One Piece

[Akonyl]

having just recently gotten through one piece, I just gotta say:

with haki's intro into the actual plot I so utterly hope it doesn't become a case of "my screaming willpower haki is better than yours!"  :V

There are different types of haki and that screaming one is the rare kind where only a few has it (Luffy being one of them). So I'm pretty sure there won't be anything like that.

it may be a different kind (luffy's isn't a scream anyway, though that's how he does it the first few times), but haki is literally:
"hey man you can't hurt me because I'm a logia made of light/fire/smoke"
"yes I can becausethe plot demands it I have haki!"

as for only "one in a million" having it, considering that hancock, whitebeard, ace, shanks, luffy and rayleigh have it, I'll hold my breath.

haki is sorta an extension of what I was afraid of once I hit Water 7. While the arc itself was awesome, every single character except robin got a power up, which was sorta silly to me (though Chopper's is awesome and also serves as an answer to his main power so I like that one). The bigger thing for me though was the introduction of the "seven forms" though, which is basically just another set of superpowers aside from devil fruits and sets a precedent of "it's 300 episodes/chapters in and we can still introduce entirely new powers", which I'm not a huge fan of because then you've basically said that the rules you previously set no longer apply. What use is a "Sickle Sickle" fruit (or whatever the weasel guy's slashy fruti was) when people can cause lightning kicks that can cut through walls without one (awesome giraffe powers aside)? The entire arc just felt very DBZ-esque, even leaving out the fact that the bad guys could literally sense power levels, and to me haki just seems like a more gradual form of that.

And yeah, Oda clearly knows what he's doing so I doubt it'll really devolve into a shouting match, but I liked the matches more when you could tell how a matchup would go (Luffy will need water to defeat crocodile, Enel vs rubber, etc) or they at least beat em with something that made sense ( Luffy using shadows on himself) rather than things like Water 7 where everybody wins because they pull something out of nowhere to beat their opponent.

That's what I've been afraid of. What if Luffy and the others are so powerful their enemies stand no chance? There must be some sort of side effect for Oda wouldn't do that kind of things.

I'm not worried that they'll be so overpowered that their enemies stand no chance, just that after this arc (which may very well be a stomp-those-fishmens-faces-in situation), in order to have good opponents, they will have to have equally overpowered abilities. And as long as fights are just "I win because I'm more overpowered", things will start to ramp up if left unchecked.

(long post is long)

[Kleene Onigiri]

the "one in a milion" is the king haki (dunno name). You can only learn that when you have the talent or something (thus, luffy and Ace had it. Probably Gol D Roger and Shanks too. Rayleight has it too, but he's like a legendary pokemon pirate )
Hancock doesn't have it (I think). She has the attack haki, like the rest of her tribe. Because the attack and defense haki can be learned by everyone it seems D:

[Akonyl]

we've never seen her use it, but she definitely has it:

Spoiler:

I'd say Shanks pretty definitely has it from his appearance on Whitebeard's ship, though it was before the word "haki" ever popped up so it wasn't explicitly stated.

[bluekaitou1412]

I thought everyone's capable of haki but only a select few can use the king's one?

[Akonyl]

yeah, iirc rayleigh said everyone can use most haki as long as they train themselves for it, though I'm not sure if that's just the attack/defense one or if it covers the mantra type as well.

[bluekaitou1412]

Maybe they can only use one type while those with the haoushoku can use two or three

[ShiraKiryuu]

yeah, iirc rayleigh said everyone can use most haki as long as they train themselves for it, though I'm not sure if that's just the attack/defense one or if it covers the mantra type as well.

I'm pretty sure that both the Mantra and Attack type can both be learned through training. Only the Conqueror's Haki is given to choses ones.

And also, was it stated before that Whitebeard knows the Conqueror's Haki? I don't remember that bit.

[Kleene Onigiri]

@ako: ah, true D: But she never used it D:



Dunno if whitebeard has it. In the fight he never used it. Just normal haki.

[ShiraKiryuu]

Yeah, he didn't use it. But maybe it was stated somewhere in the manga that he also has it. But as far as I remember, I never heard of him having the Conqueror's Haki as well.

Can anyone clarify that?

[Kleene Onigiri]

http://onepiece.wikia.com/wiki/Haki

:V
It lists that he has it too. Probably all of the 4 yonko/ 4 emperors have it. Otherwise they get knocked down XD

[ShiraKiryuu]

Well, the only use of the Conqueror's Haki is to take down weak enemies in a second anyway.

Unless there's more to it than what it seems. :V

[Kleene Onigiri]

You can tame monsters/animals. Luffy's gonna make his own food farm :x XD

[Akonyl]

Yeah, he didn't use it. But maybe it was stated somewhere in the manga that he also has it. But as far as I remember, I never heard of him having the Conqueror's Haki as well.

