Mad_Dog_of_Fujiwara
She/Her- 9,236
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"This does not Mama the Mia..." -Super "Nintendo" Mario
Currently, Mario characters can be rated as high as 2-B, due to scaling to the assumption that all dreams are universes, there are hundreds of thousands of dreams in existence, and multiple characters, items, or events have power over all dreams, or could just wipe the cosmology entirely. This scaling is bad, and I’ve come to tear it down to what it should’ve always been… lord help me.
Big thanks to @Kirbonic_Pikmin and @greymerlion2 for their help with this. Really, Kirb should’ve been the one to post this, not me, but I’m the one who slapped the keys on the keyboard to put this together, so I guess the posting rights go to me. Now, let’s at least try to keep things respectful and on-topic, and get this downgrade started.
The Dream Stone and the Power of Dreams
Let’s take a look at why the Dream Stone is 2-B to begin with. For a long time, it’s been presumed that the Dream Stone contains every good dream in existence, while the Dark Stone does the same for nightmares. Looking at the english translation reveals how strange this assumption is, though - The Dream Stone is merely “formed of good dreams”, while the Dark Stone is “a solid manifestation of nightmares”. Obviously, being formed of something doesn’t mean you are composed of every single instance of that thing in existence, so it’s impossible to tell how many dreams the Dream Stone actually contains. Being a manifestation of something is even more vague, since that doesn’t even imply that you’re made of that thing. So already, there’s not much reason to assume these stones scale to the entire cosmology.
But what about the Japanese version? As has been discussed in prior threads, the Japanese version of Dream Team merely uses “the power of dreams/nightmares” to describe the stones. It’s unclear how this would even translate to multiversal levels of power, since there’s no indication of the stones even scaling to every dream in existence. In addition, the power of dreams wouldn’t even necessarily be raw AP either, since Bowser simply wanted to use that power to grant his wishes and make the Mario Bros disappear, so it seems more akin to reality warping than anything (he mostly uses it for summoning in the actual boss fight, anyways). That aside, merely possessing “the power of” something doesn’t directly scale you to it, as it’s quite common for a character to boast about having “the power of the sun” or something similar without being scaled to 4-C (or higher).
There’s one particularly egregious counterpoint to the Dream Stone scaling to every dream in existence though, and that’s the Dreambeats. This was used to force everyone on Pil’lo Island to fall asleep, so the Dream Stone could absorb the power of their dreams. The question is, if the Dream Stone already contains those dreams, then why the hell does it need to absorb them from other sources?
TL;DR: Neither translation proves the Dream Stones contain every dream, and the original text doesn’t even imply scaling to a single dream. The Dream Stone containing every dream is also contradicted by the narrative.
The Number of Dreams is Massively Inflated
Let’s look at this calc from the 2-B upgrade thread. While I’ll go over the fine details individually, the idea is that there are at least 52 Pi'illo citizens dreaming once a night for an average of 32 years (including leap years), which is over a hundred thousand dreams even when lowballed.
First and foremost, there’s no indication that every time someone sleeps, they generate an entirely new dream. What exactly is supposed to prove that one night of sleep equals a new dream? Without that evidence, it’s safer to assume that people just enter the same dream world over and over again. This already nukes the majority of total dreams there are in existence, bumping it down to 52 at most (at least for Pi'illo Island). While there were past populations inhabiting the island, we have no indication of how many people that is, and since only 52 people are actively contributing to the dream total in modern times, it’s unreasonable to say that other, similar civilizations would have over 1000.
Even then, the Dream Stone, as well as most things that’d scale to the full cosmology, came well before most of these dreams were even created. They’d only scale to the total of dreams that existed in their time, which would be far less. So even if the modern population of Pi'illo Island was well over 1000, that wouldn’t mean much, since the Dream Stone, at least at the point of its formation, wouldn’t scale.
But are Dreams Really Universes?
