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As I already suggested a few month ago, but postponed because of more important matters, I would like to write a page listing the standard assumptions for the scenarios in battles between characters.
The purpose of that is that if the details for a battle aren't listed (as the ones doing the threads sadly mostly don't do) one can assume that any non listed detail is like specified in the standard assumptions.
In order to fulfil this function the standard assumptions should be written in such a way that a as high amount of characters as possible can have a fight with each other that would be considered fair.
Fair has mostly two sides here: For one thing a character shouldn't have an advantage he usually doesn't have and his weaknesses shouldn't be covered through the scenario.
The other thing is that a character shouldn't be disadvantaged by the scenario, because it assumes a case it usually wouldn't engage in.
Some other sides already have such pages. Two notable ones probably are the OBD and the ACF wiki ones.
So let me state my initial thoughts and suggestions to some of the standards before the discussion begins.
Version of the character used: The strongest canon version of a character is used, that we have listed. The strongest one being defined as the one with the highest tier and if there are multiple ones with the same tier the more recent one. The addition that we should use the version we have listed simply follows out of convenience for this that don't know one of the characters.
Victory conditions: Death, BFR, permanent incapacitation. For BFR a character has lost if he can not return in one month. Permanent incapacitation is reached if the opponent ends up in a state in which he can not harm the other fighter for a month, without the other fighter actively participating in keeping him like that.
Another condition could be giving up, but since whether or not a character gives up depends strongly on what the fight is about I think it is hard to accurately use that condition.
One could consider K.O. as well, but I decided against it, since it would undermine the usefulness of Regenerationn and immortality. One might say that is unfair for characters that don't want to kill, but
State of mind: In character, but willing to kill.
That means the brawlers will fight against each other using the same fighting style as they usually would. That also means characters that don't go all out at the start or hold long speeches if they usually do that when fighting. I believe that is important for a fair fight, as a bad and inefficient fighting style, that fro example makes it so that character that could blitz doesn't do that, is an important thing to consider in battle and just a legitimate weakness of the character. The addition that they are willing to kill is added because, while it technically also is inefficient fighting style, there are so many characters that will never get beaten if not killed and at the same time so many characters not known to kill that it would just not be practical for the standard assumptions, as many fights would be decided just based on that. Like this KO also doesn't have to be added to the victory conditions preserving the advantage of the characters.
Knowledge of the other character/verse: None. Simple, but what one would expect of a first encounter between characters.
Preparation time: None. There are some characters whose fighting style may depend on good preparation, but I feel like such a prepared field is actually hard to get in a fight were both characters share the preparation condition. It also is hard to determine what is allowed in prep time and what not. Like if weapons can already be pulled, the battlefield be prepared / the battlefield being reality warped, future sight be used, information about the opponent gathered, attacks charged up etc. And and appropriate length for all speed levels is even harder, given that a MFTL+ characters could do years of stuff in a second.
Equipment: Standard equipment, that is why it stands on character profiles after all.
Time: Here it begins to get difficult. It is hard to find a time fair for most characters. Night is bad for all characters that have just human senses, while day is bad for practically all vampires. Furthermore there a characters that have different powers depending on time, like Katara being stronger at full moon or Brunhild loosing all powers once every three month.
Maybe not specifying a time would be best, but just specifying how time based effects are treated is better. So an idea would be to say all characters fight as if they were at the time they are at their strongest, even if they theoretically can never be at their strongest at the same time. For the notion of characters with human senses and other abilities, for which it may matter, I would suggest generally saying that it is day. Of course, even through a vampire gains immunity to daylight through this assumption, light based attacks that would usually be especially effective against them stay just as effective.
On a side note, I choose the time were they are at their strongest here instead of when they are the most average, because it could otherwise clash with the strongest form assumption from the beginning.
Locatio: Similar problem as with time, one can hardly make it fair for all characters. Additionally it is hard to balance how much of something is fair. Taking Katara as example again: What would even be a fair location for her? In the ocean since she is strongest there? In the desert, because she doesn't get special advantages there? At a lake or at a fountain? hard to say.
