Smurph Post #1
This is what I'm listening to as I write this post. Feel free to join me.
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Judges,
So Leo basically wants to drive home Magneto's long history of waging mental and physical warfare with Prof. X, hoping to draw an effective comparison between Charles and Cable, and thus establish Erik as being effectively defended against Nate's telepathy.
Let's let Leo draw that comparison and see how it shapes out.
In this first post I'm going to deconstruct a number of my opponent's points that I see as being particularly contentious. Next post, I'm going to bring in some new points of my own from the perspective: Cable is a motherf*cking rockstar.
The Telepathy Comparison
Charles Xavier vs. Erik's Willpower: Decent Match
Before I even jump into Cable's end of things, I want to bring the focus back to Erik's history with Professor X:
Firstly, I think it's fair to say that any way you cut it, the history of the two mutant leaders has victories on both sides.
Some instances, Magneto's willpower keeps control of his mind. On the other hand, we have Fatal Attractions
http://imageshack.us/f/201/fatalattractionspt4xmenseries202536ep3.jpg/
Or, you know, Magneto admitting that Xavier piercing his mind is easy enough
http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/201/untitled1enm1.jpg/
There was also that time that Xavier took mental control of Erik's powers and used them to throw Avalon into space.
I know Leo's already raised his defenses to these instances, primarily:
Originally posted by leonidas
it is likely smurph will bring up the famous 'mind wipe' feat as proof that mags is vulnerable to psi attacks. bear in mind said event took place after a LENGTHY battle with a whole host of xmen, he was weakened by rogue, he was without his helmet and had been further weakened by bishop who had siphoned off mag's own energy and used it against him.....
And hey, fair enough. It can be argued that due to Magneto's LONG and STRENUOUS battle against a handful of low to mid metas, that he was simply no match for a low herald telepath.
Which of course leads us to the question: How do you think he'll fair against a mind superior to Xavier's given that Cable actually held off the Silver Surfer without using any offensive telepathy?
I mean, if getting attacked by Bishop, Gambit and Cyclops is an arduous task for ol' Erik, how long do you think his mental shields will hold up when he's getting struck with enough force to hold up Providence, perform vast sub-atomic matter manipulation and break Surfer's board? Especially considering that he'll be faced with a mind that LOLs at Emma Frost equipped with Cerebra?
This leads me into my next point:
God Like Cable vs Charles Xavier: Spite Match
Leo wanted to draw a comparison between Charles and Nate, let's do it.
The crux of his argument is that Xavier has accessed bigger amounts of minds than Nate (Skrull feat) and done more with them (picking and choosing Earth minds feat), and so it can be submitted that perhaps he (Xavier) is a stronger telepath than Cable.
Trolololol.
Obviously this argument rests on a couple things: God-Like Cable only appeared for a handful of issues, and so his feats, while impressive, are limited in their quantity.
While in his God-Like form, Cable:
Soothed the pain of every dying person around the globe constantly.
Telepathically ionized the atmosphere of the earth.
Telepathically monitored global conversations (those of GW. Bridge, Irene Merryweather, SHIELD, etc).
We never got to see the full extent of how far his telepathy can reach or how many minds it could access at once, and so we don't know if his range matches up to Xavier's star-spanning telepathic ability.
We do know that doing all these things took a minor fraction of Cable's power, that he was performing these tasks constantly and that he was doing it for days and weeks on end. Impressive, but not crucially important to this argument, which is why Leo's comparison is going to fall short.
Here's the scan talking about how he's constantly soothing the worlds pain,
http://imageshack.us/f/225/soothepain.jpg/
Incidentally, for a short case comparison alone, Skrull feat vs. Cable's soothing-the-pain feat:
Xavier harnessed the emotions of 8 billion beings and fired it in a beam at Galactus, who was (iirc) completely unfazed.
Cable sifted through the emotions and pain of 6.8 billion beings, seeking out the ones that were dying and soothed them of all pain for weeks.
Feats aren't entirely incomparable.
Like I said though, none of this is going to decide who's the superior telepath. Range and span of telepathic reach isn't going to win a battlezone, and we've seen the history of Xavier vs. Erik to know well enough how Charles fairs in a head to head match.
Let's give Cable the same treatment, yeah?
Leo would like us to believe that Xavier could easily pierce Cable's telepathic shielding. Well, this is baloney for two reasons. Firstly, Magneto doesn't have telepathy, so, you know, who gives two shits about Cable's telepathic shielding? Secondly, Leo and I are both aware that that feat occurred before Cable got Deadpool's healing factor, and so before he ascended to God-Like form.
