Grrl Power #243 – Taking all comers
Jiggawatt’s telebot (arc jump?) is her big hit, but it’s also sort of a high commitment attack, especially against an unknown like (FWT)Death Toll. Punching him sure doesn’t work. It’s not clear if she saw him zap Anvil either, otherwise she might not have tried to lightning him.
Some people in the comments are starting to piece Death Toll together, and this page will obviously fuel more speculation. We’ll see if the team figures it out before Sydney does.
Part of doing this comic involves tapping in to my nerd knowledge to drop in some pop culture nods or sneak in an obtuse reference to something. I’ve put in references everything from Thundercats and Krull to Invader Zim and Phineas and Ferb. Keeping my nerd cred current can be a bit tricky. I can watch Netflix or whatever while I draw, since that’s 90% listening and glancing occasionally at the screen when some actor says “look at this amazing thing which you have to see to understand and which I’m not going to describe verbally!” I am a bit down on my anime consumption since most of it is subbed and I can’t draw and read subtitles at the same time. The most recent thing I’ve watched is the first 8-12 episodes of Attack on Titan, since from about a year ago you couldn’t go anywhere on the internet without seeing some reference to it. Cartoons in general, even if they’re in English (dubbed or native) are harder to watch while I draw cause they tend to move along faster than sitcoms or other long form TV shows like your CSIs and Person of Interest or whatever, and that makes me glance up at the TV more often which slows me down.
I play about 10% as much video games as I used to as well, which is fine since most everything is sequels or remakes these days. I’ve played all of an hour of Minecraft, but that’s all you really need in order to get it. I don’t like MMOs because of the heavy time requirements, also the total lack of player agency. It’s hard to feel like you’ve accomplished anything when the boss you just beat respawns 15 seconds later and on your way back to town you pass 30 people on their way to kill the same guy. Nope, give me single player, co-op single player, or straight up multiplayer, deathmatch and fighting games and the like.
Most recently I made the mistake of installing DOTA2, since I had never played a MOBA before. I get why it’s so popular now, so mission accomplished, but holy crap am I awful at it. One game I played ended with almost everyone on my team being twice my level. I know, there’s a lot to learn and there are a million guides and early game tutorials out there, but again like with MMOs, the time commitment would be enormous. I’m glad I played it, the game world seems like an environment Dabbler would be comfortable in. I could totally see a Dabbler hero in it, but I may have to uninstall it before it sucks up any more of my time.
Comic was broke but now it’s fixed. I’m just testing the admin function really.
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Been a while since I’ve seen anyone use something even vaguely similar to Hugh the Hand’s Cursed Blade – can’t be wielded as a offensive weapon – but ridiculously dangerous as a defensive weapon – basically one-up to whatever you’re being attacked with – all the way up to dragon (the most powerful entity in the Death Gate Cycle).
I was going to ask if you were Zifnab, but since you’re coherent, the answer is obvious. :D
Hopefully Maxima will get her super speedy butt in gear and do the obvious by getting Anvil out of there (think a commenter or two already said but then you guys are way smarter than me so you usually all beat me to the punch anyway! :) ) and every one else back so they can start probing this guy properly. Someone is overdue to attack his environment to see his response (wouldn’t work but it should be next on the list if they haven’t figured him out yet.
It looks to me like he’s a wobbuffet. He wasn’t participating before because he couldn’t. His powers are maybe context sensitive and counter to whatever is aimed at him. He drained Anvil’s built up kinetic energy. He put up an ice projectile that is quite similar to the projectile Dabbler had sent at him, and he was able to catch Jiggawatt’s telebolt. I would guess that the way to defeat him is either to ignore him, or have Math, Peggy, or possibly Halo deal with him, since they don’t technically have powers. For safety’s sake in this situation I would just start ignoring him again and maybe send Achilles to keep him busy while the team mopped up everyone else.
so the same method that defeated Accelerator?
pull when you want to punch?
