Bulets able to kill jedi?

[Anguirus]

That sounds reasonable enough. What got me was the implication that Yoda somehow yanked Luke right out of orbit and deposited him wihin an easy walk. I think of him as a *bit* more subtle than that.

[PainRack]

I was being sarcastic. I don't think for a moment that X-wings are cheap. Painrack was the one going "But the rebels can't even afford to maintain their frontline fighters so no wonder the scopes went down!"

So? In most airforces in the world, up to 1% of a sortie may be cancelled due to equipment failure of some sort.

For all we know, the X-wing was already a dodgy and Luke simply had no choice but to take it out because the Empire was attacking Hoth.

Again, Luke's fighter malfunctions inexplicably with no known apparent cause, yet even when he crashes it survives intact (completely intact, as in "it could still fly later on in the film"). Again, not coincidentally, Yoda's house is within walking distance.

And of course, this isn't the first time we see SW fighters doing that. Remember a TIE pilot name Qorl?

Furthermore, we do see Luke doing maintenance on the X-wing before prepping it for flight. Unless you simply believe that the green vegetation hanging on the X-wing mysteriously disappeared.

[Tychu]

In Zahn's Thrawn Trilogy, Luke returns to Dagobah at one point and is surprised that he landed so easily. He then ponders that perhaps Yoda affected his X-wing all those years ago and that's why he crashlanded not coincidentally so close to Yoda himself. (and also might explain why his ship survived the crash as well in an operable condition, and he himself)

Basically, Zahn took one of the moments in the film which didn't make sense and rationalised them. Given that Yoda was seen in that film to lift the x-wing out of the bog and land it on the ground using the Force, I don't see why it would be so hard for him to manhandle the x-wing into the bog - as well as explaining why Luke's systems began to fail inexplicably. ("All my scopes are down I can't see a thing!")

EDIT: The important thing is that Luke muses about this, it's not like Yoda's ghost appeared conveniently and told him "Caused your crash, did I? Yes, yes. Hmmm."

To digress from the OP, i never understood why this needed to be rationalised.

So, Luke X-wing suffered a convient malfunction. So what? The Rebels aren't that rich in the first place.

And on a planet the size of Dagobah he just happens to uncontrollably crashland near where Yoda hangs out? Yoda's house is within walking distance!

And for a cheap ass fighter it sure has a lot of durability.

i always thought that instead of Yoda actually controlling were Luke landed
it was the force that pretty much guided Luke. As in Luke just followed his instincts (the force) and Yoda using the force figured out where Luke would land and poof theres Yoda waiting for Luke. YOu know we never actually see how long it takes Yoda and Luke to get to Yodas hovel, Yoda just says it isnt far

[Stofsk]

I was being sarcastic. I don't think for a moment that X-wings are cheap. Painrack was the one going "But the rebels can't even afford to maintain their frontline fighters so no wonder the scopes went down!"

So? In most airforces in the world, up to 1% of a sortie may be cancelled due to equipment failure of some sort.

Wow. A whole 1%.

For all we know, the X-wing was already a dodgy and Luke simply had no choice but to take it out because the Empire was attacking Hoth.

Commander Skywalker, Hero of the Rebellion, Destroyer of the Death Star, Leader of Rogue Squadron... flies a shitty X-wing that hasn't been maintained.

Uh huh.

Again, Luke's fighter malfunctions inexplicably with no known apparent cause, yet even when he crashes it survives intact (completely intact, as in "it could still fly later on in the film"). Again, not coincidentally, Yoda's house is within walking distance.

And of course, this isn't the first time we see SW fighters doing that. Remember a TIE pilot name Qorl?

Nope. Never heard of him.

Furthermore, we do see Luke doing maintenance on the X-wing before prepping it for flight. Unless you simply believe that the green vegetation hanging on the X-wing mysteriously disappeared.

Yes... this was after it had crashlanded on Dagobah. You implied that it had been damaged before Luke even took off from Hoth because the Rebels are cheap... which is why they have all that heavy equipment and starships and things...

[Stofsk]

YOu know we never actually see how long it takes Yoda and Luke to get to Yodas hovel, Yoda just says it isnt far

I think we can safely assume that it isn't some trans-continental trek. I doubt it took many days either; they left Luke's camp while there was still light, and the next we see they're in Yoda's hut and it's dark. Luke tells R2 to stay and watch over the ship, but R2 disobeys and tags along. I don't get the impression the hut was anything but in walking distance to the crash site.

