Flechette Storm: Difference between revisions

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{{trope}}
[[File:Sakuya_Knife_Nut.jpg|link=Touhou (Video Game)|right| [[Ninja Maid|Sakuya]] is about to [[Sean Connery Is About to Shoot You|stab you in the face.]] [[There Is No Kill Like Overkill|Several dozen times... repeatedly.]]]
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== [[Anime]] and [[Manga]] ==
* ''[[Yu-Gi-Oh!]]'' Spell Card Thousand Knives. Also, Winged Beast-Type monsters usually are depicted as having a [[Feather Flechettes|feather-based variant]].
* Dio Brando from ''[[Jo Jo's Bizarre Adventure (Manga)|Jo Jos Bizarre Adventure]]'', who tends to be portrayed as following up [[Time Stands Still|ZA WARUDO]] with a veritable hail of knives (then capping things off with [[Death From Above|a steamroller]]).
* Cinque of ''[[Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha StrikersStrikerS]]'', particularly at the end of her fight against Subaru, which has her launching all of her exploding throwing knives in a desperation attack.
** Before Cinque there was Reinforce/Book of Darkness with her Bloody Daggers.
** Then there's [[The Ace|Chrono's]] [[Laser Blade|Stinger Blade]]-[[Meaningful Name|Execution]] [[Death From Above|Shift]].
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* Many a ''[[Digimon]]'' character has such an attack, such as Renamon's Diamond Storm attack, Peckmon's Kunai Wing attack, Cherubimon's Thousand Spears, and Ice Devimon's Avalanche Claw. That's just a few -- a complete list would be very long, especially if we include the characters who didn't appear in the TV series.
* Hanzo, the Koga ninja leader in the ''[[Ninja Scroll]]'' movie, throws dozens of shuriken at Tessai with enough force to break off thick tree branches. Unfortunately, since Tessai knows the D&D "Stoneskin" enchantment the shuriken just bounce right off {{spoiler|and Hanzo gets his arms ripped off for his troubles}}.
* In ''[[Cardcaptor Sakura (Manga)|Cardcaptor Sakura]]'', Yue {{spoiler|and Ruby Moon}} can conjure projectiles and magically throw them at opponents.
* In the early chapters of ''[[Blade of the Immortal]]'', Rin uses a technique called "Curtain of Death", which is essentially a flurry of small knives thrown at the enemy. However, [[Deconstructed Trope|the limitations of using such a technique are remarked upon]] by at least one character, and eventually Rin stops using them altogether.
** Most of it comes form the fact she, 1) doesn't aim (in fact she doesn't look at the target ''at all'') 2 yells out the name. She still somewhat uses it, as a last option of course.
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== [[Comic Books]] ==
* This is the gimmick of several [[Marvel]] characters Bullseye and Ultimate Hawkeye, who can turn anything into a projectile. Also Gambit does this with the added bonus that he can make anything he touches go boom.
* Magnattack, a lower-tier ''[[Invincible (Comic Book)|Invincible]]'' villain, does this with the 88 metal plates surrounding his magnetized body. A bonus is that he can naturally recall them because of his powers.
* A demon tries to use this on [[Lucifer (Comic Book)|Lucifer]] in the "Nirvana" miniseries, which works about as well as you might expect.
* Riptide of the [[X-Men]] villains The Marauders could spin at high speeds and fling out blades that could even pierce Colossus's skin.
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== [[Fan Fiction]] ==
* Used by [[Knife Nut|Asakura]] in the [[In Medias Res|prologue extension]] chapter of ''[[Kyon: Big Damn Hero (Fanfic)|Kyon Big Damn Hero]]''.
 
 
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** Dan Simmons's ''[[Hyperion]]'' novels.
** [[William Gibson]]'s [[Action Girl]] [[Neuromancer|Molly Millions]] favours a flechette pistol ("fletcher") firing poisoned or explosive darts.
