Bane is the only one existent in Canon, and even then he's only briefly alluded to, with the only apperance being that his "ghost" talks with Yoda for thirty seconds.
You’ll find that this opener drops off in quality as you progress towards the end. I wanted to get this out in a timely matter and didn't feel the need to go into great detail on every claim I made. I dislike openers as they tend to become rehashed respect threads for the characters involved. Much of mine is just copied and pasted from these two respect threads here:
Any comic scans to backup my claims can be found in those posts, as I didn’t feel like linking dozens of scans to this thread (I did link the essential ones, though). If there is any confusion I can supply the source as needed.
Another challenge of opening posts is to not defend yourself from non-existent arguments. Me trying to explain why Zannah’s sorcery wouldn’t work on this duo in my opening post would be akin to shooting myself in the foot, as then I’m making arguments for my opponent (although that’s a pretty obvious one anyone would argue). My job is to simply put out the bait, see which ones Azronger wants to challenge, and then reel him in with the more detailed approach drawing on many other sources in following posts.
Introitus:
"The Dark Lords of the Sith have risen again. Together, we will bring down the galaxy."
―Exar Kun to Ulic Qel-Droma
The combined efforts of Exar Kun and Ulic-Qel Droma left a mark on the Star Wars galaxy that would be remembered for centuries. The legacy of the Brotherhood of the Sith formed by this duo lasted long after their mortal lives, allowing for future sith lords, notably Revan and Malak, to rise to power.
In this opening post I hope to provide a holistic analysis of this Sith duo while comparing them to Darth Bane and Zannah. I will do this by splitting the duel into two main categories, each broken down into more specific sub-categories. Because this fight is between two teams of force users rather than individuals, I will attempt to group the members of each team into specific classes where their abilities are concerned rather than analyzing each character individually.
Most battles between force users in the Star Wars mythos tend to be determined by some combination of light-saber dueling/physical fighting intertwined with force combat. These will serve as the main categories for the analysis between the Rule of Two team and The Brotherhood of Sith. Each category will be broken down into sub-sections as follows:
Physical Combat
Lightsaber Prowess
• feats
• Lightsaber styles
• Lightsaber equipment
• Lightsaber experience
• Lightsaber overall skill/speed/strength
• Physical condition/health
• Age
• Stamina
• Size
• Strength
• Agility
• Pre-existing debilitations (including force degradation)
Force Combat
Strength in connection to the Force
• determined through feats, power scaling, deductive reasoning, force potential, etc
Force knowledge/experience
• determined through feats, statements, exposure to holocrons, etc
Application in combat
• seen through feats demonstrating a user’s ability to utilize the force effectively within a combat environment
• Offensive vs Defensive abilities
• Force barriers
"Beware the jedi who fall as they are the most dangerous of all”
—children’s nursery rhyme
Assessing relative placements as lightsaber wielders:
As lightsaber duelists, both Exar Kun and Ulic-Qel Droma were prodigies when concerning their combative effectiveness. In this section I will break-down the collective abilities of both combatants and explain why they solidly outmatch Darth Bane and Zannah in lightsaber combat.
While scoping the effectiveness of a duelist can come down to a variety of factors, ultimately demonstrated feats hold the most weight as they, without a doubt, provide an accurate picture of what can be expected from a combatant. While theoretical form advantages and accolades can certainly play a part, I believe these to be supplemental materials to demonstrated feats in determining the victor of a light-saber duel.
Probably the most noteworthy feat to note from the start would be the fact that Ulic Qel-Droma and Exar Kun are, for all intents and purposes, equals as light-saber duelists. This was clearly demonstrated during the battle of Koros Major where a lengthy duel between the two ended in a stalemate—requiring intervention by the ancient sith spirit Marka Ragnos:
Source: Tales of the Jedi: Dark Lords of the Sith Issue 2
What’s really impressive about this feat is that the two could have gone on fighting for hours—demonstrating the tremendous levels of endurance each opponent has when faced with their equal in battle:
Exar Kun and Ulic fought, but they were too evenly matched for either to gain the upper hand. Their battle might have gone on for hours but for the macabre manifestation of a host of Sith spirits, led by the shade of Marka Ragnos.
- The Dark Side Sourcebook
The significance of both master and apprentice being equals with a blade comes down to the idea that either Sith is equally as formidable—something that cannot be said for Bane and Zannah. If Darth Bane’s action plan is to engage the seemingly less competent apprentice Qel-Droma in hopes of defeating him quickly in order to then aid Zannah against Kun, it would not work. Ulic is just as deadly as Kun as a light-saber duelist.
In contrast, Zannah, even during her final duel with Bane in Dynasty of Evil, was not on her master’s level as a duelist. As the forecoming passage will show, Bane’s apprentice doubted her ability to last much longer than the initial confrontation in a lightsaber duel without drawing upon her eccentric force abilities:
“He was faster than she could ever have imagined, and he was using new sequences and unfamiliar moves he had never revealed during their practice sessions. But somehow she had survived the initial flurry, and now she knew what to expect….
Her vision was blurred with stars, pain shooting through her left side with each gasp as she tried to catch her breath. Bane didn't let up, coming at her with a frenetic assault. The next few seconds were a blur as Zannah relied purely on instincts honed over twenty years to parry the wave of blows, miraculously keeping him from landing a lethal strike….
Gritting her teeth against the pain from her broken rib, Zannah rose to her feet. Bane hadn't killed her, but her survival had come with significant cost. She was tired now, the desperate scramble to escape after tripping on the grave had pushed her one step closer to physical exhaustion. She felt the broken rib with each ragged breath, and she sensed that the injury would make it harder for her to pivot and turn, limiting the effectiveness of her defensive maneuvers. She couldn't wait any longer. She'd wanted to surprise Bane, slowly gather her strength before unleashing it so he wouldn't be able to properly defend against it. But she knew she wouldn't survive another clash of lightsabers.”
