Characters and real world combat parallels

[John Venus]

I always enjoyed watching Wonder Woman doing wrestling moves. Like the time she supplexed Mongul.

Superman was probably a terrible fighter who got by on his super strength until he started encountering villains in his own weight class and started training regularly in the JL Watchtower.

[Ra-El]

I always enjoyed watching Wonder Woman doing wrestling moves. Like the time she supplexed Mongul.

Superman was probably a terrible fighter who got by on his super strength until he started encountering villains in his own weight class and started training regularly in the JL Watchtower.

I prefer if Superman learns how to fight with characters from his own mythos instead of learning it from other heroes. Just do a story where he is capture by Mongul, who knows how to fight, and is forced into gladiator fights on Warworld for 6 months or a year, and through a lot of pain he learns how to fight, until he leads a rebelion and defeats Mongul.

[Captain Smith]

I see it as having two sets of combatants. You are either invulnerable to conventional firepower or you are not.

In the latter case, folks like Bats, the Robins/Wings, Canaries, etc. are just shot down by competent firearms users such as John Wick types. I know about Bats, etc. being super duper bullet dodgers, etc. but that isn't realistic if that is part of this thread. Only Storm Trooper level of markmanship has saved many of them.

Now if you are invulnerable or have the speed, you need to develop a style that uses your powers, esp. distance attacks or implements that enhance your abiities. We have to deal with the 'never kill' mantra as it confounds the game.

For example, a Flash level speedster with a supertech edge weapon would destroy most of his or her opponents. If a Flash pulled something as simple as a Spyderco Delica on his speedster opponents, the fights would be over, if he took knife class.

MMA, and the other unarmed arts are fine but in the 'real' world, weapons and distance rule.

[hareluyafan1]

I'm no expert but looking at Dolphin's fights in "Aquaman" I think she'd be well-suited for Karate and Dragon Style Kung Fu (modified for underwater combat naturally). Given what we know of her background she probably never had formal training and is a self-taught fighter but some of her movements seem in line with the aforementioned styles.

When throwing a punch her arms usually move independently, as in Karate. Notably in her fights with Urcell and Lord Satanis she chambers her other fist at her side, just like a Karateka. She also uses elbow strikes which, while most often associated with Muay Thai, are also seen in Karate. Against Urcell and a Drift goon Dolphin used a claw strike of some kind (plus she has actual claws), and in her fight with Satanis she was able to slip around his attacks. Based on her use of both evasions and claw strikes, I think Dragon Style Kung Fu would also be a good fit.

[Incognito]

Cyborg has an athletic background so he could do some boxing or catch wrestling. He could just download martial arts into his system so he could learn how to combat his enemies or use his mother box cybernetics to analyze his opponents' fighting pattern and use it to predict their next strikes.

Raven despite being a pacifist, I could see her learning martial arts which requires a mental/spiritual focus such as Wing Chun or Tai-Chi.

[Laufeyson]

Wonder Woman's fighting style to me is supposed to be Pankration. If anyone here wanted to know Pankration, it's a mix martial arts originated from Greek and it's could be said as the ancestor of MMA. This martial arts consists of boxing, wrestling, kicking, hold, lock, and chokes. So I believe it's really suitable for Diana who had the origin of Greeks. If anyone here still had a hard time to image it, I believe Urien and Gill from Street Fighter can be a good example.

For Superman, I am still a firm believer of Superman is too strong for such a thing as martial arts. But, if you ask me, then the real world martial arts that Superman should learn is Kyokushin Karate (Full-Contact Karate). I said Full-Contact Karate, because, I believe that the strongest punch is in Karateka. Now imagine a full blow punch of Superman in style of Karate. It would leave anyone dead just one punch.

[achilles]

Wonder Woman's fighting style to me is supposed to be Pankration. If anyone here wanted to know Pankration, it's a mix martial arts originated from Greek and it's could be said as the ancestor of MMA. This martial arts consists of boxing, wrestling, kicking, hold, lock, and chokes. So I believe it's really suitable for Diana who had the origin of Greeks. If anyone here still had a hard time to image it, I believe Urien and Gill from Street Fighter can be a good example.

