Sorting Algorithm of Evil: Difference between revisions

{{quote|'''Wally:''' "I've decided to dabble in crime. I need some [[Mook|henchmen]]. Are you in?"<br />

'''Asok''' "What does a henchman do?"<br />

'''Wally:''' "A henchman's job is to be [[Cannon Fodder|gunned down]] in reverse order to his importance."<br />

'''Asok:''' "[[Sorting Algorithm of Mortality|How important am I?]]"<br />

'''Wally:''' "[[Red Shirt|I wouldn't pack a lunch for orientation day."|''[[Dilbert]]'', strip for May 12, 2009}}"

This trope has ancient roots. Possibly the earliest example, at least in the English language, is the [[Older Than Print]] epic ''[[Beowulf]]''. It just makes good sense that as our heroes fight the forces of evil, [[Taught By Experience|they should get better at fighting the forces of evil.]] So as the story progresses, the fights should get easier and easier. Of course, an easy fight is just [[Rule of Drama|bad drama]], so you have to consistently increase the threat the heroes face. This results in the [['''Sorting Algorithm of Evil]]'''. The first villain you meet is the weakest, and the last is the strongest. As the heroes get strong enough to defeat their current enemy, a new enemy will emerge that forces them to reach another skill level. It would be an [[Anticlimax]] if the hero defeated the Baddest Ass and spent the remaining time contending with lesser baddies.

A problem comes up if a long-running show goes [[Post Script Season|past its]] first [[Grand Finale]]. We may believe that the [[Evil Overlord]] is enough of a tactical dunce to think that sending his henchmen out in ascending order was a valid strategy. But why should the ''new'', unrelated, [[Big Bad]] happen to be even stronger? Sometimes the [[Big Bad|Big Bads]]s might form a string of [[The Man Behind the Man|Men Behind The Men]], making this structure more sensible. Although this leads to new [[Fridge Logic]] issues: why doesn't the Man Most Behind use the [[Authority Equals Asskicking|unimaginable power]] of his position to just wipe all the heroes out? If the first Big Bad is only a local terror, bigger bads may not have even been ''aware'' of the heroes. The increasing threats they face are a reflection of the threat they pose to the ultimate boss.

Related to [[Convenient Questing]] where ascending menace is laid out geographically, and the player must proceed through these regions in strictly ascending order by menace. <ref>[[Mordor|Mount Doom?]] It's right over there, but you have to go through the [[Death Mountain|Hills of Moderate Evil]], which are themselves on the far side of the [[The Lost Woods|Forest of Inconvenience]], reachable via the [[Ghibli Hills]].</ref>

When this happens involving entire [[Always ChaoticExclusively Evil|breeds/species of villains]], it's changing the [[Villain Pedigree]]. If it's because various villains were sealed away it's [[Sealed Cast in a Multipack]]. If a particularly powerful villain remains on screen for too long and [[Can't Catch Up|can't keep up]], compare [[Lowered Monster Difficulty]].

** The original gives characters an explicit numerical "Combat Rating". <ref>A very strong human had a rating of about 100, while the heroes' rating was [[Memetic Mutation|over 9000]]</ref>. This held out until the middle of the Frieza arc, when the devices that were used to calculate these combat ratings were destroyed; at this point, the [[Big Bad]]'s [[One-Winged Angel|strongest form]] had a rating of around ''one hundred and twenty million'', whereas just two months earlier the heroes had been hard-pressed to deal with an opponent nearly seven thousand times weaker (Vegeta, then at 18,000). The plot helps support the progression; Raditz arrived first, and called on a pair of stronger allies; the heroes went after their boss next; the next [[Big Bad]] was created from said boss's cells, plus those of the powered-up heroes, and so on. The final villain was a mild subversion because, while its final form was considerably weaker than form beforehand, its unique physiology made it nearly impossible to kill and its nature became far more merciless. If you go back to watch the series again, you soon realize that even the first fight was equally as tough as the last. The numerical concepts of "power levels" were quietly dropped after the Frieza saga, as they were starting to get to ridiculously high levels (in the first few episodes, a power level over 1000 was impressive, whereas by the end of the Frieza saga, Goku and the [[Big Bad]] were in the ''hundreds of millions''. It seems the hero increases in power just enough to get totally beaten by the next big bad. While there are episodes where Goku casually dispatches villains who fought toe-to-toe with him ''in his youth'', these are naturally filler.

