DB is not better than DBZ

[ABED]

It's not. It's baffling you would claim that. Goku vs. Piccolo happened in DB. That's not arbitrary, it's a simple statement of fact, not opinion. You're claiming Goku vs. Piccolo might as well have happened in DBZ which is an opinion.

Your statement is only a fact in the strictest sense. It's only slightly more objective than mine.

My claim is not simply an opinion, it's a factually-based opinion. The changes in production and the intent of these changes are known. The results are fairly easy to see in the episodes themselves. Particularly when compared to the fights that came before and the fights that come afterward.

That's often how opinions work. Theyr'e often based on facts, but that doesn't make them not opinions. Doesn't make it not an opinion.

Even if I agreed that it might as well have been DBZ, it's is NOT ergo nothing you can say will make it so. The fight against Piccolo Daimao was episodes 119-122 of Dragon Ball. The fight against Ma Junior occurs in episodes 142-147 of DRAGON BALL.

Here's another opinion, placing the 23rd TB in DBZ wouldn't make sense since Goku had yet to win the 23rd TB. Ending after his victory makes the most sense as a dividing line for each series because only then have all plot thread been resolved.

[MyVisionity]

Even if I agreed that it might as well have been DBZ, it's is NOT ergo nothing you can say will make it so. The fight against Piccolo Daimao was episodes 119-122 of Dragon Ball. The fight against Ma Junior occurs in episodes 142-147 of DRAGON BALL.

That may be true, but it doesn't really carry any weight in terms of comparing the fights between DB and DBZ, if Goku versus Ma Junior is considered a "DBZ fight".

Ending after his victory makes the most sense as a dividing line for each series because only then have all plot thread been resolved.

Of course that's the case. I'm not sure what you are trying to argue here.

[MechaTrunks]

I'm just using it as an example, personally, I think the 22nd Tournament and after is more or less the same thing in terms of the quality of fights. Be that Kid Goku vs King Piccolo, Roshi and Kid Goku vs Tien, etc.

A Z fight is like Pizza, you can't define what makes it work, but you'll know when you eat it.

Well, to me pre-DBZ fights may resemble a pizza, but they lack the ingredeint that defines a DB fight to me: internal coherence.
23rd TB Goku vs Piccolo is a mess in that sense (even King Piccolo vs Kid Goku was better), I mean, the last bit of the fight is very forced with Piccolo going from not able to do nothing to I'm strong enough to kill everyone + kami just so no one can interfere in the fight.
The one time gimmick attacks are also a trait of the original DB and are very present in that fight.

There's no reason whatsoever that things should be as shit as they are in the future timeline. Why haven't Bulma and her father made a spaceship to go to Namek and use their Dragon Balls?

They don't know even where the new planet Namek is, and Bulma's father is dead at that point so I don't know if they even had a spaceship able to go there or the resources to send one -the ones they made to go to Namek were Saiyan technology based and there were little resources in the future-.

Why hasn't King Kai told anyone the location of New Namek?
Why haven't Goku, Piccolo or Kami told Gohan and Trunks about the ROSAT, or how to train more efficiently?

Or maybe the androids destroyed the palace of Kami -there are no senzus in the future-. In your second point, you're right, it's true that Goku should have been able to properly tell them how to better train their SSJ through Kaito, but that's not a big plothole but a tiny small one.
But it's obvious by his interactions that Goku never made contact with any of the survivors in the earth. Maybe him dying from an illness incapacitated him for good in the other world as well? Any excuse justifies this.

How is Gohan, who has immense potential, so weak after almost two decades of constant training and fighting, that he gets his ass beat by a weaker version of Android 17 who's only using 50% of his strength?

He never has Goku to train him on how to properly achieve and master the SSJ state and any experienced fighter is long dead, so they're stuck in their unmastered SSJ forms not being able to progress any further (as demonstrated in the Cell saga through Vegeta and Trunks 2nd ROSAT training).

