Are Jedi the Uber Powerful force some people claim?

[Praeothmin]

I was lurking at SB when I saw this topic:
http://forum.spacebattles.com/showthread.php?t=114326

Which reminded me that almost everytime someone tried to pit one Force user against any other opponent, it almost always rapidly came to the cries of "Force Choke for Da Winzzzzzzzz".

Now, I may be getting old (and I'll slap any kiddie that agrees :)... ), but the Jedi never seemed so darn powerful to me.

Sure, they would sow huge amount of damage to small parties of fighters, but they usually had toruble against very talented, non-Force using individuals (Obi-Wan vs Jango anyone!?! ).
What do you think?

[GStone]

I get the first vote in the poll and I'm going with 3, they're competant, but they don't seem to use they're powers tactically good. The precognition is often good, but their mind control is limited, they don't use their TK as often as they should (Jango would have been a great time).

[Who is like God arbour]

I think, it is like Dr. Albert Oxford, PhD has said:

BATTLE DROID COMBAT SUBROUTINE

ADVERSARY: Jedi - expert swordsmen.
Weapon effective range: +/- two meters

OUR WEAPONRY: Blasters -
effective range: +/- one hundred meters

STRATEGY: Stand one meter away from adversary.

In the movies, the Jedi do spectacular looking fights. But only because nearls every enemy "stand one meter away from" them.

A competent fighter would analyze the strengths and flaccidities of its enemy and react adequate.

The Jedi have problems, when they are fired at from greater distance in rapid succession or they can't use their lightsaber during palpabilities.

Their greatest flaccidity is the dependence on the lightsaber and the aversion to use other weapons.

And for this reason, many of them was killed on Geonosis in the arena and almost all could be killed after order 66 was given.

A lightsaber, even if it can reflect blaster bolts and can cut through almost everything, has a very limited range of use.

[watchdog]

Another question is how good are they at pure hand to hand? There was only a brief couple of moments with Kenobi against Fett and an even briefer shot with Kenobi against Skywalker/Vader. A Sith would probably get a higher rate when it comes to this poll (by one at least). I remember in other threads on the Jedi some thought that they could not defend against bullets, not certain why, single shots should be similar to blasters. Now a machine gun however...

[Jedi Master Spock]

As the X-Wing novels actually discuss at some length (IIRC), being "guided" by the Force through a pseudo-instinctual precognition is more important than any superhuman strength or speed. It isn't that Luke is physically smarter or faster than Biggs, or Wedge, and his reaction time isn't any lower. He's simply reacting to a different sort of stimuli - a foreknowledge of the immediate future in motion - which means that he's done reacting before a non-Force sensitive pilot in his situation would have something to react to. This means he could be a less skilled pilot than, say, Wedge, but get much better results because the Force tells him what to do when.

Tactically speaking, this is the most powerful Jedi ability overall, and it's very hard to overrate it. It's also very hard to measure, which is why people don't focus on it very much, and clearly imperfect.

[Mr. Oragahn]

I'll avoid using Jedi as reference if that whole dark shourd really hampered them all the time the Sith were in place.

I'll use the Sith as the yardstone, and judge their best Force related feats from there.

• Palpatine.
  Best feat(s): lifting senatorial saucers, probably one to two tons each, and throwing them down. Seeing the future (but thinking that his vision was absolutely correct). Too bad the initial creepy howling flash rush he executed in his office, seen in the earlier trailers when he's about to battle against the Jedi, was removed in favor of an acrobatic figure.
• Maul.
  Best feat(s): "Hand on chest" Force TK. Throwing Obi-Wan rolling two to three meters back only. Withstanding the shock of a ten to twenty meters high fall.
• Dooku.
  Best feat(s): Lightning bolt. Either abosrbed by a lightsabre, or hurting Anakin, badly, but not enough to forbid him from jumping back into the fight. Able to topple a big metal cylinder, clamped to the floor and possibly to the roof, and crack same roof's superficial layer of hardnened dust. Choking Obi-Wan while kicking Anakin back. Pulling off a lightly grated platform from the wall and sqwish Obi-Wan with it.
• Anakin.
  Best feat(s): Precog seeing Jam Weasel or whatever, arriving in airspeeder. Managing to keep his arms glued to his body instead of being ripped off after landing on said landspeeder. Some visions of the future. A couple of superjumps here and there. Able to withstand the shock of a free fall, after a grappling cable becomes completely stiff after reaching maximum lenght. Finally nullified and defeated by Obi-Wan (who used Force accel only once in all the films, which was probably one of the best tactical powers along distant TK, and didn't use that much Force powers against Anakin, safe that kiddy hand to hand Force TK, which just sent them flying less than ten meters backwards).
• Vader.
  Best feat(s): Choke someone on another spaceship, when the fleet was flying in close formation, possibly needing to concentrate on the subject though video feeding.

