In Aldnoah.Zero, the villainous Martians pilot physics-breaking Super Robots, while the heroic Earthlings can only field pathetic Mecha-Mooks, which allow the Martians to completely massacre the Earth forces. However, protagonist Inaho Kaizuka repeatedly dominates the Martians through clever application of physics to exploit weaknesses in the Martian machines, often taking advantage of the Martians' arrogance at their invincibility, and he does this while piloting a basic training unit.
The only way the inherently much physically weaker humans can survive multiple Titans encounters is to be very, very, very skilled.
Annie Leonhart nearly effortless tosses both Eren and the much larger Reiner on their asses. Eren is amazed at how strong she is, but Annie explains that she is not that strong. She uses techniques that can turn an opponent's superior size and weight against them.
Eren later takes a page from Annie's book against Reiner, in Armored Titan form. He quickly realizes that Reiner's armor makes brute force a non-option, so he starts using Annie's techniques to get the Armored Titan in joint locks and grapples, which are effective even with the armor.
Kaku Kaioh in the Baki the Grappler series. Was once very physically strong, until he came to believe that this was the superior way to fight, as his strength would fade with age, but skill would not.
Any human in Beet the Vandel Buster capable of threatening a high star Vandel, including the main characters. Slade in particular fits this, he is small but quick, his special weapon is invisible rather than being an obvious representation of power like usual, and he is fond of advanced techniques involving intricate timing. He is nearly killed when fighting Beltorze's puppet since Beltorze is just as intelligent a fighter and has a ton of raw power to boot.
Big Windup! -– Invoked - Momome points out that despite Tajima's exceptional speed and accuracy, he just doesn't have the build to be a power hitter in baseball. While he has been holding his own so far, there are signs that as the series goes on he will struggle to progress as a result of this handicap while the other players like Hanai overtake him in usefulness by virtue of their superior power and range.
The Black Bulls who don't have large amounts of magic power like aristocrats make up for it:
Finral doesn't have the large magical power of other nobles and his kind nature makes him unable to Tele-Frag. However, he still makes his rare Spatial Magic useful, quickly creating portals to close large distances, forcibly warp enemies, and help comrades avoid attacks in the midst of battle.
As Magna states himself, he doesn't have the large magical power that nobles have, and needs to use his magic wisely as a result. Thus, he uses aim, proper timing, and tricky pitches to make the most of his fireball spells.
Vanessa tells Noelle that she specializes in magic control, which is seen in how she fights. Her magic isn't powerful, with even her fate manipulation only used for evasion, but she controls her threads to bind enemies and wrap around their wrists and ankles to make them her puppets.
Grey's Transformation Magic doesn't have much outright offensive use, but she can use it to change other spells' attributes, essentially making enemies' attacks useless or changing the environment to suit the situation. The guidebook gives her a 3/5 in Magic Amount but a 5/5 in Magic Control.
Zora's Trap Magic isn't overtly strong and like other peasants he doesn't have as much mana as nobles. Instead, he uses planning and trickery to make the most out of his counter traps.
Nero's Sealing Magic isn't offensively powerful, ranking her a Stage Six in combat ability, but it has a variety of effects like sealing damage and imprisoning enemies that make it very useful.
In general, any human being pitted against an Elf or Devil, Royal or not automatically become this because these non-humans have way stronger magic than humans. However, because non-humans are prideful and look down on humans as inferior, most throw powerful spells semi-haphazardly (and if you're the World's Strongest Man you don't really need to do anything else). This means that weaker humans can catch a few off guard and outmaneuver them with their strategic use of weaker magic.
Mayuri Kurotsuchi is not much of a physical fighter and even admits his zanpakuto works as a motion-sensor to compensate for his poor combat skills. What he is is a brilliant scientist with Crazy-Prepared skills on Batman's level. When he does have to fight himself, he proves himself as dangerous as you'd expect from a Captain by countering the opponents' tricks beforehand, using a variety of nasty poisons, setting traps, and generally doing everything possible to win the fight before it even starts. Uryu only manages to defeat him with a Dangerous Forbidden Technique that left him worse off than Mayuri in the long run (Mayuri's self-experimentation meant that he was able to pull himself back together, while Uryu lost his Quincy powers).
Speaking of Uryu, he, as well as Orihime, fit this trope among Ichigo’s circle of close friends, lacking in power, but having unique abilities. Uryu is a Quincy, with the power to absorb and manipulate spirit energy. He’s capable of harnessing it in several creative ways, including creating energy weapons, energy cages, and even puppeteering his own body’s limbs after Mayuri rendered them immobile in their battle. For Orihime, she controls the Shun Shun Rikka, a series of spirits with unique abilities, allowing her to do things such as heal injuries and create energy shields. She's able to use it for attacks, but they're weak due to Orihime's naturally gentle demeanor. The Fullbring Arc reveals that she’s been improving in the versatility of her abilities, demonstrating powers she hadn’t had before, such as producing a shield that performs offense and defense. In the Blood War arc, she actually teams up with Ichigo to take on theBig Bad, Yhwach.
Szayelaporro Granz, Mayuri’s direct counterpart in the Espadas. Granz is the 8th Espada, meaning, in terms of spirit energy, he’s the second-weakest of the team, the only one beneath him being Aaroniero. However, being a counterpart to Mayuri, Szayelaporro is a Mad Scientist who has a whole arsenal of deadly devices and traps at his disposal. His unique abilities and tools include creating minions that he can eat to heal his own wounds, creating voodoo dolls to torture and break his enemies’ vitals, taking direct control of other living beings, and even a method of self-resurrection via stealing an opponent’s life force. Even Mayuri, who became disgusted by the Espada’s claims of being perfect, admitted that he was impressed by his abilities.
In comparison to their Captains, most Lieutenant-class Soul Reapers are this. Lieutenants like Shuhei Hisagi, Momo Hinamori, Izuru Kira, and Yumichika Ayasegawa, while lacking in raw power, all demonstrate good combat skill and Kido proficiency, meaning they’re able to keep up with and aid their Captains in larger conflicts.
Yoruichi technically falls under this. Unlike most Soul Reapers, she lacks a Zanpakuto, and is generally shown to lack in raw power compared to the stronger characters in-series. Kisuke actually made special armor for her to compensate for her strength in the fight against Aizen. That said, Yoruichi is recognized as the “Goddess of Flash”, the fastest Shunpo user in the Soul Society. On top of that, she’s a master martial artist, as shown when she defeated all of the Onmitsukido (minus Soi-Fon) all by herself, and possesses impressive Kido proficiency.
Rukia Kuchiki of Squad 13. She’s lacking in strength, but when it comes to being a warrior, she’s a lot more level-headed than her usualdemeanorwould suggest. Her Zanpakuto, Sode no Shirayuki, enables her to control ice through graceful, dance-like techniques. Additionally, like her elder brother Byakuya, Rukia is shown having high proficiency in Kido, and is shown using several varied spells to aid in her battle. Besides Hachi, Rukia's the only non-Captain character to kill an Espada, defeating Aaroniero, the 9th Espada. The kicker? She beat him all by herself.
During the Fullbring Arc, Ichigo, in comparison to most of the Xcution members, becomes this. During his training with them to master Fullbring powers, he slowly starts regaining the use of spirit energy. As his powers were already depleted over a year before, Ichigo was now much weaker than he was before. However, unlike the Xcution members, save Ginjo and Tsukishima, Ichigo has spent several months in actual battles for survival. As such, his fighting experience allows him to keep up with them despite having much weaker powers.
Blood+: Both Saya and Haji are Vegetarian Vampires that refrain from drinking blood as much as possible, and are thus barely stronger than ordinary humans as a result. Nonetheless, they're both skilled fighters and can easily hold their own against more powerful opponents.
In Brave10, Rokuro is one of the smallest, lithest dudes on the team and gets thrown around like a ragdoll more than once, but he has his sonic techniques, later Blood Magic, and is fast and precise with suntetsu and his chain whip.
Buso Renkin: Gouta Nakamura's Moter Gear is noted as having the lowest attack power of all the offensive buso renkin in the series but he is able to make up for it with the weapon's versatility and his own intelligence. As a result Gouta has one of the most successful on-screen battle records of the Alchemist Warriors in the series.
A Certain Magical Index hero Touma Kamijou only has his trusty Imagine Breaker when up against incredibly powerful Espers and Magicians. He still manages to hold his own quite well thanks to his wits, overwhelming tenacity, and the occasionally clever applications he employs with his limited arsenal.
When taking part in a baseball game in Charlotte, Misa falls into this because, while she has the athletic skill, she can only act by possessing the body of her non-athletic sister, Yusa. This leaves her with a body that can't keep up with her actual ability. Despite this she's a key player in the baseball game against a telekinetic pitcher.
