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.

 

[kkck]

I personally think its implied but not stated in that fight the scales are an issue. Definitely room for interpretation so you may disagree but here's my rationale:

• Aramki used his vine/wood attack to either capture (wrap around folk) or pierce folk (presumably to drain them). You can see the difference between these two types of attacks since the latter usually has him send the vines in a stabbing fashion. Example here when he got Raizo. You'll notice he appears to coat the tip of his vine in CoA when he does this.
• Later once he captured Momo it appears he tried to neutralize him by doing the vine thing to the face. The attack from Aramki is off screened but you do see something hit Momo in the face here that was either a jab/stab from the vine or a punch.
• Lastly post Momo using Bolo breath Aramki wanted to finish him off. In this case as you can see here it was clear Aramki planned to stab Momo with the vine as you can see he has the CoA on the tip similar to how he got Raizo. However, Aramki also made the explicit statement that he planned to skewer Momo from mouth to tail.

My read on all this is that Aramki tried piercing Momo's head with his vine but failed to do any serious damage. As a result, in the second attempt Aramki would rather try going through the mouth, a clear weak point around the scales, instead of what he'd been doing with everyone else which was to just stab them on their torso and just pierce through the skin. The implication was the scales are harder to get through.

On a separate note this is how Momo looked in his first appearance after that skirmish with Aramaki. Despite getting hit by an Admiral and being slammed to the ground he left that interaction completely uninjured. On the other hand a Scabbard Raizo, and Scabbard Adjacent Shinobu, King, Queen etc all fell easily to Aramki pierce/drain technique. Considering how much a novice Momo is I think all of this durability has to be credited to his genes/Dragon form.


This is a fair point. Swordsmen do tend to only need to land a few solid hits to win. Most of the fight they are usually getting blocked. I can concede that Pica losing in a single landing attack may not indicate anything about his durability. I just didn't give him the benefit of the doubt since that fight was his only showing.


I disagree here. My comparison wasn't about who is stronger between Cracker & Doffy. My point was that Doffy a presumably weaker opponent than Cracker was able to keep getting back up despite being hit by multiple G4 attacks (on top of the injuries he already had). Cracker overall was definitely a harder opponent and faired a lot better against G4 than Doffy. However, he was unable to get back up and fight after the single G4 attack landed which is what I'm counting against him on durability.

Hmm, to me it'd be weird that aramaki never noted an inability to get past momo's scales. I would even argue that his last comment before he was coerced into stopping by shanks suggests he very much thought he could simply pierce momo. Another issue to consider, the scabbards were mostly uninjured from the confrontation. The only ones that were injured were the ones who had their nutrients drained but the others were mostly just restrained while aramaki explained how utterly worthless their unaffiliated lives were. Aramaki, for the sake of plot convenience simply didn't attemtp to drain momo. Because consistency on aramaki's part would have gotten in the way of the plot and oda can't have that.

On the zoro front the main issue is a lack of consistency in how swordsman fights are handled. Generally zoro will land but a few, if that, big techniques to win. Meanwhile he will eat all the big attacks from enemy swordsmen and just keep going (this varies across fights and arcs of course).

On the crack thing my main issue was the bit about " He was difficult due to his ability ...". Cracker was just powerful and could straight up keep up with G4 speed. His exceptional ability added a layer of difficulty on top of that.

 

[Fox666]

Hmm, to me it'd be weird that aramaki never noted an inability to get past momo's scales. I would even argue that his last comment before he was coerced into stopping by shanks suggests he very much thought he could simply pierce momo. Another issue to consider, the scabbards were mostly uninjured from the confrontation. The only ones that were injured were the ones who had their nutrients drained but the others were mostly just restrained while aramaki explained how utterly worthless their unaffiliated lives were. Aramaki, for the sake of plot convenience simply didn't attemtp to drain momo. Because consistency on aramaki's part would have gotten in the way of the plot and oda can't have that.

The fact that Momonosuke never got hit hard tells me he had plot armor, not skin/scale armor

Edit: Technically there's this...

But Yamato could hurt Kaido too, so it doesn't really prove anything

 

[kkck]

The fact that Momonosuke never got hit hard tells me he had plot armor, not skin/scale armor

Edit: Technically there's this...

But Yamato could hurt Kaido too, so it doesn't really prove anything

That's pretty much the gist of it lol. Aramaki simply never went that hard against momo but with raizo he was all "fuck that guy". Also.. does anyone even think aramaki can't hurt the actual kaido? The guy is an admiral ffs. If aramaki has non zero problems injuring momo then the guy would get foderized by kaido without ever landing so much of a scratch on him. I've never placed admirals in the same tier as yonko but they should be capable of putting up a fight at least.

 

[DeadlyBeast]

Hmm, to me it'd be weird that aramaki never noted an inability to get past momo's scales. I would even argue that his last comment before he was coerced into stopping by shanks suggests he very much thought he could simply pierce momo. Another issue to consider, the scabbards were mostly uninjured from the confrontation. The only ones that were injured were the ones who had their nutrients drained but the others were mostly just restrained while aramaki explained how utterly worthless their unaffiliated lives were. Aramaki, for the sake of plot convenience simply didn't attemtp to drain momo. Because consistency on aramaki's part would have gotten in the way of the plot and oda can't have that.

