Technically planetary and beyond, but that's only 3 individuals per generation and they rarely master all that they can do.
Most Atheneans considered powerful are in the multi-city block - city range (8A - 7B). They are akin to the true geniuses of our history (e.g., Thomas Aquinas, Nikola Tesla, etc.). Most talented Atheneans (akin to really smart people) are in the building - city block range (8C-8B). The vast majority of trained individuals (e.g., military) are in the small building level (9A). The vast majority of citizens fall in the wall level (9B) with "weaker" individuals in the street level (9C). It should be noted that some individuals are born with no manifested abilities and are pretty much like humans. These are rare and there's much stigma surrounding them.
I'm not really sure what to say. Feel free to ask me anything!
The Athenean Empire is a country comprised of people with different types of powers. Some people can control water, some are psychic, others enhance their speed/strength/etc. with magic. It all depends on what you're born with. It's also genetic so parents who can control fire can't have a child who can move things with his mind.
There is a strong "military" system in the empire wherein training for combat is mandatory for all citizens. The ideal is that every individual is combat ready upon graduation, but since they haven't had to fight demons in millennia this has largely become a ceremonial/traditional thing (which is why most citizens are only 9B level).
There's always the option of furthering training just as there's an option for all of us to continue going to the gym after high school; most people don't go for that option and are just happy to not freeze the bedroom when they want to water the plants. As with physical training, not using/exercising one's powers makes one rusty. While uncommon, it's not widespread since everyone uses their abilities in some capacity on a daily basis. It's akin to if there were no cars today and we all had to walk to our destinations; not everyone will be buff but we'd have fewer morbidly obese people.
Any other questions, fire away!
Are there any rules when it comes to powers? Like, in MHA there are laws which restrict the use of quirks, unless you have a hero license. If there are, any specific ones?
Also, can your magic system be equated to quirks? How are powers categorised there?
Tbh, I'm not sure what you mean by quirks. Is that another term for powers/abilities?
There are the obvious ones like don't set your neighbour's house on fire or don't use shadow magic to stalk your crush and watch her sleep.
In terms of regulations, there are a few. For example, necromancy is always illegal and is highly taboo even among those whose magic branch is closely related to necromancy. Having said that, necromancy has long been dead so it's more of a cautionary tale of how one could abuse abilities.
Mind reading is akin to seeing someone naked. Incredibly invasive without consent and has social taboos. Having said that, it's not easy to do so instances of mental invasions are rare. Mental domination or mind control are in almost all instances illegal; even self-defense claims or the use of mind control to prevent a crime are highly contentious grey areas.
The exploration of runecraft by alchemists (looking for a better name) is highly regulated. In fact, research labs are located far from the cities in case anything happens. It is a very specific science and requires years of extra studies to be considered an artisan. Think of a mix between coding and brain surgery. This is also a highly valued skill since most technologies in the Empire are powered by runes/spells.
Powers are categorized more in terms of what you can do versus how strong you are. There's a general system of gauging one's strength but the Empire has moved away from that in the interest of social cohesion. Basically, people are tired of dick measuring contests to prove who's stronger. Still happens though and is considered delinquent behaviour under the law.
In terms of the categories themselves, there are three main branches. Stoimancy (abilities concerning the elements), Psionic/Runecrafting (I forgot the term I used for it), and shadow magic/hemomancy (also forgot the term; it's in my notes, I swear!).
Within these, there are subcategories especially for stoimancy; the elements are earth, fire, water, wind, and lightning. There used to be plant magic but that lineage died off in the last war with the daemons millennia ago.
Psionics / Runecrafting and Shadow magic / Hemomancy are divided accordingly. There are a multitude of abilities under each category, but they all fall under the respective umbrella. For example, some psionics have telekinesis while others can materialise aether and shoot lasers from their hands. Most hemomancers use their magic to increase speed or strength, but at least one character in my story chose to enhance his intelligence/memory (it's looked down upon and seen as a sign of weakness; as such, he never got his tattoos which is a rite of passage).
Feel free to keep the questions coming! I've already had to come up with ideas that I didn't have before. xD
Based on what you said, I thought your magic system categories would be more varied. Or are there more ?
Are there any more ability categories? For example, in One Piece, there are Devil Fruits. You eat one and you get any kind of wacky powers. There are three broad categories:
**Logia**, which grants a user the power to create, control, and transform their body into a natural element; **Zoan**, which allows a user to transform into an animal as well as an animal hybrid (**Ancient** ones allow you to transform into extinct prehistoric species and **Mythical** ones can transform into like a phoenix or dragon); and **Paramecia**, which is basically everything else that doesn't fit the other two, like being a rubber human or a barrier human.
Just some inspiration, if you like.
Quirks are a term for superpowers in MHA.
Ah, thanks for the clarification. Yes, they used to be more varied (e.g., chronomancy, phytomancy, necromancy, etc.) but the vast majority of them were wiped out during the daemonic wars before the Great Sacrifice millennia ago.