Eh, that was Kihara knowing the exact timing at which Accelerator’s ability would reflect, and then he’d pull the punch there.(causing the punch to in turn be accelerated AT Accelerator)
I’ve been waiting for Halo to just walk up behind him and kick him in the balls.
Perhaps she could power up her Death Star Cannon, but there are too many people nearby and it would definitely cause collateral damage.
That’s the exact thing that she SHOULDN’T do.
If DT’s power is to counter incoming attacks, the worst thing to do is fire a powerfull attack at him
All the power in the world is going to do him much good if he doesn’t have a world to stand on.
is = isn’t
Stupid typo.
Yeah? And where are the rest of the population going to be standing?
Don’t ask me, I’m not the one who suggested it.
ROFL
Only MMO I could ever get into mostly for similar reasons as you was EVE, basically a gigantic galaxy sized sandbox to play in with so many different ways to play. Also try League sometime it’s a bit lighter on the learning curve.
League of Legends that is.
As far as MOBAs go (I still hate that acronym) I would recommend Awesomenauts, which is a MOBA/platformer hybrid. Also it does away with a lot of the weird things that make up the learning curve and simplifies builds by a lot. So much less time commitment, though a game with actual players still takes about an hour.
Also IMO it’s fun from the beginning of the game where DOTA is only fun mid-to-late game and then only if the teams are leveled fairly evenly… Well, that’s what I found anyways, YMMV.
What is a ‘MOBA’ when it is at home? Same with ‘DOTA’ (should know that, but drawing an idiot-sized blank)
MOBA is an incredibly unwieldy acronym that Riot (LoL developer) coined to try and get people to stop calling all games like it DOTA-clones. It stands for “Multiplayer Online Battle Arena.” (Also hate the acronym, ugh.)
DOTA is shorthand for Defense of the Ancients, the name of the popular Warcraft 3 mod that inspired the genre in its current form.
Multiplayer is redundant with online, plus while Battle Arena is a bit unwieldy while Gladiatorial sounds cooler, it isn’t as cool for most of those stupid acronyms.
Not completely redundant, as some games end up being just a dueling game between just two people for its online play. But for the most part you are correct.
huh… so DOTA is actually Warcraft? no wonder i never had that urge to play it… oh well,you know what they say “you learn something new every day”… this just happened to be the thing i learned today…
Thank you, kinda figured out what “MO” was, and maybe “B” but wasn’t too sure about “A” (and always feel better to “ask if not sure”) but figured it was something like that
Possibly the last person on the planet, but don’t believe have played any of the Warcraft games (those are resource gathering/force building games like “Dune 2”?)
We in trouble. Sidney is thinking
HE (Death Toll) is the one in trouble. He just doesn’t realize it yet.
ominous thinking
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B_TtbpOMAIU
Gotta love Leon’s use of FWTDT’s full name in the scouters. Someone in this crew appreciates a phrasic portmanteau!
Or an opportunity to mock someone using their own bad choices.
Ok this one thing is driving me nuts:
Will someone buy the team a set of Craokies? Seriously, high tech data eyeglasses without elastic retainers makes no sense at all, especially since the US military already uses one style of them now. Surely Sidney would suggest it after the fight if not before now.
What happens when DeathToll gets hit with a power negation attack?
Does he start boosting everyone else’s powers?
I notice that he still has not actually directly attacked anyone, but rather negated attacks and defended himself from them. Gonna be interesting to see how this plays out in the inevitable legal hearing afterward…
The cops are trying to arrest him, and he’s resisting arrest. That’s how it’ll play our
I don’t think there’ll be any meaningful legal proceedings.. Can you imagine?
Judge: In the state of Wherever vs. “Atomic Bombshell” the people find:
AB: Bored Now!
Bomb: Boom!