On the zoro front the main issue is a lack of consistency in how swordsman fights are handled. Generally zoro will land but a few, if that, big techniques to win. Meanwhile he will eat all the big attacks from enemy swordsmen and just keep going (this varies across fights and arcs of course).

On the crack thing my main issue was the bit about " He was difficult due to his ability ...". Cracker was just powerful and could straight up keep up with G4 speed. His exceptional ability added a layer of difficulty on top of that.

Yeah on the Momo thing that was just my one interpretation. I can completely see it the way you described too. We know Momo's dragon form offers defensive capabilities but its still up in the air what those limits are i.e. is he as hard as someone like Jozu, Daz Bones.

The inconsistency with the swordsman part is true. Part of why I held being KOed in a single hit against Pika was because my mind automatically compared him to Zoro and I'm like Zoro has taken so many slashes/cuts and kept fighting. But like you said it is inconsistent so if I compare Pika to anyone it should be against Zoro's past opponents who in all reality were taken out by 1-2 landed cuts from Zoro going all the way back to East Blue.

I still don't think I agree on the on the Cracker part. Do you think Cracker without any of his Biscuit soldiers would have been a match to G4 Luffy in a long 10 hour fight?

Or when you say he was powerful do you mean Cracker (the main body) is fast enough to keep up with G4 Luffy in close combat, strong enough CoA+sword to harm G4? I could buy this if we conced that Cracker is not durable enough to beat G4 Luffy (durable in the sense of taking hits to his body, not endurance like fatigue from running).

 

[kkck]

I still don't think I agree on the on the Cracker part. Do you think Cracker without any of his Biscuit soldiers would have been a match to G4 Luffy in a long 10 hour fight?

Or when you say he was powerful do you mean Cracker (the main body) is fast enough to keep up with G4 Luffy in close combat, strong enough CoA+sword to harm G4? I could buy this if we conced that Cracker is not durable enough to beat G4 Luffy (durable in the sense of taking hits to his body, not endurance like fatigue from running).

That I have no idea. Cracker was fast enough to avoid hits from G4 and immediately counter and the implication during the fight was that he was able to keep that up. But whether that alone is enough for him to win is anyone's guess, I don't think losing the ability would do cracker any favors but it's hard to determine what the deal here would be considering how massive an impact nami had on what we saw.

 

[Fox666]

Yeah on the Momo thing that was just my one interpretation. I can completely see it the way you described too. We know Momo's dragon form offers defensive capabilities but its still up in the air what those limits are i.e. is he as hard as someone like Jozu, Daz Bones.

It's really annoying how Wano is over and we don't really get a confirmation of how Kaido's fruit affected his durability.

Supposedly he was already a monster when he was a kid, so I think his fruit has nothing to do with his durability.

The inconsistency with the swordsman part is true. Part of why I held being KOed in a single hit against Pika was because my mind automatically compared him to Zoro and I'm like Zoro has taken so many slashes/cuts and kept fighting. But like you said it is inconsistent so if I compare Pika to anyone it should be against Zoro's past opponents who in all reality were taken out by 1-2 landed cuts from Zoro going all the way back to East Blue.

Pica was strong without his fruit, and fought Zoro with his sword for many chapters off-panel.

 

[albertwv]

On the Zolo part.... It was always in the back of my head and it bugged me, but for most of his climatic fights, Zolo would land fewer hits/slashes compared to his opponents. His opponents would land waaaayyy more hits on Zolo, detailing how Zolo can handle so much damage, probably even more than Luffy. And then finally Zolo turns the tide of the battle by learning a new trick and One Hit K-O's his opponent. Zolo lands some hits on his opponents but rarely damages them until the last hit where he KO's them.
Look at Mr. 1 battle, Zolo clashes with Mr. 1 but doesn't manage to cut him much less damage him. While Mr. 1 is completely unharmed and skewering/dicing Zolo until the last panel where Zolo OHKO's him.
Vs. Kaku, Zolo cuts him a few times, If I remember correctly, but doesn't damage him, while Kaku is landing so many hits on Zolo. Then finally Zolo uses Ashura and wins in OHKO.
Vs. King, Zolo knocks King on his feet while Sanji knocks Queen on his feet too, manages to cut King's mask off, stabs King directly but then King explodes, slashes King directly while King is "Recovering" but does no damage, King meanwhile keeps knocking down Zolo, not until Zolo learns ACoC did he manage to cut King in one last hit and wins the battle.

For most of his battles, Zolo takes damage up the ass, but in the final attack he one hits KO's his unharmed opponents and wins.

Anyways,
Cracker compared to DD versus Gear 4 Luffy....honestly I place Cracker slightly above DD, due to way G4 Luffy manhandled DD. But it's hard to tell due to Oda off-paneling Cracker vs Luffy. We only saw a few panels of their fight, while we saw a whole Goku vs Frieza fight of DD vs Luffy. People like to bring up the fact that Cracker himself stated that he doesn't stand a single prick of a needle against his defense. That doesn't necessarily mean, Cracker's body is weak, he just doesn't like pain, he's not Zolo who is attracted to pain. The only hit Luffy managed to land was a Gear 4 Tankman hit that sent him flying THROUGH various Cracker Biscuit Soldiers who are tough as hell.

