Are Power Scalers a cause or symptom of toxicity in the fandom?

[Robo4900]

Neither.

Much as I, like many others in this thread, find it inane and silly, for many others it's a fun system of numbers to measure precisely how hard one strong boi wailed on another strong boi when he blasted him with a huge death ray projected from his hands.
It's no wonder some people get obsessive about this stuff and enjoy discussing it; it's a combination of weird, nerdy number tracking that satisfies the logical mind, and crazy laser beams and yelling and punching, which satisfies the monkey brain. So, some people find it immensely satisfying to two major itches of the brain.
To put it in even simpler terms: It's yet another way for some people to find joy in this silly franchise, much in the way many of us find joy in overanalysing various narrative or world elements.

The toxicity in the Dragon Ball fandom isn't from some people getting obsessed over understanding inane parts of the in-universe mechanics, it's from certain people being humongous dillholes.

[Zephyr]

It has always amused me that some forumites complain about fans wanting to know who's stronger than who in a series that's focused almost solely on fighting, a series whose protagonist cares about becoming stronger more than literally anything else.

"Power scalers" are more in-tune with what the series is actually about than, for example, shippers, or people who keep wishing for "slice-of-life" stuff, yet they're not complained about as much.

Shippers and slice of life people are definitely missing half of the point of the series (it's a martial arts story).

People too hung up on the lack of consistent feats, as it impedes on their ability to cleanly determine the winners of hypothetical versus matches, however, are missing the other half of the point of the series (It's a joke).

I wouldn't say either are necessarily toxic, just that they miss the point. Toxicity arises from aggressively/condescendingly defending their having missed the point, and being aggressively/condescendingly told how/why what they're doing/pining for is indeed missing the point. It's a two-way street.

Aggressively/condescendingly conversing, I would say, is a mark of having room to grow emotionally (I'm certainly not exempt from it, myself). Further, I would also wager that not taking a deeper look into a work's ontology, yet still attempting to give (and defend) in-depth analyses of it, is a mark of having room to grow intellectually.

Of course, everyone always (and always will) have room to grow in both capacities. However, when both are below a certain threshold and collide, toxicity arises. "Power scalers" play a role, to be sure, but I wouldn't regard them as a cause or a symptom of it, strictly speaking. They're neither necessary nor sufficient, for discourse to become toxic. Character cheerleaders, lore fiends, and "wasted potential" peeps also miss the latter point, rather spectacularly.

[goku the krump dancer]

People get up in arms discussing everything related to Dragon Ball, the difference is some topics are more vulnerable to disagreement since they have a lot of interpretation going around; plus like someone mentioned in the thread, it's the internet there's no check and balances people can be awful with very little to no consequences.

Dragon Ball doesn't bring out the negative. It's like blaming violent crimes on video games, it's bogus.

This sums things up perfectly if you ask me. Debating power levels is no different to debating who’s more “believable” as Goku or debating if certain narrative decisions hurt or helped or would hurt or help the series as it stands.. It’s just all about how emotionally invested you are in that certain aspect of the show.

Being on this forum for 10 years I’ve seen some good people come and go because they’re emotions got the best of them in a debate about an aspect of the show they really resonated with! Believe it or not, very few of them have been “Power Scalers”.

I don’t really know what factors have to come into play to really declare a certain community of people who are fans of a piece of entertainment “toxic” I feel like that word gets thrown around too freely BUT I will say all experiences with people both good and bad are deemed as such depending on the individual.

[Ringworm128]

To be honest; over the years I've actually become more empathetic to "power scalers."

The people who dislike them seem to be so weird about it, and demonise fans who are more or less just having fun.

[ABED]

Toxicity is not disagreement, not even vehement disagreement. It's weird what some people's conceptions of toxicity is. I got admonished on more than a number of occasions by some site owner for disagreeing with someone in a comment section. I didn't condescend, use ad hominem, or make fun of them. Toxicity isn't about the content as much as the way we talk to each other.

[Dbzfan94]

To be honest; over the years I've actually become more empathetic to "power scalers."

The people who dislike them seem to be so weird about it, and demonise fans who are more or less just having fun.

Pretty much this. OP is creating much more toxicity than they claim power scalers cause.

[ABED]

To be honest; over the years I've actually become more empathetic to "power scalers."

The people who dislike them seem to be so weird about it, and demonise fans who are more or less just having fun.