Even if the villains didn’t just kill everyone, the only way to restrain them would be Arc Swat, in the courtroom, holding/staring them down. Which would send entirely the wrong image. Who is going to buy that the person in authority is the guy in the robes, when Maxima has the defendant by the throat?
Far better to do the trial remotely. Bad guys are warehoused and pumped fulla drugs, citizens file in and find the Injustice Gang guilty due to being obviously evil. Sentence is whatever Maxima wants.
I foresee moral problems about that like in the Justice League TV series when Superman imprisons Doomsday in the Phantom Zone since he can’t be safely held in any human facility, and how he WILL do evil when he can.
Batman flies into a rage at the “god” role he accuses Superman at taking in judging and sentencing.
Everyone’s trying to figure out Death Toll, and I’m just trying to figure out who the SH logo is supposed to be. I’m guessing Hiro, but the cast page doesn’t show any of the logos and previous pages showing Hiro don’t show the SH logo.
I wondered about that too.
SH would be logical for Super Hiro but Stalwart is in the vicinity but has no logo in the display.
I remember Super Hiro wearing his choker
Stalwart isn’t wearing his choker right now, so the glasses can’t detect him (asuming the glasses use the GPS info from the chokers to give this information)
Yes, Hiro’s codename is indeed Super Hiro.
Though in the pages where he does show up, he still doesn’t have an icon in the Who’s Who (DaveB probably didn’t design them all yet), so this is the first time we get a good look at his logo
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/1043
I guess I just didn’t go back far enough. Good eye.
Maybe Dave B. can update the cast page so the logo is shown with each character that has one. Not a big deal, but would be a handy quick reference for those of us not blessed with photographic memories.
Put a force field around DT’s head, suck out the oxygen, down he goes.
Depending on how and where you can put a force field it helps against a lot.
Put a force field in his stomach, expand it…
As far as we know, there’s noone on the good team that can do such a thing though
Dave, if you want a fun game that you can do a few rounds in 10-20 minutes, Payday 2. Fun as hell, and if you need someone to help ya out, hit me up, I’ll give you the pointers no one else gave me :P.
im guessing this is where “the big guns” name (check page 4) for halo comes from. possibly after ko’ing this guy or just holding him until he is restrained via chemical means (or depending on the type of hold lack of oxygen)
As far as games, I would suggest keeping an eye out for the Humble Bundle for games that catch your eye. There’s currently one regular bundle and a weekly bundle with games, and it’s a good way to get several smaller, indie games. Indies are great for getting a short but satisfying experience, instead of a long and unsatisfying commitment like MMOs and MOBAs.
Although, I guess if the goal is to keep up with your pop culture nerd cred, the more obscure games wouldn’t help with that. But they can be fun!
When faced with the Absorbing Man in one Marvel RP game session he was kicking our team’s arse left and right. He was only upgrading himself as opportunity arose. My mostly normal magician MA had an idea. I wrote it down. Folded the paper slid it to the GM and said, don’t read this until I’m done roleplaying the scene. He agreed. I kept the knowledge from everyone at the table too.
I then , when AM was facing our brick/muscle guy and handing him his arse again, picked up a piece of wet cardboard and proceeded to use my magic. I shaped it like a sword, something that looked runic and magical. But it still was wet cardboard by nature- then I started shouting nonsense summoning words that caught AM’s attention, giving my team some time to recover.
I yelled “Lets see how your powers handle magic from before man and time!” And I then cast a simple effect (glow/lights plus what not- all harmless showy magic (yes I had awesome showy magic just to impress girls. HEH) and drew the sword from a cloud of smoke. AM turned fully and smiled. I then struck him with it and of course he tried to absorb it.
He saw himself all a glowy and covered in shining writhing runes. I then kicked him in the Jimmies and did a video game uppercut… fight was over. GM read the note and laughed then kept the secret quiet from rest of the team. Next time AM escaped they called Dr Strange…it didn’t go so well for him vs AM. Hehe.