This is Ikki's entire Shtick in Chivalry of a Failed Knight. His magical ability is best described as "barely". Nonetheless, he manages to hold on through skill, endurance, the ability to read his opponent's fighting style, and a technique that pools all his meager magic into one single attack.
Clare from Claymore, despite being in theory the weakest of all the warriors, has learned every trick and tactic there is to kill Awakened Ones. Normally, she's cripplingly overspecialized, but as the series progresses, Awakened Beings start coming out of the woodwork. And then subverted horribly when she finally meets up with Priscilla after years of searching. Priscilla is by far the strongest character currently in the series and all the skill in the world can't put a scratch on her.
Lelouch Vi Britannia of Code Geass uses his intelligence and tactics as counter his Ace Pilot rival, all while being an average pilot and outright pathetic ground-pounder himself.
Chiko, of The Daughter of Twenty Faces. Being just a pre-teen girl, she's physically weaker than everyone else she ever fights. However, she possesses impressive agility, quick wits, and clever resourcefulness, having been trained by a Gentleman Thief.
Shinobu Kocho is physically the weakest Hashira, as she doesn't even have the strength to decapitate a demon. But her speed and arsenal of poisons make up for it.
One extra tidbit of information for a volume release showed the pure physical strength rankings of all Hashira by using arm-wrestling as a gauge, Obanai was on the bottom rankings along with Shinobu who had already proclaimed herself to be the physically weakest Pillar; he however protests that physical strength isn’t everything, having great confidence in his sword skills and that is validated by him being chosen as the swordsmanship mentor during the Hashira training regime.
Tanjiro's father, Tanjuro, looks outright ghastly due his illness in flashbacks, yet his Breathing techniques allowed him to perform physical feats that his body shouldn’t be able to handle, like performing his ritual of the Hinokami Kagura in the snow for hours upon hours without getting tired.
Humans in general are especially this, compared to even the weakest of Demons. The final fight between Kyojuro and Akaza highlight this, even at his strongest the Flame Hashira narrowly failed to behead his brutal opponent. However, Akaza didn't escape unscathed with both his neck, chest and pride severely damaged.
The series has had humans who regularly engaged hands-on with Digimon. Digimon Fusion's Zenjirou used his kendo skills combined with a digimon-made sword, while Digimon Data Squad's Masaru went barehanded against other digimon.
Puppetmon from Digimon Adventure is one of the physically weakest Mega levels of all, but his special skills means he's able to keep pace with the physical powerhouse Wargreymon and even take control of him. Note, that he's only weak for his level, he'd beat most ultimates physically.
In the original Dragon Ball, there's a bit where Goku goes back in time and meets Master Roshi's old teacher, Mutaitou. By this point Goku is far stronger than the Old Master, including having killed the monster that wiped out both the master and all of his dojo except Roshi and his Evil Counterpartrival, Tsuru. However, when they spar, Goku's moves are so reckless and sloppy that Mutaitou manages to counter all his attacks with ease. Goku's first meeting with Mr. Popo prior to this went much the same way.
Compared to the Saiyans at the beginning of Z, Goku was this. Since he was raised on Earth, which had weak fighters compared to the rest of the universe, Goku lacked real strength when Raditz came looking for him. However, Goku was able to sense energy, hide his power, and had great control of his ki, something that surprised Raditz when Goku bent his Kamehameha and powered up at various points.
King Kai in a nutshell. When he debuted during the Saiyan Saga, he was weaker than Vegeta at the time, and didn't get any stronger. He also trained Goku from weaker than Raditz to way stronger than Nappa in a mere six months, most of the Z Warriors from weaker than Nappa to strong enough to beat the Ginyu Force in a month and half, and invented the Kaio-ken and the Spirit Bomb, two techniques that left in awe even the Gods of Destruction.
This trope is the bane of the human protagonists' existence. It's entirely possible that Krillin, Yamcha, Tenshinhan, and Chaozu might be able to keep pace with the Saiyans in terms of actual fighting skill, but the uber-powerful foes the protagonists face mean that the humans typically end up as benchwarmers, or are simply beat up as per The Worf Effect. In Dragon Ball Z, Tenshinhan, Yamcha, and Chaozu faced the Ginyu Force while being trained by King Kai. King Kai's training methods, which were so good they allowed Goku to utterly thrash Nappa when he returned to Earth, proved just as effective for the humans in that it allowed them to keep pace with Freeza's elite troops, and come out on top.
The reason this rarely works in Dragon Ball is because generally powerful characters are simply incapable of being harmed by anything that isn't at least somewhat close to their power level. They will just laugh it off. Even if a weaker opponent has the skill to get around their defense and hit them 100 times before they can react it doesn't matter, because none of the those 100 blows will hurt them. Krillin struggled to hurt Vegeta when Vegeta was deliberately standing there wide open so Krillin could injure him so he'd require healing because Vegeta was that much stronger.
When it comes to ki attacks, it's the humans among the protagonists that have the creative attacks with special properties (geometry-breaking beams that can be supercharged with life energy, remote controlled projectiles that can turn on a dime, ki buzzsaws that seem to be able to metaphorically punch well above their weight class), while the Saiyans mostly just have increasingly large orbs and lasers to throw around. It's not always enough to even the power gap, but sometimes the results can be surprising...
The humans and Nameks also have the ability to sense people's life force energy, or ki. They can also manipulate their ki to seem less powerful than it is, either surprising an ignorant opponent or hiding from someone trying to pinpoint their location. The Saiyans and Frieza's army don't even realize this is possible before they see it, relying on machinery to do the same thing.
The 23rd Tournament arc also makes a really big point of this trope: Krillin and Yamcha are absolutely curbstomped, but the crowd still cheers wildly for them because their skills were still top-notch.
Piccolo gets this during the fight on Namek with Frieza. Though his power level was slightly lower than Frieza's even after his fusion with Nail, Piccolo's fighting skills nonetheless allow him to go toe-to-toe with Frieza's second form.
Vegeta, of all people, gets this treatment more than once:
In his second battle with Zarbon he found out that, even with the recent Zenkai boost, he was still weaker than his opponent. However he was a battle hardened fighter and Zarbon had grown rusty due being around Frieza for years, so Vegeta managed to get around his defenses and land two crippling blows. No-Holds-Barred Beatdown ensues.
During his fight with Recoome, Vegeta showed much more skill than his opponent... And not enough power to actually hurt him, something Recoome mocked him for.
When dealing with Perfect Cell, Vegeta found himself just as outmatched in terms of power as he had been against Recoome, something Cell mocked him for just like Recoome. Then, much to Cell's horror, Vegeta revealed the Final Flash and nearly killed him-Cell had to dodge, and even then he received what would have been crippling damage against anyone without his immense regenerative power.
After Vegeta was defeated by Cell, Trunks stepped in with his newly revealed Ultra Super Saiyan form, powerful enough to overcome Cell... But too slow to actually hit him, in addition to drain his energy and stamina far faster than normal. Cell promptly revealed that Vegeta could have done it too, he just hadn't bothered because, being far more skilled than Trunks, he had not needed to use it in combat to notice the drawbacks.
In Dragon Ball Z: Battle of Gods, he has the best showing against Beerus because of his good fighting sense, outperforming the far stronger SSJ3 Goku, Gohan, and Gotenks. Beerus even laments that he's "highly skilled, but lacks the power to match it."
Gohan (who could be the poster child for Unskilled, but Strong) lampshades this when he trains with Krillin. When Krillin congratulates him on how strong he is, Gohan says Krillin kept surprising him just because of how many different techniques he knew.
Unbelievably, Mr. Satan: in his fight with Cell he attacks with great skill and in such a way that he would have destroyed a normal opponent (indeed, the first attack had a good chance to kill a normal human), but as his opponent was the far stronger Cell he didn't even scratch him. He later proves it again in the flashback of his fight with Spopovich and then when going against two gunmen - and as these opponents were normal humans he annihilated them.
Jaco has shown his skills again and again, proving that his bragging of being a super elite for being a member of the Galactic Patrol is well-founded, with feats that include instantly calculating how much strength he needed to kick a falling giant rocket away from East City without blowing it up and noticing things that escaped Beerus and Champa. In his solo series he also flat-out admits any adult Saiyan would destroy him (he's gotten better by Dragon Ball Z: Resurrection 'F', enough to fight a small army of Frieza's soldiers and come out on top, but he's still far from the big guys).
Dragon Ball Super has many examples of how power alone does not win one a fight, and there are plenty of times where an comparatively weaker fighter manages to defeat or hold his own against a stronger one, using unique skills or greater experience:
Although Jaco didn't fight like in the movie, he is able to see Goku and Frieza's battle, something only Gohan is able to do. He was also the first to see that Goku was unharmed from Frieza's energy blast. He also catches Frost cheating when no one else did.
