Grrl Power #824 – Fist of the Sigma Octantis
Okay, a domino mask could protect someone’s identity, but not that centimeter wide “strip of tape” style. I see comics with characters wearing stuff like that, and I think it’s almost as bad as Superman’s disguise.
It can’t be any surprise to Sydney that she’s the featherest-weight puncher on the team.
I’m not sure how the same machine could register Sydney’s love tap but also not vaporize when Maxima punched it. I’m sure there are machines that can register incredible impacts, like stuff used for measuring car crashes, but Maxima can far exceed even that. Maybe a machine that measured impacts by volume of liquid displacement, but it’d have to be a lot more liquid than that little machine in the corner of the gym could have in it.
BTW I know Mantis Shrimps are known for their crazy punching, but they’re like six inches long, so that’s why they register down at the bottom. Maybe I should have used “Puppy” instead.
Instead of animals, my original chart listed sports like Karate, Boxer, but also had specific people on it like “Drago” and “Vegeta” and it seemed like a weird mix. An all fictional character one would have been amusing, but I wasn’t sure what to put down on the lower tiers. There aren’t a lot of characters famous for being weak punchers, though maybe “Aunt May” could have worked, but then who? Pillowhands McGee, who I just made up? I’m not sure if Kenshiro would slot in above a DBZ character or below. In terms of actual joules or footpounds, I guess he’s come in a lot lower than them, but arguably his punches are a jillion times more deadly.
God, if I was a woman named Jillian, my friends would be SO SICK of hearing me say “I’m a Jillian times (adverb/adjective)-er than you.”
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“Son of a Fart!”
I love Sydney’s creative swearing.
I heard a wonderful one the other day on a Lewis Black fan rant, telling someone to “Ingest a Satchel of Richards.”
Top class that lady.
Trying to out-curse Sydney would make most of us look like a bunch of Richard Craniums, for sure.
You do know that a Richard is just a self-important Dick
I was astonished when I started throws punches into a bag seriously as a Karate student in the 80s that my wrist rolled over almost every time.
Had to do a lot of knuckle pushups on rubber to make that go away.
I’m assuming Maxima just flicked it and nearly shattered the mechanism, Vegeta style.
Also looking forward to the analysis of the rankings that someone with much more patience and a better knowledge of the cast than me will surely figure out. I’m pretty certain either the black or grey is Hiro, but I cannot figure out who the other would be. I can see a distinct Dabbler purple, with (I’m assuming) Anvil, conglomerate Harem and IDK who coming in right after. Beyond that, I have no idea tbh.
Not even the resident demon rates as a demon on the punching scale! The cast page has some rough stats for most of the main cast, but it’s not terribly granular, and there’s not enough people on it to account for the 17 markers on the machine. Stalwart’s probably the other “dragon”, and I want to say he’s probably the stronger of the two, but I would also guess that the darker marker is more likely to be Hiro’s and the lighter Stalwart’s, just based on their hair color.
Completely forgot Stalwart was a thing. Cast page says he’s officially the second strongest of the team, but IIRC Hiro can absorb soundwaves to become stronger than he usually is, so yeah I agree, grey = Hiro black = Stalwart. I feel pretty confident in my guess that that’s Dabbler, Anvil, and Harem in that order in the tiger bracket. From the bottom, I’m guessing that’s Heatwave in mantis shrimp. No idea about the green in wolf, but the lightning yellow above them is probably Jiggawatt? Also colour based, that bright pink in bear is probably Pixel.
That’s 10 of the 17 accounted for (including Syd and Maxima), and characters that have yet to be placed include Achilles, Ren, Varia, Vance, Mr Amorphous, Math and Jabberwokky (although colourwise she’s probably one of the blues in mustang, bear or bull).
Stalwart can alter his own mass/density. Recall his line to Vehemence after stomping on V’s foot: “Good look moving that foot. I weigh as much as the Space Shuttle now.” As he increases his mass, his strength and durability increase proportionally (else he’d be frozen in place at higher masses, unable to lift his arms or feet, or even wiggle his toes). Apparently, there’s a top end to how heavy/strong/tough he can get, since Maxima can still outdo him. For reference, he seemed legitimately confident he could kick an M-1 Abrams into the air and catch it, but not so sure he could then throw it a good distance downrange, as Maxima did.
