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a weakened vitiate in ziost death-fields an entire planet that cracks the surface

sidious by rots thinks force storms are difficult to control, and brags about how they can annihilate armies. likewise, he obv can't tp a planet given he needs to fling rhetoric at the senate instead of controlling their minds

He does TP and drain a planet from across the galaxy only a short few months after RotS, so it's safe to say that's within his capabilities. He also unbalanced the Force and obfuscated the Jedi's senses with his power.

Comparatively, Ziost was achieved with the aid of a nexus and none of Vitiate's non-nexus feats are up to par with Sidious' best.

You can use the "why didn't X use Y" logic to most characters in Star Wars, especially when feats are so disparate (e.g. movies vs. TFU). But if you applied this standard of consistency you'd conclude that random TOR trailer sith can defeat RotS Yoda, despite the overwhelming evidence from every corner that this isn't true, or that Vader magically grows 10000x times weaker from TFU to ANH.

Anyway, Palpatine has Byss which is vastly more impressive in terms of TP than Ziost, he scales above Nihilus, and where did you get the impression that force storms as of rots can't replicate ziost? He says he can annihilate armies with a thought, but over an extended duration there's no reason to think it wouldn't cause massive damage to a planetary surface. He does say he can't "control" them yet, but what does "control" mean? He can control them well enough to target armies apparently, but probably not well enough to pinpoint teleport people or shield specific targets within the storms like he could by DE...Vitiate can't do that with his death field either though. Likewise, Vitiate's death field took some undetermined amount of time to charge up, and was likely ritualistic, so if it takes Sidious 30 seconds to replicate its effects with a force storm, that's more impressive than if Vitiate needs to charge his death field for, say, 2 minutes.

Originally posted by The Ellimist
He says he can annihilate armies with a thought, but over an extended duration there's no reason to think it wouldn't cause massive damage to a planetary surface.

lmao

?

Taking that sort of logic to basically any character is unfair.

Indeed

Once again, this is a pathetic thread. It can only be useful if the members change the topic.

Originally posted by Jaggarath
lmao

Since an officially licensed Star Wars source put worth the idea that the Emperor's storms could expand from lunar to universal, I'd say Ell is being more than reasonable here.

Originally posted by The Ellimist
Anyway, Palpatine has Byss which is vastly more impressive in terms of TP than Ziost, he scales above Nihilus,

You're neglecting the drain portion of the feat. From what we see in Rise of the Emperor, Vitiate never actively drains people; he's relying on their deaths for fuel. If he can't conventionally leech off of planetary populations to the extent that Palpatine can yet is able to pull off the death field, why would the latter be more impressive than what Palpatine does since it's just a manifestation of drain powers - a branch of Force abilities Palpatine has already proven himself superior in? If Palpatine wanted to, I'm sure he could raze a world much more casually than Vitiate.

And that's completely ignoring the transgalactic distance factor present in the Byss feat. As you note, Sidious scales above Nihilus, but not just in terms of quotes. Comparing Byss and the devastation of Katarr, the victims of both feats number in the same order of magnitude: millions (The Complete Star Wars Encyclopedia; The Old Republic Codex). Yet the key difference is that Nihilus had to be nearing the exosphere to conduct the massacre while the Emperor could comfortably sit on his ass in the Imperial Palace lightyears away and achieve the same result without relying on bombarding the planet via ships or obscure Force clouds or whatever. Considering that Nihilus is an eldritch monstrosity capable of effortlessly holding together the Ravager, a 1 200-meter-long capital ship, telekinetically (Avellone's word is meaningless), Palpatine doing something that was approaching Nihilus' limits from across the galaxy casually is something that's beyond Vitiate's showings in my books.

Originally posted by Azronger
You're neglecting the drain portion of the feat. From what we see in Rise of the Emperor, Vitiate never actively drains people; he's relying on their deaths for fuel. If he can't conventionally leech off of planetary populations to the extent that Palpatine can yet is able to pull off the death field, why would the latter be more impressive than what Palpatine does since it's just a manifestation of drain powers - a branch of Force abilities Palpatine has already proven himself superior in? If Palpatine wanted to, I'm sure he could raze a world much more casually than Vitiate.