Putting all that aside, after Trunks travelled to the past and told everyone about the androids, the entire issue could've been resolved then and there if our "heroes" actually decided to do the rational thing and use the Dragon Balls or Baba to find Dr Gero's location, and then go and stop him before he can finish building his killer robots that would, in another timeline, commit genocide and rule over the Earth as tyrants. Before you say it'd be out of character for them to kill him, they wouldn't have to kill him.

But that's a plotpoint the manga itself adresses perfectly. Bulma tells them to do exactly what you're telling, and Goku's answer is "no, I want to fight them".
Goku could've also used instant transmission to help Piccolo kill Cell before he got his perfect body, but Goku NEVER did it because he want's to fight the strongest oponents and not save earth.

You can't say that something the manga specifically explains is a plothole. Of course you can disagree with Goku and say you would have taken a different course of action, but Goku is not you, Goku is Goku and he wanted to fight against strong oponents more than anything else.

They could just destroy all his research and warn him to stop what he's doing, or get him arrested. But no, that'd require too much common sense. Instead, Goku, Piccolo and Tenshinhan decided to risk the lives of millions of innocent people across the planet, including their own friends and families, just because they wanted to test their strength against the androids.

Well, yes, that's who they are in fact.
They are fighting maniacs that between a good fight and milions of people potentially death, they choose to fight. I mean, Goku didn't kill Fat Bu in his SSJ3 just because he wanted Goten and Trunks to properly train, and he thought that Bu killing anyone cold be fixed with the Dragon Balls.

Fast-forward a bit to Cell's introduction, where he reveals his entire origin story and future plans to Piccolo in a brilliant piece of writing that removes any potential intrigue that would've benefited the story.

What? Present's Cell's actions couldn't take place in the near future because he still would be an embrion for years. What intrigue did you want there? The only one would've been to pospone Cell's appearance and play more with the "deserted cities" concept before introducing him.
Anyway, this is not a plothole.

Fast-forward a bit farther to when Semi-Perfect Cell is running rampant and Vegeta decides to let him absorb 18. Trunks could've easily swooped in and vaporised Cell with no difficulty whatsoever, but didn't. He also could've flown down and wiped out 18 so Cell couldn't absorb her.

Semi-Perfect Cell wasn't as weak as you make him to be. Besides his above average resistance to damage inherited from Freeza, Vegeta fought him at full power and Trunks was weaker than him. Cell resisted tons of attacks from Vegeta, so I don't think Trunks had the power to erase him in 1 attack.
Regarding Trunks and the androids, Trunks still wasn't fond of them but they had already spared them all without killing no one. And he thought he had time to kill Cell before Vegeta could return, so it's only logical that his first course of action was to face Cell after sending Vegeta far away with that Ki blast.
But then Cell already uses the solar flare so Trunks has only had time to land 1 kick on Cell and that's it.

Things could've gone different, but none of the characters act stupid or out of his role for that to happen.

Fast-forward some more to the Cell Games, where Gohan suddenly decides that he's a pacifist and doesn't want to fight anymore. Because it's not like he willingly fought Freeza and Freeza's soldiers on an alien planet in order to save his friends. It's not like he chose to train to fight the androids with Goku and Piccolo. That's not out of character at all.

Gohan only participated in fights obligated by the circumstances, also in Namek where they were found just after arriving, their spaceship destroyed and forced to hide.

I mean, it's not as if he didn't go to fight Cell, but the difference there is that unlike in most of his previous fights in this one he was fighting not because he had the necessity or the desire to do so, but just because Goku picked him as Cell's next oponent.
And in fact, in the other fight where he was involved against his will (when Piccolo tosses Nappa to him) he even refuses to fight and is paralysed by the fear.

Gohan has always been a pacifist, from day 0, and of course has participated in fights where he or his friends were in immediate danger, but he never wanted to fight for the sake of fighting.
From Gohan's POV, he surely expected Vegeta or even Trunks to go there before him, so he hadn't still had the time to even mentalize himself that it soon would be his turn.

He was 100% in character to me.

Regards.

[Draconic]

The difference in writting alone makes any Z fight deeper than any non-Z fight.

You keep saying this, but this means nothing. Give examples of HOW they are better written and I might take you seriously.

