Could Ranma ever stand up to Dragonball /DBZ ?

[Jester_of_doom]

This question just came to mind a few days ago: How far into Dragonball or DBZ could Ranma actually be a challenge if he got ever sinlge power-up available in the manga. I have seen a few really really bad attapts to cross the series where ranma just somehow is strong enough or skilled enough. I think thats crap. I expect he would need every dirty trick out there. I think at the very least he could match Vegita's first arrival if he had the following.
Mark of the gods
Super soba
Genma's secret techniques
Chestnut fist
Dragon assension attack
Battle Gi
Breaking point
Hidden weapons style
A few of the amazon magic items like the mask that makes people apologise and the other protection for children and the elderly.
Lion's roar bullet
Perhaps a curse of Ashura or like Taro if it can mix with his curse
Perhaps the phoenix egg that had been on Kuno's head
Its questionable that ranma could get all of those but besides Mousse being unwilling to teach him and it being hard to find the old guy who made the mark of the gods i dont think ranma would have had trouble aquiring all that if he needed to to save the planet. There are also several other possible things he could of course get.
So how far in do people think he could get with that level of firepower? Also any other ideas of stuff he could use?

[nuclear death frog]

He'd get nowhere. Kamesennin in the *first* shown World Tournament blew up the moon with a single shot, though that was his maximum power. Son Goku was stalemating him, and lost because he didn't connect in his final kick attempt because he was too short and Kamesennin wasn't.
By the time of the second shown World Tournament, three years later, Son Goku has surpassed Kamesennin. So has Tenshinhan, who was introduced in this tournament.
By the time of the third World Tournament, three years after the second, Kamesennin has been utterly left in the dust by Son Goku, Tenshinhan, Kuririn, possibly Yamucha, and Piccolo (who's a villain at this point).
Skip ahead several years and you get to Bejiita, who can destroy an entire planet in one shot with virtually no effort.

[EdenB]

I think even with all of those Ranma would proberly be beaten quite easily by most of the DragonBall/Z/GT characters.
Most of the items could proberly be destroyed with a ki attack without even getting near him and the DB characters tend to be so fast at times that they seem to disappear and reappear, quite a few are strong enough to take out a planet or moon, while Ranma doesn't even tear up the ground too much when his attacks hit them compared.
Even on a smaller scale DB characters seem to start off with attacks that can outright kill (for instance Piccolo's beam attack) while Ranma's normal Hiryu Shoten Ha just seems to hurt a lot.
Edit: I've been beaten to the post, so in overview, "Yeah, what he said!"

[Jester_of_doom]

ah yes.... exploding the moon... i had forgotten that had been so easy so early on. Really most of the battles dont look super impressive, like they only crack the ground about as much as in Ranma, and for some reason despite ability to blow up the planet shots that miss tend not to cause much damage. Thats why i was thinking maybe the first battle w/ vegita would be ok. Yeah though that goddamn moon exploding level of power way back when goku was much younger kinda destroys that train of thought.

[Nekomata-sensei]

ah yes.... exploding the moon... i had forgotten that had been so easy so early on. Really most of the battles dont look super impressive, like they only crack the ground about as much as in Ranma, and for some reason despite ability to blow up the planet shots that miss tend not to cause much damage. Thats why i was thinking maybe the first battle w/ vegita would be ok. Yeah though that goddamn moon exploding level of power way back when goku was much younger kinda destroys that train of thought.

Well, you have to remember that Kamesenin is the expert at the Kamehameha. It's quite possible there are levels of skill to the technique that the others haven't matched, which allow for obsurd power increases as far as the damage the blast can cause goes. Or perhaps he did some weird trick, like turning it into a bakusai tenketsu kamehameha that auto-blows up the moon, but doesn't really work on living beings? Kamesenin _does_ do that weird bluk up power up thing when he uses it, and the blasts he pulls off tend to look more impressive and complicated than the simple concentrated energy blasts the others tend to pull off.
Personally, I think Ranma would have a chance if he had all those items and moves and fought cheaply, but you have to remember that sayajins have ridiculous levels of durability. It takes blasts with planet destroying power to hurt Vegeta. Ranma, however, by the end of the manga, can destroy a mountain pretty easily, destroying a mountain gives kamesenin some trouble, he has to go through a big powerup sequence to destroy the fire mountain, how much damage could Ranma do if he _really_ tried?

[nuclear death frog]

Ranma, however, by the end of the manga, can destroy a mountain pretty easily

Under his own power? No, he can't -- or at least he never does. It was *Herb's* power that destroyed Horaizan and it was *Saffron's* power that destroyed Jusendo.

destroying a mountain gives kamesenin some trouble, he has to go through a big powerup sequence to destroy the fire mountain

He wasn't trying to destroy the mountain at all. He was trying to blow out the fire.
The mountain was destroyed completely on accident, along with the castle that sat atop the mountain.

[Nekomata-sensei]

I suppose you're right, but I was more thinking of the damage Ryoga can do with the shishihoukoudan, and how many moukou takabisha's Ranma can shoot out. I wasn't saying he could destroy it in one shot, I was saying he could destroy it easily. But you're right about kamesenin, it's been a while since I read dragonball, he _was_ just trying to blow out the fire.

