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fordlltwm wrote:It's in X-Wing - Iron Fist I think.

Grand Admiral Thrawn suggests that one reason Endor was such a defeat for the Imps was the emperor was using Battle Meditation / slight mind control to increase the efficiency of the fleet so when he dies the fleet is suddenly less coordinated. It's mentioned in Heir to the Empire IIRC.

Actually, that was Grand Admiral Nial Declann doing the mediation (or most of it).

Havok wrote:Oh for fucks sake the midichlorians do NOTHING to demystify the Force.
And EVEN THEN, the guy who is supposed to have all the midichlorians in the universe, KEEPS GETTING HIS ASS KICKED.
Fucking Yoda's explanation of the Force in TESB does more to demystify the Force than midichlorians do.

How? Yoda's explanation was basically the same as Obi-Wan's original definition. In TESB, the Force could still simply be magic.

I picture Nihilus as like the Star Wars equivalent of a Nazgul or Dementor. His form seems to be simply a shadow. He wears a hood and you never see his face. And he has an aura of darkness, he sucks up the Light Side from around him.

The way I see it, the demystification comes essentially from the Midichlorians putting a label on it and if not outright saying that 'high midichlorian count=powerful Jedi' at least strongly intimating it, hinting that there's a definite and verifyable connection between genetics and Force potential.
Whereas in the OT while there was apparently some genetic component (the Skywalker family's strength in the Force) it not only wasn't shoved in our face like the Midichlorians were, there was the chance that that was because the Force decided it liked the Skywalkers, or random chance, or Fate, or something else. We simply didn't know.

atg wrote:Or with their bare hands in the case of Vader..

That's actually a function of his armor, not a force power. But in the EU people block lasers with their bare hands... so, your point still stands.

jollyreaper wrote:Size matters not but lifting an x-wing kicked Yoda's ass.

He seemed to be struggling in AOTC with the big support beam(probably because he had to quickly catch it as it was falling), but in TESB he lifts the X-Wing with ease.

The X-Wing is approximately the size of a WW2 Spitfire while that column looked pretty massive. And wether or not he was from lifting that X-Wing or having forgotten to take his TK stengthening pill, he seemed winded in TESB after doing it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mt6E1-_vXQU
Show me where he's winded.

Head tilts down and draws a deep breath. He's not falling over and gasping but this does not seem nonchalant.

Incidentally, screw Lucas cgi. Gollum was art so it's not that cgi is bad, just crappy cgi is bad. Puppet Yoda has gravitas. Cgi Yoda gravitas has not, mmmmmrh. Not a scene in the prequel can touch OT Yoda.

4:51 through 4:54 defintely look like he's tired.

Well I guess I just disagree. He doesn't look tired to me. That looked like an expression of disappointment.

Even if midi-chlorians didn't demystify the force, they still didn't show any new powers in the prequels. That eliminates the mystery.

You will now explain how not showing new powers eliminates the mystery.

Well we know the full extent of what the Force can do.

Because the mystery about the Force is naturally the limits of Force powers (and how, pray tell, do you know those are the limits of Force powers, as opposed to, say, the limits of the Jedi using them?) as oppossed to...nobody really knowing what the damned thing is in the first place.

It's a fair assumption, from the movies, that that is all the force powers. No, the mystery isn't limited to powers, but it's greatly enhanced when you don't know what the Jedi are capable of.

You don't want it like superman where he gets powers at random or just being fast gets called a new power like super-knitting to make a sweater and super-baking to make bread in 10 seconds. And you certainly don't want "btw did you know I can reverse time?"

The worst bit with adding powers without an explicit mention that they are new is the assumption they were always there so why didn't the guy use it in a previous tight spot. Did you know Jedi can fly? Wait, what?! Yeah. One of the basic techniques. Then why did Luke fall at Bespin? Can of worms, that. Or the 3rd Xmen movie where Magneto can fly a goddamn bridge. Wait, is he always this powerful? He didn't get a temporary power boost?

Another classic are R2's rockets. He has that? Where did they go? Removed at some point. Why? Can other astromechs fly? Adds too many questions for such a silly sight gag.

I don't object to showing new Jedi techniques or Jedi who have advanced to high levels but I don't want writers breaking the scale of the universe. Like Palpy is the top level badass Sith lord. I don't want some new punk coming on the scene and being twice as powerful. That would feel wanky. A Jedi healer who can do amazing things to cure the sick is fine, just don't let them resurrect the dead. Healing a serious injury should leave them wiped out. That fits with the setting, fits within normal extrapolation of Star Wars themes. A Jedi mechanic with an intuitive grasp of machinery and can have an old pro's proficiency with kit he's never seen before is fine. Someone who is capable of talking to machine spirits, especially when there's no AI chip inside, that's dumb. I don't want him souping up a starfighter and now it can go four times faster and punch holes in star destroyers.

Well obviously I don't want them to fly or cause any inconsistencies. And, come to think of it, the one power they did add in the prequels I didn't like-force speed. Because of inconsistencies. Still, there are plenty of potential powers they could have shown.

...which would have kind of distracted from the mystery of what they're actually capable of?

jollyreaper wrote: Another classic are R2's rockets. He has that? Where did they go? Removed at some point. Why? Can other astromechs fly? Adds too many questions for such a silly sight gag.

