Steampunk Celebrity Death Match

[Atterton]

Imagine you have a small arena, the ground inside is covered in blood and sand. Around the arena on raised platforms stand the baying crowds of the Victorian era. They have come to see two people fight to the death. Who shall they see tonight?
I figured we could come up with some interesting matches, and talk about what kind of weapons they would use. I´m sure the first one people would like to see is Nikola "The Wizard" Tesla vs Thomas "Elephant Killer" Edison. How would they square off? Who would win? Would Edison fight fair?
I´d Imagine Tesla would use some kind of electric weapon, perhaps a pair of supercharged gauntlets. Edison might employ some kind of sonic device. Any ideas?

Next time, Verne vs Wells.

[elShoggotho]

Edison will cheat in any conceivable way. He wants to win, and pesky things like gentlemanly conduct will not hamper him.

[Captain Shipton Bellinger]

Edison would employ a mercenary to fight in his place and, if he won, claim it as a personal victory.

[The Corsair]

Tesla has already rigged the arena with an earthquake machine. He's just going to wait to find stable ground before using it. He'll then pull an excellent one-liner about American Humor.

[Pivole]

Tesla will ignore the support of the crowds in such flippant affairs as this.

[Argus Fairbrass]

[D.Oakes]

It is my belief that people who practice unfair business do so because in a fight they would be completely weak.  Tesla would win!  We couldn't tell Edison about the fight until the day we kidnap him and throw him in the back of a carriage...and we'd probably have to kill a few of our people over the course of preparation too because Edison always had spies.  In fact Edison was a sick enough businessman to pay off the builder of New York's electric chair, just to prove a point. 

So what about Westinghouse?  We always talk about Edison and Tesla, but where does Westinghouse come into play?  If Tesla wins on both counts, the investors would have only him to turn to.   

[Will Howard]

Can we revive Isambard Brunel for this?  He'd steam Edison, & give Tesla a run for his money...

[Atterton]

I was saving Brunel for later, I figured perhaps he could fight Babbage.

[akumabito]

I just imagine watching inventors, businessmen and industrialists fight won't be overly exciting.. how about some military men, proper explorers and ruthless thugs? Round up the 'finest' outlaws of Australia and the American West. Team them up with some gangs that plagued many Victorian cities. Pitch them against some of the finest military commanders of the Empire. Make the whole spectacle a trade show for inventors of weaponry. You might want to find a venue different from the Chrystal Palace though..

[Will Howard]

Brunel & Babbage- shall they fight with cabbage?

[Atterton]

Or perhaps with mortars, using difference engines to calculate the angles and such needed to hit each other.

[Will Howard]

If mortars are to be used, can we insist that pestles be the only projectiles allowed?

[Atterton]

Perhaps something like that Scrapheap Challenge show. "Here´s two piles of junk, now build something to kill your opponent with."

[akumabito]

Perhaps something like that Scrapheap Challenge show. "Here´s two piles of junk, now build something to kill your opponent with."

Well, you just KNOW Team Edison will skip the whole invention/building bit and just find some heavy pieces of pipe and beat the crap out of the other team when they are turned towards the design table..

[Captain Shipton Bellinger]

Perhaps something like that Scrapheap Challenge show. "Here´s two piles of junk, now build something to kill your opponent with."

Babbage would spend an inordinate amount of time sorting through the junk and designing a brilliant, if impractical, device to calculate a means to encompass his opponent's doom.

In the meantime Brunel would, within minutes, build a vast and devastating Engine of Destruction which would smear Mr Babbage over the junkyard - while playing popular music on a built-in fairground organ.

[Argus Fairbrass]

I'd like to see Brunel versus George Stephenson. Given that they were friendly rivals in real life. They could bash each other with sections of railway track. Brunel would probably win that match (which of course in reality he lost to the narrow gauge) because his were wider haha. It actually quite suprises me that the "Father of Railways" gets mentioned so little.

Should probably add that him and son Robert would likely form a tag team, so Brunel might need a partner. I'd suggest Joseph Locke.

[heavyporker]

Hm. Be fun to see James Watts and Eli Whitney and Elijah McCoy in there.

[chicar]

Tesla vs Edison: Tesla's invention are so exotic compared to Edison's than the sneakyness of the last would hardly be sufficient to protect him from defeat. The same would go against Brunel

Brunel vs Barbage: Barbage's weapons would have the advantage to have a mind to his own, preventing Barbage to be personally implicated in the fight. It won't necesary guaranteed his victory against Brunel, but at least it would survive the fight, no matter the outcome.

Brunel vs Stephenson:  Brunel think big and big would be his weapon. Stephenson would hardly survive such brute force.

Jules Verne vs H.G Well: H.G Well would win because who control time,control fate.


My own fight scenario:

Tesla vs Albert Einstein: Teslatech against early quantum physics, that a fight i would like to see. Einstein would have probably some sort of a steampunk version of a portal gun.

[MWBailey]

I just imagine watching inventors, businessmen and industrialists fight won't be overly exciting.. how about some military men, proper explorers and ruthless thugs? Round up the 'finest' outlaws of Australia and the American West. Team them up with some gangs that plagued many Victorian cities. Pitch them against some of the finest military commanders of the Empire. Make the whole spectacle a trade show for inventors of weaponry. You might want to find a venue different from the Chrystal Palace though..

Hmmm... Boss Tweed vs. Joaquin Murieta, albeit it's stretching the periodicity a bit...

[Angus A Fitziron]

Hm. Be fun to see James Watts and Eli Whitney and Elijah McCoy in there.

Personal gripe - did you mean James Watt?

[Will Howard]

Hm. Be fun to see James Watts and Eli Whitney and Elijah McCoy in there.

Personal gripe - did you mean James Watt?

Watt was that?

[D.Oakes]

How about a military one:

Frederick Russell Burnham vs. George Armstrong Custer

In all fairness to Custer, he was an arrogant, ethnocentric, idiot and everyone knew it.  So let's pretend that somebody further up the chain of command had not put him near the Little Bighorn. 

[Captain Reech]

If it was a one on one then Custer would probably win as he was, until the day he died, a fighting soldier no matter how much of an egotist he was.

[D.Oakes]

I like Burnham.  I came across him doing research on late 19th century scouts and snipers and boy do I like his story.  He supposedly learned a lot from the native americans, so he'd most likely lure Custer into being overconfident and then snap!