Pre-Crisis Villians more powerful than Superman

[Captain Kal]

Just a few points of discussion, Iloyzmandias ...

Mongul, while usually portrayed as Superman's superior after his initial appearance, was actually far below Superman when he first appeared.  Mongul could not defeat the Martian Manhunter who was guarding Warworld's crystal key, so he blackmailed Superman -- the one being guaranteed to defeat J'Onn -- to get the key for him.  It's ABC logic.  Superman > Martian Manhunter > Mongul, therefore, Superman > Mongul in Mongul's first book.  Mongul was mysteriously beefed up to Superman-plus levels after that story which was never explained.

When Superman faced team-empowered foes like Amazo or the Composite Superman (later Xan aka Amalgamax, which was a much cooler name), the circumstances usually kept Kal-El's own powers out of the mix.

Amalgamax only had the powers of Supergirl, Mon-El, and Ultra Boy, not Superboy, and even then, this was in their early teens when their powers were duplicated in the statuettes.  I believe Superman was pretty even with Amalgamax until he used Triplicate Girl's power to outnumber him for might.  The other Legionnaires tended to be irrelevant unless their specific talents were taking advantage of Superman's weaknesses (e.g. Element Lad creating kryptonite).  Look at the statuettes the LSH gave as a gift.  Superboy wasn't amongst them as why would they give a statuette of the recipient?  Also, Kal would have to be in on the gift if he himself stood in the duplicator ray.  No, Superboy's were not in the Composite Superman's arsenal of duplicated powers.

Amazo didn't have Superman's powers due to the same red radiation robbing Superman of his necessitating his use of the Supermobile, so the android was using MM's powers instead.  A later Amazo encounter in an annual book does suggest he was using Superman's real powers then.

[Captain Kal]

Whenever Superman lost his powers, he also lost his super-intelligence.  With his powers he is a super-genius, without them he is a genius.

Whatever level his non-solar-energized intelligence was at, it certainly was far beyond Ira Quinby's solar-boosted super-intelligence in DCCP.  Even without his solar-based powers, Superman took a single glance at a blackboard full of equations I.Q. spent days pouring over to create with his super-intelligence to notice he misplaced a decimal point and that the corrected figures indicated the Sun would return to normal unassisted.  I.Q.'s Chemo-beam would actually trigger the nova that he sought to avoid.  I.Q. was a Hawkman foe so intelligent that he could create super-scientific devices from scrap to escape from prison such as a blasting wand and anti-grav shoes.

[MatterEaterLad]

Well, in this story, Superman was intelligent enough to build a duplicate robot of himself with super powers, an exact likeness and the right costume out of raw native materials on the dark side of a planet with a red sun...

[TELLE]

Almost goes without saying: that's a great cover!!

[Duplicate Man]

Whenever Superman lost his powers, he also lost his super-intelligence.  With his powers he is a super-genius, without them he is a genius.

     
     Darkseid was at most Superman's equal in power.  Lord Satanis (like most magic-using villains) was nowhere near as powerful as Superman.  If Superman were not vulnerable to magic,  Satanis would be ineffective against Superman.   Amazo seemed to be only slightly more powerful than Superman.  Mongul was slightly stronger than Superman, but not as invulnerable.  The Composite Superman was definetely more powerful.  Joe Meach had the power of two kryptonians (Superboy & Supergirl), one daxamite (Mon-El), & Ultraboy.  With the powers of several other legionaires thrown in.

Darkseid, at his strongest, was far more powerful than Superman.  In the Great Darkness Saga, a revived DS went through the Legion of Superhero's greatest enemies like Mordru & Time Trapper like swiss cheese while complianing that he was weak.  He easily moved Daxam to a yellow sun and took control of the Daxamites.  He put Mon-el into a coma with one shot.  Superboy & Supergirl with their powers amped by Highfather STILL couldn't take him.  It took a billion freed Daxamites to make him back down.

Obviously, they had to power him down to about Superman level if they wanted to use him for anytyhing less than an end of the universe blockbuster.

[Duplicate Man]

Just a few points of discussion, Iloyzmandias ...

Mongul, while usually portrayed as Superman's superior after his initial appearance, was actually far below Superman when he first appeared.  Mongul could not defeat the Martian Manhunter who was guarding Warworld's crystal key, so he blackmailed Superman -- the one being guaranteed to defeat J'Onn -- to get the key for him.  It's ABC logic.  Superman > Martian Manhunter > Mongul, therefore, Superman > Mongul in Mongul's first book.  Mongul was mysteriously beefed up to Superman-plus levels after that story which was never explained.

When Superman faced team-empowered foes like Amazo or the Composite Superman (later Xan aka Amalgamax, which was a much cooler name), the circumstances usually kept Kal-El's own powers out of the mix.

Amalgamax only had the powers of Supergirl, Mon-El, and Ultra Boy, not Superboy, and even then, this was in their early teens when their powers were duplicated in the statuettes.  I believe Superman was pretty even with Amalgamax until he used Triplicate Girl's power to outnumber him for might.  The other Legionnaires tended to be irrelevant unless their specific talents were taking advantage of Superman's weaknesses (e.g. Element Lad creating kryptonite).  Look at the statuettes the LSH gave as a gift.  Superboy wasn't amongst them as why would they give a statuette of the recipient?  Also, Kal would have to be in on the gift if he himself stood in the duplicator ray.  No, Superboy's were not in the Composite Superman's arsenal of duplicated powers.

Amazo didn't have Superman's powers due to the same red radiation robbing Superman of his necessitating his use of the Supermobile, so the android was using MM's powers instead.  A later Amazo encounter in an annual book does suggest he was using Superman's real powers then.

Superman was not even with Amalgamax.  Meach had the power of 3 Kryptonian level heros.  He surely wasn't 3 times stronger than Superman as he boasted, since they WERE teens, but he was still clearly stronger, and even without Element Lad's power, Superman didn't have a chance in a straight fight.

Good point about Mongul.  If he could have beaten the Martian, he would have, and we saw how Superman kicked Jo'nn's butt even without using his fire weakness.  But unexplained power-up or not, he was stronger than Superman in later encounters.

[Captain Kal]

Darkseid 'at his strongest' in The Great Darkness Saga had just stolen power from all the 30th century's most powerful beings and objects of power.  He is a far cry much more powerful than regular Darkseid of the 20th century because of that.

Even the DCH RPG stats on him reflect this.  His regular 20th century stats are far lower than Superman's while his 30th century ones in the LSH sourcebook are far higher.

[Captain Kal]

Superman was not even with Amalgamax.  Meach had the power of 3 Kryptonian level heros.  He surely wasn't 3 times stronger than Superman as he boasted, since they WERE teens, but he was still clearly stronger, and even without Element Lad's power, Superman didn't have a chance in a straight fight.

The Composite Superman added Colossal Boy's power in one fight (where Superman still got a good shot in), then combined Elastic Lad's power with his extra-super-strength to finally beat him in that latter encounter.  The one time I do recall Meach seeing to get the better of Superman in a straight punch-up was after triplicating and one body still could chuck Superman into the batcave wall, so point taken on that one.  Still, back then, all Kryptonian-level beings were considered equal to each other.

Amalgamax was blocked by Superman from reaching Saturn Girl, so he got around that by triplicating himself as Superman could only block one body.  In this Bronze Age story, the differences in gender, body size, etc. between super-beings was starting to be adhered to at DC thus explaining the different way Superman fared against a single Amalgamax body.