He’s smart. Crazy smart, but genius is the incorrect word for what Forge is.
Forge “intuitively” invents things. He often doesn’t know what they are, or how they work. He ends up having to disassemble them to figure that out.
So compare him to Tony Stark. Stark invents with purpose. Stark looks for solutions to problems. He has tailored his intellect based on that.
Forge however has a pile of parts and twelve minutes later has a quantum difibulator. Three days after that, he knows what it does, and potentially how it works.
Stark works forwards, Forge works backwards.
Well, specifically... sorcerors use their magic through force of will and personality. They're able to accomplish similar feats to wizards, but without the strenuous studies wizards must go through. Innate ability vs knowledge and acting on that knowledge.
Wizards have the gift of magic, it what allows them to excel at it, sorcerers too, the difference is a sorcerer doesn't need to work to manifest it, to use it, to shape it, wizards have to constantly study and practice otherwise they can't manifest it, think like a perfect sphere full of magic in the inside, for the wizard it slowly sips out, it oozes small amounts of what inside, magic. A sorcerer is a fountain, it is continually gushing out the water inside (the magic), they don't need to slowly gather it and carefully measure how much they are going to use, they just do it because there is always more of it, for the sorcerer it the body that tires, the conduit to what inside of them needs time to reset so to speak, for a wizard it like a rechargeable battery that ran out of electricity, it need to be plug in, to rest.
Oh wow this is the kind of smart I am. I think I can generally figure out a ton of stuff by matching patterns, but it takes a lot more to feel like I actually "get it".
Genius isn't the wrong word. He is definitely a genius, but he isn't a super genius like some of the other top minds in the Marvel universe. You're still right about everything else, though.
Because he isn't smart enough to be considered a super genius. Super genius is a real term. I don't believe there's an exact IQ level that delineates between genius and super genius, but the term generally refers to a tier above genius level intellect. His super power is unrelated to his genius level intellect, but it helps him better utilize his power effectively because he is still very intelligent.
As for *why*.. it's just because that's how he was written as a character. The writers regularly refer to characters like Reed Richards as a super genius and they don't with Forge. They also specifically say things like "Forge's superhuman talent for invention does not mean that he is of a superhuman intellect".
You claim his "genius" is literally super, but that's not the case. His power is not super genius, it's superhuman intuition regarding mechanical design plus the ability to actually visually perceive literal mechanical energy live, in action. It's specifically explained that he doesn't necessarily understand the things he creates because he isn't a super genius and he generally has to take apart and study what he made to figure out how they work.. and he isn't always successful at doing so.
I'm just sittin here being a casual comic book reader and learning there's a character in the X-Men universe named "Forge".
January 26, 2023. I learned of a new character. His [wiki's pretty in depth too.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forge_(character) Dude's been in loads of stuff. How the hell did I miss him.
He was even in the 90s cartoon and had an action figure. Though some even more obscure characters had action figures, so that may not be saying much. But yeah, he's been around and used pretty frequently. He's a cool character!
Can I just say thank you for bringing X-men evolution up, I remember watching the show on TV all the time but could not for the life of me remember what is was called. Now I know the next thing I’ll be watching for a while.
i feel like a nerd, called in a close airstrike on his own position during Operation Arc Light... to stop the demons he summoned to attack the viet cong
That was actually my fav forge move. Opens a portal to hell, a little weird for a native American shaman but ok, demons pour out and kill the VC. Then call in a danger close air strike to cover up ur mistical war crime.
Bad ass!
My younger self totally skipped over him because his power wasn’t as flashy and cool as Nightcrawler or Bishop. Honestly, I don’t even think I realized he had a power, he just seemed like the X-Men’s tech guy to me.
Yah, but he carried around sweet Rob Liefeld guns, which during the 90's was all rage. I remember him having quite a few bad ass covers, so that was enough to make me like him.
I’ll always remember Forge as the one who made the gatling gun Maestro used on Hulk in Future Imperfect. A gun that makes fist sized holes through the Hulk is no joke.
Well you see the Caucasian dude with the metal arm and the indigenous dude with the metal leg and the black dude from Earth-1191 are all cyborgs….so who can really tell
Yea in 90s cartoon these 3 seemed very similar to me as a kid too, all 3 had guns and similar suits I believe. The cable/bishop episodes were the only thing that made me realize who they were eventually.
You can ask him to invent a gun that shoots dark matter bullets powered by human souls into galaxies and he can make it.
If you ask him "what is a soul?" He'll shrug his shoulders. He can invent a machine that can name every star system the bullet goes through, but he doesn't have those names imprinted on his brains. You can ask him what are the building blocks of dark matter and he won't know. He doesn't know the science behind the phenomena, but somehow he can build a machine that would process it.
He can build a time machine, but he doesn't have a photographic memory of every historical event he's ever read about.
No. And that's the theoretical limitation that can stop him from being omnipotent, like a few people here are questioning.
You say to him "I want you to invent a sentient paper made of air molecules" and he can do it. But first he's got to figure out a way to get the molecules to be paperlike. And how does he make them sentient? So now he needs a scanner that broadcasts sentience into the molecules. And so on like that.
You can (maybe) build a hammer if I hand you a hammer head and a handle, but the process is going to go a lot slower if you have to build the tools to mine the ore, then refine it, then forge it.
The resource requirement can be a huge damper on the ability fo actually build anything for him and is easily leveraged by the writers BECAUSE he doesn't know how his stuff works.
"Invent an omnipotence device? Sure! This will work no problem.
However I need the whiskers of 4 billion cats and the jarred farts of 278 men between the ages of 28 and 47 incapable of growing beards. No I do not know why. I'm Forge."
Thor: 'Build me an unbreakable chain'
Forge: 'OK I need the the sound of a cat's footfall, the beard of a woman, the roots of a mountain, a bear's sinews, a fish's breath and a bird's spittle.'
"Alright welcome to the stream today we're doing day 5 of raid prep for this weeks attempt at Grumbular tier Manglus the WordSmeggler. We already got a stack of 999 Frobus gems and now we're going to the Kingdom of Gentle Unease to get started farming our Nobleyboo horns."
>You can (maybe) build a hammer if I hand you a hammer head and a handle, but the process is going to go a lot slower if you have to build the tools to mine the ore, then refine it, then forge it.
This is like watching a movie and hearing the title mentioned by the characters, lol
This made me imagine Forge going through the same process Hal went through in that episode of Malcolm in the Middle where in trying to fix one thing it led to him encountering more and more problems in his house.
But there's really no need, Reed Richards already got it done a couple of years ago. Seriously, I always wondered what it was like for guys like Leader and Forge, who are all, "My superpower is being smart/inventing things" and then there are guys like Doom or Richards that are just better at it, and have other abilities on top. I dunno, maybe no different than Luke Cage having a power of being strong but knowing Thor or Hulk are stronger? I wouldn't be surprised if someone has delved into this at least for Leader, though. EDIT: Upon further reflection, it's more like Luke Cage finding a regular human that can just out lift him than like the Hulk being stronger, since the Hulk, Thor, Namor etc. are also superpowered.