So Anakin, child of the Force, was defeated by a Jedi which used a small amount of direct Force powers, and supposedly was weakened by some mystic Dark Side super power.

Anakin, a few years earlier on, was forced to surrender when caught by Jango and a couple of droids.

You also have to understand why the Jedi are reluctant to use the Force for violence. It is logical, considering their dogma, that you can easily see where it drives on Force sensitive person to be able to do all sorts of mystical things.

Now, if there's nothing such as that dark shroud that limits the Jedi's powers, then it's not glorious at all, and all the stuff you hear from the EU is just complete wank.

Well, some of it is anyway.

I'm hesitating between 3 and 4. Most of my Star Wars related youth and the observation of Jedi powers has been centered on some of the most powerful beings.
Yoda. Luke. Vader.

Now, Sidious. Dooku. Anakin.

They're not the averages, really.

So if those figures probably rank close to level 2, the average Jedi, and even some "masters", will rank near level 4 (the crappiest in the hierarchy).

[Praeothmin]

I remember in other threads on the Jedi some thought that they could not defend against bullets, not certain why, single shots should be similar to blasters. Now a machine gun however...

Well, I believe it really depends on what the Lightsabre does to the bullets that the Jedi blocks.
If it vaporizes it instantly, then the Jedi should be safe from any single shots.
If it simply melts it, then that means molten lead instead of solid slugs coming at the Jedi... Ouch!

Also, what really bugs me about all those Jedi/Sith versus is how the Force choke power is assumed to be possessed by every Force user, and is also assumed to be instantaneous, when we see otherwise in the movies.
Basically, the entire thread devolved into a Pro-Wars debater claiming that Anakin would Force choke Samus Aran (from Metroïds) in kill her instantly even though we've always seen Force chokes to take a lot of time to actually disable a person.

[GStone]

When did Vader choke someone on another ship? I thought it was just the SD he was on and the guy at the table when he was on the DS.

[Mr. Oragahn]

Well, I believe it really depends on what the Lightsabre does to the bullets that the Jedi blocks.
If it vaporizes it instantly, then the Jedi should be safe from any single shots.
If it simply melts it, then that means molten lead instead of solid slugs coming at the Jedi... Ouch!

How will he parry so many rounds per second? There's got to be a variance in the angle, without even counting the muzzle's movements.

Also, what really bugs me about all those Jedi/Sith versus is how the Force choke power is assumed to be possessed by every Force user, and is also assumed to be instantaneous, when we see otherwise in the movies.
Basically, the entire thread devolved into a Pro-Wars debater claiming that Anakin would Force choke Samus Aran (from Metroïds) in kill her instantly even though we've always seen Force chokes to take a lot of time to actually disable a person.

The Pro Wars debater is Leo1. It comes as no surprise.
However, he has a point in that Vader could rip metal appendages off walls and crush metal bars quasi instantly, so I guess the Force choke has always been a way for him to take time killing someone, because objectively, he could instacrush Samus' bones if he wanted to.
But only if he's super angry. Find him another girlfriend and announce him that he's not the only one poking her hole.

However, there's that whole lack of use of such a power against another Jedi/Sith. I could suspect that there's some invisible Force gauging/battle going on.

[Who is like God arbour]

As the X-Wing novels actually discuss at some length (IIRC), being "guided" by the Force through a pseudo-instinctual precognition is more important than any superhuman strength or speed. It isn't that Luke is physically smarter or faster than Biggs, or Wedge, and his reaction time isn't any lower. He's simply reacting to a different sort of stimuli - a foreknowledge of the immediate future in motion - which means that he's done reacting before a non-Force sensitive pilot in his situation would have something to react to. This means he could be a less skilled pilot than, say, Wedge, but get much better results because the Force tells him what to do when.

