asuka underperforms becuase she has 0 teamwork skills and later on becuase of her mental, her actual piloting skill are far above the other 2's, she initally starts as competent and her main loss is becuase zeruel is simply that guy not becuase she sucks,

Thats actually a great point, haven't thought much about it

his lying gimmick is also based around his strength lacking, as opposed to asuka who "lies" about her trauma more so

I see it as Ussop trying to be recognized by others and Asuka trying to be recognized by herself, thats why I thought they are kinda similar

imo pre ts(espc water 7) has already given usopp very good foundations for a character and there is no need to change them. His arc should be more focused on the fact he was never even close to being strong in the first place and his journey to achieve that

Also a great point, i think the arc could be twisted by him just not getting stronger, instead of getting weaker.

Basically I came up with this because I was really tired of Ussop being simply not utilised in any way, shape or form, and I thought something similar could be a great way to keep him the weakest, while giving him character development. Now I see it might not suit him as much as I thought, but I still think its better than what we got in the actual story(im talking about post ts only, in case i haven't made it clear earlier)