Aslan vs Shuma-Gorath

[Captain Morgan]

Thought it was cuz all of his feats are secondhand (or even further removed) retellings from folks who weren't there.

Nah, the veracity IRL is irrelevant for rumbles. The bible can be treated as a story with feats in it regardless. I wrote a paper in college for a literature course where we read Genesis and had Yahweh as part of a super hero team. It works better than you'd think.

Setting aside the controversy, the real problem with Christ in rumbles is he is like Luke Skywalker. His best feats come from his EU (Revelations) and it is questionable if that is cannon. His dad has much better feats in the Bible proper, but I'm not especially clear on whether the Trinity concept means Christ gets those feats.

Regarding the fight, can we get into detail about the stuff Aslan has above planetary? Mythological conceptions of the universe tend to vary pretty extremely in my experience and Shuma Gorath is at least on the galactic scale if not higher.

[Captain Morgan]

I thought it just bounced off his head.



And yet when I say stuff like that, people treat me suggesting creation powers without destruction is me being obstinate for arguing sake.



Well that and he was (mostly) a pacifist, so he wouldn't do well in fights anyway.

So the destruction vs creation thing here isn't super relevant, though the latter is generally more impressive. It is more just the scale. Making or unmaking planets is chump change to Shuma Gorath. It made a functioning voodoo doll for the entire Earth.

[Cthulhu_of_R'lyeh]

Nah, the veracity IRL is irrelevant for rumbles. The bible can be treated as a story with feats in it regardless. I wrote a paper in college for a literature course where we read Genesis and had Yahweh as part of a super hero team. It works better than you'd think.

Setting aside the controversy, the real problem with Christ in rumbles is he is like Luke Skywalker. His best feats come from his EU (Revelations) and it is questionable if that is cannon. His dad has much better feats in the Bible proper, but I'm not especially clear on whether the Trinity concept means Christ gets those feats.

Regarding the fight, can we get into detail about the stuff Aslan has above planetary? Mythological conceptions of the universe tend to vary pretty extremely in my experience and Shuma Gorath is at least on the galactic scale if not higher.

Hm, that's a fair point.

Also, not all that surprised. Always felt Yaweh works far better as a Marvel/DC God, considering his antics.

I feel like Aslan is out of his depth against Gorath though. I don't recall him doing much more than creating Narnia ... and then relying on a bunch of kids to fix the place up.

[Hiromi]

His best feats come from his EU (Revelations) and it is questionable if that is cannon

Not sure how it's questionable at all given where the word "canon" actually comes from.

[Cthulhu_of_R'lyeh]

Not sure how it's questionable at all given where the word "canon" actually comes from.

Because the first known listing of the proper 'canon' came in 367 AD, well after Revelations (and the rest of the books) had been written; so we're in this weird territory where folks decided on what was accepted as Bible canon, when they couldn't at all verify the veracity of the texts.

This is also ignoring the 'Apocrypha' ... some of which are accepted as deuterocanonical by the Catholics; whereas Protestants deny them outright.

[Captain Morgan]

Not sure how it's questionable at all given where the word "canon" actually comes from.

Fair enough, I'm going off of second hand accounts of people who study the Bible more than I do.

[Hiromi]

Because the first known listing of the proper 'canon' came in 367 AD, well after Revelations (and the rest of the books) had been written; so we're in this weird territory where folks decided on what was accepted as Bible canon, when they couldn't at all verify the veracity of the texts.

This is also ignoring the 'Apocrypha' ... some of which are accepted as deuterocanonical by the Catholics; whereas Protestants deny them outright.

deuterocanonical literally means secondary canon, iows that would be the EU if you accept it as all. Until Disney buys it and declares it completely separate

also if memory serves all the Deuterocanonical books relate to the Old Testament/Torah anyway, not the more infamous ones that Dan Brown wrote books about which are considered strictly non canonical by just about every major denomination, not especially relevant here.

Fair enough, I'm going off of second hand accounts of people who study the Bible more than I do.

More just commenting on the irony of questioning canon of something that's part of the project that essentially invented the word canon, s'all good

[Cthulhu_of_R'lyeh]

deuterocanonical literally means secondary canon, iows that would be the EU if you accept it as all. Until Disney buys it and declares it completely separate

also if memory serves all the Deuterocanonical books relate to the Old Testament/Torah anyway, not the more infamous ones that Dan Brown wrote books about which are considered strictly non canonical by just about every major denomination, not especially relevant here.

No, some of those ones (the Dan Brown special) are considered secondary canon. Basically, they lost the popularity vote. Protestants think they're all evil, but the Catholic church is more open-minded.