Second bit we used for the unstoppable force of juggernaught and the Hulk was me again. I cast levitation then had our gravity girl remove inertia and gravity effects in that area too. I then spun Hulk and Juggernaught until they puked… Our female SH didn’t like it one bit. GM even used the grenade toss chart and rolled it. BOTH fights both big guys HURLED on her. SO much she got a phobia around anyone who might get sick and infants.
As for this guy. Helm gives him predictive powers maybe? Suit storage, gloves absorb/store/release. (in standing there he wasn’t doing nothing. He was picking up and storing attacks he might want to use later and making himself tougher at the same time. Maybe he even did this before the surprise attack w/or w/o the knowledge of the rest of the villainous gang. /even if these powers are his and not his gear (if he is Deus or a persona of same) it takes intelligence and planning to look that tough when if a wet cardboard attack came in (glowing spit ball? that looks like mega deathball of magic and he has no counter stored?) and he absorbed that attack and didn’t have other counters ready or stored? See above for the fun.
I’m thinking Sydney’s gonna try a variation of that and use the Hentaiticle lift him up and spin him around till he’s dizzy or passes out or blows chunks (bets on who it might land on? Harem sees it coming and ports away from someone who’s not yet subdued by medspray/hypo and they can’t move fast enough and SPLASH! …
That or she’s gonna try her unknowns to test and see if she can do something with them with him as a target…
Now imagine how annoyed FWTBT would be if he were duplicated and had to face himself and his own witty reparte’. Then again, this might make his week and he’ll have a scintillating conversation with himself and harem takes him out w/drugs.
laughed hard at that part about the hurling
Still, I say “why not?” After all, a lot of amusement parks make heavy use of rides with a high “spin & hurl” factor…
Actually if you look at his body whenever he reacts to an attack it changes. It could be that his power is indeed a reactive, defensive powerset. It’s also very likely that he has to know what to change to be able to counter it. So perhaps that’s why he hasn’t rushed in.
Sydney won’t use the Pew Pew Orb do to the unknow of Death Tolls absorbance, But I get a feeling we are soon gonna either find out one of those mystery balls powers, or that Death Toll is gonna take off, with the “I win for now, It be no fare to defeat you all when I could leave you in suspicious guessing instead.” As all of a sudden he has his own character spot. And he seems to be the awesomely overpowered villain that would stick around till like the last ark but only make it to the end of the 2nd beginning of the third Ark cause he’s no lex Luther super villain.
Known facts (other commenters have said similar things, I am just typing to clarify my thinking; numbers are for reference):
1. FWTDT changes in appearance when reacting to attacks (costume & body); except the mask doesn’t change.
2. He has variable-type energy absorption (Anvil’s kinetic energy pool, Jiggawatt’s lightning form, & Hex’s stray beams so far).
3. He had super-strength near the beginning (backhanded Concretia out of the air), before being attacked directly.
4. He can soak super-strength punches by catching them (Anvil, Stalwart). This may be part of #3. It is unclear whether he can soak physical hits without catching them – note that he didn’t let Concretia hit him, he deflected her instead.
5. All but one attack he has used came from his gloves. When Anvil had him in a headlock he electrified her apparently without them (previous strip, panel 4). Still, his arms were free so he could have reached down and touched her with the gloves.
6. He has variable-type energy projection (ice & electricity so far).
7. So far, he has not thrown a clear first strike – everything seems to be in reaction to other powers (including the headlock).
8. So far, we have seen him respond to one attack at a time, although he switches quickly.
9. Despite clear super strength and multiple available powers, he has never jumped nor flown.
All this could be explained by multiple powers, but if you want to explain it with one power:
A. He has full-spectrum power absorption and broadcast (kinetic also). He either had a reserve of multiple power types already or he can transmute power types internally and project them as different types.
B. He has a reactive power that gives him what he needs to counter any incoming attack. Note that this doesn’t guarantee an “opposite” power – the “opposite” of headlock isn’t electricity.