Source: Darth Bane Dynasty of Evil
I will return to this passage again later to assess Zannah’s skills, but for the time being, you should take away that both Kun and Qel-Droma are equally as dangerous as lightsaber duelists. Once I establish that either opponent is more than a match for Bane, it will seal Zannah’s fate as dead in this battle.
Assessing physical conditions:
In this section I wish to briefly establish Kun and Qel-Droma as the physically superior combatants to Bane and Zannah. I will address dark-side force degradation, age, and physique. While not directly significant in a fight between force-users, the physical conditions of an opponent determine how much or little a user will be required to channel their force powers into compensating for their handicaps.
During their time in Tales of the Jedi, both Exar Kun and Ulic Qel-Droma were presumed to be in their mid to late twenties. Both men were depicted as being heavily built and at the peak of their natural human power. In contrast, Darth Bane at the time of Dynasty of Evil was…
…in his mid-forties now, and the first faint scars of time and age had begun to leave their marks on his body…
The aging process was subtle, but inescapable. Bane accepted this; what he lost in strength and speed he could easily compensate for with wisdom, knowledge, and experience.
I don’t doubt that Bane is in exceptional physical condition for a man of his age, but the fact remains that he is twenty-some years older than either Kun or Qel-Droma and is in the decline of his natural human power. Darth Zannah is significantly younger; presumed to be in her early thirties at the time of Dynasty of Evil. While I don’t believe her age would be a handicap, her being a smaller female would naturally leave her at a significant strength disadvantage against either Exar or Uliq—two bulked up men.
Finally, I would like to discuss the detrimental effects that dark-side degradation would have on a combatant—specifically Bane—where their physical capabilities are concerned. By the time of Dynasty of Evil Darth Bane was transitioning away from suffering solely cosmetic changes due to dark side degradation to physically debilitating conditions. This was particularly emphasized by the reoccurring tremor in his left hand:
Age was beginning to take its toll on Bane, but it was nothing compared with the toll already wrought upon his body by decades of drawing upon the dark side of the Force. He couldn't help but smile at the grim irony: through the dark side he had access to near-infinite power, but it was power that came with¬ a terrible cost. Flesh and bone lacked the strength to withstand the unfathomable energy unleashed by the Force. The unquenchable fire of the dark side was consuming him, devouring him bit by bit. After decades of focusing and channeling its power, his body was beginning to break down. His condition was exacerbated by the lingering effects of the orbalisk armor that had been killing him even as it gifted him with incredible strength and speed. The parasites had pushed his body well beyond its natural limits, aging him prematurely and intensifying the degeneration wrought by the power of the dark side. The orbalisks were gone now, but their damage could not be undone. The first outward manifestations of his failing health had been subtle: his eyes had become sunken and drawn, his skin a touch more pale and pockmarked than was normal for his age. The last year, however, had seen more pronounced deterioration, culminating with the involuntary tremor that seized his left hand with increasing frequency.
To make matters worse for Bane, in addition to dark-side degradation and the natural aging process, he was also suffering from the long-term damage imposed by the obelisk armor he had once worn. Bane recognized that in short time his frail condition would leave him completely helpless to Darth Zannah’s attacks:
“It was possible Zannah had noticed his deteriorating physical abilities and had simply decided to wait. In five years his body would be a ruined husk, and she could dispatch him with virtually no risk.”
If this is indeed the case, then he is already weakened as is. Once I establish Ulic and Exar as superiors to Zannah, Bane will have significant difficulty in matching either combatant for an extended period of time.
To conclude this section, we know that Exar Kun and Ulic Qel-Droma are two well-built human males at the peak of their natural strength and age. While Zannah also benefits from her youth, she is a physically smaller female and simply cannot go head-to-head with a physically imposing man for an extended period. Bane was once a physically impressive individual, but in his older age, dark-side degradation, and chronic injuries from his obelisks, has lost much of his natural power. Darth Zannah recognized this and knew she could simply take advantage of Bane’s rapidly deteriorating health to defeat him. Kun and Qel-Droma could do the same. At the end of the day, this fight is between two youthful, well-built males and an average female along with her dying master. The winner here is obvious.
Assessing Lightsaber Prowess
- General Feats Overview
As mentioned earlier, both Kun and Qel-Droma were prodigies as lightsaber duelists. Ulic was described as quickly mastering the art of lightsaber combat:
Ulic Qel-Droma quickly mastered the art of lightsaber dueling.
- The Complete Star Wars Encyclopedia
Even as a novice jedi and in a weakened state, Ulic single-handedly defeated Warb Null:
Warb Null-The leader of the dissident Naddist, Null combined martial prowess with his mastery of the dark-side of the Force. He was eventually killed by UIic Qel-Droma.
- Straight from the Horse's Mouth: A Guide to the Tales of the Jedi Universe, Part 3—Star Wars Insider 28
How formidable was Warb Null?
He was described as prodigious:
…capable of fighting multiple jedi at once:
Further establishing Qel-Droma’s position as an elite swordsman was shown when he along with 1000 other jedi engaged an army of war machines programmed to target the jedi posing the most significant threat. Qel-Droma was one of those targeted:
As a fallen jedi, Ulic defeated Mandalore the Indomitable despite being at a severe weapons and environmental disadvantage:
Tales of the Jedi: The Sith War 1
Among thousands of other jedi, Qel-Droma stood out as one the, if not the most, formidable of his time. After joining Exar Kun, he continue to prove his skill with a blade by matching his master in combat and eventually slaying his jedi brother in combat. Ulic’s prodigious effectivness with a lightsaber was akin to Luke Skywalker’s ability to defeat Darth Vader in Revenge of the Jedi by the co-author of Tales of the Jedi:
"Ulic is a prefiguration of Luke Skywalker. He's rash and impulsive, an excellent swordsman. He acts before he thinks and has an angry streak. It was very difficult working out the story of his turning to the dark side, because we had to do it in very few pages."