Speaking of Pica, where would you guys place the DD Pirates and Colosseum Fighters, among the Yonko Executives?
I think Vergo was the strongest and he was senior VA level. Then Pica and then Trebol and finally Diamante.

 

[kkck]

I think it's safe to say that kaido's fruit afforded him significantly more durability than conventional zoan devil fruits. But ultimately hte bulk of his durability was attributed to his conqueror's haki and could be countered with conqueror haki.

 

[Sachsenhesse]

I think Vergo was the strongest and he was senior VA level. Then Pica and then Trebol and finally Diamante.

Pica was stronger then Vergo in my eyes. Vergo had some real bad advantages over smoker and Law, which made him seem formidable.
Picas fruit on the other hand is a real pain in the ass.
Since both are capable of cladding their entire body in haki, i think they seem to be nearly on par.
I give it to Pica only because of his fruit.

But stronger then VA no.

The wouldnt even qualify for flying six.

 

[grey matter]

The wouldnt even qualify for flying six.

Look at Sanji blitzing Ovens so hard that he didn't know what hit him.
Now see Vergo basically overwhelming Sanji in CQC, and basically being implied of high diffing him.

Vergo and Pica were definitely Tobiroppo levels. Quite possibly high end Tobiroppo level characters

On the Zolo part.... It was always in the back of my head and it bugged me, but for most of his climatic fights, Zolo would land fewer hits/slashes compared to his opponents. His opponents would land waaaayyy more hits on Zolo, detailing how Zolo can handle so much damage, probably even more than Luffy. And then finally Zolo turns the tide of the battle by learning a new trick and One Hit K-O's his opponent. Zolo lands some hits on his opponents but rarely damages them until the last hit where he KO's them.
Look at Mr. 1 battle, Zolo clashes with Mr. 1 but doesn't manage to cut him much less damage him. While Mr. 1 is completely unharmed and skewering/dicing Zolo until the last panel where Zolo OHKO's him.
Vs. Kaku, Zolo cuts him a few times, If I remember correctly, but doesn't damage him, while Kaku is landing so many hits on Zolo. Then finally Zolo uses Ashura and wins in OHKO.
Vs. King, Zolo knocks King on his feet while Sanji knocks Queen on his feet too, manages to cut King's mask off, stabs King directly but then King explodes, slashes King directly while King is "Recovering" but does no damage, King meanwhile keeps knocking down Zolo, not until Zolo learns ACoC did he manage to cut King in one last hit and wins the battle.

For most of his battles, Zolo takes damage up the ass, but in the final attack he one hits KO's his unharmed opponents and wins.

Anyways,
Cracker compared to DD versus Gear 4 Luffy....honestly I place Cracker slightly above DD, due to way G4 Luffy manhandled DD. But it's hard to tell due to Oda off-paneling Cracker vs Luffy. We only saw a few panels of their fight, while we saw a whole Goku vs Frieza fight of DD vs Luffy. People like to bring up the fact that Cracker himself stated that he doesn't stand a single prick of a needle against his defense. That doesn't necessarily mean, Cracker's body is weak, he just doesn't like pain, he's not Zolo who is attracted to pain. The only hit Luffy managed to land was a Gear 4 Tankman hit that sent him flying THROUGH various Cracker Biscuit Soldiers who are tough as hell.

Speaking of Pica, where would you guys place the DD Pirates and Colosseum Fighters, among the Yonko Executives?
I think Vergo was the strongest and he was senior VA level. Then Pica and then Trebol and finally Diamante.

Regarding Zoro part.

True for Mr 1, yeah he got one shot after Zoro learned to cut steel.
But Kaku took damage from multiple attacks from Zoro pre Asura though. King took at least 3 advanced conqueror's attacks before getting "one shot" by dragon damnation.

In both these cases though, Zoro used his high end attacks (in Kaku's case Zoro's strongest technique till date even now). I wouldn't consider being one shot in exchange of high end attacks as a conventional one shot.......if that makes sense.

But anyway, Zoro has always had arguably the best attack power amongst strawhats since forever (IMO it's only debatable during/post Wano, he had the best attack power without a doubt before that).
Plus he has lethality of being a swordsman.

It is for this reason that Oda typically gives Zoro opponents that have means to deal with his damage output:
- Mr1 whose body is made of steel/swords
- Pica who has means to stall with his earth DF
- King who is even tankier than Kaido, and whose genes are specifically the factor in making Seraphim "invincible"



Cracker vs Doflamingo.....
There is a lot to unpack here lol. I've written about this somewhere, will try to find and quote it. IMO Doflamingo is stronger than most commanders, aside from the right hand men.

--- Double Post Merged, Feb 17, 2023, Original Post Date: Feb 17, 2023 ---

@albertwv regarding Doflamingo

Not making any points about Lucci vs Doffy here.........just some points about Doffy.


