Death Battle 5: Mister Rogers in a Bloodstained Sweater

[Lemmy]

Don't even try to give numbers like that. In real life, experience and technique don't even stretch that far in official fighting matches (at least not when opponents are both at the highest levels). In the end the faster, stronger, more robust fighter usually wins over the weaker experienced one. However, in real real life experience and technique can be far more decisive because you can bring in factors such as surprise, or environment, and weapons that can remove any form of physical superiority.

However, we are talking about many different fantasy worlds full of superheroes, freaks, and assorted bag of cartoon misfits. Technique and experience can do a lot of things, whatever the author wants it to really. For Batman, his skillset lets him steal Green Lantern's ring, ambush the Flash, and take down Superman. Deathstroke's superpowers aren't anywhere near the heights of most individual superheroes, but he takes on seven of the JLA in one go. Captain Boomerang has no superpowers but can still hit The Flash, yes The Flash, with a boomerang.

Of course, in all of the above cases, the character has prior knowledge of his opponent and perhaps prep time. Those things that are against DB rules.

You will notice that I never said "In Real Life". In most medias, experience and technique does allow people to defeat much stronger opponents, but even that is usually limited to people of similar "threat levels", unless there's trickery, technology or some other equalizing factor (e.g.: Batman bringing kryptonite to fight Superman, or using a trap/ambush to defeat Flash).

I'm sure there's some story where Deathstroke defeats Wonder Woman in direct combat or something, but most of the time, that kind of power gap is shown as impossible to overcome with only skill/technique (unless skill/technique is somehow able to make you more powerful - e.g.: Goku using the Kaioken and general DBZ ki mechanics, actually).

That reminds me... Did they ever have Taskmaster in DB? I don't remember, but I rarely watch the actual videos anymore, unless it's a really interesting match concept.

[HandofShadows]

You explain that Peter Parker can invent impressive gadgets on the spot with scrap, which is pretty impressive. However, Batman is the world's greatest detective, he makes and customizes his own gear in many comics, which includes an awful lot of future oriented and super tech, and is basically is a scientific and technological genius in every relevant subject.

Peter Parker is up there in terms of smarts, but his universe has a surfeit of scientific geniuses that regularly produce super-tech greater than anything Peter has made. Batman designed and put together the Hellbat Armor, armor that he used to defeat Darkseid (using the JLA member's superpowers to get the components).

So no, Spider-Man does not beat Batman in the gadget department.

Batman's equipment isn't so much that he is better than Peter, he just has a much, MUCH bigger budget to work with. The real difference is that while Batman is a builder, Peter is an inventor.

[Reddish Mage]

]
I never liked the 'at their best' rule because of some really dumb outliers. Like Donkey Kong throwing the moon, or Mario surviving a stadium shattering explosion.

That being said, I don't like taking the weakest point either. I feel it's better to look at things as 'what is a threat to these characters?' Using Mario for example, sure he can survive falling from a mountain top, but at the same time, a goomba hitting him still hurts. He can't just ignore those hits, and he can be worn down. I mean, these characters already blatantly ignore physics, why not have them operate under different rules of durability?

We've been over it, as Seppl stated, taking the "best of" is an objective rule that you can really apply consistently and criticize DB if they fail to apply it.

You're rule is too vague. Its not clear what to consider a valid threat (are we still looking at all official material or just whatever is considered canon), and not to mention the range of valid threats are extreme. I've asked you how to apply it to a number of characters:

Batman has been hurt by perfectly ordinary things and rather weak villains, Superman, at times, appears to be hurt by loud noises, bright lights and electricity, Goku was downed by an "ordinary" laser.

Apparently, half the time you want to say its not really a valid threat, but I haven't got a rule that applies universally. When you are applying it, its much like the example of the spike pit trap in a 2d platformer. You simply want to focus on what the smallest thing is that has been shown to harm them (except not really), rather than the greatest thing they have been shown to withstand.

The same rule would suggest The Flash could be killed by any guy with a gun, since he sometimes gets hit by throw objects, arrows or boomerangs. In fact, The Flash is probably the best example of how great the range is, because his reflexes (and clearly his senses) are given so clearly and so often as beyond relativistic, yet ordinary stuff has hit him.

Given that the same character can shrug these things off, and do so in their best fights (sometimes do so frequently), I think the "best of" rule captures people's expectations of how these characters perform rather than the lowest level of a "valid" threat you can find.

[Forum Explorer]

While it leads to weirdness, this is the one rule you can make that can be applied objectively. For all other rules you would have to say where you draw the line and why.

Also, for me at least, this is half the fun of Death Battle. I want to know about these weird things the characters did that I did not yet know about, and see how they play out if taken seriously.

It does have the advantage of simplicity, I'll give it that.

We've been over it, as Seppl stated, taking the "best of" is an objective rule that you can really apply consistently and criticize DB if they fail to apply it.

