How Does Planet Busting Work In Dragon Ball Z? 

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I've never heard anyone argue that planet busting is a TYPE of technique. What I have heard is that all earlier feats of planet busting relied on just sufficiently damaging the core, and then letting the planet do all the actual legwork of exploding itself.

I think it's pretty clearly NOT based on their intent to destroy the planet. If so, nobody would have worried about Goku's shot against Cell, because obviously he wouldn't intend that. It seems pretty clearly to be based on the angle, and the size of the blast(as well as having enough power)

The real reason is Toriyama wanted to raise the stakes and make a villain seem very strong and menacing, but if a villain can turn a planet to dust with a finger, then that means anyone stronger than that can do it too, even Gohan or Goten, so the logic of the universe got out of hand pretty quickly. At the end of the day, its a story. From a story perspective characters who should be strong enough to blow up the earth with a sneeze can generate explosions that leave a crater behind...but don't vaporize the galaxy, because of story reasons.

a lot of fans completely ignore the fact that a planet busting attack actually needs to be in a form that could empart the energy of the attack through the planet. Just because a punch from goku scales to the amount of energy required to blow up a planet doesn't mean it would, it would likely just vaporize a small area on impact and not go deep enough to blow up the planet, meanwhile an energy wave with the same energy could drill into the world and blow it to bits when it explodes.

The best way I can see for the more narrow beams is that they're dense spirals of energy compacting and coiling on itself to keep most potency while minimizing collateral damage

I've always ran with the logic that those powerful, but small blasts are sorta "concentrated" energy because they are trying to damage a target with a lot of their own ki protecting them from damage, while a plant has no real resistance to their attack so they are using a sorta "low density" explosion that is just really large area.

This has been something I've thought about since I was a kid watching the show. I've come to the conclusion that it depends on the intent of the user and nature of the attack itself along with how much power is being put out. Because we're at the point, where in theory, even Krillin could blow up planet earth if he wanted to.

Don't forget: The ability to destroy a planet is insignificant next to the power of the Force.

My assumption is that Vegeta would have been OK to die in Earth's explosion if it meant beating Goku.

Simplest way I see it is this: The core of the moon is relatively cool and solid. From the looks of it, Piccolo and Jackie just busted it with raw power, and then everyone from then on scales upwards from that, therefore planet-busting is pretty-much unimpressive by the Namek saga... I'm pretty sure the easiest way to do it is what Frieza did on Namek, but it's clearly not the only way. And of course, Ki control would prevent any unintended collateral... It's Toriyama's cheat code to have people who can blow up the galaxy fight without seriously harming a single planet, so it has both a narrative and meta-narrative purpose. Anyhow, you went into a great amount of detail, and used a multitude of different examples and statements with different interpretations. And what's consistent about all these interpretations is "intent". I love how you went into detail about how Ki is influenced by intent. The spiritual and mental aspects of Ki are often overlooked. It isn't just laser beams, it's the manifestation of a beings physical, mental, and spiritual strength, and it's the primary source of almost all of the abilities we see in DB...

15:15 - Guy just name-dropped the 3 most iconic time-dilated scenes in history 😂. I just watched Fast 6 the other week actually...

I never thought that it was a particular technique needed to destroy a planet, just any attack with enough energy output.

Honestly, this has to be the most accurate take on the subject. If it was simply a matter of "power level" as is commonly argued, then you literally cannot have a fight after the Cell Games without a kick or a punch dusting the planet you're standing on. Obviously you need to be sufficiently strong, but once at that level, intention seems to matter more than anything else. Hence why attacks that miss or get deflected only leave small holes or craters.

What always confused me the most was Majin Vegeta's self-destruct against Fat Buu. At that point, he was a SSJ2 even stronger than when Gohan fought Cell and yet an attack so powerful that it cost his life only left a crater maybe the size of a city block at best. You can make the argument that he was drained of ki fighting Buu and that obviously he wouldn't want to destroy the Earth since his sacrifice was meant to protect the planet, but at that point in the story he shouldn't of needed a self-sacrifice technique to create an attack of that scale even heavily drained of ki. It was one of the best moments of the story in terms of emotional impact, but it was just extremely weird power-scaling when you think about it.