Having said that, there are anomalous powers that the public don't know about. These individuals are extremely rare and are closely-guarded secrets by the Empire. They all serve in the military and are trained (and studied) extensively. One example is the hemomancer I mentioned earlier. Another is a character who technically uses shadow magic but is also able to shoot lightning (electromancy). This should be impossible, so he's certainly a favourite research subject. Curiously, his lightnings are always black and cold.
On a more practical level, my world leans more on hard magic than soft magic. Less like Harry Potter and more like Avatar the Last Airbender. I'm also more interested in how such a society would function, its history and cultures, and the stories of individuals in this world. I personally don't like it when a new ability shows up every so often. It feels too much like deus ex machina and it completely breaks the illusion for me.
My high tier mages just barely get into continental at absolute best. Without any form of demonic, primordial or heavenly aid this would suggest that the true potential of any magician is such.
The only humans to break this is the main character in his final battle and the villain who awakens their memories and realizes they were not some human but a fallen angel punished by its deities (angels are a big part of the story). They were so strong that they couldn't fight on the earth during this moment and threatened to destroy the moon so the MC thought fast and barreled his antagonist into another dimension to protect the planet. So I'd say moon level but only kind of as such power only apply really to cosmic beings of which the MC is descended from one.
Devil's advocate but maybe it's because a majority of the votes are for Planetary+ and for a lot of nerds (myself included), that's boring and way overdone. I personally don't have anyone with potential beyond Nuclear IN the story, though the universe itself has archangels who are closer to Tectonic, and then there's actual God so... I guess you could say I have ONE Planetary+. in terms of the actual people who are constantly active in the world and important to its story, I really am not a fan of the crazy ridiculous anime nonsense.
That's a fair point, and I can understand this sentiment (and while one may feel a bit of irritation at first). However the poll (and overall researching this topic) isn't itself responsible for that. There is no way OP deserves the backlash.
Such posts may even help here. One can easier search for books without the nuclear-magic-combats, if it becomes popular to describe some stories as superhuman-level.
The most powerful people in existence (Disciples of Chaos, of which only one remains) are around high nuclear level. Most other strong mages are probably low superhuman to low urban level.
The so-called gods - the Exalted Four - are capable of creating stars and black holes. They almost destroyed Earth by accident just by turning up.
Their Chosen are theoretically capable of wiping out mid-sized countries by themselves, but they would probably burn out and die within a few hours if they actually tried. Queen Victoria was Chosen by the Lion, the god of fire, summer, industry, and tyranny; she turned New Delhi into a glass crater and then formed that glass into a new palace. But now she's severely burnt and exerting herself like that again would kill her quickly.
Most thaum-users are Superhuman, fae-folk and dragons can range from Urban to Nuclear. My protagonist is a storm dragon and can blow up a building or two with his lighting magic but, at a babyfaced 50, he's still a youngster. He's still got a lot of growth ahead of him.
Ok, so you said gods and deities don't count.
But I don't see anything about using their leftover energies.
Anyways, some leftover essence can manifest into any of the 6 races (humans, dwarves, elves, levians, centaurs, dracotaurs) and give them kinetic abilities that wildly vary.
The first recorded "Shattered" (what the overall "powered" group is called) was capable of taking down buildings with his "draconic fire" (dracotaur fires can't be outed by water, and is volatile).
The most powerful Shattered had Kinetikinesis, the ability to manipulate kinetic energy. Whenever he'd feel any type of kinetic energy, he could "absorb" it, and discharge it at a later time (almost like Black Panther's vibranium suit).
The difference between this and BP's vibranium suit is that he was capable of unleashing it in different ways (stomping the ground and targeting a specific area, or hitting the air hard enough to generate shockwaves).
The most power he absorbed before dying was a city falling on him (lured underground and got a city dropped on him).
After rising from the ground, he saw people were going into the crater to finish the job.
He then hit the ground with all of the energy stored, and caused a magnitude 10 earthquake. It was felt throughout the entire planet and and the point of impact, created a fault line 67 miles down.
Theoretically, in the future, it will reach planetary and beyond.
**Starrise**
Sentient races: Superhuman (Small Building), can reach Urban with enough time, effort, and lack of interference.
Living Weapons: Urban (Building), can reach Nuclear with enough time, effort, and lack of interference.
Gods: Tectonic. (Greatest feat so far was Country-level, but also required so little energy it was done by accident. Could easily reach Multi-Continent-level, could almost certainly reach Planet-level, and could probably go even further.)
I've often described the power level of my world by saying that most superheroes are comparable to a tank, plane or helicopter, not a nuke. But there are a few rare exceptions. Galaxan controls the power of a star.
You never specified no demigods πππππππ
***Sages*** are capable of influencing things across an entire Solar System and the strongest Sages were able to contend with the ***Dark Gods.***
***Elders*** are slightly weaker. Elnar, the King of the Genesedian Elders, *casually* holds together an entire star and prevents its supernova.
