Match 13134 The Spectre vs. Cthulhu

[Guest El Wookiee]

It was humanity’s darkest hour. Madness and evil had crushed mankind beneath its heels. Millions of people had lost their sanity at the exact same moment all over the world. Natural disasters wracked the Earth. And only a handful knew the truth, that the Great Beast had finally awoken. On that dark day Cthulhu had risen up from the blasphemous Atlantis of R'lyeh to teach man the true meaning of endless heartache.

 

　

But salvation would come in the form of the Spectre. He met the Great Beast before he made land fall in South America as thousands fell prey to his wickedness. “Cthulhu, spawn of Nagoob, your time of judgment has come,†the Spectre said without passion, as a great bolt left his arm and tore through Cthulhu’s body, leaving a gaping hole wide enough to pass a war ship though. But almost as soon as it formed, foulness gushed in to fill the wound.

 

　

Cthulhu let loose a mirthless chuckle. He then spoke in a voice so vile that it made the near by mortals tear off their own ears in a desperate attempt to stop hearing it. “Who are you to judge me? I who was ancient before your kind came down from the safety of your trees.â€

 

　

“Mine is not to judge. Mine is to bear wraith and vengeance.†The Spectre blasted the Great Beast again, staggering him. In that moment, in his eternally rotted heart Cthulhu knew he could never defeat the Spectre. At least, not like this. In his twisted and abominable mind a plan formed. His mouth tentacles burst forth and engulfed the Spectre in their tangled mass. There was wicked glee in Cthulhu’s eyes as his tentacles pulled the Spectre deep into to his bottomless maw. And then…

 

　

There are 900 thousand words in the English language, 44 phonics, and 26 letters. All of which are insufficient to describe the evil and horror that the Spectre saw as he fell though the fathomless void. But then his fall came to an end.

 

　

The Spectre hit the ground with an unforgiving thud. In a fluid movement he got to his feet as his cape tried to flutter in a dead wind. He looked about him and knew in a moment were he was. It was a Qliphothic realm, locked away and forgotten long before even nothingness came in to being. The ground beneath him was dead as far as his divine eyes could see. All above him a was stygian sky. In the distance monuments to …things… made of decayed ash littered the broken landscape. Huge multi-angle masses rose from warped planes with total disregard for gravity and reason. Creatures that had no business existing outside of a fevered nightmare flopped and writhe. But that was just the beginning.

 

　

Cthulhu appeared before him out of the abyss. He now appeared as a dark titan, more ominous, larger and powerful than before. The Spectre wasted not a moment. Another bolt launched from him at the Beast, but it was the Spectre that screamed out in pain. All the length of his arm felt as if his skin had been flayed off. Cthulhu laughed his unholy laughter. “Do you feel it? Like a fetus unapologetically carved from its mother’s womb.†The Spectre paid no heed to Cthulhu’s words, and again struck the Beast. And again, he was wracked with pain, like the whole of his body had been raked with rusted nails. “You’re too far down the Tree of Death! The impotent god you serve holds no sway here!â€

 

　

The Spectre knew what Cthulhu said was true. Every second in this death dimension would bring him closer to his own demise. But it mattered not! He had come to deliver a vengeance long over due, and he would, even if it would cost him his life. The Spectre stood defiant in the bottom of sewage of the omniverse, ready to prove that even Cthulhu was NOT immune to death.

 

============================

 

Fight to the death.

Both are at 100%.

However the Spectre is dying, he only has 1 hour to win, where as Cthulhu has no time limit.

　

　

　

[Callisto]

Learn More About

The Spectre

Read more about The Spectre at Wikipedia

Official Site: DC Links: Wikipedia DC Guide Justice Society Profile

 

Cthulhu

Read more about Cthulhu at Wikipedia

Official Site: Public Domain Links: Cthulhu Wiki Cthulhu.org Cthulhu Files

 

 

[Guest skadoosh]

Damn, boy. Tough decision to make here. They are both reality-screwer-uppers, and the Specter can spin most super-people around on their heads with ease, but he;s up against a God-like being, and i don't know what Cthulhu's limits are, if he even has any, so i'm pretty much stumped here.

[Confession FPT]

Spectre don't lose.

