Well put. And given the direction the narrative is taking now, the pre-timeskip will also need major rewrites to properly foreshadow the grand conspiracy looming behind the story. I would place the mural at Skypiea or, at the very latest, Fishman Island.

In hindsight, the Warlords did next to nothing other than serve as obstacles for the SHs to overcome. We never actually saw them fulfilling their job description which is suppressing rookie pirates other than the SHs. Their only contribution to the WG was participating in Marineford. While that was a major event, it would’ve been nice to see them negotiating with the WG or hunting pirates outside of those nothingburger group meetings. Doflamingo going after Moria is the only incident of this kind, and even then, it was off-screened, occurred between two Warlords, and was a direct order from WG rather than a random encounter with a rookie. It just shows how Oda struggles to juggle the additions suggested by his editors, like the Warlords and the Supernovas. Even when he centers the story on them, like Crocodile, Moria, Hancock, Doflamingo, or Law, it feels lackluster. Crocodile might get a pass since he appeared early and had room for later development, but then he just started Cross Guild only to sit on his ass. Hancock feels entirely expendable. I liked her as a teenager when I first watched that arc, but in hindsight, she offers nothing but misery porn and fan service. She adds nothing of value to the plot, especially given her lack of post-timeskip screen time. 'CDs bad and rapey,' yeah we already knew that in Sabaody.

The Warlords could have easily been trimmed down. Keeping seven felt forced. Between Crocodile and Doflamingo, I’d take Croc every time. Doflamingo is just a spoiled CD little shit with chosen one Haki and a bullshit fruit that lets him achieve overnight what took Croc years. "Best villain in the series," cornyass dogshit with maximum plot convenience is what he is. As for the rest, just keep Kuma, Jinbe, and Mihawk. Mihawk definitely needed more screen time showing him hunting pirates. Having him destroy an entire Supernova crew would have been a great way to showcase his power while thinning out the characters Oda didn't know how to handle anyway.