Just a thought about the power level of Heroes in CoH

[kiario]

Hi,

No day goes by without me thinking of CoH. Today I thought about the actual power of the heroes in the game compared to heroes in the Marvel and DC universe.

In relative comparisson, are they more or less  powerfull than other super heroes?
A tank in CoH can have godly numbers of mitigation even compared to Marvel heroes.
So who is stronger Thing or a Tank from CoH?

And when on the subject, from where did the heroes in CoH get their power?

[emperorsteele]

Well, no one is Superman-level on any scale, that's for sure. Statesman, canonically one of the most powerful people in-universe, can on one hand take down a city-sized flying saucer by himself (promotional video), but on the other hand, can also be blown across town and KO'd by an Exploding Circle Mage (happened in an issue of the comic). That same Circle mage can be defeated in 3 hits by a normal person wielding a katana.

The way the power system and enhancements worked, a kick to the nuts could do more damage than a flung slab of concrete or a telekinitically thrown car, at least in theory.

So in short, in order to make these comparisons, we'd have to disregard a lot of things and come to a consensus as to how individual abilities scale relative to one another, then compare all that to the displayed abilities of Marvel and DC characters.

As for where various Supers got thier powers:

Statesman: Directly from the Well of The Furries
Psyche: Mutant
Synapse: Crey lab rat
Positron: Genius who built his own super suit
Manticore: Dead parents + rich

[Mistress Urd]

From the looks of things, the average person in town is almost 7' tall and every woman carrying a purse in town has super strength.

[Shenku]

As for where various Supers got thier powers:

Statesman: Directly from the Well of The Furries
Psyche: Mutant
Synapse: Crey lab rat
Positron: Genius who built his own super suit
Manticore: Dead parents + rich

All of the above + Prometheus' Fire, according to the Comics. Particularly Manticore as it was the source of his only actual power(Teleportation/Teleporting Arrows).

Also, the character Origin's (Natural, Tech, Science, Mutation, and Magic) pretty well covered a majority of the less specific sources of player/NPCs' powers.

[Golden Girl]

All comic book characters are as strong or effective as the story requires them to be ;)

[HEATSTROKE]

i dont think you can accurately compare comic book lore to City of Heroes..

for example.. when you say who is stronger a CoH Tank or the Thing..

What exactly do you mean by stronger ?

  Is that causing damage.. taking damage.. lifting something ??

[Shenku]

All comic book characters are as strong or effective as the story requires them to be ;)

Yeah, this pretty much sums up the comparison in a nutshell.

Say for example you have a comic about a fight to the death between Superman and Batman. Knowing what we do of their previous comics and exploits, we have all kinds of information about the characters' histories, their abilities, their personalities, the things they're willing or unwilling to do, exc. So who wins the fight, and who ends up dead?

Whomever the writer chooses.

Maybe the writer is a Superman fan and thinks Batman is a chump, so the Bat dies a chump death and gets punched into orbit. Or maybe the writer likes Batman more, and has Batman pull out a Kryptonite machete from his Utility Belt to chop of Supes' head. Either way, the writer of the individual story picks the outcome before the battle even begins, and each writer's perspective of what the outcome should be is a very subjective thing.

So who's stronger, The Thing or Statesman? Depends on who's writing the story.

[kiario]

Hello,

Yeah thats true, its the story and the writer that mostly decides who will win in fantasy stuff like this.

But there are fictional facts :) as example batman does not really have any superhuman strength vs superman and he is not that much smarter to fool him in to a defeat.

Statesman vs Thing, with stronger I mean of course who would win the fight. But on the whole I think heroes in this game are in general not on par power wise with super heroes in DC  or Marvel. Not at least the ones we are playing in the game.

It a little stupid comparisson I know :)

[primeknight]

Hello,

Yeah thats true, its the story and the writer that mostly decides who will win in fantasy stuff like this.

But there are fictional facts :) as example batman does not really have any superhuman strength vs superman and he is not that much smarter to fool him in to a defeat.