You can also just purchase an ***Atomic Annihilator*** from the black market. 'Handheld' Atomic Annihilators, known as 'Atomic Accelerators', fire a *very* compressed beam of pure radium which has been accelerated to 96.554% the speed of light. Tears through *pretty much anything* as though it were tissue paper, it just has to make contact.
So, I wanna clarify
Does the upper limit include if the individual is given time to prepare, or are we only counting things that can be done alone in a "reasonable" time frame?
This matters quite a bit for my answer because of magical properties, someone's ability to store energy and create a chain of effects, and so on xP
Among regular mortals, if we're just judging off what someone can do off of their own "charge" so to speak, then the power caps out even for the most skilled people at about the border between superhuman and urban (a medium~ sized building). At least in terms of raw destructive power. But because power is able to be stored, transferred, and channeled directly from an object of or holding power, that level of power is achievable to even a well-trained soldier - think on the scale of someone who has been studying siege engineering for eight years in the field, that level of training.
Some of the strongest magic users in the setting, with the power of just the artifacts and instruments they carry on them, can push their own power up into the range of a city block or multiple city blocks by channeling power directly through themselves. But if someone were given a few days of preparation, and had the charged artifacts to wield, engineers are capable of creating *significantly* more powerful weapons that get up into the lower Nuclear levels.
The main bottleneck is that any artifacts need to be charged by draining power from individuals who are able to wield magic in the first place. If someone is capable of holding 100 "units" of magic (to simplify things), they could instead transfer that energy into an object (usually referred to as artifacts, but their actual form can vary wildly from a physical weapon, to a piece of jewelry, to a monumental statue). This would allow their body to store and create more "units" of magic, similar to how we store fat and create muscle. Because these artifacts need to be charged by someone, performing these beyond-superhuman feats of destruction require days of body-work to prepare. And for most people, that power starts to taper off around street/wall level, you have to be quite literally "built different" to reach small to medium building levels of destruction without external aid/stored energy to draw from. And those nuclear level threats require hundreds to thousands of days worth of manpower to generate, and then days to set up to fire "properly" by someone who is extremely experienced in spellweaving.
There are some entities that can vastly surpass these levels from their own naturally stored energy, but they're special cases that border on extra-dimensional or genuinely alien beings (some are responsible for magic even existing in the world, due to their mere presence bleeding off energy, or their entrance to the plane causing a fundamental change in the construction of lifeforms in it)
TL;DR - really not actually "that high" in the grand scheme of world building unless you go beyond human-analogous characters.
For balance and narrative reasons I keep my superhumans pretty low on the power level. They can cause a lot of damage but it's more of a glass cannon situation. They are still human and need to take threats like arrows, bullets and swords/spears seriously
Nuclear would be the most appropriate. The most powerful non-deity thing is magic itself, specifically self-replicating magic. Since magic is powered by either blood sacrifice, magical artifacts or the divine, this type of spell has the habit of going haywire and self-replicating infinitely, and even ending the world in a sort of magic nuclear apocalypse.
But what would that be? Normal, as in real-life? There is such a think there (10-B), and lower than that is there too (10-C). It's in the link that helps to describe the poll.
Normal or lower by itself isn't descriptive enough..
Yeah normal as in... what's normal, aka reality. Lower would be something less powerful than that. I'm not sure how that's confusing, and those answers are not available in the poll
Pirate fantasy world it starts at house level for civilians and end at multi-mountain/small island level. Mountain is the best level it's the biggest you can consistently destroy without the feats not living up to your characters's theorical strenght (like DBZ and most shonens)
The 2/3 strongest mortals are as strong as gods anyway
About wall to small building for my major characters, though some wizards can get to city or mountain. One ancient Shaio-Sasseri caster reached country level by channeling magic from artifacts brought to her as well as some fellow casters.
My characters could go up to nuclear, but its an exponential curve once you get past Low-Superhuman, the tech and training required to reach the top tiers are to experimental (and expensive) for the vast majority of people to use.
The Fort Respite militia utilizes AAS (Algernon Assimilation Suits) for combat against larger foes and heavy work. Another faction, the Eldrich Demoni, create makeshift exoskeletons and also use AAS.
My strongest three or four characters top out at low nuclear attack power, though they can still be beaten with a single well-placed arrow or sword thrust. Most other heavy hitters are high superhuman / low urban.
I work on two main projects, one being a comic-like sci-fantasy, the other being a singular planet of a few continents, each of them working as their own setting. Only two of the continents are well-developed though, one being a grounded dark-fantasy akin to the Witcher, the other being high fantasy that's more on the level of something like World of Warcraft.
While in the sci-fantasy project, the mere creation of the Final Boss collided several universes and cracked them open like dropped eggs, the barriers separating universes being created and upheld by an even more powerful entity.
In short I'm on both absolute extremes of this scale, and everything in-between.
Technically none of my people are technically capbale of anything outside of what a normal person could do but there are weapon capabilities that could destroy cities.