-- Tom Veitch, Co-Author of Tales of the Jedi
- Star Wars Galaxy Magazine 8
Exar Kun, much like his apprentice, has an impressive array of feats demonstrating how even at an early age his prodigious combat skill.
As legendary jedi master Vodo-Siosk Baas’s student, Exar Kun was described as being the most formidable student he had ever had:
Exar Kun snapped his master’s force imbued staff in half with brute force first as his student and later as his enemy—outdueling his own master on two occasions. Keep in mind that Baas’s staff was more powerful than a lightsaber:
Out-sparring his master regularly:
As the Jedi Watchman of Dantooine, Master Baas spends much of his time on the planet and trains multiple apprentices at a time. His strongest apprentice, however, is a young pupil named Exar Kun. Kun's skill with a lightsaber is so great that he claimed victory over his master many times when they sparred together.
- Jedi Academy Training Manual
How powerful was Vodo-Siosk Baas?
Sources have him along with Odan-Urr (another jedi master Exar would kill) as the Yoda and Mace Windu of their time:
―Power of the Jedi Sourcebook
Imagine Anakin Skywalker striking down Mace Windu or Yoda. Exar Kun was very much the Anakin of his time.
Exar Kun has never lost a light-saber match when fighting seriously with an opponent.
Exar and Ulic have both defeated exceptionally powerful foes as apprentices, demonstrating their natural talent as swordsman. When examining Bane and Zannah, I am hard-pressed to find feats or accolades on a similar level.
As a relatively new Sith Lord Bane did manage to defeat blademaster Kas’im, but ultimately relied on his force power to do so after realizing he was outmatched as a duelist:
“Within the first few passes Bane knew he couldn't win. Kas'im had trained his entire life for this moment. After years of study, he'd mastered all seven forms of the lightsaber. Then he'd honed his skill for decades, perfecting every move and sequence until he had become the perfect weapon and the greatest living swordsman in the galaxy. Maybe the greatest swordsman ever. Bane was no match for him.”
- Path of Destruction
Even as a reigning Sith Master at the peak of his power (Rule of Two) Bane’s most noticeable feat was defeating several featless Jedi along with Zannah on Tython. But even this feat can be down-played by the fact that Bane held the significant advantage of his Orbalisk armor, rendering him nearly invincible to strikes by his enemies.
A similar story can be said about Zannah who’s greatest feat as a relatively new Sith was simply surviving a clash of sabers with two jedi, waiting for one to leave, and then utilizing Sith sorcery to finish the remaining fighter.
When you consider that Qel-Droma and Kun have outclassed the most esteemed grandmasters of their era, the deadliest of Mandalorian warriors, and several of their jedi peers, Bane and Zannah’s feats simply don’t stack up.
An additional factor to take into account is that while Exar and Ulic lived during a time of war where jedi regularly engaged with Krath, Mandalorians, and numerous other foes, Zannah and Bane spent most of their time in hiding keeping a low profile. Their lightsaber skills were utilized sparingly to conceal their existence from the jedi and rest of the universe. Instead, Bane and his apprentice focused much of his time on discovering Sith secrets and honing his force power. Kun and Qel-Droma simply lived in a different era where combat prowess was required on an almost daily basis to survive. The Rule of Two by Bane relied on power in the force and political cunning to achieve their goals moreso than warrior-like engagements on a daily basis.
Frankly speaking, I believe Kun’s ability to outduel the Yoda/Mace Windu equivalent of his era; Qel-Droma’s ability to outduel Warb Null as a novice jedi at a disadvantage; Qel-Droma outdueling Mandalore the Indominatable without his lightsaber and on non-favorable ground to be far more impressive than Bane & Zannah’s isolated duels with a handful of featless jedi.
Assessing Lightsaber Prowess
- Form, weapon, and stylistic advantages
As if overall feats did not establish the obvious superior lightsaber team, this section will consider the technicalities of lightsaber dueling to do so.
Exar Kun and Ulic Qel-Droma were masterful practioners of form VI Niman and Form V Djem So, respectively:
Both incorporated astounding levels of strength into their forms to make for extremely aggressive styles.
Kun’s use of Niman was based around the principle of leaving no weaknesses for an enemy to exploit in a lightsaber form:
"For superior balance, use the Niman form. This form has no specific strengths, but no weaknesses either."
Instead of relying on a specific lightsaber move-sequence like Makashi or Shii-Cho would, Niman allowed Kun to remain extremely flexible in combat and adapt to any situation, or opponent, he was faced with. He would then defeat an opponent through his unorthodox use of a saber-staff or through his overwhelming strength in the force—although the latter option was rarely taken as the former seldom failed.
The Essential Guide to Weapons and Technology explains the various functions of Kun’s unique light-saber. Being as prodigious as he was, Kun was the first to wield a duel-bladed weapon with great talent. By adjusting the blade length as well as power settings in combat, Exar was often able to catch his opponents off guard and defeat them in battle, as he did with his master Vodo-Siosk Baas in the Senate Chamber. This unorthodox method of fighting was highly effective as it allowed for a great deal of malleability to any situation while also keeping a high-degree of unpredictability. It could be argued that Exar Kun was the General Grievous for his time because of this.
Assuming Bane engages with Kun, he would need to rely on something other than strength or endurance to stand a chance against the young Sith. In his fights with Zannah, this was typically how he pressed her, taking advantage of the fact that his opponent was a physically smaller and weaker female whose defensive style (Soresu) did not even allow her to put up an offensive attack.
