i had a debate about this with a friend

the retail manhattan's rules specifically say that he cannot be the target of penetrating/psychic blast

so does this mean convention manhattan can't use Clear the Skies against him?

CLEAR THE SKIES: Dr. Manhattan can use Penetrating/Psychic Blast. After Dr. Manhattan uses Penetrating/Psychic Blast, he can immediately use Pulse Wave as a free action. When using Pulse Wave as a free action, Dr. Manhattan's range value is not halved, but only characters with any of the following symbols have lines of fire drawn to them: {flight},{flight-transport},{giant},{colossal}

my argument was, because retail's rules say he can't even be the target of penetrating/psychic blast, convention would never be allowed to activate the pulse wave.

Manhattan could always use P/PB on something else and then catch the other Manhattan in the follow up PW.

Even if it was just straight Manhattan vs Manhattan, you could use give Manhattan a ranged combat action to activate P/PB and shoot a wall. Then use PW.