Hiro has a basic FISS power set (Flight Invulnerability Strength Something (else)), i.e. “Superman Lite.” His something else is absorbing and redirecting sonic attacks (possibly shock waves in general, since sound waves are just pressure waves with a frequency our ears can detect). It’s possible, though not stated in the comic, that parts of all of his powers are involved in that (like Superboy (the clone version) in DC comics, whose powers all revolved around tactile telekinesis (TK with a range limited to what he was touching)). For instance, absorbing the kinetic energy of a projectile (impact) or molecular motion (which transfers heat) or even subatomic motion (blunting/preventing the effects of radiation by absorbing energy from photons, neutrons, and alpha and beta particles) would be invulnerability to the naked eye. “Metabolizing” the energy would fuel super strength, and “excreting” it in a particular way would generate thrust for flight. So, it’s possible that Hiro only actually has one power, he’s just really good at using it. That said, was there a page where Hiro was shown/stated to be able to alter any of his powers based on absorbing energy? I only recall him being shown absorbing and re-releasing a sonic shock wave attack.
I’m guessing I may be wrong about Hiro’s powers, though, since that kind of mechanic would move his powers towards Anvil’s in terms of mechanic, which might not be what Dave’s got in mind at all.
FISS = Flight, Invulnerability, Strength, Speed
What’s Hiro’s number? (PS238 reference)
Yep. Love PS238. Every [motor-factoring] page of it. In Hiro’s case, I varied it a bit, since Maxima said his top speed is (if I recall correctly) somewhere around 500 mph flying (and presumably slower than that running), and he didn’t demonstrate superhuman reflexes particularly (so “speed” seemed not quite right). Also, his power description on the Cast page includes the line “and something else maybe?” Hence: Flight, Invulnerability, Strength, Something (else).
Anvil and Mr. Amorphous are the two listed characters with three strength pips on the cast cards, so I think they’re two of the three ‘Tigers’ (who the third is I have no clue). Harem only has two ‘pips’, so I’m guessing she falls somewhere into Bull/Bear. Dabbler has no listed strength pips at all, but that might just be because of her sheer number of other abilities needing notation.
Obligatory she’s a lover not a fighter reply.
Second, third, and forth are a One Punch Man reference. Demon would be a threat capable of taking out multiple cities which Dabbler isn’t(unless you mean sexually exhausting everyone in them). God Tier was replaced with Maxima.
Demon is a step below Dragon in One Punch Man. Demon is a being that is a serious threat to a single city, while dragon is a threat to multiple cities
which makes more sense, in East Asian lore a dragon is a semi-divine (sometimes fully divine) being while a demon is something just above humans (yokai, bakemono, mogwai, yakshaha, no exact 1-1 ration, European demons aren’t a common concept elsewhere, Hell bound magical evil spirits based on pagan gods rather than distinct separate things most anywhere else.
Dabbler has a spacecraft, which makes her capable of taking out the entire world if she chooses to do so.
Qui-Gon wasn’t exaggerating when he said “It’s over, Anakin! I have the high ground!”
Since the dawn of war, holding the high ground has been a huge advantage in a fight. Being above the gravity well of a planet is the ultimate expression of that huge advantage, as anyone with a spacecraft can render an entire planet nigh-incapable (it was tried with the dinosaurs, but life recovered) of supporting life just by dropping a few rocks on it.
Umm, fairly sure Qui-Gon was gone by that stage of the movies…
The reason why having higher ground is advantageous is because of how gravity works: it takes more energy to shoot up a hill then it does to simply drop a boulder down the side and let gravity, mass and momentum do the work for you
And that only works with regards to ranged objects: if someone is above you, they have a greater distance to stretch to hit you, whereas you being below can freely whack their ankles and legs out from under them
Everyone else are talking about physical strength, not overall threats to life
Sydney has her balls which would make her capable to destroying the world if she so chooses, heck, some little twerp in a jungle in the real world has the capability of rendering this planet uninhabitable, ‘if he chooses to do so’
Actually the Maxima entry came pre-loaded.
It is the machine way to say, “Ok, you win, just don’t punch me”
Even the plaque itself shows that Maxima is the one who sets the “gold standard.”
