General Strawhat thread

[Noqanky]

I believe usopp really will have an army of 8000 giant followers by the end of the series

fixed that for you.

[400MillionBelis]

I am convinced, that if there is any chance of anyone joining in Punk Hazard, it's Monet.

[Law of the sea]

I am convinced, that if there is any chance of anyone joining in Punk Hazard, it's Monet.

i ALREADY SAID AGES AGO IF SHE JOINS ANYONES CREW IT WILL BE LAW'S BECAUSE ROBIN VS MONET WHEN LUFFY VS LAW'S CREW HAPPENS LAW HAS THE BEAR THAT KICKS STUFF TO FIGHT SANJI.

[CaptainKid]

I still don't get how ANYTIME a new character appears whether it's Caimie, Duval, Jinbe, Lola, Monet, or Kinemon somehow they all have to become SHs because they did this and this and that with the crew. Odds Monet or Kinemon are going to be asked to join after Jinbe was asked and the crew is waiting... ZERO

[400MillionBelis]

I still don't get how ANYTIME a new character appears whether it's Caimie, Duval, Jinbe, Lola, Monet, or Kinemon somehow they all have to become SHs because they did this and this and that with the crew. Odds Monet or Kinemon are going to be asked to join after Jinbe was asked and the crew is waiting... ZERO

1. What the hell is this thread discussion for then if we are not allowed to speculate who can and may join? Eye candy?
2. Oh because you're Oda and you know that the odds are zero.
3. You disprove of speculation of any character joining yet you support Doflamingo being the main villain?
4. If you don't get why people discuss these stuff, then why the hell are you in a thread called "Straw Hat Crew Theories and Predictions"?

[akagami7]

There is a reason why the last two nakamates thread was closed and a new one wasn't made. This thread was never intended to discuss possible new crewmates.

[Jabra]

There is a reason why the last two nakamates thread was closed and a new one wasn't made. This thread was never intended to discuss possible new crewmates.

Which was a bad decision to be honest. The topic is too prominent, it can't be simply "closed". Well it can, but then people shouldn't complain that it spreads into a dozen other threads.

[akagami7]

Which was a bad decision to be honest. The topic is too prominent, it can't be simply "closed". Well it can, but then people shouldn't complain that it spreads into a dozen other threads.

Oh, I know, I was just addressing his points 1 and 4

[Beowulf89]

Well, people really want more women in the crew. They are tired of the two we currently have, and really, really want more.There's too many men in the pirate crew which, by averages, has a significantly higher female population than most. It doesn't matter if the character is properly developed, interesting, wants to be a pirate, wants to be a Strawhat, has had more than a handful of lines, seems to be taking part in a plan to kidnap, drug, addict, and then weaponize children or anything like that. They just REALLY want a new woman.*

*Who is attractive. God forbid that someone that doesn't fit general pleasing aesthetics joins.

[Katzztar]

Well, people really want more women in the crew. They are tired of the two we currently have, and really, really want more.There's too many men in the pirate crew which, by averages, has a significantly higher female population than most. It doesn't matter if the character is properly developed, interesting, wants to be a pirate, wants to be a Strawhat, has had more than a handful of lines, seems to be taking part in a plan to kidnap, drug, addict, and then weaponize children or anything like that. They just REALLY want a new woman.*

*Who is attractive. God forbid that someone that doesn't fit general pleasing aesthetics joins.

LOL the above is the bare truth

[400MillionBelis]

This thread was never intended to discuss possible new crewmates.

But you can't say that speculating and predicting who could join is off-topic, right?

And growing on Monet; it was just an epiphany while I was listing to a podcast. Monet is mysterious, she hasn't shown any (major) hostility, has an interest in astronomy, and we have Eneru up in the Moon. She reminds me of Robin a lot.

[CaptainKid]

1. What the hell is this thread discussion for then if we are not allowed to speculate who can and may join? Eye candy?
2. Oh because you're Oda and you know that the odds are zero.
3. You disprove of speculation of any character joining yet you support Doflamingo being the main villain?
4. If you don't get why people discuss these stuff, then why the hell are you in a thread called "Straw Hat Crew Theories and Predictions"?

