quote: (post)

Originally posted by DarkSaint85
I have three rulings so far:
Leo, DS, Galan.

I am awaiting two more:
Digi, Delta.

What do people want - wait until a majority is reach, or all five are in?

quote: (post)

Originally posted by DarkSaint85
I have three rulings so far:
Leo, DS, Galan.

I am awaiting two more:
Digi, Delta.

What do people want - wait until a majority is reach, or all five are in?

quote: (post)

Originally posted by Damborgson
The fate of the next month of KMC hangs in the balance.

quote:

Thoughts as I read through the match (opinions early on may change as I read):

- Phil’s CIS argument will likely hold some weight with me – tourneys and BZs are ridiculously idealized versions of characters.
- Less compelling are all the WW scans. A-B-C logic is fine to an extent here, since it’s only one comparison, but I want Grail feats. Which he does provide, so that’s good, but the Diana feats still mean comparatively little imo. Same with Darkseid’s OBs later on. But this is a weird grey area, because it’s much more related than the usual feat transference which I usually abhor. Will have to ruminate on it...
- Grail’s a beast, but that is a lot of firepower on the team. Grail does have some one-shot options, yes, but a fair number of the scans were cheapshots from behind (Cpt. Marvel, Lois, etc.). How is she tracking and killing more prepped opponents as easily?
- Few posts in, I’d like to see what kind of firepower hurts Grail, and if Grail’s attacks can wreck the phased trickery of Celey’s plan. Right now there isn’t a definitive method of killing on either side.
- I’m not as down with low-balling Hype as Phil, but he’s starting to expose a couple in this fight that may be non-factors (Dracula)
- Phil’s starting to pick off other points of contention with his utilization of the mother box (density control, tracking and teleporting). There’s still a lot going on around her, though, so her attacks wouldn’t be as unimpeded as Phil supposes.

Alright, I’m at the end (having ignored celey’s last post, as instructed). The Omega Beam feat transference seems beside the point to me. I’m cool with treating it as the most powerful attack on the board, and a possible one-shot if not properly handled. Darkseid’s feats don’t need to transfer for those things to be true. Same with WW comparisons. Grail’s a notch above traditional heralds in the League, but there are a handful of instances of her being tagged and hit, so we’re talking about degrees, not orders of magnitude. I don’t think I’m ignoring anything from either side in those assessments.

Celey did a slightly better job painting Hype as a threat than Phil did knocking him down. Drac and Iron Patriot (and Attuma??) are mostly non-factors, though potentially useful as distractions. And I think both sides could kill the other in certain situations. But when there isn’t an obvious smoking gun, I try to look at what the most likely way is for the fight to play out, especially given how explicit CIS was made to be in this fight. Occum’s Razor, more or less. And Grail is one person, dealing with a LOT of versatility. I think Celey honestly erred a bit in the hide & seek strategy, which could allow Grail time to pick people off one by one. The illusions do help, though, and the various tactics made it so that Grail would have to do a lot of different things in a f---ing hurry to counter all of it. Celey also underutilized Doom’s magic a bit. But assuming there’s a sustained offensive effort, that’s a lot to ask of Grail.

Grail’s the baddest mf’er on the board. Props on the skilled defense of her against a legitimately scary team. But she’s overwhelmed imo. My vote is for The Cabal.

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OK, so first of all, kudos to Phildo for essentially posting the entirety of two JL issues. That's what you get for using an extremely new character, I guess.

Some issues I had with Phildo's arguments:

• His cross sharing of feats
  
• That MB scan of phasing is inapplicable, I believe, as it's pre-FP.
  

Some issues I had with celey's arguments:

• The JLA weren't noobs, at the time they fought Grail
  
• The Mega rod only defelected it, not stopped it.
  
• CIS/CIP
  

Yes, Grail was 'prepped' before she faced the League. She studied them, knew everything about them.

Which she would here. She would know all the Marvel Earth's general population has to know about these guys, some of whom are pretty damn famous and hardly known for skulking in the dark (even Dracula). On the other hand, the Cabal have never faced anyone as dangerous and as ruthless as Grail, not together (Hyperion's scans just lead me to believe that even in a team, he'd go off and do his own thing and not explain himself to others).

When arguing CIS, I usually think of some counters for it. Fighting a speedster, for example, is impossible because even if they run up against an unfamiliar foe, they can run through all the possible counters and strategies and adapt on the fly (if they're smart). Or, if they're just that damn well prepped, they come loaded for bear and have counters for everything, JUST IN CASE. A third way of countering unfamiliar foes is a depository of knowledge (Worldmind, for example) and the speed to act on it's instructions.

