The VSBA: Sauron VS Witch Doctor (Marvel VS Hero Factory)

“There are very few people who are going to look into the mirror and say, 

'That person I see is a savage monster;' instead, they make up some construction 

that justifies what they do.” – Noam Chomsky."

Karl Lykos: Marvel’s Sauron

Aldous Witch: The Witch Doctor from Hero Factory

They say power corrupts, and for some, that is the reason they seek power in the first place. The hunger for power these scientists craved led them down a path of villainy and transformed them into monsters. Facing down teams of heroes in a Savage Land, which of them will survive this wild encounter? Will Sauron drain the energy of the Quaza Hungry Madman, or will Witch Doctor crush the Ultimate Incarnation of Evil beneath his foot? Find out in this DEATH BATTLE! 


Before we begin…


Sauron will be analyzing his 616 appearances. A handful of guidebook appearances couldn't be found online but they are very unlikely to bring anything new. Credit to G1’s Blade Vs Buffy for some feats/calcs

For Witch Doctor, we will be compositing the show, comic, game and novel continuities of Hero Factory. They generally follow the same plot with only some slight variations and without a composite there would be much less to analyze. He will also be given access to The Wildlife of Quatros we saw him control during the events of Savage Planet, as it’s a key part of his character during what is the main piece of content.

Please keep in mind that this was done by one person who hasn’t really done comic research before on their own. I tried to stick scaling to characters Sauron directly interacts with and such so there will be feats just not included. Thanks to Garf for some of the images, as well as Seb and Round 1 for some general feedback/discussion

Background

Sauron

“Do you hear me, you soft, pink bags or rice paper flesh? Sauron is back!”

A young Karl Lykos joined his father on an Antarctic exhibition to Tierra del Fuego, alongside them was Dr. Anderssen, and his daughter Tanya. This trip of course went awry when young Tanya found herself attacked by a horde of Pteranodons. Karl fended the beasts off but was struck by them and severely injured. That night, Karl fell ill, and was not expected to make it. What came next shocked Karl, upon touching his dog he noticed its energy decrease while his own did the opposite and realized he was an Energy Vampire.

Karl grew up to become a renowned hypnotherapist still in love with Tanya. He would hypnotize his patients and then absorb their bad feelings. A way to satisfy his own hunger without hurting innocent people. However his appetite eventually grew larger and he sought his sights on an even greater source of life energy, Mutants. Absorbing the Energy of Alex Summers his power surged and he transformed into a Pteranodon Beast. Choosing that he must now use his power for evil he adopted the name of literature’s greatest evil, Sauron.

Now a full fledged supervillain he faced off with the X-Men. His new form, now able to hypnotize people with just a glance. However it would be short lived as his own evil now threatened his beloved Tanya, so he flew to the Antarctic. When Tanya and the X-Men followed, he jumped, killing himself so that he would never hurt another… or so they thought. Lykos instead found himself in The Savage Land, a tropical climate in Antarctica where thought extinct Dinosaurs roamed, and where the original Pteranadons had come from. A place free from people he could harm. But on their many escapades, he would come into contact with the X-Men a few times and eventually the The Brother of Evil Mutants. To restore Lykos to his prime as Sauron, they captured him and Tanya and transferred her life energy to him, killing her. This time, Sauron mostly stuck to his Dinosaur form. Eventually breaking off from the brotherhood, conquering the Savage Lands with a group of artificial mutates, and then getting captured and ending up in The Weapon X program. Where he didn’t do much of note in. He hated it, escaped and went back to his villain of the week duties. Along the way he attempted to turn Staten Island into “New Savage Island” and turn people into Dinosaurs, and then joined up with Kurse and Nature Girl to be an eco terrorist for a bit.

Sauron’s tragedy over time was lost to him, the humanity and struggles of Lykos decreasingly relevant as his Dinosaur identity became his primary personality. The loss of Tanya is even forgotten. While he evolved to become far more stable and sophisticated, it seems Sauron became more of a Monster than he ever thought he was.