In this fight, Bane would be fighting an opponent whose strength would at the very least match his own if not exceed it. Likewise, Kun’s superior endurance (recall his ability to fight Ulic, his equal, for hours on end) would mean Bane would be pressed for time before force fatigue sets in and his physical handicaps (e.g tremor) seal his fate. Futhermore, any so-called advantage of Bane utilizing unpredictable light-saber sequences as he did against Zannah in their last fight would be negated by Kun’s prodigious use of Niman; allowing him to easily remain adaptable to whatever Bane throws at him. Once Exar pushes his own offense, Bane would be hard-pressed as his defensive abilities have been shown to be limited during his duel on Tython with the jedi:
“She seemed to be everywhere at once-in front of Bane, beside him, behind him, circling low, leaping to come in high, deflecting his blade with one of her own then stabbing three quick times in succession at his eyes. The big man's head ducked and bobbed, twisting and turning to avoid her blows as he tried to mount a counteroffensive. Raskta's mastery of her blades was unparalleled, but even with her talents augmented by Worror's battle meditation she wasn't able to land a telling blow on such a small target through Bane's defenses. Still, the ferocity of her new strategy had turned the momentum in her favor ... or so Farfalla thought. Bane continued his retreat, circling away from Raskta's blades, then suddenly turned and ran straight toward the unarmed Ithorian standing just inside the door of the room.”
Here, Bane was being over-whelmed by a strong offensive attack; the mobility weakness of Djem So likely being exploited.
Simply put, Bane is a brute who had typically only fought female opponents, taking advantage of their lack of physical strength and endurance. When put on the defensive, Bane crumbled against a strong unpredictable attack. In this scenario, Bane will be fighting an opponent who exceeds him in every physical category. The traditional strength and size advantages he relied on will be negated, and instead he will only have his lightsaber prowess to fall back on. Exar’s Niman form was inherently designed to go up against unpredictable opponents and adapt to various situations. Bane would attempt to overwhelm Kun but ultimately fail as his opponent meets all of his strikes with equal strength. Bane would eventually be put on the defensive and crumple against the prodigy Exar Kun; whose own custom weapon would push Bane off balance.
Now we move to the Zannah-Qel-Droma line-up. Darth Zannah was a skillful practioner of the form III Soresu lightsaber style. While this style was extremely effective in mounting a defense, it only did that. As Kreia said:
"A… defensive technique. But effective. Use it if you do not wish to be hit, or if you are facing many opponents with blasters. With a lightsaber blade and enough skill in deflection, it is an excellent offense against blasters, but in other situations, it merely delays the inevitable."
―Kreia
Zannah mainly relied on her force powers, specifically Sith sorcery, to win duels against physically opposing opponents. Soresu simply allowed her to last long enough against opponents such that she could employ her force methods. In fact, I do not recall a single instance in which Zannah out-dueled an opponent without calling upon the force.
Despite the effectiveness of Soresu, Zannah still faced difficulty against opponents much larger and stronger than her. First, during the battle of Tython where she nearly died at the hands of a physically imposing jedi after her endurance ran out:
“Even though his technique was more refined than her Master's, she'd been able to withstand his assault... so far. He came at her again, his blade changing directions so quickly in midstroke that it seemed to bend and curve. Zannah repelled the assault with a furious defensive flurry, breathing hard. Her style was meant to prolong combat, exhausting her opponents as they tried to penetrate her defenses. But each time she clashed with the olive-skinned giant, she was the one forced to expend desperate, frantic energy. Slowly, he was wearing her down.”
The second instance was during her final fight with Bane. Again, she lacked the endurance and strength to outlast her master, ultimately defeating him through sith sorcery:
“Gritting her teeth against the pain from her broken rib, Zannah rose to her feet. Bane hadn't killed her, but her survival had come with significant cost. She was tired now, the desperate scramble to escape after tripping on the grave had pushed her one step closer to physical exhaustion. She felt the broken rib with each ragged breath, and she sensed that the injury would make it harder for her to pivot and turn, limiting the effectiveness of her defensive maneuvers. She couldn't wait any longer. She'd wanted to surprise Bane, slowly gather her strength before unleashing it so he wouldn't be able to properly defend against it. But she knew she wouldn't survive another clash of lightsabers.”
Considering that Ulic Qel-Droma utilizes the same aggressive Djem So as Bane, rivals him in strength and endurance, I can’t imagine Zannah would have any easier of a time against him. Ultimately this engagement will come down to force prowess which will be discussed in the next section. I deem this match-up, when purely considering light-saber combat, to be inconclusive as Zannah would incorporate her force prowess before she wore-down, and because I personally believe Exar Kun would defeat Bane before the victor between Qel-Droma and Zannah is determined.
Force Prowess
Although most battles between force-users tend to be decided by prowess with a lightsaber, a user’s power and knowledge in the force can often turn the tides of a battle when incorporated appropriately. I personally believe that Bane & Zannah’s force powers pose far more of a threat than their saber dueling abilities. Exar and Ulic outclass the Banite sith duo as duelists, but it’s a closer contest when looking purely at their knowledge and power of the force. Here I will quickly examine what force abilities both teams have at their disposal as well as their overall strength in the force. Using this information, we will determine if either team faces a significant disadvantage.
I will argue that while Bane & Zannah may rival Qel-Droma and Kun in their overall knowledge and mastery of the force, this advantage is strongly negated by the younger siths’ raw power in the force which ultimately dictates their overall force reserves.
Both Kun and Qel-Droma are in possession of their sith talismans for this battle, as both have continuously utilized the power of such ancient artifacts throughout their appearances. Combined with their own internal force powers, the talisman have allowed Exar and Ulic to achieve some of the best feats in the entire Star Wars mythos.
To summarize their most notable force feats (sources provided as needed):
Exar Kun has:
- Killed an ancient Sith Wyrm via force wave
- One-shotted the Yoda/Windu equivalent jedi master of his time, Odan-Urr (see previous citation for Odan being Yoda’s equivalent)
- Casually destroyed the spirit of Freedon Nadd
- Casually incapacitated Aleema Keto with an energy blast; overwhelming her Sith Magic powers
- Has rag-dolled mid-tier jedi like Sylvar
- Destroyed portions of the Massassi Temple with force blasts
General Accolades
Been stated to be the most powerful Sith up to his time, more powerful than Freedon Nadd, Karness Murr, Marka Ragnos, Naga Sadow, and others
Once the most powerful and dangerous of the Dark Lords of the Sith, he [Exar Kun] was responsible for the deaths of millions four millennia before the rise of the Empire.
