The balance of power levels

[Malachi]

Depending on character this is more or less an issue. In the end X-men characters are created to work as a team and face enemies as a team. They are not solo heroes.

Over the years some characters have gotten power upgrades. Some have gotten sidegrades, some have stood still and some have regressed. While in general most enemies have gotten upgrades. All enemies if one is not to count the toadies like… well toad.

This leaves us with a mixed bag to say the least. You want a foe that Jean can battle and while she perhaps shouldn’t go all out, she definitely shouldn’t hold back. The same foe should be someone that Nightcrawler, Warren, Magneto and Kitty fights. Such a fight should not be that Jean and Magneto are the big guns and the rest tend to be written more as fodder.

The standard argument that a good writer fixes this doesn’t really apply. In its most basic form this should be clear enough that a bad writer can write it and everyone has clear roles and clear contributions.

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.

Gambit. If Warren has stood still more then anything sense then Remy has regressed. In the awful Stephanie Phillips mini it was highlighted how the foes brought in to fight Rogue were way above Gambit’s level. Absorbing man, Juggernaut… so here we got a case of not the best writer in marvels payroll coming up short with the fights.
This problem has been around longer and even Carey struggled when he often had others like Shaw or Magneto around Remy.

There are other examples but I have felt for years now that Marvel has fallen away from the formula that I got introduced to. Where power levels varied but almost everyone had a specialty. In X-men 1 or 2 Betsy uses her psychic dagger to pierce Magneto. A great example of a character who lacks range but is agile, who needs to get very close to Erik to hurt him. She had a power that was almost always useful but very situational in when it could be used. The same with Logan. His claws could hurt almost everyone but he needed to get close.

These days so many characters have become downplayed to the point of losing their function in a fight. There are just so many fights where you can enjoy Kitty and her specific power not working on the enemies.