I think only Eric follows this but who knows, it's something to do while HXH is on an indefinite hiatus.
I don't like to tell people that they're too stupid to get something because it just creates a pointless elitism that's usually wrong. But when discussing HXH sometimes that's the only thing you can say. It's not like if you like HXH that makes you smart, but if you're not thinking at all it might be hard to understand what the heck is going on in HXH because combat is slightly more complicated than mainstream manga.
First let's get to one of the basics, which even Wikipedia gets wrong: Can an aura blade be so sharp that it can slice apart everything? The answer is no. The author tells you that! You can have an aura blade that is so sharp that can slice through almost anything but then that means you can also have an aura shield that is so durable that almost nothing can slice through it. And yet I always see people talk about how if the conditions are just right you can make say an aura blade that can kill even Meryem. As Zeno said, to have ability that powerful basically requires you to have a set of conditions that can never be satisified, so even if such ability exists there's no point to talk about them. You'll never be able to use such ability at all.
The next issue is whether aura is a battle of just tactics or strategy, or do you just get a scouter and take an aura level reading and say 'it's over 9000!'? Again this is a rather simple question that the answer is already in the manga. The two royal guards are clearly the top 5 most powerful characters in the story, and they both said they used to be foolish enough to believe that tactics can trump absolute power after Meryem does his power up motion. At one point HXH does look like something like Ravages of Time where people might as well talk about what they're going to do a fight and then one guy say: "OMG that strategy is too good! I lose!" In fact that's probably the lowlights of HXH. But that's why Meryem exists. He clearly possess one of the top intelligence out of all the characters but he doesn't use tactics nor strategy because it's pointless to use them when you're already invinicible. If you assume a top tier Hunter has around 70K aura points, then maybe strategy can help you overcome a royal guard that has a 700K AP rating, but it's not going to matter against Meryem who has a rating in at least the millions.
The Chimera Ant is a rather ironic arc. After all is said and done, and after all the strategy and sacrifice involved, you basically found out the Hunters cannot even touch Meryem who can pretty much kill anybody before they even move. The only way to hurt him was to drop a nuclear bomb on him at a point blank range which actually did significant damage, and that method only worked because he was separated from the royals who normally would take the hit for him. Meryem may have the abillity to get into a fireball match against a nuke but he's clearly not stupid enough to do that without a good reason. There's a reason why the Cat royal was working on raising an army of super soldiers so that the key figures wouldn't have to do flesh against nuke contests too often.
And that brings us to the climax (so far) of the Chimera battle, Gon versus Cat. It seems to me a lot of people was expecting Gon to show some superb strategy and outthink the Cat, resurrect Kite, and live happily ever after. Never mind that Gon is basically a human version of Meryem who believes strategy to be beneath him, and that like Meryem he has the power to be so arrogant. It's been foreshadowed more than a few that he's the chosen one, the strongest of the hunters and a guy who could destroy the world. The only reason he isn't super powerful is because he is only 12! So in the battle Gon just compressed time and used his abilities he would have had at around ~30 and beat the Cat to a bloody mess. Note that the Cat said it is clearly possible for Gon to beat her if he was older, and out of the aura abilities available I don't find time compression that ridiculous. I mean if you can have aura abilities that rejuenvates the user it really isn't a stretch to have abilities that can age the user too, and if anything the latter should be easier than the former.
Now people usually say so all you have to do is get angry and compress time and you can beat someone who, a moment ago, could probably instant kill you? Well the difference is that outside of Gon nobody can probably kill the Cat in 3 hits even at their peak. He is clearly supposed to be the most powerful human being in the world of Hunter as he's fighting at a level compared to an elite Hunter at the age of 12. And yes it does make sense that the Cat can instant kill him when he is only 12. I know in manga we'd like to think people are at the peak of their physical excellence at the age of 8 but the peaks of character in HXH actually resemble that of normal human beings. It's been said more than a few times that most enemies don't take Gon or Killua seriously because it is known that there's no way a child can be that good at fighting due to physical limitations.
I don't think HXH is some kind of flawless work, and I'm actually pretty upset how Togashi always kills good looking characters just because he can. Out of all the royals the Cat had the least reason to die but she was the first to die. It's almost like she died because if she decided to understand what love is and stuff that'd be too generic so we can't have that. I mean of course she had a good reason to die too but cute characters are generally allowed more leeway compared to others. Then again, I don't think Gon was ever intended to be a 'the main character is always right'. When he killed the Cat it's total overkill but he never said he did that in the name of justice.
