Oda talks about Akuma no Mis and its powered up versions

[ahill1]

I found an SBS in which someone stated some of Doflamingo's officers Akuma no Mis seem like powered-up versions of the Baroque Works officers, to which Oda replied:

"The strength of power does not correlate to character strength. You never know how every fight will turn out."

What did he mean by the latter?

 

[Fantastische Hure]

That it's all rock-scissor-paper.

 

[ahill1]

That it's all rock-scissor-paper.

"The strength of powers does not correlate to character strength". I might be off, but isn't him saying that no matter how strong you get the Akuma no Mi's power is going to stay the same?

 

[Fantastische Hure]

That it's all rock-scissor-paper.

"The strength of powers does not correlate to character strength". I might be off, but isn't him saying that no matter how strong you get the Akuma no Mi's power is going to stay the same?

Yeah, so the devil-fruit's potency'll stay the same if you just train yourself. However you can also increase the potency of your devil-fruit. In extreme-cases awakening.

 

[SSJ2]

And you can create abilities and attacks from it.

 

[ahill1]

That it's all rock-scissor-paper.

"The strength of powers does not correlate to character strength". I might be off, but isn't him saying that no matter how strong you get the Akuma no Mi's power is going to stay the same?

Yeah, so the devil-fruit's potency'll stay the same if you just train yourself. However you can also increase the potency of your devil-fruit. In extreme-cases awakening.

Sure. Do you think this has some relation to Akainu vs Ace? As in, Ace being easily defeated by Akainu was due to his Akuma no Mi being an inferior version, whereas Akainu's was a powered up version?

 

[Fantastische Hure]

Possibly. Maybe probably. I have no idea.

 

[ahill1]

This seems strange. I mean, even if Luffy didn't train his Akuma no Mi, just the fact that he got stronger would make his attacks with the fruit way more powerful, right?

 

[SSJ2]

What

 

[ahill1]

For example, a Gomu Gomu no Pistol from Luffy from Skypiea should be way more powerful than a Gomu Gomu no Pistol from Luffy of East Blue. He didn't train his fruit in the meantime, just got stronger through battles.

 

[Fantastische Hure]

This seems strange. I mean, even if Luffy didn't train his Akuma no Mi, just the fact that he got stronger would make his attacks with the fruit way more powerful, right?

He could (probably) means not what you are saying, but that devil-fruit powers can be enhanced. You can do the basic punching harder with your devil-fruit, but you can also just diversify the way you can use said ability.

 

[SSJ2]

That's obvious, but certain abilities can nullify one another. Enel wouldn't hurt Luffy with lightning no matter how powerful he got.

 

[ahill1]

That's obvious, but certain abilities can nullify one another. Enel wouldn't hurt Luffy with lightning no matter how powerful he got.

If he had Haki he probably would right?

But, is that what Oda is trying to say? I am having problems intepreting the "the strength of powers does not correlate with characters strength".

 

[SSJ2]

He's saying for example that Ace could be stronger than he looks. Akainu's fruit put him at such an advantage where it made Ace look like a scrub compared to the other commanders. Ace wasn't that weak, but he either didn't have Haki for reason of bad writing, combined with his fruit being nullified by Akainu's.

 

[Fantastische Hure]

Even Crocodile, IIRC said something as far back as Alabasta about how you can either be happy with your devil-fruit powers or find ways to make them more useful. Doflamingo could turn the entire environment into strings.

 

[SSJ2]

Exactly. Think about if Luffy exclusively used the pistol attack for the entire series? He'd get stomped by early East Blue.

 

[ahill1]

He's saying for example that Ace could be stronger than he looks. Akainu's fruit put him at such an advantage where it made Ace look like a scrub compared to the other commanders. Ace wasn't that weak, but he either didn't have Haki for reason of bad writing, combined with his fruit being nullified by Akainu's.

I see, but Oda ended the sentence with "you never know how every fight will turn out". If the Akuma no Mi's power isn't dependant of the character's strength, shouldn't fights where some character has a powered up version of fruit compared to others have its outcome easily predictable?

So maybe if he said that "the strength of the power depends of the strength of the user", in which case every fight could turn out on an expected way since Ace, despite having an inferior version of Akuma no Mi, could easily turn the tables against someone with a powered up version by virtue of being stronger.

 

[SSJ2]

He's simply saying there are tons of other factors.

 

[ahill1]

Yeah, I think I am making it more troublesome than it needs to be.

 

[ahill1]

But basically, he is saying the powers in One Piece aren't so linear, right?