Which superpowered Universe is the most fair?

[Present 2.0]

So, which universe with superpowers(whether it's magic, psi-powers, futuristic technology, ki/chakra or mutants) gives everyone a relatively equal chance at getting superpowers. That means:

-No races or families, that make some people much more powerful than others.
-The means to get superpowers must be publicly aviable and not be a secret, that only a few know about.
-Everyone can learn the same stuff. Something, where everyone has powers, but every has totally different superpowers like MHA is nice for individuality, but not so much for equality.

I think, the closest example I can think of, is FMA.

[Zmeoaice]

Big Hero Six (and the series) might qualify. The superpowers were invented by a bunch of college kids using SCIENCE, meaning anyone can use them and they could likely be easily replicated.

Most villains tend to also be tech based except for Globby who ended up basically becoming Metamorpho due to a freak accident with Honey Lemon's chemicals and Krei's headband.

[Lord Raziere]

So, which universe with superpowers(whether it's magic, psi-powers, futuristic technology, ki/chakra or mutants) gives everyone a relatively equal chance at getting superpowers. That means:

-No races or families, that make some people much more powerful than others.
-The means to get superpowers must be publicly aviable and not be a secret, that only a few know about.
-Everyone can learn the same stuff. Something, where everyone has powers, but every has totally different superpowers like MHA is nice for individuality, but not so much for equality.

I think, the closest example I can think of, is FMA.

It might be a relative thing. Hm.

any world with the powers being secret to the public at large is automatically out: Bleach, Dresden Files, WoD, and so on.

Most superhero universes are out: DC, Marvel, MHA, One Piece, Naruto, Fairy Tail, and other such things

Avatar the Last Airbender, ALMOST seems equal, but with unique benders like blood benders it gets disqualified and while the normal bendings are all pretty balanced against one another, they're not the same stuff.

hm.....does "having a giant mecha" count as a superhero power? Because Gundam seems to give everyone those, the only problem being that some people have super-prototype mecha? which muddies the issue, because while sometimes the super-prototypes get equaled by mass-produced version, the protags can just get new super-prototypes.

hm, a cyberpunk universe might count for this, but then again the cybernetics to give you superpowers are probably pretty expensive......assuming you don't just go into debt getting them. which would be in genre for cyberpunk. so, a super-punk setting where people just BUY powers but poor has to go into debt for it....I don't think I've heard of any particular setting for that, but it sounds close to what you want.

I'm legit trying to think of something here.....theoretically, Wuxia in its purest form is actually all about power equality. like Kung-Fu Panda. after all the reveal in that movie is all about how there is no secret to being a kung fu master- just hard work. but then again the superpower there becomes "how short it takes for you to learn kung fu." because if you learn it faster than others, your pretty much unbeatable.

now Eclipse Phase and other such things being a transhuman rpg, seems like its pretty equal given that you can purchase all your transhuman upgrades, which is like cyberpunk but more advanced.

so hm. your probably looking for a transhuman setting if we're talking about freely available superpowers. but even then there is the fact that the real superpower there is godlike Artificial intelligences whose IQ increase exponentially until they can basically calculate everything to manipulate the situation to however they want. which isn't equal at all.

[Ibrinar]

So no magic is not secret but mages try to keep the how secret, either? So something like "The Bartimaeus Trilogy" is out (magicians have no innate power they summon being and for summoning you just need to know the right words and symbols, but they don't tell that to non mages.) I assume a skill limit would still be okay, as in anyone could learn but for many it is just too hard to master?

Anyway I don't know much about it but couldn't anyone multiclass into caster classes in D&D even if their stats might make that a bad choice?

Some settings with pure ritual magic should count https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/RitualMagic

[Khedrac]

One possibility is the future of PS238.

The current time is a fairly standard comic-book supers universe - so not fair at all, some have and some do not, but an event has happened which means that gradually everyone will become a super. (This appears to be that mroe and more people will be born with spuer powers until the last perosn without dies of old age.) - So not a fair world now, but is likely to become one.

Thinking about it, worlds that you would class as "fair" are unlikely to be good worlds for stories, so examples are not going to be easy to find...

