Could Ranma ever stand up to Dragonball /DBZ ?

[A.Nonymous]

OK. here's a technique that might work.
All Ranma would have to do is dodge a blast or two and he could use the Umisenken attack he used on Kummon, and I think Herb, to "steal" the Ki his opponent used against him, and dump it all back on said opponent in one giant lump.
The problem is that shriveled up perverts in the DB universe can blow up the moon with their Ki blasts. The entire world is nothing but a pock marked desert because of martial arts masters learning such techniques.
For comparison's sake we'll use the "pervert scale" here:
If you move Ranma to the DB universe he should have "more power than the average pervert" and be able to blow up a REALLY BIG moon...or a sizable chunk of the Earth. Maybe not as powerful as a Z-fighter but he could hold his own for long enough to come up with a tactic to take them out.
While if you bring the Z-fighters to the Ranmaverse their power level should be lowered to only a few times as powerful than Happosai... That would put them about as powerful as Saffron. Ranma could take them...
That's another thing. The Z-fighters are so drunk on power that they've gotten lazy. They're the only fighters with worse tactics than the Sailor Senshi. They're like "Rock-em-Sock-em-Robots" and just pound on each other until one combatant can't get up anymore. At least the Sailor Senshi "snipe at it from a distance until Mercury comes up with a plan."
Assuming the Z-fighters don't just hose Ranma down in the first seconds with a world shattering Ki blast. Ranma would be coming up with a tactic or technique to take them out.

[Kyrtythren]

That fic is Savior by Michael Fetter.

Another by the same author, A Human Saiyajin, also takes on the skill vs. power issue that many people have discussed (and then gives Ranma a powerup to 'solve' the 'problem'. And doesn't get updated in like 4 years).
Yeah, it's a bit late of a reply, but I haven't been here in a bit....sorry?

[blackmamuth]

I must point you people; that Kuririn isn't the weakest Fighter around. In fact, He is the best human out there by a considerable margin, and a darn impressive one at that. He is one of the few to have come with a really useful technique by himself, able to harm the bad guy in namek in his strongest mutation, (And in a lucky blow, he could also have killed him. by mid-Dbz; he outclasses Ten shin Han, yamcha and chaos... (Goten and Trunks are arguable))
Krillin, Is perhaps the most intelligent Z-fighter, Only bested by vegeta. (And by intelligent, I mean battle smarts. He won't hesistate to go underhanded if he knows it will give him the victory. As shown in several places in DB, and Namek.)
Such a shame they butchered his character for comic relief after Namek and the androids.

[nodregah]

I agree that ranma as he is cannot compete in the DB/DBZ universe, but Ranma has skill in spades. Now a Ranma who has been trained in the DB/DBZ universe would be able to compete in it. Another thing about the DBZ universe, Hercule has more skill than the Z-Fighters. The proof, He is the World Martial Arts Champion. He stays there until the uber powered Z-fighters show up. They win by power not skill.

[nuclear death frog]

I agree that ranma as he is cannot compete in the DB/DBZ universe, but Ranma has skill in spades. Now a Ranma who has been trained in the DB/DBZ universe would be able to compete in it. Another thing about the DBZ universe, Hercule has more skill than the Z-Fighters. The proof, He is the World Martial Arts Champion. He stays there until the uber powered Z-fighters show up. They win by power not skill.

That's rather ignorant.
21st Tenkaichi Budoukai:
Winner -- Jackie Chun (Roshi)
2nd place -- Son Goku (age ~12-13)
22nd Tenkaichi Budoukai:
Winner -- Tenshinhan
2nd place -- Son Goku (age ~15-16)
23rd Tenkaichi Budoukai:
Winner -- Son Goku (age ~18-19)
2nd place -- Ma Jr. (Piccolo)
24th Tenkaichi Budoukai
Winner -- Mr. Satan (when none of the Z Senshi participated at all)
2nd place -- some nobody

[lwf58]

Yep. Mr. Satan stayed as the longest-running consecutive Budokai champion because none of the Z fighters were interested in taking the spotlight again. The only time they were interested in knocking him off his pedestal was during the Majin Buu arc, when Babbidy and his men interrupted the contest, Vegita destroyed the arena, and the contest never got to the final round.
Later, after Buu' evil side was destroyed, Buu always won the preliminary rounds and then forfeited the final round, so Mr. Satan never had to fight to retain the title. Buu just didn't want to hit his best friend. ^_^
Edit: I just recalled that Mr. Satan once had to face one of the kids in a demo match at a Budokai, and only got through that one because the kid cut a deal with him and threw the match. Don't remember which kid it was, though.
Anyway, the point was that there was only one Budokai where Mr. Satan won legitimately, and the master of ceremonies thought that year's contest was so lame and boring, he was ecstatic when the Z fighters showed up for the next one.