* ''[[Yu-Gi-Oh (anime)|Yu-Gi-Oh]]'' and ''[[Yu-Gi-Oh! GX (anime)|Yu-Gi-Oh GX]]'' presented villains not only in ascending order by menace, but also, for some reason, [[Camp Gay|effeminateness]]. For instance, the first [[Big Bad]] in season 1 of ''GX'' was a withered old man; Season 2's villain was a younger, more strapping adult male. Season 3 had a Hermaphrodite Duel Monster. Of course, the effeminateness of the villain ties directly into their personal interest towards the hero. At first, the [[Big Bad]] is usually just interested in a certain trinket or item carried by the protagonist, while the next is usually more interested in the protagonist's actual abilities and strengths. The biggest of the [[Big Bad|Big Bads]]s ''always'' seemed to have some kind of intimate interpersonal relationship with the hero, which would border on [[Ho Yay]] (since both sides in this series were invariably male), if only the [[Big Bad]] wasn't trying to enslave/murder them for some deep, scarring betrayal they blame on the protagonist. There are only two exceptions: Dartz, in the Doma [[Story Arc]], and the [[Big Bad]] of the Capsule Monsters arc, which, as far as the rest of the series is concerned, [[Fanon Discontinuity|never even happened]]. Even the original series (never released beyond Japan and taking place before the anime we all know and love) has most of the villains being random thugs met in chance encounters, fitting into the algorithm perfectly.

* ''[[Monster Rancher (anime)|Monster Rancher]]'' is complex: Pixie is the first of the big bad 4, but stronger than Gali and Greywolf -- itGreywolf—it takes the entire team ''sans'' golem to beat Pixie, but only Moochi or Tiger to beat Gali and Greywolf. Then they meet Moo (the [[Big Bad]]) on the road quite early, and the encounter plays out like a [[Hopeless Boss Fight]]. Although it's played straight in a sense, since Naga is the strongest of the big bad 4, and after that it's Moo in his Dragon Body who is incredibly powerful. But is subverted again, because in the next series they're up against one of his captains, who is obviously much weaker than Moo was.

* The classic example of the technology creep variety would be the Zeon mobile suits in ''[[Mobile Suit Gundam]]''. They go from the rather pathetic Zaku which was designed for fighting conventional vehicles rather than other mobile suits, to the fast, heavily armed & armored, though somewhat unwieldy Dom to the powerful & agile Gelgoog, which nearly matches the Gundam's performance, with a few Ace customs and [[Super Prototype|Super Prototypes]]s along the way for flavor. This would be a fairly realistic setup... if the war had lasted longer than a ''single year''. The novelization is somewhat better about this as the war drags on for two years & the Gelgoogs never show up. It also subverts this trope, as the antagonists use a slightly less advanced Mobile Armor to fight the Gundam in the climactic battle due to supply shortages and {{spoiler|though the Gundam defeats it, it proves to be enough of a distraction that a [[Mauve Shirt]] piloting a lowly Rick Dom is able to finish Amuro off}}.