Um. Or as age went on they ran out of fuel or became damaged/too much effort to repair.

As for Yoda being 'winded/tired'.

900 years old, and probably out of practice using the force in such manner of things. He's been there... 20 years? more? Doing absolutely nothing with his force powers. Likewise, he's reaching the final years of his life.

jollyreaper wrote:The whole reason why the attack had to proceed without go codes is because the rebels couldn't carry a hyperspace transmitter with them on the ground and they lacked any means of externally verifying the destruction of the shield generator. Otherwise they could just have a scout ship sitting a light-minute out wih a telescope trained on the moon. When there's a plume of smoke rising from the generator location, head back to the fleet with the go code.

A scout ship a light minute out might be detectable. Cue Imperial fleet spotting rebel activity in the system, flipping out and calling for reinforcements...

I mean, Palpatine might be crazy enough to veto that, but if I were rebel command I know I'd be worried about the possibility.

jollyreaper wrote:I never liked battle meditation. The easier answer is that he has a hierarchical organization that deplores independent thing. A little ambition is good but too much is dangerous. Degraded operation efficiency but dependable is preferable to efficient and questionable loyalties.

Therefore when you lose the emperor, his right-hand man, and possibly the entire command staff in charge of the fleet at Endor, it becomes chaos. Even if the imperials retained the numerical superiority to defeat the surviving rebels, their morale is shot and they are likely in a panic mode. Retreat, regroup, wait for orders.

If the collapse and route made no sense, then possibly you might need to invoke something like battle meditation to explain the outcome. If nobody fired on the reactor and the death star still blew up, you'd have to explain the Emperor's body exploded with just that much force. That sounds silly and fortunately is not necessary to explain what we saw.

Personally, I don't like power creep where Jedi are turned into demigods. They are a bit stronger and faster than normals, they aren't dragonball characters. That game Force Unleashed was ridiculous with pulling Star Destroyers out of the sky. Size matters not but lifting an x-wing kicked Yoda's ass. Battle meditation seems like that kind of creep. I can buy influencing individuals in a room but coordinating entire battle fleets? No, that's just crazy powerful.

I kind of like the idea that Jedi can at least influence space battles- it helps to explain why anyone took them seriously in the Republic era. And it opens up a lot of possibilities for sort of mystical, intangible influences on the balance of power, which is good for Star Wars stories.

Star Wars thrives on the mythic and symbolic, and one of its recurring themes is the triumph of the spirit over the material- Luke doesn't win because his lightsaber has more megajoules or because his rebels have a bigger bomb; he wins because he's a good man, rejects the dark side, and refuses to kill his own father for the Emperor's amusement. "Luminous beings are we, not this crude matter," and so on.

But yes, that kind of power should be intangible. Having it just be guys juggling battleships demeans it. Battle Meditation (which didn't originally have a name, I think) is pretty good for this because it isn't so concrete necessarily. It can just be one guy pumping confidence and like-mindedness and intuitive awareness of what the enemy's going to do next into his side, while pumping fear and confusion into the enemy's side, or both. That alone can change the course of a battle.

Skywalker wrote:Well obviously I don't want them to fly or cause any inconsistencies. And, come to think of it, the one power they did add in the prequels I didn't like-force speed. Because of inconsistencies. Still, there are plenty of potential powers they could have shown.

There's nothing inconsistent about it: Luke jumps out of the carbon freeze chamber in TESB like he was shot out of a cannon.

Elfdart wrote:

Skywalker wrote:Well obviously I don't want them to fly or cause any inconsistencies. And, come to think of it, the one power they did add in the prequels I didn't like-force speed. Because of inconsistencies. Still, there are plenty of potential powers they could have shown.

There's nothing inconsistent about it: Luke jumps out of the carbon freeze chamber in TESB like he was shot out of a cannon.

Jumping and flying are too different things. I would assume that a Jedi force-jumping isn't making his legs stronger but using telekinesis on his own body.

Now maybe someone might say that this means if Yoda can lift a starfighter, he could also levitate himself. And once hovering, if you move fast enough people will call it flying.

But consider, does the idea of Luke with a cape feel like Star Wars? It doesn't to me. Flying doesn't feel right. So I'd just attribute force jumps to limited tk and say flying requires too much focus, too strong an energy transfer yadda yadda. Flying Jedi would feel like dragonball.

I think he was talking about Force Speed actually.

Skywalker wrote:

atg wrote:Or with their bare hands in the case of Vader..

That's actually a function of his armor, not a force power. But in the EU people block lasers with their bare hands... so, your point still stands.

Wait, they actually say this armor can make blaster bolts just fling sideways or something similar?

In Dark Lord: The Rise of Darth Vader, Vader uses the Force to alter the trajectory of blaster bolts, preventing them from hitting him. That's just the Force. But in Empire Strikes Back, Vader simply blocks Han's blaster shots with his hands, and this is a function of his armor.

Batman wrote:I think he was talking about Force Speed actually.

Yes I was.

Skywalker wrote:In the original script for ROTJ, the Death Star was orbiting Kashyyyk,

Kashyyk might not be very hidden or out of the way, unlike the moon of endor, you know, to keep the death star hidden.

Havok wrote:

atg wrote:Or with their bare hands in the case of Vader..

Wouldn't exactly call Vader's hand bare.

no hands at all?