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Prowl
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Post subject: How Should Losing Super-Powers Work? Posted: Mon Sep 13, 2010 2:24 am |
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Joined: | 08 Oct 2006 |
Posts: | 18746 |
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This came from reading a recent X-Men related comic.
Characters are captured and fitted with inhibitors, shutting off their powers.
But how would this really work? Does it merely STOP the powers, or regress them to a normal human state?
What I mean is, say your power is intelligence/memory retention. What happens if your powers are inhibited, do you stay as smart, but simply unable to retain every new fact like a normal human, or would you LOSE all that additional info you already knew, and be taken back to an average regular level of intelligence?
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Prowl
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Post subject: How Should Losing Super-Powers Work? Posted: Mon Sep 13, 2010 2:30 am |
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Joined: | 08 Oct 2006 |
Posts: | 18746 |
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Uggh, I'm depressed by what I wrote. Makes me sound really nerdy.  I'm just bored, damnit!
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Bubbles
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Post subject: How Should Losing Super-Powers Work? Posted: Mon Sep 13, 2010 2:53 am |
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Joined: | 28 Jul 2005 |
Posts: | 21507 |
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Um. Your avatar is Optimus Prime dunking a basketball.
You wrote that.
You ARE very nerdy. Ain't nothing wrong with that.
As to the question at hand.
I really couldn't care less.
_________________ Refractory innuendos
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Prowl
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Post subject: How Should Losing Super-Powers Work? Posted: Mon Sep 13, 2010 2:54 am |
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Joined: | 08 Oct 2006 |
Posts: | 18746 |
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Bubbles wrote: Um. Your avatar is Optimus Prime dunking a basketball.
You wrote that.
You ARE very nerdy. Touche. 
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Ross
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Post subject: How Should Losing Super-Powers Work? Posted: Mon Sep 13, 2010 7:21 am |
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Not in Continuity
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Joined: | 03 Jun 2007 |
Posts: | 24101 |
Location: | Massachusetts |
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Darin
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Post subject: How Should Losing Super-Powers Work? Posted: Mon Sep 13, 2010 9:13 am |
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Joined: | 14 Aug 2004 |
Posts: | 17145 |
Location: | La Crosse, WI |
Bannings: | Not as often these days. |
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Super-powers can be lost in a variety of ways which are viable. Heck, look at Spider-Man 2. Spidey lost his powers for part of that movie due to what amounted to a lack of desire to be Spider-Man and it worked for the purposes of that movie. Storm lost her powers in the 1980s due to getting hit by a weapon Forge designed specifically to remove a mutant's powers. Gamma-negative rays used to cause the Hulk to revert back to Bruce Banner. There's no right or wrong way to do it, methinks.
_________________ Darin Wagner
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Hanzo the Razor
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Post subject: How Should Losing Super-Powers Work? Posted: Mon Sep 13, 2010 3:38 pm |
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Ancient Alien Theorist
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Joined: | 24 Jun 2007 |
Posts: | 105341 |
Location: | The Fourth World |
Bannings: | 2001 |
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Savage Dragon has a character called "Negate" that takes powers away by reverting you back to your natural state -- so it depowers characters who got their powers through external means but doesn't affect Gods or alien species who naturally have powers as part of their DNA.
I usually don't care how it "works" because it's just a story device used by writers, but if they try to get in pseudo-science, I think they should be specific -- this "depower ray" works on the mutant x-gene, so mutants would be powerless but not other superheroes or it affects radiation based powers, so it would work on the FF or Spider-Man but not Thor or the Flash.
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Joe Mayer
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Post subject: How Should Losing Super-Powers Work? Posted: Mon Sep 13, 2010 3:49 pm |
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Joined: | 21 Jun 2006 |
Posts: | 5628 |
Location: | Des Moines, IoWAN |
Bannings: | Uncountable |
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I don't think there can be a "loses all powers" device. If Forge used his Storm/Rogue depowering ray on himself, for instance, I could see it failing. That would be like saying that a single medicine could be invented that could cure everyone of everything.