[PainRack]

Wow. A whole 1%.

And this somehow makes it unbelievably impossible?

Commander Skywalker, Hero of the Rebellion, Destroyer of the Death Star, Leader of Rogue Squadron... flies a shitty X-wing that hasn't been maintained.

Uh huh.

Right. And I'm sure that amidst all the rush and hurry of prepping the Rebel transports for liftoff, the Rebels will have the time and luxury of going through every single checklist and saying"Hey, this X-wing may just crashland. Let's take it out of comission"

Furthermore, we do see Luke doing maintenance on the X-wing before prepping it for flight. Unless you simply believe that the green vegetation hanging on the X-wing mysteriously disappeared.

Yes... this was after it had crashlanded on Dagobah. You implied that it had been damaged before Luke even took off from Hoth because the Rebels are cheap... which is why they have all that heavy equipment and starships and things...[/quote]
And of course, the Rebels have the luxury of well maintained equipment, fresh from the factory supplies and a shitload of maintenance resources to expend? This when every single asset is being used to evacuate their headquarters?

[Darth Garden Gnome]

And this somehow makes it unbelievably impossible?

For one, what makes you think that the cases of malfunction in Earth aircraft have any bearing on X-Wings? Perhaps you're better served providing evidence for X-Wings malfunctioning.

And two, are you seriously implying that a 1% chance malfunction is more likely than the Master fucking Jedi of all time, who was expecting him, fiddling with his scopes?

It's the difference between, "Oops! Your shit broke for no goddamn reason!" and "YODA IS LEADING YOU TO YOUR DESTINY."

[Stofsk]

Wow. A whole 1%.

And this somehow makes it unbelievably impossible?

Not unbelievably impossible. Just wildly unlikely.

Commander Skywalker, Hero of the Rebellion, Destroyer of the Death Star, Leader of Rogue Squadron... flies a shitty X-wing that hasn't been maintained.

Uh huh.

Right. And I'm sure that amidst all the rush and hurry of prepping the Rebel transports for liftoff, the Rebels will have the time and luxury of going through every single checklist and saying"Hey, this X-wing may just crashland. Let's take it out of comission"

You're inventing false dilemmas here. YOU said earlier that the Rebels aren't rich, which says that of course Luke's X-wing broke down, the Rebels can't fucking afford basic maintenance.

When I pointed out the idiocy of this you then switched to "Oh shit the Imperials are attacking, I guess we can't fucking do our routine maintenance today, even though we could have fucking done it YESTERDAY."

Nevermind that Zahn's passage is not directly contradicted by the films, making this argument entirely pointless.

Yes... this was after it had crashlanded on Dagobah. You implied that it had been damaged before Luke even took off from Hoth because the Rebels are cheap... which is why they have all that heavy equipment and starships and things...

And of course, the Rebels have the luxury of well maintained equipment, fresh from the factory supplies and a shitload of maintenance resources to expend?

The Rebels have a large Fleet, and build well-equipped bases that have a pick-up-and-go mobility to them. So... yes, frankly, the Rebels will have supplies for that kind of shit.

Their frontline fighter is expected to stand up to larger numbers of TIE craft. That means they have to be robust and durable, and it's in the Rebellion's interest to keep their spacecraft well maintained, because they depend on them to strike at Imperial targets. Not to mention that Commander Skywalker as Rogue Leader may likely have his own personal X-wing. And even if, by some unknown reason, the Rebellion doesn't believe in routine maintenance for all it's frontline spacecraft, you could say that Luke could do it himself. Since he is technically inclined and able. R2 could even do it, why not? He's supposed to fix things.

This when every single asset is being used to evacuate their headquarters?

Yes, because of course the only time the Rebels could do routine maintenance would be during a ground assault of their installation. Like, they couldn't have done it the day or week before.

Not to mention you have no proof that Luke's X-wing was in poor repair. But let's just ignore the Zahn passage, because simple explanations are no match for wildly improbable bullshit.

And you know what the fucking stupid thing is? The thing that makes your entire ants-in-the-pants hang up totally fucking stupid? Seconds before Luke even begins re-entry he's talking to R2 and he says "Hmm... no signs of civilsation, but massive life form readings though. There's something alive down there."

