The balance of power levels

[Devaishwarya]

Power differentials really isn't that big of an issue for competent writers.

Ideally, a writer wants have stories where characters of different power-levels and sets can be engaged. Where it comes to "OL" characters ideally you want them to have levels and variations where they can be useful in a team setting without having to bust out the OL feats (at a minimum) or overshadow the other members. Iceman, Jean and Storm do work in that capacity...where they employ their skill-sets in a range of feats. OL feats are usually reserved for huge moments like terraforming Mars.

Of the 14 Omegas Hickman listed...Only Jean (solo) Storm (solo) Magneto (XM) Quentin (XM) are on active duty so far in the Brevoort Era. Iceman, Hope, Elixir, Legion are still to be placed/accounted for.

[Ra-El]

More than just big power levels, what I think is a big problem is too undefined powers.

Like sometimes a character starts as a fire manipulator, then they are promoted to temperature manipulator, then to energy manipulator and when we see the writers are explaining how molecules are atoms bonded by energy so a energy manipulator can separate or unite different atoms forming different molecules and suddenly the character that started controlling fire is a energy/matter manipulator.

They should stop with this, the guy who controls fire should keep controlling fire. The creativity, imo, is in finding new ways the character can get out of situations and defeat their enemies by manipulating fire, not in giving them a completely different power that is only related to the original by a bunch of ilogical leaps and made up words.

[Devaishwarya]

What you're describing is natural growth and development of one's abilities. Yes some writers can take things too far where they don't make much logical sense (sometimes...this is comics...where things logically don't make sense on a very fundamental level). It makes sense for someone who is a fire manipulator to gradually become a heat energy manipulator through understanding, training and pushing the limits of their power. "Gradually" being the operative word because we get to see their growth from the moment their powers emerge to where they are masters of their craft. I always think of it as an artist starting off drawing stick figures as a child and colouring outside the lines but then over the years become more and more expert as they learn in infinite details of creating art...colour, line, light, composition, bodies, objects, water colour, graphite, oil, paper, canvas, board

[Hakka84]

More than just big power levels, what I think is a big problem is too undefined powers.

Agree. Not to mention the same old character (else you anger their fans), but. TK was basically move things with your mind. I know this came from CC, but now TK is too broad, and goes from pushing a person to "molecularly rearrange your costume so you can change clothes". I mean.
Betsy went from "the focused totality of her powers", that emanated from her hand, to conjure a tk bow to throw tk arrows (something that Omega Kid does too with firearms). I mean, err?!
Remember when Jean was saved by the Phoenix Force because she couldn't shield herself on that shuttle? Well, now I think no existing TK would be in that same situation: they would easily keep the shuttle all in place and shields up. Or, you know, Storm would strengthen Jean's force shield.
Or they would have Wolverine pilot the shuttle and survive easily.

I agree that power levels are just... too much.
I read a 90s comic (not a Silver Age, not even Claremont - a bloody 90s), and I see Magneto or Storm or Jean struggle to do things that now are done by New Mutant Teen # Who Just Got Their Powers.
Some mutations have become obsolete (Warren's wings - at the time of his debut he was the only flier with Johnny Storm and Iron Man), some have been rendered obsolete because there are mutants who are too powerful to be team player (unless you nerf them).
As of now, even a brick like Rogue is almost useless (she flies and "just" fights in close combat - no offensive power to shoot or to strike an enemy with). I mean, Rogue.

Some examples. Warren from the O5. Iceman and Jean are now classified as omega. Beast is a mutated scientist, so he gets to play the smart card. Cyclops have the same powers but his blasts have been upgraded over the years. A stealth upgrade that is.
Warren got his Archangel phase, dabbled in healing powers, but mostly he is still defined by his flying ability. Something others have gotten as a bonus over the years with their powers. It’s harder to find a use for Warren when you need a foe that can challenge Jean and Bobby. Scott often has the foe being damaged by his blast and Hank uses his brain and agility to deliver some solution. Warren is sort of… well left behind.

