One Piece

Jinbe's motive is to fulfill his promise of protection, both to Ace, Whitebeard, Fishmen, and the world at large. Most of those are done by serving as Luffy's bodyguard, kinda. Especially that one time he literally guarded Luffy's body with his own.

Also, being Luffy's emergency blood bag?

Also fills the "Strawhat to die" seat.

I thought that seat was already filled by Brook.

Yohoho, SKULL JOKE!

Anyone read this article? http://www.ign.com/blogs/assassinita/2014/10/04/one-piece-why-i-love-the-series-and-hate-its-pitfalls

Kinda spells out all of the issues we've been having with the series as of late.

Who is Brook?

On the subject of Rebecca joining, though I don't think it's especially likely for her to join because of herself but I wouldn't be surprised given all of the important things in this arc if he wanted to add another crew member. In that regard, she works best, even if she's not perfect. Or at least, she makes a whole lot more since than Law, Sabo, Viola, Bartolomeo, or anyone else people were thinking of.

edited 30th Jun '15 2:14:57 PM by LSBK

I feel the biggest thing in favor of Rebecca joining is that the Straw Hats fulfill familial roles to each other, and Rebecca already has that going on with Robin, who treats her like a little sister despite not knowing her very long.

@ Yakuzu: At the last popularity poll, Becky ranked 29th out of 101. So yeah, she's up there. Didn't beat any Straw Hats though. Hilariously, Shirahoshi was exactly one place ahead of her.

edited 30th Jun '15 2:17:36 PM by HamburgerTime

Didn't even beat Franky? Good.

Notice that the Japanese tend to not rate Franky and Brook as highly as the rest of the crew, other major characters, or the supposedly badass bishies.

I wouldn't mind if there was a crew member whose style was about Deadly Dodging, but they'd need some sort of offense or distinguishing characteristic, and given the variety in the setting, I'd appreciate it if there were more crew members who weren't clearly human. Chopper (and Jinbe), and to an extent Franky and Brook do make a sizeable chunk of the crew being non-human, but I'd like one last one.
Like if Monet had joined, then we'd have a female, a scout, someone else who doesn't directly "hit it til it dies" fight, a logia, and a non-human.

I still don't like that eight of the top ten in the last poll were conventionally attractive, bar the cute mascot and (somehow) Bartolomeo.

Luffy, Law, Zoro, Sanji, Sabo, Ace, Hancock, and Nami

The last three were Bart, Chopper, and Ussop right?

That's eleven. Barty and Chopper were the other two.

Last time I checked Barty was the favorite to join the crew at Arlong Park, but I'm not really seeing it. Even if Barty wanted in (and let's face it, he probably does), I doubt Luffy would let someone who already had his own crew join up.

I have the same thought but the main reason he can't join is something more meta.

The very reason all these people love Bartolomeo is the reason he would be a terrible fit. Either he would have to grow out of his fanboying (maybe not entirely but it would become drastically reduced) as he gets to know them as people instead of idols, or he stays exactly the same and suddenly the thing that made him hilarious makes him really annoying. The only other thing he has to his personality is how cartoonishly vicious he is and those acts which got him famous wouldn't fly if he was a Straw Hat. Either he, as a character, would have to lose his most prominent traits or he would have a dynamic with all of them that would get old very fast.

For some reason most people don't think about these sorts of things and not just concerning this series. It's very annoying.

edited 30th Jun '15 3:30:35 PM by LSBK

It's kinda like what happened to Knuckles the Echidna, he got popular and fans wanted to see more of him.

So that's exactly what happened and he eventually lost the things people initially loved about him and became a shell of his former self, never to recover.

Well I don't know much about Sonic but that is a pretty good description of what I figure would happen to Bartolomeo if he joined.

Also, AP apparently hates anything even vaguely princess-shaped. Vivi being a Mary Sue is, after all these years, a common discussion topic there.

I find Arlong Park pretty toxic in general so I'll just take your word for it.

Ugggghhhh I don't want to wait another decade for all the Straw Hats to get Haki...

Don't worry.

I'm pretty sure they won't anyway.

Speaking of Haki,the concept of "overusing" it sounds silly.

Would rather have Gear 4's weakness being that Luffy 's rubber is "stretched out" and he can't maintain his shape well enough to stand or fight.

I think they'll all get it except maybe Franky, who may not be fully "human" enough anymore.

The idea of that mattering is nothing but silly.

But I also find the idea of everyone needing Haki to be annoying- in my eyes, it should be about as important as having a Fruit ability- so it's certainly a good thing to have, and if you're at the top without it it's even more impressive, but it's not actually required.

Except it's not like a fruit ability, haki is inborn. The entire talk of "getting" haki is wrong. We were told upfront that haki is a power that all people are born with, most just don't realize it and thus don't awaken it. So haki isn't the equivalent of an unnatural super power gotten from eating a terrible tasting fruit, it is simply honing your physical and mental abilities to there limit. Why it's annoying you have to do that to succeed in the worst half of the most hazardous sea in this crazy world is something that I don't understand.

Edit: So to summarize, haki should stop being thought of as a super power, it might be in our world, and most people in there's might be amazed at it, but it's something anyone is capable of (well, except Haoshoku).

edited 30th Jun '15 5:54:09 PM by LSBK

With as much of a genius as Franky is he could probably add some weird app to himself that imitates Haki.

Have Franky build Rebecca an electric stun sword. Suits her nonlethal style and lets her clear away fodder without fuss.

Edit: Franky's totally human enough for Haki. Hell, One Piece is the kind of series that would give haki to a toaster oven if it showed enough pure strength of will, how much metal you've got in your body won't make much difference.

Now whether Franky gives a damn, that's another question.

edited 30th Jun '15 6:37:15 PM by Ogodei

So...do what Nami already does?

Edit: Those are basically my thoughts on it as well. I'm sure he could learn it if he wanted to but it just kind of goes against his whole deal.

edited 30th Jun '15 6:42:51 PM by LSBK

I'm told that the anime has an alpaca with Haki, but I've never watched that particular filler.