One Piece

It doesn't help that he's supposed to be incredibly badass, yet his onscreen performance tends to not live up to that hype.

Disgusted, but not surprised

You know, I just realized that the recent reveal that CP9 was using Haki when they fought the Straw Hats isn't too big of a leap, since they also fought Enel and his Priests who all had Observation Haki and the Luffy vs Marigold and Sandersonia battle showed that Gear 2 Pre-TS Luffy was fast enough to outspeed Observation and strong enough to break through Armament.

Marigold and Sandersonia didn't seem to be as strong as Lucci was, and we have no reason to think those two are just weak, so maybe Lucci really is as powerful as the Vice Admirals hyped him up to be.

Well it does sorta recontextualize how Lucci brought Luffy to near death with just pure refined brute force.

Turns out he really was using Haki & with it he was better able to beat Luffy to death.

"I am Alpharius. This is a lie."

I kinda liked it better when it was sheer brute force personally. "This dude is brutal enough to punch the shit out of Luffy even when he's rubber" just seems more impressive than Haki.

also cause if it was Haki then Luffy should have lost completely back then

Secret Signature

Considering how Haki works, I think that's more or less the same thing, just with a name on it.

Eh, Haki allows you to outright ignore(unless the DF user is using their own) the damage resistance/intagibility of Paramecias/Logias and hit somewhat harder at the same time. Not exactly the same but I see the point.

Secret Signature

Haven't they implied that Luffy still has a slight resistance to blunt force trauma, even with Haki? Like, it does damage, but it doesn't nullify his rubbery body entirely.

Iirc it's been established that Haki doesnt cancel their powers, only Seastone can do that. So presumably yeah, he's still a bit rubbery even if hit. Plus he has tremendous stamina even without the fruit's defence since childhood, the Katakuri fight shows this the best.

Secret Signature

How long was Luffy tortured as a kid for? I feel like that went on for several hours, and he just refused to break that whole time.

It doesn't make sense for CP 9 to use Haki because they have Tekkai, which is like armament Haki only that you can't move when using it. So, why use Tekkai when you have Haki?

There isn't an impossible dream, there are only people who give up

Technically it's not confirmed they had haki when fighting the straw-hats, just that they had it pre-timeskip. They could very well have learned it after the events of the cover story. Vivre cards have been wrong before in any case.

Edited by WashTheLaundryHero on May 23rd 2020 at 3:33:07 AM

I assume that Iron Body and Finger Pistol are Armament Haki, and Paper Arts is Observation Haki.

That's not what they are, though? Like, we got an explanation about how Rokushiki works already in that arc, and it's clearly not haki.

Unrelated question: would Perona be able to defeat post-timeskip Usopp?

The answer to such questions is always the same: "if the author feels like it, sure"

That's a cop-out and you know it.

Didn't she lose to pre-timeskip Usopp already?

Edited by WashTheLaundryHero on May 23rd 2020 at 4:57:43 AM

Yes, but I'm asking if post-timeskip Usopp would still be immune to her Negative Hollows.

My own theory is that Iron Body is a lead-up to full body Haki. Full-body Haki seems like its' an advanced technique, since the only two people we've seen use it were not Big Bads. Or maybe one you need a real innate talent for Armament to pull off. It may well be that Jabura, the only one who can move in Iron Body, could use full-body Armament eventually.

This is why I personally regard Haki as more of a nerf than a buff. It wasn't created to make weak characters stronger, it's there to make strong characters weaker by giving them more things to be vulnerable to.

Take away Haki, and all but a handful of post-timeskip fights (Katakuri and Ceasar Clown being the two I can think of right offhand) could be written to go exactly the same way.

Edited by sgamer82 on May 23rd 2020 at 9:50:38 AM

No, he still clearly has self-esteem issues

Yeah, it could be retconned that way, but it should be explained somewhere. Otherwise, I'll stick with the Doylist explanation "Oda came up with Haki around Sabaody". I mean, I love One Piece and I think it's great, but Oda being human and the story being so long and complex, it's natural there are a few flaws here and there

Edited by fishysaur on May 23rd 2020 at 10:43:47 AM

There isn't an impossible dream, there are only people who give up

I don't doubt Haki didn't get fine tuned until later, even if the end of Water Seven/Enies Lobby was its first proper mention.

Intentional or not, though, it actually works out in a small, but neat way. Post-timeskip we can clearly see when Armament Haki is used by seeing the affected body/parts turn black. Something we never saw before even when Armament was in use pre-timeskip (like vs Sandersonia and Marigold). What changed? Luffy's and, by extension, the audience's awareness of it. Post-timeskip, Luffy knows about Haki and can detect it. As a result, so can we, the audience.

It works nicely with Luffy as the viewpoint character. I remember a few instances of The Unofficial One Piece Podcast that mention that our first two-page look at a new island is almost always from Luffy's perspective (ex: Mokomo Dukedom from the top down because Luffy climbed up high to get a look, or Water Seven from the bottom up because that's where the Going Merry was located.)

Edited by sgamer82 on May 23rd 2020 at 12:42:34 PM

Mmmmh yeah, it's a nice "explanation" (in Italy we'd use the term paraculata which I don't know how to translate it) but it falls a bit when during the first part of Marineford, where Luffy isn't present, and some fight using Haki (like Marco clashing with Kizaru) but we still don't see anything. And that's not counting the bits of the world we see between every saga

To give Oda credits, I personally think post-ts the Haki is well integrated into the world, it's just jarring the sudden and late introduction

Edited by fishysaur on May 23rd 2020 at 11:24:32 AM

There isn't an impossible dream, there are only people who give up

At this point in perspective, it's no longer a late addition but a middle of the story thing.

It doesn't really fall since my point is the audience's awareness of haki is the same as the Luffy's. We knew as much as Luffy did, so if he wouldn't see it in use, neither would we. Post-timeskip he can, so we can. His physical presence isn't really an issue one way or the other.

Edited by sgamer82 on May 23rd 2020 at 12:40:49 PM

Mmmmh I get it, and it's Oda's justification (btw, now that I think about it, Hx H had the same with Nen, only it was introduced and foreshadowed much earlier)

Yes, but it should've been set up sooner. It's like if Naruto introduced the concept of chakra after the timeskip

Edited by fishysaur on May 23rd 2020 at 11:43:39 AM

There isn't an impossible dream, there are only people who give up