I hear "overpowered human" pretty often as a turn off in this group and just in general when it comes to HiE fics.

Now my questions are:
When is the Human considered overpowered?
What are you basing that conclusion on?

I have an opinion but I want to see what my fellow fic writers and fic readers think.

I also have a question on this subject, is it considered overpowered if the thing that makes them over powered also hurts them

When he appears with two gatling guns strapped to his arms and starts blazing ponies away, is immune to magic, mares are crawling all over him because they totally dig the weird alien kind, and he saves the world with pure unshaved chest hair awesomeness.

I'm basing my conclusion out of experience and a Sabaton video.

Whenever a human fights a Manticore or Hydra and wins.
That is all

Well overpowered for me is like having some kind of god abilities that you would not expect to see in a human being like being able to take some crazy amount of punishment or being able to use some kind of magic.

If they do have some kind of power it has to be balanced either physically or mentally.

I have no idea, people keep using the term and I keep wondering whether the character in my primary fic counts or not...

Everyone loves them within five seconds of meeting them.

-Mary Sue's
-superpowers
-being unrealistic (comparative to universe said human comes from... If you can explain a realistic answer to how did they get the powers go for it by all means)

Personally though I only dislike the Mary Sue's

You KNOW he's overpowered when he can buck apple trees better than Big Mac and has an impressive wing span. *wink*

I ran away from a Manticore does that count? lol But really that is something that can bother me in some fics. I remember one fix I was skimming through when one of the CMC came upon the human and one mof the mane six having sex and wanted to try it too, he snapped his fingers and erased her memory as well as teleporting her home... Wow.

600708 there are human's though that could kill a Hydra or a Manticore. I personally know how to kill both

When the characer is way, way, way sronger then Celestia, Luna, Discord, and the Elements of Harmony combined. Basically a god.

600707 Guess you would hate a Duke Nuke'em crossover then.

600710 This: 600708

600727 Greeks always exaggerate, so Herakles doesn't count, besides, he had a guy to hold the torch to the Hydra's neck.

As for overpowered... Is there anyone in real life who can do what the human does? If not, you'll need to do some explaining. If they can make a sonic rainboom every time they punch something, you've got an OP human.

Would beating Twilight in a duel of mind, body and magic through the use of insanity-aided human cunning qualify as OP?

600751

Barely noticed how well my description fits!

One of my Overpowered terms would be
Overpowered = Being able to do what someone of their occupation shouldn't be able to do.

Example: A boxer blocking and dodging blows to the head and chest easily = ok
A kid that has never lifted, fought a battle blocking blows with a single finger = not ok.

Being a trained marine, knowing how to subdue a man = ok
An woman taking down a fully grown Stallion with a punch = not ok. There are some cases where you do crazy things with adrenaline but this crosses it. You would break your hand no doubt.

He is one tough cookie, that can beat Chuck Norris himself in a rap battle.

In my opinion I only see it if the human character is a official God mongers. I think the human can have powers as long it doesn't overshadows the mane 6 or celestia, unless their the antagonist.

Basically, "if it makes the mane six pretty much obsolete."

I do, however, wonder if sometimes people don't get too caught up in the whole "overpowered" or "mary sue" thing. It seems like some people go in looking for these things and they see characters being overpowered even if they're actually not.

Like, a friend of mine once wrote a human who was chronically weak, had no superpowers whatsoever, practically had to lean on the ponies for everything... you get the idea. And he still got people saying his human was "overpowered" just because his standing height allowed him to reach places the ponies couldn't.

600794 you sir, just made my day
hats of to you

overpowered is a far stretched term. I prefer to give powers to a whole species rather than to individuals. These powers vary in usage and extent. For every power you get, some weakpoints and dangers are given as well. That's how to avoid them.

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For instance:
Humans in my fic can use unicorn magic, IF and only IF they are charged with the spells by a unicorn.Also for the right usage of magic he or she has to become "magically sentient", something that needs to be trained. A human can charge large amounts of spells in his body, but the amount is limited to the extent that the body can't cope with it anymore.

This is what I call overcharge.
Overcharge CAN kill the human and if all the accumulated magic is released either by will or death of the human, you have a lot of combat spells going BOOM in a large detonation. So a sane human has to manage his magic metabolism or he might harm others.

