So, it's come to my attention that some people fail to appreciate just how monstrously huge of a force the Big Mom Pirates actually are.
Some people might intuitively feel that, yes, a quantity of troops are the Big Mom Pirate's greatest strength, even compared to the other Yonko, but let's put numbers on that, shall we?
The first really significant indication of the size of the armies that the Big Mom Pirates can field is Brulee calling Mont Dor from within the mirror world explaining that she's quickly pulled an army of 10,000 into the mirror world, mainly chess peacekeepers, though Oven and Perospero are also there, for the purpose of catching Strawhat Luffy by revealing themselves at any time and any place from any mirror near where he pops up.
This of course, later ends up being the mirror on the Sunny.
After being forced to retreat back into the mirror by Katakuri, these peacekeepers and assorted soldiers end up making up the majority of the audience observing Luffy vs Katakuri during it's initial stages, before, if we follow Daifuku, presumably deciding that Katakuri's fight was handled, and exiting another mirror (at Jam Island maybe) and forming a fleet there to cut off the Strawhat Crew's path. This fleet of ship being separate form the tart fleet that was already approaching the sunny in the above panels, and that Big Mom grouped up with to chase the thousand sunny over the water.
So, so far, 10,000 men, and an additional dozen or so populated tart ships.
Then, in chapter 882 we're introduced to a different 10,000 men. 10,000 men under Nusstorte trying to invade the Germa Kingdom.
Now, you may ask, how can you be utterly certain that this isn't the same 10,000 men?
Well, other than their different leadership, these ten thousand men were actually referenced way back in chapter 873:
Though rather then ten thousand men, they're referenced as a squad.
We never hear about a "Squad" going after Germa again, only the 10,000 men, so it's reasonable to consider them one and the same. The anime is not at all vague about this at all, in case you're wondering.
Generally, what seems to be meant here is that the Big Mom Pirates split their present ground forces into three different groups to go after three different targets.
One marched directly around Wholecake towards the Germa Kingdom, 10,000 men strong, led by Nusstorte.
One Pursued Bege, presumably by foot, before losing him at sea, due to extreme speed maintained by the Nostra Castello.
One squad Pursued Luffy's group by land before being overshadowed when Big Mom herself came after them. The left side of this following page is just about the most we see of them. They get a few single panel fights later in the seducing wood before Big Mom once again take center screen and we forget about them because she's the thing they really feel the need to run from:
And the the final "Squad" with Brulee and Katakuri became the 10,000 men we mentioned at the beginning of this post, that Brulee pulled into the mirror world with Katakuri.
Thus, we have 2 squads of 10,000 men each, 2 squads of an indeterminate amount of men, and a bunch of manned tarte ships; a force that's already numerically larger than the Beast Pirate's 20,000 men, even at the most conservative estimate, and can conceivably be read as 40,000+ men, even if there isn't much on-panel support for it.
It gets even more insane, because if Big Mom has a tendency to separate her armies into groups of 10,000, there is an army that we have on-panel and anime-supported proof of being approximate that large, that was utterly devastated near the start of this arc. This is of course, the enraged army.
Luffy and Nami end up devastating them, despite ultimately losing and it's remarked that the Chess Peacekeepers that made up the majority of the force did way worse than usual due to the Big Mom Vivre Card in Nami's possession.
Regardless, the entire chess army, presumably 10,000 soldiers, got taken out in that one battle, thus, if we're counting, there were between 30,000 and 50,000 soldiers present on Whole Cake near the start of the arc, more men than the entire Beast Pirate Lineup, even including the Samurai.
Back to the present, with the chase of the strawhats and the sunny, Smoothie was unaccounted for in all of these initial plans for pursuit, and eventually she arrives at the sea chase with, you guessed it, another fleet. Why was she late? Either she was with the guys supposed to be chasing Bege's group, and then gave up to join the pursuit of Luffy's, or she quickly went to her own person Island 100% Island, and rallied a separate fleet and army from there to chase the straw hats with. Feasibly, the Big Mom Pirates are HUGE.
But the real nail in the coffin for the size of Big Mom's Pirates, was the trap they set at Cacao Island.
At Cacao Island, they made so many people randevu together in a single place, that even guys who had not been briefed about the situation at all, were showing up.
Charlotte Brownie, one of several new characters introduced just for this occasion and to give a sense of heightened perspective to the fight, even commented:
"We've arrived! How many tens of thousands people does the enemy have?"
His thought process was obviously: 'There are tens of thousands of people gathering here on this Island, and oh how many tens of thousands! If I'm also needed, just how big must the enemy we're facing be?'
And this is remarkable because of these tens of thousands, ~30,000 of the ones we already confirmed couldn't have been included. ~10,000 had died against Luffy as the Enraged Army. 10,000 had died attacking the Germa, following Nusstorte. And another 10,000 we currently in boats and on ships, presumably following under Daifuku at sea, currently trying to fix their ships which had all been wrecked by Sulong Carrot's mast stealing and Daifuku's ineffectual genie swings. Even the other 20,000 theorized wouldn't needed suspect methods in order to arrive.
But how many actually showed up? How many is 'many tens of thousands?' I figure, for such a qualifier, only 40,000 or more is honestly sufficient, and at such number, Mont dor's boast that "Not even the Pirate King himself could've escaped this!" makes a lot more sense. An army of that size, or maybe even bigger, had rarely ever been mustered in the New World, and to call it overkill was simply obvious.
But even with all that, after the comment, before the battle, and during the battle, people and Big Mom allied ships still continued to arrive from over the horizon, until finally, near the very end, when it seemed like the straw hats had even the fainted glimmer of hope, the Big Mom Flagship arrived as the final event before they escaped.