[Guest Dinsdale Piranha]

Cthulhu is far from the most powerful of Lovecraft's Great Old Ones (though he is the coolest, IMO) and I think the Spectre would normally be more than a match for him. It'd be a good fight and could possible ruin the solar system. But with Cthulhu getting home court advantage and the Specter having a one hour time limit... it's almost too close to call.

 

Good match up, though Cthulhu's out of character in the write up. He doesn't care about humanity any more than a guy mowing his lawn cares about the ants he just plowed under. He's not evil in the conventional sense, he's just really bad for humans to be around. He doesn't talk or gloat or laugh in any of Lovecraft's stories (or the stories of most of his imitators.) The closest he comes to communication is that people with any telepathic sensitivity can become aware of his thoughts and be driven inane by the alienness of them. I've read most of Lovecraft and don't recognize the name Nagoob. What is it?

[Guest El Wookiee]

Cthulhu is far from the most powerful of Lovecraft's Great Old Ones (though he is the coolest, IMO) and I think the Spectre would normally be more than a match for him. It'd be a good fight and could possible ruin the solar system. But with Cthulhu getting home court advantage and the Specter having a one hour time limit... it's almost too close to call.

 

Good match up, though Cthulhu's out of character in the write up. He doesn't care about humanity any more than a guy mowing his lawn cares about the ants he just plowed under. He's not evil in the conventional sense, he's just really bad for humans to be around. He doesn't talk or gloat or laugh in any of Lovecraft's stories (or the stories of most of his imitators.) The closest he comes to communication is that people with any telepathic sensitivity can become aware of his thoughts and be driven inane by the alienness of them. I've read most of Lovecraft and don't recognize the name Nagoob. What is it?

 

http://warghost21.deviantart.com/journal/THE-DREAD-FAMILY-TREE-OF-GREAT-CTHULHU-218796732

Basically (in non-cannon stories) Nagoob is

the parent of Cthulhu. Not much help I know, but it’s the best I could do.

[Guest skadoosh]

What exactly does the Specter have that Cthulhu doesn't, or can't counter?

[Guest Dinsdale Piranha]

http://warghost21.de...HULHU-218796732

Basically (in non-cannon stories) Nagoob is

the parent of Cthulhu. Not much help I know, but it’s the best I could do.

 

Huh! I wonder if that's from Clark Ashton Smith's "Family Tree of the Gods":

 

 

What exactly does the Specter have that Cthulhu doesn't, or can't counter?

 

Both have reality warping powers, but Cthulhu's seem less focused. In other words, the world will change when Cthulhu rises but there's not that strong a sense that he picks and chooses how it changes. It's more like one big change and reality is more suitable where the Specter manipulated much more controlled changes, usually on a smaller scale, all the time.

 

Part of the problem with measuring them up is theological. If you're a monotheist, then the way the Specter is presented is as the agent of an omnipotent God, so Specter has infinite power to draw upon. If you go with Lovecraft, there is no God, only an uncaring universe filled with vastly powerful beings too alien for us to understand. For him, no truly cosmic entity would give a hang about the survival of humanity.

 

So who wins may depend on which view of reality you believe in.

[kainboa]

I may be wrong, but from what I can remember, we've never actually seen Cthulu display any particular high level of power, be it reality warping or otherwise.

[treacherous]

_{Here is all of them. This is really hard to say as the entire purpose of the Lovecraft storytelling was to keep the entities mysterious, esoteric and all those vague words. It's really hard to tell what they do besides freak humans out about the fact that they exist. Cthulhu isn't the most powerful by any means, but he is the most popular. He'd probably lose in this case. I know Azathoth holds court at the center of the Universe. So basically this guy holds court in the nucleaus of ultimate chaos. Sounds pretty powerful to me.}

[Guest Dinsdale Piranha]

I may be wrong, but from what I can remember, we've never actually seen Cthulu display any particular high level of power, be it reality warping or otherwise.

 

True.

 

Cthulhu doesn't really do anything in Lovecraft's stories. The implication is that if he did that would be the end for humanity but it's left pretty vague. Lovecraft makes a few general statements that when the Great Old Ones rise they will remake the earth in their own image to their liking--something that will be antithetical to human existence. It seems reasonable to think that means reshape it to the mind-twisting non-Euclidian geometry of the city of R'leyh, but Lovecraft never really says that.

