Energy Ball



An Energy Weapon, and a specific subtype of Ki Attack or Functional Magic that takes the form of one or more glowing orbs of Pure Energy/Pure Magic. Most commonly made of light, electricity or fire.

Warning: just because it's shaped like a ball doesn't always mean it will bounce off flat surfaces. In fact, they're far more likely to explode on impact. You may need special equipment if you want to play tennis.

Often created by Sucking-In Lines. This is an integral part of a Shotoclone.

See also Fireballs.

Anime & Manga

 * In Fullmetal Alchemist,
 * A more straight example of this trope occurs around that point in Brotherhood, where he fires some kind of purple energy ball from his forehead instead of creating a tornado as he did in the manga.
 * Yu Yu Hakusho: Sensui's Reikou-resshuu-ken (single) and Resshuu-shien-dan (multiple) attacks.
 * Dragonball Z: Vegeta's Big Bang Attack, and Broly's signature attack. Not to mention the Spirit Bomb, And going back much further, Yamcha's Spirit Ball. Generic balls of energy also get thrown around in pretty much every fight as well.
 * In Mobile Suit Gundam 00, the Seravee Gundam is shown to be able to create a large Energy Ball with its Wave Motion Guns.
 * Koizumi's fireball in The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya, down with Full Metal Panic! Shout Outs.
 * Keroro Gunsou: Parodied with Tamama's Jealousy Ball.
 * in Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha has the Impact Cannon, a huge energy ball that she punches out of her fist, and the Sacred Cluster, energy balls she throws which would explode around a target and bombard them with smaller energy bullets.
 * Several of the Sailor Senshi's attacks in Sailor Moon, such as Jupiter's Sparkling Wide Pressure and Pluto's Dead Scream.
 * Ku:Nel Sanders of Mahou Sensei Negima uses giant orbs of gravity magic during his fight with Kaede. Kaede hit back with massive balls of ki.
 * The Choudenji Ball (Super Electromagnetic Ball) from Voltes V, an energy ball launched from the Super Robot's Cool Sword which will simultaneously paralyze the Monster of the Week and weaken their armor, leaving them wide open for the Finishing Move.
 * Naruto's Rasengan. Unique in that it normally can't be thrown.
 * Some of the Fire Style jutsu favored by, among others, the Uchihas, fall into this category, as does the only special attack used by Naruto's four-tailed release.
 * Shin Getter Robo's Stoner Sunshine.
 * Most Ki Attacks in the Ranma ½ manga and video games are actually large spheres of force propelled forward, as opposed to the constant beams shown in the animated versions. Most epic of all: the Perfect Shishihokodan actually does generate a Pillar of Ki straight up... that coalesces into a titanic ball that crushes everything underneath and leaves a perfectly hemispherical crater.
 * Digimon: Kabuterimon's Electro Shocker can qualify as this, as well as Greymon's Nova Blast to an extent.
 * One of Ryoko's abilities in Tenchi Muyo! is to create these. If she squeezes one, it turns into a Laser Blade.

Card Games

 * Iconic Magic: The Gathering creature Ball Lightning is a ball-shaped lightning elemental. It only lasts one turn, with the intent that you'll throw it at your opponent immediately to inflict a good bit of damage.

Films -- Live Action

 * Time Bandits. The mini-fireballs that shoot out of the eyes of the cow-skull-head monsters. On YouTube starting at 5:10.
 * In Burnt by the Sun, the ball lightning is a recurring Motif.

Literature

 * During the climactic duel between Luke Skywalker and Darth Vader in the Alan Dean Foster's Star Wars Expanded Universe novel Splinter of the Minds Eye, Vader creates a kinetite, a ball of pure white energy the size of his fist, and sends it at Luke.
 * ThunderFlashes in Septimus Heap are described as energy balls that are used as weapons both by antagonists and protagonists.

Live Action TV

 * Charmed. It's part of the standard demon power package: teleport, slow moving dark energy fire-y balls, and... not being able to dodge slow moving light energy fire-y balls.
 * Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: The Mega Dragonzord's finisher is a giant blue energy sphere with a Z in the middle that completely disintegrates the monsters it's used on.