* ''[[Magic Knight Rayearth]]''. The first enemy the [[Power Trio]] faces, Alcyone, is a powerful [[An Ice Person|Ice Mage]] but easily dispatched. Then come [[Summon Magic|Ascot]], [[Master of Illusion|Caldina]], [[BFSBig Freaking Sword|Lafarga]] and, ''finally'', [[The Dragon|Zagato himself]]. While their power levels are all over the place, they have specific skills that make them increasingly dangerous, and it would have been easy for any of the later foes to eliminate the Knights had they been dispatched earlier. In particular, [[Fridge Logic|one wonders why]], since Zagato knew all about the Magic Knight legend, why he didn't go after the girls himself as soon as they arrived. In the anime, Zagato does show up for a few moments to show the heroes just a tiny portion of his power. Had he actually attacked them, they would not have survived. What Zagato wants to do {{spoiler|Other than keeping his beloved Princess alive}} is never fully explained. He may not intend to kill the Magic Knights, regardless of what that will mean for him. The Ascot arc shows the trope in miniature: the first few "friends" are indeed strong enough to squish the Magic Knights into paste, but they have glaring weaknesses that the girls discover and exploit within minutes. However, his very last Summoned Monsters are titanic foes that can go toe-to-toe with the ancient [[Humongous Mecha|Rune Gods]], and continue to be powerful presences in the second arc [[Big Damn Heroes|whenever the Knights need rescuing]]. He always had access to them, so why he didn't call these right off the bat is a mystery to everyone.

* ''[[JoJo's Bizarre Adventure]]'' both plays this trope straight and averts it. While the enemies fought in each series grow stronger the closer that you get to the end, the fact that each volume stars a different hero means that [[Big Bad|Big Bads]]s don't necessarily have to be stronger than what came before. For example, while Dio of Part 3 was quite dangerous, he wasn't as immediate a threat to the world as the Pillar Men of Part 2.

** Averted in its prequel ''[[Saint Seiya: The Lost Canvas|Saint Seiya the Lost Canvas]]''. The difficulty of the enemies varies ranging from [[Elite Mooks|simply strong Specters]], the three [[Mini Boss|Judges]], to [[Co-Dragons|Thanatos/Hypnos]], but a good deal of energy is put forth into defeating Thanatos/Hypnos before even finishing off the Judges; and many [[Elite Mooks|rankless strong Specters]] actually served as obstacles for the last arc, outlasting both [[Thethe Dragon|the Dragons]]s and [[Mini Boss|Mini-bosses]].

** But then completely plays it straight in the Finale, since the Final Angel is basically stated to be the absolutely most powerful of all in terms of AT Field, able to basically [[NoWon't SellWork On Me]] anything short of another [[Physical God]]. Fittingly, there were 2 of them in the same room with him...and he basically would have let himself die regardless anyway. Then [[The Movie]] ends with....uhhhhhh, the two aforementioned Physical Gods doing....stuff that would make your head explode. And I mean....both the Characters themselves...AND YOU!!! Enjoy your [[Mind Screw]], my friends!

** The most recent villain is played quite straight though. It's {{spoiler|Hades who is actually the former master of Fairy Tail before Makarov. He is also the leader of the strongest dark guild in the world. He makes his first actual introduction (not counting his shadowed apparition in the Oracion Seis arc) by [[Curb Stomp Battle|curb-stomping]] Makarov. It takes the combined efforts of six strong Fairy Tail mages (Natsu, Gray, Lucy, Wendy, Erza and Laxus) to beat him, and that's only after Happy, Charle and Pantherlily discover his weakness and utilizes it. However, Hades survives and escapes the island - and then [[Always a Bigger Fish|history's strongest dark wizard Zeref appears and kills him]]. If Zeref will be the next villain, it's certainly a [[Sorting Algorithm of Evil]].}}

* ''[[Batman: Year One]]'' reintroduces [[Batman|The Detective]] as being prinicipally concerned with cleaning up [[Wretched Hive|Gotham City's]] [[The Mafia|Mobster problem]]; its nominal sequels such as ''The Man Who Laughs'', ''[[The Long Halloween]]'' and ''[[Batman: Dark Victory]]'' concern the gradual emergence and rise of the supervillain threat, and by the end of ''Halloween'' and ''Victory'' nearly all the principal mobsters are either incarcerated or dead, and the supervillains have taken over. Afterwards though this trope is zig-zagged and subverted since, while Batman does deal with global, even genocidal villains as his career moves on, and as part of the ''[[Justice League]]'' takes on intergalactic menaces and otherworldly threats, those same supervillains still pose as much or even more trouble for him as they ever have, though under [[Grant Morrison]] there was / is a tendency to make the city-based threats part of larger international conspiracies, to the point where prior to the lastest [[Cosmic Retcon]] Batman had decided to start his own multinational crimefighting ''franchise'' to tackle ''crime everywhere''.