When Goku drops his guard, it makes even his powerful body vulnerable to light attacks. Sorbet manages to pierce his heart with a common ray gun after attacking Goku In the Back.
Vegeta effortlessly overpowers the drained Frieza and knocks him out of his golden form, but still loses when Frieza blows up the planet as Frieza can survive in the vacuum of space, while Vegeta can't.
Piccolo is this to almost everyone at the Universal tournament. This nearly costs Frost his match since he could have easily put Piccolo away. Piccolo nearly beats him using smart tactics and his own quick thinking. He only loses because Frost poisons him.
Master Roshi was one of the strongest people on the planet, but he fell badly behind before the end of the original Dragon Ball. He's still, however, a highly skilled and trained martial artist. He manages to take down Frieza's army thanks to his greater experience and he teaches Goku the Evil Containment Wave. In the Universal Survival Saga, he is chosen to be on U7's team over Goten and Trunks because of his greater experience and moveset, while the kids had proven themselves inefficient fighters.
Hit is anything but weak, but he falls behind Goku and Vegeta in terms of pure power. Still, he defeats Super Saiyan Blue Vegeta with ease, despite only using a low amount of power. He can do this because he can jump 0.1 seconds ahead in time and aim for his vital spots, which Vegeta can't figure out since to him it looks like Hit is moving so fast that he seemingly disappears. When Goku successfully figures out how to counter Hit's fighting style, he fares better against Hit in his base form than Vegeta did even at full power. Hit also completely defies Villain Forgot to Level Grind, as he levels up his time-leap mid-fight and has several more time techniques in his arsenal in the Universe Survival Arc. When he fights, he usually has to be stuck with Worf Had the Flu (he's an assassin fighting in tournaments where he isn't allowed to kill) to keep things fair, and when he fights Goku without any limitations, he quickly kills him (It didn't stick, of course, but still).
A trait among every version of Zamasu, barring Black. While he's by no means "weak", his power falls behind Goku, Vegeta, later Future Trunks, the angels, and Gods of Destruction. However, being a Supreme Kai, he posses abilities that are exclusive to his race. He also knows Instant Movement. His future counterpart adds Complete Immortality to that list, and it effectively means he can tank anything Goku or Vegeta dish out and still come out unscathed.
Krillin actually manages to defeat Gohan and stand his ground against Goku in tournament-ruled sparring bouts. Krillin's vast arsenal of techniques such as the Solar Flare X100 and the remote-controlled Destructo Discs definitely give him a solid chance.
During the Tournament of Power, thanks to the intensity of the battles and opponents he meets this time around, in particular the Universe 6 Saiyans and Jiren, Goku ends up being met and even surpassed in raw power more than once. The fact that he has to engage in such fights in quick succession also means that Goku ends up greatly weakened more than once in the Tournament. As such, he has to rely more on his fighting skills and experience to survive. When he fought Caulifla and later Kale in a 2-on-1 match, Goku had already spent a lot of his strength in his first confrontation with Jiren. However, he's still a master martial artist with tons more experience over the two girls, and as such, is able to keep pace with them even when he's double-teamed. In his second confrontation with Jiren, Goku's shown using more creative uses of his techniques against him, such as creating tiny ki landmines and using Krillin's Destructo Disc to slice out the arena right under Jiren, a tactic that Krillin had used against him beforehand.
Towards the climax of the Tournament of Power, with the ranks being whittled down to the strongest fighters left, Androids 17 and 18 become this in comparison to most of the other participants. While they don't match up to them in raw power, as Androids, their energy and stamina is actually limitless, so they can fight without ever becoming tired or fatigued. At the same time, they're also quite clever and pragmatic in combat. Android 17 stands out with many creative uses of his energy barrier, and, even more impressive, he becomes the actual winner of the Tournament.
Played with regarding Dyspo of Universe 11. While his strength is lacking, the threat he poses comes from his Super-Speed. Namely, he’s arguably the fastest fighter in the Multiverse. He’s able to threaten both Ultimate Gohan and Golden Frieza simply because he’s too fast to keep up with, with Gohan having to resort to Taking You with Me to defeat him. However, beyond his speed, when it comes to fighting skill, Dyspo’s moves are noted as being simple, straightforward, and ultimately predictable. Goku and Frieza (at first), after getting used to his speed and reading his moves were able to counter him, and Hit nearly defeated Dyspo twice, only failing to do so because of his teammate Rum’shii.
Ultra Instinct is this as a Power-Up. Ultra Instinct isn't a racial trait (though all Angels seem to know it) or even a technique, per se, but a state of mind; it boosts the user to a state of physical Ludicrous Precision (with maybe a touch of Hyper-Awareness), making even vast chasms of difference in Power Levels almost a non-issue. Jiren's power is leagues above everyone else at the tournament, but Ultra Instinct Goku is able to put him on the ropes because he perfectly dodges all of Jiren's attacks and every one of his blows are disproportionately powerful.
In the Moro Arc, we discover that this is the principle behind the Yardratians' Spirit Control. Being a race that's weak in power, to compensate, they have learned to become so skilled with their ki that they basically became efficient on ki alone. Vegeta trains with them for a while, learning to make much more powerful energy blasts at a lower cost, becoming more powerful with the implication that Goku did the same. Additionally, he learned some techniques Goku hadn't learned, mainly Forced Spirit Fission, which allowed Vegeta to restore the ki Moro stole. Other tricks include duplication, gigantification and even Healing Hands.
Hyunckel. At the beginning of the series he is portrayed as relatively strong and extremely skilled, but in the last chapters he's actually one of the weakest characters in the main cast, power-wise (though his skill level remains above average). He even develops a special technique allowing him to use his life as a weapon, in order to compensate his lack of sheer power. It quickly becomes one of the strongest skills in the series.
Also Aban, as near the end of the manga he's nowhere as strong as the other cast members, but still useful because of his skills.
Durarara!!: Played with in Vorona's case. By most measures, she is Strong and Skilled, being an excellent martial artist with strength and speed enhanced by training and knowledge of a body's weak points. But she keeps comparing herself to Shizuo Heiwajima, who is the epitome of Unskilled, but Strong. In their first encounter, Vorona shot a knife at a vulnerable nerve cluster in Shizuo's shoulder. He ignored it, threw her motorcycle at her, and chased her truck on foot while repeatedly kicking a car in front of himself as a shield against her gun.
Kisiragi is a weak pretty-boy with little stamina and only average speed. Yet he manages to be Co-Dragons with Marco alongside the Unskilled, but StrongGaou due to his ability to knock the ball out of a receiver's hand just after they get their hands on it. With only this skill, and his own stubbornness, Kisiragi shuts down Monta, the best Wide Receiver in-series, and helps his idol, Gaou, take down Hiruma, possibly the smartest Quarterback around.
Compared with his junior teammates, who are very large and powerful, quarterback Osamu Kobanzame from the Kyoshin Poseidons is a pushover. He's short, he's not particularly fast or strong, and he's a coward. However, because he don't want to become a burden for his teammates, he strives to perform to the best he can. As result, he became quarterback with great short-pass precision, with no interceptions during the tournament thanks to his cautious playing. And despite his own misgivings, his junior teammates actually greatly valued him.
The Devil Bats have Manabu Yukimitsu. He's only about as strong as Sena, and slightly faster than Kurita. What he does have is the brains to be a master of the option route with Hiruma as his quarterback, and the determination to pull it off.
Akira Nakabou, AKA "Chuubou", is a junior high student with a lot of passion and ambition who joins Team Japan in the World Youth Cup arc. He's a fairly average athelete, but his mastery of the three-point block ("Delta Dynamite") makes him able to take down linemen much bigger and stronger than he.
Arguably Mystogan from Fairy Tail. Despite not possessing his own inherent magic like the rest of Earth-land inhabitants, he is still considered one of the strongest mages of Fairy Tail. Meaning he uses nothing but his skill and ingenuity with his magical staves in order to take down and dominate his foes. For no greater proof, these abilities were enough to make him an S-Class Mage of Fairy Tail and even Laxus pre-Character Development considered him the only person in Fairy Tail worth his time to fight (yes, even over Natsu or Erza).
Sagara Sousuke from Full Metal Panic!. Both when in hand to hand combat (with men who are a lot more muscled, no less), and when he's fighting in his AS (although this trope is more pronounced when he's in an inferior AS). There have been numerous times where he was piloting an old, worn down model of AS while fighting against new, far superior AS. And while everyone underestimates him and thinks he'll never win, he ends up taking down the opponents easily by using his skill and strategies. It also helps that he's a Combat Pragmatist. (On the other hand, in sister series Full Metal Panic? Fumoffu, his skills as applied to every day school life is clearly overkill.)