You're rule is too vague. Its not clear what to consider a valid threat (are we still looking at all official material or just whatever is considered canon), and not to mention the range of valid threats are extreme. I've asked you how to apply it to a number of characters:

Batman has been hurt by perfectly ordinary things and rather weak villains, Superman, at times, appears to be hurt by loud noises, bright lights and electricity, Goku was downed by an "ordinary" laser.

Apparently, half the time you want to say its not really a valid threat, but I haven't got a rule that applies universally. When you are applying it, its much like the example of the spike pit trap in a 2d platformer. You simply want to focus on what the smallest thing is that has been shown to harm them (except not really), rather than the greatest thing they have been shown to withstand.

The same rule would suggest The Flash could be killed by any guy with a gun, since he sometimes gets hit by throw objects, arrows or boomerangs. In fact, The Flash is probably the best example of how great the range is, because his reflexes (and clearly his senses) are given so clearly and so often as beyond relativistic, yet ordinary stuff has hit him.

Given that the same character can shrug these things off, and do so in their best fights (sometimes do so frequently), I think the "best of" rule captures people's expectations of how these characters perform rather than the lowest level of a "valid" threat you can find.

Going by strongest feat only may be simple to apply, but it completely ignores the inconsistencies of the characters which I feel should be addressed. And going by strongest only leads to an artifical inflation of the character. And yeah, the Flash is a perfect example of this. I mean one of his main villains is Captain Boomerang. Who doesn't have powers, he's just really good at throwing boomerangs. Ignoring stuff like that is just as 'dishonest' as focusing entirely on it.

Yeah, it's really hard to reconcile inconsistencies. That's because most inconsistencies are caused by bad writing. But I find that a character being poorly written, and being deemed stronger as a result is incredibly unsatisfying. And if the difficulty in reconciling inconsistencies caused them to choose less comic book characters, then I would count that as a win.

Anyways, I feel like a just as valid way of determining their feats would be to look at their feats in the climax of their latest arc/game. Anything inconsistent with that performance gets discarded. (Though I've seen others. Like for games only having anything that is inconsistent with the cinematic gets discarded, ect.)

[Celestia]

as for Zelda timeline stuff, why can't you just call Breath of the Wild a canonical parallel universe if it doesn't fit?

Because Nintendo said that it's not. It's at the end on the timeline. The problem is that there are three timelines that split off from Ocarina of Time, and Breath of the Wild explicitly references all three of them, meaning that the timelines must somehow merge back together. That is, of course, not how timelines work, but that's why Hyrule Warriors would fix it. In that game, the timelines do merge back together thanks to Cia's magic, and the game also brings in all three timelines (though it seems to be predominantly set in the child timeline, and the other two are merged into it).

The timeline doesn't matter. All of the Links and Zeldas are explicitly the same person.

It actually does matter due to the split timeline. The Spirit of the Hero that continues in the child timeline is different from the one that continues in the downfall timeline, so even if you're giving Link access to all his gear and skills throughout history, he can't have both the spell medallions from Link to the Past and the hidden skills from Twilight Princess, as an example. You need to pick one timeline. Though, as I said, Breath of the Wild messes this up.

[Lord Raziere]

Because Nintendo said that it's not. It's at the end on the timeline. The problem is that there are three timelines that split off from Ocarina of Time, and Breath of the Wild explicitly references all three of them, meaning that the timelines must somehow merge back together. That is, of course, not how timelines work, but that's why Hyrule Warriors would fix it. In that game, the timelines do merge back together thanks to Cia's magic, and the game also brings in all three timelines (though it seems to be predominantly set in the child timeline, and the other two are merged into it).

Wow. now I know why the Elder Scroll Dragon Breaks are sometimes needed other than character choices. Too bad Legend of Zelda doesn't have those, or that would explain the timeline merge easily.

[Forum Explorer]

Because Nintendo said that it's not. It's at the end on the timeline. The problem is that there are three timelines that split off from Ocarina of Time, and Breath of the Wild explicitly references all three of them, meaning that the timelines must somehow merge back together. That is, of course, not how timelines work, but that's why Hyrule Warriors would fix it. In that game, the timelines do merge back together thanks to Cia's magic, and the game also brings in all three timelines (though it seems to be predominantly set in the child timeline, and the other two are merged into it).


It actually does matter due to the split timeline. The Spirit of the Hero that continues in the child timeline is different from the one that continues in the downfall timeline, so even if you're giving Link access to all his gear and skills throughout history, he can't have both the spell medallions from Link to the Past and the hidden skills from Twilight Princess, as an example. You need to pick one timeline. Though, as I said, Breath of the Wild messes this up.

Wait, where does Breath of the Wild reference the Flood timeline?