- The Complete Star Wars Encyclopedia
Exar Kun was far more powerful than any single Jedi of his time, including Thon, Tott Doneeta. Ultimately, only the combined might of all the jedi were able to defeat Kun.
She discovers the accounts of the Great Sith War, and learns that though Kun was far more powerful than any one other Jedi of the time, a combined force had defeated him.
- The Jedi Academy Sourcebook
"Though Kun had enormous power, it seems that the key was that the other Jedi combined their might. They fought together as a unit where all the pieces fit together, as components in a much larger machine powered by the Force."
- Star Wars Jedi Academy Trilogy Volume 3 - Champions of the Force
Exar has projected a force scream that echoed across the galaxy:
Exar Kun let out a tremendous shriek that echoed across the galaxy, calling in despair upon Master Vodo, whom he had abandoned.
- The New Essential Chronology
Nadd offered Kun a way to live, and to repair his broken body: if he embraced the dark side, he would be healed. The betrayal of light was not an easy one for Kun, but the desire to live was stronger. He accepted the dark side, his screams reaching out across the galaxy and creating ripples in the Force
- The Essential Guide to Characters
Exar Kun was extremely powerful, but by no means only dependent on his strength in the force. He also possessed a great deal of knowledge on the teachings of the sith from centuries ago:
Exar Kun had full knowledge of the Dark Holocron, which contained Sith knowledge and lore dating back more than one hundred thousand years.
Locked within it's recesses, accessible only to a Dark Lord of the Sith, are the forgotten histories and lore, dating back a hundred thousand years and more.
- Odan-Urr, Tales of the Jedi
Odan-Urr goes to the Force and the darkest power in the galaxy walks away with something that will make him even stronger.
- Tales of the Jedi
Exar Kun has the full knowledge of Naga Sadow, who in turn has a vast knowledge of every power detailed in the Jedi Academy Sourcebook, as well as of the Sith.
Exar Kun has unearthed a trove of Sith alchemical lore left behind by the original group who fled here to the fourth moon of Yavin.
- Tales of the Jedi
Exar Kun has learned all there is to know of the teachings of Naga Sadow.
- The Jedi Academy Sourcebook
Uliq Qel-Droma possesses a Sith amulet similar to his master’s which grants him a similar amount of power in the force:
Ulic was given a powerful Sith Talisman, the counterpart of Exar Kun's own. It's stated by both Ulic and Aleema Keto that this Talisman would make Ulic more powerful than Aleema. Aleema has reduced a man to a skeleton with a magic blast after just months of training. With his own amulet, Exar Kun has unleashed blasts capable of destroying portions of the Massassi Temple, the Sith Wyrm, and even Freedon Nadd's spirit.
To warn Nomi Sunrider and a group of other Jedi to back away from him, Ulic blasts her with Force Lightning. Cay states that the amulet is "deadly", indicating that he would have killed them by unleashing it's full power.
He lashed out, striking Nomi with a bolt of dark-side lightning.
- The Essential Guide to Characters
Exar Kun and Ulic Qel-Droma are stated to have more power in their Talisman's than what Aleema can achieve through her Sith Magic.
How powerful was Aleema Keto?
Likely far more powerful than Darth Zannah as a sorcerer. She has projected illusions on a far larger scale than anything Zannah has.
"Aleema and Satal Keto were able to use their Sith illusions to conquer the six of the seven worlds within the Tetan system, defeating their six military forces individually. When staging a battle over the seventh world, Koros Major, Aleema projects illusions down onto the planet which cause the Tetan armies to believe their weapons are snakes, among other illusions. Then, when Jedi reinforcements from another part of the Republic arrive to provide aid, Aleema projects massive illusions of Space Grazers, an alien lifeform which, if real, could have destroyed the Republic fleets. Nomi Sunrider is able to see through the illusions due to her abilities in battle meditation, and then proceeds to telepathically defeat Aleema. Despite this, Aleema's cousin, Satal, is able to cast a spell on the minds of hundreds of Chaos Fighter pilots, compelling them to crash into the Republic capital ships in a suicidal final attack. It's worth noting that Aleema carried out these feats within a meditation chamber, although her cousin required no such aid in his feat."
Additionally, she has possessed the strength to pull the cores out of solar suns, mask entire fleets of capital ships, etc.
Simply looking at these two’s force feats puts Bane & Zannah’s to shame.
Ultimately, Exar Kun and Ulic Qel-Droma would not have been stopped had Qel-Droma not betrayed Kun. It took the entire combined strength of all the galaxy's jedi to bring down Exar. On the other hand, you have Bane & Zannah, who knew that they had to go into hiding to save themselves from death. Hell, a strike team of 5 jedi nearly took these two out on Tython. Kun and Qel-Droma fought hoardes of jedi with ease. The victors are obvious.
@kurk: I'll refresh my knowledge of Bane and Zannah before starting to write the counter. I think this is only fair, seeing as you yourself took a month to get yours out.
@dark-sith123: Nah, it's nothing spectacular. I already have most of my arguments prepared in my head. I just wanna refresh my knowledge on Bane to see if there's anything of importance people may have overlooked.
I’ll begin by outlining Darth Bane’s power progression throughout his life, and in doing so go over his general Force potency and expertise, and make a few comparisons to Exar Kun and Ulic Qel-Droma, along with an analysis of his lightsaber dueling prowess. Then I’ll scale Darth Zannah from what I presented for Bane, and explain the intricacies of her spells of madness as well as their intensity. A summary will of course be included at the bottom of this post to demonstrate just how utterly outclassed your team is in every facet of combat.
