Battle of the Week: Aquaman vs. Iron Man

Our latest Character of the Month, Arthur Curry, a.k.a. Aquaman, has claimed his first victory in this segment! Last week, a majority of voters thought he would defeat Jennifer Walters, a.k.a. She-Hulk, in a slugfest! But what about a character who can attack from a distance and up close? This week, Aquaman's opponent is Tony Stark, a.k.a. Iron Man, and he's wearing his spiffy Extremis Armor. Will that be enough to eventually take down the King of the Seven Seas or will Aquaman drop yet another Marvel hero? Read the rules, give it some proper thought and then cast your vote!

Match Rules

• Combatants are in character. This means their usual set of morals apply.
• This is a random encounter (no prep for either side) and both sides have standard gear. Both sides have no immediate knowledge of their opponents, either. This is Tony Stark wearing his Extremis Armor and New 52 Aquaman.
• The fight begins in Times Square. It's unpopulated, during the day and the 3x3 block region surrounding them is unpopulated. The rest of the city is populated. Assume they start roughly 100 feet apart and visible.
• If you're not familiar with Manhattan, this location means the Hudson River and East River aren't too far away, but they aren't exactly close, either. They'd have to travel across several blocks to get to either and, if so, the battle will have to travel through populated sections of the city to get there. If you're unfamiliar with New York, click here to see a map.
• Incapacitation, knockout, BFR (battlefield removal, a.k.a. knocking the enemy so far away that there's no way the fight could continue in the near future) or death all count as elimination. Making a tactical retreat counts as a loss, too. "What's a tactical retreat?" It's leaving the fight with the intention of not returning to the battle in the near future. Going to another spot in the environment to catch your breath for a moment or for a tactical advantage is not a tactical retreat.
• Hey, you know what would be really cool? Treating everyone else in the debate with respect. If you think someone's saying something that just isn't true, go ahead and stick to the facts to point out why. There's no need at all to drop insults just because you disagree with someone. Seriously, this is just talking about a fictional fight, there's no need for immaturity and mudslinging.
• If you think the poll isn't going how it should, making an informative post about why a character is being underestimated and spreading the word is far more useful than just complaining.
• One more thing: you don't need to write an essay to have your post highlighted in Friday's article. Sometimes concise posts can be way more effective than a flood of paragraphs.

Check the homepage this Friday for an updated article with the following:

• The results of the poll.
• Thoughts from the staff.
• Viner arguments for both characters.
• If we're lucky, blurbs from industry talent.

Want to suggest a future Battle of the Week for Aquaman? Tell us below or share it via twitter.

Aquaman

Iron man.

Aquaman might take this, but I don't really know what the extremists armor can do.

This should be good.

Great match! I'm gonna keep my eye on this.

This will require some critical thinking..... or I could just take the easy way out and vote "Too Close to Call"

I suggested this one. Nice to see it used.

Voting for Iron Man. Strength and durability should be at least comparable, maybe an edge to Arthur, but Tony has a massive speed and ranged advantage. It's a good fight overall, but Iron Man has the right advantages.

Aquaman should take this with not real dificulty.

Ah yeah one of my suggestions made it. Nice choice Gregg this is gonna be a solid match up.

Aquaman has the physical edge whereas Tony sports a speed and ranged advantage. A close call so I'll come back later in the week for my verdict. I am just going to subtly plug a CAV I once did with @jwalser3 on this very topic in case people would like to see examples of the Iron Man vs Aquaman debate.

Iron man!!

Extremis is too much for aquaman to handle, faster, better reactions, has the firepower to both weaken and kill aquaman, repulsers twice as hot as the tempreture of the sun will dry out aquaman and perhaps even kill him, considering aquamans piercing durabilty isnt the greatest aswell precise cutting lasers will do big damage aswell, aquaman will make tony work for it but he dosent have the means to win.

Iron Man just seems way more versatile, and has more advantages over Aquaman. Iron Man 7 out of 10 times.

Very nice! Great battle choice!

I'd say Tony.

Theres no way im going to let Iron Douche win anything.

Aquaman takes this easy. Sure, Tony is tough and has tech, but even with everything he has he's still, at best, a B-lister. Aquaman has invulnerability, can smash metal with his bare hands, wields a magical trident, can control ocean currents, and can jump like nobody's business. Tony is smarter, but I don't think that'll give him the edge when Arthur crushes his suit within 5 seconds of their meeting.

I know that Aquaman's trident prabably can go through the armor, but is he fast enough to hit Iron Man?

Aquaman. He can tank Tony's attacks, and punches. Tony on the other hand, can't take many punches from Aquaman.

The bold and underlined is something Tony does as well. Iron man doesn't need to jump because he flies.

i think aquaman takes this one in a hard fought battle. I think aquaman can take any of the projectiles tony can throw at him and eventually close the distance and wear him down.

next week lets see aquaman vs magneto, or aquaman vs namor!

