Power Levelling ruins Naruto

Bad Touch Yakushi

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If you look at most other good fighting shonen animes there is a clear lack of 'power levels'

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Power levels are a very immature and silly concept basically created by Dragonball Z and...I really wish current manga and anime would stop taking inspiration from it. Fights in real life and even fiction shouldn't come down to what power level someone is on, they come from initiative, battle intelligence, instincts and capabilities. Naruto used to be quite good at this until these later years and it makes debating about the characters a tedious and silly task. The fact that this site has a versus section at all shows that people enjoy labelling tiers when really there should be more to it than that.

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The manga Blue Exorcist for example, whilst there is a subtle existence of status (students, demons, exorcists) whenever there is a 1-v-1 fight against any two characters it's incredibly exciting because there are no set levels in which they have been preset. Either one could win even if they were just a kid student because they leave the skills ambiguous. They also do this in Soul Eater, Fullmetal Alchemist and Attack on Titan- and as a result there is no bickering about which tier Itachi Uchiha is on or where is Minato in your top 10? Such questions don't need to be asked because a character's power shouldn't determine the plot, the plot should determine the powers.
 
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Sensational

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Every battle shounen degrades to power leveling, it's always been like this, there has to be a way to make it clear x character is stronger than y character, it's just a way to not have to develop every character and there powers. It's just a waste of time. If you want less power leveling, read less battle shounen and try getting into other shounen variants
 

take it easy

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intelligence used even in current fight... naruto not only about power..
 

GenKiDama

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it's not a 'silly' concept. it's pretty obvious that when you train, you get stronger. if you don't like that, stop reading the majority of shonen jump mangas. there are plenty of other things that ruin naruto.
 

ziggyZ

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What do you expect, especially when Kishi continues to try and plagiarize DBZ (G.O.A.T.).
 

S A G E

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Battle shonen mangas like the big three needs insane power leveling since their opponents get progressively stronger.
 

Bad Touch Yakushi

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it's not a 'silly' concept. it's pretty obvious that when you train, you get stronger. if you don't like that, stop reading the majority of shonen jump mangas. there are plenty of other things that ruin naruto.

Naruto levelled up to level 10. Naruto learned tailed beast bomb. Naruto's evolving into Naruto BM.
 

Bad Touch Yakushi

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intelligence used even in current fight... naruto not only about power..

Yes but it's still hugely fixated on just sheer power, if they were just a bit more discrete with the fact that these power levels exist then it'd feel less silly.

You're not going to see Shikamaru take out Madara anytime soon.
Every battle shounen degrades to power leveling, it's always been like this, there has to be a way to make it clear x character is stronger than y character, it's just a way to not have to develop every character and there powers. It's just a waste of time. If you want less power leveling, read less battle shounen and try getting into other shounen variants

Might have to try that to be honest, Soul Eater and FMA were able to avoid is luckily as they had a genuine story to tell and the fights just came along with them, I haven't got far enough into Blue Exorcist or Attack on Titan to see if they take a similar route. It does make me sad because levelling makes it seem like a silly video game.
 

Sensational

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Might have to try that to be honest, Soul Eater and FMA were able to avoid is luckily as they had a genuine story to tell and the fights just came along with them, I haven't got far enough into Blue Exorcist or Attack on Titan to see if they take a similar route. It does make me sad because levelling makes it seem like a silly video game.

But in soul eater, aside from the main trio it was clear that there was a hierarchy between the characters, and their wernt even enough major charcters or villains for that matter to warrant a power level system.

FMA wasn't reall a battle shounen, the original series was more or less a drama with shounen aspects. Brotherhood on the other hand... It made it clear that seeing the truth put one above everyone else and that certain powers literally stomp others.

Attack on titans is not a battle shounen it's a gore shounen so there's always going to be a super strong oppressing force no matter what. And that's the titans.

I agree power leveling is cheap, but when you have a battle shounen that has a but load of characters and is constantly getting new powerful opponents, it's easier to set up a system like that so you don't have to develop every character from scratch or have a training arc every time an opponent appears. It makes fights easier to mange as well, if everyone the same level it gets harder to make the fight and if the fight not a major plot event then there's no point in having an even fight cause it would last for chapters on in
 
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take it easy

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Yes but it's still hugely fixated on just sheer power, if they were just a bit more discrete with the fact that these power levels exist then it'd feel less silly.

You're not going to see Shikamaru take out Madara anytime soon.
disagree. more powerfull jutsu in naruto not equals victory... but im agree about more power.
 
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N1nken

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One of the things I like about One Piece is that some of the vs battles could really just be summed up by good or bad matchups. For instance, unless he uses Haki Mihawk, one of the strongest characters in the series, really can't kill Buggy, one of the series' weakest characters, since Buggy can't be cut.

Likewise, Aokiji vs Akainu lasted for 10 days even though, logistically, Magma > Ice. There are definite power levels, they're just not clear cut.
 

Bad Touch Yakushi

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One of the things I like about One Piece is that some of the vs battles could really just be summed up by good or bad matchups. For instance, unless he uses Haki Mihawk, one of the strongest characters in the series, really can't kill Buggy, one of the series' weakest characters, since Buggy can't be cut.

Likewise, Aokiji vs Akainu lasted for 10 days even though, logistically, Magma > Ice. There are definite power levels, they're just not clear cut.

Yes but that's infinitely more interesting than just- Madara wins this fight cuz level 100 EMS perfect susanoo
 

Renpatsu Dei

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Yes but it's still hugely fixated on just sheer power, if they were just a bit more discrete with the fact that these power levels exist then it'd feel less silly.

You're not going to see Shikamaru take out Madara anytime soon.


Might have to try that to be honest, Soul Eater and FMA were able to avoid is luckily as they had a genuine story to tell and the fights just came along with them, I haven't got far enough into Blue Exorcist or Attack on Titan to see if they take a similar route. It does make me sad because levelling makes it seem like a silly video game.

How many battles have we actually seen in Blue Exorcist? All we've really seen is Rin vs the Impure King, and a few of his battles against Amaimon and Yukio vs Toudou. They even hinted at power levels last time Rin faced Amaimon and got his ass handed to him, and Mephisto has been hinted to be top tier in power more than anything.

The less intelligent the character, the more reliant they are on levels of power to win, that's why you get characters like Yukio have intelligent battles and beating someone who clearly outmatched him but Rin going for it with the power of the most powerful demon.
 

Bad Touch Yakushi

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How many battles have we actually seen in Blue Exorcist? All we've really seen is Rin vs the Impure King, and a few of his battles against Amaimon and Yukio vs Toudou. They even hinted at power levels last time Rin faced Amaimon and got his ass handed to him, and Mephisto has been hinted to be top tier in power more than anything.

The less intelligent the character, the more reliant they are on levels of power to win, that's why you get characters like Yukio have intelligent battles and beating someone who clearly outmatched him but Rin going for it with the power of the most powerful demon.

I was referring to the Yukio fights really, I just wish and know that shonen animes can work with fights like that.
Maka, Blackstar & Kid VS The Kishin, Marcoh VS Envy, Simon VS Guame, Shikamaru VS Hidan...It can be done but they're such specialities and that personally saddens me. I think i'll just go explore in different genres.
 

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You should really stop reading Naruto then. You just don't understand that how much Kishi loves DBZ.
 
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