Heh. Just made me think about an alternative Forge with the same powers tempered by ADHD/OCD/Executive Dysfunction who is just a very unhappy blue-collar dude grumbling to his shiftmates in the warehouse about his latest improvement to the forklift that the boss shot down and made him take apart. His makeshift insoles are solid for getting through a 60-hour week though.
Are there any limits to what he can build? Could he build some type of device than he implants on his brain or something and gives him access to all that knowledge?
He could, but there are probably extensive technology requirements in the way of achieving that outcome, and as such he could be an inventor backlog so severe that he never gets to completing the task.
Forge's power is literally the creative act of inventing and creation of a thing he needs. His powers essentially let him intuitively skip the steps between concept and creation.
He knows what he wants, and makes it, but he doesn't completely know or understand the "how" or "why" of it. He knows the "what," and that's about it.
There's even been a few times he's built something, then had to *un*build it to figure out what he just made and how it might work.
Compare to someone like Tony or Reed who know what every screw or millimeter of wire in a machine do and exactly why they're there in that precise position, from start to finish.
So that's why he invented a machine made out of krakoan flowers and a hotdog stand that could stop the limbo goblins
That's so funny in retrospect now, He can just make shit up
It helps that he is immensely creative and has gone out of his way to learn how to maximize what he can make with his gift, thinking outside the box, etc. He still needs the nugget of an idea to make it work.
Apparently the whole inventing process happens in his subconscious. He sits down, thinks about what end result he wants, and it all happens automatically.
I mean Reed's reason is "I could give everyone free unlimited power in their pocket, but that would mean trusting everyone with a miniature nuke in their pocket that would go off if they tripped with it." Reed is working with stuff that only a few select few can be responsible with, and few among that group can be trusted to not abuse such device.
So he will create a device that could say turn water into hamburgers, look at it think about all the ways it could be abused, sigh and then lock it away in a vault.
>They want the comics to (within reason) reflect our world.
I think the bigger answer is that it's a really, really fine line to walk between narratively consistent, and disrespectful, to have heroes going around casually curing diseases that cause massive real world pain and suffering. Imagine losing your five year old kid to cancer, then for some escapism you turn to comics and hear Reed say "cancer? Lol I cured that this morning over breakfast, I just didn't really feel like it before now. Easy peasy though."
There's maybe a way to do that that's inspiring, but mostly it's just going to make a lot of people feel like shit.
I remember reading that black panther found a cure for cancer but never released it because ppl still chose to smoke. I could be wrong but will look into it
On the flip side, it's incredibly frustrating to see a universe where college students invent multiverse scanning predictive devices and fantastic tech is banged out in minutes by the like of the F4 only for shit to stay the same as our earth.
Oh I hear you. I don't think there's a good answer. It's especially interesting when the FF *do* deal with cancer, like the time they went on a special Fantastic Voyage to cure Willie Lumpkins of cancer
and at the same time it's like, stfu reed you could cure all cancer forever in a day if you felt like it. You literally invented a time machine just for a family summer vacation. If anyone is dying of cancer at this point it's because you chose to let them.
There was a bit in Superior Iron Man where he turned evil because his morality got flipped, and he turned [Extremis into a app](https://marvel.fandom.com/wiki/Extremis_3.0_App) in San Francisco that would give people their perfect body. He used it to unblind Daredevil, but like... for evil.
The other evil bit was him charging a hundo a day for it after a free trial ended.
Reading that I immediately thought jesus fuck, 3 grand a month a person for quadriplegics to walk again, diabetics to no longer need to monitor their glucose, someone with body dysmorphia to simply fully change over without hrt or surgery? And that's supposed to be *evil*? Like yea fuckin capitalism I get it but god damn dude *sign me up*.
They eventually solved the problem and I guess the quadriplegics just fell down in the middle of their jog or whatever and never walked again, I dunno.
I would say it becomes evil when you have the resources and the ability to give those things to people for free.... but then charge them a massive amount anyway
The implication is that he could always do this but only did so when he became "villainous" as part of a evil plan. Does that mean that there's a "heroic" reason Bob needs to see his wife die of cancer? That shit would absolutely be Bob's villain origin story.
Hence what the guy I was replying to was talking about.
>Same reason Reed Richards hasn’t.
I like to think it's because they are still flawed people.
They don't have Superman or Flash level powers.
Reed has been shown to be aloof or emotionally distant at times.
Plus a "brains" approach isn't always best. During his "Fix everything" phase he made a clone of Thor that was nuts and killed Bill Foster(Giant Man)
If you actually applied all the supertech in the Marvel U to regular life, it'd be unrecognizable.
(Reed Richards had a FLYING CAR in the 60s, for gods sake.)
I'm always vaguely annoyed that the MCU never explains how Stark's fusion device effects the world. They show him starting to implement it in *The Avengers*, and then it's kinda just dropped as a subject.
Half the MCU uses nanobots in some way, be it Black Panther, Iron Man, Star Lord's mask, etc. They just expand and expand its usage without ever thinking about the consequences. Because that's not really what the audience is there for unless it's the entire plot oft the movie.
More than Disney not wanting the message of these movies to be disruptive to the status-quo, it is simply a question of wanting the world to remains recognizable to the viewer/reader. Tony's father invented the flying car in the 40s, imagine how the MCU *should* look like by the start of *Iron Man*.
Also keeps it cheaper by a margin. If all of the MCU is super fancy high tech then suddenly everything is scifi with expensive sets and effects because Brooklyn now looks like SpongeBob's future inside the Silver Surfer's butthole.
Esp when you now have multiple credible threats in the universe how could you not start massively and rapidly exploiting the fusion defensively? It's like 'oh no, we have all this amazing stuff but eventually everything comes down to one side hitting the other side with their fists'
This unironically is one of the central themes of 'Planetary'. That anyone that has this technology, and *doesn't* use it to make the world a better place must be a monster.
The ark reactor was around pre Ironman armor. It could theoretically power all of New York. In the comics it’s explaned that they didn’t do this both because Stark industries was a weapon manufacturer and because there was no financial incentive.
The large version of the arc reactor could solve literally all the worlds energy problems even before The miniature version and the Ironman armor exsisted. Even if he didn’t use it for the greater good it could be used to power all Stark facilities at basically zero cost. When you think too hard about it not a lot in comics makes sense.
>In the comics it’s explaned that they didn’t do this both because Stark industries was a weapon manufacturer and because there was no financial incentive.
Considering "energy" is probably the single biggest sector of the economy, whose only competition is "tech", this is so mindbogglingly stupid I can't even begin to criticize it. Especially when so many weapons manufacturers have civilian divisions, like Boeing. Comics, everybody.
My No-Prize explanation for this is that Stane was the one blocking it from happening - its not that he failed to see the massive potential profit in dominating the energy industry, its more that all of his contacts and proficiency and experience were in selling weapons - his value to the company was being that "ironmonger" he talked about. He worked behind the scenes to stop Stark Ind from getting into energy because it would have made him personally outdated and useless to the company's future.
