Magneto Vs. the Emperor

[Shroom Man 777]

I mean, shit, he was able to drain micro-particulates of iron from someone's bloodstream - extracting them through not just orifices, but from... somewhere from a guy's body - and coagulate them into various metal shapes and propel them at lethal velocities to kill people and break his prison to pieces. What the fuck is that.

[Darth Hoth]

Magneto's demonstrated metal-TK is quite stronger than films-only Palpatine's TK. That was not in dispute, as far as I understood matters. Or, if it was, it certainly no longer is. If they go for sheer psychic armwrestling, film Palpatine loses, and quickly. Even if durasteel (and whatever) lacks significant magnetic properties, and/or is too structurally strong for him to twist and break in any case; Magneto brings enough of his own transition-metal to kill any single individual quite trivially.

What it boils down to is basically who hits first. Magneto is stronger in sheer brute force, but going by the force film Palpatine can apply in other situations, he can logically kill an unprotected human. Magneto has no defence against telekinesis, as far as I can tell. And while film Palpatine, on the other hand, should be able to block stuff, he is not strong enough for this to matter. He still has to get a knockout punch in before he is hit by whatever transition-metal object his opponent can throw at him.

Now, since neither of them is out gunning for the other initially per the OP, either and both will have to make their move in full view of the other. In this case, film Palpatine's "tactical" precognition should grant him some advantage. (It works against robots and training drones for Jedi, so it should not be telepathy-based, hence effective even if we assume that Magneto has protection against mind-reading.) Whether it is enough . . . I will not say for sure, but it is a point in his favour.

That is, assuming that he is smart enough to use a quick-kill attack (like the massive stroke the Nightsisters gave Luke in the novel I quoted in the recent Samus thread, or just plain a hard enough remote kick like Zannah in the Darth Bane comic/novels). And even then, Magneto might still have time to accelerate some nasty business his way to transsonic or so velocity and throw it his way with his last gasp.

My bets are still on Magneto, but Sarevok did bring up a relevant point.

[Simon_Jester]

Now, since neither of them is out gunning for the other initially per the OP, either and both will have to make their move in full view of the other. In this case, film Palpatine's "tactical" precognition should grant him some advantage. (It works against robots and training drones for Jedi, so it should not be telepathy-based, hence effective even if we assume that Magneto has protection against mind-reading.) Whether it is enough . . . I will not say for sure, but it is a point in his favour.

Point, it is not telepathy-based. On the other hand, the detailed precognition that makes it clear there's a major threat incoming from this precise direction and of this precise nature doesn't seem to give Jedi more than fractional-second warning of what's about to happen. If it did, they'd be much harder to fight because they'd be able to do things like strategically avoid detection more effectively. Their precognition wouldn't just let them avoid specific attacks on a moment-by-moment basis, it'd let them not be there when the attack happens.

[Sarevok]

Even with telepathy precognition is good enough to block blaster fire from droids and automated turrets. So it should suffice to warn Palpatine beforehand Magneto is going to chuck a hunk of metal his way. A split second warning is sufficient for a Jedi Knight to kill a man with his own bullet. Incase of a Sith Lord that's enough to deliver a multi-ton force crush to Magneto's skull.

Once again as I said before Magneto's brute strength and finesse over controlling metals is not in question. Both Magneto and Palpatine can kill each other with the first strike. It's just that Palpatine will always get the first strike. You are talking about a Force user with one of the most legendary senses of precognition and ability to peer into the future ever. The only reliable method to block a Force users precog is to cloud their minds. That's what Sith Assasins did back in the KoToR era. If Charles Xavier was accompanying Magneto this would be a real possibility. But since Magneto is alone he does not get that benefit.

[Captain Seafort]

If Palpatine can crush a man's skull in an instant, then what exactly was he waiting for during the several seconds it took for Vader to carry him to the shaft and lob him in? All he tried was his lightening which, while ultimately fatal, failed utterly to prevent his own death.