[Dragonexx]

Some language versions replace the reference to zelda makes to twilight princess with a reference to wind waker.

[ElFi]

Wait, where does Breath of the Wild reference the Flood timeline?

The Rito being present at all constitutes a reference to that timeline, since Wind Waker is the only other (canon) game they've appeared in in the series.

[Lemmy]

I never understood why people worry abour the LoZ timeline...

At some point Nintendo decided to pretend there's a timelinr because fans kept asking them about it, but it's pretty clear that the developers simply don't give a damn about it and just create whatever game they want using the same characters and general elements.

[Forum Explorer]

The Rito being present at all constitutes a reference to that timeline, since Wind Waker is the only other (canon) game they've appeared in in the series.

My headcanon is that the Rito are actually descended from the Occaco because them evolving from the Zoras makes no sense! Just somewhere along the line they mixed up the names of the two species.

But even if you don't like that idea, there is nothing preventing the Rito from evolving in any other timeline. Considering that the world flooding really should only benefit Zoras, so if anything the world not flooding would make their canon evolution more likely.

I never understood why people worry abour the LoZ timeline...

At some point Nintendo decided to pretend there's a timelinr because fans kept asking them about it, but it's pretty clear that the developers simply don't give a damn about it and just create whatever game they want using the same characters and general elements.

It's fun, and we got Hyrule Warriors out of it, which is a really fun game in my book. I just wish it had a vs mode.

Some language versions replace the reference to zelda makes to twilight princess with a reference to wind waker.

That's weird. That's really weird. Why and how did that happen?

[Reddish Mage]

It does have the advantage of simplicity, I'll give it that.

Going by strongest feat only may be simple to apply, but it completely ignores the inconsistencies of the characters which I feel should be addressed. And going by strongest only leads to an artifical inflation of the character. And yeah, the Flash is a perfect example of this. I mean one of his main villains is Captain Boomerang. Who doesn't have powers, he's just really good at throwing boomerangs. Ignoring stuff like that is just as 'dishonest' as focusing entirely on it.

Yeah, it's really hard to reconcile inconsistencies. That's because most inconsistencies are caused by bad writing. But I find that a character being poorly written, and being deemed stronger as a result is incredibly unsatisfying. And if the difficulty in reconciling inconsistencies caused them to choose less comic book characters, then I would count that as a win.

There are two problems with this line of reasoning. The first is that it isn't correct, and the second is this undermines the entire point of Deathbattle.

First, the worse opponents moments of a character are in no way equal to their best moments. Usually, the superhero will get owned in an unimpressive way, in the earlier part of the story, and its just to throw off the character, who will come back by the end better for it. The Flash can certainly out-think and outperform boomerangs (and omega beams) if he's on his game.

The "outliers" you are talking about are some of the most consequential and iconic moments of a character's entire history. Those aren't things you just dismiss. You would focus on Goku getting killed by Hit's surprise attack, or downed by a laser as more consequential than Goku going into Ultra-Instinct form. After all, you are telling me moments of weakness to "valid threats" are valid and have not labeled them outliers. Meanwhile, time after time, you take a lot of big climatic moments and scream "outlier!"

This completely messes with reader's expectations of how these characters should perform. We aren't interested in a fight where a kid from Lazer Tag Academy beats Goku because Goku's friendly, has his guard down, and so would be completely surprised by a laser hit. We want a fight where Goku is fighting at his best, and want to know if that Goku is beat by another character operating at his best.

Second, you are advocating "less comic book characters," which is the entire point of Death Battle and this thread! What would you replace them with? Its not like characters like Harry Potter, Luke Skywalker, Mario and so on are so much easier to define and prove.

Essentially, your argument comes down to saying that these character's abilities need to be consistently portrayed, and since they aren't, let's not have this sort of analysis at all.

If you don't think this thread should exist, there are plenty of others in the forum to participate in. Why are you coming in battle after battle and advocating something that you accept just doesn't work for these characters?

Wait, where does Breath of the Wild reference the Flood timeline?

There's plenty of lists of references online. The place is full of ruins and look-a-like locations. Since the timeline of the game talks about containing Ganon 10,000 years in the past that leaves a huge time period where the action in the other games could take place.

So in addition to whatever Nintendo has said on the subject, Breath of the Wild fits well as a game that could happen after all the other games simply because of all the Easter eggs.

[Prime32]

I never understood why people worry abour the LoZ timeline...

At some point Nintendo decided to pretend there's a timelinr because fans kept asking them about it, but it's pretty clear that the developers simply don't give a damn about it and just create whatever game they want using the same characters and general elements.

Yes, Nintendo always create gameplay first, then build the story around it (the Inklings starting as featureless cubes is a famous example). But I'm not sure what you're getting at.