Witch Doctor

Insane? Is it insane to see power and want it for yourself”

Akiyama Makuro was a highly successful businessman who saw the evils of the Universe and with his vast fortune founded the Hero Factory. Building Heroes was no easy task and his team of researchers searched the Galaxy for the perfect resource to power his army of protectors: Quaza. Found on the Planet Quatros, Quaza was such a powerful mineral that it actually keeps the planet itself alive, and after years of mining the loss of Quaza started to harm the planet and its wildlife. As a result mining of the Planet was halted and it became a protected nature reserve.

With so many Heroes, Makuro needed to train them and among his teachers was a professor of astronomy and architectural geology, Aldous Witch. Aldous was obsessed with Quaza and the power that it gave the heroes. He wanted it for himself. While his peers thought his thirst for hunger crazy, Aldous pursued it, and attempted to implant a Hero Core in himself. His plan of course was thwarted by Preston Stormer, one of his students and he was banished for his crimes, avoiding imprisonment because of the work he had done for the Hero Factory.

Some time later, a rookie by the name of Rocka received a distress call from Aldous Witch, who claimed he had been stranded on the Planet Quatros. Because of the planet's protected status Rocka was advised not to engage, but foolishly did so regardless. Upon landing Rocka was attacked by a wolf-like creature called a Fangz, and after defending himself was confronted by their leader. Aldous had been transformed by the Planet, morphing from a typical robot, to the monstrous, titanic Witch Doctor. Imbued with the power of Qauza that he placed within a Skull he found, he created the Skull Staff, which he used alongside Quaza Spikes he attached to Quatros’ wildlife to take control of a variety of creatures.

Stormer, now the leader of Alpha Team, led his team of heroes to Quatros to find Rocka and found themselves faced against Aldous and his corrupted wildlife, and after saving Rocka, hatched a plan to stop Witch Doctor from harvesting all the Quaza on Quatros and killing the Planet. After freeing Scorpio, Waspix, Raw Jaw, and 2 Fangz, Rocka got an upgrade, and Stormer managed to steal the Skull Staff that granted Witch Doctor his strength. With Aldous defeated and Quatros saved, the Witch Doctor was sent to prison.

Skill & Experience

Sauron

Karl Lykos was a world renowned Hypnotherapist with a great education, a fact reflected by his great scientific mind. He can craft machines capable of modifying genes to devolve people or turn them into dinosaurs. He served as the science teacher at the Hellfire Academy where he taught students to build gamma bombs and create life. He’s also just smart enough to cure cancer if he wanted to (He doesn’t). Outside of the sciences he has conquered the Savage Land, served in the Weapon-X program, taken over Staten Island, and gone on an Eco-Terrorist rampage. The writers cannot agree what they want this character’s thing to be, so he’s quite varied. He even somehow just taught himself telekinesis. He’s no slouch in a fight either. He’s waged wars against the Sun God Garrok, briefly held his own against The X-Men and Avengers. It took even Spider-Man and Ka-Zar hours to take him down and he even managed to hold his own against Nature Girl.

Witch Doctor

Aldous Witch was a professor for decades, teaching Astronomy and Architectural Geology. His scientific capability is great, he managed to harness more power from Quaza than his peers thought to be possible, and had plans to make an army greater than even The Hero Factory. While referred to as more of a scientist, he’s also implied to have also trained Heroes in some sort of combat applicable way. This fighting capability lets him match and outmaneuver basically any individual hero, and lets him pretty easily prepare for any of their typical attack methods. He is incredibly nimble and acrobatic, capable of dodging even point blank gunfire from Stormer. The heroes are no slouches themselves, Stormer and Zib are master tacticians and even rookie heroes managed to adapt to new bodies in just a couple hours when it normally takes 6-8 weeks.

Equipment

Sauron

Gun

On multiple occasions Sauron has equipped himself with a pistol. As both a human and in his dinosaur form, notably using one to take out Storm. He also likes to use them in tandem with his Telekinesis.

