Prototype Downgrades

[Dargoo_Faust]

So I'm just going to open this by saying that I'm immensely dissapointed that no admin or discussion moderator noticed the lack of justifying feats for these stats on any of the Prototype profiles, and that our calc members approved one of these calcs without properly going over the feat. Honestly I feel like it ought to be a requirement for now on for all calcs to source the feats they are calcing so our calc group members can get proper context, but that's for another day.

Part the First: Debunks
So, let's go over literally everything listed under AP and Durability on the profiles, and see if it actually supports the stats.

• Can trade blows with people who can harm him.

Fair enough on this one, although it doesn't inherently do anything in of itself. Granted the people who are usually harming him have no objective feats outside of 9-B or are regular soldiers with munitions, but alright.

• Tanked the explosion of a military base very early in the game with absolutely no injuries

So this calc is wrong on so many levels, and seemed to have been calced with a fundamental misunderstanding of what happened in the game. I'll explain:

• The calc assumes a type of fuel and how much fuel is contained in each of the containers when neither is given, when it could have, if those fuel canisters blew up, calculated the actual size of the explosion.
• The calc assumes 100% of this explosion hits Mercer, which it wouldn't under any circumstances. The limited surface area by which it hits Mercer would drastically decrease whatever force or heat hit Mercer.
• The "miltary base" that this explodes isn't much larger than a single, not very large building. This isn't 8-A, guys. And again, whatever's hitting Alex is OOMs below the yeild of the explosion as it's spread throughout the building. Heck, I'd bet a lucky regular human could survive that.
• That much gasoline actually going off would have leveled buildings in a massive radius around the explosion. I don't believe, after having watched the game, any such thing happened.
• The calc fails to link when this feat allegedly happens in the game and when Mercer 'tanks' this explosion, neither of which I have been able to locate after watching a full playthrough of the game.

At the very least, this calc is faulty and should be dropped. It fails to provide and consider vital context for this feat, and while I don't blame the calc team for OKing the math, I'm sad that seemingly nothing outside of the math on this calc was considered in judgement. New and more reliable feats should be calculated for Mercer.

• Has only got stronger with every being he consumed since then.

Literally means nothering unless he's greatly above a + rating.

• Defeated Elizabeth Greene, who made a building even more durable than the military bases, using her own power.

Firstly, scans on that ability. Secondly, this isn't anything that would apply to AP, and isn't anything that would be remotely close to Low 7-C even if it did.

• Has consumed enemies such as two Leader Hunters and Elizabeth Greene, who each possesses strength comparable to his mid-game self, and added their combined strength to his own.

I'd love scans explaining that he's actually multiplying his strength here. Simply absorbing someone who scales to you doesn't multiply your power like this unless there's something more substantial than "he absorbed them". Also literally none of the objective feats for either of these are Tier 8-C, let alone Tier Low 7-C. I'm willing to bet none of them are above 9-B, heck.

• Has also consumed a thousand people, and added all of their combined strength to his own.

Firstly, source on this, specifically explaining that he's adding individual strength to his own. See above, absorbing stuff doesn't automatically mean we start throwing multipliers and add-ons around without it being explained that way. Secondly, the combined strength of a thousand people isn't anywhere close to Tier 7, or Tier 8.

• Many times stronger than his previous self.

I like how this is worded specifically to imply a multiplier so he can be scaled up tiers. I'd also like sources on this. If the source is "he's just stronger than before" or there isn't any exact number given, this feat is nearly meaningless.

• Has casually overpowered mid-game James Heller, who should be comparable or even superior to his Prototype 1 self, even before he has absorbed the Evolved.

James Heller has no objective feats anywhere close to 8-A or Low 7-C. Without circular scaling, this is meaningless.

• Using the Musclemass power is a two-fold power increase, and the fully upgraded ability provides a boost even stronger than two times

Source, firstly. Again, this is completely meaningless without contexualization from previous feats, and doesn't serve to justify his rating without it.

• Has casually consumed eight Evolved, who should at least be comparable to his Prototype 1 self, and added their combined strength to his ow

Neato, so source on them being comparable to his Prototype 1 self. I greatly dislike these "should be this powerful" statements from users on this site, as they're basically user opinions without any solid backing.

Also reminder that this isn't a justification for Low 7-C without other feats to scale up from, and reminder that abosrbing does not immediately equal multipliers.

• Using Musclemass is a two-fold strength increase, with the Musclemass Boost exceeding the 2x multiplier.

Don't know why this is explained twice, but alright.

• The Biomass Heller gained from consuming Alex was enough to cover all of Manhattan and wipe out every infected being in New York City, with the resulting tendrils reaching the length of skyscrapers

This isn't actually City or Town level. He's spreading a large amount of biomass over a city, not destroying it, and is destroying a bunch of featless infected people. Unless those tendrils are also as wide as buildings, as we live in three dimensions, this isn't even a Tier 8 feat either. I'd sure love a calc on this, though.

• Can effortlessly pick up and throw cars, trucks, helicopters and tanks at long distances

The heaviest tanks the United States produces doesn't get into Class K, I have no idea where this is sourced from.

I'm also skipping the rest of the multiplier-scaling justifications as I already adressed those above, but good lord I feel like whoever designed this profile just picked two feats and just scaled them up tiers, which we don't do. You cannot scale up tiers unless you have a + rating from a calc, and after that you can't go any further.

And I'm pretty sure there's no actual justifiable multipliers here, so that sort of jukes 90% of what's on these profiles, yikes.

The rest of the profile just copy+pastes these justifications over and over again.

Part the Second: Anti-Feats

• This explosio reduces Mercer to bloody gore. For reference as to the size of this bomb, this is the fireball of the explosio and even with overpressure I doubt it's anything larger than the Hiroshima bomb. Now, keep in mind, Alex was hundreds if not thousands of meters away from this explosion, inside of a helicopter, so the surface area where he gets hit by this bomb is so many order of magnitude less than the yeild of the bomb that I'd be amazed if it's above 9-B. And he's reduced to a bloody pulp.
• If there was any statements in-verse about this being a multi-megaton bomb or whatever, I'm sad to explain that what's shown on-screen is more reliable than a potentially faulty character statement. And even if this was a multi-megaton thermonuclear bomb, I'll revise my statement to that I'd be amazed if it's above 9-B+.
• It should go without saying that the primary enemies Alex fights in the game are completely normal military goons. Tanks and high-level artiliery can easily hurt him. And sure, if Alex had more than a single incorrectly calculated feat to support his tier I might wave this off as PIS, but I guess this is where we're at.

Part the Third: Conclusions

• Alex has one 8-A feat that isn't even 8-A, and no other feats remotely in that range. Even if the feat was 8-A, it would be an outlier. The people he scales to have no objective feats outside of Tier 9.

• Alex has a large bredth of anti-feats that actively contradict him having 8-A durability.

• Every single other justification on the entire profile is just multipliers and scaling.

• Alex shouldn't be 8-A or Low 7-C.

• Happy New Years!

 

[Jvando]

After a read through, it does seem like there are serious issues with the scaling of the characters from the basis of the calcs to the multipliers.

 

[Qliphoth_Bacikal]

It would be good to contact some of the people on the verse page for their input.

As for mines, I look at both his page (Mercer) and the reasons for the downgrade here. While IDK anything about Prototype, those are quite a lot of questionable justifications on his page for what's been said. That and in regards to the power multiplayer thing too that needs to be sourced out.

 

[Wokistan]

I think 9-A works out. M1 Abrams is listed as up to there with it's main gun, and he can take hits from tanks. There's also a thermobaric tank. Thermobaric munitions set the air on fire and create a blast wave that lasts much longer than standard munitions, and as shown by this video they've got quite the blast radius. Alex can barely survive the thermobaric tank if he has adrenaline surge, so I think 9-A off the higher end for regular tanks along with barely surviving the much stronger one is fine.

 

[Dargoo_Faust]

That works fine. As long as 9-A is consistent, it should be fine as a replacement stat.

 

[Wokistan]

The thermobaric tank also does 1 shot a regular tank with an indirect hit, so I don't think how it nearly kills Alex on a direct hit makes it unusable. At worst he's more durable than a tank. Yeah ik nobody claimed this yet just putting it here. Agree with the OP on the other stuff though.

Calcing the tendrils at the end of prototype 2 could get something tier 8, if anyone wants to try that.

 

[Qliphoth_Bacikal]

This sounds like something that happened to Alucard (Hellsing) more or less back when he was a Tier 8.

It's definitely a good idea to have any of the calcable feats on the OP to be done and get results for Alex's tier from there.

 

[Migue79]

The thermobaric tank also does 1 shot a regular tank with an indirect hit, so I don't think how it nearly kills Alex on a direct hit makes it unusable. At worst he's more durable than a tank. Yeah ik nobody claimed this yet just putting it here. Agree with the OP on the other stuff though.
Calcing the tendrils at the end of prototype 2 could get something tier 8, if anyone wants to try that.

Lol. Just when I got this notification about the downgrades, I was writing my calc up regarding this. I got a result into Tier 7 btw. But it's a rather rough calc. I'll refine it and upload it in a blog REAAALLL quick.

 

[DeathNoodles]

">I'd love scans explaining that he's actually multiplying his strength here. Simply absorbing someone who scales to you doesn't multiply your power like this unless there's something more substantial than "he absorbed them". Also literally none of the objective feats for either of these are Tier 8-C, let alone Tier Low 7-C. I'm willing to bet none of them are above 9-B, heck.

>Firstly, source on this, specifically explaining that he's adding individual strength to his own. See above, absorbing stuff doesn't automatically mean we start throwing multipliers and add-ons around without it being explained that way. Secondly, the combined strength of a thousand people isn't anywhere close to Tier 7, or Tier 8."

Link

Alex Mercer himself explicitly stated that every living thing James Heller consumes makes him stronger (consume means absorption in the context of Prototype). Mercer explicitly said every in his statement, that heavily implies that each of the being that gets absorbed would make Heller stronger every time. Mercer was the one who granted Heller his powers, which came directly from a disease that Mercer literally is (James Heller gained his abilities from the Blacklight Virus. The Alex Mercer we know of is the Blacklight Virus), so Mercer also scales to that by default.

Absorption making one stronger is literally a thing in Prototype.

 

[Wokistan]

He obviously gets stronger from consuming things, the issue is the assumption that it strengthens him by the exact AP value of the thing he eats and not some arbitrary amount. He doesn't say anything implying that it works like a multiplier.

 

[Dargoo_Faust]

Link

My whole point was that absorbing stuff making you stronger doesn't inherently involve multipliers, and I was asking what evidence is used so that multipliers can be involved. This only establishes that he gets stronger with absorption, something I didn't even disagree with on the OP. My issue is with "okay, but how much".

 

[The_pen_or_the_sword]

I thought you would be comeing after overlords 7-b to be honest

 

[Schnee_One]

I'm sorry for my lack of any real approach on Prototype, I've been generally rather disinterested in the series and I lazily went along with a lot of the revisions

Sorry about that

 

[InfiniteSped]

I thought you would be comeing after overlords 7-b to be honest

you're safe for now, young ma

 

[XSOULOFCINDERX]

He's definitely not 9-B. The Hunters that he eats at the beginning of the game can basically One-Shot APCs and Helicopters.

 

[Dargoo_Faust]

He's definitely not 9-B. The Hunters that eats at the beginning of the game can basically One-Shot APCs and Helicopters.

Alright.

That's not 8-A, to be sure.

 

[Ciruno_Fortes]

Thank you for tackling this verse. There's been issues on it for a long time.

Would you mind giving your thoughts on the power nullification resistance developed from "Resisting a virus that was supposed to shut down his powers" and his Regenerationn feat that's based off a single frame from said nuke feat?

 

[Dargoo_Faust]

Would you mind giving your thoughts on the power nullification resistance developed from "Resisting a virus that was supposed to shut down his powers" and his Regenerationn feat that's based off a single frame from said nuke feat?

That's disease resistance, not power null resistance.

That picture doesn't establish that he was vaporized. For reference, at that distance, the nuke wouldn't even vaporize a regular human being considering the yield. At best it shows his body being burned.

 

[Dargoo_Faust]

Perhaps not vaporization like the current thing says, but incineration is definitely a thing.

Immolation would be a better word for it. Which does leave behind stuff like bones and fleshy bits a lot of the time, and considering he wasn't anywhere close to the epicenter of the explosion it's perfectly reasonable that those were left behind.

Although the length of time it took him to regenerate probably means whatever you get is not combat-applicable, so eh.

 

[The_pen_or_the_sword]

Well he also scales to the supreme hunter who regenned from a puddle.