C. He is a power copier, he has a wide range of powers available (surrounded by supers), and he is really good and fast at switching to something appropriate.
Other conclusions:
I. Per #1, the mask is important – his whole costume changes and even his flesh changes, but the mask doesn’t. Result: Target the mask. It may not get the same immunities he does (attack it). Or it may contain his powers (remove it). Even if it is a red herring, removing it would reveal his face.
II. If any of #A, #B, or #C are true, multiple attack forms at once may overwhelm his defenses (#8). This may take more than two attack forms at once.
III. Per #7 and #B, going with a containment measure may work: no attack = no response. Note that grappling is out (Anvil demonstrated this). This would be trouble – even the light hook might be considered an attack and allow a response. No-one in ARCSWAT has matter creation/manipulation at a level that would allow easy creation of a portable jail cell, although any of the strongman-types could build a rough tarmac cell. Dabbler might have something close enough to work.
IV. Per #5, even if his hands aren’t necessary to use his power, he seems to use them a lot anyway. Binding them in some way may hinder his aim. Per analysis in #III, it will be hard to bind him without provoking a counterattack. Maybe Halo can swat them with the light hook to throw off his aim.
V. If he is a multi-talent, e.g. moderate strength/invulnerability plus an energy power, he is going to be a pain to take out, unless #I is true and the mask is a weak point. If he is using multiple strong foci, e.g. suit gives one power and mask another, he is still going to be a pain.
VI. Another possible one-shot win is Harem and her hypo. If she can jump in and target his exposed neck that might do it. If his skin is too resistant to penetration for this to work, note that the wrist versions of the drug dosers seem to work on moderate invulnerable types.
VII. If #C is true, remove all other supers from the area and wake up Math. Power copy doesn’t equal skill copy so Math would wipe the floor with FWTDT… unless FWTDT has “shapeshift to Jabber”.
VIII. Per #9, he may have Antaeus syndrome – remove him from contact with the earth. Note that I find this unlikely.
Of course I left one obvious option out of an already long post:
IX. If #A is correct, power absorption may not be able to deal with power absorption. Although is doesn’t look like anyone on the team has offensive power absorption.
See Deathrite’s stuff below for other options. I think his second comment refers to mine, but he listed stuff I didn’t, e.g. gas/vacuum.
They would need to shoot him up with a strong stimulant in the hypo. His nega-powers would then turn it into a sedative and put him to sleep.
Since Jiggawatt’s attack my theory that he a capacitor of some type has become more set in my mind. A counterforce power wouldn’t affect her that way. In telebolt form, her mind is her power and her power is her mind. Her mind is obviously intact within him in panel 5 and she is responsive to pain in panel 8. Countering her telebolt would block her completely or kill her via disruption or annihilation. Copying is still possibly but given the Uncertainty Principle it’d be problematic in her case.
I’m with the people pointing out the costume changes but rushing with 2 powers seems too simple. As does a gas attack but worth a try; hard to absorb the energy from it. Vacuum as suggested last strip also seems good. One thought I like though is just floating him gently up in a bubble forcefield. No energy to absorb unless he can tap into the forcefield? I think the gentle touch of our tomboy is called for anyway.
And of course in the time it took me to type that a much better series of thoughts were posted. Just let me curl up somewhere. I am still claiming psych is the best strategy though. Not psionics just taunting. Its his Achilles heel.
Y’know, upper-half skull masks look cool on paper, but have you ever seen any of those Mortal Kombat adaptations? In reality, “FWTDT” probably looks like he’s got a really goofy overbite.