Until he Took a Level in Badass, Yuki usually just let his YandereAction Girlfriend do the fighting for him. However, he is the most skilled at utilizing the power of his Diary and anticipates moves in combat or finds very specific information from the future.
Yukki's girlfriend is the polar opposite of Yukki, but still manages to fit this trope. She is very strong and skilled, but her Diary is the weakest, only able to predict one persons actions and her own Dead End.
The Genius Prince's Guide to Raising a Nation Out of Debt (Hey, How About Treason?): Wein convinces Earthworld's ambassador to have the empire's troops train Natra's troops. While the training makes Natra's troops able to match and surpass soldiers from other countries on an individual basis, they still have lower numbers and barely any military budget, forcing them to rely on clever tactics to win most battles.
The Oarai and Jatkosota schools' sensha-do teams in Girls und Panzer are this, owing to their low numbers and lack of equipment compared to all the other schools. The latter especially, considering they have a limited tank selection and are mentioned as regularly stealing equipment and supplies from the other schools. They persist on the merits of their tank crews and have a fearsome reputation that makes even Kuromorimine's team wary.
Char Aznable. While Amuro has greater Psychic Powers, Char is a much more experienced pilot, so the two are evenly matched.
Amuro's eponymous Gundam is also much stronger than Char's re-paintedmook units, at least at first, but as Char receives more powerful mobile suits, Amuro's piloting skill increases proportionally. Eventually, Char receives a Gelgoog, which is an even match for the Gundam, and finally the Zeong, which ends up reversing their roles by being more powerful than the Gundam.
When they return in Char's Counterattack, Amuro had significantly more experience in Char's Counterattack than Char had in the original series, and stronger Psychic Powers to boot. (Char was only 20 when he faced off against Amuro for the first time. Amuro was 29 in CCA.) Once he answers Char's Sazabi with the Nu Gundam, The Red Comet Can't Catch Up.
Hayato. He piloted the Guntank, a pretty sub-par Mobile Suit that had horrendous mobility, slow reaction time, and was useless in terms of close combat; yet he still managed to use it well, and survive the One Year War.
A similar situation occurs in Gundam 00, early in the series there are a few veterans that can completely outmatch the Gundam pilots as far as skill is concerned, and best the Gundams in one on one combat. But the Gundams are so strong they can just shrug off the attacks.
Gundam fans also ascribe this quality to 0080's Bernard "Bernie" Wiseman. By his own admission, he's only ever piloted once and he got shot down very quickly, but in the final episode he uses strategy, tactics, and traps to defeat a Gundam superior to Amuro Ray'snote albeit with a less skilled test pilot behind the controls. And he does all this in a Zaku II, which is the poster child for Mecha-Mooks.
Ricardo Fellini and his Wing Gundam Fenice from Build Fighters. It's been pointed out that his gunpla is of an old make, one he's had since he was a kid, so his kit could be considered inferior from the outset, but he's introduced as the Italian Champion. As well, it has no Plavsky Particle manipulation gimmicks whatsoever, but that didn't stop him from fighting the Star Build Strike to a draw after the latter went Super Mode in episode 15, or trouncing them before then. To note, he's the first person we see to cause Team Nemesis to worry and overclock Aila's Embody System and, unlike Sei and Reiji with the Star Build Strike's RG Mode, he didn't have anything to help even the odds after that happened.
Shimon Izuna of Gundam Build Fighters Try has a basic Destiny Gundam, built straight out of the box by his younger brother. Both Yuuma and Mr. Ral are convinced that it's going to lose, especially when his teammates' suits, equally built Murasame and Jet Windam, are taken out. Instead, Shimon's boxing skills end up making the suit a powerhouse, tearing apart a team based on the Crossbone Vanguard, but also fighting the Build Burning to a standstill.
Team BUILD DiVERS have this going for them in Gundam Build Divers Re:RISE. Compared to many of the other teams in GBN, especially the heroes of the previous series, the team is pathetically weak. They have a hard time fighting Alus' One-Eyes army straight on, but once they start to realize their extremely-simplistic Attack! Attack! Attack! patterns, they're able to easily overcome them with skill.
Compared to Ippo, Kenta Kobashi is a weakling, and he's got no badass knockout techniques. In fact, he's never scored a knockout in his career... and yet, Kobashi gives Ippo a run for his money by playing mind-games, making frequent use of clinches, and using a stance that allows him to easily reach with point-getting jabs, while sacrificing his ability to score heavy blows. Definitely not badass, and the audience hates him, but by playing with the rules, Kobashi manages to win most of his matches. He would've beaten Ippo too, if he hadn't tried to finish him with a knockout.
Also Ichiro Miyata. His own physical strength is pathetic when compared to other boxers, and he has a Fatal Flaw in the form of a glass jaw... but he also has huge speed and does what he can to use counters to his benefit.
Cao Cao in High School D×D is this trope. He's just a normal human who admittedly has the strongest spear (and weapon created in the entire series) that can kill a god, but all it takes is just one hit from any character in this series and he's down for the count since the protagonists are devils who are a lot more durable than he is. It should be easy to take him down, right? NOPE.
Maya Yamada, the assistant homeroom teacher, goes up against two students in Ace Customs, using a training IS... and effortlessly curb-stomps them.
In the same vein, Charles a.k.a. Charlotte Dunois. Having explicitly stated to pilot an outdated 2nd Generation IS Rafale Revive II (the same type that Yamada-sensei uses), albeit customized, she can and has gone toe-to-toe with more modern 3rd generation machines such as Blue Tears and Schwarzer Roegen.
Initial D gives us Takumi and his AE86 Trueno. Although his Trueno pales in comparison to more powerful cars like the RX-7s and Skylines, his skill with the Trueno is what allows him to, to the shock of those who haven't seen him in action yet, hold his own against such more powerful cars.
A Stand's strength is inversely proportional to how far away from its user it can operate, making this trope common among long-range Stand users. Despite lacking a lot of raw power, creative use of their abilities allow long-ranged Stand users to threaten the heroes every bit as effectively, if not more so, than short-ranged fighters who get up close and personal. Often enough, most of a Stand fight is attempting to catch a long-range Stand user while they hide somewhere and use their Stand to hassle the protagonists, who can't effectively fight back until they pin down the user.
Joseph Joestar, from Part 2 of Battle Tendency, never fully masters the way of Hamon like his grandfather, Phantom Blood protagonist Jonathan Joestar. What he lacks in mastery over Hamon, he more than makes up for in creativity and guile, defeating his opponents by outwitting them rather than simply overpowering them. In Stardust Crusaders, he does get a Stand, Hermit Purple, but unlike the punch ghosts his companions have, it's just purple vines, and its special powers revolve around information gathering. He's still able to get a lot of use out of it as Combat Tentacles, it conducts Hamon, and he's still good at coming up with plans on the fly. The Empress stand targets him because of Hermit Purple's relative weakness, only to find out that its divination powers can be used to make maps to the exact thing (in this case, a barrel of tar) he'd need to defeat her.
Jotaro throughout most of Stardust Crusaders is a bizarre fusion of this and Unskilled, but Strong. His stand, Star Platinum, has excellent stats, but since Jotaro has only had it for a few days at the start of its adventure, he has absolutely no idea what it can actually do. So unlike the others on his team, he has to make do without use of a special ability throughout the whole trip. He manages with tactical skill, innovative techniques (like focusing all his power into Star's fingertips to allow them to stretch beyond his normal range, or inhaling a stand that took the form of mist), and some good old fashionedRapid-Fire Fisticuffs. During the final battle, he figures out that his power is Time Stands Still, but with only a fraction of DIO's time stop duration. Fortunately, Jotaro's experience allows him to overcome DIO's advantages anyway.
Oingo's stand Khnum is essentially a weaker version of the earlier Yellow Temperance, as they both allow the user to disguise themselves as others, but Yellow Temperance could also defend against attacks and absorb people, while Khnum is just the disguises and doesn't even change Oingo's clothes. However, Oingo is better at utilizing his disguises than Yellow Temperance's user Rubber Soul; while Rubber Soul blew his Kakyoin disguise by acting ridiculously out-of-character, Oingo is able to fool the Crusaders when disguising himself as Jotaro (even replicating a cigarette trick Jotaro liked to do).
The D'Arby brothers, Daniel and Terence, work in an organization filled with assassins who have incredibly dangerous and lethal stand powers (and Oingo and Boingo), while their stands have no combat potential at all. What their Stands can do is steal souls of those who lose to them (in bets or video games, respectively), which does absolutely dip if they can't get people to play against them in the first place. Daniel D'Arby uses a lot of careful preparation and some incredible cheating skills with his knowledge of where Dio's mansion is as bait to nearly win all of the Crusaders' souls, only failing because Jotaro psyched him into being Hoist by His Own Petard. Terence, meanwhile, also made a very difficult roadblock to the crusaders with his Stand Atum's ability to read minds with yes-or-no questions.