The issue with Warren is that, even when he's Archangel is seldom used at the best of his capabilities. We were discussing this in Warren's topic and, as I said there... Warren is the flying Wolverine.

So, while Logan certainly has a lot more of experience and more training in hand-to-hand combat, Warren should be the Wolverine of the skies, as lethal as Logan is on the ground. Both have the enhanced sense to be a predator stalking the prey (smell / sight), both have their own way to be lethal (close up with claws / both close and distance with wings).
Both share a healing factor (albeit Logan's is definitely more powerful).

But, unlike Wolverine who usually is treated with respect in a fight, Warren isn't. So you have a character who should be a dangerous fighter, but is threated as that one guy who flaps around and looks handsome in splash pages. Ok.

(not downplaying Logan here - just pointing out that Warren could be used in a similar capacity)

Wolverine is basically melee DPS. He's deadweight as a ranged combatant, or against the not-uncommon flying threat, and so the most effective tactic is for Colossus to *throw him at the enemy.*

And you have Warren who can do the same damage but he can throw himself on the enemy. But, for some reasons, the same authors who write Logan as a dangerous fighter can't seem to do the same with Warren (X-Force/Uncanny X-Force notwithstanding)

What you're describing is natural growth and development of one's abilities.

Yes, well. You can run all your daytime, but still you won't become Usain Bolt. Or you can drive all you want but no Michale Schumacher you will become.
There should be limits, a cap to how much you can develop.
I can understand that Bobby shouldn't be limited to be covered in snow like he did when he was a teen, but... melt down and keep his conscience (without being a telepath, so no access to the astral plane where to save himself) and reform himself into solid form I'd say it a bit too much.

[Malachi]

More than just big power levels, what I think is a big problem is too undefined powers.

Like sometimes a character starts as a fire manipulator, then they are promoted to temperature manipulator, then to energy manipulator and when we see the writers are explaining how molecules are atoms bonded by energy so a energy manipulator can separate or unite different atoms forming different molecules and suddenly the character that started controlling fire is a energy/matter manipulator.

They should stop with this, the guy who controls fire should keep controlling fire. The creativity, imo, is in finding new ways the character can get out of situations and defeat their enemies by manipulating fire, not in giving them a completely different power that is only related to the original by a bunch of ilogical leaps and made up words.

Yeah I call that power bleed. I think Niezica illustrated it well it with Storm in an issue of Gambit. Storm had to manipulate an electrical current to short circuit a control panel or some such. She tried hard and did it but it caused her pain because it wasn’t how her powers work.

[Sutekh]

Ideally the concept of omega level mutants should be done away with and I believe all mutants should have a cap on their power levels. They reach a certain point and fatigue sets in, or they unleash their power in a massive way and are drained for a bit until they recover.

That used to be the case with Banshee. He had the biggest blast of the All-New crowd (since Cyclops was just bumping up past the 'he runs out of blasts and gets tired eventually' early days and not quite the alpha threat he has become), but after doing something truly epic, he'd 'strain his throat' and be sidelined for awhile (which did him no favors, since he ended up missing some formative stories...).

I like the idea of at least some mutants having finite amounts of power, or being limited to ambient energy. Back in the day, Storm had to rely on the 'atmospheric tools available' and in her thoughts envied Thor who could just magically create a rainstorm in the desert. Vulcan would be a fine example of that. As long as there are powerful psychic around him, he can mess with their psionic energy to fake telepathy. As long as there are power lines nearby, he can call electricity from them. But he, as originally conceived, didn't actually *create* energy, and often had to rely on energy types that are always around, like heat (which led to him basically becoming an Omega Human Torch, chucking fire around (without actually taking the heat energy from anywhere?) as writers seemed to forget what his power actually was).