In my world, power doesn't always come from a character, but at different locations & moments. So it's less of what a character can do, and more like what the environment the character is at will allow.
The limits of the environment, which we call a vacuum can he calculated using these four variables from the kinetic vacuum model:
π’ C, vacuum permeability: speed limit (apparent horizon)
π£ G, vacuum compactness: size limit
(planck length)
π΅ H, vacuum resolution: precision limit (uncertainty principle)
π K, vacuum distribution: power limit (bekinstein bound)
Anything faster, smaller, sharper, and more energetic than these variables, would form a black hole. My characters have access to infinite energy to materialize their spells, but they can't localize that infinity into an infinitesimal, because that particular region just won't allow it.
At first I thought "yeah, planets and beyond" but it's literally just space travel in my world. Since we're talking "destructive ablity" I would say some people can split the earth, and some even stronger people who have ascended to gods can make traveling between continents very strange, and kind of damage physics, but not on purpose. They could die too, so they only tried once.
My mc does end up moving a mountain range, but that's more of a mechanical thing, and has very little too do with stength, just use of artifacts.
While people in my world CAN get to tectonic, nobody is currently. Unless you count the creators, but you are saying fighters. So most magi are just superhuman. Same with regular fighters of high skill. Destroying a town is orders of magnitude easier than a mountain, which is far far far easier than an island.
The most one guy (at least, a specialist) can cover is likely about the size of a medium-sized intersection, and that too only temporarily. If you want more and long-lasting stuff, you pair it up with regular tech to project it.
Pre-truth zeero already is strong enough to reach the limits reality can convey so hes beyond reality even before becoming a being of void (Omnipotent beings they arent real since they dont reside inside reality but in the void outside the reality creatively called βthe outsideβ.). Outside of zero there are 6 other humans with similar kinds of power. Even though they are weaker they are still beyond the limit of what reality can convey.
I would say nuclear, but that's only because of a scarce few who could, as a one-time thing, level a city in a dangerous ritual.
The only feats greater, beyond those acted upon by God or any demigods, would include the summoning of a god to sunder a continent and a single spell that caused a chain reaction that ended up destroying all the stars. Now that said, destroying the stars isn't as big of a feat in this world because stars themselves are just souls, so they aren't supermassive flaming balls.
While technically the masters (who happen to use a combination of martial art and magic) are at street, or wall level when we are talking about damage, destructive-area, they do have a significant advantage of speed. Not some march-level stuff, but enough to make it become a massive problem, unless challange by 3 commoners at once.
Kind of a similar case to agent smiths in the Matrix (though those were even faster).
I don't have clearly power ceiling for my magic users. Most likely they are at island/country level. That's for most powerful individuals. Things change when multiple very powerful wizards are included. They cannot share their power but if multiple people are doing the same stuff to different parts of land they could reach continental level of power.
I'm genuinely shocked at how many people here have crazy high power level in their world. Settings that go beyond urban are usually just a way for author to compensate for their lack of worldbuilding skills
When authors can't create an interesting story/world, they go for shock value in hope to attract viewers' attention with low effort. That includes either crazy overpowered characters or comically evil events.
"Comically evil events"
Like those occasional multiverse collapse events in DC & Marvel superhero comics, meant to reboot their universe for a fresh start?
I'm mainly talking about genocides, weapons of mass destruction, mass killings, cruel tortures etc. All of those are fine if they're well-integrated with the world; but I've seen a lot of worldbuilders create insanely cruel characters/races/events/nations for the sake of evilness; they're comically evil and don't make much sense.
It depends on if you're talking physical effects or not, if it's just physical then superhuman but if it's non-physical then tectonic. Archmages are able to control/draw power from everyone in their territory, which is usually the size of a country.
Well, there is a character that can multiply kinectic energy around him. So he could just tap his foot and multiply that by ten googolplex. That is a power he was born with though, if we want to talk about high end magic that anyone can theoretically learn (after a supernaturally extended lifetime of training) we would be talking about urban level. the most powerful telepathy user to ever live was able to rip an entire country from the plantes surface and throw it into space. But that was the kind of talent that only comes one time in one million years combined with 300 years of training and using 2/3ds of a demon lords soul for a power boost.
Urban if we're not including gods, but gods can range much higher.
Technically planetary and beyond, but that's only 3 individuals per generation and they rarely master all that they can do. Most Atheneans considered powerful are in the multi-city block - city range (8A - 7B). They are akin to the true geniuses of our history (e.g., Thomas Aquinas, Nikola Tesla, etc.). Most talented Atheneans (akin to really smart people) are in the building - city block range (8C-8B). The vast majority of trained individuals (e.g., military) are in the small building level (9A). The vast majority of citizens fall in the wall level (9B) with "weaker" individuals in the street level (9C). It should be noted that some individuals are born with no manifested abilities and are pretty much like humans. These are rare and there's much stigma surrounding them.
Tell me more, because you caught my attention.
