Icarax is TOUGH AS NAILS!

LEGO BIONICLE
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Let’s look at some of these points.

Given that the only canon account we have of this match is in Mutran’s musings on the topic, we’ll have to go off how he phrases things.

Icarax actually had the insane courage to try to implement his ideas without approval from the rest of the Brotherhood. He left his assigned realm of Karzahni and journeyed south with a small army of Manas crabs.

The Manas were rather loyal to their home of Karzahni, so it’s doubtful they would gladly drop everything to go follow Icarax. He likely utilized Rahi Control to form his army.

Teridax then overrode Icarax’s Rahi Control with his own.

It’s not stated whether or not Icarax restrained his powers for their fight, but even powerless, a Makuta which fought back three other Makuta at once didn’t have the physical comeuppance to topple Teridax. Ignoring the second half of the fight entirely, Icarax still couldn’t physically beat Teridax despite giving him an absolute beatdown.

Once again, the only action the Manas actually took was closing in on Icarax. If there’s anything else that occurred there, it isn’t stated.

Then Teridax exerted the smallest amount of his will and turned the Manas against Icarax. Once he was surrounded, Teridax used every power at his command to defeat… no, demolish… no, perhaps humiliate would be a better word… Icarax.

Saying Teridax brought a gun to a wrestling match simply because he used the Manas is a bit of an unfair comparison. A more accurate comparison of the fight is letting a pro wrestler beat the tar out of you for six hours and when he tires out using a flamethrower on him.

Teridax let Icarax do everything he could and it simply wasn’t enough. When Icarax could do no more Teridax made sure it would never happen again. The crabs were nothing more than a means of keeping Icarax from running away.

There’s no need to be like that about it. This isn’t a ‘my dad would beat your dad’ scenario; we’re discussing a predetermined fictional fight between two robots with an audience of crabs.

Well technically he was walking for a little while after that point so I’m technically right

Icarax took the Starscream approach of rushing headfirst into the situation and avoiding additional help to prove his capability as the new leader of the brotherhood by eliminating Teridax with the simplest and most violent strategy he knew how: punch it until it dies.

Of course, it didn’t work, and when it failed, Teridax left a lasting impact on numerous Bionicle fans as well as the Brotherhood of Makuta and clearly defined why one archetype lead the Brotherhood and the other followed behind.

“If you want power, and another has it, you get it not by outwitting him — you get it by stepping over his corpse.”
—Icarax

“We both know that there are a thousand ways I could destroy you right now. And 941 of them hurt.”
—Teridax

Three, technically. Once to Vakama for various (albeit vague) reasons, once to Takanuva through means he did not anticipate (although it can be argued he intended to lose this fight) and once to Mata Nui (by being shoved into a planet).

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Icarax used the ability outside the fight before it started and if Icarax used it in the fight I would say he was being cheap as well. If you put two people in a room together and one guy is smarter and more cunning and the other guy is a great fighter I guarantee you the fighter wins. Hands down. I have seen it multiple times, I was in the US infantry for years, I really have seen it multiple times. I also never said having Mental strength isn’t a good thing for combat, in the Army Soldiers Creed it states “I am physically and mentally tough” so it’s very important in combat, I have seen hundreds of sparring matches between soldiers and the guys that knew how to fight well always beat the really smart guys, dudes from logistics and nuclear engineering and many other areas of expertise, they were creative no doubt and cunning, coming up with all kinds of things to try and subdue their opponent but in the end it didn’t matter, it’s just the reality of it, I’ve seen real combat overseas and it’s just the same. Same thing would happen if you put a great strategist or chess champion or a scientist up against one of the Graci’s that created Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, they would lose, now it’s not impossible for an intelligent person to win but it’s unlikely, now this information may or may not apply for Teridax I’m just talking about my experience with real word smart people vs real word fighters. Ok calling Teridax a coward is unfair I agree, he isn’t. I still think it was as dirty as when Chirox fights dirty but that’s just how I view it, I’m not saying I’m the word of law on the what’s right and fair subject, it’s just my opinion. To answer the rest of you this clearly did go of the rails a bit and I think you all make good points and I was in no way trying to be offensive with my last comment it was meant to be more jovial. I like Teridax I always have, he was my first favorite character in Bionicle, I like Icarax a little more but It doesn’t change the fact I still like him, I just think there are some things he did that were questionable in his fights and decisions. Like I said though we have differing opinions and though In ways you may be right, I still am standing behind my thoughts on this.

