Hopeless Boss Fight: Difference between revisions
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These bosses tend to make their appearance near the beginning of the game, before the characters have had a chance to earn [[Experience Points]] or [[Level Up]], or otherwise become more powerful than their predefined starting levels—this makes narrative sense as well, because this is when the characters would be least likely to survive an encounter with them anyway. [[Tropes Are Tools|Done well]], this defeat will strike fear into the heart of the player, having learned firsthand just how powerful this boss really is; done poorly, it feels like [[Fake Longevity|a cheap trick designed to advance the plot]], [[Suspension of Disbelief]] be damned.
Since games like to pretend to be fair, your opponent in the
Ideally, the game should make it somewhat obvious to the casual gamer the fight is probably intended to be hopeless, lest you waste your serious healing items and abilities. This is another reason why these tend to appear at the beginning of the game, as you haven't even ''acquired'' any serious healing items or abilities yet.
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Sometimes, the apparently invincible boss ''can'' technically be defeated, if you have [[Guide Dang It|a precisely tuned tactical setup]], access to a [[Disc One Nuke]], the advantage of a [[New Game+]] or endless hours of [[Level Grinding]] behind you. In this special case, defeating the boss may net you a cool reward of [[Experience Points]] or rare items.
In any case, since a
* The boss will simply reveal that he is [[I Am Not Left-Handed|Not Left Handed]] and summon his [[Cutscene Power to the Max]] to knock your party senseless, if your party members didn't already [[Cutscene Incompetence|collapse from their own exhaustion]].
* Someone or something else pulls a [[Diabolus Ex Machina]] and finishes you off.
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A specific subtrope of [[Fission Mailed]], and related to [[Controllable Helplessness]] in that you're directly taking part in a situation that will only end one way. If the boss ''must'' be defeated in battle to avoid a [[Game Over]], but invokes a [[Story Overwrite]] ''after'' the battle to defeat you, it's [[Heads I Win, Tails You Lose]].
Compare and contrast [[Foregone Victory]] and [[Zero Effort Boss]], where it's ''you'' who can't lose the battle. See also [[Lord British Postulate]] and [[Curb Stomp Battle]].
The [[Implacable Man]] (with his [[Nigh Invulnerability]] superpower) can sometimes look and feel like a
{{examples|suf=s}}
==
* In ''[[One Piece]]'' the Luffy vs. Magellan fight during the "Impel Down" storyline
** Luffy also loses to
**
**
* This trope is parodied in the ''[[Suzumiya Haruhi]]'' side story "Haruhi Theatre Act 1". Haruhi and the Brigade are trapped in an RPG, and when Haruhi meets a sage who warns her that she can't defeat the dragon without the power to do so, she doesn't listen and drags the Brigade over to fight it. Naturally she gets creamed and regenerates next to the sage, who smugly tells her off. She doesn't listen ''again'' and continually goes back and dies. When she finally listens to him, he demands some stuff from her as he's only giving them out if she gets quest items...but she just threatens him.▼
* In ''[[Fairy Tail]]'', the brief encounter with {{spoiler|Acnologia}} turns into one of these very quickly. Even {{spoiler|Zeref, the most powerful mage in history,}} claims that {{spoiler|Acnologia}} is a being that humans could never hope to match. The point is hammered home when one character who had encountered it before notes that {{spoiler|Acnologia}} was toying with them the whole time.▼
* ''[[Captain Tsubasa]]''
* Used in-story by ''[[Ender's Game]]'', where a video game given to the cadets ends with a giant killing their character. The point was to see how they would react with an [[Unwinnable]] scenario. {{spoiler|Ender kills the giant by [[Chunky Salsa Rule|jumping into its eye and attacking its brain]]}}▼
* Parodied in ''[[College Saga]]''. The characters face Leviathan, who uses the devastating "Tidal Wave" attack, and quickly kills off the party... and then says "Just kidding LOL. You can't kill a guardian force."▼
* The whole point of the [[Kobayashi Maru]] test in ''[[Star Trek]]''. Like the Giant's Drink above, it's actually a psychological test rather than a tactical puzzle, although that doesn't stop people from trying. As various cadets' attempts to hack the infamous sim have piled up, they've resorted to ever-more-obvious tactics to keep it hopeless, including spawning extra enemies when needed or allowing them to break the laws of physics.▼
* In ''[[Ready Player One]]'', one of the events in the MMORPG game is a race where players have to avoid obstacles over a blasted apocalyptic version of New York, but not only does this challenge as a whole seem Ultra-[[Nintendo Hard]] the final obstacle - [[King Kong]] - seems an unbreachable barrier. Even the villainous [[Mega Corp]]'s paid mercenary players (who really seem to stink at this game, despite it being their job) find Kong's attacks impossible to avoid. Because they are. [[Unlikely Hero]] Gunther figures this out; after days of purposely staying in last place to farm coins from defeated players, he figures out that the solution is [[Hidden in Plain Sight]] at the Holindays Journals (the original HQ of the game's deceased creator, now a free museum dedicated to him) where a holographic display of the creator outright tells him the secret - he isn't supposed to even ''try'' to drive past Kong, he has to drive his car ''backwards'' from the starting line, which leads directly to the true finish line. Following this advice, Gunther easily wins and achieves the part of the [[Dismantled MacGuffin]] he needs to proceed - causing the aforementioned Mega Corp and their CEO to look like a bunch of idiots.
