Grrl Power VII: Let Me Explain For The Next Thirty Comics!

[tyckspoon]

Max is indeed powerful, but I suspect there's magic attacks that can take her out. We really don't know how magic works in GP-verse, but what if someone could turn Maxima into a newt? Or turn her into a snail, pick her up, and stick her in an aquarium? Or attack her willpower and turn her into Obedient Max Who Kills on Command?

Unless you can somehow transform her into 'non powered Maxima', I suspect what you'd get is a shiny gold super strong, super fast, flying, super tough newt that can project energy beams.. transforming most supers might disable them (since apparently the key to being super is a particular arrangement of DNA, changing the body into something with completely different DNA might suffice to 'deauthorize' that individual from their access to the Superion energy) but Maxima is a non-standard 'super' to start with, and I don't think it's clear yet if the alien whatsit that made her gold -granted- her powers or is just amplifying the powers she would have had anyways.

For mental attacks Maxima has previously said her powers include at least some coverage there (IIRC, when she was informing Sydney that aliens existed and were present on Earth, before that secret got blown wide open by the Fel and Alari - Sydney was concerned about somebody invading Maxima's mind and lifting Archon's secrets.) It might turn out to be one of the avenues Maxima is -less- resistant to, but almost certainly not going to be as simple as 'geeze why did you all waste your time trying to out-punch her, just cast Charm Person.'

[Radar]

For mental attacks Maxima has previously said her powers include at least some coverage there (IIRC, when she was informing Sydney that aliens existed and were present on Earth, before that secret got blown wide open by the Fel and Alari - Sydney was concerned about somebody invading Maxima's mind and lifting Archon's secrets.) It might turn out to be one of the avenues Maxima is -less- resistant to, but almost certainly not going to be as simple as 'geeze why did you all waste your time trying to out-punch her, just cast Charm Person.'

That big blood golem Sciona made actually managed to do some mental attack against her which at least stopped Maxima for a moment. Assumption that there are more powerful options available is not far-fetched.

[Shining Wrath]

Yeah, what is the save DC against the spellcaster's mental attack? We do not know that Maxima has faced "20th level caster with maxed ability score and +3 wand" equivalent yet.

[lord_khaine]

Yeah the Super Husk (golem) even had the disadvantage of a cracked eyepiece from Anvil slamming it.
But it still paused Max. It might have gotten ugly if Hiro had not been around.

Of course that is one of the things Archon is smart about.
They usually dont deploy Max without backup.

[Shining Wrath]

Yeah the Super Husk (golem) even had the disadvantage of a cracked eyepiece from Anvil slamming it.
But it still paused Max. It might have gotten ugly if Hiro had not been around.

Of course that is one of the things Archon is smart about.
They usually dont deploy Max without backup.

And in this case we know the whole team is there. Gravity Guy is likely about to have a bad moment. I'm sure he can counter a lot of stuff, but can he stop a .50 caliber bullet fired from behind? Lethal force has been authorized.

[Traab]

And in this case we know the whole team is there. Gravity Guy is likely about to have a bad moment. I'm sure he can counter a lot of stuff, but can he stop a .50 caliber bullet fired from behind? Lethal force has been authorized.

I wonder, if he projects an aura of, lets say 50x normal gravity around him, how far out would it have to be to ground a sniper round before it can reach him? And what sort of shenanigans would it take to get around that? Snipers already adjust for gravity, so theoretically it should be possible to compensate, but it may involve angled fire too high above to hit the gravity well he produces in the first place. Now I kinda want to see the math on that. How powerful would the gravity have to be if he kept the aura within say, a foot of himself to avoid crushing everything including coworkers around him?

[tyckspoon]

I wonder, if he projects an aura of, lets say 50x normal gravity around him, how far out would it have to be to ground a sniper round before it can reach him? And what sort of shenanigans would it take to get around that? Snipers already adjust for gravity, so theoretically it should be possible to compensate, but it may involve angled fire too high above to hit the gravity well he produces in the first place. Now I kinda want to see the math on that. How powerful would the gravity have to be if he kept the aura within say, a foot of himself to avoid crushing everything including coworkers around him?

