Tag Archives: Zoro

Top 30 Strongest One Piece Characters

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All right so there was recently a 13+ hour stream about the top 30 strongest One Piece characters but no matter how many lists I saw, I didn’t see one that really lined up. They all seemed to fumble the beginning, middle, or end if you ask me. So I figured I’d jump in and just throw my list out there. Keep in mind a few things though. First, I am ranking all of the characters as they are right now so not getting into end of series power ups and such. This is also only including characters who are alive or probably alive. Unless you are confirmed dead then you can be in this list. Also unlike the battles where you have to have feats, I’m going by portrayal and feats in this one. So now lets just dive in here!

30. Sengoku

Sengoku just barely makes the list but I think he works as a solid gatekeeper. His Buddha ability is really quite solid and as a big government fighter he does have a ton of haki. He isn’t fast though so most of the fighters above him would be able to easily exploit that and take him down.

29. Queen

Queen is super durable but a lack of speed is what keeps him fairly low on this list as well. You just can’t hope to succeed too much without a great deal of speed and it’s even the reason why he ended up losing the fight. When you’re getting blitzed on all sides then it is already too late to mount much of a comeback.

28. Shiryu

Shiryu’s sword skills are good and of course he has invisibility too. When you add both of those things together then it is going to be difficult for any opponent to really keep him on the defensive. I need to see more out of him to raise the guy further on the list but I do think that the guy is very promising as a fighter.

27. Raleigh

Raleigh is old and past his prime so he’s lower than he would normally be but the guy was still able to scare Blackbeard. I think that has to count for something. His sword skills also wouldn’t have deteriorated over the years even if his speed did. So this may be a bit of a low spot for him but it’s one that he would be able to defend very well.

26. Garp

Garp is the strongest out of the old man trio without a doubt. He still has a lot of power within his punches and could destroy anyone under him. Speed is what slows him down here as it does for so many other fighters. I don’t think he would be an easy victory for most of the guys above him but they would still conquer the guy.

25. Marco

Marco has incredible healing abilities and fire usage but he’s lacking KO power. The guy can just never put any of his opponents down and that will cost him in the end. You have to be able to put your opponents down or ultimately you will be the one getting pushed back. That’s something I hope to see him improve on in the future.

24. Kid

Kid is clearly meant to be one of the strongest fighters but I just haven’t seen it yet. His metal powers are just way too limited in scope though. He will have a hard time landing blows on any of the stronger fighters or really hurting them to be honest since most of them surpassed metal a long time ago. This is what is going to give him a really hard time.

23. Fujitora

Fujitora may be an admiral but he’s much lower than any of the others. He seems to have more trouble with all of his opponents than he should. Perhaps being blind takes more out of him than he would actually care to admit but he would need a really good powerup to go further up the list.

22. Doflamingo

Doflamingo may be a lower rank than Queen within Kaido’s army but he is certainly more powerful if you ask me. His strings could not be cut by almost the whole One Piece cast in Dressrosa and he was able to last long enough to outlast Luffy’s Gear 4. This guy was an absolute beast in battle.

21. S Hawk

As we near the top 20, S. Hawk is the next gatekeeper. This guy has only just appeared but he already had Blackbeard on the defensive and looked really impressive in his early scenes. I see a ton of potential behind the guy and hopefully he lasts long enough to show us what he can really do. If he gets even one on screen fight I can see him going further up.

20. Dragon

Dragon has yet to do much of anything and is pure hype. Mainly the issue here is that I’m not really sure if he will end up being much of a fighter. He may just be a tactician in the end and I’d say it’s already hinted that Sabo is more powerful. Dragon could surprise me but we’re deep into the story so I have reservations and he could even drop lower.

19. Imu

Then we have Imu who is like the reverse Dragon. He has no feats either although there was one lightning strike which may have been his. I’m very 50/50 on if he will be able to fight or not but if he can fight then this is the minimum on where he should be. I’d love to see him as the final boss in a Kaguya type role but we’ll see if that is in the cards or not for the future.

18. Ulti

Next up is Ulti who was always the best member of the group in Wano. She nearly defeated Luffy straight up and even got back up after a fight with Big Mom. Because the rest of her group was not that impressive I think it lowered her stocks a bit but she was definitely an opponent to be feared without a doubt.

17. Blackbeard

Blackbeard is this low because of his lack of speed. Also he seems to be nervous in every fight that he was in. The guy keeps getting stronger by stealing devil fruits so I could see him doing more of that in the future. That said, right now there are still a number of opponents who would very quickly take him down for the count.

16. Sabo

Sabo is a fire expert who seems to have a lot of potential. I’ve been less impressed with him than most but it is still fair to say that he’s a top fighter. His dragon claw has really dealt a whole lot of damage to his opponents as well. If he just had a slightly stronger variation of that then he could go further up but as it is we’re approaching the halfway point anyway.

15. Lucci

Lucci got a huge boost with his awakening as otherwise I wouldn’t have even put him on the list. With it he was able to hold his own against Gear 5 Luffy so you have to give him a whole lot of props there. His speed and power were already really good so this was finally enough for me to justify moving him up close to the top 10. It was a really impressive showing.

14. Kizaru

Since Kizaru can move at the speed of light he is really high up here. That said, the fighters above him can counter that well enough and keep it moving. It doesn’t help that Kizaru never seems to get a whole lot of respect by his opponents who beat him up anyway. Maybe he will surprise me in the next few chapters if we actually get to see him fight though.

