Are all suicidal explosions the same?

[Kyo]

Tenshinhan should've died holding down Cell tbh

 

[Warmmedown]

Chazou blew himself up. Big explosion attack. boom. kablam. badoosh. the big kabosh. good night irene, good night duncan.

Vegeta drained himself of all ki. He didn't explode. He exploded his ki out of him. So this one is more powerful, relative to the actor's max power level.

edit: I mean that Chazou didn't expend all his ki. He died before that.

 

[Scott]

The Daizenshuu states that the Kikoho is basically a really powerful kiai.

And the manga says that every Kiai is a Ki blast and every Ki blast is a Kiai.

気功波 (Kikōha), literally "breathwork wave", is the general term for Ki blasts.
気功砲 (Kikōhō), literally "breathwork cannon/gun", is Tenshinhan's special move.
気合い (Kiai), literally "gathered breath ", is normally used for shouts.
気合い砲 (Kiaihō), literally "gathered breath cannon/gun", is used for shockwaves that aren't necessarily accompanied by shouts. It's also used for generic Ki blasts.
エネルギー弾 (Enerugī dan), literally "energy bullet/shot", is another term for Ki blasts.

When Gokuu shouted to blow away Nappa's Ki blast, Vegeeta described it as a 気合い (Kiai).
When Gokuu shouted to do his double-handed shockwave at Jheese and Burtta, Kurilin described it as a 気合い (Kiai).
When Gokuu did his "invisible eye blast" at Freeza, he called it 気合い砲 (Kiaihō).
When Gohan did his one-handed shockwave at the bank robbers and shouted as he was doing it, it was described by an NPC as a 気合い (Kiai).
When Trunks fired his Ki blast at Goten, he and Gohan called it 気功波 (Kikōha).
When Spopovich did his one-handed shockwave at Veedel and shouted as he was doing it, Kurilin described it as 気功波 (Kikōha), but he also clarified that it was "without much power".
When Trunks fired his Ki blast at Eighteen, he called it 気合い砲 (Kiaihō).
No.18 called it エネルギー弾 (Enerugī dan).

This pretty much tells you that 気功波 (Kikōha), 気合い (Kiai), 気合い砲 (Kiaihō), and エネルギー弾 (Enerugī dan) are all interchangeable terms for the same things. So, while Tenshinhan's move can be considered a Kiai, every Ki blast is a Kiai at the end of the day. After all, Kiai literally means "gathered breath". If you don't want to translate Ki, then it means "gathered Ki". A Ki blast is obviously a blast of gathered Ki.

気功砲 (Kikōhō) is only ever used for Tenshinhan's move, or at the very least, that's the way it should be.
In the DBS Superhero film and animanga, Pan correctly refers to general Ki blasts as 気功波 (Kikōha).
But in the DBS manga's adaption, she calls it 気功砲 (Kikōhō).
Safe to say Toyotaro messed up, but the mistake wasn't fixed in the volume release.

 

[Papasmurf]

The anime changed Lord Spopovich's kiai to the correct normal Ki blast. That was better than confusing a Kikoha with a kiai imo.

 

[GSM123]

Vegeta drained himself of all ki. He didn't explode. He exploded his ki out of him. So this one is more powerful, relative to the actor's max power level.

That explains why his body turns into a statue and then it breaks.

 

[Warmmedown]

And the manga says that every Kiai is a Ki blast and every Ki blast is a Kiai.

気功波 (Kikōha), literally "breathwork wave", is the general term for Ki blasts.
気功砲 (Kikōhō), literally "breathwork cannon/gun", is Tenshinhan's special move.
気合い (Kiai), literally "gathered breath ", is normally used for shouts.
気合い砲 (Kiaihō), literally "gathered breath cannon/gun", is used for shockwaves that aren't necessarily accompanied by shouts. It's also used for generic Ki blasts.
エネルギー弾 (Enerugī dan), literally "energy bullet/shot", is another term for Ki blasts.

When Gokuu shouted to blow away Nappa's Ki blast, Vegeeta described it as a 気合い (Kiai).
When Gokuu shouted to do his double-handed shockwave at Jheese and Burtta, Kurilin described it as a 気合い (Kiai).
When Gokuu did his "invisible eye blast" at Freeza, he called it 気合い砲 (Kiaihō).
When Gohan did his one-handed shockwave at the bank robbers and shouted as he was doing it, it was described by an NPC as a 気合い (Kiai).
When Trunks fired his Ki blast at Goten, he and Gohan called it 気功波 (Kikōha).
When Spopovich did his one-handed shockwave at Veedel and shouted as he was doing it, Kurilin described it as 気功波 (Kikōha), "breathwork wave", but he also clarified that it was "without much power".
When Trunks fired his Ki blast at Eighteen, he called it 気合い砲 (Kiaihō).
No.18 called it エネルギー弾 (Enerugī dan).