Statesman vs Thing, with stronger I mean of course who would win the fight. But on the whole I think heroes in this game are in general not on par power wise with super heroes in DC  or Marvel. Not at least the ones we are playing in the game.

It a little stupid comparison I know :)

Hi,  So the beauty of fiction is that the writer decides everything. 

And there's more ways to defeat a hero that punching them into submission.  My favorite stories have a good villain that seemingly defeats the hero's spirit and ideology without having to throw a punch (at the hero).  Superman had Lex force Superman into a no win situation by choosing one rocket vs another. And then make him change the course of history to save people (by changing time).  Or the Dark Knight, the Joker defeated all three heroes:  he destroyed Harvey, killed Rachel, tarnished Bruce (forcing him to spy on everyone, and become a symbol of crime), and messed up James (making him live a lie and apparently losing his family)

So in  fiction, you can decide who defeats who and you also get to decide how, when, where, why and all that.  Anyone can defeat anyone, and everyone has their own strengths. And you, as someone who enjoys fiction, can even create their own characters and universes.  You could have your hero team up with Spiderman and Spock and cruise around on the Millennium Falcon and assist the Green Lanterns in delivering food an medicine to a planet ravaged by Unicron.  Or you could make up your own story with all your own characters. 

And that was one of the great things about City of Heroes:  there was a story and a setting to start with, but the city was so wide open that the player could make just about any character they chose and have them interact with others in any way they chose. 

[Shenku]

Also keep in mind that when it comes to comics, and Superman is a great example, if you can't deal with the task before the hero with his current abilities, make some s*** up.

There were several instances with Superman I believe where he suddenly had new powers to help him deal with something in some of the older comics, some of those powers being just ridiculous to give to the man who already was overpowered enough as it was.

So again, just because Batman wouldn't stand a chance in a "fair fight" with Superman normally, doesn't mean that the writer can't decide to suddenly make Bruce a hundred times stronger for no other reason than because he can(Venom, that "Super Serum" Superman gave to Lois in that one movie, exc.), or simply having Bruce outwit and out manuever Clark.

What it all comes down to is what is the story, and who is telling it. Everything else can be tossed out the window. Stats, fictional-facts, abilities, powers, gear, and feats of "strength" mean nothing if the writer decides that they mean nothing. Basically, there is no single correct answer because everything is the correct answer.

[Tacitala]

Well, no one is Superman-level on any scale, that's for sure.

I'll put in a vote that Tyrant was at the end of the Magisterium Trial.  How many Incarnates had to gang up on him to take him down? o_O;;

[MaidMercury]

according to the book I read, "The Web of Arachnos"
Statesman, Arachnos both got their power from Well of Furies, then afterwards
(generalization) some of that remaining power spread out in the 4 winds,
to fall on a minute population....Other heroes, heroines were appearing with various abilities.


I loved both books: The Web of Arachnos, The Freedom Phalanx.

[Ashen Fury]

i feel like at the highest incarnate level we were able to get to, we would probably were on the level of what marvel would classify as "Omega-level" powers, being that we were able to deal with cosmic level threats on our own and in a lot of cases deal with multiple archvillains at a time on our own as well. If we had been able to continue going further down the incarnate/ascended path, I assume that before long we would have been cosmic-level entities ourselves.

[Dollhouse]

Brings to mind the correct answer to the classic superhero/supervillain question, "who wins a battle between so-and-so and so-and-so?" The answer is another question: "whose name is on the cover?" =P

[Blackstar5]

i feel like at the highest incarnate level we were able to get to, we would probably were on the level of what marvel would classify as "Omega-level" powers, being that we were able to deal with cosmic level threats on our own and in a lot of cases deal with multiple archvillains at a time on our own as well. If we had been able to continue going further down the incarnate/ascended path, I assume that before long we would have been cosmic-level entities ourselves.

Remember when you did the Oroboros mission where you play yourself as an incarnate, you wipe the floor with all the baddies, including Lord Recluse.