In Diamond is Unbreakable, Shigekiyo "Shigechi" Yangu is a greedy middle schooler with a Colony Stand called "Harvest", which appears as a swarm of 500 robotic bee-men. Each individual Harvest is only a few inches tall and proportionally strong... but a swarm of them can gruesomely rip victims apart piece-by-piece, inject purloined chemicals (such as liquor) into them with stingers, tear out sinews or tendons, rip off ears and tongues, gouge out eyes and sever major artories. And Shigechi is ruthless enough to be aware of and explot all of these abilities if pressed. In his debute, he takes on both Josuke and Okuyasu, who both have more conventional "Power Type" Stands (with Okuyasu having a Story-Breaker Power in his "Erase Anything" ability), simultaneously, and almost wins. He even comes close to defeating the story's Big Bad, Mad BomberSerial Killer Yoshikage Kira, on his own before being fatally tricked. Josuke even describes Harvest in all seriousness as one of the most powerful Stands he's ever seen, characterizing it as "practically invincible". Not bad for a preteen with a Stand most obviously intended for Mundane Utility!
From Golden Wind, Mista's Stand, Sex Pistols, is the weakest in terms of power out of Bucciarati's group (including Moody Blues, which isn't even meant for combat), and he's pretty much helpless if he doesn't have a gun with bullets. But with his talent as a marksman, skill in commanding his Stand, and identifying the weaknesses of his enemies, he can hold his own against much stronger Stands. Considering that his enemies are still human, they are still vulnerable to gunfire like any ordinary person.
Kamisama Kiss gives us Nanami, an ordinary human turned Physical God. She has plenty of divine power and she's both intelligent and cunning, but she is still only a human in terms of physical strength and endurance.
Kekkaishi's Tokine builds her combat style on this trope. Comparatively speaking, the barriers she can create have nowhere near the explosive power as those made by Yoshimori, nor can she make them as big. The solution? Just use the barriers you have in really awesome ways...
Creepy Child Chikage Kushinada (and her teacher, Mikumo) adheres to this trope. She's a grade school girl but is shown to be at least on par with the teenage characters because she has enough skill to fight and defeat normal adults. She is a fighter of 100% skill, 0% power, rather than split between the two. What is actually meant by this is that Chikage applies no force of her own during a fight, but uses the enemy's force against them, a tactic used in multiple martial arts. While most fighters are a combination of strength and skill (strength being striking power, skill being throwing power or technique-related ability) Chikage is all skill—she only throws her enemy in such a way as to use their own weight, momentum, etc., against them, rather than create an impact herself. As usual, this stems from the manga taking a martial arts concept to its absolute extreme.
Miu, as pointed out to Kenichi at the beginning of his training.
Kuroko doesn't have the talent or the build for basketball, but because of his highly refined and practiced skill at Misdirection (which requires enhanced tactical acuity and play-reading, foresight, and an iron-clad rationale dedicated to performing his specific role), he was able to be considered the "Phantom Sixth Player" of the legendary Generation of Miracles, his middle school team which took the national championship three years in a row.
Among the point guards of the national-level teams, Serin's Izuki Shun is physically the weakest by a sizeable margin. However, his Eagle Eye, polished fundamentals (particularly passing and stealing), and his ability to read plays and predict upwards of three to four moves ahead allows him to go toe-to-toe with players like the expert Kasuga Ryuuhei of Seihou, Badass Normal Kasamatsu Yukio of Kaijou, and even Uncrowned King "Thunder Beast" Hayama Koutaro. Hayama in particular recognizes him as a "first-rate player", and admits he can't beat him unless he plays at his absolute best and plans his attack first.
Sano from The Law of Ueki has two powers: to turn towels to steel and his Level 2 make the towel steel supermagnetic. From this, towel-boomerangs, towel-swords, towel-gags and at one point charging at extreme speeds using a towel MAGLEV TRAIN.
Chrono Harlaown is explicitly mentioned in the first season to be weaker in power level compared to Nanoha and Fate, a comparison he scoffs at, stating there's more to magic than that. He then proceeds to prove his point during the penultimate episode of the first season where he pulls a One-Man Army in Precia'sGarden of Time while everyone else needed to charge in as a team, and again in the manga volume set immediately before the second season where he effortlessly defeated an improved Fate in record time when she had to battle him for her Mage Exam.
Yuuno Scrya is quite possibly the weakest — or at least just definitely the least well-armed — combatant in the series. However, his mastery of binding and barrier magics make him the most capable Non-Action Guy ever. He's also demonstrated the ability to force someone to be teleported against their will, which, when you think about it, is probably the single most lethal ability ever shown in the series. The unpleasant possibilities for it are endless, but sadly never explored.
Shamal is in the same position as Yuuno, only she does have a powerful Device backing her up.
She debatably has the most impressive record in the series at standoff combat, nearly paralyzing Nanoha from at least a half-mile away, and in every battle she's had a part in her opponents did not know she was there until attacked. Her skills with barrier, portal, and teleportation magic have endless tactical application that the series never explores, from making people run into instant magical walls at several times the speed of sound to portaling them off somewhere unpleasant. Yuuno would be capable of the same tricks if he had a copy of her Device.
There is the part in the final battle of A's where she locates the defense program's core and, with the help of Yuuno and Arf, teleports it to outer space, where the Arc-En-Ciel can be fired at it without risk of vaporizing a good chunk of Japan; scrying, binding and teleportation magic succeeds where Wave Motion Guns can't completely do the job.
Teana in StrikerS often worries about her own worth as a mage, noting that she has no unique skills and not that much magical power compared to the other members of Section 6. However, she eventually learns how to put her illusion magic to good use in conjunction with her sharpshooting skills, and defeats three of the Numbers Cyborgs by use of perfectly timed attacks and some help from Vice. She is apparently Nanoha's best student, as she is the only canon character whom Nanoha taught her signature Starlight Breaker spell (well, Reinforce also used it but she merely copied Nanoha). There is a subtle meaning to this fact: Starlight Breaker's quirk is that it isn't powered by the caster's mana but rather, the magical energy dispersed in the environment. In other words, it is the ultimate achievement for a weak but skilled mage, allowing her to unleash powers way over her head by skillfully managing the available resources.
Veyron from Magical Record Lyrical Nanoha Force. In the mostly Unskilled, but Strong Hückebein family, he's the only one who cannot React. Nevertheless he can hold his own against Riot Force 6's operators and actually defeats a Reacted enemy Eclipse infectee in direct combat.
Vivio in Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha ViVid. After StrikerS, Vivio underwent a Redemption Demotion and now lacks both a Relic Core and had her Linker Core damaged from Nanoha's attack. She's notably weaker, lacking her Saint's Armor, pure magical power and the build for attack or defense. Multiple characters tell her that she's not meant for combat and she gets beaten by other martial arts competitors. Despite this, she develops a fighting style based around skillful dodging and careful attacks, one that lets her fight with her Nanoha-mama albeit in a practice match.
Magilumiere Co. Ltd.: Most extermination companies work on "bigger Kaii require bigger explosions" principle and are good at what they advertise. Magilumere's magical girls come up with the right approach for each Kaii on case by case basis, and while they are more efficient at it, they are notably slower and struggle to take down a Kaii solo.
The Pro Hero, "Eraser Head"; is this due to his Quirk, "Erasure". While effective by neutralizing the activation of Quirks of others, it can't affect those that are "mutant" types (since they're always activated) or are naturally Quirkless. However, Aizawa makes up for it with his wits and being skilled in combat, capture equipment, and stealth to win a fight. His stats give him an average 3/5 in Power and Cooperation, but a good 4/5 in Speed and Intelligence, and an overwhelming 6/5 in Technique.
The "Hero Killer" Stain also falls into this if you judge purely by Quirk. Stain's Quirk, "Bloodcurdle" allows him to paralyze a person by ingesting their blood, with certain blood types being more susceptible than others. Not much compared to powers like Super-Strength, Playing with Fire, or being An Ice Person. He makes up for it by Dual Wielding knives and honing his raw physical combat ability to high levels to make the most out of his Quirk in combat. His stats give him an excellent 5/5 in Technique and a whopping 6/5 in Speed.
When using Full Cowl. Izuku Midoriya's overall power at 5% is only marginally stronger than he was without using it, and he lacks the explosive power of a full powered Smash. However, by increasing his overall power, even at a smaller percent, he is capable of fighting longer, is much faster as a result, and is capable of working in strategies better since he no longer needs to fear breaking his limbs. Furthermore, because he is limiting his power, he can gradually utilize more of it as he improves, allowing him to steadily increase his power, thus improving his abilities naturally. However, as he increases his power with One For All in certain percentages, he reverts back to Unskilled, but Strong as he has to train to master higher the higher increase in power into his skill.
