Doctor Octopus vs M.O.D.O.K. (prep battle)

The pod-armored Doc Ock vs standard M.O.D.O.K.
 
Doc Ock and M.O.D.O.K. both have evil plans that are afoot.  Both of them happen to need the exact same radioactive element to complete their plans.  Doc Ock has it now.  M.O.D.O.K. is going to come and try to get it.  Doc Ock knows he's coming.  They have one month to prepare for their upcoming battle.  They both have a reasonable amount of information about the other's capabilities.
 
Neither gets to use any human or super-powered henchmen--it's strictly those two individuals, and whatever tech they create.  They are allowed to make robot flunkies. 
 
The eventual battle will take place at Doc Ock's underwater headquarters.  They both get whatever tech they normally have, or could reasonably build.
 
In character.  Neither has debilitating health issues.  Win by any means.
 
Who wins and why?
 

If I remember accurately, Otto already proved he had the superior intellect when he outmaneuvered MODOK during the Sinister Six's battle with the Intelligencia.

@BringnIt said:

If I remember accurately, Otto already proved he had the superior intellect when he outmaneuvered MODOK during the Sinister Six's battle with the Intelligencia.

Whoops! Well, I had forgotten all about that. But I'd disagree that that issue proved that Ock had the superior intellect. I went back and checked, here's what happened.

Ock wanted to make sure MODOK didn't take over the world, because Ock wanted to take over the world himself. MODOK wasn't expecting an attack from him. Ock and the Sinister Six didn't show much in the way of real strategy in the attack, other than planting Chameleon to infiltrate them, which could well have been Chameleon's idea. It was a basic surprise frontal assault.

It was a mostly physical battle, mostly involving other supervillains (so it's a fairly different situation than this thread, where they both have forewarning of the battle, and there are no super-powered allies). The battle was basically about the Sinister Six (Rhino, Electro, Mysterio, Ock, Chameleon, Sandman) beating up the Intelligentsia (MODOK, Red Ghost and his apes, Wizard, and Mad Thinker and his Android). Chameleon blew up MODOK's psi-blaster right at the start of the battle, which was a decisive move, but again was Chameleon's idea, not Ock's. Then Ock and MODOK started playing a game of "chess" by using MODOK's gravity cannon to send the others into space. But this was totally arbitrarily done and was full of PIS: Ock sent Wizard to space, then Electro pushed Thinker into the beam, Rhino pushed the Android into the beam, and somehow Red Ghost and some of his apes get in the beam. It wasn't really clear at all that Ock was using the cannon in a superior way than MODOK.

The Sinister Six being triumphant, Ock forces MODOK to say Ock is smarter. But this is just like a bully making someone cry Uncle. He just wanted to rub MODOK's face in the dirt.

Basically Ock's team won through a little strategy, which was at least partly due to Chameleon, brute force, and luck in the gravity gun chess game. Plus it was all PIS in the sense that the whole story was meant to prop up Ock as a major villain as he moved towards Ends of the Earth. MODOK has been a lot more effective at other times, such as the Fall of the Hulks.

So while I think that comic does show some evidence in favor of Ock as an organizer, it's not really decisive in terms of how the battle in this thread would go down, especially since it was a surprise attack.

While I don't disagree strongly with any particular point, I viewed the arc as demonstrating Ock's superiority--at least in Slott's mind--regardless of whether or not it's congruous with other portrayals of the character. So while I have no qualms with anyone using other evidence to make a case for MODOK, one presumes that the Intelligencia had their best defenses and technology installed at the time of the attack, surprise or otherwise, since it took place at their secret base.

MODOK. He just seems better at seeing contingencies and possibilities. His lousy people skills should not be a problem in this scenario.

I give this to doc due to his defensive capabilities ... defense wins super bowls!!

@BringnIt said:

While I don't disagree strongly with any particular point, I viewed the arc as demonstrating Ock's superiority--at least in Slott's mind--regardless of whether or not it's congruous with other portrayals of the character. So while I have no qualms with anyone using other evidence to make a case for MODOK, one presumes that the Intelligencia had their best defenses and technology installed at the time of the attack, surprise or otherwise, since it took place at their secret base.

Fair enough. The battle itself didn't really do so much for me in terms of comparing Ock vs MODOK, but the immediately following Ends of the Earth, and now his switch into Superior Spidey, have turned Ock into a much more formidable villain than I saw him as before, and I think the prominence of these storylines should probably eclipse previous somewhat lesser showings to some extent.

While MODOK has been, in my mind, a generally more competent and formidable villain over his overall career than Ock's baseline, Ock's recent showings may well put him above standard MODOK. I can't recall offhand MODOK doing anything quite so complicated or successful as his Ends of the Earth weapon/scheme. Fall of the Hulks did have some impressive feats, in that it showed the Intelligentsia's involvement with creating Red Hulk, and then creating all those other Hulked-up people, who as I recall destroyed most of Washington DC (just a little while before the Serpent did :) ). Turning most of the heroes into Hulked-up heroes was probably about as good a feat as when Ock's teams beat down most of the heroes in Ends of the Earth. But most of the Fall of the Hulks prep feats were orchestrated by multiple members of the Intelligentsia, not just MODOK, so he can't stand on those feats as solidly as Ock can stand on his.

@robertloucksjr said:

MODOK. He just seems better at seeing contingencies and possibilities. His lousy people skills should not be a problem in this scenario.

I agree that this should be a big factor. MODOK, over the long run, seems better at the whole "wheels within wheels" kinds of plans, while Ock tends to be more straightforward--at least until recently.

MODOK was quite ingenious in the Super Villain Team-up miniseries.

M.O.D.O.K

M.O.D.O.K

@wesat: Waitaminnit! You're using Happy the Golem as your icon!? Sweet. I uploaded that picture to the Vine and have just about finished wiki-ing all of the Books of Magic, so I am happy to see that.