1) Nothing wrong with speculating but it's a bit tiresome when every new character becomes part of the "next nakama" discussion
2) I never claimed to be Oda and there are times when it's pretty obvious due past experience (of reading One Piece) when someone's chances of joining are slim to none
3) I don't support Doflamingo as the main villain, I've always said Blackbeard was. I have Doflamingo in my signature because people kept speculating that Doflamingo was behind a lot of things (which I believed) however there was a backlash of people saying that Doflamingo wasn't behind all of the goings on. I was being swayed by the backlash but then Doflamingo was revealed to be a villain who WAS behind lots of stuff. So I was going to change my signature from supporting "all Doflamingo did theories" (the word 'all' being used as partial sarcasm) to something else then when he was revealed I tacked on the "<--- which all in turn are correct" to kind of mock myself and others who were saying Doflamingo couldn't be x, y, and z.
4) I'm not against discussion but there is a "baseless or silly or stupid" prediction thread where all the Caimie for nakama and Kinemon for nakama threads should spawn

[400MillionBelis]

1) Nothing wrong with speculating but it's a bit tiresome when every new character becomes part of the "next nakama" discussion
2) I never claimed to be Oda and there are times when it's pretty obvious due past experience (of reading One Piece) when someone's chances of joining are slim to none
3) I don't support Doflamingo as the main villain, I've always said Blackbeard was. I have Doflamingo in my signature because people kept speculating that Doflamingo was behind a lot of things (which I believed) however there was a backlash of people saying that Doflamingo wasn't behind all of the goings on. I was being swayed by the backlash but then Doflamingo was revealed to be a villain who WAS behind lots of stuff. So I was going to change my signature from supporting "all Doflamingo did theories" (the word 'all' being used as partial sarcasm) to something else then when he was revealed I tacked on the "<--- which all in turn are correct" to kind of mock myself and others who were saying Doflamingo couldn't be x, y, and z.
4) I'm not against discussion but there is a "baseless or silly or stupid" prediction thread where all the Caimie for nakama and Kinemon for nakama threads should spawn

1. You can describe "what's gonna happen next" discussions the same way. If you find it tiresome then ignore it - if the discussion isn't for you then go somewhere else that fits you.
2. Because it was immediately obvious Robin would join, Miss Wednesday was a princess, Upper Yard was part of Jaya, the Skypieans came from the moon, Usopp would eventually defect, the Galley-La workers were evil government agents, Kokoro was a mermaid...yeah I could go on. Punk Hazard, at it's current stance, is premature. You can't say "fuck no it's obvious that you're wrong". I am not convinced that Monet will join no matter what - it's just what has been shown that got me to thinking about it. There is nothing wrong about talking about it, nothing off-topic about it, and it will not harm anyone unless you make a fit about it.
3. I will give you that - my bad.
4. It seems you have a pompous stance on utterly shooting down any speculation on any character joining (that seemed to have stemmed from Camie.) That mermaid is done and we won't see her again for some time - are you going to carry on blabbing about how preposterous it is to have any pondering on a character, if they could join and how they will do? You say you have no problem with discussion on it - that doesn't seem the case. Calling these predictions and speculations "baseless or silly or stupid" is your opinion (but I have to give it you that it is a matter of who [really Caribou joining?]), but for you it seem that any character will and no matter what would come under as baseless and stupid, and speculation of them joining should go in a dumb predictions thread. If you have some bad experience on a former next nakama thread, let it stay there - you don't have to be butthurt about it every time someone starts saying "does x have a chance of joining?" because a discussion is a discussion; if Monet or Kinemon joins or not, we get what we get. Let's move on to the next. There will be no point in these forums if we disprove of discussing these things.

~

Anywho, I'm done with the argument above, and I will come back to Monet joining. If Enel's cover story is of any importance, and if there's a chance that either the Straw Hats will go to space, or space will go to them (it's not a stretch!), and maybe the Sky People have any importance in the Void Century, Monet, who has shown great interest in Astronomy (which was pointed out in on the Unofficial Podcast) could be of help. I'm pretty sure that considering with the amount of things to come (let's assume another four sagas will come), we would not be limited to 10 people - that would be silly just to have them only and not have new people. I am not saying Monet is a given, but plain speculation that will, I reiterate, will die out after this arc no matter what outcome we get, will not hurt. I'm just thinking it would be awesome to have an Astronomer. We already have an Archaeologist, and we were supposed to get a botanist (though, you can say Usopp is now both a sniper and a botanist), so an Astronomer wouldn't be a stretch.