Another thought would be for mind control based characters. Should we assume a population of humans/animals close by so that they can use their advantage of mind control fully, or is that an unfair advantage? Should we maybe even give them their usually mind control subjects, if they have some? Or should they be in a lifeless zone so that they are helpless against a character with resistance to mind control?
What about people that can manipulate technologies or users of magnetism? They are in quite a disadvantage in a forest.
At the same time a plant user has problems in the city.
All such things could be considered, while choosing a fair location.
The only general thing would suggest is to not let them start in a closed space. Because of the large Area of Effect of many attacks one should easily be capable of moving large distances to dodge.
Starting Distance: How far should the characters stand from each other at the beginning of the battle?
The OBD writes 20 paces, the ACF wiki 50 meters. In my opinion that is both to low. A huge amount of characters listed are at least supersonic or higher. Such characters can cross 50 meters in a split second, which means that effectively all battles are close combat and the range stat becomes insignificant for the outcome of a battle. Characters like Reki that are specialized in long range combat are at a disadvantage here, even through their range should usually be a hudge advantage.
Technically I would want to say that placing the characters as far away from each other as the larger one of their ranges are is good, but that has too many problems. Like the fact that too large distances may never be crossed and that a battle starting with several ten-thousand kilometers between the opponents, because of one of the participants attacks is also not exactly fair or realistic. Finding a location for a variable range would also be difficult.
So here I also don't have a good solution for the problem.
Verse equalization: I initially didn't even want to list it, but I guess it is important to mention. To make it short I like the ACF wikis approach on energy equivalence. One might have to discuss how verses are equalized with different forms of supernatural abilities that are equally important. Like for example if in a battle between one piece and To aru majutsu no index devil fruits would be equalized to magic or esper abilities.
Edit: See here for the discussion on the topic of verse equalization. (please only discuss it there for the sake of organization)
So that are my thoughts for now... quite a bit of text actually. So everyone: ideas, opinions, good formulations for the rules?
The purpose of that is that if the details for a battle aren't listed (as the ones doing the threads sadly mostly don't do) one can assume that any non listed detail is like specified in the standard assumptions.
In order to fulfil this function the standard assumptions should be written in such a way that a as high amount of characters as possible can have a fight with each other that would be considered fair.
Fair has mostly two sides here: For one thing a character shouldn't have an advantage he usually doesn't have and his weaknesses shouldn't be covered through the scenario.
The other thing is that a character shouldn't be disadvantaged by the scenario, because it assumes a case it usually wouldn't engage in.
Some other sides already have such pages. Two notable ones probably are the OBD and the ACF wiki ones.
So let me state my initial thoughts and suggestions to some of the standards before the discussion begins.
Version of the character used: The strongest canon version of a character is used, that we have listed. The strongest one being defined as the one with the highest tier and if there are multiple ones with the same tier the more recent one. The addition that we should use the version we have listed simply follows out of convenience for this that don't know one of the characters.
Victory conditions: Death, BFR, permanent incapacitation. For BFR a character has lost if he can not return in one month. Permanent incapacitation is reached if the opponent ends up in a state in which he can not harm the other fighter for a month, without the other fighter actively participating in keeping him like that.
Another condition could be giving up, but since whether or not a character gives up depends strongly on what the fight is about I think it is hard to accurately use that condition.
One could consider K.O. as well, but I decided against it, since it would undermine the usefulness of Regenerationn and immortality. One might say that is unfair for characters that don't want to kill, but
State of mind: In character, but willing to kill.
That means the brawlers will fight against each other using the same fighting style as they usually would. That also means characters that don't go all out at the start or hold long speeches if they usually do that when fighting. I believe that is important for a fair fight, as a bad and inefficient fighting style, that fro example makes it so that character that could blitz doesn't do that, is an important thing to consider in battle and just a legitimate weakness of the character. The addition that they are willing to kill is added because, while it technically also is inefficient fighting style, there are so many characters that will never get beaten if not killed and at the same time so many characters not known to kill that it would just not be practical for the standard assumptions, as many fights would be decided just based on that. Like this KO also doesn't have to be added to the victory conditions preserving the advantage of the characters.