I think the fighters concentrate their power so it’s a lot of power in a small area. Buus self destruct is insane and it could destroy the planet but doesn’t because its contained to a small radius. To destroy a planet they have to focus on the planet itself.

A good example is may be a railgun can shoot straight through a building or house, but it’s still gonna be standing, but you can destroy the house with a smaller piece of explosive that would not be able to destroy a tank when the rail gun would

“What’s the matter, Frieza? I can’t be harder to destroy than a _planet,_ right…?”

I love this channel cause you be asking the real questions

Mike I am absolutely love if this new form of video you been doing. These are awesome dude

It's stated in the dragon ball z guide that to be able to destroy a planet, you need a power level of at least 10,000. King Vegeta was even able to destroy multiple planets at once. The namekian Nail can bust a planet., even krillin , yamcha , tien , master can destroy Mutiple planets , So It became an Ordinary Technique Now Days ,

They can blow up Suns too but can't survive being thrown into one. They can't survive lava according to characters during fights but take atomic bomb level blasts.. the durability is confusing

One thing that Super taught us, or more accurately Resurrection F, is that planets can be destroyed by ki attacks by accident, as displayed by Beerus when he literally sneezed an energy blast into one of the moons of his planet. That was just a regular energy attack, not one powered by energy of destruction. All that said, I don't think it takes a special kind of technique to do a planet in. Just an attack of sufficient power. The fact that Roshi blew up the moon with a standard energy beam, and Piccolo did the same thing with an unnamed ki attack. It certainly helps if the intent is there, but I can certainly see that it isn't necessarily required. If mountains can't survive a Z fighter being thrown through them, there's no way the planet could survive a direct hit from a Cell saga level attack. I honestly think that the only reason that the planet survived Tien's Kikoho barrage is because Cell was there tanking the majority of the damage. If Cell had been able to dodge, the Earth would have been toast.

Loving this kind of content

This is a really fun discussion video for some head canon but it really just comes down to the writing. The reason these galaxy destroying attacks from God level characters going all out don't destroy the planets theyre fighting on is because it would be inconvenient for the writers. So fights get to stay just as flashy as they ever were, even after some God level characters double their strength, and the planets don't have to worry until the script says "and then the planet exploded" lol. It's the only downside to writing the Anime with the highest power ceiling

Dragonball does not follow real science or physics, it is still consistent tho. The big take away people should have is a characters strongest technique is MASSIVELY above just their normal power level. So someone waving their hand and destroying a planet is not even remotely similar to them using some mega technique to destroy the planet

good video! the area of effect is the best explanation to this. In super, we have more examples to that too

I always thought that in terms of beam clashes in this series, they canceled out each other's damage instead of multiplying the output into an explosion. So it would be angle and whether the attack is being blocked by someone with enough defense or an equally strong beam as to whether the planet would survive.

First & Foremost Fantastic video! The originality to think of this as a episode/video & you're complete coverage from Magna to Anime. My questions Mike is do you think that Ball energy attack types (Pretty much all the Top villains have Frieza, Buu & Beerus) are more destructive than beams, & are they that effective at busting Planets because they all are thrown from a High perspective sometimes even from Outer Space?

A good example of terrible ki blast that doesn't destroy the planet is the shin kikohoo released by Tien multiple times against semi-perfect Cell. Is it the Tien's intention that doesn't permit a planet destruction since he is focused on hitting Cell? Or maybe because the energy is totally concentrated in a precise point? Because if you consider the angle, which is almost vertical, and Tien's power at that point of the story, he would have destroyed the planet quite easily, I guess.

The biggest mystery for me when it comes to planet busting characters is how on Earth does Super Broly Enraged manage to keep the Earth from blowing up? or similar characters that have lost all sense of rationality?

How about Vegeta destroying planet Arlia? It was filler episode in anime, but still he did destroy it.

