Why Power Scaling Actually Matters A LOT In One Piece

[PauloJrchannel]

I think powerscaling only really gets toxic when people put it above everything else in the story. I've seen people arguing that "Luffy can't fight Blackbeard, because he already beat Kaido, who is above Blackbeard" or "Luffy won't fight Akainu, because Akainu is only as strong as an Admiral, and Luffy is stronger than an Admiral". Powerscaling is an important element in the story, this is a Battle Shonen after all, but it isn't the only important element. Ignoring stuff like the characters' personal rivalries or the symbolism of the story, which are elements that are just as important, just for the sake of powerscaling really makes no sense to me.

[aberaham]

Oda's power scaling is narrative based and fan powerscaling is most often feat/portrayal based. I think the idea that Oda doesn't care about power scaling is mostly from people obsessing over things like not showing Tobi Ropo and commanders using haki, despite it should be narratively obvious they can.

[MagillanicaLouM]

In my view, the reason i like how Oda handles it compared to other manga is that he showed us what the top echelon looked like pretty early on and has kept that the level to aspire ever since. The second Whitebeard and Shanks split the sky, he was telling us what it would take and almost a thousand chapters later that is still the case seeing Roger v Whitebeard in that flashback and against Kaido. Just elaborated more on HOW they're performing the feat. Its not a matter of "Luffy gets x power up so every future antagonist strength has to scale" it's "yeah Luffy got a big bounty boost but he's still a wee lad with all these MONSTERS running around, but this'll be what he has to reach eventually" and i like that structure more.

[upopkzq]

I think what many mistake for “not caring about powerscaling” is the idea that being stronger or having certain hyped abilities isn’t an insta-win in all cases.

[Oggy-ub]

I think what people miss is that powerscaling can also enhance certain character moments. An easy example would be Momo from just last chapter. For it to make sense you have to understand how strong the admirals actually are in comparison to everyone else to show how desperate the situation is. But you also have to understand that Luffy and a few good men could easily deal with the threat. Both of these things come together and makes Momo's dialogue more impactful as he chooses not to take the easy route.

[Tyzerx]

I've been seeing so many people on Reddit and Twitter slating powerscalers lately (saying they ruin the series by match ups between characters and factions). I feel like this video came out at the perfect time. In the same way people compare the likes of Tyson vs Ali, Messi vs Ronaldo, Naruto vs Sasuke etc. the same can be applied with a shonen anime like One Piece. There's no issue in that. It's human nature to compare the best vs the best. I guess the issue lies in how far people take it sometimes and how toxic debates can get.

[nonyabusiness]

Power scaling isn't the problem it's the parameters that people use to power scale. They believe X beat Y and Y beat Z therefore X can beat Z when fights in OP are a touch more complicated.

It's also the terms that people use like Yonko commander 1 2 3 and use that as a pure base

[zael]

powerscaling is probably one of the most important things to establish in any series, especially a shonen series; yet people still act like the author can freely do what they want with no regards to consistency

[Archius]

I think the issue comes into play when we consider the degrees of power-scaling communicated to us. Keen readers were quick to see that Doflamingo was roughly equivalent to a yonkou commander, he was afraid of being pressed between Kaido and the Admirals yet clearly fought/tested two admirals on two separate occasions. Yet it appears he would have never thought to do the same thing to Kaido. This established a non-confirmed power-scaling of yonkou > admirals > commanders, but Oda didn't out right say "Yonkou > Admirals > Commanders". If someone says "because Oda didn't explicitly say it, therefore it's head cannon" would that be correct? No, its a grey-area in between that is based on observation and interpretation, a good hypothesis. Saying Don Krieg can defeat Mihawk would be bad head cannon as opposed to a good hypothesis, because even assuming Oda didn't directly say that Mihawk will win, the evidence suggests that Mihawk would. Consistency is key with these discussions but these arguments are not just made with logic but with feelings. If I really like Marco for example, do I want to say that he's like trash compared to green bull? Probably not, even if Green Bull in story says the opposite of commanders and quite literally stomps on King and Queen whom Marco had difficulty holding back.

[jojosoni]

I'm so tired of many people giving bs argument like "you shouldn't have hold any expectations at all" like bruh, expectations is so basic in reading or watching any story.
Ofc, some go wild with expectations and get disappointed. But reader does not have to have 0 expectations.

[olivercardoso]

Dunno how you're only at 170k subscribers, you have some of the most thought-out and articulate One Piece content on YouTube. Keep up the good work.

[sakurasango]

I've always thought that those little "inconsistentes" or "plot armors" (more or less) are because Oda is trying to point out that even if some of the characters are not in the same level as an enemy, they can still fight and actually have a chance to win some "seemingly impossible battles" (maybe using other strategies, intelligence, being helped by others, even by luck or whatever it is, as long as it doesn't involve sheer strength alone), kinda like a "David vs Goliat" situation. Crocodile was fairly dangerous when Luffy beat him (he seemed to rely too much on his DF, ok, but still - he had many "plans B" too and those didn't work either...).
Lucci WAS stronger than Luffy, but Luffy won thanks to his well-thought gears AND the power of friendship (or his incredible will, you call it -though it required that he became stronger, I know).
Usopp didn't really win against Luffy, but HELL, his attacks made him look like he at least had some chance if he worked hard and planed every hit...
Zoro was stronger than Buggy, but Zoro didn't know about his ability, so he let his guard down and Buggy stabbed him, etc.
There are other examples like those, and I think they're glorious, ad they portray that, no matter how "weak" your enemy is, you should NEVER underestimate them, or else.... Many OP villains also were reaaally mistaken in believing "a weakling/rookie like Luffy" couldn't stand a chance against then, only to be proven wrong... so I always believed Oda wanted to show that even if strengh AND power-scaling are important and well organized in his story, anyone can have a chance if he works hard for it :)