13. Aokiji

Aokiji was able to stalemate Akainu for a while which is a huge feat. It’s safe to say that he should be able to defeat any admiral aside from Akainu. His ice mastery is super impressive and it seems like he may end up being one of the final bosses of the series which will also be a very good look for him.

12. Akainu

Akainu really needs to show me something soon but as the fleet admiral I do think that he should be able to be a top fighter. Fire powers are always really good after all and you don’t get to be the top boss without a whole lot of abilities at your disposal. This is why I have him all the way up here even if his speed could be a little better. Haki + Logia abilities should be a really busted combo.

11. Law

Law may be lacing in physical ability but his devil fruit is so handy that it won’t matter as much as you would expect. He can stab right through his opponents and that would be the end of them. He can teleport thanks to Room and so his range and overall attack power is just absolutely insane. He won’t be taking any Ls below this spot.

10. King

King may not be a Yonkou but he certainly fights like one and would be in my list for the top 10. His sheer durability and power make him too much of a threat not to make it. He is effectively invincible while in his fire mode and the only way for any character to hold their own was for him to scale it back. I do think this invincibility has a limit which the top 9 could crack but he is still tough to stop.

9. Big Mom

Big Mom may have earned the nickname of Big Meme due to being rather unimpressive relative to her station in Wano but at the same time she is still a very powerful fighter. I would expect that she can still defeat anyone under her because of her sheer durability and power. Lacking in speed just won’t be enough to sideline her.

8. Katakuri

Katakuri over Big Mom? Yes I’d definitely say that he has earned it. Big Mom is powerful and she is a huge pirate with dominating strength but she won’t be stopping Katakuri here. He has the edge in speed and seems to have kept up with his training based on Film Red. It’s still tough to see very many fighters passing him in overall stats which is why he will stay up here.

7. Sanji

Sanji may still be behind Zoro in the rankings but he has really proven himself during Wano. His speed and power are still really impressive and I could see him surpassing Yamato at some point. I don’t think we’ve fully seen everything that Sanji can do just yet and in a final battle onslaught I’d like to see him be included with the main cast next time instead of remaining on the side.

6. Yamato

While nobody seems to take Yamato being able to hold off Kaido as seriously as they should, she did still stalemate his hybrid form for some time. That’s not a small feat and she is the most underrated fighter in the series. I definitely see her keeping a spot in the top 10 even when the series has ended. That’s just how powerful she is.

5. Shanks

The Shanks pick scares me a bit because as the series goes on I keep thinking that he might get bumped off screen. If that happens then expect him to sink a whole lot but right now I want to believe in the hype. He has the best haki feat in the whole verse so if he can just build off of that then we should be all set.

4. Zoro

Might be a hot take here but he’s rather close to Luffy in terms of stats. Now that he has awakened his haki abilities there is almost nobody who can catch him. He has been step in step with Luffy for most of the series and that gap has closed up once again. Make no mistake, Luffy would beat Zoro but there are few others who could.

3. Luffy

Part of what helps Luffy is that I don’t think he will get any more power ups in the series. I think he has already reached his pinnacle of strength and can defeat just about anyone right now. I always see him ranked rather low in these lists but he has proven himself time and time again. There’s just no way that Gear 5 is going down to anyone who is not one of the top 2 without some big circumstances in the background.

2. Kaido

Kaido took on pretty much the entire One Piece cast and still nearly won the fight in the end. It’s hard to see just about anyone surpassing him in the end. I just don’t think it’s going to happen and the anime made him even more impressive. This guy is absolutely not someone to underestimate at this point and if he ever returns then the rest of the cast is doomed.

1. Mihawk

Finally in first is Mihawk. There’s not a whole lot more that needs to be said about this guy. He is the world’s strongest swordsman, even more talented than Shanks. His abilities continue to grow further and further so right now I don’t see anyone stopping him. His raw stats are just way too crazy at this point in time but of course part of the trickyness in being so mysterious is that there is always a chance he could turn out to be a dud. Hopefully that is not the case but he seems like the most balanced fighter at the top.

So that’s a wrap! We’ll see if things change in the future but right here right now this is how I’d stack things up. The series has quite a huge cast so it took some time to get this all set but I’d say it came out really great.

One Piece – Defeat Him! The Pirate Ganzack Review

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It’s time to jump far into the past with this one for a retro One Piece adventure. It’s a full original story with just the first 3 Strawhats so that’s pretty fun. The team has grown a lot over the years but there’s still something special about seeing the first crewmates team up to take a villain down. The special goes by very quickly but makes the most of its roughly 30 minutes. We get some good action here and Luffy gets one step closer to being the King of the Pirates!

The story starts with Luffy and the crew chilling on a boat when they are attacked by a giant monster. Unfortunately they are at sea so Luffy isn’t able to fight once he hits the water and this prevents Zoro from claiming the easy victory because he has to save Luffy. So Nami is kidnapped and eventually Luffy finds himself on a mysterious island. He saves a girl named Medaka from two pirates and finds out from her that the pirate known as Ganzack has taken down the whole village. They no longer have enough food to survive and need someone to save them. Luffy may not be a traditional hero but he likes his food so he is ready to help.