* Subtly toyed with in ''[[Point Blank (film)|Point Blank]]'' -- the—the hero keeps killing his way up the chain of command without truly getting anywhere.

* ''[[Kung Fu Hustle]]'' has a rather clearly evident Algorithm, starting with basic [[Gang of Hats|Axe Gang]] members that are countered by the Pig Sty Alley's three martial artists, who are then countered by the Axe Gang's hired [[Musical Assassin|Musical Assassins]]s, who are then countered by the Landlord and Landlady, who are in turn countered by the [[Made of Iron]] and [[Super Speed|superhumanly-fast]] Beast, who is in turn countered by the {{spoiler|[[Heel Face Turn]]-ed [[Unsympathetic Comedy Protagonist]] [[Villain Protagonist]]}}. In a slightly jarring subversion, the Beast attempted to use a pile of basic Axe Gang members to soften up the hero before properly fighting him.

* ''[[Pirates of the Caribbean]]'' began with the enemies being a crew of cursed undead pirates. The second movie had them facing against the mythological Davy Jones. The third was a battle royal against Davy Jones and the entire East India Company navy, with the God of the Ocean thrown in for good measure. Good thing they had the Pirate council and Elizabeth [[Took a Level Inin Badass]].

* ''[[The Lord of the Rings (film)|The Lord of the Rings]]'' breaks from the trope -- thetrope—the [[Big Bad]] sends out his uber-henchmen first to get the Ring from Frodo. Resulting in a rather awkward situation when they content themselves with {{spoiler|stabbing him with a poisonous dagger and retreat instead of slaughtering everybody, as they're fully capable of doing}}, demonstrating that the algorithm exists for a good reason. The trope is broken again after the war is over: the hobbits return home and are forced to deal with a bunch of thugs and an effectively powerless {{spoiler|Saruman}}.

** Be fair, now. The Nazgûl stabbed Frodo, but were chased away by Aragorn (their [[Achilles' Heel]] is their fear of fire, a common motif that Tolkien went with). And when Frodo is being taken to Rivendell, the Wraiths have regrouped, with all of them being washed away by the river. When they appear again in ''The Two Towers'' and ''The Return Of The King'', they've [[Took a Level Inin Badass|gotten even more powerful]] with the felbeasts. Even though they failed to reclaim The One Ring, they were not the [[Quirky Miniboss Squad]], by any means.

* In the first ''[[Alien (franchise)|Alien]]'' film, just one alien manages to kill off all but one crew member of the ''Nostromo'', Ripley. In ''Aliens'', she has to face an entire ''colony'' of them, including their Queen. Then averted in ''Alien³'', which like the first in the series has only a single alien menacing our protagonists, in addition to {{spoiler|a Queen embryo maturing in Ripley's thorax}}. And finally played half-straight in ''Alien: Resurrection'' when an entire colony of them is being faced again, but this one consists of no more than 12 individuals in addition to their Queen, as well as {{spoiler|some sort of alien-human hybrid in the end}}. However, between their low numbers and [[Took a Level Inin Badass|how badass Ripley has become]], a lot if not most of the tension was unfortunately lost.

* Used briefly in the first ''[[Gamera]]'' series. In ''Gamera vs. Gyaos'', Gamera takes the entire film to kill Gyaos. Then, for ''Gamera vs. Guiron'', Guiron is introduced as he's effortlessly killing a Space Gyaos. This wasn't entirely intentional on the filmmaker's part, as they'd originally intended for Space Gyaos' role to be filled by a completely different, new kaiju--theykaiju—they only reused the Gyaos costume because they couldn't make the new monster in time.