Here? Grail herself is a speedster. She basically does one or two things VERY well - speed coupled with a couple of deadly attacks. Some of which (the OB and the MB) the Cabal have NEVER seen before in all their adventures in Marvel.

As celey himself said, prep has laid low many a team. And I believe that it will lay low the team here as well.

It was a good fight, to the both of you. But ultimately, what swayed me were the Hyperion scans (of him being a dick to his team-mates, reminding me that the team isn't exactly a polished fighting force) and the Grail scans of her speed and weaponry. The Cabal have the sheer edge in versatility, to be sure. Loki alone has more powers than most of the League put together, let alone Grail. But getting all of that done, at the ring of the bell, before she goes serial killer on them? I have my doubts.


Winner: Philosophia

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Hey vote...


Okay, so... phil and celey are NOT controlling the characters here, and we're forced to go by how they acted in the comics ONLY. That's huge.

What I also tried to do is treat this BZ like the characters were brand new to me. I did not go beyond what was explicitly posted, and HOW the material was presented by Phil and celey.

Anywho...
Phil is having Grail lean on the MB a lot here, and I understand why -- it's haxx AF, and she needs it. What I didn't see(and am not sure of myself) is if any of MB's 'abilities', like TP-blockage and matter restructuring/phasing, come preset with each user, or if Grail would have to individually activate them right at the onset of this battle. But from what I saw here, however, Grail herself didn't come off as the type of character who would use a MB's more esoteric abilities unless she realized she needed to -- she seems like more of a fighter than a 'gadgeteer'... And by the time she realized she needed MB's TP-defense, Loki might already be in her head with illusions and such. However, because celey's initial post consists of having the rest of the Cabal stay in defense mode at the onset, I believe it'd be rather easy(and would happen rather quickly) for Grail to have MB block out ALL mind-phuckery while the rest of the Cabal watches on...

As the debate was presented, the only other potential threat to Grail here would be Doom... But I just didn't see quite enough to make me see *how* he could possible beat her. Nothing presented looked beyond Grail's ability to deal with, given her physical stats+OB+MB+Magical Axe+bloodlusted nature. /shrug


At the end of the day, I think Phil just proved the capabilities of Grail better than celey proved the capabilities of the Cabal. So based on that, my vote goes to Phil. Had celey been a bit more aggressive with his team at the onset, and posted a bit more pertaining to their offensive/defensive prowess, this could have gone a different way.



Great job to both... I can't remember the last time I had such a difficult time judging one of these.

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ok, a bit of an odd match up here. tough arguing for a character with such ltd showings, especially against some characters who are so well established...

in this case though, i think forum and agreed upon bz rules played a very large part in how this would go down. i look at celey's team and know there are some powerhouses there. if we look at all their best feats, it's easy to see why you'd think they could beat grail every time. problem here is the rules. because along with the fact that the team is made of powerhouses, they are also among the most arrogant of all characters in comics. and since one of the rules of the bz says we're taking cis into account, well, this suddenly becomes a very large problem for celey.

the cabal would know they were fighting a single woman, but, by the other rule we're to take into account, they would know....nothing else at all about her. because of that, i just don't see them entering a match where all of them are facing one woman and immediately assuming some of the defensive positions celey was trying to sell. it seems more than likely they would be disgusted that all of them are needed to take out one woman. if anything, i feel like their defenses might be down, more than up. at the least, i can't see them doing anything overly defensive--their personalities wouldn't let them.

with that as the case, i could see grail taking out several of them almost immediately with her beams. not sure she could control them like ds (celey did have a good point regarding some of the feat comparisons) but she's more than fast enough to get of multiple blasts regardless, or simply kill with her weapon. phil did a great job showcasing her overall power and i can believe that she would pretty easily whittle down the team. from there, i think she's just too powerful. team would need to be at full strength to take her. i thought the mind games/tp issue would be something celey could exploit, but the MB stuff threw just enough doubt on it to make it less than a sure-thing.

based on all of this i have to go with phil. were the rules that governed this thing different, this would have been a very different match imo.

kinda sucks the way things fell out in this, but i did enjoy some of the scans from both sides. i happen to like both participants and think you're both bright guys who should bury the hatchet. fools. [cs,]sneer[/csm]

quote: (post)

Originally posted by Digi
Phil and I have a BZ match coming up. Voting against him was step one of my plan to put him on tilt.



But seriously, congrats! I enjoyed reading through the match.

quote: (post)

Originally posted by abhilegend
What BZ?

quote: (post)

Originally posted by DarkSaint85
It should be. If Digi didn't keep whining.