[ToastedPine]

What's with making giving Ranma an outsider's ability (not his canon ability) to reason out techniques? What he pulls off in the manga is far from complex and they're a far cry from the genius levels you'd see in something like HxH.
Ranma's battle tactics should roughly be the same level of the best dragonball offered like young Goku's use of his tail to dodge attacks and move, and later, using freeza's (or was it cell's?) own energy disk against him.
Beating saffron or any of the other weird challengers is not rocket science. Their weaknesses were spelled out in bright neon signs.
Anyways, if Ranma get's an IQ upgrade when going up against DBZ people, I say DBZ people should get an IQ upgrade as well.
Besides, everyone knows that it's superior dancing skill that decides the winner in battle. Ranma doesn't have the all powerful fusion dance so he's not even a threat. Sure, he could use his anything goes ballroom dancing skills, but let's get real-- ballroom dancing doesn't stand a chance against the mighty fusion dance.

[antimatterenergy]

Ranma is very good at martial arts and doesn't require a IQ upgrade (anime version does though, anime version is a lot dumber than the manga version). He can see a technique only once and then duplicate it. His learning speed is even mentioned as being extreme in the manga (Genma mentioning that he only showed him the umisenken once and Ranma learned it Cologne surprised that Ranma was able to learn the Hiryu Shoten ha so quickly and that he figured out the end of it without seeing it done).
Manga Ranma generally has very good battle tactics when he's taking the fight seriously (a large number of fights Ranma doesn't take seriously i.e. fight with Kuno -spent time righting out buffoon on kuno's head, fight with Ryoga - ignored ryoga in favor of arguing with Akane, fight with Ukyo - spent most of fight trying to figure out why she was attacking him etc..). Most people would not think to use a smoke stack to get Taro's tentacles. Ranma can and will adapt to the fight using anything around him and will create or modify techniques in mid-battle.
How were they're weakness's spelled out? Saffron could fly, throw massive fireballs, and regenerate. Where is the weakness? (don't say using cold attacks because that didn't bother Saffron since his own heat and the staff he was using threw the cold back at Ranma) Herb got pissed at Ranma showing of his female side but that isn't really a weakness since Herb would than attack with more force. Cologne never showed a weakness.
Ranma is in most cases not a threat in a straight battle because he doesn't have the raw strength, speed, and amount of ki to fight the DBZ characters. He also has a tendency to not injure his opponents even taking hits himself instead of using techniques that are lethal or can cause permanent injury and if he's fighting the DBZ characters the only chance he has in a one on one fight is to use dirty tricks and lethal attacks.

[ToastedPine]

He can see a technique only once and then duplicate it.

Riiiight... the only thing he really did that with was the shishihokudan, and that's a low level ki ability that he had the basics to figure out already. Even then, he figured it out by accident. The chestnut fist took several tries and luck also had a part in that. It also took several tries for him to decifer the really dumb attack known as the fist of the white swan. Ranma techniques were not techniques made by smart people. Heck, if he had any real talent for taking apart techniques and using them, he should've already figured out the splitting cat hairs and the breaking point. (The breaking point also works under a very striaght-forward theory btw)
Figuring out the Yamasenken was pretty easy too, he saw the techniques first hand repeatedly. As for learning the umisenken, the principle behind that was just a simple pose, and some wierd "don't notice me" mindset. You can talk about ki and what not all you want but they didn't mention it.
Saffron was weak to physical attacks, which is pretty easy to figure out once you punch him or he gets hit by a rock (which is what happened in he manga) but he could regenerate, which is stupidly similar to cell. How do you kill something that has almost limitless regen ability? Ummm... rip it up till he can't regenerate no more.... duh. There are better more intelligent ways to get that done. Ranma and DBZ chose no-brainer method. And don't give me all that bull about hot and cold. Ranma's been using the HSH for some time now, and the technique itself isn't complex either, even then, cologne had to spell it out for him. His completion of the Hsh, while ingenius is also REFLEXIVE, meaning he didn't do it on purpose. There was no planning or deep thought behind that.