For a direct comparison, directly prior to
Originally posted by leonidas
even in the god-cable arc, there was this brief exchange between cable and xavier:
http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/256/xavierb.jpg/
charles agrees to respect the barriers, but in no way does he imply he couldn't get through them had he tried, nor does he seem in the least intimidated. even cable seemed more outraged than surprised to me.
Cable was exhausted by going about his days work and then extracting a deadly virus from some bodies (hence Charles' worrying about the effect of all this power on his body).
After getting that healing factor, Cable was able to dedicate his focus to controlling the virus globally.
Anyways, now that it's clear that we lack a direct comparison between Cable and Charles, we have to go to the next-most direct comparison available.
In this case, Cable vs. Emma Frost
Emma, I think we can all agree, is one clear notch below Charles. She has her own feats of global telepathy, and she's matched and outperformed Exodus telepathically (who in turn has stalemated Sersi. Leo brought up a comparison between Sersi and Cable in his post and this should neatly put that to rest as well).
Emma with Cerebra, then, should be beyond Charles I would think.
http://img46.imageshack.us/img46/4083/newxmen114page5.jpg
Cerebra amps psychic power to the 10th degree. Note that this is obviously different from multiplying it by 10:
5*10 = 50
5^10 = 9 765 625
mmm
Anyways, in a match where we're talking about Cable's ability to cut through psychic shielding, the most direct comparison we can find is him up against the psychic shields of Emma with Cerebra.
If Cable is a Sersi/Xavier level telepath, Emma should hold up pretty easily, no?
http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/513/ionizeplanet.jpg/
"Psychic are holding. Barely."
The kicker? Cable wasn't probing for the X-Men. He didn't even realize that Emma was near Providence or attempting to shield the group psychically.
Emma comments that as Cable casually looks into the minds of the entire planet, she (with Cerebra at her disposal) can barely shield the thoughts of her team.
I submit that Cable is during his time on earth as a God, Cable was an astoundingly superior telepath to anybody else on the planet. Without actually attempting to do anything, his telepathic presence nearly shattered the shields of Emma Frost, one of the top five telepaths on Marvel Earth.
I submit further that Magneto has never gone up against a telepath of this caliber. Leo mentioned Jean Grey as 'Phoenix', but it's certainly a little misleading to call that incarnation of Jean 'Phoenix'. She was at a loss for her real power, which is why she lacks telepathic feats and which is why she was getting power-trumped by Magneto.
Wrapping Up
Leo knows what this match rests on. I know what this match rests on. The judges know what this match rests on. It's all about telepathy. We have on-panel proof that Magneto's mental defenses are far from impregnable, and we know that should they be penetrated, that's game over for Erik.
Finally, one last point for this post. I've brushed over this, but not paid it the attention I feel is due:
Leo mentions that while Erik may have succumbed to the telepathic attack of Professor X, it was only after a lengthy battle with a bunch of low tier X-Men.
This is true, and a fair point to raise.
Erik was tired after a match with the X-Men, and his willpower fell short.
God-Like Cable spent his entire career as a character soothing the pain of the entire planet. He telekinetically levitated his utopian island, even while sleeping. He mentally probed the minds of the entire planet.
He rerouted enough water to flood half the Sahara. Kicked loggers out of the rainforests. Stopped the white blood count deterioration of every AIDS victim in Africa. Straightened the leaning tower of Pisa.
On a daily basis he stopped 14 individual acts of terrorism, 1100 attempts of murder, 7 thousand car accidents.
Magneto was tired after a battle with the X-Men. Cable spent his career doing that every single day, and then went head to head with the Silver Surfer.
Magneto starts fresh.
So does Cable.
i don't necessarily disagree, btw...
not really. my point in drawing all these analogies with xavier is simple--xavier is freakin UBER. low herald? doubtful. high herald is a lot closer. hell, thanos even used a comatose prof to battle the goddess in the infinity crusade! it came down to xavier, thanos and warlock against the goddess. pretty good company..... charles is a PROVEN UBER TP, with hundreds of showings, and i showed that mags can resist even XAVIER! the times he fell were littered with context, and in the final showdown, he didn't even have his helmet! and THIS little OFFICIAL retcon only serves to STRENGTHEN mags' defenses further:
