End of Series One Piece power levels

Hey there!

As the title no doubt spoiled for you, let's talk about One Piece.

Being the only member of the HST (Holy Shonen Trinity comprising of Naruto, Bleach and OP for the uninitiated) which is still ongoing and has at least another few years left, opinions vary widely on where the verse will reach in terms of power by the end. Some say it will never reach the levels of Bleach or Naruto, others believe it already has for the most part and others (including me) can't really make up their minds for certain.

This is partly due to the fact that most of OP's true top tiers (the Yonko, Admirals and beyond) are still so heavily shrouded in mystery, and to make matters worse, several key concepts like Devil Fruits , Haki, Awakening, the Voice of All Things and Ancient Weapons have yet to be fleshed out in full.

In short, predicting where the verse will stand at EoS is a daunting prospect indeed, with opinions bound to clash.

Which brings us to today. Being an avid OP fan, I decided to share my thoughts on the EoS power level of the verse. This isn't exactly a fan theory, more a logical extrapolation from what we do know.

Let's get started then.

First of all, to clear a HUGE misconception...

Marineford Whitebeard is the power ceiling for the verse

This belief mainly stems from WB's introduction where he was stated to be the World's Strongest Man.

And Sengoku and a few others' (including Buggy lol!) statements later referring to WB as the "World's Strongest man"

I don't buy this for a few reasons:

1) Nobody knew about WB's terminal illness and as a result failed to take it into account. However, as we saw, his illness did have a severely detrimental effect on his fighting capability at Marineford. He couldn't even use Observation Haki to dodge a simple sword stab, and was coughing up blood when he tried to use Conqueror's, so it's safe to say the feats we saw from him at Marineford isn't even remotely close to his healthy level.

2)WB was holding back massively throughout the arc, because his objective was never to sink Marineford or destroy the Marines, but rather to rescue Ace. The only time he ever cut loose (somewhat) was after Ace's death and even then I doubt he would use an attack that can truly sink Marineford, because all his allies were still on the island. Not to mention he was already stabbed through the gut, had half his face melted off and had his insides pumped with lava by the time he fought Akainu. So practically a walking corpse.

In essence, even if you say old WB is the power ceiling for the verse, we don't really know what that limit is, because we didn't see him ever go truly all out in optimal conditions.

3)WB received the title over 20 years ago, and has grown old since then. There's obviously no annual competition in the OP world where all the strong fighters sign up and duke it out, winner gets the title of "World's Strongest Man", right? So what, if anything, does the title imply? Prime WB at the time of Roger's death 20 years ago may have been the world's strongest man, but who is to say the current prime Yonko like Shanks or Kaido haven't surpassed him since then?

In my opinion, it's just an epithet which has stayed due to the aura surrounding the legend of WB, but definitely not to be taken literally. Somewhat like how if Michael Jordan gives an interview, the host would likely introduce him as "The Greatest Basketball player ever".

After all, Shanks did casually block a 2 handed strike from angry WB which split the skies, so I doubt old, sick WB was really the "strongest" man in the world.

So, I believe that the current prime Yonko (Shanks, Kaido and Linlin) are in fact more powerful than the old, sick WB we saw at Marineford, and that EoS Luffy and Blackbeard

will likely surpass even them.

There's something else I hear frequently, that is...

Oda wouldn't go crazy with power levels!!! (aka he will keep One Piece weak)

I don't have a problem with the statement itself, which is perfectly valid. Oda and OP are generally very consistent with power levels.

The only issue being, we literally have zero clue where the true top tiers of the verse stand.

Oda almost seems to be deliberately hiding the verse's true power and at the same time rubbing it into our faces that current Luffy is nowhere near there, as the recent chapters so painfully reminded us and him.

So if Kaido is that far above Luffy it's stupid to use current Luffy as a benchmark for the EoS verse's strength. Which is why the "Luffy is only mountain level now, how can he bust countries" logic falls flat.

