How strong is Mr Buu?

[Pantalones]

I don't think the original "Mr. Buu" (immediately after the good/evil split) was that much weaker than the first Fat Buu, if he was weaker at all. Buu is magic; there's no reason to believe he works by numbers or even any kind of normal logic when nothing else magic-related really does (Babidi being able to control beings MUCH more powerful than himself, for example... or Potara fusion allowing someone to fight as candy... or the old Kaioshin's ability to bring someone's power beyond the limit of their potential... or Buu's internal space being able to split the supposedly-permanent Potara fusion.)

I never considered this possibility before just now, but it's possible that the "Mr. Buu" created after Super Buu got split up was actually different from the one created by the original split. That would explain away one of the supposed "plot hole" complaints of the Buu arc (why does removing Fat Buu cause Kid Buu rather than Skinny Buu?); the creation of Super Buu separated off the Kaioshin influence into the Mr. Buu body (possibly making him weaker than either of the previous fat Buus, since initial Fat Buu had all of Buu's own power and the first-split Mr. Buu had less Kaioshin influence--due to the skinny Buu also having some--than the final Mr. Buu did), so when he was removed there was only the original Kid Buu left behind and so that's what Super Buu reverted to. This would also mean that the Kid Buu we see might be slightly weaker than the original Kid Buu that killed off the Kaioshins, since Mr. Buu still has some Buu in him (unless, of course, Mr. Buu after this split can only exist at all because of magic and didn't actually take any of the original Buu's power with him.)
He's also the only one we actually see fighting and doing worse than would be expected of the original Fat Buu at full power (unless Kid Buu is just that much stronger than any of the Fat Buus, you'd expect the original Fat Buu to be at least sorta close to Kid Buu's power, the main difference between them being that he was less psychotically destructive and easier to control rather than being so much weaker.)
So if there was ever a really drastic drop in Fat Buu/Mr. Buu's power, I'd guess that it happened when Super Buu was split rather than when the original Fat Buu was split.

As for Fat vs. Skinny Buu... from what I remember, their fight in the manga was extremely brief with neither side actually doing much (if any) damage to the other before the good Buu tried to turn the evil one into candy and got that attack reflected back on himself. They seemed fairly equal, or maybe the skinny Buu was a little stronger (possibly just from the fact that the fat one had to deal with the exhaustion of having just produced an entirely separate being through an unconscious burst of rage plus magic, or possibly an actual power drop.)

If they are "split" power-wise, though, it's probably not an even mathematical split like 7/3 out of the original Buu's 10 or something like that. Just because original fat Buu was a 10 doesn't mean the two "halves" need to add up to 10--he's magic. Magic's whole deal is breaking the mathematical, logical rules of things, especially with Buu. Maybe the fat one is as strong as the original fat Buu's "base" level before he got super-angry and the skinny one is always at the "angry mode" level of power... so maybe kind of like a "3 and 10" or "5 and 10" situation, rather than 3 and 7. Maybe they're both 6 or 7. Maybe one's an 8 and the other's a 7. Maybe the fat one's still a 10 and the skinny one's actually stronger than the original, like around 11 or 12!
It's not as simple as a Piccolo/Kami situation; the fat Buu's personality did not really change as a result of the split, and there were still worries that Buu could spawn another evil Buu later on if his anger got out of control again (and why worry if there would be another big split and the resulting evil Buu would be so much weaker than the original that even SSj2s could probably handle it?) The skinny Buu isn't like Piccolo Daimaou, he's more like a magic-based physical manifestation of Buu's violent murdering rage-tantrum that he would have had as a result of Mr. Satan and his dog both getting shot, if he hadn't learned that killing was wrong before then. His only motivation is to kill anything in his path and overtake the original Buu (like violent murderous anger tends to do!) by absorbing him.

Even if the fat Buu after the split was only a "3" out of the original Fat Buu's "10," though, he'd still probably be stronger than SSj2 Goku or Vegeta. SSj3 Goku would've been able to defeat the original Fat Buu (though it seems likely that only dead SSj3 Goku could pull it off, just like what happened with him vs. Kid Buu later thanks to not being able to gather enough energy while alive), and he's 4 times stronger than SSj2 Goku... so if you take someone who's a bit below SSj3 Goku and divide their power by 3, they would still probably end up stronger than SSj2 Goku, or equal at the very least. Which means even at pretty much the weakest possible level that Mr. Buu could be, he'd still stomp SSj2 Goku or Vegeta (equal or greater power + Buu regeneration... one of the SSj2's might have a chance if they managed to build up enough power to destroy him in one shot like SSj3 Goku was trying to do against Kid Buu, but short of that or another giant Genki Dama they'd be screwed.)

