Discussion Theory x Theory

[Bomber D Rufi]

I always find it rather ironic that people praise HXH for its depth and yet often misses its worldview completely. Whether this is because it's too subtle or that its worldview often does not make sense, the end result is that HXH is clearly not as deep as people claim it to be if people rarely get its underyling themes.

In the world of HXH if you're an aspiring evil guy, you should consider skills in computer hacking, embezzlement, selling drugs, or become a politician. Brute force is the last thing you want to rely on in the world of HXH because the Hunter's Association will strike you down with extreme prejudice, and even if you're Meryem-strong someone will just launch a nuke your way and cover it up with politics (which is why being a politican helps a ton so you understand how these things work).

Hisoka is the most successful example of a bad guy who managed to make a name for himself on just brute force alone. But even he operates under the laws of HXH. He become a Hunter to avoid dealing with the Hunter's Association in the first place. He is aware that Hunter's Association forbids 'heinous crimes', whatever this actually means, and we can see that for the most part Hisoka avoids taking action in massive murdering sprees without reason. In fact his biggest murdering spree by the numbers was done during the Hunter Exam in a portion of the course where your average guy isn't expected to make it out alive anyway. He took almost no part in the Spider's rampage in Yorknew against the Mafia. The only time he violated this principle was in the Election Arc, but even there he made sure there are no witnesses (no party seems to be even aware that Hisoka was involved), and of course in that arc he was fighting to protect his own life since he's under the impression that he'd be dead Killua had to repay his wishes.

Although Hisoka's murderous actions are well-known, he's never done anything that'd cause him to get outlawed from the Hunter's Association. In some sense he is no more powerful than an organized crime lord, which can coexist with Hunters. As long as you don't do whatever Hunters deem as 'heinous crime' they'll leave you alone. Hisoka covers his track well and has even plausible denialability in most of his killing sprees.

Of course the Spiders are also successful too, but they've massive numbers (13), while the largest organized group of pro Hunters we've seen so far is 4 (in GI) (not counting the group of useless guys that were killed in the Election Arc). Although more than 4 Hunters were mobilized to deal with the Ants, it was more like 3 teams of 2 + Netero. Hunters do not operate in large groups by nature so the relatively large numbers the Spiders enjoy contributes to their longevity in a world dominated by good. Even then, the smart Spiders keep a low profile. In group missions, Kuroro always has at least 2 other members by him, and he disappears after a mission is done. When Machi contacted Hisoka it's clear she avoided any exposure longer than necessary. Even in Yorknew when the Spiders are relatively bold, we see that Kuroro sent 2 more guys to follow Machi and Nobunaga in secret.

So going back to the original topic, asking whether there are strong people in the Hunter's Association is pointless. The Hunter's Association is supposed to be overwhelmingly powerful to the point that no overt form of evil can possibly exist in the world of HXH. Every character of dubious character either operates from the loopholes or has some kind of political protection, because if you're stupid enough to openly defy the rules set aside by the Hunter's Association, it is a given you'll be ruthlessly crushed. By the way, being an Assassin is clearly considered a normal job in the view of the Hunter's Association. After all Hunters can work as hitman for Mafia bosses so why not Assassins? As long as you're not killing indiscriminately enough to violate the code the Hunters don't really care about other people dying.

I dunno. I sorta get the idea that HXH's world is kind of what the shady parts of our world are just...everywhere rather than in the back allies of some third world country. I think part of the problem here is that Hunters are given a lot of free reign, so it's hard to pinpoint what exactly they do. Sure you have the guys who are black list hunters and gourmet hunters and stuff, but for the most part it's the sorta thing where you can pretty much just say 'Imma go do this' and as long as you have a license, it's pretty much okay. I think we can all pretty much agree that the world of HXH is pretty...depressing? I mean it's mostly hidden by Gon and Killua's exploits and adventures, but as you pointed out, assassination is a perfectly reasonable way to earn money, magical beasts exist, guys like Hisoka and the Spiders are pretty much able to do what they want since the Hunters association doesn't openly try to stop them, and since Hunters are technically not police officers, there's technically no one to stop this from happening. Being a mook in the HXH world has to be like awful, since it's not as if every single person is a shingen ryu master. In essence, I'm saying the line between good and evil in HXH is pretty much always skewed to a point that even the most heinous of bastards looks like a saint, and the best good guy kinda comes off as a hell bent psychopath.

To stay on topic discussing power in HXH is difficult since Nen is sort of difficult to encompass in a normal battle system-type thing. Especially since we have things like Alluka that can (at least at this point in time), take away the repercussions for using up your nen to go Hulk on your enemies.

 

[Phantron]

There is a such term as Temp Hunter, but I miused it. I stand corrected, He did kill all 20 and it's reflected on the votes.

---------- Post added at 10:54 PM ---------- Previous post was at 10:52 PM ----------


At 30% physically, if I recall properly. And since that did not happened, I just doubt Morel would fail into caging anyone. He's too smart.

When Nobunaga talks about 'another Hunter ally' he's surely not concerned about a temp Hunter level of character. Given they know almost nothing about Melody's ability the only thing they've base off is that the Chain Assassin has an ally who has a Hunter's license, and that was enough to make them pause. If it's common to have the 'temp Hunters' around then having a Hunter as a friend isn't enough to give Spiders pause. In the beginning, all Hunters are more or less pros or the whole Yorknew scenario wouldn't even make sense where the Spiders chose to regroup instead of pursuing Kurapika. Yes, after you look at what happen in the Election Arc you really have to ask 'what are the Spiders afraid of if the average Hunters totally sucks', but the point is that originally any Hunter is a potential threat.