First they released The Legend of Zelda, which is about two Triforces and killing Ganon. Then they released a sequel called Zelda II, which is about collecting the third piece of the Triforce while enemies try to revive the dead Ganon. I can understand the argument that Nintendo stopped caring about timelines, but not that Zelda II was never meant to take place after Zelda I. Then they released a third game which was so explicit about being set before I and II that they put it in the title. So at what point did they stop caring?

So in addition to whatever Nintendo has said on the subject, Breath of the Wild fits well as a game that could happen after all the other games simply because of all the Easter eggs.

BotW even lampshades it with that sidequest where three archaeologists have mutually exclusive theories on a past extinction event, and end up deciding that all three have evidence and they may never know which one is true.

Though references aside, on a thematic level it would weaken Wind Waker if it had a sequel where Ganondorf came back.

[Forum Explorer]

There are two problems with this line of reasoning. The first is that it isn't correct, and the second is this undermines the entire point of Deathbattle.

First, the worse opponents moments of a character are in no way equal to their best moments. Usually, the superhero will get owned in an unimpressive way, in the earlier part of the story, and its just to throw off the character, who will come back by the end better for it. The Flash can certainly out-think and outperform boomerangs (and omega beams) if he's on his game.

The "outliers" you are talking about are some of the most consequential and iconic moments of a character's entire history. Those aren't things you just dismiss. You would focus on Goku getting killed by Hit's surprise attack, or downed by a laser as more consequential than Goku going into Ultra-Instinct form. After all, you are telling me moments of weakness to "valid threats" are valid and have not labeled them outliers. Meanwhile, time after time, you take a lot of big climatic moments and scream "outlier!"

This completely messes with reader's expectations of how these characters should perform. We aren't interested in a fight where a kid from Lazer Tag Academy beats Goku because Goku's friendly, has his guard down, and so would be completely surprised by a laser hit. We want a fight where Goku is fighting at his best, and want to know if that Goku is beat by another character operating at his best.

Second, you are advocating "less comic book characters," which is the entire point of Death Battle and this thread! What would you replace them with? Its not like characters like Harry Potter, Luke Skywalker, Mario and so on are so much easier to define and prove.

Essentially, your argument comes down to saying that these character's abilities need to be consistently portrayed, and since they aren't, let's not have this sort of analysis at all.

If you don't think this thread should exist, there are plenty of others in the forum to participate in. Why are you coming in battle after battle and advocating something that you accept just doesn't work for these characters?



There's plenty of lists of references online. The place is full of ruins and look-a-like locations. Since the timeline of the game talks about containing Ganon 10,000 years in the past that leaves a huge time period where the action in the other games could take place.

So in addition to whatever Nintendo has said on the subject, Breath of the Wild fits well as a game that could happen after all the other games simply because of all the Easter eggs.

You seem extremely hostile at the moment, though maybe I'm misreading you.

First off, you seem to be misunderstanding me. I'm not talking about looking at their worst opponent. I'm saying that looking at their strongest feat is just as misleading as looking at their weakest feat. If you look at the time Spiderman gets knocked out by a vase, you'll think he's only about as strong or tough as an ordinary human. If you look at the time he threw a tank, you'll think he's as strong as Colossus. When most often, he falls somewhere inbetween.

If you cannot reconcile inconsistencies and must take a standard, then rather than taking their strongest feat, I'd prefer if you took them at the point of the climax of the story, or the latest arc in the case of comics/games. Then throw out feats that are inconsistent with that point in time. And only if they are actually inconsistent. Goku being taken out by sneak attacks is inconsistent, but not with Ultra Instinct, but with the really old DB stuff where Launch shot him in his sleep. Regardless, what it tells me is that Goku's defense needs to be activated. If he lets his guard down, even a weak attack can kill him. He lost to Hit at that point, but I'm pretty sure at the current point in the story, he wouldn't lose. Not to one hit anyways.

Which comes back to why I say the best point to take is the climax of the end/latest arc. There the character will often be at the end point of their story arc. That's when a character will usually be at their best, and they'll pull out all the stops. If they are missing a power they used one time in the past, then it's worth looking into why they aren't using it. Was the power retconned out of existence? Did it have special requirements? These are questions I feel are worth asking, rather then just taking that power and saying they always have it, when they very clearly don't.

I advocate less comic book characters because I outright dislike DC and I'm not super fond of Marvel either. And the reason I don't like either company that much is because I find their characters often poorly written and inconsistent. You know, exactly what I'm complaining about right now. And it's not like they are lacking characters to pick from. Any video game character, many movie characters, manga, anime, and even books. There are a nigh infinite number of characters to look at.

So no, I'd hardly say it's undermining the purpose of Death Battle to change how they look at a character's feats. The purpose is who would win in a fight. Taking a viewpoint that disallows stuff like 'that one time, Superman picked up a black hole', isn't a bad thing. It's certainly a more difficult thing, that might require some strict rules on how you are determining things, but I feel their analysis would only get better for implementing said rules, or at least considering them.