[Bussani]

I don't think the original "Mr. Buu" (immediately after the good/evil split) was that much weaker than the first Fat Buu, if he was weaker at all. Buu is magic; there's no reason to believe he works by numbers or even any kind of normal logic when nothing else magic-related really does (Babidi being able to control beings MUCH more powerful than himself, for example... or Potara fusion allowing someone to fight as candy... or the old Kaioshin's ability to bring someone's power beyond the limit of their potential... or Buu's internal space being able to split the supposedly-permanent Potara fusion.)

I might have agreed with you, but the narrator(box) flat-out says that the Skinny Buu took the majority of the power when they split. That's probably where most people are coming from.

If they are "split" power-wise, though, it's probably not an even mathematical split like 7/3 out of the original Buu's 10 or something like that. Just because original fat Buu was a 10 doesn't mean the two "halves" need to add up to 10--he's magic.

To be honest, I don't think ki very often works like simple mathematics anyway, even without magic.

[hleV]

The simplest explanation is usually the correct one. Pure Evil Boo's power + Good Boo's power = Fat Boo's power. Good Boo doesn't necessarily equal Mr. Boo, though.

[Bussani]

The simplest explanation is usually the correct one.

Even when it's different from other examples? E.g. if it's shocking for the Nameless Namekian to be beaten by a Saiyan (as per the Elder's dialogue), then surely the Nameless Namekian power was more than just Kami's power + Piccolo Daimao's power? Which seems doubly likely considering how much stronger they get when they finally do rejoin.

That said, I have no problem believing that Good Buu + Pure Evil Buu = Fat Buu, either.

[DBZGTKOSDH]

That would explain away one of the supposed "plot hole" complaints of the Buu arc (why does removing Fat Buu cause Kid Buu rather than Skinny Buu?)

It was never a plot-hole. Toriyama was aware of what was going on, since Vegeta expected Evil Boo to revert to Pure Evil Boo, but instead, he reverted to Pure Boo.

[Pantalones]

Yeah, I know it's not really a plot hole. That's why I mention "supposed 'plot hole' complaints" (there are lots of people who, like Vegeta, can't understand why he didn't just revert to the skinny Buu!) rather than just "plot hole."

I might have agreed with you, but the narrator(box) flat-out says that the Skinny Buu took the majority of the power when they split. That's probably where most people are coming from.

Yeah, I tend to go more by what's actually shown than by narrator statements, especially when that's the only thing that suggests there's a huge power gap or that there was an easy "split" in power between them. It's entirely possible (probably even likely) the skinny Buu was stronger, I just can't really picture the kind of massive power difference a 7/3 split would imply by reading or watching the fight between the two. In both the anime and manga versions they seem fairly close for the most part (I just rewatched the anime version; the fat Buu has trouble landing hits at first but they get closer as the fight goes on and he gets angry... skinny Buu even seems to have a good bit of difficulty breaking out of fat Buu's blubber-ropes trick, it's the only time the skinny Buu ever has much of a worried/strained facial expression throughout the whole fight and fat Buu seems shocked that he was able to break them at all.) Even being on the wrong end of a Kamehameha struggle doesn't cause any super-serious damage to fat Buu (just burns/scratches... though that is the only visible damage he takes in the whole fight that isn't immediately regenerated, so it's something at least.) I know that's only in the anime version, but the fight in the manga is incredibly short from what I remember (mostly just clashing punches and then the candy beam) so it's hard to really get much out of that beyond that they're both strong enough to at least keep up with the other for a little while.

I can see there's some evidence that the skinny Buu is stronger than the fat Buu at least, but nothing but the narrator really supports there being a literal split of the original Fat Buu's power with the skinny Buu getting most of the power. Maybe a 5.5/4.5 split or something (which would about the same power gap as 12/10), but I don't see why the two Buus need to be a perfect mathematical split of the original Fat Buu's power (Buu has to get non-mathematical at some point--either they don't just split the original's power, or when they combine it's something more than just adding them together. Since Super Buu's absorptions after that all seem to work pretty close to plain addition, going by how Goten, Trunks, and Piccolo were barely a drop in the bucket power-wise while Gotenks brought him far enough to completely turn around his losing battle with Gohan, it seems possible to me that the absorption that created Super Buu might work that way too, while the split that made it possible doesn't really have to go by math.)

