Episode #0308 (19 August 2012)

[VegettoEX]

Episode #0308 (download MP3) (rss feed) (subscribe in iTunes) (YouTube version)
36:38; 96 kbps, mono; 25.4 MB

Episode #0308! VegettoEX and Kaboom discuss the ways in which characters are at advantages and disadvantages depending on the method by which they sense each others' power. Additionally, if some characters cannot mask or amplify their power, what are they doing when they otherwise appear to be powering up? A quick news recap gets you on your way to round out the episode! Referenced sites:

• “Dragon Ball Heroes: Ultimate Mission” Coming to Nintendo 3DS
• “Dragon Ball Heroes: Ultimate Mission” (3DS) Website Opens
• Kazuya Hisada Added to the Animation Styles Guide

Enjoy!

[Kaboom]

Ah, the joys of being invited to record with zero prep time. Oh well, I like a challenge.

Also note how I switched from "Kuririn" to "Krillin" halfway through the episode.

[Bussani]

The analytical side of me really finds this topic interesting--but I suppose you could guess that from what I've said in the threads and the chat room! After listening to the podcast, I did have a few thoughts I wanted to share.

The question of whether Toriyama intended for there to be a difference between natural ki sensing and scouter ki sensing is an interesting one. In the podcast, Mike seemed to lean towards it being a case of Toriyama not thinking things through (at least not as much as folks around here seem to like to think things through). However, I think there's a good chance that it was intentional, and that Toriyama either didn't do a good job of explaining that or didn't feel it was necessary to explain it. Either way, I think he may have had it in his head that there was a difference when he wrote it. Take a look at the order things happen in:

• Vegeta and Nappa show up. Everyone knows they're monstrously strong from the get go, but I suppose they still think they might have some sort of chance against them.
• Vegeta points out that the initial numbers from Nappa's scouter are worthless because these guys can change their battle powers when they start fighting. The way he says it seems to imply that Vegeta and Nappa themselves can't change theirs, and this is backed up in the next arc where Vegeta explains he learned to control his battle power while on Earth.
• Nappa "powers up". Despite it being fairly clear that they can't change their battle powers, everyone's surprised at just how much ki he has.
• Piccolo guesses that Vegeta must be the stronger of the two after seeing how Nappa cowered and obeyed his orders. This seems to indicate not only that Piccolo and the others can't tell just how strong Vegeta is, but that they can't even tell how he stacks up against Nappa.
• After seeing Goku's battle power of 5,000, Vegeta is quick to point out that this may only be for starters, since "these guys" change their battle powers. If Vegeta and Nappa did the same thing, he wouldn't be saying it like it was odd, would he?

It's back and forth so much, and so consistent with the two point of views, that it really seems like it could be intentional to me.

So, is there a solution? I think so, and I could go into it, but I'd probably just be repeating what we've all said in the other thread. But maybe I can boil it down to a very simple thought?

What if "battle power" (the numbers a scouter gives) is a measure of the amount of ki, but "size of a ki" (what the Earthlings feel) is--just as an example--the amount of ki multiplied by how much effort is being put into using it, or how fired up that amount of ki is? That way, Earthlings would feel a difference between Nappa standing around and Nappa preparing to punch Tenshinhan's arm off, but a scouter wouldn't; at the same time it would mean that both scouters and natural ki sensers would be fooled by someone hiding their ki (which would lower both the amount and the effort, of course). The two would still sensing the same thing--ki--but there would a fundamental difference in the way they interpret it. It's kind of like having a machine that measures the volume of a sound for you, but that can't tell you whether it's a high or low frequency. If I look at it that way, all of the above makes sense to me.

Finally, one example you guys didn't mention was Gohan trying to sense Videl in the Buu arc. Presumably she can't hide or increase her ki at will, as she doesn't even know what ki is at the time, yet Gohan can't pick her ki out of all the other human auras until she starts fighting. It does seem to lend itself to the idea that ki is just clearer or easier to detect when a person's all fired up, doesn't it?

[Kaboom]

Finally, one example you guys didn't mention was Gohan trying to sense Videl in the Buu arc. Presumably she can't hide or increase her ki at will, as she doesn't even know what ki is at the time, yet Gohan can't pick her ki out of all the other human auras until she starts fighting. It does seem to lend itself to the idea that ki is just clearer or easier to detect when a person's all fired up, doesn't it?

Yes! I knew there was another key example that I was forgetting.

[Bussani]

I did used to think that maybe the size of her ki fluctuated subconsciously, but if it was that simple, it wouldn't be considered such a rare ability by Freeza's men, right? Anyway, that's one of my favorite examples for some reason.

