OT Palpatine Vs DE Palpatine

I actually considered this a few years back, but never wanted to get flamed for it.

Spoiler:
Now I'm in more of a position to be flamed but **** it:

While Krayt states that death and rebirth makes a Sith considerably stronger, and Tyranus demonstrates on Vjun that being on a dark side nexus makes a dark sider stronger; Plagueis stated something along the line to Force alignment (to either the dark or light side) literally provides a Force user with a larger power level...and the Sorcerers of Rhand (read wookieepedia) confirmed that the dark has a will of its own and makes its practitioners more powerful for succeeding in increasing its presence throughout the galaxy; than no single Sith corrupted the galaxy as much as Sidious, the guy literally plunged the galaxy into the Dark Times after the PT. Sidious' death literally reset the balance of dark and light throughout the galaxy.

Is it possible that Emperor Palpatine lost his influence over the dark when he died? Of course it's suggested that his Force storms were granted him by the dark, he also said that he'd discovered the ability long before his death in Book of Sith, this indicates that it was in fact a result of his Force corruption, as was his scarring. In RoTS he claims he wishes for his empire to stand 10,000 years, but even body hopping between clones would not give him total immortality because each new clone is less Force sensitive than the original (DE handbook) - so is it possible the dark was also increasing his longevity before his death, and that it betrayed him because he was trying to create rather than destroy, as the Sorcerors of Rhand claimed?

Could OT Palpatine really have been more powerful than DE Palpatine? He could have already been feeding off of the collective life essences of his subjects on Coruscant along with its inhabitants, he had 24 years to do so...

I think they were likely similar if not OT Sidious being superior. As you say Palpatines clonebodies were inferior to the original in force sensitivity and were corrupted by the guy who created them as I recall. On the other hand Sidious' mastery of the Force had increased iirc and the bodies were younger, so maybe it all balances out.

Originally posted by Nephthys
I think they were likely similar if not OT Sidious being superior. As you say Palpatines clonebodies were inferior to the original in force sensitivity and were corrupted by the guy who created them as I recall. On the other hand Sidious' mastery of the Force had increased iirc and the bodies were younger,

No, there was no genetic manipulation (other than making them younger or trying to make them more like the original template) with any of the clones at all, what so ever. A few traitors began chopping up a lot of his clones and he had to get into one that wasn't as good.

so maybe it all balances out.

But then again he'd transferred his essence from his "truest" clone - losing whatever he'd gained from Force drain.

I doubt Palpatine gained many additional powers in DE and I think it's debatable how much more powerful he became. His younger body may have allowed him to use the Force more effectively and it certainly helped his saber use though. Can't wait for Episode VII to, hopefully, rid the Star Wars universe of reborn Palpatine.

I bet that after 2015 DE won't be a canon source anymore.

Originally posted by Zett
I bet that after 2015 DE won't be a canon source anymore.

Jedi don't love! #Marajade

The whole point of Jedi not procreating is that it's dangerous, now you have a Skywalker family line.

Originally posted by Zett
I bet that after 2015 DE won't be a canon source anymore.

Overriding canon isn't good for sales though. I suspect that the new SW saga will take place much later.

Also, a lot of this speculation is implicit on behalf of OT Sidious, who has only demonstrated Battle Meditation and rather mundane lightning. I have to agree with Neph that even if natural inclination was decreased with clone hopping, it was counterbalanced by increased mastery or at least demonstration of mastery and had a very small effect. DE Sidious is usually shown as being the strongest incarnation of the character, with the most high-level, cosmic feats to his name. If he is weaker than OT Sidious by implication of DE sourcebook material, this would be unfortunate given the utter lack of comparable feats.

No one would consider Naga Sadow or Nyriss to be stronger than say Vader or Dooku because of implicit strength not shown on-screen, so advocating the same for OT Sidious is inconsistent.

Originally posted by Stealth Moose
Also, a lot of this speculation is implicit on behalf of OT Sidious, who has only demonstrated Battle Meditation and rather mundane lightning.

Only if we confine 'OT Sidious' to his appearances in the films. As far as OT-era EU, the Emperor has a veritable wealth of impressive feats and accolades to his name.

Originally posted by Stealth Moose
DE Sidious is usually shown as being the strongest incarnation of the character, with the most high-level, cosmic feats to his name.

The only real feat the Emperor has to his name as of Dark Empire that his original incarnation doesn't is his ability to trigger Force storms. And even that is suspect, in light of implications from Star Wars Gamer and Book of Sith that Palpatine had made use of the ability prior to his death at Endor.

Originally posted by Stealth Moose
No one would consider Naga Sadow or Nyriss to be stronger than say Vader or Dooku because of implicit strength not shown on-screen, so advocating the same for OT Sidious is inconsistent.

Actually, that's been a prevailing argument for years concerning lesser known characters like Ragnos. Implicit strength shouldn't be outright disregarded and, in an inconsistent mythology like this one, feat wars shouldn't always be decisive.