Two things to consider here:
1. Doflamingo was nerfed. We can't say for sure how nerfed he was, but was significant enough where he went from casually dodging G2 Luffy, to barely dodging G2 Luffy
Doffy easily dodging G2 gataling spam:

Spoiler

While post GK, Doffy had a hard time keeping up with G2, getting hit often (but with then commenting that Luffy's attacks were too weak to damage)


2. He was getting dominated only pre awakening. Awakening Doffy was actually on the same level as G4 Luffy, and foought equally with him for 20+ minutes.
Doflamingo starts using awakening and able to comfortably deal with G4 attacks (while prior he was getting smacked around):

Spoiler

20 more minutes passed, they are in stalemate:

Spoiler

Riku says they don't know if Luffy will win or not, again indicating a more or less even fight:

Spoiler

****************

What eventually happened was that Doffy's finisher got overpowered by Luffy's finisher.
No be noted however, is that KKG is G4 Luffy's strongest attack in terms of raw power. Just the impact of Doffy landing from that attack folded an entire city block in half!

This is similar to the ending of Wano, where Kaido's finisher clashed with G5 and he lost.
Where both Kaido and Doflamingo believe that their finisher was stronger and intended to take the attack head on, instead of working around it.

But just as how we don't know if Kaido could've overpowered if he didn't go through a gauntlet and was out of gas. I'd say a similar argument can be used for Doffy, whose power got nerfed after getting hit by gamma knife.
I'm not saying it's a 1:1 comparison, because the nerf argument for Kaido is more applicable since it was more of a tug of war there while Doffy's finisher got overpowered easier. But, just putting it out there

They did hurt G4 Luffy
This was Luffy's state after coming out of G4. Just running out of stamina won't do this, you could see that in later instances where Luffy's G4 ran out. He was just tired and couldn't use haki.

Spoiler

Sabo: you look like hell

Spoiler

Luffy after the fight, was so injured that he was KO'd for 3 days straight. Even Katakuri fight didn't do that to Luffy.

It just so happens that whatever damage Doffy did was off-screened.




Fighting fodders don't matter.
Bellamy is again fodder. Maybe not worthless fodder, but still a low diff material for Luffy.

A nerfed Doffy was having an even fight with G4 Luffy for 20 mins (implied from the dialogues), or at the very least holding his own. If Luffy went to G4 in pure 1v1 against healthy Doffy, Doffy easily outlasts the time limit, and kills off Luffy when he runs out of G4.



Lucci probably wins.
Like I said, I wasn't trying to say anything about Doffy vs Lucci here.

I was just pointing out that Doffy is generally underrated due to how G4 Luffy vs Doffy was perceived.

 

[Nie Li]

On the Zolo part.... It was always in the back of my head and it bugged me, but for most of his climatic fights, Zolo would land fewer hits/slashes compared to his opponents. His opponents would land waaaayyy more hits on Zolo, detailing how Zolo can handle so much damage, probably even more than Luffy. And then finally Zolo turns the tide of the battle by learning a new trick and One Hit K-O's his opponent. Zolo lands some hits on his opponents but rarely damages them until the last hit where he KO's them.
Look at Mr. 1 battle, Zolo clashes with Mr. 1 but doesn't manage to cut him much less damage him. While Mr. 1 is completely unharmed and skewering/dicing Zolo until the last panel where Zolo OHKO's him.
Vs. Kaku, Zolo cuts him a few times, If I remember correctly, but doesn't damage him, while Kaku is landing so many hits on Zolo. Then finally Zolo uses Ashura and wins in OHKO.
Vs. King, Zolo knocks King on his feet while Sanji knocks Queen on his feet too, manages to cut King's mask off, stabs King directly but then King explodes, slashes King directly while King is "Recovering" but does no damage, King meanwhile keeps knocking down Zolo, not until Zolo learns ACoC did he manage to cut King in one last hit and wins the battle.

For most of his battles, Zolo takes damage up the ass, but in the final attack he one hits KO's his unharmed opponents and wins.

Anyways,
Cracker compared to DD versus Gear 4 Luffy....honestly I place Cracker slightly above DD, due to way G4 Luffy manhandled DD. But it's hard to tell due to Oda off-paneling Cracker vs Luffy. We only saw a few panels of their fight, while we saw a whole Goku vs Frieza fight of DD vs Luffy. People like to bring up the fact that Cracker himself stated that he doesn't stand a single prick of a needle against his defense. That doesn't necessarily mean, Cracker's body is weak, he just doesn't like pain, he's not Zolo who is attracted to pain. The only hit Luffy managed to land was a Gear 4 Tankman hit that sent him flying THROUGH various Cracker Biscuit Soldiers who are tough as hell.

Speaking of Pica, where would you guys place the DD Pirates and Colosseum Fighters, among the Yonko Executives?
I think Vergo was the strongest and he was senior VA level. Then Pica and then Trebol and finally Diamante.

You're not wrong that Zoro has always been the biggest damage sponge alive. I guess this is subjective because I can see why you'd dislike Zoro taking all that damage and then winning in one hit most of the times but I never hated that about him.

His opponents were just not as tanky as he is. Sure, some like Mr.1 and King were a lot harder to injure than Zoro is, his body isn't hard like theirs, but he can take a lot more punishment, and I always believed not even Luffy really is tankier than him (and I also believe that to be the proven case on Thriller Bark after Luffy had already fainted but Zoro took on his stuff + his own already accumulated damage and kept standing until morning).

I remember back when I started reading the manga there was an SBS in which Oda commented on the LITERS of blood Zoro lost in each specific fight. He should have been dead at Arlong Park already and he bled even more vs Mr.1.

