One Piece Power Level Discussion Thread

goldb

Strongest Under the Sun
神のごとし / Kami no Gotoshi / Godlike
Joined
Mar 12, 2008
Messages
27,709
Reaction score
27,506
Gender
Male
Country
United Kingdom
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.
 
Last edited by a moderator:

kkck

Waifu Slayer
神のごとし / Kami no Gotoshi / Godlike
Joined
Sep 3, 2007
Messages
46,280
Reaction score
24,915
Gender
Hidden
Country
Fire Nation
Basically what I am saying. Quality > quantity.
Yes, quantity matters too, but at some point fodders stop making a difference.

Quite baffling to me that dudes don't get it.
Fodders are seconds away from being taken out in a sweep by commanders. Especially if you have AOE like like King, Ace, Katakuri etc, they are nothing. Ace took down several fodders and their ships in a second.
Jozu could lift up a mountain and throw, there goes half the fodder.

Fodders played a big role in Wano to begin with, only because the "good guys" were in a weaker position to begin with.
Kaido's commanders and executives were of higher quality, at least in the beginning. Like, Zoro/Sanji needed powerups to beat King/Queen.

Peak WBP had:
- 5 commanders (6 if you wanna count pre DF Blackbeard), while Kaido and BM had 3. And on top of numerical advantage WBP commanders were also stronger on overage
- 11 executive level fighters in commanders 6-16; while Kaido and BM had like 7. With a likely higher average power on top of numerical advantage
- more hyped subordinate captains

Peak WBP would mid diff Big Mom Pirates, and mid-high diff Beast Pirates





What I am saying is not that fodders are completely irrelevant.

What I am saying is that, they can play a crucial role only if there are high level fighters on their side, keeping the high level fighters on the opposite side occupied.

Look at Marineford.
While WB commanders obviously would've lost, they were powerful enough to hold their own against the admirals. If Marco/Jozu/Vista weren't there, admirals would've dogwalked the WBP, because the lower end commanders can't hold their own.

What happened there was, WB and top 3 commanders, mainly Marco and Jozu fought the admirals. The commanders 6-16 and allied captains fought the vice admirals. Fodders fought fodders.
You see the point?

Now let's look at say WBP vs BMP hypothetical.
- WB fights BM
- 3 top commanders of WB fight Kata/Smoothie/Cracker
- 6/7 amongst 11 lower commanders fight 6/7 executives of BMP
- allied captains fight each other

In all these scenarios, WBP has the advantage (since we both agree WB has the higher quality/average power level). ALONG WITH 2 more top commanders and 4-5 more lesser commanders left free to cause absolute destruction on the BMP fodders.





How am I wrong, when the manga itself called WBP the strongest pirate force in the world, multiple times?
When Big Mom herself wanks up Whitebeard with "I could've taken down Kaido, Shanks and even Whitebeard" ?


WBP 30 years ago were a bunch of kids, with Oden who didn't reach his prime (didn't know advanced conqueror's haki) and maybe a few executive level characters. Of course they get packed up by BMP or BP.

Roger pirates on the other hand would pack up BMP, and also Beast Pirates but with more difficulty.

People don't remember how much of a threat Big Mom was to her crew, when she was going on a rampage without even her full mental faculty. It was implied that she alone may possibly be a match for the entire BMP. And this is Big Mom, who is amongst the lower end of top tiers.

Roger Pirates have Roger and Rayleigh. Roger is amongst the strongest characters ever; and given what we know of Rayleigh, he is a solid Yonko level fighter who is for sure stronger than Big Mom or at bare minimum is as strong as her. I have prime Rayleigh ~ Shanks.
Rayleigh alone may take on the rest of BMP, while Roger takes down Big Mom solo. And this isn't even considering others like Scopper and that fish guy. Scopper has special portrayal as Roger pirates 3rd strongest, he is an "in-betweener"/YC1+ at bare minimum. The fish guy is probably the Jinbe of Roger pirates, and likely a commander tier.

We know Luffy's crew is parallel to Roger's crew and Shanks' (main) crew. Small, but very reliable crewmates.
If that is the case, Roger's crew even apart from the 4 I mentioned, are likely many strong executive level characters at least.