I've always found feat wars to be unrealistic. Because clearly the characters with more exposure will have more feats to show for it.

They shouldn't always be decisive, but definitely having a good feat to a character's name does change the general way in which that character is viewed.
Although realistically, if we ever saw the main characters from the PT and OT in games such as TOR or KOTOR, I can guarantee they'd aquire a good load of great feats to their name; like say, Sidious flying with Force lightning or toying six Jedi at once or destroying difficult-to-destroy shit with his lightning. That's why imo you have to consider a healthy combination of both feats and accolades to even attempt to judge the character's powers.

I think implicit strength in certain characters should be considered.

Power scaling is more retarded than Kurupt Thanosis' brain on a bad day.

Sidious became more powerful after his return. However, it took him several years to become stronger then ever before.

Sidious was able to unleash powers such as Force Storm Wormhole after his return because he was siphoning energies from billions of individuals (populace of Byss). Midichlorian count no longer mattered to him.

This is why I believe that no mortal could be as strong as Sidious at the height of his power.

Regardless:

Sidious, during his reign as Galactic Emperor, was already a master of the dark side. He had already acquired know-how of immortality and further honed his grasp of Force Storms (thanks to tutorship of Darth Malgus in this respect).

Originally posted by The_Tempest
Only if we confine 'OT Sidious' to his appearances in the films. As far as OT-era EU, the Emperor has a veritable wealth of impressive feats and accolades to his name.

Can you refresh my mind on some?

The only real feat the Emperor has to his name as of Dark Empire that his original incarnation doesn't is his ability to trigger Force storms. And even that is suspect, in light of implications from Star Wars Gamer and Book of Sith that Palpatine had made use of the ability prior to his death at Endor.

Draining Byss, body hopping, and Force wormholes qualify.

Actually, that's been a prevailing argument for years concerning lesser known characters like Ragnos. Implicit strength shouldn't be outright disregarded and, in an inconsistent mythology like this one, feat wars shouldn't always be decisive.

Alright, so if we use implicit judgments within reason, OT Sidious is probably implicitly better than his DE counterpart, even if only marginally. This might have more weight of comparable EU feats for OT Sidious are shown. OT Sidious also, IIRC, hasn't dueled in like 30 years so whether or not his saber skills atrophied or remained constant or progressed begs for proof.

In the case of Ragnos, it's entirely implicit because he is never shown in canon alive, while Nyriss and Sadow and Sidious have, so his case was always the caveat of "based on his dominance of badasses and the power of his walking stick, it seems likely that he's a beast". Additional gems of his undefeated terrentatak tomb-pet (which killed intruding Sith for over a thousand years) and his SWTOR codex entry seem to reaffirm this.

The reality is, that EU could come around and show Ragnos as being decisively weaker than Vitiate or Nihilus (which I find plausible even now) or he could come out being some kind of cracked out titan who chokes Sith Lords across the galaxy to maintain his dominance while battling the ones foolish enough to spill wine on his throne. We just don't know, so the cases aren't quite comparable.

Vitiate is canonically more powerful then Ragnos, Tulak and even Nihilus.

I'm not sure how you concluded that absolutely. Not that I disagree he could be such, but when you add "canonically" it implies some higher up made a decision, and that's not what I've seen so far.

Originally posted by Stealth Moose
I'm not sure how you concluded that absolutely. Not that I disagree he could be such, but when you add "canonically" it implies some higher up made a decision, and that's not what I've seen so far.

"Lord Vitiate sacrificed millions, stealing their life force to make himself immortal. Their deaths also made him stronger than any Sith who had come before, and he ceased to be known as Lord Vitiate. On that day, the Emperor was truly born." (Darth Nyriss)

From Star Wars: The Old Republic: Encyclopedia

The Sith Emperor, history's most powerful dark side master, performed a ritual of incredible scope to consume the life energy of every being on his homeworld.

From Star Wars: The Old Republic: Encyclopedia

The Sith Emperor is the most powerful Force-user who has ever existed. Unless this implacable enemy can be defeated, the Jedi Order is doomed.

TOR represents entire ancient history ranging from Rakatan era to Great Galactic War event. Possibly even earlier times.

And we confirmed that the Encyclopedia does not have an in-universe POV like some other reference books we've seen?

Much of the star wars content represents "in-universe perspective" of things in the mythos.

The latest "real-world perspective" based sourcebook that I have access to is Star Wars: The Essential Reader's Companion. Characters have not been power-scaled in this source.

However, if multiple accounts/sources are implying that Vitiate is stronger then his predecessors, we are likely to take this seriously.

Star Wars: The Old Republic: Encyclopedia covers entire ancient history since Rakatan era (Marka Ragnos included).

I agree that the comment has merit, but whether or not it is absolute depends on if the book is written from the perspective of an omniscient third party narrator or if it's "attributed to Sudo Blaas, Imperial Scholar 2,500 BBY".

It isn't written from anyones perspective and from reading it its obviously NOT written from a singular perspective or scholar. But the blurb at the front says its an in-universe source. So its in the air imo.