/jp/ - Otaku Culture

Isn't Alice a stage 3 touhou?

Yes, and she's always seen as submissive or masturbating to Marisa, or screwing her own dolls out of loneliness.

I think the Yuugi one is limited to retarded youtube and danbooru comments. I've never seen anything about Yuugi and sake spilling anywhere else.

Even ZUN himself says she's just a hitbox.

>Meiling would utterly destroy Cirno in a fight

>despite how badass they are in canon (Looking at you, there, Meiling).

Where exactly?

No really, I'm curious. I've looked for evidence of it myself, and Meiling is never once "badass" in any kind of canon material that I've been able to find.

Unless you're counting random crap from her 12.3 storyline, in which case, nigga you silly.

>>9672361

I think the only comics that got her personality right is the Iron of Yin and Yang. Everything else is LOL LESBO TSUNDURO ALICE-tier shit.

>And we all know that the full potential of danmaku is still far weaker than the Touhou's true power.

ESPECIALLY with Meiling, since direct physical attacks are bant by spellcard rules, and that's where much of her ability lies - she's as good with her fists as with her danmaku.

So in the cute little magic duels, she's weak. But in a real no-holds-barred asskicking contest, wheras many touhous are weak in physical combat (patchy, Alice, possibly Marisa, any of the other touhous you could 'beat up in a fistfight,') Meiling is a fucking powerhouse - without that weakness, and with the ability to exploit it in others.

>>9672424

ayep. 12.3 does the most to show her personality, where she comes across as good-natured, generous, and willing to fight to defend others.

>>9672420
>her 12.3 storyline
She saved all of Gensokyo from an unbeatable youkai's catfish minion!

>>9672426
Well if that's the case then why is Youmu a stage 5 boss (and generally considered to be a powerful Touhou.)? Her ability is swordsmanship, how does that translate into good Danmaku unless she's just naturally better at it than Meiling is?

>>9672426
In an actual duel though, the magicians would be directing all their magic attacks directly at the opponent, instead of just in pretty patterns. While Meiling would be much better in that kind of fight, it's not fair to say the magicians would be pushovers.

>>9672426

You are really just stretching this out further than you should. The only kind of official word we've gotten on what she's capable of says she's a more well-rounded and balanced fighter. Saying she's a "powerhouse" is going a little far.

>>9672430
You're not equating stage position to powerlevel are you?

>>9672439

Of course not. Though necessity or design they've traded close-combat ability for devastating ranged power - it's just that in typical danmaku duels, their disadvantage doesn't matter. So, more then any other touhou, Meiling's performance in duels is significantly inferior to her actual asskicking potential.

>>9672455
But where would that put more physically inclined folks like Suika or Yuugi?

I wish Keine was my teacher.

>>9672289
No Alice is an extra boss and has that status forever.

>>9672420

Meiling's badass because she doesn't depend on magic for everything. The fact that she isn't good with magic, but good with melee implies that she's not always performing magic, meaning she's brave enough to do things by hand.

She will attack without mercy if you break into the SDM. That means she WILL kill you, unless you hurry up and GTFO. (Unless you're Marisa because of magic).

The only way to actually not lose to her in a fist fight is to formally challenge her, with a time limit, and somehow last without dying and bring it to a draw.

>>9672415

By goofy memes, I also mean Cirno being called the strongest and somehow able to overpower any and every Touhou. Sure, she was able to fight Marisa and win, but Marisa was going easy. Cirno was clearly implied to be weaker than Letty, since Cirno was probably going full-power against the player in PCB, while Letty was just going half-heartedly. I assure you, due to this, Meiling could easily obliterate Cirno, since Meiling could probably best Letty as well.

>Yuugi with her "NOT EVEN DROP"
but it's true

>>9672454
No, but I am saying that Youmu (being a stage 5 boss) is better than Meiling at Danmaku when essentially they have very similar physical skillsets.

I'm just saying that Meiling might not be this super-powered martial badass that everyone says she is.

>>9672463
>meaning she's brave enough to do things by hand.
>She will attack without mercy if you break into the SDM
>she WILL kill you
Now you're just making things up.

