
    God damn it people, you aren't talking of the same thing I am.

    Tankobon volume 4, page 153. Luffy gets directly hit in the back of his head. He takes the chakram off and walks off with a minor cut. In volume 5, page 74, he catched Captain Kuro as Kuro is slashing him across his torso, once again surviving with minor cuts.

    If that's not proof of beyond human durability against slashing attacks, what is?
    Are we using the standards of human durability of real life or One Piece for that?

  28. - Top - End - #58
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    Are you forgetting that Luffy has a scar right under his eye from a knife and has since the start of the series? He was cut during the Arlong fight and during the Captain Kuro fight also.
    Last edited by Devonix; 2021-09-02 at 09:53 AM.
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  29. - Top - End - #59
    Eldritch Horror in the Playground Moderator
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    Since this is apparently a One Piece thread now (come back tomorrow, it will be a Star Wars thread), could Luffy have gotten that knife scar before he gained his magic fruit powers?

  30. - Top - End - #60
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    I though it was a purely cosmetic scar?

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