I'd say it did pierce. I see liquid dripping off his arm. And the visible part of the knife is too wide, the top has clearly pierced in.
It seems that the main argument for Jellal right now is comparing how he'd go against Jacob compared to Natsu,
I voted for Natsu. Just because his yet-to-be-seen current DF is allowed (which is nuts and all speculation, but alright xD).
but the fact that Natsu was holding back a lot is continually ignored by a lot of people.
In all my arguments I'm regarding a Jacob vs BDKM Natsu, 1 vs 1, both going all out, and I still see no way Natsu would beat Jacob's hax.
If Natsu hadn't of held back, it would've been a lot different. Jacob's invisible weapons would've melted,
That's mere assumption. I'm going to assume too:
1. Natsu only melted that knife because he knew where it was coming from and focalised MP/heat on that point.
2. Natsu cannot emanate heat from all the cells of his body so there are unprotected spots.
3. Natsu's heat cannot instantaneously melt a weapon in BDKM if it's thrown fast enough to pierce his body before it gets to melt
4. Jacob has used various tools and weapons. Maybe he's got a material which doesn't melt.
These are all assumptions based on nothing...
Now onto Natsu vs Jellal, nothing anyone has said has swayed me at all. I still believe Natsu would take this fight at high diff, and I'm giving Jellal the benefit of the doubt here of being able to do a pretty decent job at avoiding Natsu. The truth is Jellal's shown durability isn't that great at the end of the day, as we've seen him get taken out my Neinhart with one-shot (call it plot or whatever but the fact remains he was under the water and not moving by himself) and that he's previously been defeated after taking only a few hits from DF Natsu in the ToH, which is nothing compared to Natsu's power in FDKM.
I mostly agree.
Now, Jellal hasn't shown much growth at all,
We must be reading different mangas... Jellal's growth rate has been as enormous as Erza's, Gray's or Laxus'.
and I believe he's always been a Spriggan level character.
That's enormously inaccurate but I'm going to respect your opinion.
Now people might say he's been portrayed as getting stronger but really he's just been holding back less and less throughout the story.
Pre-pre-TS Jellal hasn't shown big feats.
Back in ToH he was about to go all out and kill Natsu but he was severely wounded and that affected his performance. DF Natsu proceeded to own him.
Makarov > ToH Jellal.
In O6, I agree he was severely injured but that's no excuse to pathetically lose against Midnight.
Now, after the first timeskip, he arguably didn't have much time to train since he was mostly in jail, but he managed to become as powerful as to oneshot the whole O6 save Brain/Hoeteye. I call this improvement.
Current Jellal has gone as far as to be capable of defeating a Spriggan 12.
How can you even put ToH Jellal on the same league of a Spriggan 12? Do you not remember everyone's reactions (Natsu's, Gray's, Erza's, Lucy's) upon being close to Brandish? Spriggan 12 is unlike any other enemy they've ever faced. A Spriggan 12 is stronger than José, Zero, Jellal, Hades or even Mard Geer! Their MP alone is enough to freeze a low or mid class mage!
in ToH, he couldn't bear to brake the tower so he held back a lot.
Until he began to go all out...
I just play like you, you are the one who assumed Jacob > BDKM Natsu because of travesty reasons :')
Jacob can transport them to his place ain't making him any stronger. If Natsu went all out from the beginning he would really have destroyed Jacob with no effort. Lucy just undo his spells and saved the guild from his clench supplemented by Makarov giant fist, Happy here is usless because Jacob can't do the same trick twice because of Marin presence moreover Makarov punch won't do shit to Jacob it just send him flying. When natsu used BDKM mode he 1 shotted Jacob and evaporated the lake.
Anyways i ain't going to post again in this thread, Natsu wins mid-high diff
I'm not playing anything I'm providing sound arguments... if you don't agree with them let's kindly agree to disagree.