History Main / InverseLawOfUtilityAndLethality

* The ''HarryPotter'' movies seemed to employ this trope as well. While in the books, spells can have many physical effects on their targets, in the movies, nearly all spells are designed to knock your opponent back a few feet. [[AdaptationDecay Even the ones that weren't.]]

** That's probably a case of linear warriors quadratic wizards, actually.

But [[FriendToAllLivingThings the guy who can talk to squirrels]] can get [[JamesBondage the keys to your prison cell]]. The girl who [[GreenThumb controls plants]] can grow the MagicAntidote to the villain's poison. The wimpy kid with {{Telepathy}} can tell you [[MemeticMutation "It's a trap!"]] as it's sprung... well, okay, this trope does [[DependingOnTheWriter depend on the authors]] giving these little-thought-of powers their due use.

** Um, while the first two sure get used a lot more, the series has a pretty high body count, and most of the casualties died to Avada Kedavra. That's the point of the trope, though. Avada Kedavra may be lethal, but unless you're 100% sure you want the target dead, it's useless.
** {{Lampshaded}} by other characters who point out Harry's seeming preference for casting "Expelliarmus" all the time. Also note that by the end of final book, its ''plot importance'' in the series is quite comparable to "Avada Kedavra".

** The Bard epitomizes this trope. Combat skills? Average at best. Spells? Typically lackluster against the [[big bad]]. But when it comes down to sheer utility, it's arguably one of the best classes. Bardic knowledge checks have allowed many a bard to skip over entire sections of dungeons (for those not familiar: One can make a bardic knowledge check, a mostly unmodified D20 roll, for almost anything. Such as solving riddles instantly, deciphering texts, remembering they know languages, and the location of the [[infinity plus one sword]]). Oh, and did I mention they have the most diverse trained skillset in the game, and get a bonus to untrained ones? Any GM that likes skill based dungeons can be annoyed by them rather easily.

** The Bard epitomizes this trope. Combat skills? Average at best. Spells? Typically lackluster against the "big bad". But when it comes down to sheer utility, it's arguably one of the best classes. Bardic knowledge checks have allowed many a bard to skip over entire sections of dungeons (for those not familiar: One can make a bardic knowledge check, a mostly unmodified D20 roll, for almost anything. Such as solving riddles instantly, deciphering texts, remembering they know languages, and the location of the "infinity plus one sword"). Oh, and did I mention they have the most diverse trained skillset in the game, and get a bonus to untrained ones? Any GM that likes skill based dungeons can be annoyed by them rather easily.

* [[DCComics DCComic's]] ''Legion Of Substitute Heroes'', the rejects and washouts of the ''[[LegionOfSuperHeroes Legion of Super Heroes]]''. Their powers were deemed useless or dangerous. The ones who best fit this trope were Infectious Lass (she gave people contagious diseases - but couldn't control when she used it, who got it, or what disease they got), Porcupine Pete (could shoot porcupine like quills, but again, lacked any control), Color Kid (could change the colour of objects) and Stone Boy (turned into an immobile statue). Despite their potentially offensively devastating powers, Infectious Lass and Porcupine Pete, due to their lack of control were reduced to objects of humour, while Color Kid and Stone Boy, despite their powers being, on the surface, useless, had moments of awesomeness - like changing all Green Kryptonite to Blue, rendering it harmless to Superboy and Supergirl, or immobilizing Pulsar Stargrave by falling on him from a great height.

*** Either hollowfication of Ichigo was too strong, or she actualy can't do that. She mentioned it while trying to "reject" the hole in his chest left by Espada. Something like - Evil that lurks inside is too strong to reject - or something.
** Another facet of her power is explored when she and Ichigo search for Rukia throughout the Soul Society after the battles had ended - She has her Rikka search for her, too, showing that she not only has the rejection powers, she also controls six ''faeries'' that can run certain errands for her.

* Yajirobe of ''{{Dragonball}} Z'' is pretty useful to have around, at least early in the series. He's the one who cut off Vegeta's tail while everyone with super powereful lazer disk attacks got their rears handed to them.

* ''UnknownArmies'' features "skill penumbras", meaning that just about every skill - most of which are custom-made by the players - has a substantial number of uses. eg, a player's Cap In Your Ass skill is used not only for gunfights but also for weapon maintenance and accessing the black market, depending on how much the GM is willing to let them get away with. On the flipside, this also means that players can use skills like Crazy Driver to [[CarFu attack]]. Additionally, high skills usually imply a measure of fame in a particular area, meaning that, for instance, a player with a skill of 55% in Jeet Kune Do would probably be well-known in the martial-arts circuit.