That would be an interesting thing to try to set up to experiment on and/or do the math on - my instinct is it would work similarly to when you fire a bullet into a medium with a very different density, like firing from air into water? Which is (assuming a standard lead round) the stress and shock on the bullet itself both changes the path of travel of the bullet and can fracture or deform the bullet itself, which has several effects that mostly add up to the bullet no longer being effective - the individual fragments are tumbling loose chunks instead of an aerodynamic spinning cone, so they lose a lot more energy to air resistance; they're split off on multiple trajectories so targeting is messed up, and they're separate smaller masses, so they are much easier to further affect and carry much less individual kinetic energy, reducing penetration potential. And all of those effects can be hugely amplified if his power can be directional or shaped and not just a generalized region of 'stuff weighs more here' - if he can form a lense, direct things in a torus or band, or make the source of the gravity be 'out' or 'behind' the bullet it would not be very hard to negate its velocity or just destroy the bullet.

[Shining Wrath]

If he sets the gravity at 50x, a shot into the top of it might very well hit him in the top of the head at a speed greater than muzzle velocity. If the gravity well doesn't extend for far enough around him, a shot aimed for his head might hit him in the back instead, and a sniper rifle round is not anything you want hitting any of your favorite body parts.

I will hypothesize that there's a tradeoff between "volume affected by gravity power" and "strength of gravity power". He's probably not capable of turning the Earth into a mini black hole if his feelings are hurt. Maybe he can generate a field strong enough to protect him from the first shot, but a skilled sniper might be able to compensate. I think it's unlikely he can generate, e.g., 50x gravity for a 20' radius hemisphere and maintain it. We'll find out.

Also, can he go in reverse and reduce gravity? If so, NASA wants to talk to him. Of course, that might be fatal if done carelessly - turn off gravity, and the earth's orbital velocity of 50,000 MPH in a heliocentric reference frame means you are very quickly in outer space - assuming you don't hit anything on your way to orbit.

[InvisibleBison]

Of course, that might be fatal if done carelessly - turn off gravity, and the earth's orbital velocity of 50,000 MPH in a heliocentric reference frame means you are very quickly in outer space - assuming you don't hit anything on your way to orbit.

That assumes his powers work in a heliocentric reference frame, though, an assumption I see no reason to make.

[Dragonus45]

Heck if he has fine control he could just have a bubble of gravity pointing away from him.

[halfeye]

Heck if he has fine control he could just have a bubble of gravity pointing away from him.

Gravity in the 50 Earths range won't be anything like enough to stop a bullet.

[Traab]

So im doing a quick search binge on the subject and it seems like the deciding factor is distance from target. As in, the difference in drop between 100 and 150 yards is far less than the distance at 200 and 250 yards. Due to the steadily lessening speed of the round from air resistance. I will put up a quote talking about white tail hunting for reference.

Let's say you're hunting with a 150-grain softnose .308 Winchester load, which is one of the most popular whitetail cartridges in America. It leaves the muzzle at about 2,820 feet per second, according to the manufacturer's ballistic chart, and you have zeroed your gun at 100 yards, which is the most commonly used sight-in distance among all deer hunters. You've studied that chart, and you know that with a 100-yard zero your bullet will hit about 1.2 inches low at 150 yards, 3.75 inches low at 200 yards, and a whopping 14.25 inches low at 300 yards - should you ever dare to shoot that far. You're prepared to deal with that, because you have a scope with a trajectory-compensating reticle, and you've checked to make sure where the bullets actually hit by firing at known-distance targets on a shooting range.

But when you get to the field and encounter an animal that's not standing at exactly 150, 200, or 300 yards, what happens if you don't correctly determine how far away he really is? Well, if you use that .308 to shoot at a deer you think is 100 yards away and he's actually at 150 yards away, it probably won't make enough difference to matter, because the bullet only drops an inch and a quarter crossing that additional 50 yards and you'll still be well within the kill radius if you've aimed for the center of his heart/lung zone.

But what if you think he's 200 yards away and he's actually 250 yards away? Different story. Your bullet is going to drop an additional 4.3 inches below the 200-yard impact point traveling across that additional 50 yards. So even if you put your reticle's 200-yard drop marker right on his heart, you're going to hit more than four inches low. You're going to miss his heart, and probably shoot under him entirely, even if you're steady as a rock when you press the trigger.


And, if you range a deer to be at 250 yards (which is a shot at a trophy buck most of us would take in a heartbeat with a .308), and he's actually at 300 yards, you won't even touch a hair, even if you've got your aim solidly placed for the 250-yard distance, because traveling that additional 50 yards from 250 to 300, the bullet is going to drop yet another six and a quarter inches.