[Devonix]

A lot of my issues with ignoring anything but the highest showings and tossing out everything else is that it basically is a self eating serpent. ok Flash shouldn't be able to be tagged by any marksman. Alright. Well You take away every single feat that the rogues have and now they can't be used in any verses. A low showing for someone is a high showing for their opponent.

[Lemmy]

It'd also be nice if they didn't use composite versions of characters... Or at least not do it to only one side of the match. One big problem with some death battles is how horribly unbalanced they are in terms of how "optimized" each version of a character is... GL x B10 is a good example, with GL using the abilities of multiple different characters, while B10 was basically limited to a single continuity.

[Devonix]

It'd also be nice if they didn't use composite versions of characters... Or at least not do it to only one side of the match. One big problem with some death battles is how horribly unbalanced they are in terms of how "optimized" each version of a character is... GL x B10 is a good example, with GL using the abilities of multiple different characters, while B10 was basically limited to a single continuity.

The only Compisite issues I have are with things like Compositing all Link's even though they are explicitly separate individuals with different skills, strengths and weaknesses. Allowing Hal to do things other GL's could do is more showing what the Ring is capable of. Hal " Could " do those things... if he knew how to do them.

[Lemmy]

The only Compisite issues I have are with things like Compositing all Link's even though they are explicitly separate individuals with different skills, strengths and weaknesses.

They fuse different versions of the characters all the time... Including, you guessed it... GxS.

Allowing Hal to do things other GL's could do is more showing what the Ring is capable of. Hal " Could " do those things... if he knew how to do them.

That's like saying Ryu should get (nearly) every special move from SF franchise because he "could" do those things... if he knew how to do it.

[Rynjin]

The only Compisite issues I have are with things like Compositing all Link's even though they are explicitly separate individuals with different skills, strengths and weaknesses. Allowing Hal to do things other GL's could do is more showing what the Ring is capable of. Hal " Could " do those things... if he knew how to do them.

"If he knew how to do them" is kind of an important factor though. It's like saying "Any random guy could beat Batman in a fight if he knew how lol".

[Reddish Mage]

I'm not talking about looking at their worst opponent. I'm saying that looking at their strongest feat is just as misleading as looking at their weakest feat. If you look at the time Spiderman gets knocked out by a vase, you'll think he's only about as strong or tough as an ordinary human. If you look at the time he threw a tank, you'll think he's as strong as Colossus. When most often, he falls somewhere inbetween.

If you cannot reconcile inconsistencies and must take a standard, then rather than taking their strongest feat, I'd prefer if you took them at the point of the climax of the story, or the latest arc in the case of comics/games.

Pardon my hostility, but I read what you said as basically attacking the concept of Deathbattle itself and specifically the idea of doing Superhero battles as incohernet (because they clearly have highly inconsistent characterizations even in their "canon" material).

However, let me try to understand, you are talking (now) again about a typical or "standard" depiction of the character. Spiderman's "standard" strength is supposedly not tank-lifting strong but really he has a standard strength somewhere between that and getting knocked out by a vase (I note the two are not measuring the same thing).

The problem with the notion of a "standard" is that you aren't giving me a standard. You are either just claiming that, obviously, Spider-Man cannot usually pick up a tank, or suggesting that, because Spider-Man doesn't typically pick up tanks we should simply ignore that case as too far from the mean. However, I see images showing Spider-Man doing A LOT of stuff that seems more or less tank sized, like lifting buses, towers, and (multiple) train cars.

By all means, let's ignore one-off feats that flies in the face of clear evidence that a character cannot repeat that feat. For example, if the character had a unique item or powerboost at the time they cannot usually access. But we've already been doing that on the thread.

Let's say the only reason to think a character can't do something is that they only pull it out once or twice or a couple of times and during climatic battles or in enormously consequential situations! Enormously consequential...like if they were in a battle to the death against an opponent that we are made to think is going to kill them or something...these feats seem relevant.

You may not like DC and Marvel characters for having so many stories written about them over the years and the inevitable inconsistencies but the same problem affects the video games, movies, books and other media regarding all the other characters. None of these characters are depicted with consistent strength, endurance feats, etc. In fact, going with video game character introduces a whole lot of other problems, as we just discussed.

[Forum Explorer]

Pardon my hostility, but I read what you said as basically attacking the concept of Deathbattle itself and specifically the idea of doing Superhero battles as incohernet (because they clearly have highly inconsistent characterizations even in their "canon" material).

However, let me try to understand, you are talking (now) again about a typical or "standard" depiction of the character. Spiderman's "standard" strength is supposedly not tank-lifting strong but really he has a standard strength somewhere between that and getting knocked out by a vase (I note the two are not measuring the same thing).