Ganzack actually does rather well as the villain here. For starters he actually takes down Luffy twice which is likely way more than anyone was expecting here. He just takes him down like it’s nothing and you may expect that once, but twice? Granted Luffy was much weaker back then but it’s still fairly unheard of to be taken out like that. Ganzack also talks about being the King of the Pirates several times which helps to really establish him as a big threat. He’s not someone who’s just playing around here but trying to accomplish his dreams.

There isn’t much more to his character beyond this but it’s enough to still make him a solid villain. I liked his fighting style with the little crab arms. It wasn’t something that you’d quickly forget. I dare say Zoro would have had a tougher time beating him though. This was early enough in the series where you could make the case that Zoro was stronger than Luffy. Some would say Luffy didn’t truly pass Zoro until he obtained Gear 2 but it would be a fun debate either way.

Regardless Zoro definitely looks great here though. He commands a lot of attention as the pirate hunter and pretty much takes down the whole army on his own. He didn’t need any help and he didn’t take any Ls. He was just around dominating the whole time with his 3 sword style. Meanwhile Nami is surviving as bet she can with a little trickery and it makes sense as a strategy. When you can fool the villain really easy then you may as well do that right? Luffy and Zoro should still have enough confidence in her not to think that she has actually turned evil or anything like that. I’m cool with the plan because it didn’t seem super risky and it’s not like she had to do anything villainous in order to gain Ganzack’s trust. So it worked out pretty well.

Meanwhile this is probably not Luffy’s best appearance since he was getting wrecked so often but I guess we can chalk it up to him being overconfident. By the end he was ready to make his comeback and start winning. It just took him some time to really get settled. Luffy gets credit for not backing down from a fight although that’s the bare minimum for any good lead.

It’s definitely interesting seeing One Piece with such a different animation style. It feels extra retro and not having the same sound effects when Luffy does his attacks will take a little getting used to. Still, I think this group could have done a fine job with the series. I liked the speed showings they gave to the characters and the action scenes are on point. I wouldn’t call this high budget but it has aged well enough so it works on that level. The soundtrack is more on the forgettable side for the most part. There are a few scenes where it feels like the music is about to pick up but then the scene ends real quick before that can happen.

The special is really short as I mentioned but it does work well. You’ll be engaged from start to finish and it’s really just a chance to see the characters get to fight some villains. It would have been nice if Ganzack had a right hand man or something so Zoro could fight him instead of the normal minions though. That would have helped make the film even cooler but this way at least they had Zoro taking on the whole army.

The original character here was also not bad. Medaka may just be a kid who wants to help her town but she doesn’t get in the way and actually saves Luffy twice. Once directly and the other indirectly by triggering his rage mode. So she really did a good job here and was likable which isn’t always easy for the heroes made up for the movies and specials. In general the writing here was on point which really goes a long way to making this a solid special.

Overall, If you’re looking for more One Piece content then this is a special you will want to check out. Ganzack makes for a memorable villain and there is a lot of action here so that’s all you really need. There is never a dull moment here and everyone gets something to do. It’s too bad they don’t make short specials like this quite as much nowadays. Personally with how One Piece sells I’d be trying to generate one of these every year. I’m sure the profits would be enough to cover the expenses each time. Maybe have a dedicated company that would handle these so it doesn’t impact the show.

Overall 7/10

One Piece Film: Red Review

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“The hierarchy of the One Piece franchise is about to change” Well this film definitely pulled it off. Eventually every great franchise has its definitive movie. That one installment that you feel will never be surpassed. Some do this multiple times like Dragon Ball Z (Original Broly movie, Resurrection F, Dragon Ball Super: Broly) but most will at least do it once. Justice League Crisis on Two Earths, Bleach: Hell Verse, Avengers Infinity War, Spider-Man 3, the original Mortal Kombat, Transformers G1 the movie, etc. Well this has finally happened with One Piece as it’s hard to see this one going down. Film: Red delivers on every front from action to music and it gets a massive bump in the theatrical experience. It’s a film that you have to see as soon as possible and it’s relatively new audience friendly so you can jump in and have a blast.

The movie starts out with a bunch of people yelling for help and they’re sad because the world is going to the pits and nobody is there to help them. The world is in the great pirate era after all so villains are everywhere and the government is so completely corrupt that you can’t really count on them to help you out either. Well, one girl has a dream…a dream of world peace! Her name is Uta and this is her story. In the present she has invited all of her fans to an island so that they can see her sing in person. Throughout her career she has only sung virtually through the cameras so this is a big deal. Just about everyone has come to watch her songs and 70% of the entire planet will either be watching her on TV or on the island. She almost literally has the world at her grasp and now she can try to achieve her dream. Is the dream really possible though?

Luffy is glad to see her because they used to be childhood friends until she mysteriously vanished one day. There’s a lot of questions about where she went and why she vanished but there isn’t much time to ask her at the concert. Things take a turn though when she announces that the concert will never end and she’s not letting anyone off the island. Is it even possible to have a never ending concert and how will this bring about world peace? All Luffy knows is that he needs to stop Uta but it won’t be easy as she has grown tremendously powerful over to the years to the point where there are few on this planet who can challenge her. He will have to go full force because if he can’t defeat her then he will never become King of the Pirates!