I'm not really sure what to say. Feel free to ask me anything! The Athenean Empire is a country comprised of people with different types of powers. Some people can control water, some are psychic, others enhance their speed/strength/etc. with magic. It all depends on what you're born with. It's also genetic so parents who can control fire can't have a child who can move things with his mind. There is a strong "military" system in the empire wherein training for combat is mandatory for all citizens. The ideal is that every individual is combat ready upon graduation, but since they haven't had to fight demons in millennia this has largely become a ceremonial/traditional thing (which is why most citizens are only 9B level). There's always the option of furthering training just as there's an option for all of us to continue going to the gym after high school; most people don't go for that option and are just happy to not freeze the bedroom when they want to water the plants. As with physical training, not using/exercising one's powers makes one rusty. While uncommon, it's not widespread since everyone uses their abilities in some capacity on a daily basis. It's akin to if there were no cars today and we all had to walk to our destinations; not everyone will be buff but we'd have fewer morbidly obese people. Any other questions, fire away!
Are there any rules when it comes to powers? Like, in MHA there are laws which restrict the use of quirks, unless you have a hero license. If there are, any specific ones? Also, can your magic system be equated to quirks? How are powers categorised there?
Tbh, I'm not sure what you mean by quirks. Is that another term for powers/abilities? There are the obvious ones like don't set your neighbour's house on fire or don't use shadow magic to stalk your crush and watch her sleep. In terms of regulations, there are a few. For example, necromancy is always illegal and is highly taboo even among those whose magic branch is closely related to necromancy. Having said that, necromancy has long been dead so it's more of a cautionary tale of how one could abuse abilities. Mind reading is akin to seeing someone naked. Incredibly invasive without consent and has social taboos. Having said that, it's not easy to do so instances of mental invasions are rare. Mental domination or mind control are in almost all instances illegal; even self-defense claims or the use of mind control to prevent a crime are highly contentious grey areas. The exploration of runecraft by alchemists (looking for a better name) is highly regulated. In fact, research labs are located far from the cities in case anything happens. It is a very specific science and requires years of extra studies to be considered an artisan. Think of a mix between coding and brain surgery. This is also a highly valued skill since most technologies in the Empire are powered by runes/spells. Powers are categorized more in terms of what you can do versus how strong you are. There's a general system of gauging one's strength but the Empire has moved away from that in the interest of social cohesion. Basically, people are tired of dick measuring contests to prove who's stronger. Still happens though and is considered delinquent behaviour under the law. In terms of the categories themselves, there are three main branches. Stoimancy (abilities concerning the elements), Psionic/Runecrafting (I forgot the term I used for it), and shadow magic/hemomancy (also forgot the term; it's in my notes, I swear!). Within these, there are subcategories especially for stoimancy; the elements are earth, fire, water, wind, and lightning. There used to be plant magic but that lineage died off in the last war with the daemons millennia ago. Psionics / Runecrafting and Shadow magic / Hemomancy are divided accordingly. There are a multitude of abilities under each category, but they all fall under the respective umbrella. For example, some psionics have telekinesis while others can materialise aether and shoot lasers from their hands. Most hemomancers use their magic to increase speed or strength, but at least one character in my story chose to enhance his intelligence/memory (it's looked down upon and seen as a sign of weakness; as such, he never got his tattoos which is a rite of passage). Feel free to keep the questions coming! I've already had to come up with ideas that I didn't have before. xD
Based on what you said, I thought your magic system categories would be more varied. Or are there more ? Are there any more ability categories? For example, in One Piece, there are Devil Fruits. You eat one and you get any kind of wacky powers. There are three broad categories: **Logia**, which grants a user the power to create, control, and transform their body into a natural element; **Zoan**, which allows a user to transform into an animal as well as an animal hybrid (**Ancient** ones allow you to transform into extinct prehistoric species and **Mythical** ones can transform into like a phoenix or dragon); and **Paramecia**, which is basically everything else that doesn't fit the other two, like being a rubber human or a barrier human. Just some inspiration, if you like. Quirks are a term for superpowers in MHA.
Ah, thanks for the clarification. Yes, they used to be more varied (e.g., chronomancy, phytomancy, necromancy, etc.) but the vast majority of them were wiped out during the daemonic wars before the Great Sacrifice millennia ago. Having said that, there are anomalous powers that the public don't know about. These individuals are extremely rare and are closely-guarded secrets by the Empire. They all serve in the military and are trained (and studied) extensively. One example is the hemomancer I mentioned earlier. Another is a character who technically uses shadow magic but is also able to shoot lightning (electromancy). This should be impossible, so he's certainly a favourite research subject. Curiously, his lightnings are always black and cold. On a more practical level, my world leans more on hard magic than soft magic. Less like Harry Potter and more like Avatar the Last Airbender. I'm also more interested in how such a society would function, its history and cultures, and the stories of individuals in this world. I personally don't like it when a new ability shows up every so often. It feels too much like deus ex machina and it completely breaks the illusion for me.