Roger takes on Kaido/BM.
His crewmates take on the their crew and destroys them.

The only Yonko crew I can see being a match for Roger pirates would be WBP or RHP.
I think your calculation there misrepresents big mom's forces with a good margin. Big mom's forces simply are far larger than what you mention there. The totality of her forces is something like:

-Sweet commanders.
- Top executives (I usually put perospero, snack, compote, oven and daifuku in this category)
- some other 60-ish kids with varied skills, devil fruit and power. definitely not all of them have executive level, that would be absurd, but at a minimum their average level is pretty high. Flambe is a skilled enough sniper that she actually injured luffy with whatever it is she shot. Smoothies sisters at least look strong-ish. When sanji attempted to sky walk away with luffy he was easily contained by more of big mom's kids who were able to keep up with him. Mont-d'ior, amonde got actual respect from germa.
- Then you get to rooks, fighters and knights. Bege, pekoms, tamago, bobin... It's unclear how many there are but as a whole it seems like they have a lot of these.
- Then you get to homies. Thousands upon thousands of homies and we saw some of them have some decent skill. And on top of that they are fairly expendable. These also allowed big mom an insanely effective intelligence network.
- And then however many soldiers big mom had, which was probably thousands.

As far as roger vs wb pirates went, the manga showed us they were literally tied. there's no reason to think that back then the roger pirates for some reason went easy on the WB pirates. Since then we saw that while the roger pirates were nearing the end of their voyage the WB continued to expand and eventually got to 16 divisions. The roger pirates that tied with roger's crew would get crushed by modern big mom pirates in an all out war type scenario. Barring a miracle (which in fairness can and has happened).
 

albertwv

Registered User
英雄メンバー / Eiyuu Menbaa / Hero Member
Joined
Mar 1, 2019
Messages
865
Reaction score
797
Age
30
Country
United States
I think your calculation there misrepresents big mom's forces with a good margin. Big mom's forces simply are far larger than what you mention there. The totality of her forces is something like:

-Sweet commanders.
- Top executives (I usually put perospero, snack, compote, oven and daifuku in this category)
- some other 60-ish kids with varied skills, devil fruit and power. definitely not all of them have executive level, that would be absurd, but at a minimum their average level is pretty high. Flambe is a skilled enough sniper that she actually injured luffy with whatever it is she shot. Smoothies sisters at least look strong-ish. When sanji attempted to sky walk away with luffy he was easily contained by more of big mom's kids who were able to keep up with him. Mont-d'ior, amonde got actual respect from germa.
- Then you get to rooks, fighters and knights. Bege, pekoms, tamago, bobin... It's unclear how many there are but as a whole it seems like they have a lot of these.
- Then you get to homies. Thousands upon thousands of homies and we saw some of them have some decent skill. And on top of that they are fairly expendable. These also allowed big mom an insanely effective intelligence network.
- And then however many soldiers big mom had, which was probably thousands.

As far as roger vs wb pirates went, the manga showed us they were literally tied. there's no reason to think that back then the roger pirates for some reason went easy on the WB pirates. Since then we saw that while the roger pirates were nearing the end of their voyage the WB continued to expand and eventually got to 16 divisions. The roger pirates that tied with roger's crew would get crushed by modern big mom pirates in an all out war type scenario. Barring a miracle (which in fairness can and has happened).
While you are right about there is no evidence that the Roger pirates went easy on the WB pirates. The match ups were probably: Roger vs WB, Oden vs Rayleigh or Gaban, and then Gaban/Rayleigh versus anybody else. No one else from the Roger and WB pirates at that time were worthy of mentioning. Marcos was just a kid, so was Vista and Jozu. Little is known of Roger's crew outside the top 3. But I give the outcome to RP due to having more power houses (Roger, Ray, and Gaban)

Regarding the bolded part, it reminds me of that time Mont Dor claimed that even Roger the PK could not escape alive from Cacao Island. Yet Luffy was able to, albeit with help of Sanji, Germa and ultimately the Sun Pirates. Nonetheless, if Roger himself was coming out of that mirror and facing BMP army, I have full confidence that he would escape alive and them dead (knocked out). I don't see anybody from the BMP giving Roger hell except BM herself and even then she is lower than him.
So who knows maybe the Roger Pirates could take on BMP, numbers really don't do much if you have powerhouses like Prime Roger, Prime Ray and Prime Gaban.
How I see it to put in layman terms. I rank those 3 prime figures above/equal to current Kaido. Imagine current Kaido fighting all of the BMP except BM. Who do you bet on? Now imagine 3 Kaido's.
We saw how Kaido defeated powerful characters in the rooftop, who would destroy all of the top BMP fighters.