Pretty much this. OP is creating much more toxicity than they claim power scalers cause.

How did the OP create toxicity with the post?

[Dbzfan94]

To be honest; over the years I've actually become more empathetic to "power scalers."

The people who dislike them seem to be so weird about it, and demonise fans who are more or less just having fun.

Pretty much this. OP is creating much more toxicity than they claim power scalers cause.

How did the OP create toxicity with the post?

Because they're going on about how power scalers are terrible, they're the cause for all the arguments and are worse than Vic Mignogna defenders. Like really? I'm not even involved in power scaling, but still that's a pretty asinine thing to say when talking about a fighting show.

[ABED]

Pretty much this. OP is creating much more toxicity than they claim power scalers cause.

How did the OP create toxicity with the post?

Because they're going on about how power scalers are terrible, they're the cause for all the arguments and are worse than Vic Mignogna defenders. Like really? I'm not even involved in power scaling, but still that's a pretty asinine thing to say when talking about a fighting show.

That's more than a tad hyperbolic to say the original poster is claiming they are the cause of all the fights. I don't see that at all, especially given the last paragraph of the first post.

I don't agree with his claim that they'd take Vic supporters over power scalers, but I'd be interested to hear why.

[KBABZ]

I think Dbzfan94 meant that they created more toxicity for the sake of their argument, not literally conjuring it into the world.

[ABED]

I think Dbzfan94 meant that they created more toxicity for the sake of their argument, not literally conjuring it into the world.

I know that. Not sure where you got the idea that I didn't get that distinction.

[MarCas92]

How did the OP create toxicity with the post?

Because they're going on about how power scalers are terrible, they're the cause for all the arguments and are worse than Vic Mignogna defenders. Like really? I'm not even involved in power scaling, but still that's a pretty asinine thing to say when talking about a fighting show.

That's more than a tad hyperbolic to say the original poster is claiming they are the cause of all the fights. I don't see that at all, especially given the last paragraph of the first post.

I don't agree with his claim that they'd take Vic supporters over power scalers, but I'd be interested to hear why.

Yeah, I never said Power Scalers are terrible. I just think the prevalent ones do more harm than good. As for the Vic thing it was kind of a joke. I won't say which side of the argument I stand on since this isn't the thread for that argument. But as far as Power Scalers vs Vic Stans go, at least with the most toxic Vic stans, I get it. Whether or not you agree with them, they are doing something they believe is morally right. They are trying to defend this man who they truly believe is innocent and is being screwed over by feminism or PC Culture or w/e. They truly believe they are doing the right thing. People who get worked up over power levels and purposefully seek out arguments with people over them; I just don't understand. What's the point? You can rationalize an out of universe decision in-universe better than someone can? Ok? Why does it matter? And if it does, did it matter so much that the in universe answer is more important than what Toriyama/Toei was trying to accomplish story wise? In my opinion the answer to that question is always no.

[Kokonoe]

I find power-scaling to be essentially another word for world balance just focused on the balance of the fighters themselves.

Character 1 has innate powers that make them stronger than everyone else
Character 2 has innate powers that make them stronger than everyone else except 1
Character 3 is weaker than 2 and 1, but has trick up their sleeves that can stall either 1 or 2 but not win
Character 4 is as strong as 3 but has no unique tricks and is dwarved in combat

Can call 2 the protagonist and 1 the villain. 1 should be higher tier and 2 should be the underdog or else the fight won't mean anything. Especially if 3 or 4 could take on 1 easily which would ruin the dynamic.

[Rory]

There's no denshi jars (though admittedly that move never got off the ground), no attacks which can blind the foe, no ability to leave after-images to confuse them, nothing.

The taiyoken disagrees, and the after image is shown to be a fairly elementary technique that only the least skilled fighters fall for.

DB is a world where sometimes the gap between the weaker and stronger is so big that no amount of technique can make up for it.

Perhaps I should've clarified, I was referring to moves introduced after battle powers were a thing. As in, techniques introduced pre-battle powers were (for the most part) varied in their effectiveness and could be interesting (Taiyoken, Zanzoken, Piccolo's demon children, his extending limbs, Muten Roshi's varied techniques in the 21st, I could go on). Afterwards moves are boring and samey. Make yourself stronger for a limit peroid, make yourself stronger permanently, hit the enemy harder using other people's ki, hit the enemy harder using your own ki etc.
I agree with your ending sentiment, though I still don't think it makes more versatile movesets a less important asset.