[Piccolo Daimao]

What if "battle power" (the numbers a scouter gives) is a measure of the amount of ki, but "size of a ki" (what the Earthlings feel) is--just as an example--the amount of ki multiplied by how much effort is being put into using it, or how fired up that amount of ki is? That way, Earthlings would feel a difference between Nappa standing around and Nappa preparing to punch Tenshinhan's arm off, but a scouter wouldn't; at the same time it would mean that both scouters and natural ki sensers would be fooled by someone hiding their ki (which would lower both the amount and the effort, of course). The two would still sensing the same thing--ki--but there would a fundamental difference in the way they interpret it. It's kind of like having a machine that measures the volume of a sound for you, but that can't tell you whether it's a high or low frequency. If I look at it that way, all of the above makes sense to me.

Finally, one example you guys didn't mention was Gohan trying to sense Videl in the Buu arc. Presumably she can't hide or increase her ki at will, as she doesn't even know what ki is at the time, yet Gohan can't pick her ki out of all the other human auras until she starts fighting. It does seem to lend itself to the idea that ki is just clearer or easier to detect when a person's all fired up, doesn't it?

Yes, I agree with this. I've always explained it as being more like surfacing their ki, rather than an actual ability to control it at will. And I borrowed someone else's analogy of an ocean being splashed up, so it looks like it's bigger and more fierce, but the size actually hasn't changed at all. And as for the Videl example, I think it might be a similar thing to what Nappa was doing, just without an aura, since she doesn't have any understanding of ki by this point.

Talking of which, I don't know whether or not this is worth mentioning, but despite never doing it in the manga or anime (to my knowledge), in Sparking! METEOR, Videl actually has the ability to fire off a small close-range ki blast, even though it only seemed as if Gohan's ki training only entailed the ability to fly. Which makes me wonder that, in the main continuity, Videl probably could develop into a really great fighter with Gohan as her teacher, but also, imagine what would happen if she trained under Roushi, climbed Karin Tower, and had her skills honed by Kami and Mr. Popo?

You see, even though she didn't do much in the way of forwarding the plot other than persuading Gohan to enter the tournament (a role that could've been filled in by anyone, like Chi-Chi, or even just Gohan himself deciding to participate for money or whatever), I think she had some potential. It's just a shame that it was at the very end of the series, and she didn't see how she improved, or could've improved.

And I apologize for going off-topic; it's just something I like to think about.

[JeffJarrett]

Videl charging ki in her hands:



from episode 207. Her ability to fire Ki Blasts in the Budokai Tenkaichi games comes from this scene.

I think that powering up works like in the Budokai Tenkaichi games. Nappa and Freeza's soldiers need to charge their ki bars like the Z Fighters, but they can't hide the bar's full extend. Z Fighters can hide the ki bar's full extend, so when a scouter scans them, it only detects the ki charged, not the ki bar's whole potential/maximum.

Contrary to scouters that give precise numbers, Ki Sensing only gives an approximation of someone's ki/BP. That's why Piccolo was surprised by Nappa's ki when he charged it to its maximum, the bar's actual maximum being above what Piccolo estimated before Nappa powered up.

[DragonBoxZTheMovies]

Pretty sure Kaboom used a similar analogy in a previous episode of the podcast.

[Piccolo Daimao]

Videl charging ki in her hands:

http://images.wikia.com/dragonball/imag ... idelKi.png

from episode 207. Her ability to fire Ki Blasts in the Budokai Tenkaichi games comes from this scene.

Oh, I've never seen that before. I wonder why she didn't use it against Spopovich. But perhaps she was too tired and/or beat-up by that point to muster up enough energy.

Another thing I want to mention, if it hasn't been already, is that natural ki-sensors sometimes have the ability to sense whether or not an opponent's suppressing their ki, like when Gohan and Kuririn knew that the Namekians were suppressing their ki against Freeza's men (starting from a BP to 1,000 and rising it to 3,000 when they began fighting).

[soulnova]

All this talk about power levels and ki reminded me of the DBZ Roleplaying Game. They can't explain Nappa "powering up" but I liked very much the mechanic of Ki usage.

In that game system, you have your "energy/ki reserve" and your "active energy" pool. You need to power up your reserve to make it "active" and start using it for ki blasts and techniques. So for example you have a total energy of 500 points and then you power up 100 points, those 100 ki points is what you will sense with your own abilities and scouters, and you still have 400 points left. Your reserve will eventually run out and you wont be able to replenish how much Ki you have activated for techniques.

That struck a cord for me because we have seen many times that when a character's ki starts dwindling mid fight, he will be defeated. In the game there's also a skill that you can use to hide your "active energy", so you can be fully charged and still be felt lower.