Alicorn magic however CAN'T be absorbed, this is far too powerful for the human body. Changeling magic however can be absorbed, but it's like poison.

I wrote some thoughts about it in An idea about biotech weaponry.
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So much for that. The whole concept of humans being "immune" to magic seemed overused and overpowered to me for it renders unicorns and alicorns to not threatwning at all to humans but to stab them. Thus I reworked it and now every human might have a little magic toolbox with him/her.

Plus, in order to make things a bit more interesting, I made humans receptive for the "influence" of higher beings such as alicorns, Changeling queens and draconequus as seen here.
.
.
.
overpowered... Well, I don't make such characters, so it's not easy to think of something. A lots of skillsets combined in one character seem overpowered to me. A pilot knows how to fly an aircraft, he has little to no experience with driving a tank. And I've yet to see the football athlete that can do quantum mechanics as well after winning the Pulitzer prize.

600751
The character was converted into a pony (Oh god, the horror, never understand why people hate that so much ), and explicitly into a Gary Stu, during which time (in the prologue), he was explicitly overpowered. What I'm curious about whether he's 'overpowered' after he's transformed into a Unicorn

Ok, time to reply to all of that.

600707

But what if the fic in question was a gunzerker john woe/duke nukem style fic?

600708

Hmm...What if in that fic manticores are bottom barrel threats and the human has special abilities and it's established that it is that kind of fic not a normal Joe?

600709

How would this be overpowered if that was the kind of power that the human required to even compete with the threats in the story?

600715

That is a mary sue/gary stu

600716

I like the part about how they got the powers. That really has nothing to do with their level of power, but it does flash massive warning signs when the human just has powers. There needs to be a reason.

600721

Lo freaking L

600726

I haven't even read that story, but I think I need brain bleach.

600743>>600751

But what if the threats he is meant to face in the story are that powerful?

As for the sonic rainboom statement, that is along the lines of mary sue/gary stu, because you're taking a characters special one of a kind ability and giving it to your OC to make them cool. But punching so hard that it causes sonic booms hardly points towards him being OP. Heck, thats several times weaker than Titan, Terra, Celestia, Luna, and Twilight in The Immortal Game.

Lots of good responses, but as I expected the question was answered with statements that all sound OP in a vacuum...

I'll give examples from my story in my next post and I'd like to tell you if I crossed a line. Then I'll give you more context after I see some of the responses. Until I do that thought, free discussion on this topic is fine.

600877 As a unicorn, if he's better at magic than Twilight, he's OP, if he can find gems better than Rarity, he's OP. Other than that, barring extreme fights that even Twilight doesn't undertake (like fighting a hydra), that should be okay.

600880

Meh, I guess as long as it's funny it'd be cool. But they would have to pull it off really well.

600880

But what if the threats he is meant to face in the story are that powerful?

Then there better be one hell of an explonation as to how/why the character is so freakin powerfull.
If the antagonist is basically a god, then a very convincing means of defeating him better exist. And even then it should take more then one person to do so. Just look at Final Fantasy VI.

600854

I like this response, it assumes nothing about the world and gives me some examples of how you do things.

I like the way you put all of that information together, really unique stuff, and interesting.

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I don't necessarily believe that every power should have a weakness (unless by weakness you mean obvious things like how taxing it is or it not working for everything.) But weaknesses are a MUST.
-----------------------------------

Also dont forget that if you want me to actually respond to you you have to quote me or else I wont see it.

600708 Weapons, they change everything. It is completely reasonable for a human to take on a manticore, or even a hydra with the right weapons and maybe a little dash of cunning.

600880 You can call it whatever you want but doesn't change how overpowering it is.

Little to zero character flaws. To err is to be human and nobody is perfect.

Underwhelming character background. IE: Office temp turns into kung-fu MacGyver with a degree in Astrophysics once they end up in Equestria.

Human tech in Equestria being treated as indestructible/replaceable/easily crafted luxury items instead of holy crap, Twilight, please don't turn my weapon/car/super spy laptop into a fruit shaped sphere.

Unlimited ammo or fuel. I don't care if said human drove into ponyvillie on freighter ship full of the stuff, None thing lasts forever. Everything has a shelf life. Bullets get used and gas goes bad. Once it's gone, it's gone. Of course, if said human was crafty, they could figure out a interesting way to work around this instead of relying a lazily written, bottomless backpack or jerry can.