And lastly, Oda probably hasn't even revealed all the major players of the series yet. Who would have thought, for instance, that there's someone behind the scenes who sits on the Empty Throne and commands even the Gorosei?

So what would that EoS level be? As I said, it's hard to say right now, because Oda always seems to off screen any major fights involving the top tiers (Akainu vs Aokiji, Fujitora and Green Bull vs Revolutionaries) or nerf them in some way (Fujitora holding back at Dressrosa, Big Mom suffering from hunger pangs through 90% of Whole Cake Island).

But we can make an educated guess from what we do know. Starting with...

1) Statements

One Piece actually has a number of continental-planetary statements, starting with WB himself when Sengoku said he has "the power to destroy the world".

I mean if you take Sengoku's "World's Strongest Man" statement so literally, you should do the same for this, right?

Next, we have Shanks and Mihawk's duels supposedly "shaking the Grand Line", which implies continental level power.

2) Feats we have seen

The only time we have seen an OP top tier be even somewhat serious is WB at Marineford, and the feats he performed have been calculated at small country level at least. This is because shaking islands, tilting tectonic plates and causing tsunamis at incredible distances is consistent with the effects of Richter 9 earthquakes, which pack country level energy at the epicenter.

I am also pretty sure that EoS Blackbeard, with the Gura Gura no mi's Awakening at his prime, would show much better feats than the old, terminally ill, holding back WB we saw.

3)The size of the OP planet

This isn't confirmed yet, but as was revealed during Robin's flashback, the OP world seems to have 7 satellites, which would make it immensely bigger than real world earth.

This would substantially bump up any feats performed on the planet, because of the increased gravitation which would make it harder to destroy mountains and such.

It's exactly what Toriko did, and though OP probably won't go that crazy, it would be still a cool way to justify the EoS power creep without seeming like an asspull. And Oda already has planted seeds for the same.

4)The scope of the verse

This one's a bit philosophical, but hear me out.

Unlike Naruto, where the action mostly stayed confined to Konoha and its surroundings or Bleach, where it was mostly confined to some specific city (Seireitei, Las Noches), OP has always focused on the world at large, from a very early stage. Heck we even have outer space involved now with Enel being on the moon. The action in OP moves from island to island and there's always a sense of the entire globe being the playground for the series' conflict.

As such I believe that the final war of the series will be something that will engulf the entire OP world and wouldn't remain confined to one particular island or even sea. So expect pirates fighting all across the Grand Line, and in all the 4 seas by the time of the Final War, and hence, feats that justify a war of planetary scope.

So where do I put EoS One Piece?

At continent busting levels, at least for Luffy and Blackbeard. Oda did not have Sengoku make the "he can destroy the world" statement for nothing. I strongly believe Blackbeard will show us what the statement truly meant by EoS.

While I don't think he will do something really crazy like outright bust the planet, he will at least do stuff like causing quakes all round the globe, creating tsunamis and natural disasters everywhere, messing with tectonic plates, etc. In other words, surface wiping power, a truly planetary threat which was foreshadowed since Marineford and fits with the scope and scale of the verse.

Incidentally, there's also a very popular theory that EoS Blackbeard will destroy the Red Line, thus revealing the All Blue underneath and destroying Fishman Island, in accordance with Madame Shirley's prophecy. Which ties up with continental level power as well.

I would say the other Yonkos will likely be country-continent busters scaling from old,sick WB, with the Admirals following closely behind. Ditto for guys like Mihawk and Dragon.

The wild card in all this is Im Sama, one of the likely final villains. He doesn't seem a physical fighter at first glance, but rather a character who has some incredibly dangerous hax . Then again this is OP, so who knows. Either way I won't speculate on Im Sama till we know more about him.

So that's that. Continental level physically EoS Luffy + whatever versatility his Awakening and future Gears would give him. Is that enough to beat EoS Naruto for instance?

I think so but that's for another blog.

Till then, keep your fingers crossed.

See you next time:)

Cheers!

Shirso