 

[Dargoo_Faust]

Well he also scales to the supreme hunter who regenned from a puddle.

Could you source that, for reference?

 

[Migue79]

He regened from that heat in the same night. So I'd argue that it is.

 

[DeathNoodles]

That's disease resistance, not power null resistance.

That picture doesn't establish that he was vaporized. For reference, at that distance, the nuke wouldn't even vaporize a regular human being considering the yield. At best it shows his body being burned.

The Parasite injected into Mercer explicitly nullified a majority of his abilities. Mercer then adapted to it after gaining the necessary adaptation, along with consuming Elizabeth Greene and gaining her abilities (who was able to resist the Parasite injected into her and ejected it out of her body). That seems reasonable for Power null resistance to me.

I recall that the nuclear explosion was stated to be able to destroy the city, and had a blast radius of 10-15 miles in the Prototype ending credits, so range of the nuclear explosion is actually larger than what it has been briefly shown on-screen.

 

[Dargoo_Faust]

He regened from that heat in the same night. So I'd argue that it is.

Fair enough.

 

[The_pen_or_the_sword]

Here skip to 4:14

 

[Dargoo_Faust]

The Parasite injected into Mercer explicitly nullified a majority of his abilities. Mercer then adapted to it after gaining the necessary adaptation, along with consuming Elizabeth Greene and gaining her abilities (who was able to resist the Parasite injected into her and ejected it out of her body). That seems reasonable for Power null resistance to me.

I mean, you're telling me it's power null resist in the same sentence that you're telling me he "resist[ed] the parasite", which is disease resistance. The power null is facilitated by a disease; adapting to and resisting the disease is exactly that.

I guess you could make an argument that he'd resist powernull that's facilitated by a disease, but the he's resisting the later, not the former.

I recall that the nuclear explosion was stated to be able to destroy the city, and had a blast radius of 10-15 miles in the Prototype ending credits, so range of the nuclear explosion is actually larger than what it has been briefly shown on-screen.

I posted the blast radius in the OP, in the ending cutscene where it detonates in the city. It's not 'briefly' shown on screen, the fireball actually has enough time to grow, flare, and wane, before the mushroom cloud forms.

The fireball is monumentally less than 10-15 miles.

 

[XSOULOFCINDERX]

It's still stated to be 10-15 miles ingame though.

 

[Dargoo_Faust]

It's still stated to be 10-15 miles ingame though.

Fireball radius or airblast radius? The difference here is big.

Even if it's the former, though, what's objectively shown on-screen is more reliable than a character statement.

 

[Ciruno_Fortes]

Considering different Infected beings have different abilities and specialties they might not all share the same Regenerationn feats. I don't think Alex consumed the Supreme Hunter after the blast of the nuke either.

He didn't exactly do this by himself. He needed a doctor to help expel that thing out of him and even then I doubt it's an ability adressed ever again so that further hurts him.

Though Dargoo ninjaed me with a better explanation

 

[DeathNoodles]

I mean, you're telling me it's power null resist in the same sentence that you're telling me he "resist[ed] the parasite", which is disease resistance. The power null is facilitated by a disease; adapting to and resisting the disease is exactly that.

I guess you could make an argument that he'd resist powernull that's facilitated by a disease, but the he's resisting the later, not the former.

snip

I posted the blast radius in the OP, in the ending cutscene where it detonates in the city. It's not 'briefly' shown on screen, the fireball actually has enough time to grow, flare, and wane, before the mushroom cloud forms.

The fireball is monumentally less than 10-15 miles.

Yes, and it's a disease that's capable of power nullification. When he gained the adaptation, he got all the abilities that was locked from him back. It can still be argued that it's power null resistance in the end. I mean, I'm pretty sure resisting a Power Nullification from Magic can be argued to be Power Nullification, even if it's done by magic (unless by that logic you would argue that it's Magic resistance then?).

The game itself literally stated 10-15 miles. We can not just ignore the context of the canon like that.

 

[The_pen_or_the_sword]

Considering different Infected beings have different abilities and specialties they might not all share the same Regenerationn feats. I don't think Alex consumed the Supreme Hunter after the blast of the nuke either.