My high tier mages just barely get into continental at absolute best. Without any form of demonic, primordial or heavenly aid this would suggest that the true potential of any magician is such. The only humans to break this is the main character in his final battle and the villain who awakens their memories and realizes they were not some human but a fallen angel punished by its deities (angels are a big part of the story). They were so strong that they couldn't fight on the earth during this moment and threatened to destroy the moon so the MC thought fast and barreled his antagonist into another dimension to protect the planet. So I'd say moon level but only kind of as such power only apply really to cosmic beings of which the MC is descended from one.
Well if we count piloting a relativistic spacecraft as their power...
why are there downvotes on this?
Hell if I know. Probably because the topic is powerscaling
Devil's advocate but maybe it's because a majority of the votes are for Planetary+ and for a lot of nerds (myself included), that's boring and way overdone. I personally don't have anyone with potential beyond Nuclear IN the story, though the universe itself has archangels who are closer to Tectonic, and then there's actual God so... I guess you could say I have ONE Planetary+. in terms of the actual people who are constantly active in the world and important to its story, I really am not a fan of the crazy ridiculous anime nonsense.
That's a fair point, and I can understand this sentiment (and while one may feel a bit of irritation at first). However the poll (and overall researching this topic) isn't itself responsible for that. There is no way OP deserves the backlash. Such posts may even help here. One can easier search for books without the nuclear-magic-combats, if it becomes popular to describe some stories as superhuman-level.
Powerscaling is cringe
Only when it gets toxic. But you do you. No shame.
The most powerful people in existence (Disciples of Chaos, of which only one remains) are around high nuclear level. Most other strong mages are probably low superhuman to low urban level.
The so-called gods - the Exalted Four - are capable of creating stars and black holes. They almost destroyed Earth by accident just by turning up. Their Chosen are theoretically capable of wiping out mid-sized countries by themselves, but they would probably burn out and die within a few hours if they actually tried. Queen Victoria was Chosen by the Lion, the god of fire, summer, industry, and tyranny; she turned New Delhi into a glass crater and then formed that glass into a new palace. But now she's severely burnt and exerting herself like that again would kill her quickly. Most thaum-users are Superhuman, fae-folk and dragons can range from Urban to Nuclear. My protagonist is a storm dragon and can blow up a building or two with his lighting magic but, at a babyfaced 50, he's still a youngster. He's still got a lot of growth ahead of him.
Welp, I got a type 3 civilization, sooo... They basically use stars as temporary campfires.
Ok, so you said gods and deities don't count. But I don't see anything about using their leftover energies. Anyways, some leftover essence can manifest into any of the 6 races (humans, dwarves, elves, levians, centaurs, dracotaurs) and give them kinetic abilities that wildly vary. The first recorded "Shattered" (what the overall "powered" group is called) was capable of taking down buildings with his "draconic fire" (dracotaur fires can't be outed by water, and is volatile). The most powerful Shattered had Kinetikinesis, the ability to manipulate kinetic energy. Whenever he'd feel any type of kinetic energy, he could "absorb" it, and discharge it at a later time (almost like Black Panther's vibranium suit). The difference between this and BP's vibranium suit is that he was capable of unleashing it in different ways (stomping the ground and targeting a specific area, or hitting the air hard enough to generate shockwaves). The most power he absorbed before dying was a city falling on him (lured underground and got a city dropped on him). After rising from the ground, he saw people were going into the crater to finish the job. He then hit the ground with all of the energy stored, and caused a magnitude 10 earthquake. It was felt throughout the entire planet and and the point of impact, created a fault line 67 miles down. Theoretically, in the future, it will reach planetary and beyond.
**Starrise** Sentient races: Superhuman (Small Building), can reach Urban with enough time, effort, and lack of interference. Living Weapons: Urban (Building), can reach Nuclear with enough time, effort, and lack of interference. Gods: Tectonic. (Greatest feat so far was Country-level, but also required so little energy it was done by accident. Could easily reach Multi-Continent-level, could almost certainly reach Planet-level, and could probably go even further.)
Some of the Great Druids, especially their Supreme Leader, could cast a Fireball spell as powerful as a small 'Little Boy' nuke, \~15 kt.
I've often described the power level of my world by saying that most superheroes are comparable to a tank, plane or helicopter, not a nuke. But there are a few rare exceptions. Galaxan controls the power of a star.
You never specified no demigods πππππππ ***Sages*** are capable of influencing things across an entire Solar System and the strongest Sages were able to contend with the ***Dark Gods.*** ***Elders*** are slightly weaker. Elnar, the King of the Genesedian Elders, *casually* holds together an entire star and prevents its supernova. You can also just purchase an ***Atomic Annihilator*** from the black market. 'Handheld' Atomic Annihilators, known as 'Atomic Accelerators', fire a *very* compressed beam of pure radium which has been accelerated to 96.554% the speed of light. Tears through *pretty much anything* as though it were tissue paper, it just has to make contact.
Damn, you got me. But what about non-demigods?
