The Emperor's lousy contingency planning in ROTJ and precog

[Adam Reynolds]

Yes, the CIS was losing the war, but we don't have any real information on why. Was Dooku making deliberately poor strategic decisions in order to serve Sidious' purposes? It's entirely possible.

I would say that it is likely that clones are simply superior. Especially in space combat where superior numbers are less of an advantage due to the expense of capital ships.

Politically, he can just leave Dooku in charge and have the CIS be just as oppressive as his Empire became.

That gives too much power to his apprentice. Even the threat of death would be less effective. What is Sidious going to do, kill Dooku and take his place as figurehead? An apprentice like Dooku would milk this advantage at every possibily opportunity. It is likely that this is what Palpatine did to Plagueis, using his political advantage to slowly make his master irrelevant.

It is debatable whether Palpatine was actually losing or pretending to lose in order to sway Anakin's loyalty. Remember that bringing on the assassination attempt was part of a deliberate plan to justify Order 66. He wanted them to attack him, so he could have a publicly viable reason to wipe them out. Even younglings, who he could have easily perverted to the dark side.

It makes more sense overall if Mace Windu was winning. In AOTC, Anakin refered to Obi-Wan as being "as wise as Master Yoda as powerful as Master Windu." This indicates that it was common knowlege among the Jedi that Mace Windu was the muscle of the Jedi Order. In addition Mace Windu was able to return Force lightning to the source, actually pushing it back into Palpatine's face. Yoda was completely drained by this action and lost immediately afterwards. As for the idea that Palpatine was simply more powerful, Anakin was more powerful that Obi-Wan and still lost.

Whether or not Palpatine killed Mace Windu immediately was irrelevant to the question of the Jedi assassination attempt. The attempted and were foiled. The exact means of this are irrelevant, it it were, then he would have drawn out the entire fight rather than just with Mace Windu.

Younglings are too weak to be considered according to the rules of the Sith. Having multiple apprentices leads to the weak ganging up on the strong.

Not sure I agree with that. It's an inference not really supported by evidence.

Why else would there not be more resistance to his rule? It's the same reason why support for Israel was so strong after WW2, through the political strategy of poisoning the well.

How? The shield was down, the attack was commencing. The Death Star was going to get blown up, and Luke's influence on the battle on Endor or in space over Endor was nil.

Luke's direct influence was nil. The Emperor's was not. Luke's efforts in distracting the Emperor's attention in the Force(and ultimately causing his father to remove it) lead to the Imperial fleet falling apart.

The CIS was clearly losing...but Palpatine was pulling the strings! He had created the army of the republic in the first place! He could have created LESS of an army, or given it less lead time, etc. The course of the war was up to him.

My point was at the time of ROTS, he had less of a choice. It was a fairly obvious choice to side with the Republic over the CIS and gain the legitimacy of retaining the seat of power.

[Terralthra]

Yes, the CIS was losing the war, but we don't have any real information on why. Was Dooku making deliberately poor strategic decisions in order to serve Sidious' purposes? It's entirely possible.

I would say that it is likely that clones are simply superior. Especially in space combat where superior numbers are less of an advantage due to the expense of capital ships.

Clones are superior based on what? I could as well point to the fact that clone capital ships and fighters need pilots and crew (and thus crew spaces and life support systems, which consume finite resources), while droid ships could avoid pilots and crew entirely. That they don't is a deliberate decision which may or may not be to weaken them.

Politically, he can just leave Dooku in charge and have the CIS be just as oppressive as his Empire became.

That gives too much power to his apprentice. Even the threat of death would be less effective. What is Sidious going to do, kill Dooku and take his place as figurehead? An apprentice like Dooku would milk this advantage at every possibily opportunity. It is likely that this is what Palpatine did to Plagueis, using his political advantage to slowly make his master irrelevant.

Sure, it's not as ideal, but that doesn't mean it can't work. I'm saying that Palpatine was running a Xanatos gambit. Either he gets emergency dictatorial powers that he keeps past the end of the war, or the other side wins and imposes similar dictatorial martial law.