Most people would not think to use a smoke stack to get Taro's tentacles

Wrong, that was a stupid and misguided assumption that just happened to have a favorable outcome. Who the hell would've known that the tentacles had the intincts of an octopus inside them? It was common knowledge with Ranma and the rest that octopi lived in jars.... I'm not sure if that's true in real life, but I made my point regardless.

Herb got pissed at Ranma showing of his female side but that isn't really a weakness since Herb would than attack with more force

What the heck does that have to do with being smart? He's had plenty of experience with the HsH by then, he'd have to be really stupid to not figure out his tactic.
In addition, Ranma has shown times where he's been extremely stupid in battle. What kind of idiot wouldn't know that the cheap tricks he used against god marked ryouga wouldn't work too well?

[antimatterenergy]

The chestnut fist was not an attack in the manga it was a training routine to gain speed. Cologne was even surprised that he used it that way, since the amazons only ever used it as speed training. Ranma was also under handicaps while learning the amaguriken - he was in his female form which he had only had for a few months at most and he was under a pressure point that made him very sensitive to heat making it much harder for him to do it as cologne showed.
Splitting cat hairs never happened in the manga and I've already said anime ranma is significantly stupider than his manga counterpart. The fist of the white swan was very different in the manga and Ranma figured it out instantly since it was just a white swan shaped potty trainer and clearly a joke. Ranma probably knows the breaking point but he is unlikely to use it since Ranma tends to not destroy things all around him like Ryoga does. The breaking point is also not really that great a technique against the people he fights since it's either over kill like if he used it on Kuno or it's not strong enough since people like Ryoga can ignore the rocks hitting him or impossible to use such as during battle with Saffron where he wasn't close enough to the ground to use it and even Ryoga doesn't use the technique to fight Ranma very often since it doesn't really work on Ranma. Also Ranma rarely even uses ki techniques (over kill, lethal, or not taking the fight seriously enough to bother using them) in the manga the Hiryu shoten ha is used maybe 10 times in the entire manga (most were new variations), the mokotakabisha is used three or four times outside of its story arc (once was a new variation), umisenken is never used outside of it's story arc, happosai's throwing technique is used only once outside of the story arc ranma used it, Ranma only uses the Amaguriken in the same way only during that one battle versus Ryoga (only calls it out once after the arc he learned it).
The umisenken is an entire school of martial arts that includes using cloth to bind your opponent, becoming invisible, hiding your aura, moving very fast, and being stealthy. Genma the creator of them even said that the umisenken was the more difficult art.
Saffron was not weak to physical attacks how can you call a guy who will rip his own wings off to use them in a technique as being weak to pain? Saffron was hit by multiton boulders moving at hurricane force speed and wasn't even knocked unconscious. Ryoga and mouse only thought he was weak to physical attacks (multiton boulders hitting them isn't much) because of how he was raised (a king) and how Ranma's kick seemed to affect him more than losing a limb, also before Saffron took on his adult form he had taken hits that were hard enough to crack solid rock.
What better ways are there to kill Saffron than to freeze him and use a tornado to tear him apart? Couldn't stay close to him since he was hot enough to melt rock therefore Ranma couldn't just get close and tear him apart. He could fly when Ranma couldn't therefore Saffron had more maneuverability. The weapon Saffron was using was tough enough to take multiple ki blades sharp enough to tear through rock like butter. Saffron had the home ground - i.e. the air and it being his mountain, a weapon he was familiar with, an unnatural regenerative ability, flames that were hot enough to cause Ranma damage just by touching Ranma, Saffron had significantly more powerful blasts, and Ranma was under a time limit to save Akane.
What plenty of experience using the Hiryu Shoten Ha against Herb? It was the third and fourth time in the manga he had ever done it and he altered it to do things it wasn't designed to do mid-battle.
About the cheap tricks he was using against Ryoga when Ryoga had the mark of the god. Remember who he was fighting, Ranma knows that Ryoga is an idiot and knew that Ryoga would fall for those tricks and Ryoga did fall for all of those techniques. There is nothing wrong with using seemingly stupid techniques if you know that they will work on your opponent. The magical nature of the mark allowed Ryoga to not be defeated by them but Ryoga still did fall for them.
Every single technique that Ranma tried to copy he did on his first try unless the technique also required a different mind set. The only techniques he didn't learn instantly were shishihadoken and Hiryu shoten ha both required a different mind set. Shishihadoken required focusing through an emotion and the Hiryu shoten ha required staying absolutely calm while battling. Unless Ranma was also a telepath he had no way of knowing that the shishihadoken required focusing through an emotion.
Also the Dragonball Z characters have been using ki techniques for years. Ranma has only been actively using his ki for less than a year and had no one to train him (Cologne taught him one (two if you count amuguriken which was taught mostly by her attacking him) technique and didn't even teach him all of it, Genma didn't teach him any ki techniques by choice (used it on him once only), and Happosai had not taught him any on purpose. DBZ, HxH, Naruto, etc... had people who were willing to teach them ki techniques. Ranma had to make up or duplicate most of the techniques he uses since he doesn't have anyone willing to teach him ki techniques.

