Every week, one thread containing the best setup and arguments will be pinned to spotlight it and encourage a higher standard of thread-making and debating. This week, this is that thread.
Cool. Its good seeing moderator involvement in the section.
Every week, one thread containing the best setup and arguments will be pinned to spotlight it and encourage a higher standard of thread-making and debating. This week, this is that thread.
WOW, uhh cool. :D
Great job so far. Tag me in for v-v-votes pretty please
Okay let's finish this bad boy up, shall we?
I apologize for the delay, I had to go looking for a set of scans for this debate. I found 'em though so it was worth it.
The Rings are almost impossible to separate from the Mandarin, he is psionically linked to them and has been for decades of real life continuity. He can perceive what goes on when someone else uses them, he can stop others from using them and he oftentimes allows his 'hand' (alternately comprised of zealots and The Hand) to use his rings in his steed, he can teleport the rings to and from them. Distance doesn't seem to be an issue either.
Mandarin Teleports his ring off of Killmonger half a world away (This was the scan set that I was looking for btw).
Teleports his rings off of his 'hand' goons
Teleports the rings off of him and to the hand
And although the relevancy of this set can be debated, here the rings auto return to him when he's rendered unconscious.
If Light were to employ an EMP, perhaps in an attempt to try and disable the rings, that wouldn't work either.
As for the Haunted storyline you mentioned I can only hypothesize why The Mandarin didn't return his rings to him. Perhaps he was unable to because his hands were destroyed previously in the (ironically named) Hands Of The Mandarin arc and the prosthetic hands didn't let him interact with the rings and that was why he had to have them fused into his spine in the first place.
He also seemed to be more interested in his plan to spread Extremis than killing Tony and seemed to be stalling for time.
On a more personal note, I disliked this arc because The Mandarin has been shown multiple times that he can go toe-to-toe with some of Tony's more powerful armors, certainly more powerful than the old Silver Centurion armor. As I've shown, he's matched up to the Modular and retro red and gold armors which succeed the S.C armor by almost thirty years. Despite that though, Tony was beating on him with this obsolete and under powered armor, his manifestations of the rings powers weren't as impressive as I'd have liked either.
Moving on, assuming Mandarin is victorious against Brainiac and Light goes for the 'port of the rings trick Mandarin (I hope I've shown) should have no trouble pulling them back to him.
From There the options really open up:
Vs The Scarlet Witch
Her Hex powers mess up his rings a bit but also doubles as another solid durability feat for the Mandarin.
Another Iron Man battle from Vol 4 of Iron Man
Or he could just go nuts and channel all ten rings against Light at the same time.
I thought to use some of the other ability feats for the rings themselves but they weren't being controlled by the Mandarin at the time and I don't want to muddy the waters and leave that open as a counter argument, even though I think he should be able to do anything a less experienced user of the rings can. So instead I'll move back to the gas, now by combining that with Spin (The Vortex ring) I can force the gas into Light's nose and or mouth.
The thing about this match up is I think Mandarin has many differenet ways to attack Light (to many for Light to have a counter for everything), by channeling multiple rings and abilities (Energy, Electricty, Gravity) he can disrupt his powers and he's still free to attack with the other rings. I'll also explain why I think Nightbringer is the game changer.
It behaves simarly to the Darkforce (in fact it has long been thought to be the Darkforce). If you're not aware the hero Cloak is a wielder of the Darkforce, he absorbs light (among other things) but light based attacks are basically useless against him. Now if Doc Light were imprisoned in a field created by Nightbringer, he should have no way out, any time his powers were used they'd be absorbed by the field, if he tried teleporting out (assuming it worked) Mandarin could simply put the field back on him. Something else to consider, with basic knowledge, he'd know that Light's powers are...well light based. The main difference between the Black Lanterns and The Mandarin seems to be that Black Lantern's powers are UV based and the Nightbringer seems to absorb UV based attacks.
As far as teleportation, I think he's got her beat.
