Apply DB Super's Logic Of Insanely Fast Power Increases To Ordinary DBZ.

[PerhapsTheOtherOne]

I've seen all the current eps of super and I don't recall Freeza or anyone getting stronger simply by pacing around. you don't have to like Super's logic behind power-ups/training whether they be on screen or off, but there's no need to exaggerate.

People hating on Freeza's power-up when all Gohan did to get Ultimate was sit on his ass. At least in Super he actually had to work to get to that stage again.

Its not over exaggeration when Freeza lightly punched a guy(he HAD to hold back because he was more than 20x Togoma) everyday for four months and then somehow got a golden form just because light to moderate exercise yields legendary potential. Its merely a step above pacing around for four months.
It may as well be said that light to moderate exercise counts as training at this point because if 17 and Roshi just need to stay active to keep up then Super's logic has the right to be exaggerated.

Okay then, so what counts as light-to-moderate exercise in the franchise? How much context do we have of that? Hmm?

Without context, these exaggerations lose a lot of their initial credence. The conclusions reached in the anime may be ridiculous, but they DO benefit to a degree by not bogging down viewers with explanations, as it allows them to focus on other areas of the show. Of course, that's assuming the general viewer isn't as nitpicky as forum-goers on Kanzenshuu often can be perceived as.

What you saw as "light exercise", I could easily reinterpret as us not seeing the whole picture and thus coming to the wrong conclusions. Thus, based on Super's logic, power-ups are somewhat more sudden and often unexplained, but generally don't occur mid-battle and follow a certain narrative consistency of allowing other characters to catch up to Goku and Vegeta.

For example, one could easily say that Freeza had to learn how to control his strength like never before and thus put in a lot of effort into suppressing his power whilst also trading blows, resulting in a much more intense regime that powered him up as he gained control over his naturally high potential, like how he powered up significantly after learning to control his Golden Evolution.

If we apply this to Z, for example, Krillin could've worked his ass off so much when training for the arrival of the Androids that he managed to catch up to base Goku's level.

[theherodjl]

I've seen all the current eps of super and I don't recall Freeza or anyone getting stronger simply by pacing around. you don't have to like Super's logic behind power-ups/training whether they be on screen or off, but there's no need to exaggerate.

People hating on Freeza's power-up when all Gohan did to get Ultimate was sit on his ass. At least in Super he actually had to work to get to that stage again.

Its not over exaggeration when Freeza lightly punched a guy(he HAD to hold back because he was more than 20x Togoma) everyday for four months and then somehow got a golden form just because light to moderate exercise yields legendary potential. Its merely a step above pacing around for four months.
It may as well be said that light to moderate exercise counts as training at this point because if 17 and Roshi just need to stay active to keep up then Super's logic has the right to be exaggerated.

Okay then, so what counts as light-to-moderate exercise in the franchise? How much context do we have of that? Hmm?

Without context, these exaggerations lose a lot of their initial credence. The conclusions reached in the anime may be ridiculous, but they DO benefit to a degree by not bogging down viewers with explanations, as it allows them to focus on other areas of the show. Of course, that's assuming the general viewer isn't as nitpicky as forum-goers on Kanzenshuu often can be perceived as.

What you saw as "light exercise", I could easily reinterpret as us not seeing the whole picture and thus coming to the wrong conclusions. Thus, based on Super's logic, power-ups are somewhat more sudden and often unexplained, but generally don't occur mid-battle and follow a certain narrative consistency of allowing other characters to catch up to Goku and Vegeta.

For example, one could easily say that Freeza had to learn how to control his strength like never before and thus put in a lot of effort into suppressing his power whilst also trading blows, resulting in a much more intense regime that powered him up as he gained control over his naturally high potential, like how he powered up significantly after learning to control his Golden Evolution.

If we apply this to Z, for example, Krillin could've worked his ass off so much when training for the arrival of the Androids that he managed to catch up to base Goku's level.