[Shift]

While we're on the subject, I suppose I can explain my theory on why we'll end up with 11 members total with a woman as the final one. Of course it's not infallible, but I'm confident on the logic behind it.

The crux of my theory is conjecture from the sketches in Databook Green that show Oda's concept art of the crew, both during the planning stages and just before the series started:



As you may have noticed in the circled sections, something or someone was most likely erased, since if it was a future member(s), they wouldn't want to spoil it.

You'll also notice that while Robin is included in the second sketch, the one from just before the series began, she isn't anywhere in the first sketch, nor is there any other girl besides Nami.

My thought comes from simple logic: would Oda, as we know him, ever seriously consider having only ONE woman on his crew? That he might have played his single female trump card within the first few chapters and made all the other members men and the last one that seedy guy or one of those catfish carpenters? (Who, as far as my sensibilities can tell, was gonna be a guy).

If we say that no, he wouldn't, then we're left to ask, where's the other woman? Why couldn't she have been left as the precursor to Robin? That brings me to my other conclusion: if we assume that Oda would have certainly planned more than 1 woman for the crew, then perhaps what changed was instead of only 2 women, he bumped it up to 3.

If that's the case, then it's likely that presumed 2nd woman from the first sketch was a lot closer to the presumed 3rd woman from the second sketch than she was to Robin. In other words, Robin was the one added later on, and Nami and the mystery woman could have originally been the two girls of the otherwise male-heavy group.

And what of the 11-member total, you may ask? Simply put, it's probably Jinbe and that final mystery woman. Right at the beginning Oda had Luffy put in the desire for 10 people. And we now know from Green that Oda had his crew planned out, however roughly, even before the series began; if he didn't plan on a specific number, he probably wouldn't have had Luffy use a specific number, or go on with those "The __th Person" chapter titles. He wants the readers to realize when we've finally hit 10 people plus Luffy; he may decide after that to go for those hundreds of followers Usopp keeps feigning, but until then, 11 total's the minimum. And if you need proof that the 10-member thing likely hasn't changed, just look at Oda's past history of foreshadowing; Haki, Brook and Laboon, Rayleigh, and Jinbe himself are testaments to that.

So no, I don't see Monet or Kin'emon joining. XD

[400MillionBelis]

Quoting to notify.

I never realized that there are erased figures - it does seem there were something in the spaces beforehand.

And for the record, Robin replaced the botanist guy behind Nami, which later Usopp kinda took too.

~

I just realized - if Monet joins this saga is making me think more and more of Baroque Works. D:

[Shift]

And for the record, Robin replaced the botanist guy behind Nami, which later Usopp kinda took too.

Just wondering, does that analysis have something to do with the caption on the bottom left? I can see Robin's name but I can't make out more than that.

The whole thing is here, so it'd be great if someone could actually translate it:

[RomanceDawn]

I will instantly know our last crew mate the panel she pulls out a giant battle ax.

It's funny, between Luffy and Zoro it looks like cleavage and collar bones to me.

[TheLaw]

WARNING(wild speculation): If Koala reappears, she's gonna be the next crewmember.

[Shift]

I will instantly know our last crew mate the panel she pulls out a giant battle ax.

If she does, I'll be right behind you.

[Beowulf89]

I'm a follower of the Boy-Girl-Boy-Boy belief.

Zoro-Nami-Usopp-Sanji The East Blue Crew Members
Chopper-Robin-Franky-Brooke The Grand Line Crew Members
Male-Female-Male-Male The New World Crew Members

So yeah, I think the "At least 10" means exactly that. Ten is the minimum number of crewmates he'll need to get through, but not the maximum number that he'll recruit.

