Cassandra Cain and Batman VS Midnighter

Hm. At this level, one could flip a coin. Midnighter's computer would still give him a tremendous advantage, the issue is that he may still get nailed because he is nerfed in speed and strength. Sometimes knowing the right thing to do doesn't matter simply because you can't move fast enough to do it.

I'll go with the team because of strength in numbers.

Midnighter showed functional superhuman strength on an earth-shattering scale when he appeared in Grifter's comic. He's shown the ability to inflict damage on Martian Manhunter and characters on his level. DC Midnighter may not match up to Wildstorm Midnighter, but he should still have wrecked Grayson with no problem.

@hatemalingsia said:

@zhurong@bat_girl_cc

That Midnighter would need to wait for his opponent to attack first has been disproved by countless comics. One thing that says he does in no way erases the numerous times he's shown he doesn't.

The characters most fitting your description would be Nemesis and Zealot. They're both superhumanly strong, bulletproof to a degree, and fast enough to block bullets. Neither they nor Midnighter's physical strength has a clear measure so its hard to say there's no stat edge, and since Midnighter's high strength feats can easily be seen as exploiting weak points instead of outright strength, those don't really clear things up. Where speed is concerned, determining how much Midnighter knowing every move that's going to be made and being able to act at the right time (or before it) affects how perceived speed is impossible, so like strength, it's hard to say if Midnighter's speed is truly greater or not. But we do know Midnighter has skill of his own, he's been seen training against holograms, he's provided a breakdown of martial arts being used in a fight where he was unable to actually interfere, and he's commented on training he's received, so he's not wholly skill-less. Back to Zealot and Nemesis, assuming theyre near-equals physically, as would be the case in this fight, they'd still blow Batman or Cass out of the water in terms of skill and teamwork so Midnighter's bouts with them would be less than helpful. That said, he more or less lost to Nemesis, though he wasn't at a disadvantage in their fight until Jack Hawksmoor got involved, despite having his brain messed with at the time (I'd note, a precaution that Nemesis thought would be necessary to engage him). And he beat Nemesis after hours and hours of combat and taking a pretty good hit. Other mentions would be Assassin8, a killer built and trained to take him (and the rest of the authority) out. Midnighter beat him and was enjoying that fight. Also, two androids also built to take Midnighter out that would turn off all his powers if they laid one hand on him. He defeated the two of them at once in close combat without effort.

What is fighting skill? It seems to me knowing how to maneuver and position yourself and parts of your body to achieve your ends (namely, maximum damage) and to counter your opponents ability to do the same is what it comes down to. And whether Midnighter's pure skill allows him to do that is largely irrelevant. His combat computer gives him the very same information, and he clearly has the muscle memory and physical ability to pull off his moves quickly, accurately, and with the appropriate force. I personally think that even if his trained skill isn't on their level, his combat computer is more than enough to fill the gap because it would tell him all the right moves and counters to make, just like their skill would be telling them, except he'd know everything right at the start whereas they'd be playing catch up. Sure, 2 on 1 is an obvious advantage, but with Midnighter being able to take on anywhere from a dozen to a million coordinated enemies at once, it doesn't seem so significant. And 2 on 1 only lasts until Midnighter kills Batman, then its one fighter that can see the next couple moves fighting someone that can see every move.

Just noticed this now. I put the wrong Cass pic. IIRC it was Cass dodging bullets, it was supposed to be Cass fighting Deathstroke. Oh well, no harm done.

@buckshot:

The characters most fitting your description would be Nemesis and Zealot. They're both superhumanly strong, bulletproof to a degree, and fast enough to block bullets. Neither they nor Midnighter's physical strength has a clear measure so its hard to say there's no stat edge, and since Midnighter's high strength feats can easily be seen as exploiting weak points instead of outright strength, those don't really clear things up. Where speed is concerned, determining how much Midnighter knowing every move that's going to be made and being able to act at the right time (or before it) affects how perceived speed is impossible, so like strength, it's hard to say if Midnighter's speed is truly greater or not. But we do know Midnighter has skill of his own, he's been seen training against holograms, he's provided a breakdown of martial arts being used in a fight where he was unable to actually interfere, and he's commented on training he's received, so he's not wholly skill-less.

Fair enough. I was aware of midnighters fight with zealot but admittedly his fight with nemesis was news to me. I wasn't saying midnighter was skilless, I was mostly just saying his skill level isn't really established.He is skilled with using pressure points like on apollo and maul.

Back to Zealot and Nemesis, assuming theyre near-equals physically, as would be the case in this fight, they'd still blow Batman or Cass out of the water in terms of skill

Are you saying zealot and nemesis are far more skilled than Cass and batman? If so what makes you say that? Apologies for the misunderstanding.

and teamwork so Midnighter's bouts with them would be less than helpful.

I'm not sure what kind of team work zealot and nemesis have had but my understanding is they have never fought midnighter at the same time.