[ABED]

Even if I agreed that it might as well have been DBZ, it's is NOT ergo nothing you can say will make it so. The fight against Piccolo Daimao was episodes 119-122 of Dragon Ball. The fight against Ma Junior occurs in episodes 142-147 of DRAGON BALL.

That may be true, but it doesn't really carry any weight in terms of comparing the fights between DB and DBZ, if Goku versus Ma Junior is considered a "DBZ fight".

Ending after his victory makes the most sense as a dividing line for each series because only then have all plot thread been resolved.

Of course that's the case. I'm not sure what you are trying to argue here.

It carries all the weight in the argument to say that it's a DB fight. It's a fight that happened in Dragon Ball. If someone argues that DBZ's fights are better, I can point to those fights and say, they are just as good as any fight in DBZ. It's utterly absurd to claim "well it's closer to the fights in DBZ than DB" because they are fights that happened IN DRAGON BALL.

The fights build in intensity and power over the course of DB and DBZ. Of course the fights in the latter part of DB will resemble DBZ. It's a simple matter of progression. That doesn't make them DBZ fights.

[Mike XL]

I like Dragon Ball a ton, although I prefer Z, Dragonball is a lot more Goku centered than DBZ is, so I agree that criticism never made any sense. Goku beat Tao Pai Pai, beat the Red Ribbon Army, beat Piccolo Daimao, beat Piccolo Jr, basically every major moment in the show was done by Goku. Yamcha was rendered irrelevant immediately after his early fight with Goku, the only real moment he had was a fun little fight with a heavily suppressed Tenshinhan. Kuririn beat a couple of guys in the 21st and 22nd Budokai, but didn't done much other than that, got beat up by General Blue who Goku crushed, got killed by Tambournine easily, lost to a vampire/bat in Babas tournament lol. Roshi won the 21st Budokai by a hair but didn't do much other than that. Tenshinhan was the only other character that was presented as legitimate on the protagonist side, beat Goku in the 22nd Budokai, lost do Drum but was obviously very occupied with Piccolo and getting him with the Mafuba, and had a respectable showing against Goku in the 23rd.

Z gives way more shine to guys, Goku is out for about half the time in every arc, Piccolo is very relevant through the Cell saga, being the strongest Z fighter for a while in the Android arc, Gohan obviously vs Cell and Buu, Tenshinhan gets his moment with the Shin Kikoho vs Cell, Vegeta gets a ton of moments, Trunks puts Freeza away and is very relevant through the Cell arc, etc

[MasenkoHA]

I like Dragon Ball a ton, although I prefer Z, Dragonball is a lot more Goku centered than DBZ is, so I agree that criticism never made any sense. Goku beat Tao Pai Pai, beat the Red Ribbon Army, beat Piccolo Daimao, beat Piccolo Jr, basically every major moment in the show was done by Goku. Yamcha was rendered irrelevant immediately after his early fight with Goku, the only real moment he had was a fun little fight with a heavily suppressed Tenshinhan. Kuririn beat a couple of guys in the 21st and 22nd Budokai, but didn't done much other than that, got beat up by General Blue who Goku crushed, got killed by Tambournine easily, lost to a vampire/bat in Babas tournament lol. Roshi won the 21st Budokai by a hair but didn't do much other than that. Tenshinhan was the only other character that was presented as legitimate on the protagonist side, beat Goku in the 22nd Budokai, lost do Drum but was obviously very occupied with Piccolo and getting him with the Mafuba, and had a respectable showing against Goku in the 23rd.

Z gives way more shine to guys, Goku is out for about half the time in every arc, Piccolo is very relevant through the Cell saga, being the strongest Z fighter for a while in the Android arc, Gohan obviously vs Cell and Buu, Tenshinhan gets his moment with the Shin Kikoho vs Cell, Vegeta gets a ton of moments, Trunks puts Freeza away and is very relevant through the Cell arc, etc

These bad faith arguments are getting out of hand.