>>9672438
>Saying she's a "powerhouse" is going a little far.

I can't really say anything else to this without invoking power-tier arguments, which are all pointless for the usual reasons. All there is to discuss there is: is her ranking as a boss reflect her overall power, or just her ability at danmaku duels?

>>9672430
>Youmu

Her swords can cut metaphysical concepts, so I don't get too hung up on the melee/ranged distinction on that one. Given the way Japanese popular media depicts katanas and those that use them, I'd theorize she can dodge like a motherfucker, much like American action heroes never reload and rarely need to use cover.

>>9672430
Her reaction to it, silly. Though I must say that

>UNSTOPPABLE EVIL CATFISH YOUKAI

-would've been more interesting then the 'real' plot. Because, you know, GIANT ENEMY FISH. Hue.

>>9672464

Meiling herself admitted she couldn't use danmaku properly. Plus, Meiling was probably training herself. Youmu had Youki training her. That and Youmu has an ability that allows her to use even more danmaku (Her speed and her ability to turn her ghost half into a clone of her).

This is a silly thread with a bad opening post.

I don't know what it is but Meiling fans seem to have some kind of complex with trying to convince themselves and others that she's actually a secret total badass. And this even includes myself to a degree as she's my favorite.

Some of the art I've seen takes this to particularly bad degrees. Pic related probably being the godawfullest worst of them all, to the point where I don't even really want to post it for fear of the reactions to it.

The queen above the rest of those stage 3 junkies.

>>9672460

Perhaps they're better at danmaku just because, well, they ARE better at danmaku, or Meiling just sucks at it. Her actual physical prowess is as yet untested. Perhaps with it accounted for she's amazing, or perhaps it's just good, and with her danmaku deficit she really is underpowered. Perhaps the Oni are better at magic simply because they're older and have had lots of time to practice.

Or perhaps their danmaku, good as it is, is a mere shadow of their physical prowess, and they're holding back with the magic to make the 'game' more interesting. Which means their true power, unchained, hardly bears contemplating.

A touhou thread with actual discussion?
On MY /jp/?

>>9672468
>Her swords can cut metaphysical concepts
No it can't, fuck, don't be stupid, anon. Are you telling me you believe that whole 'cutting through confusion' idiocy? 'Cause that's not what her sword actually does.

>>9672481

Keine is so lovely. Her role in the village is very interesting, too.

>>9672471

ZUN himself said that, if you break into the SDM, or sneak in, she WILL attack without mercy. That usually implies that, unless you do retreat, you're dead. That's what no mercy means, after all.

>>9672468

Most of the time it's actual power (Like Patchouli being a higher rank than Rumia, or Mima being a higher rank than Marisa, etc.) but other times, it's their actual danmaku skill. (Like Letty being just a stage 1 when at full power she may be Stage 3-4, Meiling just being a stage 3 even though she's quite powerful to the point where she implies she even goes easy on Sakuya, or Yuugi being a stage 3 just because she was too much of an alcoholic to want to fight seriously).

>>9672476
>I don't know what it is but Meiling fans seem to have some kind of complex with trying to convince themselves and others that she's actually a secret total badass.

Since there's no canon power ranking (and for good reason,) then it's perfectly okay to believe that - or to embrace the lovable bumbling incompetent Meiling interpretation, if you find it more fun.

The spellcard dueling system makes sense both in and out of universe - in-universe, it's the only way so many entites of demigodlike power or greater could coexist in such a small space without utterly nuking each other to hell. On the meta-level, it frees ZUN from having to attempt the utterly fucking impossible task of rating each new bullshit hax power against a universal standard of badassitude. To date, I believe he's only established that EX-Keine has the most raw power, which isn't problematic considering the limitation.

>>9672481

Keine is pretty fucking awesome mang

>>9672495
What the fuck is wrong with her hands and feet?

>>9672500

Goddamnit.

>>9672500
First time seeing a work from this artist? How new can you be.

>>9672483

Meiling admitted she's bad with danmaku.

