Story-Breaker Power: Difference between revisions

This is a common problem for sequels of works that end with the protagonist unlocking their full power. Once they get [[Super Weight|too much power]] they win the [[Superpower Lottery]] and become [[Physical God|godlike]] or worse, ''[[God Mode Sue|Suelike]]''. On the other hand, a simple or limited power can lead to viewers [[Fridge Logic|asking]] "[[Why Don't You Just Shoot Him?|Why doesn't he just]] use his power of X to do Y and stop the bad guy/get the [[MacGuffin]]?". The easiest way to tell if this trope is in effect is when the writer resorts to handing the protagonist the [[Idiot Ball]] and [[Forgot About His Powers]] to keep the character from using their powers in a straightforward way.

 

 

The abilities most likely to be Story-Breaker Powers without careful use are:

* [[Flying Brick]], at least at higher levels of power

* Any convenient way of bringing people [[Back From the Dead]]

* Mass [[Mind Control]]

* [[My Significance Sense Is Tingling|Omniscience/prescience]]

* [[Nigh Invulnerability]]

 

 

Compare [[Deus Exit Machina]] and [[Story-Breaker Team-Up]], where this trope appears not because of a power itself but because of disparities between them. [[Game Breaker]] is a similar but otherwise unrelated trope, when a player manages to inflict this on a game.

* ''[[Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha]]'' has been suffering from this in recent seasons. During the timeskip between the second and third seasons, the main characters (who were already [[Person of Mass Destruction|People of Mass Destruction]] to start with) became obscenely powerful and had to have their powers nerfed in the third season by the use of [[Power Limiter|Power Limiters]], extensive use of [[Anti-Magic]] fields and a half-hearted attempt to shift the focus over to the newer (and much weaker) characters, though ultimately the focus returned to the super-powerful main characters beating the crap out of people. The SSX Sound Stage and the ''ViVid'' manga solved this issue by completely switching focus to follow the new characters, but ''Force'' went the opposite direction by introducing villains with the ''even more'' broken power of ''complete immunity to all magic'', forcing the characters to essentially ditch their old powersets in favor of new weapons of [[Flawed Prototype|questionable reliability]].

** One cannot forget the new protagonist of Force, Tohma. He starts out rather basic, for this series anyway, but then {{spoiler|he becomes fully infected and is turned into a [[Divide By Zero|Zero Divider]], [[Cursed With Awesome|a person who can cause everyone around him to fall unconscious and possibly die, doing so completely subconsciously.]].}}

** Accelerator actually can't count anymore. His ability can be countered as shown by Amata Kihara. His power can even by disconnected and taken away from him. There are also a lot of characters stronger then him currently. His awakening could still count but that's another story.

** There's a list of at least a dozen characters, if not more, in the Toaru-'verse who are explicitly so broken no one can touch them except maybe a few other people on the broken list. There's a character who can make you fall into a coma if you ever think even the slightest negative or confrontational thing about her anywhere in the universe that's undefendable except with a [[Power Nullifier]] or [[Anti-Magic]]. There's a guy who's powerset includes the ability to be +1 in power to whoever he's fighting, can hit you with an instantaneous attack from anywhere that ignores everything but causality and destroys whatever it hits, and defends the same way PASSIVELY. Or the guy who can completely negate and make useless anything he thinks of "as a weapon". To be perfectly blunt, it's an entire UNIVERSE filled with cheating, insufferable assholes, who are all powermad, crazy, genocidal, [[A God Am I]]-types. This is done simply because the author needed people who only the somewhat doofy, nearly powerless main character could beat, catered to his own ability.

** For that matter, the Lifemaker, who goes beyond mere [[Reality Warper]] to [[Reality Maker]]: {{spoiler|within the realm of the Magical World, he's practically omnipotent (logical enough, since he created said Magical World). He's vulnerable to "real" mages, from the physical world, but even compared to them he's tremendously strong. Only Nagi "Invincible" Springfield has ever been confirmed to have beaten this guy in combat.}}

** And finally [[Our Vampires Are Different|Evangeline AK McDowell]], whose implied power level is so high that Fate ran away from her, stating that he would be at a disadvantage fighting against her. And when she loses any fight, it is suggested that [[I Let You Win|she wanted to lose]].