[Lord Insanity]

Something else to consider in Magneto's favor. He has dealt with telepathy and telekinesis before. Palpatine has not encountered a "metal-bender" before. I mean really, it is highly probable (given the use of magnetic boots in the Clone Wars) the entire room is a weapon at Magneto's command far more so than any force user has ever demonstrated.

That said remember in X1 Cyclops thought it was completely logical to have Storm "fry" Magneto. With Magneto retorting, "Oh, yes a bolt of lighting into a huge copper conductor." So it is possible movie Magneto is not actually immune and/or able to absorb and be strengthened by lighting like comic Magneto.

Still barring a lucky shot, going by just the movies Palpatine is completely out of his league here. It is far more likely Magneto can entomb Palpatine in a block of metal made from the very room around him long before Palpatine could pull off an instant force choke/ crush/ lightning bolt of death.

[Nieztchean Uber-Amoeba]

There's a weird idea going here that it's a complete Mexican stand-off because both Magneto and Palpatine could will each other with their first shot, because Palpatine could directly TK a person by crushing them. But we have never, ever seen him do that. What if his first shot is to try to throw something metal at Magneto, like he did against Yoda? Well, he's fucked. What if he first tries to lightning-attack Magneto? Even if Magneto isn't immune to Sith Lightning, we've only ever seen Sith Lightning cause immense pain, and not actually kill anybody - and guess what? Rage and pain are the things that activate the higher levels of Magneto's powers most easily. What if Palpatine goes after him with a lightsaber, which always seemed to be his first move in RotS? Well, then Magneto has plenty of time to react, or probably take control of the lightsaber (at least some of its components are probably metal, and Magneto can control even tiny amounts of metal, even metal he could only possibly sense through his power {such as a metal tooth filling} with huge precision and power). Palpatine can only win if his first move is to do something which we have never seen him actually do ever. He has never just tried to blast a person's insides with TK in the movies.

I dunno, maybe he did in the cartoons. But even so, it doesn't seem to be his normal M.O., and his normal M.O. will get him killfucked right quick.

[Stark]

I think his normal MO is 'employ the entire galaxy to destroy Magneto', honestly. Magneto is a direct combat powerhouse (absurdly so, depending on where he is on his power curve) so this is just another silly matchup.

That said, I'd love to see more examples of Magneto's helmet blocking all telepathy-related stuff. Would it block Watchverse mind control? D&D sleep spells? Hypnosis? In many settings, 'mind powers' are top of the pyramid.

[Nieztchean Uber-Amoeba]

I think his normal MO is 'employ the entire galaxy to destroy Magneto', honestly. Magneto is a direct combat powerhouse (absurdly so, depending on where he is on his power curve) so this is just another silly matchup.

GET HIM IN A ROOM WITH HIS FAMILY AND CONVINCE THEM TO OFF EACH OTHER

FLAWLESS STRATEGY

[Shroom Man 777]

Even with telepathy precognition is good enough to block blaster fire from droids and automated turrets. So it should suffice to warn Palpatine beforehand Magneto is going to chuck a hunk of metal his way. A split second warning is sufficient for a Jedi Knight to kill a man with his own bullet. Incase of a Sith Lord that's enough to deliver a multi-ton force crush to Magneto's skull.

Or Magneto hurls multiple chunks of metal Palpatine's way, so Palpatine will be too distracted deflecting the metals to muster up a direct TK attack on Magneto himself. Unlike other Jedi, Magneto's superior metal-manipulative abilities will allow him to keep up a constant rate of fire to keep Palpatine on the defensive until he is overwhelmed.

Again, just like how droidekas repulse Jedi by firing so fast that Jedi are forced into the defensive, continuously blocking blaster bolts (which the droideka's shields can withstand), and preventing them from concentrating and attacking the droidekas with direct TK.

[Lex]

The fact that Jedi/Sith aren't as super-fast as some people make them out to be, and Magneto could very well killfuck Palpatine before he could do that?

