neo vs raven fight, what are you thoughts luke?
Raven. She has the superior experience, not only in being a Huntress considering she’s been at it for around 20 years, and even longer since she’s been fighting all her life while in the tribe, but she’s also a Maiden. A Maiden that has been honing her power for a lot longer than Cinder or Penny. Neo’s a skilled fighter, but she also stopped fighting when Cinder busted out the Maiden’s powers.
Neo has her powerful Semblance, but Raven has a superior array of skills. Her fighting style isn’t slowed down or hindered since she has shown that she:
Can use her surroundings in the fight, and is quite flexible with the use of kicks, unorthodox use of her sword in addition to the force of her body like in the fight with Cinder, and powerful strikes. (She knocked Weiss out with one kick and sent Qrow flying with a kick at the start of their fight in Haven, the woman’s got some legs)
Can turn into a bird. This ability is criminially underused in fights considering just how useful it is. Neo can’t hit a small target like a bird, and since there’s no downside to the ability, Raven can spam it to get into a position to strike back.
Doesn’t let emotions cloud her. Cinder is strong, but she’s ruled by her lust for power and her rage. Raven is meant to be shown as a smart fighter, and Neo’s tendency to either taunt her opponents into a rage or use their loved ones to make them falter, as seen with Yang and Ren respectively, won’t work on Raven. Neo turning into Yang could get under Raven’s hardened shell, but it won’t be enough to make Raven falter if she believes she has to fight.
The only thing that Neo has over Raven is her Semblance. Raven can teleport away if things somehow get rough, but unless someone she’s linked to is in the fight with Neo, there’s no way she can teleport back. Meanwhile Neo can make illusions that can shatter and disorientate Raven, even using them to control the battle and, most importantly, get the element of surprise.
All of this has basically been answered in canon anyway. Neo is canonically afraid of Raven and chose to retreat rather than fight, so I think that alone answers this question.