Human's just waltzing right into ponies homes with ease. Sure, they not have locks on their doors and some the stores/public/government buildings may have tall ceilings but don't forget just who built these homes: Other three to five foot tall ponies. Moving about inside should range to irritating, to challenging to @*!$ My head!

Human kills villain/wild animal/magical critter and everypony just nods their head in approval. Ugh. That goes without explaining I hope.

So would you class a team of a sr. Brown belt (who is kinda possesed by a power house thing (don't want to spoil it)), a well built (phisically) man, and a small fast smart guy who have trained together, and have good survival skills ie. Starting fires, building traps ect. And can take down a manticore con sidered OP?

600979

They are separate elements that can be part of the whole. Getting all of the mares would make the character a black hole, but if the focus of the fic/conflict of the fic isn't how many mares he gets. Then is it really overpowering?

If it was a romance and he got mare just by breathing then yes, in the context of that story he is overpwered and a gary stu.

600902

Personally I dislike both of those examples, i'm just being unbiased.

600917

Is the reason really as important as the implementation? Does it have to be some really well thought out reason when it works? Spider -man's a radioactive spider did it has worked for decades. X-men, it's a genetic mutation works just fine even though some characters are just completely out class others. Hulk and Superman have been performing incredible feats since their creation with no other real reason than radiation did it. If the reason they have powers isn't integral to the story is it necessary to have a lengthy explanation?

I see you have a very ridge perception of how these things should be handled.

Tell me. Why can the protagonist not defeat the big bad alone like in Bleach (Characters that can nuke cities are common place), Dragon Ball Z(Planets are as fragile as glass), or Seint Seiya?(some of the characters in that series can create universes). Is there something inherently wrong with a showdown between just two powerful characters or do you have some power ceiling that you believe the characters should top out at? Do you believe powerful characters hurt the story?

I'm not trolling you, I'm asking legitimate questions. Since you seem to basically be saying "You do it like this."

601002

This is all just damn terrible writing, not really OP just damn shitty writing.

601044
Spider Man, The Hulk, and the mutants from X-Men may have simple explinations, but they are plausable, and thus convincing. Plus in those example how/why they have powers are sentral plot points in plenty of occasions.
The xplinations doesn't have to be extremly lenghty, but it should deffinitly be a convincing one.

You do realise that animes, especially those ones, have very overpowered characters. Not to mention inconsistant powers. The creator of DBZ even stoped because of how rediculous it as becoming.
Even then their abilities are explained.
I have nothing wrong with characters with amazing abilities. It is just that these abilities should be explained.
Every character should have limits. Even the ones in the animes that you have mentioned. And like in those animes the characters had to train tirlessly to overcome them. Even then they struggled with enimes, but that is because of writers. Getting stronger through training, and hard work is a part of character growth.
Over powered characters ruin stories when they have very over the top powers that basically make them gods, and when they could briez through every conflict with no struggle at all.

The difference between a powerful but interesting character and an "overpowered" character lies chiefly in how their being "powerful" affects the story and the characters in it.

• Does their power act as a useful plot device to excuse lazy story lines, quickly and cleanly resolve conflicts, and serve to make them look attractive/authoritative/badass/etc. to other characters? Chances are, they're not only overpowered, they're a (borderline) Mary Sue.

• Does their power act as a useful plot device to facilitate intriguing story lines, cause just as much (if not more!) conflicts than it resolves (especially if those conflicts cannot be solved using said powers), and possibly serve to make them appear alarming/mysterious/suspicious/etc. to other characters? Chances are, they're not "overpowered," and if written well they're likely an interesting character too.

...That's just how I look at it, anyways. A "powerful" main character is not impossible to write, just harder to pull off, since many are tempted into drifting towards the path labeled "overpowered," even if they didn't mean to stray there. However, "powerful" characters can be some of the most interesting characters in a series if they're written well.

A good example of a character who is far more powerful than any of the other characters in the main cast would be Tolkien's "Gandalf" from Lord of the Rings. An ageless immortal being that fought the Balrog, the giant monster made from the elemental force of fire, in hand-to-hand for days on end and came out victorious; hell, they even split the side of the mountain with only their physical blows whilst fighting... and yet, Gandalf still isn't considered "overpowered" in the series, is he?

