How they Compare: The Dark Knights (DC Comics Dark Multiverse)

 

The multiverse is a manifestation of all the universes that should be...but seeping down beneath it are the universes that shouldn't be, the other side of the multiverse made of dark matter, the dark multiverse. The dragon of destruction ruling the dark multiverse is the horrible Barbatos. When Batman was sent back in time by Darkseid's Omega Beams during the Final Crisis, Barbatos caught notice of Batman and planned to use him as a portal to invade and consume the light multiverse.

To fufill this purpose Barbatos brought together a group of 7 Batmen from different universes of the Dark Multiverse, each corresponding to a member of the JLA. These would serve him as his invasion force, his Dark Knights. As the Dark Multiverse is formed of fears, each also represents a specific fear of Batman's.

All of them have an immunity to conventional attack as dark matter can't be interacted by the matter-energy with the Multiverse and required divine weapons for their regular universe counterparts to hit. However all the Dark Knights have a shared weakness. They come from the Dark Multiverse, the opposite frequency of Nth Metal. Nth Metal can badly damage them upon contact.

The Devastator comes from Earth -1. On Earth-1, Superman went mad from an unknown incident and slowly killed everyone else important to him and Bruce, leaving Batman the last one alive, taunting him as he destroyed Batman's Kryptonite Weapon about how Batman was supposed to be the one capable of stopping him and telling him that people's belief in him was why they were gone. In despair and desperation Batman injected himself with the Doomsday Virus, killing Superman and becoming the monterous Devastator. The Devastator represents Batman's fear of losing his hope, represented by Superman and his fear he might someday have to fight Superman.

In stats Devastator is strong enough to battle Rebirth Superman evenly, with Flash even noting the two are equal in speed. Devastator has many of the usual abilities of Doomsday, including regeneration capable of regrowing an army in seconds, rapid evolution capable of growing spikes to kill Superman mid-combat, and a virus that turns people up to an entire city range into Doomsday-infected. He likely can resurrect after his death like the original Doomsday. He can also breath kryptonite gas, and can change forms into a normal looking Bruce Wayne form capable of fooling Superman before returning to his true state.

Devastator's brain has also degenerated somewhat from the Doomsday Virus. While still capable of recreating the Monitor's Tuning Form, the multiversal technology of the Type 5 Monitors technology, hes more brute-ish and revels in destruction and death. 

On the gender-inverted world of Earth -11 Bryce Wayne was a retired vigilante when her love Sylvester Kyle was slain. In retaliation she launched a one-woman war against the metahuman populace. After gaining power over the surface world, she was opposed by Atlantis and in a pitched battle killed the Atlantean Queen, taking her trident. In retaliation and to protect this, Atlantis drowned all of Gotham City and began to drown the entire world. Bryce rapidly used cybernetics and biologically engineering to change herself into an aquatic entity. She then used the stolen trident and her technological brilliance to turn the Atlanteans against each other, mutating them into her underwater horror army the Dead Water. She represents Batman's fear of going too far in his distrust of others, especially superhumans, and his fear of Catwoman ever dying. 

The Drowned is strong enough via her biological enhancements to physically face off against Rebirth Aquaman and Mera at the same time. Her trident is also powerful enough to hurt Dawnbreaker when it was used against him. Her hydrokinesis is strong enough to instantly drown cities and flood the entire planet. She can shoot energy blasts with her trident and can convert an enemy with a touch into one of her army the "Dead Water", nightmarish underwater monsters capable of fighting Aquaman. She can also summon them to her side at any time. Her waters are also immune to conventional hydrokinesis as Mera could not control The Drowned's water.

On Earth-12, the war god Ares succeeded in getting a helmet which bolstered his power 100 times over. Batman and Wonder Woman together led a desperate final stand against the war god. The two managed to wrangle the Helmet from his head but Ares struck down Diana. In rage and defiance Bruce equipped the Helmet of Ares, gaining the mad bloodlust and divine power of the wargod and slew Ares. He felt a delirious rush of power, the thrill of battle, wondering why he had ever held his own code, when such a naked display of raw power had given him what he wanted. To his surprise Wonder Woman was not slain, only stunned by Ares. Diana pleaded with Bruce to remove the helm, knowing it was turning him into Ares' successor but Batman unwilling to feel powerless again battled Wonder Woman, eventually killing her, cementing himself as the new god of war. He represents his fear of what he would be like if he started killing, and his regret that his crusade against injustice, his war, will never end since his villains will always return. 

