Attack Its Weak Point: Difference between revisions

[[File:Togglodyte 2538.png|link=Magic: The Gathering|frame|Hint: Pull the bright yellow lever.]]

 

 

[[Boss Battle|Boss villains]] are usually [[Nigh Invulnerable|invulnerable]] all over their body, with the exception [[Achilles' Heel|of one or a few weak points]] which you can often attack [[For Massive Damage]].

Named for the line in the 2006 E3 [[Sony]] presentation.

 

 

{{examples}}

== General ==

 

* In ''[[Vinland Saga]]'' {{spoiler|Thorkell has a glass jaw, one punch will knock him out cold. Rarely happens, what with him being several feet taller than nearly everyone else in the series.}}

* In ''[[Neon Genesis Evangelion]]'', every Angel has a bright red core which is its sole weak point. Attacks on other parts of its body are usually healed almost instantly; even weapons of mass destruction can only render them immobile for a time until they eventually regenerate all damage. This is the main reason for employing the Evangelions against the Angels; only by creating an opposing AT field can the core be made vulnerable.

* In ''[[Bokurano]]'', the weak points for the [[Humongous Mecha|giant robots]] are balls with gloving points on the outside, quite sensibly hidden under massive layers of armor. {{spoiler|They are later revealed to be the cockpit containing their human pilots.}}

* In ''[[Prétear]]'', one of the main reasons why the [[Magic Knight]]s need the [[Magical Girl]] is that she can see the weak points for the demons they're fighting, and they can't.

* In ''[[Scrapped Princess]]'', a [[Nightmare Fuel|Peacemaker Proxy]] could only be destroyed by destroying a small glowing crystal-like object that could only be revealed by powerful magic destroying the ever-regenerating slime that the proxy is made of.

* The [[Big Creepy-Crawlies]] of ''[[Blue Gender]]'' are covered in tough armor that renders them almost immune to small arms fire, but have a small tube (referred to as "the core") usually mounted on their heads. Shoot that thing and the bug drops. The only way to kill Blue without hitting the core is to use a [[Humongous Mecha]]...unless of course you're [[Badass|Marlene]].

* Happens in ''[[Ghost in the Shell]]'' all the time. When facing heavily armored opponents without proper equipment, the usual tactic is to get on its back and tear open a hatch to either fry the electronic controls or shoot the driver in the head.

* Pentagram marking on the body of the demons in ''[[My Balls]]'' are their magical weak spot.

* Done in the beginning arcs of the first and second seasons of ''Digimon'' where they free the creatures being controlled by destroying the [[Mind Control Device]]s.

** VenomMyotismon seemed to be pretty much invincible, even to the likes of WarGreymon and MetalGarurumon. His one weak point? His [[Weaksauce Weakness|crotch monster]]. The good guys exploited this, taking down the [[Big Bad]] [[Groin Attack|with a Terra Force blast to his happy place]]. Ouch.

* The crystals on the chests of the Skrugg in ''[[Heroman]]''.

* ''[[Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann]]'': In the [[Final Battle]], {{spoiler|when Simon and the eponymous mech fail to overpower the Anti-Spiral's [[Humongous Mecha]], he just takes the smaller Gurren Lagann mecha and boards the Anti-Spiral home planet (which is on the mecha's forehead), finishing off the Anti-Spiral himself}}.

* In ''[[Crossbone Gundam]]'', [[The Empire|the Jupiter Empire]] has a [[Stone Wall]] called the Tortuga, with incredibly thick armor and battleship-class beam shields. In the final chapter, [[Guile Hero|Tobia]] finally destroys it by shoving a beam saber into one shoulder joint and punching it out the other side, ripping through all the internals in between.

* {{spoiler|Magical girls}} in ''[[Madoka Magica]]'' are extremely resistant to damage, especially if they have self-healing powers; but a direct hit to {{spoiler|their brightly-glowing [[Exactly What It Says on the Tin|Soul Gem]]}} causes instant death. {{spoiler|This happened to Mami, Kyoko, and Madoka in a previous timeline.}}

 

* In ''[[Megalex]]'', the Undergrounders, especially Adamâ, have an uncanny ability to hit the robotic Shock Troopers right in the control chip, through a tiny gap in their armor.

 

* Interestingly, played straight in ''[[Zero Shock]]''. Jack is [[Colossus Climb|attacking a giant golem]], and so [[Talking Weapon|Derflinger]] advises him to attack its core. However, there are problems: there's no real guarantee that the core is even there. And if there is one, then there might be a chance that it explodes on destruction.