DARTH BANE
"Darth Bane had gained more knowledge and mastery of Sith techniques and power than anyone who had come before him. He used that knowledge and skill to change the Sith Order forever."
RITUAL OF THE BROTHERHOOD
During Path of Destruction, Darth Bane convinces the Brotherhood of Darkness to concoct a ritual in which all the participants would channel their power through a single vessel, Bane himself (link). Every Dark Lord in the Brotherhood partook in the ritual, so at that moment Bane’s body contained the combined power of more than a hundred Sith Lords (link), which he unleashed in a firestorm that threatened to kill the entire world, destroying most of the Jedi and Sith who in total numbered in the thousands (link).
ORBALISK ARMOR
When Darth Bane plunders the tomb of Freedon Nadd in Rule of Two, he gets assaulted by crustaceans called orbalisks, two of which latch onto his body. Bane learns that the creatures bolster the dark side, and he harnesses their strength to fuel his own. As a result, his power skyrockets to levels beyond anything he had ever experienced (link), which would include the aforementioned ritual where Bane acted as the amalgamation of the power of over one hundred Sith Lords in one body.
In the following decade, the orbalisks spread over most of Bane’s body, with only his hands and head being exposed (link). Given that only two orbalisks were enough to propel Bane beyond a hundred Sith Lords, one can only imagine how much hundreds of orbalisks - all feeding his command of the dark side - would cause his power to increase. Bane himself believed his strength measured up to the feats of the Sith described in ancient texts, such as razing worlds and causing stars to go nova (link). This opinion was shared by the Huntress, who saw Bane’s personal power as greater than the devastation of Ambria, a cataclysmic event where most life on the planet was wiped out by a tsunami of dark side energy, and that was during Path of Destruction, before he donned even a single orbalisk. Interestingly enough, the Huntress soon after is awe-struck by Zannah’s power, implying her strength as of Rule of Two eclipsed her Master’s as of Path of Destruction (link). This is rather convenient, as Bane in Rule of Two could have snapped Zannah’s neck with a thought, without the orbalisks, so his full power with the orbalisks would be much greater (link).
EMBODIMENT OF POWER
After having the orbalisk armor removed from his body, Darth Bane still continued to grow in power. By the time of Dynasty of Evil, his natural power had even surpassed that which the orbalisks had provided him in Rule of Two, as is apparent from three key comparisons: firstly, he moves faster than Zannah could ever have imagined in their final duel, and she has witnessed his orbalisk-induced berserker speed first-hand (link); secondly, his regular strikes stagger Zannah and cause her to lose her balance, whereas in his orbalisk fury, she managed to hold her ground against a jumping attack with far more baseline force despite being far inferior to herself as of Dynasty of Evil (link); and finally, Bane managed to stay conscious and perform the complicated ritual of Essence Transfer while experiencing the most intense agony he had ever felt that went beyond the physical, whereas in his orbalisk armor in Rule of Two, he collapsed from lesser pain (link). All three comparisons are related to the Force: speed and strength are the product of Force augmentation, which in turn stems from overall Force reserves; and the ability to withstand pain is brought about by willpower, which Darths Sidious, Plagueis and Wyyrlok III - all among the most knowledgeable Sith ever - would centuries later come to understand as a critical aspect in one’s command of the Force (link). Thus, all three comparisons would point to Darth Bane as of Dynasty of Evil being more powerful than when he donned a full set of orbalisk armor. While you cite Bane’s musings in Dynasty of Evil as proof that he has declined in speed and strength, this does not invalidate my argument. Bane can still be more physically imposing than he was with the orbalisks, while having regressed from his peak; it simply means his theoretical prime occurred sometime before Dynasty of Evil, but still after Rule of Two. Bane as of the former undoubtedly remains the superior version to himself as of the latter, however.
Leading up to Dynasty of Evil, Darth Bane had had decades to study the dark side of the Force, in sharp contrast to Exar Kun’s meager year or two. While Kun did master Naga Sadow’s knowledge, it was also included as part of Freedon Nadd’s teachings, so Bane would undoubtedly be aware of whatever Kun may have known as well (link), since he owned Nadd’s holocron, a device containing all of Nadd’s dark side secrets. Given that it was locked in a hidden room that seemed to have been undiscovered, it is likely Kun never came into possession of the holocron unlike Bane (link). Therefore, just on the basis of their mastery of Freedon Nadd’s power, Bane is more knowledgeable than Kun, and that’s not even mentioning the holocrons of Darth Revan, Belia Darzu, Sorzus Syn, and Darth Andeddu Bane had plundered. All in all, he would have had access to the equivalent of “an ancient, planet-sized Sith storehouse of knowledge” from Darth Revan (link), every single Force ability detailed in the Tales of the Jedi Companion and all the knowledge of Naga Sadow from Freedon Nadd (link), the ritual of Essence Transfer from Darth Andeddu (link), the abilities he wrote down in his own manifesto (link), and an undefined amount of additional lore from Belia Darzu and Sorzus Syn (link).