The Merciless is strong enough to battle Rebirth Goddess Wonder Woman, and slew the Greek gods of his own universe, although its unclear if these were just their emanations or their true forms from the Otherplace, dark counterpart to the Sphere of the Gods which would presumably be much more impressive. He wears the helm that boosted Ares' power a hundredfold. He presumably has the powers of war gods, and has personally shown the ability to control those who "worship war" meaning those in professional militaries as well incite bloodlust and the desire for combat with his presence. He was able to tank Projectile Valhalla, a missile that was supposedly able to kill any terrestrial metahuman because all weapons of war can't hurt him, only empower him. His helm also lets him "peer into the hearts of men."

The Merciless also has other enchanted equipment including the divine weapons of the Greek pantheon he took after slaying them. He also has a flaming sword and a golden drachma that can summon the angry souls of the damned Amazons that he slew which he can send to battle for him. He also possesses the Godkiller, a blade made to kill blades that can be summoned to the user and which can adjust its size freely. 

Hypothetically because Merciless's powers come from his helmet, disarming him of it might rid him of at least some parts of his powers, though this isn't a big weakness given even the gods couldn't do so. 

On Earth -32 when young Bruce Wayne saw his parents gunned down in front of him, he felt in himself....a sickening void....no emotions. Just the sheer will to kill. For his pure absence of fear and total will the Green Lantern Ring of the sector chose him, which he used to pursue criminals, overriding the Ring's own moral code by infecting it with the black void in his soul. The Guardians of the Universe try to remove his ring recognizing his quickly deteriorating mental state but Bruce simply murders them and taking on a new oath (With darkness black, I choke the light/No brightest day escapes my sight/I turn the dawn to midnight/Beware my power, Dawnbreaker's might!) he was reborn in the Central Power Battery as someone beyond fear, born of the void of loss and pure will, the Dawnbreaker. He represents Batman's fear of how dangerous he would be with superpowers, and if his discipline has crippled his emotional response to his parents death.

Dawnbreaker was strong enough to kill every single Green Lantern and the Guardians of the Universe of his universe and battled Rebirth Hal Jordan. He also survived the death of his universe, turned into a void its implied by the void in his heart. Dawnbreaker has the standard powers granted by a Green Lantern Ring but his lantern constructs are made from a strange anti-light that normal Lantern lights can't interact with. This is likely related to Dawnbreaker's signature ability Blackout. By directly manifesting the void within his heart, Dawnbreaker can absorb all light in at least city-wide area creating pitch darkness. This darkness is filled with his anti-light monster constructs within the darkness, strong enough to fight the Green Lantern corps. 

On Earth -44 Batman's rogue gallery inflitrated the Batcave. They assaulted and interrogated Alfred demanding to know where Batman was but loyal to the end Alfred refused to even acknowledge he knew what a "Batman" was, until his death. Wanting to keep Alfred with him, not wanting to lose his "father" again, Batman tried to recreate Alfred within an AI, an AI designed to protect and aid Bruce. but the AI went out of control killing all of Batman's rogue gallery to protect him. When Batman tried to stop him, the Alfred Protocol "realized" Batman couldn't be trusted to protect himself and engulfed him, fusing the two into the Murder Machine, a father who would never leave his son again, and a son who would never be left alone again. He represents Batman's fear of his own dependency on technology, his fear of the loss of his humanity to the Batman role, and his fear of losing Alfred.

The Murder Machine was strong enough to kill his own universe's justice league and temporarily held down Rebirth Hal Jordan with his metallic tendril. The Murder Machine can shift his body into blades to slash, energy cannons, or tendrils to grab and restrain. He has advanced scanners to tell him enemy power sources, shields to block attacks, and can create portals that can suck in even universal entities. The Alfred Protocol is obviously fanatically devoted to protecting Bruce and can essentially duplicate by creating numerous robot bodies it can operate at once. It also has powerful technopathy able to battle Cyborg's and quickly take control and recreate the JLA Watchtower. The Murder Machine is noticeably more defensive with forcefields, a fast acting mid-low regen, and turning off all emotions so that Bruce will never have to feel hurt again. 