Right off the bat I can say that the movie absolutely delivers on the big songs here. One of the things the movie was getting a lot of hype for was how many songs it was going to have. Instead of calling it part musical I’d call the film part concert. Even as the battles are going you will usually have some kind of song going. It really helps to pump up the scene. One of the villainous songs sounds like something out of Lost Song and then you’ve got a ton of really peppy songs like in Sword Art Online. Hearing these in the full Imax settings was excellent. My ears were still ringing long after the film had ended and I was back home. I don’t think I’ve heard a movie with such loud decibels before but it’s perfect for a concert film.

You really felt like you were in one and that’s why the theater experience is a good boost to the film so I recommend seeing it in that setting at least once. The songs will hold up even after that though and I look forward to finding them online to listen to. Meanwhile the animation is also the best that it’s been in the series. It’s not surprising as One Piece’s animation grew quite noticeably better during Wano. And if that’s how good the show looks you can only imagine how good the movie would appear. They didn’t hold anything back here and every scene really shines. The colors are bright and there is a ton of movement in the fights.

Everyone looks powerful here and it also helps to really show just how powerful Uta is with her being able to block so many hits. In general I also liked the way her powers worked. Yes it seems incredibly broken but why shouldn’t there be a Devil Fruit that is this good? Eventually someone needs to have the best fruit out there and why not have hers be the best one? Because I think it’s fair to say that no other fruit can compare. It does have its own weaknesses of course but in most scenarios you figure that she will be able to defeat her opponents without a problem. The power levels in the film were all handled really well so I don’t have any issues on that front. I did find it a little funny that some randoms would actually challenge Luffy though. He’s one of the emperors now, would they actually try to challenge Kaido or Shanks? I feel like Luffy doesn’t get a lot of respect right now, maybe he just looks too young?

People who start their One Piece experience with this film may find Luffy to appear a bit on the weaker side but he is holding back for almost the whole film so he doesn’t really get to cut loose. That’s probably one difference compared to the previous films which is that Luffy doesn’t get a lot of action. It helps the movie avoid the usual power level concerns though. Keep in mind that Luffy is already Top 10 in the verse by this film so if he was having trouble with anyone then that would be hard to really make sense of. This way that isn’t really messed with.

Luffy also looks great in general here. He handles things very maturely and also does his best to respect Uta’s wishes even if they disagree on things. When she starts talking about how she doesn’t like pirates and how he should stop being one, he just walks away instead of trying to talk her out of it. He’s just not planning on having an argument and is ready to walk away. Perhaps confronting her would be best but they’re both super determined characters so he probably realized that it wouldn’t amount to anything. He also just doesn’t want to fight her since they’re still friends.

Luffy will fight his friends if he has to like when he took Usopp down but for the most part ever since then he tries to handle things peacefully like when Sanji would try and attack him. So it’s a solid character moment here and Luffy ended up fighting when the time was right. His best film appearance is likely still in Stampede but overall he has looked great in quite a few of the movie and this one would be near the top as well.

Uta also looks great here and is an excellent film original character. Film original characters usually have had a negative rep over the years although recently it hasn’t been much of an issue. That’s because they tend to be rather annoying and hold the cast back but that isn’t the case here as Uta is close to being the main character and a lot of the film is about her dream. We get flashbacks scattered throughout the movie on her childhood and what led her down this path. It’s all really emotional stuff and her plan is actually a very interesting one.

Make no mistake, she is a villain here and has gone off the deep end, but I do appreciate films where the villain is following their own sense of justice. It’s much easier to follow a villain who is at least trying to do the right thing and has strong ideals than one who is just evil for no good reason. (There’s a place for those villains too of course) Uta can handle herself in a fight and also really thought things through here. She had a strong plan that was nearly unbreakable so you really can’t ask for much more than that. It’s fair to say that she was the greatest threat to the planet in terms of sheer numbers and I’m not sure any future One Piece villain will top that.

At the end of the day Uta was by herself for many years aside from the old guy at the kingdom and she never lost hope. She just kept fighting until she got to her own answer on how to achieve world peace. It wasn’t the right answer perhaps but at least it was one. Now the film got a lot of hype for Shanks showing up but of course you shouldn’t expect him to do a lot here. It’s a fairly small role for him but it’s still nice to see the guy. He does leave an impact in his few scenes and you can tell that he is powerful. I have my doubts on if he could really take on Luffy right now but either way he is in the upper ranks.

I did disagree with Shanks’ decision to leave Uta though. You can watch the film to see how that all plays out but at the end of the day I think he needed to trust Uta to choose her own future a bit more. He may have thought himself to be doing something noble but I did not agree with it. It was not the right thing to do imo. It’s also nice to see his crew even if they don’t look as impressive as the Strawhats. Personally I think Luffy’s crew is easily the most powerful in the series by this point.

They get their own subplot on finding out a way to try and stop Uta but for the most part they aren’t as big a focus. You get to see them get some action and all though so everyone uses their special abilities. Zoro continues to prove why he is Luffy’s strongest fighter during this as several characters even react when he does his ultimate attack. Even Yasopp was impressed and that guy has seen Shanks fight up close and personal. Zoro was also the first one to react when Luffy’s crew was attacked and I appreciate that. You have to defend them right away. I give Bartolomeo similar credit because he was the first one to step in and try to help Luffy when he was nearly captured while a lot of other characters just froze.

