DTL Season 5-Week 8 (Set 4)

[DTL Commish]

The rules:
This is one of four threads containing matches.
Due to the holiday, these threads will be in use for 10 days. Days 1-4 (Jan 6 - Jan 9) are strictly setup time for owners to plead their cases, tell us their team’s strategies, breakdown the match ups, and do whatever else they can/want to do to try and convince you that their team would pull out a victory. Please, let the owners do this on their own with no help.

On Day 5 (Jan 10) I will post and tell everyone that voting may begin. Any votes cast before I open voting will not count. Look over the matchups and read the strategies, and take into consideration how in-character each character is. Afterwards, use your best judgment to decide who you think has the best chance to win the match. (Note: The length of a writeup the discretion of the owner. Do not punish owners just for having a shorter writeup.)

To vote, post the team names you think will prevail in each match. Remember to vote for all matches or your vote will not count! The teams with the highest vote total at the end of the 10th day (Jan 15) will get a W while the other will get an L. (Equal votes will result in a tie.)

The battleground for this week is: The Himalayan Mountains

In Jesus' Name
Thanos (MU)
Captain Marvel (Genis-Vell x2) (MU) - mine is combinded with and old version of himself(which has Centuries and experience more)
Mimic (MM)
Multiple Man (MR) - I have the old version where the dupes all have Jaimes persona
Tap (DR) - weakling that can dampen more than one persons powers(Magic as well

VS.

Chaos & Order
Adam Warlock (MU)
Shanzar (MU)
Vision (MM)
Deadline (DR) - Super durability, reflexes, intangibility, weapons expert.
Ragman (DR)

 

[wiegeabo]

Prep-Time here...

Warlock: "Thanos. Again."

Ragman: "He a problem?"

Adam Warlock looks at their newest team mate. "A very big problem," he says with a sigh. "I had hoped that facing him once would be enough."

Ragman: "So you've fought these guys before?"

Warlock: "That is the strange thing. I do not believe we have. These others are not familiar." The team looks at the images that Shanzar has conjured.

Vision: "This is a difficult team."

DL: "Oh, yeah? What's the big deal? I mean, sure, Thanos is tough, but Adam can handle him. And this 'Marvel' character...well, that's why we have Shanzar."

Shanzar: "Someone must face him. Since you are far too weak."

DL: "Yeah, yeah. All-powerful strange wizard or whatever. It's getting old." Shanzar's gaze almost burns Deadline. Literally.

Ragman looks at Vision. "Um, you said something about this team being difficult?"

Vision points at two of the figures. "Specifically Mimic and Multiple Man. Although this Mimic does not look like the one I am familiar with, his powers are similar. He can 'mimic' the powers of any mutants near him."

Ragman: "Ok. But, none of us are mutants."

Vision: "Madrox is. He uses the name Multiple Man because any impact to his body creates duplicates. Literally, he is a one man army."

Shanzar: "Oh, that's brilliant," he says, admiring the obvious strategy.

Ragman: "I guess I'm still a little lost."

Warlock: "Mimic will copy Multiple Man's power. So, not only will there be an army of Multiple Men, there will also be an army of Mimics."

DL: "And looking at Mimic's other powers, that's going to be one *****in' army."

Shanzar: "So, any ideas?" he says sarcastically, looking at Deadline.

Warlock: "Possibly," he says in deep thought, apparently not noticing. "Ragman."

Ragman: "Why am I getting nervous?"

Warlock smiles grimly. "I'd like to hear more about your powers..."

 

[wiegeabo]

Battle-Time...

Ok, short and sweet battle...


High above the mountains, Shanzar and Marvel clash. Nega energy against Strange magic. Shanzar attacks with a variety of methods and a host of demons. Anything to keep Marvel at bay. Teleporting doesn't work since each one can bring themselves back to Earth.