Yamucha was used far more as an ACTUAL character (even if that character was a joke) in Dragon Ball than he was in Z where the only time had any relevance was in the Saiyan saga. And didn’t really do anything after that. He was a bit player by the Cyborg saga


Tenshinhan had like 3 moments to shine in Z and they were incredibly small moments (and one of those moments was him dying to avenge Chaozu) compared to being center stage for a story arc and his redemption still playing a part in the following two arcs in the original Dragon Ball.


Kuririn , I’ll give you managed to get out of Z okay far more than Tenshinhan and Yamucha and Chaozu who might as well have all stayed dead at the end of Namek. But even in Dragon Ball his role was still important.


Piccolo (that is the Piccolo we grew to love in Z not The Great Demon King) was introduced in the final arc of Dragon Ball so that really doesn’t mean much. Like Kuririn he gets out of Z never becoming a bit player (although he certainly had his prominence reduced after Cell went Semi-Perfect)


Saying Roshi didn’t do much in the original Dragon Ball other than winning the 21st Budokai by a hair is severely undercutting what a key character he was pre-23rd Budokai. His mentoring of Goku and Kuririn in the 21st Budokai was kind of the whole point of the arc “There’s always someone better” he was also incredibly important to Tenshinhan’s redemption arc in the 22nd Budokai and Daimao arc being a replacement mentor for Tenshinhan since The Crane Hermit’s teachings were wrong.


I don’t know just seems like a lot of people trying to argue there wasn’t better use of the characters in pre-Z Dragon Ball are treating the characters like fighters in a video game rather than characters..

[Mike XL]

I like Dragon Ball a ton, although I prefer Z, Dragonball is a lot more Goku centered than DBZ is, so I agree that criticism never made any sense. Goku beat Tao Pai Pai, beat the Red Ribbon Army, beat Piccolo Daimao, beat Piccolo Jr, basically every major moment in the show was done by Goku. Yamcha was rendered irrelevant immediately after his early fight with Goku, the only real moment he had was a fun little fight with a heavily suppressed Tenshinhan. Kuririn beat a couple of guys in the 21st and 22nd Budokai, but didn't done much other than that, got beat up by General Blue who Goku crushed, got killed by Tambournine easily, lost to a vampire/bat in Babas tournament lol. Roshi won the 21st Budokai by a hair but didn't do much other than that. Tenshinhan was the only other character that was presented as legitimate on the protagonist side, beat Goku in the 22nd Budokai, lost do Drum but was obviously very occupied with Piccolo and getting him with the Mafuba, and had a respectable showing against Goku in the 23rd.

Z gives way more shine to guys, Goku is out for about half the time in every arc, Piccolo is very relevant through the Cell saga, being the strongest Z fighter for a while in the Android arc, Gohan obviously vs Cell and Buu, Tenshinhan gets his moment with the Shin Kikoho vs Cell, Vegeta gets a ton of moments, Trunks puts Freeza away and is very relevant through the Cell arc, etc

These bad faith arguments are getting out of hand.

Yamucha was used far more as an ACTUAL character (even if that character was a joke) in Dragon Ball than he was in Z where the only time had any relevance was in the Saiyan saga. And didn’t really do anything after that. He was a bit player by the Cyborg saga


Tenshinhan had like 3 moments to shine in Z and they were incredibly small moments (and one of those moments was him dying to avenge Chaozu) compared to being center stage for a story arc and his redemption still playing a part in the following two arcs in the original Dragon Ball.


Kuririn , I’ll give you managed to get out of Z okay far more than Tenshinhan and Yamucha and Chaozu who might as well have all stayed dead at the end of Namek. But even in Dragon Ball his role was still important.


Piccolo (that is the Piccolo we grew to love in Z not The Great Demon King) was introduced in the final arc of Dragon Ball so that really doesn’t mean much. Like Kuririn he gets out of Z never becoming a bit player (although he certainly had his prominence reduced after Cell went Semi-Perfect)


Saying Roshi didn’t do much in the original Dragon Ball other than winning the 21st Budokai by a hair is severely undercutting what a key character he was pre-23rd Budokai. His mentoring of Goku and Kuririn in the 21st Budokai was kind of the whole point of the arc “There’s always someone better” he was also incredibly important to Tenshinhan’s redemption arc in the 22nd Budokai and Daimao arc being a replacement mentor for Tenshinhan since The Crane Hermit’s teachings were wrong.