>>9672497
>Since there's no canon power ranking (and for good reason,) then it's perfectly okay to believe that
That's not how reasoning works. Don't make me invoke the Invisible Pink Unicorn.

Also,
>EX-Keine has the most raw power
What the fuck is this bullshit? Her erasing history crap? She doesn't have any such ability; she can only eat history, whatever that entails. Nothing has been established, since we have no fucking clue what 'eating' history actually means.

>>9672488

There's not really any proper discussion though.

All we can do is blindly infer and imply. We have never seen what Meiling is capable of outside of perhaps her movesets from the Fighters, but those make it look like the entire damn cast is a bunch of martial artists.

I would certainly like to believe Meiling is capable of much more. But I'm not willing to let my fanboyism have me spout crap without anything to back it up.

>>9672494

I know, I know, the Yama even explained what it really does to Youmu. I'm just saying that one sword can magically aid confused spirits in achieving enlightenment and the other can swing faster then light or some shit, so attempting to compare touhou-to-touhou on a melee versus ranged metric is probably a waste of time. It applies to Meiling primarily because it was mentioned in her profile, but as >>9672496 explains, Youmu might just be flat-out BETTER, given her ranking. Maybe Meiling would be her equal with her melee skills in play... but considering that Youmu can into danmaku and she's mainly a swordsman - and higher rank then Meiling *with* the same restriction - maybe she IS flat-out more powerful.

>>9672510
Her "eating" history ability, which she can only do in her human form allows her to hide history, not actually erase it. In her hakutaku form, she can create it. She was able to hide the human village in IN with her power, so that says a little something about what she can do with.

>>9672496

Even as a Gate Guard she can't just straight-up kill people. That's breaking the Spellcard Rules.

And seriously stop pushing this idea that Stage placement has anything to do with anything than "Order of the random bystanders that the Player Character happens to run over on their way to solving whatever incident is at hand".

>>9672515

Y'know why Youmu is probably better than Meiling in combat and in Danmaku? Because she can apparently move at a sizable fraction of the Speed of Goddamned Light (or was it sound? Either way...) and can do crazy shit with her Ghost Half.

Not because she's a Stage 5 while Meiling is a Stage 3.

>>9672512
>I would certainly like to believe Meiling is capable of much more. But I'm not willing to let my fanboyism have me spout crap without anything to back it up.

Its only "spouting crap" if you advance it as SUPER TRUE BETTER BELIEVE YOU DAMN AUTISTICS. If you're just using your IMAGINATION! within what's theoretically possible, especially in a nice chat on /jp/, then it's all in good fun.

>>9672510
>She doesn't have any such ability; she can only eat history, whatever that entails. Nothing has been established, since we have no fucking clue what 'eating' history actually means.

That's actually been explained. It just translates to an ability to conceal information - she can "hide" the village, but not actually make it physically vanish. It's less clear what her EX ability is, the ability to "create" history, but I posit that since she has "access to all information in Gensokyo" my theory is that whatever information she records as a scholar is treated as 1000% accurate by the public - thus she controls, creates, the version of reality that future generations will read. This might have more then philosophical/intangible power, considering that (again, per canon,) gods can change their natures by spreading new myths about themselves that their followers (sources of faith) then hear and believe. Control of the public record is pretty dang powerful, considering.

>>9672540
So Keine's a dirty politician?

>>9672535
>And seriously stop pushing this idea that Stage placement has anything to do with anything than "Order of the random bystanders that the Player Character happens to run over on their way to solving whatever incident is at hand".
Stage placement has something to do with the difficulty of a character's spell cards, which has something to do with how good they are at danmaku.

>>9672535

Stage Placement is clearly highly situational. And as that other nice anon noted, quite often the circumstances are actually acknowledged - either immediately, in-game, or in the characters profile. Alice is noted as not always fighting at "full power" because she's really a coward and couldn't stand it if she DID get her ass kicked at full-strength, if she can't rationalize by saying "well I wasn't fighting at my FULL ability" her inner autismal will rip itself apart in frustration and shame, or something. And then there's Cirno, who started out at the bottom but has subsequently given some of the best a hard time, perhaps because she's always had raw power but has all the finesse of the killdozer (but she's learning!)