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oh boy how did this topic devolve into an argument within one day

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that’s the internet for ya buddy

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ttv message boards moment

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On planet Earth, with two humans, I agree. Problem is, this isn’t Earth, and these are definitely not humans. The introduction of powers here means you can’t easily compare it to natural fights we’d see. Cunning and intelligence when combined with powers, leads to mental discipline being much much more useful in direct combat

Examples would be anytime a Jedi fights a monster of some form. They’re typically much larger, and physically much stronger, but the Jedi being able to use the force in smart ways, comes out on top.

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Is what you want to hear that in brute force toe to toe that Icarax may be physically stronger than Teridax? Its possible. I’m not sure its the case, but for the sake of it, lets say it is.

Lets stack up the odds.
Icarax is marginally stronger than Teridax.
Teridax is VASTLY smarter than Icarax.
In a fight with pure braun (pretty much no reasonable point for this to take place. Why would you only have a slug fest, EVER?) then Icarax can win.
In a battle of brains, Teridax wins.
In a battle of brains plus braun, Teridax wins because even if he was weaker physically then it was only marginally so, so combining it with his intellect he wins everytime.

Also this is a set, closed story. Icarax is designed to be lower than Teridax. Thats not really up for debate.
Personally Teridax isn’t my favorite character but trying to chalk up a fight to only head smashing is just about never how a real fight would go down when Kraata and Kanohi powers exist.

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consider also that icarax was killed not by terry but by other makuta in karda nui outsmarting him lol. and then consider that all the makuta in karda nui were set up to be killed by energy storms by terry cos he was smarter than ALL of them

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Did I want to hear that Icarax is physically stronger than Teridax? Yes lol. Well them outsmarting him is debatable, they lied to him with a lie that is very plausible considering the circumstances, the toa were very close to actually accomplishing their mission it just wasn’t as close as Gorast said. So like I said it probably doesn’t apply to Teridax because it’s not real life and they have powers and are made of metal. You guys really don’t like to let things go I see hahaha, It’s just my opinion and we can at this point just chalk it up to my “head canon” that I believe Icarax is better. So Makuta armor is made of the same material Protosteel correct? And Makuta are all Antidermis gas inside that armor, So when it states that Icarax pounded on him for hours how would that be possible without it puncturing Teridax’s armor and leaking out? Was he just constantly using his defensive Kraata powers like Limited Invulnerability and intangibility?

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Yeah it pretty much only works as a head canon. Theres plenty of characters that I like more than Teridax in the story that would still lose to him 1v1 too, it isn’t personal.

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Good point, also who’s to say Icarax didn’t learn from his last battle with Teridax, who knows perhaps he could have beaten Teridax if they fought again after all those years, after he had honed his skills through all those battles. We will never know unfortunately.

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seems relevant to what yall were talking about

(also i love “hi mr Greg” lmao)

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:laughing:

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Spoken from the man himself. Case closed indeed on the first fight, I am still wondering though a thousand years later if it might have been possible now for him to be on par with Teridax in a fight, maybe not win but not lose, maybe win but yeah still might be a draw. he had learned at least from the last battle I would assume how Teridax fights which as an excellent warrior such as himself would have used that experience to better himself and also make it easier to predict Teridax’s moves come the next battle. I mean Greg did write in the Mutran Chronicles that Teridax had to use every power at his disposal to subdue the tired Icarax, so I would think with more experience and understanding of how Teridax operates he could stand his own by the end of the story.

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He didn’t say he had to, just that he did. And he said he did that to “demolish and humiliate” which implies that it wasn’t close. A close match isn’t something you’d use the terms demolish and humiliate with. Teridax was pretty much just being overly brutal in the fight to prove a point.

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Yeah after I re read that part I was like I guess I should have brushed up first haha. So as Greg stated that it came down to experience and intelligence, Icarax has more experience in combat than Teridax but is not as intelligent, so if he learned from their last battle how Teridax fights and by now he is a much more seasoned warrior, I would expect him to be able to match Teridax. Teridax is intelligent but if your enemy knows how you fight and is a better fighter than you then you being more intelligent only gets you so far. For instance, Teridax is very Intelligent, but so is Chirox, does Chirox automatically win every fight just because he is intelligent? No, he isn’t a warrior, he has not spent the last 100,000 years honing his skills as a warrior in battle like Antroz and Icarax and Gorast, he spent it learning and bettering himself mentally, that does not make him automatically better at fighting. I think the writer is very much throwing experience in combat to the wind and saying intelligence is just trumps skill. Which isn’t true, enough skill can be equally as powerful as intelligence, even more so.