_________________ Do not meddle in the affairs of dragons because, to them, you are crunchy and taste good with ketchup.
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Bully
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Post subject: How Should Losing Super-Powers Work? Posted: Mon Sep 13, 2010 3:50 pm |
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Joined: | 21 Jun 2007 |
Posts: | 13750 |
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Joe Mayer wrote: I don't think there can be a "loses all powers" device. If Forge used his Storm/Rogue depowering ray on himself, for instance, I could see it failing. That would be like saying that a single medicine could be invented that could cure everyone of everything. The Panacea Potion from The Squadron Supreme?
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Joe Mayer
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Post subject: How Should Losing Super-Powers Work? Posted: Mon Sep 13, 2010 3:51 pm |
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Joined: | 21 Jun 2006 |
Posts: | 5628 |
Location: | Des Moines, IoWAN |
Bannings: | Uncountable |
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Okay, I was trying to be all nerdy but I realized I have been IMWANIAN longer than some of the people in this thread yet have less than ten percent of the posts. Iam instead going to go and feel shamed.
I want to be a nerd too.
_________________ Do not meddle in the affairs of dragons because, to them, you are crunchy and taste good with ketchup.
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Darin
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Post subject: How Should Losing Super-Powers Work? Posted: Mon Sep 13, 2010 5:34 pm |
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Joined: | 14 Aug 2004 |
Posts: | 17145 |
Location: | La Crosse, WI |
Bannings: | Not as often these days. |
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Joe Mayer wrote: I don't think there can be a "loses all powers" device. If Forge used his Storm/Rogue depowering ray on himself, for instance, I could see it failing. That would be like saying that a single medicine could be invented that could cure everyone of everything. I'm not following you.
_________________ Darin Wagner
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That meddlin kid
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Post subject: How Should Losing Super-Powers Work? Posted: Mon Sep 13, 2010 6:23 pm |
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Biker Librarian
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Joined: | 26 Mar 2007 |
Posts: | 25165 |
Location: | On the highway, looking for adventure |
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Joe Mayer wrote: I don't think there can be a "loses all powers" device. If Forge used his Storm/Rogue depowering ray on himself, for instance, I could see it failing. That would be like saying that a single medicine could be invented that could cure everyone of everything. That makes sense. They don't all get them the same way, so there shouldn't be one simple way to lose them all.
_________________ The kingdom of heaven is like a merchant seeking fine pearls who, when he found an especially costly one, sold everything he had to buy it.
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Madjak
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Post subject: How Should Losing Super-Powers Work? Posted: Mon Sep 13, 2010 9:16 pm |
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Awesome
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Joined: | 16 Jan 2007 |
Posts: | 2372 |
Location: | "We're all mad here" |
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I think normally, it would drop you down to "normal" levels. Some cases are weird though. How can Rogue steal Thors power? But she has..
_________________ Discerning posters agree! "Madjak is absolutely right." Beachy "Madjak is correct." Li'l Jay "I want what Madjak's having." Brotoro
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Darin
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Post subject: How Should Losing Super-Powers Work? Posted: Tue Sep 14, 2010 1:01 am |
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Joined: | 14 Aug 2004 |
Posts: | 17145 |
Location: | La Crosse, WI |
Bannings: | Not as often these days. |
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Rogue was also able to steal some of Juggernaut's power too. Not all of it, since he has infinite power. Even after Rogue had stolen some of his power, and he had shrunk to near normal size, he was regaining more power and getting bigger again while Rogue still had her power intact... because Juggernaut's power continuously flows from where ever it comes from. I thought that was neat. As far as Rogue stealing Thor's power... well, I can see her stealing his strength, but that's it. She doesn't steal power from objects, just people.
_________________ Darin Wagner
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Simon
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Post subject: How Should Losing Super-Powers Work? Posted: Tue Sep 14, 2010 4:30 am |
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Joined: | 26 Oct 2006 |
Posts: | 59410 |
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I think it should "work" however the writer wants it to. 
