 You need to understand what we're sailing into. There's a reason why the Grand Line is called the Pirate's Graveyard. It's because of the three great powers that rule those waters. One of which is the Seven Warlords of the Sea. Hello and welcome to One Piece 101, the series that breaks down everyone and everything in the One Piece world. To date, we are going to be exploring a long overdue group consisting of some of the most loved characters in the entire series, the Seven Warlords of the Sea. The Seven Warlords of the Sea, also known as the Shichi Pukai, are a group of powerful pirates whose actions are granted immunity by the world government in exchange for their assistance with various undertakings in the interest of maintaining global order. In fact, the Seven Warlords, along with the Marines and the Four Emperors, are referred to as the three great powers, and the Marines in combination with the Seven Warlords are said to provide a balance to the Four Emperors, implying that without these seven figures, the scale of power would tip greatly in favor of the Emperors. This is despite the fact that most Warlords of the Sea don't care whatsoever for the interest of the world government and will more often than not ignore their summons and proceed to use the title of Warlord for their own individual pursuits. Now, the makeup of the Seven Warlords has changed quite dramatically over the course of the series, but at the commencement of Luffy's adventure, the Seven Warlords of the Sea consisted of Sir Crocodile, an exceptionally intelligent mastermind and at the time the leader of a highly influential underground organization named Baroque Works, who very nearly succeeded in the task of plunging a country into complete civil war. Not only that, but he is a user of a logotype devil fruit that allows him to conjure, manipulate, and become sand. So he is a fearsome opponent in his own right as well. Gecko Moria, the captain of the world's largest pirate ship, Thriller Bark and a one-time rival of Kaido, one of the Four Emperors. Moria also possesses a very deadly devil fruit that allows him to steal and manipulate the shadows of his opponents. Bartholomew Kuma, an incredibly complicated individual who has ties to almost every major faction in the One Piece world. He possesses terrifying raw strength and a devil fruit that allows him to repel anything he touches, which is much more powerful than it sounds. Oh, and he's a cyborg. Don Quixote Dol Flamingo, the heavenly demon. He is a former world noble and the figurehead of a vast underground black market within the One Piece world, primarily involving weapons manufacture and the slavery trade. He is an awakened devil fruit user whose power allows him to conjure and manipulate strings. Once again, this power is much more devastating than it sounds. And he was able to blackmail his way to becoming a warlord of the sea by threatening to reveal the national treasure of the world nobles. Boa Hancock, the pirate empress and captain of the all-female Cougar Pirates with a devil fruit that in conjunction with her natural beauty allows her to turn just about anybody in the world into stone with a few notable exceptions. She joined the Seven Warlords in order to protect her home island of Amazon Lily from being entered by the world government. Jin Bei, the Knight of the Sea, a very honorable master of Fishman Karate and a former member of the Sun Pirates led by Fisher Tiger, who is considered to be one of the greater enemies of the world government. Jin Bei accepted a position amongst the Seven Warlords in order to strengthen the bonds between human and fishmen. Drakeul Mihawk, the undisputed world's greatest swordsman and one-time rival of red-haired shanks, who currently serves as one of the four emperors. He is quite possibly the most powerful member of the Seven Warlords and very potentially the greatest asset to the world government. Or he would be if, you know, he ever did anything that they asked him to. So as you can see, we have quite an odd mixture of people who comprise this group, all of whom are exceptionally dangerous but tend to operate individually. In fact, several of the warlords have gone their entire tenure without ever having met their contemporaries at all, making them a not really efficient fighting force, at least not when compared to the Marines or the crew of an emperor. For the most part, that's not really the point of the Seven Warlords, though. They exist to deter the existence of other pirates. They're a ceremonial show of power by the world government. It's the general idea that, you know, if even people like Drakeul Mihawk or Bola Hancock can be brought under control, then what chance do you have? As well as the idea that if you were to stand against the world government, then there is every chance you'll have to face off against one of these individuals at some point, which is not an appealing idea for most pirates. Other than that, the warlords are essentially allowed to operate however they'd like with the caveat that they compensate the world government