Just look at his first real battle in the manga, when he fought Cabaji: had been stabbed through the abdomen with a knife and lifted a heavy cage over his shoulders which made him bleed further. Then took a nap but the building he was in was blown up. Then the fight started and he was kicked in the wound, then he slashed his own abdomen open mid-fight just to prove that a wound wasn't an excuse to lose (that was censored out of the anime).

That trend has continued throughout the manga before he was forgotten as a character post-TS until Wano, where more or less he was brought up to be the tank that he's always been but that was poorly executed by Oda as most things were in Onigashima.


King is the tankiest opponent he's had since he did tank a couple of advanced CoC attacks before the third brought him down.

 

[LadyVados]

That doesn’t make sense. Seeing how long it took 2 commanders to wear out 1….Obviously the single commander is a stronger individual than the duo.

Not to mention Marco still had stamina left. He was just really tired. Marco still protected Zoro from King’s attack..& Nami & co from A Boro Blast…Marco.

YC1 wouldn’t make Big Mom use up souls. Only a YC1+ would

Queen left after 2 seconds to fight Chopper and Sanji

--- Double Post Merged, Feb 17, 2023, Original Post Date: Feb 17, 2023 ---

Look at Sanji blitzing Ovens so hard that he didn't know what hit him.
Now see Vergo basically overwhelming Sanji in CQC, and basically being implied of high diffing him.

Vergo and Pica were definitely Tobiroppo levels. Quite possibly high end Tobiroppo level characters



Regarding Zoro part.

True for Mr 1, yeah he got one shot after Zoro learned to cut steel.
But Kaku took damage from multiple attacks from Zoro pre Asura though. King took at least 3 advanced conqueror's attacks before getting "one shot" by dragon damnation.

In both these cases though, Zoro used his high end attacks (in Kaku's case Zoro's strongest technique till date even now). I wouldn't consider being one shot in exchange of high end attacks as a conventional one shot.......if that makes sense.

But anyway, Zoro has always had arguably the best attack power amongst strawhats since forever (IMO it's only debatable during/post Wano, he had the best attack power without a doubt before that).
Plus he has lethality of being a swordsman.

It is for this reason that Oda typically gives Zoro opponents that have means to deal with his damage output:
- Mr1 whose body is made of steel/swords
- Pica who has means to stall with his earth DF
- King who is even tankier than Kaido, and whose genes are specifically the factor in making Seraphim "invincible"



Cracker vs Doflamingo.....
There is a lot to unpack here lol. I've written about this somewhere, will try to find and quote it. IMO Doflamingo is stronger than most commanders, aside from the right hand men.

--- Double Post Merged, Feb 17, 2023, Original Post Date: Feb 17, 2023 ---

@albertwv regarding Doflamingo

Zoro always gets beaten up and is losing then goes super saiyan and mid diffs his opponents.

 

[Pirate Queen]

Look at Sanji blitzing Ovens so hard that he didn't know what hit him.
Now see Vergo basically overwhelming Sanji in CQC, and basically being implied of high diffing him.

Vergo and Pica were definitely Tobiroppo levels. Quite possibly high end Tobiroppo level characters



Regarding Zoro part.

True for Mr 1, yeah he got one shot after Zoro learned to cut steel.
But Kaku took damage from multiple attacks from Zoro pre Asura though. King took at least 3 advanced conqueror's attacks before getting "one shot" by dragon damnation.

In both these cases though, Zoro used his high end attacks (in Kaku's case Zoro's strongest technique till date even now). I wouldn't consider being one shot in exchange of high end attacks as a conventional one shot.......if that makes sense.

But anyway, Zoro has always had arguably the best attack power amongst strawhats since forever (IMO it's only debatable during/post Wano, he had the best attack power without a doubt before that).
Plus he has lethality of being a swordsman.

It is for this reason that Oda typically gives Zoro opponents that have means to deal with his damage output:
- Mr1 whose body is made of steel/swords
- Pica who has means to stall with his earth DF
- King who is even tankier than Kaido, and whose genes are specifically the factor in making Seraphim "invincible"



Cracker vs Doflamingo.....
There is a lot to unpack here lol. I've written about this somewhere, will try to find and quote it. IMO Doflamingo is stronger than most commanders, aside from the right hand men.

--- Double Post Merged, Feb 17, 2023, Original Post Date: Feb 17, 2023 ---

@albertwv regarding Doflamingo

You just reminded me of a wild time when Pica was argued to be stronger than all F6 combined by a certain member that is no longer with us

 

[kkck]

Nah, the power scaling is simply not in vergo's or pica's favor. Just for the sake of context, luffy responded to freaking ulti with gear 4 during the onigashima raid. Does anyone think vergo, who didn't turn an injured sanji into a bloodstain with a single half assed kick would ever get luffy to even consider gear 4? An arc later sanji was nigh instantly wrecked by doflamingo and doflamingo could handle without that much trouble gear 2-3 luffy. The flying six were completely lackluster by yonko executive standards but come on, they were better than doflamingo's crew by a fair bit. The only one that might pose a threat would be pica and that because his ability is tough to deal with. Any flying six should at least last a bit against doflamingo, something which no one in doflamingo's crew coul boast of.

 

[Fox666]

Look at Sanji blitzing Ovens so hard that he didn't know what hit him.
Now see Vergo basically overwhelming Sanji in CQC, and basically being implied of high diffing him.