601092

This is what I was hoping to hear from you. I actually don't have to address any of the other things you said because of the last line.

Over powered characters ruin stories when they have very over the top powers that basically make them gods, and when they could briez through every conflict with no struggle at all.

So your primary problem is characters that are so powerful they void the threat? And that's the definition I was trying to extract eventually.

I will address the rest though because it is somewhat important to my point.

X-men was plausible, until you you look at some of the abilities and the huge power gap. Ice Man's mutation, believable. Colossus, bull-. A genetic mutation that allows him to substitute his flesh for organic metal from another dimension? Magneto, ok. Any mutant who taps the dark force is just totally implausible though. How they got their powers is rarely important in Xmen, their discovery might be though.

Spiderman and the Hulk's simple explaination were plausible at all in the least until years and years later when the writers added more psuedo science and exposition (The vemon of the spider being augmented into something similar to a retro virus, Bruce banner being pumped full of nanomanchines, or the hulk already being a part of him, but only needed the push to manifest). It didn't matter at the time, it didn't matter until it became a big plot point in those characters stories.

You do realise that animes, especially those ones, have very overpowered characters. Not to mention inconsistant powers. The creator of DBZ even stoped because of how rediculous it as becoming.

How are they overpowered when thats the same level of power the opposition brought? The creator stopped, not because of how powerful they were, but because the story was far way from the main focus of the series. The dragon balls became irrelevant in a show called Dragon Ball Z, the primary artifact was so weak in the series that it was only a side Deus ex machina.

Bleach characters aren't that powerful, at all, they are almost at the bottom of the barrel actually.

Yeah, bad animes have that. But thats a pretty moot point because every medium has rotten eggs. Ichigo, Goku, and the Saints all have well establish abilities. Probably in filler things get wonky, but then again its filler and is rarely consistent with anything.

Every character should have limits. Even the ones in the animes that you have mentioned. And like in those animes the characters had to train tirlessly to overcome them. Even then they struggled with enimes, but that is because of writers. Getting stronger through training, and hard work is a part of character growth.

That's a good point, but not the point. The same can be easily accomplished through dialogue and interaction with their environment. In some cases following a characters power trip is a pointless waste of time. Especially it nothing of note happened during that span of time. (IE we see them train when its relevant. We didn't see the training for goku to obtain super saiyain 3 at all.)

TTGL had mechs tossing galaxies like frisbees and through attacks that could end the universe, but there was nothing Overpowered there.

I hope that you understood that I don't condone a character with god like power and never having to understand it to utilize it to its fullest. No, thats not what im saying at all.

What I'm asking is what makes a character overpowered and are the readers being fair? (IE judging based on the context of the story or judging based on what they see as overpowered).

This was a nice converstion, I got some good info from you. I respect your input on the subject.
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601120

Nice response my good sir.

I was actually about to talk to Gandalf.

I was also going to mention Shiryo's Unlimited Blade Works as well.

601174
Shirou, and that's interesting considering what plot I've been working on myself...

601183

I blame bad dubs.

Anyway, what plot are you working on?

601186
Sent you a private message or two. Feel free to comment on the thread if you like.

Well, there was a fic I read where the human was a dragonborn, he could do magic, and he was the son of Celestia and Discord.

601193

I'll have to check that stuff out in the morning. Way to much coherent information to read at 11:30pm.

I'm gonna finish this next post then go to sleep. I'll say something tomorrow.

601202
But did that make him interesting and facilitate the story-line, or did it just allow him to run around solving all problems with ease?

601158
It was a nice conversation.
Well good night, and good luck with all of your endeavors.

Breaks the story.
No weaknesses.
Mary/Gary Stu

Those are the only three that I can come up with.

Now time for what I said I was going to do. Examples from my story.

I will put them in spoiler tags, so that you can only see them if you want to tell me that I crossed the line. As I said before I won't give all of the context, just what happened. Then when people say something about the events I'll post more context.

ps, they are going to be bare bones summaries of what happened.

In chapter 1

He escapes Tartarus with his own power.
Basically turns off both princesses powers.
Turns off Twilight's powers then later bests her in magic.
Has an Army of Demons under his control

In chapter 2

He grabs a 3 story tall monster by the wrist and it can't move because of his grasp, When the demon looked into the humans eyes it was terror stricken.

That's thus far.