So basically, the farther away peggy is taking the shot, the worse effect increased gravity will have on the round when it hits that zone because the bullet is slowing down and thus being effected by it longer. The shots she was taking in the super brawl? He would need an absurd gravity multiplier to drop the round to the ground before it hits him in any reasonable width of aura. If she tries to dome him from 1000 yards out, then thats likely no bueno, the sheer drop from additional gravity would likely only need like 25 yards to turn a head shot into a big toe loss. Less the higher he cranks gravity. And without the actual numbers involved in how much he is multiplying gravity, she wouldnt be able to adjust in any reasonable time frame to hit him anyways.

[Forum Explorer]

So im doing a quick search binge on the subject and it seems like the deciding factor is distance from target. As in, the difference in drop between 100 and 150 yards is far less than the distance at 200 and 250 yards. Due to the steadily lessening speed of the round from air resistance. I will put up a quote talking about white tail hunting for reference.



So basically, the farther away peggy is taking the shot, the worse effect increased gravity will have on the round when it hits that zone because the bullet is slowing down and thus being effected by it longer. The shots she was taking in the super brawl? He would need an absurd gravity multiplier to drop the round to the ground before it hits him in any reasonable width of aura. If she tries to dome him from 1000 yards out, then thats likely no bueno, the sheer drop from additional gravity would likely only need like 25 yards to turn a head shot into a big toe loss. Less the higher he cranks gravity. And without the actual numbers involved in how much he is multiplying gravity, she wouldnt be able to adjust in any reasonable time frame to hit him anyways.

Considering they are inside, I imagine that if she has a shot at all, than the increased gravity won't matter.

[Shining Wrath]

Peggy is not the only member of ArcSwat Gravity boy has to worry about. He can, probably, stop Hiro. He can stop Math casually, if he sees him coming. If Math gets within reach of him for 0.01 picoseconds he's likely unconscious, even if Math is an ordinary human (callback very much intended). He could probably drop Halo flat on the ground, if she was here, but would that disable death ray / tentacle smack?

His nightmare is Anvil above him. "Hey, I'm going to defeat you by accelerating you into the ground!" would be, shall we say, counterproductive. But she also is not here.

Harem presumably can teleport next to him - or teleport to sitting on his shoulders with her legs wrapped around his neck. That would be a test as to how fine his control is.

Zephan could presumably control his ethereal battle-buddy in a gravity field, and does gravity even affect the ethereal dude?

That assumes his powers work in a heliocentric reference frame, though, an assumption I see no reason to make.

Physics works in every reference frame, which is why Einstein was smart. If you turn off gravity, you'll continue in the direction you are moving in (Newton, not Einstein, pick your mega-genius), but the earth will continue to trace an elliptical path around the sun. At 50,000 mph, it doesn't take much difference between "straight" and "ellipse" to really ruin your day.

[The Glyphstone]

Anvil might actually be a great match up, if he can decrease or redirect gravity as well as increase it. His ability to grav-pin Max without collapsing the entire building around him does indicate selective targeting or directional control. If so, Anvil above him can be juggled helplessly as long as he wants.

[Shining Wrath]

Anvil might actually be a great match up, if he can decrease or redirect gravity as well as increase it. His ability to grav-pin Max without collapsing the entire building around him does indicate selective targeting or directional control. If so, Anvil above him can be juggled helplessly as long as he wants.

We've seen him use his powers to hurl Varia and pin her to the wall, so he does have directional control. Arguably, if he's mentally fast enough he could decelerate a bullet and even fling it back, D&D monk style. That would require a Maxima / Math level of quickness, unknown if he's got it.

[lord_khaine]

His name is Supermassive.
And yeah, he both have a pretty high degree of fine control over his power, being able to glue Varia to a wall without hurting or harming her.
As well as a significant amount of raw power, forcing Maxima to boost her strength to purple to endure it.
Considering thats 90-100 on the marvel scale..

Then it means forget about x50 gravity, and increase the gravity with a couple orders of magnitude to something like x500 or x5000.
If he isnt a catagory 9 super like Max, then he is at least category 8 i would say.
Significantly more dangerous than any other Archon member. It can be other would be able to defeat him.
But that would be because of a type advantage (to steal pokemon terms seems fitting here :D )

I also better get why he on his own decided to pick a fight with Max now.

