Gillard has said that once you get to level nine, the difference lies in fighting styles and the "circumstances of the surroundings". Gillard and Lucas have also stated that Palpatine's fighting style is "one in which you'll never get the better of him". Yoda won only because of the environment.
Gillard's even said that Palpatine's "better than Yoda in a way" and "beyond anything we've experienced", referring to lightsaber combat. The website says that the Emperor can best any Jedi in lightsaber combat. Some of the developers mention in an Insider issue that they intended to depict Yoda meeting his match against the Emperor [in lightsaber combat]. And Ian McDiarmid's said that Palpatine's the fastest character in the films, for whatever its worth.
Indeed. Back and forths exist, especially between two combatants of relatively equal standing. Even a tired AotC Obi-Wan drove Dooku back once.
It's likely that Yoda drove Sidious into the pod as part of that "back and forth", with the pod limiting Palpatine's space. That prevented him from forcing Yoda back out.
Originally posted by SunRazer
Indeed. Back and forths exist, especially between two combatants of relatively equal standing. Even a tired AotC Obi-Wan drove Dooku back once.It's likely that Yoda drove Sidious into the pod as part of that "back and forth", with the pod limiting Palpatine's space. That prevented him from forcing Yoda back out.
1. Retconned by what?
2. Ataru is "the aggressive style", lol. Sidious' mixed form isn't more aggressive than that.
The fact of the matter is that Palpatine is at least as good as Yoda in both dueling and the Force. There's no way around that.
Also, to add one more quote to the list, Yoda admits in the novel that "he just didn't have it" as he was dueling Palpatine.
1. Dooku was toying with kenobi and so logically, let kenobi drive him back. Furthermore considering this also had aotc anakin being a legitmate challenge for dooku, its not consstent with later lore.Besides dooku's style isn't at allt he same as sidious's and he tends to retreat and elt people driv ehim.
2. Which was rreferring to the force based parts of it to, throwing pods at each other, lighting exchanges ect.And in fairness, that potrayal of the fight is an outlier which compared to the movie, the script, and the junior novel is very favorable to sidious. It has sidious outright beating yoda at the end rather than an explosive stalemate, had sidious force blasting yoda at the start when the exact opposite happened in the movie and script.
This isn't to say yoda and sidious are perfect equals(as multiple secondary sources and quotes you've used show, they aren't).
1. Dooku was still clearly better than Obi-Wan even when toying with him. There was a brief moment where he was actually driven back (as in not a voluntary retreat), but recovered quickly. The forms don't matter. My point is that it can happen.
2. No, it was in the midst of their lightsaber duel. And whether or not the quote is fallible, it's hardly alone. It sits alongside a mountain's worth of quotes stating that Yoda couldn't beat Sidious. I'm just saying that I identified one more quote to add to the list.