The different levels of effort Kid Buu used (Personal theory)

[Natasha Romanoff]

Here, I am going to exclude situations such as him punching Base Vegeta and would focus on main instances such as his big fights.

Level of effort #1: Against Ssj2 Vegeta & Good Buu initially

With this level of effort he is able to stomp effortlessly Vegeta, who thought he was going to die, but the gap is not big enough for him to oneshot and unlike Cell vs Vegeta, he didn't got three shotted, even though, is a 4x gap.

However, in this level effort, Good Buu can hold his own pretty well, landing some blows, even though, Gohan couldn't land one on Gotenks Buu, which tells me that the gap is smaller than that. So, this gap would be like a 1.1 to 1.15 times over Good Buu (at max a 1.2, but that'd be reaching imo) and like a 1.33 to 1.5 times over Vegeta.

Level of effort #2: Against Good Buu during the rest of the fight

With this gap, he is able to stop Buu with his legs and overpower him in a much easier way than what he did initially. Had not been for Buu's limitless stamina, he could have been stomped as easily (if not more) as Vegeta.

At this point, Good Buu is no more than 60 to 63% of Kid Buu displayed level.

Level of effort #3/Close to full effort: Against SSJ3 Goku & Genkidama initially

SSJ3 Goku & The Genkidama were the only actual challenges Kid Buu had.

He is close to full effort as Vegeta admires how Goku is able to fight/keep up with him:

Chapter: 510 (DBZ 316), P8.2
Context: as Goku fights pure Boo
Vegeta: “Kakarot…You’re incredible…I am simply no match for that Majin Boo…You’re the only one capable of fighting him…”

Chapter: 511 (DBZ 317), P8.2
Context: as pure Boo beats up on Vegeta
Vegeta: “Wh-what fast and heavy attacks…! …Kakarot was…fighting with a gu-guy like this…?!”

However, with this level of effort, he is totally powerless against the Genkidama:

Spoiler

Full effort: Blast that destroyed the Earth/vs the Genkidama

Is curious as to how Goku admitted inferiority on those two instances, one saying that he can't stop Kid Buu's blast and the other saying that he would train so he could get much stronger to actually defy him which makes me believe that he used the same level of effort in both occasions.

Spoiler

Chapter: 516 (DBZ 322), P11.2-3
Context: after Polunga restores Goku’s stamina and he’s about to finish Boo off with the Genki-Dama
Goku: “…You’re amazin’. You hung in there really well all on your own…This time, be reborn as a good guy…I wanna fight you one-on-one…I’ll be waitin'…And I’ll have gotten much, much better…See ya later!”

What do you think about this theory?

 

[Pyro]

Goku can't beat him 1v1 at his Boo Saga level. SSJ3 is too demanding. He's got to get to a point where he can offset that demand with enough power to also erase Boo.

 

[GreatSaiyaman123]

Agreed entirely.

Not sure if the planet buster scene implies Kid Boo > Goku. Kid Boo wouldn’t be capable of deflecting a FP blast from Goku either, according to Goku himself.

 

[SIAD]

@MikaelHarding What do you think?

 

[Pakl]

Why not simply saying Pure Boo was toying with Good Boo and Vegeta because they were much weaker?

 

[Natasha Romanoff]

Goku can't beat him 1v1 at his Boo Saga level. SSJ3 is too demanding. He's got to get to a point where he can offset that demand with enough power to also erase Boo.

I agree. Goku could kill him had it not been for stamina issues but he could also kill stronger people than him with amped ki blasts.

Agreed entirely.

Not sure if the planet buster scene implies Kid Boo > Goku. Kid Boo wouldn’t be capable of deflecting a FP blast from Goku either, according to Goku himself.

Kid Buu FP blast is strong enough to overpower both Goku and Vegeta's maximum efforts. Not only just Goku which is basically the same statement Super Buu has.

 

[MikaelHarding]

I think he's serious all the time

 

[SIAD]

I think he's serious all the time

So Kid Boo gave his 100% effort in hitting Base Vegeta? If so, shouldn't Vegeta die in an instant?

 

[MikaelHarding]

So Kid Boo gave his 100% effort in hitting Base Vegeta? If so, shouldn't Vegeta die in an instant?

well vegeta is known to be extremely durable

taking a spirit bomb head on

getting crushed by a great ape gohan

getting beaten up by a transformed zarbon

getting beat up by recoome

getting beaten within an inch of his life by final form frieza

 

[Natasha Romanoff]

Cell three shotted him and did short work of him (Vegeta), though.

 

[MikaelHarding]

Cell three shotted him and did short work of him (Vegeta), though.

he still lived and endured that

 

[Natasha Romanoff]

Because Cell let him do so (similar situation to the Androids) as he has no interest for him. And was about to shot to him until Trunks came to rescue.

 

[MikaelHarding]

Because Cell let him do so (similar situation to the Androids) as he has no interest for him. And was about to shot to him until Trunks came to rescue.

I'm just saying vegeta is extraordinarily durable I didn't say he was immortal

 

[Natasha Romanoff]

I'm just saying vegeta is extraordinarily durable I didn't say he was immortal

Realistically he'd have been oneshotted by Kid Buu either if he was in base or SSJ2. SSJ2 tier characters are shown to be oneshot material for SSJ3 or above

 

[GreatSaiyaman123]

I think he's serious all the time

But he’s not. His name is Kid Boo because he never takes anything seriously, like a kid.

 

[Pyro]

And Goku pointed out that Boo was purposefully dragging out his regeneration at one point.

 

[Natasha Romanoff]

Weird to think that 17 didn't play with Kamiccolo having limitless stamina, neither 16 played zero games with Imperfect Cell or Super Buu with SSJ3 Gotenks. If it's that much of a benefit having limitless stamina.

 

[GreatSaiyaman123]

Boo was playing games with Gotenks. He pretended to be weaker so Gotenks would be confident, fuse again and get absorbed. Gotenks also lost from SSJ3 strain just like Goku.

Piccolo wasn’t under SSJ3 strain and 16 wanted to kill Cell.

 

[Natasha Romanoff]

@GreatSaiyaman123

He wasn't. As smart as Buu proved to be, getting killed before Gohan ever appeared doesn't make sense from a narrative perspective. On top of Gohan giving the chance of Gotenks to end Buu actually goes against Buu pretending to be weaker (as well as Piccolo's statement). It's interesting how Super Buu got mental unstable against Gotenks while Kid Buu didn't against Goku.

Android 17 decided to go serious after testing for a while to Piccolo, he knows that he would eventually beat him making use of his limitless stamina, but is clear that he no longer was playing around like Kid Buu vs SSJ3 Goku.

Android 16 just wanted for the androids to escape, and he knew that Cell wouldn't be defeated by regular means which is heavily implied towards the fact that a massive attack couldn't actually do much on him, which means that he could only have beaten him if the fight gets longer and Cell gets tired.

The fact of life is that almost every even fight of limited stamina vs unlimited stamina has the character with unlimited stamina not playing around and taking things seriously, unlike Android 18 vs SSJ Vegeta. YEAH!