Roger stole a RP from BM.
 

DeadlyBeast

Registered User
有名人 / Yuumeijin / Celebrity
Joined
Apr 3, 2014
Messages
3,089
Reaction score
3,975
Gender
Male
Country
United States
Where do ya'll rank Buggy in power level?

I think he is going to be portrayed as weak Yonko executive level fighter.

He obviously is not a Yonko level fighter despite the title but I also don't think he's as weak as he was pre-skip. I personally think post-skip/current Buggy is going to be around the weakling trio in strength. We know at the very least he can keep getting beat up and get up. The muggy ball seems to be his most offensive attack and if its been upgraded I'd say is not too far off from Usopp's offensive attacks in damage output (it does lack the versatility that Usopp has though). And at this point Oda is having the weakling trio fight Yonko execs so by proxy I think Buggy is going to get similar treatment. And by saying weakling trio are Yonko Exec level I mean they will end up winning fights against this level opponent from this point on in the story using strange circumstances like outside interference, which fits Buggy to a tee.

I mean if Buggy hasn't improved to at least their level it would be a shame. I know he's not meant to be strong but he also shouldn't so fodder that he can't even watch Luffy or Shanks fight i.e. he needs to be able to stay conscious from bursts of their CoC. Old Buggy I think would pass out similar to how Mr. 3 did during Marineford from pre-skip Luffy CoC burst.
 

Fox666

Registered User
MH中毒 / MH Chuudoku / MH Addicted
Joined
Apr 28, 2008
Messages
7,007
Reaction score
4,650
Country
Galactic Empire
Everything points out Buggy has not evolved at all, and 99.9% of his subordinates could beat him.
 

XXGenesis

Registered User
有名人 / Yuumeijin / Celebrity
Joined
Oct 8, 2011
Messages
3,133
Reaction score
1,885
Age
35
Gender
Male
Country
Turkmenistan
Wow, I’m impressed I’ve stayed away for so longer. But I’m going to start my Managerial Campaign career now, Buggy The Clown for OnePiece Aka Pirate King. Lmfao He’s the best gag of the manga I swear. Buggy honestly in Stature, resume of survival & con he’s Yonkou lv.

Garp’s fist is str8 wtf lol. Gives even more credence to how monsterous he was in his Prime. I’m pretty sure Garp is going to be showed up by someone from the current generation, but Garp is exactly where I assumed he would be. His offensive output is impressive asf, I’m sure stamina issues will kick in

Kidd/Law….Kidd’s stock is bankrupt it’s over. Whether he plays any role going foward. Law got a gentleman’s sweep from the BBP. End if the day he put up a fight before his defeat.

Kaido & BM were strong Asf. Shanks is def stronger. Mihawk also himself is more than likely stronger than BM & Kaido.

Admirals I think we should put a lot more respect on their name. They are very comparable to the Yonkou. The differences between them is nigh.
 
Last edited:

HereNThere

Alive Ain't Always Livin'
MH中毒 / MH Chuudoku / MH Addicted
Mangahelper
Joined
Jul 8, 2009
Messages
8,382
Reaction score
12,171
Gender
Male
Country
United States
I can see him being around the Weak Trio levels, sure. That'd be more than appropriate for him. He's always been a very situational "fighter" or, more accurately, someone who is always in the right place at the right time. So I can see him being strong enough to do whatever it is he needs to at the right moment. Upgraded Muggy Balls would likely be his only real upgrade though. And if there are at least on the level of Usopp's Pop Green, that should be enough to get him by.