That said, he more or less lost to Nemesis, though he wasn't at a disadvantage in their fight until Jack Hawksmoor got involved, despite having his brain messed with at the time (I'd note, a precaution that Nemesis thought would be necessary to engage him). And he beat Nemesis after hours and hours of combat and taking a pretty good hit.

Impressive.

Other mentions would be Assassin8, a killer built and trained to take him (and the rest of the authority) out. Midnighter beat him and was enjoying that fight. Also, two androids also built to take Midnighter out that would turn off all his powers if they laid one hand on him. He defeated the two of them at once in close combat without effort.

Do we have anything to compare assassin 8's performance to? Did the androids actually touch midnighter and shut his powers down?

What is fighting skill? It seems to me knowing how to maneuver and position yourself and parts of your body to achieve your ends (namely, maximum damage) and to counter your opponents ability to do the same is what it comes down to. And whether Midnighter's pure skill allows him to do that is largely irrelevant. His combat computer gives him the very same information, and he clearly has the muscle memory and physical ability to pull off his moves quickly, accurately, and with the appropriate force. I personally think that even if his trained skill isn't on their level, his combat computer is more than enough to fill the gap because it would tell him all the right moves and counters to make, just like their skill would be telling them, except he'd know everything right at the start whereas they'd be playing catch up.

Well I agree with your thoughts on what skill is. But I don't think the battle computer alone is enough. I mean midnighter may know exactly what they are going to do but he needs the skill and physicals to counter them still. Using Karnak as an example he can see the weaknesses in other peoples fighting styles, but he has never done well against black panther in their fights because he doesn't have the speed and skill to counter him. Obviously midnighter is better and more competent than karnak (and speeds not an issue here), but there abilities are kind of similar so I think it shows that midnighter does need to be comparable in terms of fighting skills. In this setup midnighters physicals are equal to theirs so in this scenario its just a matter of skill. An example of what I mean is in Midnighters fight with zealot midnighter tried to restrain her but zealot was skilled enough to counter. Granted the end result was a stalemate, but if we are assuming that they are equal physically it means zealot used skill to even things out. I believe I saw a scan of midnighter even stating before the fight he saw a scenario where he won but when they fought they stalemated despite the battle computer.

Another issue is doesn't midnighter like to drag out fights to make them more fun? So its still up to midnighter to pick the scenario he wants to follow.

Sure, 2 on 1 is an obvious advantage, but with Midnighter being able to take on anywhere from a dozen to a million coordinated enemies at once, it doesn't seem so significant. And 2 on 1 only lasts until Midnighter kills Batman, then its one fighter that can see the next couple moves fighting someone that can see every move.

When you say midnighter can take down a dozen to a million enemies at once, what kind of enemies do you mean? Cass and Bruce aren't really comparable to fodder IMO. If midnighter is fighting and beating coordinated teams, than that is something, but than it would depend on what kind of teams midnighter is taking down. Midnighter is fighting 2 enemies here that are physically even with him. If we are using performances like his fight with zealot as a measuring stick here (I'm not familiar with his fight with nemesis so I'm not sure what happened), that was just one enemy coming at him. Even if you argue midnighter had the upper hand zealot did pretty well and from what I recall I don't think zealot outclasses batman and Cass too much if at all in terms of skill.

Midnighter is leagues above them. Even equalized he still has a battle computer that shows him every way to victory, and that whole Grayson nonsense about him having to wait for an attack is blasphemous

@jashro44:

I agree that Midnighter's pure skill isn't really established. It's an incredibly hard thing for him to showcase separately from anything else given his powers as well as the people he tends to fight. However, I think what he does have is sufficient.

Though I don't really like getting into discussions about fighting skill, I'll say yes I do think Zealot and Nemesis are far more skilled than Cassandra and Batman. By pretty much any metric commonly used to determine skill, they come out ahead. People often talk about how long characters have trained. Zealot and Nemesis have been masters of close quarters combat for thousands of years (Zealot's contemporary is Majestic, who is like 10,000). People talk about when characters started learning (for example, Cassandra being trained in combat since birth) and Zealot and Nemesis have been trailed to kill since birth. People talk about who characters were taught by, and while this is a less solid thing for Zealot and Nemesis, there's still something. Their culture is largely is largely built around physical combat. It's their art, their entertainment, their science, their language (more on that later), and everything else (this is not my interpretation, this has been explicitly stated). They are DEDICATED to warfare on a very personal level. Their entire culture is their teacher. Beyond that, Nemesis was trained by Zealot (and a slew of other Coda that followed Zealot). People talk about reputation and recognition, and Zealot is widely considered, both on Earth and on her home planet of Khera, to be the best sword fighter in existence, and the rest of her combat skills aren't far behind. And Nemesis is her near equal (and maybe better unarmed or with things that arent swords). Zealot was the leader of the Coda (I say was because she eventually left them then hundreds of years later tracked them all down and killed them almost everywhere they were on the planet because theyd become a worldwide organization and one she didn't like anymore), the faction of her people most dedicated to close quarters combat. Heck, it's rumored in the wildstorm universe that all Earth combat came from Zealot back when she landed on Earth before recorded history and taught her followers. People also talk about unique skills characters have (like Batgirl's move reading), and Zealot and Nemesis take that sort of move reading to a whole new level. They read body language to the point where they can have whole conversations and pass secret messages to each other through silent combat. To them, combat IS language. Fighting is better than texting. The thing that makes Batgirl so special is like an afterthought for them, it's just default for any Coda warrior. Really, the only thing people talk about to discuss skill that Zealot and Nemesis don't thoroughly win on is who they've beaten. But that's mostly because Wildstorm doesn't really have a lot of characters with nothing but fighting skill for them to engage with (the only skilled fighters they mess with that they don't instantly kill are other Kherans like Backlash, who also has thousands of years of combat experience and is also considered the top hand to hand fighter on earth), and the universe doesn't have decades and decades of stories and characters to call on. But really, that last metric is just ABC logic anyway so take that for what it's worth. So yeah, with Nemesis and Zealot having been trained to kill from birth and having had thousands and thousands of years absolutely dedicated to improving their skills, being considered to be easily in the top 5 of fighters in their entire universe, if not the very best, and having Batgirl's abilities as almost an afterthought, I think they're far more skilled than Cassandra and Batman.

