- 10,748
- 6,476
There is a certain thing that has been bothering me lately, and that is our kinetic energy standards, or rather a certain part of our kinetic energy standards. What I'm referring to is the practice of using Kinetic energy when a character carries a living human at certain speeds. That's the main thing I'll be addressing here but there are also a few other things that I'll include in this discussion, they just won't be the centre of attention.
The Issue
So if you didn't already know, our standards demand a few things before we tier someone based off how much kinetic energy they would generate running at a certain speed. Right now, if you simply get from point A to Point B at mach 5000 it will say nothing about your AP; but if you're carrying something or someone while doing the exact same thing you get to be rated based off the kinetic energy the object will possess due to moving at that speed. This is why characters like the CW Flash are currently rated around town level in his earlier keys, because he has had to move people at certain speeds to save them from various calamities.
Scientifically speaking, this makes perfect sense. If you're making a 100kg object move at 5000km/hr then you're supplying kinetic energy equivalent to a mass of 100kg moving at 5000km/hr to that object, logic doesn't get simpler than this. And surely many feats of moving objects at high speeds are still valid in my eyes, but, doubts really start to arise when you're specifically talking about feats where another human or living being is moved at high speed
What's the problem here? Well, to explain that I would first have to remind everyone why simple movement feats aren't applicable to KE in the first place: because in fiction, moving at certain speeds is recurrently not portrayed as generating raw force that would come out of a human moving at that velocity. And this is the problem, the same thing can be said for speedsters moving other people as well .
If you are dealing with a heroic speedster, feats like this would usually play out something like this "Innocent civilian is in mortal danger, speedster dashes in, they have now been moved to a safe spot". Even if you're not, taking a human from one place to another at high speed will seldom see the human suffer consequences of moving at these speeds and they will be just as fine as when the speedster picked them up in most cases. Cases where the human doesn't come out totally fine and are shown to endure some negative effects (vomiting, disorientation etc) but nothing major are arguably worse, because in this case the verse demonstrates how high-speed movement harms a human body, and it's not remotely at the level kinetic energy would imply even if the Kinetic energy is as low as 9-A. Even something as "slow" as hypersonic+ generates KE thousands of time above what a human can handle and fiction rarely portrays it as anything more harmful than having a ride with an extreme motorcyclist.
Point being, saving/transporting humans at MHS+ speeds is normally not supposed to demonstrate the speedster's ability to apply nuke levels of energy to a person for offensive purposes, doing so at HHS+ speed is not supposed to imply the capability to hit someone with the force of building destroying explosions, etc . And yeah I know, someone blowing up Earth is not usually supposed to demonstrate their ability to destroy Jupiter either but, when we already reject basic speed feats as means of calculating AP on the basis of them being disconnected, why should we not do the same for speed feats while carrying person, when they also have this exact issue? That's what I wanted to get across
Changes
In case this is accepted, what should the new standards be? Well, moving human beings and living creatures would no longer be applicable for Kinetic Energy Calculations under normal circumstances. Hurling/Launching someone away at high speeds and moving at high speeds specifically for an attack though are still perfectly applicable. Further discussion may be needed to decide how we treat moving inanimate objects at high speeds, since the situation is more ambiguous here. Another thing, since humans not experiencing harmful effects was a point in why KE shouldn't be used, some may point out that in cases of moving an explicitly superhuman character, KE should be fine. I think it would just depend, if they don't acknowledge experiencing any kind of force from the high speed movement an exception shouldn't be made but if they do the situation might be different.
Other Stuff
Now that that's out of the way, it's time to move on to the other stuff I want to talk about
KE For Scientifically Accurate Depiction Of Speed And AP
There should be a new condition added to Kinetic Energy Standards, and that is for KE to be usable when the given story utilizes a scientifically accurate depiction of superspeed. The logic behind disallowing KE for simple movement is that fiction usually does not treat it as AP, obviously there would be exceptions to this and it just doesn't feel right to have the rule without acknowledging this simple fact. An example of what I'm talking about is Korosensei from Assassination Classroom. He is capable of moving at mach 20 and it is explicitly stated that if he tried to move at this speed while carrying his students, they wouldn't survive. The verse acknowledges the connection between speed and damage dealing capabilities so Korosensei should be able to be rated according to his kinetic energy. So should other character whose verses go this in-depth into the character's speed and its implication in the context of harming people.
Rule Modification/Removal
There's a certain rule for when Kinetic Energy should not be used
"There is a destruction/AP calculation along with a speed calculation. The destruction/AP calculation would take priority over the speed calculation in this case as the AP calculation would be a better proof in regards to how much damage he/she is capable of in an attack."
At the very least I think it should be changed to something like this
"An attack is performed, but it explicitly fails to achieve a level of destruction/damage that the supposed kinetic energy of the attack should have been sufficient for"
"For example a hammer is thrown against a concrete wall with a calculated speed of mach 5000, but upon hitting the wall doesn't cause any damage at all. <insert concise explanation of why kinetic energy shouldn't be used here>"
You can also add another condition or expand the previous one to include
"The kinetic energy feat is part of a destruction feat and among the two, only the latter is actually portrayed as a demonstration of the character's capabilities"
"For example, if a character swings a mace into a large hill at near the speed of light and destroys it completely, with the destruction of the hill being meant as a showcase of his power; the energy required to destroy the hill will take priority over the energy required to swing the mace"
As it stands the whole "if there are two calculations and one of them isn't KE then KE can't be used" is an extremely flimsy policy to enforce and should be modified, if not outright removed. Following what the rule currently is, a feat where someone is punched into the moon and leaves a 2 meter wide crater can only be said to have tanked 9-A/8-C levels of energy because of the crater.