Darth Bane’s power at this point in his life was so great that he deemed the talismans and other trinkets the ancient Sith had used to ostentate themselves with to augment their strength as superfluous to his natural command of the dark side, likening them to “a single drop of rain” in “an ocean of power he already commanded” (link). In sharp contrast, Exar Kun and Ulic Qel-Droma saw it apposite to wield amulets, the latter even integrating his into a gauntlet in the vein of his Master, and many times the importance of amulets is noted in regards to the pair (link). Bane had read upon Naga Sadow’s stuff, so he would undoubtedly be aware of the amulets he fashioned and how to replicate them, which happened to be the exact same ones Kun carried, yet he still held the opinion that he did (link). Not to mention, as I outlined in the first paragraph, Bane as of Dynasty of Evil is more powerful than he was in Rule of Two when he wore the orbalisks. Merely two orbalisks were enough to augment his strength beyond the combined might of a legion of Sith Lords capable of planetary devastation, and Bane’s natural power surpassed an entire set of armor consisting of hundreds of individual orbalisks. You can’t just dismiss Bane’s word as “Sith arrogance” or whatever excuse you might come up with; we can evidently see his assessment is legitimate: only a few orbalisks probably far eclipse Kun’s amulets in the boons they provide, but they logically wouldn’t be of much use to a guy whose natural strength is greater than a gross of orbalisks. All in all, this seems like compelling evidence that Darth Bane became more powerful than Exar Kun and Ulic Qel-Droma in regards to their unaugmented strength in the Force, and while this advantage is somewhat negated by the fact that Kun and Qel-Droma still have their gauntlets in this scenario, they only provide a temporary boost as detailed in the Tales of the Jedi Companion, and only enhance specific attributes like telekinesis and sorcery, not the whole nine yards. Bane still has a solid edge in overall Force strength.
LIGHTSABER DUELING
You attempt to denigrate Bane with the fact that his innate skill with a lightsaber doesn’t measure up to Kas’im’s, and cite that fact that he only won via his superior strength in the Force. But I must ask - so what? What difference does it make whether Bane wins through superior skill or a greater Force connection so long as he still wins? Your entire section about these characters’ fighting styles and skill levels becomes entirely irrelevant so long as I prove that Bane’s power in the Force eclipses Kun’s by a significant amount - which I have above. He can simply rely on that and not worry about technique, as Kas’im told him: his lightsaber has become an extension of the dark side, driven solely by Force-based instinct without any thought on Bane’s part, who himself has gone beyond forms and sequences entirely with this new level of Force mastery (link). He also has encyclopedic knowledge of the double-bladed lightsaber, so Kun’s weapon wouldn’t catch him completely off-guard either (link).
But Darth Bane does possess great inherent skill with a blade unlike your opener would like to admit. Starting from the bottom:
KORRIBAN SITH STUDENT / KIEL CHARNY: Each student at the Korriban academy had the potential to become a full Sith Master in the Brotherhood of Darkness. Most had been training every since childhood with Sith Master-tier potential, and for many it took years to even get accepted into the Korriban academy (link). This would mean they had been studying in one of the other academies, and since their potential set them apart, they’re likely superior to the Sith marauders, assassins and adepts, each of whom have their own minor accolades. The Korriban apprentices were also noted to stronger than half the Dark Lords on Ruusan (link). Thus, it is obvious that these guys are above average as far as Force users go, and can’t simply be dismissed as fodder especially when the feats and accolades you brought up for Kun and Qel-Droma weren’t all that better. / Kiel Charny was noted to be a “champion” among the Jedi and “a true warrior who epitomized the Jedi ideal” (link), so he’s another above-average Force user, and likewise not to be written off for no reason.
GITHANY: During her stay in the Korriban academy, Githany developed a reputation for “crushing” her opponents in the dueling ring (link), meaning she would’ve repeatedly stomped the above students there. She also quickly defeated Kiel Charny when they fought (link). You might dismiss her victory to be the result of Charny’s lack of willingness to fight, but that would only hinder his offence, not defence, and doesn’t excuse his swift loss. Githany’s unorthodox whip also wouldn’t have factored in much, as the two had trained together in their youth as Jedi (link), and Charny would’ve undoubtedly been exposed to the weapon’s intricacies and possibly even sparred against her. It might have been more of a deciding factor in Githany’s victory over the other apprentices, but do take note that most would have studied her fights and training prior to engaging her in the ring, so they wouldn’t have been completely taken off-guard. Regardless, Githany’s solid superiority to both the other students and Kiel Charny should be clear.
SIRAK: Sirak was repeatedly noted to be the Korriban academy’s top apprentice (link). When Githany proposed to Bane that she would face Sirak in the ring in hopes of manipulating him, he remarked that Sirak would destroy her, and Githany herself admitted she would lose (link). On top of that, he had never lost a match, cementing his superiority to the other students (link), and he could seamlessly shift between lightsaber forms mid-sequence and has been witnessed utilizing Form VII, making him canonically a “high-level master of multiple Forms” (link).
BANE: When he fought Sirak for the second time, Bane had improved immensely. His skill was such that he was able to instantly identify mistakes in Sirak’s technique and could have stomped him in a few moves. He however decided to prolong the engagement and toy with his opponent, demonstrating his vast superiority nonetheless (link).
LORD KAS’IM: In the opening exchanges of his duel with Bane, Kas’im very nearly eviscerates his opponent. He remarks with surprise that Bane had improved since they had last dueled, implying that Bane prior to unlocking the secrets of Darth Revan’s holocron and growing more powerful as a result would not have survived (link). This means that Kas’im could have speedblitzed the same Bane who toyed with and could have stomped Sirak in a few moves.
DARTH BANE (PATH OF DESTRUCTION): As their duel continues, it becomes clear that Kas’im simply cannot beat Bane due to the latter being too strong in the Force (link). Kas’im only gains the upper hand when he switched to a weapon type Bane had absolutely no experience with or against, theoretical nor practical. But in a conventional fight where the neither is unfairly disadvantaged, Bane is the superior swordsman.
DARTH BANE (DYNASTY OF EVIL): When Darth Bane travels to Dxun in Rule of Two, he is assaulted by a swarm of orbalisks. Bane attempts to bat them all aside, but deems it impossible despite also using Force telekinesis to supplement his lightsaber defence, likening the task to deflecting raindrops in a storm (link). Two decades later in Dynasty of Evil Bane is seen casually warding off rain for ten minutes with such efficiency that by the downpour’s end he emerged completely dry (link). So Darth Bane’s defensive capabilities with a lightsaber as of Dynasty of Evil vastly eclipse PoD/early RoT Bane’s lightsaber and telekinetic defences combined. Then add in the fact that DoE Bane is far faster and physically stronger than even orbalisk Bane who is faster and stronger than PoD Bane (link), and we have ourselves quite a big pile of evidence indicating Bane of Dynasty of Evil is far, far beyond his earlier iterations as a lightsaber duelist.