Gene Modifying Machine

Throughout his history Sauron has created a few machines capable of modifying DNA to change people's form. Devolving them or turning them into Dinosaurs. He only ever sets these up in labs however and they aren't combat applicable.

Black Lotus Flower

Sauron once had Whiteout use a Black Lotus flower to put Cyclops into a deep sleep. It works incredibly fast and those affected are “Lost in the Lotus Dream.

Witch Doctor

Skull Staff

By mounting a skull on a staff and implanting in with Quaza, Witch Doctor created the Skull Staff, using the corrupted Quaza spikes on its side to take control of wildlife, any attempt to disobey or break free can be thwarted by blasting energy from the staff. These blasts aren't just good for bending the wills of those he has equipped with Corrupted Quaza Spikes, they can also be used offensively to make explosions or blast his opponents away and seemingly prevent them from moving. It also is what Aldous primarily used to amp himself with Quaza Energy. Even if the Witch Doctor is away from the fight, he can use the staff to watch people that are even on other parts of the planet.

Quaza Spikes

Witch Doctor attached Quaza spikes to a variety of wildlife which linked them to the Skull Staff and allowed them to control them. It's likely that he possesses more spikes and could attach them to other wildlife if he chose to, especially since we see them on Witch Doctor himself

Explosives

In a plot to steal a trophy of pure Quaza, Witch Doctor planted a bunch of explosives on a football field and blew up a bunch of Football players.

Championship Trophy

Witch Doctor briefly possessed a football trophy made of pure Quaza which seemed to work as a substitute for the power of the Skull Staff.

Abilities

Sauron

Flight

As a giant winged dinosaur, naturally Sauron is able to fly. He’s quite good at it, able to keep pace with winged mutants like Angel and even avoid gunfire.

Hypnosis

Sauron’s staple has always been Hypnosis. With his new Dinosaur form he gained the ability to activate it just by making eye contact. His mental bombardments are incredibly potent being stated as superior to both Mesmero and even Jean Grey (In 1969, She later matched and surpassed his Mental Power). Targeting the mind and soul Sauron can use his hypnosis to imbue a variety of illusions and make people believe their allies are monsters. Instantly knock people like Polaris and Spider-Man unconscious. Force people to attack their allies, and even outright take control of their mind so that they do his bidding, even for an extended period of time like he did with Portal. Sauron’s hypnosis does have its limitations, Angel developed some amount of resistance to it after a couple encounters, and it has failed to work against masked people and a Dinosaur with a petrified brain.

Energy Draining/Manipulation

Sauron’s nature as an Energy Vampire allows him to drain the lifeforce of people and use it to increase his own strength. This very ability is what allows Lykos to become Sauron. Originally he only ever used this on contact, absorbing the energy of mutants like Alex Summers, Storm, and Wolverine, but eventually it gained the ability to absorb energy of mutants from a distance, even temporally picking up some of Wolverine’s healing factor. The Energy Draining eventually expanded to forms of energy other than Life. He can drain energy from planes, absorb explosions, and absorb and redirect energy blasts. Not only can he absorb energy, but he can unleash it into powerful blasts as well. His absorption is not unlimited and it has been overtaxed by surges of energy from Colossus, but at its best Sauron could drain the energy of Angel, who is powered by a Celestial Life Seed capable of regrowing worlds.

Fire Breathing

Sauron is able to unleash devastating rays of fire from his mouth to absolutely scorch foes.

Telekinesis

Sauron is a Telekinetic. This fact alone is not particularly interesting, what is interesting is that he uses it exclusively on his own firearms. Either firing his pistol wildly or using a more thematic harpoon, he's never actually used it outside of firing a gun.

Witch Doctor

Robot/Hero Physiology

Robots in Hero Factory are quite hardy beings, Witch Doctor’s Quaza Spikes are also similar to Hero Cores, likely granting a lot of the benefits that come with a Hero Core. Their bodies effectively work as portable batteries and so long as they have energy, they will stay alive, but no energy will result in their death. The greatest showings of this come from Core Hunter who could reassemble himself from pieces and even survived being infinitely folded in upon himself until he no longer existed. While impressive it's unlikely the latter can be achieved in a combat applicable timeframe.