[Present 2.0]

Thinking about it, worlds that you would class as "fair" are unlikely to be good worlds for stories, so examples are not going to be easy to find...

Would it be really that difficult to take dragonballs Ki-Powers, make Kage-Sennins school public knowledge, take the advantage from Saiyans away and tell a story in that universe.

Hey, Naruto is almost there. Yes, the Jutsu aren't public knowledge and are hidden in the ninja villages, but the story is completely inside them, so it makes no difference for the viewer, that normal people can't learn jutsus, because they don't matter. There are the kekkei genkai, but those become storybreaker pretty late and I don't think, it would be impossible to tell narutos story without kekkei genkais.

[Anonymouswizard]

So, which universe with superpowers(whether it's magic, psi-powers, futuristic technology, ki/chakra or mutants) gives everyone a relatively equal chance at getting superpowers. That means:

-No races or families, that make some people much more powerful than others.
-The means to get superpowers must be publicly aviable and not be a secret, that only a few know about.
-Everyone can learn the same stuff. Something, where everyone has powers, but every has totally different superpowers like MHA is nice for individuality, but not so much for equality.

I think, the closest example I can think of, is FMA.

In some varieties of Wuxia natural talent basically means nothing at the higher levels. Sure, if both have trained for a thousand hours with the same style then the one with more natural talent will win, but if only the talentless one put in the work than the talented one will find their rear having a boot applied. Although even there you can have problems learning a particular style if your body isn't used to it that seems to be relatively rare in the wuxia I've encountered. The secret to power is to learn martial arts.

In Fullmetal Alchemist there is certainly a tendency for alchemists to run in families, although this seems to just be the case of alchemists are likely to teach their kids alchemy. There's also a massive, massive tendency to keep the 'strong' powers a secret, only Roy Mustang knows how to make Flame Alchemy work, Armstrong seems to have something going on that's unusual, even Ed is noted to be keeping his developments secret.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

Magic in Elenium/Tamuli is available to anyone that wants to put in the time to learn the language of a deity willing to grant said magic, and there are literally hundreds of them, some of which are really not picky about who they grant powers to. The stories being set in medieval times, though, it means that that kind of education is well out of reach for most of the population, but if a moderately successful thief can manage it, anyone probably can, with just a modicum of application.

GW

[Lord Raziere]

Would it be really that difficult to take dragonballs Ki-Powers, make Kage-Sennins school public knowledge, take the advantage from Saiyans away and tell a story in that universe.

Hey, Naruto is almost there. Yes, the Jutsu aren't public knowledge and are hidden in the ninja villages, but the story is completely inside them, so it makes no difference for the viewer, that normal people can't learn jutsus, because they don't matter. There are the kekkei genkai, but those become storybreaker pretty late and I don't think, it would be impossible to tell narutos story without kekkei genkais.

Lets see on Dragon Ball:
Well there is at least two universal power ups in that universe:
Kaio-Ken which is a technique that pushes the limits of your body at the cost of wrecking it after wards

Ultra-Instinct, which is just "I fight so good that my body is moving on its own to do the fighting for me like I'm in the matrix" taken up to eleventy-billion.

and I have been doing a dragon ball roleplay where people of various races just have super forms as a part of universal laws of martial arts and biology. they're not exactly the same as super-saiyans, but when you invent a martial arts style based on cosplay and your super form is basically cosplaying Asriel Dreamurr, who cares? variety is cool. and it hasn't really impacted it at all.

While Naruto........eh. here is the thing: most of the ninjas you see in the show come from ninja families. Naruto's dad and mom were a ninja, Sasuke's parents were ninja, all the other Rookie Nine were ninjas aside from Sakura and Lee and maybe Ten-ten who didn't have good showings, and Rock Lee is a particularly unequal case as he is unable to form chakra techniques at all and has to rely purely on taijutsu. I mean he got to Chuunin/Jounin yes, and Might Gai was a Jounin so while its technically possible for a pure Taijutsu user to not only be a good ninja but an ELITE ninja, its going up against all the kids who've had family training, officials keeping tabs on their progress since they were kids, and freaking Jinchuuriki who are basically the ninja equivalent of super-weapons, thats not equal at all. the fact that a vast majority of the elite ninjas come from ninja family backgrounds kind of is not equal at all. Rock Lee, Might Guy are pretty much guys who broke a ceiling somewhere.

bottom line: I wouldn't call Naruto near equal at all. and thats not even getting into reincarnation stupidity, or the Rinnegan. I mean, the Kote in the Boruto series is probably a bit of an equalizer since its a hax tech that can fire any jutsu from it ever without skill, but its not in common use yet.

