How have YOU made the Earthlings relevant again?

[rereboy]

To me, its obvious that the whole arc would be much worse without fights like Krillin versus Piccolo and Tenshinhan versus Goku. Its true that Piccolo and Goku weren't using their whole power in those fights, but they weren't holding back THAT much, which is why the fights turned interesting. It seems to me that you are saying that just because it had to be Goku to defeat Piccolo by himself, that everything else in that arc is irrelevant and that we wouldn't lose anything relevant if that was removed. I completely disagree. The rest of the fights provided much more variety in fighters, technique, fights and situations, all of them interesting, and since Goku and Piccolo aren't THAT much stronger than most of the others, the others don't look like a joke or completely out of the picture like they do after Namek.

Its the same thing regarding the rest of the series. Making them be not that far behind the saiyans and giving them moments to shine would only make the arcs more varied and richer.

Also, I fail to see why the introduction of a new character has to mean the dismissal of an old one. It seems to me that the development of both of them, even if in varying degrees, would be much better.

[RandomGuy96]

To me, its obvious that the whole arc would be much worse without fights like Krillin versus Piccolo and Tenshinhan versus Goku. Its true that Piccolo and Goku weren't using their whole power in those fights, but they weren't holding back THAT much, which is why the fights turned interesting. It seems to me that you are saying that just because it had to be Goku to defeat Piccolo by himself, that everything else in that arc is irrelevant and that we wouldn't lose anything relevant if that was removed. I completely disagree. The rest of the fights provided much more variety in fighters, technique, fights and situations, all of them interesting, and since Goku and Piccolo aren't THAT much stronger than most of the others, the others don't look like a joke or completely out of the picture like they do after Namek.

Its the same thing regarding the rest of the series. Making them be not that far behind the saiyans and giving them moments to shine would only make the arcs more varied and richer.

Also, I fail to see why the introduction of a new character has to mean the dismissal of an old one. It seems to me that the development of both of them, even if in varying degrees, would be much better.

So, you just like them in earlier arcs because they add variety to the fights? In that case, in the newer arcs, rather than just being Goku vs the main bad guy alone, we also have supporting characters who can fight the villains. There's no need to throw the older, weaker, and more boring characters in on top of that. And why does it matter exactly how much they were holding back? Either way, the humans are completely useless, and either way, they look like jokes. A half-dead Piccolo outright laughing at Krillin's suggestion that maybe that he and the rest of the Jobber Squad could manage something against him after he used more power against Goku and they teamed up has got to be the most humiliating moment to be a supporting cast member.

Why? Actually relevant characters ARE closer to the main characters in later arcs. Why would buffing these three help?

Because with the introduction of the new characters, the old characters no longer serve much purpose. As I said, Ten and Chaozu should have been one or two shot characters.

[SilverArmada]

Maybe I could have phrased my annoyance a bit better, but I still feel my issue stands. Perhaps the thread starter did mean it to go in this direction, in which case that's fine, but from my own POV we had a nice thread that was talking story-related things about how to give the humans more to do...and then it all once again turned into 'human characters are worthless unless we do this blargh' like usual. And to me that is beyond old now. So what if Dragon Ball is primarily about fighting. There was a time when it was equally about fighting and humor, but nowadays it seems like half of you can't stand the human characters in THAT material even. Am I really one of the few fans anymore who enjoys the series for more than 'who can beat who cuz stats'?

No you are not the only one! I like Dragonball for the fights and techniques, sure, but I also dig the story and characters.

As for the humans, well, my own fanfic is set in the future timeline where almost everyone is dead, so I don't do much for the humans we know from canon. In my fic, Trunks is traveling around space and meeting people from races I've created, some of which fight with ki, some who cannot ever learn. So I use technology in what I think are interesting ways to create conflict for Trunks - he isn't going to just go SSJ on every problem. There are handcuffs that suppress ki, devices that can forcibly suck ki out of a person, devices that block the use of ki completely in a certain area/field, devices that mask ki, devices that can be powered by ki, devices that can scan and track a person based on their ki signature, etc. But it's also easy with Trunks as a character because he's more cautious and so isn't going to go full power on every enemy he comes across, whereas Vegeta might be one to do that. I also have characters who, while not human, don't fight with ki - characters who have telepathic/telekinetic abilities, characters who are genetically or physically modified and physically super strong, characters who use magic and sorcery, etc. The cool thing is, even if a specific idea did not appear in the Dragonball canon, there's usually some form of it already included so it's not a huge stretch anyway.

To the main point of the topic, how to make characters such as Yamucha and Tenshinhan relevant... I'm not sure since it's not something I've devoted a lot of time to. But perhaps expanding their abilities into different realms, like psychic or magical powers, if only because the power gap when it comes to ki is too great to overcome logically.

[TheZFighter]

but from my own POV we had a nice thread that was talking story-related things about how to give the humans more to do

That was all I wanted. I'm not foolish, I know the Dragon Ball series has been completely Saiyan dominated since the arrival of Raditz. I even like many of the Saiyan characters. I'm just a big fan of the Human/ Earthlings as well. Story-related discussion and the exchange of ideas was what I was looking for.

To me, its obvious that the whole arc would be much worse without fights like Krillin versus Piccolo and Tenshinhan versus Goku. Its true that Piccolo and Goku weren't using their whole power in those fights, but they weren't holding back THAT much, which is why the fights turned interesting. It seems to me that you are saying that just because it had to be Goku to defeat Piccolo by himself, that everything else in that arc is irrelevant and that we wouldn't lose anything relevant if that was removed. I completely disagree. The rest of the fights provided much more variety in fighters, technique, fights and situations, all of them interesting, and since Goku and Piccolo aren't THAT much stronger than most of the others, the others don't look like a joke or completely out of the picture like they do after Namek.

Its the same thing regarding the rest of the series. Making them be not that far behind the saiyans and giving them moments to shine would only make the arcs more varied and richer.

Also, I fail to see why the introduction of a new character has to mean the dismissal of an old one. It seems to me that the development of both of them, even if in varying degrees, would be much better.

Great post.