Sans' KR and Durability Negation mechanics

[Saikou_The_Lewd_King]

There has been some confusion about the exact mechanics of Sans' attacks.

First of all KR. There has been quite a myth about how Sans' KR dishes out more damage the more sinful a character is. However, this has never been demonstrated in-canon. We only know that "KR" is officially called "KARMA". However, this is only a name for said attack. It doesn't tell us anything about the mechanics behind it.

In fact, it seems to have been contradicted in canon. Sans outright says to Pacifist Frisk that he didn't kill them, only because of Toriel's promise, not because he couldn't because of KR. Which is plain speculation. This has caused people to both Wank and Downplay Sans. Such as assuming that a mass murderer would be one-shot, or that a pacifist character wouldn't be harmed by Sans.

As such, I think that it should be added to Sans' profile (As a clarification) that his KR is NOT dependent on a character's kill count, and that it is likely a "mere" Soul Poison effect.

Secondly, as some may know, KR isn't the only way Sans manages to harm Chara with. KR is stricly defined as the purple poison effect given off by Sans' attacks, but he has shown the ability to cause damage on his own, without it. However, the mechanics behind this durability negation has not only never been canonically explained, but it was never even discussed here.

Gameplay-wise, Sans simply ignores "invicibility frames", thus dealing tons of 1 HP damage per seconds. This is obviously not applicable in a real context, as invicibility frames do not exist, and that would require Sans (And by proxy, all of the Undertale cast) to be at least High 3-A, which is nonsense. I'm not exactly sure how we should treat this ability in a VS Battle context, but it is clearly present, as Sans wouldn't have been a challenge at all to Chara otherwise.

 

[AidenBrooks999]

Sans simply bypass durability

KR just works like "poison" for people that kills others, giving extra damage.


Personally, the only thing I never could see how to translate to a battle, is Sans attacking you in the menu.

Is like attacking you mind and prevent you from making a certain move?

 

[Saikou_The_Lewd_King]

"Simply" bypassing durability seems way too vague. Duarability Negating isn't an hax in itself, just a term that regroup several kind of hax.

I think attacking in the menu should be left as unquantifiable. It isn't too major anyway. My best guess would be that he just attacks you will you're out of range.

 

[The_real_cal_howard]

"Sans outright says to Pacifist Frisk that he didn't kill them, only because of Toriel's promise, not because he couldn't because of KR"

BoS Frisk is 9-B. Sans w/out KR is 9-B. Sans has more experience than a scared child. Kinda obvious who would win. Because that match would be worse than putting Batman up against Grunkle Stan. They're in the same tier, but one is so much greater that its ridiculous.

 

[Saikou_The_Lewd_King]

Frisk is At least 7-C even at BoS though. Reminder that they can kill one of the strongest monster (Toriel) just before they reach Snowdin.

 

[The_real_cal_howard]

That makes such a mess out of scaling that it's hilarious.

 

[Saikou_The_Lewd_King]

Frisk just isn't linear. They go from beating LV 80 Toriel to being damaged by LV 11 Snowdrake, before beating LV 50 Undyne and then struggling with LV 30 Mettaton.

 

[DerpCity]

I agree with the first part. I've only argued it because I've seen it argued by admins in other threads despite me not entirely agreeing with it being canon.

Sans should technically ignore durability against most characters if I understand soul manipulation properly. Him ignoring invincibility frames in a game where everyone attacks the soul can be seen as ignoring the soul's durability, can't it?

 

[The_real_cal_howard]

Ah yes. The normal argument for scaling for UT's lack of linearity. Unfortunately, that hurts the argument here. How would he be 7-C in this situation? He has no connection to Sans yet.

Also, Frisk is only explicitly stated to be filled with DETERMINATION at Asgore and the many Asriel fights. Don't know where the shifting AP on the fly came from, not that I'm entirely against it.

P.S. Shouldn't Flowey and Asriel have the same profile? Just realized it after all this time.

 

[The_real_cal_howard]

With the whole SOUL thing and everyone should ignore durability to an extent/get soul manipulation. The idea that Froggit can technically beat Goku if given a shot is beyond laughable.

Sorry. I just get really exasperated at UT threads. I love the games, but they're a small bit...I don't even know what to call it.