This pretty much tells you that 気功波 (Kikōha), 気合い (Kiai), 気合い砲 (Kiaihō), and エネルギー弾 (Enerugī dan) are all interchangeable terms for the same things. So, while Tenshinhan's move can be considered a Kiai, every Ki blast is a Kiai at the end of the day. After all, Kiai literally means "gathered breath". If you don't want to translate Ki, then it means "gathered Ki". A Ki blast is obviously a blast of gathered Ki.

気功砲 (Kikōhō) is only ever used for Tenshinhan's move, or at the very least, that's the way it should be.
In DBS Superhero film and animanga, Pan correctly refers to general Ki blasts as 気功波 (Kikōha).
But in the DBS manga's adaption, she calls it 気功砲 (Kikōhō).
Safe to say Toyotaro messed up, but the mistake wasn't fixed in the volume release.

In our real world (non-dbz)
気功 = qigong. It doesn't functionally mean breathwork.
気合 = the shout. It doesn't functionally mean gathered ki.

they're constructions with different meanings. Language doesn't work literally. "Labour" as a political party comes from "labour" to mean workforce, but a "Labour policy" doesn't functionally mean a "workforce policy" (same in languges without capital letters to serve as a written-form differentiator). "Zoo" in English means a garden for animals and "ology" basically means "the study of", but of course "Zoology" is not functionally the study of zoos. "Ura nage" means backwards throw, but functionally only refers to a specific judo throw and not to generally grabbing someone and throwing them backwards. "Islam" can be translated to "submission to God" from Arabic, but as far as I know non-Muslim Arabic-speaker wouldn't call their own submission to God "Islam", because it refers to a specific religion and set of beliefs/practices. There are millions, if not billions, of similar examples across languages. It's reasonable to think the same applies in the DBZ world. After all, Goku's kamehameha isn't literally throwing a turtle.

 

[Scott]

In our real world (non-dbz)
気功 = qigong. It doesn't functionally mean breathwork.
気合 = the shout. It doesn't functionally mean gathered ki.

I gave the literal, real world definitions. Obviously, they can be used in different contexts, too, but they're never meant to stray too far from their original meanings.

気 (Ki), read in Chinese as "Qi" or "Ch'i", literally means "air", "breath", "gas", "steam", "vapor", etc. It's colloquially used to refer to "life energy" because in times past, the air we breath was thought of as the energy to sustaining life.
功 (Kō), read in Chinese as "Gong" or "Kung", literally means "work", "labor", "cultivation", "exercise", "skill", etc. It refers to the act of developing, preparing, improving, training, etc something. It can also mean "achievement", "merit", "result", etc because you normally work to achieve something, gain a merit, or see a result. This is why "Gong fu" and "kung fu" are translated as "hard work" or "man's work".
合 (Ai), read in Chinese as "he" or "ho", literally means "gathering" or "joining".

気功 (Kikō) literally means "breathwork", "breath exercise", "breath control", etc and that's what Qigong is used for.

気合 (Kiai) literally means "gathered air" or "joined air". It's colloquially used to refer to a shout because when you shout, you gather air and release it. It can also just refer to one's fighting spirit because spirit is a synonym for "breath" and you gather your breath, spirit, energy, etc when you fight.

 

[Scott]

The anime changed Lord Spopovich's kiai to the correct normal Ki blast. That was better than confusing a Kikoha with a kiai imo.

The anime just had a habit of changing Kiai into visible Ki blasts. Stuff like Freeza Form 3's finger attacks on Piccolo, Freeza Form 4's blowing Gokuu away into the water, Cell blowing Gohan away into a giant rock, etc get turned into visible Ki blasts to make scenes more exciting. Even Gokuu's final Kiai to push the Super Genkidama gets turned into a giant visible Ki blast in the Budoh-kai games.

This commercial right here turned Tenshinhan's Kiai that he used against Cyborg Tao into a visible mouth blast:

It's an artistic liberty. Kurilin clarified that while Spopovich's blast was a Kikoh-ha, it didn't have much power to it. Vegeeta clarifies further that Spopovich held back as to not kill Veedel. Because Spopovich held back, it was invisible and would more normally be described as a Kiai. Turning it into a regular visible Ki blast misses that nuance.