Can We Rely on Power Levels?

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JSnively03
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Can We Rely on Power Levels?

Post by JSnively03 » Fri May 29, 2015 11:41 pm

A lot of people ask, "Are power levels accurate?".

Toriyama says nowhere on the Kanzenshuu that they're inaccurate. Kanzenshuu says they aren't accurate, but Toriyama only said that they are hard to measure.

Goku in the Frieza Saga had a power level of 150,000,000.

To destroy the moon, you have to have a power level of 139.

36 moons = the size of of Earth, so 150,000,000/36 = 1,079,136.

1,079,136/139 = 29,796, so that's how many planets Goku can destroy in his SSJ form (Frieza Saga) according to power levels.

This would make Goku multi-planet level in his SSJ form (Frieza Saga) and that's more than his maximum destructive capability was in the Frieza Saga.

In conclusion, power levels are accurate depending on how we use them.
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Re: Can We Rely on Power Levels?

Post by Rocketman » Sat May 30, 2015 12:05 am

The entire point of power levels was that they were unreliable.

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Re: Can We Rely on Power Levels?

Post by Saiga » Sat May 30, 2015 12:32 am

Rocketman wrote:The entire point of power levels was that they were unreliable.
I've seen this said so many times before but that simply isn't true. There's no evidence that Toriyama intended this, as battle powers are just a common and popular in Japanese shounen series.

And if that was the intent, it just didn't even remotely work out in practice. Battle powers are 100% reliable, the Earthlings could just manipulate their ki. Which meant... the numbers were never actually wrong, it was simply a mistake to assume a given number was somebody's maximum power. A 5,000 was always weaker than a 10,000.

They're just a numeric expression of ki, which the protagonists constantly rely on anyway. All confusion comes purely from a few villains being unable to understand that some people could change their power. It'd be the exact same if they were sensing ki instead of using scouters, or if the protagonists used scouters and battle power numbers in place of all those scenes where they sense ki.
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Re: Can We Rely on Power Levels?

Post by Zephyr » Sat May 30, 2015 1:05 am

You can rely on power levels for some things. Not as many as some parts of the fandom would like to think though.

Is there a consistent scale and system from which you can extrapolate feats and such consistently? Toriyama's recent contributions seem to want to say "no". Seems to ruffle a lot of peoples' johnnies.

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Re: Can We Rely on Power Levels?

Post by Darkprince410 » Sat May 30, 2015 2:00 am

JSnively03 wrote:
To destroy the moon, you have to have a power level of 139.
There's nothing saying that Roshi was at 139 when he destroyed the Moon. When Bulma read off that number with Raditz's scouter, he was lounging around at his house. He was certainly not combat ready in any sense, nor was he in his bulked-up state that he was in when he fired the Kamehameha that blew the Moon up.

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Re: Can We Rely on Power Levels?

Post by Kamiccolo9 » Sat May 30, 2015 2:13 am

"Toriyama says nowhere on the Kanzenshuu?"
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Re: Can We Rely on Power Levels?

Post by Polyphase Avatron » Sat May 30, 2015 3:52 am

That really depends on what you mean by 'accurate'. With a few exceptions, it can generally be said that someone with a higher power level will be stronger, faster, tougher, and able to throw more powerful blasts than someone with a lower power level. So someone with a higher power level will more than likely win in a fight, and the bigger the difference is, the easier the victory will be.

However I don't think you can actually apply ratios and things to power levels to determine precisely how much faster/stronger/etc. one character is than another. That way lies madness.
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Re: Can We Rely on Power Levels?

Post by Dayspring » Sat May 30, 2015 9:27 am

I saw it more as the stronger you got, the less important a gap between Battle Powers became, as well as how fast a person could become even stronger through training and fighting. This very problematic aspect of Battle Powers simply wasn't an issue for people like Freeza and co, because an extremely small amount of people in the Universe surpass a BP of 1,000 (1,000 is considered "strong" by scouter readings and 177 is considered "large." That tells us at least half the Universe has a BP under 177.). Prior to SSJ, nobody was on par with Freeza's 120,000,000 before, let alone in the hundreds of billions.
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Re: Can We Rely on Power Levels?

Post by Polyphase Avatron » Sat May 30, 2015 10:06 am

Dayspring wrote:I saw it more as the stronger you got, the less important a gap between Battle Powers became, as well as how fast a person could become even stronger through training and fighting. This very problematic aspect of Battle Powers simply wasn't an issue for people like Freeza and co, because an extremely small amount of people in the Universe surpass a BP of 1,000 (1,000 is considered "strong" by scouter readings and 177 is considered "large." That tells us at least half the Universe has a BP under 177.). Prior to SSJ, nobody was on par with Freeza's 120,000,000 before, let alone in the hundreds of billions.
Except the Kaioshin, possibly Kibito, Yakon, Dabura, Buu, Beerus, Whis, and a bunch of others if you include anime/movie material...
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Re: Can We Rely on Power Levels?

