Just for the record, Chopper is one of my favourite chracaters, definately top five when it comes to One Piece and probably top 20 of all time anime/manga characters. I hope One Piece in very high esteem. However in between working very random hours over the course of seven day weeks, i do tend to have the incline to theorise and speculate A LOT. This isn't about whether i think Choppers weak or boring, it's about holding true to the values of One Piece as i seem them, and even then it's probably through the indoctrination of the views on this board.
Time and time again, i've read in threads how One Piece isn't about strength of fighting it's about a story, so i thought to myself, it's probably that Oda wouldn't make it about that and thus having a big fight for every character, every major arc wouldn't fit. An example of story over show-of-strength was Sanji at Skypiea, however yes he more than made up for it when he got back down to the ground.
Choppers always been a great character and his cutesy-ness makes a lot of people A LOT of money in terms of merchandise, not to mention, in terms of storyline it's always an easy thing to write for, however at some stage, Chopper will have to start dealing with his full forms more (whether Deer form or Human form) maybe that's just wishful thinking by me.
To my disappointment this arc, Chopper was quite the third-wheel and then he got his super fight with Kudamori and i really enjoyed that, i really enjoy his liasons with Zoro too, the fatherly figure type role that Zoro has with Chopper (this could be Alabasta filler) and i'd love to see Chopper develop as a fighter, but i simply queried whether it will always happen.
We know that no matter what Luffy and Zoro will always fight, Sanji 99% of the then we've also just brought in an incredibly strong fighter like Franky, who is without a doubt a better fighter than Nami, Usopp and Chopper. Without seeing the end of this arc, we really can't even begin to speculate in which direction Oda is going with Usopp but given his dream, i'm without doubt he'll continue to feature in the fights of the arcs up until the closing of the story as a whole.
So i simply arrive back at my question of, will Oda continue to increase the number of fights per arc, until we're having ten fights per arc or will he simply mix them up and leave the numbers a little smaller (ala Sanji, Nami, etc at Skypiea)
Now given that Chopper will without a doubt get some post-Water Seven focus, in which they'll explore his monster form, his reasons for doing it, his bond will grow with the crew and they'll tell him never to do it again. It makes sense that yes he will want to become stronger to protect his crew in a pinch, but he's not quite Luffy and even Luffy acknowledges that some of his crew need protecting.
The last thread i made on the subject of Chopper using my 'twisted speculative what some may refuse to call logic' had almost immediate resolution by the author himself. So to question where do we go from here, i don't think it's such a bad or ludicrous thing.
i really don't get the attitude of this board that posting in a thread "thanks for raw" or "thanks for the trans" (glorified leeching) is somehow a more valuable input into the community than taking time out to make threads and probe the future of One Piece as a collective. Neither do i understand why people go into Chapter threads and bitch about people discussing the events as they unfolded, even if they do get over-analyzed. Maybe i'm missing the point these forums, but i thought it was a dedicated One Piece discussion board, surely if you disagree or disapprove of a thread that much, you'll be at ease to formulate a post in which it makes further discussion pointless through sound arguments?
I don't think i've gone into a thread with my mind fully made up on any aspect of One Piece, i'll have opinions in which i'm willing to change, i'll even sometimes mess around and say that Sanji is stronger than Whitebeard but he's hiding his power from the Mugiwara, but i don't make threads to state opinions, i make them to ask questions so i can come out of a thread a more enlightened person, to me that's what a community is supposed to be about.