[Rater202]

Uh... Honestly, in terms of "chance to get super-powers," Marvel's probably the fairest: Most of the human race are the descendants of a group of Homo Erectus who were genetically engineered with the Cosmic Tier Magiscience of the Celestials.

The mutants are the most prominent of these experiments, followed by either the Inhumans(Who the Kree genetically engineered from Neaderthal's who had the same gene that eventually mutated into the X-Gene in mutants) or the Gamma Gene which gives you personality powers when you're exposed to Gamma radiation(The Hulk being the most prominent example.)

Then there are just people with "inherent genetic potential to mutate" which covers your Spider-Men and your Fantastic Fours.

Every Superhuman who didn't have a mutagen fed to them and a good number who did get super-powers because they had the inherent potential to do so.

For every mutant, there are about two people who have the X-Gene latently which can be activated by outside sources(The Mutant the Whizzer got his X-gene activated when he was transfused with irradiated Mongoose Blood) and dozens who actually have the gene, while the "latent potential to mutate" present in most mutates seems to be rather widely distributed, as is the Gamma Gene, and it seems like every major city in the world has at least a dozen people with Inhuman ancestry and the Inhuman gene from both parents.

Not to mention that most Super Soldier Serums, the Goblin Formula and it's variants, the Connors formula and it's variants, Pym Particles, Parker Particles, cybernetics, bonding to a symbiote, and having mutant/mutate DNA grafted to your Genome works on everyone and there are ways to give the X-Gene to people who don't naturally have it, anybody can learn to channel their chi, and you can find minor magic rituals that anyone can do on the internet. If you're willing to stretch the definition of Super Powers a bit, technically speaking Daredevil's Radar Sense is a learned skill: Matt's enhanced senses and need to compensate for his loss of vision gave him an advantage in unlocking and developing the skill, but anyone can learn how to do it if they're willing to do some extreme training. Likewise, a great deal of what seems to be super science in the Marvel Universe is just the Marvel Universe's tech level being more advanced than it looks--An issue of Ms. Marvel from a few years ago had not one but two separate high school science fair teams casually solve the Energy Crisis with all other entrants on the same level. One of the kids at Avenger's Academy was explicitly just a normal kid who happened to be good enough at robotics to fix and reprogram a damaged Sentinel he found.

It seems that most people in Marvel Earth have the potential to get Super-Human powers.

Whether or not those powers are any good or not is another question(It's basically a game of Super Powered Roulette), but just about anybody can get them.

[HolyDraconus]

I say dragonball. Ultra Instinct is currently the highest obtainable skill, and its NOT race specific. Literally its train till you max out your power, then train to max out skill.

[Lord Raziere]

I say dragonball. Ultra Instinct is currently the highest obtainable skill, and its NOT race specific. Literally its train till you max out your power, then train to max out skill.

Problem: That power ceiling is VERY high. and Saiyans have the inherent advantage of getting stronger every time they nearly die, and various power ups BEFORE that. that can basically reach it faster than any human.

that and there is the Bio-Android Cell. He is basically genetic biology as a hax frankenstein combo to make sure he is a tireless, ever-regenerating from a single cell, ever nonsexual reproducing super weapon. HE can probably get ultra instinct to. and still have his hax biology backing it up. you think Goku is bad, wait until Cell has it and out-endures Jiren and Goku. Then his Cell Juniors achieve ultra-instinct to.

oh and there is the Angels, who are REALITY WARPERS in addition to having Ultra-Instinct on at all times.

and Zeno who can just erase everything with a literal wave of his hand without ki powers.

then there is the Androids who who infinite energy engines who currently don't share their infinite energy engines and cybernetics to fight better with no one, so not really equal.

then there was that ridiculous bull Zamasu pulled. anyone who wishes for immortality has a REAL unfair advantage.

not equal. there are a lot of ways to break Dragon Ball if you know its hax abilities.