with a portion of their plunder, kind of like an immunity tax, I guess, although I highly doubt that the world government have any effective method of enforcing this. But while the exact balance of power is unknown, the world government has deemed it exceptionally important that there are seven individuals with this warlord title at any given time, which gives rise to great concern whenever a member of this group leaves for whatever reason. For example, the very first time this occurred in the series was when Sir Crocodile was defeated by Luffy on the desert nation of Alabaster. Not only was this counterproductive to Crocodile's purpose of being a show of intimidating power, but it was also uncovered that he was concocting a nefarious plot to obtain the ancient weapon Pluton and cause great instability to the world. And so the world government were left with no choice but to arrest Crocodile and strip him of the warlord title. Of course, to maintain balance, the world government then hurriedly scrambled to replace Crocodile and the candidate they landed on was Marshal D. Teach, also known as Blackbeard. Now, Teach was a rare case because he didn't outwardly portray the traditional qualities of a warlord, as he had next to no name recognition at the time. And in fact, he did not even have a bounty assigned to him. However, he had managed to defeat and capture Firefist Ace, a notorious member of the Whitebeard Pirates. And so Teach was accepted. Sometime after this, it became clear that a war with the Whitebeard Pirates was inevitable. And so all seven of the warlords were summoned to the Holy Land of Marishwa. And this would be the event that triggered the largest change in the composition of the seven warlords. Firstly, Jinbei refused to participate and was thus stripped of his title and imprisoned in Impel Down. Meanwhile, Blackbeard betrayed the world government almost immediately and used his position to infiltrate Impel Down to recruit fearsome pirates for his own crew. And following the war, Gekko Moria was deemed too weak to continue his association and was abruptly sacked, in a manner of speaking. So this left a rather large power vacuum following the time skip. The seven warlords looked incredibly different. Only four of the original members remained, however, being added to the fold after the time skip were Trafalgar Law, the surgeon of death who was a member of the worst generation and was accepted as a warlord after he presented the hearts of 100 pirates to the world government. Buggie the Clown, leader of the pirate dispatch organization and a former member of the Roger Pirates who gained extreme notoriety during the paramount war for his highly successful marketing campaigns. And Edward Weevill, the self-proclaimed son of the late Whitebeard and an extraordinarily powerful figure who was systematically eliminating his alleged father's former crew and allies in search of his fortune. And just like that, we had a full set of warlords once more. However, this would not last long, not long at all, as Trafalgar Law formed an alliance with Monkey D. Luffy in order to take down another of the warlords, Dol Flamingo, essentially culminating in both of them being removed from the positions and the arrest of Dol Flamingo after his various grand crimes came to light. And so for quite some time in the series now and still at the time of this recording, only five of the seven warlord positions are currently filled. And actually without getting into too many spoilers for the reverie arc, let's just say the Bartholomew Kuma status as a warlord is questionable. However, whether or not new members will be recruited is subject to debate, as it has been implied by Admiral Fujitora that the legendary Dr. Vagapunk has created something that has eliminated the need for their existence. Some more fun facts about the seven warlords. At one point during his career, the title of warlord was offered to port Gasti Ace, although he declined the position, which is the only known time in the series thus far that an offer has been refused. Upon becoming a warlord of the sea, the world government officially freezes whatever bounty is currently assigned to that individual, removing a huge incentive to engage them in combat. In one piece, Colour Walk Seven, Etchera Oda revealed that he originally intended Basil Hawkins, another member of the worst generation, to become a warlord of the sea, that idea was eventually scrapped. In the one piece anime special, 3D2Y, it was rather interestingly stated that the warlords of the sea were established within the last 30 years of the current timeline. However, this special is not canon, and thus we should take that information with several thousand grains of salt. And finally, a truly useless fact, the seven warlords of the sea were once parodied in the legendary series Gintama, labeled as the Chichi Bukai. And furthermore, that isn't even the only reference to the warlords of the sea as seen in Gintama. But that pretty much does it for the seven warlords. 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