I wish you'd talked about what I think is the most interesting case of a planet being destroyed for this video which is Resurrection F. Frieza has progressed to a level where he doesn't need to power up or even use a blast. He just smacks the Earth and shoves so much ki into it that it breaks apart, and he's not even Golden when he does it.

The planet destroying attack vegeta used against frieza in an act of desperation actually was his ultimate attack in the raging blast games, I think it was called galick burst cannon or something along the lines of that

Oh good putting in science in a show that has a gravity machine that would flatten our inners

Great work.

They work because the writer wants them to work and in whatever way they feel like at the time. I'm glad there was no filler involved. Filler writers usually have no idea what they are talking about. King Vegeta casually destroys a solar system with a wave of his hand, yet Lord Freiza himself takes time to destroy just one planet. Factoring in filler taints the data and produces a flawed model that will give incorrect calculations and data.

I think their ki is a just their physical punching energy condensed into a raw destructive energy. So they could spend days punching the world apart or just put that strength and energy into a single vaporizing beam. For example ssj 2 Goku and Vegeta fighting are probably punching each other with enough to destroy islands per hit.

I mean planet size doesn’t always tie into its gravity , it’s about the density , if planet vegeta is the same size as earth it would need a much denser core but if it was massive it could be similar sized core but the size effects the gravity instead

Like when Broly rolled his dice hand and tosses a baby Ki blast that blew up another planet from where he was but then you got Broly Raging out charging a blast to kill Gohan and Goten and the explosion was only like a building size blast

I would just like to argue that when these feats are made or boasted by their characters, they come from a great deal of ignorance seemingly as Akira Toriyama doesn't know how much force is needed in order to blow up a planet. So it's hard to quanitfy how strong a character is in terms of physics. You have to consider what is the primary objective of them shouting out these hyperbolic statements like "This attack has enough power to blow up the multiverse!!!11" is to ratchet up TENSION and the DRAMATIC STAKES of the scene. Regardless of whether the attack would be able to destroy the planet or not. It could be true that Vegeta in the Saiyan Saga could blow up the Earth, but in that case I would like to pose the question of how come when people fight in Dragon Ball Z their physical power doesn't scale with their Ki Powers? Like when a character gets kicked into a mountain they fly into the mountain, stones crumble, and they emerge bruised or bloodied. And how this happens pretty much the same in OG Dragon Ball as in Dragon Ball Z and Dragon Ball Super. My personal theory is that Ki and "Power Levels" functions effectevly as a "Shield" or protection against other people's Ki. And in order to severely hurt the other person your Ki needs to be able to overpower and dominate the other person's Ki. This kinda makes sense when you take into account that characters in Dragon Ball rarely if ever are "En Par" when they fight, it's often one underdog fighting a stronger opponent until something changes the status quo. And fights that are close are usually drawn out and really coming down to the nitty gritty. So the base power for destroying a planet remains rather low. But for one fighter to hurt another they need to focus their Ki into attacks that can penetrate the Ki of their opponents. Planets don't have like "Ki" in the same way as the fighters so the feat of destroying one is somewhat basic. But we later see that in the Buu saga Goku struggles to life like 40 tonnes, which does not scale to the power that we would suppose he would've grown, being presumably thousands of times stronger than he was in OG Dragon Ball. Even though in OG Dragon Ball Goku pushed a boulder that would possibly be in a comparative ballpark of a couple of dozen tonnes. So Ki doesn't necessarity equate to physical power, or scales at a much lower rate, than Ki Damage output. At the end of the day, Toriyama doesn't know physics, and we shouldn't expect him to. Dragon Ball is wildly inconsistent in how it portrays "Power". I honestly don't believe Super Goku to be all that physically stronger than Namek Saga Goku. His power has ascended but since the series doesn't contextualize how power is meaningfully scaled (And every character that tries to quanitfy is shown to be foolish for doing so), we can't really say for certain just how strong these characters truly are.

