The Combat Speed Fallacy.

@petey_is_spidey: I'm gonna take a quote I read from someone on youtube and see what you think of it. remember these are still not my words. I'm just using them as reference.

"Your muscles determine your speed. If you run at a certain speed, you can't punch or kick a great deal faster than that. It's a different motion, but not greatly so, and you are obviously using the exact same limbs and the exact same muscles. Certainly you can't do it hundreds to thousands of times faster. Otherwise you are saying their muscles are thousands of times faster than their own...muscles. You see how utterly stupid that sounds when you think about it?"

I'm not sure if this person had the right idea or not but from the way he said it it sounded like he knew what he was talking about.

http://www.reddit.com/r/respectthreads/comments/2m4ov3/meta_the_nature_of_speed/

So basically he's saying you can only punch as fast as you run? That's greatly incorrect, due to the fact that boxers and mma fighters can punch much faster than any human can run.

Combat speed is still movement speed, not the speed of individual limbs. A human doesn't move at 10 mph during a fight either and being a good runner doesn't make you faster in combat.

So, Thor has FTL combat speed, right?

Nop

According to the article, yes.

And that's why it's bullshit.

Oh, i see now :)

I think people are being a bit stringent about this. The battles we have are about characters that are fictional. Rules are laws that apply for real beings don't always apply to them.

Given the abstract nature of debates in the battle forum and the fact that these are fictional characters, I think people should just stick with what is generally accepted. The very nature of battle forums makes it such that there is no conclusive right or wrong method to evaluate who would win.

The stringent scientific concepts only over complicates an otherwise simpler approach.

That's my 2 cents in that matter

@petey_is_spidey: No I don't think that' that's what he mean't. I just think he mean't you can punch/kick faster then you run but not TO much faster. If the gap is to huge then it doesn't make sense.

Yeah, I can agree with that.

Everytime.

@dum529001: everytime what?

If character X can run at Speed Y and can reach speed Y after taking a single step then yes he should be able to fight that fast, but that is not the case with most characters with travel speed feats as they usually accelerate over a good distance to achieve their Travel speed feats which is rendered useless in a fight and if they achieve it via flight then they also need proof that they can move their limbs that fast

Example:

We know that the Superman can fly MFTL based on his feats, but can he reach that speed after flying for 1 meter? and can he move his limbs at that speed?

I can tell you from years of fighting experience that runners are not always fast punchers or kickers, nor are fast puncher or kickers very fast at running. This is because muscles need to be trained to particular motions. Thus I can guarantee you that I can out strike most olympic runners with no combat training, just as they will outrun me and in a more fair matchup, any olympic wrestler or judoka. Now as we move into the realm of comics, things get weird because say you're fighting the Silver Surfer. He only has to will himself to move most of the time. This acts as a huge bonus in combat maneuvering, allowing himself to freely orient himself to strike effectively even while evading or mitigating blows. Let's say he has standard reaction and action speeds but retains that maneuvering advantage. He would make mincemeat out of people better trained than he simply because of that advantage. The reason is simple....

There is no such thing as combat speed.

There are combat movements. How you train to utilize movement matters. For instance let's assume a battle between Spider-Man and someone with all the same powers except the wall crawling, and no webbing for either party. Spider-Man now has a massive advantage in being able to engage or disengage at favorable moments for either. add in the webbing only for maneuvering and he becomes even more able to pick and choose confrontations. This allows his to control the pace of the battle and is a decisive edge. Even if his opponent were a better combatant, overcoming this raw advantage would be hard.

Back to the Silver Surfer example. Or better yet let's use a lantern to avoid board-related combat. If a lantern was limited to my stats and skills, but could use their ring to fly at normal speeds, they would trounce me repeatedly. The why is simple, they will not have to worry about footing, have vastly superior balance in any position, and could engage/disengage again with ease. Even if not allowed to disengage I would be at a substantial loss. If you don't have to dedicate as much effort to balance and footing then you will be able to concentrate on everything else. If you don't need to get into position, or can put little effort into attaining that position then you effectively gain speed of execution over your opponent, and that's the speed that matters. So we need to start arguing about speeds in relation to actual combat maneuvers, not just "combat speed." Superman for instance never has to be as fast as the Flash to outmaneuver him, because he can move outside standard parameters (I'm simplifying here). The Flash will have to find a way to utilize his powers differently than just raw speed (and he has a number of them, I am just simplifying for H2H movement here). Any Lantern can strike without using their limbs and thus has an advantage when recognizing an opening. These are the factors that need to be addressed more often in fights. They will get complicated and we will have to make conditional statements at times.