 

[DerpCity]

Another thing to note, Frisk being able to kill Toriel can be attributed to the fact she was horribly holding back, because she didn't want to hurt you, and to Killing Intent. It was so potent that it was pretty much the reason they lost the war, if I remember the history things in Waterfall right.

 

[Saikou_The_Lewd_King]

@Cal Admitly that part confuses me too, but it isn't the place for that right now.

Frisk is only Sans-level of Wall when at the lowest amount of DT possible. Even when fighting Snowdin monsters, they are stronger than Sans.

Flowey and Asriel both have two keys. Even if they are the same person, it would be very messy to fuse their pages.

 

[The_real_cal_howard]

You mean BoS, which he is when he first meets Sans?

It wouldn't be that hard. We fused Caliborn and Lord English recently, who sort of had that same distinction.

 

[Saikou_The_Lewd_King]

Frisk goes through a bunch of monsters all stronger than Sans way before he actually meet Sans.

I guess, but they are still different persona, almost different characters. I'd say it's better if we keep them seperate. We did so for Zamasu and Goku Black too.

 

[AidenBrooks999]

Frisk is 7-C when fighting with DT, in the moment Sans tethered Frisk, they weren't fighting, so Frisk durability would at 9-B


Zamasu and Goku Black have the same page. Only future zamasu has a different one, but because he has nothing to do with the other two.


Whereas Asriel is indeed flowey

 

[The_Everlasting]

Asriel and Flowey are so different they might as well be different characters.

 

[Saikou_The_Lewd_King]

@Aiden Pretty sure that being attacked by a skeleton would still count under "fighting", especially as Sans likely wouldn't just one-shot Frisk even without DT. Beside this isn't even my main argument. There was nothing hinting that KR is dependant on kill count canonically anyway.

 

[Ultima_Reality]

I agree


Besides the name, there is nothing that says that KR is dependant of the kill count of the one that is fighting Sans

 

[DerpCity]

I still agree with Saikou, but why isn't Sans' tier "9-B physically, Unknow with hax"? Its always bothered me that its been accepted that he's Wall level without his hax but its just not on his page.

 

[Saikou_The_Lewd_King]

There was a thread about that too, but it just...died.

 

[AidenBrooks999]

Aswell as his durability

 

[DerpCity]

Yeah, that too. Also, Sans' speed rating should probably be "At least Massively Hypersonic+" since he's faster than Frisk. The unknown rating he has now is awkward. I know he's unknown for being faster than them to an unknown degree, but I think it'd be preferable to give him the MHS+ rating because it'd give new users a baseline for his speed. The reasoning is also from back when Undertale was at Sub-Rel at the moment, I think.

 

[Azathoth_the_Abyssal_Idiot]

Asriel and Flowey are so different they might as well be different characters.

This.

Caliborn and Lord English were fused because they are literally the same person except LE has fully realized his power.

Asriel and Flowey share memories, but are entirely different personas.

 

[MarvelFanatic119]

I thought flavor text like:

-You feel your sins crawling on your back

-You feel your sins weighing on your neck

-KARMA coursing through your veins

-Doomed to death of KARMA!

In his flavor text during his battle would show that. Also, Sans seems to act and feel different from everyone else, considering he's the only one who bypasses durability with the invincibility frames and so on. Not to mention his knowledge on the timelines, knowing about the meanings of LOVE and EXP, how he "judges" you each time you reach the hallway, even having code words and phrases in case he met a time traveller, and he somehow pranked Frisk without them realizing it then too. He is far too different and abnormal to scale to everyone else, since his powers and abilites work differently.

Ignoring this would be a mistake imo, as many of the UT mechanics have shown to be a HUGE role in the actual lore of the world (EXP,LV,LOAD,SAVE etc.), so dismissing him ignoring invincibility frames would be hypocritical to me, if it were that simple, why doesn't everyone else do it then since it's so effective?

 

[DerpCity]

I think that his skipping of invincibility frames is him ignoring the durability of the soul itself, allowing him to damage the souls of entities with high soul manipulation resistance like Chara near their absolute, which we know they have (at least against direct damage to it) because every enemy in the game uses soul attacks and they don't just instantly die.

Our only experience with Karmic Retribution in the game suggests its incredibly potent, but since there are no other times you encounter it when you're at a lower level of violence, I'm not sure if it increasing with Sin Count or Level of Violence is something that is safe to assume.