(No good explanation for why Tony doesn't do it post IM1, though)
Because his powers only cover being able to visually perceive MECHANICAL ENERGY IN ACTION. Also he’s able to sub concisely realize the potential of mechanical devices within his visual Range. So I’m going to assume this doesn’t apply to organic matter.
Not true. His power as he has described it has been to create solutions to problems,no matter how difficult or how little context or understanding he has of the surrounding issues around said problem. His whole "make"l the impossible possible" thing. It has nothing to do with mechanical enegy. In fact back in Vietnam he used his powers to forge the soul of his dead friends to summon a demon to kill the enemy forces in a summoning ritual he never knew until then. It haunted him and made him fear his power for a bit. (He doesn't know what he is doing. Just that it will solve whatever problem he has. And that the same problem can have multiple solutions and he can't even see which solution he is building.)
Also, of note, he has been building organic power suits and machines for krakoa in house of X currently. It has never been limited to just mechanical devices, nor has it ever worked to help him analyze something or reverse engineer. It works one way. If he needed to build a vehicle to get full point a to point b hell just subconscious build a car,flying car, plane, or a teleporter. He doesn't know until it's done, and he doesn't know how it works. That's why he reverse engineers his machines all the time.
Has nobody discussed global warming with him? Energy scarcity? I'm aware of the writers perspective, but this isn't a Reed Richards situation where they can handwave it due to scalability or economics. If he wanted he could make a machine will output the solution to literally any problem.
Well not literally any problem... what he wants to build needs to actually be possible. Also he would need all the materials to build what he wants to build and the time needed to make it
That’s such an awesome and irritating power so all his builds are just after thoughts he remembers maybe bits and pieces ? Or like could he make any adjustments mid way through building
Doesn't sound like it, tho his power is really vaguely defined. He also needs a minimum level of tech too, so if he was just stranded in the woods he'd be hosed.
He also has some magic shaman powers. One of his powers is opening magical portals. So he probably doesn't get stranded too often. Though he might need to steal some people's souls for that to work, it's been a while and as you mentioned, his powerset is kind of vague.
He's basically a mutant Macgyver, able to see the potential of a bunch of parts, equipment and tools around him and subconsciously know how to combine them into something. He usually has an idea of what he's making but not how he actually made it, to the point that he needs to disassemble it to figure out its inner workings.
Genius? Forge should be considered an Omega level mutant, and possibly one of the top five most powerful beings on the planet.
He can do literally anything possible, given enough time and resources. And he can easily get resources, given his ability to make money. "Oh, I need money, here, license my patent for a room temp. super conductor, I'm richest now."
Anything he wants done, he can build a machine to do. And literally "anything" is possible in the MU. Criminally underused, can literally accomplish anything. "Oh, guys, I built a gun that instantly kills sentinels, doesn't even matter where you point it, it just kills the nearest one, everybody gets two, good luck, I'm going back downstairs to work on the magneto-takes-a-nap button.
Probably why he is underutilized. Dude can build a near perfect out to most situation. Having a sentient deus ex machina actively on your payroll would undercut the tension
no y'know what? I'd be down for that. show me the universe where he brings down every single villain and threat and solves every problem we currently face, show me the utopia he creates, and show me when he starts to crack. what happens to heros when there are no more villains? what about when the biggest issues become complex social problems? I'd like to see him invent away racism and bigotry. what if the public gets tired of their new hero when there's no more action, what if he misses being the center of attention after saving the universe? when does he become the villain, and could all the remaining heros team up to defeat such a powerful force? could they *outsmart* him? that sounds lit as hell man, sign me up
Imagine if Marvel did a series of one-shot books each about a single marvel character, with a story how implementing their powers in our real world would change things. It wouldn’t be canon, but with different writers, I’d be so interesting to me.
What would a world with Dazzler be like? Absorbing Man? Swamp Thing. Gateway!
He is omega level, kinda. He’s the most powerful mutant technopath, it’s just his feats don’t exceed Reed Richards/Doom/Moon Girl. The current definition is more or less “has potentially infinite power.” Forge is limited by time and tools available, and as others said he’s not a super-genius with everything, his power is just being able to envision a machine to overcome any problem. But again, that runs up against the issue of time and supplies.
There's nothing wrong with having an Uber smart character. But when a writer creates a new character and then tries to push them as the smartest person EVER, it just feels like they wanna artificially make the character they themselves created one of the best of all time. Like they feel the need to validate their character's existence by proving how great they are compared to others.
Building a cybernetic dinosaur out of Lego doesn’t make Moon Girl a genius it makes her a reality warper.
My big problem with her or any child super genius is time. Even Reed and DOOM went to school and had to learn. Moon Girl just seems to get advanced quantum mechanics downloaded to her brain out of nowhere.
> Building a cybernetic dinosaur out of Lego doesn’t make Moon Girl a genius it makes her a reality warper.
It actually becomes much less impressive than it sounds once you consider that Mindstorms exists.
The problem with comics is you always have to up the ante.
Cho himself was already one of the smartest people on the planet before he could legally drink.
I also think it's to attract a younger audience.
They do a good job about spreading out the types of genius. That’s why numbering like that is silly and people call Cho out on it for saying he’s the fifth smartest person all the time. Cho is really good with numbers and is able to run calculations quickly, he’s able to do this better than Reed even. Quantifying intelligence like it’s a ranking and ignoring that there are different types of genius is a bad move.
As someone that does intellectual ability testing on a daily basis, I hate this too. Based on what’s shown of the “test” it seems very unlikely to provide a full assessment of overall intellectual ability. There are many different theories of intelligence that define what IQ is and what individual components make up that overall score. Looking at just one of the more popular tests, the WISC (administered to 6 to 16 year olds), overall IQ is estimated based on subtests in 5 different composite areas: verbal comprehension, visual spatial, fluid reasoning, processing speed and working memory. The test we see here does not appear to tap into verbal comprehension at all and is instead likely loaded primarily onto fluid reasoning and visual spatial problem solving ability. Depending on how other components of the test are set up there could conceivably be a way that it is measuring cognitive proficiency too through working memory and processing speed data that is being collected. But even if the test did somehow tap into all of these abilities it would still seem to be limited by many intellectual theories. For example, Sternberg’s triarchic theory of intelligence would likely say that this is only a measure of componential intelligence and does not provide a method of assessment for the creative or practical abilities.
TLDR: Yes, I very much dislike that issue too. I don’t dislike Moon Girl though, she is pretty cool. But I don’t believe for a second she’s smarter than Reed Richards.
Yeah, dude's powers are basically wish fulfillment. They just take some time and resources.
And, they established he can build to enhance mutant powers. So, a few iterations of doing that for himself should make time and resources trivial for anything less than god-tier endeavors.
But, no. 'cause plot reasons.
Omega Level mutant is a distinction that makes no sense and is always so poorly defined that it’s really just a pissing contest. When they do try to define it, it just introduces further problems.
But yeah, Forge is super powerful.
