For the following, I'm just writing about the usefulness of crew members in situations and their roles. After reading feel free to argue/correct any of my thoughts and using these thoughts consider what the new nakama should bring to the crew and how the personality might be.
@Jim13ei:
Well if you look closely… Sanji was doing the same things for the crew and even Zoro. He was going alone to rescue Robin. He was able to throw away his life like Zoro and against PX he was going back to rescue his crew... So I think you can very sure say he will be always near Zoro and Luffy
Yeah, the Sanji case slipped my mind. First situation was the little island arc in which the legend of Mr. Prince was about to start, then the W7 and probably one or two more cases. Resourceful wise, he seems equivalent of Robin though even less noticed and usually acts as a trump card.
As for first mate, that is more Zoro's description. As you brought up, Sanji has quite a major role too in terms of the orientation of how the crew works in hostile territory outside of his cooking and ero-power. Robin seems like Sanji in the case of searching for information and problems, while disappearing of course. Unlike the case with Sanji finding info and waiting for his time to bring in his hand (lying in wait in the shadows), Robin seems to look for the overall picture (whether for her archeology, the predicament/traps befalling the crew, and/or the main scheme of the enemy).
Chopper seems a little weak in resourcefulness along with Luffy and Usopp, maybe Franky. These three seem to form the Reaction group as they only fall into traps and situations.
- Usopp with his charisma lent by the Sogeking persona in his mind, can sometimes get him associated with allies, but this was only seen in one instance and aside from sniping abilities not much else is sure. He can help craft weapons through his ingenuity but it does overlap with Franky now as they seem like kindred spirits.
- Franky seems slightly resourceful in finding out problems but it seems more of luck than brains. He can build things within practically seconds making him the engineer, obvious of course. He can be easily spotted though, possibly making him bait or useful in the cases of diversion.
- Chopper seems to only be able to heal people and character-wise we do not see him do much other than trying to learn about the world due to his naive nature, fight the strangest people of the enemies and maybe at best warn other people of a dangerous poison… Best mention he needs more character development...
- Luffy, obviously he may only react to circumstances, but he strengthens the resolve/conviction of other crew members and allies, weakens that of enemies and fights to the bitter end against the antagonist. As Nami and Vivi suggested, he seems to have a knack to finding who the true enemy is even before learning who they are (ex: Lucchi), sort of like a built in strength radar. Comedic relief? Sure, which person isn't. Bait/diversionary character? Sure, has been. Leader? Of course.
Brook is truly an unknown so I am not really sure what his roles are and what his ways of how to deal with situations may be. I think he may fit in between comedic relief (like chopper in situations) and have some resourcefulness due his sheer speed and his light body frame, so I can picture him viewing the area through the shadows while singing Yoho Yohohoho while sipping tea. In short he can creep out people and possibly leave the area in the blink of an eye while being frightened himself at the same time.
Nami is sort of a wild card between being the:
- negotiator (a real one, especially in cases of money)
- comedic relief in terms of money and anger vs stupidity of other characters (whether crew, random people or enemies)
- resourcefulness in terms of surveying the area both in geography and basic understanding of the social problems and situation
- getting caught by the enemy… Unlike Sanji and Robin, she stays in the light in terms of searching for information and usually gets dragged into horrid situations by the reactionary/screw-up team.
Edit: KiShiDo
Actually many people do consider Margaret (sp?) as a possibility to join in place of Boa and has been thrown around a lot. Perhaps Hancock will ask her to keep an eye on Luffy? Not likely but people hoped for that.