As for his ability to withstand CoC, I'm going to give him the benefit of the doubt and say that he can. He seemed pretty fine in Marineford when Luffy awakened his. Plus, he was traveling with at least three (four including a pre-awakened Shanks) Conquerors back in the day and Roger was clashing with others. I'd hate to imagine he was passing out every major fight.
 

kkck

Waifu Slayer
神のごとし / Kami no Gotoshi / Godlike
Joined
Sep 3, 2007
Messages
46,280
Reaction score
24,915
Gender
Hidden
Country
Fire Nation
Yeah, i also don't think buggy has become all that much stronger. His entire scam revolves around his subordinates not knowing his real strength, which is best done by not fighting. Maybe he has trained on his own but that shouldn't get him any insane results. If buggy gets power ups i could see them from two things:

1.- haki awakening of sorts? Maybe finally getting the resolve to put his life on the line causes him to awaken at least feeble haki.
2.- maybe awakening? Buggy has had his fruit for decades and uses it as far as we have seen nigh constantly. I don't think the lore necessarily suggests you need to be powerful to use awakening, rather you need your mind to catch up to your body. In the case of buggys awakening there are multiple possible abilities he can get. The first is greatly extended range for his floating to work. Next is being able to split other people, maybe at will. And another possibility is being able to use his ability on things. The range thing is useful but not exactly powerful. The other two are perhaps abilities worthy of a yonko (or at least a executive).
 

DeadlyBeast

Registered User
有名人 / Yuumeijin / Celebrity
Joined
Apr 3, 2014
Messages
3,089
Reaction score
3,975
Gender
Male
Country
United States
Buggy awakening his fruit would be interesting. Extending his abilities range and application to others/objects would be a big advantage. At the point he can split others it will be like having Ope Ope base powers especially if Buggy is in control of how the pieces float even for other peoples bodies and objects.
 

kkck

Waifu Slayer
神のごとし / Kami no Gotoshi / Godlike
Joined
Sep 3, 2007
Messages
46,280
Reaction score
24,915
Gender
Hidden
Country
Fire Nation
Yeah, I sort of figure buggy would basically be able to turn his militia, which is still one of the stronger militias among the yonko in general since kaido's smile users are out of the game, into a pseudo immortal army. Welp, at least invulnerable to swords which is the most common weapon in the manga. Looking at the mihawk angle it would also allow mihawk to simply attack indiscriminately without concerning himself with ending his allies. If he also gets control over the pieces of people affected by his ability he'd be able to sort of fuse them I suppose? And himself with others?
 

Pirate Queen

Registered User
九千以上だ! / Kyuusen Ijou Da! / It's Over 9000!
Joined
Jun 1, 2010
Messages
9,680
Reaction score
17,737
Country
United States
I think Buggy is set up for a funny clash with Ussop which makes people believe Ussop is the second strongest Strawhat because he is fighting "Yonko level" Buggy on equal terms.

Anyone else?
 

Fox666

Registered User
MH中毒 / MH Chuudoku / MH Addicted
Joined
Apr 28, 2008
Messages
7,007
Reaction score
4,650
Country
Galactic Empire
I think Buggy is set up for a funny clash with Ussop which makes people believe Ussop is the second strongest Strawhat because he is fighting "Yonko level" Buggy on equal terms.

Anyone else?
More like, Buggy is a Yonko, Usopp is called "God", they will be scared shitless of fighting each other

I imagine Usopp's bounty would skyrocket then
 

kkck

Waifu Slayer
神のごとし / Kami no Gotoshi / Godlike
Joined
Sep 3, 2007
Messages
46,280
Reaction score
24,915
Gender
Hidden
Country
Fire Nation
Hmm, ussop definitely is among the weaker strawhats, if not the weakest, but he has definitely acquired some degree of super strength during the timeskip. At the end of the punk hazard arc ussop precisely aimed what looks like tons of rocks at buffalo and baby 5. He should be very capable of physically overpowering buggy. Though buggy might still be a more skilled cqc fighter.
 

albertwv

Registered User
英雄メンバー / Eiyuu Menbaa / Hero Member
Joined
Mar 1, 2019
Messages
865
Reaction score
797
Age
30
Country
United States
So do people think Aokiji >/= BB?
 

