Naruto Chapter 483

[Archangel]

Why is it that people can't just admit that their point was stupid instead of trying to justify it with increasingly vague and misleading arguments?

You were wrong, happens to everyone, let it go.

[Uchiha Barles]

Why is it that people can't just admit that their point was stupid instead of trying to justify it with increasingly vague and misleading arguments?

You were wrong, happens to everyone, let it go.

Not that I'm interested in starting an argument with you, but I don't see either where I was vague, or wrong. Sorry man.

[Sam98034]

The Naruto story has one very enduring constant: strength trumps all. It trumps experience, it trumps inventiveness, cleverness, it trumps numbers, everything. If there's a significant strength difference between opponents, the weaker opponent certainly cannot beat the stronger, but he also cannot hide from the stronger, cannot run from the stronger, cannot outsmart the stronger to any significant effect. The only time variables other than strength matter, is when the opponents are evenly matched in strength. There used to be this rock/paper/scissors theory going around about which fighter would be able to defeat which other fighter, but clearly that's been done away by a preponderance of evidence against that theory found in the manga. Strength far outweighs all else.

I can definitely see why this might seem like the case, but I think it's only this way because it is so easy to overlook cases where this doesn't hold true. Naruto's whole Rasengan technique is not pure strength. It's a technique. It required inventiveness and cleverness on Naruto's part to learn. Power in the manga is either raw power, lots of chakra, or bloodline limits/innate talent. You can't say learned techniques are power; otherwise, you negate the fact you need inventiveness, cleverness, and experience to develop these techniques. You would in effect be saying that power, which includes experience, cleverness, etc.., always trumps experience, cleverness, etc...

Deidara (spl?) had much more raw power than Sasuke. He also had much more experience... He even was able to counter Sasuke sharingan. How did Sasuke win?

Turning it around, Gaara had much more raw power than Deidara.

What about the puppet guy? Was Sakura + Old lady much more powerful?

Sage-mode Jiraiya was a lot more powerful than Pain, but Pain had the upper hand as far as technique/inventiveness.

Going way back, was Sasuke really stronger than Kyuubi Naruto when Sasuke beat him?

There are many examples where the stronger person loses.

As far as a weaker opponent cannot run from stronger opponents, explain the very first Arc where Zabuza ran. Naruto escaped the first encounter with Itachi, Itachi got away from Jiraiya. The genins got away from the chakra prison in the Sasuke chase arc.

Yes. You do have a case with many examples, but if you look, you'll also find many counterexamples.

[poopdeville]

How did Sasuke win?

Didn't Deidara commit suicide after Sasuke neutralized his bombs?

Turning it around, Gaara had much more raw power than Deidara.

I don't agree. If Gaara had "much more raw power", he would have had chakra left over after protecting the Sand Village. I mean, Deidara made a bomb out of chakra. A bomb isn't a targeted attack. It goes off in all directions. Half of the explosion shot off into the sky. So Gaara only had to protect the village from about "half of" the effects of the bomb. Half of Deidara's chakra was wasted by that attack. In short, Deidara had at least twice as much chakra-using ability (either through capacity or efficiency) as Gaara + Ichibi.

What about the puppet guy? Was Sakura + Old lady much more powerful?

I'd call that team work.

Sage-mode Jiraiya was a lot more powerful than Pain, but Pain had the upper hand as far as technique/inventiveness.

This one is at best debatable. Why do you think Jiraiya was more powerful than Pein? Pein had 6 elements, the chakra of six men, crazy summons and resurrection techniques, etc. I do agree he used his strengths to his advantage. Jiraiya was there to challenge him, but ended up spending half the fight running away. I'd say that was a sign of Jiraiya's smarts and his strength. He knew he couldn't take Pein on 6 on 1, so he tried to split them up and pick them off. In the end they caught him and crushed his throat.

Going way back, was Sasuke really stronger than Kyuubi Naruto when Sasuke beat him?

Yeah, he was. Naruto REALLY REALLY wanted to bring Sasuke back. He would have if he could have. One of them got up and walked away from that fight, and one of them was carried away.

Yes. You do have a case with many examples, but if you look, you'll also find many counterexamples.

True enough.

[Sam98034]

The first one was retorical.
Gaara had much more raw power b/c of the 1-tail, regardless.
Yes, you're right about the teamwork. The point is that he was more powerful than they were.
Jiraiya kicked Pein's but after sage mode...only Pein came back and Jiraiy a couldn't figure out how to kill them. If you wan't to call Pein's techniques as more powerful, then he was more powerful than Naruto since control over life/death kinda does it as far as power goes.
Naruto has the 9-tiles, so he had more power than Sasuke.

Don't bother arguing back. You are right. I understand everything you said and your point of view. I believe we just have a different view of "power" so we would go back and forth arguing passed each other.

[Uchiha Barles]

@Sam: You actually have a pretty good point with the Jiraiya fight. While I don't agree that Jiraiya was clearly stronger than Pain, the reason I don't agree is because its hard to establish who was actually more powerful. But, that difficulty in establishing their strength, even relative to each other, makes it also difficult to establish the extent to which the other variables I mentioned (cleverness, inventiveness, etc.). They might've played a small role, or a very large role depending (at least in part) on whether or not the strength gap between the two is a large one or a small one.I think what I'm trying to say is that those other variables, when they make a difference, can actually make it hard to establish which fighter is stronger. I might actually have to concede the point.

@Archie: Now, wasn't what Sam (and everyone else who participated in the debate) a whole lot better than just going "rawr! You're wrong, quit it!" ^.~

[Assertn]

I'm pretty sure Jiraiya could've outmatched each Pain body one by one if it came to that. In that regard, Jiraiya was stronger. So how did Jiraiya lose? It was because of Pain's technique that overwhelmed it. Jiraiya's inability to land a hit on any single body because of their shared vision... his inability to even remove half the bodies due to the reincarnation technique...

Pain's jutsus ultimately gave him the advantage over Jiraiya. Then again, Jiraiya's jutsus are what gave him his strength in the first place. When it comes down to it, the same basic model works pretty much the same way its always worked: The paper/rock/scissors effect. No single jutsu overpowers every other jutsu every time.