One Piece Power Level Discussion Thread

[goldb]

Ground Rules for the Power Level Discussion Thread
​

As always, please follow the guidelines set by the Forum Rules that apply across the board.

It's important that discussions from a current chapter are spoiler tagged until 24h have passed from an english release.

• For the sake of constructive discussion, where and when possible please quote/ source any information you provide. Particularly when it comes to conversations carried over from other threads.
• Avoid passive agressive posts, sly remarks or baiting/trolling. You can certainly have fun or disagree without it being at someone's expense.
• Only use anime examples that are canon and as means to provide clarity to pages in the manga. Any other anime material is otherwise non-canon and should only be referenced if it can be proved that the mangaka had approved it.
• We will strive to avoid repetitive discussions and any extensive battle topics will be guided to the Davy Back fight to existing threads or new ones can be made there.

As of now these topics are shelved due to repetitiveness or until the manga can present us with material to further discussions:

1. Shanks v Mihawk
2. Hand to hand fighters > Swordsmen
3. Zoro > Luffy
4. Zoro v Sanji
5. Is Smoker a top 30 character?
6. Mihawk's rank within the story
7. Law having CoC currently.
8. Katakuri > Kaido/Luffy/Etc.

If you wish to continue any of these discussion and remove it from the list, you will need to provide manga material as proof. If there's also anything you think we've covered numerous times, let me know and I'll update the list.

This is the only warning there'll be regarding these ground rules, anything no adhering will be removed. So please just check your posts before posting them.

 

[Lord Traffy Law]

Sorry but luffy is superior to Zoro in all facets of haki
Future sight
Mastery of bassic COC ( hence I hate Zoro skipping steps to get advanced coc, Zoro could have become a conscious basic user ages ago )
Advanced COA , the handcuffs removal stuff

 

[really_jonny]

Sorry but luffy is superior to Zoro in all facets of haki
Future sight
Mastery of bassic COC ( hence I hate Zoro skipping steps to get advanced coc, Zoro could have become a conscious basic user ages ago )
Advanced COA , the handcuffs removal stuff

Zoro has Advanced Busoshoku since Alabasta:

Spoiler

I saw in some media people wondering what the hell Zoro used to drive King away in this scene.

this is called "Kekkai - 結 界" Barrier, Zoro used this technique for the first time in Fish Men's Island in his battle against Hyouzou, the only difference between the two uses is that against Hyouzou Zoro it creates a Busoshoku Haki barrier, against King the barrier created is Haoshoku Haki and so it is evidently much superior and we can also see the various black rays in the process, some people interpreted as the Clash of Haki, but note that Oda made a point of emphasizing that King wasn't coating his Blade with Busoshoku Haki at the time, instead opting to apply his sword with flames this time.

結界 - "Kekkai" (Barrie) - Zoro used this technique for the first time in Fish Men Island in his battle against Hyouzou, for some reason I'm not aware this scene was altered and cut off the moment when Zoro talks about the barrier , in my country's Scam they translated the Kaji from the Original as Kekkai, but I saw that in some Scans from USA this mention doesn't exist either, in case you want to check it is in chapter #642, in some Scans from USA the term Kekkai is also used. , this ability of Zoro to create barriers is also not specified in the Wiki, as an ability of Busoshoku Haki and Haoshoku Haki.

This moment is much forgotten by fans as the Anime distorts it completely and makes it look like Zoro cut all of Hyouzou's swords in the same place where the division of the blade's edge is, but no!! Hyouzou hits Zoro's barrier hard with all of his swords, but he can't get through because of the sorbing power difference between the 2 and then the blades split.

As Oda has talked about before in SBS, Zoro is very proficient in Busoshoku Haki so much so that he first used it on his own in Alabasta when he passed Wado Ichimonji through a Tree Leaf and didn't cut it (Practically applying what Koushirou and Hyogoro explained about how Ryou - "Flow" is used), he, unlike Sanji and Luffy, used the Emission first and then Mihawk taught him the stiffening technique, which in this case, Sanji and Luffy learned first and in this case Sanji doesn't know yet the Issuance and Luffy mastered it with the help of Hyogoro now in Wano's arc.