Even 70,000 to 90,000 men would be insufficient to describe the magnitude of Big Mom's crew. Even after all of that, people will still keep on showing up.
Till the very end, people kept on coming from the far reaches of Big Mom's territory to join the fight, and mathematically, even if they received the call for help at Cacao Island the moment the Wholecake collapsed, less than half of the Kingdom could've reached it at standard boat speed within the ~12 hours of the wedding plot. If the Big Mom Pirates were spread evenly, if even disregarding some of the more faulty or prone ideas, you still end up with the Big Mom Pirate numbering ~100,000 strong.
Compare that with the Beast Pirate's 20,000, or Whitebeard's ~5,000 and it's easy to see why Big Mom's crew gives off the impression of being just so unimaginably big; it is.
So, thoughts? Does all this make sense? How big do you think the Big Mom Pirates are?
Some people might intuitively feel that, yes, a quantity of troops are the Big Mom Pirate's greatest strength, even compared to the other Yonko, but let's put numbers on that, shall we?
This of course, later ends up being the mirror on the Sunny.
After being forced to retreat back into the mirror by Katakuri, these peacekeepers and assorted soldiers end up making up the majority of the audience observing Luffy vs Katakuri during it's initial stages, before, if we follow Daifuku, presumably deciding that Katakuri's fight was handled, and exiting another mirror (at Jam Island maybe) and forming a fleet there to cut off the Strawhat Crew's path. This fleet of ship being separate form the tart fleet that was already approaching the sunny in the above panels, and that Big Mom grouped up with to chase the thousand sunny over the water.
So, so far, 10,000 men, and an additional dozen or so populated tart ships.
Then, in chapter 882 we're introduced to a different 10,000 men. 10,000 men under Nusstorte trying to invade the Germa Kingdom.
Well, other than their different leadership, these ten thousand men were actually referenced way back in chapter 873:
We never hear about a "Squad" going after Germa again, only the 10,000 men, so it's reasonable to consider them one and the same. The anime is not at all vague about this at all, in case you're wondering.
Generally, what seems to be meant here is that the Big Mom Pirates split their present ground forces into three different groups to go after three different targets.
One marched directly around Wholecake towards the Germa Kingdom, 10,000 men strong, led by Nusstorte.
One Pursued Bege, presumably by foot, before losing him at sea, due to extreme speed maintained by the Nostra Castello.
One squad Pursued Luffy's group by land before being overshadowed when Big Mom herself came after them. The left side of this following page is just about the most we see of them. They get a few single panel fights later in the seducing wood before Big Mom once again take center screen and we forget about them because she's the thing they really feel the need to run from:
Thus, we have 2 squads of 10,000 men each, 2 squads of an indeterminate amount of men, and a bunch of manned tarte ships; a force that's already numerically larger than the Beast Pirate's 20,000 men, even at the most conservative estimate, and can conceivably be read as 40,000+ men, even if there isn't much on-panel support for it.
It gets even more insane, because if Big Mom has a tendency to separate her armies into groups of 10,000, there is an army that we have on-panel and anime-supported proof of being approximate that large, that was utterly devastated near the start of this arc. This is of course, the enraged army.
Back to the present, with the chase of the strawhats and the sunny, Smoothie was unaccounted for in all of these initial plans for pursuit, and eventually she arrives at the sea chase with, you guessed it, another fleet. Why was she late? Either she was with the guys supposed to be chasing Bege's group, and then gave up to join the pursuit of Luffy's, or she quickly went to her own person Island 100% Island, and rallied a separate fleet and army from there to chase the straw hats with. Feasibly, the Big Mom Pirates are HUGE.
But the real nail in the coffin for the size of Big Mom's Pirates, was the trap they set at Cacao Island.
At Cacao Island, they made so many people randevu together in a single place, that even guys who had not been briefed about the situation at all, were showing up.
Charlotte Brownie, one of several new characters introduced just for this occasion and to give a sense of heightened perspective to the fight, even commented:
"We've arrived! How many tens of thousands people does the enemy have?"
And this is remarkable because of these tens of thousands, ~30,000 of the ones we already confirmed couldn't have been included. ~10,000 had died against Luffy as the Enraged Army. 10,000 had died attacking the Germa, following Nusstorte. And another 10,000 we currently in boats and on ships, presumably following under Daifuku at sea, currently trying to fix their ships which had all been wrecked by Sulong Carrot's mast stealing and Daifuku's ineffectual genie swings. Even the other 20,000 theorized wouldn't needed suspect methods in order to arrive.
But how many actually showed up? How many is 'many tens of thousands?' I figure, for such a qualifier, only 40,000 or more is honestly sufficient, and at such number, Mont dor's boast that "Not even the Pirate King himself could've escaped this!" makes a lot more sense. An army of that size, or maybe even bigger, had rarely ever been mustered in the New World, and to call it overkill was simply obvious.
But even with all that, after the comment, before the battle, and during the battle, people and Big Mom allied ships still continued to arrive from over the horizon, until finally, near the very end, when it seemed like the straw hats had even the fainted glimmer of hope, the Big Mom Flagship arrived as the final event before they escaped.
Till the very end, people kept on coming from the far reaches of Big Mom's territory to join the fight, and mathematically, even if they received the call for help at Cacao Island the moment the Wholecake collapsed, less than half of the Kingdom could've reached it at standard boat speed within the ~12 hours of the wedding plot. If the Big Mom Pirates were spread evenly, if even disregarding some of the more faulty or prone ideas, you still end up with the Big Mom Pirate numbering ~100,000 strong.
Compare that with the Beast Pirate's 20,000, or Whitebeard's ~5,000 and it's easy to see why Big Mom's crew gives off the impression of being just so unimaginably big; it is.
So, thoughts? Does all this make sense? How big do you think the Big Mom Pirates are?