I respect you and your arguments Azronger, but I'm rather befuddled by your comparison of Vitiate and Sidious' respective drain feats, from start to finish.

In truth, Sidious' drain with Byss is utterly tame compared what Vitiate does on Ziost. Sidious himself states that the population of Byss is, "slowly surrendering their life energies to add to mine," and that this process, "will strengthen the body and the mind, merely slowing the decay of crude matter." This alone shows that the extent of Sidious' drain on the individuals of Byss is gradual and passive, hardly reminiscent of the death and destruction caused by Tenebrae on Ziost.

Tenebrae, conversely, grows exponentially/absurdly in power by merely consuming the spirits of the dead from a single city. This is likely because completely consuming the spirits of individuals >>>>>> passively, gradually leeching off the life energies of individuals. Furthermore, Tenebrae's consumption of spirits allows him to actually control them, like he did with Vaylin in KOTET Chapter 9, so it's also on a whole new level of depth and scope. It's downright dishonest to assert that Sidious' gradual drain (alongside his Dark Side Adepts) that is merely slowing the decay of his body and isn't killing/consuming any of the populace or their spirits, is even in the same universe as utterly consuming an entire planet's force energy, populace and fauna, wreaking massive destruction, and functionally granting Tenebrae corporeal immortality, along with a monumental boon in power.

So essentially, why the hell are you taking Sidious' Byss feat as if he's constantly and passively performing a feat on the same level as Ziost from across the galaxy?

Id agree with that Skillz, but I'm not sure that's the extent of Sidious' drain. Wasn't there something along the lines of doing Force Drain too much/too quickly one would end up like Nihilus or something? So taking it slower is smarter than just consuming it all in one swoop.

I'm not saying that's the full potency Sidious can exert with his force drain, given how casually he performs Byss, but the feat itself is simply incomparable in terms of power and scope to what Tenebrae does on Ziost.

Edit: Sidious' Byss drain imo is essentially a large scale version of what Tenebrae did with Revan at the end of the Novel, or how he feeds on his servants, leaving them withered and frail. There's even a source iirc that differentiates Vitiate consuming spirits from Vitiate draining life energies.

Originally posted by Zenwolf
Id agree with that Skillz, but I'm not sure that's the extent of Sidious' drain. Wasn't there something along the lines of doing Force Drain too much/too quickly one would end up like Nihilus or something? So taking it slower is smarter than just consuming it all in one swoop.
Yet Vitiate pulls a Nihilus and becomes even less like Nihilus, lmao.

Yeah, I think it's important to note that Nihilus is Nihilus because of Malachor, not because he consumed too much too fast. He NEEDED to consume planetary energies to merely sustain his existence.

Originally posted by XSUPREMEXSKILLZ
I'm not saying that's the full potency Sidious can exert with his force drain, given how casually he performs Byss, but the feat itself is simply incomparable in terms of power and scope than what Tenebrae does on Ziost.

Edit: Sidious' Byss drain imo is essentially a large scale version of what Tenebrae did with Revan at the end of the Novel, or how he feeds on his servants, leaving them withered and frail. There's even a source iirc that differentiates Vitiate consuming spirits from Vitiate draining life energies.

Ok that I can get behind, I guess the post was just confusion.

@Ant

I do recall something along those lines with Force Drain though...but if not /shrug, meh irrelevant now.

Originally posted by XSUPREMEXSKILLZ
Tenebrae, conversely, grows exponentially/absurdly in power by merely consuming the spirits of the dead from a single city. This is likely because completely consuming the spirits of individuals >>>>>> passively, gradually leeching off the life energies of individuals. Furthermore, Tenebrae's consumption of spirits allows him to actually control them, like he did with Vaylin in KOTET Chapter 9, so it's also on a whole new level of depth and scope. It's downright dishonest to assert that Sidious' gradual drain (alongside his Dark Side Adepts) that is merely slowing the decay of his body and isn't killing/consuming any of the populace or their spirits, is even in the same universe as utterly consuming an entire planet's force energy, populace and fauna, wreaking massive destruction, and functionally granting Tenebrae corporeal immortality, along with a monumental boon in power.