Post by The Monkey King » Sat May 30, 2015 10:53 am

I'd say so. Vegeta found scouters reliable enough that he still senses ki as though he were using a scouter to detect their Power Level.

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Goku: “It’s a ki…! A huge ki has appeared…! Majin Boo has finally come out…”
Vegeta: “Fuffuffuh…Majin Boo, huh?...Here I was wondering what kind of amazing guy he would be, and he’s got this kind of battle power number?...I thought so…Kakarot, you and I have now become too strong…By a wide margin! By his nature, Kaioshin is supposed to be someone tremendous, but have you ever once thought that he was incredible? Quite the opposite, it's Kaioshin who’s been bewildered…Majin Boo is fearsome from Kaioshin’s perspective, but from ours he’s not so much…”
Goku: “N-no…That’s not it…There’s something abnormal about this ki...”

Although Vegeta's method of sensing proves to be too 'scientific' in this case, Vegeta doesn't really ever dub ki 'abnormal' or 'evil' as Goku, Gohan and co do. He just calculates a number and gets down to business.

Also Toriyama simply stated that he created scouters for it to be easier for himself and the readers to keep track of how powerful characters so he had a number attached to them.

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Re: Can We Rely on Power Levels?

Post by Dayspring » Sat May 30, 2015 11:19 am

Polyphase Avatron wrote:
Dayspring wrote:I saw it more as the stronger you got, the less important a gap between Battle Powers became, as well as how fast a person could become even stronger through training and fighting. This very problematic aspect of Battle Powers simply wasn't an issue for people like Freeza and co, because an extremely small amount of people in the Universe surpass a BP of 1,000 (1,000 is considered "strong" by scouter readings and 177 is considered "large." That tells us at least half the Universe has a BP under 177.). Prior to SSJ, nobody was on par with Freeza's 120,000,000 before, let alone in the hundreds of billions.
Except the Kaioshin, possibly Kibito, Yakon, Dabura, Buu, Beerus, Whis, and a bunch of others if you include anime/movie material...
None of whom are are regularly being encountered by people who use scouter technology prior to the introduction of SSJ. Hence my point.
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Re: Can We Rely on Power Levels?

Post by ParkerAL » Sat May 30, 2015 11:30 am

I've said it before, but battle powers (or power levels, whatever) really are the bane of this franchise. Everybody gets hung up on them and they contribute nothing of real value. Rather than look at the strategies and techniques one fighter might employ against another, every fight in Dragon Ball Z ultimately boils down to a dull numerical equation. I wish they were unreliable. If that were the case, combat in the series would be far more interesting, and less prone to absurd exponential power creep.
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Re: Can We Rely on Power Levels?

Post by B » Sat May 30, 2015 1:28 pm

Battle powers were unreliable in the context of the Freeza arc because those guys didn't know how to pick up on ki without Scouters and could be caught off guard. Sure, in the grand scheme of things, Krillin successfully sneaking up on Majin Buu means nothing because of the huge gap, but at that point BPs are in the billions, certainly not being counted by anything official, and the win goes to whoever isn't screwing around. Toriyama even had to simplify them to two-digit numbers to talk about Goku, Beers, and Whis.

I truly believe, for example, if Vegeta makes a tactical mistake, Gohan could sneak a win on him. Everyone is so strong now that the gaps are negligible.
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Re: Can We Rely on Power Levels?

Post by FoolsGil » Sat May 30, 2015 3:00 pm

The tricky thing about the PL talk is while they are unreliable, they are reliable at the same time.

-Raditz being defeated was due to luck, not Goku's and Piccolo's determination and sheer will.
-No matter what plan was enacted, and how stupid Nappa was, it was all settled by Goku raising his PL via Kaioken.
-Vegeta became a great ape, ten times his normal power level to attempt to win, and was still dangerous when he was shrunk down again.
-Vegeta killed Dodoria and Zarbon when there was only a 1000 pl gap between them.
-Humans become absolutely worthless because of a low power level.

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Re: Can We Rely on Power Levels?

Post by Lord Beerus » Sat May 30, 2015 5:09 pm

Power levels are really double edged sword. I certainly think that power levels can be useful guide for gouging a person's strength or potential strength in the future. But at the same time, fans have become some hung over on numbers since the Freeza arc, how strong a person is, or can be become, has been seriously taken out of context due to misinformation, bad math or flat out fan-wanking.