Hmmm… so he absorbs, contains, and redirects energy. (Atleast Kinetic and electrical energy.) Atleast, that seems to be the Idea here. He can probably absorb any energy type, which makes him incredibly difficult to handle. His biggest weakness will probably be the Light Hook. He can absorb energy directed at him, but throwing him isn’t neccessarily something he can do anything about. So throwing him into the dirt means he’s going to probably feel it. Anvil had the right Idea, but wasn’t aware that he could zap her. (Or throw energy at her, whatever)
Although a thought just occured to me. He could have some kind of Mimic or Nemesis power. Mimic being copying a power; Nemesis being adapting to counter a persons powers. More likely Mimic. (He copyed Jiggawat to zap Anvil, then copyed Anvil to down her.) We shall see. I’m curious as to what his actual powers are. Hopefully a reveal will be coming. Although, it would be interesting to see him get away and we not know what his actual powers are.
Except throwing him means he just absorbs the kinetic energy when he land and no damage.
Not neccessarily. We’ve seen that he can absorb the kinetic energy from sources attempting to act upon him. But him hitting the ground is his own energy acting upon the ground (Whether he initiated it or not). There’s no evidence thus far suggesting he has the ability to negate his own energy, only act/react to energy thrown at him, and generate energy when needed. So he may very well not be able to deal with his own body hitting the ground at high speeds, and that very well might simply cause him to take the hit like you or I would. That said, if his power turns out to be something closer to nemesis, it becomes a moot point anyway.
They need to just hold him in place somehow. Dump a few hundred gallons of glue on him.
“And our top story tonight, an attack on a government special forces team today was thwarted by a man calling himself Paste-pot Pete.”
Sydney sticks him in a forcefield – a small one – and makes it impermeable to air….
Then everyone hangs around and lobs one-liners while they wait for him to go nighty-night.
Or – forget the ‘air’ part – maybe she just rolls it around like a hamster-ball for an hour or five.
Maybe in a couple of upgrades, but currently she has to be inside the Shield
Hmm, he changed color when he did that…
Anyone else thinking Achiles?
My 5 cents says he got one power… the power to automatically adapt to block and/or repel any attack on him, probably an Automatic power he doesn’t even have to concentrate on maintaining…
Note how his costume turned to a copper armor to contain Jiggawatt?
And Dave… X-Com: Enemy Unknown, give it a try :-)
Well I’ll be, this guy is actually pretty beastly and I’m happy that hes doing work, after all the disappointing fodder this is nice. I’m thinking his power is strictly energy related since thats all hes been doing/countering so far.
Um isn’t death toll the same guy with the lightning boom clicker???
Cuz the body build is the same to me as is the glimpses of his jawline
So if I am right pleez tell me!!!
It’s doubtful. While the skull mask would definitely hide Deus’s “X” shaped face scar, he just doesn’t seem to be able to hold his personal dignity together for long enough to pull this off. Also, the jaw isn’t quote a perfect match, DT has lines along his cheeks, while Deus doesn’t.
Also, it wouldn’t exactly run in his best interests to try and wipe out his biggest customer right away.
The flair for the over dramatic does fit though.
Deus is under fan suspicion for starting this little brawl. DT may be his ace in hole design. Intended to be able to down most of the Arc SWAT team by turning their power against them. SWAT comes to him looking for a counter weapon for next time. BAM! Deus looks good, gets richer and has the sleep function disabled on his dramatic background clicker. At least that is his plan. Actually Halo disables the suit with a lighthook wedgie. DT turns states evidence, and Deus ends up hiding in South America at a seedy bar on the Amazon.
Thought of a funny restaurant to add to the mall part of the Arcon building.
Premise is pretty much opposite of hooters. Well built guys ranging from skinny but well toned to body-builder wearing speedos. They serve a variety of salami and other meats, cheese and serve wine. Name of the restaurant is Sausage-Feast.
I suggest you trademark that one. Eventually someone will try it IRL and you can charge royalties.