* A literary example comes from the ''[[Lensman]]'' series of novels, which worked up from interplanetary gangsters to an evil older than the formation of the solar system whose goal was domination of all intelligent life in the universe. These books [[Justified Trope|justified]] the algorithm by revealing in each book that the [[Big Bad]] of this book was [[The Man Behind the Man]] of last book's [[Big Bad]]. Then again, the nesting that would be present in the beginning is somewhat mind-boggling. <ref>The prologue of the first book describes it. This is a [[Retcon]]. The original Lensman series consisted of ''Galactic Patrol'', ''Gray Lensman'', ''Second Stage Lensman'', and ''Children of the Lens'', all originally published in ''Astounding Stories'' magazine. In this version, the Eddorians weren't revealed as The Men Behind the Men Behind the Men Behind the Men until the last set of stories. When [[E. E. "Doc" Smith]] sold the rights to a book publisher, his editor felt the lack of foreshadowing made the series a bit silly and asked Smith to write a prequel introducing the Eddorians from the beginning. Smith took an old, unrelated novel of his, ''Triplanetary'', added the prologue and tweaked the plot to fit the Lensman universe. He then wrote ''First Lensman'' to bridge ''Triplanetary'' with the original series.</ref>

* Justified in the ''[[Honor Harrington]]'' series. The People's Navy starts out the war with Manticore commanded by a bunch of inept bureaucrats and politically-appointed admirals, but the [[Enemy Civil War|Committee of Public Safety's coup]] kicks most of the garbage out of the system and allows the best Havenite admirals to rise to the top...in a purge that also happens to remove their most experienced admirals before they ever come into play. They also implement a system that prevents their best admirals from showing any strategic initiative, including [[State Sec|commissars]] with the authority to override admirals and [[You Have Failed Me...|executions for anyone who fails "pour encourager les autres"]]. <ref>It isn't until Esther McQueen becomes Secretary of War and reorganizes the system that they manage any significant strategic victories. When Thomas Theisman overthrows Chairman Saint-Just and restores the original Republic, the [[State Sec]] apparatus and political commissars are cleared out entirely, and the finest generals Haven has available can use whatever means they have at their disposal to fight the war with everything they learned in the first war. The second war does not start out well for Manticore.</ref>

** ''[[Stargate SG-1]]'' started with Apophis. When they finally got rid of him, even stronger Goa'uld showed up. But that's okay, the team got good at dispatching Goa'uld. So Anubis shows up, with the full knowledge of the godlike beings who had created the stargates. But they took care of him -- thoughhim—though it was a close one. For almost a whole month there is peace. Then the godlike Ori turn up. <ref>This progression is grounded in the plot by Tok'ra. He says that every time the Tau'ri defeat a System Lord an even worse one inevitably takes his or her place. By killing Ra, and others, SG-1 kept disrupting the Goa'uld balance of power, allowing more aggressive Goa'uld to sweep up now-leaderless forces and rise in threat level. They didn't cause Anubis, but probably sped up his timetable. They did make the Replicators more dangerous, by giving the nanotech precursor of the Replicators to the Asgard, from whom it was then captured. A self-application of [[Stop Helping Me!]] The Ori only found out about the Milky Way galaxy when Daniel Jackson and Vala accidentally warped over to their home galaxy and caused a scene. An unfortunate coincidence, perhaps, but still their doing.</ref>

** The ''[[Stargate Atlantis]]'' team woke up the Wraith ''and'' turned on the Asurans' hostility switch. [[Nice Job Breaking It, Hero]] indeed. At first glance it might even seem like the Stargate Program was responsible for Earth being attacked by the Goa'uld -- Earthuld—Earth being safely ignored by them until the SGC used the Stargate and wound up killing Ra. However, if the stargate had never been dug up in the first place, then humanity would never have (re)discovered the Goa'uld until humans discovered FTL travel on their own probably hundreds of years from now... and the Goa'uld would probably have been out there waiting for them. So in the case of the overall series' problem itself, the SGC didn't create the villain, just drew their attention prematurely. The last episode of ''Atlantis'' was essentially the concept of when the villains skip a few levels past where the heroes are expecting.