Sometimes you're just not supposed to think about some things in fiction. You're not supposed to wonder why they don't accidentally destroy the planet all the time. You're not supposed to wonder what happens if Ranma from Ranma 1/2 gets pregnant as a girl and then changes back to a boy. You're not supposed to wonder why Frodo didn't fly the giant eagles directly to Mordor in Lord of the Rings.

Full power Frieza: *blows up Namek in 5 minutes* King Vegeta: Hold my beer.

I never got how all these characters are this powerful that any stray ki blast that hits the planet or anything else isnt blown up

The idea of the intent behind the energy is a game changer for me. That explains so well why energy blasts from current characters don't destroy the entire galaxy when they miss their target.

People out here destroying moons when they could just remove tails or obscure the moon

the funny thing is that the moon is PRETTY far away from earth, at least if we talk about real life, the fact that roshi and piccolo can destroy the moon is not as impressive as the idea that they can do it FROM EARTH, you could fit about 30 earths between earth and the moon, that's some incredible range

They work by busting the planet 😏 Lol, love the content LSM

9:05 didn't Vegeta destroy that bug planet with Nappa using only one finger? idk if that was in the manga but it was definitely in the anime

31:30 Problem is Buu was literally stated to use a special technique to trigger a chain reaction, with the added note that Frieza's Supernova is similar to it. 😅 Single Attack that Destroy the Earth : "A technique where he (Buu) levitate a gigantic spherical ki over the palm of his hand, then strike the ground with it. Throught the ki's power, the magma within the Earth swells and explodes. This technique wiped out the Earth without leaving a trace behind. Freeza also use a similar technique." (Daizenshuu 2, p. 216)

Attack Potency and Destructive capacity is all you need to settle this argument

As far as the angle and distance goes it’s like a bullet works. Hit the sides of a sphere it takes smaller damage off it. Hit the middle it’s a bull eye and puts a huge hole in the item. Same principle basically.

Mike i love ur videos followed ur channel for years ur a great content creator. Love ur collabs with danny but i want more vids with with juan and quaman great Content there if ur a decade old youtube dragon ball fan.

If it makes them look cool then it makes sense Dbz logic in a nut shell

Intent is a decent way to put it, but an arguably better way is to say that the attack has to have high enough AP (attack potency) with enough DC(destructive capability). For example characters in DBS are universal and their attacks hit the planet all the time. The reason why it doesn’t destroy it is because the AP of the attacks are universal, but the DC is low. A bullet or frieza’s dead beams are good examples of high AP and low DC.

You should do a what if piccolo got his potential unlocked either by guru on namek or by making a wish during cell saga

I know you have a video on here detailing what would have happened if Goku got to king Kai planet in the time he was supposed to

10:32 Vegeta's attack used here is called "Final Burst Cannon" and is equated to a proto-Super Galick Gun. Just like Final Crash, Vegeta is experimenting with moves he will later perfect in the following arcs.

I always figured the thing with frieza on namek was Goku had been fighting him for so long that he didn't accuratelly judge how much energy he had left. I mean he'd been fighting Vegeta, Piccolo, and Krill for awhile, then Goku, survived a spirit bomb, and then SSJ Goku had been beating the shit outta him and Frieza had wasted a lot of energy just trying to damage SSJ Goku. Not was he not sure if he'd survive, but he likely didn't have the energy to casually do it without powering up a little. So he held back and likely had less energy than he thought.

haven't finished your video but I personally believed it was always a combination of technique and intent. A destructo disc might not destroy a planet but a beam style ki blast from the same person could and even then it would have to be aimed otherwise it would just take a chunk out of the planet and not blow it up entirely.

6:14 "I'll turn you into ashes with the planet *along with it!"* Accounting Goku, the shield for the Planet to destroy them both. Another point is when Buu used a low power Ki blast and Vegeta blocked it. Then Buu attacked the Earth a second time with a huge sphere of energy, this time Goku said that they can't block that.