Hitoshi Shinso has excellent control over his Quirk, "Brainwashing", and is very good at tricking people into answering his questions in order to activate it, but as noted by Aizawa during his match against Midoriya, his combat skills are relatively poor and once Midoriya is able to break free of Shinso's Mind Manipulation, he overpowers him in minutes. His stats reflect this very well, with his Technique and Intelligence both being 4/5, but Power, Speed, and Cooperation being an underwhelming 1/5.
Neito Monoma's Quirk allows him to copy the abilities of others' quirks, but he could only use them one at a time and up for 5 minutes. Due to these limitations, he will never be able to rigorously train them like his peers do. But he's listed as having a 5/5 in both Technique and Intelligence, and can use the different quirks creatively.
Best Jeanist is the No. 4 (later promoted to No. 3 after All-Might's retirement) Pro-Hero who's quirk "Fiber Master" gives him control over fibers, denim being the most effective. In-spite of its strange nature, it is an incredibly versatile quirk that is good for offense, defense, and capture, him being able to overpower and capture an entire league's worth of Nomu's and being able to block a direct attack by All-For-One. All-For-One himself makes an observation that his super-abilities are almost completely reliant on skill and thus rejects it for its low power level, implying that while "Fiber Master" is versatile, it relies on practice and technique for it to be the least bit useful.
Mirio Togata, AKA Lemillion, possesses the quirk "Permeation" that makes him intangible at will. This came with a laundry list of drawbacks (complete loss of sense and an ability to breathe due to all light and matter slipping through him, his clothes falling off, his body mass weighing him down and causing him to fall through the floor, etc.) that made him fall behind the rest of his peers, but with extensive training in both physical combat and practice with his Quirk under Sir Nighteye's supervision, Mirio became one of UA's most promising students. Sir Nighteye chose Lemillion as a potential candidate for One-For-All and Aizawa (famous for his high-standards) claims that he is good enough to become the next No. 1 hero even among active pros.
Himiko Toga's Quirk allows her to copy the looks of someone whose blood she drunk but not their Quirks at first, so in combat she relies on a knife and being fast and skilled enough to get the drop even on Heroes in training.
To an extent, Hawks also qualifies, having a Quirk which allows him to control the feathers of his wings with his mind. His direct attacks against the Hood do not cause much damage, but he can still demolish ordinary Nomu through pure speed compensating for his average strength. His wings also provide him various forms of utility. Using almost all of his feathers, he was able to telekinetically evacuate everyone in a collapsing building alongside those on the ground, and he can use the feathers to complete multiple tasks at once from a distance, as well as pick up on conversations covertly. In fact, he is one of the few heroes with multiple 6/5 scores in the Ultra Analysis Data Book — both Speed AND Technique.
Surprisingly, All For One himself proves superior with this trope alone. Unlike All Might who relied purely on his brute strength, All For One survived merely by the grotesque collection of Quirks he stole. Furthermore, the villain was fighting in a much weaker state than before. It's terrifying to think how overpowered he was in his prime.
Shikamaru Nara lacks raw power and stamina (by ninja standards) and is initially too lazy to even put in much training, but his sheer intelligence means that he can consistently hold his own against opponents who are not only stronger, but older and more experienced than him. As he was wonderfully described by some troper, "Watching Shikamaru fight is like watching an acrobat work without a net."
Amusingly, Sakura Haruno is this in after the Time Skip despite possessing Super-Strength and juggernaut-esque healing, as her power and healing abilities are almost solely derived from her excellent chakra control. In terms of her chakra capacity, she's a drop in the ocean next to her far more powerful teammates. Tsunade (her mentor) is much the same.
Haku is this in spades. His best attacks come from zipping around at high speed, nailing people with senbon needles in their pressure points, and using his ice mirrors to get faster. Not once does he ever use a truly destructive technique, and yet he would have beaten both Naruto and Sasuke without even trying to kill them, had Naruto not gone berserk when Sasuke went down.
Itachi Uchiha is known to have been severely weakened by keeping his Sharingan activated permanently throughout the series, yet still manages to completely obliterate his perfectly healthy genius brother in their proverbial duel of fate. Even before the diminished capacity derived from his illness is brought up, he is said to have less than average power/endurance, which his partner Kisame Hoshikagi hints at by reminding Itachi that he shouldn't use his exceptional ocular powers more than a few times a day, lest he be completely drained. What Itachi lacks in quantitative power, he more than makes up for in qualitative.
For that matter, Neji Hyuga is one of the most dangerous of the Konoha 12 and the first to make Jonin, despite having relatively low physical strength. His mastery of the Gentle Fist, Byakugan, and Heavenly Spin render him capable of crippling opponents far physically stronger than him while blocking, dodging, or redirecting most attacks. For instance, he was able to fight on equal terms with Naruto during the Chunin exams and was favored to win that fight, even when Naruto drew power from the Nine Tailed Fox, allowing Naruto to completely outclass him in terms of raw power, stamina, and quantity of attacks (thanks to Naruto's Shadow Clones).
Rock Lee plays with this trope. He's immensely strong, fast, and durable, and has mastered the Eight Celestial Gates, which makes him exponentially more powerful. However, he also has only his physical skills because he can't use chakra other than for the gates. His sensei Might Guy is much the same way, though he can use conventional chakra techniques (but just chooses not to).
The Fourth Hokage, Minato Namikaze, was this as well, at least compared to his peers. His most destructive technique shown was the A-Rank Rasengan... which at full power, can destroy maybe a twenty-foot area. Compared even to most equivalent elemental jutsu, that's pretty underwhelming (for comparison's sake, the A-Rank Giant Waterfall Jutsu can splinter and flood an entire forest in the hands of a Jounin-level user). And yet his speed, brutally efficient combat style, and mastery of sealing techniques (not to mention his teleportation powers) made him one of the deadliest shinobi in all of history.
Tobi, at least in comparison with other members of Akatsuki. His space-time abilities make him one of the most powerful tactical fighters of the series, but he almost never uses large scale ninjutsu, whereas the rest of Akatsuki relies on several highly destructive techniques. It's because of this deficiency in raw power that Itachi was convinced that "Madara" was a shadow of his former self; at the time, Tobi was masquerading as the real Madara Uchiha, who was tied with the First Hokage (aka the second "God of Shinobi") in strength. It should be noted that his ability to control several tailed beasts with his eyes makes up for his lack of personal firepower. And this is not to mention when he became Jinchuuriki of the Ten-Tails...
Konan is a subversion. At first glance, her paper ninjutsu seems fairly underwhelming, as she mainly uses it to travel around, capture or bog down opponents, and avoid taking hits via flight or splitting into sheets of paper. It's effective enough to get the better of multiple Konoha shinobi, and even Jiraya for a while, but ultimately doesn't amount to much. That is, until she faces the above-mentioned Tobi and breaks out the explosives. Six-hundredbillionexplosivetags, in fact. Tobi only escapes by using the Reality Warper Izanagi and sacrificing his left eye in the process.
Though Kakashi Hatake lacks in stamina compared to other top-level ninja, he's considered the equal of the unbelievably powerful Might Guy by virtue of having learned literal hundreds of jutsu and being a master tactician who rarely fights his enemies head-on until he's ready to destroy them.
Despite still being way more powerful than the average Jounin, he's also way outclassed in strength by most of the Kage-level fighters he's compared to as an equal. It's perhaps no surprise that Kakashi was a student of the aforementioned Fourth Hokage.
One of the most interesting things about Kakashi's case is that his strength is so obviously displayed. He's known internationally as "The Man Who Copied a Thousand Jutsu", but that in and of itself both hides and reveals his true strength: not that he can copy your techniques with his Sharingan, but that he has thousands of them and thus likely has a counter to everything you can do. And yet he consistently makes people fall for variations on the same tricks, time after time. He basically subverts his own combat style at will just to screw with his enemies.
Kabuto Yakushi during Part 1, in a similar vein to Sakura above. Sure, he can't destroy much himself, but he can sever muscles and tendons and even damage internal organs with his Chakra Scalpels (which are normally impossible to use in combat because they require such intense focus; they're a technique intended for surgery). And he can also heal himself from any injury he takes, up to and including having his stomach puréed by Naruto's Rasengan, by using that same unreal chakra control to heal the individual cells of his body. It has limits, though, as he lacks the chakra capacity to completely recover from large enough hits; Naruto's attack still takes him out despite not killing him like it should have. He became Strong AND Skilled during Part 2, thanks to assimilating his old master Orochimaru's remains and mastering the techniques of him and several of his strongest minions while losing none of the brilliance he had already, which allows him to become one of the few beings capable of defeating Itachi Uchiha, only losing thanks to Sasuke's interference.
