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What would YOU change about Star Wars?

Posted: 2006-09-02 02:07am
by Sun Wukung
Like the title asks, what would you do with the existing Star Wars universe to make it more suited to you? Would the Jedi be different and not the benevolent protectors of the Republic? Would the Sith turn out to be the "good guys" and the Jedi be the evil conspiring organization hiding behind conspiracy? The idea is to come up with your changes for Star Wars. It can contradict anything, if you can defend your reasoning. That means the Emperor can be less powerfull or more, the Sith can have a different structure in thier Order. Just do what you want to do with the SW universe. Remember:If the EU authors can do it, why can't you?

Posted: 2006-09-02 02:46am
by The Grim Squeaker
First of all, increase the number of Everything. Allmost every number given in SW (Mainly military wise) can afford to have a 0 added to the end and still be moderately conservative.
Show massive amounts of ships and fleets, a minor shipyard for a single sub-sector cranking out Defender class SD's over weeks or days (Defenders are a more advanced version of SSD's/Executor class ships from the NJO).

Stop having every single battle, adventure or planet being a threat to the whole Galaxy/Universe/republic.
Let's have adventures over multiple planets affecting the fates of billions, but not have the Senate start dithering about it or the Galaxy as being Threateend. (Cough, 5 killik ships and a galactic civil war)

Showcase the scale and population of the Galaxy, (for example A statement of the dropped population of a city-world a fraction of the size/population of Coruscant as being only a few Trillion registered legal beings).

Finally (Out of personal taste but not quality concerns), Show the Jedi in quantity as well as relatively large amounts of Force adepts. (Thousands of Jedi [given the time period of the NJO+] and roughly one out of every ten-two thousand beings as a force Adept).
And show them as competent and using their force powers (We don't need Ship throwing wank, but no stun blasts taking downa jedi master :x )

Posted: 2006-09-02 02:56am
by Ace Pace
I'd go the other way, lets fucking ignore size, it's nice from a debate prespective, but I'd enjoy a larger focus on small scale, small events.

Posted: 2006-09-02 03:01am
by Ritterin Sophia
Get rid of everything Karen Traviss.

Posted: 2006-09-02 03:47am
by Havok
More alien porn :wink:

Posted: 2006-09-02 03:55am
by Jim Raynor
-Odds and any related T-canon bullshit are completely expunged from canon.

-Likewise, Therefore I Am (the retarded story in which IG-88 takes over the Death Star :roll: ) is removed.

-Less Rebel fighter wanking. TIEs will be portrayed as more specialized, lower-cost, but effective starfighters, not worthless cannon fodder.

-Bigger/less stupid numbers all around.

-Boba Fett gets taken down a notch. The level of sheer fanboy wanking this character gets is sickening.

-General Grievous makes a better showing of himself in ROTS. His movie appearance was very disappointing compared to what he did in the Clone Wars shorts.

Posted: 2006-09-02 04:21am
by Crossroads Inc.
EU Starships allllll over the Prequails. Victories, Dreadnaughts, Carracks, oh yeah, they should have been everywhere.

Posted: 2006-09-02 04:50am
by defanatic
Less stupidly powerful EU, like the suncrusher, or whatever. Or Yoda crushing starships together and crap like that. If he could do that, why not in the movies?

Posted: 2006-09-02 05:17am
by The Grim Squeaker
Ace Pace wrote:I'd go the other way, lets fucking ignore size, it's nice from a debate prespective, but I'd enjoy a larger focus on small scale, small events.
Stop having every single battle, adventure or planet being a threat to the whole Galaxy/Universe/republic.
I.E small scale (Though small scale in SW is relative :P ). I mean relative small scale, not retarded EU scale.
I want stories that don't attempt to shake the galaxy all the time, (Especially when they shouldn't).

Thats one of the reasons I like the Boba fett stories- he's "powerful, feared and dangerous" but barring Traviss-wanking :roll: he is not a galactic shaker or affector (Even with EU wanking and him destroying imperial bases and having a spy system better than that of a planetary goverment [though the latter is understandable since a single planet govermetn would be a drop of water in SW economics]. And yeah, I'm a Fett fanboy :oops:

Posted: 2006-09-02 01:05pm
by Darth Servo
Show the full power of SW cap ships in the films. I wanted a BDZ in ROTS damn it. :evil:

Posted: 2006-09-02 01:34pm
by Bounty
- Keep the Jedi as near-mystical do-gooders and not as an open political entity. If the Republic is in danger, a Jedi shows up and quietly fixes the mess before retreating to his clay shack somewhere out in the boonies to meditate.

- Push back the creation of the Empire a few decades. Turn the Clone Wars into the original rebellion against the Empire, by the few Republic territories it didn't yet control, that got brutally squashed. After the CW, the Empire annexed the rebel territories and hunted down the surviving Jedi.

