[Haak]

Originally Posted by Sabaku Kyu

You're saying all 20 of them were meant to be VL? Despite that it was already mentioned (chapter 197) that they were extremely rare --likely no more than 10 existing in all HM--and that Aizen told Gin some chapters later he had not finished gathering them for his army?

Again: How else is it meant to be interpreted? Given the fact that they were just talking about how many Vasto Lorde's it would take to bring Soul Society down, how else is it meant to be taken?

It was already mentioned that no more than 10 existed, but that's kinda like a bad guy saying "You can't win" and then the good guy saying "yes I can". Sometimes you make something that sounds like exposition for the sole purpose of breaking it seconds later. The fact that Aizen hadn't finished gathering his army doesn't suggest anything except that he doesn't have the full number. That doesn't mean he has less than 22.

And no offense, but your definition of a retcon is wrong. You say that because the espada all lost, their strength was retconned.

If Hitsu had said that it was utterly impossible for any captain to defeat a VL, I would say you had a point. But the only thing that Hitsu said would make victory hopeless is if Aizen marched his army consisting of at least 10 VL against a Gotei 13 missing 3 of it's captains...something that never happened. And Gotei 13 had it's ranks boosted by the vizards besides that.

No that's not what I'm saying. I'm saying that most of the Vasto Lorde lost to a single captains sole combat capabilities when we were specifically told that "the fact of the matter is that the Vasto Lorde's combat capabilities are above that of our captains". That is a retcon because it goes against established exposition without a convincing explanation.

Me pointing out the fact that Stark face two captains twice at the same time is fan-wanking about his strength (because they didn't go bankai, even though those same captains didn't even go bankai fighting someone powerful as Aizen), yet you give Histugaya victory over Halibel, when she wasn't even damaged by his strongest attack.

Does she have to be damaged? Hitsugaya only says that when the last of the 100 petals falls her life will be claimed. I don't recall it ever being mentioned that she would take damage in between. If the last petal already fell when Wonderweiss freed he then i you might have a point, but even then she's still trapped and that also counts as a defeat anyway.

You also make the point that those same captains didn't release their bankai on Aizen. And? Are you seriously suggesting that them releasing their bankai's would not make them stronger? Frankly that's an even bigger retcon since we were speciifcally told that bankai's are generally more powerful that shikai, but even then that's no proof that their bankai doesn't make them stronger (it's just proof that they're fucking retarded). However if you believe that those cpatains releasing their bankai doesn't make them stronger then I'm going to hold you to that. If they ever release their bankai later on and it shows that they're stronger then I'm going to bring this up again. That fine with you? Are you really willing to make that bet?

And say Shunsui basically beat Stark with nothing but shikai. Yes. That and a opening given by Stark being distracted in a fight against two opponents. The good guys healed each other, rescued each other, fought together. The Espada (aside from WW), barely lifted a finger to help each other. That is, when they weren't being betrayed by their own. Really, they would've each had to have been insanely overpowered just to overcome their lousy comradery.

This is a rather weird perspective of what happened. Right after Stark fired a cero into Shunsui's back point black, two vizard captains proceeded to fight Stark and were completely outclassed (but without going bankai for some reason). Then Shunsui comes back and stabs Stark in the back and after that Shunsui proceeds with his fight with Stark without the other two captains helping at all. There wasn't any team work going on here to the extent you're suggesting. The only thing that makes the fight uneven is the fact that they both got a point blank shot at each other and it would be fanwanking to suggest that one was stronger than the other.