Tony is way to versatile for Aquaman.

Tony (In the extremis armour) can easily take the damage Aquaman is dealing and can just as easily give it back.

Tony also has the advantage of flight.

Also, considering Aquaman has to go through a populated area to get to the water, I think this would end up being a battle of morals. Tony (IMO) would be willing to sacrifice a few people to win, Aquaman would never do that, as his morals are too high.

Verdict: Iron Man 6-7/10.

I don't see why he can't. Iron man with 2% of his shields tanked a nuke.

Differences between his Extremis armor and Bleeding Edge?

I dont know :/

Aquaman vs Namor would be a spite in favour of Namor, but lets not change the subject.

Undecided which way to give this. Aquaman has a big physical edge, he's much stronger and more durable, and with his trident if Tony comes into close quarters I see Aquaman taking an easy win. That being said, Iron Man has got weaponry that gave Rulk, someone of a similar durability, a lot of difficulty. Despite Aquaman's jumping ability, if Tony plays it smart and keeps his distance then he's got a good chance. Waiting to see what other viners think on this...

Is tanking a nuke supposed to do anything good when compared to Aquaman's striking power? Yes, most likely, specially when at 2%, but I find Aquaman's striking feats better than Tony's durability, cause Aquaman has been capable of sending Superman flying (sucker punch, but still, very impressive) and two panels later sends Wonder Woman flying. Not to mention that Tony could literally rip apart Iron Man's body armor.

Or he could throw a ship at him. jk.

I'm not impressed by aquaman sending superman flying. Superman only weighs like 200 pounds and as you said it was a sucker punch. Tony in his older armor managed to knock out hulk with his punches (his armor collapsed but this armor is far inferior to extremis so not really a big deal). Same more or less applies to wonder woman.

I think Iron Man wins this with difficulty though part of me wants to say Aquaman.

He only weighs that much, but did you forget that Superman can fly faster than light, react faster than light and maouvre his body faster than light? Arthur messing Superman up like that when Superman can just come back in an instant is impressive.

Fairly certain Ironman is ridiculously faster than Aquaman in combat speed.

If he can hit Superman or Wonder Woman I don't see how he couldn't hit Iron Man.

@bladewolf: you are so off it isn't even funny. The iron man armor is far, far more durable than people give it credit for. Aquaman doesn't have the strength it takes to break the armor. Not even close. His EM force fields at 2 PERCENT can tank a nuke. Plus, tony is just as strong, faster, and has mountain busting energy beams that he would spam Arthur with until he wins. Those blasts are no joke, even at low power they are many times sun surface heat (as shown when he owns graviton in new avengers) The only way Aquaman could win is with his trident, but tony's way too fast to be hit by it. And if all this isn't enough, he has nanites that can and will enter Aquamans bloodstream. Tony has KOed she hulk this way. It could work on Arthur.

He suckerpunched them. Arthur won't have that element of surprise against Tony.

If Arthur takes it into one of the rivers, I'd give him the win. If not probably Tony.

Aquaman.....Up In The Sky........lol

Aquaman...

Aquaman in a effortless curbstomp.

Iron Man. Too much versatility.

I need feats from both Ironman and Aquaman to make a decision.

slight edge goes to Aquaman

Hahahahaha....No.

Aquaman has the edge in many factors. Weapon to block and tank Tonys attack plus telepathy and then some. Travel speed iron man has the edge and few arsenals to defend him self. I dont see tony taking down aquaman with out prep or some info

@citizensentry: Yesssssssss.

Even if he used the Hydro-Armor, Aquaman would own Stark

This is inverted Iron Man. He wins.

Peace out.

Senglord.

I wish it was Superior Iron Man

Iron Man wins this.

He's fought and beaten Namor before so he'd know exactly how to handle Aquaman. Arthur and Namor both have a heat weakness that Tony could easily exploit. In fact, he's fought Namor both underwater and on the surface before in his classic armor and used heating technology from his armor to evaporate the moisture from his body and make him weaker. Something he could probably do to Aquaman if they ever got close.

Gallery

He doesn't even have to get close if he doesn't want to. His repulsors are hot enough to melt through steel and his uni-beam has burned Graviton at temperatures hotter than the surface of the sun.

Both of these attacks will quickly dehydrate and weaken Aquaman.

Iron Man's also got a speed advantage on Aquaman. He can fly at massively hypersonic speeds and has millisecond reaction time. With his speed and flight advantage he can speed blitz Aquaman or punch him at 3,500 feet per second (2386.36 miles per hour).

Not to mention Aquaman's weakness to electric based attacks.

Gallery

Iron Man can emit electricity that would severely harm Aquaman.

I can see Iron Man taking a majority against Aquaman due to these reasons.