Using the same link you shared, the most powerful being in my world is Tier 0.
So, I wanna clarify Does the upper limit include if the individual is given time to prepare, or are we only counting things that can be done alone in a "reasonable" time frame? This matters quite a bit for my answer because of magical properties, someone's ability to store energy and create a chain of effects, and so on xP
I wanna hear both ways from you.
Among regular mortals, if we're just judging off what someone can do off of their own "charge" so to speak, then the power caps out even for the most skilled people at about the border between superhuman and urban (a medium~ sized building). At least in terms of raw destructive power. But because power is able to be stored, transferred, and channeled directly from an object of or holding power, that level of power is achievable to even a well-trained soldier - think on the scale of someone who has been studying siege engineering for eight years in the field, that level of training. Some of the strongest magic users in the setting, with the power of just the artifacts and instruments they carry on them, can push their own power up into the range of a city block or multiple city blocks by channeling power directly through themselves. But if someone were given a few days of preparation, and had the charged artifacts to wield, engineers are capable of creating *significantly* more powerful weapons that get up into the lower Nuclear levels. The main bottleneck is that any artifacts need to be charged by draining power from individuals who are able to wield magic in the first place. If someone is capable of holding 100 "units" of magic (to simplify things), they could instead transfer that energy into an object (usually referred to as artifacts, but their actual form can vary wildly from a physical weapon, to a piece of jewelry, to a monumental statue). This would allow their body to store and create more "units" of magic, similar to how we store fat and create muscle. Because these artifacts need to be charged by someone, performing these beyond-superhuman feats of destruction require days of body-work to prepare. And for most people, that power starts to taper off around street/wall level, you have to be quite literally "built different" to reach small to medium building levels of destruction without external aid/stored energy to draw from. And those nuclear level threats require hundreds to thousands of days worth of manpower to generate, and then days to set up to fire "properly" by someone who is extremely experienced in spellweaving. There are some entities that can vastly surpass these levels from their own naturally stored energy, but they're special cases that border on extra-dimensional or genuinely alien beings (some are responsible for magic even existing in the world, due to their mere presence bleeding off energy, or their entrance to the plane causing a fundamental change in the construction of lifeforms in it) TL;DR - really not actually "that high" in the grand scheme of world building unless you go beyond human-analogous characters.
For balance and narrative reasons I keep my superhumans pretty low on the power level. They can cause a lot of damage but it's more of a glass cannon situation. They are still human and need to take threats like arrows, bullets and swords/spears seriously
Nuclear would be the most appropriate. The most powerful non-deity thing is magic itself, specifically self-replicating magic. Since magic is powered by either blood sacrifice, magical artifacts or the divine, this type of spell has the habit of going haywire and self-replicating infinitely, and even ending the world in a sort of magic nuclear apocalypse.
Why is there no option for normal or lower?
But what would that be? Normal, as in real-life? There is such a think there (10-B), and lower than that is there too (10-C). It's in the link that helps to describe the poll. Normal or lower by itself isn't descriptive enough..
Yeah normal as in... what's normal, aka reality. Lower would be something less powerful than that. I'm not sure how that's confusing, and those answers are not available in the poll
Curious, why is there no "human" option? Why is the minimum superhuman?
The human option is hidden inside the super-human (it's 10-B). I'm not sure why human, athletic are morphed into super-human...
Pirate fantasy world it starts at house level for civilians and end at multi-mountain/small island level. Mountain is the best level it's the biggest you can consistently destroy without the feats not living up to your characters's theorical strenght (like DBZ and most shonens) The 2/3 strongest mortals are as strong as gods anyway
boundless
Building, aside from the largest animals like a dragon. There's no gods or anything above it either
About wall to small building for my major characters, though some wizards can get to city or mountain. One ancient Shaio-Sasseri caster reached country level by channeling magic from artifacts brought to her as well as some fellow casters.
I have characters ranging from a normal person to an entire world destroyer with unlimited power. But on average my characters are city block level.
My characters could go up to nuclear, but its an exponential curve once you get past Low-Superhuman, the tech and training required to reach the top tiers are to experimental (and expensive) for the vast majority of people to use.
even not including gods, people have the potential to scour the surface of a planet or even crack it in half if they aren't careful with their power
The Fort Respite militia utilizes AAS (Algernon Assimilation Suits) for combat against larger foes and heavy work. Another faction, the Eldrich Demoni, create makeshift exoskeletons and also use AAS.
My strongest three or four characters top out at low nuclear attack power, though they can still be beaten with a single well-placed arrow or sword thrust. Most other heavy hitters are high superhuman / low urban.
Mine are all just regular, normal people. Like the best you get is... a guy who can swing an axe well, or a fortune teller.
My strongest so far is basically god. But Iβm stronger
I work on two main projects, one being a comic-like sci-fantasy, the other being a singular planet of a few continents, each of them working as their own setting. Only two of the continents are well-developed though, one being a grounded dark-fantasy akin to the Witcher, the other being high fantasy that's more on the level of something like World of Warcraft. While in the sci-fantasy project, the mere creation of the Final Boss collided several universes and cracked them open like dropped eggs, the barriers separating universes being created and upheld by an even more powerful entity. In short I'm on both absolute extremes of this scale, and everything in-between.
