freezamite wrote:Godo wrote:Raditz was in denial about the strength of Goku, Gohan and Piccolo pretty much the whole fight.
He didn't even trust his scouter readings about Gohan's strength.
Of course it was a surprise attack when Gohan suddenly bursted out of the ship and headbutted Gohan.
Being in denial doesn't mean to not be aware of it. Dodoria also was in denial, and by any means his fight against Vegeta can be considered a surprise attack. Regarding him trusting the scoutter readings, that's only right until before the fight starts. Once Piccolo and Goku show themselves, Raditz knows that the scoutter is working perfectly and that it is Gohan the one with that much strength.
Gohan suddenly bursted out of the ship, true, but then he stays still enough time for Raditz not only to realize Gohan's presence, but also to read the strength he had.
Since Raditz:
1. Knows where is Gohan and where the attacks comes from.
2. Knows how much strength Gohan had at that point
It couldn't be considered a surprise attack. Look, Raditz at 1500 would put Gohan and Piccolo's deadly beam at the same position Goku was in front of Vegeta when he used KKx2 (in fact, there would be more difference in favour of Raditz).
Darkprince410 wrote:1) He was aware of Gohan's battle power and location, but if you remember, he was constantly dismissing the reading as a scouter bug. Likewise, even though he knew the location and the battle power, as quickly as Gohan attacked him, he didn't have time to react.
That would be valid for every single attack seen on the manga!! Look at how the Goku vs Freezer fight started, Goku also attacks "suddenly". It's of course an evidence that a character won't warn the other one about his upcoming attack. I mean, I can't imagine anyone saying "hey, I'm attacking you in 3, 2, 1..."
Gohan attacked and Raditz couldn't react to it, which means that he was inferior.
What makes an attack a "surprise attack" is:
1. The attack comes from someone/somewhere not expected to be on the fight.
2. The attack comes at a strength that's not expected by the enemy (sudden energy increase like KKx2-3 against Vegeta or KKx20 against Freezer, Freezer's increase from 50% to 70%, Zarbon's transformation).
3. Special circumstances (Vegeta punching Zarbon's back after throwing sand at his eyes to blind him).
Gohan's attack against Raditz it's like any other frontal attack, the only "surprise factor" as you say is that the attack is performed without a warning which can be applied to nearly any attack seen on the series.
Darkprince410 wrote:2) I know he didn't try to guard or block it, because he didn't anticipate the attack and it came on too suddenly for him to block.
Nearly every single attack in DB comes suddenly except for two or three cases where one fighter warns the other one. If it came too suddenly for him to block, it's because it came too fast, or in other words, because Raditz hadn't enough power to react to it.
Darkprince410 wrote:If he were able to dodge, even just barely, Piccolo's Makankosappo with a battle power of 1,330 behind it, he would have at least been able to attempt to evade Gohan's headbutt if he had anticipated it.
The difference between Gohan's attack and Piccolo's attack is that Piccolo's attack is one of the few ones an enemy is conscious it's comming before it's launched. It's not that Gohan's attack is a surprise attack, it's that Piccolo's attack was something Raditz was aware of much before it was launched, so he could of course be more prepared to evade it than a normal, frontal attack.
Darkprince410 wrote:4) Even then, it only did moderate damage. In comparison to other physical blows we've seen people take like that, Raditz's ability to move around pretty easily afterward, and was able to keep on his feet despite taking the hit. Yes, it damaged him to the point that he couldn't break free of Goku's hold, but it was still what I'd consider moderate damage in the grand scheme of the manga.
Well, considering that Goku had only 1/3 of Raditz's strength, that at that point he was so injured that at the very best he had a fraction of his normal strenght, and that Raditz's wasn't able to break this hold because of how weakened he was left, it seems to me that his energy had to descend really sharply. For him to be at 1500, that was quite a hit, don't you think?
Darkprince410 wrote:Cell deliberately took the Final Flash because he thought it would do no damage to him given Vegeta's battle power. He was confident in his ability to tank the blast when he saw Vegeta powering it up normally, suggesting full well that he had the battle power superiority at the time, and was shocked when he saw the blast fired, seeing that Vegeta had narrowed the beam to the point of it actually being dangerous.
Yes, and then he was affraid of Vegeta and he addmited defeat. But all that turned to be an act that he put in order to impress Vegeta. In other words, the whole reaction to the final falsh was Cell mocking Vegeta.
Darkprince410 wrote:Likewise, he didn't take it to show off his regeneration abilities and make fun of Vegeta for it. He made fun of Vegeta by playing like he was defeated from the attack, that even though he didn't expect to take damage from it at all, he was still going to win no matter what Vegeta threw at him.
He mocked Vegeta clearly, from the start to the end.
Darkprince410 wrote:Given what is said and how he's berating Raditz, Vegeta's comment suggests that, by numbers alone, Raditz shouldn't have lost to them. It's not like they were unaware of how strong he was (as indicated by Nappa's comment about the Saibamen), so him calling Raditz pitiful suggests that, even with his strength, he should have still been able to beat Goku and the others going by the numbers alone.
Or simply that he wasn't that much strong from his point of view, or in other words, he was killed by weakling so he was really pathetic. Was Goku with KKx2 comparable to Vegeta? Or Dodoria? Because that's the difference you imply there was between a Gohan or Piccolo's attack and Raditz.
Now, I think this all comes because some of you reffuse to admit that the Daizenshuu could be wrong, well then, I will use the own Daizenshuu to demonstrate how inconsistant it was.
Let's take Yamcha's power according to the Daizenshuu. We can agree in that Yamcha totally owned the saibaman, and also in that the saibaman was fighting at his maximum power since the begining (Vegeta threatened him killing the saibaman that lost against Ten-Shin). The match ended with a draw thanks to the Kamikaze-surprise attack the saibaman did, but after fighting against them, Yamcha was pretty confident on being able to kill them all.
Well then, Yamcha's power was (at that point) of only 1480 according to the Daizenshuu, weaker than Raditz. So how can be justified that 1500 was comparable to 1200, when a 1480 Yamcha dominated the fight completely to the point where he didn't receive even a single hit?
That's not what I would say an "even fight" or "a comparable strength".
Kaboom wrote:There's no strict limitation for what counts as "a little bit." 1500 doesn't clash with anything we're shown.
Yes there is a limitation when equally big differences result in nearly one hit kills. Goku hadn't even the slightest chance against Vegeta with his KKx2 (16.000 to 18.000, a much tinnier difference than 1.200 to 1.500), Dodoria didn't had the slightest chance against Vegeta (+20.000 to 24.000, also smaller than 1200 to 1500), etc.
There was never a strict limit specified in the sence that it was never said anything like "a +8,5325% difference it's the point where a fight becomes one sided", but there was a point where the strenght difference was enough to decide the fight and 1200 to 1500 was clearly past that point.
, P4.1, P8.3, P9.4