It is debatable whether Palpatine was actually losing or pretending to lose in order to sway Anakin's loyalty. Remember that bringing on the assassination attempt was part of a deliberate plan to justify Order 66. He wanted them to attack him, so he could have a publicly viable reason to wipe them out. Even younglings, who he could have easily perverted to the dark side.

It makes more sense overall if Mace Windu was winning. In AOTC, Anakin refered to Obi-Wan as being "as wise as Master Yoda as powerful as Master Windu." This indicates that it was common knowlege among the Jedi that Mace Windu was the muscle of the Jedi Order. In addition Mace Windu was able to return Force lightning to the source, actually pushing it back into Palpatine's face. Yoda was completely drained by this action and lost immediately afterwards. As for the idea that Palpatine was simply more powerful, Anakin was more powerful that Obi-Wan and still lost.

I disagree. First of all, Mace Windu was pushing the lightning back with his sabre. Yoda absorbed force power with his fucking hand, and did so multiple times. No one else in the series has shown they can do that.

At least one time, he appeared only momentarily under strain. The second time, vs. Palpatine, it was definitely an effort (we can probably chalk this up to strength in the Force differences), but when it arced back, it pushed both of them back, and it was only luck and mass differential that meant Yoda fell while Palpatine didn't. After his fall, Yoda was strategically defeated, because he was under a time limit to begin with. He has to defeat Palpatine before Palpatine gets more guards, because a) sooner or later, Yoda will be unable to defend himself against the guards while prosecuting the duel with Palpatine and b) he's already under the pall of a Jedi coup/assassination attempt. Having a bunch of guards and the public see him trying to kill the Chancellor again will hardly help his case, regardless of what color lightsabre Palpatine has.

This leads back to the question of whether Palpatine was faking the loss. It makes a certain amount of thematic sense that Palpatine, who anticipated the arrest attempt and easily cut down 3 Jedi masters, was deliberately playing the duel out and making it look like Mace Windu was about to cut down a helpless old man because that's the exact scenario that plays out in the beginning of the movie, which Anakin regrets, and Palpatine knows it. The whole ploy was, yes, to get an excuse to execute Order 66, but also to finish turning Anakin. In that respect, to me, it is highly logical that Palpatine would be faking it. That he goes so instantly from "oh Anakin he's killing me!" to ::lightning to the face:: reinforces that.

Lastly, in AotC, Obi-Wan and Anakin both refer to Yoda as the epitome of a sabreist.

Obi-Wan: If you spent as much time practicing your saber techniques as you did your wit, you'd rival Master Yoda as a swordsman.
Anakin: I thought I already did.
Obi-Wan: Only in your mind, my very young apprentice.

Whether or not Palpatine killed Mace Windu immediately was irrelevant to the question of the Jedi assassination attempt. The attempted and were foiled. The exact means of this are irrelevant, it it were, then he would have drawn out the entire fight rather than just with Mace Windu.

Again, he sets up the turning of Anakin throughout the entire movie, and deliberately creates exactly the scenario he saw Anakin conflicted about at the beginning: a Jedi about to kill a helpless old man.

Younglings are too weak to be considered according to the rules of the Sith. Having multiple apprentices leads to the weak ganging up on the strong.

Depending on your EU source choices, Palpatine built up a whole stable of force-sensitives to use as enforcers.

How? The shield was down, the attack was commencing. The Death Star was going to get blown up, and Luke's influence on the battle on Endor or in space over Endor was nil.

Luke's direct influence was nil. The Emperor's was not. Luke's efforts in distracting the Emperor's attention in the Force(and ultimately causing his father to remove it) lead to the Imperial fleet falling apart.

Evidence? At no point through the entire interaction between him, Vader, and Luke, does he pay any attention to the battle on Endor or above Endor other than to point out that he's set the battles up to be a trap and defeat the Rebellion. He's not seeming to concentrate on managing the Imperial Navy or Army at all, and if your point is "that's because he was focusing on the Skywalker Soap Opera!", then you've just agreed with my initial point: Palpatine took his eye off the ball because he thought Force-users were the real threat to his Empire. They were a threat to his person, of course, but he allowed them to be by getting Skywalker the Younger there in the first place (which, again, he not only allowed, but instigated). The Rebellion defeated the Empire Navy and Army without any real Jedi assistance.