Touhou is kind of nice in that people can win and lose without it being that big a deal, either in import to their derr powerlevel or general worth or anything. It frees it from the typical vegeta, scouter etc. bullshit and places more emphasis on their individual personalities.

>>9672551

HUE

why not

>>9672556
So Yuyuko sucks at danmaku, considering TD? Got it, thanks.

>>9672565
No, because she obviously wasn't trying to win.

>>9672551
If she wanted to be, she would be the best politician.

>>9672569
Well there you go, you just killed >>9672556's argument.

It has NOTHING to do with the difficulty of a character's spell card or power, since we mostly don't know if within the context of the game they were giving it their all or was just fooling around.

>>9672565

Considering that she can just waste people by thinking it, or something of the sort, I wouldn't bother with magic either.

What're they gonna do to her? Kill her? Heh.

>>9672565

I didn't bother mentioning that because as >>9672557 says, it's highly situational.

And y'know what the main situation is?

Because before anything else, it's a videogame, and it would be very silly if the difficulties were all over the place instead of steadily ramping up. By trying to figure out a reasoning behind every character's stage placement, you have begun to care more about it than the creator of the series itself.

>>9672580
Even better than Miko the dictator? I don't believe you.

>>9672581
No, I didn't, you overreaching retard.

>It has NOTHING to do with the difficulty of a character's spell card or power, since we mostly don't know if within the context of the game they were giving it their all or was just fooling around.
It can be assumed that most people put a reasonable amount of effort into winning their spell card battles unless we have reason to believe otherwise. If two people play chess and demonstrates clearly superior play, one can conclude SOMETHING about who's the better player, even though the loser could be a grandmaster sandbagging for shits and giggles.

>>9672587
>Because before anything else, it's a videogame, and it would be very silly if the difficulties were all over the place instead of steadily ramping up. By trying to figure out a reasoning behind every character's stage placement, you have begun to care more about it than the creator of the series itself.

In a fucking nutshell, truth.

I'm impressed ZUN's explanation works so well on both in the story and the meta level.

>>9672581
>Well there you go, you just killed >>9672556's argument.
No, I didn't, you overreaching retard.

>It has NOTHING to do with the difficulty of a character's spell card or power, since we mostly don't know if within the context of the game they were giving it their all or was just fooling around.
It can be assumed that most people put a reasonable amount of effort into winning their spell card battles unless we have reason to believe otherwise. If two people play chess and white demonstrates clearly superior play, one can conclude SOMETHING about who's the better player, even though black could be a grandmaster sandbagging for shits and giggles. Just because one of the players might not have been trying at all doesn't mean you can throw up your hands and declare that no conclusions can be drawn from the game.

>>9672587

Just to clarify this, I wasn't trying to be all "Stop talking about this crap so much guys its just a videogame nobody cares".

It's just that ZUN has never, from what I've ever seen, given even an iota of fuck about Stage placement when writing or talking about the characters. They have never had any impact on the rest of the canon other than, again, the order of bystander that the PC happened to run over on the way to solving the incident at hand. So why the hell does everyone else care so goddamn much about it?

>People implying that stage order has anything to do with actual strength.

Why would Letty, say, consider a danmaku battle against a bystander as important as Remilia who's the source of the problem?
If someone is not connected to the problem they'll probably use shitty spellcards for shits and giggles.


I suspect they have some sort of limitations on stronger spellcards which make the use the stronger ones more sparingly.

>>9672622
Nobody "cares so goddamn much" about it. People use it as a a single measure of how difficult it would to defeat them in a spell card battle, along with other information.

Well, sometimes people like to draw all the second stage bosses together, but I don't what's what you're complaining about right now.