{{quote|“If it has one. Usually a sphere of some kind. Mostly stones with runes on them, squiggly little things like the one on the back of your hand. Some of the time. I think. Saw a few that had just a [[Refuge in Audacity|smiley face and a name on them]]. One of them just had a rude word on it! But anyway, find the core, [[Insistent Terminology|partner]]! You might need to do some searching, though, since sometimes [[This Is Gonna Suck|there are more than one core]], sometimes there aren't [[Oh Crap|even any]]! Most fun of all,[[Made of Explodium|some of them blow up]]! But one thing's for sure; the best thing is to go for the core, partner!”}}

 

* In ''[[Star Wars]]'', the Rebels learn the Empire's Death Star can be destroyed by attacking a small thermal exhaust port, right below the main port. The exhaust port led right to the main reactor.

** In ''[[Attack of the Clones]]'', Anakin demonstrates his tech-savvy by ordering the gunship he's on to target the Techno Union Hardcell-class ships (the ones that look like and take off like real-life rocketships) right above their fuel cells.

* In "Imitation General", Glenn Ford devises a plan to ambush advancing German tanks. To get them to expose their weakest point (the underside) they put a crude sign saying (in supposed German) "Bridge Mined" on a small bridge. The German tank commanders don't believe it, but neither will go first and the plan works.

 

* The Russian ''Hind'' military helicopter that Rife used as an escape vehicle in ''[[Snow Crash]]'' was made of reinforced steel, capable of shrugging off the type of small-arms fire that Rife (and the Russians who used to use them) was expecting. However, as Hiro (and incidentally, the Afghan rebels years before him) realized, the cockpit glass was just that: Glass. That's right: the Russians made an armoured helicopter that had a cockpit of completely ''non''-bulletproof glass. Hiro was never given an opportunity to demonstrate this, however, as the magnetic properties of the belly of the chopper turned out to be a much more deciding factor in bringing it down in the end.

** In [[Real Life]] the cockpit is surrounded by armored titanium, aside from the aforementioned glassy bits. Reinforced steel would, in some respects, be a ''downgrade'', especially in the "light enough to take off" department.

*** Also, the [[Real Life]] helicopter could take 12.7 shots to the screen with no problems. It was a very well armoured craft for such weapons.

* ''[[The Hobbit]]'': The dragon Smaug {{spoiler|was killed by an arrow hitting a chink in his armor.}}

* Similarly, the dragon in ''[[Beowulf]]'' is killed by {{spoiler|a sword hitting a chink in the exact same place on his armor.}}

** The [[Beowulf (film)|film version]] upgrades this to Beowulf {{spoiler|reaching through said chink and pulling out the dragon's heart.}} Now that is [[Badass]]. He knows this because of a speech from Hrothgar about dragon-slaying, in which Hrothgar claims to have succeeded with this exact technique on a dragon named Fafnir. Now, anyone who knows anything about [[Norse Mythology]] or the works of [[Richard Wagner]] could tell you that Sigurd killed Fafnir, which hints that Hrothgar is as big a liar as Beowulf.

* [[John Christopher]]'s ''The Sword of the Spirits'' trilogy. In ''Beyond the Burning Land'' Luke fights and kills the Bayemot (a giant ameoba-like creature) by striking at its nucleus deep inside its body with a sword.

* ''[[Wing Commander (novel)|Fleet Action]]'' has the Kilrathi getting [[Genre Savvy|savvy]] with this trope and designing a dreadnought with multiple layers of armor shells throughout the ship, specifically to eliminate conventional weak points and shrug off full salvos of anti-ship torpedoes. Too late they realized it just [[Subverted Trope|made a different kind of weak point]]... Marine boarding parties setting off massive blasts ''inside'' the ship, which would be contained by the armor and completely gut everything inside.

 

* In the late fourth season, most of ''[[Angel]]'''s cast is fighting {{spoiler|Skip}} and getting ''hammered''. Wesley, though every shot he's taken has bounced off the creature's armor, sees one of the few wounds it has suffered: A horn has broken off. He aims for the hole... and thanks to the [[Million-to-One Chance]], the bullet enters the head. This is lethal even to super-badass demon guys.

** Of course, there's also the fact that vampires are [[Nigh Invulnerable]] except for a stake to the heart or decapitation...

* [[Subverted]] in an episode of ''[[Star Trek: Deep Space Nine]]''. The crew of the starship ''Valiant'' discover a new, massively powerful Dominion warship. They discover a weakpoint and plan an attack accordingly. The attack goes off masterfully, causing a massive explosion... [[Worf Barrage|which then dissipates and reveals the ship, still battle-worthy]]. {{spoiler|The ''Reliant'' is soon destroyed, and most of her surviving crew is killed when the Jem'Ha'Dar decide to [[Sink the Life Boats]].}}

 

 

* Dragons [[Our Dragons Are Different|almost always]] have a weak spot on their neck or chest, this goes back at least as far as Fafnir. See the above examples from ''[[The Hobbit]]'' and ''Beowulf''.

** And speaking about Fafnir, [[Blood Bath|bathing in his blood]] rendered Sigurd/Siegfried invulnerable. Apart from a spot on his shoulder where a leaf had stuck to him.