What special abilities does mercer lack that other infected have (IIRC the supreme hunter is literally an offshoot created from mercers dna)? I honestly can't remember the infected having much of anything that mercer didn't...Further with him returning from immolation (He regens from an incredibly small peice of his body) Id need some more reason to believe the supreme hunters regen is better then his...

 

[Ciruno_Fortes]

Way I see it the effect of power nullification is rendered moot when you kick out a disease that's using said ability. So yeah it's natural Alex is gonna get those abilities back. And outside help.

We rejected the statements said in a franchise before when it's more reliable to use onscreen feats. They might be just inaccurate too.

 

[DeathNoodles]

Considering different Infected beings have different abilities and specialties they might not all share the same Regenerationn feats. I don't think Alex consumed the Supreme Hunter after the blast of the nuke either.

He didn't exactly do this by himself. He needed a doctor to help expel that thing out of him and even then I doubt it's an ability adressed ever again so that further hurts him.

Though Dargoo ninjaed me with a better explanation

The Supreme Hunter is literally stated to be a being synthesised from Mercer's very own DNA, and has demonstrated abilities that only Mercer himself has demonstrated later on (such as the Tendril Devastator that the Supreme Hunter performed, which Mercer can do). As a being that inherited its abilities from Mercer, I don't see why Mercer can't scale to its Regenerationn.

Doesn't matter if he didn't do it by himself, he still gained the adaptation to it in the end thus the permanent resistance to it, which is all that matters for the resistance.

 

[DeathNoodles]

Way I see it the effect of power nullification is rendered moot when you kick out a disease that's using said ability. So yeah it's natural Alex is gonna get those abilities back. And outside help.

We rejected the statements said in a franchise before when it's more reliable to use onscreen feats. They might be just inaccurate too.

By that logic, would that mean that Power Nullification is rendered moot when the Power Nullification is performed by things such as Magic from a character as well? I don't see why the origin of the Power Nullification matters here.

Statements from the canon that literally came from the plot would matter, I don't see why it should be rejected in this case.

 

[XSOULOFCINDERX]

Wasn't the size of the explosion brought up in a news report in the credits? Why would they lie about that?

 

[Ciruno_Fortes]

Because some infected beings can specialize in one thing. That's why different Infected creatures have different abiilties on the first place. The existence of more anti-feats for Alex hurts more and makes it difficult to consider scaling the Regenerationn feat

That's one interpretation of it. Unless power null is induced by a disease I'm not trusting it. Even then the makings of the feat . Also you can reject something without getting the bonus of the power nullification.

If I delete a Trojan virus from my software through a different means that means my software still isn't safe from another one.

@second response

What? I'm unsure of what you mean, but like I said before. You can kick out a disease and reject it without having to adapt to it. Alex certainly only adapted to it by kicking it out, thus cancelling it from negating his abilities.

I've seen franchises do this before. Contradictions exist. I'm so sick of being on both sides of this argument but it seems no matter what, onscreen feats are better basis for the franchise since it's consistent

 

[The_pen_or_the_sword]

Because some infected beings can specialize in one thing. That's why different Infected creatures have different abiilties on the first place. The existence of more anti-feats for Alex hurts more and makes it difficult to consider scaling the Regenerationn feat

I cant agree the hunter is an offshoot produced by mercers dna, mercer was reduced to a single tendril and regenerated, I need more to go off to buy not scaling their regen. The infected really don't specialize much, the hunters and more advanced variants have claws, the hydra throw things and tunnel. The mooks have pretty much nothing... And mercer isn't hurt in another cutscene beyond the parasite...

 

[Ciruno_Fortes]

Cause mooks are weak. Single tendril where? You mean the puddle? As long as it's not the vaporization feat I'm in support of it really. And even then the specialties still exist

 

[XSOULOFCINDERX]

But he literally takes the abilities of the things he absorbs. He got claws from the Hunters, his Sword and Armor powers from eating the Anti bodies inside the Hunter he injected and the Infected Vision/Link to the Hive Mind from the Leader Hunter. Then he consumed Greene who could just expell the Parasite and wasn't really effected by it.

 

[The_pen_or_the_sword]

I was referring to the supreme hunters puddle and mercers end game feat (A single tiny peice of him hooked onto the crow and consumed fully regenning himself), their was barely anything left of him after the nuke and he still regenned. My arguement wasn't really focused on the vaporization aspect of the feat.