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While I know what consequences of this will have in my rewrite (like for one example: more Class 1-B students ending up in the final round of the Sports Festival). I'm curious what you personally believe how this switch to primarily focus on Rescue Training for the first semester would affect canon and the more combat-oriented Class 1-A students.

The thing about it is that we go from the battle trials, to the USJ, to the sports festival weeks later. 

Canonically, class 1-A barely had any combat training when they fought off villains at the USJ. Their baseline is “defeat scores of adult villains when outnumbered 20 to 1.” 

How much does ‘combat training’ or the lack of it alter their chances in the sports festival? Probably not at all. 

Now, if you wanted a bigger change, then skip the USJ attack. During a random Friday, All Might brings the 1-A students to the USJ to train rescue spontaneously. When Tomura broke into the school to steal the schedule, he found the old one. All Might demanded changes after the Bakugo incident. 

Aoyama doesn’t know about the USJ happening until he’s in the building so he can’t tip the League off. 

The USJ is where they were truly tested and fought as teams and the friendship between Bakugo and Kirishima first formed. Without that? Bakugo remains a prickly guy who Kirishima observes at a distance. 

Now, since the class didn’t have a life or death experience or get ‘famous’ for surviving a villain attack, maybe they take it easier. Also, Class B and Shinso don’t show up outside their door when Aizawa announces the sports festival. 

So nobody throws down the gauntlet and makes them think they have to fight for their lives out there against every other class.

But there would be changes to the sports festival, too. If they had half their hero students doing rescue and the other half doing combat, then at least one of the games is going to be about rescue.

That shows Nezu adapts the tests depending on what the students are good at and to test Class B while also giving Class A something they should theoretically be best at.

So the second test is a team dummy rescue match or something. Save enough civilians and deliver them to the rescue zone to score points, but lose points if you damage any of the civilian dummies. Maybe you get an auto fail if a dummy ‘dies.’ 

It still follows what they said the general structure of the festival is. A race, a team game, and then a 1 vs 1 tournament.

You may be wondering what the alternate USJ is. 

I’d argue that you should save a villain attack for the summer camp. 

If this is a timeline where the villains attacked much later, and class A is training in rescue, while class B is training combat, then narratively you give them chances to actually do rescues and combat.

Class A and B are 40 people, and if All Might goes on the trip with them (you could use the argument that he can maintain his muscle form indefinitely if he’s not actively fighting in it) that means it’s 3 teachers, with Vlad and Aizawa, plus the pussycats for 7. So we’re looking at 47 characters. 

But by this point, Tomura would have a bunch of nomu. At least the ones from the hosu attack, plus the USJ nomu, plus the chainsaw nomu, plus the ones Garaki was working on that they saw at the nomu labs. 

If the goal is to isolate All Might in the forest, invade with villains and nomu and take kids hostage to use against him, and eventually kill the guy, then the Tomura of this universe is attempting to finish All Might in one blow rather than the protracted campaign we saw in canon.

Now, I'll say that I do love your AU premise. It could actually be really, really funny.

Imagine if All Might, while Izuku was waiting for his UA acceptance letter, sent Izuku 30 DVDs of his home self defense courses.

So Izuku spent the time in between the entrance exam and his enrollment in UA punching a heavy bag he bought and practicing roundhouse kicks, haymakers and liver punches.

So when he fights Bakugo in the battle trials, he straight up sucker punches the dude when in canon he'd have thrown him.

But actually getting the wind knocked out of him by Deku of all people has Bakugo decide to go plus ultra, so he blows up the building immediately.

No one died. Deku ran. Uraraka and Iida floated out of the aftermath. Bakugo survived the collapse with another explosion.

But All Might was mondo pissed.

And so was Cementoss. He built that building for hero course training and it was supposed to be used by multiple hero course classes that week. Nezu had to pull him from his hero work to come to school to work overtime to fix this.

Vlad was mad because he was supposed to use that building too. And then we have the catalyst for why he decides to do combat training in this universe.

