Basic Trope: Aliens have racial superpowers compared to humans.
- Straight: Herculean Alliance of Aliens (HAA) civilians all have superhuman strength, no exceptions.
- Exaggerated:
- HAA civilians regularly juggle planets.
- HAA civilians constantly lift the largest planets and supergiants in the multiverse.
- The HAA are made up of hyperdimensional Eldritch Abominations.
- Downplayed:
- HAA civilians have superhuman strength, but they never interact in a manner where it would be useful.
- HAA civilians are all stronger than the average human. They're not superhuman, but you'd never see them struggle to open a jar or get out of breath climbing a few staircases.
- Humans Are Average. Every alien species has something they can beat humans at, and something where humans overshadow them.
- Justified:
- The HAA made use of extensive genetic engineering to improve themselves.
- The HAA civilians come from a tougher environment,so they evolved to be stronger for it.
- Inverted:
- People of the HAA have no advantages over humans and plenty of weaknesses compared to them.
- Humans are horrifyingly strong and smart by the standards of HAA.
- Subverted:
- The HAA civilians seem to have superhuman strength, only for them to be combat robot avatars.
- HAA civilians have superhuman strength compared to humans. It's only later on that humans figure out humanity's strength is endurance: humans can just keep going when the toughest HAA members would be exhausted.
- Double Subverted:
- Which are less effective that the real thing.
- Parodied: Similar to the Inverted example, but some fairly mundane thing humans do is considered a superpower (digesting salt, standing on two legs without a tail, binocular vision, yawning emits a universal Brown Note, etc.)
- Zig Zagged: HAA civilians use combat robot avatars as go-betweens, which are less effective than the real things, only for something as taken for granted as humming turning out to have a powerful compulsive effect on aliens, which rockets them to the top of the galaxy.
- Averted: HAA members have advantages over humans that correspond to their native locations, just as humans have advantages over HAA members that correspond to their native locations.
- Enforced: An alien species that's just like us wouldn't be very interesting to the audience, and there wouldn't be much drama if we could just push them aside if they disagree with us.
- Lampshaded: "Jesus, it's like we pissed off the creator of the universe. How else to do you explain every alien species having all sorts of advantages over us?"
- Invoked: What Measure Is a Non-Human? gets applied to all sorts of Superpowered Beings, including mere Humans that simply have "ordinary" superpowers.
- Exploited: Sports teams on Earth try to recruit from the HAA to get an advantage.
- Defied: After finding out about the huge power breach between humans and the HAA, The Federation starts experimenting with genetic engineering and cybernetic implants to increase human body's capabilities.
- Discussed: "Hey Zork, you can juggle planets right? Can you help me carry in the groceries?"
- Conversed: "Is everyone in the universe better then we are? Screw You, Elves!"
- Deconstructed: Aliens advocate marginalizing, obliterating or outright ignoring Humanity like ants because they can't compete. As Humanity is surrounded by such beings who are advanced, powerful, huge and incomprehensible, Humanity develops a massive inferiority complex, and loses their will to progress, hope and meaning in life, becoming a race of suicidal Nietzsche Wannabes with the occasional Cult which advocates worshiping and becoming with the aliens. The whole story then plunges into Cosmic Horror Story.
- Reconstructed: Humanity's inferiority complex leads to mankind subverting Can't Catch Up or proving that Humans Are Warriors. End result: Species level Badass Normal; no superpowers, but capable of giving those jerks in the HAA a run for their money.
Back to Puny Earthlings.