Palpatine couldn't even use his TK to stop a senate pod from almost crushing his already-ugly face and barely reacted in time to evade it, while Magneto was able to use his powers on salvos of missiles and shells traveling much faster and in considerably more numbers than the senate pods.

Ah so how do you arrive at this conclusion? Obviously, Jedis are superfast as they are able to deflect any bolts directed at them, even if those are multiple from different ankles, with their lightsabers. That means they can not only sense where they might be hit, but also move so extremely quick as to deflect a large number of bolts aimed at them (seen multiple times in the prequals). Magneto would first need to tie lose some form of metal in order to hit Palpatine, any by that he might as well be dead already.

Any of the difficulties Palpatine has in dealing with his opponents only arise when he faces yet ANOTHER Jedi/Sith, as seen in his duel with Yoda. And Yoda is considered the most powerful Jedi Master. He has no problem whatsoever killing a few Jedi Masters by superior speed, Jedi Master which themselves are able to deflect bullets as outlined above. So, how can you even assume that he is not super fast, going along the lines of movie evidence?

[AMT]

Because in the movies they don't do "bullet time", so the speeds we seem them move at are the speeds they actually go, ergo we have no evidence that Palpatine can move super fast. Just that he can fly and spin across a room, surprise Jedi Masters long enough to pose menacingly, then stab them in the chest.

[Shroom Man 777]

Computate the speed of the blaster bolts the Jedi deflect, as seen in the films. How fast do those little red blips, which the lightsabers block, really move and how do they compare to modern bullets? Not the blaster bolts on Geneosis. But the blaster bolts the Jedi actually deflect with their sabers.

Hell, computate how fast the Jedi themselves move. Why can't I say the Jedi/Sith move at superspeed? Because they DON'T move superfast in the movies, barring one scene in The Fatty Menace. Compute how they move, frame by frame, like as though they were vaporizing asteroids in 1970s SFX. They don't move that fast.

And the whole point is that, as the droideka example shows, Palpatine will be too busy deflecting metal projectiles to actually use his TK offensively against Magneto - which is what exactly happens with droidekas, with their shields and their blasters they can shoot continuously at Jedi (without being damaged by deflected blaster bolts) and the Jedi is too busy deflecting bolts and can't TK the droidekas directly.

Eventually either Palpatine gets overwhelmed, or Magneto throws the whole ceiling down on Palps and turns him into Pulpedpatine, but either way this is an effective method for Magneto to gain the initiative. And Magneto can hurl far larger and heavier objects than Palpatine's TK can overcome.

[AMT]

Though he doesn't even need to hurl large objects. Just get some small spheres like he created in X-2 and send them whizzing along like bullets. They were small, numerous, and pretty deadly. All Palpatine has to defend himself is (maybe) a lightsaber, and black cloth robes. Send enough of the little bastards at Palpatine and like you said, he'll likely be overcome.

[Nieztchean Uber-Amoeba]

Hey, remember when some random gangster with a blaster managed to shoot GREATEST JEDI OF ALL TIME Luke in the hand in RotJ?

A lot of people don't.

[Connor MacLeod]

Computate the speed of the blaster bolts the Jedi deflect, as seen in the films. How fast do those little red blips, which the lightsabers block, really move and how do they compare to modern bullets? Not the blaster bolts on Geneosis. But the blaster bolts the Jedi actually deflect with their sabers.

Anywhere from several km/s for very long distance battle scenes (like Hoth or GEonosis) to several feet per second in close up scenes (like sitting at a table, like when Han shot first, or Han fired on Vader.) Take your pick, but its probably not going to help a great deal. If that wasn't enough, there are the Eu examples of near-c or lightspeed beams being blocked.

On top of that, its not neccesarily the projectile "speed" that matters here, its whether or not the Jedi can out-react or anticipate the aiming point of the shooter. Considering jedi can have precog, telepathy/empathy, and the like, that shouldn't be too hard.

