Suppose there is a type of person who is otherwise a normal human, but can temporarily transfer muscle strength from one part of their body to another. Whether this occurs through mutant genes, superpowers or magic is not material here. What can they do with this ability?
To make this (somewhat) more precise, assume the following:
- If the sum of the maximum force* that can be exerted by all the muscles in the person's body is X newtons, they can redistribute that total however they like. There may be practical reasons not to, but there is no technical reason they can't give one pinky the ability to move X newtons and have no strength in the rest of their muscles.
- All muscles are subject to the ability, including cardiac and smooth muscles.
- Ignore the potential to damage tendons, ligaments, bones, etc.
- The person in question is a reasonably fit human male of average size.**
- The strength transfer happens instantly. The person either instinctively knows how to reposition strength effectively or has been extensively trained.
The obvious combat application of this ability is to take strength from one's legs, smooth muscles and non-dominant arm to put into the dominant arm, and throw a super-powered punch (or leg for a kick). What I'm not clear on is the limits of this strategy. Obviously you couldn't take all the strength from your legs, or you'll collapse on the ground. No strength at all in your core and your guts fall out. There's also a question of leverage--a punch doesn't do much without leverage against the ground, right? (That super-strong pinky referenced above would be pretty useless). But perhaps one can compensate for weakness in the legs by standing in a position that relies more on the skeletal structure than the muscles?
Other combat applications? Non-combat applications?
* Despite some googling, I couldn't find a standard term for measuring muscle strength. In weight-lifting there is the "1 rep maximum", the maximum weight one can lift in a particular movement without injury, but that doesn't quite seem right here. If there's a measure I'm missing, let me know in the comments and I'll update the question.
** In practice, it would behoove someone with this ability to make every muscle in their body as strong as possible. Average human male chosen just to have a baseline.