If Class A has a kid who can nuke a training building, then Class B needs every edge they can get, pronto.

Now, something else I thought about.

When you said combat training, you could extend this to quirk training.

What if Vlad decides that he's going to put his class through a three day intensive training, similar to what Class B canonically undergoes at the summer camp?

If you wanted some absolutely fantastic fights later, then you could have Class B pull up with power ups they'd have canonically had much, much later at the joint training arc.

Tetsutetsu is resistant to the elements. Monoma's copying is improved. Pony can fly. There's minimal lag time between when Kendo punches and when her fists expand, so she can throw what looks like a normal albeit very fast punch that becomes big moments before impact.

It depends on just how plus ultra you want them to go though. Now, since you wanted to talk about butterfly effects, let's have a fast round of them: -Without the USJ event trauma bonding Aizawa to this class and seeing their heroic grit, he acts colder to them. He might actually expel someone to do his taste of death thing if he thinks they aren't taking rescue training seriously. -Bakugo's isolation because he didn't do anything cool at the USJ, should you choose to delay the attack, could majorly impact his sports festival, possibly taking him out in round 2. -Izuku may learn full cowling sooner. No USJ battle means Aizawa is even less tolerant of Izuku's failures. His early martial arts training may be the key to keep him from getting expelled. -The sports festival may be a total blood bath for 1-A. The heavy hitters like Todoroki, Tokoyami and Bakugo if the rescue stuff doesn't take him out, still can push through, but you might have Monoma in the semi finals. Especially if he went and copied quirks from pro heroes in the crowd before his matches. -If you wanted to, you could have the most epic duel ever if Endeavor spoke to Monoma and offered him an internship if he made Shoto use fire, and then let Monoma copy Hellflame. Shoto steps up to use ice like he's been using, and then Monoma ignites and has the Endeavor fire facial hair. Shoto is 100% going to go plus ultra on this guy. -You may wonder what happens with Hosu. Aizawa is watching more carefully, sees all of them are for Hosu based heroes, and he just denies Iida's applications and says he's training with Aizawa instead. If he has the energy to go and try to confront a serial killer, then running laps until he pukes shouldn't be hard for him. Plus ultra. -If you didn't do the USJ attack and instead class A had a normal USJ experience, there is no class 1-A vs class 1-B rivalry. It's just Monoma and Tetsutetsu vs Bakugo. Bakugo was rude to them in canon and it made them believe all of 1-A was arrogant. In this universe, these two just really hate Bakugo and the feeling is mutual. They target him during the sports festival. -Because Stain remains at large since Midoriya never beat him in this universe, he's available to be recruited by Tomura later to increase his threat level. You could give Tomura his canonical League members afterwards, with them drawn by Stain's name and ideals. -Tomura could still have guys like Moonfish and Muscular here on his team for the raid. They just want to kill people. You could also use some of the war arc villains. Kunieda, for example, was never stated WHEN he got arrested and thrown into Tartarus. In your story, you can have him fight the heroes because he didn't get locked up yet in this timeline and AFO reached out to him to get Tomura more muscle. -The League likely has no desire whatsoever to kidnap any UA students, much less Bakugo. This means if Bakugo wants to kick some ass, he'll be in significantly more danger. The buffed up Class B students are going to be needed to keep people alive here.

The narrative protects Bakugo from the real consequences of his flaws. To truly rehabilitate him, you'd first need to break the narrative's habit of protecting him. One concrete way to start? Imagine if winning the Sports Festival earned an internship with All Might...

So he wins it and then they don't actually do any heroics. All Might just sits with Bakugo in his true form and explains, frankly, all of the pitfalls and the tribulations he's gone through. They spend hours where Bakugo can ask him about anything, from a man who has forgotten more about heroics than the majority of people will ever know. This is more valuable than anything UA could ever teach him because he's getting to learn real knowledge from the man who redefined modern heroics and from which all other heroes who came after, on some level, are copying him. This man wrote all the playbooks they're studying from.