* This is acknowledged in the ''{{Thief}}'' games, in which gas arrows, which release silent knockout gas, are among the best weapons available in the game. While ''Thief'' guards do not distinguish between dead and unconscous bodies and raise the alarm either way, gas arrows require no sneaking-up-close, work even on alerted opponents, and cause a silent faint while ordinary arrows cause screaming and bloodstains. Some missions also forbid lethal force.

** Also quite present within [[FanNickname Ozai's Angels]] between Mai and Ty Lee. The former specializes in throwing implements while the latter is able to disable oppenents by striking points on body. Even with her slightly {{Cloudcuckoolander}} personality, Ty Lee is widely considered much more effective, what with the fact that as of yet, Mai has never managed to actually strike skin, and yet has very little trouble when it comes to [[KnifeOutline harmlessly pinning down clothes]]. ([[WordOfGod The Creators]] state that Mai doesn't want to actually kill people so she does this on purpose.)

** Curious example from the 80's cartoon; after a couple of seasons, parents complain about Michelangelo's nunchuks, cause kids supposedly started to imitate him (remember the toy nunchucks covered in foamy? ...well simply they just remove the cover and beat the plastic out of each other), so in later seasons the producers replace Mikey's weapon with a rope/grapling hook thing. Talking about something pretty lame.
*** The thing is, a grappling hook weapon can be pretty lethal (Manriki-gusari is based on it, I believe) if you consider choking and flinging it at a vulnerable spot. The real kicker is that the least harmful weapon to imitate, and most difficult to duplicate -- the nuncuck -- is removed, while swords, knives, and staffs are allowed to stay. Considering their {{expy}}s would be kitchen knives and broom handles -- easy enough to obtain and hurt someone with -- sounds like a case of [[NiceJobBreakingItHero nice job breaking it, watchdogs!!]]

[[CrowningMomentOfAwesome ''What is good for Russians, deadly for Germans''. Old russian saying. ]]

**** People are forgetting that a lot of WW1 generals genuinely believed in [[WeHaveReseves disposable]] [[ZergRush personnel]]. A dead soldier just needs a funeral. A wounded soldier gets dragged out of combat by at least one of his buddies - and provided weeks, months or even years of medical attention. From a [[AMillionIsAStatistic statistical standpoint]], adopting helmets drastically increased the effectiveness of enemy weapons. ArmiesAreEvil, tropers.

* JoJosBizarreAdventure. No further description required.

* The first time Batman meets Scarecrow in [[BatmanTheAnimatedSeries Batman: The Animated Series]], Batman turns his back on Scarecrow to deal with his goons and Scarecrow pulls out a gun and shoots Batman in the neck. It seems entirely a matter of luck that it was loaded with a dart full of nightmare toxin instead of something crazy like bullets.

* ''YuGiOh'' has several cards that fit the bill. To name a few:

** [[http://yugioh.wikia.com/wiki/Messenger_from_the_Underworld Messenger From]] [[HellHound the Underworld]], who embodies this trope by being a Level 7 Tuner Monster. Tuners, to say it simply, combine with one or more other monsters to form a Synchro Monster whose level EQUALS that of the combined monsters EXACTLY. Meaning that to summon a Level 8 Synchro Monster... yeah. However, by summoning him with ONE Tribute instead of two and halving his ATK and DEF, you drop him down to Level 5, which is a lot more useable.

* The ''HarryPotter'' movies seemed to employ this trope as well. While in the books, spells can have many physical effects on their targets, in the movies, nearly all spells are designed to knock your opponent back a few feet.
** [[AdaptationDecay Even the ones that weren't.]]

* Yami Yugi on ''YuGiOh''. [[YuGiOhTheAbridgedSeries "Remember kids, stealing and bullying is wrong. Crushing people's minds with magical powers is A-OK"]]. Overall, it seems that breaking minds, exiling people into Hell Mouth and stealing souls is far better to show children than anything ''physical''.
** But in this case, something highly lethal gets used all the time, instead of a non-lethal technique that would be morally superior, which is never used because kid's show.

* The ''HarryPotter'' movies seemed to employ this trope as well, where in the books many spells have physical effects on their targets in the movies nearly all spells are designed to knock your opponent back a few feet.

**Justified in that the Russians were pressed for time, and so had to deploy them as soon as they could, regardless of their faults, and they did make a lot of improvements later when they weren't on the back foot.