The CIS was clearly losing...but Palpatine was pulling the strings! He had created the army of the republic in the first place! He could have created LESS of an army, or given it less lead time, etc. The course of the war was up to him.

My point was at the time of ROTS, he had less of a choice. It was a fairly obvious choice to side with the Republic over the CIS and gain the legitimacy of retaining the seat of power.

Yes, but that's not relevant to my point, which is that Palpatine was used from his earlier manipulations to being in control of both sides, and picking the winner he wanted. He may think of the Rebellion that way.

[Adam Reynolds]

Let's see if I can finally write this without firefox crashing.

Clones are superior based on what? I could as well point to the fact that clone capital ships and fighters need pilots and crew (and thus crew spaces and life support systems, which consume finite resources), while droid ships could avoid pilots and crew entirely. That they don't is a deliberate decision which may or may not be to weaken them.

It clearly is a weakness based on their performance in the films and Clone Wars. When droids lose their leadership they are completely worthless, especially in space combat. This was a significant plot point in the Clone Wars episode Storm Over Ryloth. Ashoka's entire plan hinged on the fact that droids were poor to respond to unexpected attacks.

Sure, it's not as ideal, but that doesn't mean it can't work. I'm saying that Palpatine was running a Xanatos gambit. Either he gets emergency dictatorial powers that he keeps past the end of the war, or the other side wins and imposes similar dictatorial martial law.

He would have won either way, but letting the CIS win would be extremely problematic for him as a Sith Lord. Letting your apprentice have more power than you is a recipe for disaster. Besides this, the CIS was likely not large enough to actually win. All indications are that the strategic balance was roughly similar to the US Civil War, with the CIS able to hold out in the outer rim, but unable to push the war into the core worlds. Coruscant was analogous to Gettysburg, a failed attempt to prosecute the war corewards. And like Gettysburg, Coruscant was a strategic disaster for the CIS. The fact that Palpatine controlled both sides couldn't make one more powerful than it was.

I disagree. First of all, Mace Windu was pushing the lightning back with his sabre. Yoda absorbed force power with his fucking hand, and did so multiple times. No one else in the series has shown they can do that.

Besides the fact that we saw Darth Vader pull off the same stunt with a blaster bolt, Yoda only had to deflect it with his hand because his lightsaber was just blasted out of his hands. This was something that Palpatine was unable to do to Mace Windu.

At least one time, he appeared only momentarily under strain. The second time, vs. Palpatine, it was definitely an effort (we can probably chalk this up to strength in the Force differences), but when it arced back, it pushed both of them back, and it was only luck and mass differential that meant Yoda fell while Palpatine didn't. After his fall, Yoda was strategically defeated, because he was under a time limit to begin with. He has to defeat Palpatine before Palpatine gets more guards, because a) sooner or later, Yoda will be unable to defend himself against the guards while prosecuting the duel with Palpatine and b) he's already under the pall of a Jedi coup/assassination attempt. Having a bunch of guards and the public see him trying to kill the Chancellor again will hardly help his case, regardless of what color lightsabre Palpatine has.

Yoda did lose strategically, but he also lost the battle of endurance. At the end of the fight, Yoda literally crawled away in defeat. Palpatine was cackling and back to normal within minutes.

This leads back to the question of whether Palpatine was faking the loss. It makes a certain amount of thematic sense that Palpatine, who anticipated the arrest attempt and easily cut down 3 Jedi masters, was deliberately playing the duel out and making it look like Mace Windu was about to cut down a helpless old man because that's the exact scenario that plays out in the beginning of the movie, which Anakin regrets, and Palpatine knows it. The whole ploy was, yes, to get an excuse to execute Order 66, but also to finish turning Anakin. In that respect, to me, it is highly logical that Palpatine would be faking it. That he goes so instantly from "oh Anakin he's killing me!" to ::lightning to the face:: reinforces that.

It also makes a certain amount of thematic sense if the paragon of the Jedi lost, while the more pragmatic and morally ambiguous master who had a tendency towards the Dark Side, as indicated by his purple lightsaber, won. Palpatine was clearly feigning weakness with the lightning ploy. That doesn't mean he was through the entire duel. And it doesn't mean he could have won had the duel continued without Anakin.