So essentially, why the hell are you taking Sidious' Byss feat as if he's constantly and passively performing a feat on the same level as Ziost from across the galaxy?

I likewise respect you, but I'm afraid you've completely missed my point. Whether Tenebrae is feasting on spirits or not is irrelevant here as he could only do so after the victims had died - something which he we know he did not engineer through draining them to death but by gunning them down while possessing the planet's armed forces. I haven't seen evidence that he can leech on the civilians' power while they're still alive like Sidious can. The fact that he went through the effort of killing them with muggle weaponry rather than through the Force indicates that the latter is beyond his ability to do. Instead of ripping and devouring their souls straight out of their bodies, he waits for the spirits to be manually dislodged from the body at the time of death immediately after which he consumes them (as you claim).

Sidious on the other hand is able to siphon the Byssians' essences at will without needing to kill them; he's able to tap into the spirits and gorge himself on them without needing for them to be released from their host bodies. It's a direct demonstration of superiority in the field of Force drain powers.

This alone shows that the extent of Sidious' drain on the individuals of Byss is gradual and passive, hardly reminiscent of the death and destruction caused by Tenebrae on Ziost.

You lost me at "passive." Where is the process implied to be passive i.e. not contingent on Sidious actively exerting his power to feed on the populace?



That came later. In Evasive Action, where the Emperor is chronologically first depicted siphoning the colonists' life energy, the dark side adepts are just being established. He did the feat solo for a while.



Sidious' drain only slowed aging because he chose to channel the stolen energy that way. We see in the aftermath of the Battle of Endor that he grew in power daily by feeding on the prisoners on Byss while recovering from his year-long voyage there. He is fully capable of empowering himself, but merely chose not to because his interests at the time lied elsewhere. He was already on death's door by RotS and so extending his lifespan and survival would have been much more pertinent than increasing his power, which would have only worsened the bodily necrosis.



This the secondary aspect of my argument: Palpatine has already demonstrated his superiority in conventional drain abilities, so why would Vitiate simply manifesting his drain in a different way (death field) change that? It just indicates Palpatine would ravage a planet in a much more profound way.

Before I respond, I need to ask a question: Are you arguing that Sidious being able to casually drain the populace of Byss gradually is more impressive than Vitiate consuming Ziost, its inhabitants, the fauna, etc, or that Vitiate choosing to kill the inhabitants of New Adasta conventionally before wholly consuming their spirits is proof that he can't gradually leech off of their energies without killing them? Because it sounds like you're trying to argue the latter, but you contradict that by stating that the death field is an expression of force drain, meaning that Tenebrae is able to kill and consume the entire planet with drain/without resorting to conventional weaponry first.

@Az

Just because Vitiate opted not to passively drain the inhabitants of Ziost doesn't mean he couldn't. Setting them against each other and reaping their souls from the carnage is a faster and more effective way to return to a state where he could decimate the planet than simply leeching off their essences at the pace of a snail.

As for him not being able to directly drain them, he (as you admit) death fields the planet (i.e draining them to a husk while they're still alive) immediately after growing strong enough to do so. So we can come to two conclusions:

a) Assuming we're taking your word for it, Vitiate's weakened state + the telepathy prohibited him from draining them all until he's consumed enough energy via setting them against each other

b) Vitiate could drain them in that state, but it wouldn't be enough to return him to full power as quickly as he needed. Therefore, he used the carnage to return to a state where he could simply drain them all to a husk as you describe.

Either way, you need more proof as to why he can't drain living beings other than "he didn't, therefore he couldn't."

edit: didn't see skillz's post. Restated most of his points here, but whatever.