[Lvl 2 Expert]

Is a superpower even still a superpower if everyone gets it?

[Ibrinar]

In the sense that it doesn't follow normal physics, yes, but yeah people of the world would probably not call it a super power.

[Traab]

Im going with naruto, because as far as we can tell, any child can learn to be a ninja. Yes there are specific bloodline skills and other such things that not everyone can learn, but as we see in the series, you dont have to have those skills to win.

[Lord Raziere]

Is a superpower even still a superpower if everyone gets it?

Yeah, thats the problem with such "everyone gets the same superpower" settings, that ol' Syndrome quote applies.

so, a fair superpower setting would be one where not everyone gets superpowers, but you have to fairly earn the right to have them, like a test or a challenge or being taught. you don't get them until you prove your worthy to wield them correctly, and the villains are the ones who cheat their way into power and use it irresponsibly.

like, you can theoretically learn any power, but its like choosing a college major: you have to earn it, and you can't choose them all. and of course you have to obey all the ethics and moral rules of wielding the power you choose, and the practical pragmatic considerations of having it. (like Midoriya/Deku's constant breaking of his bones because he has super strength but no invulnerability to go with it)

so eeeeh, Wuxia and settings like Dragon Ball and Naruto are a little better than super-mutant settings like MHA or Marvel by that metric, because then anyone can theoretically gain A superpower through training but not everyone EARNS it, because by fair means they didn't cut the mustard. like if you found a guy who want to fly but was bad at the necessary skills to be a good flier, and no matter how hard he tries he still isn't cutting the mustard, then its pretty fair that he doesn't get the power, yes? because if he did, he'd just screw it up. or someone who wants to wield fire but clearly isn't following safety rules of wielding fire, so its fair that they don't get the power because you don't want things on fire.

so I think the questions to ask are: what is a fair reason for someone to NOT get superpowers? that is what all these settings struggle with. and what is a fair reason for a villain to get them anyways, without compromising the overall fairness?

[Ibrinar]

I believe in the anime From the New World every human has the same powerset though some are stronger than other I think. Or maybe that only applies to the ones there and the outside wold might have non psychics can't remember.

Spoiler

Show

IThe non psychic got turned into monster rats but I don't know whether that is a global or local thing.

Edit: One Piece! You just need to dope with the right fruit once. Yes this is a different super powers case but technically if you can get your hand on it you can pick a power so everybody has the chance to get that power. But I guess powerful factions should have an easier time getting fruits.

[Battleship789]

The magic from Warbreaker would probably contend for this. Everyone is born with a spark of divine power, called a Breath. Magic is done by commanding the Breath to inhabit an inanimate object, which will then follow orders. However, most animation requires more than a single Breath, and the more Breath one has, the more abilities are gained (perfect pitch/hue, immunity to diseases, and immortality are some of the abilities gained by holders of large amounts of Breath.) Breath can only be given to someone else by a certain command, so it may not be stolen (though, torture and trickery may be used to take the breath).

There are people who, when they die, are reincarnated as a Returned. A Returned has a single, very large, Breath that gives them many of the above abilities (immortality among them), but they must burn a Breath every week or they will die, so it isn't a very large benefit.

[Mechalich]

I believe in the anime From the New World every human has the same powerset though some are stronger than other I think. Or maybe that only applies to the ones there and the outside wold might have non psychics can't remember.

That is true, but that series is built on a massive unfairness.

Spoiler

Show

The big reveal of the series is that the people with powers converted all the humans who did not have powers into rat-folk and used them as slaves forever. So it's just full on social stratification, where those with powers rule over those who do not have powers.

Im going with naruto, because as far as we can tell, any child can learn to be a ninja. Yes there are specific bloodline skills and other such things that not everyone can learn, but as we see in the series, you dont have to have those skills to win.