- None of this "Palpatine was pulling strings!" nonsense. In fact, keep the Emperor a mystery - don't even confirm if he's actually in charge or just a sock puppet of the admiralty. The deformed holographic face was perfect.

- Don't turn the force into a cartoonish /godmode. No random superpowers that can be turned on and off, no acrobatics. Jedi don't control the Force directly, they surrender to it and trust it will guide them. They can still levitate, have telekinesis and precog and all those party tricks, but they only kick in when needed - like Luke figuring out how to pull his lightsaber out of the snow in the Wampa cave. Make it work more like Ben's little tutorial in the Falcon.

- No more scenes set on Tatooine. Luke leaves, the end. It's a shithole where nothing happens.

- And above all, don't tell the whole story. Don't connect every character to every other character. You've got a big galaxy to play with, there's no reason why Chewie's mother-in-law needs to be Han's nurse while smuggling the plans for the X-wing to Ackbar's cousin.
First of all, increase the number of Everything.
No. No fucking way. The bigger and more wankish you make your univserse, the more you show how powerful it is, the more pathetic it becomes. The lone ISD in ANH was absolutely terrifying; the Executor is ESB was "meh", despite being twenty times bigger. Why? Because in ANH, you could only wonder what other terrors the Empire had at it's disposal; and no amount of massive fleets and ships can come even close to what your imagination can conjure up.

Less is more.

Posted: 2006-09-02 02:08pm
by Havok
Hey, aside from the more alien porn, I'm with Bounty!

Posted: 2006-09-02 02:34pm
by K. A. Pital
Yoda gets killed pretty quickly by the Emperor, only Obi-Wan survives. I always wanted to see this storyline.

Imagine how tough it would be for Obi. Imagine how he would've felt on the Death Star, how he'd try to avoid death because he's the only one to teach Luke... there's no one after him.

Moreover, he _will_ be morally confused in the fight with Anakin... so perhaps he, not Anakin, suffers severe injuries and is later saved by Bail Organa...

And then, Padme doesn't die, she and Anakin overthrow the Emperor shortly after the Mustafar events and build their version of the Empire...

A nice Infinities storyline.

Posted: 2006-09-02 04:42pm
by Edi
I second General Schatten, get rid of absolutely fucking everything Traviss ever wrote. Less headaches that way.

Edi

Posted: 2006-09-02 08:37pm
by Elfdart
99% of the EU goes in the shitter if I'm in charge.

I'd also get rid of Luke being Leia's brother. She should be The Other, but because of the Force, not by being Luke's long lost sister.

Posted: 2006-09-02 08:49pm
by Batman
I'm with Bounty AND DEATH. Increase the number of everything (200 Dreadnoughts making the difference in the war? You gotta be kidding me) but DON'T make everything universe-shattering. Stay away from the grand things but if you DO go with the grand things MAKE them grand.
I don't neccessarily want storylines that affect the entire galaxy but if you DO those storylines kindly involve forces that actually CAN affect the entire Valendamned galaxy.

Posted: 2006-09-02 08:55pm
by Noble Ire
I would attempt to fix the Padme-Anakin love subplot to add impact to the genesis of Darth Vader. This could be accomplished two ways:

- Simply portray their relationship as a more loving and natural one than it was in AOTC and ROTS (and I'm not necessarily just talking about changing the dialogue). Making Anakin's attitudes slightly more mature throughout AOTC, and replacing the hairbrush sequence in ROTS with something more valid might be all that is need to accomplish this; livening up or replacing both Portman and Christensen would be helpful as well, but not absolutely necessary.

- Go the love triangle route. Have both Obi-Wan and Anakin fall in love with Padme; the relationship goes until normal up until after Luke and Leia are conceived, and then Padme has an affair with Obi-Wan. Anakin eventually discovers this and it crushes him, forcing him down the path of the Dark Side. Of course, this would change the entire core of ROTS, and impact the mood of the OT; I'm not sure if it would be superior to the original plot.

I would also heavily alter the opening of ROTS; the Shaak-Tii subplot would remain in the film, time spent on the buzz droids would be used to focus on the overall battle, the battle droids wouldn't have stupid voices (I wouldn't have SBDs talk at all), General Grievous would be more like he is in the CW cartoons. And the Palpatine "yip" would be purged, of course.

In terms of the EU, I would simply attempt to make it more consistant. Change technical details and inconsistancies, alter moronic battle plans to make more sense, fix continuity holes and such. Works like The Crystal Star, The Swarm War books, and every Traviss work save the original Republic Commando novel and her Vader short would be erased.