When it comes to teamwork I was just talking about them in general (this is why you don't split up sentences when you respond to someone). Their skill is so beyond the bats that comparing how they did against Midnighter wouldn't say much.

Well Assassin8 did successfully take down every member of The Authority except for Jenny Quantum. He was obviously well trained, prepped, and outfitted. The androids never touched Midnighter.

You're saying Midnighter may know exactly what they're going to do but he needs the skill and physicals to counter it. I don't know what that means. He has the physical ability (even if all their stats are equal) and you said you agreed with my description of skill (knowing how to move and act to accomplish what he wants to and stop them from accomplishing what they want to, which is exactly what his combat computer would be telling him) so he has that too. In your example with Karnak, you point to him not having the skill to counter Black Panther, I'm not going to get into that whole thing, but what is the "skill" he's missing? The knowledge of how to counter? Midnighter would have that. The physical ability to pull it off? Midnighter would have that. The comparison doesn't really work because unless your definition of skill is something entirely different (which it shouldn't be since you've expressed agreement with how I presented skill), then Midnighter has that in spades thanks to his combat computer.

Zealot had the knowledge of how to move and the physical ability to do so, sure. She had the skill to counter Midnighter's move. By that understanding of skill, Midnighter has the same thanks to his combat computer. Zealot also having skill (and again, it's far more skill that any bat character has) doesn't mean Midnighter lacks it. It's not like her being able to get out of the grip means he lacks skill any more than her getting stuck in that position to begin with means she lacks skill. Just because it's presented as a good fight with a nice back and forth doesn't mean one character is lower on skill. Sure you could see it as Zealot using her skill to equal things out, but the whole fight could also easily be seen as midnighter using his combat computer to at the very least stalemate a character with more combat skill than the entire human race. You're seeing it as two equals where the skills makes up for not having a combat computer and anyone with skill could also fill that gap, but you have to consider how much skill she has, because the way I see it, the combat computer allows midnighter to beat a character with so much skill that it should be impossible to even stand in a ring with her. And I said "at least stalemate" because in my reading, Midnighter won that fight. He took a really good hit from her, but the fight ended with him holding her sword in her neck with them being evenly matched and both choking each other out immediately before that. One of them backed down and it wasn't Midnighter, counts as a win in my book. If someone had a sword digging into my neck, I wouldn't call it a stalemate.

I don't see how Midnighter choosing how he's going to fight is in any way a disadvantage. How is it any different from a pure skill fighter choosing what tactic or style they want to start with? Actually, the difference is that Midnighter knows how the whole fight will go.

Midnighter has fought groups of all sorts, trained military, coordinated super teams, teams of villains that had been a match for stormwatch in other books, etc, etc. They're not all nameless badguys. Batman and Cassandra may not be fodder but at some point it doesn't matter what the skill level of the enemy is. Midnighter fought a million aliens and was doing fine except for his head feeling weird because he was calculating all the scenarios for a HUGE number of enemies at once. A million is a lot regardless of what it is. Batman and Cass couldn't take a million enemies at once even if they were just thugs.

Sure, Zealot was just one enemy coming at him, but she was one enemy with far more skill than Batman and Cassandra combined. And knowing exactly what moves both of his enemies are going to make he can engage one while knowing exactly where to be to avoid the other. It's so strange to me that Batgirl gets so much credit for knowing what an enemy will do but Midnighter can know every move coming down the pipeline but just add one more body and now its too much for him.

@buckshot said:

@jestersmiles said:

@bat_girl_cc said:

@jashro44 said:

I'll say the team. Not sure if midnighter has faced an established fighter he never had a stat edge on. The battle computer is an advantage but it can be overcome I am sure.

He'd stomp under regular conditions.

In the New 52 Grayson gave him trouble on 2 ocasions, but that was WIS.