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Darin
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Post subject: How Should Losing Super-Powers Work? Posted: Tue Sep 14, 2010 8:43 am |
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Joined: | 14 Aug 2004 |
Posts: | 17145 |
Location: | La Crosse, WI |
Bannings: | Not as often these days. |
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Simon wrote: I think it should "work" however the writer wants it to.  I agree, but it does at least have to make sense on some level. For example, the earlier idea of Rogue stealing Thor's power. It would make no sense if she also gained the power to manipulate the weather since that power comes from Mjolnir and not Thor himself. If a writer had Rogue touch Thor and Thor fell unconscious and suddenly Rogue was flying through the air manipulating lightning and making it rain, I would cry foul. Even if she did so by using Mjolnir, that wouldn't work, since whether or not someone can use Mjolnir has nothing to do with Thor's physical power.
_________________ Darin Wagner
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Simon
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Post subject: How Should Losing Super-Powers Work? Posted: Wed Sep 15, 2010 5:06 am |
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Joined: | 26 Oct 2006 |
Posts: | 59410 |
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Yes, I'd agree that there have to be some kind of "plausible" guidelines which govern how it works, as well. The way it's used has to follow the "internal logic" of the fictional universe that the story takes place in. So, unless Mjolnir is somehow mystically "alive" (and Rogue touches it and is able to duplicate/absorb some of its power), I agree with your point, Darin.
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Darin
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Post subject: How Should Losing Super-Powers Work? Posted: Wed Sep 15, 2010 9:09 am |
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Joined: | 14 Aug 2004 |
Posts: | 17145 |
Location: | La Crosse, WI |
Bannings: | Not as often these days. |
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I remember a similar thing happening back when Kurt Busiek was writing Iron Man with Sean Chen doing the art chores. There was this superhero costume party and the people there were given a drug that gives them the powers of established Marvel characters (based upon psuedo-science). Well, one guy manifested the Absorbing Man's powers and I wrote Busiek and told him that a scientific formula couldn't give anyone the Absorbing Man's powers because Absorbing Man's powers were magical in nature. Busiek replied that he had forgotten about that and I kinda felt like a jerk... so I stopped doing that kind of thing.
_________________ Darin Wagner
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Simon
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Post subject: How Should Losing Super-Powers Work? Posted: Wed Sep 15, 2010 10:12 am |
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Joined: | 26 Oct 2006 |
Posts: | 59410 |
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Darin wrote: ...so I stopped doing that kind of thing. To Busiek, yes. 
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Darin
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Post subject: How Should Losing Super-Powers Work? Posted: Wed Sep 15, 2010 11:21 am |
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Joined: | 14 Aug 2004 |
Posts: | 17145 |
Location: | La Crosse, WI |
Bannings: | Not as often these days. |
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Simon wrote: Darin wrote: ...so I stopped doing that kind of thing. To Busiek, yes.  To pros.
_________________ Darin Wagner
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Simon
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Post subject: How Should Losing Super-Powers Work? Posted: Wed Sep 15, 2010 12:20 pm |
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Joined: | 26 Oct 2006 |
Posts: | 59410 |
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Beachy
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Post subject: How Should Losing Super-Powers Work? Posted: Wed Sep 15, 2010 12:49 pm |
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Mr. IMWANKO
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Joined: | 18 Sep 2005 |
Posts: | 73866 |
Location: | the Moist Periphery of Pendulum Tide |
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They should just kill the heroes if they capture them. The only reasons to bother developing ways to shut off their powers is if you need to do so to kill them, or you need to study them (in order to kill the others you haven't captured yet, or for trying to figure out how to give other people these powers), or becuase you want to convert them over to your side.
Just kill 'em, and dice 'em up later on. It never seems to work the other ways.
_________________ Staging Areas Approach Area Area of a Triquetra Area of Effect Life Longing
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