Other less noticeable moments are when Zoro talks about using Haki to block King's Explosion and also when Zoro momentarily stopped Kaido and Big Mom's "Hakai" that covered a large area of several kilometers, it wouldn't be possible to hold all that energy with just the physical, obviously it would need a barrier to hold it and keep it from hitting the other supernovas that are relatively far apart.

I consider this one of Zoro's best abilities and played a big role in his defense against massive blows, even if the blow is tens of times more powerful than Zoro, he could still survive because of this barrier, and now that she can too. be used with Haoshoku Haki, I wonder if Zoro could at least survive the Hakai, even if defeated. Efim hope that Oda brings this great utility more often.

Créditos: Bússolavertical​

 

[Wurstkuche]

Zoro has Advanced Busoshoku since Alabasta:

Spoiler

I saw in some media people wondering what the hell Zoro used to drive King away in this scene.

this is called "Kekkai - 結 界" Barrier, Zoro used this technique for the first time in Fish Men's Island in his battle against Hyouzou, the only difference between the two uses is that against Hyouzou Zoro it creates a Busoshoku Haki barrier, against King the barrier created is Haoshoku Haki and so it is evidently much superior and we can also see the various black rays in the process, some people interpreted as the Clash of Haki, but note that Oda made a point of emphasizing that King wasn't coating his Blade with Busoshoku Haki at the time, instead opting to apply his sword with flames this time.

結界 - "Kekkai" (Barrie) - Zoro used this technique for the first time in Fish Men Island in his battle against Hyouzou, for some reason I'm not aware this scene was altered and cut off the moment when Zoro talks about the barrier , in my country's Scam they translated the Kaji from the Original as Kekkai, but I saw that in some Scans from USA this mention doesn't exist either, in case you want to check it is in chapter #642, in some Scans from USA the term Kekkai is also used. , this ability of Zoro to create barriers is also not specified in the Wiki, as an ability of Busoshoku Haki and Haoshoku Haki.

This moment is much forgotten by fans as the Anime distorts it completely and makes it look like Zoro cut all of Hyouzou's swords in the same place where the division of the blade's edge is, but no!! Hyouzou hits Zoro's barrier hard with all of his swords, but he can't get through because of the sorbing power difference between the 2 and then the blades split.

As Oda has talked about before in SBS, Zoro is very proficient in Busoshoku Haki so much so that he first used it on his own in Alabasta when he passed Wado Ichimonji through a Tree Leaf and didn't cut it (Practically applying what Koushirou and Hyogoro explained about how Ryou - "Flow" is used), he, unlike Sanji and Luffy, used the Emission first and then Mihawk taught him the stiffening technique, which in this case, Sanji and Luffy learned first and in this case Sanji doesn't know yet the Issuance and Luffy mastered it with the help of Hyogoro now in Wano's arc.

Other less noticeable moments are when Zoro talks about using Haki to block King's Explosion and also when Zoro momentarily stopped Kaido and Big Mom's "Hakai" that covered a large area of several kilometers, it wouldn't be possible to hold all that energy with just the physical, obviously it would need a barrier to hold it and keep it from hitting the other supernovas that are relatively far apart.

I consider this one of Zoro's best abilities and played a big role in his defense against massive blows, even if the blow is tens of times more powerful than Zoro, he could still survive because of this barrier, and now that she can too. be used with Haoshoku Haki, I wonder if Zoro could at least survive the Hakai, even if defeated. Efim hope that Oda brings this great utility more often.

Créditos: Bússolavertical​

Great post! Definitely worth a YouTube video

 

[XXGenesis]

Who are some of the fastest characters we’ve seen??

If I threw out a few I’ll say Kizaru, Law*, Kaido, Katakuri*, Brook/Sanji…..

