#aren't you supposed to be a cultivator ?? I know you're weak as fuck but you should be able to protect your face !!

[melonteee]

Gotta be real, One Piece has a really big flaw in that there's no real threat to losing... characters never die, even after making a big hoopla about 'if that hits you you'll die!' or what have you. The only deaths to stick were Whitebeard and Ace, but they're the exception that proves the rule at this point. There's no threat or tension to characters losing a battle. This is particularly bad in the Skypia arc, where every time a character was struck down by Eneru, it was treated like death... only for everyone to be 100% okay, zero lasting damage. Or Luffy vs Bellamy in Dressrossa - 'the next hit will kill you' - nope he's totally fine afterwards. While I totally appreciate Oda avoiding needless, gratuitous death, he's swerved way to hard in the other direction and now losses have zero tension. No one ever dies or suffers grievous injuries that can change the story. Something like Zoro losing his eye would actually help this, a loss that leaves actual lasting damage... but nope, it happens totally off screen and is never mentioned or impacts the story. When every loss is treated like a death, but isn't, how are we supposed to 1) know when characters are *actually* killed and not just (handwave) hiding and 2) care about possible loss? It feels like being asked which hand Oda holds an apple in, but he can just change the hand if we guess right and tell us we were wrong. And if every battle wound can just be rested off, why should we care about bad wounds? After big battles, they immediately party when it would be far more impactful to show characters weak and recovering but peaceful in their success or something - again, Skypia is a big offender in this and Wano is bad about it as well.

Sorry, I hope this makes sense. I've just been watching One Piece and I can't bring myself to care during battles. There's no risk! It's one thing to avoid unnecessary character death, it's another to have loss have zero lasting consequences. Even the few that do happen, like Luffy's shortened lifespan or, again, Zoro's eye, just don't really effect the story. We were never going to hang around to see Luffy grow old regardless...

I have no idea what you're talking about because if Luffy loses the world is fucked. Were you not on the edge of your seat for his fight with Crocodile? Or his fight with Enel, trying to ring that golden bell? I guess if you focus on the characters themselves and their injuries, yeah it wouldn't matter, but these fights aren't ever just about who gets the biggest wounds. The tension in each fight and battle relies on everything else happening around them, they rely on what the characters are saying to each other and the events that have taken place for these fights to be happening. I also couldn't care less about how many wounds one gets, I couldn't care if Luffy loses and arm or Zoro loses a leg - the emotional and world impact of these fights is what we're looking at.

Law lost an arm against Doffy, did he sew it back on? Yes, but we're not meant to give a shit about that. What we're meant to care about is how much Doflamingo had scarred him, both mentally AND physically, and how he was finally free with Luffy defeating him. Bellamy didn't die because Luffy didn't want to kill Bellamy - that was VERY purposeful - because Luffy's main target was Doflamingo, and Doffy even laughed at how Luffy 'wasted time' not wanting to kill a 'friend.'

One Piece's fights are not something I look at on a physical level, and I don't think that's what they're meant to be. These fights are the cultivations of every single story point we have seen reaching a climax. These fights rely on the mental state of these characters MUCH more than the physical, with a good example being how Zoro was so fucked up after Kuma beat him, that he rushed in head first in Sabaody due to not wanting to be weak.

Luffy's fight with Doflamingo not only had the entirety of the Dressrosa country on the line, but Law had literally been mentally beaten to hell and back due to Doffy's abusing of him. The conversation Law and Doffy had the whole time was fucking terrifying with how Doffy was manipulating him.

Ace's death wasn't even meant to be a 'threat' of the moment, but the most important part was the follow up of how Luffy was mentally distraught from it. I guess if you see it on a simple fighting level, yeah I can see where you're coming from, but death is not the end all be all of consequences and stakes - especially in One Piece's world. I feel SO MUCH tension with every fight in One Piece due to seeing what all these people have been through, due to knowing what will happen if Luffy DOESN'T win, and whether Luffy comes out of it fully healed or not honestly doesn't matter to me. There are huge wounds in all these fights, they're just not physical ones, and Wano especially is a great example of just how everyone was grieving until Kaido's downfall.

This is why I always say, you need to focus on the dialogue more than ANYTHING during fights, because there is TONS of tension there. At least, tension I felt, and risks I could see, but maybe it's just me idk. I don't tend to care about battle shonen to begin with, so obviously One Piece is doing something right in its battles to make me care lmao

[mdzs-owns-my-ass-i-guess]

I posted 6,222 times in 2022

That's 276 more posts than 2021!