That all being said, I'm rather glad this thread has gone the direction it has. Initially I was going to post answering the topic at hand directly, but it was just draining even thinking about it/making drafts, and I was a tad concerned about being seen as a toxic individual myself. I guess now that's given me some insight into how I view the topic at hand.
I find looking at a sub-section of fans as potentially 'toxic' to be self-congratulatory at best, at worst it comes off as elitist, especially considering the phrasing of some very "those type" comments:

the biggest difference between the type of fan I am and Power Scalers, is that I don't mind if characters battle powers are logical or not as long as it serves the story. They, on the other hand, think if the Power Scale is out of whack the story element in which it is presented has failed.

Perhaps I'm being overly defensive, but that specific excerpt really rubbed me the wrong way. I don't care to get into my own view of power scaling here, but there's a huge variation of 'power-scalers', some people may well think the narrative has failed because the story lacks a certain internal consistency? Perhaps they value that in a story. Again, I know you covered yourself by saying "not all", but that's the equivalent of "no offence, but" when you go on to say the majority of 'toxic' behaviour comes from this sub-section.
I'd also like to mention that it's probly' a little too dismissive to call people 'power-scalers' when trying to make a point, as if that's all they care about in the show. I very much doubt there's a large amount of fans who literally only care about the numbers. I wouldn't have really noticed this if you didn't refer to the other side of things as "The type of fan I am", which sounds like it's too complicated to have an all-encompassing label slapped onto it (as opposed to power-scalers, who are so simplistic in their fandom that they just care about one aspect of the show). Not saying people can't have labels put onto themselves, I know people who are proud of being shippers for example, but I very much doubt they'd like to have people condescendingly state "Well the difference between the type of fan I am and shippers is I care about the story.". See what I mean?

Not trying to call out OP or others who share their opinion here, I get that all that likely came off as very aggressive/defensive, that's just the most straightforward way I could articulate it. Though I admit I did waffle.

[KBABZ]

Perhaps I should've clarified, I was referring to moves introduced after battle powers were a thing. As in, techniques introduced pre-battle powers were (for the most part) varied in their effectiveness and could be interesting (Taiyoken, Zanzoken, Piccolo's demon children, his extending limbs, Muten Roshi's varied techniques in the 21st, I could go on). Afterwards moves are boring and samey. Make yourself stronger for a limit peroid, make yourself stronger permanently, hit the enemy harder using other people's ki, hit the enemy harder using your own ki etc.

I think the three Saiyan Arc moves are good though (although I'll use English names for spelling reasons). The Special Beam Cannon is an assassin-style drilling move and the Destructo Disc can cut through almost anything, so the power put into those moves don't matter. The Spirit Bomb meanwhile is unique in that you don't need to match its power in order to use it (since both Krillin and Gohan were able to use it and deal a critical blow against Vegeta).

After that though you are correct, there aren't really any moves introduced that feel unique in those ways, either being a Kamehameha-style attack like the Galick Gun, or just generic ki blast attacks that don't even warrant a name unless you're listing it in a video game.

[dbzfan7]

Yes. This and Canon bible thumpers. But lately I'd rather focus consistency when it comes to that. More so when it comes to where we draw the line of a believable part in the story or if it's dumb. Like I guess I'd rather call myself a power consistency enthusiast rather than debating who's stronger than who. I like story beats and situations to make sense in the context of the universe. It's part of tension building and sustaining. Having an understanding of power consistency can really give weight to a dreadful scenario. Like when Freeza scares Goku after showing just how much more powerful he was in their battle. Just when you realize he's not bluffing and everything feels hopeless. It really adds to the fight. It's not really different than in other shonen series where the heroes are usually gauged as being 1000's times weaker than the opposition and they feel the weight of just how much trouble they are in.

[Rory]

I think the three Saiyan Arc moves are good though (although I'll use English names for spelling reasons). The Special Beam Cannon is an assassin-style drilling move and the Destructo Disc can cut through almost anything, so the power put into those moves don't matter. The Spirit Bomb meanwhile is unique in that you don't need to match its power in order to use it (since both Krillin and Gohan were able to use it and deal a critical blow against Vegeta).

After that though you are correct, there aren't really any moves introduced that feel unique in those ways, either being a Kamehameha-style attack like the Galick Gun, or just generic ki blast attacks that don't even warrant a name unless you're listing it in a video game.