@namasthetu: What you said is true, but you're going into too much details and it doesn't really address the Combat speed vs Travel speed argument, the main point of this thread is to discuss the claim that a character who can travel at speed X can fight at the same speed, which is not true unless the character has feats to prove it

What are your thoughts on that?

I think it's wrong.

It's proven time and time again that Travel Speed doesn't equal Combat Speed

There are fighters who punch faster than people who train to run, and that's because of training for certain areas.

There's a clear difference between the two. Don't mean to bring Goku in this, but he is known for fighting at incredible speeds instead of flying at people with speed, and that's because of his way of training.

It's logical. If Thor can get tagged by Wolverine, and comics are using this logic (Batman telling Superman the Usain Bolt analogy), then I see no point in trying to refute it. If someone full aware that is FTL in travel speed is tagged in combat, what does that tell you?

Sorry it was late and there was much insomnia ranting. My point was that we need to be talking about maneuvers whose speed are not simply divided into travel or combat speed. This is particularly true when the methods of travel or motion are abnormal. In other words travel speed may sometimes equal combat speed and sometimes not based on the type of movement and the maneuver in question.

You do have a point. Limb acceleration determines "combat speed".

I've always hated the combat speed argument. No matter how many times I go back to it I always see holes in the argument. It makes my head hurt always trying to get a straight simplified answer. Does anyone miss those old days where it was simply "I have super speed and you don't"? Cause I do.

The thing about combat speed is sure it works in theory but if the gap is to freaking huge then it makes no sense. Your still using the same muscles. Like say I can throw punches faster then light but can only run faster then a car. Does that make sense? Heck no. I might as well run by using those same arms to punch the ground to go to places faster. By this logic I would be watching myself run in slow motion. And that would be utter torture. Responding faster is one thing. But the movement that comes with the response? Totally different. You can't fly in space without being in danger of hitting asteroids and stuff. Just because she/he can react faster doesn't mean her/his arms movement speed is any better then his/her. Let me put this in another way. What if you gave a snail a head start in a race? Just because they get a head start doesn't mean you won't humiliate them in that race in the long run. Wonder woman has better muscle memory then superman. Does that matter compared to someone like the flash? Of course not. The raw speed gap is simply to big for it to matter and make any difference. Again why do I hate it so much? Because it sounds pretty stupid. reaction Speed is closer to what your thinking of, but that's the brains,ability to process information and act on it. How fast the body moves is just how fast it moves. Why can't it be as simple as that? I'm tired of all the unneeded variables.

im not saying the Usain Bolt - Bruce Lee analogy is incorrect. Im saying that its silly to claim that one aspect of speed is thousands or millions of times greater than another unless its explicitly shown.

Bolt-Lee comparison works because both are still on human levels. Superman And Wonder Woman are also on the same level of speed. But when that is not the case... if my perceptions and reflexes where somehow boosted to 100 times what they normally are, making bullets seem relatively slow to me... i would still be screwed if someone opened fire on me. Since my body remains at human levels, the only thing i could do would be watching the bullets approach.

Dont know if im getting my point across, but hey, i tried...

Sigh I'll post this again.

http://outskirtsbattledomewiki.com/index.php/13-general-obd-terms/79-combat-speed-fallacy

Ok! Let's put it like this

Travel speed = how fast you go from this place to another place, can be use to Biltz enemy that to slow to dodge at this speed. (But can be counter with aim dodge)

Combet speed = how fast can you punch, kick or swing a sword or another close range weapon and Block or Parry enemy attack.

Reaction Speed = how fast can you think and React to attack from all range (close, mid, Long) you can use this aim dodge. (Precog should be count as this to.)

I see that I haven't changed one bit in the past year and 7 months

@ryokuma100: @le0nhart: Sory this is old, but if someone can reach relativistic speed in few seconds(1,2) second, does that count as relativistic combat speed, i mean it does not need to be after few meters can it be after few seconds and it is useful in combat

Silver Surfer and Thor have fought each and Thor has kept up with Silver Surfer in combat. Silver Surfer has traveled through time with his speed alone which is immeasurable speed. Thor scales to the Silver Surfer at immeasurable from that. Thanos has fought and slapped them up multiple times, so even though Thanos cannot travel through time with his speed alone, he can combat people who can, so Thanos too scales at immeasurable speed.