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Assuming Teridax wasn’t accumulating experience as well. I think from what we’ve seen of Teridax he is pretty versatile in his approaches and strategy.

Look you can make any headcanon where you make your favorite wins and noone can stop you. But from the evidence and actual events that happen, Teridax is the winner. :man_shrugging:t3:

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Well no doubt Teridax did gain more experience I have no doubt about that. I just mean Icarax and the other warrior Makuta were basically sent by Teridax to handle most of the fighting and killing (which any good leader would do, not saying that was a bad call) and Teridax had a few fights along the way, but warriors like the few I mentioned would be spending alot of time practicing so would gain much more combat experience over time. You can keep saying that and that’s fine I’m not taking about things set in stone though, I’m talking hypothetically, just talking about what might have been, things that were never brought up in the story, there never was a rematch between the two so you and I don’t know definitively who would win, just because he won the first time doesn’t automatically make it so he will win again. Look at other stories, Optimus prime beat Megatron and then Megatron beat Optimus and so on, just because you win the first time doesn’t automatically give you the win in round two. Teridax lost to Mata Nui in a fight at the end of his life, an naive being who had been in a grand total of two fights and got maybe a days worth of training from a retired Glatorian and Teridax was in a more powerful body. Icarax lost to three top tier Makuta that he fought all at once who had to come up with a plan to trick him just to win. That speaks volumes to me about how the next fight would have gone.

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couple quick comments here:

greg has specified repeatedly that there is no definitive answer to who would beat who in bionicle due to there being too many variables for every circumstance in which a fight would occur. so there’s no way to find a definitive answer, however given the ridiculously stacked nature of other fights in bionicle I’d say this is the closest to a fair fight we could’ve had between the pair. Icarax chose his more honed skillset - physicality over makuta powers (which as shown by Teridax effortlessly overriding Icarax’s rahi control means Teridax would likely have been able to negate anything he tried to pull) - and the result is Teridax did next to nothing for hours while Icarax tried his hardest and then completely humiliated him.

however, the argument here seems to be that if Icarax isn’t literally capable of whipping Teridax, then he’s a worse character. which simply isn’t true; Icarax one-shot Botar with little effort and as you said fended off three other Makuta quite efficiently, only losing when he tried to use his teleporting to get away and left himself wide open. he’s a complex and flawed character with a clearly defined archetype and works as an excellent foil for that part of the Bionicle story, but toughness =/= excellence; some of the most beloved characters in Bionicle are Matoran who are pretty much bottom-of-the-rung in the MU. just because Icarax isn’t strong enough to beat the primary villain of the story (who is also one of the most powerful and intelligent characters in the story as well) doesn’t mean he’s weak or a bad character.

while both of them were giant robots and lost by getting shoved into a planet.

and it’s important to note that even in that fight Teridax held all the cards. Mata Nui couldn’t touch him without risk of hurting the inhabitants of the universe and Teridax was also leveraging the inhabitants of bara magna against him as well. Mata Nui just happened to have a large chunk of a literal planet cruising by at the right second to take advantage of.

but that doesn’t mean Teridax is undefeatable; he lost to Vakama using cheesy shenanigans and he failed to defeat Brutaka, who at the time was suffering from mutation and decreased movement speed underwater, and he only barely bested the Shadowed One after an extensive battle against him and his minions.

Icarax was undoubtedly the most physically impressive Makuta, with a significant amount of battle experience under his belt and practically unbested in the realm of armed combat. but he was at least hesitant to use his Makuta powers, as using them was what ended up getting him killed, and he detested strategy and planning to the point where he actively avoided it in favor of smash-and-grab tactics. in a scenario where both parties could have utilized their powers to do extensive damage to each other, Icarax chose not to. you can argue that it was because he was being fair to Teridax, but he’s never been fair to anyone else, and Teridax let him have his fun for hours before absolutely decimating him.

yes, Icarax is incredibly impressive, and yes, Icarax held his ground among three of his equals, and yes, Icarax lost to Teridax by being Icarax. On the very original post in this topic, I have to agree, toughing out excruciating agony and pretending like nothing was happening is tough as nails.

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I actually appreciate your comment and you said it all in a way that I can both accept the truth of the matter and also still appreciate Icarax. Well done. I agree and thank you.

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