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Re: Can We Rely on Power Levels?

Post by supercat » Mon Jun 01, 2015 4:11 pm

Power Levels are great at evaluating and helping to determine outcomes of battles, as well as predicting how a battle may potentially turn out.

With that being said, the whole concept of how one must be at a certain power to accomplish a particular task (destroying a planet for example), doesn't necessarily have to be taken so literally in my opinion. I strongly agree that certain numbers can be too restricting in terms of exploring further into the depths of creativity.

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Re: Can We Rely on Power Levels?

Post by Hitiro » Mon Jun 01, 2015 4:36 pm

JSnively03 wrote:A lot of people ask, "Are power levels accurate?".

Toriyama says nowhere on the Kanzenshuu that they're inaccurate. Kanzenshuu says they aren't accurate, but Toriyama only said that they are hard to measure.

Goku in the Freeza Saga had a power level of 150,000,000.

To destroy the moon, you have to have a power level of 139.

36 moons = the size of of Earth, so 150,000,000/36 = 1,079,136.

1,079,136/139 = 29,796, so that's how many planets Goku can destroy in his SSJ form (Freeza Saga) according to power levels.

This would make Goku multi-planet level in his SSJ form (Freeza Saga) and that's more than his maximum destructive capability was in the Freeza Saga.

In conclusion, power levels are accurate depending on how we use them.
It wouldn't actually work this way. You can't use "Well Earth is 36 moons worth so this battle power should be enough." Because gravitational binding energy increases to pretty much exponential proportions the more gravity and mass an object obtains. But I've never believed that the destructive force of a Ki attack is linear either. In all eventuality it would would be something like exponential itself. Because Freeza could destroy a planet with 10x Earth's gravity with just a battle power of 530,000. So 18,000 to blow up Earth is a complete possibility.

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Re: Can We Rely on Power Levels?

Post by supercat » Mon Jun 01, 2015 6:29 pm

Hitiro wrote:
JSnively03 wrote:A lot of people ask, "Are power levels accurate?".

Toriyama says nowhere on the Kanzenshuu that they're inaccurate. Kanzenshuu says they aren't accurate, but Toriyama only said that they are hard to measure.

Goku in the Freeza Saga had a power level of 150,000,000.

To destroy the moon, you have to have a power level of 139.

36 moons = the size of of Earth, so 150,000,000/36 = 1,079,136.

1,079,136/139 = 29,796, so that's how many planets Goku can destroy in his SSJ form (Freeza Saga) according to power levels.

This would make Goku multi-planet level in his SSJ form (Freeza Saga) and that's more than his maximum destructive capability was in the Freeza Saga.

In conclusion, power levels are accurate depending on how we use them.
It wouldn't actually work this way. You can't use "Well Earth is 36 moons worth so this battle power should be enough." Because gravitational binding energy increases to pretty much exponential proportions the more gravity and mass an object obtains. But I've never believed that the destructive force of a Ki attack is linear either. In all eventuality it would would be something like exponential itself. Because Freeza could destroy a planet with 10x Earth's gravity with just a battle power of 530,000. So 18,000 to blow up Earth is a complete possibility.
A bit off topic but somewhat related, I feel like certain attacks are more condensed and concentrated forms of ki. For instance, Frieza's Death Beam and even Piccolo's Makankosappo, are thin blasts of energy, and not nearly as physically large in volume as the Kamehameha fired by Roshi during the events of 21st Budokai. Regardless of this size difference, a Death Beam and/or a Makanksosappo can easily one-shot a powerful enemy that Roshi's 21st Budokai Kamehameha would never even be able to conceive of taking down. I feel like just because an attack looks more amplified, or it creates an explosion that appears physically larger, it doesn't mean it is better at taking down a stronger opponent. Nappa's attack on the city may have been damaging to his surroundings, but in no shape or form would that attack (despite all of its volume and destructive capabilities), have the same effect on a powerful enemy who knows how to leverage ki, as a Makankosappo from Piccolo from Buu arc would have. We see powerful attacks in subsequent events that don't seem to dish out nearly as much damage to the environment as Nappa's attack on the city However, it is likely these attacks can one-shot fighters who wouldn't even be fazed by the attack Nappa used on the city. I guess what I'm trying to say is, when it comes down to taking down or one-shotting a powerful opponent, how large or destructive an attack looks doesn't mean much if the ki contained within that attack is weaker than a physically smaller or more condensed attack with stronger ki. An attack with stronger ki and condensed volume can easily outshine a massive blast with weaker levels of ki put into it despite how much more destructive the attack with the larger volume and weaker ki may appear to be.

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