Say you got to reimagine spinner's design and abilites granted from his quirk to be more based around actual geckos.

What gecko species would you use as inspiration for his design? It doesn't have to be just one speices either, you can use multiple and make a composite design if you want.

And furthermore, what abilities would you give him? You don't have to make them a complete 1-to-1 of how real gecko adaptations work, suspension of disbelief is par for the course in the superpower genre after all, but the abilities do have to be based on the the real life abilities of actual geckos to a reasonable degree.

Alright, with the rules set, good luck.

I think his design is fine. I’d just give him a tail. 

Like, clearly the author really likes ninja turtles. Okay. But the tail tho. That's the best part of a reptile. Lots of MHA characters who could have tails, don't. I think the author just doesn't like drawing tails.

As far as his powers? All of them. If there is any sort of special ability I could conceive a lizard person having, he’s fucking got it. 

He’s going to be like a cross between Mirio and Tsuyu except as a villain.

Mirio’s claim is that there’s no weak quirks. That’s obviously nonsense, but Spinner is going to benefit from the same gains Mirio did.

Tsuyu can just do whatever the author feels like and her tongue is blatantly a tentacle and doesn’t function like a frog’s tongue at all, so it’s whatever. If it’s good enough for her, it’s good enough for Spinner.

What I think the story objectively loses is representation for people born with crap quirks, but maybe we actually stick with the idea that working hard can make any quirk good.

You know how Koichi is pushed into situation and then he develops more ways to use his quirk? 

That’s Spinner. 

He starts off with just the ability to be sticky and climb things. It’s tiring to do it. But he never actually worked out or trained in his life.

That changes when he gets into fights. Oh, sweet, then he unlocks a low grade super strength. Oh, then his scales harden and deflect blades. 

I’m using the logic that winning fights gives you EXP in the MHA universe like a Pokemon game. It’s the only way I can explain Toga kicking so much ass despite her lack of real training, not having an offensive quirk, and zero apparent muscle mass. 

So we spend several arcs where Shigaraki goes “Spinner, I choose you!” And then he cuts up pro heroes. 

So that’s why I said all of them. If Spinner is getting his ass kicked, suddenly he’ll go “Oh yeah, what if I did THIS!” and then he does it. 

Like, he straight up just fires blood from his eyes to blind someone, then he cuts them. 

I’m fully aware this is a horned lizard technique. But since we give the hero characters endless training arcs and power ups and buffs, during a brutal beat down, Spinner would flash back to Dabi’s micro aggressions and how he called him lizard repeatedly even after being corrected.

And then he’d think “Wait. That’s my quirk. I’m not just a gecko: I’m a LIZARD!” 

I’m aware you wanted to know how he’d use a gecko quirk to be strong, but if we’re going to have Bakugo go from getting 1 shot by Tomura to being able to kill AFO, then yeah, Spinner’s gonna get buffed. 

However, since you do want to see Gecko specific moves, he’s got this:

The Tail Drop: So he has a tail in this world. He can drop it. It hurts really, really badly to do so and the tail wildly flails around to distract and bowl people over as it spasms. It also gives him a massive adrenaline based movement buff and also he’s faster because he lost his tail and the weight it contained. Think of this like Rock Lee dropping his weights. 

Before that, he’d use the tail in his martial arts. 

Van der Waals Strength: Geckos stick to walls using microscopic hairs on their toe pads that manipulate intermolecular forces. So in this universe, he’d grab someone and his grip is unbreakable. He’d use this to pound people across the face with wild haymakers and they can’t get knocked back or fall away from him. 

Leaf-Tail Camouflage: Some geckos, like the Mossy Leaf-Tailed Gecko, have dermal flaps that completely eliminate their shadows, making them practically invisible against surfaces. So Spinner would press himself against a wall, and then bend light around his body so nobody can see him unless they physically bump into him. Remember: If Tsuyu gets a stealth mode that objectively makes her a better version of Hagakure for no reason, Spinner should get this.

You may wonder why Spinner has all of this.

I’ll tell you. 