 

[Lord Traffy Law]

Who are some of the fastest characters we’ve seen??

If I threw out a few I’ll say Kizaru, Law*, Kaido, Katakuri*, Brook/Sanji…..

Luffy

 

[Core D. Roy]

Who are some of the fastest characters we’ve seen??

If I threw out a few I’ll say Kizaru, Law*, Kaido, Katakuri*, Brook/Sanji…..

I think it's more useful to sort them by category when it comes to speed:

Burst (Generally teleporters or close enough to it): Kizaru, Law, Kuma

Sprint (Short distances at insane speeds): Sanji, Luffy, Katakuri, Kaidou, Yamato

Sustained (Essentially marathon runners): Brook, Su Long Carrot

 

[really_jonny]

Why don't you guys recognize that Zoro surpassed Kaido's speed when the beast was trying to attack him first?

 

[Pirate Queen]

Why don't you guys recognize that Zoro surpassed Kaido's speed when the beast was trying to attack him first?

Because Kaido wasn't being serious. At no point was Zoro a threat to Kaido

--- Double Post Merged, Mar 22, 2022, Original Post Date: Mar 22, 2022 ---

Sanji is probably one of the fastest characters in the verse

 

[Core D. Roy]

Why don't you guys recognize that Zoro surpassed Kaido's speed when the beast was trying to attack him first?

I assume Kaidou took the attack on purpose just to see what Zoro could dish out. Zoro dished it out, and Kaidou didn't fall, though he acknowledged that Zoro made a pretty wicked wound on top of Oden's. It's not a speed feat at all really, it's not like Kaidou was meeting him with a Thunder Bagua, his own blitzing move- dude just took it head on.

 

[Lord Traffy Law]

Kaido rarely tries to dodge tho that’s the issue
We’ve only seen when big mum warned him to dodge and when luffy stated it
Most times he’s trying to yank it

 

[grey matter]

Luffy wouldn’t be a 10 in every category, as that would indicate he’s the strongest…

Mine went like this
Luffy
Power:9
Speed:8
Durability:8
Stamina:9
Skills:8.5
Haki:9
51/60

Zoro
Power-8
Speed-6.5
Durability-5
Stamina-8
Skills-7.5
Haki-7.5
42/60

11-off the charts
10-Highest rating

Nah, I use relative scaling by normalizing all values of Luffy to 10

What does "10" otherwise even mean?
The issue with saying Luffy is "9" in power would be.....9 relative to who?
That in turn means that 10 is the ceiling in the entire series. But, if Luffy's attack power is 9, Kaido's should be more than 10. Prime WB and Roger would be way above 10.

Plus, there would be other issues in just adding up stats as well.
For each character, depending on abilities, some stats are more important than others.

I think this is a realistic gap that exist between Luffy & his 1st mate.

In terms of lifting I think Luffy & Zoro can most likely lift the same weight. In terms of destruction/damage/power. Luffy still comes out higher, even though Zoro can cut a ship in half.

I'd say, overall Zoro would be 80% of Luffy. Zoro can give him a high diff, or mid-high diff at least.

Luffy probably can lift more (pure strength), but same tier.
Zoro is capable of more damage/destruction IMO, though again they're in same tier. What makes you think Luffy is better in this regard?

--- Double Post Merged, Mar 22, 2022, Original Post Date: Mar 22, 2022 ---

Who are some of the fastest characters we’ve seen??

If I threw out a few I’ll say Kizaru, Law*, Kaido, Katakuri*, Brook/Sanji…..

There are three categories of speed IMO: pure speed (conventional), blitz/burst speed (short distance), attack speed (attack rate).