Evidently light exercise was Freeza's training because he stomped Tagoma into the ground on a daily basis and showed no sign that he had worked up any significant sweat that we the viewer, could notice. He let Tagoma off the hook in training to recover everytime he punched him to a near death state which should be child's play for Freeza given the gap between them.
So far the only substantial effort that Freeza put forth was learning to control his Ki while in hell, everything else suggests a context that Freeza only need gently punch someone half to death for some hours to improve. He never states that his training was strenuous or harsh on him but just seems to brag about his status that he's the emperor of the universe so maybe for Freeza...he doesn't need harsh training or want it. He just does what he needs to which apparently isn't a lot.

[MR.Mark]

Look no further than the character of Tagoma himself in Super.

Training with Freeza changed his personality to the point of him almost being another Freeza, or his successor, a stone cold sociopath killer.

Whether you agree with the four month times span or not, Tagoma and his character after the training more than obviously implied that the training was brutal, torture.

If you want to interpret the training as merely Freeza punching him for four months because your unsatisfied with not being shown everything that happened, fine I guess.

It's a far cry from literally showing Freeza pace around in one scene and literally turn Golden, then gleefully declare that his pacing training has paid off.

Super really doesn't deserve some of the baseless nitpicking it gets, seriously.

[theherodjl]

Look no further than the character of Tagoma himself in Super.

Training with Freeza changed his personality to the point of him almost being another Freeza, or his successor, a stone cold sociopath killer.

Whether you agree with the four month times span or not, Tagoma and his character after the training more than obviously implied that the training was brutal, torture.

If you want to interpret the training as merely Freeza punching him for four months because your unsatisfied with not being shown everything that happened, fine I guess.

It's a far cry from literally showing Freeza pace around in one scene and literally turn Golden, then gleefully declare that his pacing training has paid off.

Super really doesn't deserve some of the baseless nitpicking it gets, seriously.

You see to misunderstand, I'm not nitpicking Super's logic, I'm defending it. It can be crap because DB has gone on for so long that we as the fans, can't really be expected to think the training and gains will become anymore logical or artistically improved. If they want to show Freeza become stronger whether it was with any effort or not is fine with me.

[MR.Mark]

Fair enough, if only we saw Freeza chase Tagoma around like bubbles for four months, his jump in power would be more believable.

[dragonball0900]

The gap between Gohan and Piccolo was nowhere near that large when they started to train in the three years to preparing for the Androids. Piccolo was just over 1 million while Gohan was in the mid to low hundreds of thousands. And Gohan had far greater potential to get stronger than both Piccolo and Goku. We see that with how much stronger Gohan gets from training in preparation for the Saiyans and how much stronger he gets when get some of his hidden power awoken by Guru and not to mention how much his battle power spike every time he got really angry. It really does't add up all that well that after three years of training he's not as powerful as Goku or Piccolo. Honestly speaking, he should have been a SSJ by the time Android 19 and 20 arrived. It's all the more baffling considering that Future Gohan was able to become a SSJ with far less support.

Manga covers mean nothing of importance, and really don figure at all into this debate.

What does it matter if Android 17 and Roshi just trained because they like it? Goku and Vegeta train just because they like it and get much stronger as a result. Why should we single out Android 17 and Roshi? It must be stressed that we have no idea how much gains Androids make when they train. All we know is that they can get stronger through conventional training methods. For all we know, Android 17 could make/could have made Golden Freeza level gains. It's possible. The concept of an Android training has never been explored before. So it's not like it's breaking any established lore or "head-canon". They can literally do whatever the hell they want at this stage with the battle power of Android 17. Android 17 just did some light training over the the last decade or so and his power just unexpectedly creeped to an insane height. Again, it's a rational possibility. There nothing established that it can't happen. It been more than 10 years. Goku wasn't fighting seriously as a SSJB against Android 17 and was trying to make sure he didn't kill Android 17 when they were sparring, so I don't think he became SSJB level right off the bat. We also have no idea just how much stronger SSJB is compared to the other SSJ forms, so we can't come to a rationale as to just how much stronger Android 17 got.