** If that wasn't enough, may I present Kirie Opie, who not only have an even stronger Final Form, but the reishi slavery can enslave and assimilate anything made out of spirit particles including people. Did I mention that he is also just one of the captain, and it was implied everyone in Vandenreich can do that?

** Applies to the [[Big Bad]] of the story, Sosuke Aizen as well, whose special ability is complete control over the senses of other people, to the point were they cannot escape his illusions even if they know something's wrong. On top of that, the sheer magnitude of his spiritual pressure serves to make him extremely formidable even without using it. It works on anyone who has seen his sword's release, which is ''everyone'' of considerable power in Soul Society, and as a result it's impossible for any of them to beat him and why [[The Hero|Ichigo]] was effectively the only one who stood a chance. {{spoiler|By the time Aizen actually fights Ichigo, [[Idiot Ball|he doesn't even]] [[Forgot About His Powers|use his powers]] anyways, because both of them have several other story-breaker powers.}}

** Yamamoto, with just his primary release, could be able to {{spoiler|kill every single arrancar, shinigami, and vizard present, plus Aizen.}} Inevitably this leads to {{spoiler|his sword getting sealed eventually resulting in his defeat, though even then he just casually goes about beating up the arrancar who sealed his power with his bare hands. Reminder: this particular arrancar was able to not only fight evenly with the likes of Urahara with his abilities sealed, but also overpower Ukitake, one of the other cemented badasses of the series (albeit by surprise)}}.

** Ichigo himself after {{spoiler|his training in Dangai. He was strong enough to easily beat Aizen when Aizen was in his upgraded form thanks to the Hogyoku. No wonder he had to lose his powers or else every other conflict in the story would be Ichigo curbstomping his opponent. It still wasn't enough to kill Aizen who currently has a [[Nigh Invulnerability]] status.}}

* The ''[[Digimon]]'' franchise:

** It's worth noting that Angemon is supposed to be particularly powerful against thematically evil digimon (such as demons, ghosts, the undead, and [[Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking|clowns]]), which makes sense given that he is an angelic Digimon. On the occasions where he fights Digimon who don't fit this criteria, he's no better than the other Adult Digimon.

** In a more extreme version of this trope, in ''[[Digimon V-Tamer 01 (Manga)|Digimon V-Tamer 01]]'', Arkadimon is pretty much the most powerful Digimon period. For one thing, it can one-shot a Ultimate-level digimon ''as a freshly-hatched baby.'' Not just any Ultimate, but the above-mentioned Piemon.

** Taiki Kudo and Shoutmon serve as an in-story example in ''[[Digimon Xros Wars the Young Hunters Leaping Through Time (Anime)|Digimon Xros Wars the Young Hunters Leaping Through Time]]''. As the legendary general and the Digimon King respectively who saved the world in the preceding ''[[Digimon Xros Wars]]'', the Watch Man is understandably concerned that his very presence will destabilise the balance of the Digimon-hunting game. So far, he's being proven ''very'' correct - Taiki and Shoutmon have spent most of the series so far effortlessly curbstomping everything that Tagiru and Yuu have trouble handling.

*** From the [[Digimon Xros Wars|previous series before the one above]], has Shoutmon X7 Superior Mode. Thought Arkadimon and Zero were powerful? Shoutmon probably [[Up to Eleven|surpasses all the other digimon examples here.]] How? {{[spoiler| He digixrosses with Thousands, if not, ''millions'', of digimon that appeared in the entire digital world, and one shots the big bad with it in one slash.}} Consequently, it has NEVER appeared again since.

** It's not just that he sees the future: he is able to simultaneously exist in every moment in time. This makes him extremely disconnected from story events, so he has little ability to change them.

*** Not even so much that as he experiences time differently. He experiences it in a non-linear way, but he sees it as a whole.

** And as of ''[[Final Crisis]]'', Superman has one of these things. That he built himself, meaning he knows how to build them. What do you wanna bet he never uses it again?