Hell, computate how fast the Jedi themselves move. Why can't I say the Jedi/Sith move at superspeed? Because they DON'T move superfast in the movies, barring one scene in The Fatty Menace. Compute how they move, frame by frame, like as though they were vaporizing asteroids in 1970s SFX. They don't move that fast.

Actually there's quite a few scenes of superfast blurring movement even in their jumping. At least with the initial acceleration. The problem is, though, that Jedi aren't consistent in their abilities. So their acceleration/speed capabilities could vary rather dramatically for various reasons (I'm not even convinced they all use the same ways to execute super-speed either.) So this is pretty useless.

Besides, it would actually be more efficient, if the Jedi has TK, to use that to slow down or immobilize the opposition (Force walls and such, as mentioned in the aotc novelization.)

And the whole point is that, as the droideka example shows, Palpatine will be too busy deflecting metal projectiles to actually use his TK offensively against Magneto - which is what exactly happens with droidekas, with their shields and their blasters they can shoot continuously at Jedi (without being damaged by deflected blaster bolts) and the Jedi is too busy deflecting bolts and can't TK the droidekas directly.

That depends. I'm not entirely sure you can easily use lightsabers to deflect projectiles the same way they deflect blaster bolts - momentum and explosive vaporization issues make that really tricky to pull off. Odds are he'd use TK to deflect them, and that could be accomplished in different ways (deflecting individual projectiles, setting up some sort of immobile barrier like was mentioned in sources like AOTC, interposing something between said projectiles, etc.)

Alot of that will depend exactly on how fast Magneto can accelerate projectiles, how many he can juggle at once (especially at those speeds) and how long it takes him to accelerate them.

[Connor MacLeod]

]Point, it is not telepathy-based. On the other hand, the detailed precognition that makes it clear there's a major threat incoming from this precise direction and of this precise nature doesn't seem to give Jedi more than fractional-second warning of what's about to happen. If it did, they'd be much harder to fight because they'd be able to do things like strategically avoid detection more effectively. Their precognition wouldn't just let them avoid specific attacks on a moment-by-moment basis, it'd let them not be there when the attack happens.

I actually suspect that Precog isn't one all-encompassing sort of feat, but it has several sub-discipliens that cover different abilities.

The first is the short term precog like we commonly attribute to them in combat. We're probably talking at most seconds. The other kind is much longer term, which is the sort of stuff we see Yoda and Palpy do to read the future (days, months or years ahead of time.) The former can generally be fairly accurate, whereas the latter is much less precise. The ROTJ novel made some allusion to how hard it is to predict the future. The further along the various routes/branches one tries to read or predict, the more complex and difficult it gets to read. A few seconds into the future probably isn't too complicated to read.

Another aspect is that precog usage (like most usage) carries with it a varying degree of "surrender' to the Force, which means there is an inverse relationship between conscious decision and instinctive reaction. using the force (as Obi-Wan describes it) requires a deliberate submission to it and its guidance, which might be useful in some cases (like deflecting lightsabers, or perhaps fighting.) But the more one surrenders to the Force, the less control over one's actions one has - it is quite possible (and has been done) where one completely surrenders to it, becomes superhuman briefly, but also essentially loses themselves or their identity (The most immediate example to come to mind was Darth Maul: Shadow Hunter, where a rather newbie and low powered Padawan totally surrendered to the Force, and was able to hold off and even threaten Maul.)

The whole "concisous control/instincitve guidance" thing also seems to play into the varying/relative Power levels of force users. The more they surrender to the Force, the more powerful they are. but also the harder it is to actually use that power consciously. This may be especially vital for Darkside force users, as the Dark Side is essentially all manner of negative emotions, and quite often is described as being a path to madness (especially in Death.) That means that a Darksider may in fact be more reluctnat to surrender to the Force, which could impose some limitations on them that a Jedi would not ordinarily have.