Some say that Android 17 shouldn't become this strong... but... since when was it stated that he can't? Why put a literal glass ceiling on how strong a character, who's never trained before, can get? I'm not saying that people don't have the right to criticize a scenario were certain character get explicitly stronger and the show doesn't go into more depth into how he/she got stronger. There's nothing wrong with wanting a bit more detail. But's it's far from lore breaking or story breaking.

Plus, Future Gohan becoming as strong as he did is a bit of a miracle considering he had nobody to help him get to that stage in power in his base form, let alone become a SSJ.

It's the same deal with Rishi. Why can't he get stronger from training? And besides, the best he was able to do was fight evenly with Base Goku. Plus, we also have no idea how strong Tien is after training with King Kai. So making a comparison with Roshi and Tien is a bit moot.

Dragon Ball runs a simple premise: People train and get stronger. The fashion in which most cast, especially the Saiyans, got strong in the show is the exception not the set stand and rule that must be obliged by every other character that trains. There's no universal gradient that must be abided to when a character grows in power. Especially for a character that's never trained before like Android 17. Some people make small gains through training for a very long time and others make great gains from training for a much lesser amount of time. Some do it on their own with basic tools and others do it with the aid of others or unique enhancements. It's all really dependable on... well... what the plot demands. Some use gimmicks and get special treatment to take shortcuts in get stronger while other just do it the old fashioned way. That's just how Dragon Ball has been since day one. Not every character needs to jump through hoops to become insanely strong.

Maybe Gohan just didn't give it his all when he trained with Piccolo and Goku. I have to admit, that's an inconsistency in Z too.

Manga covers do matter, how can you say they don't figute at all? They are also part of the manga.

You forget that Goku and Vegeta in comparison to Roshi and 17, they got zenkai boosts on Namek and also trained in gravity or (in Goku's case) with lots of masters like King Kai, they also trained with Whis in Super, not to mention they also have transformations on top of it. Roshi and 17, however, they just simply train. It's insane that they got a lot of power than what they should. Obviously it's possible for 17 to become a lot stronger, but seriously, to the point where Goku needs SSJB? 17 could've easily been used to help fighting Buu, and 18 could've also make the similar gains if we assume she trained a bit.

Future Gohan had a lot of years to become a SSJ in comparison to the current Gohan. It's plenty of time to become x20 times stronger. It's more reasonable than 17's increase.

Again, it's impossible for someone who trained with King Kai, and kept on with his training, to be weaker than someone who just did normal training all the time. Tien naturally should be stronger. Roshi being stronger than Tien is one of the most unreasonable and unsense thing in DB.

There are inconsistencies in Z, I agree, Piccolo's increase in the Android arc is one of those. However, while it certainly doesn't make sense for that to happen, at least it's more believable than 17's and Roshi's increasings, and they don't make sense. Things like that is what make Super a lot more inconsistent than Z.

[MR.Mark]

17 had like what, a DECADE to get to wherever he is now? Plus Roshi has apparently been training in secret for who knows how long according to Goku.

I still don't see the problem here, especially with 17.

[DBZ Macky]

17 had like what, a DECADE to get to wherever he is now?

So what? Goku trained in the afterlife and Vegeta trained in insane gravity for 7 years and still barely surpassed SS2 Gohan. No. 17 on the other hand can just range his park and surpass Super Saiyan God for some reason, when Goku himself said that he'd never be able to attain that kind of power by himself, and that it was far beyond his imagination.

[Lord Beerus]

Manga covers do matter, how can you say they don't figute at all? They are also part of the manga.

You forget that Goku and Vegeta in comparison to Roshi and 17, they got zenkai boosts on Namek and also trained in gravity or (in Goku's case) with lots of masters like King Kai, they also trained with Whis in Super, not to mention they also have transformations on top of it. Roshi and 17, however, they just simply train. It's insane that they got a lot of power than what they should. Obviously it's possible for 17 to become a lot stronger, but seriously, to the point where Goku needs SSJB? 17 could've easily been used to help fighting Buu, and 18 could've also make the similar gains if we assume she trained a bit.