The problem with the notion of a "standard" is that you aren't giving me a standard. You are either just claiming that, obviously, Spider-Man cannot usually pick up a tank, or suggesting that, because Spider-Man doesn't typically pick up tanks we should simply ignore that case as too far from the mean. However, I see images showing Spider-Man doing A LOT of stuff that seems more or less tank sized, like lifting buses, towers, and (multiple) train cars.

By all means, let's ignore one-off feats that flies in the face of clear evidence that a character cannot repeat that feat. For example, if the character had a unique item or powerboost at the time they cannot usually access. But we've already been doing that on the thread.

Let's say the only reason to think a character can't do something is that they only pull it out once or twice or a couple of times and during climatic battles or in enormously consequential situations! Enormously consequential...like if they were in a battle to the death against an opponent that we are made to think is going to kill them or something...these feats seem relevant.

You may not like DC and Marvel characters for having so many stories written about them over the years and the inevitable inconsistencies but the same problem affects the video games, movies, books and other media regarding all the other characters. None of these characters are depicted with consistent strength, endurance feats, etc. In fact, going with video game character introduces a whole lot of other problems, as we just discussed.

I'm not trying to attack the concept so much as propose a better way of determining the strength of a character. Spiderman is just a example, and I chose vase and tank because I can actually remember both of those incidents, but I can't remember a really over the top durability feat and didn't want to look it up.

The standard I'm proposing is using the climatic fight from the end of a story or game to determine the standard level of a character's feats. If something later or earlier contradicts that or is dramatically different from that, then that case should be discounted. Like the Mario Tennis cutscene where Mario tanks a massive explosion. Since that contradicts him being in danger from Bowser's fire breath in the final fight of Mario Oddessy, it's discarded. It's not a perfect system, but I think it's more fair then 'a writer ten years ago had him fall through a black hole, and thus he's invincible to anything his opponent can do.'

I also don't like the writing in most of the DC and Marvel stuff I've read. Marvel is admittedly much better, and thus I tolerate it a lot more, but it has some really stupid stuff anyways.

[Traab]

I'm not trying to attack the concept so much as propose a better way of determining the strength of a character. Spiderman is just a example, and I chose vase and tank because I can actually remember both of those incidents, but I can't remember a really over the top durability feat and didn't want to look it up.

The standard I'm proposing is using the climatic fight from the end of a story or game to determine the standard level of a character's feats. If something later or earlier contradicts that or is dramatically different from that, then that case should be discounted. Like the Mario Tennis cutscene where Mario tanks a massive explosion. Since that contradicts him being in danger from Bowser's fire breath in the final fight of Mario Oddessy, it's discarded. It's not a perfect system, but I think it's more fair then 'a writer ten years ago had him fall through a black hole, and thus he's invincible to anything his opponent can do.'

I also don't like the writing in most of the DC and Marvel stuff I've read. Marvel is admittedly much better, and thus I tolerate it a lot more, but it has some really stupid stuff anyways.

The problem with that is it opens the fights up even more to interpretation. Virtually any feat can be offset by a time they didnt display that level of power/durability/speed/etc. That leaves us with both sides of the fight ticked off because of various subjective arguments being made. Its just better all around to pick the objectively strongest level of the character that can be backed up by references than trying to average them out to some level where nobody is going to be happy. And the black hole comments are a part of that because they dont just pick two guys out of a hat and declare them enemies only to later discover one is a street level hero while the other survived the heat death of the multiverse, they match up opponents AFTER doing research and finding two that are at least presumably fairly close. Sometimes it doesnt work well like flash versus quicksilver due to their love of thematic matches and the total lack of speedsters that fight on par with flash and arent already known enemies of him, but generally it works out.

You will notice the largest source of outrage in deathbattle comes from every single time they make a subjective judgement. When they unilaterally decide that toph can take garras sand from him, or give link everything and cloud barely anything, or decide that ki isnt magic, etc etc etc. Yes there may be arguments on the science side where people object to the total figure given for a feat, but generally that stuff gets left alone in favor of, "How DARE you interpret things like that? My personal favorite is clearly better than that!" Thats literally all death battles would be going by your setup. WAY too subjective, and good only for triggering massive arguments every single time.

[CarpeGuitarrem]

Taking a character's best feats might be an objective way to handle things, but it's a really really really bad way to answer the core question of a DB: "who would win?" Mostly because it powercreeps characters to no end.

Quick thought experiment: let's say there's a character called "1% Woman". Her power is that 1% of the time, she wins a fight against her opponent, no matter who that opponent is. 1% of the time, she loses a fight against her opponent, no matter who that opponent is. Over the course of the series, we see her take on a wide variety of opponents, and the writers slavishly follow the 1% rule: 1% of the times she fights opponents, she beats them outright and conclusively using this power, even when she has no right to.

