This thread was long time coming and should have been made months ago. I suck at intros so getting straight to the point....
Let's of course, begin with Garp's statements
Balance of the THREE Powers, consisting of:
-Marines(hundreds of thousands lumped together as one)
-Shichibukai(7 individuals lumped together as one)
-Yonkou(4 captains and their crews lumped together as one)
2 of the world powers are allied together to counter balance the remaining world power, which are the yonko. It's pretty much basic grammar.
Common arguments against this notion:
-The yonko are disunited
-If the marines are that powerful, how come the yonko still exists?(will get to later)
--If the marines are that powerful, how come thry freak out when 2 emperors ally? (Will get to later)
The Yonko aren't united
-This is irrelevant. The Balance of Powers is something created, maintained and cared for by the Marines and WG. Garp's statements directly says that the 4 Emperors are together as a world power, and they are trying to counter balance said power.
The combined strength and influence of the 4 Emperors must be matched....influence being the main reason the Emperors have so much sway. Rob Lucci for example was the STRONGEST of CP9 but Spandam was the most POWERFUL. No matter how strong Mihawk is compared to an Emperor, he's nowhere near as powerful. The Kanji refers to the Yonko as the Great Politicians(credits to Den_Den_Mushi for the translation), bringing emphasis to their poltiical power or in other words....
INFLUENCE
Influence is an aspect of world building that gets overlooked. The Paramount War showed us this first hand the power of influence.
Sengoku was absolutely furious at WB for saying that by why? The Marines won.....they killed off the most famous pirate alive....defeated the crew of the strongest man....cause the spoils of that victory was tainted by WB's last words.
The victory of the Marines caused this:
And WB's speech caused this:
The Marines winning the war should have substancially increased their influence, demoralizing anyone from committing crimes but the influence of WB only convinced some people to become outlaws....it influenced pirates to pillage harder than before.
This isnt the first time something like this happened
The influence of the Pirate King was so great that it sparked an entirely new age of piracy. The Yonko influences events on a constant basis but on a lesser scale than Roger. As long as the yonko exists, people will believe that they can become successful outlaws.
The Shichibukai are no different.
Created to be weapons against the Emperors, what has to be their most defining trait?
The ones with the most influence.
Influence is also the main reason the WG is so reliant on cover ups
Failures can cripple the Marines' influence over the people.
They covered up the Rocks, making Garp the Hero of the Marines.
And Garp's influence over the marines was great enough to protect him from the Celestial Dragons.
Hell... Monkey D. Luffy himself showed us time and time again how powerful influence can be....from having Marines assist him to people becoming outlaws to become his crewmembers or grand fleet.
With influence out of the way, we can move on the final section about strength when it comes to the BoP.
"If the Marines are that powerful, how come they had such a hard time against the WBP? How come the Yonko still exists? Why do the Marines freak out about 2 Emperors allying?"
The answer to all these questions is simple: resources.
What is constantly overlooked is the fact that the Marines are the most vulnerable world power. Not only do they have to monitor the Shichbukai and the Yonkou, they have thousands upon thousands of other outlaws they have to deal with(just look at how much trouble the SHs and the Supernovas caused), they also have to deal with these guys
The Marines are grossly underpowered when it comes to total number of criminals in the world. They cant afford to waste any of their precious resources unless they have to. Even if they take out an Emperor, it would cause a power vacuum that the Marines cant control.
The only reason the Marines declared war on WB was because of Ace was the son of the Pirate King.
And what happened during this time? Kaido and Shanks, 2 Emperors, got involved
ID got raided and the escapees entered the war
These escapees weren't no joke either, as even WB didn't want them as enemies
3 of the shibukai fought against them(Jinbe, Hancock and BB)
A Supernova got involved
BB stole WB's powers(no image required)
All of these factors outside of the Marines' control, and they still achieved a one sided victory(only John Giant and Lonz were beaten). This alone shows just how powerful the Marines are and how much things can go wrong for them hence, the extreme caution and over-preperation. Intel is invaluable to them.
So obviously, just going after one Emperor requires lots of preparation and anything can go wrong. The Marines are always going to gun for overkill as to not lose resources, but that means leaving other countries and their HQ low on manpower, which they cant afford.
Even the Yonko have to deal with it.
Kaido, despite having the much stronger force, was freaking out about BM getting to Wano cause it could start a war(aka a loss of resources)
And a lone King almost caused the death of Emperor Big Mom; a prime example of how anything can go wrong.
WB had an ability that can easily sink islands. As such,
It's no wonder that they fear an Emperor allaince.
The Allaince between Emperors means that their influence and their ability to destory and absorb other crews would be insane. The Marines would have to expend a LOT of resources to surpress them and as it was stated before, leaves themselves wide open to ambushes.
This is why the Marines want the Emperors to remain at a deadlock while they, the Marines, increase their resources and influence.
However, the Marines never said that they CANT handle them.
The problem was the timing
Timing was a factor shown to us earlier
Once again, it was resource management hindering the Marines. Heck, the only reason BM and Kaido made contact at that time was because they knew the Marines had their hands full with the Reverie
But wait! One last thing...a popular one at that.
Orochi said the entire World Government cannot beat Wano solely because of Kaido....so without Kaido the WG wins? But Kaido was freaking about BM coming to Wano....what about the Marines statements on their ability to handle a Yonko Allaince? What about Oden almost beating Kaido and his crew? Orochi's statement is the only one that creates an inconsistency when taken at face value. Orochi was obviously being true to his character by thinking Kaido is invincible and cant be beaten. Its literally bo different from the hype the BMP gave Katakuri and the seats about Mingo.....