There are a lot of guest stars here so be on the lookout for them. Some like Katakuri should have gotten a bit more to do if you ask me though. You almost wondered what the point of Katakuri was here since he didn’t end up adding much to the fight. It was still nice to see him though. Oven and Brulee were some of the more random ones initially but it did help to make the film feel a bit more ambitious. Having the canon characters show up to fight will do that to a movie.

The film does ultimately resort to a giant CGI monster as the final boss though so that still seems to be a curse in the anime movie industry. Why can’t we end with a humanoid battle? So many of them love the giant monster at the end and it’s just not as exciting. The movie’s top notch animation makes the most of it but having Uta as the final boss herself would have been a lot of fun. I’d say that would have absolutely been the best way to go here.

This movie has a ton of replay value either way. The pacing is really fast, I remember being surprised when the film goes to the present and we see that Luffy and the gang are already at the concert. No time is spent on them travelling there or an opening montage to set up. They’re just ready right from the jump and we get into the singing. It probably happens within the opening 10 minutes and things just keep escalating from there. The film doesn’t take many breaks either. We get some lore and flashbacks but always very briefly until we jump to the next big scene. The film is just really high energy and that fits in with the series always being a colorful adventure.

Fans of the government/navy who have lasted this long will probably be fine but if you’re someone who was on the fence about if they were good guys or not will want to step back here. They look so evil that it’s almost funny. They basically figure at one point that they should sacrifice millions of people to take one character down and you can probably guess who. At that point it’s not even cracking a few eggs to make an omelet. You’re destroying the whole farm for one. They just have no justification at this point and seem to just be trying to murder people for no reason. Kizaru was ready to destroy people without a second thought and the pirates have to stop them. Yeah the government definitely appear to be the true enemies here which is why anyone working for them feels complicit after a while. Just look at how they serve the Celestial Dragons who are still as evil and petty as they come.

Overall, One Piece Film: Red is excellent and one of the top anime films. I’m confident that it will be remembered as a big game changer for a long time to come. The writing is just excellent and set up a really great rivalry/friendship with Uta and Luffy from the jump. They have a better dynamic than most of the Strawhats to be honest. I can see why she was an instant fan favorite in the franchise. They should really drop Brook off the crew and replace him with someone cool like Uta. I wasn’t a fan of the way the film ended which is the only sour spot there but it’s not a horrible ending or anything like that. (After all, that would have kept this from being the best One Piece film) It’s just not how I would have done things, I would have gone with a slightly different ending because all you need to change is one thing. The scene after the credits is pretty fun though as one character gets re-energized. If you haven’t seen the film yet then it’s definitely time to change that.

Overall 9/10

Cloud vs Zoro

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Suggested by Destroyer This is definitely a close one. Both Cloud and Zoro are tremendously powerful and have more tools up their sleeve than simple sword strikes. Zoro has advanced haki and Cloud has his limit abilities and elemental spells. Ultimately I would give this to Zoro though. His skills have kept on improving at a rapid pace while Cloud has had to mostly remain still for a while. By Wano Zoro’s speed and power appear to both be superior to Cloud’s. I don’t think he would be able to keep up in this fight. Zoro wins.

Tashigi vs Zoro

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Tashigi is a good swordswoman but she’s not quite ready to take on Zoro just yet. Zoro’s just way too powerful and continues to get stronger in each arc. At this point he should be able to run rings around her and once he takes out his swords then it’s really all over. There just won’t be a whole lot that she could do to stop him and at the very least will need a more powerful sword. Zoro wins.

Captain Morgan vs Zoro

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Captain Morgan may have been a tough guy back in the day but even he wasn’t a match for a swordsman who was as skilled as Zoro. Zoro’s three sword style is just way too difficult to get past. He has speed and Haki as well which will allow him to block any of Morgan’s hits with ease. As skilled as Morgan may have been, he’s severely outclassed in every single attribute. That’s why he will be doomed here. Zoro wins.

Zoro vs Pica

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Pica is a fairly powerful fighter who is hard to pin down since he can merge into the rocks to escape. As long as there is any Earth around him, he will be tough to stop. That said, Zoro is still a lot stronger here and can slice through just about anything. That means Pica will have no true hiding spots and ultimately he will fall to Zoro’s immense power. Pica just isn’t fast enough to have any alternate path to victory. Zoro wins.

One Piece: World Seeker Review

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I remember World Seeker was getting a lot of hype when it was first announced but it seems like the hype died out when it came out. I just happened to run across it at a Gamestop and figured that was a good time to see if it was any good. Fortunately this is another great title to add to the One Piece collection. The franchise has really done well in that arena. While most of the other games were big beat em up titles, this one’s more of an open world action/adventure game. It works out really well and feels like a Breath of the Wild type experience.

The game starts out with a very cinematic approach as the credits roll while we see Luffy getting ready to be executed by the government. Fortunately he is able to get out of there just in time but the whole crew has been split up. They were lured to the island with treasure but it turns out to all have been a trap by Isaac and the World Government. Luffy and friends need to get off the island but the Sunny won’t be repaired for a few days so there is no escape. Additionally, there may be something more to this situation other than a simple trap as famous pirates, admirals, and many other figures are all converging on the island. It’s time for Luffy to help Jeanne save her island and prove that even a pirate can be a hero.

Right off the bat you’re thrown into the rather large island and then have to make your way from place to place for the missions. The hub world is quite large to the point where you will be using the quick travel mechanic a whole lot. It’s not as big as Breath of the Wild, but the size is impressive enough where it’s worth noting. They did a really good job there. There is a whole lot to do in the various areas as well with side missions everywhere and a whole lot of treasure chests. This is good because the main campaign is really not that long. I cleared it in around 8 hours which feels short for this kind of big open world adventure.

Throw in the replay value like grabbing all of the PS4 trophies and the deal looks a lot better though. It’ll take a while to get up to rank 100 and take down all of the quests which helps put in a lot of extra value here. The game uses Luffy’s rubber abilities well as you can swing from place to place almost like Spider-Man and all of his classic moves are in the game. I would have liked some kind of flying option though as some mountains are just too high to jump onto so you have to go the long way around the valley.

I suppose it shows that even Luffy has some limits but I wouldn’t have minded the game helping me out a bit there. Just give me a bit of a boost so I don’t have to do the leg work, that’s all I wanted. As for the combat, it’s definitely really solid. There’s a bit more variety here than your average beat em up so you can have fun with your combos. That said, I would make the case that some tactics are simply better than others. For example, against the robots, just use your fire fist because it’s a guaranteed 1 hit KO. I used that technique for 90% of my battles simply because it was so efficient.

There are two weaknesses that the game has though. The first is that there are a ton of loading times. Any time you want to quick travel somewhere you have to sit through a full loading screen which is quite long. Keep in mind that you will be using quick travel dozens of times since it is always significantly faster than running the full distance. The missions will usually have you crossing large portions of the map so walking just wouldn’t make as much sense. The loading times just seemed excessive though and something that could have been improved.

Then there’s the story which is ambitious but felt really choppy at times. There are no smooth transitions between lines so the screen will go black and then they’ll say the next thing. It’s really noticeable while playing through the game. Also, there is almost no voice acting here which feels a bit lazy for a PS4 title. Most of the time they’ll just grunt or say 1 word. It was cool to see all of the characters showing up on the island but half of them don’t get to do anything. Sanji’s family show up for a transaction for example and then dash off. The admirals appear to get in their fight and then run off.

The amount of times a villain is about to beat Luffy but is told to let him go is crazy. I feel like Luffy could take some of these guys at this point in time too. Gone are the days where he had to run off just because an admiral was around. When we do get a cutscene they’re fun like seeing Zoro take on Isaac. We just needed more of that and the story doesn’t necessarily have to be longer. Just cut out some of the mandatory side missions and you’re good. I see what the intent behind the side missions was. It was to introduce us to all of the islanders so it’s emotional when they come together in the climax. I get the logic there but personally I’d have liked to have seen more of the actual Strawhats taking names. Even Law vanishes early on although he apparently got his own DLC pack so I suppose you would need to play that to see what’s going on with him.

As for the graphics, those are definitely really good as you would expect. The game looks sharp and feels like a PS4 title. It helps that the island is just a lot of fun to look at and the city was developed well too. Then you have the soundtrack which is actually really solid but they don’t play the tunes very often. You might hear a theme that sounds great but then it never appears in the game again. This is the kind of soundtrack you’ll want to look up on Youtube afterwards to see if you can find all of the cool tunes.

Overall, One Piece: World Seeker is definitely a winner in my book. The story could have been a lot stronger to be honest but it would make for a fun movie. Just needed to focus up a bit more. I appreciate that the game went with an original story though and the execution on the open world concept was really solid. Open world can absolutely be a blast when it’s like this. In a lot of ways it does remind me of Breath of the Wild, just with Luffy as the main character. If I had any more nitpicks on that I would like Luffy to be a little faster when moving around so I didn’t have to rely on quick travel so much but the speed isn’t bad either. I’m also glad there is a quick travel since that’s an absolute must have feature for any open world game.

Overall 8/10

Yamato will be Luffy’s strongest Strawhat if she joins

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The saga of One Piece to Clover to One Piece editorials is now at an end with this one at least on the One Piece side. Get ready for one more Black Clover piece and after that I don’t know which editorials will come up next but I’ll think of something. At least once I get the reviews a bit lower. So Yamato is a brand new One Piece character. I suppose the term should be used loosely since she’s probably been in the story for about a year or two at this point but she has only just had her first serious fight where she was on the losing side. Yamato has been stomping everyone with the exception of Luffy prior to this.

So is the title clickbait? No, I’d say Yamato has firmly placed herself as being more powerful than Zoro and Sanji. I don’t doubt that they will catch her by the end of the series but right now she is considerably more powerful and the strongest Strawhat next to Luffy. She isn’t quite as powerful as he is but that man’s the future pirate king so it makes sense. It goes without saying that this editorial will feature content from the current saga in Wano so proceed with caution. I won’t be spoiling specific battle outcomes or anything like that, just attack damage so I don’t consider this one to be a big spoiler like my other editorials but it’s still a fair warning in case you want to enter Wano completely unawares.

So right now I see many say that Yamato is still weaker than Sanji and Zoro as well as this being necessary since the “Monster Trio” as they are referred to has been a concept since the beginning of One Piece. Among the Strawhats , Luffy, Zoro, and Sanji have always been the strongest and in that order. It’s never been the case that this order could be shattered. One thing fans point to in order to show that Oda conscientiously keeps this balance is how Jinbei was introduced to the crew early on but decided not to join for another arc or two. 