Pure speed:
Kizaru, Enel, Cavendish (Hakuba), King, Sanji, Luffy, Brook

Blitz speed:
Law, Kaido, Oden, Luffy, Zoro, Sanji, Yamato, King, Killer, Cavendish (Hakuba), Brook, CP0

Attack speed:
Luffy, Katakuri, King, Zoro, Sanji, Kaido

 

[LadyVados]

Spoiler: 1044

Luffy isn't Yonko level but the Gomu Gomu No may be

--- Double Post Merged, Mar 22, 2022, Original Post Date: Mar 22, 2022 ---

Spoiler: 1044

I wonder if "Luffy" is able to damage Kaido because of Joyboy's Haki ?

 

[Rein Avara]

Spoiler: 1044

Luffy isn't Yonko level but the Gomu Gomu No may be

--- Double Post Merged, Mar 22, 2022, Original Post Date: Mar 22, 2022 ---

Spoiler: 1044

I wonder if "Luffy" is able to damage Kaido because of Joyboy's Haki ?

What?

 

[LadyVados]

Spoiler: 1044

Was Luffy using Joyboy's Haki that was contained in the fruit throughout the entire series ? Maybe he himself can't actually use Haki ? Maybe Luffy's voice of all things and his personality come from the Gomu Gomu no too ? We may not have met the actual Luffy since Chapter 1.

 

[Nie Li]

Moving on from the 1044 topic that's more trolling than anything.

I see it has recently been argued that Zoro may have a hard time keeping up with Sanji's speed and I would like to give my two cents regarding their current speeds.

Spoiler: Regarding Z v S

Sanji does indeed have a base speed vastly superior to Zoro's now that he has awakened his... cyborg genes. Zoro can blitz enemies with his techniques, but he can't do something like move around so fast that he disappears.

However, who else can move around so fast he disappears? Zoro's latest opponent.

In chapter 1034, Sanji demonstrated how he can move so fast, even a high tier YC can lose sight of him.

Of course, Queen lacked the reaction time, advanced CoO or at least some integrated cyborg radar to follow his movements, but just disappearing entirely from his sight is very impressive.

Now, only one chapter later, on chapter 1035, King's powers were explained and he pulled a very similar speed feat on Zoro, who's also a high tier YC level character, and one that arguably has better kinetic vision than Queen given their respective fighting styles.

King's flames allow him to trade his unique durability for speed (or, in better words: he gets slowed down when he uses the flames to insanely boost his durability. The fact that he naturally gets faster when he uses his flames for anything else seems to suggest this is his real speed).

However, this is all that superior speed does for King once Zoro has figured him out.

King gets a single hit on Zoro before receiving a massive CoC-infused cut. And we can also see Zoro look right (the direction King is about to appear kicking him) before actually taking the hit, meaning Zoro can react to such an speed and not just after the physical contact.


So, what does this mean for a current theoretical fight between Sanji and Zoro, regarding their speeds?
While Sanji shines brightier than Zoro on the speed department, to take advantage of it to win a fair fight between the two, he should be capable of taking Zoro down on a single hit before Zoro takes him down with a single CoC attack (which may be a counter attack or just a big-ass CoC AoE like tatsumaki).

So then: can Sanji take Zoro down with a single kick? Ifrit Jambe is impressive (and it looks just too cool on the volume cover) but if we assume Zoro can at least tell where the attacks are going to come from (just like he knew with King) we also know that Zoro can defend himself with hardening anywhere on his body (just like he did to survive King's explosion a couple of chapters before this) so it is very possible that Zoro can block/tank and counterattack Sanji.

Not to say Zoro would come out unscathed since Sanji is closer to him than ever after his current boost and despite lacking CoC, but I don't see the difference in base speed, despite it being big, making a big difference in the outcome.

Now, that being said, Zoro is really on the path of Rayleigh 2.0, but Sanji is keeping up easily as the other wing of the Pirate King, and while I didn't initially like at all the activation of his modified genes, I've come to eventually like it as something that makes Sanji's character more unique while allowing him to keep growing ever stronger. It gives some variety to this Haki dick-measuring contest that we see in other fights.

 

[MakMatik]

Moving on from the 1044 topic that's more trolling than anything.