Statistics Amplification

Just touching Quaza causes Witch Doctor to jump great levels in power. While he can match heroes even without the use of any extra Quaza energy, with an amp even the strongest heroes like Rocka XL and Stormer XL are overpowered by him. He can use the Skull Staff to buff himself on a whim. While hard to quantify this boost, it's likely comparable to a Hero Core, and two of those could energy amplify the power of Von Nebula’s Black Hole Staff 10,000x. Meaning each has at minimum a 100x boost. It's hard to say if this numerical representation is super accurate it is overall not super relevant as his scaling chains mostly need him to be boosted.

Potential Plant Manipulation

Witch Doctor is implied to be capable of moving the roots of trees to trip up his opponents, although it is entirely possible that Furno just perceived it incorrectly.

Acrobatics

Despite being a massive robot, Witch Doctor is somehow just incredibly nimble and acrobatic, able to perform flips, jumping spin attacks and even adjust his momentum while midair.

Forms (if applicable)

Sauron

Karl Lykos

If Sauron runs out of energy he returns to his human form. Losing his abilities outside of his energy absorption. Lykos is obviously much weaker than Sauron, but still has use of his gun.

Giant Sauron

When Sauron absorbs too much energy he grows to a much greater size. He’s clearly much stronger in this state but runs into the issue of not being able to get into small places.

Witch Doctor

Not Applicable

Support

Sauron

None Applicable

Witch Doctor

Fangz

Witch Doctor took control of two of these wolf-like creatures. Fangz sport spears on the underside of their jaw and have a keen sense of smell. They fight by jumping at and biting their targets.

Scorpio

Perhaps the greatest catch Witch Doctor had was a massive Scorpion-like creature capable of taking on multiple heroes at once. Scorpio can crawl even on the underside of surfaces, fire powerful blasts of energy, and stab at enemies with its bladed tail

Waspix

Despite being weaker than other animals, Waspix is a great asset to Aldous. A massive flying Wasp-like creature. Armed with wrist mounted blades it's quite a threatening foe for a hero.

Raw Jaw

To carry and mine Quaza, Witch Doctor enslaved a hulking, ape-like creature with great strength.

Feats

Sauron

Overall

  • Became an Energy Vampire as a child

  • World renowned Hypnotherapist

  • Absorbed Alex Summers Energy to become Sauron

  • Survived in an even conquered The Savage Land

  • Has fought the X-Men many times

  • Taught at the Hellfire Academy 

  • Turned Staten Island into New Savage Land

  • Became and Eco-Terrorist with X-Men Green

Power

Speed

Durability

Witch Doctor

Overall

  • Taught and trained heroes for decades

  • Took control of Quatros’ wildlife

  • Defeated nearly every notable hero at one point or another

  • Nearly destroyed Quatros and built the strongest army in the galaxy.

  • Escaped Prison during Breakout

  • Stole a football trophy

Power

(See Before The Verdict)

Speed

Durability

Scaling

Sauron

Weapon X

Sauron is clearly among the strongest of the people to come out of Weapon X, having overpowered both Sabretooth and Mecha Stryker who had earlier beat up most of the program's members.

The X-Men and Their Villains (Debatable)

Sauron has consistently held his own against a variety of X-Men and X-Men Villains but nothing on a level that’s matching the strongest showings of top tiers like Storm. It still is arguable to scale him to the lower high tiers he has fought such as Rouge, Garrok, Cyclops and Nature Girl (See Before The Verdict)

Heroes


Villains

Other Miscellaneous Heroes (Debatable)

Sauron on occasion takes on other heroes beyond the X-Men performing moderately well against or surviving hits from characters like Iron Man, Luke Cage, Namor. He also has done well against Spider-Man and fucking Hercules. Needless to say there will be a more in depth Breakdown in (Before The Verdict)

Witch Doctor

Hero Factory

Witch Doctor is clearly established as stronger than any individual hero, especially when using Quaza to buff himself. He has positive showing against even Stormer XL and Rocka XL, and his Quaza amp is directly comparable, if not superior to a Hero Core.

