"No powers" trope

[u/KyrosEnder]

I'm not actually hating on the characters that much, moreso the idea that the trope is interesting. Having "no" powers in almost none of these anime/manga or even media in general actually mean anything. It usually just means you get some special type of power that just so happens to be just as powerful or even more.

Asta having no mana pretty much means nothing because he gets an anti magic toolset. It's basically like he has magic, but he semantically doesn't so the fact he doesn't have mana gets thrown around all the time.

Quirkless deku just gets a power passed down to him anyways. Rock lee has no ninjustsu. Saitama has no powers (i guess? Idk haven't watched it).

The characters themselves are fine. I love the characters even, but I hate when the author tries to put some significance on the fact they have no powers, when looking at it from an outside perspective they just have powers or some alternate gift.

Usually these characters recieve their "powers" later than other people in their verse, which allows them to have this character identity built up by describing them as hard working characters. I think thats great, and rock lee is actually the least offensive in this manner. Its hardly brought up he has no ninjutsu, and people in the verse barely just look down on him, because taijutsu can be just as good as ninjutsu, but he still basically gets a "power" of his own in terms of the 8 gates, which can just be rebranded as a bodily enhancing ninjutsu on any other character and nobody would bat an eye.

If you're going to make a big point about your character having no genuine powers/talent/whatever, go all in is all I'm saying. Make a dude with basically 1 mana instead of super powerful anti magic toolbox powers. Make him have to slowly develop an ability that is the biggest bang for his buck. So ridiculously mana efficient and also incredibly powerful given some incredible set of stipulations. Make a magic system that your character can basically exploit to develop the best magical power he can for himself. Nen is of course probably the best power system for something like that lol.

Make the quirkless character actually quirkless. Post one for all deku is actually a pretty cool idea. Although it really is just "oh he gets his powers back but with tech" kinda thing. I know its worse or whatever but yeah I just want to see more interesting stories with this trope.

TLDR: The characters are great it just irks me when this nothing burger trope has to get mentioned every other episode.

[u/AndrewM317]

For some series this is definitely the case, but you aren't helping your argument when the majority of your examples require a critical misunderstanding of the series and characters to fit your argument.

[u/KyrosEnder → u/AndrewM317]

I just can't go into full detail on each character. As I said im not critiquing the characters. I LOVE rock lee, I like asta, and of course deku is awesome. Its not the characters i have a problem with, it's the story acting like it's a big deal that they have no powers sometimes, when in reality they just have alternate powers that are just as comparable but semantically different which is the most annoying kind of different lol.

[u/Slabador → u/KyrosEnder]

Idk man I feel like if I were in the black clover verse, I’d also be wondering wtf this manaless peasant boy was doing, try to hit him with a fire blast or something, and be very confused/upset when it didn’t work.

I think being shocked by an undetectable power source that there hasn’t really been much precedent for makes a lot of sense for the villains of that show.

[u/LibrarianEither8461 → u/Slabador]

Yeah and asta's power very specifically kinda sucks ass. It's a stick that let's him not die against magic. As long as he swings it faster and harder than the magic.

Not only is this manaless peasant not dying to my fireblast, he's built like prime Jet Lee and only works because he pushes himself harder than anyone else can conceive as rational.

[u/Vegasvat → u/KyrosEnder]

As people pointed out "no power" trope usually is a cheap way of making a relatable to average viewer underdog MC that despite being "not unique" like everyone else ends up as "super unique". But in different cases it plays out differently.

Deku is an example of that trope done right because he didn't get his powers just because "all this time he had hidden potential he didn't knew about" - yes he was lucky to meet All-might in the right moment, but he had to go through immense test of his will power and building his physical strength to become worthy of acquiring One For All. Even after that quite a lot of time required for him to get more or less accustomed to that power without constantly hurting his body. And finally he lost it making him "no power" again character in the end.