Tabletop Games

 * Dungeons & Dragons: numerous, including the ever-popular Fireball spell.
 * And Magic Missile, although that may be dart-shaped.
 * interestingly enough, Magic Missle can be assigned any visual representation the caster wishes, even as its being cast (at least for spontaneous casters) though it defaults to this trope. Being killed by mini casters glomping you to death has never been so much fun.
 * Also, the Psionic Power "Energy Ball".
 * Not to mention the Epic Level Spell: Hellball.
 * Though perhaps the best examples are the various "Orb of X " spells, most of which have a "Lesser" version too.
 * The Wichita Witches' trademark spell, Ball o'Doom.
 * GURPS: Magic the Ball of Lightning spell that makes an intangible guided missile that makes an explosion of electricity when it reaches a target.

Video Games

 * Present in almost every shoot'em up, especially if it's a Bullet Hell genre where every projectile is typically like it.
 * The Hadoken move in Street Fighter, of course.
 * And every other projectile attack that isn't physical.
 * Super Mario Bros.. Unique in that not only does the fireball bounce off the ground, it also obeys gravity. Freaky!
 * Mario's fireballs in the Super Smash Bros.. series behave like this, but Luigi's travel in straight lines regardless of gravity.
 * Doom's BFG 9000 fired one of these. In addition, Imps, Cacodemons, Hell Knights and Barons of Hell are well known for hurling (or spitting, in the Cacodemon's case) fireballs. Mancubi use cannons built into their arms that shoot fireballs that explode like rockets.
 * A good number of Pokémon attacks are represented as balls of whatever element; however, the move entitled Energy Ball is a Grass-type as opposed to being Normal, Electric, or Steel-type. Most likely it's a solar-powered move a la Solarbeam.
 * In addition to the actual "Energy Ball" attack, there's also Zap Cannon (Electric-type), Shadow Ball (Ghost-type), and Aura Sphere (Fighting-type). Flash Cannon, which is a Steel-type attack, also looks like a round ball of energy, even if it's not explicitly in the name.
 * Focus Blast is a Fighting-type chi blast.
 * Gyro Ball is also depicted as one of these, though that's more of the user spinning at high speeds and slamming into the opponent, similar to Rollout and Ice Ball.
 * Strangely, there are no Fireballs. It would be pretty useful on Psychic-types who can't learn Flamethrower.
 * Generation V brings us Searing Shot (Ball of Flame/Flame Bomb in Japanese), an attack that can only be learned by one Pokémon, Victini, who happens to be a Fire/Psychic-type.
 * Furthermore, Fusion Flare (Fire-type) and Fusion Bolt (Electric-type), the respective signature moves of the Tao Dragon-type Pokémon Reshiram and Zekrom, resemble powerful fireballs and electrical balls, corresponding with the secondary elemental types of this Dragon duo. If both moves happen to be used in the same turn, the one that occurs second receives a boost, as well.
 * Castform's signature move Weather Ball could also be seen as a form of Energy Ball, as it changes its elemental type with the weather, complementing Castform's own weather-dependent ability of changing type, Forecast. Weather conditions also provide a boost, doubling Weather Ball's base power from 50 to 100. The variants of Weather Ball occur with the following weather settings:
 * Sunny weather yields the Fire-type.
 * Rain brings forth the Water-type.
 * A hailstorm converts the move to the Ice-type.
 * Sandstorm changes the element of Weather Ball to Rock-type, though Castform itself remains Normal-type and still takes residual Sandstorm damage.
 * Just like Castform, the move remains as a Normal-type if no weather is occurring or if foggy conditions are present.
 * Under the Shadow Sky condition (present in Pokémon Colosseum and XD), this move assumes the ???-type, causing neutral damage against all defending types.
 * Ancient Power is depicted as a silvery-white sphere of energy, but only in the anime. The game animations include throwing levitating stones at the enemy. The move is Rock-type, but the anime might have tried to emphasize that this is also a special attack rather than a physical one (it wasn't shown in the anime until Generation IV, even though the move was introduced in the Generation II games).