Gee, what was he using there? Was it maybe... his sensors? The same sensors that inexplicably stop working as he descends? There's your 'poorly maintained X-wing with faulty scopes' for you. Yoda couldn't have possibly brought Luke's X-wing down via the Force as Zahn says, no, it had to be because the Rebellion is cheap.

[Darth Fanboy]

[
I was being sarcastic. I don't think for a moment that X-wings are cheap. Painrack was the one going "But the rebels can't even afford to maintain their frontline fighters so no wonder the scopes went down!"

I agree with you, I was trying to add some emphasis to your point there and I didn't quote it like I should have. My bad.

Again, Luke's fighter malfunctions inexplicably with no known apparent cause, yet even when he crashes it survives intact (completely intact, as in "it could still fly later on in the film"). Again, not coincidentally, Yoda's house is within walking distance.

Some of it might have been luck (like how Luke began re-entry even in the same continent as Yoda) or will of the force, but even the will of the force can only go so far before you start to think "hang on that's a large number of coincidences."

You could say that Yoda made Luke's X-wing 'malfunction' but the will of the force was what brought Luke even near Yoda to begin with.

You never know with the force eh? It's like a random numbe rgnerator that keeps throwing out the same number endlessly, and since its random you can never tell if its broke.

[Kurgan]

In the Jedi Power Battles we see the Tuskan Raiders shooting projectile weapons and if you put your saber up to deflect it just disintegrates
Its a corny game but good but its very arcadish

Game Mechanics. Doesn't count.

And with good reason too! In JPB, ordinary Battle droids are able torepeatedly and successfully block lightsaber blades with their forearms and ordinary garbed bounty hunters and other humanoid enemies (no armor, shields, or force abilities) take multiple saber hits to go down in battle.

It was an awful game, plain and simple, even if the Dreamcast version was more tolerable than the even more horribly made PSX version!

[Jadeite]

Let it melt, as long as you have a good bit of molten metal traveling at high speeds it will probably still kill. As long as it doesn't completely vaporize.

I tend to think that if there was something as easy as that killing a Jedi, their enemies would've thought of it over the course of 25,000 years.

Of course, the villians in SW tend to not be the very competent sort, so it wouldn't surprise me if they didn't. Flamethrowers seem like a good weapon vs Jedi, especially if mixed with shotguns. And of course, cluster munitions should do the trick.

[Noble Ire]

Let it melt, as long as you have a good bit of molten metal traveling at high speeds it will probably still kill. As long as it doesn't completely vaporize.

I tend to think that if there was something as easy as that killing a Jedi, their enemies would've thought of it over the course of 25,000 years.

Of course, the villians in SW tend to not be the very competent sort, so it wouldn't surprise me if they didn't. Flamethrowers seem like a good weapon vs Jedi, especially if mixed with shotguns. And of course, cluster munitions should do the trick.

Of course, both flamethrowers and shotguns (flechette launchers) exist in the SW universe, and are used by Jedi hunters (case in point, Jango Fett). I would imagine the reason that more soldiers don't use those weapons is that simple blasters are far more versatile, and even exotic weapons don't always work on Jedi, because of their "Force wall"-esque abilties.

[Darth Fanboy]

That's funny, the opponents of Jedi during the clone wars routinely used these sort of weapons against Jedi. It was only later on after the Jedi were almost wiped out that you don't see them being carried around much.

[Anarchist Bunny]

Another reason for a lack of anti-Jedi weaponry being its a very small percentage of the galatic population(hell the galatic militant population) that is Jedi.

At the start of the Clone Wars there was 10,000 Jedi or so iirc(and I wonder if that includes the Agri-, Med-, and Explor- Corps). After the War they started developing methods of fighting the Jedi(MagnaGuards for example) but just before it there was no need to. Most people in the galaxy(scum and militaries included) probably never even saw a Jedi their whole life. So spreading out a bunch of weapons that may kill a Jedi, but will be at best not as effective against standard military/pirates, would be a giant waste of money.

[Shrykull]

Not the normal FMJ rounds, but DU or tungsten cored ones might simply go through a lightsaber without completely melting.

Had this in my head for while but didn't know if it was feasible.