And then there's the utterly eye-rolling nonsense with the Omega moniker. Morrison introduced a 'Kid Omega,' who was a middling level telepath (and super-genius inventor!) who had to use a power-enhancing drug named Kick to overpower even B-grade telepaths like Slick, and who had his psychic influenced 'Riot at Xaviers' shut down by one of the Cuckoo sisters using Cerebro. Now he's mysteriously A) an Omega telepath, B) telekinetic, C) totally different in personality, D) a figure of affection for one of Cuckoos whose sister *died* stopping his madness, and E) not in jail, where he and the other primary Riot-ers (Glob, Radian, Tattoo) were supposed to get sent at the end of Morrison's arc (and, weirdly, only Radian and Tattoo actually seemed to go, per the events of the New Warriors arc).

[whitecrown]

Ideally the concept of omega level mutants should be done away with and I believe all mutants should have a cap on their power levels. They reach a certain point and fatigue sets in, or they unleash their power in a massive way and are drained for a bit until they recover. But unfortunately the horse has left the barn and it's not coming back. To many X-fans love their faves being uber powerful and performing massive feats. Anything short of that is seen as jobbing. So we're stuck with ever expanding power levels, hell, even power damperners don't seem to exist anymore.

I agree. It's become tiring now especially the way just about any mutant can be branded an omega as it takes away from the unique appeal. I liked the way the movies classified it, specifically The Last Stand. With there being five classes of mutants and most mutants being class 1-3. Magneto and Pyro were class-4 mutants and Jean was the only class-5 mutant that Xavier and Magneto had ever encountered.

[marhawkman]

I agree. It's become tiring now especially the way just about any mutant can be branded an omega as it takes away from the unique appeal. I liked the way the movies classified it, specifically The Last Stand. With there being five classes of mutants and most mutants being class 1-3. Magneto and Pyro were class-4 mutants and Jean was the only class-5 mutant that Xavier and Magneto had ever encountered.

Yeah, the whole Omega thing is mostly hype these days :/

[Devaishwarya]

Yeah, the whole Omega thing is mostly hype these days :/

Well...technically it's only 14 mutants going by what Hickman stipulated (13 if we count the F4 kid as no longer a mutant) with one or two mentioned "btw" in other books. So it's not just any Earth mutant. However, The Arakko mutants were a very different story...but that was never developed into anything significant, plotwise. The only ones who got major play were Lactuca, Sobunar and Tarn.

[Sutekh]

Yeah, the whole Omega thing is mostly hype these days :/

It became really obvious first to me with the Authority, after it devolved (IMO) from the otherwise decent Stormwatch. All of the characters were less powers and more 'cool' catchphrases, like 'Night's Bringer of War' or 'God of Cities.' Just sort of running with the fuzzily defined themes, instead of actual powers, like an attempt to borrow from the vastly better fuzzily-defined abilities of Dream, of the Endless, but lacking utterly in the serious characterization and storytelling skill that went into the Sandman books. (And that was a separate issue. The characters themselves when written that way tended to be all cliches and catchphrases, with no set characterization or 'voice' for anybody, just interchangeably barfing out the same 'edgy' dialogue. Storm, in particular, seems to have suffered the most from this as well, with her formerly having a well-rounded mixture of personality traits, including gentle, nurturing, humble, curious and in tune with all of the natural world, such as plants and animals, not just weather, but since going Omega, she's been more and more imperious and dismissive and obsessed with Omega energy manipulation tricks. I don't know if she even *likes* plants and animals anymore, and she doesn't seem to have much humble and nurturing left in her...)

In the case of characters like Dream, or Galactus, or whomever, that sort of fuzzily defined power level works, but when someone who has a long history of not being 'an Omega' (like Storm, Jean or Bobby, who had regular limitations for most of their published history) it doesn't work so well, IMO.

[Marvell2100]

Could be the problem is that there are too many omega level characters. These type characters should be rare and using their powers at the highest level should only happen in certain circumstances. Maybe it shouldn't be something so tapped into.

It's funny that one of the most dangerous X-Men isn't an omega level character, isn't one of the strongest, fastest and isn't telepathic or telekinetic. They don't shoot rays or beams either.