570 posts created (9%)

5,652 posts reblogged (91%)

Blogs I reblogged the most:

chemical-abscess

mdzsquoteoftheday

wangxian-on-repeat

jiaoji

twenty-orange-balloons

I tagged 1,184 of my posts in 2022

#mdzs - 562 posts

#mo dao zu shi - 532 posts

#original thots - 412 posts

#wangxian - 201 posts

#writing attempts - 106 posts

#wwx - 63 posts

#incorrect mdzs quotes - 36 posts

#mdzs incorrect quotes - 36 posts

#lwj - 14 posts

#same - 13 posts

Longest Tag: 139 characters

#i honestly see lxc as an example of how lack of information/lack of depth of information and excessive trustworthiness can misguide someone

My Top Posts in 2022:

#5

Wei Ying has his fear of dogs, Lan Zhan deals with it the best he can by shooing the dogs away and he gets kisses in return plenty

But my personal headcanon is that both the fearsome Yiling Patriarch and his illustrous Hanguang-Jun have a shared fear/disgust of spiders

Fierce corpses, ghosts, ancient beasts? Fair game.

Spiders?

Nah, they don't fuck with that.

"Lan Zhan, you saw it first, you deal with it."

"No."

"What do you mean no?! Aren't you my husband? You're supposed to protect me!"

"Mn. But you are also my husband, so, likewise."

"This is ridiculous. You're Hanguang-Jun, the Second Jade of Lan. That's just a stupid spider!"

"You are also the Yiling Patriarch, the grandmaster of demonic cultivation."

"Lan Zhan, come on, we can't stay up on this table forever. Just kill it!"

"Killing is forbidden in the Cloud Recesses."

"A whole lot of things we do are forbidden in the Cloud Recesses but that never stopped you before!"

"Mn."

"No 'mn'!! You have to do something about it and quickly, unless it..."

"Wei Ying?"

"The...the spider...I don't know where it is, it's gone!!"

"Gone?!"

(Sizhui comes to visit and finds his two most respected parental figures in battle stances, Chenqing is out, talismans float about and the two very graciously stand on their spiritual swords safely away from the floor.

Sizhui kills the spider.)

985 notes - Posted May 20, 2022

#4

"Ask me now, see if I would deny you anything." is the most romantic, erotic, emotional, heart-wrenching, devotion-filled, loving sentence I have ever read and I will never recover from it

1,030 notes - Posted March 11, 2022

#3

AITA for getting punched in the face?

So I (16, M) am betrothed to a girl (16, F) I don't really like but my mom and her mom made the arrangement before we were born and neither of our dads (or us) get much say in this because our moms are scary.

Anyway, I really don't like this girl. She's just average and the only reason we're supposed to marry is because our moms are sworn sisters and we're from powerful, noble families. Not to brag, but I'm exceptionally good-looking and highly skilled, and I don't think a girl so meek and ordinary would be fit for me at all.

I don't see the point of hiding my disdain for her. Anyone with a good pair of eyes can see how different I am from her and there is no point in me pretending I feel any different about her.

To preface, I don't think I'm the asshole and I want to prove I'm not the only one who thinks that.

Onto the story:

Some friends were talking about pretty girls and such, and since I don't necessarily care for those discussions, I kept silent. One of them then mentioned I am not saying anything because I am already in love with my forced fiancee and see no other girls as interesting.

I simply responded like I did above: that I find her unappealing and she's not at all my type. Which prompted her almost-brother (long story, but the guy isn't even adopted in the family, just hangs out around them and somehow ended up as head disciple) to punch me in the face. Hard.

I am not weak at all but the hit took me by surprise and led to me walking around with a swollen face for several days. The guy got punished but not without him and my fiancee's actual brother both calling me an asshole.

Could you all convince them I am NTA once and for all?

Edit 1: To update you all, I actually did marry my fiancee (not resulting from the arranged marriage, it was annuled and then we ended up falling in love on our own) and she's an amazing, kind and beautiful person with whom I am going to have a son in a few months.

I was an arrogant, annoying, entitled, incel-esque piece of shit two years ago but thankfully, I got better and am on the way of becoming a decent person and hopefully a good father!!

I love my wife very much and I regret I didn't treat her right from the start, but I now have the rest of my life to make it up to her although I know she has already forgiven me anyway.

Growth is a wonderful thing and I think everyone should embrace it. I used to really hate my life and resent my parents for the environment they have raised me in as an arranged marriage couple that was never really happy. I thought the same would happen to me and I projected all of that onto my wife for no reason - but now I am happily married and feel so loved and appreciated that I can't help but model after my wife's kindness and good character.

Edit 2: My son just came into the world a few days ago. He is happy and healthy and I am fighting with my wife about who gets to hold him more!! I can't wait for his one month celebration, I'll try to make up with my wife's brothers and make sure my son has all his uncles in his life! I'll update you all with pictures after the event!

Last updated: 15 years ago

1,304 notes - Posted July 31, 2022

#2

Wangxian is like

WWX, perfectly capable of defending himself: Lan Zhaaan save me!!

LWJ, perfectly aware that WWX can defend himself: *saves him with no hesitation*

And then they kiss

1,652 notes - Posted September 3, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

Wei Ying is a trophy wife icon

Does not have a job

Husband pays for everything

Spends time with the kids all day

Gets dicked down silly every day

Can focus on his hobbies and interests without needing to work

Is insanely pretty

1,914 notes - Posted July 28, 2022

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