Lastly, in AotC, Obi-Wan and Anakin both refer to Yoda as the epitome of a sabreist.

Both of the quotes could be true. Yoda was obviously strong enough in the force to overcome his weakness of size, which causes him to appear a more powerful duelist. He is also powerful enough to give Palpatine a difficult fight and was clearly defeating Dooku. But that doesn't mean that Yoda was more powerful that Mace Windu. Mace Windu's style is far more effecient. Notice that Mace Windu was not winded by driving back Palpatine's lightining in the way that Yoda was.

Again, he sets up the turning of Anakin throughout the entire movie, and deliberately creates exactly the scenario he saw Anakin conflicted about at the beginning: a Jedi about to kill a helpless old man.

There was an interesting bit of dialog in the novelization that pointed this out directly. As Mace Windu is about to kill Palpatine, he asks Anakin "If you could have spared Dooku, would you have?" Anakin's response was, "That was different." It is an interesting dichotomy, Anakin recognized that it was not the Jedi way, Mace Windu did not. Even if he was correct in his reasoning.

Depending on your EU source choices, Palpatine built up a whole stable of force-sensitives to use as enforcers.

It would be foolish to take Jedi younglings that had already been indoctrinated in the beliefs of the Jedi from birth.

Evidence? At no point through the entire interaction between him, Vader, and Luke, does he pay any attention to the battle on Endor or above Endor other than to point out that he's set the battles up to be a trap and defeat the Rebellion. He's not seeming to concentrate on managing the Imperial Navy or Army at all, and if your point is "that's because he was focusing on the Skywalker Soap Opera!", then you've just agreed with my initial point: Palpatine took his eye off the ball because he thought Force-users were the real threat to his Empire. They were a threat to his person, of course, but he allowed them to be by getting Skywalker the Younger there in the first place (which, again, he not only allowed, but instigated). The Rebellion defeated the Empire Navy and Army without any real Jedi assistance.

He was right to focus on the Skywalker family. Without Luke's Force abilities over Yavin, the Rebellion would have died then and there. There wouldn't have been a battle of Endor for the Rebel fleet to carry out without him. Luke would have been a threat to the Emperor and thus the Empire regardless of where he was. The Emperor didn't want a repeat of his duel with Yoda or Mace Windu with Luke in that role. In that sense it was safer to go after him with Vader at his side. The Emperor had no reason to believe that Vader would be redeemed. It was likely unprecedented from his perspective.

The Emperor's military strategy was perfectly sound. Strategically his idea was the wet dream of counter-insurgency strategists. If the US could get ISIS to mass their entire army in one convenient place in the open so that it could be bombed they would. In the end, the Empire was defeated tactically because of a pair of gamblers who failed to plan ahead properly. They thus avoided the Emperor predicting what they would do. And they used tactics that the orthodox soldiers of the Empire would fail to anticipate. They would never consider enlisting natives, relying on stolen enemy vehicles, or suicidal point blank tactics with inferior warships as valid strategies. And the Emperor was not unreasonably to discount them.

As for the idea about the Emperor's death leading to the defeat of the Empire, that was from the novelization. As I indicated previously, those presumably aren't canon anymore and thus irrelevant. I had forgotten that.

Yes, but that's not relevant to my point, which is that Palpatine was used from his earlier manipulations to being in control of both sides, and picking the winner he wanted. He may think of the Rebellion that way.

Sure, but that doesn't mean that he could have kept the Clone Wars going as you previously indicated. As for the Rebellion, why would he treat them any differently than he had the Jedi? He couldn't control them directly either.

[Terralthra]

Clones are superior based on what? I could as well point to the fact that clone capital ships and fighters need pilots and crew (and thus crew spaces and life support systems, which consume finite resources), while droid ships could avoid pilots and crew entirely. That they don't is a deliberate decision which may or may not be to weaken them.

It clearly is a weakness based on their performance in the films and Clone Wars. When droids lose their leadership they are completely worthless, especially in space combat. This was a significant plot point in the Clone Wars episode Storm Over Ryloth. Ashoka's entire plan hinged on the fact that droids were poor to respond to unexpected attacks.