** ''[[Honor Harrington (Literature)|Honor Harrington]]'' features flechette guns as one of the more common small arms in the series. They're mostly used aboard ships and similar environments-the hailstorm of little darts that one flechette gun fires is entirely capable of chewing a whole group of humans into cat food, but aren't powerful enough to go through heavy armor, meaning that they're unlikely to rupture the hull of the ship. Pulser guns, the most basic small arm, also follow the same principle, rapid-firing a stream of hypersonic darts.
** In ''[[The War Against the Chtorr]]'', the AM-280 rifle fires 18-grain flechettes at 3000 rounds-per-minute; a rate high enough to chew through the segmented bodies of the alien worms. With any other rifle they're virtually [[Immune to Bullets]].
** In [[Lois McMaster Bujold]]'s ''[[Vorkosigan Saga|The Warrior's Apprentice]]'' {{spoiler|Bothari}} is killed with one of these.
** Just one of the many weapons used by the Howlers in one of the ''[[Animorphs (Literature)|Animorphs]]'' books.
*** And the Blue Meanies in the ''[[Remnants]]'' books.
** In ''[[Starfist (Literature)|Starfist]]'', this appears to be the standard weapon for all human military forces outside the Confederation Armed Forces.
* There are a LOT of descriptions of this in ''[[Shadows of the Apt]]'', particularly after the snapbow gets into general use.
* In some ''[[Star Wars]]'' [[Expanded Universe]] book or another, it's stated that Mon Calimari Cruisers have "bomb blisters" - bubbles on the hull that look like just another Mon Cal hull bubble, but explode for decent backblast and a hailstorm of starfighter-shredding shrapnel. Good tactic for a rebel/New Republic starfighter pilot: drag a squadron of baddies across this and have the cruiser set it off just as you pass out of range.
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* ''[[Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon]]'' villain Jade Fox brings us this in the form of poison darts, which she fires from a blowgun at a rate that rivals ''[[Gatling Good|gatling guns]]''!
** In the same climactic battle, Li Mu Bai {{spoiler|kills Jade Fox by using the Green Destiny sword to shatter her own blade into a burst of steel shards that impale her}}.
* [[Aladdin (Disney film)|"Get the point?"]]
 
 
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** Not to mention Cascade of Cutting Terror, which can be done with any thrown item, causing it to multiply hundreds of times to strike over a wide area (with the duplicates vanishing after hitting). For emphasis: ANY thrown item. Including daggers, icicles, coins, peanuts, tuna fish, peasants, ''elephants'', etc.
** A recent [[GURPS]] supplement provided rules for a similar power. Except you don't necessarily need magic.
* ''[[Dungeons and Dragons (Tabletop Game)|Dungeons and Dragons]]''
** In AD&D2 and before, base rate of fire for throwing daggers or knives was 2x, darts 3x and shurikens (in ''Oriental Adventures'') varying up to 4x per round. ''Specialized'' warriors, along with attack and damage bonuses, has rate of fire up to 5/round with knives or large shurikens and 6/round for darts and small shurikens.
** D&D3 also had [[Prestige Class|Prestige Classes]] for this type of fighting, including the Master Thrower, who specialises in throwing lots and lots of knives, and the Bloodstorm Blade, who specialises in throwing things very, very hard.
** The Rogue class in 4 edition of has a number of abilities which hurl a knife, individually, at every single enemy in a 15-foot-by-15-foot square. If you use a magic dagger, you even somehow manage to hurl the ''same'' knife at every one. One of these attacks even hurls said knife to such effect as to ''blind'' every victim with blood streaming into the eyes!
* ''[[Magic the Gathering|Magic: The Gathering]]'' - [http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=42278 there] [http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=45198 are] [http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=83410 a] [http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=152837 few] cards using this trope.
* Corvus Belli's wargame ''[[Infinity (Tabletop Game)|Infinity]]'' has the chain rifle, a flechette firing template weapon. The reasoning the game gives for it's existence is actually relatively plausible, and it functions (hence the name) by having a chain strip flechettes of metal from a steel block and then accelerates them to supersonic speeds. The result is the target being hard pressed to dodge the approaching wall of hot metal with small holes in it.
 
 
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* The ''[[Final Fantasy]]'' series has the cactuars and their 1000 Needles [[Fixed Damage Attack]]. Also the 10,000 Needles attack -- often a [[One-Hit Kill]].