Posted: 2006-09-02 09:00pm
by Stark
You love the EU so much. That's why it's such an indicator when YOU don't like new EU novels or 'developments'. :)

Posted: 2006-09-02 09:12pm
by Noble Ire
Stark wrote:You love the EU so much. That's why it's such an indicator when YOU don't like new EU novels or 'developments'. :)
I won't deny liking a good deal more of the EU than many of the people on this board. However, I am not devoted to the books themselves, but rather the sense of depth that they provide to the universe. As such, I quite frankly would not mind if, with the exception of a handful of the decent main stories like KOTOR, Dark Lord, and the Thrawn trilogy, the EU was completely reteconned away and replaced with a complex history, encyclopedia, technical-type guide book in the style of Publius and Saxton (their summaries and examiniations are often more enjoyable than most of the more recent EU novels). Using this central, cohesive guide, novels, short stories, and comics could be written dealing with interesting aspects of the galaxy at large, obscure stories, and minor characters, so that the validity of the central plot is not corrupted, as it is increasingly today.

And your faith in my abilities to discern true suckiness is appreciated. :wink:

Posted: 2006-09-02 10:51pm
by Havok
Elfdart wrote:99% of the EU goes in the shitter if I'm in charge.

I'd also get rid of Luke being Leia's brother. She should be The Other, but because of the Force, not by being Luke's long lost sister.
Hmmm interesting. Perhaps Obi-Wans prequell love child?

Posted: 2006-09-02 11:20pm
by Surlethe
I'd completely scrap the EU, alter a few details in the trilogies, and then hire RedImperator to collaborate on writing a new EU: that way, we get the depth, but instead of shit, we also get concentrated awesomeness.

If anyone's interested, here's a short list of the things I change in the trilogies:
  • Have Jabba the Hutt not live on Tatooine, but instead on some other planet (Nar Shadda, perhaps?). In general, I'd like to get rid of the "we've got to go back to the same planets over and over and over again" brain bug.
  • Show more of the core's old and affluent planets, so we get a sense of the truly cosmopolitan nature of the Empire.
  • Show the industrial might of the Empire/Republic: KDY beginning construction on the Acclamators during AotC, e.g., with huge, panning shots of the system-wide factories.
  • Make more evident the internal power plays in the Empire.
  • Get good actors to play Anakin, especially as a boy.
  • Eliminate Jar-Jar Binks, and then personally burn all the tapes that have him in it.
  • Possibly change the setting in the end of RotJ to Kashyyk, and change the separatist-loyalist battle before Order 66 to some other venue -- a space battle, perhaps.

Posted: 2006-09-02 11:27pm
by Wyrm
First off, dump the EU, or rewrite it under the iron-fisted law: NO WANK!!! All figures should be in line with what a galactic civilization is capable of and would realistically need. (This means, among other things, that Karen Traviss can be given the summary boot.)

While we're at it, apply the "NO WANK" rule to the entire francise. The technology keeps its frightening scale of power, but no ever-larger escalation of Star Destroyers - Super Star Destoryers - Eclipses - ect. The ISD can already frag a planet, what more do you want? Superlasers require Death Stars to support them. Period.

Next, the PT. The PT should be brought into compliance of what we know in the OT. That means no kid-Aniken; when Aniken Skywalker meets Obi-Wan, he should be a twenty-something pilot who is a beld ace at some starfighter. And don't put him on Tatooine in the beginning. I'm with Bounty on this: Tatooine is the anus of the galaxy, let it remain that way.

Lessee. Original unaltered OT. Han shot first. End of discussion.

Other than that, you guys already expressed views similar to my own.

Posted: 2006-09-02 11:34pm
by Tychu
defanatic wrote:Less stupidly powerful EU, like the suncrusher, or whatever. Or Yoda crushing starships together and crap like that. If he could do that, why not in the movies?
He did that in the Clone Wars

take out anything KJA and that Jeter fellow you know the Bounty Hunter Trilogy

Posted: 2006-09-02 11:42pm
by Stofsk
Surlethe wrote:I'd completely scrap the EU, alter a few details in the trilogies, and then hire RedImperator to collaborate on writing a new EU: that way, we get the depth, but instead of shit, we also get concentrated awesomeness.
I concur. I would miss Zahn's contributions, but what percentage did Zahn contribute to the total whole? I hate thinking about it like that though.
Have Jabba the Hutt not live on Tatooine, but instead on some other planet (Nar Shadda, perhaps?). In general, I'd like to get rid of the "we've got to go back to the same planets over and over and over again" brain bug.
It's a part of mythological writing/hero myth etc. The idea is that the hero returns to where he came from, coming full circle.

That said, there's no reason why Anakin had to come from Tattooine too.

Posted: 2006-09-03 12:01am
by SirNitram
Get my outline of a 'Worst Imperials Ever Fight To Preserve Empire' story published and made canon. The basic idea is, take a VicStar out on the Rim that has the worst behaved and most insubordinate officers in the military consigned to it, and have them get dumped into a plot running concurrent to the OT. It's a lovely vehicle to correct so much of the scale, because you're behind the stick of the war machines, with the main characters those who know how to squeeze every ounce out of these things.

Plus, likable, misbehaving Imperials are underrepresented.