Future Gohan had a lot of years to become a SSJ in comparison to the current Gohan. It's plenty of time to become x20 times stronger. It's more reasonable than 17's increase.

Again, it's impossible for someone who trained with King Kai, and kept on with his training, to be weaker than someone who just did normal training all the time. Tien naturally should be stronger. Roshi being stronger than Tien is one of the most unreasonable and unsense thing in DB.

There are inconsistencies in Z, I agree, Piccolo's increase in the Android arc is one of those. However, while it certainly doesn't make sense for that to happen, at least it's more believable than 17's and Roshi's increasings, and they don't make sense. Things like that is what make Super a lot more inconsistent than Z.

Manga covers serve as superficial advertisement for the content that may or may bot be in the manga chapter itself. It has no significant or overreaching influence of what kind of story plays out in the manga chapter itself. Hell, there are some chapters that didn't even have proper covers.

And what wrong with just basic training? I'm made this comment before but not every character needs to jump through hoops to become insanely strong. Some people make small gains through training for a very long time and others make great gains from training for a much lesser amount of time. Some do it on their own with basic tools and others do it with the aid of others or unique enhancements. Some use gimmicks and get special treatment to take shortcuts in get stronger while other just do it the old fashioned way. This ties back into you point with Tien and Roshi. Although, Tien trains a lot, we have no idea what kind of gains he makes in training in comparison to what kind of gain Roshi would make if he were to train again. Plus we have no idea just how much stronger Tien got after training with King Kai. Roshi's strength at best Base Goku tier, so it's not like he's knocking down Super Saiyans and Androids with the flick of his wrist. And how strong Base Goku is in Super is ambiguous to begin with, so it really can't be judged as to whether Roshi made substantial gains from off screen training to begin with.

And in regards to Android 17, as I've previously stated, Goku wasn't fighting seriously as a SSJB against Android 17 and was trying to make sure he didn't kill Android 17 when they were sparring, so he's not SSJB level. We also have no idea just how much stronger SSJB is compared to the other SSJ forms, so we can't come to a rationale as to just how much stronger Android 17 got.

17 had like what, a DECADE to get to wherever he is now?

So what? Goku trained in the afterlife and Vegeta trained in insane gravity for 7 years and still barely surpassed SS2 Gohan. No. 17 on the other hand can just range his park and surpass Super Saiyan God for some reason, when Goku himself said that he'd never be able to attain that kind of power by himself, and that it was far beyond his imagination.

I've said this before and I'll say it again: The fashion the Saiyans got strong in the show is the exception not the set standard and rule that must be obliged by every other character that trains. There's no universal gradient that must be abided to when a character grows in power. Especially for a character that's never trained before like Android 17. Lest we forget Golden Freeza.

[MR.Mark]

Indeed, Saiyans may be a warrior race but that doesn't mean other beings can't be more gifted at other things like training. Let's also not forget that universe 7 Saiyans were a joke battle power wise until Goku and Vegeta starting getting ludicrously strong by the Namek arc.

Moreover, 17 and 18 don't have stamina issues, that alone should insure massive gains from training.

[Drellz26]

Goku going from not bing able to beat Saiyan Saga Vegeta to being able to out class Captain Ginyu with a few days of training.
Oh wait.

Fair enough, if only we saw Freeza chase Tagoma around like bubbles for four months, his jump in power would be more believable.

I won't let the best responses in this thread go unnoticed, bravo guys

Who outside of 17 has really had an extreme power up? Roshi is in the tourney for fighting experience, he's been stated to be training but it's never truly stated how strong he is. Trunks is probably the one I have the biggest issue with, everyone else felt legit to me(Caulifla aside).

[dario03]

Goku went from low 400s to 150,000,000 in less than a year at the start of Z. This despite the fact that from birth until the start of Z he only went from 2 to low 400s and fighting and training was basically all he did. That's a ~360,000x increase compared to a 200x increase in a fraction of the time. So basically he just all of a sudden starting making gains at 1800x the rate he had before. Should of starting calling him Gainsku.

