How to use “ as … as ” to mean something is beyond someones experience

Question

I found the following means something AT the limit of someones experience

"The wooden stair descending to the Capitol's subbasement were as steep and shallow as any stairs Langdon had ever traversed."

So I was wonder how to use similar expression to say something is beyond someones experience.

Answer 1

If you want to use the expression as .. as to mean beyond someone's experience then you have to qualify it in someway. For example:

• The wooden stairs descending to the Capitol's subbasement were twice as steep and shallow as any stairs Langdon had ever traversed.

Alternatively, you can use the comparatives of the adjectives and the word than:

• The wooden stairs descending to the Capitol's subbasement were steeper and shallower than any stairs Langdon had ever traversed.

Answer 2

Given a phrase X was as Y as Z had ever..., indicating that X is at an extreme of Z's experience, convert the first as to more, and the second to than, to indicate that X is beyond Z's experience. Your example becomes:

The wooden stairs descending to the Capitol's subbasement were more steep and shallow than any stairs Langdon had ever traversed.

[I changed stair to stairs for agreement with verb were. An alternative is the wooden stair ... was ...]

Answer 3

If OP wants to keep the as ... as any construction, he you could say...

...[it's] as whim-driven as any big-label new-wave pop could possibly be — and then some.

...physically they are as fine a body of men as any — and then some.

...where and then some is a (primarily spoken) final clause to a statement, meaning whatever was just mentioned, only more so.