Hiruzen Sarutobi, the Third Hokage, had become this by the end of his life. While undeniably still strong enough to hold the title of Hokage, Sarutobi's incredible raw power had degraded over time, as age sapped his stamina and chakra capacity. In his prime, Sarutobi was capable of using Ninjutsu of allfive elements simultaneously basically at will, but by the time he's in his 70's, he can really only use one or two at a time, and he can't spam them with impunity either. Instead, he focused on his bojutsu, fuuinjutsu, and combination attacks, as well as a greater reliance on strategy and working with his Summons than in his youth. His age doesn't stop him from going toe-to-toe with Orochimaru and two (imperfectly) reanimated Hokage during Operation Konoha Crush and holding him to, at best, a Pyrrhic Victory, though Sarutobi admits that if he'd been at his full strength, he could have taken Orochimaru out via his Shiki Fuuin.
This is the explicit reason Evangeline McDowell was able to reach the quarterfinals during the first Tournament Arc of Negima! Magister Negi Magi despite being Brought Down to Normal. Even a ten-year-old girl can do some damage when she has been practicing aikijutsu since before most of the competition's grandparents were born (she only had to break out the strings against Setsuna).
It is heavily implied that she learned straight from either Morihei Ueshiba or Takeda Sokaku (respectively, the creators of Aikido and Aiki-Jujutsu.)
Takahata is unable to cast spells but still manages to be badass within a society of mages with his Kanka (his title is "Death Glasses Takahata").
The most straightforward example is probably Nodoka, who has very little actual combat experience or magical skill, but still does a number on a Reality Warper who had been erasing people from existence, simply by skillful use of her artifact. Her artifact is a diary that can read a person's surface thoughts if she knows their name. Not impressive, by itself, but handy. When she Took a Level in Badass, she teams up with a group of artifact hunters and grabs two things: a ring that, when pointed at a person, reveals their true name, and a doohickey that lets her read books without opening them. The most major villains in the series have been defeated by "What are you planning?", "Where can I find X?", or "How do I escape from this situation?"
Usopp and Nami are the crew's Lovable Coward and token girl respectively, and have little ability in physical combat. Word of God has even stated that Usopp will always be the weakest fighter of the crew. However, both are highly skilled in their specific fields of sharpshooting and navigation. Usopp, an amateur Gadgeteer Genius, has also built various weapons for himself and a Weather-Control Machine for Nami with the specific intent of using their brains over their brawn to win battles. And he has proved that he's no pushover; when he goes all-out, he's capable of giving Luffy a run for his money while his entire body is injured and bandaged up. And as for Nami... she's an expert meteorologist with a Weather-Control Machine.
Robin would also qualify. While her physical strength is minuscule compared to the majority of foes that come her way, her extensive experience as an assassin as well as having two decades to work out the uses of her powers ensure that she's still very much a serious threat to most people. Furthermore, the nature of her powers allow her to apply what strength she has almost infinitely, limited only by the surface area of what she is grabbing. She has used this to twist a giant's arm behind its back with a giant arm made of other arms. Through smart use of her powers, she's one of the most dangerous Straw Hats and often lumped in with the far physically stronger 'monstrous trio.'
For a villainous example, Foxy. He's not exactly "weak" per se, but he's a total joke compared to Luffy when it comes to raw power. He makes up for it with surprisingly clever use of his Devil Fruit power, as well as cheap tactics and low blows.
Another villainous example is Ain from the twelfth movie One Piece Film: Z. She may be far from weak, but her physical strength still pales in comparison to her captain and several of her foes. To make up for it, she is very fast and uses her Devil Fruit powers in creative ways to gain or regain the upper hand in fights.
Rebecca from the Dressrosa arc may very well be the physically weakest fighter in the Corrida tournament, but she still makes it to the finals because she is the master of a fighting style that lets her use her opponents' strength against them and knock them out of the ring, and because she is the only one whose Haki is good enough to anticipate Cavendish's/Hakuba's attack and dodge it. That said, she is very fast, so she's not entirely without physical skills.
This is usually a trait of the more successful Paramecia-type Devil Fruit users. While they lack the straightforward abilities of Logia or Zoan fruits, they often make up for it with the most outside-the-box thinking and diversity in the application of a single fruit's powers. While a few Paramecia Fruits provide massive destructive power (the category is simply a catch-all for anything that's not Logia or Zoan), most are far from impressive. Even the main character Luffy became far weaker as a child when he ate the Gum-Gum Fruit and became a Rubber Man; it took years of training before he could even regain the ability to throw a punch. While he's become monstrously strong since then, he's had to come up with truly bizarre ways of utilizing his Devil Fruit power to do so (thus, he personally doesn't fit this trope, but his Devil Fruit power pretty much does).
There are some clear example of Zoans like this, because the inherent combat potential varies greatly depending on which specific animal the Zoan can transform into. Being able to become a leopard or a king cobra or a T. rex provides very obvious strength, but transforming into a giraffe? Not so much. But after eating that Devil Fruit, Kaku is able to use both his assassin training and his innate creativity to come up with an amazing variety of deadly attacks using his giraffe transformation, and does so on the fly in the middle of battle.
Three years prior to the series, the titular character was able to kill a monster despite being a Muggle at the time through skillful maneuvers and clever use of his tie.
In comparison to her sister and Psykos, Fubuki's Esper abilities don't have the raw power to match their feats, but she's a capable Esper in her own right and can use what she has well enough to fend off Psykos.
Zombieman doesn't have freakish strength, or much offensive capacity at all, but his main skill is being unable to die, ever; and since he can practically regenerate from everything, with a skill like that you don't need to be terribly strong when you can simply outlast the strength of your enemy.
For extremely relative values of "weak", but Garō is noted as posing a particular threat because, while previous monsters relied on brute strength to overwhelm heroes, Garō fights with actual martial arts and specializes in redirecting his opponents' attacks instead of just countering them. Basically, his fighting style is geared specifically towards defeating heroes. Once he goes One-Winged Angel, he becomes this especially in comparison to Saitama, as while he's still much weaker (something he himself admits), he completely surpasses him in terms of martial arts and even manages to force him to fight "Semi-Seriously".
Carol Reed from Ouke no Monshou has zero fighting skill, but her almost encyclopedic knowledge of Ancient Egypt comes off very handy when she needs to get the upper hand in the middle of constant power struggles in Pharaoh Memphis's court.
Red and Blue's main Pokémon have levels that range from the 80s to 90s, while only Green's main powerhouse Pokémon has the level of 80 and everyone else is around 60-70 (her Granbull is only in its 20s). However, she rarely engages in direct combat as her victories are contributed to her skilled use of gambits.
Yellow counts too, when she's not using her level-booster powers. By base level alone, she is by far the weakest of the Dex Holders. She can think up of a few sound strategies during battle to make up for her lack of strength (since overusing her powers rapidly exhausts her), but the flaws of this trope are pointed out to her when she works out a complicated scheme to counter Lance's offense but is unable to actually break through his defense due to simply not having enough power.
Syuusuke Fuji. He eschews physical fitness and outright strength in favor of counter techniques that require outrageous (impossible) amounts of skill to perform. He later gains some strength in a filler training camp in the anime, but this never happens in the manga. Either way, it stops being addressed as the series delves into further ludicrousness.
Also Eiji Kikumaru, who has a flashy and fun style of playing yet is plagued by low stamina. Unlike Fuji, his Training from Hell that makes him go from Fragile Speedster to Lightning Bruiser happens in both the anime and manga.
In Puella Magi Madoka Magica, Akemi Homura is eventually revealed to be a version of this. Her actual powers are fairly limited; her status as one of the most accomplished warriors in the series comes from her creative applications of them. As well as a lot of Dakka.
Ranma defeated Prince Herb, who far outclassed him in every way possible, by using a technique to gather up all of the energy Herb was giving off and turning it against him.
Subverted with Happosai: at first he seems just a frail old man who can easily toss far stronger opponents through walls or over the horizon by redirecting their momentum with a pipe, but at times he shows that he's just as powerful, and rarely shows his real power because it's funnier that way.
While many of the human warriors are definitely strong by normal human standards, such as Lü Bu and Adam, when compared to the gods they end up facing in the Ragnarok tournament, they are far outclassed in the strength department. However, they make up for this in the skill department, having honed their techniques and fighting styles to their absolute limits, allowing them to face the gods on equal ground.
Sasaki Kojiro makes up for being physically weaker than other characters by spending his entire life (and afterlife) honing his skills with a sword, his training eventually putting him on the same level as other, much stronger characters. In fact, it's this skill that ends up as the deciding factor in his victory over Poseidon.
