Piccolo vs. 17

[HazelMystic]

I recently had a debate with someone who said that Piccolo would probably defeat #17 in the battle they had. I argued the opposite, and used the manga to back up my assertions. My opponent stated that Piccolo could have used the following techniques to secure victory...

1. Super Large Body Technique

The argument was saying that Piccolo could mitigate the disadvantage of this technique by only becoming a "little bit bigger". I was sort of thrown by this idea, because Piccolo (in all the history of DB and DBZ), has never shown that he can appear at sizes below what he's shown (much like Oozaru).


2. Instantaneous Movement

He said that Kami used Instantaneous Movement to get Goku from Snake Way... now to me, this ability really only seems applicable to the fact that Kami is a KAMI, and that it's just an ability to use this to get to snake way and back. Goku had to get to the battlefield by himself. My opponent argued that Kami would have been in danger by using Instantaneous movement to get back, but it seems like a silly idea...he also argued Piccolo could have used this ability to charge the "Special Beam Cannon" and catch #17 off-guard.

3. Demon Creation

King Piccolo had the ability to create demon clones of himself, but at the price of shortening his life...My opponent argued that Piccolo Jr. could have done this as well...but I find it perfectly plausible that his children wouldn't necessarily share all of King Piccolo's abilities... Uub was never shown to possess all abilities of Buu.


4. Multi - Form

There is no instance of this in the manga, but my opponent claimed that Piccolo's transmutation powers might open this to possibility...


5. Piccolo was Toriyama's favorite, so he wouldn't have lost...

He never verified this...


I just ask this question because it really makes me wonder. These ideas all seem faulty, but I am going strictly by the manga, and if you guys have one up on it, I'd really appreciate it if you were able to answer this. I hope you guys can! Thanks so much!

[Savage68]

Piccolo was completely even with #17, but it was pointed out that #17 would eventually win, due to his infinite stamina.

Whoever that guy is, he's citing techniques Piccolo only used once, never canonically used, or is just citing just baseless claims.

Now, if Piccolo had used the Gekiretsu Kodan on #17, that would've done some serious damage, or just flat-out kill him.

[HazelMystic]

That's what I said! I actually analyzed the fight and it demonstrated that #17 had higher battle statistics, specifically...

Here is the link to the debate I hosted...

http://www.debate.org/debates/Artificia ... ived.../1/

Here are the stats...My last round has a statistics link as well.


---Piccolo---

---Melee---
Piccolo Total Hits Attempted (Physical): 9
Piccolo Total Hits Succeeded (Physical): 5
Piccolo Physical Hit Success Rate: 55.6%

---Defense---
Total Guards: 1
Total Evasions: 1
Guard Rate: 12.5%
Evasion Rate: 12.5%

---Energy---
Total Blasts Attempted: 29
Total Blasts Succeeded: 1
Blast Success Rate: 3.4%




---#17---

---Melee---

#17 Total Hits Attempted: 8
#17 Total Hits Succeeded: 6
#17 Hit Success Rate: 75%

---Defense---
Total Guards (Barrier included): 2
Total Evasions: 3
Total Evasion Rate: 33%
Total Guard Rate: 22%

[Kendamu]

Wow. Battle stats! I'd love to see more of those! Someone get on that and make a website about it!

[HazelMystic]

I'm actually considering creating anime (fillerless adaptations) on youtube complete with battle statistics. I have also considered using such stats to derive my own power levels based on those stated in the manga. It would make for a cool project I think.

[Kendamu]

You can do the power level thing if you want. I just wanna see the battle stats themselves.

[Herms]

2. Instantaneous Movement

He said that Kami used Instantaneous Movement to get Goku from Snake Way... now to me, this ability really only seems applicable to the fact that Kami is a KAMI, and that it's just an ability to use this to get to snake way and back. Goku had to get to the battlefield by himself.

In addition, there's the fact that Kami teleported to pick Goku up from Enma's palace, but didn't just teleport to Kaio's to pick him up and spare him the trouble of re-crossing the Serpent Road. Well, I guess Kami wouldn't have any way of knowing about all the trouble with Kaio forgetting to factor in the time it would take Goku to run back, but he'd know something was wrong when Goku failed to turn up on time, and if he really had the ability to freely teleport anyway you think he'd start teleporting around trying to find Goku. So I think he probably does just have some special power to teleport to and from Enma's palace. Uranai Baba is also only shown teleporting from the living world to Enma's palace, so maybe there's something special about the place? It does seem to be where all the souls of the dead automatically turn up after dying.

3. Demon Creation

King Piccolo had the ability to create demon clones of himself, but at the price of shortening his life...My opponent argued that Piccolo Jr. could have done this as well...but I find it perfectly plausible that his children wouldn't necessarily share all of King Piccolo's abilities... Uub was never shown to possess all abilities of Buu.

According to the daizenshuu, Warrior-type Namekians can't lay eggs, and Piccolo/Ma Junior is a Warrior-type (whereas Daimao was a Demon Clan Namekian, and the Great Elder was of the Dragon Clan). That explains why Piccolo didn't lay an egg when Nappa killed him (of course, even if he could, Nappa and Vegeta would have probably just destroyed it soon after).

[HazelMystic]

Thank you for that valuable bit of information! I wish I had known about that when debating, but I specified that for consistency, I would be using the manga, but my opponent kept making up all these different non-canon scenarios. Do you know where in the Daizenshuu this is noted? Additionally, I wish you guys could vote for me on my debate! That would be really awesome.