Yes, I get that it is a weakness. My point is that it doesn't have to be. The droid armies are designed in a massively incompetent manner in several ways. It could've been designed way better. One must account for this somehow. It could be because they're initially designed by businessmen, not soldiers. Another explanation is that the architect of the Separatist crisis and war wanted the CIS to lose, and lose convincingly as soon as he achieved his goals, so he manipulated their forces to be weak.

Sure, it's not as ideal, but that doesn't mean it can't work. I'm saying that Palpatine was running a Xanatos gambit. Either he gets emergency dictatorial powers that he keeps past the end of the war, or the other side wins and imposes similar dictatorial martial law.

He would have won either way, but letting the CIS win would be extremely problematic for him as a Sith Lord. Letting your apprentice have more power than you is a recipe for disaster. Besides this, the CIS was likely not large enough to actually win. All indications are that the strategic balance was roughly similar to the US Civil War, with the CIS able to hold out in the outer rim, but unable to push the war into the core worlds. Coruscant was analogous to Gettysburg, a failed attempt to prosecute the war corewards. And like Gettysburg, Coruscant was a strategic disaster for the CIS. The fact that Palpatine controlled both sides couldn't make one more powerful than it was.

I agree with all that you're saying. The main point to which I'm calling attention is that Palpatine was ultimately in control of both sides, through various puppets. If it suited his desires to have the CIS win more, that's not out of the realm of possibility for him. He may have instigated the attack on Coruscant in order to shock the Senate into voting him more powers, even. He has probably done this before in smaller-scale conflicts (we know he has, in fact). He may have fallen into the mental trap of thinking that since he called the tune for the Clone Wars, and the Rebellion dances to his tune into the Battle of Endor, they're under his control, too, and he need not worry about them.

I disagree. First of all, Mace Windu was pushing the lightning back with his sabre. Yoda absorbed force power with his fucking hand, and did so multiple times. No one else in the series has shown they can do that.

Besides the fact that we saw Darth Vader pull off the same stunt with a blaster bolt, Yoda only had to deflect it with his hand because his lightsaber was just blasted out of his hands. This was something that Palpatine was unable to do to Mace Windu.

Couldn't, or wasn't trying to. Either way is irrelevant. Obi-Wan blocked lightning with his sabre, it's clearly an easier task. Yoda absorbs it and just swallows it, or arcs it back, with his bare hand. That's not a trick we see often. That Darth Vader can do it with a blaster bolt is a useful data point, if he actually did. He blocked it with his right hand, and we later find out that hand is prosthetic. It's also possible that it was just, like, armored. Or got scorched, but was black anyway so we couldn't tell. We do know he can't do it with lightning because of his prosthetics. Before them, he probably could have, since he was alleged to be one of the most powerful Force users around.

At least one time, he appeared only momentarily under strain. The second time, vs. Palpatine, it was definitely an effort (we can probably chalk this up to strength in the Force differences), but when it arced back, it pushed both of them back, and it was only luck and mass differential that meant Yoda fell while Palpatine didn't. After his fall, Yoda was strategically defeated, because he was under a time limit to begin with. He has to defeat Palpatine before Palpatine gets more guards, because a) sooner or later, Yoda will be unable to defend himself against the guards while prosecuting the duel with Palpatine and b) he's already under the pall of a Jedi coup/assassination attempt. Having a bunch of guards and the public see him trying to kill the Chancellor again will hardly help his case, regardless of what color lightsabre Palpatine has.

Yoda did lose strategically, but he also lost the battle of endurance. At the end of the fight, Yoda literally crawled away in defeat. Palpatine was cackling and back to normal within minutes.

Yoda crawls away to hide, and is winded because he's running away from security forces trying to track him down. He appears stunned by the massive fall he's taken, but it cuts away from that seconds later, and cuts back minutes later to him on the run, and timing is critical to his getaway. I don't think it's beyond reason that he's winded because he's exerting himself crawling through vents.

This leads back to the question of whether Palpatine was faking the loss. It makes a certain amount of thematic sense that Palpatine, who anticipated the arrest attempt and easily cut down 3 Jedi masters, was deliberately playing the duel out and making it look like Mace Windu was about to cut down a helpless old man because that's the exact scenario that plays out in the beginning of the movie, which Anakin regrets, and Palpatine knows it. The whole ploy was, yes, to get an excuse to execute Order 66, but also to finish turning Anakin. In that respect, to me, it is highly logical that Palpatine would be faking it. That he goes so instantly from "oh Anakin he's killing me!" to ::lightning to the face:: reinforces that.