This way by the time he had joined, there was enough time for Sanji to surpass him. (I would argue Zoro was already ahead) So in this way the Monster Trio was untouched when Jinbei joined. He came in as the 4th strongest fighter and will sink to 5th if Yamato joins. The reason why this is important is because if Yamato joins it will certainly be at the end of the arc which is seemingly already in the climax. There isn’t time for Sanji and Zoro to surpass her or at the very least it is incredibly unlikely given how well she has performed thus far. While her joining then crew isn’t a certainty, there are a lot of things pointing to it like upcoming promotional images showing her as a Strawhat, toys where she is with the crew, her appearing in the big 1000 anniversary special as a featured character with the other Strawhats, etc. 

Now, maybe Carrot will be the one to join…..but probably not. So if we all assume that Yamato has been joining, then a lot of people are saying that she absolutely has to be weaker. I disagree both on the count of her being weaker but also that it would be bad to destroy the monster trio. The trio was in existence for 100+ volumes. That’s an incredible run and I don’t think that it is bad they were surpassed. Surely it had to happen at some point so why not now right? I don’t think the trio is something I’ve even thought about as a concept almost at all while reading the series to be honest.

Now usually I am in the camp where I’d say that Yamato joined the series way too late. I’d be saying how she would ruin the dynamic and all but this time I’m not on that side. Why? Because she’s a much better character than most of the Strawhats. I’ve never liked Brook after all. I find Franky to be a little boring and while Jinbei isn’t bad, I feel like there isn’t much to him. Chopper isn’t really my style and Sanji would be really great if not for how he is always flirting and getting wrecked by every villainess he fights. Yamato is automatically the best Strawhat aside from Luffy and Zoro. The rest just don’t compete so instead of ruining the dynamic she may end up enhancing it. Her whole Oden gimmick should be interesting with how the other characters bounce off of it although in don’t see that surviving past this arc anyway so it may not matter.

Now let me get into why I believe Yamato is stronger than Sanji and Zoro. Sanji is a lot easier so let’s go with him. In Wano he got to fight Page One, seemingly one of the weakest fighters on the island. Sanji did really well and styled on him so points there. Then he fought a girl and you know how those fights go since Sanji refuses to fight back. Sanji didn’t even get invited to the famous Roof Piece event to fight with Kaido and has been stuck on the sidelines fighting the lower ranked King and Queen, not doing so well until Zoro showed up. Sanji hasn’t shown me anything to suggest that he would last more than a moment against Kaido before being promptly steamrolled.

Then you have Zoro. While he is more powerful than Sanji which makes it tougher to surpass him in that sense, he has fought against Kaido which makes for a great direct comparison. Skipping through the details to the end, Zoro was able to land one really good slash on Kaido and almost landed another blow but it missed. Zoro has the raw strength needed to injure Kaido which is extremely impressive. If he has some allies around to buy time and distract Kaido then he really has a decent shot at pulling out the win here at any time. The issue is that one on one he isn’t going to be seeing those openings.

Zoro won’t have time to charge up some kind of super attack, he will need to get in there up close in order to secure the victory. So we don’t see anything that says he could fight Kaido one on one. It’s just not happening. Now let’s talk about Yamato. Keep in mind that she was chained up for years prior to the start of this arc and so she has seemingly never gotten to fight with her devil fruit before. She has to learn as she goes and will keep getting stronger. We are not talking about potential here but raw ability so let’s shift gears for a minute. Yamato took down one of Kaido’s top warriors with a single blow but you could make the case that as a sneak attack it didn’t count. Yamato was stalemating Luffy when he was trying to defeat her and she was not fighting back. 

Well, Luffy may have been tired and he was definitely not going out right? That’s fair so then let’s just jump to the Kaido stuff because that’s the only thing that will give us the clear answer here. Well, Yamato was stalemating 1 on 1 a Hybrid mode Kaido. So this is something to really keep in mind here. Those Zoro feats? We were talking regular Kaido at that point. Yamato is performing better against a Kaido who is in a much more powerful form. As far as I’m concerned that’s pretty much a game over moment for any chance or Yamato being weaker. Sure, she was ultimately getting overpowered but unless you think Zoro would have beaten Kaido one on one then that’s moot anyway. The strongest case for Zoro being more powerful than Yamato is if he’s just that much faster and given that Yamato speed blitzed Ulti, I think that would be a very difficult case to make. While the anime tends to drag things out for dramatic effect, you can see the speed in the clip below. Even by the end of the fight larer on with Kaido Yamato was able to use a new special move and didn’t even lose before the fight was interrupted.

So that rests my case or at least what I would consider to be the mainly spoiler free version. I could go into more detail with using specific scenes but I encourage you to check out the manga battles first hand. This is a bit of a smaller editorial than some of my others but that’s because this is really just to answer a quick question.

Is Yamato the strongest Strawhat comrade if she were to join? Well the answer is yes, none of Luffy’s teammates can hope to defeat her at this point in the story. They are going to need some kind of power up in a future arc in order to close the gap. Yamato is not unbeatable, there’s a really good chance hat she will be surpassed by the end but make no mistake, the others will have to surpass her. They aren’t on the level right now.

Is Mihawk the strongest Swordsman in One Piece?

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As the title suggests, this editorial is going to discuss if Mihawk is really the greatest Swordsman in the One Piece verse. Now that is a very big title so we definitely want to go into depth here and see if this is really the case. There are a lot of sword fighters in the series after all so we are going to need to qualify this a bit. First I think it’s important that we set straight what the definition of a swordsman is at least on this site.

