Heart Is an Awesome Power: Difference between revisions

 

{{examples}}

== [[Anime]] and [[Manga]] ==

* A number of characters in ''[[One Piece]]''.

** Baroque Works Member Number 3, Galdino. His power allows him to create an endless supply of candle wax from his body. He was also able to make this wax hard as steel and make keys out of it, but its greatest use didn't come in until he {{spoiler|used it to stop the flow of the warden's impossibly corrosive and utterly deadly poisonous flood in Impel Down. Even Crocodile mentioned how odd it is when some powers meet.}}

** Kin'emon's unnamed Fruit lets him create clothing. ''Any'' clothing he can imagine, he can create. At first glance, one might think he could become rich as a fashion designer, but no such luck, as the clothing only lasts until the wearer removes it. To his credit, however, Kin'emon (who's ability as a swordsman have proven [[Badass Normal| good enough to survive a fight with Trafalgar Law]]) can use this rather creatively to disguise himself, in one episode successfully impersonating Donquixote Doflamingo.

* ''[[The Law of Ueki]]'' bases its entire setting on this. Nearly every power (with precious few exceptions) is weak or weird, but with proper application can become deadly.

* Everyone in ''[[JoJo's Bizarre Adventure]]''. Powers like healing, making maps and summoning zippers have all deadly combat applications when in the hands of a stand user. In a world full of guys who can stop time, have super strength, and can even reset reality, it's amazing to see what such seemingly under-powered abilities as controlling sound effects and drawing manga can do.

* [[Aquaman]], who is absolutely ''not'' as weak as [[Memetic Mutation]] would have one believe. A combination of [[Required Secondary Powers]] (he can swim like a fish and punch people while under [[Water Is Air|500+ atmospheres of pressure]], which is [[Superman]] level asskickery) and [[Fridge Horror]] (he commands ''everything'' that lives in the ocean; guess where [[Godzilla]], [[Cthulhu Mythos|Cthulhu]], and the [[The Bible|Leviathan]] live?) have had many writers portray him as horrifically powerful and outright feared by heroes and villains alike, and for very good reasons.

{{quote|"He could control every creature that lives in the sea. But I don't think either of you know what that really means. Do you know, do you understand, do you have any idea how much life there is in just one single square mile of sea? I don't think you do... and if you multiply that by lots of miles in every direction... I'd never seen anything like it in my whole life... [[Go Mad from the Revelation|and God as my witness, I hope to never see it again]]."}}

* Heck, some of Aquaman's fellow Detroit League members qualify for this trope. How many comic-book loving Tropers don't think much of Vibe because of his vibrational powers and [[Ethnic Scrappy]] tendencies? [http://i130.photobucket.com/albums/p278/lammal412/Vibe1.jpg Check out this example of sheer power.] [http://i130.photobucket.com/albums/p278/lammal412/New/Vibe2.jpg And how about] [http://i130.photobucket.com/albums/p278/lammal412/New/Vibe3.jpg this sequence] [http://i130.photobucket.com/albums/p278/lammal412/New/Vibe4.jpg in which he stabilizes time eras] during ''[[Crisis on Infinite Earths]]''? "You was sayin', Tropes?" [[Memetic Mutation|OUTRAGEOUS!]]

* ''[[Rising Stars]]'' has Laurel Darkhaven, who can telekinetically manipulate very, very small objects. Such as your carotid artery. She becomes a government assassin. She later uses the ability to control "very small things" to telekinetically sift EVERY inch of arable soil under the entire Middle East in order to make the entire region fertile again. The results can be seen from ORBIT!

** Recently the offpanel thing is becoming mostly subverted, as she easily defeats Wolverine in a sparring match, shown mostly in silhouette but still visible, and she was also shown ripping killer Nazi mechas to shreds.

* This is a grand tradition for [[The Legion of Super Heroes]]. Most characters have only one power, and it's not always something very impressive. One of their first recruits was Triplicate Girl, with the ability to transform from one ordinary teenage girl... to ''[[Doppelganger Attack|three]]'' [[Doppelganger Attack|ordinary teenage girls]]. Useful for doing chores and [[Power Perversion Potential|pretty fun in bed]], but not much good in combat. At least, not until she became [[Weak but Skilled|a master of Tri-Jitsu]], a martial art based around the fact that you have six arms, six legs, and three potential points of attack to coordinate from.

*** In at least one version, being able to bite through and chew up anything meant the [[Required Secondary Power]] of acidic saliva, providing a potentially nasty ranged attack.

* [[Batman]] villain The Ten-Eyed Man is an interesting case. Fans usually interpret this as him having ten additional weak points. But as most people will attest, eyes are pretty useful. Eyes on your hands? Makes you one of the best shooters in the DC universe, due to an unerring aim.

** Makes it a bit hard to pull the trigger, though...

* ''[[Stormwatch]]: Team Achilles'' had a character whose superpower was to make plants grow really fast... and he worked as an assassin. The thing is, most people at any given time have seeds in their digestive tract from the vegetation they've eaten, and growing those up to full plants in a few seconds leads to a nasty death from internal injuries and/or choking.

