How would you evolve the powers of less powerful mutants?

[marhawkman]

For Scanner, the simplest offensive application for her power would be that she could interfere with someone's nervous system by phasing through them. By flying through someone in her astral form, the energy from her astral form would 'block' the signals travelling through the person's body and leave them paralyzed. (Sort of like how Kitty somehow disrupts machinery by phasing through it.) She'd be a person-shaped 'psychic knife' of sorts. Being able to fly around at pretty much any speed she can think, and being totally insubstantial (and therefore immune to any form of attack other than some magics meant to bind 'ghosts,' or psychic attacks from telepaths and the like), she'd be pretty buff. If her astral self can actually *overpower* the signals of another person, she could even possess them, but that's, IMO, an unnecessary power-up. Just being able to 'interrupt' other people would be fine.

Well... Scanner's done this in the comics:
scanner7.jpg
Yeah.... So she already has the bio-electric disruption ability as a power in the comics. Punching Xavier's astral form and knocking him into his physical body is something very few can do. Oh wait I forgot about that in my previous post. It doesn't seem to do much beyond stunning people temporarily.

Kitty's phasing disrupts things by pushing them in and out of phase a bit. Scanner's power doesn't work that way. She shifts into an energy form instead.

[Michael Watkins]

It’s still very useful in handling unwanted telepathy spying

[Michael Watkins]

The thought crafting here is about how to make them more powerful without drastically changing them. It's a thing that's been done a lot in comics already. For example: Jubilee seemed weak and a bit useless at first, but then got retconned to be able to blow up buildings. That was a simple as changing the amount of energy she could throw into an attack.

the backstory for Mr. Sensitive doesn't seem like he'd be all that powerful. But he does the Daredevil thing where he's a super-martial artist that normal people can't match.

In Scanner's case it's ambiguous how her ability to sense the difference between humans and mutant works. Is it a form of aura reading? If so she might have the ability to see the auras of everyone near her. We know she can sense the presence of astral forms. Maybe her mutant sensing ability is simply a matter of being able to read auras? If so as a martial artist she'd be able to feel her opponent's location. Adding in the ability to reflexively phase like Kitty does and she suddenly becomes a lot more dangerous, and without actual changing the nature of her powers.

Hmm. But this would seem to bolster my point. Mister Sensitive had a natural advantage but, correct me if I’m wrong, had to learn his fighting style. He didn’t become more powerful; just more practiced.

[marhawkman]

Hmm. But this would seem to bolster my point. Mister Sensitive had a natural advantage but, correct me if I’m wrong, had to learn his fighting style. He didn’t become more powerful; just more practiced.

Well yeah, my idea is for her to take the powers she's already manifested and use them to do martial arts.

[marhawkman]

Next up: Ocean.

https://marvel.fandom.com/wiki/Ocean_(Earth-616)

Well I'm actually not sure if it's proper Hydrokinesis. One panel described her as a "weird water woman" and she's never actually shown manipulating any water not attached to her... and also the water is always the sea-green color of her skin. This makes me wonder if it's actually a extreme metamorphic talent. IE she becomes a mass of living water. She's possibly a hydrokinetic mutant, but definitely has a power that lets her transform. So the #1 thing is to properly define her powers.

The incident that nearly killed her... also seemed to leave her unable to use her powers. Although it's not explained WHY. It was a blast created by Arnie Lundt's reality warping... It seemed to turn her legs into decayed rotting flesh. The wounds don't bleed and Orphan describes the process of Arnie healing her as "atrophied tissue stirring Lazarus-like." Which seems to indicate the flesh in her legs was literally dead. Also the first thing she says after the blast is "I can't feel my legs". Her injuries apparently weren't painful and didn't bleed. Hmmm the way that seemed to prevent her from using her powers was weird.

That aside what WERE her powers? She was only seen using them a few times. The first time was fighting a group of gunmen who had been hired to kidnap several former celebrities. For this she changed into liquid form and seemed to smother some of them or grapple them it water form. Then Ocean later does it to Orphan, but this time she only shifts her hands to water form, then stretches them to grab Orphan from across the room. Then forms them into a bubble of water around his head to drown him. The scope of her powers seems to be highly limited by this. She's kinda like a heavily nerfed Hydroman. But how to change her powers without making her full Hydroman or less nerfed Hydroman?

[Lapsus]

The way i see it, not every mutant must be combat oriented. This is a team book, the mutants combine their powers to defeat their enemies, thats why the big X-Men villains are so powerfull.

Jubilee dragon balling can be fun but we risk that if we are not consistent, people will wonder why jubilee does not rain fire on the enemy every time there is a big fight.

Not every mutant should be a one man army.

[marhawkman]

The way i see it, not every mutant must be combat oriented. This is a team book, the mutants combine their powers to defeat their enemies, thats why the big X-Men villains are so powerfull.

Jubilee dragon balling can be fun but we risk that if we are not consistent, people will wonder why jubilee does not rain fire on the enemy every time there is a big fight.

Not every mutant should be a one man army.

That's kinda why I was saying that I think any changes need to be relatively minor things that fit the existing character concept. The goal is not to make everyone uber powerful, it's about how some are basically feeble weaklings in terms of their power level.