Post
by Cipher » Sat Mar 20, 2021 4:22 am
This is just the same as the larger Strength thread now, right...?
Re: Kefla and Gohan: I don’t think anything there is a huge stretch, given the presentation.
Kale is able to surprise Freeza and Goku, as well as Vegeta and Toppo, but all the dialogue ever tells us is that they think they could take her if they got serious. She’s up there in power, but not taking any of them 1:1, most likely, even if it wouldn’t be an effortless match for the Blue-level fighters.
Caulifla adding some power, but not an outrageous amount with the gap in strength, already has precedent in Zamasu, whose fused power is able to overwhelm Vegeta and Goku together whereas Black had just struggled with one, but still nowhere near Vegetto, the product of two fighters together both at that Super Saiyan Blue-level.
Gohan fighting Kefla to a draw then only requires a Gohan up in that SSB level of the hierarchy, and much dialogue is expended as he battles her as to his having grown further within the tournament and displaying the potential to surpass Goku if he ever committed himself entirely to martial arts in the same way.
I think the only thing slightly sketchy about it is where it would position Gohan and Freeza relative to one another, since it seems like the overall thrust is that Freeza is still #3 in Universe 7 by the end of the ToP, but that’s still possible, especially if, say, Freeza is up there with the perfected Blue characters, as Goku implies he is near the start of the arc.
If Kale is between God and Blue (or even up to initial Blue) — enough to deal with most of the competitors, enough to startle Freeza, Goku and the others, and enough to seriously jeopardize their chances of lasting out the tournament were they have to deal with her (remember, conserving energy is at the fore), Kefla and Gohan are between initial Blue and the perfected variant from the end of the Zamasu fight, and Goku, Vegeta and Freeza at full power are all one rung up from that, everything shakes out.
As far as the Potaras’ effects, we don’t even need to limit our precedents to Super. In the original series, Goku is concerned that fusing with Mr. Satan might actually make him weaker, and Kibito-Shin, while stronger than either apart, is still held to mostly be a liability in a serious fight with any of the forms of Boo populating they arc’s back half. I don’t even think one has to say that the level of increase Vegetto displays over Goku and Vegeta individually has to be some kind of exception. Rather, it’s our only case of seeing two fighters of relatively equal power (minus Goku’s extra form) combining—hence a greater disparity between the end result and either of the individual fusees; all the other examples are petty lopsided.
The only thing that sets you up for problems is being overly literal with an idea of strict multiplication, but if that were the case, frankly Kibito-Shin should already have been kicking all kinds of ass, and it’s kind of an unwieldy standard for the series to have to hold itself to. Even if you look at the Super anime, which seems to hold itself to stronger Potara fusions, there’s a lot that’s hard to make heads of tails of with Kale and Kefla’s respective performances against Super Saiyan Blue Goku.