Makes me wonder also, how many Jedi get killed by droideka's, which they can't seem to handle, like Qui-Gon and Obi-wan. What would have happened if the Confederacy of independant systems used [ [/i]nothing but[/i] droidekas and not just ones that roll, ones that could walk too, and instead of slow blaster bolts, machine guns. Jedi couldn't move his arms fast enough to block them.

[Invictus ChiKen]

Going Jedi hunting? To hell with blasters, give me a shotgun! Preferably something like this: http://www.camo-store.com/auto_assault_ ... hotgun.htm

I WANT!!!

[Pint0 Xtreme]

The answer to the question in the OP depends on the power output of a lightsabre blade, assuming that the blade is actually massless and will not actually stop the bullet physically. If the transit time multiplied by the power output of the blade is less than the energy required to melt the bullet, the bullet will, naturally, not melt, and continue on to strike the Jedi.

However, there is a load of on-screen evidence that suggests the lightsaber is anything but massless. Battle droids react to the lightsaber cuts like a sharp physical sword transfering the wielder's momentum onto the object. And in ROTS, Yoda's saber throw into the clone trooper didn't result in the saber falling off. It actually remained in the clone's chest until Yoda pulled it out. From what we've seen, there's no reason to assume that bullets would react differently. A lightsaber blade will not only melt a bullet. It would stop it cold.

[Cykeisme]

I think the perception that a Jedi can only defend himself against blaster ranged attacks is flawed. Considering the fact that telekinesis appears to be a basic skill among Force adepts (though of varying capability depending on the "strength" of the user), it should be apparent that solid projectiles are subject to this manipulation.
Such projectiles may either be outright stopped by a "Force wall" (a variant of the ability described being used by Tyranus and Anakin to hem in movement), or for weaker users, merely have their course deflected (hopefully) far enough that they would miss, though this might endanger allies behind the defender.

In fact, I propose that the traditional popularity of the lightsaber as a Jedi weapon stems from the fact that as blasters came into widespread use, the Jedi found themselves unable to telekinetically deflect blaster fire. Upon discovering this, the Jedi discovered that they were able use a lightsaber's powerful, albeit physically narrow, ray shield-like abilities, overcoming the fact its narrowness through application of precognition and superhuman precision, to protect themselves from blaster fire.

Additionally, common use of a lightsaber by the primary Force-wielding traditions (the Jedi Order and Dark Lords of the Sith) may also stem from the related fact that lightsaber blades cannot be telekinetically gripped or "walled-out". This makes them far more potent against one an opposing Jedi or Sith compared to, say, a traditional sword, even an incredibly sharp and hard one made from Star Wars materials.

Essentially, people are going about it backwards; Jedi deflect blaster fire with lightsabers because they can't block it with telekinesis, the way they can against other projectiles.

The answer to the question in the OP depends on the power output of a lightsabre blade, assuming that the blade is actually massless and will not actually stop the bullet physically. If the transit time multiplied by the power output of the blade is less than the energy required to melt the bullet, the bullet will, naturally, not melt, and continue on to strike the Jedi.

However, there is a load of on-screen evidence that suggests the lightsaber is anything but massless. Battle droids react to the lightsaber cuts like a sharp physical sword transfering the wielder's momentum onto the object. And in ROTS, Yoda's saber throw into the clone trooper didn't result in the saber falling off. It actually remained in the clone's chest until Yoda pulled it out. From what we've seen, there's no reason to assume that bullets would react differently. A lightsaber blade will not only melt a bullet. It would stop it cold.

Actually, even if the blade was massless, that doesn't mean that it would be unable to perform those feats (knock down battle droids and stick in a clone's chestplate, and stop bullets). Even a massless blade could transfer momentum to the lightsaber's hilt, if the blade were "solid" in the sense that you could apply force to it.

The blade seems to be solid and unable to pass through matter until it actually "destroys" the matter in its path, either a thermal process or more likely, ripping apart the inter-molecular or inter-atomic bonds in the material through some exotic mechanism.. once this has happened, it actually slips between the two surfaces of the fresh cleavage, rather than actually "through" the material. Of course it's a continous and rather rapid process, but it's apparent when a very dense material is being cut through, such as the Trade Federation battleship's blast doors in TPM.
In the same way, the massless blade of a lightsaber can still make contact with the blade of another lightsaber, and apply force (and torque, since it's so far from the pivot point of the wielder's wrists) on each other.

