Over the Garden Wall-verse Strategy Guide

How to be OP in the Over the Garden Wall-verse

Local Scale Threat:

Over the Garden Wall takes primarily in the Unknown, a strange and metaphysical forest that follows it's own rules. There are many threats in these forests, some mundane and some magical, and it is difficult to survive.

There exists a number of species of natural animals, including bears and gorillas. However these species are sentient, and can be taught to recognize letters and numbers beyond their mundane counterparts. These animals provide a number of threats, up to superhuman speed and wall level. Wirt and Greg, enemy of the commonwealth, have managed to avoid the enraged charge of one of these bears, and so it should scale to most people. The two have also managed to travel to Pottsfield, which the sign stated was a mile (~1.61 kilometers) in, if the video duration is to be believed, seconds. This is a likely superhuman speed feat, and also consistent with Wirt managing to blitz The Woodsman when he though he was The Beast.

The verse also possess power above that of wall level. A small piece of the Beast corrupted a regular Dog into the Beast-Wolf, a being capable of tanking enough force to crack open the Woodsman's mill. There also exists the strange being known only as "Papa" who is the size of a small house and whose tears quickly filled a small clearing, even flooding it (notably Wirt and Greg avoiding these teardrops despite their notable speed).

All of this suggests that the verse's power gets up to approximately subsonic and low building level.

In terms of dangerous abilities, the verse possesses witches such as Adelaide who has the ability to bind up those who enter her house and replace their brains with wool in order to control them. Roaming the forest is an demon that possesses people and turns them into people-eaters as shown in the tragic tale of Lorna and Auntie Whispers. There is also the tale of the bluebirds, that if one crosses a bluebird, they may curse one to become a bluebird too. At this tier this is all of the strong abilities. These also exists even within the unknown a ghost, that of the highwayman. However possibly due to the metaphysical nature of the highwayman, he seems to interact physically with the world around him.

In terms of weaknesses, the first thing that seems to come up is stealth or "disguise" builds. The Frog people were unable to tell Wirt, Greg, and Jason Funderburker dressed up as one of them from a normal frog. Wirt and Greg were able to manipulate Quincy Endicott by claiming to be his nephews. A whole school was intimidated by the mere appearance of a gorilla without being able to tell the fake nature of the gorilla. In general the verse doesn't think in a way that is consistent with normal logic, made most evident when the people of the bar Wirt goes into ask Wirt who he is, and don't understand when he tells them his name, instead iterating their roles. Beyond that the verse has a number of other weaknesses. The Witch Adelaide must stay isolated in her home, for the fresh air is heavily corrosive to her. The Demon can be controlled by the Whisper Bell.

It should be noted the verse in general lacks range feats, mostly only be able to affect within a meters, particularly in this tier. Of course being in a forest mitiates this as a weakness somewhat since trees can block most projectiles. This leads to my first idea for a counter power, a relatively mundane one but one that would be heavily dangerous. That being fire manipulation.

Fire would tear through the forest and obscure the vision of anyone trying to find the source of the fire. This leads me to my first counter, that being

The Pyro from Team Fortress 2.

The Pyro has been able to burn down small buildings before in Meet the Pyro and has been calced at moving at over 80 meters per second, giving him a speed advantage against the verse. 

Pyro could burn down the area most of the OTGW-verse lives in without them being able to get even close or see what is doing the attack. Bluebirds would not be able to curse him without seeing who it even is doing the attack, and fire can obscure him with it's smoke.While Auntie Whispers has enhanced smell, her smelling feat is not that big, and smoke creates a rather overpowering smell. 

Also while the Pyro is insane, he is also rather intelligent, becoming a successful CEO shortly after the mercs were fired, which means he would likely be more tactical then expected. Pyro's weapon is also something the animals of the verse would have difficulty dealing with, as fire is traditionally something animals have difficulty with. You might think the skeletons would be able to be resistant to heat, however fire actually does well against bones, which is why it is used to cremate bodies, including bones.

That said, you might argue that if Pyro accidentally burns the bell he would be a sitting duck for the demon, and also that he would be drawing all the aggro from burning everything. For a counter that's also brutal, but less overt and potentially self-destructive, I would suggest

Conan the Barbarian.

Conan the Barbarian is strong enough to destroy large pillars and was able to match the speed of Red Sonja who could blitz trained warriors, putting him comparable to superior to the verse in stats.

Conan the Barbarian, while he may seem like a brute, is actually famous crafty and cunning, as well as equipped with high amount of stealth and enhanced senses. Put it in the OTGW-verse, he could "rambo" the verse, hunting down pretty much anything in the verse with traps or sudden attacks. In fact most of the enemies of the verse would be considered a relatively mundane day for Conan.

He has swum for days on end, suggesting it would be hard to outlast him, as well as often considered one of the best swordsman in fiction, as well as a master martial artist, brawler and wrestler. Conan also possesses high willpower and fortitude providing in-universe a high resistance to magic and poisons, giving him resistance to any hax in the verse. 

Conan would be an unstoppable monster in the verse at this tier, and his stealth and range would make him pretty impossible to even see coming. The Demon might be tricky but Conan can probably figure out how to stop it, while he himself can resist the Demon's power. 

