Why Valkorion is more powerful than Palpatine.
For years we have witnessed the argument that Sidious unbalancing the Force was infact the product of the greatest Force feat of all time. I will prove why it is not.
Firstly and most importantly, the feat was the product of two Sith in unison:
The shift had been the outcome of months of intense meditation, during which Plagueis and Sidious had sought to challenge the Force for sovereignty and suffuse the galaxy with the power of the dark side.
Secondly, the feat was accomplished against no form of serious tangible resistance:
Brazen and shameless, and at their own mortal peril, they had waged etheric war, anticipating that their own midi-chlorians, the Force’s proxy army, might marshal to boil their blood or stop the beating of their hearts. Risen out of themselves, discorporate and as a single entity, they had brought the power of their will to bear, asserting their sovereignty over the Force. No counterforce had risen against them. In what amounted to a state of rapture they knew that the Force had yielded, as if some deity had been tipped from its throne. On the fulcrum they had fashioned, the light side had dipped and the dark side had ascended.
While midi-chlorians appeared to resist manipulation of a sort that might imperil the balance of the Force, they remained passive, even compliant, in the case of a weak-willed being manipulated by one who was strong in the Force.
Instead the Force conceived the Chosen One, as a means of restoring the balance from the Sith threat which equated to both Sidious and Plagueis:
"Midi-chlorians are not easily persuaded to execute the dictates of one newly initiated in the mysteries. The Force needs to be won over, especially in work that involves the dark side. It must be reassured that a Sith is capable of accepting authority. Otherwise it will thwart one’s intentions. It will engineer misfortune. It will strike back.”
This was actually as a result of manipulating Darth Plagueis' own experiments:
Anakin’s mother, Shmi, confirmed in her own words what Qui-Gon had already suspected—the boy was immeasurably strong in the Force. Neither knew of Darth Plagueis’s suspected involvement in inducing midi-chlorians to create life, though Shmi informed Qui-Gon that Anakin had no natural father.
Palpatine had carefully cultivated Anakin's hopes for preventing this dire premonition, and had revealed everything to Anakin: Palpatine's secret identity as Darth Sidious. His murder of his own Master, Darth Plagueis. The role that the Sith had played in creating Anakin by manipulating the midi-chlorians.
This is generally misconstrued and even outright exaggerated to suggest that Sidious and Plagueis are of a premier threat. In actuality, Sidious and Plagueis together shifted the Force against no real form of resistance and Plagueis himself conceived the boy without his own knowledge, by the will of the Force.
This is often used as a counter argument against the Sith Emperor Vitiate, ironically indicating that only Plagueis and Sidious together have performed feats of greater import.
The Sith Emperor was capable of a galactic scale ritual in which all flora and fauna would perish and be consumed by the Sith Emperor himself so as to achieve godhood. Furthermore this act would reduce every star innthe galaxy to a drained black corruption, all planets would be turned to ash and the galaxy would be dead:
The darkness will consume all it touches. Stars will burn black, ashes raining on lifeless worlds. Everything ends.
This is merely a greater manifestation of the Emperor's prior rituals, which is stated to be the power of the dark side taken to its extreme:
Whispered rumors have persisted of planets snuffed out through intricate Sith rituals or by way of deadly, arcane machines--such as the device Revan sought to employ on Yavin 4--but Ziost represents a clear display of the corrosive power of the dark side of the Force taken to its extreme.
But what had happened on Nathema was different, and it disturbed him in a deep and profound way.The Emperor had consumed everything. Life, sound, color, even the Force—nothing remained.
Everything on Nathema had simply been snuffed out, extinguished so completely that it ceased to have any meaning or purpose. It was a vacuum of existence; a blight on the natural order.
This ritual is dismissed by many for a number of reasons, which I will now seek to debunk as fallacious:
Firstly, we have the idea that the empowerment of a dark side nexus was a reauirement for the Emperor, this is in and of itself ridiculous. The dark side nexus of Dromund Kaas is a product of the Emperor's own rituals, at great expense to his own energy reserves:
Power hungry, the Emperor spent great energy discovering and perfecting esoteric rites of darkness – rituals that wrecked the atmosphere of Dromund Kaas, transforming the ionosphere into a swirling electric storm.
Burial place, prison, and reliquary, the Dark Temple was built on the orders of the Emperor to seal away powerful artifacts and the Emperor's enemies, both alive and dead. The temple became a nexus of dark side energy as the Emperor performed rituals within, drawing strength and knowledge from his captives.
The Dread Masters created the incredible dark side nexus of Oricon utilising a mixture of rituals, the seeds and the Phobis Devices:
"The Dread Masters possess incredible, unprecedented power over the dark side of the Force; a power developed through rituals created by one of their own, the incomparable Sith alchemist known as Styrak."
"Their name was earned when they studied the power of the Phobis devices, artifacts that have driven even the most depraved Sith mad with terror."
"Fear is a powerful weapon, and those who wield it can rule the galaxy. The Phobis devices were constructed for just that purpose. Brimming with dark energy, their mere presence was enough to spark crippling horror in the bravest of minds. Many Sith who meditated on the devices were driven mad by their attempt. Only the lost Sith Dread Masters successfully harnessed and perfected the Phobis devices' frightening power."
"Oricon is a remote moon that is immeasurably strong with the dark side – a perfect home for the feared Dread Masters!"
"Oricon was affected by the Dread Masters."
Yet the combined power of the Dread Masters, and thus Oricon itself, are insignificant compared to the Emperor:
"The Dread Masters changed Oricon. Even their combined power is insignificant compared to the Emperor."
There is a very clear and obvious reason why the Emperor renders any dark side nexus completely insignificant compared to him. Because he absorbed the power of the strongest dark side nexus ever to occur during the Nathema ritual:
The ritual lasted ten days. Lord Vitiate orchestrated the sorcery and the planet Mediraas was consumed by the largest dark side nexus the galaxy would ever see. When the ritual ended, Lord Vitiate emerged as the only survivor. The pain, energy, and suffering of every living entity on the planet fueled his power and would prolong his life for centuries. The lifeless planet of Mediraas became a void in the Force and was erased from history. From that moment forward, the world would forever be known as Nathema, birthplace of the one and only Sith Emperor.
He is for all intents and purposes the very embodiment of the dark side itself:
A mysterious, almost godlike avatar of the dark side.
The Emperor is more than a man - he is the living embodiment of the dark side.
The Emperor is the dark side incarnate.
Even Sith such as Darth Bane outgrew the artifacts and relics of ancient times:
Zannah knew he looked on the rings, amulets, and other paraphernalia with disdain. The spark of the dark side that burned within them was like a single drop of rain falling into the ocean of power he already commanded; he saw no need to augment his abilities with gaudy jewelry fashioned centuries ago by ancient Sith sorcerers.
Yet the rituals which Vitiate enacted, were far beyond Darth Bane's scope of comprehension:
Bane could barely wrap his mind around their awesome potential. Some of the rituals were so terrible-so dangerous to attempt, even for a true Sith Master-that he doubted he would ever dare to use them.