It's Kitty Pryde. With her powerset, skills and fighting abilities, she's one of the most dangerous mutants there is and is nowhere near being an omega(at least not that I know of)

I think Warren is very dangerous in his Archangel identity. He may not have the offensive fire power like some of the other mutants(although those wings are very deadly) but as seen in Remender's Uncanny X-Force run, he can be very much a major threat.

Back to omega characters: I believe that there is a role for them although like I said, it should be a rare occurrence and the powerset should lead to someone becoming an omega (being able to control a fundamental force of nature/the universe).

But even having an omega doesn't mean that the other team members aren't needed. For one thing, most omegas aren't omnipotent or super-geniuses. They can't be everywhere once. Also, there maybe villains who are omegas, villain teams/organizations or situations where you actually need teams to deal with.

[Hakka84]

Funny that I was just thinking about Authority as an example of a team made of "Omega" superpowered people who were given very specific caps and limitations, so that the team could feel balanced (and include a "simple" flier-claws such as Swift). Also, the team was usually involved in planetary threats, which helped (they could go "full powers" on their enemies and then run out of powers and turn vulnerable).
X-Men are in an odd position because they have god-like supers but they are mostly involved in petty fights and local threats.

[marhawkman]

Could be the problem is that there are too many omega level characters. These type characters should be rare and using their powers at the highest level should only happen in certain circumstances. Maybe it shouldn't be something so tapped into.

It's funny that one of the most dangerous X-Men isn't an omega level character, isn't one of the strongest, fastest and isn't telepathic or telekinetic. They don't shoot rays or beams either.

It's Kitty Pryde. With her powerset, skills and fighting abilities, she's one of the most dangerous mutants there is and is nowhere near being an omega(at least not that I know of)

I think Warren is very dangerous in his Archangel identity. He may not have the offensive fire power like some of the other mutants(although those wings are very deadly) but as seen in Remender's Uncanny X-Force run, he can be very much a major threat.

Back to omega characters: I believe that there is a role for them although like I said, it should be a rare occurrence and the powerset should lead to someone becoming an omega (being able to control a fundamental force of nature/the universe).

But even having an omega doesn't mean that the other team members aren't needed. For one thing, most omegas aren't omnipotent or super-geniuses. They can't be everywhere once. Also, there maybe villains who are omegas, villain teams/organizations or situations where you actually need teams to deal with.

I still like the idea that Kitty is really a Neo

[Malachi]

Funny that I was just thinking about Authority as an example of a team made of "Omega" superpowered people who were given very specific caps and limitations, so that the team could feel balanced (and include a "simple" flier-claws such as Swift). Also, the team was usually involved in planetary threats, which helped (they could go "full powers" on their enemies and then run out of powers and turn vulnerable).
X-Men are in an odd position because they have god-like supers but they are mostly involved in petty fights and local threats.

It's been a while since I read it but as the titel went on I remember Swift getting less and less to do and Angie getting more to do. Jack the same. The doctor was always a missfit, enormously powerful but often out of his high to keep him from doing to much. Apollo and Midnighter were the stars.

[Hakka84]

It's been a while since I read it but as the titel went on I remember Swift getting less and less to do and Angie getting more to do. Jack the same. The doctor was always a missfit, enormously powerful but often out of his high to keep him from doing to much. Apollo and Midnighter were the stars.

You're not wrong. It's been a while since I re-read it in its entirety.
But Angie herself was limited, if I remember right, because the nanites pumping in her blood weren't infinite, while Apollo quickly depleted his resources and needed to recharge. And enemies tended to bring the fight away from cities to crippled Jack. They were given a variety of enemies so you could have both the superhero foe for Middy and the one who had to be tackled by Apollo, and usually the one that was meant to fight Middy had a way to tackle Apollo.
But I might remember wrong!
(the doctor was nerfed down with the excuse of his drug addiction. I don't remember much about the second doctor ATM)