* Virtually all tabletop RPGs run into this case (whether the DM wants to or not) if the players don't recognize a character as a major villain (or don't give a damn) and attack. Since many games take place in settings where [[Asskicking Equals Authority]], the team of level 3 adventurers deciding to settle things with the ancient dragon lord tends end exactly as it should: in two turns (at most) with a room full of dead [[Player Character|PCs]]. Entire sections of various dungeon-mastering guides have been dedicated to helping get powerful fiends away from a group of comparatively piddly heroes without having to murder them all.▼
** Of course, the reason why they tend to be ridiculously tough and immune to [[Chunky Salsa Rule]] in the first place is that clever players often cut the plot via "[[Lord British Postulate|premature termination]]" of the villain, per [[Things Mr. Welch Is No Longer Allowed to Do In An RPG]]. It gets derailed to the left, or derailed to the right, [[Morton's Fork|your choice]].▼
* In a rare tabletop game semi-example, there is Caine from ''[[Vampire: The Masquerade]]''. In one rulebook, there is a section regarding fighting Caine that consists of [[Two Words: Obvious Trope|two words]], [[Game Over|"You Lose."]] To expand - he is the Biblical Cain, turned into the first vampire by God. He knows [[All Your Powers Combined|the disciplines of all vampires,]] centuries upon centuries of experience, and the ability to do - more or less - anything he wants.▼
** In addition, he possesses the Mark of Caine from the Bible. Any damage inflicted on him is returned seven fold to his attacker. On the off chance someone did manage to kill Caine, they would instantly die.▼
* Similar to the above example is Togashi Yokuni in ''[[Legend of the Five Rings]]''. The utterly mysterious lord of the Dragon Clan, who is so enigmatic that those who speak with him don't even really remember what his voice sounded like or what words were said, is actually {{spoiler|Togashi-Kami, the immortal child of the Sun and Moon and the only remaining sibling of the first Emperor. He is also a dragon.}} He can see the future and knows when he will die, and it sure ain't gonna be you that kills him.▼
* ''[[Planescape]]'':
*
** One example that is essential to the plot of a story, Dispater is this in ''Fires of Dis'' when he confronts the party at the climax of the story. Aside from the obvious reason here (the module is designed for PCs of levels 5 to 9, while Dispater is someone that epic-level heroes would find a challenge) the text does not give him stats here, the text simply saying that nothing the PCs have can injure him in the slightest. Fortunately, he has no desire to fight them as he finds their mere presence amusing - he had expected "thousands of noble paladins descending upon my hateful plane in the name of all that's holy" rather than "a band of — you'll pardon the expression — ordinary thrillseekers" and is more than willing to give them what they came for and send them on their way.