But yes, considering it knocks droids down and gets lodged in a clone's chest, I don't see why it wouldn't be able to stop projectiles. In fact, a dense projectile composed of a material is difficult to cut would in fact be less likely to get cut in half and hit the Jedi.

However, I believe the hypothesis I outlined at the beginning of this post to be more relevant.

[Darth Fanboy]

I think the perception that a Jedi can only defend himself against blaster ranged attacks is flawed. Considering the fact that telekinesis appears to be a basic skill among Force adepts (though of varying capability depending on the "strength" of the user), it should be apparent that solid projectiles are subject to this manipulation.
Such projectiles may either be outright stopped by a "Force wall" (a variant of the ability described being used by Tyranus and Anakin to hem in movement), or for weaker users, merely have their course deflected (hopefully) far enough that they would miss, though this might endanger allies behind the defender.

How does the above portion of your post account for Maks Leem being taken down by Flechette launchers in "Dark Rendezvous"?

[Noble Ire]

How does the above portion of your post account for Maks Leem being taken down by Flechette launchers in "Dark Rendezvous"?

She was attacked by what, a dozen assassin droid at once? Even the most powerful Jedi Masters could eventually be overwhelmed by sheer numbers. With enough volume, I would imagine projectiles could easily get through a "Force Wall".

[Ted C]

On the original question, I wonder what the relative amount of momentum carried by a blaster bolt is compared to a bullet.

Blaster bolt momentum doesn't look very high; we certainly don't see a lightsabre blade move as if it were involved in a collision when it reflects a blaster bolt.

A lightsabre does appear to be a solid force-field of some sort which should be able to intercept a bullet, I wonder if a bullet would affect the motion of the lightsabre far more drastically, making it far harder to deflect multiple bullets than multiple blaster bolts.

Depending on the physics involved, a slug-thrower with a decent rate of fire might be a more effective weapon against a Jedi than a blaster with a similar fire rate.

[glass]

There's a reason why many examples of anti-Jedi weaponry are either noise based or something along the lines of grenades.

One of the Corellian trilogy books (Assault at Selonia, I think) has Leia 'deflecting' mini thermal detonators back at their throwers with her lightsabre.

It's a holiday in the UK on Monday (yay!), so I won't be able to get back with a page reference 'til Tuesday, so hopefully someone else know the passage I mean and has their books closer to hand. It's the bit with Leia & Mara on the window trying to escape from the Governer's building.


glass.

[The Original Nex]

How does the above portion of your post account for Maks Leem being taken down by Flechette launchers in "Dark Rendezvous"?

Don't start subscribing to the No Limits Fallacy. As Ire mentioned, she was attacked by many droids, all fireing flechettes. The reason she couldn't fend them all off is the same reason 186 Jedi in the Geonosis Arena succumbed to blaster fire. Or should we use your logic and assume that, because many Jedi were killed by blasters in AotC, that Jedi cannot adequately defend themselves against that weapon?

[Pint0 Xtreme]

On the original question, I wonder what the relative amount of momentum carried by a blaster bolt is compared to a bullet.

Blaster bolt momentum doesn't look very high; we certainly don't see a lightsabre blade move as if it were involved in a collision when it reflects a blaster bolt.

Au contraire, Jango Fett made several carefully placed shots to effectively "push" a Jedi's lightsaber out of the way before placing a couple shots center mass killing him at the battle of Geonosis in Attack of the Clones.

Depending on the physics involved, a slug-thrower with a decent rate of fire might be a more effective weapon against a Jedi than a blaster with a similar fire rate.

As we've seen, blaster fire varies in terms of power and there's no reason to assume that doesn't apply to its "momentum" as well. Jango's pistol blaster fire had demonstrably more punch than say the 501st clonetroopers that attacked the Jedi Temple, who used a lighter but more rapid style of blaster fire.

[Darth Fanboy]

I'm not trying to subscribe to any "No Limits Fallacies". What I thought Cyke was saying is that Jedi would have an easier time handling bullets (or other similar physical projectiles) than blaster shots to the point where they were somewhat useless, hence the development of blasters. I wondered why that would be the case when it has been established that fragmentation weapons, flechette rounds, and the like have been proven effective anti-Jedi weapons and also recognized as such in the SW Galaxy. If I misinterpreted what Cyke was saying or if I am wording my posts poorly I apologize.

Edit: Typing/Grammar.