I see it has recently been argued that Zoro may have a hard time keeping up with Sanji's speed and I would like to give my two cents regarding their current speeds.

Spoiler: Regarding Z v S

Sanji does indeed have a base speed vastly superior to Zoro's now that he has awakened his... cyborg genes. Zoro can blitz enemies with his techniques, but he can't do something like move around so fast that he disappears.

However, who else can move around so fast he disappears? Zoro's latest opponent.

In chapter 1034, Sanji demonstrated how he can move so fast, even a high tier YC can lose sight of him.

Of course, Queen lacked the reaction time, advanced CoO or at least some integrated cyborg radar to follow his movements, but just disappearing entirely from his sight is very impressive.

Now, only one chapter later, on chapter 1035, King's powers were explained and he pulled a very similar speed feat on Zoro, who's also a high tier YC level character, and one that arguably has better kinetic vision than Queen given their respective fighting styles.

King's flames allow him to trade his unique durability for speed (or, in better words: he gets slowed down when he uses the flames to insanely boost his durability. The fact that he naturally gets faster when he uses his flames for anything else seems to suggest this is his real speed).

However, this is all that superior speed does for King once Zoro has figured him out.

King gets a single hit on Zoro before receiving a massive CoC-infused cut. And we can also see Zoro look right (the direction King is about to appear kicking him) before actually taking the hit, meaning Zoro can react to such an speed and not just after the physical contact.


So, what does this mean for a current theoretical fight between Sanji and Zoro, regarding their speeds?
While Sanji shines brightier than Zoro on the speed department, to take advantage of it to win a fair fight between the two, he should be capable of taking Zoro down on a single hit before Zoro takes him down with a single CoC attack (which may be a counter attack or just a big-ass CoC AoE like tatsumaki).

So then: can Sanji take Zoro down with a single kick? Ifrit Jambe is impressive (and it looks just too cool on the volume cover) but if we assume Zoro can at least tell where the attacks are going to come from (just like he knew with King) we also know that Zoro can defend himself with hardening anywhere on his body (just like he did to survive King's explosion a couple of chapters before this) so it is very possible that Zoro can block/tank and counterattack Sanji.

Not to say Zoro would come out unscathed since Sanji is closer to him than ever after his current boost and despite lacking CoC, but I don't see the difference in base speed, despite it being big, making a big difference in the outcome.

Now, that being said, Zoro is really on the path of Rayleigh 2.0, but Sanji is keeping up easily as the other wing of the Pirate King, and while I didn't initially like at all the activation of his modified genes, I've come to eventually like it as something that makes Sanji's character more unique while allowing him to keep growing ever stronger. It gives some variety to this Haki dick-measuring contest that we see in other fights.

I've never had too much of a problem with the raid suit or its modified genes. I just wanted the power up to feel more "earned". At least physically as opposed to psychologically/mentally with the family. Something like his upgraded durability coming from the 99 recipes or repeated use of his own upgraded recipes based on that, and then all the combinations to make Ifrit Jambe. That along with something in the fighting department that helped them escape WCI. Maybe an "Ifrit light" that had some double edged damage or something. I remember so often being like "wait until Sanji gets his first must defeat opponent in the NW" and Oda went straight for a YC2.

In regards to the speed feats. It all depends on how Sanji attacks. If, like King against Zoro, he goes for a big attack after his speed attack gets blocked then it becomes a durabilty battle. Zoro is already known to have insane durabilty and Sanji has the exoskeleton. We don't really know the full extent of his haki + exoskeleton strength and how it would fare against Zoro's CoC attack. I mean this in the sense of his CoC attack hitting the Ifrited leg. I think as opposed to an AoE attack like Tatsumaki, Zoro would need a more concentrated attack like his 103 damnations. The exo + muscle + haki + speed could probably tank CoC tatsumaki. At least that's my guess for now. There is also the whole movement speed vs attack speed argument I've seen but I don't care to go into that level of power scaling.