601262
Complaining about something being OP somewhat reminds me of Soviet Tanks in World of Tanks game... Um... yeah... Not many will understand that reference. Well anyway

In my story the character is pretty darn powerful, having a control over Void magic granted to him by a cosmic trickster, however if he goes overboard with it (and he did, when he stopped time... Twice) The Void consumes him and he will be no more.

Granted he's a character of a game (Crossover with Dishonored), a professional assassin and wielder of unknown, unbound power it's pretty hard for me to draw an OP line there as he has situational advantage every time. I mean come on... Stopping time? Who the hell can do that? Well, then you have a situation when someone disallows him to speak, as his abilities work on uttering a single phrase to bend reality. Without the ability to talk he would just be a skilled assassin with ridiculous amounts of dexterity (in the game Void power allows him to pull of some incredible stunts), able to withstand ludicrous amounts of punishment (He literally regenerates from wounds...). So if it was an OC i would never hear the end of him being OP, but since he's a character from a game... Well... Creators fault not mine :P

Anyway had to do something to make him NOT that all powerful, so the Ponies are developing a way of stopping the wicked magic he wields, someone finally outwits him exploiting his sense of superiority and so on.

However big the power pool of a character is, there always will be a weakness to exploit making a potentially OP guy... Not that really OP I suppose :P

601262
Yeah....Unless him using his abilities is also killing him you have most definitly crossed the line. The line is just a speck from where you are. It seems that your character basicaly has god level powers.

Here's another thought I felt like interjecting real quick.

In general, I think giving characters (any character) special powers at all must be handled with caution. Powers have a way of becoming a crutch.

Like when I was writing Scene 7 of "Surprise Days," I had problems with the duel in the second half because I felt like the villainness (an earth pony with self-replication powers who is supposed to be a top-rank martial artist) lost too easily. I talked it over with a friend, and I noticed something... throughout the conversation, we kept coming up with ways to make her duplication powers more threatening.

This kind of thing is, I think, something a lot of newbie authors fall victim to (no doubt because of the influence of superhero comics), where characters' entire beings are defined by their abilities. Sure, abilities are a large part of your life, but you can't just be "the guy who runs super fast" or "the guy who is impervious to bullets" or, in the above case, "the girl who can duplicate." It's a very bad trap to fall into, because it leads to the character being flat and boring and for the stories and situations to end up feeling artificial. Powers should not be a matter of whether they're "strong" or "weak," but rather "do they make sense." This includes what the power can do and what it can't. If it all makes sense, then balance will result on its own. It's just like real life: The sherman tank is pretty strong, but you need to clean its treads, oil its joints, clean the turrets etc. every once in awhile. If a weakness feels natural, it helps the story.

(As for my character--when I finally finished the story, I wound up sticking to my original image of her and downplaying her duplication powers)

601336

Naw those powers definitely aren't killing him, but as promised the context that goes with that stuff:

The rest of the context is basically that, he lost to the Celestia and Luna already (with the elements), hence how he ended up in Tartarus in the first place. An intentional plot hole I left for the time being is, if he was strong enough to just shut down the princesses, how did he lose the first time? That will be answered in not to long actually. And the drain on his powers from keeping Celestia and Luna weaken is so great that he's actually worried about the fact that he may be mortal at the moment.

When he death glared the demon he passed out afterward because it took a lot of what energy he had left.
Most of those demons are going to betray him.

Twilight is the main character, but not the mane six, and as such Twilight and her crew will get powerful enough to fight him face to face during the events of the story.

I start every chapter with an page from the human's journal it goes over the human's history etc... but he also talks about it and such during the story.

What I told you of the story is pretty much him at his weakest. He'll never get to his full power though because at full power he's is the progenitor of the pony race, creator of all life on the planet and can do all most whatever he wants to do. He loses his chance at being full powered again when he gets betrayed. It's funny because he so powerful, yet I have the common sense to use his power like this:

• Does their power act as a useful plot device to facilitate intriguing story lines, cause just as much (if not more!) conflicts than it resolves (especially if those conflicts cannot be solved using said powers), and possibly serve to make them appear alarming/mysterious/suspicious/etc. to other characters? Chances are, they're not "overpowered," and if written well they're likely an interesting character too.

Instead of the mary sue way

Honestly its hard to fully explain without reading it. Lets just say that I have a good balance.