I think Sanji got stronger between Dressrosa and Whole Cake... and I would guess Oven could defeat Vergo.

 

[kkck]

I kinda wonder, how powerful exactly is the strawhat crew? As in, the primary members, not the affiliated crews. Looking at the primary crewmembers it's beginning to look like the strawhats far exceed the known yonko crews, with some caveats. In context:

Luffy	Big mom	Kaido	Whitebeard
Zoro	Katakuri	King	Marco
Sanji	Smoothie	Queen	Jozu
jinbe	Cracker	Jack	Vista
Franky	Perospero	Whos whos	Ace
Robin	Snack	Sasaki	Fossa
Brook	Oven	Black maria	Rakuyo
Ussop	Daifuku	Drake	Izou
Nami	Compote	Ulti	Haruta
Chopper		Page one	Bleimheim

That roughly in order of strength, though admittedly WB's crew is a little wonky. Couldn't decide on who to put as big mom's 10th person. Too many potentially viable candidates. Smoothie's sisters, bavarua, mont d'or, all seem appropriate candidates.

In any case, in a one to one confrontation to me it looks like the strawhats are incredibly powerful even by yonko executive standards. Power is definitely a bit skewed towards the top though, with the final members sort of lagging behind. But zoro is definitely more powerful than king and katakuri at this point. What he pulled at the end of his fight against king would even suggest he should be able to even hold his own in single combat against a yonko for at least a bit. Sanji is not there yet but he should be able to perform quite well against king or katakuri. King is probably more of an issue due to sanji's skillset not being ideal to fight him to begin with. I would assume king has some innate resistance to fire at least. Sanji is so fast that he is invisible to queen and there's evidence his observation haki is excellent even without foresight so foresight alone shouldn't be something katakuri can lord over him. I don't think sanji would win yet but this isn't an easy fight for katakuri.

I am not sold on jinbe being a YC1-2 fighter but he should be quite high up the pecking order. His water should cancel cracker's ability but cracker is still a formidable combatant and fast enough to handle G4 luffy at WCI. Then we have jack or vista... honestly, both more dangerous than jinbe considering jack was framed from the get go as someone substantially more dangerous than even doflamingo and vista held his own against mihawk, who clearly respected his strength. Kinda wonder if jinbe would win against doflamingo. The idea is weird but perhaps jinbe has grown stronger? Jinbe feels somewhat lackluster compared to YC3-4s we have seen.

Marco, jozu and vista are weird to place, their feats are all over the place. Marco held his own against both queen and king. And iirc there was even an instance of marco causing damage through king's defense form. Which is obviously ridiculous. I suppose marco could be somewhere in between king and kaido strength wise. Which I suppose would explain the insane amount of respect marco gets in the story. In combat I think marco would simply outlast zoro for now though it'd be interesting to see if perhaps zoro's flame cutting somehow hard counters marco or works towards dealing more damage than more conventional attacks. If not that, at least shutting down marco's flame based attacks.

Normally I am of the idea that a YC4 is somewhere in the ballpark of doflamingo. Though to me it's kinda hard to imagine the flying six being there. Could franky hold his own against doflamingo? Franky shogun did hold his own against sasaki but was ultimately trashed. It sounds unnatural that he could actually hold his own against doflamingo. I suppose no one in the story can eat a laser and not feel it, including yonko....

Robin is not a character I understand. His martial art is fair to argue is uniquely deadly though its weird to think there's that many people it would really be that useful against. At her tier I suppose the people she should be handling are oven... fossa types? Fossa feels like someone who at some point had the role of number 2 in WB's crew though. Oven should be able to cook robin. Is robin even a haki user? If she had haki even logia users wouldn't be able to ignore her infinite chokehold.

Brook... has had a somewhat lackluster showing in the new world. he did defeat a number and BM's subordinates which is worth mentioning at least and the numbers seem to be fairly durable but how does that help to determine whether's he'd be worth anything to oven-daifuku... rakuyo?

Nami is wildcard. With the acquisition of zeus her actual firepower is off the charts, potentially yonko level. But her basic skills are entirely lackluster. I suppose her strength can be regarded as situational. As in, if she gets a chance to prepare a decent attack she will one shot most yonko executives but otherwise can't actually hold her own.

I suppose this goes back towards the strawhat crew strength being severely skewed towards the top. Luffy is an actual match to real yonko. Zoro can moonlight as a yonko level threat for a bit. Sanji is at least dangerous to non marco YC1 types. But then jinbe seems to be a rather awkward fit to actually handle YC3-4 types which he doesn't hard counter (doflamingo, vista, jack). Franky doesn't seem like that solid a match against YC 4-5 types outside the topo robi though I suppose he could be a reasonable match in some cases. Maybe he can laser down oven-daifuku types.

 

[M3J]

I always lol at the idea of Vergo beating Sanji with the logic used. But I tire of repeating myself against the dumb points made for Vergo.

In any case, I hope we get a rematch of Luffy vs. Kaidou, one-on-one without anyone else helping. I'd love to see who and how is strong.

 

[grey matter]

I think Sanji got stronger between Dressrosa and Whole Cake... and I would guess Oven could defeat Vergo.

Why? He didn't fight anyone at all.
After the Vergo incident, he got no diff'd by Doffy and that's it. Then he fights Ovens.