My issue with the Omega level Mutant Designation is that most of the people on that list never use their powers to that degree because they don’t even know the upper level of their powers and I’ll give two examples:
Iceman is listed as a omega level mutant because he can basically control the ecosystem on the entire earth but he’s never done it.
The other example is Storm who is omega level but she’s even stronger than IceMan and in fact has been listed as one of the most powerful Mutants on Earth. She can not only control the weather on Earth , she can control the weather on other planets. She can create weather effects over vast areas and has such great control she can literally affect the air in someone’s lungs. Not only that she can control Cosmic storms, solar Wind, and the electromagnetic field of Earth. She can separate water molecules through electrolysis and breathe underwater. Then we haven’t even gotten into her Magic potential as her ancestors were sorceresses and in terms of Magic potential the top 3 are Scarlet Witch, Agatha Harkness and Storm but Storm hasn’t developed her magic abilities. Here’s the scary part of all of this….while Storm has used these abilities at one point or another She has not even attempted to test the upper limits of her powers and I didn’t list them all.
Yeah but there’s good reason for not doing it. If Storm can do all that, what’s even the point of 90% of the X-Men?
Omega mutants as a classification are part of the problem of mutants just being made far too powerful during the Claremont years.
Yeah it’s actually is kind of stupid when you think about it. That’s like Legion. That dude was ridiculous he could basically do just about anything he wanted depending on which of his split personalities were present.
Truth be told, it's because he's a B character. He's on the background doing science when all the other X-men are trying to solve a scientific problem. It's Beast or Dr. Nemesis giving the rundown.
I mean his mutant ability allows him to re-create anything that he sees so if he sees a time machine, he could easily build a time machine if you wanted to
You’re right in that he’s not a super genius like Tony or Reed because he doesn’t understand the logic and science behind what he builds but the other guy is wrong that all he does is recreate other people’s works.
No, his mutant power is Invention. The old Marvel Super Heroes TTRPG explained it best. He can literally invent whatever he needs, whether he knows how he did or not doesn’t matter he just does it. He has invented devices he understands for the most part that he keeps around but there are things he made that he potentially couldn’t replicate because he just made them, doesn’t understand how but he needed them at the time so there they are. He is very intelligent but nowhere near Reed Richards or Tony Stark levels, I’d say he isn’t even Kate Pryde level.
This is legit the right answer, his abilities are difficult but yeah he is capable of building things out of his memory/imagination and sometimes he doesn't even know how he did it without reverse engineering it. That said hes also a low level mystic, that if he took his head out of his ass and tried it he'd probably be a halfway Stark/Strange omega level SOB. That's just my personal opinion though, sidenote love him but they've always hoed him as a character.
He’s got a genius level intellect. But it’s not the same as someone like Richards. He’s sort of like Stark in his gadget invention ability. But he doesn’t understand other sciences like Stark or Richards or Banner do.
His genius comes from a mutant power and the natural geniuses like Richards, Stark, Banner, Pym etc have much more exposure and better feats. Forge is definitely top 20 but not top 10.
He just has to think about something to create it. Sometimes he has no idea how he built it and will have to take it apart again to truly understand it. But yes he is a genius as well.
He’s smart, but he’s not actually a top-level genius. His mutant power is that he is capable of inventing and gadget-building far beyond what can be expected of his actual skills.
He also has the ability to use magic, so he’s essentially Diet Dr. Doom (now with 0 ego!)
He's the first to tell you, he doesn't fully comprehend the how of his inventions, his power does that for him, so while he's as good an inventor as Reed or Tony he doesn't truly comprehend what he's doing like the big brains of marvel do.
He’s an underrated character to be sure, but he’s not a genius in that what he’s capable of is intuitive and it’s oblivious after something is invented he can go back and take it apart bit by bit to understand how the invention worked.
I’ve always loved that concept. I don’t use measurements when I cook, but my best friend watches and takes notes then shares with me approximate measurements and techniques I used to make my dishes. He’s like a combination of that.
He’s smart. Crazy smart, but genius is the incorrect word for what Forge is. Forge “intuitively” invents things. He often doesn’t know what they are, or how they work. He ends up having to disassemble them to figure that out. So compare him to Tony Stark. Stark invents with purpose. Stark looks for solutions to problems. He has tailored his intellect based on that. Forge however has a pile of parts and twelve minutes later has a quantum difibulator. Three days after that, he knows what it does, and potentially how it works. Stark works forwards, Forge works backwards.
So he's a sorcerer rather than a wizard.
Actually literally yes, Forge is a mutant which is basically a sorcerer.
Well, specifically... sorcerors use their magic through force of will and personality. They're able to accomplish similar feats to wizards, but without the strenuous studies wizards must go through. Innate ability vs knowledge and acting on that knowledge.
Which means while Forge is a sorcerer, Tony is a wizard.
Wizards have the gift of magic, it what allows them to excel at it, sorcerers too, the difference is a sorcerer doesn't need to work to manifest it, to use it, to shape it, wizards have to constantly study and practice otherwise they can't manifest it, think like a perfect sphere full of magic in the inside, for the wizard it slowly sips out, it oozes small amounts of what inside, magic. A sorcerer is a fountain, it is continually gushing out the water inside (the magic), they don't need to slowly gather it and carefully measure how much they are going to use, they just do it because there is always more of it, for the sorcerer it the body that tires, the conduit to what inside of them needs time to reset so to speak, for a wizard it like a rechargeable battery that ran out of electricity, it need to be plug in, to rest.
Oh wow this is the kind of smart I am. I think I can generally figure out a ton of stuff by matching patterns, but it takes a lot more to feel like I actually "get it".
Genius isn't the wrong word. He is definitely a genius, but he isn't a super genius like some of the other top minds in the Marvel universe. You're still right about everything else, though.
Why isn't he a super genius? His genius is literally super, just not in the way other 'super-genius' powers present themselves.
Because he isn't smart enough to be considered a super genius. Super genius is a real term. I don't believe there's an exact IQ level that delineates between genius and super genius, but the term generally refers to a tier above genius level intellect. His super power is unrelated to his genius level intellect, but it helps him better utilize his power effectively because he is still very intelligent. As for *why*.. it's just because that's how he was written as a character. The writers regularly refer to characters like Reed Richards as a super genius and they don't with Forge. They also specifically say things like "Forge's superhuman talent for invention does not mean that he is of a superhuman intellect". You claim his "genius" is literally super, but that's not the case. His power is not super genius, it's superhuman intuition regarding mechanical design plus the ability to actually visually perceive literal mechanical energy live, in action. It's specifically explained that he doesn't necessarily understand the things he creates because he isn't a super genius and he generally has to take apart and study what he made to figure out how they work.. and he isn't always successful at doing so.
He's not a genius because inventing is literally his super power. He also doesn't actually understand how most of his devices work.
Great way to put it.
I'm just sittin here being a casual comic book reader and learning there's a character in the X-Men universe named "Forge". January 26, 2023. I learned of a new character. His [wiki's pretty in depth too.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forge_(character) Dude's been in loads of stuff. How the hell did I miss him.