Meanwhile, Warlock engages Thanos because...well...they wouldn't have it any other way. But Thanos isn't alone. Adam isn't someone to take lightly, so the Titan comes with backup. A couple of Mimic's who have sacrificed Beast's agility for Madrox's power. But Warlock doesn't need to fight long because Deadline, phased, joins the fight, bringing along Ragman, also phased by Deadline's technology. Now, what can Deadline and Ragman do in this fight? Physically, nothing. But Thanos has sinned. He has sinned greatly. He has killed countless beings and done untold damage. And that's just what Ragman needs. Because when someone has sinned enough, Ragman can envelop them in his rags and absorb their soul.

And that's just what happens to Thanos. And once Thanos is taken, Ragman, who can call upon the souls imprisoned in his costume, can bump up his strength and endurance to the peak of what a regular can have. Which is useful since he, Deadline, and Adam must take on the Mimics.


Intangible, Vision has been fighting off other Mimics while using his scanners to search for Madrox and Tap. Unfortunately for those two, they are in one of the coldest places on Earth, and the elements are sapping the life from the otherwise normal humans. Of course, Madrox is a clever person, so he's taking a cue from another creature to keep warm. Just like the Emperor Penguins, dozens of Madrox stand grouped together, using their body heat to keep each other (and Tap) warm while the last of the Mimics guard them to make sure Tap can keep dampening the powers of any who come for them. Unfortunately for Tap, Vision has no superpowers for him to dampen. Only his intangibility keeps Vision from being overwhelmed because none of those they are fighting have a counter for it.


Shanzar's attempt to possess Marvel has failed because of Marvel's unstable mind. But the fight continues until Adam arrives. And the reason Adam can help his teammate is because he was able to disable the Mimics they were fighting with karmic blasts. And, if necessary, that's how he'll stop Marvel as well.


While Adam and Shanzar fight Marvel, Deadline has joined Vision. Both are phased and have no (significant) powers for Tap to suppress. And once they take care of Tap (because Mimic and Jamie can't stop them) it's safe for Ragman to join the fight against a few Mimics and an small army of Multiple Men. Now, I can see Ragman falling. And if Vision or Deadline can't remain intangible throughout the fight (shouldn't be a problem for Vision), they might get taken out as well. But once Adam and Shanzar are finished with Marvel, there will be no one to stop Chaos & Order.

 

[AnnoyingSilence]

In Jesus' Name
Thanos (MU)
Captain Marvel (Genis-Vell x2) (MU) - mine is combinded with and old version of himself(which has Centuries and experience more)
Mimic (MM)
Multiple Man (MR) - I have the old version where the dupes all have Jaimes persona
Tap (DR) - weakling that can dampen more than one persons powers(Magic as well)

Vs.

Chaos and Order
Adam Warlock (MU)
Shanzar (MU)
Vision (MM)
Deadline (DR) - Super durability, reflexes, intangibility, weapons expert.
Ragman (DR)

Pre-Battle​

​

Location: Forges Office in the X-Factor's Base

Now, admit it. If you were this team, your first and DEFINITELY most logic thing to do is have Mimic Drop Beasts' powers and pick up Multiple Mans...... So for all of you seeing the same strategy everyweek, just think, if you were on this team, you'd be doin the same thing.

Next. the cold of the himalays will be no problem for this team. right out of Forges office is the same suites every x-team wears that is bullet-proof, heat resistant, cold resistant, etc...

Battle​

​

Location: Himalayas

As the battle starts the obvious move is made by the other team as Adam Warlock SOARS by grabbing Thanos, carrying him off

Tensing, Genis-Vell: Form a Bubble!

)Mimic starts duplicating, Forming a Bubble of Mimics, protecting MM and Tap.(Something this team has time to practice)(
}Shanazar hails magic blasts down on Captain Marvel as Deadline, Ragman and Vision are busy with a Mimic of thier own.{
Now in the air returning fire, Captain Marvel finds himself playing defense for a moment, until

Telepathically, Thanos: Tap! The only person thier going to have fight Captain Marvel is another PowerHouse!.. Get him!