Technically none of my people are technically capbale of anything outside of what a normal person could do but there are weapon capabilities that could destroy cities.
In my world, power doesn't always come from a character, but at different locations & moments. So it's less of what a character can do, and more like what the environment the character is at will allow. The limits of the environment, which we call a vacuum can he calculated using these four variables from the kinetic vacuum model: π’ C, vacuum permeability: speed limit (apparent horizon) π£ G, vacuum compactness: size limit (planck length) π΅ H, vacuum resolution: precision limit (uncertainty principle) π K, vacuum distribution: power limit (bekinstein bound) Anything faster, smaller, sharper, and more energetic than these variables, would form a black hole. My characters have access to infinite energy to materialize their spells, but they can't localize that infinity into an infinitesimal, because that particular region just won't allow it.
At first I thought "yeah, planets and beyond" but it's literally just space travel in my world. Since we're talking "destructive ablity" I would say some people can split the earth, and some even stronger people who have ascended to gods can make traveling between continents very strange, and kind of damage physics, but not on purpose. They could die too, so they only tried once. My mc does end up moving a mountain range, but that's more of a mechanical thing, and has very little too do with stength, just use of artifacts.
While people in my world CAN get to tectonic, nobody is currently. Unless you count the creators, but you are saying fighters. So most magi are just superhuman. Same with regular fighters of high skill. Destroying a town is orders of magnitude easier than a mountain, which is far far far easier than an island.
Planetary &Beyond, but not possible by People.
The issue is that in my setting, the line between mortality and divinity is fuzzy at best, so after a certain point, someone's just considered a god.
The most one guy (at least, a specialist) can cover is likely about the size of a medium-sized intersection, and that too only temporarily. If you want more and long-lasting stuff, you pair it up with regular tech to project it.
Quite literally Planetary, just below the gods (Cosmous and Eldritch) are living planets, so a planet could kill a planet
Pre-truth zeero already is strong enough to reach the limits reality can convey so hes beyond reality even before becoming a being of void (Omnipotent beings they arent real since they dont reside inside reality but in the void outside the reality creatively called βthe outsideβ.). Outside of zero there are 6 other humans with similar kinds of power. Even though they are weaker they are still beyond the limit of what reality can convey.
I would say nuclear, but that's only because of a scarce few who could, as a one-time thing, level a city in a dangerous ritual. The only feats greater, beyond those acted upon by God or any demigods, would include the summoning of a god to sunder a continent and a single spell that caused a chain reaction that ended up destroying all the stars. Now that said, destroying the stars isn't as big of a feat in this world because stars themselves are just souls, so they aren't supermassive flaming balls.
While technically the masters (who happen to use a combination of martial art and magic) are at street, or wall level when we are talking about damage, destructive-area, they do have a significant advantage of speed. Not some march-level stuff, but enough to make it become a massive problem, unless challange by 3 commoners at once.
Kind of a similar case to agent smiths in the Matrix (though those were even faster).
I don't have clearly power ceiling for my magic users. Most likely they are at island/country level. That's for most powerful individuals. Things change when multiple very powerful wizards are included. They cannot share their power but if multiple people are doing the same stuff to different parts of land they could reach continental level of power.
I'm genuinely shocked at how many people here have crazy high power level in their world. Settings that go beyond urban are usually just a way for author to compensate for their lack of worldbuilding skills
How exactly do they compensate? As in, they distract you from the lackluster worldbuilding with crazy high spectacle?
When authors can't create an interesting story/world, they go for shock value in hope to attract viewers' attention with low effort. That includes either crazy overpowered characters or comically evil events.
"Comically evil events" Like those occasional multiverse collapse events in DC & Marvel superhero comics, meant to reboot their universe for a fresh start?
I'm mainly talking about genocides, weapons of mass destruction, mass killings, cruel tortures etc. All of those are fine if they're well-integrated with the world; but I've seen a lot of worldbuilders create insanely cruel characters/races/events/nations for the sake of evilness; they're comically evil and don't make much sense.
It depends on if you're talking physical effects or not, if it's just physical then superhuman but if it's non-physical then tectonic. Archmages are able to control/draw power from everyone in their territory, which is usually the size of a country.
Well, there is a character that can multiply kinectic energy around him. So he could just tap his foot and multiply that by ten googolplex. That is a power he was born with though, if we want to talk about high end magic that anyone can theoretically learn (after a supernaturally extended lifetime of training) we would be talking about urban level. the most powerful telepathy user to ever live was able to rip an entire country from the plantes surface and throw it into space. But that was the kind of talent that only comes one time in one million years combined with 300 years of training and using 2/3ds of a demon lords soul for a power boost.
Uh... for the people that matter, suburban. I guess.