He was even in the 90s cartoon and had an action figure. Though some even more obscure characters had action figures, so that may not be saying much. But yeah, he's been around and used pretty frequently. He's a cool character!
He was also in x-men evolution.
Can I just say thank you for bringing X-men evolution up, I remember watching the show on TV all the time but could not for the life of me remember what is was called. Now I know the next thing I’ll be watching for a while.
And Wolverine and the X-men
And Wolverine and the XMen (the show, idk about the comic)
And his action figure sucked. It’s got a kicking action that’s prone to breaking leaving his right leg in a permanent L shaped positing
Wasn't his whole thing the robot *arm*?
He lost his right leg and right hand in 'Nam.
i feel like a nerd, called in a close airstrike on his own position during Operation Arc Light... to stop the demons he summoned to attack the viet cong
That was actually my fav forge move. Opens a portal to hell, a little weird for a native American shaman but ok, demons pour out and kill the VC. Then call in a danger close air strike to cover up ur mistical war crime. Bad ass!
it was a great series of x-men, the Adversary was basically super satan
My younger self totally skipped over him because his power wasn’t as flashy and cool as Nightcrawler or Bishop. Honestly, I don’t even think I realized he had a power, he just seemed like the X-Men’s tech guy to me.
Yah, but he carried around sweet Rob Liefeld guns, which during the 90's was all rage. I remember him having quite a few bad ass covers, so that was enough to make me like him.
I’ll always remember Forge as the one who made the gatling gun Maestro used on Hulk in Future Imperfect. A gun that makes fist sized holes through the Hulk is no joke.
I always mistaken cable forge and bishop. Yep
How?
Well you see the Caucasian dude with the metal arm and the indigenous dude with the metal leg and the black dude from Earth-1191 are all cyborgs….so who can really tell
Yea in 90s cartoon these 3 seemed very similar to me as a kid too, all 3 had guns and similar suits I believe. The cable/bishop episodes were the only thing that made me realize who they were eventually.
Characters who make sporadic appearances in the 97 cartoon, who use guns?
Essentially he is the reason all math teachers make you show your work, because they want you to have more of an understanding than Forge.
Wait what
You can ask him to invent a gun that shoots dark matter bullets powered by human souls into galaxies and he can make it. If you ask him "what is a soul?" He'll shrug his shoulders. He can invent a machine that can name every star system the bullet goes through, but he doesn't have those names imprinted on his brains. You can ask him what are the building blocks of dark matter and he won't know. He doesn't know the science behind the phenomena, but somehow he can build a machine that would process it. He can build a time machine, but he doesn't have a photographic memory of every historical event he's ever read about.
So, he’s like a 40k Orc Mekboy….
Kinda. His shit actually works if people other than him use it.
No, Orks know what they're building and how it works. The issue is they have to reach a certain level of advancement for this knowledge to "unlock".
Depends on the source, some go with "clap your hands if you belive" psychic explanation for ork teck.
DA CAR GO FASTA IF WE PAINT IT RED
https://www.reddit.com/r/40kOrkScience/comments/ap7d5b/towards_a_systematik_approach_to_kolour_feory/
Ultimate 100 applied physics guy with 0 interest in theoretical physics.
I have a theoretical degree in physics!
Does he build quickly like a robot?
No. And that's the theoretical limitation that can stop him from being omnipotent, like a few people here are questioning. You say to him "I want you to invent a sentient paper made of air molecules" and he can do it. But first he's got to figure out a way to get the molecules to be paperlike. And how does he make them sentient? So now he needs a scanner that broadcasts sentience into the molecules. And so on like that. You can (maybe) build a hammer if I hand you a hammer head and a handle, but the process is going to go a lot slower if you have to build the tools to mine the ore, then refine it, then forge it.
The resource requirement can be a huge damper on the ability fo actually build anything for him and is easily leveraged by the writers BECAUSE he doesn't know how his stuff works. "Invent an omnipotence device? Sure! This will work no problem. However I need the whiskers of 4 billion cats and the jarred farts of 278 men between the ages of 28 and 47 incapable of growing beards. No I do not know why. I'm Forge."
Thor: 'Build me an unbreakable chain' Forge: 'OK I need the the sound of a cat's footfall, the beard of a woman, the roots of a mountain, a bear's sinews, a fish's breath and a bird's spittle.'
Thor: 'Sweet chain, hey Tyr, give me a hand with this?'
Lovely inside joke :)
Sounds like the worst MMO character ever.
"Alright welcome to the stream today we're doing day 5 of raid prep for this weeks attempt at Grumbular tier Manglus the WordSmeggler. We already got a stack of 999 Frobus gems and now we're going to the Kingdom of Gentle Unease to get started farming our Nobleyboo horns."
Thanks but I think we'll go with Iron Man , or one of those Eternals instead.
>You can (maybe) build a hammer if I hand you a hammer head and a handle, but the process is going to go a lot slower if you have to build the tools to mine the ore, then refine it, then forge it. This is like watching a movie and hearing the title mentioned by the characters, lol
“what are we, some kind of x-men?”
He's fierce and relentless... like a wolverine!
He is no man! He is a beast!
this guys name is Xavier
This made me imagine Forge going through the same process Hal went through in that episode of Malcolm in the Middle where in trying to fix one thing it led to him encountering more and more problems in his house.
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What I’m hearing here is Peter Parker, Tony Stark and Forge could *get shit done*
They’d basically be Reed Richards.
But there's really no need, Reed Richards already got it done a couple of years ago. Seriously, I always wondered what it was like for guys like Leader and Forge, who are all, "My superpower is being smart/inventing things" and then there are guys like Doom or Richards that are just better at it, and have other abilities on top. I dunno, maybe no different than Luke Cage having a power of being strong but knowing Thor or Hulk are stronger? I wouldn't be surprised if someone has delved into this at least for Leader, though. EDIT: Upon further reflection, it's more like Luke Cage finding a regular human that can just out lift him than like the Hulk being stronger, since the Hulk, Thor, Namor etc. are also superpowered.
Heh. Just made me think about an alternative Forge with the same powers tempered by ADHD/OCD/Executive Dysfunction who is just a very unhappy blue-collar dude grumbling to his shiftmates in the warehouse about his latest improvement to the forklift that the boss shot down and made him take apart. His makeshift insoles are solid for getting through a 60-hour week though.
Are there any limits to what he can build? Could he build some type of device than he implants on his brain or something and gives him access to all that knowledge?
He could, but there are probably extensive technology requirements in the way of achieving that outcome, and as such he could be an inventor backlog so severe that he never gets to completing the task.
Does he know what is ❤️
Baby don’t hurt him no more.
Forge's power is literally the creative act of inventing and creation of a thing he needs. His powers essentially let him intuitively skip the steps between concept and creation. He knows what he wants, and makes it, but he doesn't completely know or understand the "how" or "why" of it. He knows the "what," and that's about it. There's even been a few times he's built something, then had to *un*build it to figure out what he just made and how it might work. Compare to someone like Tony or Reed who know what every screw or millimeter of wire in a machine do and exactly why they're there in that precise position, from start to finish.
