Board Thread:Naruto Discussions/@comment-25498052-20141004162612/@comment-24649454-20141016212751

Naruto hasn't had the upper hand once in this fight. Yes he may be holding back but even if he goes all out he most likely won't be more powerful than Sasuke due to Sasuke having more Tailed Beast chakra than Naruto and also Sasuke being a better tactician/strategist.Before absorbing the tailed beasts chakra into Susanoo Naruto probably had a slight edge in raw power from his tailed beast chakra but Sasuke evens that out with his intelligence and strategies. With no tailed beast beast chakra they're roughly equal in raw power due to Hagoromo's chakra. Without that we can say Naruto after gaining his tailed beast mode was stronger than Sasuke, and probably had a slight edge over him even using Jugo's version of sage mode. Before the war arc though, Sasuke was clearly stronger as he was on par with Naruto while using his MS without Susanoo while exhausted after fighting Danzo, the Kage and a load of Samurai. (Don't know why Naruto wasn't fighting in Sage mode since he was in it up until just before saving Sakura). Then I think it's also obvious that base Naruto is weaker than base Sasuke as Sasuke has always been better in base and if we're judging it on stats, he still should be due to his Genjutsu and Intelligence. I think Sasuke will get: Nin 5, Tai 4.5, Gen 4.5, Int 4.5, Str 3.5, Spd 4.5, Sta 4, HS 4.5, Total 35, while I think Naruto will get: Nin 5, Tai 4.5, Gen 3, Int 3.5, Str 4, Spd 4, Sta 5, HS 3, Total 32. In their base forms they both have 5th tier Ninjutsu anyway, and are somewhat equal in Taijutsu but not on the levels of Guy or Lee etc. Sasuke has great Genjutsu and Naruto has improved his through befriending Kurama to help him escape it (I imagine that doesn't count as exceeding base form) Both characters have grown in intelligence but Naruto is clearly still kinda dumb as evidenced by forgetting almost instantly that Sage Jutsu was all that worked on Juubito, I think physically Naruto is probably stronger as he seems to have a slightly better physique and relies more on brute strength than Sasuke, but Sasuke is faster in base as Naruto has somewhat average speed without Sage mode or Kyubi mode, obviously Naruto has more chakra/stamina but Sasuke has shown he is no slouch in terms of endurance and finally in terms of hand seals/signs, Naruto has clearly improved with all the Fuuinjutsu he'd learnt but Sasuke has much more knowledge of hand signs and fuuinjutsu etc mostly from Orochimaru's tutelage and also being able to use more jutsu that require more complex hand signs than what Naruto uses.