A swordsman is someone who primarily fights with a sword. That’s the basis of the character and when you think of this individual, a sword should always come to mind as well. So what I’m saying here is that just using a sword is not enough. Put it this way, Goku with a sword could easily beat Trunks but that doesn’t make him a swordsman. Superman could use a sword to beat Katana but that’s because his actual abilities are so much greater. So that’s not what we’re really talking about here. Otherwise just about anyone can use a sword and there have been fighters who have wields a sword once or twice like Goku. It’s not the same thing though so they would have to be ruled out.

That means Luffy doesn’t count as he only used a sword twice. Weapons that are similar to swords won’t be counted either. Now if it’s got a blade like a Katana or something that is effectively a sword then that’s quite all right. Kaido’s Thunder Bagua for example is definitely not the kind of weapon I would consider to be a sword. This is very fortunate for Mihawk I should say since it’s hard to see him tangling with Kaido.

So now that we’ve defined what it is to be a swordsman let’s look at Mihawk’s competition. As mentioned, Kaido is ruled out so that’s one less rival. Big Mom has her legendary fire sword but nobody actually considers her to be a sword fighter. She uses hand to hand combat primarily and the sword is just something she whips out on occasion. Is she close to counting? I’d say yes, if she just were to use the sword a little more often then I would say that is a wrap.

Another fighter we can’t count here is Oden. The title of the strongest is a current one after all and Oden is not around right now. The same goes for Whitebeard and King Roger. If you’re not around anymore then of course you can’t have a claim to being the strongest so that absolutely makes a lot of sense and I would stand by that. This is a title for characters who are alive or at least still moving around.

For primary sword fighters the main rivals then would be Zoro, Shanks, King, Fujitora, Law, and Brook. I can barely say the last name with a straight face though. He is directly weaker than Zoro so we will remove him right now.

Now let’s talk about Law. He is a talented swordfighter in large part because he has his room abilities but he also may have the single best sword feat in all of One Piece when he destroyed an entire mountain range with a single swing. Even characters like Luffy and Kaido have never been able to match that kind of destructive power. I would say it’s fair to count that as an outlier though given that it was so far above what is usually seen as possible in the series. Or if not, you can just scale the other above him anyway.

Additionally Law has taken several Ls since then and generally hasn’t been as impressive. Mix in the fact that his Haki is not developed enough to even damage Kaido and I would say he loses his claim to being the strongest. King is the next challenger and we haven’t seen a ton from him yet so maybe he has some secret abilities lying in wait. At the moment though he appears to be weaker than Zoro so that would rule him out as well.

Fujitora is an interesting figure because we just haven’t seen a whole lot of him relative to the others. He’s an admiral which is very impressive but even then we don’t really know how they stack up only that they are weaker than Yonkou’s individually. Zoro was able to briefly stalemate him in one of the films which is really the best comparison we’ve got. Ultimately I don’t see any possible path for Fujitora being stronger than Zoro or Mihawk, both of whom have far more impressive moments.

So we’re down to the big 3, Mihawk, Zoro, and Shanks as the world’s greatest swordsman. So now let’s drill even further down into the definition of the phrase “greatest swordsman” as it will start to become more relevant here. Does the term greatest refer to the most powerful such as who would win in a fight counting Haki abilities and such or who has the most skill in a true blade battle?

If it’s the former then Shanks will likely carry this title. The man has done little to nothing in the 1000+ chapters of One Piece but at the same time he is a Yonkou. Moreover, he is the only one not to fight yet and by Shonen Jump/Any media standard that implies that he will end up being the strongest. Although Oda has put himself in a very sticky situation here because if Shanks actually does lose his first ever fight off screen to Blackbeard as many suspect, that would be a truly awful payoff to everyone who was looking forward to him getting some action.

So from a feats standpoint Shanks is lacking but in a lore sense the odds of him being more powerful than Mihawk is quite considerable. Just consider the parallel between Zoro and Mihawk vs Luffy and Shanks. It would make sense that the latter combo is stronger than the former even if Mihawk will be more skilled than Shanks.

Then we cut (See what I did there?? Heh) to Zoro. Well, it’s clear that Zoro was a lot weaker than Mihawk pre time skip and then had to get trained by the main for almost 3 years. At this point we can say that Zoro was still weaker. After that though, Zoro got the legendary Enma, the ability to cut through fire, and improved enough to block a combined Yonkou attack. Zoro also awakened the Conqueror’s Haki which is something we don’t even know if Mihawk has. Most likely he will end up having it since he may become irrelevant in the fights otherwise but these are a lot of of points in Zoro’s favor.

Right now I would have to put Zoro ahead of Mihawk both in skill and power. There’s certainly a decent chance that Mihawk can prove me wrong since in a lore perspective it would make sense for him to be incredibly strong like Shanks but until we see it, I can’t give him the title.

So there we go, if we’re talking about lore or pure ability then Shanks is the most powerful swordsman in the world. If we are talking about feats or overall skill with a blade then Zoro takes this. Either way I’m afraid that Mihawk will need to relinquish his title effective immediately. He cannot be considered the world’s strongest swordsman. Not right now. If you have any doubts at all after reading this, just check out this final clip of his reaction to Shanks entering the battlefield at Marineford.