Trick him into taking himself out of the fight in one way or another. Forcing him to fly somehow and then suddenly disengaging from the fight would be a pretty funny one though it’s possible his powers would trigger from the impact. If he doesn’t have anything beyond the counterattack power suite, the poor chump can be taken out by getting locked in somewhere or starvation and dehydration. Just have Heatwave follow him around passively evaporating everything he tries to drink. Cruel but effective.
That or just talk with the guy and figure out what he wants. Diplomacy is fun too.
Do people actively not pay attention to this comic? Heatwave is out of the fight
Yes, Heatwave evaporating his drinks over the course of several days was my exact prediction for next 5 strips… or I was just talking about general strategies for dealing with him. Lighten up.
My best guess is that what he has is “mirror ability”. Specifically he’s able to mimic the powers of anything he targets through his palms. His inaction up to this point was probably scouting and considering the order in which to use the teams abilities against each-other. The imperious arms-crossed gesture could even have been an effort to not accidentally pull a power that left him vulnerable during the first phase of the fight. The mistakes the team’s making here are
1 – Announcing their intentions before they attack (giving him time to respond) and
2 – Not coordination simultaneous counteracting power strikes.
Assuming he can only mimic powers from people and not objects, Sydney would be a good choice for combat him. . . Depending on the range of his abilitys, Maxima should really get out of sight.
hhmmm, this guy is a puzzle. Most Kinetic Thieves have a limited range on what they can absorb, even energy absorbers tend to be direct in that it has to be physical energy, kinetic, heat, electricity, reducing flames.
However in all the anime, manga, comics, and what have you; these guys tend to either have an overload point, or else the energy flow works both ways and they can be just as easily drained by using ice or a siphon spell…which then brings up magic. Typically when utilized these guys can’t handle direct magical attacks as magic tends to not be “energy” in the traditional sense, but rather (exotic force) from another dimension or else is its self a mutli-dimensional distortion rather than energy and thus isn’t so much exacting a force on the target as its compelling a change in the physical space.
It occurs to me that Death Nell (that’s my little pun, not a misspelling) isn’t actually attacking anybody. He’s simply standing there while the so-called good guys are attacking him. The way I see it, they can’t take the moral high ground here and claim to be defending themselves against him when he hasn’t launched an assault. All he’s done is exchange in catty talk with Atomic Bombshell and offer to have Anvil join him (join what, exactly?). Maybe they should just tag him with a tracer and see where that leads instead of launching futile assaults on his person.
That’s not how the moral high ground works, actually. By his “Excellent” comment when Maxima tells folks to target him, he actively wanted to be in the fight against them. also he’s associating with AB specifically, and clearly knows the other bad guys and has made it clear he’s here to be part of it. He’s jsut got a defensive power set so he has to draw aggro to be able to fight. Plus, when Anil said she’s going to arrest him, he didn’t protest innocence and say “I’m just a bystander” or something. Plus maniacal laughter. Clearly a villain, clearly has no basis for moral high ground claim. If a cop comes to arrest you and you resist, then you are breakign the law. The correct response is to protest innocence, call your lawyer and demand to know the charges. If they release you without charges, great. If not, you defend yourself under the legal system and then, if actually innocent, sue the pants off them for wrongful arrest. No moral quandry here at all.
Once more, from the top (for anyone who still needs it): since they were attacked, Archon has a legitimate interest in confirming that any bystanders are indeed innocent. Hence, Anvil could legally order FWTDT to surrender. If he had doubts about her authority to do so, he could have asked her to provide proof of such. Instead, he signaled his refusal to comply by answering with a veiled threat.
I get the feel he’s eventually going to:
-to be trapped inside Sydney’s shield alone, unable to affect the outside, until he surrenders or starves.
-have his possible limitation of 1 power usage per power seen (until seen again) exposed; then perhaps even just blinding him with some kind of smoke would disable his copying or he’d eventually run out of attacks if no one uses any. That limit would make sense as he did delay his entry into combat a lot.