[Herms]

I was thinking of Daizenshuu 4's section on racial (and group) characteristics.

For general Namekian characteristics, it says:

REPRODUCTION
They can lay eggs.
Any member of the Dragon Clan can lay eggs. However, on the current Planet Namek there is a hereditary system, so only Saichourou lays eggs. Normally the number of eggs laid by a single member of the Dragon Clan would be from 10 to 20. In Saichourou's case, he was afraid that their race would go extinct so he laid over a hundred eggs, an exceptional amount.

Then for individual Namekians' abilities, it has:

PICCOLO DAIMAO
He has the ability to give birth to Demon Clansmen from eggs.
Demon Clansmen are born from Daimao, who came into the world from the evil portion of the Earth's god. This is the egg-laying ability natural to the members of the Dragon Clan, but since Piccolo's heart has been transfigured by evil he births Demon Clansmen.

OK, so actually looking at it I can’t find anything that flat-out says Warrior-types can’t lay eggs, but since egg-laying is touted as the special ability of Dragon Clan Namekians, it’s implied that they can’t. Also, Daizenshuu 7’s page on races says that any Namekian born into the Dragon Clan can lay eggs, which again doesn’t flat-out say Warrior-types can’t, but implies it (otherwise, why not say all Namekians can lay eggs?).

[Yamcha_krillin]

It was clearly obvious that # 17 would have wone that match.

We also don't know if the attack Piccolo used on Cell would have done some serious damage to 17 since Piccolo lost a lot of his power before he fired that attack.

[Savage68]

Piccolo's not an idiot. He wouldn't use the last of his power on an opponent considerably stronger than him if he didn't have at least some grounds to presume it would be successful.

And there's the whole thing about ki blasts multiplying power, etc...

[Son_Gohan]

In the end, I'd say #17 would be the victor, solely due to the stamina factor.

He was too arrogant initially, and underestimated Piccolo. But as the battle progressed he started acknowledging him as a worthy opponent and began taking the fight more seriously. At Piccolo's state, he'd have to use a very powerful Ki attack to defeat #17, which would possibly take a considerable amount of time for him to conjure up. #17 may not actually give him the time to do that, and even if Piccolo was able to accomplish it, 17 could always pull out that Ki barrier again.

[HazelMystic]

The guy I'm debating with says that it was easy to get Toriyama's approval for the Daizenshuu, so it's no more reliable than the anime and hence shouldn't count as evidence... what do you guys think?

[Hero 004]

Boy that was a cool fight. I think he would have won using that blast he ended up using on Imperfect Cell. Did the Daizenshuu give a name to that attack?

[Bussani]

The guy I'm debating with says that it was easy to get Toriyama's approval for the Daizenshuu, so it's no more reliable than the anime and hence shouldn't count as evidence... what do you guys think?

He's basically saying, "you can't prove my made up stuff is wrong using the manga alone, so I'm right." Wonderful logic there.

[Herms]

The guy I'm debating with says that it was easy to get Toriyama's approval for the Daizenshuu, so it's no more reliable than the anime and hence shouldn't count as evidence... what do you guys think?

Well, Daizenshuu 4 is based solely on the manga, and contains lots of things we know are straight from Toriyama (the map of the cosmos, vehicle info, etc), so I think he'd certainly be more reliable than the anime filler.

Boy that was a cool fight. I think he would have won using that blast he ended up using on Imperfect Cell. Did the Daizenshuu give a name to that attack?

Not really, but it gets called "Gekiretsu-Kodan" (Violent Light Bullet) in the video games.

edit: Wait, seems Daizenshuu 2 calls it "Chou-Bakuretsu-Maha" (Super Explosive Demon Wave)...though Daizenshuu 7 and several video games use this name for the attack Piccolo uses to blow the city away during his match with Goku at the 23rd Tenkaichi Budoukai.

[HazelMystic]

I told him I was done. I get really frustrated with people who wish only to deviate and make up their own terms... I won the debate, but he tried to instigate me in the comment thread and that eventually irritated me *sigh*

[Snail]

Boy that was a cool fight. I think he would have won using that blast he ended up using on Imperfect Cell. Did the Daizenshuu give a name to that attack?

Not really, but it gets called "Gekiretsu-Kodan" (Violent Light Bullet) in the video games.

edit: Wait, seems Daizenshuu 2 calls it "Chou-Bakuretsu-Maha" (Super Explosive Demon Wave)...though Daizenshuu 7 and several video games use this name for the attack Piccolo uses to blow the city away during his match with Goku at the 23rd Tenkaichi Budoukai.

Additionally, I specifically recall the FUNimation dub having Piccolo utter "Mokosen"...although it could have merely been my imagination.

[Herms]

Additionally, I specifically recall the FUNimation dub having Piccolo utter "Mokosen"...although it could have merely been my imagination.

It's not your imagination, the Funi dub apparently has Piccolo call that attack the "Makosen". Now, "Makosen" (Demon Beam) is the name the daizenshuu give to the attack which Piccolo Daimao uses to finish off Goku the first time they fight, where he shoots a beam from one hand, then from the other. I don't whether Funi somehow knew this fairly obscure attack name but applied it to the wrong attack, if they intended to have Piccolo say "Masenko" but messed up, or what.

[Snail]

Ah, thanks Herms!

I guess the scriptwriters took the liberty in reserving that handful of minor bit of Dragonball info and applied it to where-ever they saw fit. I believe there were other incidences like this involving the mishandling of certain terms derived from the original dialogue.