[Darth Hoth]

Point, it is not telepathy-based. On the other hand, the detailed precognition that makes it clear there's a major threat incoming from this precise direction and of this precise nature doesn't seem to give Jedi more than fractional-second warning of what's about to happen. If it did, they'd be much harder to fight because they'd be able to do things like strategically avoid detection more effectively. Their precognition wouldn't just let them avoid specific attacks on a moment-by-moment basis, it'd let them not be there when the attack happens.

Yes, agreed. Second-range or so warning was what I meant when I said "tactical". They can get effective warning of various threats in advance, as well, but much less reliably. Still, a split-second warning of impending attack should still be useful in this scenario, although not necessarily game-winning.

On a different topic related to this debate: I finally got around to watching X-Men: First Class last night, and there it was said that film Magneto's helmet (or, well, Shaw's, at that point) was designed by the Soviets in the early 1960s. There was also talk about rebuilding a radar antenna into a prototype Cerebro. Would that point towards Xavier's telepathy being electromagnetic? The Soviets, at least, as far as I could determine, did not seem to have much sci-fi supertech lying around at the time, which might put limits (albeit tentative) on how exotic the helmet (and thus also the telepathy it protects against) can/should be. If so, it would not necessarily be effective against Force powers.

[Shroom Man 777]

I can also say that as a non-native of the Star Wars universe, Magneto would be as affective or would be affected by the Force just as much as a Vong would.

[Lex]

I can also say that as a non-native of the Star Wars universe, Magneto would be as affective or would be affected by the Force just as much as a Vong would.

Pure speculation, this argument is exactly as meaningless as "Magneto could not affect Star Wars metal because it's different than Earth metal".

Furthermore, the Vong were actually stripped of the Force by their home planet's consciousness, that's why Jedi had only limited means to interact with them. No point in comparing their situation to Magneto.

As for the speed: Sure, I'll start comparing frames and then calculate bullet speeds^^ afterwards, if I still have time, I'll try to get a life too *eyeroll*

The point is, Jedi do not move that fast on screen because the actors are no Jedis, and because people in frong of the screen are supposed to see whats happening. That's like saying Neo cannot really dodge bullets, because on screen the bullets slow down (by your logic because their speed is suddenly reduced).

[Shroom Man 777]

Uh, in the Matrix they have something called bullet time and slow motion selectively happening. Whereas in the Star Wars movies, they don't use that kind of visual effect.

If the Jedi don't actually move that fast on screen, because the blaster bolts don't actually move that fast on screen, then how fast do they really move and how fast are the blaster bolts really supposed to move? So apparently visuals and crap on-screen is now worthless when they don't show shitty 1970s special effects that somehow computate into gigatons that win VS debates and instead show inferior/sub-par Jedi performance that can't cut it in this VS debate?

I might as well say that when Jar Jar eats an insect, his tongue actually moves at hypersonic speeds ten times the speed of sound but "Jar Jar's tongue does not move that fast on screen because the actors are not tongues, and because people in front of the screen are supposed to see whats happening".

[Nieztchean Uber-Amoeba]

The only on-screen evidence that matters is that which makes Star Wars win, Shroom. You know that. When Jedi get gunned down by clones/ droids/ gangsters, that can all be disregarded because the movies are intending to show Jedi as vastly superior but actors cannot help but be hit by blaster bolts you see.

[Connor MacLeod]

I can also say that as a non-native of the Star Wars universe, Magneto would be as affective or would be affected by the Force just as much as a Vong would.

The Vong were actually stripped of the Force via Zonoma Sekot (or at least its ancestor.. basically a giant, mobile, force-sensitive planet, created courtesy of Greg Bear back when TPM came out.) so their "blindness" seems to be an artificially created thing, not naturally so.

I havent kept up on SW stuff for years, but to my memory we dont really know how non-SW universe people would handle force users. alot of that depends greatly on your conception of what the Force is and how it is created, maintained, etc.