 

[Yes850]

Just browsing through, karma was initially going to have a numerical value which would be decided via your actions. This didn't end up being implemented, although it's up for debate whether or not the idea itself behind karma is still there. In the official art book there are many instances where ideas were half or not implemented because of time constraints, or Toby just forgot.

 

[MarvelFanatic119]

Also, INV is also a stat in UT and items like The Cloudy Glasses and Torn Notebook make Invincibility Frames last longer too.

 

[DerpCity]

So are these changes going to happen, or is there a reason they haven't?

 

[Antvasima]

What has been decided here?

 

[DerpCity]

That, at the very least, Sans has Wall level AP and Durability without his hax. Not sure if everyone agreed to put him at MHS+ from scaling to pre-absolute Chara instead of leaving him at Unknown, but I'm not sure why that wouldn't be accepted outside of being way faster than them. Those at the very least should be applied, I feel.

Other than that, I don't think anyone other than maybe MarvelFanatic and Aiden disagreed with the thread's original purpose, which was to remove the "Sins to Damage" part of Karmic Retribution on Sans' page, due to it being an unconfirmed part of the ability, and to note that Sans can fight without it, since its normally assumed that he can't.

 

[Antvasima]

Okay. It might be best if Azathoth carries out these changes though. He knows Undertale well.

 

[CrossverseCrisis]

You know, I personally think The suggested changes above aren't that hurtful to put in, really.

DK of what Azzy thinks of this, however

 

[Azathoth_the_Abyssal_Idiot]

Sans having Wall level dura and AP without hax is a good idea. "At least Massively Hypersonic+, likely far higher" would be fine for his speed, though it should be stressed as an absolute low end, as he literally dodged Frisk in his sleep.

Not sure how I feel about the complete removal of KARMA to damage. Sans obviously has some form of durability negation, but judging by the text that is used during the battle, I sincerely doubt most of his damage is coming from his regular attacks, as this implies he does equal damage to everyone, and the repeated mentions of KARMA and "sins" would have no reason to be there.

 

[MarvelFanatic119]

Agree with what Azxy says here

 

[DerpCity]

@Azathoth The problem with KARMA to damage is that its not really 'proven', its just strongly hinted towards. Sans hasn't shown that his KARMA is any stronger if they've killed a bajillion people or any weaker if they've killed ten people, its simply suggested by the name of the ability and flavor text pertaining to it.

This is probably a bad example, but Saitama isn't rated any higher than he's shown, outside of a "Likely at least 5-B" off of scaling to a statement made about Boros and the "likely higher", despite being strongly suggested to being way stronger than he's portrayed by both the casualness of his victories and other character's observations, but he hasn't shown it outside being casual in his victories.

Also, according to the Undertale Wiki, the Karma and Sins statements are based on how much KARMA you ended with on Sans' turn, and according to their source for that statement, the amount of KARMA you can accumulate has a cap, though that blurs the line between lore and game mechanics.

If you still disagree with removing Karma to Damage though, that's fine. I mostly just want his page to have statistics that aren't simply Unknown.

 

[Azathoth_the_Abyssal_Idiot]

@DerpCity

It definitely has a cap, which is why it would be bad to assume it can affect anything significantly above Chara. However, I don't like assuming its cap is also its base, and that anyone hit with it will suffer as much damage as Chara did.

Yes, the KARMA statements are made based on how much of it you accumulated, which is part of why I disagree. When it is killing you, the game makes it very clear that KARMA is doing you in.

 

[Saikou_The_Lewd_King]

Pretty sure that KARMA has no relation to actual kill count or whatever though? Your kill count is always the same, and so is the damage.

 

[MarvelFanatic119]

That's because you need to kill EVERYONE there and can't kill any less people to fight Sans? I mean, if there was a canon part in the game where you fight Sans and he does the same damage regardless if you're just Pacifist or Neutral I would agree with you, but there isn't.

 

[Azathoth_the_Abyssal_Idiot]

That's because your kill count has to be the same. The requirement for fighting Sans is "kill every possible enemy".

Edit: Ninja'd.

 

[MarvelFanatic119]

And again, the text in the game CLEARLY states this is what's hurting you.