The Murder Machine however is made of technology and sufficiently strong technopathy or other anti-tech based abilities do work on it. 

On Earth -52, after Batman was too slow to stop the deaths of each of his sidekicks, he confronts Barry Allen making the claim he could use the speedforce more optimally than Barry could. After a confrontation, Batman manages to subdue Barry, strapping him and the cosmic treadmill unto the Batmobile and driving into the speedforce. This actually fused the two, putting Batman's awareness primary but inside Barry's superfast body. Though easily able to stop mundane criminals by violently murdering them the moment they try to commit a crime, this Batman quickly realized that he was still not fast enough to stop everything and the destruction of his entire universe was coming, causing him to join Barbatos' forces. He represents Batman's fear of time taking his loved ones from him, of taking his ability to protect others from him. 

Physically Red Death is essentially identical to Barry in abilities and stats, just controlled by an evil Bruce Wayne although somewhere along he gained the ability to turn into a cloud of bats and reform. Beyond that he also has other advanced technology including the weapons of the Flash's rogue gallery that he took for his original confrontation with his universe's Barry. He also has in his Batcave a number of speedforce-powered Batmobiles able to keep up with Barry, and can build one with his super speed and supergenius intellect in a matter of moments.

However Barry's consciousness is still inside the Red Death, though sent into despair from years of unsuccessfully pleading with Bruce and watching his murderous actions. While he can't naturally take control of their shared body, positive energy can briefly give him control of his body again.

The Batman Who Laughs is the leader of the Dark Knights, gathering them in service to Barbatos. On Earth -22 when the Joker was dying he set off on his final crime spree. He managed to temporarily paralyze Batman so he would be forced to watch while the Joker attacked a hospital, shooting a large number of the parents dead before injecting the children who saw with a final irreverisble Joker Toxin in an attempt to create the hybrid of the Batman and the Joker. In his last dying action as Batman attacked him Joker breathed out same irreversible Joker venom unto Batman, slowing causing Batman to go crazy and become The Batman who laughs. He represents Batman's fear of becoming as bad as the Joker and the fear that he can not stop the Joker without killing him. 

The Batman Who Laughs truly is a combination of the Batman and the Joker. He was able to outfight Rebirth Batman and required both Rebirth Batman and Joker working together to beat. He is the smartest of the Dark Knights, he who hears and executes Barbatos' master plan. He has a wide variety of gadgets and tricks. He can use a much stronger version of the Joker Venom that infected him and particularly tips his batarangs with them to corrupt people on a single slight touch. His visor lets him see into across multiverses from the Dark Multiverse into the Light Multiverse and back which he can use with an inter-universal gun to snipe people from literally a multiverse away. He has an eighth metal gun capable of KO-ing Wonder Woman and has a guide to the multiverse with instructions on how to destroy it. He has also learned dark magic, such as dark magic playing cards that grant the users dark desires and dark magic which he used to kill his universe's version of the Spectre and bind the main universe's Phantom Stranger.

The Batman Who Laughs got way stronger later on but that version has a different title (The Darkest Knight) and isn't part of the team anymore so this is focusing on him just as was during his time as the Batman Who Laughs

Name: The Dark Knights, Nightmare Batman, Dark Council

Origin: DC Comics

Powers and Abilities: Superhuman Physical Capabilities, Immunity to damage from normal matter and energy (made of dark matter), War God Powers (The Merciless), Green Lantern Powers (Dawnbreaker), Speedforce Powers (The Red Death), Summoning (Underwater Monsters, Robot Bodies of Murder Machine, Amazonian Wraiths, Anti-Light Constructs), Shapeshifting (Red Death can turn into a cloud of bats, Devastator can disguise himself as normal Bruce Wayne, Murder Machine can shift his form to bring out various pieces of equipment), Infection/Corruption (Devastator, Batman Who Laughs), Planetary-Scale Hydrokinesis (Drowned), City+ Scale Darkness Manipulation (Dawnbreaker), Technopathy (Murder Machine), Energy Projection (Drowned), Mid-Low Regen (Murder Machine), Rapid Evolution and Resurrection (Devastator), Kryptonite Breath (Devastator), Poison (Batman Who Laughs), Multiversal Sight (Batman Who Laughs), Scanners (Murder Machine), Multiversal Dark Magic/Sealing (Batman Who Laughs), Reality-Warping (Batman Who Laugh's playing cards), Immunity to Emotional-Biological Manipulation (Murder Machine)

Weaknesses: Nth Metal and Energy X are the opposite frequency and badly damage them.