* Partially seen, partially reversed on ''[[Charmed]]'', which actually followed a Bell Curve of Evil. At first, the villains grew progressively more powerful, from warlocks, to demons, to the Source of All Evil himself. Once the Source of All Evil was blown to bits three times over halfway through the show's run things went a bit downhill. Later Big Bads included a [[Well-Intentioned Extremist]] angel, the Source's slightly less powerful rival, and finally the show's last [[Big Bad]] were basically the heroine's [[Evil Counterpart|Evil Counterparts]]s, who were roughly at the same power level they were.

* Reversed on ''[[Mission: Impossible (TV series)||Mission Impossible]]'', largely as a result of plot decay. While in the first few seasons the IMF went up against international terrorists, tyrannical dictators, and the [[Red Scare|Red Menace]], later seasons mostly found them up against the Mob.

* Every [[Class and Level System|class and level based]] [[Tabletop Game]] ever, with ''[[Dungeons and& Dragons]]'' being the [[Trope Maker]]. For that matter, any [[Tabletop Game]] that has experience points and character advancement ever. As the PCs get more powerful, they have to battle more and more powerful enemies. The difference is whether it's plain rubber band difficulty, or sandbox with variety of challenges and expectation that [[Player Character]]s won't be foolish enough to bite obviously more than they can chew (or at least the new PCs won't, after it happened once).

* The Necrons in ''[[Warhammer 4000040,000]]'' do this in reaction to strong attacks. If the Scouting parties the Necrons send first, they send another more powerful one, than another and another till all resistance is dead. Of course, since the Nercons are a race of undead machines, and they are the most advanced in the galaxy, they have yet to meet resistance that would warrant awaking their more powerful weapons of war.

** ''[[Final Fantasy XII]]'' has a few major exceptions to the trope. Many of the early stages have extremely powerful enemies wandering around that eclipse the normal small fry. A normally leveled party at this point has absolutely no chance against them. <ref>A few determined level grinders choose to go after them anyway, for the experience they give makes it [[Disc One Nuke|very easy to reach level 50 before even fighting the first boss]]</ref>.

* Averted in the MMORPG ''[[City of Heroes]]'', Paragon City is divided in many different zones, each of which has its own difficulty level. But except for a few limited-access areas, characters can go (and possibly die) anywhere they want in the city. Most [[MMORPG|MMORPGs]] are structured like this; the only thing stopping a low-level character from reaching high-level areas are the powerful monsters. The sorting algorithm is there, just pointed out as how you should do things, not enforced. Typically, the very high-level areas are an inordinately long walk from the low-level areas, or behind a locked door for which the key is easily acquired on the high-level side, in order to at least suggest the intended progression. However, not always: the Forsaken starting area in ''[[World of Warcraft]]'' contains a mid-level dungeon in one corner, and is directly adjacent to one of the max-level areas, with some helpful NPCs hanging around to tell new players not to go past; and the Blood Elf and Night Elf starting regions aren't much better.

* While present in most (if not all) [[Roguelike|Roguelikes]]s, it's also slightly averted in some, such as Dungeon Crawl where there's a chance some of the most powerful enemies in the game will spawn on the first couple of levels of the dungeon, not to mention Sigfried who kills more PCs than any other named enemy in the game; or ADOM which can spawn horrifyingly out-of-depth monsters (especially in the Dwarven Halls early in the main dungeon, where the PC can encounter Balors, Ancient dragons, etc.)