Tactically speaking, this is the most powerful Jedi ability overall, and it's very hard to overrate it. It's also very hard to measure, which is why people don't focus on it very much, and clearly imperfect.

I think, that precognition is a good thing, but it brings one only so far.

It doesn't enable someone to move faster. The limits of the own body have to be considered still. And when more blasters or projectiles fly simultaneously at a Jedi, although he knows it, he can't move fast enough to block or dodge them all. The same apply to flying a fighter. The fighter itsels is subject to restrictions, which a Jedi can't sidestep only because he wants it because he knows, that he have to be at another place in the next instant.

In many situations, even an instantaneous act can't prevent the implementation of the imminent danger.

To defeat a Jedi, one has to create such an impasse.

The Force would have to prevent, that a Jedi get in such an situation at all.

But for this, the precognition would have to be more foresighted. Some seconds before the implementation of the imminent danger could be to late already.

But then, it should have been impossible, that the clone troopers in RotS could kill almost all Jedi.

[Praeothmin]

How will he parry so many rounds per second? There's got to be a variance in the angle, without even counting the muzzle's movements

I was talking about parrying 1 round fired by an automatic pistol, much like the bolts fired by blasters.

I never mentioned blocking shots fired in full auto... :)

However, he has a point in that Vader could rip metal appendages off walls and crush metal bars quasi instantly, so I guess the Force choke has always been a way for him to take time killing someone, because objectively, he could instacrush Samus' bones if he wanted to.

When have we ever seen such use of the Force vs a living opponent?
It seems to me, from what I've seen in the movies, that bringing such destructive powers to bear on a living opponent has always been harder then on unliving things.
And there's also the pesky little thing called "concentration", that seems to be needed everytime one calls or uses the Force.

Example, Force push:
We see Obi-Wan Force push many Battle droids easily, yet never against Super Battle droids, or even Droidekas.
Nor do we see him Force push the Magnaguards when he was fighting them.
Or even General Grievious...
So in this case, it seems that Force push requires concentration, and is more difficult against bigger, or heavier opponents.
Or, since we see Obi-Wan and Anakin use it on each other in RotS, it may simply be that you need to concentrate for one or two seconds, which is ample time vs slow, dull-witted Battle droids, but thougher vs faster oponents.

Or even Force speed.
Many pro-Wars debaters often argue that all a Jedi needs to do to win, against faster opponents, is to use Force speed to fight a lot faster.
The problem is, aside from Luke in "Shadows of the Empire", I've never seen or read about anyone using Force speed in this manner.
All we've seen are Qui-Gonn and Obi-Wan in TPM use it to either escape the Droidekas super fast, or pursue Darth Maul.
But never to fight.

Why must they always assumed that an ability never displayed by the Force user being debated is automatically possessed by him, or that an ability never used in fashion "A" will allow such use?

[AnonymousRedShirtEnsign]

If memory serves, in KotOR 2 you get a lesson in how to kill Jedi from to party members. They basically said, don't shoot 'em with blasters and don't let them know what you are planning to do. Explosives are good, though they might super-jump away from a grenade, or use precognition to avoid mines, though contact grenades and rockets would do well. The best anti-
force-user weapon would probably be a shotgun, though any full auto weapon that fires more than 10 rounds/ second should quickly and easily overwhelm a Jedi. Actually any KE weapon of sufficient force should knock the lightsaber from the Jedi's hands, so an anti-tank rifle would work well too. I voted for 3 by the way, as apparently most people did.

[Mr. Oragahn]

How will he parry so many rounds per second? There's got to be a variance in the angle, without even counting the muzzle's movements

I was talking about parrying 1 round fired by an automatic pistol, much like the bolts fired by blasters.

I never mentioned blocking shots fired in full auto... :)

Ok. I think the lightsabre would do more than simply melt a single bullet.
Considering what it does to an armored door, and considering that apparently a lightsabre can remain stuck in a droid's torso, I think the bullet would be mainly blocked and destroyed in the same process.