Also, in the first, Dick was winning until Midnighter admitted that he was holding-back, then he beat up on dick, and on the second, dick started by move-reading him, but he got eventually overwhelmed...anyway, Grayson lasting even 5 seconds in a fight against Midnighter, its WIS.

How would Bruce and Cass overcome the battle computer?

You are assuming the New 52 midnighter is as strong as his Stormwatch version, which is uncertain. So saying his showings in Grayson is WIS is a bit jumping the gun In my opinion.

Midnighter showed functional superhuman strength on an earth-shattering scale when he appeared in Grifter's comic. He's shown the ability to inflict damage on Martian Manhunter and characters on his level. DC Midnighter may not match up to Wildstorm Midnighter, but he should still have wrecked Grayson with no problem.

@hatemalingsia said:

@zhurong@bat_girl_cc

That Midnighter would need to wait for his opponent to attack first has been disproved by countless comics. One thing that says he does in no way erases the numerous times he's shown he doesn't.

@jashro44 said:

I'll say the team. Not sure if midnighter has faced an established fighter he never had a stat edge on. The battle computer is an advantage but it can be overcome I am sure.

He'd stomp under regular conditions.

The characters most fitting your description would be Nemesis and Zealot. They're both superhumanly strong, bulletproof to a degree, and fast enough to block bullets. Neither they nor Midnighter's physical strength has a clear measure so its hard to say there's no stat edge, and since Midnighter's high strength feats can easily be seen as exploiting weak points instead of outright strength, those don't really clear things up. Where speed is concerned, determining how much Midnighter knowing every move that's going to be made and being able to act at the right time (or before it) affects how perceived speed is impossible, so like strength, it's hard to say if Midnighter's speed is truly greater or not. But we do know Midnighter has skill of his own, he's been seen training against holograms, he's provided a breakdown of martial arts being used in a fight where he was unable to actually interfere, and he's commented on training he's received, so he's not wholly skill-less. Back to Zealot and Nemesis, assuming theyre near-equals physically, as would be the case in this fight, they'd still blow Batman or Cass out of the water in terms of skill and teamwork so Midnighter's bouts with them would be less than helpful. That said, he more or less lost to Nemesis, though he wasn't at a disadvantage in their fight until Jack Hawksmoor got involved, despite having his brain messed with at the time (I'd note, a precaution that Nemesis thought would be necessary to engage him). And he beat Nemesis after hours and hours of combat and taking a pretty good hit. Other mentions would be Assassin8, a killer built and trained to take him (and the rest of the authority) out. Midnighter beat him and was enjoying that fight. Also, two androids also built to take Midnighter out that would turn off all his powers if they laid one hand on him. He defeated the two of them at once in close combat without effort.

What is fighting skill? It seems to me knowing how to maneuver and position yourself and parts of your body to achieve your ends (namely, maximum damage) and to counter your opponents ability to do the same is what it comes down to. And whether Midnighter's pure skill allows him to do that is largely irrelevant. His combat computer gives him the very same information, and he clearly has the muscle memory and physical ability to pull off his moves quickly, accurately, and with the appropriate force. I personally think that even if his trained skill isn't on their level, his combat computer is more than enough to fill the gap because it would tell him all the right moves and counters to make, just like their skill would be telling them, except he'd know everything right at the start whereas they'd be playing catch up. Sure, 2 on 1 is an obvious advantage, but with Midnighter being able to take on anywhere from a dozen to a million coordinated enemies at once, it doesn't seem so significant. And 2 on 1 only lasts until Midnighter kills Batman, then its one fighter that can see the next couple moves fighting someone that can see every move.

" Midnighter showed functional superhuman strength on an earth-shattering scale when he appeared in Grifter's comic. He's shown the ability to inflict damage on Martian Manhunter and characters on his level. DC Midnighter may not match up to Wildstorm Midnighter, but he should still have wrecked Grayson with no problem. "

Exactly.

" That Midnighter would need to wait for his opponent to attack first has been disproved by countless comics. One thing that says he does in no way erases the numerous times he's shown he doesn't. "

That's what i thought.

" Sure, 2 on 1 is an obvious advantage, but with Midnighter being able to take on anywhere from a dozen to a million coordinated enemies at once, it doesn't seem so significant. And 2 on 1 only lasts until Midnighter kills Batman, then its one fighter that can see the next couple moves fighting someone that can see every move. "

This is why i didn't gave the team the win right way, although Cass can actually know her opponents next moves way before they actually make them, and with stats equalized, plus Batman helping Cass, this should be interesting.

@buckshot:

I agree that Midnighter's pure skill isn't really established. It's an incredibly hard thing for him to showcase separately from anything else given his powers as well as the people he tends to fight. However, I think what he does have is sufficient.

Alright.