Okay I think that's all
The Issue
So if you didn't already know, our standards demand a few things before we tier someone based off how much kinetic energy they would generate running at a certain speed. Right now, if you simply get from point A to Point B at mach 5000 it will say nothing about your AP; but if you're carrying something or someone while doing the exact same thing you get to be rated based off the kinetic energy the object will possess due to moving at that speed. This is why characters like the CW Flash are currently rated around town level in his earlier keys, because he has had to move people at certain speeds to save them from various calamities.
Scientifically speaking, this makes perfect sense. If you're making a 100kg object move at 5000km/hr then you're supplying kinetic energy equivalent to a mass of 100kg moving at 5000km/hr to that object, logic doesn't get simpler than this. And surely many feats of moving objects at high speeds are still valid in my eyes, but, doubts really start to arise when you're specifically talking about feats where another human or living being is moved at high speed
What's the problem here? Well, to explain that I would first have to remind everyone why simple movement feats aren't applicable to KE in the first place: because in fiction, moving at certain speeds is recurrently not portrayed as generating raw force that would come out of a human moving at that velocity. And this is the problem, the same thing can be said for speedsters moving other people as well .
If you are dealing with a heroic speedster, feats like this would usually play out something like this "Innocent civilian is in mortal danger, speedster dashes in, they have now been moved to a safe spot". Even if you're not, taking a human from one place to another at high speed will seldom see the human suffer consequences of moving at these speeds and they will be just as fine as when the speedster picked them up in most cases. Cases where the human doesn't come out totally fine and are shown to endure some negative effects (vomiting, disorientation etc) but nothing major are arguably worse, because in this case the verse demonstrates how high-speed movement harms a human body, and it's not remotely at the level kinetic energy would imply even if the Kinetic energy is as low as 9-A. Even something as "slow" as hypersonic+ generates KE thousands of time above what a human can handle and fiction rarely portrays it as anything more harmful than having a ride with an extreme motorcyclist.
Point being, saving/transporting humans at MHS+ speeds is normally not supposed to demonstrate the speedster's ability to apply nuke levels of energy to a person for offensive purposes, doing so at HHS+ speed is not supposed to imply the capability to hit someone with the force of building destroying explosions, etc . And yeah I know, someone blowing up Earth is not usually supposed to demonstrate their ability to destroy Jupiter either but, when we already reject basic speed feats as means of calculating AP on the basis of them being disconnected, why should we not do the same for speed feats while carrying person, when they also have this exact issue? That's what I wanted to get across
Changes
In case this is accepted, what should the new standards be? Well, moving human beings and living creatures would no longer be applicable for Kinetic Energy Calculations under normal circumstances. Hurling/Launching someone away at high speeds and moving at high speeds specifically for an attack though are still perfectly applicable. Further discussion may be needed to decide how we treat moving inanimate objects at high speeds, since the situation is more ambiguous here. Another thing, since humans not experiencing harmful effects was a point in why KE shouldn't be used, some may point out that in cases of moving an explicitly superhuman character, KE should be fine. I think it would just depend, if they don't acknowledge experiencing any kind of force from the high speed movement an exception shouldn't be made but if they do the situation might be different.
Other Stuff
Now that that's out of the way, it's time to move on to the other stuff I want to talk about
KE For Scientifically Accurate Depiction Of Speed And AP
There should be a new condition added to Kinetic Energy Standards, and that is for KE to be usable when the given story utilizes a scientifically accurate depiction of superspeed. The logic behind disallowing KE for simple movement is that fiction usually does not treat it as AP, obviously there would be exceptions to this and it just doesn't feel right to have the rule without acknowledging this simple fact. An example of what I'm talking about is Korosensei from Assassination Classroom. He is capable of moving at mach 20 and it is explicitly stated that if he tried to move at this speed while carrying his students, they wouldn't survive. The verse acknowledges the connection between speed and damage dealing capabilities so Korosensei should be able to be rated according to his kinetic energy. So should other character whose verses go this in-depth into the character's speed and its implication in the context of harming people.
Rule Modification/Removal
There's a certain rule for when Kinetic Energy should not be used
"There is a destruction/AP calculation along with a speed calculation. The destruction/AP calculation would take priority over the speed calculation in this case as the AP calculation would be a better proof in regards to how much damage he/she is capable of in an attack."
At the very least I think it should be changed to something like this
"An attack is performed, but it explicitly fails to achieve a level of destruction/damage that the supposed kinetic energy of the attack should have been sufficient for"
"For example a hammer is thrown against a concrete wall with a calculated speed of mach 5000, but upon hitting the wall doesn't cause any damage at all. <insert concise explanation of why kinetic energy shouldn't be used here>"
You can also add another condition or expand the previous one to include
"The kinetic energy feat is part of a destruction feat and among the two, only the latter is actually portrayed as a demonstration of the character's capabilities"
"For example, if a character swings a mace into a large hill at near the speed of light and destroys it completely, with the destruction of the hill being meant as a showcase of his power; the energy required to destroy the hill will take priority over the energy required to swing the mace"
As it stands the whole "if there are two calculations and one of them isn't KE then KE can't be used" is an extremely flimsy policy to enforce and should be modified, if not outright removed. Following what the rule currently is, a feat where someone is punched into the moon and leaves a 2 meter wide crater can only be said to have tanked 9-A/8-C levels of energy because of the crater.
Okay I think that's all