(That being Shanazar)Dropping from the sky, Shanazar is hammered by a malestorm of Mimics(the ones that were protecting MM and Tap) that successfully knock him out. Captain Marvel is now free to help Thanos' fight...

Ragman now powerless because of Tap is easily knocked out by a Mimic, but in this comes a sacrifice of Tap being shot by Deadline in the head as Deadline himself is stripped of his flight discs, helmut and gun. Falling(intangible) to the ground Deadline solidifies as he hits(so he doesn't die on the inside of the mountain by phasing into it), goes unconcious for a few seconds(which is enough time for Deadline to be stripped of all armor) leaving him to one Mimic as the others fly off to Vision. And Multiple Man faints...

which means: Tap, Deadline, Ragman, Multiple Man and Shanazar are all out of it
Leaving:

Vision vs. a bunch of Mimics

... Thats a Long Drawn out battle which Mimic wins

Captain Marvel and Thanos Vs. Adam Warlock (Soul Gem)

...ANOTHER drawn out physical fight battle that ends with Adam's death...



(how do you want me to write it out?! a 5 paragraph fight that eventually ends with the same situtation? Or just lay out the facts?)

End​

​

 

[wiegeabo]

Probably won't have my writeup until tomorrow, but I am working on it. May have prep-time tonight.

 

[wiegeabo]

Short battle up. I will defend one assumption I made.

I have Tap sticking with Madrox and the Mimics to give them the edge over anyone coming after them. But, you could argue that Thanos keeps Tap close to surpress Warlock's power (or close to Marvel to surpress Shanzar). But all Deadline (or Vision if he detects where Tap is and follows Deadline into the fight) has to do is phase through any obstacles to take Tap out. Once that happens, the uber battle progresses the same way, and the Mid/Reg battle becomes a little easier for my guys.

 

[DTL Commish]

Voting may now begin.

 

[AnnoyingSilence]

wtf? already? i thought voting didn't open till sunday

 

[XFanTim]

Wieg is posting the dates of each match at the top of each thread, since the week and a half schedule means it's not always the same days of the week anymore.

This week voting was scheduled to open on the 10th (yesterday) and to run through the 15th (Tuesday). So it's open now, but there's no rush to vote if people are still planning to write more.

Are you going to write any more? Or should we go ahead and vote based on what you have up?

 

[Nightwing]

yeah AS thats poor even for you.....

'mimic takes out the regs and meds'

how?with what?how goes first? i mean come on man....a little creativity wouldnt go a miss

also Taps power dampening....does that happen automatically or when he concentrates cos if so then surely CM's powers would be dampened too if hes giving Tap a piggy back all around

 

[Aristotle]

Tap's power dampening is voluntary, I believe, but it's been awhile since I read the issues.

But yeah, AS, are we getting anymore? I'm not saying I'm voting against that writeup, because it's a little more than last week's, and I haven't put much thought into it yet, but should I watch this thread for more?

 

[AnnoyingSilence]

i'll be doing more people

 

[AnnoyingSilence]

Battle-Time...

Because when someone has sinned enough, Ragman can envelop them in his rags and absorb their soul.

Most significantly, having defeated an enemy, he can acquire new souls by absorbing them with the suit.(straight form your profile)

And the reason Adam can help his teammate is because he was able to disable the Mimics they were fighting with karmic blasts. And, if necessary, that's how he'll stop Marvel as well.

whats up with these "karmic blasts"

 

[XFanTim]

"Karmic blast" is one of Adam Warlock's attacks using the Soul Gem. Basically, it's a blast of spiritual energy that disrupts someone's soul and knocks them out. Think of it kind of like a psi-blast, except that ordinary telepathic diffenses won't stop it. (E.g., he was able to take out Maxam with one after Moondragon failed to drop him with a psi-blast from the Mind Gem.) Basically only enhanced "spiritual defenses" will stop it, which generally means high level magic. Thor has resisted a Karmic blast before because of his "royal Asgardian soul" (ordinary Asgardians don't have this resistance). Dr. Strange has defended himself against the Gems before, so he could probably stop one. I think Silver Surfer has developed some spiritual defenses based his experience battling Mephisto. Someone like Zauriel could withstand one, I'd think. Soulless beings like androids are also immune.