Naruto is massively unfair. Ninjutsu are only available to everyone in theory, not in practice. Capability is simply mediated by chakra instead. Many, almost certanly the overwhelming majority, of people do not have chakra reserves sufficient to perform any jutsu at all. Even some ninja are stuck at low levels for their entire careers do to their inability to perform potent techniques. Naruto is like most shounen series in that it is built around a central lie: claiming that the massive prodigy who serves as the protagonist is actually a screw up.

[gooddragon1]

D&D 3.5. The wizard is the example of a college degree (I'm not sure which level of degree though) granting a level of power that might rival the of Jiren.

[Jay R]

"And when I'm old and I've had my fun, I'll sell my inventions so that everyone can be superheroes. Everyone can be super! And when everyone's super... <Mad cackle> ... no one will be."

[AgentofOdd]

The most extreme example I can think of is what happens at the end of the "The Banned and the Banished" series.

Spoiler

Show

The main character changes things so that instead of a few people being born with magical abilities, all available power is distributed evenly among the people. So everyone is equally "powered up." But, the diluted magic doesn't really do much for one person. Instead of the elemental powers few people used to get, now everyone gets a small boost to a random ability. For example one person might bake really well, while another might be really good at sculpting.

[Traab]

That is true, but that series is built on a massive unfairness.

Spoiler

Show

The big reveal of the series is that the people with powers converted all the humans who did not have powers into rat-folk and used them as slaves forever. So it's just full on social stratification, where those with powers rule over those who do not have powers.

Naruto is massively unfair. Ninjutsu are only available to everyone in theory, not in practice. Capability is simply mediated by chakra instead. Many, almost certanly the overwhelming majority, of people do not have chakra reserves sufficient to perform any jutsu at all. Even some ninja are stuck at low levels for their entire careers do to their inability to perform potent techniques. Naruto is like most shounen series in that it is built around a central lie: claiming that the massive prodigy who serves as the protagonist is actually a screw up.

And yet we are told specifically how everyone can get that chakra. Hard training. Power isnt handed out for free, you have to bust your rump working for it, but, genetic defects aside, there is nothing stopping jill or joe blow from becoming strong ninjas. Heck, even genetic defects like rock lee can become massively powerful just by having an insane trainer and the guts and willpower to keep working at it. Everyone can become super strong, super fast, super tough. They may not all end up with cookie cutter cloned skills with each other but thats generally a matter of personal preference and what type of ninja magic you are best suited for.

[Aeson]

Some video game settings might qualify. In The Elder Scrolls, for example, it appears that, at least from Morrowind onwards, everyone has the potential to learn magic, and in Oblivion and Skyrim maximum potential - at least for player characters - is very similar regardless of starting race and birthsign. Another example might be Dungeon Siege, if you assume the player character to be typical of the average peasant in the setting.

[tensai_oni]

Pokemon of course. Everyone can theoretically catch the same Pokemon, if their own creatures are strong enough to beat them into submission (and if they're lucky with the catch RNG). Controling a legendary nigh-omnipotent being counts as a superpower, right?

Less facetious answers: not sure if it's the most fair, but Nanoha is definitely one of the more fair universes. Anyone can learn to use magic and unless you're born on some backwater (like Earth for example), you also have good opportunities to do so. Moreover, not only does the series state that any natural talent or inborn abilities you may have aren't anywhere as important as steady long-term improvement through hard work, it generally* follows through with its own message as opposed to preaching one thing and then doing the other. On Midchilda, magic is just another skill people can have, practice and improve, and not everyone uses it for the same reason not everyone is a martial artist or an aeronautical engineer in real life.

*Just ignore anything Vivio does

[gooddragon1]

If a made up one would work: a combination of drowtales with everything having mana and the peaceful nature of MLP would be perfect for this.

[NovenFromTheSun]

I've never seen One Peice, but can't anyone there get powers from eating a devil fruit? Albeit, from what I've heard those might be hard to find.

[Lord Raziere]

I've never seen One Peice, but can't anyone there get powers from eating a devil fruit? Albeit, from what I've heard those might be hard to find.