>>9672611
You're working under a flawed assumption, though. Why would someone with no connection to an incident get all worked up for a random danmaku duel? Especially in a non-lethal conflict, I don't see any point for anyone to go all out on a meaningless, trivial duel. This rings even truer if you have a reason to conceal your spells or hold back (for example, you don't want anyone to see your strongest spell unless you really need to, so as to lessen the chance that someone can figure out its weakness).

In the end, the main issue here is that stage placement only implies how involved someone is with an incident, and to that extent, how willing they are to fight and use more of their power. It doesn't really show their real skills or power, especially for the first few stages' boss. Otherwise, I can just say that Yuyuko is weaker than Cirno or Yuugi is weaker than the Prismriver sisters, and you'd have no way to refute that.

>>9672642

It's just that it somehow manages to come up every single time anyone talks about the characters' capabilities. Someone always ends up trying to use it as a measure of how strong character A is compared to character B, or how good one is at Danmaku compared to the other.

It's never meant any of this.

>>9672640
who are you quoting?

>>9672672
how would you compare power level for touhou then? no really, I'm curious
stage ordering means jack shit and the official sources are usually treated as lolAkyuu or something to that effect

>>9672667
>Why would someone with no connection to an incident get all worked up for a random danmaku duel? Especially in a non-lethal conflict, I don't see any point for anyone to go all out on a meaningless, trivial duel.
Because it's fun. People like getting involved in incidents. Obviously stage six bosses are putting in close to a hundred percent and the people having fun on the first few stages aren't, but even when Mystia goes all-out Last Spell Midnight Chorus Master she's just not scary. You know, being a stage two boss after all.

>In the end, the main issue here is that stage placement only implies how involved someone is with an incident, and to that extent, how willing they are to fight and use more of their power.
Stage placement corresponds to: 1. How much they feel like using their power; and 2. How much power they have. It has as much to do with one as with the other.

>>9672672
Probably because it's the most obvious measure. "I think Orin is probably stronger than Cirno because Orin killed me 2842394732492374 times and I can perfect Cirno." It may not be accurate, but why are you acting surprised or disappointed by it?

>>9672682

>how would you compare power level for touhou then?

I wouldn't. Power level arguing is stupid when the entire goddamn setting is based around a game that takes Power Levels and breaks it over it's knee like so much Batman Spine.

That, and any kind of other information that could give some insights to all this are so clouded and vague you can't pull anything definitive out of them.

It all just ends up getting heavily colored with personal bias and after a while everyone involved is arguing about things while their head-canons are muddling the fuck out of everything.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gZEdDMQZaCU

>>9672689
>Stage placement corresponds to: 1. How much they feel like using their power; and 2. How much power they have. It has as much to do with one as with the other.
Chen and Kogasa are as strong as Sanae and Nue. In fact, they're pretty much equals, I'd say.

>>9672724
I'd say Sanae could kick Chen's ass any day of the week so long as she's not being juiced by Ran.

>>9672729
No, no, they're all mid-bosses in an EX stage, so they've got to be equal in power, there's no other way to explain it.

>>9672735
You can take your retarded strawman and stuff it up your ass now.

>>9672689
>Stage placement corresponds to: 1. How much they feel like using their power; and 2. How much power they have. It has as much to do with one as with the other.
No
>but even when Mystia goes all-out Last Spell Midnight Chorus Master she's just not scary. You know, being a stage two boss after all.
You have it backwards. Mystia is actually weak, in particular she is not strong enough to cause an incident troublesome for Reimu to bother with.
And for this reason she will be a stage 2 boss; she's never strong enough to be near the source of an incident.

>>9672738
Only if you do it first.

I'm just complying with what was stated here >>9672689, and even providing real evidence from the game that agrees with the statement (and in the process possibly revealing a contradiction). Nowhere did I mentioned anything that can be accrued as a strawman argument. You, on the other hand, can't seem to do anything besides coming up with fallacious arguments and resorting to name-calling.

>>9672789
>I'm just complying with what was stated here:
No, you ignored half of it, and then after ignoring that half, proceeded to create a retarded strawman: "They've got to be equal in power, there's no other way to explain it," when nothing of the sort was said or implied.