I don’t know just seems like a lot of people trying to argue there wasn’t better use of the characters in pre-Z Dragon Ball are treating the characters like fighters in a video game rather than characters..

Kuririn is used as well, if not better, as a character in Z. Piccolo obviously as well, as he was introduced very late. Chaozu was never relevant to begin with. The only ones who get shafted are Tenshinhan and Yamcha, but that's natural storytelling. They're warriors who are outgunned, Yamcha through the whole series, at least Tenshinhan is used as a warrior for the most part, even if he loses. It makes sense for the old cast to be more in the background, they were replaced by newer characters who were more relevant to the plot because they were far more powerful like Vegeta, Gohan, etc. Gohan, Piccolo, Vegeta, and Trunks were more relevant in Z and used better than Tenshinhan, Yamcha, and Roshi were used in Dragonball, both as characters and as fighters who would actually win and be relevant from time to time.

[nickzambuto]

The series kept getting better as it went on. Toriyama became a better writer and artist with time. Just like how Goku grows stronger over time.

[ABED]

The series kept getting better as it went on. Toriyama became a better writer and artist with time. Just like how Goku grows stronger over time.

I agree to an extent. He kept getting better and refining his talents, but he tops out at the Namek/Freeza arc. There's still some good stuff afterwards but he settled into a formula that worked and by the end, it's clear that he's running on fumes and is racing towards the finish line.

Piccolo's journey has meaning because of where he started. You can't be redeemed if you don't do anything wrong.

[DBPirate]

I like Dragon Ball a ton, although I prefer Z, Dragonball is a lot more Goku centered than DBZ is, so I agree that criticism never made any sense. Goku beat Tao Pai Pai, beat the Red Ribbon Army, beat Piccolo Daimao, beat Piccolo Jr, basically every major moment in the show was done by Goku. Yamcha was rendered irrelevant immediately after his early fight with Goku, the only real moment he had was a fun little fight with a heavily suppressed Tenshinhan. Kuririn beat a couple of guys in the 21st and 22nd Budokai, but didn't done much other than that, got beat up by General Blue who Goku crushed, got killed by Tambournine easily, lost to a vampire/bat in Babas tournament lol. Roshi won the 21st Budokai by a hair but didn't do much other than that. Tenshinhan was the only other character that was presented as legitimate on the protagonist side, beat Goku in the 22nd Budokai, lost do Drum but was obviously very occupied with Piccolo and getting him with the Mafuba, and had a respectable showing against Goku in the 23rd.

Z gives way more shine to guys, Goku is out for about half the time in every arc, Piccolo is very relevant through the Cell saga, being the strongest Z fighter for a while in the Android arc, Gohan obviously vs Cell and Buu, Tenshinhan gets his moment with the Shin Kikoho vs Cell, Vegeta gets a ton of moments, Trunks puts Freeza away and is very relevant through the Cell arc, etc

I agree. Never understood the complaint that Z pushed the characters to the side, when Goku was front and center the entire time. Not that there's anything wrong with that since he's the main character.

Still, I frequently see comments saying something along the lines of "back when Yamcha was relevant" in regards to DB. He was always a gag character and never advanced passed the quarter finals in any tournament he was in.

[ABED]

In DBZ, the other characters might get more screentime, but it comes at the cost of having Goku continually sidelined just to keep the tension up. One or two times is fine, but it's schmuckbait after a while. Toriyama does it twice in the Namek arc. Much of the time the other characters spend much of that screen time waiting for Goku to return.

[MasenkoHA]

It also seemed by the Saiyan portion of the story Toriyama was afraid to allow Goku to lose a fight. A bad guy can have the upperhand for a bit but Goku was never allowed to actually lose a fight.

Compare to pre-Z era Dragon Ball where Goku straight up lost and was near death to General Blue, Tao, and Piccolo Daimao

[ABED]

It also seemed by the Saiyan portion of the story Toriyama was afraid to allow Goku to lose a fight. A bad guy can have the upperhand for a bit but Goku was never allowed to actually lose a fight.