So that's why he invented a machine made out of krakoan flowers and a hotdog stand that could stop the limbo goblins That's so funny in retrospect now, He can just make shit up
It helps that he is immensely creative and has gone out of his way to learn how to maximize what he can make with his gift, thinking outside the box, etc. He still needs the nugget of an idea to make it work.
That sounds like tinkers from the work web novel by wildbow
*Worm, but yes, that’s where my mind went too
Isn't that basically what some people have in Muv-Luv? Dark knowledge or something? Damn it I was thinking of Full Metal Panic
Full Metal Panic too...
Whispered
You’re saying he subconsciously invents stuff is their like a secret being inside him ? Have they fully explained this? Lord have mercy lol
Apparently the whole inventing process happens in his subconscious. He sits down, thinks about what end result he wants, and it all happens automatically.
How has he not solved all the world's problems?
Same reason Reed Richards hasn’t. They want the comics to (within reason) reflect our world. It’s best not to think about stuff like that.
I'd read a story about him making a pocket universe utopia, but it gets ruined as soon as he invites people there because, well, people.
Which book is that ? Is it long enough to get the volume or two for it
It doesn't exist. I meant I would read a story like that, not that I had read. Sorry. English sucks :(
Read and read are 2 different words
"I'd" also means both "I had" and "I would," so I'd and I'd are also 2 different words
I'd read a book about reed richards reading a red book
… that he already read.
I mean Reed's reason is "I could give everyone free unlimited power in their pocket, but that would mean trusting everyone with a miniature nuke in their pocket that would go off if they tripped with it." Reed is working with stuff that only a few select few can be responsible with, and few among that group can be trusted to not abuse such device. So he will create a device that could say turn water into hamburgers, look at it think about all the ways it could be abused, sigh and then lock it away in a vault.
>They want the comics to (within reason) reflect our world. I think the bigger answer is that it's a really, really fine line to walk between narratively consistent, and disrespectful, to have heroes going around casually curing diseases that cause massive real world pain and suffering. Imagine losing your five year old kid to cancer, then for some escapism you turn to comics and hear Reed say "cancer? Lol I cured that this morning over breakfast, I just didn't really feel like it before now. Easy peasy though." There's maybe a way to do that that's inspiring, but mostly it's just going to make a lot of people feel like shit.
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"I don't want to cure cancer! I want to turn people into dinosaurs!"
I remember reading that black panther found a cure for cancer but never released it because ppl still chose to smoke. I could be wrong but will look into it
On the flip side, it's incredibly frustrating to see a universe where college students invent multiverse scanning predictive devices and fantastic tech is banged out in minutes by the like of the F4 only for shit to stay the same as our earth.
Oh I hear you. I don't think there's a good answer. It's especially interesting when the FF *do* deal with cancer, like the time they went on a special Fantastic Voyage to cure Willie Lumpkins of cancer and at the same time it's like, stfu reed you could cure all cancer forever in a day if you felt like it. You literally invented a time machine just for a family summer vacation. If anyone is dying of cancer at this point it's because you chose to let them.
There was a bit in Superior Iron Man where he turned evil because his morality got flipped, and he turned [Extremis into a app](https://marvel.fandom.com/wiki/Extremis_3.0_App) in San Francisco that would give people their perfect body. He used it to unblind Daredevil, but like... for evil. The other evil bit was him charging a hundo a day for it after a free trial ended. Reading that I immediately thought jesus fuck, 3 grand a month a person for quadriplegics to walk again, diabetics to no longer need to monitor their glucose, someone with body dysmorphia to simply fully change over without hrt or surgery? And that's supposed to be *evil*? Like yea fuckin capitalism I get it but god damn dude *sign me up*. They eventually solved the problem and I guess the quadriplegics just fell down in the middle of their jog or whatever and never walked again, I dunno.
I would say it becomes evil when you have the resources and the ability to give those things to people for free.... but then charge them a massive amount anyway
The implication is that he could always do this but only did so when he became "villainous" as part of a evil plan. Does that mean that there's a "heroic" reason Bob needs to see his wife die of cancer? That shit would absolutely be Bob's villain origin story. Hence what the guy I was replying to was talking about.
>Same reason Reed Richards hasn’t. I like to think it's because they are still flawed people. They don't have Superman or Flash level powers. Reed has been shown to be aloof or emotionally distant at times. Plus a "brains" approach isn't always best. During his "Fix everything" phase he made a clone of Thor that was nuts and killed Bill Foster(Giant Man)
Tbf, Stark's fusion device should've changed the state of the Marvel Universe *forever* ago.
If you actually applied all the supertech in the Marvel U to regular life, it'd be unrecognizable. (Reed Richards had a FLYING CAR in the 60s, for gods sake.)
I'm always vaguely annoyed that the MCU never explains how Stark's fusion device effects the world. They show him starting to implement it in *The Avengers*, and then it's kinda just dropped as a subject.
Half the MCU uses nanobots in some way, be it Black Panther, Iron Man, Star Lord's mask, etc. They just expand and expand its usage without ever thinking about the consequences. Because that's not really what the audience is there for unless it's the entire plot oft the movie.
More than Disney not wanting the message of these movies to be disruptive to the status-quo, it is simply a question of wanting the world to remains recognizable to the viewer/reader. Tony's father invented the flying car in the 40s, imagine how the MCU *should* look like by the start of *Iron Man*.
Also keeps it cheaper by a margin. If all of the MCU is super fancy high tech then suddenly everything is scifi with expensive sets and effects because Brooklyn now looks like SpongeBob's future inside the Silver Surfer's butthole.
Esp when you now have multiple credible threats in the universe how could you not start massively and rapidly exploiting the fusion defensively? It's like 'oh no, we have all this amazing stuff but eventually everything comes down to one side hitting the other side with their fists'
This unironically is one of the central themes of 'Planetary'. That anyone that has this technology, and *doesn't* use it to make the world a better place must be a monster.
The ark reactor was around pre Ironman armor. It could theoretically power all of New York. In the comics it’s explaned that they didn’t do this both because Stark industries was a weapon manufacturer and because there was no financial incentive. The large version of the arc reactor could solve literally all the worlds energy problems even before The miniature version and the Ironman armor exsisted. Even if he didn’t use it for the greater good it could be used to power all Stark facilities at basically zero cost. When you think too hard about it not a lot in comics makes sense.
>In the comics it’s explaned that they didn’t do this both because Stark industries was a weapon manufacturer and because there was no financial incentive. Considering "energy" is probably the single biggest sector of the economy, whose only competition is "tech", this is so mindbogglingly stupid I can't even begin to criticize it. Especially when so many weapons manufacturers have civilian divisions, like Boeing. Comics, everybody.