At the same time, those Fruits can be massively unfair in what they actually DO, because each one is different, and there are some are so hax, while others are very weak in comparison. its essentially a lottery of what you get, only instead of birth like most, its at eating it, so your lottery superpower is opt-in, which is more fair than "heres what your born with, if you got "made of fire" as you superpower, tough luck!"

there is also Haki which serves as "normal" superpower attained through pure training one piece, but only two are available to everyone, the third is known as Kings Haki, is apparently only available to a certain weird bloodline and is massively unfair because its basically a mark of a superpower or leader. there is also merpeople and fishmen who can breathe underwater and have their own unfairness, because they can do things underwater while Devil Fruit users all drown in water. so race unfairness, also against the OP's specifications.

As for Naruto's magic:
well keep in mind it has a certain elemental affinity going on even if you don't have a bloodline- there are people that just better at fire jutsu than water jutsu, even if they're common folk and then there is genjutsu to think about. illusions that require certain levels of chakra control.

also keep in mind the ability to wield chakra was infused into humanity through a fruit from an alien tree designed to suck the world dry for some alien rinnegan ninja's experiment or something. so. thats a thing. one could say that Rock Lee is closer to how humanity naturally or originally WAS in Naruto before chakra was introduced. so its less a genetic defect and more a throwback to before a mutation that got introduced.

Pokemon could work as a fair superpower setting, depending on your interpretation. There is the anime interpretation and the mechanistic interpretation:

Anime Interpretation:
The anime interpretation of pokemon is that while types matter, as long as you train your pokemon right you can overcome the weaknesses they have and kick ass with any pokemon you want, and that any pokemon can be awesome. The idea that all pokemon are Magikarp in some way but can become Gyarados to some degree.

The Mechanistic Interpretation:
This interpretation is more about the games and how the actual mechanics of pokemon hash out. By the games actual mechanics, there is a massive tier list of which pokemon better or worse than others, as well as how certain type match ups are simply better than others in more situations. For example, most Ice types are not consider very good, so most people don't use types but pokemon that have better defensive typings given ice type moves that are offensively good. at the same time, the pokemon meta is one where people make mostly weather teams to just outright overpower people with their chosen type, which is mostly sunny day or rain dance. then there is the fact that mechanically, the best pokemon you can have are ones you have bred obsessively to produce perfect IVs so that they're inherently better than anything you find in the wild at birth and outclass the pokemon you've built memories with on your journey through the game. so mechanically speaking, there is in fact a lot of unfairness, as there are entire classes of pokemon that outpower and out-versatility most others, and its not just legendaries. I mean hell, Articuno is on the lowest tier at PU, so not even legendaries are immune to being outclassed.

Which would of course in the pokmonverse lead to rich kids and so on breeding pokemon to be the most powerful and generally treating them as objects to win them battles, and thus be a more cynical version of the pokemon universe we know and love. the more successful pokemon criminals wouldn't be stealing pokemon- they'd be capturing and forcefully breeding them and selling the offspring on black markets. the only reason to actually steal a pokemon is if your really desperate or want to do resource denial/emotional manipulation upon trainers, and that is if your being suboptimal about the stealing of pokemon. if you want optimal pokemon stealing, you hack into the global pokemon trading/transportation network and start redirecting all the pokemon being transferred to teleport to you instead, or even just teleport pokeballs right out of the trainers hands. so really, the pokemon universe is only fair as long as you don't think about how you can exploit the technology and rules it uses as background plot device.

[deuterio12]

In Touhou seemingly everybody if not anything can learn how to use spellcards even if you are just a bird or bug or ordinary human. Some get them seemingly from natural talent but others is explicitly hard work. And with said spellcards you have a shot at defeating the gods themselves.

[Kitten Champion]

Warcraft.

Every race - well, a significant amount of races - of either sex or socioeconomic class can become an Adventurer, including the Undead. Adventurers become really quite objectively powerful with effort and experience, though share relative parity between them... for the most part.

With the possible exception of Medivh, children don't inherit supernatural powers based on their lineage -- they acquire it as individuals. There are a lot of ways of accruing power - be they mystical or mundane - if you put the effort into them. The influential characters in the setting aren't exclusive to any specific power-set, if they have any superpowers to begin with.