kkck

Waifu Slayer
神のごとし / Kami no Gotoshi / Godlike
Joined
Sep 3, 2007
Messages
46,280
Reaction score
24,915
Gender
Hidden
Country
Fire Nation
Bb is a wonky yonko but he managed to get the drop on shanks before having any devil fruits... And I've never been of the idea that at least pre time skip the admirals were actually yonko level. Aokiji is presumably stronger than he wad pre time skip but so is bb. I suppose aokiji would give bb a run for his money but the plot required bb to be stronger.
 

grey matter

Registered User
MH中毒 / MH Chuudoku / MH Addicted
Joined
Dec 4, 2019
Messages
6,580
Reaction score
10,155
Age
30
Gender
Male
Country
India
So do people think Aokiji >/= BB?
Blackbeard wins in a fight because even apart from Darkness DF which is a counter for all DFs, earthquake DF is very much implied to be a counter for ice DF. Blackbeard can easily free himself from being frozen.

That said, I have Aokiji "overall" stronger than current Blackbeard. In a ranking list, I would place Aokiji above Blackbeard but in same tier, even tho Blackbeard would win in a 1v1 due to matchup.
 

albertwv

Registered User
英雄メンバー / Eiyuu Menbaa / Hero Member
Joined
Mar 1, 2019
Messages
865
Reaction score
797
Age
30
Country
United States
Bb is a wonky yonko but he managed to get the drop on shanks before having any devil fruits... And I've never been of the idea that at least pre time skip the admirals were actually yonko level. Aokiji is presumably stronger than he wad pre time skip but so is bb. I suppose aokiji would give bb a run for his money but the plot required bb to be stronger.
Okay I have an issue with the whole "Blackbeard scarred Shanks" making it seem like Teach was as strong as current Shanks.
First of all, we have no idea how or WHEN it happened. Yes, Shanks did mention that he got the scar from Teach in a straight forward battle.
But let's analyze the timeline.
Shanks 24 years ago after Roger's death went his own way.
12 years later, he has a $1b bounty, powerful crew, not-Yonko status, dueled many times with Mihawk, and had 2 arms.
6 years later he becomes Yonko and presumably receives a $4b bounty. Stopped dueling Mihawk but presumably became stronger than he was 12 years ago, when he first met Luffy.

So...
39 years old Yonko-One Armed-$4b bounty Shanks > 27 yo Not Yonko-Two-Armed-$1b bounty Shanks >>> 15 yo Shanks

His fight versus Teach happened between 15 yo and 27 yo Shanks. We have no idea how strong Shanks and Teach were at the time of their battle. For all we know, it could have happened when Shanks up and coming 15 yo. Much much weaker than his 27 or 39 yo self.

So I wouldnt give Teach credit to scarring Shanks, not without knowing the full context of the battle.


And one last thing, do you have proof that Aokiji is stronger than he was Pre-TS. If anything I would say he got a little bit weaker due to losing a leg. I would place Aokiji Post TS at the same level of Pre TS. I don't think he got stronger nor weaker.
Same goes Akainu. People seem to believe that since his promotion to FA, Akainu somehow got stronger. NAH.
I don't think becoming FA means you become stronger. As we seen FA is more of a political-commanding-strategic position. Akainu is in his late 50's I wouldnt understand why he becomes stronger.
 

kkck

Waifu Slayer
神のごとし / Kami no Gotoshi / Godlike
Joined
Sep 3, 2007
Messages
46,280
Reaction score
24,915
Gender
Hidden
Country
Fire Nation
Okay I have an issue with the whole "Blackbeard scarred Shanks" making it seem like Teach was as strong as current Shanks.
First of all, we have no idea how or WHEN it happened. Yes, Shanks did mention that he got the scar from Teach in a straight forward battle.
But let's analyze the timeline.
Shanks 24 years ago after Roger's death went his own way.
12 years later, he has a $1b bounty, powerful crew, not-Yonko status, dueled many times with Mihawk, and had 2 arms.
6 years later he becomes Yonko and presumably receives a $4b bounty. Stopped dueling Mihawk but presumably became stronger than he was 12 years ago, when he first met Luffy.