** Also the Gil Toss ability and [[Final Fantasy VI|Setzer]]'s razor-sharp [[Death Dealer|cards]].
* [[Ninja Maid|Sakuya Izayoi]] from ''[[Touhou]]'' uses this in combination with [[Time Stands Still|her stopping time]], in a [[Shout-Out]] to [[Jo Jo's Bizarre Adventure (Manga)|Dio Brando]].
** Her predecessor from the PC-98 era, Yumeko, also a [[Ninja Maid]], does this minus the timestopping. [[Brother Chuck|Too bad no one remembers her]].
*** Truthfully, Yumeko is supposed to use [[Storm of Blades|swords.]]
** [[Chinese Vampire|Yoshika Miyako]] in Ten Desires also uses this, with kunai-like bullets.
** A lot of other characters use a lot of knives or swords in their attacks, too, such as Ran and Yukari in their boss fights (whose non-spells are 100% kunais).
* ''[[Wizardry (Video Game)|Wizardry]] VII'' had "Blades" spell good for shredding a group of low-agility opponents (bad Missiles resistance), such as plant or [[Squishy Wizard]] types, "Whipping Rocks" is blunt variant of the same.
* The Hunters from ''[[Half-Life 2 (Video Game)|Half-Life 2]]'', firing hails of flechettes infused with Dark Energy. Why not pick up a object to absorb the darts and throw it back at them for extra fun?
* The Ice Blast powers in ''[[City of Heroes]]'' resemble flechettes made up of shards of ice.
* The Ice Needle spell in the ''[[Tales Series(series)]]'', which fires a minimum of three shards of ice depending on game. Sometimes the mage simply throws them, but sometimes they form directly above the enemy's head and drop. And yes, the archers in the series naturally have techs for this.
** Cheria from [[Tales of Graces (Video Game)|Tales of Graces]] tends to favor this (especially with her third [[Limit Break|Blast Calibur]]), examples can be seen [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xancnh4PMQY here]
* The [[Limit Break]] of [[Catgirl]] Nano-Nano Pudding's [[Cool Ship]] in the ''[[Galaxy Angel (Videovideo Gamegame)|Galaxy Angel]]'' gameverse is the [[Exactly What It Says Onon the Tin|aptly-named]] Needle Flechette, which impales surrounding foes with ship-sized needles made out of [[Nanomachines]].
* Ibuki in ''[[Street Fighter]] III'' has a special move in which she does this by throwing a dozen of kunais at the opponent.
* One of several types of firearms [[The Hero|Alph]] in ''[[Luminous Arc]]'' can use in place of casting spells is the Flechette Gun.
* In ''[[Command and Conquer]] Renegade'', Havoc gets a Tiberium Flechette launcher. It rips all non-mutant units to shreds.
** All of the three or so enemies you encounter after getting it, that is...
* ''[[Quake (Video Gameseries)|Quake]]'' and the infamous Super Nailgun, a man-portable ''minigun'' that fires these.
* The aptly named Needler weapon from the ''[[Halo]]'' series, which shoots guided explosive crystaline needles.
** The also aptly named Mauler, Spiker and Spike Grenade weapons from [[Halo]] 3 fire long red-hot metal spikes in a buckshot-like spread, automatic spray or cone-shaped blast respectively.
** Actually the Mauler uses fairly standard shotgun pellet analogues, no heated spikes involved.
* Sheik's neutral B move in ''[[Super Smash Bros|Smash Bros]]'' is the aptly-titled Needle Storm.
* True Assassin in ''[[Fate/stay Stay Nightnight]]''. As the limits of what people can carry are actually fairly realistic, he only throws a total of around 40 dirks, a kind of special throwing dagger. However, he does unload them all in a matter of seconds when he wants to. Not that he ever manages to do any good with them but...
* The Rogue class's Fan of Knives ability in ''[[World of Warcraft]]'', inherited from the [[Our Elves Are Different|Night Elf]] Warden hero unit in ''[[Warcraft III]]'''s expansion.
* Rogues in ''[[Nethack]]'' have the unique ability to throw several daggers in a single action. The number they can throw at once increases with experience.