[BlueBasilisk]

Goku went from low 400s to 150,000,000 in less than a year at the start of Z. This despite the fact that from birth until the start of Z he only went from 2 to low 400s and fighting and training was basically all he did. That's a ~360,000x increase compared to a 200x increase in a fraction of the time. So basically he just all of a sudden starting making gains at 1800x the rate he had before. Should of starting calling him Gainsku.

Everyone started seeing massive gains at the beginning of Z. The training with Kami took Goku's friends from the 1-200 range into the thousands, and Piccolo got like 10 times stronger training in the wilderness with Gohan

[dragonball0900]

Manga covers serve as superficial advertisement for the content that may or may bot be in the manga chapter itself. It has no significant or overreaching influence of what kind of story plays out in the manga chapter itself. Hell, there are some chapters that didn't even have proper covers.

And what wrong with just basic training? I'm made this comment before but not every character needs to jump through hoops to become insanely strong. Some people make small gains through training for a very long time and others make great gains from training for a much lesser amount of time. Some do it on their own with basic tools and others do it with the aid of others or unique enhancements. Some use gimmicks and get special treatment to take shortcuts in get stronger while other just do it the old fashioned way. This ties back into you point with Tien and Roshi. Although, Tien trains a lot, we have no idea what kind of gains he makes in training in comparison to what kind of gain Roshi would make if he were to train again. Plus we have no idea just how much stronger Tien got after training with King Kai. Roshi's strength at best Base Goku tier, so it's not like he's knocking down Super Saiyans and Androids with the flick of his wrist. And how strong Base Goku is in Super is ambiguous to begin with, so it really can't be judged as to whether Roshi made substantial gains from off screen training to begin with.

And in regards to Android 17, as I've previously stated, Goku wasn't fighting seriously as a SSJB against Android 17 and was trying to make sure he didn't kill Android 17 when they were sparring, so he's not SSJB level. We also have no idea just how much stronger SSJB is compared to the other SSJ forms, so we can't come to a rationale as to just how much stronger Android 17 got.

So you're saying that Goku never used SSJ in his training against Piccolo? That doesn't seem reasonable to me at all.

Goku trained with King Kai and got like 20 times stronger. The same can possibly apply to Tien, possibly more than 20 times stronger since he trained much longer than Goku. It's crazy to think that Roshi would become way stronger than him with just doing normal training, and even if he makes the best efforts or the best methods to train and get stronger, it is still ridiculous to think that he would suddenly became much higher in level than someone who trained with a god in 10 times gravity.

Maybe you're right with Android 17, yeah that concept of androids getting that strong was never brought up before. However, I have to admit that is still a crazy power up. The problem is that, despite Android 17 being much weaker, Goku decided to use SSJB, making Android 17 even higher than SSJ2 or SSJ3.

17 had like what, a DECADE to get to wherever he is now? Plus Roshi has apparently been training in secret for who knows how long according to Goku.

I still don't see the problem here, especially with 17.

The problem is that it doesn't make sense, for Roshi at least, how can someone, who was already much stronger in the beggining and getting even stronger by using special methods like x10 gravity with a god, suddenly be weaker than someone who only trained normally with anything special?

Android 17's power boost might be explained since he is an android, but is still a crazy power boost.

[MR.Mark]

All we have to go on is 17 is a lot stronger, but by how much we don't know. Given the timespan it's not even the craziest jump in power compared to some in earlier stories.

As for Roshi, he's taken out some of Freeza soldiers, it's not even like he's WAY stronger than before anyhow.

[Lord Beerus]

Manga covers serve as superficial advertisement for the content that may or may bot be in the manga chapter itself. It has no significant or overreaching influence of what kind of story plays out in the manga chapter itself. Hell, there are some chapters that didn't even have proper covers.

