Power Flaw

NOTHING YOU DO CAN HELP ME, NEWBIE.

When someone or something is too powerful, too powerless, or doesn't have abilities that work anymore. This could do some serious damage to their character and could result in them being Too Broken To Fix. Power Flaw can so badly ruin somebody's balance between strong and weak that the creators have little choice outside of cutting the person out of their work altogether. However, there are ways to prevent Canon Bannin', such as by Bussing them or, much more extremely, killing them off. Any self-respecting creator knows the importance of balance and the beauty of simplicity. The Hero mainly starts their journey on Average, the third tier on the Epic Scale, or sometimes a notch below at Lame. They have little in their ownership and tend to get the best at the latter end of their adventure. The Chosen One, though, is a super-powered Hero whose Unique Ability may be a latent ticket to Epic, tier 5 the Epic Scale. All it needs is the time to be acknowledged and send the Chosen One from Amazing to Epic. This can later be scaled upward as the Chosen One adds on to their already uninteresting arsenal. Eventually, there may be little difference between them and a god. That's the point when the main protagonist becomes overpowered beyond a doubt.

The state of being overpowered is when a person or thing has too much strength or too many abilities to maintain balance. An example of being overpowered is if Guy has Invincibility that he can trigger at any moment he desires. To combat this issue, it's highly advised the creator come up with a fix like Guy loses the Power Medallion that grants the superpower. Bussing Guy until he can get his act together is an alternative valid option. This can be done as long as it doesn't look confusing, awkward, or out of nowhere. And since we aren't going to keep Guy out of the story for good, he might as well get Debussed at some point, this time balanced in power. Either robbing Guy of his Power Medallion or Bussing him can buy the writers time to fix his problems and make him ready to be returned to the canon.

On the other side of the scale is being underpowered. This is much rarer in fiction as some creators have a strong desire to make their leading protagonists unbelievably strong. The Idiot, Weakling, Wimp, and many Nerds and Geeks are excellent examples of roles that have too little power to have any relevance in the Fiction Meta. Despite their best aspects, such as the Idiot's unintentional entertainment or the Nerd's smarts, their practical usefulness is next to nonexistent. They get pushed around by others higher up on the Role Tier List more than anyone else. At least a Main who's being picked on by the Bully in school has their friends to fall back on. Nerds and Geeks are usually too alone to have anybody to rely on. Even if they have a few chums of their own, they're likely too scared like chicken fuck by the tormentor to assist their fellow uncool kid.

When it comes to the audience's reception of characters with Power Flaws, it's never good. When somebody is overpowered, the audience Can't Be Surprised they're going to win with a perfect win streak. This Perfection Flaw is a dagger to the heart of any attempted suspense in the story. It also becomes hard to relate to or care about somebody who's so laughably powerful. They did nothing to earn the audience's respect and have no sentimental value to them either. When the Hero must struggle to get better in training, the audience starts to cheer for their eventual victory, and when the Hero pays off the emotional investment, the audience is rewarded tremendously. An Ace who can smoothly move through their daily existence does not give the audience any reason to root for them while they constantly win at everything they try. The Weakling can be just as frustrating as a Strongling in similar but opposite ways. No one can realistically hope somebody who gets whupped around the clock can learn to rise above their challenges. Their utterly helpless status evokes the worst kind of pity and irritation from the audience who may find themselves on the side of those against the Weakling, even if that Weakling happens to be the Hero. Their pathetic level of power can be their own fault if they had the opportunity to learn from previous mistakes but never took it. The Weakling can find themselves the loneliest person in the world when the audience says they deserve their downfalls and setbacks.

The cleverest writer can make good out of even the trashiest of UnTrashes. They can make a Power Flaw, whether strong or weak, the most compelling aspect of a character's arc if they try hard enough. A person wielding too much power at once can become twisted and transform their strength into a weapon of destruction against anyone who defies them. They can discard their sense of sympathy and be emotionally unaffected by the sight of dozens being killed in their wake. While this would make them great Villain material, it'd be even better if they were a former partner to the Hero, especially if they could be considered a flimsy loser before. An overly weak individual can be so without getting on the viewers' bad side, believe it or not. If they fight their hardest to get better but get nothing other than pain out of it, they can lose value in themselves and say they're Good For Nothing. Most creators opt to have this loss of self-worth be the driving force behind a person's Undying Willpower, but it can also be used in a Dismal play where the Weakling feels training any more would be a waste of time.