It also makes a certain amount of thematic sense if the paragon of the Jedi lost, while the more pragmatic and morally ambiguous master who had a tendency towards the Dark Side, as indicated by his purple lightsaber, won. Palpatine was clearly feigning weakness with the lightning ploy. That doesn't mean he was through the entire duel. And it doesn't mean he could have won had the duel continued without Anakin.

I think that's why it's a question that's deliberately ambiguous, and not easy to answer. There's evidence both ways. My personal theory is that Palpatine is Anakin's father in a real sense, and willingly gambled on deliberately losing the duel betting that Anakin would come in before it cost him his life, turning Anakin to his side, because Anakin as his apprentice has been his goal for decades. There are other perspectives, which I acknowledge.

Lastly, in AotC, Obi-Wan and Anakin both refer to Yoda as the epitome of a sabreist.

Both of the quotes could be true. Yoda was obviously strong enough in the force to overcome his weakness of size, which causes him to appear a more powerful duelist. He is also powerful enough to give Palpatine a difficult fight and was clearly defeating Dooku. But that doesn't mean that Yoda was more powerful that Mace Windu. Mace Windu's style is far more effecient. Notice that Mace Windu was not winded by driving back Palpatine's lightining in the way that Yoda was.

Yeah, but neither was Obi-Wan. I'm not impressed by being able to defend against force lightning with a lightsabre, because that's pretty much what a lightsabre is supposed to do: defend against nearly every weapon. The only sorts of personal-scale weapons Jedi can't either dodge, push away, or deflect with a sabre appear to be flamethrowers and similar diffuse threats.

Again, he sets up the turning of Anakin throughout the entire movie, and deliberately creates exactly the scenario he saw Anakin conflicted about at the beginning: a Jedi about to kill a helpless old man.

There was an interesting bit of dialog in the novelization that pointed this out directly. As Mace Windu is about to kill Palpatine, he asks Anakin "If you could have spared Dooku, would you have?" Anakin's response was, "That was different." It is an interesting dichotomy, Anakin recognized that it was not the Jedi way, Mace Windu did not. Even if he was correct in his reasoning.

I think we agree here.

Depending on your EU source choices, Palpatine built up a whole stable of force-sensitives to use as enforcers.

It would be foolish to take Jedi younglings that had already been indoctrinated in the beliefs of the Jedi from birth.

Given the number of Jedi who fall to the dark side, I'm not as sure of this as you seem to be.

Evidence? At no point through the entire interaction between him, Vader, and Luke, does he pay any attention to the battle on Endor or above Endor other than to point out that he's set the battles up to be a trap and defeat the Rebellion. He's not seeming to concentrate on managing the Imperial Navy or Army at all, and if your point is "that's because he was focusing on the Skywalker Soap Opera!", then you've just agreed with my initial point: Palpatine took his eye off the ball because he thought Force-users were the real threat to his Empire. They were a threat to his person, of course, but he allowed them to be by getting Skywalker the Younger there in the first place (which, again, he not only allowed, but instigated). The Rebellion defeated the Empire Navy and Army without any real Jedi assistance.

He was right to focus on the Skywalker family. Without Luke's Force abilities over Yavin, the Rebellion would have died then and there. There wouldn't have been a battle of Endor for the Rebel fleet to carry out without him. Luke would have been a threat to the Emperor and thus the Empire regardless of where he was. The Emperor didn't want a repeat of his duel with Yoda or Mace Windu with Luke in that role. In that sense it was safer to go after him with Vader at his side. The Emperor had no reason to believe that Vader would be redeemed. It was likely unprecedented from his perspective.

He was reprising the battle aboard the Invisible Hand. Potential apprentice vs. apprentice. Either his apprentice wins, confirming his status, or the potential apprentice wins, turning to the Dark Side to do so. Again, Xanatos gambit: either of his envisioned outcomes results in a positive outcome for him. He didn't anticipate the possibility of redemption, I agree, but the point remains that he didn't have to set the battle up at all. Darth Vader brings Luke to the Emperor because that was the Emperor's command in the first place.