Leon hacked the machine’s display so too put in that top entry.
Word of Dave (the important one, not me) has said that for strength the top four are:
1. Maxima
2. Stalwart
3. Hiro
4. Anvil, but she can “charge” past the two guys.
If Stalwart is fatigued, or Hiro is having a good day, then the 2 and 3 ranking easily gets reversed. If Anvil has absorbed enough kinetic energy, she can temporarily get almost as strong as Maxima. Yeah, despite being the biggest on the team, with a very visible muscle mass, Anvil strength is surpassed by some other people. Mind you, I think Stalwart and Anvil will probably have very similar masses. She is taller; he is wider.
As demonstrated elsewhere, Hiro can punch through concrete, even when trying to resist instinctual reactions.
Nah, Maxima just glared at it.
I was going to mention how “mantis shrimp” would be an interesting addition to Jabber’s repertoire, only to see that it was already listed on the page! Things can hit ludicrously hard for their size.
What about her orbs? Sidney crushed a villain’s gentleman plums with them in the restaurant battle, and walloped Math across the face with one back when they first met, hard enough to send him down. How hard can she hit with them on that scale?
Not to mention breaking ol’ Sci-fright’s wrist.
Math took a deliberate fall for humour value, somewhat like the prat fall that Dabbler took in the shower
Not sure Dabbler’s was entirely a pratfall. I have no idea how much a punch in gavorzaplorums would hurt, since, as far as I know, I don’t have those (I’m assuming) organs. Max might have been judging toughness by Dabbler’s general ability to take a punch, without accounting for the alien/succubus/doppelganger equivalent of having one’s grapes pressed (as it were).
Aside from her orbs, Sydney can probably hit pretty hard with the Lighthook. She slapped/whipped Jiggawat’s ass with it during the Fight at the (Ex-)Steakhouse™, and if it can lift a few tons it can probably also hit with about the same force.
Umm, no she didn’t, Sydney light-whipped Anvil who was currently in freefall and would take too long to come down on her own
I will forgive you for being your typical clueless self.
Was trying to remember a time when she slapped Jiggs with force
And you are still a moron about Qui-Gon having the high ground, would link to it, except, you did that to your self (it’s even in the clip name!)
Doesn’t QUITE fit with Syd’s police history though.
Faith’n’begorrah!
That’s because Sydney wasn’t fighting a cop
Eh, somewhat expecting Saitama aka One Punch Man to be on there. Maybe Iron Fist? As for weak punches, you could go for a psychic hero like Professor X, or maybe Deadpool (his punches tend to fail for comedic effect). Maybe a Jojo’s reference somewhere on there – Josuke’s stand heals or fixes things by punching them – I’ve always wondered how hard / soft his actual punches are.
Well, They sort of have the disaster levels from One Punch Man.
Wolf
Tiger
Demon
Dragon.
They are missing God though. Although I suppose Maxima counts for that.
They’re also in the wrong order for Saitama’s world. Dragon is stronger than Demon, there.
Now if they were in the correct order, and you scrolled up it should read God, Saitama, and Saitama (serious), in that order…
Oh yeah. Dragon is stronger than demon. But I suppose it makes sense in this universe considering Dabbler’s abilities.
It would be out of character for Argon. They never get Sydney’s references, so they probably can’t get any reference themselves.
You are forgetting that Maxi is a recovering former-nerd herself, plus you have Leon on the team, Sydney isn’t the only one who gets popular culture references
Good point.
Glad someone mentioned Saitama. Could do one with all one punch man characters maybe. Get bang on there among others.
So my question becomes, what’s that wall made of?
My thoughts exactly !
I also love DaveB subtle joke about said wall showing cracks right around the “Punchomatic 6000”. :-)
This also leaves to wonder about where such a device came from to begin with, because there can’t be all that many buyers of equipment that can measure a “Maxima”. It would not surprise me if “6000” means that this is the first model, of at least 5 others, which was able to survive her.
Dude, the Superman disguise works.
Henry Cavil walked around Times Square wearing glasses for an afternoon. He stood next to a Man of Steel movie poster.
No one recognized him.
He wasn’t even wearing glasses. And he was even wearing a superman shirt.