 

There are some other authors who make Cthulhu more active. August Derleth wrote a story in which Cthulhu was starting to rise and the US Nave dropped an atomic bomb on him. That stopped him but the main character reflects that when the Great Old Ones fought in ancient times planets were shattered and suns extinguished, and that nothing as puny as a human weapon could do more than delay the rising. In some of Brian Lumlay's Titus Crow novels Cthulhu seems to be very active, but these are hard enough to find that I've never read them.

 

All of which is to say that I'm just making an informed guess about Cthulhu's powers. There's a frustrating lack of hard evidence for any of his abilities.

[Guest Dinsdale Piranha]

What Treach said.

[leroypowell3]

The way Treacherous put it, I think I'll go with Spectre. If he's dying then, he'll go all out and draw upon everything availible to him. That should be enough to win.

[Guest Manar]

Didnt Lovecraft himself write a text where Cthulhu were defeated simply by getting rammed by a ship ? I am sure the Spectre can top that.

[Guest Shadow Flesh]

I'm really rusty with my Lovecraft Lore, but doesn't Cthulhu get put back to sleep before he can truly rise and the atomic bomb and ramming with the warship nothing more than simple nudges back to bed for him?

 

I want to give Cthulhu the nod just because I think he's cooler. But even with the time limit the Spectre should be powerful enough to put down Cthulhu (who has no definitive feats or actions to call on)

[Guest Hastur]

I'm really rusty with my Lovecraft Lore, but doesn't Cthulhu get put back to sleep before he can truly rise and the atomic bomb and ramming with the warship nothing more than simple nudges back to bed for him?

The freighter knocked him apart just long enough to escape. According to the Lumley interpretation, though, that wasn't even Cthulhu. That was just one of the random spawn who woke up because R'lyeh was so close to the surface. Great Cthulhu is held down not just by the cycle of ages, but by a massive Greater Elder Sign welded to his resting place. I'm inclined to buy that part of the Titus Crow books and not the rest because... really? His time rolled around again and lasted two days? I haven't got anything on the Derleth bombing, though. That might be the one Mythos story I haven't read.

 

Not that the setup wasn't awesomesauce, but Cthulhu is a horribly ambiguous character to CBUB, since his characteristics written by Lovecraft are all but nonexistant, and his characteristics by other authors are all over the place. Lovecraft didn't put him close to the power levels of the Outer Gods (Shub, Azathoth, Nyarlat), referenced in the Call of Cthulhu as the Great Old Ones, but others have.

 

So basically what Dinsdale and Treach said. But more pontificate-ed. 'Cause this is pretty much my only expertise in life :- /

[Guest Dinsdale Piranha]

In case anyone wants to check them out...

 

The ramming with the ship incident is in the short story "The Call of Cthulhu" by Lovecraft.

 

The atom bomb attack is in "The Black Island" by August Derleth which is collected in TRAIL OF CTHULHU.

[treacherous]

I'm going to say the thing rising from the sea was Cthulhu. Regardless, it wasn't fully formed but more a gelatinous blob. So it wasn't just obliterated as much as popped. It was no more injured than melting ice gets rid of H2O.

[Guest Hastur]

The atom bomb attack is in "The Black Island" by August Derleth which is collected in TRAIL OF CTHULHU.

Awesome. Thanks.

 

Regardless, it wasn't fully formed but more a gelatinous blob. So it wasn't just obliterated as much as popped.

Pretty much. Cthulhu is made of a semi-liquid non-terrestrial matter that does largely what he wants it to. When the boat hit him, he came apart into vapor and (maybe) chunks before reforming maybe a minute later.

 

Anyway. Probably the strictest canon power level for Cthulhu can be inferred from At the Mountains of Madness. Before his imprisonment, Cthulhu and his race fought a high-tech race of barrel-sized crinoids for millions of years before a truce was reached. Of course, this is kind of weaksauce compared to all the later interpretations, so I guess that the Mythos' reputation for being ever-changing, ineffable, and contradictory is upheld perfectly.

[Callisto]

Match Final Results

USER RATINGS

A

B

A 'A' off the matchup alone! leroypowell3

SCORE

The Spectre: 20

Cthulhu: 6

FPA: 3.7