Other Villains

Because Witch Doctor Upscales Heroes and their Cores, he also scales to their Villains.

A Brain dodged a laser (Relativistic)

Weaknesses

Sauron

Sauron is running on limited energy and will revert back to his human form if he is hurt too much or drained. His mental stability is also very varied depending on the time, but he’s typically good in modern times.

Witch Doctor

Witch Doctor’s power is entirely reliant on the Skull Staff, without it he becomes far weaker and loses access to basically all his abilities. The Animals of Quatros that support him are also controlled through Quaza, and without the Staff or Quaza Spikes, they will turn against Witch Doctor and attack him.

Before The Verdict

Where on Earth Does Sauron Scale?

The time I said I wasn't planning of scaling Sauron to Hercules and the immediately found his Hercules fight

Sauron's overall tiering is hard to figure out because his character and by extension showings are very inconsistent. Many characters ride the line between Street Tier and Herald but Sauron is definitely one of the more confusing characters. We will break down most of his notable positive and negative showings in an attempt to justify if he should be considered a Street Tier or Low Level Herald. Let’s start with some of his negative showings to paint a picture of why a higher interpretation may be a tough sell

Nothing here is super insane for a minor villain but loses against characters like classic Angel or Toad in the fashion they are not something that pushes a character towards a herald argument. Another point towards this is just his general susceptibility to bullets, which you would also expect for a character like this

Now There are characters we see Sauron go even with quite consistently with or he is fairly narratively entwined with and scaling to is very logical

This is where a higher interpretation starts to come around. The Weapon X members are of course street tiers, and Cannonball (At least without his invincibility) should be a well. Garrok is fairly disconnected from most characters, but scaling to him is fine in my opinion. Stregron and Spidey are clearly Spidey Tiers and I think that would also be a fine placement for Sauron, but Nature Girl is a tough one. Her scaling arguments to stronger characters like Genocide or Armageddon Man rely on her seeminly stronger Armageddon Girl Form so at the time she fought Sauron its hard to say he was at such a level. Still I think Nature Girl likely being a lower end Herald is where you'd get the most merit for a Herald Sauron Argument. Now lets get into his other arguments for a higher level and the general problems I think they have, and address the Hercules in the Room

Rouge

Namor

  • The Exchange is really too brief to get anything out of, and Namor didn't seem all too worried even if Sauron drew blood

Iron Man

  • Sauron tends to not do super well against Tony, even against what seem to be weaker armours. He did still survive a hit in his human form so you could push a higher rating that way

Rockslide (Colossus scaling chains in general)

  • While Rockslide got flung around by Sauron, it wasn't really though being overpowered and more Sauron flying a lot. We also see Sauron clearly portrayed as weaker than Colossus so a character like Rockslide that really just serves as a stepping stone to scaling to the metal man is iffy

Hercules

  • One-shotting Hercules definitely teeters on outlier for Sauron but if you scale Sauron to Hercules it could be used to push universal or higher for Lykos. Beyond the obvious outlier I think you can reconcile it with a pretty simple idea of Hercules not being fireproof. I of course did not fully research Hercules for this but the line of thinking is supported in the story where it happens. Burning Hercules is inherently impressive but it’s very specifically the burns alongside prior battle damage that put Hercules out of commission. I don’t think this is a strong scaling chain.

To finish this section off I also want to discuss Angel and Cyclops. Both have planetary arguments and while Sauron does not outright take hits from the strongest of their attacks, his ability to absorb their energy makes me fine with scaling him to said feats.

In conclusion:

Conservative-End: Typical Street Tier Stats (Town)

Mid End: Spidey Tier/Garrok Scaling (City)

Generous End: Cyclops/Angel Scaling (Planet)

Very Generous End: Rouge, Nature Girl, Iron Man and other Low Tier Heralds (Star)

Extreme High End (Not Bought): Hercules scaling (Universal)

Cosmic Hero Factory?