And in DB, those are the only times that matter. Let's say she's up against Saitama, good ol' One Punch Man himself. Within the story, what percentage of a chance does she have of beating him? 1%. Within Death Battle, what percentage of a chance does she have of beating him? 100%, because we're cherrypicking her best feats, and there was that one time her 1% power gave her the win over a literal god.

Every character is like this, every single one. Raw power fluctuates, expertise varies, and luck happens. Sometimes you're on a good day, sometimes not so good, sometimes you pull off a feat you didn't realize you were capable of, and you never manage it again.

Interestingly, Deadliest Warrior (for its historical flaws) gets this right. Instead of trying to nebulously find the high point of their combatants, the ideal situations, they build out data based on the weapons and techniques of the warriors, and then feed it into a computer simulation and run it 1,000 times, and the side that won more times wins...and then the hosts talk about the results, and whether they agree or disagree.

Does it produce a definitive, conclusive result? Not at all, because trying to explore a situation where one character beats another 100% of the time, barring clear stomps, is a fool's errand. Death Battle's results might be conclusive, but they're not always true to the characters, and if you ask me, being true to the characters is kinda important.

[Reddish Mage]

You will notice the largest source of outrage in deathbattle comes from every single time they make a subjective judgement. When they unilaterally decide that toph can take garras sand from him, or give link everything and cloud barely anything, or decide that ki isnt magic, etc etc etc. Yes there may be arguments on the science side where people object to the total figure given for a feat, but generally that stuff gets left alone in favor of, "How DARE you interpret things like that? My personal favorite is clearly better than that!" Thats literally all death battles would be going by your setup. WAY too subjective, and good only for triggering massive arguments every single time.

In a multiverse of subjectivity and darkness, the "best of the character" rule is a shining star that allows Deathbattle to be Deathbattle.

This is what allows DB to bring in moments of "peak performance" analyze them and determine the winner.

Without this sort of thing, instead what the others are saying is that they want to go page by page over the character's entire body of work to get the stats. We see how absurd that is for a Goku, who literally grows up over the course of his work and gets stronger every time there is a new story arc.

Forum Explorer suggests instead taking the character at their latest story arc or at their power at the very climax of the latest story...which work well only for characters with linear story lines that have already culminated in a big final battle, and essentially means those characters get their peak feat. Meanwhile ongoing characters get whatever is in their latest manga, comic, video game etc. even if that happens to be a side-story that isn't big on combat.

The most criticized DB results actually appear to violate the "best of" rule. Ben 10's Alien X is supposed to be omnipotent, Garra is supposed to have Omega-Mutant level control over sand, Cloud is practically invincible on certain builds (its a JRPG!) and certainly strong enough to beat Sephiroth.

I think Goku vs. Superman is something special. Critics here are pretty much ignoring the first battle at this point (although that is probably where the most criticisms are found on the internet), to focus with laser precision on whether Superman's strength can fairly be read as "infinite" based on the shown feats...This criticism is that DB is actually not doing a peak feat analysis, how do you measure picking up an book of infinite pages in terms of newtons or kilograms?

Here is one of the cases (also He-Man) where DB reads an ability in abstract terms (in both instances, doing the impossible) and deciding the character wins on that fact. DB has only pulled out that a character can do "the impossible" in a few of these battles, for some reason it wasn't controversial when He-Man did it, possibly because people just didn't care about that fight, but also because throwing a mountain seemed with in line with his feats anyway.

Taking a character's best feats might be an objective way to handle things, but it's a really really really bad way to answer the core question of a DB: "who would win?" Mostly because it powercreeps characters to no end.

What is the problem with power if the character really can and does operate at that power when it is called for?

You guys are arguing as if DB is always taking peak moments from some minor moment of a side story. These are feats the characters are doing in their big climatic battles. I've shown how these feats are often repeated. Spiderman didn't just throw a tank, he has done such with buses, multiple train cars, and other big stuff.

Deathbattle is about putting superpowered characters against each other. It seems odd to object that these guys are simply too powerful.

Quick thought experiment: let's say there's a character called "1% Woman". Her power is that 1% of the time, she wins a fight against her opponent, no matter who that opponent is. 1% of the time, she loses a fight against her opponent, no matter who that opponent is.

Deathbattle actually says we take the character, after measuring their stats by their best feats, and imagine 1,000 battles, and the winner is the one who wins the most times. Usually, of course, you have to determine the stats by deriving them, here we learn that the superhero has an abstract power that works in a very funny way.

1% Woman, very explicitly has only one power, will win exactly 10 of those battles, lose exactly 10 and draw every other time, because that's what you said her power is...so I'm guessing that means its a draw?

Its not a very illuminating thought experiment.