There is a story of Marilyn Monroe taking one interviewer to a walk. When the latter asked how is it that nobody seems to recognize her, Monroe said “Oh, you want to see HER?” She then changed her posture and facial expression a bit, and in a few moments they were swamped with
selfieautograph-seeking fans.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BIaF0QKtY0c Best example EVER of how important body language can be for a disguise.
The best example I’ve seen was in “Jekyll”, a 2007 BBC mini-series. Through the use of body language, expressions, and voice, the viewer was never in doubt for a second whether Jekyll or Hyde was in control at the time. Actor James Nesbitt was nominated for a Golden Globe award for his performance.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wahKlUZyk-M
Lon Chaney, Sr was the ultimate master of that.
Read the ‘clark kenting’ page on tvtrope (at your own risk) (superman section, of course) it explain it pretty well, IMHO.
Didn’t she flip Mr. Amorpheous onto the ground using only his tongue as leverage? She’s gotta have SOME strength on those spaghetti arms!
Adrenaline-fueled strength is a hell of a thing.
on the other hand, It may be that Sydney’s particular personal routine doesn’t build muscle well for punching, but DOES give her a bit more power for grappling and THROWS.
Mr. Amorphous throw himself or people would have seen he was super-stretchy.
I’m pretty sure she has more strength than she shown here – that basically her punch was not full strength because she had SO bad technique.
Spell check panel 4: in this context with this meaning, it is “principles” not “principals.”
Whoops.
Because he’s your ‘pal’.
Here’s a simple system through which the Punch-o-meter could safely work from Sydney to Maxima:
There is a Bunny to Wolf detector that tops out and gets stopped before it gets damaged, and that’s set inside the plate for the Wolf to Tiger detector, which in turn tops out and is stopped and set in a Tiger to Maxima detector. In doing so, they can measure the whole range from one Punch Pad without having the various parts getting overloaded and destroyed.
Also, Rabbits can box, and have quite the kick – I’m pretty sure they should be a little bit higher in the ranking…
Just ask those that have been kicked by Kat, the were-jack-rabbit.
True, but both kittens and bunnies are babies. A kitten can actually be felt if the swings a paw, a bunny’s kick is totally feeble.
Will we be seeing a training montage?
The last few pages basically are the montage.
The principal behind it? And who might that be?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principal
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principle
“SKINNEEEEEEEEEEEER!!!”
Kitten is a believable dream Sydney, we believe in you.
It could also be the scale is imported and shared between multiple machines. So the reinforced behemoth notes the power of Maxima and is on the system. And the small machine notes the normals and near normals.
Well, we know that her Lighthook Tentacle can knock parking curbs out of the air with a flick, so, they should at least rate Tiger.
The
molestorblighthook had a lifting power of 15-16 tons according to Maxima, combine that with a small surface area and I think you’re looking at somewhere between Dragon & Demon.Mind you, during the big fight Sydney slammed a fire guy into the ground damaging him severely on the side of the impact, but causing nowhere like 16 tons of impact damage.
Yeah, except we are talking about Sydney’s base strength, not her balls’
Knowing how the male brain works, witness accounts of her appearance would suffer a lot from this.
“Can you describe this masked assailant?”
“She huge boobs, and… huh…”
Naked woman with a distinctive tat somewhere normally completely covered by clothing – a perfect disguise.
Colonel Colin Campbell was right- give a witness one striking detail to focus on and they remember nothing else.
*puts on eyepatch*
She definitely needs more training. Perhaps get her started with some half pound weights practicing her form
Aaahh, lets not overstress this. Take some potato bags. Hold one in each hand, and raise them shoulder-high. Stand there until you feel stressed, then put them down. Do this once per day, and try to hold them up for 10 minutes. Once you reach 10 minutes, add another bag, and go for 20 minutes. Etc. When you can hold the bags up for 60 minutes, lts try going back to 1 bag, and adding one potato to each one, then hold those at shoulder height for as long as possible…
Regarding that scale, My experiences with Animals tell me that bunnies punch harder than kittens. Kittens do more damage though, due to sharper claws.
Rabbits are not bunnies
At least she’s on the high end of Bunny tier?