Something unexpected for Hero Factory was the existence of such high end arguments and their validity. Specifically Von Nebula’s Black Holes/Black Hole Vortex, Quaza sustaining the Planet of Quatros, and Core Hunter absorbing the Doom Box.

Von Nebula’s Black Holes are not consistently depicted to obey the typical rules black hole feats are supposed to. Still they are clearly intended to be black holes, so arguing them as such is not super unreasonable. It's also irrelevant when The Black Hole Vortex is the size of a Galaxy. An exact value on this is a little tough but a spitball of affecting just the stars in a galaxy and moving them at such insane speeds, come in at over a GigaFOE! The next logical assumption is reasonably no one should scale to The Black Hole Orb Staff that creates all this. However the energy of Heroes like Furno and Stormer are explicitly capable of amplifying Von Nebula’s powers 10000 times over. This is just a very blatant scaling chain, given Witch Doctor uses a comparable power source to amp himself.

Incredible showings from The Power Source of Heroes is not inconsistent, as the plot of Savage Planet the Story surrounding Witch Doctor himself, see Quaza actively sustains a planet. This is also quite blatant: a very clear amount of Quaza roughly in the range of 100 pieces is returned to allow the planet to stay alive, and without it the planet would break apart and dissolved. The Energy of the Quaza clearly serves to sustain its GBE and the living creatures on its planet. While just a sliver of Quaza is used in The Skull Staff itself, the 4 massive Quaza spikes on his person should make up at least 1 piece of Quaza and this should get about 1/100th of Planet.

Then there is Core Hunter. Using the Hero Core Extractor he absorbs the Doom Box, a Galaxy Destroying Superweapon, states he could destroy the Galaxy, and then the very same Hero Core Extractor is just Overpowered by Surge. It is a very simple argument that when you consider alongside The Black Hole Vortex, Galaxy is just consistent for Hero Factory somehow.

Hero Factory Speed

This was a shockingly complicated part of researching Hero Factory. Hero Factory frankly has a lot of feats where Heroes and Villains have shootouts and dodge each other's projectiles but somehow none of these on screen fights involve the various laser projectiles. In fact the main characters who would have very clearly had this feat would have been Nex and XT4 during the events of Breakout. However they just don’t appear in the show or comic of this storyline. We do see lasers on screen during Invasion from below, however that episode sees the Heroes fight wild beasts who are not dodging their attacks. The only real laser dodging comes from the novels but for what it’s worth I think the feats are still viable.

First off Hero Factory has a very concrete Lightspeed Laser. The fact that they bounce off reflective surfaces is made into a plot point. They are even referred to as light, The main two Laser Dodge feats are Speeda Demon’s and a Brain’s. And neither have many obvious issues. Speeda Demon’s involved him dodging a significant amount of laser fire from multiple directions using a ship, so he’s clearly reacting to the actual projectile. The Brain is described as jumping after the weapon fires which would imply in-tandem movement but it’s also possible the attack just missed. Neither feat is calculable but they should be vaguely Relatavistic to FTL

While not a super valid argument Rotor’s ability to shoot a Hero Pod (which move and MFTL+ speeds) out of the sky supports the idea that character can react to high speed projectiles

Verdict


The Breakdown for this one comes down to 3 main Categories, Their Experience, Abilities, and Stats. The direction of these categories should paint a pretty clear picture of a winner. Let's start with Experience


Both Karl and Aldous are accomplished scientists and while we can assume that Aldous has been studying and working longer and more consistently, Karl is very clearly smarter in the sciences. Witch Doctor may be capable of crafting armies to rival Hero Factory and perform things his peers thought unimaginable. Sauron is just able to cure Cancer if he wanted to. He can make Gamma Bombs, modify Genes, and just generally is absurdly scientifically capable.