* In one of the ''[[Warrior Cats]]'' tabletop games included with a few of the books, if you attempt to fight a [[Humans Are Cthulhu|Twoleg, it becomes this trope.]] The PCs' only options are to attack, which does nothing but damage them, or run away.▼
* [[Eldritch Horror|The big boss himself]] in ''[[Call of Cthulhu (tabletop game)]]''. In some versions, his ''only'' stat is that he [[Just Eat Him|eats 1d6 players]] ''per round''.▼
* In ''[[SLA Industries]]'', two unstoppable [[badass]]es are repeatedly made mention of: the infamous serial killer, Halloween Jack, and the king and father of all Manchines, Digger. While both are a notable threats or inconveniences to the company, and have many attemps made against them, both are effectively unkillable: Jack has has a bounty of 2 billion credits on his head that no sensible op would try and collect on, and Digger has a whole army to fight with. Niether character has stats in any of the books, as they are considered to [[One-Hit Kill|OHK]] [[Total Party Kill|the party]] if they ever cross paths. This especially bad news for those taking one premade platinum mission, which requires them to go right into Digger's homebase, and sabotage his ultimate plan to conquer Mort.▼
* This and [[Random Encounters]] are the only gameplay in the module version of ''The Avatar Trilogy''. Naturally they are considered the worst modules ever published by TSR.▼
== [[Video Games]] ==
=== Action Adventure ===
* In ''[[Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia]]'', at the final battle with Dracula, once you've whittled his HP down to 0, if you're not fast enough to quickly equip the {{spoiler|Dominus Union}} he unleashes an unbeatable move that's supposed to instantly kill you (it does 9946 damage, though if you use the Volaticus Glyph, you can fly in the corner of the screen to dodge it, though the frame of Dracula and the explosion stays unmoving and never ends).
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* In ''Ys Seven'', there's the first fight with {{spoiler|Scias in Altago Palace where you MUST lose after his HP is at half, since ALL attacks are BLOCKED (0 Damage) from then on ALONG WITH an attack that does 2k+ damage to you.}}
* In ''[[Pokemon Rumble Blast]]'', {{spoiler|at the end of World 2, you get a Team Battle with one of these. Lampshaded with a Help Sign stating that "things might not always go your way, but sometimes is a good thing." Hurts your pride if you don't read the sign, but is considered a Critical Hit after winning the Charge Battle to reach this zone.}}
* Downplayed a little with Genichiro, the [[Starter Villain]] and tutorial boss
* In ''[[American McGee's Alice]]'', Alice cannot defeat the Jabberwock the first time she fights him. The objective of the battle is to survive and stall until the Gryphon can arrive to chase him away. Succeed, and you get the final component of the Jabberwock Eye Staff, a powerful weapon. Ironically, while the second battle with him doesn't fit the Trope (not only ''can'' she defeat him, she ''must'', because he'll kill her if she can't), the second fight is much, much harder than the first, likely because he has enough room to fully utilize his flight in the second battle.
** In [[Alice: Madness Returns|the sequel]], the Executioner is this and a [[Puzzle Boss]]. Alice has no chance in an open fight with him, and can only flee the titanic Executioner and his mighty scythe. After a long chase through the castle, Alice is finally able to use the cake labeled "EAT ME" to grow much, ''much'' bigger than he is and [[Karmic Death|smoosh him under her foot]].
=== Action Game ===
* Kratos's first encounter with Zeus in ''[[God of War
** Similarly, in [[God of War: Chains Of Olympus|''Chains Of Olympus'']] your first battle against Charon is hopeless, since you don't have the right weapon to fend off one of his attacks. You must cross all of Tartarus to find it
* ''Blood Omen: [[Legacy of Kain]]'' includes an early battle with Malek. He cannot be killed, forcing Kain to leave and seek help, first from the oracle (Moebius) and then Vorador, who defeats Malek himself.
** In fact, the very first battle is against respawning bandits. If you kill them all, more will come along, and eventually kill you in order to progress the story.
* The [[Newgrounds]] flash game ''Mobile Weapon'' contains an example of this. At some point in the game, you fight Fleet Commander Ariel Highwater in her mecha, Serra Superion. The mecha has ridiculous health and power and will maim your party within a few hits. However, you don't lose the game: you merely need to repair your own mechas after the battle. You'll never hear from her again.
**
*
* This happens twice in ''Breakdown'', both with [[The Dragon]], Solus. The first time isn't much of a fight, since he slams you against a wall before you can really do much. The second time is more of a fight, but the second he gets more strength, the fight's basically over. {{spoiler|However, you get to fight him again after some [[Time Travel]], and after he remarks that you were supposed to die quick, you beat him because you're now as powerful as he is.}}
* If you play the Zeon campaign in ''[[Mobile Suit Gundam]]: [[Gundam vs. Series|Federation vs. Zeon]]'', nearly every encounter with Amuro and his Gundam is this. You're not even able to consistently damage him until the final mission, where you drop into his own final battle with Char.
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* In ''[[Far Cry]] 2'', you start the game trying to flee a town while a civil war is going on all around you. You can't successfully escape the town, because even if you avoid getting killed by gunfire, you collapse from malaria before you can get far. Once you're out of commission, one of the factions picks up your semi-conscious body and drags you to safety to get you to work for them. Which makes very little sense, considering that you may have just shot a lot of them... and then either lost, or collapsed from your {{spoiler|terminally}} serious case of malaria.