To grow stronger, you need fights.

You just reminded me of a wild time when Pica was argued to be stronger than all F6 combined by a certain member that is no longer with us

??

I don't see any arguments against Vergo/Pica being Tobiroppo level at least.

Zoro always gets beaten up and is losing then goes super saiyan and mid diffs his opponents.

Yep, basically it.
Gets beaten up in mid diff, gets powerup, mid diff the opponent.

For Kaku though, I'd argue it's still high diff overall.
Zoro didn't get a "powerup" strictly speaking. He just learned his strongest attack, and proceeded to overpower Kaku's strongest attack (which he prior had to dodge) and then defeat him.

--- Double Post Merged, Feb 18, 2023, Original Post Date: Feb 18, 2023 ---

Nah, the power scaling is simply not in vergo's or pica's favor. Just for the sake of context, luffy responded to freaking ulti with gear 4 during the onigashima raid. Does anyone think vergo, who didn't turn an injured sanji into a bloodstain with a single half assed kick would ever get luffy to even consider gear 4? An arc later sanji was nigh instantly wrecked by doflamingo and doflamingo could handle without that much trouble gear 2-3 luffy. The flying six were completely lackluster by yonko executive standards but come on, they were better than doflamingo's crew by a fair bit. The only one that might pose a threat would be pica and that because his ability is tough to deal with. Any flying six should at least last a bit against doflamingo, something which no one in doflamingo's crew coul boast of.

Reason G2/G3 Luffy could fight against Doffy was because:
- Doffy was massively nerfed. Prior to that nerf, you could see him dodge a G2 gataling casually. While later on, he could get tagged by G2 and was basically equal to G2 in CQC
- Luffy's rubber body, which can expand/contract, counters Doffy's strings. Without these exapansion/contraction, Doffy ties him up easily as Sanji (maybe takes a bit more time)

G4 Luffy was gonna low diff Ulti anyway. He just wanted to get things over fast.
Luffy used G4 against a random number too, and numbers are fodder. Is the number now stronger than Vergo/Pica?

 

[Pirate Queen]

Nah, the power scaling is simply not in vergo's or pica's favor. Just for the sake of context, luffy responded to freaking ulti with gear 4 during the onigashima raid. Does anyone think vergo, who didn't turn an injured sanji into a bloodstain with a single half assed kick would ever get luffy to even consider gear 4? An arc later sanji was nigh instantly wrecked by doflamingo and doflamingo could handle without that much trouble gear 2-3 luffy. The flying six were completely lackluster by yonko executive standards but come on, they were better than doflamingo's crew by a fair bit. The only one that might pose a threat would be pica and that because his ability is tough to deal with. Any flying six should at least last a bit against doflamingo, something which no one in doflamingo's crew coul boast of.

Yeah Pica and Vergo are a tier below even the weakest Toppi Ropo.

Pica would only be difficult to deal with because he'd run and avoid for most of the fight

 

[grey matter]

I kinda wonder, how powerful exactly is the strawhat crew? As in, the primary members, not the affiliated crews. Looking at the primary crewmembers it's beginning to look like the strawhats far exceed the known yonko crews, with some caveats. In context:

Luffy	Big mom	Kaido	Whitebeard
Zoro	Katakuri	King	Marco
Sanji	Smoothie	Queen	Jozu
jinbe	Cracker	Jack	Vista
Franky	Perospero	Whos whos	Ace
Robin	Snack	Sasaki	Fossa
Brook	Oven	Black maria	Rakuyo
Ussop	Daifuku	Drake	Izou
Nami	Compote	Ulti	Haruta
Chopper		Page one	Bleimheim

That roughly in order of strength, though admittedly WB's crew is a little wonky. Couldn't decide on who to put as big mom's 10th person. Too many potentially viable candidates. Smoothie's sisters, bavarua, mont d'or, all seem appropriate candidates.

In any case, in a one to one confrontation to me it looks like the strawhats are incredibly powerful even by yonko executive standards. Power is definitely a bit skewed towards the top though, with the final members sort of lagging behind. But zoro is definitely more powerful than king and katakuri at this point. What he pulled at the end of his fight against king would even suggest he should be able to even hold his own in single combat against a yonko for at least a bit. Sanji is not there yet but he should be able to perform quite well against king or katakuri. King is probably more of an issue due to sanji's skillset not being ideal to fight him to begin with. I would assume king has some innate resistance to fire at least. Sanji is so fast that he is invisible to queen and there's evidence his observation haki is excellent even without foresight so foresight alone shouldn't be something katakuri can lord over him. I don't think sanji would win yet but this isn't an easy fight for katakuri.

I am not sold on jinbe being a YC1-2 fighter but he should be quite high up the pecking order. His water should cancel cracker's ability but cracker is still a formidable combatant and fast enough to handle G4 luffy at WCI. Then we have jack or vista... honestly, both more dangerous than jinbe considering jack was framed from the get go as someone substantially more dangerous than even doflamingo and vista held his own against mihawk, who clearly respected his strength. Kinda wonder if jinbe would win against doflamingo. The idea is weird but perhaps jinbe has grown stronger? Jinbe feels somewhat lackluster compared to YC3-4s we have seen.