** A minor character in the ''Legion'' comics is Duplicate Boy. Despite the name, he doesn't have the same power as [[Me's a Crowd|Duo Damsel]], instead he can duplicate anyone else's superpowers. He's not a story breaker only because he's not in the Legion (he's a hero on some other planet), and a bit of a lunkhead besides.

** He ''did'' actually help out in ''[[Crisis On Infinite Earths]]'' (where, with a bit of magical assistance, he fought the [[Big Bad]], who had already absorbed the titular Infinite Earths, to a standstill) and in ''[[Blackest Night]]'' (pity the [[Big Bad]] didn't have a soul).

* One of the longest-standing examples in [[Marvel Comics]] is Franklin Richards, son of Reed and Sue Richards of the ''[[Fantastic Four (Comic Book)|Fantastic Four]]''. A [[Reality Warper]] on a cosmic scale, he has been largely [[Comic Book Time|kept as a child for decades]] specifically because it has been demonstrated that his mature power levels would be so far off the scale that he would become virtually unusable as a character.

* [[X-Men|Professor Charles Xavier]] is the most powerful psychic in the world. By rights, any problems the X-Men face should be dealt with at, literally, the speed of thought. As a result, most of the major plotlines the team faces start with either a [[Deus Exit Machina]] or a lecture on [[Mind Over Manners]]. That or some kind of suitable [[Poke in The Third Eye|anti-telepathy gadget]] has to be brought in to explain why he cannot do anything.

* ''[[Doctor Strange]]''. A long term editorial problem concerns just why Strange can't wave his hands and fix everything. Whenever the good doctor gets involved in any significant way in Marvel's other books, serious [[Nerf|Nerfage]] occurs by necessity.

* Gandalf of ''[[The Lord of the Rings]]'' goes [[Put On a Bus|offstage for hundreds of pages]] after the Balrog to allow other characters to struggle. He did this earlier in ''[[The Hobbit]]'' as well, as he would often leave Bilbo and the Dwarves to go on other business, leaving them to fall prey to spiders and elves.

* In an obscure children's book called ''[[Samantha Stone and The Mermaids Quest]]'', Samantha spends much of the book trying to learn how to teleport - both herself and objects. She gradually becomes realistically better at it, able to teleport herself and others, but often not exactly where she intends. But by the end, Samantha is teleporting behind enemies to knock them out, teleporting out of ropes when tied up, and teleporting captured prisoners out of a cell. The villain only undoes this power by binding and gagging her, thus preventing her from [[By the Power of Grayskull|casting the spell]]. However, the story ends shortly after that, on a cliffhanger. So basically, if Samantha keeps her teleportation powers for the sequel (should it get made), then she could easily "break" the whole story by warping out of danger at all times, unless the villains are prepared to bind and gag her over and over - unless something appears to [[Weaksauce Weakness]] her excessively powerful ability down to uselessness. She'd have to lose the power, or some sort of magic would have to nullify its usage in many areas, or the power would have to gradually drain the life out of her every time it's used - ANYTHING, to prevent it from being used to break the plot to pieces. Or unless the challenges she faces aren't of the type that can be avoided by teleporting.

* As detailed under [[God Mode Sue]], Noah Watanabe's every-growing power ''does'' break Brian Herbert's ''Timeweb'' trilogy, since he has no [[Kryptonite Factor]] and no qualms about interfering for the greater good. However, Herbert deserves a certain amount of credit for keeping him under control for two books without using the [[Idiot Ball]].

* In ''[[The Dark Tower]]'' by [[Stephen King]], one of the side characters in the last book {{spoiler|has the power to materialize anything, including inter-dimensional portals, out of thin air when he draws them on a paper. Guess what happens when he draws something/someone already there, and then ''erases'' it.}}

* [[Kamen Rider Kabuto]]'s [[Up to Eleven|Hyper]] [[Super Speed|Clock Up]] allows him to move faster than light, and travel through time and alternate dimensions. On top of Kabuto being [[The Ace]]. However, [[Power Incontinence|he does not appear to have full control over its more powerful functions]], it will sometimes send him to random places of its own accord, his most powerful attack cannot be used while it is active, and some of his enemies have [[Time Stands Still|powers which can counter it]].