[VegettoEX]

That sounds incredibly similar to the ki charging system in basically every single last DBZ video game. For example, Goku can do a Kamehameha when he has three bars of ki built up, but can't do the Super Kamehameha until he has five bars of ki charged up. Things get even more interesting in Budokai 3 when that "baseline ki" came into play, whereby each character has a set number of ki bars that will always auto-regenerate back up (without you NEEDING to MANUALLY charge them, though you can, and it will go back up faster) even when they dip below.

Interesting, interesting... game mechanics being applied and used back to define in-universe happenings!

[soulnova]

The problem here, for your character at least, is that in that game you won't get your ki back right away. There are no bars. You need to rest and wait at least for a couple of hours to regenerate it. It's a pen and paper roleplaying game after all.

I haven't had the chance to use the game with my friends yet. I don't know if you have heard about it VegettoEX.

[Herms]

In that game system, you have your "energy/ki reserve" and your "active energy" pool. You need to power up your reserve to make it "active" and start using it for ki blasts and techniques. So for example you have a total energy of 500 points and then you power up 100 points, those 100 ki points is what you will sense with your own abilities and scouters, and you still have 400 points left. Your reserve will eventually run out and you wont be able to replenish how much Ki you have activated for techniques.

That's also pretty similar to how things work in Hunter X Hunter.

[Bussani]

That's also sort of how I imagine it working in Dragon Ball. I kind of see battle power or ki size as how much power you have at a given time, but that power comes from a unseen reserve. Of course, this unseen reserve isn't really a tangible thing, but rather, an easy metaphor to represent the person's stamina.

Of course, since Nappa and Vegeta's battle powers aren't supposed to change, the idea is that their current power would constantly be refilled from their reserve unless a) that reserve starts getting low, or b) they take significant damage. I guess that's like the idea of having bars that auto-refill up to a certain point.

[soulnova]

Of course, since Nappa and Vegeta's battle powers aren't supposed to change, the idea is that their current power would constantly be refilled from their reserve unless a) that reserve starts getting low, or b) they take significant damage. I guess that's like the idea of having bars that auto-refill up to a certain point.

I think you are up to something. I guess that's as close as we will get to an answer.

[Bussani]

I thought of an analogy for it earlier. We could imagine their reserves as a big tank of water, with the water representing ki, and the current battle power of a person by the water that's currently in a hose attached to that tank. Vegeta and Nappa can control the nozzle of the hose, allowing them to shoot out either some water or a lot of water (either way, the amount of water in the hose won't actually change because there's constantly more entering it from the tank). The Earthlings, on the other hand, can control the water itself, allowing them to reduce the water flowing through their hose to a trickle, or raise the pressure even higher than usual. If the tank begins to run dry (i.e. they use up all their stamina), the hose's pressure will be effected, and eventually the water in the hose will be reduced. Likewise, if the hose is damaged (i.e. the person has been beaten the hell up), it could end up with compressions and bends that reduce how much water can get through, as well as leaks that waste water and empty the tank faster.

I tried to work the difference between sensing ki naturally and detecting ki with a scouter into this, but it's a bit tricky. The best I can think of is to suggest that the water gets hotter the more fired up a person is, and that Earthlings sense the amount of water in the hose via the heat it gives off. A scouter would somehow measure the amount of water more directly instead.

[Nex Carnifex]

I love trying to make sense of the nonsensical

[Son_Gohan]

Perhaps what Nappa and Vegeta did on Earth wasn't essentially raising their Ki like we've come to recognize, but rather a technique that effected their Ki in a way that would raise other attributes, such as power, speed, durability, etc. While their Ki remained at the same level.

Once Vegeta learned how to control his battle power, he didn't have an electric aura when he powers up on Namek, but an attack like he used on Recoome still exhibited that trait:



Which could suggest that what he did is technically similar to what he used on Earth, pertaining to how he used his Ki, but instead of it increasing the power and speed of one attack, it was his whole body that was effected.

Well, at least that's the conclusion I got on trying make sense of this matter.

[Kaboom]

That could simply be a case of gathering and straining their ki to attack, come to think of it. That wouldn't quite be the same thing as actually controlling their power.

[Piccolo Daimao]

I find that similar to Saiga's theory of ki and energy being different things, explaining how Dabra was able to sense the energy of Gokuu and co., despite the fact that they'd suppressed their ki. However, ki, energy and battle power are often described as synonymous with each other: multiple terms for basically the same concepts.

Even "genki" donated to the Genki-Dama is often flat-out called just "ki" or "energy", which doesn't make the distinction and is the source of people thinking that Ultimate Gohan's weaker than Pure Boo because his ki alone wasn't quite enough to defeat Pure Boo (ignoring the fact that it was Gokuu himself powering it and he didn't have enough stamina to unleash it anyway, and once it was restored, he could finally blast every inch of Boo's cells to Hell). But that's a whole other can of worms I don't wish to open here.