Now let’s get this clear: Future Dream, from Mario Party 5, is clearly stated to be a universe. The issue with dreams in general being universes stems from whether or not these dreams would actually scale to Future Dream’s scope. As stated multiple times, Future Dream is specifically a dream of the universe, which of course confirms its universal size. But this also implies that the only reason it's universal in size is because it’s, well, a dream of the universe. So with that in mind, why would dreams of things that aren’t universes scale to a dream of the universe?
Dreams are also shown to contain celestial bodies like stars and nebulae (shown in the same scans above). This is notable, but we typically don’t consider this universal without further evidence. At best, it ranges from 4-A to 3-C. Same goes for dreams containing “dimensions”; No context is provided that’d make these dimensions higher than what they’ve visibly shown (which is not universal). Put simply, the average dream in Mario doesn’t meet our criteria for universes, even if some dreams do.
Now, I know what the inevitable counterargument is: Dream Depot, also from MP5, which showcases these dreams as small orbs, all comparable in size to one another, spinning around in some kind of void. Under the typical universe requirements, this would allow other dreams to scale to its size. There’s just one problem, though: As shown in this same cutscene, if you watch closely you can actually see various maps represented multiple times by different dreams (eg; Future Dream is shown in one dream, and then another, and another still). We know these are individual dreams, but as shown in the ending, they’re all “split” into multiple smaller chunks, and THAT’S what the Dream Depot stores. So even if Future Dream is a universe… well, it’s a universe divided into a number of small pieces, which isn’t universal at all, which means no dream would be a universe.
TL;DR: Nothing scales to Future Dream’s universal size, and Future Dream wouldn’t even be universal by virtue of being split into several, smaller dreams.
Nobody in Super Paper Mario Knows What the Dream Stone or Dream Depot is
So nobody in mainline Mario scales to every dream in existence, that much is clear. But there’s still some argumentation for cosmology wiping to be had, stemming from the Void in SPM being stated to destroy everything in existence. This worked reasonably well until recently, where it was decided to split Paper Mario from mainline Mario, primarily based off of the existence of Paper Jam, where the Paper Mario games are just stored in a book and are shown to have never had any contact with the main series in this context.
So with that being said, when characters in SPM are referring to how the Void will destroy everything… why would they be referring to locations that nobody in that verse knows exists? The book that Paper Mario exists in has been gathering dust on a shelf for years on end, to the point where older characters like Kamek regard its existence as a mere legend. Obviously, this lack of contact would go both ways, so characters in SPM would have no way of knowing what things like the Dream Stone and Dream Depot even are.
There’s also the fact that none of the big, cosmology-altering events in either world has had an impact on the other. We have no indication that the Void would exit the book it’s contained in and start affecting the main Mario verse, including the Dream Depot. There’s no real proof to assume so.
The Void Wiping the Cosmology is Wrong Anyways
This was brought up previously, but never concluded. In the english version of SPM, it is frequently stated that the Void will destroy “all dimensions/all worlds”, and various worlds are referred to as dimensions. The problem is that the original Japanese text just… doesn’t say that. Let’s go down the list 1 by 1:
-Merlon says the Void will consume “all worlds, all dimensions”, but the OG text just says “the world”.
-Tippi calling the Sammer Kingdom a dimension is in fact her calling it a world.
-The Pure Heart being split across dimensions isn’t a thing, just different worlds.
-Literally everyone in the Japanese version uses “world” and not “dimension”.
-The Underwhere and Overthere are stated to be underground and in the sky, respectively, so these “worlds” all occupy the same space.
The statements referring to the world are further backed up by human translations posted here. In short, there’s nothing suggesting the Void will destroy anything beyond “the world”, with only world 4 being universal just by virtue of being outer space, and infinite. There’s further evidence of the Void not affecting the entire cosmology, as the Woah Zone, which is stated to exist outside space (in a semi-official guide, making it tertiary canon), has no traces of the Void inside it (it’s a 20 minute video, but you can skim through it and see there’s no Void anywhere, even when other locations in world 4 do), even further supported by how Dimension D, an actual alternate dimension, also lacks the Void in any capacity. So there’s an obvious limit to the Void’s range, which means it cannot be a cosmology wiper.