 * The Legend of Zelda: Ganon shoots off balls of energy in a few of the boss fights throughout the series; Playing Tennis With the Boss results.
 * Plasma bombs and Energy Cannon weapons in Homeworld
 * Kirby can throw these when using the Fighter ability in some of his later games, in exactly the same fashion as a hadoken.
 * Mega Man shoots off spherical energy pellets of varying size throughout the series.
 * Biotic charges in Mass Effect 2 appear as basketball-sized semi-spherical missiles of blue and white energy, with slight variations depending on which power you use.
 * In Devil May Cry, Dante can launch fire or light balls at points, while in the first game during his Eleventh-Hour Superpower, he launched demonically powered energy balls.
 * Half-Life 2 has the Combine assault rifle, which can generate a ball of energy as its Secondary Fire. These also exist in the Combine's power generators. They vaporize other people instantly, but not you; perhaps the HEV suit grants some sort of protection against vaporization.
 * Portal uses similar energy balls to Half-Life 2 in many puzzles. Portal and HL2 are set in the same universe, and use the same graphic effect and sounds for the balls, but they are referred to as "High Energy Pellets" in Portal. Unlike HL2, if they hit you they will vaporize you instantly.
 * Samus' Charge Beam, Mewtwo's Shadow Ball and Lucario's Aura Sphere in Super Smash Bros. Though in Samus' case, both the Power Beam and the Charge Beam are depicted as spherical shots in her series.
 * Pikachu's Thunder Jolt (more evident when used in midair).
 * Final Fantasy XI: Chi Blast, despite people sometimes making Kamehameha macros for it.
 * Marathon has the Zeus Class Fusion Pistol.
 * Halo has several. One of them is the plasma pistol, which has semiautomatic firing of these, or you can charge it up and release a big one at the expense of energy and overheating. Plasma rifle has fully automatic firing energy balls.
 * Arcana Heart has a few, such the Sfaira attacks of Partinias, the Arcana of Love, and the projectiles of Anutpada, the Arcana of Time.
 * The Valhawk in Super Robot Wars W can generate this with it's "Plasma Executor" weapon, which also counts as a Chest Blaster.
 * In Dissidia Final Fantasy, Kuja has several of these floating around him during battle, and uses them for several of his attacks.
 * Elizabeth Greene's One-Winged Angel form in Prototype can fire what are presumably energy balls. Somewhat off considering the mostly organic nature of the series.
 * The King of Fighters: Athena and her Psychic Friends can throw energy balls. Hers and Kensou's don't bounce, but Bao's does, and Athena has the ability to become an energy ball herself, and fire copies of herself at enemies.
 * Several attacks in Baten Kaitos, such as Xelha and Lyude's level II finishing moves.
 * This is the ranged attack that bareknuckles have in Soul Nomad and The World Eaters.
 * Enough attacks in Touhou (a lot of bullets are round), but especially Utsuho Reiuji's attacks (read: nukes) and Reimu's Fantasy Orb and Fantasy Seal.
 * Your plasma gun in Purple shoots these.
 * In Tales of Symphonia, Yuan has a lightning orb that he uses this way in cutscenes, and the Sorcerer's Ring allows the onscreen character to fire several different types of them when solving puzzles (depending on what dungeon you're in). Oddly, neither of these examples is ever used in battle.

Web Comics

 * In Order of the Stick, Tsukiko the Mystic Theurge learns a number of non-core "orb" spells (Electric Orb, Fire Orb, Lesser Acid Orb, Cold Orb) in order to counter Haley's evasion skill.
 * In El Goonish Shive, the fire summon spits the fire variation of this during the battle with Justin and Elliot.

Western Animation

 * Shego, Kim Possible's rival, often uses energy attacks in fights, but so far she has only used an actual energy ball once; in Bad Boy, she charged up a giant ball lightning and fired it at Kim.
 * Starfire from Teen Titans fires energy balls called starbolts from her hands.
 * Danny Phantom and the main character's Energy Ecto Rays which at times works in this manner.
 * Aelita from Code Lyoko, since the start of Season 3, gains pink energy balls, called Energy Field, as an attack in Lyoko form. When it hits one of XANA's goons, this covers entirely the monster in energy that destroy it, with no need to Attack Its Weak Point.