-be mad the media does not use his own supervillain name
-escape, anyhow, especially if this is Deus and he used Harem as a “spy” mostly to have a copy of Harem’s teleport powers handy frequently to practice and to escape.
-have the largest evil monologue on record, and eventually use a copy of that long rant in book form as projectiles. In a “what would sideshow bob do?” way.
-have the evil overlord list thrown at him by both sides
-might not be able to copy ITEM-based powers…
-leave a theory conspiracy around for not using a copy of his team mates powers… whyyyy?
-need brain bleach after Dabbler sends on him an “attack” that Dabbler actually would love to be cast back on her… (moooore brain bleach!)
-have his favorite cloak damaged…
Umm, hello? Sydney can not form the Shield without her inside
(as far as we know)…
actually, the second i saw him do what he did to anvil, i knew his power set, because i have a character i once created called energin, whose powerset was exactly the same. he’s like bishop, only he has a much better understanding of what his power does. energy is all relative. technically, there’s only potential energy and kinetic energy. if you have an understanding of how energy can react, you can do whatever you want with it. absorbing a person’s energy as soon as they touch you, right down to the energy making his or her heart beat, or even absorbing the electrical impulses in the brain, thus removing memories, thought processes, personality, etc. AND, bishop’s biggest weakness is his inability to absorb more than a certain amount of energy. BUT, if one really, CONTROLLED energy, you could “stash” it in a pocket dimension by using the energy to rip a tiny, black hole in the fabric of reality, which, since you control energy, you could then take with you, allowing you access to the energy, and a place where you could store an infinite amount of it, at any time. the concept is similar to dabbler’s hammerspace. also, on the projection side, he’s demonstrated the ability to absorb heat at a distance, creating the illusion of ice projection, although that’s essentially what ice projection is. lightning absorption, along with an almost husk-like ability to change skin elemental qualities, probably by rearranging the electron fields of the atoms in his body to cause them to merge protons and neutrons into alternative elements, such as copper, demonstrated here. KEY TO DEFEATING THIS GUY: vacuum. if death tolls is placed, by teleport, into a vacuum, (preferably a vacuum inside an unbroken steel sphere with energy absorption fields lining the surface of the sphere) he would need to concentrate on reusing the energy his body was putting off to regenerate his cells, keeping them alive in a vacuum with no air, and thus keeping him from using any other energy for any other thing. (like escaping) WHICH MEANS that dabbler has the best chance of defeating him, although sydney is going to be the one who has to figure out what it is he’s doing. also, possibility that the unknown orbs absorb and project energy, working in tandem? me likey the possibility
He could still be Deus, keep in mind that he has a mole in ARC through which he got to know about Halo’s truesight. I don’t think it’d be too much a stretch to imagine that he probably knows all of the team’s powers. This has given him time to equip up so he can counter all of them – he does lead a presumably massive company so equipment wouldn’t be a problem.
So to take him down you come up with a new way of attacking him on the spot. Maybe Halo could use a skilltree moment here? :P
Anyway to make him use his strength? Then have him sap that energy he is exerting?
It would be fun to figure out that plan.
His neck and chin has the studs as well. That’s his skin, he is nude!
Or its a symbiote like Spawn’s costume.
Wait, who is “SH” in panel 2 top-left?
Super Hiro
The coolest stupid pun of a name possible.
He is a power leach like the guy off Heroes!
Sydney should use the comm orb to get him to attack her Holo-Sydney. It will drive him crazy when he can’t hurt her. She could out-macho him while he drains all his energy. Once his energy is gone wrap him up in that binding gun Dabbler has.
I’m sure Stalwart can keep going after that… probably. It was just one little Jiggawatt.
The only thing that seems certain with this guy is that the clothes make the man. In this instance, the mask specifically. I do hope ARC Light is not falling down on the job here and not scanning him with magic and whatnot, because if it turns out the mask is an artifact and nobody thought to scan it/him and check for voodoo they should all have their pay docked.