Though I don't really like getting into discussions about fighting skill, I'll say yes I do think Zealot and Nemesis are far more skilled than Cassandra and Batman. By pretty much any metric commonly used to determine skill, they come out ahead. People often talk about how long characters have trained. Zealot and Nemesis have been masters of close quarters combat for thousands of years (Zealot's contemporary is Majestic, who is like 10,000). People talk about when characters started learning (for example, Cassandra being trained in combat since birth) and Zealot and Nemesis have been trailed to kill since birth. People talk about who characters were taught by, and while this is a less solid thing for Zealot and Nemesis, there's still something. Their culture is largely is largely built around physical combat. It's their art, their entertainment, their science, their language (more on that later), and everything else (this is not my interpretation, this has been explicitly stated). They are DEDICATED to warfare on a very personal level. Their entire culture is their teacher. Beyond that, Nemesis was trained by Zealot (and a slew of other Coda that followed Zealot). People talk about reputation and recognition, and Zealot is widely considered, both on Earth and on her home planet of Khera, to be the best sword fighter in existence, and the rest of her combat skills aren't far behind. And Nemesis is her near equal (and maybe better unarmed or with things that arent swords). Zealot was the leader of the Coda (I say was because she eventually left them then hundreds of years later tracked them all down and killed them almost everywhere they were on the planet because theyd become a worldwide organization and one she didn't like anymore), the faction of her people most dedicated to close quarters combat. Heck, it's rumored in the wildstorm universe that all Earth combat came from Zealot back when she landed on Earth before recorded history and taught her followers. People also talk about unique skills characters have (like Batgirl's move reading), and Zealot and Nemesis take that sort of move reading to a whole new level. They read body language to the point where they can have whole conversations and pass secret messages to each other through silent combat. To them, combat IS language. Fighting is better than texting. The thing that makes Batgirl so special is like an afterthought for them, it's just default for any Coda warrior. Really, the only thing people talk about to discuss skill that Zealot and Nemesis don't thoroughly win on is who they've beaten. But that's mostly because Wildstorm doesn't really have a lot of characters with nothing but fighting skill for them to engage with (the only skilled fighters they mess with that they don't instantly kill are other Kherans like Backlash, who also has thousands of years of combat experience and is also considered the top hand to hand fighter on earth), and the universe doesn't have decades and decades of stories and characters to call on. But really, that last metric is just ABC logic anyway so take that for what it's worth. So yeah, with Nemesis and Zealot having been trained to kill from birth and having had thousands and thousands of years absolutely dedicated to improving their skills, being considered to be easily in the top 5 of fighters in their entire universe, if not the very best, and having Batgirl's abilities as almost an afterthought, I think they're far more skilled than Cassandra and Batman.

I don't think length of training means much. Ras al ghul has trained a lot longer than batman but batman has beaten him pretty easily on a number of occasions. I would say the overall quality of the experience is what matters once you have a certain amount. I only think experience is an advantage when one character is really lacking it but I think Cass and batman have enough.

The rest of what you said sounds really impressive. The only things I might be willing to say is what have nemesis and zealot done with there move reading? Passing secret messages through combat is impressive but Cass can do similar. I remember in one issue of batgirl she came to David Cains jail sell and started punching him over and over to try and figure out if shiva was her mother. She didn't get any info because David would have rather died than tell her who Cass's mother was (thats what his body language told her). I also remember other stuff like her reading superboys emotions to determine superboy likes her, she figured out lady shiva wanted to die, or how when she got her move reading back she predicted batmans moves by the way he was breathing. I'm guessing zealot and nemesis move reading can do similar things? But out of curiosity what makes there move reading better? Because Cass can talk through violence as well, and I think if she was fighting someone else who can speak through violence she could pass a secret message along.

I think Cass has also taken it a step further than just communicating, by even using her move reading to copy other peoples fighting techniques. Can Zealot and Nemesis do that as well?

When it comes to teamwork I was just talking about them in general (this is why you don't split up sentences when you respond to someone). Their skill is so beyond the bats that comparing how they did against Midnighter wouldn't say much.

OK but they still fought midnighter one at a time though. So there team working skills weren't an issue unlike in this scenario. Even if Zealot and Nemesis are way more skilled than Cass and batman midnighter has to deal with both of them at once. So its not just the individual skills of Cass and Bruce he has to deal with but the combined skills of them both which makes this a bit different than midnighters battle with zealot. He is defending against 2 combatants who are basically individually equal to him in speed. There are going to be different attacks coming from different angles, and midnighters speed is limited to whoever you consider to be faster between batman and Cass.

Well Assassin8 did successfully take down every member of The Authority except for Jenny Quantum. He was obviously well trained, prepped, and outfitted. The androids never touched Midnighter.

The fight with assassin 8 sounds impressive. The fight with the androids doesn't seem impressive if midnighter had his stats.

You're saying Midnighter may know exactly what they're going to do but he needs the skill and physicals to counter it. I don't know what that means. He has the physical ability (even if all their stats are equal) and you said you agreed with my description of skill (knowing how to move and act to accomplish what he wants to and stop them from accomplishing what they want to, which is exactly what his combat computer would be telling him) so he has that too.

The computer may tell midnighter how to win but midnighter still has to able to perform the actions. Maybe I don't fully understand how the computer functions but does it only give him knowledge on scenarios that are 100% guaranteed to work? Like if it can provide a scenario does this mean that the scenario has a 0% chance of failing?