While bunnies might KICK harder I have seen a cat carring a dead rabbit so kittens above bunnies is fair. BTW they have to house Mantis Shrimp in special tanks because they can crack the glass of a normal tank.
Cats taking rabbits often involves the use of ambush and terrain, rather than pure strength. They particularly like it when Humans build sheds near a warren – DEATH FROM ABOVE!!!
Eh, I figure it’s calibrated to the current staffing levels. So, someone who is unaugmented and not math will almost always come out on the bottom end of the scale.
p.s. oh and uh, I’d watch out for that bunny. He’s a vicious one he is.
“That’s no ordinary rabbit! That’s the most foul, cruel, and bad-tempered rodent that you ever laid eyes on.”
You know, after Zootopia I’m not sure “Bunny” is such a low level.
Judy’s hard hit was a kick, tho.
i would have put glass joe as the weakest
I nominate the Pillsbury Doughboy.
Paper Mario. if we are literal.
I was expecting too see some good weak character suggestions. At the moment I’m half asleep so it’s hard to come up with much on the spot. Still:
Samwell Tarly
Rincewind
Keep them coming.
Would Magicarp be too low to register?
Depends on how hard you swing it :P
Actually, there is a point in showing distinctive stuff: It’s distracting (and works best if the distinctive mark is fake). Doesn’t work nearly as well on cameras, but for most people, if you see someone you don’t know that has some big distinctive mark, they’ll remember *the big distinctive mark*, and not other recognizable details. So a nice painted-on facial scar running down your chin behind a Zoro-style mask is much more effective than the Zoro-style mask alone – provided you wash off the fake scar before resuming your civilian identity, anyway.
In jabberwokky’s case, she could have gotten much of the same effect with the tattoo by simply covering up whenever she’s not trying to be flashy (which is no longer relevant, now that Archon has her on file).
Oh, also: she should try it with the orbs, and the lighthook.
For a serious cape/vill, nothing less than a full face mask or helmet is going to help with keeping your identity secret given modern facial recognition software.
‘But mah face ain’t in tha system!’ Have you posted, or been tagged in, pictures on Facebook? Do you have a drivers license? You’re in the system.
The cracks in the wall behind the Punchomatic 6000 are a nice touch.
Ummm doesn’t a Mantis Shrimp’s “Punch” move fast enough to cause shockwaves?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oppJAxIN4sQ
Their punch is impressive for their size, but it’s still a punch from a shrimp.
Thank you for being the only one to remember the ‘proportional’ part :)
I am kinda surprised that Dab is not in the demon category seeing as how well… she is part demon.
Love Jabberwokky! Very happy to see her again, and putting her experience to good use :).
Your scale isn’t necessarily off. A mantis shrimp doesn’t punch with a ton of force, but it’s so fast that the impulse (momentum change) is similar to that of a bullet. It’s why boxers are trained to snap their punches and why a jab stings more than a cross and can have a greater stunning effect.
How the machine registered Maxima’s punch is simple. She pulled it to avoid breaking the machine.
The punch machine is simple; nothing done to it will make the arrow reach “Maxima” and the “Maxima” plaque is made of a different material than the rest of the machine, so that IF she ever punched it, the plaque would be the only thing left.
I was expecting some rating on that machine to be “OVER 9000!”
The thing is, this thing has a higher limit to its scale. Over 9000 would be the dragon, demon, and Maxima ratings.
Also I would think Sydney would want to focus more on escapes than offensive fighting moves. Not just because she’s small but because she has the Orbs to use for that. Learning how to get free if someone grabbed her by surprise should be an important part of her training.
Training her to escape grapples might help sometimes, though. When she broke Sciona’s arm with an orb, it didn’t make Sciona release the hold she had on Sydney’s hand (preventing her from holding her orbs). That said, she might have just generally been screwed, of course. Massively bigger/stronger opponent, held aloft so she has no leverage, and her opponent doesn’t give a fart about damage done to her troll-based loaner chassis. Much like a certain Asgardian, Sydney should have gone for the head.
ORC-based loaner, she just happened to have troll-blood on hand to regenerate
And Sydney didn’t go for the head, because she’s not a damn killer!
At least she scaled on the HIGH bunny side, …
At least she registered on the HIGH bunny side of the scale, …