More just commenting on the irony of questioning canon of something that's part of the project that essentially invented the word canon, s'all good

I'm pretty sure Star Wars invented canon.

Cuz it happened a long, long time ago, in a galaxy far far away.

[Sol_M]

The

spoilers:

Pussy getting destroyed by a tentacle monster.

end of spoilers

Ah, I would never have made that connection.

Well, he's genuinely divine being who has enough magic/reality warping to create a whole world (Narnia), arguably an entire universe.

He should be able to put up some kind of fight at that level of magic/reality warping/power of creation.

Although it's possible Mephisto would have been a more appropriate Rumbles antagonist for him from among the Marvel demons.

It doesn't explain what you actually expect him to be able to do to Shuma Gorath though.

For example, do you think he can survive an attack from Shuma Gorath?

What I was thinking was, we've got Shuma-Gorath who consumes/subsumes universes into his own realm (if I recall correctly), and Aslan who roars worlds (universes?) into existence and knows all the secrets of space and time.

All I am hearing in terms of feats is that Aslan created a world and judged people at the end times. Classic Strange takes on beings like that without prep.

Regarding the fight, can we get into detail about the stuff Aslan has above planetary? Mythological conceptions of the universe tend to vary pretty extremely in my experience and Shuma Gorath is at least on the galactic scale if not higher.

I feel like Aslan is out of his depth against Gorath though. I don't recall him doing much more than creating Narnia ... and then relying on a bunch of kids to fix the place up.

Sooo....Aslan was pretty much literally supposed to be Jesus, while he was still a plot device, there were in universe reasons for him doing things a particular way.

Most people are referring to the fact that he created Narnia, but he also destroyed it.

Among other things, he's:

1) Created and destroyed worlds, presumably also the Wood Between Worlds. This includes not just creating the land and oceans, but the sun and the stars in the sky. He also created all living creatures, at least in Narnia. He also destroys Narnia reverting it back into a void.
2) Teleportation, including being able to travel within the same world, between worlds/move people between worlds. He does this by straight up teleportation, portals, or blowing people across the world with his breath.
3) Healing and resurrection.
4) Transmutation, like turning people into animals, for example. Though he's obviously a pretty massive reality warper that creates magical worlds and stuff, so this isn't a big deal.
5) Is obviously a giant lion that's tanky enough to ignore hits from someone strong enough to break off lamp posts with their bare hands.
6) Is a multi-dimensional/multi-versal being that exists in all worlds by different names and forms (Narnia, the "real" world, etc).

Main problem is he never actually fights anything like Shuma Gorath who can otherwise take on Classic Strange, for example. So unless you extrapolate on feats, I'm not sure how what his actual offensive or defensive options are.

If it's a pure reality warping contest and nothing else, sure, he can compete.

[Shai-Hulud]

1) Created and destroyed worlds, presumably also the Wood Between Worlds. This includes not just creating the land and oceans, but the sun and the stars in the sky. He also created all living creatures, at least in Narnia. He also destroys Narnia reverting it back into a void.
2) Teleportation, including being able to travel within the same world, between worlds/move people between worlds. He does this by straight up teleportation, portals, or blowing people across the world with his breath.
3) Healing and resurrection.
4) Transmutation, like turning people into animals, for example. Though he's obviously a pretty massive reality warper that creates magical worlds and stuff, so this isn't a big deal.
5) Is obviously a giant lion that's tanky enough to ignore hits from someone strong enough to break off lamp posts with their bare hands.
6) Is a multi-dimensional/multi-versal being that exists in all worlds by different names and forms (Narnia, the "real" world, etc).

Thanks for the list of feats, it's a great little summary.

It doesn't explain what you actually expect him to be able to do to Shuma Gorath though.

For example, do you think he can survive an attack from Shuma Gorath?

Don't know, but on the strength and scale of Aslan's magic/reality warping/divine power, I figured I'd put it up to the Board.

If people are participating in the thread in a positive way, I consider it a win for all of us.

[Captain Morgan]

So based on the listed stuff, the thing it seems to come down to is how we treat creating "the sun and the stars in the sky." If we treat that as literal, Aslan gets promoted to a true cosmic in the abstract sense. But again, mythological stuff doesn't tend to treat stars that way often. Now, Narnia was written when we had a more modern understanding of the cosmos, but it is also an allegory to a creation story from before we did. So, hard to say. I don't feel comfortably drawing a conclusion myself without revisiting the actual text.