>You, on the other hand, can't seem to do anything besides coming up with fallacious arguments and resorting to name-calling.
You are either a genuine retard or deliberately acting like a retard in order to ridicule me, and either way I'm perfectly happy to call you a fucking moron.

That's it. I'm sick of all this "shows the right direction leading to the real incident perpetrators" bullshit that's going on in Gensokyo right now. Stage 3 bosses deserve much better than that. Much, much better than that.

I should know what I'm talking about. I myself was a genuine Stage 3 Boss in Something of Lasers with 4 spellcards (that's about 7 minutes of gameplay) and have been practicing with them for almost 2 years now. I can even make expert players bomb with my spellcards.

Eastern youkai spend years working to be a Stage 3 boss for a single time and train up to a million times to produce the hardest danmaku known to mankind.

Stage 3 bosses are thrice as powerful as Stage 2 bosses and thrice as difficult for that matter too. Any player a Stage 2 boss can force to bomb, a Stage 3 boss can force them to bomb more. I'm pretty sure a Stage 3 boss could easily ASAPIN playing on slow mode go "pichuun" with a simple vertical bullet curtain.

Ever wonder why Lunarians never bothered conquering Gensokyo? That's right, they were too scared to fight the disciplined Stage 3 bosses and their danmaku of destruction. Even in Yukari's moon war, moon rabbits targeted the little girls who looked like they could be Stage 3 bosses first because their danmaku showers were feared and respected.

So what am I saying? Stage 3 bosses are simply the most difficult challenges that Touhou has ever seen, and thus, require better stats in Gensokyo. Here is the stat block I propose for a Stage 3 boss:

(Midboss)
2 noncards
3 spellcards
1 timeout spellcard
Immune to bombs

(Boss)
7 noncards
12 spellcards
3 timeout spellcards
Immune to bombs
Respawns as a more powerful version if beaten in second loop

Now that seems a lot more representative of the difficulty of Stage 3 bosses in real life, don't you think?

tl;dr = Stage 3 bosses need be more powerful in Touhou, see my new stat block.

That's it. I'm sick of all this "shows the right direction leading to the real incident perpetrators" bullshit that's going on in Gensokyo right now. Stage 3 bosses deserve much better than that. Much, much better than that.

I should know what I'm talking about. I myself was a genuine Stage 3 Boss in Something of Lasers with 4 spellcards (that's about 7 minutes of gameplay) and have been practicing with them for almost 2 years now. I can even make expert players bomb with my spellcards.

Eastern youkai spend years working to be a Stage 3 boss for a single time and train up to a million times to produce the hardest danmaku known to mankind.

Stage 3 bosses are thrice as powerful as Stage 2 bosses and thrice as difficult for that matter too. Any player a Stage 2 boss can force to bomb, a Stage 3 boss can force them to bomb more. I'm pretty sure a Stage 3 boss could easily make ASAPIN playing on slow mode go "pichuun" with a simple vertical bullet curtain.

Ever wonder why Lunarians never bothered conquering Gensokyo? That's right, they were too scared to fight the disciplined Stage 3 bosses and their danmaku of destruction. Even in Yukari's moon war, moon rabbits targeted the little girls who looked like they could be Stage 3 bosses first because their danmaku showers were feared and respected.

So what am I saying? Stage 3 bosses are simply the most difficult challenges that Touhou has ever seen, and thus, require better stats in Gensokyo. Here is the stat block I propose for a Stage 3 boss:

(Midboss)
2 noncards
3 spellcards
1 timeout spellcard
Immune to bombs

(Boss)
7 noncards
12 spellcards
3 timeout spellcards
Immune to bombs
Respawns as a more powerful version if beaten in second loop

Now that seems a lot more representative of the difficulty of Stage 3 bosses in real life, don't you think?

tl;dr = Stage 3 bosses need be more powerful in Touhou, see my new stat block.

>>9672851

Well played.

>>9672851
>could easily make ASAPIN playing on slow mode go "pichuun" with a simple vertical bullet curtain.
It's funny because ASAPIN couldn't ever dodge a vertical bullet curtain without lucking out.