When have we ever seen such use of the Force vs a living opponent?

PG rating.

It seems to me, from what I've seen in the movies, that bringing such destructive powers to bear on a living opponent has always been harder then on unliving things.

Do you mean the Force automatically grants any living being a sort of anti Force power shield, because the Force is linked to life?

We'll never know, really. We didn't see that much combat situations with Sith, the guys who don't hesitate to use the Force for destructive purposes, actually facing creatures.

There's Anakin, but he just prefered to slay all the CIS representatives with his lightsabre.

And there's also the pesky little thing called "concentration", that seems to be needed everytime one calls or uses the Force.

It depends on the task. Dooku seemed pretty instinctive and instantaneous in his use of the Force, just like Sidious.

Example, Force push:
We see Obi-Wan Force push many Battle droids easily, yet never against Super Battle droids, or even Droidekas.

Super battle droids even punch standard battle droids! :D

But it's true, there's not that much Force Push used against droids.
Side note: Force push on droids always seemed to deactivate them as well (battle droids, C3PO).

Nor do we see him Force push the Magnaguards when he was fighting them.

I think it has to do with the school of thought. QuiGon Jinn had a rogue influence on Obi-Wan, but the young padawan was quite convinced that his master wasn't doing the right choice in staying distant from the ways taught in the Jedi temple, where the lightsabre is uber glorified and you must castigate yourself for using the Force.

Well, arguably, Qui Gon Jinn's master was Dooku, I think.
It explains his greyness and intensive use of the Force on living beings.

Obi-Wan was well more respectful of the retentive dogma.

Or even General Grievious...

They seem reluctant to use the Force against living beings, while they had no such concerns against crude matter.

So in this case, it seems that Force push requires concentration, and is more difficult against bigger, or heavier opponents.

Yes, the heavier the object, the more concentration a Jedi is seen needing.
But not that much. Yoda was near death in TESB. He didn't need to stop and concentrate like he did in the swamps years later, when Sidious threw him a saucer.
It was in the middle of a fierce combat, and he reacted just as fast against lightning bolts (well, most of the time) and stopped Dooku's trick.

But there's clearly a question of focus. Concentration as focus then, not as meditation. When it comes to combat at least.

Or, since we see Obi-Wan and Anakin use it on each other in RotS, it may simply be that you need to concentrate for one or two seconds, which is ample time vs slow, dull-witted Battle droids, but thougher vs faster oponents.

You'd rather think that using that power against a Force sensitive person is one of the rarest cases imaginable, but it happened.
That said, I've always believed that we only see the tip of the iceberg during such a battle.
After all, they're both tapping energy from a same "realm", and they're located close to each other.
It's like while there's a physical battle in our reality, there's a similar battle on the Force plane.
Sometimes, there's a crack in an oponent's Force aura, and a Jedi or Sith can use it quickly to strike a Force coup.

Much like they're trying to hack each other's Force code, with trojans, sniffers and firewalls.

It's like in Ghost in the Shell, while Kusanagi can both fire her guns and try to hack into the brain of her oponent at the same time.

Or even Force speed.
Many pro-Wars debaters often argue that all a Jedi needs to do to win, against faster opponents, is to use Force speed to fight a lot faster.
The problem is, aside from Luke in "Shadows of the Empire", I've never seen or read about anyone using Force speed in this manner.
All we've seen are Qui-Gonn and Obi-Wan in TPM use it to either escape the Droidekas super fast, or pursue Darth Maul.
But never to fight.

I don't even remember them using it to follow Maul.

Maybe this power is very tiring. OWK and QGJ used it for only one or two seconds, after that they kept running down the corridor normally.

Maybe a trained Force sensitive person can actually cast an aura that forbids an oponent from using most of his powers.
Most powerful fighters could actually overwhelm that barrier, and use that advantage to use the Force agressively if they want to. Like Dooku did.

This would also mesh well with that idea that Sidious may have been casting some kind of super shroud that dismishes most Jedi powers.

But frankly, it's one of the worst plot powers ever used.

That would also make boring and stupid looking fights.