The Emperor's military strategy was perfectly sound. Strategically his idea was the wet dream of counter-insurgency strategists. If the US could get ISIS to mass their entire army in one convenient place in the open so that it could be bombed they would. In the end, the Empire was defeated tactically because of a pair of gamblers who failed to plan ahead properly. They thus avoided the Emperor predicting what they would do. And they used tactics that the orthodox soldiers of the Empire would fail to anticipate. They would never consider enlisting natives, relying on stolen enemy vehicles, or suicidal point blank tactics with inferior warships as valid strategies. And the Emperor was not unreasonably to discount them.

Getting them there was good strategy, yes. Getting them there, then holding back the conventional forces to flaunt the superweapon in the Rebels' face was stupid. Letting the (known) stolen shuttle land untracked and unmonitored was stupid. All of it was allowed in order to get Luke into the room, then drive him to despair. Minor changes would've made the Rebels' defeat certain, rather than likely, but wouldn't get Luke into the room to taunt and attempt to turn.

As for the idea about the Emperor's death leading to the defeat of the Empire, that was from the novelization. As I indicated previously, those presumably aren't canon anymore and thus irrelevant. I had forgotten that.

Yes, but that's not relevant to my point, which is that Palpatine was used from his earlier manipulations to being in control of both sides, and picking the winner he wanted. He may think of the Rebellion that way.

Sure, but that doesn't mean that he could have kept the Clone Wars going as you previously indicated. As for the Rebellion, why would he treat them any differently than he had the Jedi? He couldn't control them directly either.

I'm open to considering various canonicity levels in the interest of a greater discussion. Do you have a quote? I tend to treat the movies as the highest level of canon, but find that other sources lend interesting perspectives and hypotheses.

And he may have treated them like that because that's what he was used to doing in naval war. "I don't care what happens, I've already picked the winner because everyone is my puppet anyway." It's a hypothesis, not a fact, but it seems to fit the evidence.

[Adam Reynolds]

Yes, I get that it is a weakness. My point is that it doesn't have to be. The droid armies are designed in a massively incompetent manner in several ways. It could've been designed way better. One must account for this somehow. It could be because they're initially designed by businessmen, not soldiers. Another explanation is that the architect of the Separatist crisis and war wanted the CIS to lose, and lose convincingly as soon as he achieved his goals, so he manipulated their forces to be weak.

I wonder if it was because they were concerned about the possibility of a droid revolt.

As for Mace Windu vs Yoda, we will have to agree to disagree. It really can't be called either way.

I'm open to considering various canonicity levels in the interest of a greater discussion. Do you have a quote? I tend to treat the movies as the highest level of canon, but find that other sources lend interesting perspectives and hypotheses.

I don't see how they could possibly fit with the new canon given the ROTS novel - Clone Wars contradictions. But here is the quote anyway(I took this from the main site database):

For the first time, the Death Star rocked. The collision with the exploding Destroyer was only the beginning, leading to various systems breakdowns, which led to reactor meltdowns, which led to personnel panic, abandonment of posts, further malfunctions, and general chaos.

Smoke was everywhere, substantial rumblings came from all directions at once, people were running and shouting. Electrical fires, steam explosions, cabin de-pressurizations, disruption of chain-of-command. Added to this, the continued bombardments by Rebel Cruisers- smelling fear in the enemy- merely heightened the sense of hysteria that was already pervasive.

For the Emperor was dead. The central, powerful evil that had been the cohesive force to the Empire was gone; and when the dark side was this diffused, this nondirected- this was simply where it led.

Confusion.

Desperation.

Damp fear.

I was thinking that it might justify the loss of Executor but that actually happened first according to this passage.

And he may have treated them like that because that's what he was used to doing in naval war. "I don't care what happens, I've already picked the winner because everyone is my puppet anyway." It's a hypothesis, not a fact, but it seems to fit the evidence.

That does make sense. It makes one wonder how much he even cared about the Empire at that point.

[Lord Revan]

Well as far as I can gather everything was a tool to gain more power for Palpatine so he never had any real attachment to the Galactic Empire it was just another tool for him to gain more power.