As you saw he teleported four men from Earth to the Moon (250,000 miles) and back casually, men he wasn't even paying attention to. There is nowhere she can teleport on the island that he can't teleport her back from. You've already admitted that Zero and Incandesence would likely work on her as she has no feats to extreme temperature, your solution was to teleport away and counter attack. Combine that with Nightbringer and or Spin and you can call it a wrap. As Zero worked her systems would be compromised and at near absolute zero temperatures there is very limited molecular manipulation, so I'm doubtful of her ability to do to much in such a state. Now in addition to that we have molecular manipulation.
As far as him not figuring it out, if there is one thing I've shown it's that the Mandarin has no problem using his rings in multiples or conjunction with each other add to that his intelligence (he's widely regarded as one of the world's foremost scientists), battle sense (he is an absolute beast with prep)
and experience...taking that into account I don't think it'll take him any length of time to use the Spectral, which he has shown no problem or hesitation using before, in fact that was his opening move in this battle.
As far as her taking him out, as I've shown he can tank near city busting attacks unscathed. As far as being faster than Iron Man, that may or may not be true, however Mandarin has no problem intercepting and blocking Tony's repulsors (as I've shown multiple times) so I have no doubt he can tag Braniac anytime he needs to. His rings auto defense can also protect him from her lasers as his rings can channel similar attacks not to mention he's been eating Tony's repulsors for the better part of 40 years with little problem. So as it stands now, I see he has at least three solid ways to beat her and she doesn't have much that can stop him.
I think the Mandarin's sheer amount of versatility and ways to counter my opponents powers and attacks should grant him the win in this case, not selling either one of my opponents short but Mandarin has the edge in sheer amount of ways that he can take down the other two, at least in my mind.
And with that, I'll toss it to @veshark. Take it away dude.
@sovereign91001 Nooooo you were too late, Sov! We're no longer BOTW!
Awesome closer, anyway. I'll try to get mine up by tomorrow if I can find the time.
And we have arrived at the final round, gentlemen. Brace yourselves for an extremely text-heavy post. @sovereign91001 @kidman560
On the Mandarin’s rings – yes, I am aware that he has a psionic connection, and is able to recall them too (as I noted in my last post). But the difference here is this: Light isn’t looking to permanently remove them. And the outcome of the Haunted fight itself isn’t why I brought that particular battle up. I only posted that fight to prove that Mandarin’s rings can be removed.
Now, you appear to have conceded that that is true, and that Light can neuter the Mandarin. And your counter is that Mandarin can recall his rings, but don’t forget – Light doesn’t need a lot of time to kill a ring-less Mandarin. Speed of light, remember? Do you think that Mandarin could recall those rings before a beam of photons burn a hole in his chest?
You are correct in that Mandarin has an arguably higher level of versatility; but all that versatility comes at a price: it’s all in the rings. Whereas Brainiac 8 & Dr. Light control their own powers, Mandarin’s abilities depend on a singular source that can be exploited. Take away the rings, and you take away any chance Mandarin has of winning in this battle.
Right after teleporting away Mandarin’s rings, Light could just as easily turn into a beam of photons and shoot right through Mandarin. Even with the man’s reflexes and enhanced durability, I doubt Mandarin can survive this killing blow. And in that short gap, I don’t believe that the Mandarin would have enough time to recall any rings.
Speed of light > Speed of thought, after all. If you want the science of the matter; average nerve conduction tops out at 250 miles per hour (though Mandarin is arguably higher), six orders of magnitude slower than light-speeds (670 million miles per hour).
With that in mind, my basic counterargument is this: Dr. Light will kill the Mandarin before any rings can be recalled back. Now, I want to explore two additional scenarios just to further my argument for why Light wins with this stratagem.
The first is this: would Mandarin be able to recall the rings at the same speed if Dr. Light were to teleport them to different locations? You’re correct in that distance is no object, but what about individual proximity? In all three scans that you posted, Mandarin was only shown recalling rings that were in close-proximity to one another.