Knowledge of the other character/verse: None. Simple, but what one would expect of a first encounter between characters.
Preparation time: None. There are some characters whose fighting style may depend on good preparation, but I feel like such a prepared field is actually hard to get in a fight were both characters share the preparation condition. It also is hard to determine what is allowed in prep time and what not. Like if weapons can already be pulled, the battlefield be prepared / the battlefield being reality warped, future sight be used, information about the opponent gathered, attacks charged up etc. And and appropriate length for all speed levels is even harder, given that a MFTL+ characters could do years of stuff in a second.
Equipment: Standard equipment, that is why it stands on character profiles after all.
Time: Here it begins to get difficult. It is hard to find a time fair for most characters. Night is bad for all characters that have just human senses, while day is bad for practically all vampires. Furthermore there a characters that have different powers depending on time, like Katara being stronger at full moon or Brunhild loosing all powers once every three month.
Maybe not specifying a time would be best, but just specifying how time based effects are treated is better. So an idea would be to say all characters fight as if they were at the time they are at their strongest, even if they theoretically can never be at their strongest at the same time. For the notion of characters with human senses and other abilities, for which it may matter, I would suggest generally saying that it is day. Of course, even through a vampire gains immunity to daylight through this assumption, light based attacks that would usually be especially effective against them stay just as effective.
On a side note, I choose the time were they are at their strongest here instead of when they are the most average, because it could otherwise clash with the strongest form assumption from the beginning.
Locatio: Similar problem as with time, one can hardly make it fair for all characters. Additionally it is hard to balance how much of something is fair. Taking Katara as example again: What would even be a fair location for her? In the ocean since she is strongest there? In the desert, because she doesn't get special advantages there? At a lake or at a fountain? hard to say.
Another thought would be for mind control based characters. Should we assume a population of humans/animals close by so that they can use their advantage of mind control fully, or is that an unfair advantage? Should we maybe even give them their usually mind control subjects, if they have some? Or should they be in a lifeless zone so that they are helpless against a character with resistance to mind control?
What about people that can manipulate technologies or users of magnetism? They are in quite a disadvantage in a forest.
At the same time a plant user has problems in the city.
All such things could be considered, while choosing a fair location.
The only general thing would suggest is to not let them start in a closed space. Because of the large Area of Effect of many attacks one should easily be capable of moving large distances to dodge.
Starting Distance: How far should the characters stand from each other at the beginning of the battle?
The OBD writes 20 paces, the ACF wiki 50 meters. In my opinion that is both to low. A huge amount of characters listed are at least supersonic or higher. Such characters can cross 50 meters in a split second, which means that effectively all battles are close combat and the range stat becomes insignificant for the outcome of a battle. Characters like Reki that are specialized in long range combat are at a disadvantage here, even through their range should usually be a hudge advantage.
Technically I would want to say that placing the characters as far away from each other as the larger one of their ranges are is good, but that has too many problems. Like the fact that too large distances may never be crossed and that a battle starting with several ten-thousand kilometers between the opponents, because of one of the participants attacks is also not exactly fair or realistic. Finding a location for a variable range would also be difficult.
So here I also don't have a good solution for the problem.
Verse equalization: I initially didn't even want to list it, but I guess it is important to mention. To make it short I like the ACF wikis approach on energy equivalence. One might have to discuss how verses are equalized with different forms of supernatural abilities that are equally important. Like for example if in a battle between one piece and To aru majutsu no index devil fruits would be equalized to magic or esper abilities.
Edit: See here for the discussion on the topic of verse equalization. (please only discuss it there for the sake of organization)
So that are my thoughts for now... quite a bit of text actually. So everyone: ideas, opinions, good formulations for the rules?