Sauron also just has a pretty varied resume compared to Witch Doctor, having just done more via having a greater amount of content, he's been in more fights and done crazier things like conquering the Savage Lands and Staten Island. However Sauron has basically no combat training or impressive showings of skill, relying on his hypnosis or help from others for his best accomplishments. In comparison Aldous basically solo’d all the heroes, twice, fully prepared for any of their plans and easily showing himself to be a better fighter than Stormer. He's out here doing spins and flips and dodging close range gun shots as he does it. So while Sauron is a more impressive academic with a better resume, his combat showings make this category a draw.

Now let’s take a look at Abilities


Abilities are quite a discussion and you can draw a lot of comparisons in their kits. Both have similar ranged options between Sauron’s Gun, Fire Breath and Energy Blasts, he has more options than Witch Doctor, but the energy blasts from Skull Staff serve the same purpose. Telekinesis could serve as an option to disarm Aldous, if Sauron had ever used it to do anything other than fire guns.

Mobility is a similar story, Sauron’s flight gives him a more consistent aerial options, but Witch Doctors acrobatics and ability to run fast enough to blitz Furno means he should be able to keep up at most ranges

The Black Lotus Flower is unlikely to even be used by Sauron, given he only ever had someone else do it one time and never since, but it’s also unlikely to work on a Robot that is not known to sleep. Similarly Witch Doctors control over plants might not even be real, but tripping up an aerial foe with plants is not a particularly strong option.

Witch Doctor does have better options for indirect fighting, spying from afar with his staff and planting explosives, but that is unlikely to come into play.

Both are also likely to be able to keep fighting basically indefinitely, Sauron’s Energy Draining was not overwhelmed when draining from Angel’s Celestial Life Seed, so he should be able to handle energy from planet sustaining Quaza. Similarly the amount of energy Quaza provides Aldous should keep him alive. It's unlikely Sauron still would be able to fully drain Witch Doctor, given in the Angel example, Angel didn't really lose a significant amount of energy from his brief interaction with Sauron. Even if he were to be at risk, The Championship trophy serves as a backup option. This is unlikely to extend to Witch Doctor’s Support who would be at risk of being drained to death.

Now the biggest abilities in play are the abilities to manipulate or control minds, Sauron with his hypnosis and Witch Doctor linking himself to The Wildlife of Quatros. The Wildlife gives Witch Doctor a pretty significant numbers advantage, something he could use to overwhelm Sauron, while Waspix also gives him a chance to take on Sauron in the air. Scorpio is an additional ranged option, while Raw-Jaw both Fangz are gonna serve to punish Sauron when he’s on the ground. Sauron’s Hypnosis however mitigates a lot of what the support will get done, taking them away from Aldous’s control and into his own. Witch Doctor can take them back under his control however, provided Sauron doesn’t figure out to remove the Quaza Spikes.

The next part of the discussion is if their mind control options would work on each other, and the answer is that it's complicated, but likely not. Sauron is very clearly vulnerable to mental attacks, but the impracticality of getting a Quaza Spike on his back during a fight makes it incredibly unlikely to happen. Now, if Sauron’s Hypnosis would work on Witch Doctor, then it would be a massive boon to Sauron, and likely give him the win. There is no reason to assume Hero Factory Robots are inherently immune to Mind Control, given Brain Attack sees the Brains take control of The Hero Surge. The issue that arises however, is that Sauron’s hypnosis has no showings against robots, and has failed against people he cannot see the eyes of (And Robots don't technically have traditional eyes), but more importantly, it has failed to work against even organic beings because they had inorganic Brains. This means it's very unlikely that Sauron’s hypnosis would work on a Robot like The Witch Doctor.

Sauron and Witch Doctor both have slight advantages over each other in this category, but with neither able to use any of their abilities to outright pull out a win, this category is a draw.

With neither able to take a major advantage in the previous two categories, we now have to look at our deciding factors, Stats.


