Resistance by Higher Levels of Infinity
As common sense dictates characters which have infinitely higher durability than another character has attack potency are immune to all regular forms of attacks from the weaker character. However, many kinds of durability circumventing hax exist. Whether or not they can affect infinitely stronger characters depends on the kind of hax and the fashion in which the target infinitely transcends the user.
Hax Categories
For ease of explanation, we sort hax into the following 6 categories. A hax could belong to multiple ones.
- Abilities which only circumvent durability to a limited extent: These are abilities which do not function completely independent of the scale of durability. This includes things like pressure point techniques, acupuncture and attacks on internal organs, as all those need to be able to deal at least a tiny amount of damage to produce their effect. Certain more exotic hax can also fall into this category, such as abilities that disintegrate molecules or atoms, as for a character with infinitely stronger durability the bonds between the particles making up their body would also need to be infinitely stronger.
- Abilities that need scale and range to work: These are fully durability circumventing abilities whose area of effect needs to cover all or a significant fraction of the character's body to have a lethal effect and, for that purpose, need to be able to target the respective parts of the characters. Examples for that could be Existence Erasure or Transmutation via Reality Warping. Poison also falls into this category, although it has the advantage that when hit the character's physiology might transport through the whole body.
- Abilities that just need range to work: These are fully durability circumventing abilities which target things that are not necessarily bound to physical size, such as the non-physical mind or the soul of a character. Note that depending on the fiction these could also be of the same dimension as the character in which case mind and soul manipulation would be of the 2nd Type instead.
- Abilities that affect reality, not the target: These are fully durability circumventing abilities like law manipulation or concept manipulation, which affect reality, or part of a reality, as a whole instead of targeting just a character.
- Abilities where the target affects themselves: Fully durability circumventing abilities where the target does something to make them affect themself. The most typical example would be Madness Manipulation Type 3, where the act of perceiving the user is what "delivers" the effect to the target. Note that this only applies if there is no supernatural power reaching out (which could be limited by range), but truly just perception itself is what manifests the effect, for example, due to subliminal messages hidden in it.
Transcendence Types
With the categories of hax clarified, the following list offers guidelines for how the abilities may be assumed to interact with the respective types of infinite transcendence. Note that all of this is under the assumption that the abilities have no particular feats of affecting characters that are
qualitatively superior to the user.
Exlusively Statistical
This could be called the most basic type. The target has Durability that is infinitely higher than the users Attack Potency, but otherwise doesn't transcend them. They have the same dimensionality, there is no layer of
Reality-Fiction Transcendence between them and there also otherwise is no further superiority that is of relevance.
- Abilities which only circumvent durability to a limited extent: These would usually be assumed not to work, as the infinitely higher durability makes a limited circumvention of durability still meaningless. Even if the attacker only had to deal with a millionth of the character's durability, with the initial difference being infinite that is still beyond the attacker's power. Techniques like pressure points would also be unlikely to be triggered, as actually pushing the point is likely beyond the attacker's strength.
- Abilities that need scale and range to work: As the character is scale and range-wise not special those would work, as they would against a character with a finite stat difference.
- Abilities that just need range to work: Same as 2.
- Abilities that affect reality, not the target: As long as the character exists within the same reality as the attacker these should in principle work as when used against a character with just a finite stat difference.
- Abilities where the target affects themselves: As the character has no specific protection against this, they would be affected the same way as when the ability is used against a character with just a finite stat difference.
Higher-Dimensional Existence
Characters which have higher-dimensional existence i.e. whose body extends through at least one more dimension than the attacker usually operates in. This is strictly in terms of proper mathematical dimensions.
- Abilities which only circumvent durability to a limited extent: As those characters also have infinitely higher durability, these would be ineffective for the same reasons as for this with an exclusively statistics-based transcendence. This might not apply to not tiering-applicable dimensions.
- Abilities that need scale and range to work: Such abilities would usually have no effect on beings of a higher dimensionality. That is due to such beings simultaneously having an infinitely larger "volume" than the ability's demonstrated area of effect as well as most of the body existing along a dimensional axis the ability has no access to, i.e. beyond the ability's range. It should be noted that one could argue, that a 2-dimensional plane of a 3-dimensional character being erased would bisect them and that analogue effects would happen for higher dimensions. However, it could just as likely just amount to cutting of a strand of hair, instead of down the middle, and no further damage could be dealt. It also would not work if the dimensional difference is more than one, as that would be like erasing an infinitely thin line of a 3-dimensional being. Furthermore, the cut would be infinitely thin, which would arguably mean the body does not actually fall apart, as it is like cutting something with a knife so thin that it misses all the atoms and hence ends up not shifting anything. So unless the fiction clarifies otherwise, even by such a cutting method it is unlikely to cause significant damage.
- Abilities that just need range to work: As established, most of the character's body would exist beyond the dimensional axis and hence be beyond the range of the ability. One could now argue that some non-dimensional thing like the mind or soul of the character could happen to still be in the same space as the attacker and hence within range. However, there is no particular reason that would be the case and the mathematical probability of that happening by mere chance is 0%. Hence such abilities should generally not work on higher-dimensional characters.