* The Handsome Dragon from ''[[Borderlands]] 2'' , specifically the ''Tiny Tina's Assault on Dragon's Keep'' DLC. Not only is this boss from Tina's game-within-a-game completely indestructible and unbeatable, it can [[Total Party Kill]] the whole group with little effort. The reason, of course, is that Tina is a [[Killer GM]] who also ''crazy'', but after a lot of complaining by the other characters she replaces the dragon with a much easier boss.
* [[Robeast|The Songbird]], from ''[[BioShock Infinite]]''. Don’t let the name fool you, this mechanical monstrosity tasked with guarding Elizabeth is one of the most dangerous creatures in Columbia, and she knows it; when Booker goes to rescue her, she pleads with him to be quiet, knowing what it will do if it sees him. Of course, it does, and the beast is so massively powerful and [[Evil Is Bigger|massively… massive]], that his weapons are worthless against it, and all the duo are able to do is flee. Of course, even ''that'' is a challenge, for while the chase is scripted, it’s still one of the most tense parts of the game, as the Songbird literally tears the entire tower apart in its attempts to smash them. The only way the duo survive is for [[Sheathe Your Sword|Elizabeth to simply surrender]], pleading for the creature to spare Booker, and it does; it's directive is to guard Elizabeth, and it really doesn't care about Booker once he stops trying to prevent it from doing so. Second time around, Booker still cannot fight it, and the encounter makes it more of a [[Cutscene Boss]], as Elizabeth - by then able to harness her true power - teleports the three of them to Rapture’s Welcome Center; whoever built it [[No Waterproofing in the Future| didn’t think a flying robot needed to be made waterproof]], and it is crushed by the undersea pressure.
=== Mecha Game ===
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* Spontaneous Bootay in ''[[South Park|South Park: The Fractured But Whole]]''; she has infinite hit points and her one attack kills everyone on the ''nine spaces'' she occupies. The only way for the player to proceed here is to flee.
** The same is true in the DLC "Bring the Crunch", but she becomes a [[Zero Effort Boss]] if New Kid has the Final Girl power.
* The first encounter with Lance in ''[[Epic Battle Fantasy|Epic Battle Fantasy 5]]'' starts with [[Tank Goodness|Neon Valkyrie]] instantly ramming and crushing the entire party before you have time to do anything. Even if by some miracle, one of the party members survives (only possible in [[New Game+]] with Evade boosted through the roof), [[The Dev Team Thinks of Everything|Neon Valkyrie will keep ramming until everyone is down]].
=== Shoot Em Up ===
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** The same game also features a sequence where the player must run from Sae Kurosawa, another extremely powerful one-hit kill ghost. In this case, though, she's invincible because the player has lost the Camera, and with it their only means of defending themselves against ghosts. Curiously, when she's encountered as the [[True Final Boss]], she's no longer able to one-hit kill you.
** The Fatal Frame series makes a tradition out of this: Kirie Himuro from the first game is also invincible and a one-hit kill until the final boss fight. The third game has Reika Kuze, who does not have one-hit kill powers, but is invincible until (you guessed it) the final boss fight.
* In ''[[Don't Starve]]'', calling Charlie a "boss" is something of a stretch, as you cannot even fight her. She attacks is the player is in total darkness, doing an automatic 100 points damage to Health and 50 to insanity every 5 to 11 seconds, until the player either dies or manages to create a light source, which causes her to flee.
=== Turn Based Strategy ===
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* ''[[Grand Theft Auto]] [[Grand Theft Auto II|2]]'' featured a mission that required you to "die" while attempting to break into an enemy gang's stronghold. Your employer then picks you up at the hospital and sends you back to the fort with a better plan and better equipment.
** The original [[Grand Theft Auto]] featured a mission where you're asked to board a train as part of a plot to prove that your boss is the one true god. It's then revealed that the train is rigged with explosives. If you stay on it, after you die your boss apologises, saying that he was high on smack and is impressed you made it... Assuming that wasn't your last life. Worth getting off the train and failing just for the quote: "Only the righteous shall be saved! You! You are a shithead and bound for hell!"
* In ''[[Infamous
*
* ''Every'' boss fight in ''[[Subnautica]]'' is a Hopeless Boss Fight.