In your example with Karnak, you point to him not having the skill to counter Black Panther, I'm not going to get into that whole thing, but what is the "skill" he's missing? The knowledge of how to counter? Midnighter would have that. The physical ability to pull it off? Midnighter would have that. The comparison doesn't really work because unless your definition of skill is something entirely different (which it shouldn't be since you've expressed agreement with how I presented skill), then Midnighter has that in spades thanks to his combat computer.

I was originally thinking that Karnak knows how to counter black panther but he doesn't have the actual technique to beat black panther. Having the knowledge and being able to use the knowledge aren't the same thing is what I am trying to say I guess. All though rethinking things I guess this comparison doesn't work. I am guessing now that I think about it, the computer makes sure that midnighter is capable of performing the action? So he would only lose here if he has no chance of winning?

Zealot had the knowledge of how to move and the physical ability to do so, sure. She had the skill to counter Midnighter's move. By that understanding of skill, Midnighter has the same thanks to his combat computer. Zealot also having skill (and again, it's far more skill that any bat character has) doesn't mean Midnighter lacks it. It's not like her being able to get out of the grip means he lacks skill any more than her getting stuck in that position to begin with means she lacks skill. Just because it's presented as a good fight with a nice back and forth doesn't mean one character is lower on skill. Sure you could see it as Zealot using her skill to equal things out, but the whole fight could also easily be seen as midnighter using his combat computer to at the very least stalemate a character with more combat skill than the entire human race. You're seeing it as two equals where the skills makes up for not having a combat computer and anyone with skill could also fill that gap, but you have to consider how much skill she has, because the way I see it, the combat computer allows midnighter to beat a character with so much skill that it should be impossible to even stand in a ring with her. And I said "at least stalemate" because in my reading, Midnighter won that fight. He took a really good hit from her, but the fight ended with him holding her sword in her neck with them being evenly matched and both choking each other out immediately before that. One of them backed down and it wasn't Midnighter, counts as a win in my book. If someone had a sword digging into my neck, I wouldn't call it a stalemate.

I agree that zealot being skilled doesn't mean midnighter is lacking and I am not saying that midnighter isn't a good fighter. Just that zealot being a better fighter was able to match midnighter despite the battle computer. My point of her getting out of the grip wasn't that midnighters submission technique sucks. But midnighter putting her into that hold was his attempt to finish the fight and incapacitate her? I assume he got the idea to use the submission hold as well from the battle computer. If thats the case than that kind of comes back to what I was trying to get across with the whole karnak thing. The computer told him how to win, and midnighter tried a method and asked zealot to tap out but zealot was able to counter that method because midnighter lacked the skill to restrain her. At least thats what I got from the scans.

From what I saw of the fight I don't think midnighter won. Him disarming someone as skilled as zealot is impressive but they both had each other by the throat. They both looked like they could go a few more rounds, before Maul arrived from the scans I've seen.

I don't see how Midnighter choosing how he's going to fight is in any way a disadvantage. How is it any different from a pure skill fighter choosing what tactic or style they want to start with? Actually, the difference is that Midnighter knows how the whole fight will go.

I think if midnighter wants to win he needs a scenario where he has no chance of losing, but if he wont pick that scenario because he favours the more bloody one I think that puts him at a disadvantage.

Midnighter has fought groups of all sorts, trained military, coordinated super teams, teams of villains that had been a match for stormwatch in other books, etc, etc. They're not all nameless badguys. Batman and Cassandra may not be fodder but at some point it doesn't matter what the skill level of the enemy is. Midnighter fought a million aliens and was doing fine except for his head feeling weird because he was calculating all the scenarios for a HUGE number of enemies at once. A million is a lot regardless of what it is. Batman and Cass couldn't take a million enemies at once even if they were just thugs.

Fair enough.

Sure, Zealot was just one enemy coming at him, but she was one enemy with far more skill than Batman and Cassandra combined. And knowing exactly what moves both of his enemies are going to make he can engage one while knowing exactly where to be to avoid the other. It's so strange to me that Batgirl gets so much credit for knowing what an enemy will do but Midnighter can know every move coming down the pipeline but just add one more body and now its too much for him.

I think Cassies move reading is very impressive and gives her an edge on a lot of fighters. But if she were in a similar scenario I would say she loses as well. There was a bullseye and daredevil vs cassandra cain thread a while back where I said the duo would stomp her. I think she could beat either individually for a majority but fighting off 2 enemies like that is just really difficult. Even if you think she can beat either enemy easily in a one on one fight I think the addition of an extra body makes a big difference.

Its the same idea here. Maybe even under these conditions midnighter would beat either handily but facing both at the same time is a big difference IMO. Especially since Cass and Bruce have experience working as a team. Midnighter may have experience dealing with large numbers but I think the duo coming at him at the same time means a lot in this setup.

Cass and Bat

Haven't read much about Midnighter but I know MMH has owned him mentally. Batman is Batman, Cassie is formidable perhaps the team can take him.