And in DB, those are the only times that matter. Let's say she's up against Saitama, good ol' One Punch Man himself. Within the story, what percentage of a chance does she have of beating him? 1%. Within Death Battle, what percentage of a chance does she have of beating him? 100%, because we're cherrypicking her best feats, and there was that one time her 1% power gave her the win over a literal god.

You told me she had only one feat, now she has a ton of them but they only work 1% of the time....

You say Superman is, and Goku, and Shazam and everybody are like this and they are not. Superman has all that power and all that strength all the time, he just doesn't bring it out except on occasion because most Superman stories are not about that.

We don't consider the stories where the characters lose their powers and have to prevail as mere mortals (or even weaker) because what's the point of doing that!?

Why is it relevant how many times and in how many ways Superman has been exposed to kryptonite!? Does it matter that sometimes Bruce Banner can't bring out the Hulk or its weak Grey Hulk? These aren't the stories we are trying to tell here.

We are telling a story of two of the strongest characters going after each other in all their strength.

This is not slapstick comedy showing how Spiderman can get pwn'd by a vase that one time...However, if you want to write such a battle. Go for it. I challenge you to go and find out how weak and ordinary these characters can really be and write a battle on that basis!

I expect it'll take you several weeks. Afterwards, we can take the worse case scenario, put it together with the best case scenario from their actual Deathbattle, and see what the average gets us.

My crystal ball says the average of those results will be weird, highly arguable, and not really satisfy anyone.

Interestingly, Deadliest Warrior (for its historical flaws) gets this right. Instead of trying to nebulously find the high point of their combatants, the ideal situations, they build out data based on the weapons and techniques of the warriors, and then feed it into a computer simulation and run it 1,000 times, and the side that won more times wins...and then the hosts talk about the results, and whether they agree or disagree.

Except we've never seen how their computer works or how these "accurate" calculations are made. I strongly suspect its BS. Let's talk after they predict the odds for how professional fights will go.

If DB said they fed all their combatant's fights into a computer and that computer told them that this is how things go would that be better?

This is a thought experiment about how to do something impossible in the real world, and then apply it to fictional characters that engage in impossible fights. After gathering accurate data across the characters entire media presence, we have this impossibly great computer that can somehow analyze the extremely vague data, and come out with the exact amount of times one character will win over another.

If you think you can do all that, go ahead, we'll critique the result. In the meantime, don't use this as a basis for criticizing Deathbattle.

Does it produce a definitive, conclusive result? Not at all, because trying to explore a situation where one character beats another 100% of the time, barring clear stomps, is a fool's errand. Death Battle's results might be conclusive, but they're not always true to the characters, and if you ask me, being true to the characters is kinda important.

These results are nearly always true to the characters, at least some version of the character you can legitimately point to from the original source material.

Your alternative is the equivalent of putting everything into a blender and seeing what pours out and insisting that the blender produces something "true to the characters."

If instead, you can program what you are throwing everything into so that the perfect 1,000 scenarios comes out, let me know what this secret formula is.

[CarpeGuitarrem]

Deathbattle actually says we take the character, after measuring their stats by their best feats, and imagine 1,000 battles, and the winner is the one who wins the most times. Usually, of course, you have to determine the stats by deriving them, here we learn that the superhero has an abstract power that works in a very funny way.

Interesting, so basically it's actually the Deadliest Warrior method. Didn't realize that!

Now, the accuracy is questionable since it's mixing up peak performance with a delta of performance, but it's a start.

[Reddish Mage]

So regarding the Combat simulator. I've been wondering how this marvelous engine manages to "scientifically" determine the winner.

They took a video game and tweaked the engine for the show analysis.

So why not cut out the computer? You can take the combatants, create Mutant & Masterminds character sheets for them, and do 1,000 single battle scenarios.

[Lemmy]

You know... As much as we complain about people constantly rehashing GxS, at least it kept the thread moving... XD

[Reddish Mage]

You know... As much as we complain about people constantly rehashing GxS, at least it kept the thread moving... XD

Well, now we’ve established it’s the best most scientific method what would Superman’s and Goku‘s character sheets look like on mutants and masterminds?

Who is going to argue that Goku’s power level translates directly into his power level?

[Man on Fire]

I realized today random if Death Battle did Red Hood vs Winter Soldier, which many people want, they’ll likely bring up Jason having bested both Cass and Shiva in New 52. Now, this on itself doesn’t mean much since New 52 Cass and Shiva have little impressive feats and have been worfed into oblivion because Dan DiDio hates them. But Death Battle loves to use composites and would likely use that to scale Jason up to Pre-Flashpoint Cass and Shiva’s feats. And if that happens, I dunno but I just find it kinda amusing, a perspective of Cass buying her older brother a win.

[Lemmy]

Poor Shiva... Few characters have been worfed as hard as her... Possibly even worse than Doomsday.

I wish DC would treat its villains with more respect... And bring back Cass. She's the coolest Batgirl by far!