The only real weakness Conan has is he's a bit of a hot-headed and impulsive, meaning he could hypothetically be manipulated. That said at this tier, there's no one who I would suggest is crafty enough to manipulate him.

For a counter that is basically the opposite of Conan you could do

Ma-Ti from Captain Planet.

Ma-Ti is strong enough to throw a brick into a beam supporting a water tower and breaking it. He should also scale to Wheeler, who tanked a helicopter exploding right behind him. Wheeler was also able to run fast enough to briefly outpace a bear, suggesting Ma-Ti would have speeds comparable to the verse. The planeteers, including Ma-Ti can also tank the presence of Nukem, who emits powerful radiation to the point that others need to wear radiation suits.

Ma-Ti's signature power, is the power of heart. The power of Heart gives him numerous hax abilities, including the ability to sense all nearby life, including their entire life stories and their emotional states. This means Ma-Ti would know all potential threats around him, their current emotional states, and how to potentially defeat them. Ma-Ti was able to scan an entire city to see if there was anyone not addicted to Bliss.

Ma-Ti's ring can also be used for mind control and control of white blood cells, which would give him one-shot abilities against basically everyone in the verse. 

However Ma-Ti's abilities don't work on beings that don't have hearts or are too evil which would likely include the demon and the skeletons. He could still probably beat them just by sensing their locations and information about them, and them overwhelming by numbers, however there is another tactic.

The Demon has consistently proven the hardest being to counter. However what if you tried to fight fire with fire and use a demon to fight the Unknown. For that I would suggest

Pumpkinhead from....Pumpkinhead.

Pumpkinhead is strong and tough enough to devastate cars and tank bullets, and should compare to his sibling Excess who could destroy small building and knock them over. Pumpkinhead was the one who killed Excess. He has also been shown to outpace cars before, showing that in speed he would compare to the verse.

Pumpkinhead is a demon summoned by seekers of vengeance. If somehow he was summoned by one against the Unknown he would be unstoppable for the tier. Pumpkinhead is clairvoyance and sees the location of his prey at all times. He was able to hypnotize Maggie and draw her out just by whispering her name. Against the verse he could immediately know and incapacitate any threat by simply hypnotizing them from the start.

 Pumpkinhead is also proficient in stealth and can induce pain or set opponents on fire just by willing it, which would give him the advantages of both Pyro and Conan but from a larger range. He also is implied to have the ability to drive people insane, which could also hypothetically be helpful.

Most famously Pumpkinhead can not be dispelled until vengeance is wrought, and will always return, to the point that he returned from his sibling Excess eating him. Depending on who his target is, he would be functionally immortal and unkillable to the verse.

City Scale Threat:

The Unknown is a massive forest, containing numerous villages within like the village of Pottsfield, the village that Fred comes from etc. However there is one being that rules the forest, a being whose name strikes fear far and wide, who claims the land as his domain. He is known as the Beast.

The Beast is implied to be the strongest being in the woods, suggesting he would scale to the subsonic low building level feats from earlier. However, it's not his physical might alone that makes The Beast so threatening but his abilities.

The Beast is only sometimes corporeal, having shown the ability to turn into darkness, a form of logia. Tiny parts of the Beast can be separated from it. These parts when consumed can corrupt the entities, as it corrupted a dog into the Beast-Wolf. 

The Beast has control over darkness, and possibly control over the weather. More infamously is the Beast most iconic ability, turning people into edelwood trees, which is then used by him to keep the lantern where his soul is kept alight. The Beast also has the ability to create illusions, convincing the Woodsman that the flames inside the lantern was his daughter's soul instead of his own. 

The Beast is also implied to potentially have mind manipulation abilities, as Adelaide the witch seemed to be controlled by him. Even without it however, he is a clever manipulator who is good at deceiving others, aided by his immortal age that has bolstered his intellect. 

The Beast however has two, relatively large weaknesses. Most of his powers do not work on one who has not given up hope. Hope acts to resist the power of The Beast. Also the Beast's soul is the flame within his lantern. If one is to make the fire go out, then The Beast would die along with it.

Most of my counters are people with a lot of hope, but my first counter is almost the metaphorical embodiment of it. The first counter I would suggest is 

Kamina from Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann.

Kamina is a source of spiral energy, and a rather large one at that. Spiral Energy is the energy of all living beings, and represents the potential to improve and evolve past boundaries. It is linked to mindset, with a mindset of hope, a mindset of the potential of the future being that which grants one access to more of it. Kamina as a relatively high spiral power human would have massive amounts of hope.

In terms of stats, Kamina scales to Viral who was able to send a birdman through a wall with a strike, and was fast enough to snatch an arrow out of air at close range, showing his stats and reaction speed.

While Kamina is weaker then The Beast, he's likely comparable to a bit faster in speed, and his weapons, including his sword and gun would likely be able to harm or kill The Beast. Kamina is also a more skilled physical fighter then The Beast has ever shown, and in fact The Beast has been out-skilled by the Woodsman on at least one occasion.