Well in the anime Vegeta on namek blast was dub in 2 video games final burst cannon better known as final galick gun cannon in which was shown with a massive massive explosion out side of planet namke when Frieza kick the blast off world

I think a better question is how does galaxy/universe busting works. I'm no physics master but theres nothing but empty space and astroids between this galaxy and the next. Wouldnt that just destroy the planets and stuff and thats about that?

i remember vegeta saying something in the anime about how high someone's power level had to be to instantly wipe out a planet of a specific size. wasn't it right after him and napa killed off that alien race he said something about a few thousand is all it would take? i cant remember an exact number but it was 15000 or less

My theory: With specialized technique, time to charge and distance(so it build power) even a low hundreads battle power ki user can destroy a celestial body. The closer, the more generic the technique, the less time it take to charge, the harder it became, and the stronger you need to be to do it. Thats why we see all the anomalies we see in the show.

How i always viewed it was is that you need a certain amount of power and you have to able to casually emit or use that kind of power in a blast. Vegeta in the Saiyan Saga was the first confirmed planet level character with his power level of 18,000 Gallick Gun. Note that Vegeta isn't winded or really tired after this. He can casually destroy worlds. And while it was filler, in the anime we see Vegeta casually destroy planet Arlia. So you could argue that maybe Raditz, Piccolo, or Goku in early Z could destroy the earth, but unlike Saiyan Saga Vegeta, it would take ALL of their power. Assuming they could do this. Just like it took Roshi all of his energy to destroy the moon in Dragon Ball. It does seem like they have to create a blast and charge it sufficiently to destroy a planet, which explains why it doesnt by accident very much. You have to charge the blast enough to do it and then shoot it at the planet directly.

Curiosity, all times blow up a planet/moon is easy, is made from AFAR, maybe ki attacks build power with time and distance? Edit: In power of the gods, the showckwaves from Goku/Bills punches, don´t damage earth, but destroy planets far away. And old kai, said it was building power. So there is a canon exemple.

I also think when they say destroy the planet they are referring to life on the planet. Except when frieza said he was going to destroy the planet. Like a firecracker held on your palm as opposed to closing your palm around the firecracker

With how Frieza is coloured in on this video's thumbnail, he looks a bit more like how King Cold likely would in his first form.

He didn't mention about Freiza blowing up planet vegeta with his supernova

I think that Piccolo was implying complete destruction of human society on the planet... That's how I read it.

I figure they would have to be very dense blasts that can retain its form all the way to the core in order to detonate it. The amount of power required doesn't seem to be all that much as Roshi is able to destroy the moon way all the way back in early Dragonball.

Apparently the explosive demon wave blew up the moon.

You forgot the moment when Vegeta was in space with Nappa on there way to Earth when he destroyed a planet.

If your power level barely meets the minimum required to bust a planet, it would require you to use a technique to use the most efficient possible attack. Much like using a fulcrum for mechanical advantage. Basically, if you use the shatterpoint of the planet you can hit it in just the right way using a minimum of Chi, instead of an unfocused blast of the same small output getting absorbed in the crust of the planet because it wasn't focused in the right way.

I Just Wanted To Say We Control Photons Not Electrons. Photons Are Packets Of Light Energy, Electrons Are Atomic Nucei Particles.

You've got a nice mustache going there, very distinguished!

Yess love videos like this here always wunna know how much power does it take to destroy the planet

There’s a certain point where you may as well destroy the physical planet when a big chunk is blown off and it will no longer be in its natural spin and orbit. You have to think for a star to destroy one it either needs to engulf it close enough to its core to break it all down to plasma or go super nova.

1:33 before I watch the whole thing I think the planet will explode after the ki attack detonates

WAIT... MASTER ROSHI IS JACKIE CHUN?!?

You’re channel is such a breath of fresh air, like, such novel topics from such a long running series. You love to see it.

Anyone know where I can download the thumbnail?

Do the rest next. Like solar system, galaxy snd universe. When we say characters are universal and beyond, does that mean they can one shot a universe? How does that make sense? Where would you shoot the blast for it to obliterate so many damn galaxies, and how long would it take for it to actually be destroyed? You get what im saying? Like when cell said he was gonna destroy the solar system for example, did he mean instantly? Or the blast would stretch across the solar system and wipe out all the planets moons and stars over time.