So...
39 years old Yonko-One Armed-$4b bounty Shanks > 27 yo Not Yonko-Two-Armed-$1b bounty Shanks >>> 15 yo Shanks

His fight versus Teach happened between 15 yo and 27 yo Shanks. We have no idea how strong Shanks and Teach were at the time of their battle. For all we know, it could have happened when Shanks up and coming 15 yo. Much much weaker than his 27 or 39 yo self.

So I wouldnt give Teach credit to scarring Shanks, not without knowing the full context of the battle.


And one last thing, do you have proof that Aokiji is stronger than he was Pre-TS. If anything I would say he got a little bit weaker due to losing a leg. I would place Aokiji Post TS at the same level of Pre TS. I don't think he got stronger nor weaker.
Same goes Akainu. People seem to believe that since his promotion to FA, Akainu somehow got stronger. NAH.
I don't think becoming FA means you become stronger. As we seen FA is more of a political-commanding-strategic position. Akainu is in his late 50's I wouldnt understand why he becomes stronger.
Welp, shanks is the one that said BB gave him a scar in a straight fight and was concerned enough about him in modern times that he specifically went well out of his way into a risky meeting with BB to beg him to recall ace. It's unclear when this happened but given the context I don't think it matters. Since when it happened does not matter to shanks.

regarding aokiji growing stronger, I said "presumably". Add to that, aokiji being is able to use his powers to create new limbs. Shanks in turn seemingly does ok and he doesn't even have powers to grow extra limbs. Aokiji can probably manage and still grow in strength with the limbs he has left and haki.
 

HereNThere

Alive Ain't Always Livin'
MH中毒 / MH Chuudoku / MH Addicted
Mangahelper
Joined
Jul 8, 2009
Messages
8,382
Reaction score
12,171
Gender
Male
Country
United States
So do people think Aokiji >/= BB?
As this point in the story, I'd say yes, it's likely. At the very least, they are equal.

Kuzan being stronger would be the only reason I see him joining with no fuss and sticking around. We know he's still on the up and up given his talk with Smoker, so he has a sense of justice. With that being the case, he likely feels, should things go sideways in the worst way, he'd be able to take down Blackbeard before things get too bad. And given Blackbeard's reaction to a confrontation with Kuzan, he likely feels the same on some level.

However, that will change if/when BB reveals something game that propels him to another level beyond what he (and potentially Shanks) expected or could handle.
 

kkck

Waifu Slayer
神のごとし / Kami no Gotoshi / Godlike
Joined
Sep 3, 2007
Messages
46,280
Reaction score
24,915
Gender
Hidden
Country
Fire Nation
Hmmm, to be it's a bit of a reach that kuzan specifically aims to keep BB is check. As dangerous as BB is it's a tad weird that kuzan would have made such a move at a time when kaido and big mom, the more veteran and arguably more dangerous yonko, were around. BB seems special to us readers but outside of his dual devil fruits I am not sure that characters in the story would see BB that much differently than any other pirate scum. When the new world saga started and up to recently BB was the yonko furthest from OP, having exactly zero poneglyphs. Kaido and big mom had one each. Shanks had zero but he definitely knows shit.
 

HereNThere

Alive Ain't Always Livin'
MH中毒 / MH Chuudoku / MH Addicted
Mangahelper
Joined
Jul 8, 2009
Messages
8,382
Reaction score
12,171
Gender
Male
Country
United States
Hmmm, to be it's a bit of a reach that kuzan specifically aims to keep BB is check. As dangerous as BB is it's a tad weird that kuzan would have made such a move at a time when kaido and big mom, the more veteran and arguably more dangerous yonko, were around. BB seems special to us readers but outside of his dual devil fruits I am not sure that characters in the story would see BB that much differently than any other pirate scum. When the new world saga started and up to recently BB was the yonko furthest from OP, having exactly zero poneglyphs. Kaido and big mom had one each. Shanks had zero but he definitely knows shit.
I don't think his aim is to keep Blackbeard in check, moreso that he's in a position to do something about him should the need arise and feels comfortable in "following" Blackbeard for that reason. Especially after he accomplishes his own unknown goals.
 
Top