BUT! Even if we give Aslan the best possible interpretation, I'm still doubtful he could take Shuma. Sharp, please chime in if I get details wrong here. To fight Shuma Gorath, Doctor Strange had to work his way through Shuma's lieutenants, absorbing their power into himself and becoming a crazy super being. Had he returned to our dimension in this state, Strange could-- and would-- destroy galaxies upon arrival. Galaxies, plural. I am skeptical one needs to make more than a single galaxy if your only intention is to put some pretty lights in the night sky. That level of destruction seems rather extreme to me.

[Sol_M]

If people are participating in the thread in a positive way, I consider it a win for all of us.

That's true.

But it's more dramatic to say "how is this even a fight??" :P

So based on the listed stuff, the thing it seems to come down to is how we treat creating "the sun and the stars in the sky." If we treat that as literal, Aslan gets promoted to a true cosmic in the abstract sense. But again, mythological stuff doesn't tend to treat stars that way often. Now, Narnia was written when we had a more modern understanding of the cosmos, but it is also an allegory to a creation story from before we did. So, hard to say. I don't feel comfortably drawing a conclusion myself without revisiting the actual text.

Yeah, stars in Narnia are sentient beings, that do have a human sized humanoid form (when they're on the land of Narnia anyway), so I definitely wouldn't treat them as regular real world stars. This was a form they usually acquired when they lost most of their energy and fell to the earth though, so their cosmos form may be bigger.

Either way, it doesn't mean a whole lot for this fight, in particular.

That being said, while I don't know what you meant by "true" cosmic, singing entire universes (even small ones) out of nothing but the void is something we associate with cosmic entities, the only problem in this fight is the scale.

BUT! Even if we give Aslan the best possible interpretation, I'm still doubtful he could take Shuma. Sharp, please chime in if I get details wrong here. To fight Shuma Gorath, Doctor Strange had to work his way through Shuma's lieutenants, absorbing their power into himself and becoming a crazy super being. Had he returned to our dimension in this state, Strange could-- and would-- destroy galaxies upon arrival. Galaxies, plural. I am skeptical one needs to make more than a single galaxy if your only intention is to put some pretty lights in the night sky. That level of destruction seems rather extreme to me.

That is pretty much the case, yeah. Also, remember that he has no actual combat feats of taking on something on the level of Classic Strange.

[Captain Morgan]

That's true.

But it's more dramatic to say "how is this even a fight??" :P



Yeah, stars in Narnia are sentient beings, that do have a human sized humanoid form (when they're on the land of Narnia anyway), so I definitely wouldn't treat them as regular real world stars. This was a form they usually acquired when they lost most of their energy and fell to the earth though, so their cosmos form may be bigger.

Either way, it doesn't mean a whole lot for this fight, in particular.

That being said, while I don't know what you meant by "true" cosmic, singing entire universes (even small ones) out of nothing but the void is something we associate with cosmic entities, the only problem in this fight is the scale.


That is pretty much the case, yeah. Also, remember that he has no actual combat feats of taking on something on the level of Classic Strange.

Building a "small universe" akin to what has been described for Aslan would not be something on the cosmic abstract scale, compared to Galactus or Eternity or a Celestial. It feels more like something I'd expect from a planetary scale reality warper, such as the Queen of Fables or Molecule Man or something. It is just a scale thing for me.

[Nik Hasta]

I mean, just as a starting point at the end of the last battle when the monsters are destroying the Narnia that was, one of them reached up into the sky a crushes the sun in it's hand like an orange.

That alone implies that the sun is not of the same dimensions of our real world version.

There's also zero evidence, that I can recall, that Aslan created the Wood Between the Worlds as both it and our world predate Narnia and are there before Aslan is even introduced.

[Sol_M]

Building a "small universe" akin to what has been described for Aslan would not be something on the cosmic abstract scale, compared to Galactus or Eternity or a Celestial. It feels more like something I'd expect from a planetary scale reality warper, such as the Queen of Fables or Molecule Man or something. It is just a scale thing for me.

That's entirely true, though I do feel that's because Marvel and DC cosmics (and often non comics) just tend to be on a completely different level than most cosmic entities in fiction and mythology. I would consider a planetary scale reality warper to be a minor cosmic, if they have divine/cosmic origins.

But yeah, that's unrelated to Rumbles.

I mean, just as a starting point at the end of the last battle when the monsters are destroying the Narnia that was, one of them reached up into the sky a crushes the sun in it's hand like an orange.

That alone implies that the sun is not of the same dimensions of our real world version.

The sun is also probably much closer to Narnia so that's definitely the case.

There's also zero evidence, that I can recall, that Aslan created the Wood Between the Worlds as both it and our world predate Narnia and are there before Aslan is even introduced.

It lies in Aslan's country, so it was _probably_ created by either Aslan or The Emperor Beyond The Sea.