This is just a sad attempt to nerf Midnighter down far enough to get a Batfamily win over him, but it is still not enough, Midnighter still wins.

I don't want to get too into it because I'm fine with leaving it with us disagreeing on how much an extra body will matter since Midnighter's skill is a nebulous thing, but there were some comments I wanted to make.

I don't think length of training means much. Ras al ghul has trained a lot longer than batman but batman has beaten him pretty easily on a number of occasions. I would say the overall quality of the experience is what matters once you have a certain amount. I only think experience is an advantage when one character is really lacking it but I think Cass and batman have enough.

So you think that after a few decades skill just plateaus and nothing more useful can be learned? That would be the implication of your point about Batman beating Ras. How about I-Ching, O-Sensei, or Sensei? They've trained for longer than Batman and have shown to be better than him, even beating him easily. So does that lend credence to the idea that continued training over years can lead to greater ability? And that's with their human bodies. Imagine if they could continue to be in the prime of their lives for thousands of years, not getting physically weaker as their skills grew. As for the quality of the experience, I'd say Zealot more than has that. Batman occasionally goes up against characters that are around his level in skill, but MOST of his time fighting is against thugs who he barely needs skill to beat and characters that he's outsmarting more than he is outfighting. Zealot and Nemesis spent thousands of years honing their skills against and alongside characters brought up in their same martially-focused environment. Literally every social outlet for them is combat. When I say it's their religion, their art, their language, their entertainment, their politics, it's not an exaggeration or a metaphor. Their culture revolves around warfare so I think her quality is up to snuff. It's not JUST that she's been around along time, it's that all of that time she's been fighting and training (whether that's training herself or training others).

The rest of what you said sounds really impressive. The only things I might be willing to say is what have nemesis and zealot done with there move reading? Passing secret messages through combat is impressive but Cass can do similar. I remember in one issue of batgirl she came to David Cains jail sell and started punching him over and over to try and figure out if shiva was her mother. She didn't get any info because David would have rather died than tell her who Cass's mother was (thats what his body language told her). I also remember other stuff like her reading superboys emotions to determine superboy likes her, she figured out lady shiva wanted to die, or how when she got her move reading back she predicted batmans moves by the way he was breathing. I'm guessing zealot and nemesis move reading can do similar things? But out of curiosity what makes there move reading better? Because Cass can talk through violence as well, and I think if she was fighting someone else who can speak through violence she could pass a secret message along.

I think Cass has also taken it a step further than just communicating, by even using her move reading to copy other peoples fighting techniques. Can Zealot and Nemesis do that as well?

The thing is, while move reading is a huge thing for Cassandra, it's a throwaway ability for members of the Coda. It's not even special, every single one of them does it as default. So think of it this way, who would you expect to be a better speaker, one who is surrounded by others that don't speak her language, or one who has been surrounded by other native speakers for thousands of years and formally educated on the subject as well? And the examples you've brought up about Cassandra are very personal and immediate. They're what the person she's interacting with feels or plans to do in the immediate future. Whereas Nemesis and Zealot have passed information about a third party at an unconnected point in time. Nemesis saying (translating here, it's presented as a fight so we don't get the exact "words") "Mr. Majestic captured your daughter and is keeping her prisoner" is a higher level of communication. Displacement is one of the design features of language and it's something that the Coda show to a greater extent than I've seen of Cassandra.

Off the top of my head I can't think of Nemesis or Zealot copying moves, but honestly I'm not surprised by that. If you take the characters as they're consistently presented, they're two of the best close combat fighters in the universe. Why would they need to copy anyone else's techniques? What techniques would someone be using that they haven't already mastered in their thousands of years on Khera and on Earth? And, really, if the rumors are true and Zealot's teachings are what started martial arts on Earth, then really any technique she (or Nemesis, her best student) copied, would be their own already.

The computer may tell midnighter how to win but midnighter still has to able to perform the actions. Maybe I don't fully understand how the computer functions but does it only give him knowledge on scenarios that are 100% guaranteed to work? Like if it can provide a scenario does this mean that the scenario has a 0% chance of failing?

I was originally thinking that Karnak knows how to counter black panther but he doesn't have the actual technique to beat black panther. Having the knowledge and being able to use the knowledge aren't the same thing is what I am trying to say I guess. All though rethinking things I guess this comparison doesn't work. I am guessing now that I think about it, the computer makes sure that midnighter is capable of performing the action? So he would only lose here if he has no chance of winning?

That's more like it, the computer is showing him what he can do in the situation, so if he's getting a scenario it's something he can actually pull off.

I agree that zealot being skilled doesn't mean midnighter is lacking and I am not saying that midnighter isn't a good fighter. Just that zealot being a better fighter was able to match midnighter despite the battle computer. My point of her getting out of the grip wasn't that midnighters submission technique sucks. But midnighter putting her into that hold was his attempt to finish the fight and incapacitate her? I assume he got the idea to use the submission hold as well from the battle computer. If thats the case than that kind of comes back to what I was trying to get across with the whole karnak thing. The computer told him how to win, and midnighter tried a method and asked zealot to tap out but zealot was able to counter that method because midnighter lacked the skill to restrain her. At least thats what I got from the scans.