>>9672804
>Stage placement corresponds to:
Okay, let's assume this is true.

>1. How much they feel like using their power;
Kogasa and Sanae are both EX midbosses. They have absolutely no reason to fight the heroines except for them being there and for shit and giggles.

>2. How much power they have. It has as much to do with one as with the other.
This we don't know about (as both are midbosses in the same level and fought with arguably equal danmaku difficulty in-game), but since stage placement corresponds to how much power someone has, we can phrase this another way, that is, how much power they have corresponds to their stage placement (otherwise, it won't make sense that f(n) = x but x != f(n)). Sanae and Kogasa are both EX midbosses, and so their power can't be all that different, as otherwise 2) would be false.

Hence, since 1) and 2) are true, Sanae and Kogasa are equal in strength.

Except this is total horsecock and your statement doesn't really hold.

There, I've taken your statement and showed you the contradiction in it. If anything, I'd agree more with >>9672762's statement.

how can a thread about stage 3 bosses being awesome turn into such a retarded nerd fight? jesus /jp/.

>>9672880
And then, Sanae was given a huge power boost when she became a playable character and specialist in incident resolution, at which point it was established that she's more powerful than Kogasa.

Had Sakuya been the third playable in UFO and Sanae never shown up again, people might actually buy what you're saying.

>There, I've taken your statement and showed you the contradiction in it.
Thank you for actually bothering to make an actual response.

>>9672894

It started out pretty bad in the first place frankly.

>>9672904
>Had Sakuya been the third playable in UFO and Sanae never shown up again, people might actually buy what you're saying.
Even though it's not true at all (canonical materials outside the game, Sanae's status as a living Goddess, etc is enough to justify this, I think). Which just shows how terrible stage placement is as an indicator of someone's full potential.

And,
>And then, Sanae was given a huge power boost when she became a playable character and specialist in incident resolution, at which point it was established that she's more powerful than Kogasa.
I don't think that really says much to defend your argument.

Look at it this way. Sakuya and Sanae are both stage 5 bosses. Then they became PCs. All well and good?

Now in their respective games, they proceed to tear through the stages, including stage 6 and extra stage. But if stage placement is anything to go by, that means the stage bosses amongst the games are similar in strength, including the EX and stage 6 bosses. This implies that Sanae and Sakuya, who are powerful enough to defeat other stage 6 and EX bosses, are stronger than both Kanako and Suwako, and Remilia and Flandre, respectively. But again, this is not true (even the in-game dialogue reflects this). Bring in Reimu and Marisa being bosses and this gets even more messed up.

I think I've pointed enough contradiction that stage placement shouldn't be taken as concrete proof of a Touhou's power.

>>9672963
Being a goddess doesn't actually mean that you're particularly good at combat. Some goddesses have a hard time doing anything other than baking sweet potatoes.

>This implies that Sanae and Sakuya, who are powerful enough to defeat other stage 6 and EX bosses, are stronger than both Kanako and Suwako, and Remilia and Flandre, respectively.
People don't automatically rank playable characters as automatically being stronger than the characters they defeat. But they tend to be considered more powerful than EX midbosses.

>I think I've pointed enough contradiction that stage placement shouldn't be taken as concrete proof of a Touhou's power.
Nobody has used them as concrete proof in this thread. At most they it was suggested that were a suggestion or just one factor you could look at.

>>9672985
>Being a goddess doesn't actually mean that you're particularly good at combat. Some goddesses have a hard time doing anything other than baking sweet potatoes.
Valid point. I concede on this one.

>People don't automatically rank playable characters as automatically being stronger than the characters they defeat. But they tend to be considered more powerful than EX midbosses.
Well how else are they able to defeat them then? Since >>9672611
>It can be assumed that most people put a reasonable amount of effort into winning their spell card battles unless we have reason to believe otherwise.
and >>9672689
>Obviously stage six bosses are putting in close to a hundred percent
which would imply that PCs are in fact stronger than stage 6 bosses, since they can defeat those bosses whilst they've "put a reasonable amount of effort into winning" and "put[ting] in close to a hundred percent" (and they have any and all motivation to prevail, after all).