Spoiler:

Now then... let's look at how Oda filled out the ranks of the Strawhats. The interesting thing, I think, is that he started with two of the strongest crewmembers joining. Luffy and Zoro are the muscle of the team, and generally represent the greatest threat to their opponents. From there, we recruited two of the weakest members. Usopp and Nami are intelligent, but they mostly rely on range, trickery and their increasingly powerful/versatile weapons to win fights. He capped off the crew in East Blue with the final member of the Monster Trio, giving them one desperate situation where they are saved from the Marines by the intervention of a powerful member of the Revolutionary Army before setting sail.

In the Grandline, Chopper was recruited, rounding out the "weakling trio" while actually being a bit more competent and reliable than Usopp and Nami. But he still basically fights like they do. It's just that instead of setting up traps, he seeks the enemy's weakness and then uses his forms to exploit it. After Chopper, we got Robin, Franky and Brooke. All are capable fighters who can be relied upon, typically with a single small weakness. Robin's grappling was initially weak against larger opponents, Franky had a limited fuel supply and Brooke didn't have any big damage attacks. Note that the weaker fighters tend to be smarter, with the middle group being skewed the same way. Again, after the crew was assembled for this part of the voyage, they faced a dangerous situation with the Marines, only to be saved by a member of the Revolutionary Army.

What's my point so far? Well firstly, everyone has moved "up" a ranking. Robin, Franky and Brooke have covered their initial weaknesses and are generally showing combat skills on the level of the pre-timeskip Monster Trio. Usopp, Nami and Chopper are now capable fighters with one single weakness that doesn't typically come into play. The Monster Trio are... ridiculous, and probably roughly on par with Shichibukai. Even if we assume Usopp will always be the weakest crewmember, then what we are looking to fill in are people who were as strong as p-ts Monster Trio or the p-ts middle group, both of which are well explored territory by this point. That's assuming that they still fit in those three orderly tiers, by the way, which I'm not so sure of.

Secondly, that when we are looking for new Crewmembers, we are going to slot them into one of those three groups first. And since I'm a stickler, I'll also generally not be accepting of something that breaks the boy-girl pattern. So of the Punk Hazard candidates, we have Kinemon and Monet. Kinemon has established himself as being roughly on par with Brooke in straight (slightly crippled) combat, with a few neat tricks to round him out (burning sword, disguises, Observation) that would more or less equate Brooke's neat tricks (freezing sword, illusions, speed). Monet has not established herself as a fighter, and she seems to have a strong intellect, so my instinct is to stick her in the lower tier. Based on the way Oda seems to work, his tendency is to establish the upper and lower tiers, then work inwards when that's done. So we can probably expect one Monster Trio-strength recruit, one Weakling Trio-strength recruit and then two in the middle group. If you consider Jinbe already a member of the crew, this works in Monet's favor. If you don't and then take the position that Kinemon was VERY hampered when he briefly fought Brooke, then it's in his favor, but this locks out Jinbe unless we overstack the crew with heavy hitters.

But I'm not telling the whole story. See, in addition to the proper crewmembers, there were temporary allies who sailed with the Strawhats. Coby in East Blue, and Vivi in the Grandline. In both cases, they started sailing with the Strawhats before the first crewmember was recruited, and left before the second one joined. In other words, if Oda holds to this generalized pattern, we need someone to sail on the Strawhat's ship with them before we start speculating about a new crewmember joining, and then we need to get rid of this person before we look for the next one. Note that the combat abilities of these two have steadily increased. Coby was barely able to throw a punch, and Vivi was about as tough as Nami or Usopp. If I were to follow the Boy-Girl pattern VERY strictly, I'd note that the first two "not-quite crew" members went Boy-Girl, meaning that we'd be looking for a male to sail with the Strawhats for awhile, but ultimately not join, and that they'd be on the Robin-Franky-Brooke level... like Kinemon.

Of course, since I'd be following the pattern VERY strictly by that point, it would also mean that AFTER the crew was fully recruited, we'd get someone sailing with the Strawhats but not joining them, probably for the very final story-arc, and that they'd be as strong as the Monster Trio by that point. As pure speculation, I'd say... Aokiji, but the pattern so far is that it's not someone the Strawhats have met before. We also need to have a desperate situation with the Marines, only for a member of the Revolutionary Army to save them... maybe the whole damn army, this time.

Or the above is just a product of me being too tired and REALLY wanting the new chapter to come out.