That said, you could argue the Beast would be able to use his intelligence to manipulate Kamina's impulsiveness, and that The Beast's likely superior raw strength and darkness manipulation would allow him to win. While I don't agree, if you want a character that can fight The Beast physically even better then you could use

 

King Arthur Pendragon from the Arthurian Mythos.

King Arthur was strong enough to contend with giants including CUTTING ONE CLEAN IN HALF, and fast enough that his opponents would lose track of his position and was able to retrieve his sword and sheath before Sir Accolon could react. King Arthur would be able to contend physically with The Beast without question, especially given Arthur's skill advantage over him.

Arthur's arsenal would also be a massive help. Excalibur can blind people with the light of 30 torches, which would not only be problematic for The Beast, but also potentially provide a defense against his darkness manipulation. He would also have invisibility with his cloak, which would add another layer of being difficult to detect to the Beast.

What's interesting about this fight is that both Arthur and The Beast rely on an object for their endurance. The Beast relies on keeping his Lantern lit while Arthur relies on the sheath of Excalibur which heals all his wounds and renders him invulnerable (no wound, no matter how deep of Arthur's, will bleed so long as he has the sheath). While neither of them would know each others' weaknesses inherently, Arthur also possess the mystic dagger Carnwennan which always hit the target. As the Beast's "real self" is in the lantern, it's arguable attempting to use Carnwennan would inform Arthur the Beast's soul is in the lantern giving him the information to win.

While Arthur is not the perfect incorruptible knight like Galahad, he is still a holy knight, given weapons by God and would likely not lose hope easily against The Beast.

You could maybe argue that Carnwennan wouldn't work like that however, and that Arthur wouldn't know Beast's weakness. For a character with an even more direct counter I would suggest

Go (sometimes spelled Goh), the Leafe Knight of Fire from Pretear.

Go is one of the older Leafe Knights, being an unaging entity that looked identical 16 years ago, and is responsible for training the younger Leafe Knights. His fire power is stated to be able to defeat a Saihi seed, and to be able to destroy a tree possessed by a Saihi seed. Saihi seed regularly destroy the local environment, destroying the matter itself. As such he should scale to at least low building level. He is also likely comparable to the subsonic speeds of the wind knight Hayate who moved comparable to the wind. 

The Leafe Knights are the guardians of the leafe or energy of the world. They can sense and control their element all across a city-scale range at least as the sound knight could hear communications across a city. This means on a city scale range, Go would be able to sense the fire burning in the lantern of The Beast and at will extinguish it. Given that he would be able to sense what it is too, he would do so as well.

Beyond that The Leafe Knights did not fall to despair even though they had to spend 16 years fighting the Saihi Seeds without a Pretear. They also are implied to possess the ability to travel between dimensions, something no one in the OTGW as well as possess sealing abilities as they were able to seal away Saihi 16 years ago when she fell to despair. Sealing would also hypothetically work on The Beast. Go's fire would also likely illuminate the area, acting as a defense against the Beast's darkness.

The only real counter to Go for the Beast would be to outlast him, since Go's stamina is not very high, as manga-wise the Leafe Knights had to draw from their own life energy to use their magic (as only Pretear can create new leafe) while The Beast's stamina is functionally immortal. If Go foolishly decided to not immediately extinguish the flame of The Beast, it's conceivable the Beast could outlast him, albeit still unlikely as Go would still be able to seal him. 

For a counter that is even better and more thematically appropriate I would suggest

A Noble from Princess: The Hopeful. Especially a Champion of Spades.

A Champion Princess is a Warrior that protects the weak ("Be strong for the weak"). Under the guidance of the Queen of Spaces, she gains a light-heart, to laugh at the darkness and to be as free as the wind.

The Nobles are bearers of the light, the metaphysical power of hope that burns away the darkness. The Beast would only be viewed as a single Cataphractoi which a powerful Champion of Spades could fight regularly without tiring.

The Nobles are the bearers of hope, and their powers are based on their hope. It's highly unlikely The Beast would be able to do much to her, especially given her light would easily pierce through his darkness.

A Champion of Spades would have access to the invocation Aria which controls the wind. All of her attacks are wind-based and would pose an immediate massive threat to the Beast by threatening to blow out his lantern even by accident. In fact the easiest fight charm a Champion of Spades knows is using the wind to disarm an opponent of an object they hold. And her power would come at no cost as aria comes under no cost when under among other things, trying to catch an opponent by surprise, to cast doubts, or trying to expose pretension or arrogance. Especially given that a Champion regains magic trying to protect the weak or helpless, A Champion of Spades would have effectively infinite stamina against the Beast. 

Other Aria charms allow for bullet-speed reflexes and move fast enough to flash step,  along with creating a wind powerful enough to create a thunderclap which would immediately blow out the lantern. A Champion of Spades would also scale to the Princess' dark counterparts the Dethroned, who can tear through buildings easily. 

A Princess from Princess the Hopeful is thematically the ideal counter to The Beast, and not only can clearly resist his abilities via being the bearer of the light itself, but can easily scale to the same stat level as him, and every attack of hers would immediately threaten to put out his lantern. 

And that's how to be OP in the Over the Garden Wall-verse.