I don't like to tell people that they're too stupid to get something because it just creates a pointless elitism that's usually wrong. But when discussing HXH sometimes that's the only thing you can say. It's not like if you like HXH that makes you smart, but if you're not thinking at all it might be hard to understand what the heck is going on in HXH because combat is slightly more complicated than mainstream manga.
First let's get to one of the basics, which even Wikipedia gets wrong: Can an aura blade be so sharp that it can slice apart everything? The answer is no. The author tells you that! You can have an aura blade that is so sharp that can slice through almost anything but then that means you can also have an aura shield that is so durable that almost nothing can slice through it. And yet I always see people talk about how if the conditions are just right you can make say an aura blade that can kill even Meryem. As Zeno said, to have ability that powerful basically requires you to have a set of conditions that can never be satisified, so even if such ability exists there's no point to talk about them. You'll never be able to use such ability at all.
The next issue is whether aura is a battle of just tactics or strategy, or do you just get a scouter and take an aura level reading and say 'it's over 9000!'? Again this is a rather simple question that the answer is already in the manga. The two royal guards are clearly the top 5 most powerful characters in the story, and they both said they used to be foolish enough to believe that tactics can trump absolute power after Meryem does his power up motion. At one point HXH does look like something like Ravages of Time where people might as well talk about what they're going to do a fight and then one guy say: "OMG that strategy is too good! I lose!" In fact that's probably the lowlights of HXH. But that's why Meryem exists. He clearly possess one of the top intelligence out of all the characters but he doesn't use tactics nor strategy because it's pointless to use them when you're already invinicible. If you assume a top tier Hunter has around 70K aura points, then maybe strategy can help you overcome a royal guard that has a 700K AP rating, but it's not going to matter against Meryem who has a rating in at least the millions.
The Chimera Ant is a rather ironic arc. After all is said and done, and after all the strategy and sacrifice involved, you basically found out the Hunters cannot even touch Meryem who can pretty much kill anybody before they even move. The only way to hurt him was to drop a nuclear bomb on him at a point blank range which actually did significant damage, and that method only worked because he was separated from the royals who normally would take the hit for him. Meryem may have the abillity to get into a fireball match against a nuke but he's clearly not stupid enough to do that without a good reason. There's a reason why the Cat royal was working on raising an army of super soldiers so that the key figures wouldn't have to do flesh against nuke contests too often.
And that brings us to the climax (so far) of the Chimera battle, Gon versus Cat. It seems to me a lot of people was expecting Gon to show some superb strategy and outthink the Cat, resurrect Kite, and live happily ever after. Never mind that Gon is basically a human version of Meryem who believes strategy to be beneath him, and that like Meryem he has the power to be so arrogant. It's been foreshadowed more than a few that he's the chosen one, the strongest of the hunters and a guy who could destroy the world. The only reason he isn't super powerful is because he is only 12! So in the battle Gon just compressed time and used his abilities he would have had at around ~30 and beat the Cat to a bloody mess. Note that the Cat said it is clearly possible for Gon to beat her if he was older, and out of the aura abilities available I don't find time compression that ridiculous. I mean if you can have aura abilities that rejuenvates the user it really isn't a stretch to have abilities that can age the user too, and if anything the latter should be easier than the former.
Now people usually say so all you have to do is get angry and compress time and you can beat someone who, a moment ago, could probably instant kill you? Well the difference is that outside of Gon nobody can probably kill the Cat in 3 hits even at their peak. He is clearly supposed to be the most powerful human being in the world of Hunter as he's fighting at a level compared to an elite Hunter at the age of 12. And yes it does make sense that the Cat can instant kill him when he is only 12. I know in manga we'd like to think people are at the peak of their physical excellence at the age of 8 but the peaks of character in HXH actually resemble that of normal human beings. It's been said more than a few times that most enemies don't take Gon or Killua seriously because it is known that there's no way a child can be that good at fighting due to physical limitations.
I don't think HXH is some kind of flawless work, and I'm actually pretty upset how Togashi always kills good looking characters just because he can. Out of all the royals the Cat had the least reason to die but she was the first to die. It's almost like she died because if she decided to understand what love is and stuff that'd be too generic so we can't have that. I mean of course she had a good reason to die too but cute characters are generally allowed more leeway compared to others. Then again, I don't think Gon was ever intended to be a 'the main character is always right'. When he killed the Cat it's total overkill but he never said he did that in the name of justice.