 

[AnnoyingSilence]

i'm sorry, but the question was for wea.. i do believe that you just committed "interference" and should be docked a vote(seriously, thats wea's debate all the way)

and the last time i checked even the "offical records", Adam Warlock doesn't have the (Soul Gem) next to his name

 

[wiegeabo]

No, he didn't commit interference. He just answered a question. Tim didn't offer advice or a strategy or how he 'thinks' something would/should go.

As for the Soul Gem and karmic blasts, Adam always had those in the League. Although you are right in that it should probably say Adam Warlock (Soul Gem).

 

[AnnoyingSilence]

its part of debate. your debate.

 

[wiegeabo]

No it's not. He's just explaining how something works. He didn't say how I would use it against you. Just what it is and how it works. We've always done that for other owners over the years.

 

[XFanTim]

i'm sorry, but the question was for wea.. i do believe that you just committed "interference" and should be docked a vote(seriously, thats wea's debate all the way)

God, you're an ass. First of all, I didn't debate anything ... it's not like you said "There's no such thing as a karmic blast" and I disputed it. (Wieg wouldn't need my help winning that argument, anyway.) You asked about them like you didn't know what they were, so I tried to explain it to help you out. And got *****ed out for it.

And when the **** have we ever docked anyone a point in the history of this thing? Never, that's when.

And of course Adam Warlock has the soul gem, same as he had it in season four, season three, season two, and season one. You can argue that Wieg should have listed it in his character description, but even if you win that argument it just means you can assume your characters know about it -- not that he can't use it.

 

[AnnoyingSilence]

lol... i like pissin people off real fast

 

[XFanTim]

Strangly, it's not your silence that annoys me . . . .

 

[Aristotle]

This writeup's a little sloppy from both sides, actually. Wieg, Ragman's gotta beat someone before he can take their soul, and that soul-taking isn't actually part of the fighting process. At least, that's how it's always seemed to me. Otherwise, he coulda stopped the Spectre in a real hurry.

On the other side of things, AS, Tap can't affect the power of cloth. He affects the power of metahumans, and Rory Regan isn't a meta. His cloak is what has the power, so Tap's useless.

I also still don't know how I feel about the idea of a power-copier picking up duping powers along with other powers. I really feel that's a ranking bump, but apparently no one agrees.

I guess in the end I have to give this to In Jesus' Name. 40 Mimics is gonna be too much for Ragman, Vision, and Deadline, although I can see them taking out Tap and Jamie Madrox.

As for the uber fights, Wieg doesn't provide me with a convincing way of taking out Thanos, because Rory just plain can't do that to Thanos. I gotta give that one to AS, and because Wieg writes Genis as falling to basically his entire team, and I don't buy that happening because of the way the other fights go, I gotta give the one to AS as well.

AnnoyingSilence takes it, 3-0. In Jesus' Name.

 

[wiegeabo]

Ragman doesn't have to beat someone to take them. He can take them whenever he wants. He was getting his ass handed to him by Blue Moon. He wanted to take her into his rags, but she hadn't done enough evil. He also doesn't have to fight all the regular criminals he takes either. He just envelops them and absorbs them.

And if you think someone is getting bumped up to another rank, feel free to call them on it and vote against them if you want. (And I know you can't change your vote, I'm just making it clear to everyone what their powers as a voter are.)

 

[wiegeabo]

Rebuttle:

I agree. Mimic would drop Beast's power for Madrox's. I even wrote that in mine. It's the most logical thing to do.