* [[Kamen Rider Double]] has the villanous rider Eternal who can [[Game Breaker|make all gaia memories that were not crested before his stop working]](Gaia memories are the source of power in this series for villains and heroes alike he can also [[All Your Powers Combined|use all T2 Gaia memories for several powerful attacks]])

** The Doctor could just evacuate everyone on the doomed space ship that's getting sucked into the sun, sucked into a black hole, crashed into meteors a la the Titanic, etc, in the TARDIS, if it didn't always (in)conveniently get blasted away into space and out of useful range for the episode. (You'd also think that, given how clever he is plus 900 or so years of adventuring, he would have tried to develop an app or setting for his sonic screwdriver that would just turn off Cybermen and Dalek armour, but apparently that would break the drama too much.)

** The Doctor is a member of one of the most [[Sufficiently Advanced Alien|advanced races]] that the universe ever has or ever will produce. If he seriously applied himself to any single project, he could probably end up [[Emperor Scientist|running everything]]. However, his short attention span keeps him constantly moving and prevents him from hatching many long-term plans. His seventh incarnation was an unusual exception in that he apparently had a number of elaborate schemes going on. But he [[Nice Job Breaking It, Hero|rarely bothers to clean up after them]].

** This could have had a decent explanation (the power of the Magatama will also destroy your soul if you fail at breaking the locks too many times) or in the worst case be an example of [[Forgot About His Powers]] if the "Magatama" didn't activate itself automatically when you're investigating (it requires you to show it for the lock-breaking powers though), making actually carrying it the only requirement to use it. Since Phoenix always brings the charm to his trials and it never activates, this is one of the VERY few examples (if not the only one) of [[They Just Didn't Care]] in the series.

* In ''[[Touhou]]'', Fujiwara no Mokou and Kaguya Houraisan drank the Hourai Elixir, granting them immortality and the ability to come back to life ''even if their bodies were completely destroyed''. Specifically, they can come back to life and keep fighting no matter how many times they are killed, as the very concept of death has been erased from their beings, and the only limiting factor is how much pain they are willing to endure before they just give up and decide it's easier to [[Defeat Means Friendship|just drink tea with your enemies instead.]]

** Reimu Hakurei possesses literal [[Plot Armor]], her status as Gensoukyou's [[Barrier Maiden]] ensuring that she can never be killed as it would cause Gensoukyou to experience [[Critical Existence Failure]]. Furthermore, her [[Lethal Harmless Powers|Fantasy Heaven]] ability temporarily causes her to "fly away from reality" and become ''completely invincible'', and [[Word of God]] is that if she didn't implement a time limit she would be unstoppable. She has lost battles though, as fighting in Gensoukyou is largely a game and pushing the "I win" button all the time would be boring.

** [[Cute Ghost Girl|Yuyuko Saigyouji]] has the power to kill ''anything'' (except, of course, the above-mentioned two unkillable characters) just by thinking about it. However, gaining this ability is the reason she was [[Driven to Suicide]] in the first place and is thus highly reluctant to use it (except against aforementioned Mokou, who considered it rather rude).

** Yukari Yakumo the most blatantly abusable power; her ability to "manipulate boundaries" allows her to [[Teleporters and Transporters|teleport at will across space]] and [[Time Travel|time]], [[Summon Magic|summon anything from anywhere]], up to and including [[Nuke'Em|nuclear weapons]], ''and'' can alter the border between "fantasy and reality" to attack people with things that can't even physically exist, or just alter the border between them existing or not existing. Fans refer to any inconsistencies or unexplained events with the disclaimer "Yukari is fooling around again", as a bored [[Reality Warper]] with with no limits aside from her sloth would tend to create a lot of weirdness.

** Eirin Yagokoro, as former Brain of the Moon and a super genius, basically has the superpower of making [[Artifact of Doom|Artifacts Of Doom]]. Aside from the aforementioned Hourai Elixier, her plot in ''Imperishable Night'' was to hide outer space from the Earth. [[Bigger On the Inside|She did this by hiding Earth in a pot.]] [[Recursive Reality|In a pot she kept on the Earth. She made a fake moon and sky to stick to the inside of the pot, too, so people wouldn't notice they were suddenly in a world that could fit into the hand of a person standing on the world that was in the pot they were holding in their hand.]]