Marco, jozu and vista are weird to place, their feats are all over the place. Marco held his own against both queen and king. And iirc there was even an instance of marco causing damage through king's defense form. Which is obviously ridiculous. I suppose marco could be somewhere in between king and kaido strength wise. Which I suppose would explain the insane amount of respect marco gets in the story. In combat I think marco would simply outlast zoro for now though it'd be interesting to see if perhaps zoro's flame cutting somehow hard counters marco or works towards dealing more damage than more conventional attacks. If not that, at least shutting down marco's flame based attacks.

Normally I am of the idea that a YC4 is somewhere in the ballpark of doflamingo. Though to me it's kinda hard to imagine the flying six being there. Could franky hold his own against doflamingo? Franky shogun did hold his own against sasaki but was ultimately trashed. It sounds unnatural that he could actually hold his own against doflamingo. I suppose no one in the story can eat a laser and not feel it, including yonko....

Robin is not a character I understand. His martial art is fair to argue is uniquely deadly though its weird to think there's that many people it would really be that useful against. At her tier I suppose the people she should be handling are oven... fossa types? Fossa feels like someone who at some point had the role of number 2 in WB's crew though. Oven should be able to cook robin. Is robin even a haki user? If she had haki even logia users wouldn't be able to ignore her infinite chokehold.

Brook... has had a somewhat lackluster showing in the new world. he did defeat a number and BM's subordinates which is worth mentioning at least and the numbers seem to be fairly durable but how does that help to determine whether's he'd be worth anything to oven-daifuku... rakuyo?

Nami is wildcard. With the acquisition of zeus her actual firepower is off the charts, potentially yonko level. But her basic skills are entirely lackluster. I suppose her strength can be regarded as situational. As in, if she gets a chance to prepare a decent attack she will one shot most yonko executives but otherwise can't actually hold her own.

I suppose this goes back towards the strawhat crew strength being severely skewed towards the top. Luffy is an actual match to real yonko. Zoro can moonlight as a yonko level threat for a bit. Sanji is at least dangerous to non marco YC1 types. But then jinbe seems to be a rather awkward fit to actually handle YC3-4 types which he doesn't hard counter (doflamingo, vista, jack). Franky doesn't seem like that solid a match against YC 4-5 types outside the topo robi though I suppose he could be a reasonable match in some cases. Maybe he can laser down oven-daifuku types.

At this point, I think only Whitebeard crew amongst the 3 Yonko crew we know, could be stronger than Strawhats, if we consider "top 10" characters. BP and BMP top 10 are for sure outmatched by current SH top 10.
(Considering we know nothing about RHP, we ignore that)

Luffy's crew
Luffy is Yonko level. Stronger than BM, old WB (marineford). Weaker than Kaido, old WB (in meds)

Current Zoro can mid-high diff King, and mid diff Katakuri. And can fight at Yonko level for maybe 10 mins or so at this point.
Marco would be the biggest problem here, He is someone Zoro can't take out fast, cause nobody in the verse takes out Marco fast. But Marco is also someone against whom Zoro doesn't need KoH mode. He can just be his rooftop self and give Marco a run for his money, with fire cutting technique and advanced armament.
I guess Zoro wins this after an incredible long fight, but this would be his toughest YC1 fight.

Current Sanji would be borderline YC1 level. I think he has a real shot against Katakuri. But he can't damage King, and Marco outlasts him.

I'm not sold on Jinbe being some YC1-2 either.
But I do recognize that Oda has retconned all the Shichibukai, and so Jinbe should be at least as strong as Queen now

The mid trio are Tobiroppo level.

Coming to weak trio. Monster point Chopper may be Tobiroppo level, but it only lasts for 10 mins. Nami has high end Tobiroppo level attack power with zeus, but can be one shot by anyone. Ussop is weak across the board.



Coming to WBP.
I think we both agree that Marco is the strongest YC1. Though I'd chalk up Marco damaging defence mode King to his usual fire shinanigans that we saw against BM, or maybe just inconsistency from Oda .... cause there is no way Marco hits harder than rooftop Zoro.

I think Jozu, Vista and Ace are borderline YC1. Would lose against all YC1 like Sanji, but still up there
Jozu and Vista due to their fights against actual top tiers in Aokiji and Mihawk. Ace due to the novel and portrayal (he was as strong as Jinbe as a rookie, then grew stronger since joining WBP)

Thatch was at least as strong as Jinbe. Since he was stronger than rookie Ace, who stalemated Jinbe
I'll be safe and say he's YC2 level.

Izo is surely stronger than every Tobiroppo, as seen from his feats. Quite possibly borderline YC3 level.

Rest of WB commanders should be varying Tobiroppo level characters.



Comparing SHs and WBP:
WB (in meds) > Luffy > WB (out of meds) > Zoro >= Marco > Sanji >= Jozu ~ Vista ~ Ace > Thatch ~ Jinbe > Izo > mid trio ~ 3 of WB commanders

Ultimately, when we are looking at matchups, following are extreme diff:
- WB fights Luffy
- Marco fights Zoro
- Jozu fights Sanji
- Thatch fights Jinbe
- Izo + 3 WB commanders fight mid trio + weak trio

Leaving Vista and Ace without any real opponent. They are strong enough to roflstomp the mid tio and weak trio.


Conclusion:
Top 10 of WB Pirates > top 10 of SH pirates