For Superman, I am still a firm believer of Superman is too strong for such a thing as martial arts. But, if you ask me, then the real world martial arts that Superman should learn is Kyokushin Karate (Full-Contact Karate). I said Full-Contact Karate, because, I believe that the strongest punch is in Karateka. Now imagine a full blow punch of Superman in style of Karate. It would leave anyone dead just one punch.

I have no doubt Mas Oyama could knock most people out with that. And that they hit hard in general. But the hardest punch? Boxing. But none of that will help Superman when he's in the air, as none of the typical martial arts body mechanics will work in the air. He'd have to either modify the moves, or work out some way to use his power of flight to brace himself. Ditto Diana or any other flyer. Honestly, every super strong type should also know some type of wrestling, and know how to apply holds mid-air if they fly.

[Laufeyson]

I have no doubt Mas Oyama could knock most people out with that. And that they hit hard in general. But the hardest punch? Boxing. But none of that will help Superman when he's in the air, as none of the typical martial arts body mechanics will work in the air. He'd have to either modify the moves, or work out some way to use his power of flight to brace himself. Ditto Diana or any other flyer. Honestly, every super strong type should also know some type of wrestling, and know how to apply holds mid-air if they fly.

You are right, the martial arts when fighting in the air is really hard to determine and aside from wrestling, there is nothing that he could do. But, still, I think in street fight karate will beat boxing all day because of the kick used. For punch... I don't know, boxing punch seems not that hard, considering karate punch used all body momentum to throw punch.

[achilles]

You are right, the martial arts when fighting in the air is really hard to determine and aside from wrestling, there is nothing that he could do. But, still, I think in street fight karate will beat boxing all day because of the kick used. For punch... I don't know, boxing punch seems not that hard, considering karate punch used all body momentum to throw punch.

I've seen a bunch of this sort of thing on YouTube, (yes, that's a thing), and it seems to depend a lot on the relative skills of the practitioners. That said, however, the Kyokushin/Ashihara and Enshin karate styles, (the others are variants that add dodging instead of simply going toe to toe, and some judo), have a rule, no face punching. Which is a bit weird, since they've got no problem with knocking you out with a kick to the head. But...they don't practice hitting the face. There is a video out there on yt with a boxer and his girlfriend walking through a park in Russia or somewhere like that, and getting hassled by two idiots. What happens there is both funny, (no one got really hurt), and instructive about boxing. The boxer's footwork was pretty good, and totally fooled those guys. And watch his punches. Boxing teaches power in punches better than any other martial art. Their body mechanics for punching and moving are pretty much as good as it gets. And...there is a good hero teacher in that art in the DCU, Wildcat. I would just assume that everyone on both the JSA and JLA has trained in some form with him. Batman a lot obviously, but I wouldn't be surprised if even Superman found a way.

But yeah, those karate styles are pretty awesome and effective---and train toughness and body conditioning properly; I'd say pretty much anyone could do worse if they want to train to fight.

And of course...modern boxing is a very restricted version of 18th and 19 century versions which had kicking, biting, some weapons use...basically, from the descriptions of those fights, I'm not sure anyone now would beat those guys. The very early fights, pre 1860s or so, were very nearly no rules affairs.

[Lightning Rider]

Some interesting points brought up over the last page or so.

With regards to the "hardest punch", with exception to run-up type shots, boxing will give you the hardest punch. The technique to get leverage from your feet into the hips and through the shoulder is the most efficient and effective.



That being said, someone like Superman will often be punching in air, not pushing off the ground; but clearly he can generate leverage through manipulating his gravity anyway, so he could still pivot into a shot in much the same way. The same with any kicks he'd want to use.

I also agree about the effectiveness of a Flash/speedster using weapons; projecties from a Flash are already quite effective, and edged weapons have been ruthless whenever Thawne has used them.

[PCN24454]

While I also love seeing real-world martial arts parallels, they're a superfluous detail in most DC works.

[Sutekh]

I always felt that one of the countless bits of Kryptonian *everything* that got downloaded into Kal's brain, along with history, philosophy, Kryptonese language, religion, science, etc. was some Kryptonian martial arts. But he never needed it, against 95% of his day to day encounters as Superman, and didn't practice it and get it burned into muscle memory, so to speak, so he's kind of like someone who *used* to know martial arts, but hasn't practiced any of it for a decade or so, kinda rusty and getting by on his sheer power, until faced with someone able to match him power for power, at which point he can start shaking off the cobwebs and pulling out the advanced fighting techniques.