** It is telling, that Flandre Scarlet, whose power,[[Exactly What It Says On the Tin|"Destruction of anything and everything",]] allows her to annihilate things with a mere thought is so far down on the list.

** ZUN is very aware however of the stupid levels of power many characters can throw around, and has spent a lot of effort explaining it. Firstly, the Spell Card system ensures that by law everyone is [[Holding Back the Phlebotinum]] during battles, and while they are nowhere near equal the disparity is vastly reduced. Secondly, most of the characters are either [[Blood Knight|Blood Knights]], far more interested in finding someone with whom they can have a good fight than completing or thwarting plots, or realise that just eliminating everyone who annoys them by unleashing their full power will make their life boring, never mind that it might destroy the world, so they prefer to play by the Spell Card rules. Thirdly, for all their bluster and sloth Reimu and Yukari are truly dedicated to protecting Gensoukyou, and if anyone becomes serious in their plots they will come down on them ''hard'' (just ask Tenshi).

== Web Comics ==

* Richard from ''[[Looking for Group]]''. He is a nigh-invulnerable dark mage with vast, vast powers: half the time he is sidelined in one way or another to let the other characters achieve something, the other half he is jarringly abrupt in his resolving of fights/problems. An [[Crazy Awesome|entertaining character]], but problematic.

* In ''[[Order of the Stick]]'' {{spoiler|Vaarsuvius becomes ridiculously powerful through a [[Deal With the Devil]]}}. The resulting arrogance results in a serious backfire/subversion later on {{spoiler|when Xykon turns out to be much too well prepared for a simple brute force attack to work}}. The above-described Scry and Die tactic is explicitly mentioned.

** Also, Story Breaker Power is averted in that, despite being a wizard, Conjuration is V's banned school - which means no [[Teleportation]], and forces the characters to actually travel places instead of just being able to 'port around. V defends his choice of barred schools by pointing out that when he/she chose them, Teleport was not a Conjuration spell, and it's not his/her fault that the fundamental laws of the universe have been changed since then.

** In fact, she has SEVERE trouble in the team tactics class, as she has to dial herself down, and in fact now has a Rad-counter bracelet to check herself.

** In "Ayla and the Great Shoulder Angel Conspiracy", the authors figured out how to use her backstory to give her a [[Heroic BSOD]] and totally take her out of the game.

 

 

== Western Animation ==

* ''[[The Zeta Project]]'' introduces a remote that can control any mechanical device, even Zeta. Eventually, Roe gets her hands on one, but by the end of the episode it is forgotten and for good reason, If the heroes have one they never have to fight again and if the villains have one they don't need to work to stop the heroes.

* ''[[Generator Rex]]'' has Breach, an E.V.O. with the ability to create portals that go ''anywhere'', including at least one [[Pocket Dimension]] where she placed an entire city to be her "dollhouse". The only thing keeping her from completely breaking the story for either the [[Deus Ex Machina|heroes]] or the [[Diabolus Ex Machina|villains]] is that she's too [[Sanity Has Advantages|mentally broken]] to reach her full potential.

* In ''[[Avatar: The Last Airbender]]'', Bloodbending, which enables the user to control people's bodies, would be this if it were not only usable under a full moon. The only way Katara is able to defeat Hama while she is Bloodbending Aang and Sokka is to use Bloodbending herself.

* ''[[Teen Titans (Animation)|Teen Titans]]'' [[Reality Warper|Raven can bring a movie to life subconsciously.]] If it weren't for being afraid of her powers going out of control she'd end every episode on five minutes. She does this once against Cardiak.

* ''[[Justice League Unlimited]]'', [[The Flash]], period. Like the comics, the writers had to find a way to nerf his powers to better maintain tension in the story. When the writers finally have him go all out, Flash completely [[Curb Stomp Battle|curbstomps]] [[Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?|Brainthor.]]

[[Category:Speculative Fiction Tropes]]

[[Category:Story Breaker Power]]