[Shining Wrath]

His name is Supermassive.
And yeah, he both have a pretty high degree of fine control over his power, being able to glue Varia to a wall without hurting or harming her.
As well as a significant amount of raw power, forcing Maxima to boost her strength to purple to endure it.
Considering thats 90-100 on the marvel scale..

Then it means forget about x50 gravity, and increase the gravity with a couple orders of magnitude to something like x500 or x5000.
If he isnt a catagory 9 super like Max, then he is at least category 8 i would say.
Significantly more dangerous than any other Archon member. It can be other would be able to defeat him.
But that would be because of a type advantage (to steal pokemon terms seems fitting here :D )

I also better get why he on his own decided to pick a fight with Max now.

ArcSwat being an American paramilitary organization, with officers and enlisted and so on, I would really hope that they will use combined arms on these guys, with supers with complimentary powers backing each other up. We don't know yet what Supermassive's weaknesses might be. Is he Math-level quick? Can he prevent Halo from teleporting him? And again, how large an area can he affect, for how long, at what level of strength? If he can go Marvel Scale 95, but only on a single person, does that mean he could go MS 75 on a 50' circle? Or MS 20? We dunno.

[lord_khaine]

I think i mentioned previously its one of the places where Archon has my respect.
So far they have not deployed Max without someone to back her up. Unless she were the backup.

As for Supermassive. He has to be some degree of quick to catch Max, who herself are around spiderman level fast as her baseline.
And the scary part is less than a second of 95' ms gravity would kill a human.

[halfeye]

So im doing a quick search binge on the subject and it seems like the deciding factor is distance from target. As in, the difference in drop between 100 and 150 yards is far less than the distance at 200 and 250 yards. Due to the steadily lessening speed of the round from air resistance. I will put up a quote talking about white tail hunting for reference.



So basically, the farther away peggy is taking the shot, the worse effect increased gravity will have on the round when it hits that zone because the bullet is slowing down and thus being effected by it longer. The shots she was taking in the super brawl? He would need an absurd gravity multiplier to drop the round to the ground before it hits him in any reasonable width of aura. If she tries to dome him from 1000 yards out, then thats likely no bueno, the sheer drop from additional gravity would likely only need like 25 yards to turn a head shot into a big toe loss. Less the higher he cranks gravity. And without the actual numbers involved in how much he is multiplying gravity, she wouldnt be able to adjust in any reasonable time frame to hit him anyways.

The drop due to gravity increasing with range has nothing to do with the bullet slowing down (that does happen, but it's a minor effect). The drop is mainly due to gravity being an acceleration, so the downward speed increases exponentially with the time of flight, it would do exactly the same on the moon, though to a lesser extent because the moon's gravity is less.

That's with more or less standardised gravity fields, with variable ones who knows, but the bullet will fly as normal until it reaches the variation.

[Shining Wrath]

Just arguing from "story" rather than "what we've seen", I expect Supermassive to be a recurring villain. He and the rest of the welcoming committee are going to almost but not quite capture Maxima, and he's going to escape.

[lord_khaine]

It is pretty reasonable to assume that someone powerful enough to give Max pause will be recurring.

[The Glyphstone]

Darude was practically fighting her to a standstill if Halo hadn't intervened, and that led to him being a one-shot appearance. So I think it mostly depends on how entertaining Dave thinks this guy is.

[lord_khaine]

Its a reasonable point that Darude is likely not to interesting story wise, due to being pretty one-trick and hard to interact with.
But at the same time. He isnt gone. Just stuffed into Deus's bottle.

He is a single containment error away from recurring.

Edit.
I no longer think its relevant how well his gravity powers deflect bullets.
This guy decided to brawl with max. Since he is not suicidal we must assume a significant level of strength and durability.
Depending on how well he does in the brawl he might be the most allround powerful super we have seen so far.

[Shining Wrath]

Darude returns when it suits Deus' super-genius plotting for him to return.

Max's point about Archon having the PR team is well taken, and thus FWTDT is the Periwinkle Butt Sniffer forever more. So let it be written, so let it be done.

Between Gravity Goombah and FWTDT, ArcSwat is dealing heavy psychic damage with words.