Say if Dr. Light chose to teleport one ring to a certain location, and then a second ring to another one a good distance away? Now yes, Mandarin could still psionically recall them, but I assume it takes a degree of focus to mentally locate one ring after the other. This delay of seconds – however limited – could buy Dr. Light more time to finish the Mandarin off.
If assuming that the Mandarin is able to recall the rings before Light kills him, Dr. Light could opt for this method and so have more time. And before one argues that Mandarin could just recall a single ring to use against Light (like the Nightbringer), don’t forget that he hardly has the reaction time to tag a beam of photons before it tags him.
And this conveniently enough brings me to my second scenario: What’s stopping Dr. Light from trying this again? For instance: if Mandarin is able to recall his rings before Light kills him, what’s preventing the good Doctor from simply activating his cloaking again? And then teleporting the rings away one more time?
You haven’t provided a method for Mandarin to detect an invisible Dr. Light, and far as I can tell, none of his rings are able to do it either. The closest you could make a case for would be the Daimonic ring’s control of the EM spectrum, but then I’d direct you to look at my case for Light vs. Brainiac 8 as a rebuttal.
So for a second time, an invisible Dr. Light could sneak up to an unwary Mandarin, and teleport the rings aside yet again (this time perhaps to disparate locations, as I suggested above). The Mandarin would, again, be helpless and he can’t very well tag a foe he can’t see. And then just as before, Light turns into a beam that should kill Mandarin before the villain can recall those rings.
On Brainiac 8’s sensors: I don’t see her relation to the original Brainiac as being particularly relevant. Sure, you could say ‘she should be able to’, but should is not the same as is. It’s entirely dependent on theory, and without any on-panel showings to back it up, there’s simply no merit behind the claim.
Also, I don’t see how your second scan proves that Brainiac 8 has better vision than Superman. You realize that Clark could easily replicate what she did there, and probably do it better too? As far as you’ve shown, Indigo doesn’t even have any feats that depict her as being to see across every wavelength of the EM spectrum ala Superman either.
The comparison here is this: Superman – who has a greater number of superior sensory feats to Brainiac 8 – failed to detect Dr. Light’s cloaking, so why would Brainiac be able to? This is before we even look at the feats where Light shows manipulation of wavelengths, lending credence to the stance that his cloaking can hide from Indigo’s sensors.
You’ve also focused entirely on whether or not Brainiac 8 can detect Light that you’ve neglected the other issues I’ve raised. One being whether or not Brainiac 8 would actively sense for wavelength manipulation in-battle, and another being: would she be able to if she was already in heated combat with the Mandarin?
Moving on, I don’t think you caught my points on your ‘play-dead’ strategy. I never said Light would remain cloaked or that he’s invincible – I said the tactic is far-fetched because it hinges too much on circumstance. E.g. what if Dr. Light really thinks Brainiac 8 is dead and then teleports away, thinking he’s won the fight? What would Indigo do then?
It’s a bit of a silly plan because putting aside the question of whether or not it’s in-character, does Brainiac 8 really need to resort to such a long-winded stratagem just to beat Light? As I said, you may want to go deeper in detail if you’re running with this, because I don’t see how it’s necessary or effective.
As for Brainiac 8’s knowledge: your scan doesn’t prove that she has expansive data on everyone in the DCU on her fingertips at all. Far as I can tell, the page seems to indicate that Indigo got all that intel by hacking into databases. “Intelligence reports that I was able to decode…” was what she said, actually. And I see four other problems with that here:
1) In-character Brainiac doesn’t do detailed research for every foe she meets 2) She should be unable to research in the midst of battle 3) She has never encountered Dr. Light before, and so does not have any established data on him beyond ‘basic knowledge’ 4) In this fight, we’re presumably in a neutral universe, and so she shouldn’t have access to DCU databases.
And as a matter of fact, I’ve already posted a set of scans where Dr. Light attacked while in light form. As a stream of light, he killed several people in Mia Dearden’s high-school. And in the following set, Light entered Christmas lights and attacked Hal Jordan’s family with it. And of course, I’ve already shown scans where his holograms can physically affect others.