* ''[[Quest for Glory]]'' -- not—not so much within episodes but present in the larger arc. For instance, if you attempt to venture into the forest when you first begin'' Quest For Glory 1'', you will almost certainly not escape alive without prior knowledge of its layout. As you acquire skills, equipment, items, and experience, you are soon able to survive the forest during the day -- butday—but you still had better stay the hell out of there at night. Even as a top-level player, a nighttime venture in the forest is nigh-suicidal, thereby really giving it a sense of menace. However, as you progress from game to game, enemies as a whole become globally stronger so as to keep up the challenge. A ''Quest For Glory 1'' character imported into ''Quest For Glory 4'', for instance, would probably be killed from the suspense alone. <ref>Imports are boosted to a minimum skill level, which helps but not that much. The freaking ''bunny'' will probably pose a challenge to an imported character.</ref>

* [[Inverted Trope|Partially inverted]] in ''[[Wild ArmsARMs 4]]''. The game seems to follow this trope until you face an ancient demon with total control of space whose lover you just killed. When the enraged demon goes after you, you're only able to kill her because she expends too much energy creating and supporting [[Another Dimension]] [[Death Trap|designed to kill your party]] ''and'' she goes after you again despite her wounds to ensure she takes you out while collapsing the dimension. Her death causes [[The Dragon|Lambda's]] strategist to propose a plan to have the remaining [[Quirky Miniboss Squad|Brionac Lieutenants]] attack the heroes all at once, which gets rejected because [[The Omniscient Council of Vagueness]] had other ideas. From that point on, it seems like you fight the [[Quirky Miniboss Squad]] in ''descending'' levels of power, culminating in a battle against a scientist who just stands there while you wail on him. {{spoiler|This is of course exactly what [[The Omniscient Council of Vagueness]] had in mind all along, as they wanted to cull Brionac's numbers so that the surviving members would be easier to keep under their control.}}

** ''[[Fallout 2]]''. Benefits from the trope. The enemy progression is: giant ants and scorpions at first then rats and geckos. The Den will probably see your first human vs. human battle with nearly everyone in leather armor, pistols or SMGs. Vault City will have metal armors and assault rifles. Redding is fairly light but piss off the Salvatores in New Reno and your ass will get lasered -- thelasered—the Sierra Army Depot nearby has various battle robots. If you are evil, Broken Hills will see your first human vs. supermutant battle. NCR has policemen armed with gauss rifles. In gameplay terms, that means ouch. Both the raider hideout and Vault 15 is full of raiders in leather armor and boasting pistols & hunting rifles but three of them has combat armor and assault rifles. Mariposa is a deathtrap full of super mutants armed with laser rifles, flamethrowers, miniguns, you name it. San Francisco is light but Navarro and the Oil Rig are both utterly deadly with every single combatant clad in power armor and boasting energy weapons. Oh, and the [[Big Bad]] has 999 HP, a really powerful plasma cannon, a big-ass knife and about a dozen minigun turrets for backup. <ref>Speedrunning the game is hard: you can get to the final battle via San Francisco. But to get there from your starting location, you have to pass near Navarro which is chock full of Enclave soldiers and plasma turrets. Regardless how good you are, chances are very high that you will stumble into at least one Enclave patrol or a pack of Aliens/Floaters/Centaurs/Deathclaws. If this happens at level 2, you should reload immediately since you will be dead in the first turn anyway. Even an experienced character will have trouble here.</ref>

* Played relatively straight in both ''[[Mass Effect]]'' games. In the first game, the initial antagonists are the mechanical Geth and rogue Spectre Saren, whom is eventually revealed to be working for {{spoiler|[[Sapient Ship|Sovereign]], a Reaper, who are [[Eldritch Abomination|Eldritch Abominations]]s intent on destroying the galaxy's organic life}}.

* In ''[[Mass Effect 2]]'', [[Slave Mooks|the Collectors,]] who are abducting human colonies <ref> to build a human-based reaper</ref> become the main antagonists. They are controlled by Harbinger, another [[Eldritch Abomination|Reaper]], though most early-game enemies are just mercenaries unrelated to the Collectors. At the end of the game, Harbinger mobilizes hundreds of [[Sapient Ship|Reapers]], all with a personal vendetta against [[Player Character|Shepard]], which will presumably need to be dealt with in ''[[Mass Effect 3]]''.