And what wrong with just basic training? I'm made this comment before but not every character needs to jump through hoops to become insanely strong. Some people make small gains through training for a very long time and others make great gains from training for a much lesser amount of time. Some do it on their own with basic tools and others do it with the aid of others or unique enhancements. Some use gimmicks and get special treatment to take shortcuts in get stronger while other just do it the old fashioned way. This ties back into you point with Tien and Roshi. Although, Tien trains a lot, we have no idea what kind of gains he makes in training in comparison to what kind of gain Roshi would make if he were to train again. Plus we have no idea just how much stronger Tien got after training with King Kai. Roshi's strength at best Base Goku tier, so it's not like he's knocking down Super Saiyans and Androids with the flick of his wrist. And how strong Base Goku is in Super is ambiguous to begin with, so it really can't be judged as to whether Roshi made substantial gains from off screen training to begin with.

And in regards to Android 17, as I've previously stated, Goku wasn't fighting seriously as a SSJB against Android 17 and was trying to make sure he didn't kill Android 17 when they were sparring, so he's not SSJB level. We also have no idea just how much stronger SSJB is compared to the other SSJ forms, so we can't come to a rationale as to just how much stronger Android 17 got.

So you're saying that Goku never used SSJ in his training against Piccolo? That doesn't seem reasonable to me at all.

Goku trained with King Kai and got like 20 times stronger. The same can possibly apply to Tien, possibly more than 20 times stronger since he trained much longer than Goku. It's crazy to think that Roshi would become way stronger than him with just doing normal training, and even if he makes the best efforts or the best methods to train and get stronger, it is still ridiculous to think that he would suddenly became much higher in level than someone who trained with a god in 10 times gravity.

Maybe you're right with Android 17, yeah that concept of androids getting that strong was never brought up before. However, I have to admit that is still a crazy power up. The problem is that, despite Android 17 being much weaker, Goku decided to use SSJB, making Android 17 even higher than SSJ2 or SSJ3.

We can't determine whether he did or didn't. It's possible he did becuase he may see it as an incentive to get stronger. But he may not because he's a guy that does his own thing when it comes to training. 90% percent of the time when see him training, it usually consists of his just meditating. We can't come to any real conclusion as to exactly how he trained to get ready for the Androids. Especially through using the cover of a manga chapter as an indicator.

We have no idea what kind of gains Tien made while on King Kai's planet. It's an absolute mystery. I've said this a million times: Gains made in training aren't universal. Just because Character A became X times stronger through Y training doesn't mean the same thing will happen to Character B or Character C. That being said, "potential" is such a crapshoot in Dragon Ball. It's a plot device that can be handed to anyone at any given time to suit the circumstances of the narrative. It's a literal roulette wheel when it comes to how much dormant power a certain character can tap into through specific circumstances. We've had zero hints that guys like Krillin, Tien and Roshi could make massive gains through special training, but if the plot needs a character to be relevant, their strength will bloat like nothing before it. Piccolo is a prime example of this in the original story. Any time he fall behind, he's gets a monster power up or his strength ridiculously bloats when he trains.

Yeah, Android 17 did get much more powerful than I thought he would, but it's nothing I personally find that is just too drastic.

[MR.Mark]

Yeah, Android 17 did get much more powerful than I thought he would, but it's nothing I personally find that is just too drastic.

Agreed, it surprised me at first to but I rolled quickly with it because nothing in the story prior gave any indication that 17 or 18 couldn't get much stronger.

These are the same two artificial humans created by a scientist from earth that at a time were much stronger than Freeza, so yeah, I don't see a problem here.
Unless some fans want modern DB to continue to be the Goku and Vegeta show, I'm more than happy with certain already powerful characters like 17 playing catch up.

[dragonball0900]

We can't determine whether he did or didn't. It's possible he did becuase he may see it as an incentive to get stronger. But he may not because he's a guy that does his own thing when it comes to training. 90% percent of the time when see him training, it usually consists of his just meditating. We can't come to any real conclusion as to exactly how he trained to get ready for the Androids. Especially through using the cover of a manga chapter as an indicator.