But then this would create a contradiction as I've pointed out, where a stage 5 boss can be stronger than a stage 6 and EX boss. And if we take stage placement to the extreme, we can even get cases where, for example, Nue is simultaneously stronger and weaker than Nue...

>Nobody has used them as concrete proof in this thread. At most they it was suggested that were a suggestion or just one factor you could look at.
Eh. That's not how I'm seeing things here, but fair enough.

>>9672963
>Sanae's status as a living Goddess

Now, if we delve into technicalities, Kogasa is also a goddess.

>>9673041
>which would imply that PCs are in fact stronger than stage 6 bosses

PCs retry until they win. And since, basically, anyone can beat anyone else in danmaku duels, their eventual win is assured by laws of probability alone and speaks little about their relative power.

>>9673095
That is to mean, PCs can get really damn lucky.

Every time this discussion starts again, whoever is enough of a retard to believe stage placement is a valid indication of a character's power is ALWAYS just trying and trying to counter the infinite shower of arguments that show them how immeasurably stupid they are, believing firmly into something so blatantly and obviously absurd.

God.

Oh wait, who was a Stage 6 and Stage 1 boss?

Right, stage means nothing.

It's enough that you as a fan take her seriously.

>>9673095
>PCs retry until they win.
Does that mean they repeat the same dialogue over and over?
Also why do the same faries keep attacking you in the same order, are they masochistic or something?

Does this mean I've unsealed Byakuren over and over?
Why does she get sealed away again if I lose to her?

>>9673145
Just make believe you are an amnesiac Rika.

>>9673095
>their eventual win is assured by laws of probability alone and speaks little about their relative power.
You try fighting an UFC cage fighter and see if you can win. Go on, you could even have infinite retries.

Or, given a Touhou context, since "anyone can beat anyone else in danmaku duels," then surely given enough time, a stage fairy can defeat Yukari! Of course probability dictates that this is possible, but it's not realistic. The chances are infinitesimally small that it might as well not exist.

Contrary to what you're saying, their victory does have something to do with their relative power. Even if they do won through retries, they must have the skill as well, since I imagine they can't keep retrying forever. Continuous use of danmaku exhausts the user, and they can't keep fighting forever (this is canon). They have to win at some point, which again, requires some form of skill.

>>9673145
Read one of ZUN's email archive.

>>9673144
I take her role as a joke character very seriously, thank you very much.

>>9673155
>The chances are infinitesimally small that it might as well not exist.
Maybe they could try integrating.

>Someone suggests that "retrying" to explain PCs power where the PCs are bashing themselves at the incident every time they fail.
>Others take this literally.

This is obviously false,you only have one try in IN for example.
Rather believe that a characters winning run is the only one that matters, where everything else doesn't actually exist.

>>9673164
I like you.

>>9673170
Well if that ``someone'' happens to be ZUN, you don't really have much of a choice but to take it literally...

>>9672219
> despite how badass they are in canon
> badass
> canon
> Touhou
Ahahahahahahaha.
Fuuh... Okay, that was funny.

>>9673155
>surely given enough time, a stage fairy can defeat Yukari

Of course. Are you going to say that no stray bullet hit you in some IN stage, ever?

>>9673236
I'm not Yukari. Are you?

>>9673244
You wouldn't believe me even if I said I am.

>>9673170
>you only have one try in IN for example

But IN in particular NEEDS to be beaten twice (and therefore retried at least once).

>>9673244
I can explain that. Sakuya is involved in the incident so she could've just reset the time and everyone went to Kaguya instead the second time.

>>9673252
I can explain that. Sakuya is involved in the incident so she could've just reset the time and everyone went to Kaguya instead the second time.

>>9673255
Sakuya can stop and slow time, but not rewind it.

I don't see why you're all arguing about power levels, it doesn't really matter. The PCs are just good at dodging bullets, which is much more important than raw power in danmaku. Their actual capability isn't really that important.

>>9673261
Tell that to EoSD Easy.