Obviously this is all just conjecture, but out of 10 fights with both of them at peak condition I would give Zoro 6, Sanji 4 at best. As the series goes on I'm not sure if it would sway Z7, S3 or Z51, S49.

 

[XXGenesis]

Luffy

Well yea of course. As we’ve seen. I think their stats are closer start of the Rooftop fight. When Luffy has to take on the #1 he surpasses Zoro…Zoro doesn’t close it a bit until next arc and then it happens all over again.

I think it's more useful to sort them by category when it comes to speed:

Burst (Generally teleporters or close enough to it): Kizaru, Law, Kuma

Sprint (Short distances at insane speeds): Sanji, Luffy, Katakuri, Kaidou, Yamato

Sustained (Essentially marathon runners): Brook, Su Long Carrot

Well a Burst/Blitz is different from Teleporting in my dictionary..

I would say FS & Teleportation are at the top. Either instantaneous movement; Foresight for perfect movement.

Blitz IMO would come next Ex.Thunder Bagua nearly outspeed FS; Zoro’s attack Speed;

 

[Nie Li]

I've never had too much of a problem with the raid suit or its modified genes. I just wanted the power up to feel more "earned". At least physically as opposed to psychologically/mentally with the family. Something like his upgraded durability coming from the 99 recipes or repeated use of his own upgraded recipes based on that, and then all the combinations to make Ifrit Jambe. That along with something in the fighting department that helped them escape WCI. Maybe an "Ifrit light" that had some double edged damage or something. I remember so often being like "wait until Sanji gets his first must defeat opponent in the NW" and Oda went straight for a YC2.

In regards to the speed feats. It all depends on how Sanji attacks. If, like King against Zoro, he goes for a big attack after his speed attack gets blocked then it becomes a durabilty battle. Zoro is already known to have insane durabilty and Sanji has the exoskeleton. We don't really know the full extent of his haki + exoskeleton strength and how it would fare against Zoro's CoC attack. I mean this in the sense of his CoC attack hitting the Ifrited leg. I think as opposed to an AoE attack like Tatsumaki, Zoro would need a more concentrated attack like his 103 damnations. The exo + muscle + haki + speed could probably tank CoC tatsumaki. At least that's my guess for now. There is also the whole movement speed vs attack speed argument I've seen but I don't care to go into that level of power scaling.

Obviously this is all just conjecture, but out of 10 fights with both of them at peak condition I would give Zoro 6, Sanji 4 at best. As the series goes on I'm not sure if it would sway Z7, S3 or Z51, S49.

I don't have much to add to the ZvS part since as you say here we are all just guessing, but I want to comment something regarding Sanji's durability.

It is true that we don't know the upper limits of Sanji's durability, that is very true. In fact, even without the exoskeleton, we didn't know the upper limit of his CoA durability but we can estimate it to be inferior to King's YC1 CoA, since Sanji thought he would have died without his suit when King divebombed him into the ground beak-first.

Now, we also know that some characters (King with the flames on his back, and very likely Jozu) have sturdier bodies than Kaido himself through their race and/or DF powers. King especifically tanked attacks from Zoro like they were nothing even when Zoro was using CoC. Meanwhile, Kaido was hurt (even if of course very lightly) while in dragon form by Zoro's Tatsumaki when Zoro was still barely taping into his CoC. A full-powered CoC tatsumaki would reasonably deal more damage even if it would of course also be more draining to Zoro.

So the question here is: do we assume Sanji with haki + exoskeleton is sturdier than dragon Kaido? Because if not, he wouldn't come unscathed from a Tatsumaki.

Not to say he can't see it coming with CoO and stay away from it. It's not like Sanji is out of options, I'm merely debating his durability now.

__________________________________________________________________________________________________

Now, regarding what you said about Sanji's power.

I do agree that I like it more when power ups are earned through some form of training rather than just "unlocked out of nowhere" but when has Sanji ever trained for his powerups in the series?