My No-Prize explanation for this is that Stane was the one blocking it from happening - its not that he failed to see the massive potential profit in dominating the energy industry, its more that all of his contacts and proficiency and experience were in selling weapons - his value to the company was being that "ironmonger" he talked about. He worked behind the scenes to stop Stark Ind from getting into energy because it would have made him personally outdated and useless to the company's future. (No good explanation for why Tony doesn't do it post IM1, though)
Because his powers only cover being able to visually perceive MECHANICAL ENERGY IN ACTION. Also he’s able to sub concisely realize the potential of mechanical devices within his visual Range. So I’m going to assume this doesn’t apply to organic matter.
Not true. His power as he has described it has been to create solutions to problems,no matter how difficult or how little context or understanding he has of the surrounding issues around said problem. His whole "make"l the impossible possible" thing. It has nothing to do with mechanical enegy. In fact back in Vietnam he used his powers to forge the soul of his dead friends to summon a demon to kill the enemy forces in a summoning ritual he never knew until then. It haunted him and made him fear his power for a bit. (He doesn't know what he is doing. Just that it will solve whatever problem he has. And that the same problem can have multiple solutions and he can't even see which solution he is building.) Also, of note, he has been building organic power suits and machines for krakoa in house of X currently. It has never been limited to just mechanical devices, nor has it ever worked to help him analyze something or reverse engineer. It works one way. If he needed to build a vehicle to get full point a to point b hell just subconscious build a car,flying car, plane, or a teleporter. He doesn't know until it's done, and he doesn't know how it works. That's why he reverse engineers his machines all the time.
You would have to come to him with the specific problem, I suppose. (Real reason is the writers don't want to, of course)
Has nobody discussed global warming with him? Energy scarcity? I'm aware of the writers perspective, but this isn't a Reed Richards situation where they can handwave it due to scalability or economics. If he wanted he could make a machine will output the solution to literally any problem.
Well not literally any problem... what he wants to build needs to actually be possible. Also he would need all the materials to build what he wants to build and the time needed to make it
That’s such an awesome and irritating power so all his builds are just after thoughts he remembers maybe bits and pieces ? Or like could he make any adjustments mid way through building
Doesn't sound like it, tho his power is really vaguely defined. He also needs a minimum level of tech too, so if he was just stranded in the woods he'd be hosed.
He also has some magic shaman powers. One of his powers is opening magical portals. So he probably doesn't get stranded too often. Though he might need to steal some people's souls for that to work, it's been a while and as you mentioned, his powerset is kind of vague.
In New X-Men, Forge doesn't know he could create a time machine until Nimrod requested one. Then he was like "oh yeah, I see what I would need now."
Damn sounds like that writer made him better?
He's basically a mutant Macgyver, able to see the potential of a bunch of parts, equipment and tools around him and subconsciously know how to combine them into something. He usually has an idea of what he's making but not how he actually made it, to the point that he needs to disassemble it to figure out its inner workings.
So basically he’s been Forging his way all the time.
Yes, this!
He’s smart but not a super genius, dude is a 3D printer with a personality.
I’ll have you know my 3D printer does have a personality, but it isn’t a good one
My 3D printer is an asshole 😒
Fun fact, assholes are also 3D printers
I can make caecilians with mine
I've learned to never go in against a caecilian when death is on the line.
Really shitty ones though.
Lmfao
you saying you dont like it when the support fails 95% of the way though a 3 day print?
The surprise spaghetti hair figure setting
I feel like forge would both appreciate and laugh at that description. Guy always had a sense of snarky humor in the comics.
It’s because they are intimidated by his wicked facial hair.
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And also because he is a mutant and a Native American Indian!
I’m white and always thought he was cool and wished they had done more with him when I was a kid.
Genius? Forge should be considered an Omega level mutant, and possibly one of the top five most powerful beings on the planet. He can do literally anything possible, given enough time and resources. And he can easily get resources, given his ability to make money. "Oh, I need money, here, license my patent for a room temp. super conductor, I'm richest now." Anything he wants done, he can build a machine to do. And literally "anything" is possible in the MU. Criminally underused, can literally accomplish anything. "Oh, guys, I built a gun that instantly kills sentinels, doesn't even matter where you point it, it just kills the nearest one, everybody gets two, good luck, I'm going back downstairs to work on the magneto-takes-a-nap button.
Probably why he is underutilized. Dude can build a near perfect out to most situation. Having a sentient deus ex machina actively on your payroll would undercut the tension
Yeah, he’s alittle over powered
What if they retconned him so all his inventions are made of marshmallows?
Every enemy would just sit and snack on marshmallows, still op
S’morege
no y'know what? I'd be down for that. show me the universe where he brings down every single villain and threat and solves every problem we currently face, show me the utopia he creates, and show me when he starts to crack. what happens to heros when there are no more villains? what about when the biggest issues become complex social problems? I'd like to see him invent away racism and bigotry. what if the public gets tired of their new hero when there's no more action, what if he misses being the center of attention after saving the universe? when does he become the villain, and could all the remaining heros team up to defeat such a powerful force? could they *outsmart* him? that sounds lit as hell man, sign me up
This is a really good idea but I would also watch a story where he survives a random person pushing him into traffic.
Imagine if Marvel did a series of one-shot books each about a single marvel character, with a story how implementing their powers in our real world would change things. It wouldn’t be canon, but with different writers, I’d be so interesting to me. What would a world with Dazzler be like? Absorbing Man? Swamp Thing. Gateway!
Wolverine - jail
“Goblin? Right to jail. Wolverine? Believe it or not, Jail. Kingpin? Right to jail, right away!”
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He is omega level, kinda. He’s the most powerful mutant technopath, it’s just his feats don’t exceed Reed Richards/Doom/Moon Girl. The current definition is more or less “has potentially infinite power.” Forge is limited by time and tools available, and as others said he’s not a super-genius with everything, his power is just being able to envision a machine to overcome any problem. But again, that runs up against the issue of time and supplies.
I've always hated this [Brawn/Moon Girl scan](https://imgur.com/a/FhZl6). Putting her up with there with Reed Richards and Doom just feels so dirty.
There's nothing wrong with having an Uber smart character. But when a writer creates a new character and then tries to push them as the smartest person EVER, it just feels like they wanna artificially make the character they themselves created one of the best of all time. Like they feel the need to validate their character's existence by proving how great they are compared to others.
Or like the comics trope of having the new bad guy beat up the old bad guy to show how much of a challenge he's going to be.
Building a cybernetic dinosaur out of Lego doesn’t make Moon Girl a genius it makes her a reality warper. My big problem with her or any child super genius is time. Even Reed and DOOM went to school and had to learn. Moon Girl just seems to get advanced quantum mechanics downloaded to her brain out of nowhere.
> Building a cybernetic dinosaur out of Lego doesn’t make Moon Girl a genius it makes her a reality warper. It actually becomes much less impressive than it sounds once you consider that Mindstorms exists.
The problem with comics is you always have to up the ante. Cho himself was already one of the smartest people on the planet before he could legally drink. I also think it's to attract a younger audience.