I do like the Saiyan arc moves a fair bit, they add visual flair and variety to attacks that would otherwise feel same-y. But when I stop and think about it, if Piccolo had Goku hold Raditz so he could charge up his Kienzan (Destructo Disc), it would've made no difference. They would've both been cut in half, which means the end result is the same. See what I mean? They're both moves that directly harm the opponent with ki, one just focuses on drilling while the other slicing (the execution of these moves in the series never really makes their application necessary).

I'd also like to add that my previous post was a bit harsh upon reflection, and likely overly emotional. If upon reading it it does seem like I'm directly attacking anyone, I apologise (though I can't edit it now, unfortunately).

[Soppa Saia People]

After that though you are correct, there aren't really any moves introduced that feel unique in those ways, either being a Kamehameha-style attack like the Galick Gun, or just generic ki blast attacks that don't even warrant a name unless you're listing it in a video game.

i mostly agree but i think all of gotenks moves deserves a shout out for being unique and really fun, he's such a funny character lol.

"um,,, magnum sundae!!!"

[KBABZ]

I do like the Saiyan arc moves a fair bit, they add visual flair and variety to attacks that would otherwise feel same-y. But when I stop and think about it, if Piccolo had Goku hold Raditz so he could charge up his Kienzan (Destructo Disc), it would've made no difference. They would've both been cut in half, which means the end result is the same. See what I mean? They're both moves that directly harm the opponent with ki, one just focuses on drilling while the other slicing (the execution of these moves in the series never really makes their application necessary).

Well in particular they focus on dealing mortal penetrating wounds. But there are differences: while they both take a while to charge up, with the Kienzan it's more about focusing the aim and stabilizing the thing, while with the Makayouknowtherest it's about gathering all of that energy into your fingertips, and it punches a hole rather than being able to slice mountains. The Kienzan would also have better application for, say, slicing off Oozaru Vegeta's tail, but sadly this isn't demonstrated.

They both differ from a standard ki attack though in their penetrating/slicing facet. A typical ki move, even the Kamehameha to a certain extent, can be blocked with the classic crossed arms stance, but you couldn't exactly do that against a Kienzan unless you galactically outstrip the thrower like Perfect Cell did.

[MarCas92]

I find looking at a sub-section of fans as potentially 'toxic' to be self-congratulatory at best, at worst it comes off as elitist, especially considering the phrasing of some very "those type" comments:

the biggest difference between the type of fan I am and Power Scalers, is that I don't mind if characters battle powers are logical or not as long as it serves the story. They, on the other hand, think if the Power Scale is out of whack the story element in which it is presented has failed.

Perhaps I'm being overly defensive, but that specific excerpt really rubbed me the wrong way. I don't care to get into my own view of power scaling here, but there's a huge variation of 'power-scalers', some people may well think the narrative has failed because the story lacks a certain internal consistency? Perhaps they value that in a story. Again, I know you covered yourself by saying "not all", but that's the equivalent of "no offence, but" when you go on to say the majority of 'toxic' behaviour comes from this sub-section.
I'd also like to mention that it's probly' a little too dismissive to call people 'power-scalers' when trying to make a point, as if that's all they care about in the show. I very much doubt there's a large amount of fans who literally only care about the numbers. I wouldn't have really noticed this if you didn't refer to the other side of things as "The type of fan I am", which sounds like it's too complicated to have an all-encompassing label slapped onto it (as opposed to power-scalers, who are so simplistic in their fandom that they just care about one aspect of the show). Not saying people can't have labels put onto themselves, I know people who are proud of being shippers for example, but I very much doubt they'd like to have people condescendingly state "Well the difference between the type of fan I am and shippers is I care about the story.". See what I mean?

Not trying to call out OP or others who share their opinion here, I get that all that likely came off as very aggressive/defensive, that's just the most straightforward way I could articulate it. Though I admit I did waffle.

I'll concede that it may come off as elitist when I word it like that. Unfortunately, when talking about any grouping of people it's very hard to either not generalize or to separate into so many distinct groups it comes off as "Us vs Them". Not my intention at all. I tried to cover all my bases but to reiterate: If you are into power scaling and that's a part of the franchise you want to digest the most, go for it! If that's all you care about when it comes to the story, that's fine too. You do you. I just feel that such debates don't add anything meaningful to the franchise discourse. I just wanted to bring up the discussion that people who power scale too much might be detrimental to the fandom.