Even "Mr. Buu" at the very end (who may actually be weaker than the original good fat Buu was) is considered a possible threat, with someone (Vegeta I think?) bringing up the possibility of him spawning another evil Buu (like the skinny one) if he let his anger get out of control again. Yeah, they could've been talking about the possibility of a hypothetical second skinny Buu eating the fat Buu again and making another Super Buu, but the way it's worded makes it seem like the problem is the possibility of producing another evil Buu at all. I've always taken that as saying that however the power-division ends up when Buu spawns an evil skinny Buu, the result would still be too much for Vegeta to handle based on all that he'd seen of the various Buus. And Buu ki is never said to be that difficult to pick up on, so I'm sure by this point everyone knows exactly how strong the Buus were; if "Mr. Buu" himself is only SSj2-level (or even weaker) by the end and splitting would cause a massive power gap between the good and evil parts (so that even the stronger of the two would be significantly weaker than SSj2 Goku or Vegeta), there shouldn't have been any concern, right?

[TobyS]

I kinda lean towards a "7-3" split theory, not those exact numbers but y'know, given the ease grey buu was able to beat him.

I did take that wimp vegeta's fear of "Buu spitting out another evil buu" as risking a potential new super-buu rather than a fear of the grey buu. Because Gohan and Goku and Gotenks could solo another grey buu quite easily.

So it kinda has to be that by elimination.

I like the idea that Mr Buu is still stronger than Vegeta.
But bearing in mind theres a gap between ssj2 Goku and Vegeta which Vegeta needed the incredible Majin power up to close (and even then Goku woulda won 'because Goku') There's room for Buu to fall between Goku and Vegeta.

[Saiga]

I kinda lean towards a "7-3" split theory, not those exact numbers but y'know, given the ease grey buu was able to beat him.

I did take that wimp vegeta's fear of "Buu spitting out another evil buu" as risking a potential new super-buu rather than a fear of the grey buu. Because Gohan and Goku and Gotenks could solo another grey buu quite easily.

So it kinda has to be that by elimination.

I like the idea that Mr Buu is still stronger than Vegeta.
But bearing in mind theres a gap between ssj2 Goku and Vegeta which Vegeta needed the incredible Majin power up to close (and even then Goku woulda won 'because Goku') There's room for Buu to fall between Goku and Vegeta.

I don't think Vegeta would have lost that power though. It seems to work like any other 'unlock potential' ability and those don't appear to disappear upon death.

[Super Saiyan Turlast x4]

I've never been one to believe he lost the power, either. I just never liked the idea of his hidden powers being released, then suddenly disappearing back into being...um, hidden. However, one can simply say he no longer had the power based on the fact that he was no longer possessed. The other power-up's were different, since they didn't require them to fall under someone's control to obtain said power. Still, I prefer to believe he kept the power.

[Kaboom]

Even if being under Bobbidi's control was a prerequisite for bringing the power out, I don't see why it would be necessary for keeping it.

It's like joining some sort of rewards program where you earn points to get prizes. If you quit the program later, they don't repossess all your prizes.

[Saiga]

I've never been one to believe he lost the power, either. I just never liked the idea of his hidden powers being released, then suddenly disappearing back into being...um, hidden. However, one can simply say he no longer had the power based on the fact that he was no longer possessed. The other power-up's were different, since they didn't require them to fall under someone's control to obtain said power. Still, I prefer to believe he kept the power.

Didn't Bobbidi release Vegeta's potential separately from brainwashing him, though?

[Super Saiyan Turlast x4]

I....never looked at it that way.

Chapter: 456 (DBZ 262), P4.3
Context: as Babidi takes control of Vegeta
Babidi: “While I’m at it, I’ll draw out his hidden power to beyond [his? its?] limits!”

Based on that, he just brought out his hidden powers for the hell of it. So it doesn't have to be apart of the actual mind control process after all. I always thought it all went together.

[Kaboom]

I suspect it is, at least, something he can only do to people under his control.

[Saiga]

I suspect it is, at least, something he can only do to people under his control.

He kind of never actually had Vegeta under his control, though.

[hleV]

He can do that to people who are marked with an M!