Food for thought:

Palpatine's method of Force Drain (not his invention) is designed to replenish a physical body. Tenebrae struck Ziost as a disembodied entity, and therefore had to employ different techniques to replenish himself.

Ziost was one of the major population centres back then. Tenebrae wasn't dealing with a small population base here.

Death field is one of the most difficult techniques to employ ever. Darth Bane had to draw power from a nearby nexus structure to pull it off, and he still found it incredibly difficult to retain. His sphere of energy was like 10 feet across.

Now try to comprehend what it takes to subject an entire planet to Death field - thousands of Force-users working in tandem and/or some kind of superweapon (Zildrog ???). Yet, Tenebrae pulled it off on his own.

lol if sidious could have mega-amped himself and ended physical aging he would've

Even without doing that, he still ended up more powerful than Valkorion(or at least as powerful).

Most impressive.

Originally posted by XSUPREMEXSKILLZ
Before I respond, I need to ask a question: Are you arguing that Sidious being able to casually drain the populace of Byss gradually is more impressive than Vitiate consuming Ziost, its inhabitants, the fauna, etc, or that Vitiate choosing to kill the inhabitants of New Adasta conventionally before wholly consuming their spirits is proof that he can't gradually leech off of their energies without killing them? Because it sounds like you're trying to argue the latter, but you contradict that by stating that the death field is an expression of force drain, meaning that Tenebrae is able to kill and consume the entire planet with drain/without resorting to conventional weaponry first.

There's no contradiction here. As I've said before, a death field is, while a variant of drain, still markedly different from the standard technique. Namely, the number of victims is wholly irrelevant to its potency; it's an area-of-effect ability that affects everyone caught in it regardless of the numbers. Vitiate casting it over the entire surface area of Ziost isn't an indication he could manually desiccate the entire population person-by-person simultaneously.

Originally posted by slayne
@Az

Just because Vitiate opted not to passively drain the inhabitants of Ziost doesn't mean he couldn't. Setting them against each other and reaping their souls from the carnage is a faster and more effective way to return to a state where he could decimate the planet than simply leeching off their essences at the pace of a snail.

As for him not being able to directly drain them, he (as you admit) death fields the planet (i.e draining them to a husk while they're still alive) immediately after growing strong enough to do so. So we can come to two conclusions:

a) Assuming we're taking your word for it, Vitiate's weakened state + the telepathy prohibited him from draining them all until he's consumed enough energy via setting them against each other

b) Vitiate could drain them in that state, but it wouldn't be enough to return him to full power as quickly as he needed. Therefore, he used the carnage to return to a state where he could simply drain them all to a husk as you describe.

Either way, you need more proof as to why he can't drain living beings other than "he didn't, therefore he couldn't."

edit: didn't see skillz's post. Restated most of his points here, but whatever.

I'll ignore the points Skillz already made.

So essentially, as I understand it, your argument is predicated on the speed at which Vitiate grows stronger. What you fail to realize is that the two methods aren't mutually exclusive. The absolute fastest possible way for him to have regained his power would have been to do both: directly sap the people's life force while they're alive and consume the released spirits should they die. Yet I've never seen any evidence to indicate he did the former even though in conjunction with the latter it would have been quicker than solely doing the latter.

It was you who set the precedent that Vitiate's modus operandi depends on the pace at which his power would accumulate; that he would utilize the quickest method possible to revivify himself. The fact that he used an inferior method to the most efficient one is therefore an indication of his inability to use conventional drain to siphon the people's essences directly.

@Az


Which makes sense, because your route isn't that sound in terms of efficiency. If Vitiate drained them while he possessed them, they'd most likely be too weak to kill each other after prolonged exposure - especially the Jedi and Sith, who would logically be his most powerful assets due to their abilities. He'd also have to massively restrict the amount of people he does this to given his limited Force reserves, which nets a pretty big loss in terms of power gained. It doesn't matter in the end if he gains power slightly faster if the victim count is pretty substantially reduced.