Class 1-A is 20 people. Class B is also 20 people. 

Tomura is Izuku and Bakugo’s villain. Dabi is Shoto’s. Toga is Uraraka and Tsuyu’s. Compress and Twice aren’t assigned to any of the hero kids.

That leaves Spinner here to make up the numbers.  Now, just for a moment, examine the League's quirks and fighting styles and you'll figure out the hole the author wrote himself into: on paper, everyone here should absolutely rip children to shreds. Dabi and Tomura's powers by all rights should be one hit kills. Toga is a serial killer who stabs people. Compress' power is a one touch victory for him, and if he fights at a distance, he's going to throw boulders and potentially vehicles at you. Twice can make copies of all his friends who have one touch kill abilities. So that just leaves Spinner as the one 'safe' guy people can fight. Having his sword get broken is a major gift to the narrative because now it means we can turn him getting disarmed and then boxing people up into a common combat routine.

I want you to think about the fact that we see constant training arcs from the hero children...but they barely actually DO anything with their powers. 

Who, for example, has Sero ever actually fought outside of a movie besides his own friends in class events? 

Enter: Spinner. If the story wants us to take the League seriously, then we show Spinner is un-jumpable. Meaning, you can attack him with 8 dudes and he fights them all off.  Also, consider his personality: He actively did not want Izuku dying in the first arc. That means, if we CHOOSE to use it, Spinner could be the one guy in the league with actual morals! Which means, he's the one guy who actively WILL NOT MURDER his child opponents! Then the narrative needs zero justification for why he flattened groups of kids and didn't kill them! No last minute rescues, no having him carry the idiot ball. A group of students spots him while on patrol and he's buying food from the 7-11, they jump him, he reverse jumps them, and then leaves them laying and escapes. THEN, we can have this happen again when the kids get their run back after a training arc! But then we'll have buffed Spinner to keep him competitive because he's getting jumped by half the cast and needs anything to keep his head above water.

We give the fodder characters in Class 1-A something to do and Spinner is finally allowed to do something. 

"How to commit high treason and become Japan's #1 Hero" Can you imagine if Cathleen Bate, AKA, Star And Stripe survived? The MHA government would give her Japanese citizenship if the Americans rightfully wanted to court martial her. But this is MHA Japan, where crimes aren't crimes if it worked and went well. "An American citizen stole military assets and forced multiple soldiers to desert to illegally enter Japanese airspace and attack a Japanese super villain, and then illegally deployed a nuclear weapon on Japanese soil to murder a Japanese citizen." "Well, Mister President, Tomura Shigaraki was an S class threat and he needed to be eliminated. Ms Bate solved the problem for us and decapitated the League of Villains. I believe she deserves our highest awards and should not be punished." "She NUKED your country, Prime Minister." "We WANTED her to nuke, Mister President."

"You wanted… a rogue foreign soldier… to deploy state-of-the-art, highly classified intercontinental cruise missiles on your sovereign soil. Without consulting your government." "Technically, Mister President, she punched the missiles really hard before they detonated. The Hero Public Safety Commission has officially classified the incident as a 'Quirk-Assisted Melee Attack.' Therefore, no international treaties regarding weapons of mass destruction were breached." "It vaporized a trench into the Pacific Ocean!" "She solved the Shigaraki crisis. We've decided to waive all charges of illegal airspace entry and unauthorized military action. In fact, we've already ranked her Number One on our JP Hero Billboard charts."

"She is an American soldier! She is facing a court-martial for high treason! You can't just put a war criminal on a billboard!" "Ah, about that. We actually expedited her Japanese citizenship this morning. Her new hero agency, Nuclear Liberty, opens next Tuesday in Roppongi. The PR writes itself, really." "What about the pilots?! Her squad! They committed mutiny! They deserted their posts to follow her!"

Kirishima is Bakugo's training wheels friend so Bakugo could learn how to actually be a person. The author realized he had a problem: There is zero reason any human beings or the audience reading the story would have to root for or want to interact with Bakugo. He made his character TOO toxic. Enter: Kirishima "Shitty Hair" "He's not so bad when he's not hitting me" Eijiro.