Planet go boom. That's how. 😊

Thanks

I would bet that after firing a ki blast, the person shooting it could unfocus the beam or otherwise cause it to dissipate - goku shot a kamehameha that he could move around and change its direction, so it would make sense if people who could fire off blasts that destroys the planet they are on would learn to be disciplined enough to have a similar connection to their beam attacks to not let them destroy the ground beneath their feet. If the person they are fighting is standing at the surface, the explosion would be large enough to be a problem, but as far as Gohan not destroying the solar system, makes sense that after it goes a certain distance he could let it stop being a coherent laser beam and start spreading out

I think a few of the "you'll destroy the planet" statements are just saying the attack is powerful. I think most fighters in Dragon Ball can control the blast radius for their attacks, Ki blast are typically meant to be small explosions the deal splash damage but can cover larger areas at a cost of a weaker blast in comparison, while beam attacks like Kamehameha are meant to do direct damage.

I hate the fact that planet busting was even a thing. Since it all started by Frieza blowing up planet Vegeta, and then Vegeta and nappa were just randomly destroying planets for no reason essentially.

Freeza was using 50% of his power when he claimed he was going to destroy Namek; stating later he held back to much - which was due to him wanting to test his full power against SSj1 Goku. Even if Freeza is to lose and can last until Namek blows up - Goku would die in the vacuum of space while Freeza can survive in it. This would set his BP at 60,000,000 during that controlled held back energy attack. It only takes a BP of 10,000 - 15,000 (Daizenshuu/guide books) to destroy a celestial body. The size is never stated. It's safe to assume it would at the very least take 10,000 to 15,000 to destroy Earth. Ki control/focus/concentration is a thing; angle and shape matters also. Just wanted to add my 2 cents.

Anytime a character gets tired fighting or frustrated they say “I’m about to blow up this entire planet”

Ki control and intent is a big thing, as well as technique. Stronger attack don't mean bigger explosions. Look at Gogeta's stardust breaker. It's way more potent and can vaporize opponents who would laugh off a planet busting blast x 10, but it wouldn't harm a fly next to the opponent it hit. Certian ki blasts can make bigger explosions than others. Some have potential to accidently destroy a planet. Other attacks that are much stronger wouldn't even make a big crater on its surface, but could be 1000x more potent than the one that destroyed the planet. I think you could a have a ki blast hit the Earth powerful enough to destroy the galaxy and only make a small hole in the ground, if the technique is used to make it a very potent and direct hit on an opponent.

I think they are more saying the damage done to the planet would kill everyone. But i agree a planet buster attack is intent. only because of android 16 attack that doesnt destroy the earth while firing up directly into the earth

Vegeta tanking two planet buster attacks and still getting up in his first appearance is crazy

The attack vegeta used to try and blow up namek would of 100 billion percent blow up the planet if u watch the anime the explosion was bigger than the planet

In both the case of Goku firing his warp Kamehameha at Cell, and Gohan repelling Cell's Kamehameha, it's simply a matter of the angle at which they were fired. Goku is much shorter than Cell and was clearly aiming up at Cell's torso/head, and Gohan was aiming directly above him at Cell. There's no reason in either case that their own attacks should harm the planet. Kamehameha isn't an aoe attack.

I have an easier explanation for why Freeza's blast didn't destroy the planet, which kind of relies on the fact that Freeza doesn't actually have a grasp on ki. He thinks that he held back too much... what if it's the opposite? His attack went RIGHT THROUGH and didn't actually detonate at the core of the planet. Freeza is used to using a gigantic but much weaker blast that just blows the planet right up, which he can use in his first form, so when he tried in his final form, it was actually TOO strong and went right past the planet.

In the Majin Buu saga in the anime, Babidi is astounded that they have power levels over 300 Kilis or at least that's what I think it's called but it only takes 50 or 80 Kilis to destroy a planet.

Omg I’m first wow, this is the best moment of my life

"Cell himCellf" Nice.