* Dove of the (Teen) Titans is a low-level [[Flying Brick]], who also has the power of "perfect peace". In the ''[[Blackest Night]]'' crossover, this not only allowed the previous Dove to ''not'' come back as a [[Zombie Apocalypse|zombie]], but also {{spoiler|allowed the current Dove to destroy hordes of the otherwise-unstoppable emotion-powered zombies at once.}}

* One of the ''[[Captain Planet]]'' comic books actually has Ma-Ti lamenting over how lame "Heart" is as a power after Wheeler makes fun of him for it. Later in the issue, Ma-Ti uses his ring to reach and understand the hearts of all the creatures in the forest to help the other Planeteers, including [[Everything's Worse with Bears|bears.]]

== Fan Works ==

* Or, in this case, clairvoyance in ''[[With Strings Attached]]''. The Hunter calls Ringo's mindsight “the single most valuable ability” amongst the four—beating out [[Super Strength]] / [[Nigh Invulnerability]], [[Making a Splash|complete control over water]], and [[Voluntary Shapeshifting|unlimited shapeshifting]]—because he can see anything. Including atoms. With perfect clarity. At any distance, up to and including ''the surface of the sun''. Knowledge is power, indeed.

 

== [[Literature]] ==

** Power of various emotional Estates are ridiculously powerful when combined with the animistic nature of Mythic Reality, especially in 1st & 2nd edition. Suddenly, gravity doesn't ''like'' you anymore.

** In 3rd edition, Persona miracles can let you affect the "borders" or your Estate, making things more or less like the important traits of it. For example, if the Power of Hope states that one of the properties of Hope is that "Hope springs eternal," then Persona miracles of Hope can make things immortal.

** Illusion is the same way. Even a low level illusionist has the ability to create voices in crowds, pass unreadable messages, and make documents that appear to be whatever paperwork is required, which while not spectacular in straight combat are ideal for running a rebellion. At higher levels, incredibly complex illusions can be created with a nigh-impossible saving throw, or can manipulate foes by substituting their reality for another or causing them to die of a fright-induced heart attack. ([[Your Mind Makes It Real]] applies in all these situations.) The problem here that something like 2/3rds of the creatures in the game are flatly immune to 90% of the spells in the illusion school, the same issue with Enchantment has this same issue.

** In 4E, there's Warlords (and to a lesser extent, Bards) with the "grant free melee/ranged basic attack" gimmick. Hey, cool, a free attack that usually has a lower to-hit chance than most abilities, and one roll of weapon damage instead of potentially between 2-5 rolls plus all sorts of bonuses. Nice, not great. And then Essentials came out, whose character classes usually base around turning someone who only has melee/ranged basic attacks into a [[Person of Mass Destruction]] suddenly lashing out three times their equivalents' damage ''per attack'', and a Warlord that could grant an extra attack or three just cut the average encounter time in half...

* ''[[Suburban Knights]]'' involves this {{spoiler|very literally with Mati (from ''[[Captain Planet]]''). His ring is the one thing that can defeat [[Big Bad|Malachite]] and it gives him an amazing [[Crowning Moment of Awesome]].}}

** {{spoiler|As it turns out, this delves more into [[Crippling Overspecialization]]. The ring was originally designed with the express purpose of counteracting magic. When it was successful in doing this by defeating Malachite the first time, it resulted in the world eventually being dominated by technology, with so little magic left for the ring to counter against that it ended up basically useless - until Malachite came back.}}

 

== [[Western Animation]] ==

** Pinkie Pie's special ability is making other ponies happy. While this mostly manifests in throwing sweet parties and being a delightful [[Cloudcuckoolander]], this also gives her access to the [[Rule of Funny]], allowing her to regularly perform feats that break even the magical rules of Equestria.

** A literal example with Princess Cadence, the third Alicorn in the series. She's a [[Love Goddess]] who has the power to repair the bonds between ponies and spread love wherever she goes. Compared to the [[Physical God]]dess level abilities her aunts show, this doesn't seem as impressive. Then you remember that [[The Power of Friendship]] is the most powerful magic in the world, and [[The Power of Love]] is it's close cousin. Cue her and her husband-to-be using [[The Power of Love]] {{spoiler|to deliver a [[Heart Beat-Down]] to [[Big Bad|Queen Chrysalis]] that sends her and her minions ''hurtling over the horizon''.}}

* The aformentioned Stinkor in the 2002 ''[[He-Man and the Masters of the Universe|He Man and The Masters of The Universe]]'' series. In this cartoon, the character got the chance to show just how lame of a power stink really was, and He-man was almost defeated. In later episodes, Skeletor treated Stinkor much better than his other minions, just because of how powerful he was. Stinkor's stench is so awful that Skeletor has to hold his nose around him. ''Skeletor doesn't have a nose''.

* [[DC Comics]]' Sportsmaster is a minor super-villain who uses sport-themed gimmicks. In ''[[Young Justice (animation)|Young Justice]]'', he's one of the most powerful villains, and [[wikipedia:Outline of sports|his repertoire seems to have been expanded greatly]], to the extent that he's effectively an evil version of Batman.