[germanbrandeburgo]

I don't think this was actually the problem. It is perfectly clear that Oda loves power scaling within organizations, the problem is when you compare organization to each other. That's when power scaling gets kind of iffy and it feels most inconsistent.
Most obvious example that comes to mind is Crocodile. Beaten by pre Gear 2 Luffy, but then shown to attack Whitebeard head on. That makes it impossible to determine if he is stronger than say Moria, for example.
I remember a previous Morj video talking about the Sanji/Zoro comparison, where Oda sometimes presents Zoro as being on par with Sanji, and other times on par with Luffy, even when Sanji and Luffy have never been shown to be close in strength. So I'm not saying power scaling doesn't matter, but we have to admit that it tends to take a back seat to other aspects in the story.

[michaeleanthonyjr]

Without power levels, your story is basically a Saturday morning cartoon where one episode could have the big bad be the biggest threat imaginable, and the next episode could have him be a man baby sucking on his thumb. So yeah, power levels are good actually if you're trying to tell a story with stakes where there are discrepancies in power.

[jjack]

I love powerscaling, I absolutely hate talking about powerscaling because everyone thinks there right - whether it's the scaling itself or the pressence of powerscaling or the fact there's a discussion at all - and it ends with debates that just go around in circles

[ghanilawal]

You literally put all of my thoughts in video format. Thanks for doing this Mr. Morj!!!

[bwhit]

The fact that the Shichibukai almost exactly scale to the level of one Yonko crew just blew my mind

[Linny]

Meanwhile Momo, with minimal training, was able to release an attack that can damage an Admiral + his haki, but also 5 seconds ago he could barely light a stick on fire.

Make it make sense

[evercastillo]

I don't know if I'm missing something here. I've never been in a power scaling discussion that dismises power hierarchies or states that power hierarchy=power scaling. The discussion is usually about the power creep related to the power scaling. For example, according to what we've seen, crocodile would have been a non threat at marineford since he was beaten by a pre gears luffy, however, narratively it would be fine. Also, being powerful most of the time doesn't give you immunity o lower threats, like a stab wound (kaido and big mom are just freaks like that). What I wouldn't like to see in one piece is that luffy gets so powerful that an event like what happened in logue town couldn't happen again. Most of the cast should be vulnerable when their guard is down even if they're the most powerful person in the planet. I hope my point came across, english isn't my native language and I'm figthing my automatic dictionary and typing on a lousy phone, so I'm done for the moment.

[nuttbutt]

It just doesn’t make sense for an individual yonko to beat an individual admiral.

If shanks can beat an admiral and can GET INTO A GOROSEI MEETING why doesn’t he corner a celestial dragon, get them to call an admiral while not telling them he’s there, and- with his entire crew no less- take out 1 out of what, 5 or so (?) people that keep the WG in power? Then systematically repeat until there’s nothing left to take him down. Is there ANYTHING more worthwhile to ANY of the yonko than taking down the world fucking government? Why would he bet his arm on luffy in the East blue if under the right circumstances, his full strength could bring the dawn of the world? Did Roger tell him that whatever was at god valley or laughtale showed him that IM, the gorosei, or fucking Kong were so strong he couldn’t beat them? Do they have the ancient weapon we don’t know about and choose to just send out buster calls? What does the dawn of the world even mean if it’s not the fall of the world government, and what protects the world government if it’s not what they have explicitly refered to- the admirals- for over 600 chapters? Why does big mom care about having the giant army, kaido care about mass producing an army of gifters, or Blackbeard care about stealing powerful devil fruits? Why when big mom and kaido ally do they give a single thought towards ancient weapons when apparently if they and 6 commanders can fly up to marejois before +3 admirals get there can get RID OF THE CELESTIAL DRAGONS!
The question is not yonko vs admirals, it’s: does the world government let the yonko exist to crush piracy in the new world, or do the yonko let THE WORLD GOVERNMENT have control over EVERYTHING ELSE! The admirals would have to travel in 2’s in order protect themselves from potential yonko attacks, and the celestial dragons would essentially be imprisoned in marejois. I mean, what are they going to do to protect themselves if they ever want to leave, call an admiral?

Not to mention the disinfo around marineford. Here’s a pro analyzation tip: When whitebeard sacrificed a quarter of his head, he got a hit on akainu that made him start bleeding. Whenever akainu hit whitebeard, a hole appeared. When the haki using commander made of DIAMOND hit aokiji, he was startled. When aokiji hit him, his arm fell off. Kizaru not only could’ve ended the war if he aimed his lasers between the eyes of almost everyone he was fighting, but was only ever stalled because there was someone there who could REVIVE HIMSELF! Not take no damage, not fight equally, but continue annoying him even though half of the attacks kizaru landed SHOULD have killed him.

It just isn’t close.