Destructive Capacity: Most of the Dark Knights reach Universal. Batman Who Laughs can potentially end the multiverse with prep 

Range: Infinite (Batman Who Laughs can snipe people from another multiverse)

Speed: Up to Infinite Speed. Conceptually Infinite for the Red Death

Durability: Most of the Dark Knights reach Universal.

Stamina: Massively Superhuman (most at least relative to Rebirth Batman), up to Infinite

Standard Equipment: Various pieces of technology (Batman Who Laughs, Murder Machine), Divine Weapons (The Merciless), Aquawoman's Trident (Drowned), 

Intelligence: Type 5. All relative to Rebirth Batman with even Devastator's whose mind is somewhat degenerated from the Doomsday Virus able to recreate Monitor technology

So how would the Dark Knights do if Barbatos sent them to invade different multiverses

In the Marvel Multiverse, the Dark Knights would be on par power-wise with most of the greatest of Earth's defenses who have their own suite of universal+ feats. Their speed may be a problem, though some of the characters possess time travel and acausality such as the Silver Surfer, Dr. Strange, and Dr. Doom and so should be able to keep from being blitzed, although the Red Death's speed may still prove somewhat problematic. Dr. Doom's armor might be at threaten from Murder Machine's hacking but given its resisted hacking from Reed Richards and Tony Stark, I think it's unlikely.

Most forms of direct attack from Earth 616's defenders probably wouldn't do that well relying on matter and energy. Divine weapons work so its likely Mjolnir would be able to affect them if Thor can hit them with it. This combined with the raw power and hax strong enough that several members of the Dark Knights were able to fight the JLA single-handedly for a time means it would definitely require the strongest forces of the universe to intervene to stop them. Batman Who Laughs dark magic could even threaten the cosmics. 

There are several forces on Earth 616 that can stop them together however. While Murder Machine was able to fight Cyborg's planetary technopathy, Ultron was able to overwhelm a galactic sized empire with his technopathy, suggesting he could use his technopathy to mess with Murder Machine and Batman Who Laugh's tech. Ghost Rider has a raw power advantage against them and his Archangel Nature means his weapons would definitely quality as weapons that could hurt the Dark Knights. He also has a spiritual purification that can extend over countries which could potentially purify Batman who Laughs of the Joker Toxin, restore those infected by the Doomsday Virus including Devastator, restore those transmuted by Drowned's infection and restore Barry to controlling Red Death's body. Also of note is that the Merciless's Greek Divine Weapons wouldn't work as GR can't be hurt by other divine sources. There's also a large number of power psychics in the verse that may try to restore Barry to control or telekinetically rip the Merciless' helmet off. As such I think that alliance might be able to stop the Dark Knights, though they would definitely still be a danger. 

In the Saint Seiya Multiverse, the Dark Knights would be roughly on the level of the Divine Saints who can battle the Gods who divine cosmo can travel the infinite multiverse in finite time, and whose power exceeds that of the Gold Saint Aries Mu's attack which destroyed and recreated a universe. If anything they might be slightly weaker in raw power, though at that level of speed.

The Dark Knights can definitely be hurt by most of the Saints, their fists being turned into divine weapons in the name of Athena being a recurring theme. While a lot of the Dark Knights abilities can be resisted by enough cosmo, Saints actually have a somewhat consistent weakness to biological abilities and horrifically enough Joker Toxin might be able to infect them, turning them psychopathic, though their mental weakness may prevent that and cause it to just work like a normal poison instead. The spacetime powers of Dawnbreaker's Green Lantern Ring, or its energy manipulation might also be a tricky. The Dark Knights also have the advantage of absolutely immense intelligences, each being smarter than anyone in the verse save maybe Chronos and as such the 7 of the Dark Council could something akin to a group of malevolent puppetmasters leading the multiverse to darkness. 