* In an aversion, while he's received some upgrades over the years, Megabyte from ''[[Re BootReBoot]]'' is not only still the main villain, but with the exception of the now-deleted virus Daemon, he seems have become the most powerful virus in existence!

* Surprisingly, ''[[The Fairly Odd ParentsOddParents]]''... Timmy first starts off having to deal with mean babysitters and school bullies, eventually upgraded to his crazy fairy-hunting teacher. Now he routinely has to deal with the [[Evil Plan]]-loving Pixies and Anti-Fairies who seem to be content with nothing less than the total domination and remaking of both Earth and the magical world. This reflects his getting deeper into the world of magic, where the stakes are higher: later on there is The Darkness which is a threat to the normal galaxy and the magical universe. Timmy is thrown right in the midst of it.

* Subverted in ''[[WITCH (animation)|WITCH]]'', where the relative power levels of [[Big Bad|Big Bads]]s, [[The Dragon|Dragons]], and [[Mooks]] seem to spike up and down from time to time. The most powerful evil entity in the series is Prince Phobos, fought by the girls at the end of season one {{spoiler|and a bit at the end of season two}}. He's ''always'' dangerous, and always requires the guardians to pull some kind of [[Xanatos Gambit]] to beat. Season two's villain is Nerissa, less powerful [[The Chessmaster|but more cunning]] than Phobos. Season two's [[Quirky Miniboss Squad|Quirky Miniboss Squads]]s elevate in power throughout the season (from Phobos' former mooks to custom-created elemental monsters and finally to the former Guardians themselves), but despite this, Nerissa's power remains generally the same, even as she absorbs Hearts throughout the season. Nerissa frequently runs from the guardians rather than fight them, as she gets trounced whenever she faces them directly. She's still a threat because of her planning, however. By the end of it all, the final battle of season two ''is'' against a bad guy who's as powerful as Phobos and Nerissa combined: {{spoiler|[[The Dragon]] Cedric, who has consumed Phobos in order to absorb his and Nerissa's powers, along with the powers of the former Guardians}}, but because [[How Do I Shot Web?|he doesn't know how to shot elements]], he {{spoiler|[[Anticlimax Boss|goes down in a few minutes in spectacular fashion]]}}.

* ''[[Teen Titans (animation)|Teen Titans]]'' both uses and ultimately subverts this with its seasonal [[Big Bad|Big Bads]]s

** First, there was [[My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic/Recap/S1 E1/E01 Mare in Thethe Moon|Nightmare Moon]]. Perhaps more powerful than her sister [[Big Good|Celestia]], she was however defeated by the main cast with little fuss once they acquired the Elements of Harmony.

** Then came [[My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic/Recap/S2 E1/E01 The Return of Harmony Part 1|Discord]], a [[God of Evil]] who was so powerful enough that Celestia and Luna had to team up to defeat him last time; against the main characters he's able to neutralise the Elements of Harmony twice (once by stealing them, and once by breaking the friendship that powered them). The only way Celestia and Twilight are able to beat him is by [[Xanatos Gambit|being clever]].

** This is averted with the next villain however, [[My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic/Recap/S2 /E25 A Canterlot Wedding Part 1|Chrysalis]], who is substantially weaker than Discord and possibly weaker than Nightmare Moon. However she is also a shapeshifting [[Emotion Eater]] who successfully [[Brainwashed and Crazy|Brainwashed]] the captain of the Royal Guard to expose Canterlot to her invading horde, and who--aswho—as a result of absorbing all the love surrounding a wedding--''beat Celestia in a fair fight''. She’s also clever enough to quickly prevent the main cast from acquiring the elements of harmony, thus increasing the tension through denying them most of the resources they previously counted on.

* Most wars subvert this trope- at the beginning of the war both countries will be at their best but as one side begins to suffer defeats and begins losing its territory its professional soldiers will have been killed off and it comes down to the point of sending old men and boys to the front. e.g. [[World War OneI]], Germany in [[World War II]], etc....