Can anyone clarify that?

they mention that he has it when Luffy uses it in Marineford (and looking for the page, apparently they also directly mention that shanks has it, at least in the manga):

Spoiler:

and yeah, you can use it to take down weaker enemies but I wouldn't be surprised if it turns out you can stun stronger people with it as long as your will is sufficiently higher than them or something.

[ShiraKiryuu]

That may be true, but I doubt it can stun strong enemies but it can intimidate them as well. Although, there's probably more about the Conqueror's Haki that we don't know about yet.

Edit:
Quoting something from an earlier post: (I was too lazy to read it earlier so I'm only replying to it now :V)

as for only "one in a million" having it, considering that hancock, whitebeard, ace, shanks, luffy and rayleigh have it, I'll hold my breath.

In anime logic, one in a million means a people who are important to the plot. So even if that term was used, it's no surprise if we saw more of those that have the Conqueror's Haki show up.
Well, even if they do appear, I'm pretty sure only the big baddies will have them. Blackbeard can be one of those few.

haki is sorta an extension of what I was afraid of once I hit Water 7. While the arc itself was awesome, every single character except robin got a power-up, which was sorta silly to me

Robin not having a power-up is pretty self-explanatory since she was held captive at that time. And even if she did without us knowing (I highly doubt this part), she didn't have any time to show off her powers anyway. Water 7/Enies Lobby arc is mainly about her character development so I didn't mind her lack of power up that much.

The bigger thing for me though was the introduction of the "seven forms" though, which is basically just another set of superpowers aside from devil fruits and sets a precedent of "it's 300 episodes/chapters in and we can still introduce entirely new powers"

I was kinda lost at this. Is the seven forms you're referring to the powers of the CP9?

And yeah, Oda clearly knows what he's doing so I doubt it'll really devolve into a shouting match, but I liked the matches more when you could tell how a matchup would go (Luffy will need water to defeat crocodile, Enel vs rubber, etc) or they at least beat em with something that made sense ( Luffy using shadows on himself) rather than things like Water 7 where everybody wins because they pull something out of nowhere to beat their opponent.

It's true that the uniqueness of each Devil Fruit kind of waver because of haki but there's still room for improvement. Haki can also strengthen ones devil fruit so when two logia haki users fight, their ability to render the attacks of their enemies useless can still be applied. But then again, it's all a matter of who has a stronger haki. And from gaining powers out of nowhere, I'll agree on Luffy, Zoro, and Sanji's power-ups but Chopper, Nami, and Usopp's were explained. Chopper has the side-effects of the Rumble Ball while the other two had an upgrage of weapons which happened before the Water 7 Arc.

Regarding Zoro's Ashura and Sanji's Feet-on-Fire-which-name-I've-forgotten, it might be some sort of haki. When and how they learned is not explained though.
Also, it was seen in one of the movies where Luffy first used his Gear Second by accident. But yeah, that isn't canon so ignore this part.

[Akonyl]

I'm not sure you got the main point of my post exactly 

I didn't dislike it because Robin didn't get a power up, I'm fine with her not getting one. My problem was with all of the other characters getting huge unnecessary power-ups at the same time (especially Zoro's gorilla arms and Sanji's flame-foot, which for the most part just mean they're gonna hit you harder and it doesn't change their fights at all). As for Nami/Usopp, yeah they got power ups but that was sort of necessary to keep them relevant as characters because they were already way behind in usefulness compared to the rest of the cast.

(Although to be fair, Robin does get a "power up" pretty much as soon as she's free, as once Water 7 ends and Thriller Bark starts, she starts using her hands to make massive constructs (like wings and giant hands), however that's just her perfecting her ability which would be like if luffy learned how to stretch further.)

And sorry, it's six, not seven, but yeah, I meant the martial arts used by the CP9 fellows.

I'm not saying that Haki or Sanji's fire foot or Zoro's gorilla arms or Zoro's Ashura or anything like that don't make sense / aren't explained, or that they don't make sense, because yeah they're all explained. Basically, my point was that aside from Chopper's ability (which was a pretty clear point that needed to be dealt with since his character was introduced) and Nami/Usopp (who needed an upgrade to stay relevant to fightin'), I'm not a fan of abilities which aren't even alluded to for hundreds of episodes and then randomly brought in, and abilities which are never alluded to and then randomly "awaken" in main characters, because it introduces a bad precedent of things which can easily be used to Deus Ex Machina a fight / plot, which makes things much less interestin to me.

It's sort of like in DBZ where you're told that there's one legendary super saiyan, and you go through the series and then Goku turns SSJ and kills Frieza. You think "oh wow, he's the legendary super saiyan, awesome!". And then, all the other Saiyans start turning Super Saiyan. Then Goku and Gohan can be permanently SSJ, and then they go SSJ2 and 3 and it just keeps getting higher. Even if "legendary super saiyan" apparently means something other than being the only person able to turn SSJ1, it basically breaks the expectations they set up early on and it sorta cheapens things because they've pointed out that if a situation ever gets too bad, they can just have something "awaken" in the hero and make them get more powerful so they can beat the evil dude.