* [[The Bible]]: Goliath got killed, partly, due to this trope.

 

* ''[[Gamma World]]'' adventure GW1 ''The Legion of Gold''. There's an amoeboid monster almost a kilometer wide in a lake. Its body can withstand 1,000 [[Hit Points]] of damage, but its nucleus can only take 50 [[Hit Points]] before it is killed. The catch: the nucleus is in the center of the lake under 150 meters of water.

 

** Surprisingly while the [[Giant Enemy Crab]] sparked a massive meme relating to attacking weak points for massive damage, the fact that a game supposedly based on "Famous battles which actually took place..." was not parodied as much.

* The ''[[Contra]]'' series likes the red, glowing orb variety, at least in earlier games.

** And in a later panel: "The CRATE comes back down and clocks the WEAK SPOT for massive damage."

* ''[[MS Paint Masterpieces]]'' hilariously referenced it. While the comic usually has ''[[Mega Man (video game)|Mega Man]]'' finishing off the Robot Masters with their [[Elemental Rock-Paper-Scissors|weaknesses]], at one point a heavily damaged Mega Man, riding in a stolen [[Humongous Mecha|walker]] is confronted by Quick Man. After a little taunting from the latter, Mega Man makes the walker [[Groin Attack|kick Quick Man in the crotch]], while he mutters to himself, "I hope...that was...his weakness..."

* Discussed at length in ''[[Sluggy Freelance]]'' when Torg and Sasha face a giant monster. Sasha recommends using their one bazooka shot to hit it [[Go for the Eye|in the eye]]. [http://sluggy.com/comics/archives/daily/20091207 Torg has different ideas . . .]

{{quote|'''Torg:''' The big eye is ''too obvious'' a weak spot! You'll be wasting our one shot! [[Wrong Genre Savvy|You've got to look for a more difficult target!]] . . . Ah-''ha!'' There's markings on one of its teeth that resembles a bull's-eye!

* Perhaps a reference to ''Genji: Days Of The Blade,'' [[Tsunami Channel]]'s [http://www.tsunamichannel.com/index.php?date=2002-06-26&comic=MaMi Magical Mina] flips the buglike Armor over on its back and stabs it several times in various joints on its underbelly to get it to yield. She [[Subverted Trope|only had to flip it over]] to do this.

* In ''[[El Goonish Shive]]'', The Goo's weak point is its [http://www.egscomics.com/?date=2002-11-09 demon nuclei which is the size of a marble]. Everything else is merely a shell for the nuclei and thus replaceable.

 

 

* In ''[[Code Lyoko]]'', all of XANA's monsters in the game-like [[Cyberspace|virtual world]] have one or more "XANA Eye" symbols (sometimes actual eyes) somewhere on their bodies. Hitting this spot will usually de-rez the monster instantly.

** With the exception of Aelita's Energy Fields, which normally kill no matter where they hit the monster. [[Cutscene Power to the Max|Unless she's supposed to lose, of course.]]

 

 

* Tanks are almost always vulnerable from above and below, and to a lesser extent, the sides and [http://www.simhq.com/_air/air_053j.html rear]. Tank Destroyers and other specialized AFVs often take this further, in some cases resulting in open-topped or open-backed vehicles such as the M10 and Marder series.

** It's usually difficult, if not impossible, for an infantry team to attack a tank from above. If the enemy has a good formation, attacking it from behind is difficult too. To solve this problem, the Javelin Missile Launcher was created. This is a missile that can either fire in a straight line, like most missiles, or, in an awesome display of [[Roboteching]], travel about three feet forward and then ''straight up'' to a height between 500 and 1000 feet, before inverting and smashing down on the tank from above. The only defense against a Javelin Missile attack is to ''kill the user before he can fire it''. Or go underground (but then, the missile ''still'' fires straight if need be...).

**The same thing was done in the Pacific by both the Americans and the Japanese though the Americans did it better, in the end having more resources. There were differences. It is easier to get into the enemy territory at sea than on land because the sea is so big and ships are so small compared to sprawling divisions of tanks and infantry. One limit many people do not know about is that aircraft at the time needed a fairly steady prevailing wind to get lift under the wing -- which meant that not only could you not bypass every island, the islands you could not bypass could reasonably be guessed at. All that said, the Pacific often looked like a nautical version of blitzkrieg with carriers as armored divisions, battleships as artillery, and Marines as infantry doing the dirty mop up.

***Actually the mop-up was done by the army. Marines were more likely to spend a few really intense days and be pulled out to train for the next island and the army was more likely to be dealing with what was left of a garrison that occupied some island that couldn't be bypassed. Perhaps the Marines were like the mechanized infantry prying open the breech the tanks made and the Army was like the infantry stomping on whatever fragments were left.

{{reflist}}

[[Category:Older Than the NES]]

[[Category:Boss Battle]]

[[Category:Trope Names From Memes]]

[[Category:For Massive Damage]]