Portgas D. Ace

Portgas D. Ace is the biological son of the late Pirate King, Gol D. Roger, and Portgas D. Rouge, as well as the sworn older brother of Luffy and Sabo. Ace was adopted by Monkey D. Garp, as had been requested by Roger before his execution.

Ace is a tall muscular young man with jaw-length curly black hair. Although they were not blood-related, Ace looked remarkably like his foster brother, Luffy. However, Ace was more serious looking than Luffy's lighthearted design and was also taller and more muscular. He also sported rather childish freckles (inherited from his mother) Interestingly, his facial features were almost akin to his biological father Gol D. Roger in his youth without his mustache.

Ace's tattoos were among his most remarkable, trademark features. He had a tattoo on his back of the Whitebeard symbol—purple bones formed in a cross behind a purple skull with a white mustache—that he described as his pride and joy. Ace had another tattoo on his upper left bicep that spells "ASCE" vertically. The "S" crossed out is a tribute to Sabo.

Ace wore an open-front shirt until he received Whitebeard's tattoo - afterward, he stopped wearing anything over his upper body except when on winter or desert islands due to the weather requirements. He wore black boots, black knee-length shorts with an eyelet-studded orange belt, and a blue pouch belted around his left leg. He also wore a short second belt with a large red "A" on the silver buckle over his right hip, but left it unfastened and threaded the free end along the back of his shorts. A dagger in a green sheath hung at his left hip. On Ace's left arm, he wore a Log Pose and a red and white striped bracelet around his wrist, an orange elbow guard, and his "ASCE" tattoo. He wore a red beaded necklace and an orange hat with two blue smileys, one frowning and one smiling, and a string of red beads sitting above the rim. Two long orange side straps hung down sides of his hat and met at a large medallion of a bull's skull with orange tassels.

Ace was much more intelligent, polite, and generally, more bearable than Luffy. It seems that among the very few things the brothers shared was their recklessness as pirates (and their near-bottomless stomachs). In addition, Ace likes to party as much as his brother does. Ace could be a bit inappropriate though as he once used a woman's skirt to wipe his face while he was dining at Spice Bean in Arabasta.

There were two running gags about Ace. The first was his rather extreme narcolepsy. He tended to randomly fall asleep while eating and conversing, leaving strangers around him wondering if he had died. This was first seen in Arabasta when they thought he died in the middle of eating. The second was that he did a "dine and dash" routine wherever he went. This went back to his younger days with Sabo and Luffy, when they would often dine and dash in the city of Goa.

Ace was also shown to be quite impulsive, much like his younger brother, as he too would make hasty decisions and, in some cases, neglect listening to reason.

His "politeness" is due to Makino's teaching after Ace asks her how to introduce himself to Shanks (being his brother's savior). Before that, Ace was rather cold and rude to anyone he was not familiar with.

Ace had a tendency to never back down from a fight, saying that he would never run once facing an enemy. Also like his father and brother, Ace was confident and fearless when confronting his opponents even when they were compelling people. Ace had a death wish, but in truth, he wanted to prevent the people he cared for from getting hurt. Dadan stated that he inherited this tendency from his father despite loathing him. While Ace emerged victorious over enemies he refused to run from.

Ace was also easily provoked by and became violent towards anyone who insulted or harmed people close to him. In one of Garp's conversations with Curly Dadan, this was revealed to be a trait of Roger as well. During his childhood, Ace had a tendency to severely injure anyone who insulted Roger, though he himself disliked his biological father. Alongside his loyalty is Ace does not judge people by their appearance and race, but by their character.

Ace and his brother, Luffy, were very close as children and remained so as pirates, even after more than three years of separation. Though they were not related by blood, they were still bound by a brotherly bond. Luffy was also aware that Ace was Gol D. Roger's son. As a child, Ace was initially aloof and hostile towards Luffy. Such an example was when Luffy innocently followed Ace onto an old rope bridge and Ace (being greatly annoyed by his presence) knocked Luffy off the bridge and into the ravine. After learning how lonely Luffy was, Ace warmed up to him, but got annoyed whenever Luffy cried. Ace later grew very protective of him, particularly from Garp, even insulting their grandfather in an attempt to stop his abusive behavior towards Luffy. T

Ace tended to portray a typical good-big-brother behavior, such as asking the Straw Hat crew to keep an eye on his little brother. He also ensured Luffy had a way of meeting up with him by giving him a Vivre Card. They respected each other's choices despite their differences and understood that the other was strong enough to look after himself.

Sabo was Ace's good friend and brother from ten years ago. They had planned to become pirates by saving money to buy a pirate ship, a joint attempt that began five years before Luffy followed Ace to the Gray Terminal and to Sabo. Sabo was one of the two people Ace considered a brother along with Luffy. They performed an informal sakazuki ceremony together to seal their bond as brothers. Ace had a tattoo on his upper left bicep that spells "ASCE" vertically. The "S" is a tribute to Sabo.