[ToastedPine]

Yeah, took a while to reply since I needed to read the manga again but it was worth it since I got to see shampoos dad. The anime and manga tend to bleed into each other for me so that took a while to sort out as well.

Cologne was even surprised that he used it that way, since the amazons only ever used it as speed training.

Weird abstractions that don't have anything behind it. All Cologne did was show Ranma the move. When he used it to punch Ryouga, cologne didn't say anything besides how the training at the cafe payed off. There were no obviouse signs of surprise there. I can only read english so the original version might say otherwise but it's pretty murky in the translation.

The fist of the white swan was very different in the manga and Ranma figured it out instantly since it was just a white swan shaped potty trainer and clearly a joke.

Who are you to say this? Ranma in its entirety is a joke. I took a look at this as well and the only thing Ranma did to foil this was catch the potty thing with his foot. Yeah, genius mind in battle required right there.

Ranma probably knows the breaking point but he is unlikely to use it since Ranma tends to not destroy things all around him like Ryoga does.

The heck? No evidence that he knows it. "Probably" doesn't have any weight at all. There's either Ranma using the breaking point in the manga or there isn't.
I'm not going to go into what parts of the Yama and Umi senken Ranma really does or doesnt know. Instead, I'll direct you to this thread: link
You'll see that it lasts forever trying to decide things so I'll leave it as an undecided issue that's hard to use to prove anything about being a genius in battle. Hell, no one can even agree what mechanisms umisenken uses to make people undetectable.
[/quote]What plenty of experience using the Hiryu Shoten Ha against Herb? It was the third and fourth time in the manga he had ever done it and he altered it to do things it wasn't designed to do mid-battle.

He didn't really change the HsH, he used the same principles. While I admit that it was a rather clever trick, its not anything special.
M odified Spirit Bomb anyone?
I know the nonesense about DBZ people being trained to be better able to handle ki attacks blahblah. I find it hard to quantify something like that considering how dissimilar training exercises are between the two aside from principles in basic endurance training. Point is Goku also did something with a technique it wasn't really originally designed to do. The parallel is obvious, what isn't obvious is which one far oustrips the other in supposed battle genius.

Unless Ranma was also a telepath he had no way of knowing that the shishihadoken required focusing through an emotion.

Oh, I don't know, he could've easily made an educated guess. The technique was far from complicated. That aside, if you do argue that it's a very sophisticated move (which is possible), there's the issue of why ranma wasn't able to touch ryoga even though the only thing stopping him was a blast of supercharged air. There have been plenty of anime where fireballs are thrown at amazing speeds and people dodge by reading moves or cancelling the effect by using their surroundings.
As for Saffron, Ranma took the most direct and simple route. Maybe I was wrong and it was the only way, the point is that it's really not all that different from how Gohan destroyed Cell. So Ranma used a fancy technique he supposedly didn't use all that much, Gohan didn't have all that much training casting fireballs either.
All that said, this is the last time I'll post in this thread. DBZ and ranma should never be crossed IMO so it's kinda pointless.