That could be your reading, but if we take it less that Zealot's skill let her match Midnighter and more that Midnighter combat computer and skill let him match Zealot's thousands of years worth of experience and skill, the question is easily turned. Since we're looking at the Midnighter Zealot fight to help us gauge this one, who says Cassandra and Batman would have the skill to outmaneuver Midnighter laying out the perfect moves to beat them? Now, this all lies on the assumption that Midnighter's move was supposed to be the end of the fight and Zealot getting free wasn't something he was ok with, which cannot be proven, but say it was, and that Zealot's amount of skill allowed it, it's not really a given that Batman or Cassandra are on her level of skill or anywhere close to it. Just because Zealot could, with skill and willpower alone, get out of Midnighter's planned takedowns doesn't mean Batman or Cassandra have any hope of doing the same. It's not just "Zealot got out with skill and the bats have skill", it's "Zealot got out with Zealot's skill, which is far and away beyond what Batman or Cassandra could be expected to match given any of the standard metrics".

From what I saw of the fight I don't think midnighter won. Him disarming someone as skilled as zealot is impressive but they both had each other by the throat. They both looked like they could go a few more rounds, before Maul arrived from the scans I've seen.

Sure, but then you're not crediting Midnighter with abilities and opportunities granted to him by his combat computer. Given that Midnighter has accurately predicting people randomly teleporting into the area around him (and various other surprises), him using his combat computer to predict and plan for Maul's appearance is more than reasonable. It's an example of him using his combat computer to account for and plan around every action that happens. They may have been even before Maul showed up, but Midnighter was able to use the situation to his advantage (instead of Zealot being caught offguard and leaving herself incredibly vulnerable) and end the fight with a sword in her neck. What I'm saying is, sure, it was at least a stalemate before Maul, going off just "skill" (using the loose definition of "knowing how to maneuver and position yourself and parts of your body to achieve your ends and to counter your opponents ability to do the same", regardless of the source of that knowledge), but because of the combat computer, Midnighter brings more to his fights than just skill.

I think if midnighter wants to win he needs a scenario where he has no chance of losing, but if he wont pick that scenario because he favours the more bloody one I think that puts him at a disadvantage.

Well there you're assuming that a more bloody fight means he has a chance of losing. Though I don't even agree with your first premise, that to win this fight he needs to pick a scenario where he has no chance of losing. If you look at his abilities like theyre presented in one of the issues of his solo series, he sees all the end results and can pick whichever one he wants and just follow it. So if he has multiple ends where he wins the fight, but one is more violent and enjoyable, he can still pick that one and get both the bloody fight and the victory. The victory is assured multiple ways and he just chose the one that was the most fun. All he'd have to do is play it right and I see no reason why he wouldn't or couldn't.

I think Cassies move reading is very impressive and gives her an edge on a lot of fighters. But if she were in a similar scenario I would say she loses as well. There was a bullseye and daredevil vs cassandra cain thread a while back where I said the duo would stomp her. I think she could beat either individually for a majority but fighting off 2 enemies like that is just really difficult. Even if you think she can beat either enemy easily in a one on one fight I think the addition of an extra body makes a big difference.

Its the same idea here. Maybe even under these conditions midnighter would beat either handily but facing both at the same time is a big difference IMO. Especially since Cass and Bruce have experience working as a team. Midnighter may have experience dealing with large numbers but I think the duo coming at him at the same time means a lot in this setup.

Well what I see as a big difference is that while Cassandra can read moves, Midnighter reads outcomes. He knows everything that will happen and how it all fits together and can pick and choose the fight he wants. To me its like you're saying that before the fight Batman and Cassandra are going to sit down with Midnighter and tell him step by step exactly what they're going to do, how to counter them, and where their moves will leave them exposed, and even with all that knowledge (and more) and being as fast and strong as them, there won't be a single way he can stop them. And that I just don't believe.

@misterwhisper:

Not a single way Midnighter can lose?

Right, thank you for your wall of text.

Here you have 2 of the most capable street-levelers there is, in both DC and Marvel Universes, put together, and still, in order for them to even have a chance against Midnighter, Midnighter had to be nerfed, here...

This is the reason why Midnighter was nerfed in the New 52...and it will probably happen to Cassandra Cain as well, and some others...i hate when companies nerf their characters, but i can understand it, to a certain extent.

batman could solo with cass there the team stomps i mean if midnighter could still heal and had his enhanced stats then maybe he could give the team a good fight but bruce alone has duplicated most of his feats and the batcomputer can do the same things as midnighters battle computer he just as never used all of the functions together but there is no reason he couldn't

what, shouldn't midnighter stomp, theirs no way he's losing this battle if people regularly pit him vs gamora , heck even angela ofcourse angela lolstomps the wankednighter but still.

New 52 midnighter,one that got stalemated by nightwing gets stomped.