While Jack the Ripper may be even weaker than Sasaki, his sheer intelligence, trickery, and mastery over weapons puts him on an even playing field with even a powerful god like Heracles.
The main character from Red River (1995) herself, Yuri Suzuki. She's a complete weakling physically speaking and can't do a thing when she's being sexually assaulted, but being from the future has its advantages. She is revered as Ishtar because she rode a horse, something that's common nowadays, but in ancient Turkey was unheard of. She also recognized an iron sword and used it against Zuwa, ignoring the other, weaker swords available. Back in the Bronze Age, iron was a Game-Breaker, so the fact that she knew what iron was and how effective a weapon it is causes the people to see her as very intelligent.
Rosario + Vampire: The Doppelgänger criminal encountered early in Season II knows full well the value of this trope. A doppelganger's power is to copy the form of a person onto another person or themselves - which will get you pretty far if you grab someone like a vampire or a werewolf, but doesn't do you much good if you end up snagging a human or a witch. So the criminal trains himself in martial arts, which humans came up with because they're weak, and now he can hold himself against an entire Amazon Brigade with a human's form.
Kenshin Himura of Rurouni Kenshin fits this trope. Kenshin is a short, skinny and relatively weak man, so much so that he eventually has to give up swordmanship because his kenjutsu style is meant to be used by stronger men and overusing it damaged his muscles. Despite this handicap, he is able to take down the most powerful warriors in the series (aside from his own master) because he's just that damn skilled.
Sailor Moon: Among the physical combat-inclined Sailor Senshi, Sailor Venus and Uranus are this compared to Sailor Jupiter: Jupiter is the physically strongest of the Sailor Senshi, but the other two are so much more skilled that Uranus handed her a Curb-Stomp Battle, and in the manga the (untransformed) fight between a Brainwashed and Crazy Jupiter and Venus was over in one kick.
Samurai Champloo: While Jin is definitely not physically weak, he's a lot more reliant on technical skill than his rival Mugen. This trope is most evident in the fight against Kariya; Jin's actually very close in skill with him, but outclassed in sheer power and Ki-Attacks.
Yoh's father tends to say "It matters not who has the most furyoku, but who uses it properly". He can defeat his overpowered son and friends with his technique alone, but then again, Yoh and friends don't seem to understand that in the anime.
To stop Lee Bai Long after he goes berserk once Jun's spell tag is destroyed, Anna summons the ghost of Bai Long's deceased master, who possesses Yoh in order to put the raging zombie down. Bai Long's master died a decrepit old man — and still kicks Bai Long's ass.
ST☆R: Strike it Rich: Nozomi, at least relatively to Hina: she doesn't have nearly as much strength, but she has experience, unlike her opponent. As such, she can capitalize on Hina's big openings to pin her leg to the ground. However, the sheer gap in raw strength means Nozomi couldn't win a real fight, something she is well aware of.
Sword Art Online: Kirito is this in real life. While he retains the muscle memory of sword skills he picked up in SAO, his real body, having spent two years in a coma, isn't very athletic. Nonetheless, he was able to hold his own against Suguha, a kendo quarterfinalist, after two months of physical therapy in a sparring match, only losing because he tried to activate a Sword Skill in real life. This is especially prominent in Ordinal Scale where the Augmented Reality game requires players to use their real bodies. Kirito initially struggles against early bosses, even tripping over during battle which results in a Face Plant.
The Ghoul Investigators in Tokyo Ghoul operate on this principle. Ghouls are physically superior to humans in every manner, with Combat Tentacles or Razor Wings, a Healing Factor, and resistance to conventional weaponry. To have any hope of winning against them, humans have to be incredibly skilled and willing to resort to whatever methods can score a victory.
Toriko has Shuu, who uses a knife skill similar to the main character's. However, while Shuu's "Petty Knife" lacks the raw, destructive power of Toriko's, he more than makes up for it with ludicrous precision, capable of using it to slice an individual's blood vessels open in the blink of an eye.
Vinland Saga: Thorfinn fights like this when he's got his head on straight. When he doesn't, he turns into a Screaming Warrior and proceeds to lose rather spectacularly. Askeladd fights like this as well, all the time, but with him there's a slight subversion. Despite the tactics he employs physically he's still one of the strongest characters in the series.
Having low trion causes low powered weapons and brittle shields. Despite this, Kitora and Yoneya managed to bring their teams to A-rank. To make up for their low attack and defense, Kitora supplements her skillset with traping skill, while Yoneya opts for higher reach by mounting his spear. Series protagonist Osamu also has the problem. And being a rookie at the start of the series, he has to work on that "skilled" part, too.
Border as a whole effectively ends up as weaker but just as skilled as the alien invaders in the Invasion arc. The vast majority of Border members can't match the raw power and advanced triggers of the Aftokratorian invasion team, and have to beat them though tactics, skill, numbers, and outright trickery.
Yugi Mutou seems an ineffectual wimp who, in spite of being a gutsy little mite, would be about as much use in a fistfight as a squashed watermelon. But in a universe where Card Games are Serious Business, Yugi reigns supreme. (Regular Yugi fits this trope better since the Other Yugi has Hard Work Hardly Works going for him, whereas Yugi slowly but surely develops his abilities to the point at which he can and does actually defeat the pharaoh.
The Pharaoh is a prime example of this trope regarding the games. In Capsule Monster Chess, he defeated Mokuba's strong monsters with a single weakling. And in the card game Duel Monsters, he's so good that he defeated Obelisk the Tormentor with his three Magnet Warriors. And in the 10th Anniversary movie, his deck is actually very old and weak in comparison to his two partners Judai and Yusei and the opponent Paradox, yet he manages to destroy the Malefic Paradox Dragon (4000 ATK) with his freaking Dark Magician, who doesn't have even an effect.
Haga/Weevil likes to affect this image, as he plays a deck of mostly weak Insects supplanted with powerful cards and abilities, and tends to make more tactical plays than other Duelist Kingdom players. However, this is subverted later on, as it turns out he's actually in many ways just as reckless as his fellows; whenever he gets his hands on something powerful, he blunders right into a trap. He also cheats, which he considers skill.
In Yu-Gi-Oh! GX, Jun Manjoume conquers the North Academy with a mix of random weak cards. Later, his brothers challenged him to a duel where Manjoume must only use monsters with maximum 500 ATK. He wins anyway (in fact, he took the challenge further by using 0-ATK cards). Also, Manjoume's final deck has the Ojama trio as his core cards besides his Armed Dragons.
Yusei Fudo has a deck full with weak monster cards. However, since his deck is built for Synchro Summoning and is prepared for almost every situation, he never loses on-screen. This goes away later on as he displays more and more Synchros, though.
Team Taiyou is probably the biggest example in the franchise. "Budget" doesn't begin to describe their decks, which are mostly made up of Com Mons, random Speed Spells, and Traps that would have been subpar in Duelist Kingdom. They're so lacking on offense that their main source of damage is a Field Spell exclusive to the tournament they played in. Even their D-Wheel is basically The Alleged Car. In spite of all this, they managed to reach the WRGP quarterfinals, give Team 5Ds an incredibly close match, and bring out a card so Awesome, but Impractical that it was thought to be unsummonable, all by playing to their strengths and eking out a near-unbreakable stall.
After The Beautiful Suzuka was humiliated by the super strong Younger Toguro, he became obsessed with proving that skill is superior to strength, so he spent all his time working on special techniques instead of his strength. However, Genkai pointed out strength and skill are equally important and mocked him for not building up his strength before beating the shit out of him.
Sniper more or less fits the trope. Physically, he's a normal human who could easily be knocked out from a mere tap by any of the main characters, yet he's dangerous enough of a psychic and marksman to give Genkai the chills. And sure enough, Yusuke stood no real chance against him during their "fight." Fortunately for Yusuke, Hiei was lurking about.
Kuwabara also fits this trope to an extent. He's the weakest of the main cast by a fair margin, and his overall skill isn't as great as the others. Despite this, he is incredibly gifted in energy manipulation, winning or coming close in a great many of his fights through his many impromptu variations of his Spirit Sword, even managing to defeat somebody roughly two spirit classes above him.
In a surprising moment, Shinobu Sensui, the Big Bad of the Chapter Black story arc. He admits that Yusuke is every bit his physical superior in almost every way, but he has him completely outclassed when it comes to skill in real combat, and though they both use the same tactics of analyzing their opponents fighting style he's done it for far longer and can predict his every move, and finally concludes with the fact he's far more skilled and powerful with his spirit energy.
Sensui:: If your spirit energy could fill a fishbowl, then mine could fill the ocean.
and nearly killed him-Cell had to dodge, and even then he received what would have been crippling damage against anyone without his immense regenerative power.