Were Tenshinhan and co suppressed?

Inspired by a discussion in another thread. As we all know, the official stated in the manga battle powers for the Earthlings at the beginning of the manga are 250, 206, and 177 for Tenshinhan, Kuririn, and Yamucha respectively. The official numbers for Goku and Piccolo are 416 and 408 but many claim they're suppressed, their true powers were at 900 and that the Chou Kamehameha doesn't amplify one's power. Is it possible that the Earthlings, despite not having Kami-sama's training yet, were also suppressed?

Honestly, IMO the manga battle powers are bullshit. There's no way Tenshinhan is less than 1.2x Kuririn. That's not even a noticeable difference in power. I've always suspected that he was just taking a nap when they sensed his battle power and that his true power is at 340 or so. It seems you need Ki training from someone like Kami-sama to raise and lower one's power but yet you have stuff that seems to be the same thing far before that.

There's instances of characters claiming to be able to sense someone's presence or fighting spirit dating back to the 21st Tenkaichi Budokai and you have Goku fighting Kuririn and co at Match Level then switching to Battle Level when Tenshinhan overpowered him. There's also Roshi "powering up" against Tenshinhan. Anime-wise his power raises from him bulking up but nothing like this seems to be the case in the manga where he simply removes his shirt and becomes more powerful.

The Earthlings seem to have learned many things from training with Karin-sama, including being able to control where their Ki attacks go and being able to sense Goku's presence (if they couldn't do that before) so is it possible they were just suppressed at the start of Z?

Well, they are shit. They may be factually correct, but they are still shit lol

Maybe i am...? lol Too many numbers to remember damnit!!

quote CatouttaHell

Tenshinhan can't be less than 1.2x stronger than Kuririn.

Apparently he can, so deal with it.

quote CatouttaHell

If Kuririn is at 206 Tenshinhan should be at like 280 minimum IMO.

Well he's not.

quote CatouttaHell

Also he clowned Weighted Goku, who the manga levels put at 334. So yes, they are shit.

He clowned 23rd Budokai Weighted Goku, who clearly was not at 334.

quote CatouttaHell

So yes, they are shit.

That's the equivalent of saying that Goku being a Saiyan is shit and you disagree with it.

quote CatouttaHell

So you think Goku's power grew that much faster than Tenshinhan's

Yes, yes I do. Goku's power has always grown a lot faster than Tenshinhan's.

quote CatouttaHell

despite him settling down

I don't see any evidence that he wasn't training.

quote CatouttaHell

because you believe Tenshinhan wasn't suppressed

Nobody knew how to suppress their power before training under Popo/Kami.

quote CatouttaHell

Goku really was 1.33x stronger than him despite being weaker 5 years ago?

This is how I have it:

Start of Z Goku - 416
~ Weighted - 334

23rd Budokai Goku - 320
~ Weighted - 210

Start of Z Tenshinhan: 250

23rd Budokai Tenshinhan: 220

Yes I think working backwards is the way to go for DB numbers. Whether or not to use the scouter numbers or not really is a no brainer. AT gave us little choice even though his expertise in numbers creates a whole slew of problems, essentially, there is nothing we can do about it.

So from working backwards , one could suggest that Yamcha/ Krillen from the 23rd Budokai were at least nearing Piccolo Daimaio as crazy as that sounds.

Piccolo Daimaio is at best 200 I would think using the logic of working backwards.

The problem with the numbers is that they're also a ranking system used to make Character A > Character C. It'd be OK if Toriyama stopped using them soon after but they continued on to the Freeza saga and had a similar pattern/system.

So what this means is that the very first numbers contradicted the power rankings of the first 194 chapters of DragonBall. It reminds me of the 40 Ton/Goku issue or MSSj Gohan needing 20 minutes to fly 1000 kilometers. Most people would ignore these plothole riddled feats.

So yes, while it may sound pretty arrogant, I do think Toriyama is factually wrong when he wrote the DBZ intro numbers.

If it weren't for Piccolo's statement everything could work actually. It kind of sucks that one statement could cause so many problems.