We have no idea what kind of gains Tien made while on King Kai's planet. It's an absolute mystery. I've said this a million times: Gains made in training aren't universal. Just because Character A became X times stronger through Y training doesn't mean the same thing will happen to Character B or Character C. That being said, "potential" is such a crapshoot in Dragon Ball. It's a plot device that can be handed to anyone at any given time to suit the circumstances of the narrative. It's a literal roulette wheel when it comes to how much dormant power a certain character can tap into through specific circumstances. We've had zero hints that guys like Krillin, Tien and Roshi could make massive gains through special training, but if the plot needs a character to be relevant, their strength will bloat like nothing before it. Piccolo is a prime example of this in the original story. Any time he fall behind, he's gets a monster power up or his strength ridiculously bloats when he trains.

Yeah, Android 17 did get much more powerful than I thought he would, but it's nothing I personally find that is just too drastic.

Just because we see Piccolo meditating alone it doesn't mean he always trains alone. If the partner is a good partner (in this case Goku) then he will surely go and try training with that partner all the time, to get higher boosts than normal.

Maybe you're right about one training method being different from another, but seriously, the difference between them was really big, and even if we don't know how much stronger was Tien at King Kai's, it has to be over Nappa at least (I'd obviously put him above Vegeta, possibly surpassing the Ginyu's except for the captain), it's still jarring how Roshi became more powerful than Tien when their difference was already like more than 10 times back in the saiyan arc, and specially with training with a god like King Kai in a gravity that is 10 times heavier than earth's (where Roshi trains).

You did convince me with 17, at least because he is an android, his gains should be quite big. Though it still puzzles me how he wasn't around when Buu showed up. That's really an inconsistency from Super.

[Lord Beerus]

We can't determine whether he did or didn't. It's possible he did becuase he may see it as an incentive to get stronger. But he may not because he's a guy that does his own thing when it comes to training. 90% percent of the time when see him training, it usually consists of his just meditating. We can't come to any real conclusion as to exactly how he trained to get ready for the Androids. Especially through using the cover of a manga chapter as an indicator.

We have no idea what kind of gains Tien made while on King Kai's planet. It's an absolute mystery. I've said this a million times: Gains made in training aren't universal. Just because Character A became X times stronger through Y training doesn't mean the same thing will happen to Character B or Character C. That being said, "potential" is such a crapshoot in Dragon Ball. It's a plot device that can be handed to anyone at any given time to suit the circumstances of the narrative. It's a literal roulette wheel when it comes to how much dormant power a certain character can tap into through specific circumstances. We've had zero hints that guys like Krillin, Tien and Roshi could make massive gains through special training, but if the plot needs a character to be relevant, their strength will bloat like nothing before it. Piccolo is a prime example of this in the original story. Any time he fall behind, he's gets a monster power up or his strength ridiculously bloats when he trains.

Yeah, Android 17 did get much more powerful than I thought he would, but it's nothing I personally find that is just too drastic.

Just because we see Piccolo meditating alone it doesn't mean he always trains alone. If the partner is a good partner (in this case Goku) then he will surely go and try training with that partner all the time, to get higher boosts than normal.

Maybe you're right about one training method being different from another, but seriously, the difference between them was really big, and even if we don't know how much stronger was Tien at King Kai's, it has to be over Nappa at least (I'd obviously put him above Vegeta, possibly surpassing the Ginyu's except for the captain), it's still jarring how Roshi became more powerful than Tien when their difference was already like more than 10 times back in the saiyan arc, and specially with training with a god like King Kai in a gravity that is 10 times heavier than earth's (where Roshi trains).

You did convince me with 17, at least because he is an android, his gains should be quite big. Though it still puzzles me how he wasn't around when Buu showed up. That's really an inconsistency from Super.

Fair enough. But the show does indicate that Piccolo spends a far amount of his time just isolating himself and meditating.

If Piccolo can become more than 10 times stronger by beating around a 4 year for a year, then it really becomes apparent that any kind of training can grant you can any kind gain the plot needs you to.

You can just assume that when Majin Boo rolled his fat pink ass around, Android 17 wasn't all that powerful to really do anything. Fast forward 5-6 years, and by that time, he had grown much stronger.