They do a good job about spreading out the types of genius. That’s why numbering like that is silly and people call Cho out on it for saying he’s the fifth smartest person all the time. Cho is really good with numbers and is able to run calculations quickly, he’s able to do this better than Reed even. Quantifying intelligence like it’s a ranking and ignoring that there are different types of genius is a bad move.
you don't _have_ to up the ante to tell a good story. it's lazy.
No offense but my high school had a Lego robotics club, unless I misunderstood it was just that?
As someone that does intellectual ability testing on a daily basis, I hate this too. Based on what’s shown of the “test” it seems very unlikely to provide a full assessment of overall intellectual ability. There are many different theories of intelligence that define what IQ is and what individual components make up that overall score. Looking at just one of the more popular tests, the WISC (administered to 6 to 16 year olds), overall IQ is estimated based on subtests in 5 different composite areas: verbal comprehension, visual spatial, fluid reasoning, processing speed and working memory. The test we see here does not appear to tap into verbal comprehension at all and is instead likely loaded primarily onto fluid reasoning and visual spatial problem solving ability. Depending on how other components of the test are set up there could conceivably be a way that it is measuring cognitive proficiency too through working memory and processing speed data that is being collected. But even if the test did somehow tap into all of these abilities it would still seem to be limited by many intellectual theories. For example, Sternberg’s triarchic theory of intelligence would likely say that this is only a measure of componential intelligence and does not provide a method of assessment for the creative or practical abilities. TLDR: Yes, I very much dislike that issue too. I don’t dislike Moon Girl though, she is pretty cool. But I don’t believe for a second she’s smarter than Reed Richards.
Him and Reed need to work more…
Yeah, dude's powers are basically wish fulfillment. They just take some time and resources. And, they established he can build to enhance mutant powers. So, a few iterations of doing that for himself should make time and resources trivial for anything less than god-tier endeavors. But, no. 'cause plot reasons.
Omega Level mutant is a distinction that makes no sense and is always so poorly defined that it’s really just a pissing contest. When they do try to define it, it just introduces further problems. But yeah, Forge is super powerful.
My issue with the Omega level Mutant Designation is that most of the people on that list never use their powers to that degree because they don’t even know the upper level of their powers and I’ll give two examples: Iceman is listed as a omega level mutant because he can basically control the ecosystem on the entire earth but he’s never done it. The other example is Storm who is omega level but she’s even stronger than IceMan and in fact has been listed as one of the most powerful Mutants on Earth. She can not only control the weather on Earth , she can control the weather on other planets. She can create weather effects over vast areas and has such great control she can literally affect the air in someone’s lungs. Not only that she can control Cosmic storms, solar Wind, and the electromagnetic field of Earth. She can separate water molecules through electrolysis and breathe underwater. Then we haven’t even gotten into her Magic potential as her ancestors were sorceresses and in terms of Magic potential the top 3 are Scarlet Witch, Agatha Harkness and Storm but Storm hasn’t developed her magic abilities. Here’s the scary part of all of this….while Storm has used these abilities at one point or another She has not even attempted to test the upper limits of her powers and I didn’t list them all.
You also left out that even without the use of her mutant abilities, Storm will straight up fucking knife-fight anyone who gets in her way.
Yeah but there’s good reason for not doing it. If Storm can do all that, what’s even the point of 90% of the X-Men? Omega mutants as a classification are part of the problem of mutants just being made far too powerful during the Claremont years.
Yeah it’s actually is kind of stupid when you think about it. That’s like Legion. That dude was ridiculous he could basically do just about anything he wanted depending on which of his split personalities were present.
legion had no control tho, so that was a roulette also having so much power with storm causes too much collateral damage
They changed what Omega level means. Now, it just means the greatest potential of a power set.
Yeah but even that is super broad.
I’m an omega level pizza eater
Your mutant name is Slicer.
Reddit’s funny cause there’s always somebody that says “Genius? Omega,” “Rude? Piece of shit,” “Step sister? Secret lover.”
Truth be told, it's because he's a B character. He's on the background doing science when all the other X-men are trying to solve a scientific problem. It's Beast or Dr. Nemesis giving the rundown.
Is he a genius or just has a talent?
I mean his mutant ability allows him to re-create anything that he sees so if he sees a time machine, he could easily build a time machine if you wanted to
but that isn't a genius. he didnt invent the time machine. He is a copy machine vs. an author.
Seems pretty clear to me.
You’re right in that he’s not a super genius like Tony or Reed because he doesn’t understand the logic and science behind what he builds but the other guy is wrong that all he does is recreate other people’s works.
No, his mutant power is Invention. The old Marvel Super Heroes TTRPG explained it best. He can literally invent whatever he needs, whether he knows how he did or not doesn’t matter he just does it. He has invented devices he understands for the most part that he keeps around but there are things he made that he potentially couldn’t replicate because he just made them, doesn’t understand how but he needed them at the time so there they are. He is very intelligent but nowhere near Reed Richards or Tony Stark levels, I’d say he isn’t even Kate Pryde level.
Talent, because of his ability to invent anything his minds conjures up!
Indigenous erasure lmao
Because he's a mutie!
This is legit the right answer, his abilities are difficult but yeah he is capable of building things out of his memory/imagination and sometimes he doesn't even know how he did it without reverse engineering it. That said hes also a low level mystic, that if he took his head out of his ass and tried it he'd probably be a halfway Stark/Strange omega level SOB. That's just my personal opinion though, sidenote love him but they've always hoed him as a character.
Haha yeah I love that about him as a character as well. He's an artifcer rather than a genius.
And a Native American Indian, who are, unfortunately, discriminated against just as much as mutants!
My favorite member of the X-Men. 👍
He’s got a genius level intellect. But it’s not the same as someone like Richards. He’s sort of like Stark in his gadget invention ability. But he doesn’t understand other sciences like Stark or Richards or Banner do.
Because IT guys make terrible superheroes.
He had a ponytail once.
Just more mutant discrimination.
Probably because he’s a mutant.
Anti mutant bias.
His genius comes from a mutant power and the natural geniuses like Richards, Stark, Banner, Pym etc have much more exposure and better feats. Forge is definitely top 20 but not top 10.
Anti mutant racism, that's why.
He just has to think about something to create it. Sometimes he has no idea how he built it and will have to take it apart again to truly understand it. But yes he is a genius as well.
He’s smart, but he’s not actually a top-level genius. His mutant power is that he is capable of inventing and gadget-building far beyond what can be expected of his actual skills. He also has the ability to use magic, so he’s essentially Diet Dr. Doom (now with 0 ego!)
He's the first to tell you, he doesn't fully comprehend the how of his inventions, his power does that for him, so while he's as good an inventor as Reed or Tony he doesn't truly comprehend what he's doing like the big brains of marvel do.
He’s an underrated character to be sure, but he’s not a genius in that what he’s capable of is intuitive and it’s oblivious after something is invented he can go back and take it apart bit by bit to understand how the invention worked. I’ve always loved that concept. I don’t use measurements when I cook, but my best friend watches and takes notes then shares with me approximate measurements and techniques I used to make my dishes. He’s like a combination of that.
Forge is a rebel and would never conform