But it's still downloaded knowledge, and he's gonna have to spend years of intense training if he ever wants to fight at an equal skill level with Wonder Woman or Batman.

IMO.

[Lightning Rider]

I always felt that one of the countless bits of Kryptonian *everything* that got downloaded into Kal's brain, along with history, philosophy, Kryptonese language, religion, science, etc. was some Kryptonian martial arts. But he never needed it, against 95% of his day to day encounters as Superman, and didn't practice it and get it burned into muscle memory, so to speak, so he's kind of like someone who *used* to know martial arts, but hasn't practiced any of it for a decade or so, kinda rusty and getting by on his sheer power, until faced with someone able to match him power for power, at which point he can start shaking off the cobwebs and pulling out the advanced fighting techniques.

But it's still downloaded knowledge, and he's gonna have to spend years of intense training if he ever wants to fight at an equal skill level with Wonder Woman or Batman.

IMO.

This is really interesting, and led me to imagine what a Kryptonian martial art would look like. There's no reason they wouldn't be somewhat similar to existing ones, but what would the emphasis be? The specifics of styles/forms often have a traceable sociological root. What if there was a martial art that emerged out of Brainiac's first invasion which captured Kandor? That event must have been societally traumatic, and could have easily led to a combat system built around disabling his drones. Once firearms give way to close-quarter fighting, I imagine something that targets their stiff robotic legs, defends against their long mechanical tendrils, and incapacitates the arm once they've grabbed your skull. A polearm type weapon wouldn't hurt.

I'm sure there are other aspects/chapters of Kryptonian culture and history that could inform what their martial arts could look like too. I don't know much about Klurkor or Horu-Kanu (which is described like Kyusho-Jitsu) but would be interested to learn more.

[Lightning Rider]

I imagine Vixen, who often lets her claws out, would use a lot of moves that resemble Tiger style Kung Fu. As would Cheetah:

[achilles]

I always felt that one of the countless bits of Kryptonian *everything* that got downloaded into Kal's brain, along with history, philosophy, Kryptonese language, religion, science, etc. was some Kryptonian martial arts. But he never needed it, against 95% of his day to day encounters as Superman, and didn't practice it and get it burned into muscle memory, so to speak, so he's kind of like someone who *used* to know martial arts, but hasn't practiced any of it for a decade or so, kinda rusty and getting by on his sheer power, until faced with someone able to match him power for power, at which point he can start shaking off the cobwebs and pulling out the advanced fighting techniques.

But it's still downloaded knowledge, and he's gonna have to spend years of intense training if he ever wants to fight at an equal skill level with Wonder Woman or Batman.

IMO.

An interesting though not new idea. But, as you point out, it has a flaw. The knowledge would be in the mind, perhaps mostly forgotten, but muscle memory is what counts in fights, and if he's never intensely practiced the moves against someone who can fight back and actually beat him, it's not really going to help Superman except in an after the fight analysis of just how he got his butt kicked.

I can see Kryptonians having that sort of technology, in fact it's already been established; that's how Power Girl was educated, (no word on whether her education included anything like physical skills of any sort), but I would think they'd know they had to supplement it with regular practice and instruction. For example, it's one thing to watch a performance of say Suparinpei, (a karate kata), and try to copy it, quite another to have a very experienced black belt correct your form. That may seem like it has little relevance to actual fighting, but for someone who has never had live instruction, personal instruction and correction of from can help develop power, and help you with defense. Things like keeping your hands up in boxing, (or really any martial art if you want to keep your face intact), has to be reinforced by someone else, preferably someone much better than you.

So, IMO, the Kryptonians probably wouldn't have bothered downloading martial arts knowledge into the brains of anyone who didn't need it, which would likely be most of the population. Hobbyists on Krypton probably would learn the old fashion way, and I assume there would be old fashioned martial arts masters who learned that way as well. Military or police on Krypton though probably would have that as a way to ramp up more quickly, supplemented with likely daily practice. I would assume that Kryptonian special forces units would probably receive much more physical practice.

Other things that can't be taught like that, determination, will to win no matter what...things like that which are key to winning. They can be learned through experience, but not in that way. And there's learning to take a hit, and not fall apart, even when it's Doomsday doing the hitting.