Spoiler: Sanji's curriculum so far

Sanji went from having trouble with Mr.2, to not having any major fight through which to push himself and evolve for two arcs, and then suddenly, like three arcs later, there he was still being comparable to Zoro (who busted his ass training) on Enies Lobby where he was kicking Jyabura around with mild difficulty even before somehow coming up with Diable Jambe. Even his two year time skip as far as the manga was concerned involved more running around than anything else, though at least the anime did expand on that making up those Okama Kenpo challenges. And after the timeskip more of the same: he barely holds up against Vergo, doesn't get a fight in Dressrosa, no proper fight in WCI either, and then suddenly he's kicking an All-Star around with no training inbetween.

So I'd say his new power-up is actually the most reasonable/justified one he's got in the series.

 

[Pirate Queen]

Sanji would struggle with Zoro's Attack Power to the same degree that Zoro would struggle with Sanji's Speed.

Their power ups truly complimented eachother. I'm excited for their next levels of combat. Both seem so close to their peak or prime

 

[grey matter]

Moving on from the 1044 topic that's more trolling than anything.

I see it has recently been argued that Zoro may have a hard time keeping up with Sanji's speed and I would like to give my two cents regarding their current speeds.

Spoiler: Regarding Z v S

Sanji does indeed have a base speed vastly superior to Zoro's now that he has awakened his... cyborg genes. Zoro can blitz enemies with his techniques, but he can't do something like move around so fast that he disappears.

However, who else can move around so fast he disappears? Zoro's latest opponent.

In chapter 1034, Sanji demonstrated how he can move so fast, even a high tier YC can lose sight of him.

Of course, Queen lacked the reaction time, advanced CoO or at least some integrated cyborg radar to follow his movements, but just disappearing entirely from his sight is very impressive.

Now, only one chapter later, on chapter 1035, King's powers were explained and he pulled a very similar speed feat on Zoro, who's also a high tier YC level character, and one that arguably has better kinetic vision than Queen given their respective fighting styles.

King's flames allow him to trade his unique durability for speed (or, in better words: he gets slowed down when he uses the flames to insanely boost his durability. The fact that he naturally gets faster when he uses his flames for anything else seems to suggest this is his real speed).

However, this is all that superior speed does for King once Zoro has figured him out.

King gets a single hit on Zoro before receiving a massive CoC-infused cut. And we can also see Zoro look right (the direction King is about to appear kicking him) before actually taking the hit, meaning Zoro can react to such an speed and not just after the physical contact.


So, what does this mean for a current theoretical fight between Sanji and Zoro, regarding their speeds?
While Sanji shines brightier than Zoro on the speed department, to take advantage of it to win a fair fight between the two, he should be capable of taking Zoro down on a single hit before Zoro takes him down with a single CoC attack (which may be a counter attack or just a big-ass CoC AoE like tatsumaki).

So then: can Sanji take Zoro down with a single kick? Ifrit Jambe is impressive (and it looks just too cool on the volume cover) but if we assume Zoro can at least tell where the attacks are going to come from (just like he knew with King) we also know that Zoro can defend himself with hardening anywhere on his body (just like he did to survive King's explosion a couple of chapters before this) so it is very possible that Zoro can block/tank and counterattack Sanji.

Not to say Zoro would come out unscathed since Sanji is closer to him than ever after his current boost and despite lacking CoC, but I don't see the difference in base speed, despite it being big, making a big difference in the outcome.

Now, that being said, Zoro is really on the path of Rayleigh 2.0, but Sanji is keeping up easily as the other wing of the Pirate King, and while I didn't initially like at all the activation of his modified genes, I've come to eventually like it as something that makes Sanji's character more unique while allowing him to keep growing ever stronger. It gives some variety to this Haki dick-measuring contest that we see in other fights.

Agreed for the most part.

Sanji having Raid suit would've been much better than this though. It would've achieved the same thing.
Had great buildup over years, had some subplot behind it etc.