But, using the X-Force base is strictly out. Not only do you not have Forge in your lineup, meaning you can't use his resources, but this is battlefield prep-time this seasonl. You can't use anyone's resources that they don't have with them. And none of these guys are going to be carrying anything to keep the cold out.

So, while the cold won't effect my team, Madrox and Tap will be freezing. And if the fight goes on long enough, they'll probably just collapse from the cold.


I'm not sure what the heck happened to Deadline. Why did he lose all his technology? Tap couldn't shut it down because that's not how his power works. And no one is going to take it from him because he's intangible.

I don't thing Tap can effect Ragman. And even if he could, Tap doesn't take away powers, he can only dampen them. (If he could take them away, he could have stopped Atom Smasher and Black Adam from escaping.) And even a dampened Ragman could still control his rags and pull all the power he needs from the souls within.

I don't know how a bunch of Mimics can beat Vision since Vision never has to be tangible. Which means Mimic has no way of attacking him while Vision can still phase through them and use his energy blasts. Vision could also max out his density and become diamond hard. Harder than Mimic's organic steel, and fight him physically (although that probably isn't the best strategy).

Keeping Tap near the ubers is a good idea, but I already came up with a counter to that. Tap can't effect Vision, so Vision just takes him out.

 

[XFanTim]

It's true that AS isn't allowed to use the X-Factor base, but I don't really consider his use of the base very important in determining the outcome of the fight. He just got equipment to protect Tap and Multiple Man, neither of whom would be a huge factor in my opinion.

Personally, I think an army of Mimic's is uber. If Colossus has even half the strength of an uber, surely a few dozen flying, optic blasting Colossuses would be uber. However, Wieg didn't argue the point -- in fact he used Mimic in the same way AS did. So I don't really see how I can hold it against AS.

I buy that Genis backed up by an army of Mimics could beat Shanzar -- hell, Genis could probably give him a good fight one-on-one, as even Wieg's writeup acknowledges. And Mimic would have enough copies to keep Vision busy while also aiding Genis.

That said, I think that if Warlock could get by Thanos he could beat Genis, since so far as I know Genis doesn't really have any good defenses for soul-based attacks. But would Warlock get by Thanos? One-on-one, I'd give the edge to Thanos, who's actually killed Warlock before (although Warlock did return the favor with an assist from Spider-Man, and anyway those were weaker incarnations of both of them than the current versions). Anyway, I think Warlock probably needs some help to beat Thanos.

So that's where Ragman comes in. The question is whether or not Ragman could steal Thanos's soul the way Wieg has him do it. (Of course, Warlock could always steal Thanos's soul himself, but he's always held back from doing this. At one point it was explicitly stated that he avoided stealing Thanos's soul for fear that Thanos's dark spirit would overwhelm him. See, Warlock is somewhat mentally linked to all the souls he's taken to the gem's Soul World. So if he absorbs a really evil soul, there's a chance that its influence could actually make him more evil.)

Anyway, I don't know squat about Ragman, so I looked him up online. His wikipedia article seems to echo Aristotle's take on things, saying "Most significantly, having defeated an enemy, he can acquire new souls by absorbing them with the suit." (emphasis mine) However, this more detailed profile says the following:

The suit can steal a person's soul as long as it is still touching his body. Ragman will usually subdue a target (knock them unconscious or Stun them) to minimize their ability to resist, but this is not necessary.

That's good enough to satisfy me. (Plus, I kind of suspect Adam could use the Soul Gem to amplify Ragman's power as well.)

So, Adam keeps Thanos occupied long enough for Ragman to take him out. (I don't think Tap could stop Ragman's power, and anyway if he gets close Warlock would easily take him out.) Meanwhile, Genis beats Shanzar with some aid from the Mimics. But Warlock is able to finish Genis off, and then he can probably drop every Mimic with one shot (since I doubt that their soul duplicates just because the body does).

I vote for Chaos & Order in a close match.