And we're finished....TL;DR, Marines+Shichibukai~Emperors combined. Postskip Marines alone~Emperors combined. It's not always about Yonko-Admiral power levels.....
Let's of course, begin with Garp's statements
Balance of the THREE Powers, consisting of:
-Marines(hundreds of thousands lumped together as one)
-Shichibukai(7 individuals lumped together as one)
-Yonkou(4 captains and their crews lumped together as one)
2 of the world powers are allied together to counter balance the remaining world power, which are the yonko. It's pretty much basic grammar.
Common arguments against this notion:
-The yonko are disunited
-If the marines are that powerful, how come the yonko still exists?(will get to later)
--If the marines are that powerful, how come thry freak out when 2 emperors ally? (Will get to later)
The Yonko aren't united
-This is irrelevant. The Balance of Powers is something created, maintained and cared for by the Marines and WG. Garp's statements directly says that the 4 Emperors are together as a world power, and they are trying to counter balance said power.
The combined strength and influence of the 4 Emperors must be matched....influence being the main reason the Emperors have so much sway. Rob Lucci for example was the STRONGEST of CP9 but Spandam was the most POWERFUL. No matter how strong Mihawk is compared to an Emperor, he's nowhere near as powerful. The Kanji refers to the Yonko as the Great Politicians(credits to Den_Den_Mushi for the translation), bringing emphasis to their poltiical power or in other words....
INFLUENCE
Influence is an aspect of world building that gets overlooked. The Paramount War showed us this first hand the power of influence.
Sengoku was absolutely furious at WB for saying that by why? The Marines won.....they killed off the most famous pirate alive....defeated the crew of the strongest man....cause the spoils of that victory was tainted by WB's last words.
The victory of the Marines caused this:
And WB's speech caused this:
This isnt the first time something like this happened
The influence of the Pirate King was so great that it sparked an entirely new age of piracy. The Yonko influences events on a constant basis but on a lesser scale than Roger. As long as the yonko exists, people will believe that they can become successful outlaws.
The Shichibukai are no different.
Created to be weapons against the Emperors, what has to be their most defining trait?
The ones with the most influence.
Influence is also the main reason the WG is so reliant on cover ups
They covered up the Rocks, making Garp the Hero of the Marines.
And Garp's influence over the marines was great enough to protect him from the Celestial Dragons.
Hell... Monkey D. Luffy himself showed us time and time again how powerful influence can be....from having Marines assist him to people becoming outlaws to become his crewmembers or grand fleet.
With influence out of the way, we can move on the final section about strength when it comes to the BoP.
"If the Marines are that powerful, how come they had such a hard time against the WBP? How come the Yonko still exists? Why do the Marines freak out about 2 Emperors allying?"
The answer to all these questions is simple: resources.
What is constantly overlooked is the fact that the Marines are the most vulnerable world power. Not only do they have to monitor the Shichbukai and the Yonkou, they have thousands upon thousands of other outlaws they have to deal with(just look at how much trouble the SHs and the Supernovas caused), they also have to deal with these guys
The Marines are grossly underpowered when it comes to total number of criminals in the world. They cant afford to waste any of their precious resources unless they have to. Even if they take out an Emperor, it would cause a power vacuum that the Marines cant control.
The only reason the Marines declared war on WB was because of Ace was the son of the Pirate King.
And what happened during this time? Kaido and Shanks, 2 Emperors, got involved
ID got raided and the escapees entered the war
These escapees weren't no joke either, as even WB didn't want them as enemies
3 of the shibukai fought against them(Jinbe, Hancock and BB)
A Supernova got involved
BB stole WB's powers(no image required)
All of these factors outside of the Marines' control, and they still achieved a one sided victory(only John Giant and Lonz were beaten). This alone shows just how powerful the Marines are and how much things can go wrong for them hence, the extreme caution and over-preperation. Intel is invaluable to them.
So obviously, just going after one Emperor requires lots of preparation and anything can go wrong. The Marines are always going to gun for overkill as to not lose resources, but that means leaving other countries and their HQ low on manpower, which they cant afford.
Even the Yonko have to deal with it.
Kaido, despite having the much stronger force, was freaking out about BM getting to Wano cause it could start a war(aka a loss of resources)
And a lone King almost caused the death of Emperor Big Mom; a prime example of how anything can go wrong.
WB had an ability that can easily sink islands. As such,
It's no wonder that they fear an Emperor allaince.
The Allaince between Emperors means that their influence and their ability to destory and absorb other crews would be insane. The Marines would have to expend a LOT of resources to surpress them and as it was stated before, leaves themselves wide open to ambushes.
This is why the Marines want the Emperors to remain at a deadlock while they, the Marines, increase their resources and influence.
However, the Marines never said that they CANT handle them.
The problem was the timing
Timing was a factor shown to us earlier
Once again, it was resource management hindering the Marines. Heck, the only reason BM and Kaido made contact at that time was because they knew the Marines had their hands full with the Reverie
But wait! One last thing...a popular one at that.
Orochi said the entire World Government cannot beat Wano solely because of Kaido....so without Kaido the WG wins? But Kaido was freaking about BM coming to Wano....what about the Marines statements on their ability to handle a Yonko Allaince? What about Oden almost beating Kaido and his crew? Orochi's statement is the only one that creates an inconsistency when taken at face value. Orochi was obviously being true to his character by thinking Kaido is invincible and cant be beaten. Its literally bo different from the hype the BMP gave Katakuri and the seats about Mingo.....
And we're finished....TL;DR, Marines+Shichibukai~Emperors combined. Postskip Marines alone~Emperors combined. It's not always about Yonko-Admiral power levels.....
Last edited: