Heroic Spirit All Might

[BitVyper]

Because she tried to use a bunch of weightlifting equipment as a focus to summon Saber (shown in Hollow Ataraxia IIRC), Tohsaka gets All Might in the Archer slot instead of Emiya. He appears in the state he was at the start of MHA, which is to say, still in possession of One For All, but still limited to three hours a day (although even Tohsaka probably can't meet the mana requirement to sustain it that long). Only feats from the original three stories (Stay Night, Unlimited Blade Works, and Heaven's Feel) apply for the Nasuverse characters. All Might will participate in the Grail War, at the very least because it endangers people the longer it goes on.

How do he and Tohsaka get along? How does the Grail War go?

While I can't recall any huge amazing speed feats in the original stories, if I'm missing some iteration that put everyone at bullet time or something, we'll just say that the Heroic Spirit template puts All Might into the ballpark of the other knight classes enough to make it a non-factor.

[Kirika]

What I want to know is how does he far against Gilgamesh, both when he's playing around and not joking around.

[Harbinger19]

Because she tried to use a bunch of weightlifting equipment as a focus to summon Saber (shown in Hollow Ataraxia IIRC), Tohsaka gets All Might in the Archer slot instead of Emiya. He appears in the state he was at the start of MHA, which is to say, still in possession of One For All, but still limited to three hours a day (although even Tohsaka probably can't meet the mana requirement to sustain it that long). Only feats from the original three stories (Stay Night, Unlimited Blade Works, and Heaven's Feel) apply for the Nasuverse characters. All Might will participate in the Grail War, at the very least because it endangers people the longer it goes on.

How do he and Tohsaka get along? How does the Grail War go?

While I can't recall any huge amazing speed feats in the original stories, if I'm missing some iteration that put everyone at bullet time or something, we'll just say that the Heroic Spirit template puts All Might into the ballpark of the other knight classes enough to make it a non-factor.

Some day I’d like to to do a Nasuverse speed algorithm thread, sort of like what’s been done for Trigun, Naruto...

Short version? People who are probably around Danny Rand levels of speed* can “fight a defensive battle” against really average Servants. Meaning, “they can run away and not immediately get killed, so it’s TECHNICALLY a fight.”

I’m not all caught up on MHA by any stretch but the stuff I’ve seen from All Might is like, I dunno, ringer speed. Never seen him dodge bullets or anything. Faster than the eye, sure, but nothing special by Nasuverse standards.

Now he’s got much better strength feats than the Servants AFAIK, (have yet to see that final fight of his but have vague notions) but I don’t know if he can handle the conceptual trickery he’s gonna have to deal with, and probably at a speed disadvantage since he’s subbing for Archer.

I could see Medusa ruining him by being a terrible match-up, perhaps even True Assassin if Hassan can avoid AOEs. That doesn’t bode super well for a throwdown with Gil.

But like I said, I haven’t seen All Might’s best, so I may be completely off.

*Mainly Ciel-senpai of Tsukihime, who by my estimation is about 3.5–4.5 speed tiers above fresh Dead Apostles. Kirei burning through Command Spells and at “Dead Apostle level combat ability” being able to pimp-slap rifle-caliber hand cannon bullets at close range.

[BitVyper]

I'd be interested in hearing the feats if they're from UBW, Heaven's Feel, or Stay Night. I don't think that covers Ciel though. To be honest, I've played the original VN completely, but I've not seen any of the animes entirely, as I find Shirou to be such a paternalistic, toxic, gaslighting little jerk as to be totally intolerable, while the narrative only seems to care that he's self-destructive. I'm thinking of picking up Apocrypha though, because I do generally like the premise of Fate, and most of the non-Shirou characters.

As for All Might, while it's not real relevant to this thread, since I covered my ass, I feel he's generally just a couple shades below bullet time, in the nebulous "does anime things" speed tier. He also has the fairly flimsy feat of being portrayed roughly even with All For One, who was in turn able to react to an attack from All Might moving at full travel speed (he knew it was coming, but not precisely when to expect it, since All Might's speed was actually down from his estimations), but I wouldn't really expect anyone to take that too seriously.

[Harbinger19]

Yeah, I’m afraid feats are limited if we’re looking at VN alone. (I’ve personally only gone through HF) The Ciel thing only works as an ABC kind of power-scaling and then only by virtue of Word of God comments from interviews.

I thought it might be acceptable since Archer apparently got his coat from Ciel, but that’s WoG again. Up to you as the OP if you wanna roll with it, or stick to the VN.

If it’s the latter though, you know the stuff better than me.

[BitVyper]

Oh, I didn't mean just the VN. Animes of SN, UBW, or HF are fine too.

But I know things start getting crazy when you get to extended universe stuff, like Gil having spaceships and junk.

[BitVyper]

For what it's worth, I tend to agree that Medusa would probably be the worst matchup for him, at least in a scenario where she's operating at full strength.

[Harbinger19]

Agreed.

I will go ahead and recommend Apocrypha to you. It’s pretty solid for most of its run (though I’ll personally always prefer Zero and Heaven’s Feel). That said some of the animation in Apoc’s last episodes is fantastic and I’ve rewatched them more times than most any other Fate stuff.

[BitVyper]

Heaven's Feel just has the one movie so far, right? I like the Heaven's Feel story because you get to see Kirei really cut loose in it. Plus Rider is great. Shirou hits his absolute peak for pissing me off in that route though.

True Assassin is great. Zouken also makes a pretty good villain.

[Harbinger19]

Kirei’s my favorite character in fiction period, so yeah, HF is great. And yes, the one movie that’s out is literally my favorite movie period. Really boils the story down to its essence IMO. I think Shirou comes off a lot more sympathetically in the movie than elsewhere too.

Definitely can see how you’d hate a character like Shirou, though. Really disliked him watching UBW. That said, when reading through HF I understood more where he was coming from and respected the swerve from UBW’s philosophy. Nowadays I can actually say I like him for the purpose he serves, psychologically and philosophically screwed up as he is. (Less so in HF IMO, though very few people seem to agree)

It’s interesting how polarizing Fate can be. Personally I “like” every character and their contribution to the narrative but some people despise my personal favorites like Kirei and Sakura.

[BitVyper]

I mainly hate the guy because he's propped up as being selfless to the point of self destructiveness, so that at the very least we're supposed to see his fundamental nature as "good," but then he does stuff like gaslight and physically assault Sakura because she told him no, while continually saying that he thinks Shinji is a good guy deep down. The most telling scene for me is when Sakura, visibly ill, wants to go to archery practice. He starts by going way the hell overboard telling her she can't, repeatedly calls her stupid, grabs her by the wrist and yanks her so hard she falls over when she says she's going, and then when he finds out she's only going for the sake of Shinji's reputation, he's like oh well that's okay then as long as you don't do any archery. There's also the bit in Stay Night where he points out that the bright side of his friend getting sexually assaulted is it might teach her to be more feminine. Like what the hell, dude.

He's so on the nose for particular traits, I kept expecting the other shoe to drop, for the narrative to go "aha! But you see, this disgusting man is, in fact, the hero of all of your aneemays!" But it never did, so it was just endlessly frustrating to watch this paternalistic jerk get to keep being the main character.

Edit: Give him some classier clothes and put him in a narrative that doesn't default him to the protagonist role, and Shirou is basically Touga or Saionji from Utena.

Edit: Sorry, not trying to start a fight, I just have a real intense loathing for Shirou, made worse by his presence in a series I otherwise like.

[Harbinger19]

No worries man. I’ll be sure to keep an eye out for that stuff when I go back through the VN from the beginning someday.