Compare to pre-Z era Dragon Ball where Goku straight up lost and was near death to General Blue, Tao, and Piccolo Daimao

I don't know if that's really true. Goku was clearly in over his head against both Raditz and Vegeta. Vegeta had him dead to rights and only lost the battle because of a combined effort.

[Banduck]

It also seemed by the Saiyan portion of the story Toriyama was afraid to allow Goku to lose a fight. A bad guy can have the upperhand for a bit but Goku was never allowed to actually lose a fight.

Compare to pre-Z era Dragon Ball where Goku straight up lost and was near death to General Blue, Tao, and Piccolo Daimao

Yeah that's absolutely not true.
Goku died against Raditz, lost to Vegeta and got all his bones crushed, was much weaker than Freeza until he turned SSJ, and he lost to Cell and let Gohan fight.

[MasenkoHA]

It also seemed by the Saiyan portion of the story Toriyama was afraid to allow Goku to lose a fight. A bad guy can have the upperhand for a bit but Goku was never allowed to actually lose a fight.

Compare to pre-Z era Dragon Ball where Goku straight up lost and was near death to General Blue, Tao, and Piccolo Daimao

Yeah that's absolutely not true.
Goku died against Raditz, lost to Vegeta and got all his bones crushed

And none of that is correct.

He died against Piccolo who killed both him and Raditz. He did not lose to Raditz. And that was assisted suicide.

He did not lose to Vegeta it ended in a draw. Vegeta was just as badly beaten as Goku and Kuririn would have finished him off if Goku didn’t beg him to spare Vegeta.

, was much weaker than Freeza until he turned SSJ

I clearly said in my original post that the villains in Z were allowed to have the upper hand for a bit but never actually beat him. Freeza was stronger until Goku became a Super Saiyan but he never defeated him.

, and he lost to Cell and let Gohan fight.

He didn’t lose to Cell. The fight was pretty much a stand
still. He forfeited the match to let Gohan fight. Cell never actually defeated him.

[Banduck]

He did not lose to Vegeta it ended in a draw. Vegeta was just as badly beaten as Goku and Kuririn would have finished him off if Goku didn’t beg him to spare Vegeta.

I thought we are only talking about Goku.
He definitely lost to Vegeta. It only became a "draw" with the help of Gohan, Kuririn and Yajirobe. I don't know if you can really call this a draw.

Raditz and Cell are probably debatable.

[MasenkoHA]

Again he did not lose to Vegeta. Would he have lost without outside help? Probably. But the actual income was a draw. He wasn’t beaten and left for dead with Vegeta coming up on top like Tao and King Piccolo.

Raditz and Cell aren’t debatable. Raditz didn’t defeat Goku, Piccolo killed both of them on Goku’s orders.

And again Cell and Goku were shown evenly matched.
Cell didn’t beat him in the fight, Goku threw in the towel so Gohan could fight him.

[ABED]

It wasn't a draw and it was with absolute certainty that we know Goku wouldn't have won. Goku was beaten, exhausted and damn near powerless. Vegeta was scuffed up after the beam battle but not gravely injured.

Raditz knocked Goku down for the count with a single gut shot. He had Goku beaten but it wasn't a one on one battle. At that point, Goku couldn't hope to win a one on one battle. You're right, it's not debatable, Raditz defeated his brother before managing to dodge Piccolo's first Makankosappo.

Cell and Goku weren't evenly matched. Cell was way stronger and had a deeper well of power he wasn't showing yet. Goku only drew out their battle so Gohan could study Cell's movements but he never thought he could win. That's not subtext. He didn't give up so Gohan could fight him for the hell of it. He knew he couldn't win.

[Magnificent Ponta]

Again he did not lose to Vegeta. Would he have lost without outside help? Probably. But the actual income was a draw. He wasn’t beaten and left for dead with Vegeta coming up on top like Tao and King Piccolo.

This is a real reach. Vegeta was literally crushing Goku to death in his hands when Krillin and Gohan showed up.

That's a "draw" like King Arthur vs. The Black Knight was a draw.