Actually, I think it's polite to call people what they want to be called, within reason. He's Supermassive, not GG or SH. Of course, that's after the fight is over. If Maxima can get inside his head during the battle by calling him Suck Hole, all's fair in love & war.

And Maxima is being very foolish. Why go one on one? Bring in the entire team. They've got a teleporter, she could bring in 256 different supers to take the side of Supermassive 5 seconds from now.

[Traab]

I think sydney is a baaaad influence on max. I dont think she would have even considered pulling the name card like this before meeting her.

As for bringing in the others, most of them would squish like grapes against supermassive. Harem in a single body is pretty strong, but not maxima strong, varia would need a specific synergy skill to handle it and be one slip away from squish, and most of the rest flat out cant tank it. I have honestly lost track as to who is here with arcswat. Even the ones who could probably tank it would be slowed and weakened by the gravity. With max its like with that golem at the vault that hit everyone with a debuff. When asked after she casually stomped it if it effected her, she replied it did. Its just, she has plenty of power to spare.

[lord_khaine]

Actually, I think it's polite to call people what they want to be called, within reason. He's Supermassive, not GG or SH. Of course, that's after the fight is over. If Maxima can get inside his head during the battle by calling him Suck Hole, all's fair in love & war.

That yeah. I dont think its possibly a field Max want to get to much into. Dont throw rocks when you live in a glass house and all. Since i really dont think Max would like being called Gold Barbie or worse.
Besides that i think the logic is slightly flawed, its quite possible Supermassive have the biggest pr team, considering what they spend on expendable secret bases.

While regarding bringing in others. It is a big deal, even for Max. As i recall the scale this works on, going from blue to green on strength likely makes her an order of magnitude weaker than normal.
Spider man is 40 at strenght. So she is just above him right now (thats massively strong for a human, but not massively strong for a super).

And im honestly uncertain if there are anyone other than Hiro or Stalvart who can survive the gravity field (besides achilles who is useless in it).
Anvil perhaps? but i would not want to test it.

Also. I do agree with Supermassive on the breakaway suit.
Lets be fair, Max would 100% consider a sucker punch if he started to remove it the normal way.
And fighting with it on? it would be like wrestling while wrapped in tissue paper. At least with a breakaway suit he has something to put on after the fight.
I genuinly think is a prudent choice when your power dont protect your clothes.

[Kantaki]

Supermassive's loosing what little style points he had here.
I mean sure, tossing the fur cloak is probably sensible, but the suit? What are you? A stripper?
Also, that helmet looks kinda silly now. Put the cowl back on. And your shirt.

On the plus side that tacky belt buckle tells everyone what SM likes.
The 7th Gen. Pokèmon Games.

[lord_khaine]

I mean sure, tossing the fur cloak is probably sensible, but the suit? What are you? A stripper?
Also, that helmet looks kinda silly now. Put the cowl back on. And your shirt.

How do you think the suit would stand up to Maxima's weakest beam attack?

[Traab]

That yeah. I dont think its possibly a field Max want to get to much into. Dont throw rocks when you live in a glass house and all. Since i really dont think Max would like being called Gold Barbie or worse.
Besides that i think the logic is slightly flawed, its quite possible Supermassive have the biggest pr team, considering what they spend on expendable secret bases.

While regarding bringing in others. It is a big deal, even for Max. As i recall the scale this works on, going from blue to green on strength likely makes her an order of magnitude weaker than normal.
Spider man is 40 at strenght. So she is just above him right now (thats massively strong for a human, but not massively strong for a super).

And im honestly uncertain if there are anyone other than Hiro or Stalvart who can survive the gravity field (besides achilles who is useless in it).
Anvil perhaps? but i would not want to test it.

Also. I do agree with Supermassive on the breakaway suit.
Lets be fair, Max would 100% consider a sucker punch if he started to remove it the normal way.
And fighting with it on? it would be like wrestling while wrapped in tissue paper. At least with a breakaway suit he has something to put on after the fight.
I genuinly think is a prudent choice when your power dont protect your clothes.

They are a secret group of bad guys, they dont have a pr team. At least not a standard one. If the official government super agency comes out talking about the latest bad guys captured and names them suck hole and periwinkle butt sniffer, i really dont think there is much that will reverse the image damage they will take. And yeah, I actually thought the mask helmet thing looked decent with the rest. Remove his top and its very strange.