- Abilities that affect reality, not the target: This would be very similar to the 2nd and 3rd case. Most of the character is outside of the abilities area of effect and range, making it next to impossible that it has a significant effect on them. One important difference to note is that any part that enters the reality, and hence the range of the ability, may still be affected. If laws or concepts were altered to erase the higher-dimensional character, them sticking their hand into the altered reality would still erase their hand, somewhat limiting their attack options.
- Abilities where the target affects themselves: As long as the ability does not need to contend with the character's scale these should be still effective. A higher-dimensional entity may still be affected by the subliminal messages in a movie it watches, for example. The usual range problem is circumvented by the target's own sensory capabilities leading to them perceiving the threat. It should be noted, however, that such entities sometimes have things like higher-order minds or generally very alien mental structures. These could under certain circumstances interfere with the effectiveness of such abilities.
Reality-Fiction Transcendence
As an example for how more qualitative transcendence systems may work, we will look at
Reality-Fiction Transcendence.
- Abilities which only circumvent durability to a limited extent: As the attacker's attacks would appear entirely fictional to the target, they would not be able to deal even the tiny amount of an effect that would be necessary for these to be effective.
- Abilities that need scale and range to work: As such characters would typically exist completely outside of the attacker's reality the abilities are unlikely to reach them and even if they did, they would only be registered as fictional and hence incapable of having a real effect.
- Abilities that just need range to work: Same as 2.
- Abilities that affect reality, not the target: These abilities would be incapable of effecting their target, as it would be outside of their range and the change itself would arguably be one fictional to them, possibly not even affecting their access to the reality.
- Abilities where the target affects themselves: Things like subliminal messages or social influencing may still be effective against such characters. While a movie with subliminal messages might be fictional to such a character, so was it to the original viewer. It being less real has no actual influence on whether the comprehension of the subject matter has an effect on the target. Another example could be if there, for example, is a reality-fiction difference between the attacker and target, in which the lower plane of reality is analogous to a virtual reality game and the target enters that game by transferring their consciousness into it. By bringing their consciousness to the level of the game, they essentially expose themselves to mind attacks, as they made the game "real" to themselves in that way.
Others
Several other kinds of transcendence exist in fiction. The exact way hax would interact with these types would need to be analyzed case-by-case. The arguments presented for the three types above can be used as a reference for which arguments may apply to such other types. Many cases will, for example, have targets exist in some other space than the people using the ability, in which case the abilities likely wouldn't work without feats of reaching that other space.
Smurf Abilities
A fan term that originated in MMORPG communities where a player restarts their game and is matched against newbies after having years of experience and resources. However, in the vs-community, it has come to instead refer to characters who possess abilities capable of harming characters who are in durability
qualitatively superior to them by means which should be impossible for regular abilities. I.e. they possess abilities which in themself can, at least in some aspect, be considered qualitatively superior to their regular counterpart.
Due to that, they can often circumvent certain defences against the abilities, although this depends on in which aspect the ability can be considered qualitatively superior.
The two big aspects to differentiate between are power/potency and range/area of Effect.
Power / Potency
Abilities that in terms of pure power are
qualitatively superior to the physical stats of the character, e.g. a physically Tier 7 character capable of casting a Tier 1-A fireball, or hax which has potency
qualitatively superior to the baseline potency, e.g.
soul hax which can affect a character that
sees them as mere fiction.
The typical way for an ability to be proven as being smurf in the aspect is it having showings or statements of being able to affect a character, which it shouldn't due to them transcending them in a way that it would require such a higher potency to affect them. A typical example would be affecting characters which see them as mere fiction. See "Resistance by Higher Levels of Infinity" for some examples of reasoning for why characters with certain transcendence resist certain things.
It's important to separate the case of Power or Potency from the case of Range or Area of Effect. A higher-dimensional character might be immune to regular mind manipulation due to being outside its range, but not due to their mind being fundamentally infinitely harder to affect. Of course, exceptions may apply if there are statements or feats of the opposite.
Another way an ability can be shown to have smurf potency / power is if it significantly affects a structure of
qualitatively superior size. E.g. existence erasure which can affect a (tiering-applicable) higher-dimensional structure or character would qualify.
Lastly, if it overcomes a resistance which is known to operate on a
qualitatively superior level it would also be considered smurf.
The main advantage of an ability being considered smurf in power / potency is that it is assumed to be able to overpower all resistances that don't have feats or statements of being able to perform on an equal or superior level. That in practice means that, for example, a 3D character that has abilities with Low 1-C smurf potency would be able to overcome all the regular Tier 2 or lower resistances as if they weren't there.
Range / Area of Effect
Abilities which can in terms of range or area of effect reach structures outside of the reality the character itself exists in. An example would be a regular human, which can attack points in different universes, or a character that is physically Tier 2, but can erase 16-dimensional structures.
The importance of smurf range and area of effect is that without it many entities with certain kinds of transcendence ove rthe user can not be significantly harmed. A target with
Reality-Fiction Transcendence may for example exist beyond the book in which the user's reality is contained. And even if a character had enough brute strength to kill a higher-dimensional character, they may not be able to do so in practice if they can't project their strength to a more then 3-dimensional area of effect, as they then can't affect a significant portion of the target's body. See "Resistance by Higher Levels of Infinity" for further details.
It is important to note that, contrary to abilities with smurf power or potency, abilities with smurf range or area of effect alone do not necessarily bypass all regular resistance on the level of the user.