Bakugo doesn't have friends, he's apart of Kirishima's friend group.

Bakugo is the cat they non consensually adopted and continue to feed.

Kirishima is tossed from that dynamic once Bakugo 'graduates' to the new big 3 and spends all his time with Midoriya and Todoroki.

Poor viewers, right? We expect far too much from these cardboard cutouts who are props for people the author actually cares about.

It's why we're eternally disappointed. We have expectations that characters will have character. But let's take a step back and examine who the story tell us Kirishima is supposed to be.

In middle school, Mina Ashido was the one naturally intervening when underclassmen were being bullied, and she was the one who bravely stepped between her friends and a literal monster (Gigantomachia). Kirishima, meanwhile, froze in terror.

Kirishima’s entire foundational character arc—the reason he dyed his hair red, changed his hair gel, and adopted the "Crimson Riot" ethos, was based on the intense guilt and self-loathing he felt for standing by and doing nothing while people were being harassed. His core resolution was: “I will never stand by and let someone be bullied or victimized again.”

Cut to U.A. High School. Kirishima walks into Class 1-A, a newly forged man of chivalry, and immediately meets Katsuki Bakugo.

Bakugo spends the entire first semester:

Screaming at Midoriya.

Physically lunging at Midoriya during the Quirk Apprehension Test.

Actively trying to blow Midoriya’s head off in the Battle Trial, forcing All Might to intervene.

Threatening his classmates and calling them "extras."

If Kirishima’s backstory actually mattered to the narrative, Bakugo is the exact type of person Kirishima should despise. Kirishima should have been the first person stepping between Bakugo and Midoriya, crossing his hardened arms, and saying, "Picking on the smallest guy in the room? Not manly, bro." But he doesn't. And it doesn't.

Everything Kirishima is, exists in service to his utility to Bakugo and softening his early series solipsism and sociopathy. It's part of a three step program.

Phase 1 (Solipsism): Bakugo hates everyone and operates in a vacuum of his own ego.

Phase 2 (Domestication): Kirishima forces a one-sided friendship, acting as a PR manager to prove to the audience that Bakugo is capable of basic human attachment.

Phase 3 (Integration): Now that the audience accepts Bakugo has a "soft side" (hidden beneath ten layers of screaming), he is allowed to narratively graduate. He can now stand next to Midoriya and Shoto without looking like a primary antagonist. The fact that his quirk is Hardening and he laughs off Bakugo exploding him isn't subtle at all.

Kirishima can't stand up to Bakugo, because if he drew a firm boundary, it would force Bakugo to actually face a consequence.

If Kirishima said, "Stop screaming at people or I'm not hanging out with you," Bakugo would simply tell him to die and walk away. The narrative cannot afford to isolate Bakugo again, so Kirishima is forced to be infinitely, uncharacteristically submissive to a bully. It completely contradicts his entire "chivalrous, manly" ethos just to keep Bakugo in the room.

Logically, this is 100% correct. Dabi is the product of eugenics and has a power directly stated to be stronger than Endeavor's. We saw Endeavor rip a building to pieces in seconds with fire whips during the Hood fight. Anything, Endeavor can do, Dabi can do better. At the cost of his health, but that doesn't matter because his opponent will be dead. But...and it's a very big but. He's Dabi. The scrub stamper. The guy who kills people who don't matter and never get any backstory. See: Snatch, all those random men he killed, the handful of MLA people he torched during MVA. Dabi's kill count is around 40 if we include movies. All of them were people without names or were Snatch. If there's a fight, and you don't know who'll win...and Dabi is one of the combatants and his opponent doesn't have a name...always bet on Dabi. But if they have a name and weren't created just to be killed by him...he's cooked. See: How he turned Onima and Kido into crispy black BBQ but they survived that and apparently made a full recovery. You have so much more faith in Dabi's ability to kill named characters than I do.