* ''[[Batman: Arkham Asylum]]'' has the Boss fight with the Scarecrow, which combines this with [[Puzzle Boss]]. The battle is, in fact, a nightmare experienced by the hero after inhaling the villain's fear gas. In this horrible, inescapable dream, Batman is trapped in a facsimile of Gotham with a kaiju-sized Scarecrow who shoots [[Frickin' Laser Beams]] from his eyes. Trying to fight this thing the regular way is suicidal, as even one hit will kill you. To "defeat" him, Batman has to wake up, and to do that, {{spoiler|he has to get to the Bat-Signal without Scarecrow noticing him and shine it in the villain's eyes.}}
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==
▲* In ''[[One Piece]]'' during the "Impel Down" storyline, the Luffy vs. Magellan fight is one of these, the point being driven home when {{spoiler|Luffy ''loses'' the fight}}.
▲*** Heck, the point is really driven home when {{spoiler|Luffy tries again later on in the arc, this time with quite a bit of backup, but can still do little more than slow Magellan down; he can't even do ''that'' once Magellan ''really'' goes all-out.}}
▲** Luffy also loses to {{spoiler|Aokiji}} much earlier in the series.
▲** Also, in the very beginning of the series, Zoro's fight against Hawk-Eyes Mihawk, which makes it clear that, at this point in the story, Zoro's just a big fish in a small pond, not even ''remotely'' close to being able to take on the world's ''real'' heavy hitters.
▲** Also the Straw Hats, immediately after struggling to defeat a Pacifista, are faced with another one, Sentoumaru and Marine Admiral Kizaru. Even when Rayleigh arrives to help fight Kizaru, Luffy even orders the crew to run away, declaring that that "Right now... we can't defeat them!". {{spoiler|It doesn't do any good; the real Kuma arrives, scatters the Straw Hats across the world, and the Straw Hats suffer complete defeat}}.
▲* This trope is parodied in the ''[[Suzumiya Haruhi]]'' side story "Haruhi Theatre Act 1". Haruhi and Brigade are trapped in an RPG, and when Haruhi meets a sage who warns her that she can't defeat the dragon without the power to do so, she doesn't listen and drags the Brigade over to fight it. Naturally she gets creamed and regenerates next to the sage, who smugly tells her off. She doesn't listen ''again'' and continually goes back and dies. When she finally listens to him, he demands some stuff from her as he's only giving them out if she gets quest items...but she just threatens him.
▲* In ''[[Fairy Tail]]'', the brief encounter with {{spoiler|Acnologia}} turns into one of these very quickly. Even {{spoiler|Zeref, the most powerful mage in history,}} claims that {{spoiler|Acnologia}} is a being that humans could never hope to match. The point is hammered home when one character who had encountered it before notes that {{spoiler|Acnologia}} was toying with them the whole time.
▲* ''[[Captain Tsubasa]]'', Japan Youth VS Hamburg SV (featuring [[Final Boss|Karl Heinz Schneider]] and half of his Germany team plus Wakabayashi), Japan gets beat down badly, and Hyuga can only score one goal because Wakabayashi lets him.
▲=== Literature ===
▲* Used in-story by ''[[Ender's Game]]'', where a video game given to the cadets ends with a giant killing their character. The point was to see how they would react with an [[Unwinnable]] scenario. {{spoiler|Ender kills the giant by [[Chunky Salsa Rule|jumping into its eye and attacking its brain]]}}
▲=== Film ===
▲* Parodied in ''[[College Saga]]''. The characters face Leviathan, who uses the devastating "Tidal Wave" attack, and quickly kills off the party... and then says "Just kidding LOL. You can't kill a guardian force."
▲* The whole point of the [[Kobayashi Maru]] test in ''[[Star Trek]]''. Like the Giant's Drink above, it's actually a psychological test rather than a tactical puzzle, although that doesn't stop people from trying. As various cadets' attempts to hack the infamous sim have piled up, they've resorted to ever-more-obvious tactics to keep it hopeless, including spawning extra enemies when needed or allowing them to break the laws of physics.
▲=== Tabletop Games ===
▲* Virtually all tabletop RPGs run into this case (whether the DM wants to or not) if the players don't recognize a character as a major villain (or don't give a damn) and attack. Since many games take place in settings where [[Asskicking Equals Authority]], the team of level 3 adventurers deciding to settle things with the ancient dragon lord tends end exactly as it should: in two turns (at most) with a room full of dead [[PCs]]. Entire sections of various dungeon-mastering guides have been dedicated to helping get powerful fiends away from a group of comparatively piddly heroes without having to murder them all.