[antimatterenergy]

If Ranma wanted to kill one dragonball person he probably could by cheating. Umisenken invisibility - which also hides his ki, super soba to make him stronger, and then stab the person in an artery with a magical weapon as hard as he can.
Dragonball people are just to damn powerful for Ranma to take head on in an even somewhat fair fight though Ranma maybe adaptive and sneaky enough to defeat a few of them and use their own power against them. (Dragonball people tend to be over confident and do not act overly smart.) But I would not give Ranma good odds even magically powered up because they outclass Ranma to much physically and in terms of power. Though give Ranma a few years to actually learn how to better use and power his ki techniques and Ranma maybe able to fight them (Ranma is a novice ki user and has only had a ki attack for quite a bit less than a year.)

[nuclear death frog]

The biggest Shishi Houkoudan that Ryouga ever used -- by far -- was the one he used against Lime. And it created a crater that had a diameter well under a hundred meters. And that's being very generous. And that was with a level of depression that would be extremely hard for Ryouga to top: Lime was choking him to death; he thought he was dying and would never see Akane again, and thus Ranma would win her by default.
Ranma never fires a single ki blast anywhere near that powerful in the whole series.

[antimatterenergy]

The "perfect" Shishi Houkoudans waste a lot of energy attacking the surroundings if Ranma found away to gather up all the energy that goes into the surounding area and condensing all of the energy into a single point and all the energy hit the target it would be quite a bit more effective and would probably leave a much much larger crater. This would be possible for Ranma since that is pretty much what he did during the battle versus Herb. Also Ranma generally does not spend time building up his aura. I can only remember him spending a few seconds at most and that was at the poor rich guy's hot spring to break the giant rock. The entire build up time and the throwing of his moko takabisha's is the amount of time it takes to say moko takabisha. Since the fights he is in he either doesn't need it (he rarely uses it, used it only around 3-4 times not counting the arc in which he learned it and one of those times he had improved on it by making a double) or are to fast for him to spend any time building up his aura (to busy fighting up close or using another technique like the hiryu shoten ha). The Dragonball characthers spend quite a bit more time powering up.

[nuclear death frog]

The Dragonball characthers spend quite a bit more time powering up.

Two things.
One, they've got a hell of a lot more power *to* build up.
Second, that's horribly exaggerated by the anime. In the manga, powering up is near-instantaneous in a number of cases.

[Screwball]

The problem Ranma has is that he just doesn't have enough power. Even with all the enhancements, he just starts off too far behind. He might might if he's insanely lucky, be able to hurn a DB character a bit, he won't seriously injure or disable any of them. In contrast, then can defeat him with one shot. It is not dissimilar to trying to kill a tank with a handgun. You can exchange the pistol for a much more capable rifle, but still do absolutely nothing.
It is, in fact, a situation fitting of this song, shamelessly stolen from Spacebattles:
Let's all sing the Curbstomp Song,
come on now and sing along:
Chorus:
When a fight is just plain wrong
We all sing the Curbstomp Song
Up in space their ships go boom
In a blaze of fiery doom
On the ground no hope is found,
Dying in a big tall mound.
Chorus
With tools behind fire and wheel
Going up against cold steel.
Strategy? Well they just rush;
There is no one they can crush.
Chorus
With a weakness so painful,
Quite Obvious and shameful
Tikes packing super soakers
Gaily melt these poor jokers.
Chorus
So when a fight's a slaughter,
not given any quarter,
just sing the Curbstomp Song
and ask 'why can't we all just get along?

[antimatterenergy]

As I already stated Ranma can't win in a straight fight but they're are other ways that Ranma can win if he fights smart and dirty.
Here is someways.
Manipulate the dragonball charachters into killing each other.
Figure out away to enter the DB charachters dreams like the one old man did to Ranma's dreams for a date and convince them in their dreams that someone they trust is going to betray them.
Use Junsenkyo waters to weaken the DB charachters as we have seen Ranma's cursed form is weaker than his normal form and we have seen by Herb that Herbs cursed form has less ki than his normal form. At the same time use Junsenkyo's powers to add to you're own.
Use a very strong poison in their foods. Since Goku eats so fast he probably won't notice until after it starts killing him.
Use sugestion inscense or magic mushrooms to convince them to do something detrimental to their health like convince them to fly to the center of the sun (you're so powerful I'm sure you can do it with the added effects of the magic they probably would especially if Ranma in girl form is hitting on them at the time).
Since Magic does effect DB characthers use the koi rod and make the person fall in love with you then to prove they're love have them kill the others or have them kill themselves afterall Ranma was willing to die for Ryoga under the power of the koi rod. Though this can back fire.
Use the sneak up and magic weapon to vulnerable spot method mentioned earlier.
Use multiple nukes. The explosion may not kill them but enough of the radiation might.
Use a wishing item like the sword Kuno had or the Dragon balls to wish himself able to fight them.
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.

[WG_Writer]

perhaps Ranma isn't tough enough to be a serious fighter in the DB universe, but lets be honest, he could beat Hurcule easily. Its more a matter of the fact that Ranma isn't trained well enough, I am sure that he could undergoe the usual DB crash course in fighting and get to a point he is better then Krillen. As to the rest... I doubt Ranma could get anywhere near Goku or most of the others.

[nuclear death frog]

As I already stated Ranma can't win in a straight fight but they're are other ways that Ranma can win if he fights smart and dirty.

And if you're going to have him do these...why use *Ranma* in the first place? By making him act so utterly out-of-character, you're basically making him an original character, so why not save yourself a hassle of explaining why he's acting in ways that he simply WOULD NOT DO under any normal circumstances, and just make up your own character?