Why must they always assumed that an ability never displayed by the Force user being debated is automatically possessed by him, or that an ability never used in fashion "A" will allow such use?

That's another problem. I think this is a mistake to make such assumptions.

For example, though Maul's KE sounded like thunder, he didn't seem able to do more than that.

We know that all powers are not granted. The Jedi phantom trick was apparently discovered by Qui Gon Jinn, and taught to Yoda and Obi-Wan.

[Mr. Oragahn]

Another point.

As seen, the Jedi glorify their lightsabre like the epithome of weapons.

BEN: Your fathers lightsaber. This is the weapon of a Jedi Knight. Not
as clumsy or as random as a blaster.

Luke pushes a button on the handle. A long beam shoots out
about four feet and flickers there. The light plays across the
ceiling.

BEN: An elegant weapon for a more civilized time.

Sure, elegant, but pretty much limited. See Geonosis.
"Ha, let's run over that multiyards wide plain, under the intense and heavy fire of the enemy, until I get a chance to stick my blade into one of those super droids!"

There's been that 80s anime, Ulysses 31, which I'm a big fan of, and it was very similar to Star Wars in some ways.

The hero, Ulysses (a modern version in the 31th century), though not possessing any magical power, used a rather well thought combination of weapons and defenses.

His weapon was a single handled high accuracy gun. Think of a gunblade, but with less style and more ergonomy.
If necessary, an energized solid blade could materialize pretty much like a lightsabre, at the tip of the pistol, above the grip (the sound even was the same!).

His defense consisted of a wrist apparatus aple to cast a protective disc of energy able to repel all sorts of things, from energy to matter.







Imagine a high accuracy blaster, coupled to a one-hand-grip lightsabre, used in conjunction with something similar but even better than a gungan shield.

THAT is what any Jedi should have had since millenia. Of course, it has more to do with greek warriors than with samurais, which was the essence of Star Wars' Jedi.
I guess you can't always win. :D

[Praeothmin]

PG rating.

Not a valid reason In Universe, so not acceptable in this case.
It is exactly like trying to say TIDC in ST is valid example of Trek power, because the writers wanted to show the crust being destroyed, but the VFX guys screwed up the effects.
Again, not valid...

There's Anakin, but he just prefered to slay all the CIS representatives with his lightsabre.

And the Jedi in the Temple, and Mace Windu, and the Geonosians.
Which reminds me that Anakin did use Force push against them, but since they weren't really quick or powerful, and that their only true weapons were those... Ballblasters... which weren't in use at the start of the fight, they come under the "slow, dull-witted" opponents.

It depends on the task. Dooku seemed pretty instinctive and instantaneous in his use of the Force, just like Sidious

Yup, Dokuu whipped up that Force choke pretty quick against Obi-Wan, but in AotC, he had to concentrate to bring down the pillar watchamacallit down on Obi and Ani.
It took precious seconds during which Yoda, if any Force powers were instantaneous, could have flung him accross the room like he did the Emperor in RotS.
But, as we saw in both these Force battles, concentration (even slight concentration) is needed for big Force use.

I think it has to do with the school of thought.

Your argument is interesting, but without anything to back it up, it is merely an assumption, and as they say in "Under Siege: Dark Territory":
"Assumption is the mother off all fu**-ups!" :-)

That said, I've always believed that we only see the tip of the iceberg during such a battle.
After all, they're both tapping energy from a same "realm", and they're located close to each other.
It's like while there's a physical battle in our reality, there's a similar battle on the Force plane.
Sometimes, there's a crack in an oponent's Force aura, and a Jedi or Sith can use it quickly to strike a Force coup.

Since it is described as such in the movie novelisations, it is probably true, but what about when a Force user faces a non-Force user, like Jango vs Obi-Wan.
We didn't see Obi use much of the Force, when a simple Force push, or a Force yank of Jango's weapons would have been useful.

The fact is, although they can come up with the excuse that against another Force user, they are both cancelling each other's powers through the Force, that explanation doesn't hold water when facing an ordinary opponent.

For example, the Force Wall ability which many Pro-Wars argue all Force users have.
Why haven't we seen it used at Geonosis, against all those droids?
It would sure have been useful.


And Ulysse 31 rocked... :-)