* [[The Medic]] of ''[[Team Fortress 2 (Video Game)|Team Fortress 2]]'' can shoot a rain of needles filled with a mysterious substance at the enemy, and can even earn an unlockable that allows him to absorb the damage as health. [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z8B2xIt3tNA Demonstrated here.]
* Vergil from ''[[Devil May Cry (Video Game)|Devil May Cry]] 3'' can shoot a stream of magical swords. After summoning them [[Reverse Shrapnel|around himself]], he can make them fire even faster.
** As Nelo Angelo from the original game, he was also quite fond of summoning those swords around Dante as well before cutting loose.
** Let's not forget Dante's Lucifer devil arm from Devil May Cry 4, which can be used like this.
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* ''[[Persona 4]]'''s version of Alice's ''Die For Me!'' attack features kunai attached to cards raining down from above.
* ''[[Super Mario RPG]]'' is full of enemies with such attacks
* ''[[Unreal Tournament (Video Game)|Unreal Tournament]]'' has the flak cannon, which fires superheated shards of metal in shotgun fashion. Its alternate mode shoots out a flak bomb that, upon contact with a physical object, explodes into said shards.
* Flechette rounds are available for shotguns in ''[[Fallout Tactics Brotherhood of Steel]].'' Incredibly effective against unarmoured targets, especially when used with an automatic shotgun, but nearly useless against anyone with decent armour.
* And on the other side of the line, flechette rounds are available for shotguns later on in ''Jagged Alliance 2 [[Game Mod|v1.13]]'' (which is perhaps the poster child for [[Gun Porn]]). Much more expensive than traditional buckshot or slug rounds, flechettes can tear through armor and whatever's behind it, making the shotgun a viable close/medium range weapon in the endgame.
* In ''[[Arc Rise Fantasia]]'', Serge's Excel Trinity, Million Regret, has him throwing (ostensibly) a million knives, made of [[Kill It Withwith Ice|ice]], at the enemy.
* The level 3 final animation of the Thousand Kill [[Combination Attack]] in ''[[Agarest Senki 2]]''.
* Gambit's Royal Flush in the [[Capcom Vs Whatever Series]].
* One of the [[The Many Deaths of You|many ways to die]] in ''[[Haunting Ground (Video Game)|Haunting Ground]]'' is a very messy version of this trope.
* If Hawkeye undergoes a light class change in ''[[Seiken Densetsu 3]]'', his level two weapon technique, the 'Flying Swallow Toss,' has him using multiple throwing knives against his foes.
* In the fights against Ghirahim in ''[[The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword]]'', he can conjure a flurry of red diamond-knives at Link. To counter this, Link can [[Tennis Boss|slash them right back at the source.]]
* In ''[[Mickey Mousecapade]]'', [[That One Boss|Pete]]'s primary attack is a near-constant storm of homing daggers.
* Subverted in the ''[[X (Videovideo Gamegame)|X-Universe]]''. The game's two flechette weapons are almost universally ignored by players since the flechettes rarely actually hit anything.
** The "almost": Players sometimes pair Cluster Flak Arrays with [[Lightning Gun|Ion Disruptors]] because the latter gun jumps between targets, and can use the flechettes produced by the former to do so.
 
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== [[Western Animation]] ==
* One ''[[Jackie Chan Adventures (Animation)|Jackie Chan Adventures]]'' episode had a [[Death Dealer]] Mook who could do this.
** Just like in the Jackie Chan film "City Hunter", there was a casino card dealer who could kill the bad guys simply by [[Death Dealer|throwing a playing card]] at their neck, although that's not an example of this trope as it's not "a hail of these weapons".
* Used by ''[[Avatar: The Last Airbender]]'''s resident [[Knife Nut]], Mai. This is also a waterbending move involving icicles. {{spoiler|A fully realised Avatar can do this with earthbending.}}
* ''[[Tom and Jerry (Animation)|Tom and Jerry]]'' has one episode where Jerry throws a bunch of knives at Tom by pulling the knives - at an infinite supply, supposedly - ''from a thought bubble.''
 
 
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