freezamite said:
But if Nappa was only 3000 in terms of strength while stressed, that would mean that his resistance was even more huge, which in turn makes it really hard (or directly impossible) to explain how could Goku break him with a simple KKx2.
Nappa was heading at Kuririn and Gohan at that moment and most likely unaware that Goku would struck his back like he did, so wasn't really prepared for Son's attack. And I'm not saying he was only 3,000 at that moment, he just wasn't strong enough so he could completely tank a 2,800 level.
True, we don't know it, but besides it being really low (from 2500 to 2800 that's less than a 10% increase) it also makes Nappa's performance against Goku completely inconsistent. If he had an offensive power of 3000 and could resist hits with a strength of 8000, why was he 1 hit broken by a 16000 KKx2 Goku when his offensive power was at least 8000?
It's a 12% increase, which is a considerable one considering it rendered Goku no match for 18k Vegeta with a similar type of gap. Because he wasn't expecting Goku to double his power like that and attack him into the head. Goku just took him of surprise.
If 416 is the reading after he took his clothes off, then no, that was all the power he had.
I thought you were arguing in the past that the 416 and 408 weren't Goku and Piccolo's full power, but I must have confuded you with someone else.
But until that point, when a character read a technique's power it was always specified. Raditz always distinguished between "he has X power" and "he has X power concentrated in his fingers".
But at that point one's power being considerably increased by a strong chi attack was just introduced and was a surprise by Raditz's standard, so him making note of how Goku's power increased so much suddenly makes sense. In Gohan's case, them Z warriors increasing their powers tremendously in a pinch was already something known by Vegeta, so the wording (noting how Gohan did that) isn't strictly necessary.
Vegeta is not speaking of the power Gohan is concentrating in his hands, but the power of Gohan hismelf, and after he has launched the masenko Vegeta says "his ki has suddenly decreased, it seems that this attack has consumed most of his energy", which reinforces the idea that he was speaking of Gohan and not the attack itself (it would be weird for Vegeta to speak of the attack's power, and then suddenly change the topic to Gohan's strength).
Vegeta just said how their powers increases a lot all of a sudden (which doesn't mean he wasn't talking about the attack) and after it he states how Gohan's chi decreased, since he used it all in the Masenko. It doesn't contradict anything about the reading being related to the Masenko. Gohan's chi decreased so much that he couldn't even escape from Nappa after it, so noting his powers decreased would be nothing special.
Like I said, Gohan's power is read just after him putting his hands in the position to make the attack and screaming it. Literally two panels after Vegeta's reading, Gohan fires the Masenko. Similarly, Raditz scouted Goku when this was in the KMHMH's position and just one panel after it Goku fires it.