If this was to happen their biggest threat by far would probably be the Goddess Athena, a goddess representing wisdom and civilization, whose presence serves to keep such tragedies from occuring in the worlds. This is especially because Athena is a conceptual entity and the Dark Knights ability to affect conceptuals is somewhat limited and the fact that there are different Athena in different universes. The Dark Knights could wait for Athena to reincarnate as she does, but this doesn't seem to happen at the same time in every world, meaning that at best they can manipulate different universes at different times. I think most likely they would cause darkness across universe after universe until one Athena and her defenders finally catch them, and then battle them. They may win or lose, but it could go either way and sooner or later an Athena will win. The biggest problem would likely be Merciless who can control soldiers, and absorbs the attacks of weapons. It would likely take a saint whose heart is gentle like Shun to be able to stop him.

In the Cthulhu Mythos, the Dark Knights would be in power akin to the Elder Gods of Earth, greater than most of the Great Old Ones but infinitely weaker than the Outer Gods. Against their own tier they would be quite strong, as they are relatively versatile and intelligent and have plenty of ways to attack incorporeal entities. 

It's notable that with their extreme intelligence, that the Dark Knights would likely quickly learn of the Outer Gods, and would do what they can to if they can gain such power and if not to keep from being destroyed by them. In the Extended Canon it was known that one human, the Buddha, attained a state like an Outer God losing his humanity in the process. Not valueing their humanity particularly, the Dark Knights may try to replicate this.

Also the Drowned has a kinda decent fight against Cthulhu for dominion over the Ocean.

In the World of Darkness, another Dark Multiverse, the Dark Knights would rank nearly at the top of the possibly playable characters. They would be roughly on the same power range as Fifth Tier Mages who are able to warp entire timelines, but below full Archmages or the other god tiers. They are nowhere near as versatile, but they have some pretty alright haxes such as multiversal energy manipulation, war empowerment, spacetime manipulation, and multiversal dark magic. Considering that Mages are near the top of the Player characters in WoD that is quite impressive.  

The bigger threat of the Dark Knights in WoD is not neccesarily how strong they would be immediatly but how fast they could rapidly grow in contrast to a verse like the Cthulhu Mythos. in WoD much like DC reality is shaped by the beliefs, aware and unaware, of people. The Dark Knights are naturally smart enough to rival or surpass the magical intellect of the Mages, and already have some magical knowledge particulary the Batman who Laughs. They could very quickly become 7 extremely powerful dark mages with the added powers and abilities they already had. If not for the fact that mages and demons in the verse have insane information-gathering ability and could plausibly stop them before they get too strong, that would actually make them a threat to Archmages. 

Finally in the Billy and Mandy-verse, the Dark Knights would fit interestingly.

For the low to mid tiers the verse has several feats from country to star level, the level of power of Drowned and Red Death, and for Devastator, Merciless, Dawnbreaker, and Murder Machine they are roughly on par with the universe level entities like the Gods and Grim's Scythe which can threaten the universe. Even the Infinite Power gained from Infinite Size would be equal to Batman Who Laugh's dark magic. In terms of speed the infinite speed gods can grant from infinite size would be equal to most speedsters of the Dark Knights, meaning the group would roughly be seen as speedsters, though not uncounterable.

The Gods in general would be signifigantly difficult for the Dark Knights to defeat as they are conceptual entities. The Dark Knights ability to affect conceptuals are limited to particular interpretations of Dawnbreaker and Merciless (Green Lantern rings can affect the emotional-electromagnetic spectrum entities and Merciless killed the Greek Gods) as well as Batman Who Laughs' dark magic. However given their sheer intelligence its likely they could manipulate some of the gods, given their tendency to just blatantly act on their concept like Eris acting chaotically. While the verse has hax that can definitely affect them like mind manipulation on a planetary scale and meta attacks the Dark Knights would collectively be a massive threat due to combination with complete seriousness + extreme intelligence and speed +very signifigant power/hax.

However the verse has a possibly extremely potent counter. Thje Dark Multiverse is made of fears, with each of the Dark Knights being a fear of Batman's. There's an object in the Billy and Mandy universe called Horror's Hand which is the living embodiment of fear, and could potentially control or disperse the Dark Knights dark matter. Also if Grim can react quickly enough he could trap him them in the Underworld Fairy Tale Book. Due to their horrific warped nature, it's unlikely the Dark Knights would be able to complete a classic fairy tale for a long time.