Perhaps most-impressively, Light (he's in his light form here) was capable of attacking Kyle Rayner & Jade when they were all sucked into Rayner's Power Battery. Inside there, Light was able to absorb all the Oan energy for his own use and attacked the Lanterns with it. In his light form, he was even able to tank a powerful blast of energy from the Central Battery itself and was unharmed:
So to answer your question, yes, Dr. Light is perfectly capable of attacking others while in light form. I’m not quite sure what’s accomplished by raising this point, but alright.
Now, moving on to Dr. Light’s strategy, I don’t think I’m assuming much. The only factor 'hinging' is for Light to remain undetected until one of you falls, and so far, neither one of you has provided a counterargument that successfully disproves this. Sov has already conceded that Mandarin has no way to detect Light’s invisibility, and I’ve already refuted your own points.
And I don’t see how I’m assuming that Mandarin & Brainiac 8 will start punching each other – it was the two of you who explicitly stated that your characters would attack one another. Mandarin will start with animating the Statue of Liberty, and you’ve responded with shooting its legs out. It’s all there in your opening posts.
If your characters aren’t going to strike the moment you see one another – then what are they even in-battle for? And if Brainiac 8 was really opting for another strategy instead of direct combat; why haven’t you mentioned it until now? I’m not making anything up or assuming your own characters will act a certain way; I’m just going with the flow here.
And as it stands, you haven’t provided any solid counters for my proposed strategy to beat Brainiac 8 too. You didn’t address Dr. Light’s use of soligrams, or his method of decapitating Brainiac either. You keep referring to how she could only be beaten by ‘plot’ or by ‘transmutation’…but nothing you’ve shown says a missing head can’t stop her.
For Indigo’s teleportation: as I’ve already noted, Dr. Light himself is capable of teleportation, so it’s merely delaying the inevitable and the tactic seems redundant. And you didn’t factor in Light’s speed; his movements and blasts are at near-light-speeds, so unless Brainiac has shown that level of reflexes, arguing that she’ll be able to teleport away in time is doubtful.
You claim Brainiac has ‘resisted high temperatures’, but never produced a feat as proof, and your own scan showed her hand getting burned off by Starfire. To my knowledge, a standard starbolt has never grounded Superman before, so I don’t see why a straight beheading on Light’s part won’t work. In fact, I believe Arsenal once used a similar threat on her:
And it doesn’t matter if Brainiac 8 has taken ‘beating from heavy-hitters like Jade & Starfire’, if there’s nothing in her showings that disprove my proposed strategy. Up until now, I believe my argument still remains valid. That Dr. Light has the means to hurt Brainiac 8 and win, while the android can’t even harm Light.
To summarize my entire argument for Dr. Light, let's start from the beginning. Instead of engaging his opponents in direct combat, Dr. Light is going to let Mandarin & Brainiac 8 battle it out among themselves. And whoever remains standing will fall at the hands of Light. This strategy affords Light with the option to study his opponents and understand their combat capabilities, giving him time to both gather his strength as well as formulate counterstrategies for both opponents.
To that end, the first thing Light will do upon arrival at Liberty Island will be to activate his cloaking. An invisible Light will remain undetected, and he can build his power while his foes waste their strength on one another. As stated, Light will take this time to deduce his opponents' weaknesses, and he might even aid one or two of them to speed up the process. E.g. Light could secretly leech the light from Mandarin's optic nerve, thus rendering him blind.
Whatever the outcome, once one of you has fallen, Dr. Light – having observed all your capabilities in battle – should be more than able to defeat the last villain standing. Unlike his opponents, Light has the advantage of both surprise as well as a more extensive knowledge-base. If it comes down to Dr. Light versus the Mandarin, to reiterate:
And If it comes down to Dr. Light versus Brainiac 8, he’ll win thanks to these factors and strategies:
Having covered all my strategies rather extensively, I believe that Dr. Light has the most effective and intelligent tactics between the three villains, and I've gone into detail on how he'll defeat both opponents should it come to either one. With all that said and done, it's time to pass the mic over to kidman to close this off.
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