Stats are where a proper, meaningful advantage comes about, and it's pretty clear on who holds the Advantage here. Let's start with Speed. Both are comparable to characters capable of dodging lightspeed projectiles, and even though The Hero Factory Feats are not able to be properly calculated, the extent the Witch Doctor up-scales a random Brain, when he has blitzed Furno, means its highly unlikely that Sauron would have a speed advantage.

For AP and Durability, there are 3 ends of stats to consider here, and they all result in an advantage for the Witch Doctor. The Lowest End we have Sauron surviving the destruction of Hellfire Academy, coming in at 1.95 Kilotons, by comparison, the lowest end of Bulk tanking a power surge that blacked out half a city gets at least 12.6 Kilotons, a 6.5x difference. The higher end of the blackout feat sees the gap jump even higher at 66x.

At the mid end, we can compare Garrok thawing the Savage Land to Von Nebula’s Storm, and the trend starts of Witch Doctor’s stat advantage only getting bigger with the higher ends.


A 2.5 million times stat advantage is huge and well into stomping range.

Now at the higher ends, we can compare Sauron to feats in the Planet to Star Range, capping out with comparing Rouge to Frost Giant’s Freezing Stars at 128 Quettatons. While this would exceed Quaza sustaining Quatros, it, however, doesn’t stack up to The Black Hole Vortex or Core Hunter absorbing The Doom Box, the former of which comes in at 1.14 GigaFOE, a 200 Billion times Gap over Rouge.

The only way to argue a stat advantage for Sauron would be to scale him to Hercules, which is not bought for previously stated reasons. Needless to say Witch Doctor takes stats by a huge margin.


While Sauron and Witch Doctor were relatively matched in Experience and Abilities, the massive stat advantage renders that all mostly mute, leaving Witch Doctor perfectly set up with his greater combat ability to consistently land a killing blow. 


Summary

Sauron

“I choose… Evil! An evil so great, so monumental that only one name in all the annals of literature will contain it! The name of Tolkien’s ultimate villain… The name of… Sauron!!

Advantages:

  • Comparable Speed and Mobility

  • Much more diverse abilities

  • Should be able absorb Witch Doctor’s Energy over time

  • Should be able to hypnotize Witch Doctor’s animals…

  • Garf thinks Sauron’s funny

Disadvantages:

  • Much Weaker at all ends

  • …Could not Hypnotize Witch Doctor

  • Less skilled fighter

  • Outnumbered

  • Could be potential be Mind Controlled by Quaza Spike

  • No actual way to win

  • Writing inconsistencies

Witch Doctor

“My Quaza theories are too radical, they said. That much Quaza doesn't exist, they said.

You can't harness that kind of power, they said. You are CRAZY! they said! – They were wrong!”

Advantages:

  • Comparable Speed and Mobility

  • Much Stronger at all Ends, to the point of stomping

  • Better Fighter

  • Not vulnerable to Hypnosis

  • Outnumbers 6-1

  • Not particularly threatened by Sauron’s options

  • Could theoretically control Sauron with a Quaza Spike

  • Best Hero Factory Figure

Disadvantages:

  • Worse abilities

  • Comparatively less intelligent

  • Sauron could drain his Quaza Energy to keep himself going

  • Would have to deal with Sauron turning his support against him

  • Hero Factory is fucking dead

Sauron has to figure out Which Doctor he’s gonna see after this

Winner is Aldous Witch, The Witch Doctor

Thanks for reading! This was a fun experience that while I went into it for the sake of researching Witch Doctor and Lego Hero Factory, I ultimately really enjoyed taking a look at Sauron as a first attempt of a comic character research. I expect some disagreements surrounding the hypnosis argument and I myself flip flopped on that a few times, but I'm pretty confident in the argument. I also expect some pushback for my comic stat arguments or calcs, but ultimately, I’m not here to shake up the comic scene. Please just don’t be a dick about it (Reddit). I’m considering starting another blog soon in Turnip Boy Vs Kril, as announced in my previous blog and will be opening it to the public. So expect a call for help on that in the coming days or weeks. You can also reach out ahead of time if you are interested.

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