▲** Of course, the reason why they tend to be ridiculously tough and immune to [[Chunky Salsa Rule]] in the first place is that clever players often cut the plot via "[[Lord British Postulate|premature termination]]" of the villain, per [[Things Mr. Welch Is No Longer Allowed to Do In An RPG]]. It gets derailed to the left, or derailed to the right, [[Morton's Fork|your choice]].
▲* In a rare tabletop game semi-example, there is Caine from ''[[Vampire: The Masquerade]]''. In one rulebook, there is a section regarding fighting Caine that consists of [[Two Words: Obvious Trope|two words]], [[Game Over|"You Lose."]] To expand - he is the Biblical Cain, turned into the first vampire by God. He knows [[All Your Powers Combined|the disciplines of all vampires,]] centuries upon centuries of experience, and the ability to do - more or less - anything he wants.
▲** In addition, he possesses the Mark of Caine from the Bible. Any damage inflicted on him is returned seven fold to his attacker. On the off chance someone did manage to kill Caine, they would instantly die.
▲* Similar to the above example is Togashi Yokuni in ''[[Legend of the Five Rings]]''. The utterly mysterious lord of the Dragon Clan, who is so enigmatic that those who speak with him don't even really remember what his voice sounded like or what words were said, is actually {{spoiler|Togashi-Kami, the immortal child of the Sun and Moon and the only remaining sibling of the first Emperor. He is also a dragon.}} He can see the future and knows when he will die, and it sure ain't gonna be you that kills him.
▲* Also similar to the above examples is the Lady of Pain in ''[[Dungeons & Dragons]]''. She is the enigmatic steward and protector of Sigil, the City of Doors, whose motives cannot be divined and who can (and has) annihilate even higher tier deities with her power. She ''will'' flay you outright or trap you into a nigh-inescapable labyrinthine dimension should you ever do anything to cross her. Stats for her simply aren't given, because She > You no matter how many epic levels you've got.
▲* In one of the ''[[Warrior Cats]]'' tabletop games included with a few of the books, if you attempt to fight a [[Humans Are Cthulhu|Twoleg, it becomes this trope.]] The PCs' only options are to attack, which does nothing but damage them, or run away.
▲* [[Eldritch Horror|The big boss himself]] in ''[[Call of Cthulhu (tabletop game)]]''. In some versions, his ''only'' stat is that he [[Just Eat Him|eats 1d6 players]] ''per round''.
▲* In ''[[SLA Industries]]'', two unstoppable [[badass]]es are repeatedly made mention of: the infamous serial killer, Halloween Jack, and the king and father of all Manchines, Digger. While both are a notable threats or inconveniences to the company, and have many attemps made against them, both are effectively unkillable: Jack has has a bounty of 2 billion credits on his head that no sensible op would try and collect on, and Digger has a whole army to fight with. Niether character has stats in any of the books, as they are considered to [[One-Hit Kill|OHK]] [[Total Party Kill|the party]] if they ever cross paths. This especially bad news for those taking one premade platinum mission, which requires them to go right into Digger's homebase, and sabotage his ultimate plan to conquer Mort.
▲* This and [[Random Encounters]] are the only gameplay in the module version of ''The Avatar Trilogy''. Naturally they are considered the worst modules ever published by TSR.
* ''[[Homestuck]]'': There are a number of these, almost always going against the heroes:
** Dave's first sword battle with his Bro was a doomed endeavour from the start, with Bro flash-stepping fast enough to use a PUPPET to fight Dave, and win easily.
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*** A surprising aversion occurs when Vriska goes off to fight him in the doomed timeline. Everything before that point implied that she would lose just as badly as everyone to face Jack before her, but due to her god-tier power of incredible control over luck, she rolls 8 8s on her dice, gaining a huge power boost, before actually putting up a decent fight against Jack. Whilst the outcome of the battle is uncertain (and wouldn't matter anyway due to it being in a doomed timeline), it's implied that Vriska might just have won.
▲=== Real Life ===
* One of the ways the Aztecs conducted [[Human Sacrifice|sacrifices]] to [[Aztec Mythology|the god Tezcatlipoca]] involved taking a captured enemy warrior, tying him in place, giving him a fake weapon (a stick covered in feathers, usually, since the typical weapon was a stick edged with obsidian blades), and forcing him to fight several fully-armed [[Badass Army|Jaguar Warriors]].
{{reflist}}
[[Category:Boss Battle]]
▲[[Category:Hopeless Boss Fight]]
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