As explained previously, the Underwhere and Overthere are just the underground and sky relative to the world at large. We can see this in world 7, where being launched into space has a visual of you getting thrown out of earth’s atmosphere, and into space, which is visually identical to world 4. So, worlds 7 and 4 at bare minimum share a cosmology, laying the groundwork for “worlds” not being different universes.
Regular characters with no capabilities of dimensional travel are repeatedly shown to be able to enter and exit these realms, as shown by how they frequently recall events from different worlds, as well as collect souvenirs from them. This is further supported by how the monsters in the Pit of 100 Trials are stated to come from all around the world, singular, despite many of them being world-specific.
Now, there are some common counterarguments to these points, which I’ll address below.
“The different worlds in SPM have different skies, so they must be different worlds.”
This is silly for a few reasons, but above all else would be this level from NSMBU. Different verses, sure, but it sets a precedent for individual levels within the same space-time having wildly different skies. Or we could go with TTYD, in which you can see different colored skies on the same planet (here, here, and here). Of course, it doesn’t make much sense to say that different skies = different dimensions in the first place when our own planet has a ton of different skies.
“Mario is said to come from another dimension.”
True! A different dimension from Flipside, a place which is not a dimension in and of itself. This means anywhere, even a low 2-C structure containing all the worlds in SPM, would be a “different dimension” from Flipside, so this doesn’t prove that these worlds are different dimensions from each other... Just that they're a different dimension from Flipside.
“The Void affected Flipside, which is in-between dimensions.”
That’s just the thing though; Flipside is the space between dimensions, but isn’t a dimension in and of itself. Of the worlds we know to be different dimensions (like Dimension D and the Woah Zone), none are affected by the Void. So while it can reach the space between those dimensions, it can go no farther (like being able to walk to a bus stop, but being unable to board the bus).
TL;DR: All the worlds in SPM are shown to share the same space-time, and the Void is consistently incapable of affecting anything outside of one space-time.
Conclusion
-The Dream Stones don’t scale to the total number of dreams.
-The number of dreams in existence is far less than what’s been proposed.
-Not every dream is universal in size.
-The cosmology wiping statements in SPM would have no reason to apply to the Dream Stone/Dream Depot.
-The Void likely doesn’t even scale to the entire cosmology.
So with that all said, what would the changes be if everything were to be accepted? For starters, all dream-related scaling for mainline Mario would need to go. This includes 2-B Dreamy Luigi, Dreamy Bowser, Zeekeeper, and so on. They wouldn’t exactly be low 2-C/2-C either, due to the ambiguity of whether or not all dreams are universes (or any of them, for that matter). That being said, these characters are still several leagues above the 3-C ratings the verse typically has, so they’d be rated as “at least 3-C”. This also somewhat lines up with 3-C base characters somewhat downscaling from Antasma, which would be an absurd outlier if 2-B/2-C stats were kept.
The Void in SPM, and those who scale to it, would be downgraded to Low 2-C, due to being able to destroy world 4, which is in outer space and described as infinite. So Super Dimentio and Pure Heart users would peak at low 2-C, which would likely be the highest definitive scaling for the entire verse. Granted, if greater evidence of 2-C is provided, I’d be okay with that as well.
Also, before anybody mentions Culex, he’s a 2D bitch who practically pisses himself over 3D levels of power. Making him tier 2 is laughable.
Agree: @Kirbonic_Pikmin, @greymerlion2, @Shmooply, @Hiryu-Z, @Roachman40, @Seol404 (Neutral on the Void downgrades), @BLS (Neutral on Void downgrade), @Maverick_Zero_X (Neutral on Void downgrade), @LephyrTheRevanchist (Neutral on Void downgrade), @LuciferX, @Foxthefox1000 (Disagree with Void downgrade), @Quantu, @Nexp06
Disagree: @DarkDragonMedeus (Agrees with downgrading Dream Stones from 2-B), @Mephistus
Neutral: @StrymULTRA, @JJSliderman (Agrees with downgrading Dream Stone calc)
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