Morel at 30% means he can't sustain as long. It's not like his body can only take 30% of the damage he normally can or that his offense is only 30% as potent as normal. That'd be suicide. It takes some time to blow out enough smoke to trap someone and normally an enemy capable of flight wouldn't just stand there will you start spewing out smoke. It worked on Pufu since he was basically in a state of shock.If you look at the brief scrimmage once Pufu got out of Smoke Jail, that's how he would normally fight against any character who do not have a strong anti-air ability (and it's rare to have such abilities since abilities are generally designed to fight against human foes). He'd never get trapped or even have his real body exposed given he is perfectly capable of putting up a strong fight while remotely controlling his clones. He'd only need to expose his real body for say, the time he grabbed Morel's pipe (that's presumably done by his real body). Rest of the time you'd just be hitting a group of endlessly regenerating clones.

---------- Post added at 11:42 PM ---------- Previous post was at 11:08 PM ----------

I dunno. I sorta get the idea that HXH's world is kind of what the shady parts of our world are just...everywhere rather than in the back allies of some third world country. I think part of the problem here is that Hunters are given a lot of free reign, so it's hard to pinpoint what exactly they do. Sure you have the guys who are black list hunters and gourmet hunters and stuff, but for the most part it's the sorta thing where you can pretty much just say 'Imma go do this' and as long as you have a license, it's pretty much okay. I think we can all pretty much agree that the world of HXH is pretty...depressing? I mean it's mostly hidden by Gon and Killua's exploits and adventures, but as you pointed out, assassination is a perfectly reasonable way to earn money, magical beasts exist, guys like Hisoka and the Spiders are pretty much able to do what they want since the Hunters association doesn't openly try to stop them, and since Hunters are technically not police officers, there's technically no one to stop this from happening. Being a mook in the HXH world has to be like awful, since it's not as if every single person is a shingen ryu master. In essence, I'm saying the line between good and evil in HXH is pretty much always skewed to a point that even the most heinous of bastards looks like a saint, and the best good guy kinda comes off as a hell bent psychopath.

To stay on topic discussing power in HXH is difficult since Nen is sort of difficult to encompass in a normal battle system-type thing. Especially since we have things like Alluka that can (at least at this point in time), take away the repercussions for using up your nen to go Hulk on your enemies.

The world of HXH is depressing if you live in equivalent of the slums. In the 'civilized' area you can be pretty sure there is no form of overt evil. Anybody who tries to go on a rampage in a civilized part of the world will surely get stopped by Hunters. While Hunters aren't necessarily all good in nature, they're sort of the de facto international police. The Hunters have a rather cozy relationship with the bad elements of the world, but Hunters are on the top, not the other way around. You don't mess with whatever the Hunter's ten rules, and presumably one of them is something akin to 'no crimes against humanity'. Now if you're the Mafia and bribed the local city and get to shoot anyone looking suspicious, the Hunters don't care about that because if the mayor says it's okay and as long as it's not a 'crime against humanity'. For that matter they also don't really care if the Spiders slaughtered all the Mafia either because nobody really cares about the rights of the Mafia. All the 'evil' elements, like Zs or Spiders, or even Diego or Gyro, plays by these rules. You first have to secure some kind of political backing (NGL, Meteor City, Hunter's license of your own) and then at least have some kind of plausible excuse, and if you did something that gets you hunted make sure you hide in countries where the Hunters do not have jurisdiction (which pretty much seems limited to NGL and Meteor City).

So life can be pretty grim because it's apparently totally legal for someone to hire a hitman and kill you, but I guess assassins in HXH don't work for cheap so it's not that common to resolve a problem this way. Now there may be all kinds of corruption even in the shining cities where the Hunter's Association reigns, but Hunters never guaranteed you'd be safe from that. In fact I'd say as an average citizen in a city in HXH you've more to worry about someone stealing your bank account than any particularly powerful individual decide to go on a killing spree.

At any rate while HXH's combat system isn't as simple as just measuring a number of a power chart (unless you're Meryem), the guy with more power is still stronger, and unlike most manga you aren't supposed to get an unlimited life time supply of plot bailouts. That's why Kuroro is not afraid of death, not because he secretly knows Togashi has his back, but that as a veteran of the HXH world he knows dying in aura combat can happen anytime so there's no reason to worry about these things. In some sense Kuroro's philsophy on the Spiders where it's more important for the organization to survive as opposed to an individual highlights the weakness of the Hunters. The Hunters can easily deal with any individual no matter how powerful because they're supposed to the organization with the most powerful individuals. However they have a hard time dealing with a system. It'd be harder for the Hunters to wipe out say, the Mafia, compared to any particular powerful human criminal character, not because the Mafia is powerful but that Mafia is a system entrenched within the accepted rules of the HXH world. Likewise Pariston pretty much is the antithesis of the organization. He may very well be as weak as he claims, but he embodies a system of evil (which we still don't know what it represents) that the Hunters cannot defeat. If he wanted to, he could change the charter of the Hunter's Association and succeed, without even fighting anybody in the process, because his system is well established.