[antimatterenergy]

As far as learning new techniques both Goku and Ranma are genius's the thing is Ranma (manga version not anime) is a lot less gullible, more manipulative, more likely to do something underhanded, more likely to do something unexpected, and has altered more techniques than Goku has mid-battle (not 100% sure on the last one).
About the breaking point I agree Ranma didn't do it in the manga but he probably could. There really wasn't any time in the manga doing it would have benefited him except once when playing a trick on Ryoga by pretending to be ryoga's maid and instead of using the breaking point to blow up the wall and spy on Ryoga he did a technique we hadn't seen before and cut a perfect hole in the wall with his hands.
During the Shishihadoken story arc Ranma at least to me did not seem to actually be trying to defeat Ryoga. He seemed to be trying to figure out the technique and defeating the technique instead of Ryoga. Really how would he guess that a ki blast required focusing through emotion when he's never even seen a ki blast prior to that point? Also though this didn't transfer in translation that story arc was absolutely filled with puns and the entire story arc was a big joke.
Here is a quote from a website that I no longer am able to locate that somewhat explains that story arc.

Specifically, part 4, where Ranma generates one type of floating "ki"
after another, is just really a string of puns, the point being that what
the floating "ki" does is connected, via a pun, to Ranma's frame of mind,
as described by some set expression that has the word "ki" in it (this
gives us the "ki" that will not move, the "ki" that scatters, the "ki"
that loses its way, the short little "ki" (a pun on "short-tempered"), and
so on. Not being a native Japanese I can't tell, of course, which of
these puns are real groaners, but I suspect that most of them are.
And, in a sense, this is all just setup for the "ultimate pun", which
comes at the climactic moment, in part 6, where Ranma figures out why
Ryoga isn't hurt as the "heavy ki" (another pun, of course) comes crashing
down on him. This revelation, which Ranma yells with a straight face and
all the Furinkan high students echo with equally serious expressions, is
again nothing more than a pun based on the word "kinuke" (dispiritidness,
dejection) and the further meanings of "nuku"/"nukeru"/"nuki" (pull out,
withdraw, extract; leave out, skip), including, specifically, the compound
"surinuku"--which, again, you will not find in dictionaries, but which is
not really a made-up word, I have seen it in other mangas to describe a
"glancing or grazing blow, a blow that barely misses" (probably related to
surimuku, to graze). Anyway, the point is that because Ryoga is "kinuke"
his "ki" goes "surinuku"--and at that moment, which the Western reader
would no doubt mistake for a highly dramatic moment, the Japanese reader
is probably groaning and saying (the equivalent of) "oh, noo..."

I also agree that the two should not be crossed becuase of the differance in power.

[FOG3]

Use multiple nukes. The explosion may not kill them but enough of the radiation might.

Japan has no nuclear weapons at this time, although with NK claiming to have done so they _may_ in the immediate future. So just who is he going to convince to give him a serious nuclear weapon to use? Pakistan's and North Korea's aren't exactly *cough cough* reliable and rather primitive low kT fission devices besides.
He might as well just buy a T-72, it'd be cheaper and much more likely to go through. After he spends the rest of his mortal life working so he can buy one and the bribe to get it to go through, of course.

If you're creative there are a number of ways that Ranma can kill a DB character though in a straight fight it is very, very unlikely. May get extremely lucky and win though but the odds are really against him.

If you're smart you can kill every anime character that isn't absurdly wanked out there ever was using conventional military hardware without breaking a sweat. Non-uberwank characters are DPICMs bitch, either in CBU-52B, CBU-87/B, M-77, or numerous other forms. M-829s and CKEM can kill the remainder that aren't "I so stupidly powerful I ignore physics, eat stars and shit victory" uber-uber-uber wank.
I'm with Screwball, Curb Stomp song time.

[antimatterenergy]

Japan may not have nuclear weapons but so what Ranma could most likely steal a few nukes from Russia. Ranma has no problems with stealling stuff and he does have enough stealth techniques and abilities to steal several nukes/guns/bio weapons from china or russia if he wanted to.

[Neko-]

If you're smart you can kill every anime character that isn't absurdly wanked out

Point being... In respect to almost any anime out there (I don't want to say all, but I just might)... DBZ is 'absurdely wanked out'. It's so overpowered in comparison to other anime's which makes the blend so hard to do.
Which is kinda what spawned this thread. Could you put Ranma against Vegeta or Goku and somehow win?