So to condense all that into one paragraph, in a duel DoE Bane would likely humiliate PoD Bane, who was better than Kas’im, who in turn could have speedblitzed trainee Bane, who was able to curbstomp Sirak, and he in turn could have allegedly wrecked Githany, who emphatically bested Kiel Charny and repeatedly bodied the other apprentices on Korriban, who honestly have almost as good credentials as Warb Null. Ulic Qel-Droma’s handling of the latter could be replicated by Sirak, and the master duelist accolades are matched and exceeded by him too. On top of that, Mandalore the Indominable is a non-Force user, and Vodo-Siosk Baas may be the top dog of his era but you've presented nothing for the Jedi he's superior to so that's quite an empty accolade. All in all, nothing you've shown for either of your team members places them any higher than Sirak, so it’s quite funny to think that they’d ever hold a candle to Darth Bane at his peak.
DARTH ZANNAH
"She was the chosen apprentice of Darth Bane. She was the heir to the legacy of the dark side. And she was the future Dark Lord of the Sith."
OVERALL FORCE POWER
By the time of Dynasty of Evil, Darth Zannah had surpassed her Master in the ways of the Force, so therefore all of the above that I credited Darth Bane with is applicable to her as well even at the start of the novel (link). After she killed Bane, she became the master to embody all the power of the dark side in accordance with the Rule of Two. It is probable that this was more than metaphorical, as Cognus felt Bane’s power pass on to Zannah at the moment of his death, and Darths Plagueis and Sidious underwent a similar exaltation upon becoming the galaxy’s sole Dark Lord. Sidious later remarked that Bane’s power has literally passed down from master to apprentice for a thousand years, so all the evidence points to the notion that Zannah inherited all of Bane’s Force power and gained it on top of her already existing strength (link). Essentially, she doubled her power, and Darth Zannah at the end of Dynasty of Evil has twice the strength of all I described above regarding Bane.
SPELLS OF MADNESS
On top of being more powerful, sagacious and overall superior to Exar Kun and Ulic Qel-Droma in just sheer potency, Darth Zannah possesses her Sith magic, the deadliest application of which are her spells of madness. The sorceries went beyond anything Darth Bane was capable of comprehending (link), and his depth and breadth of knowledge regarding Sith lore eclipses Kun’s by a country mile as discussed previously. The spells function through three different attack methods: standard mental pain, artificial horror, and illusory recreations of the victim’s worst experiences, except much more complex than regular variations as Bane regarded Horror to he “a simple mental manipulation” yet had difficulties fathoming Zannah’s spells (link). All three afflictions trigger rapidly after one another and make the spell extremely difficult to defend against, and its full intensity can be unleashed by Zannah with a simple gesture in a split second, so it requires no preparation (link). Darth Bane, despite fully expecting the technique, having studied up on it beforehand and mentally prepared for it, was struck to his knees, shrieking like a madman, and only managed to repel it after mountainous tribulation (link). Ultimately he concluded that the only real defence against the spells was willpower.
Speaking of willpower, let’s talk about the spells’ potency. As I mentioned, Darth Bane was almost driven to the breaking point upon being hit with the conjuration. Therefore, Bane’s strength of will seems like the perfect criterion to judge how mentally robust Exar Kun and Ulic Qel-Droma must be to overcome the onslaught on their psyches. I’ll start with Lord Kaan, someone whose domination attempts Bane resists with ineffable ease (link): during the assembly of the Brotherhood of Darkness on Ruusan, Kaan telepathically compels the entire army to obey, eradicating their doubts and raising their morale (link). Given that at the very end of the Brotherhood’s existence there were almost two thousand Sith alive, and that most of the Sith forces were destroyed in the firestorm ritual that Darth Bane masterminded as shown previously, that would mean there were at least around 4000 Force users Kaan was quasi-dominating with his telepathy. He later states to Bane that he is powerful enough to single-handedly join the minds of the remaining 2000 Sith - the most powerful in the Brotherhood, all of whom were “highly mentally trained” and “so skilled in mental-physical combat,” so they’re not without credentials - in the thought bomb ritual, and in the ritual act itself, Kaan is depicted speaking through the other Sith Lords and is the only one who retains his autonomy while the rest lose their individuality. Bane later commented that Kaan “pooled the abilities of the other Sith Lords to create a brute-force wonder: the thought bomb,” and Valenthyne Farfalla added that they were all “enthralled to his will,” indicating total telepathic subjugation on Kaan’s part (link). At the very least, we know for a fact that Kaan was controlling the minds of the Brotherhood’s leadership, which, if we make the reasonable assumption that it refers to the Dark Lords, would mean he was dominating over one hundred Dark Lords of the Sith with his telepathic abilities, since all of them were involved in the firestorm ritual and thus couldn’t have perished in it (link). So in summary, Lord Kaan’s mental domination capabilities allow him to enslave Force users ranging from the hundreds to the thousands, and Darth Bane had zero difficulty shrugging that level of psychic power as of Path of Destruction. In Rule of Two, we also see him resist the pull of the two thousand Force spirits trapped in the thought bomb with similarly casual effort, for whatever that’s worth (link). It’s clear, however, that Bane’s strength of will is absolutely titanic even relatively early in his life, although he did have his limits. In the same novel, he collapses in pain from the being cooked alive by his lightning and having the orbalisks release acid into his system, although in Dynasty of Evil we see that he is capable of maintaining consciousness in the face of even greater agony that went beyond the physical, and simultaneously perform the complicated technique of Essence Transfer, indicating his willpower had heightened tremendously. And it was in Dynasty of Evil where Darth Zannah’s Force wizardry almost drove Bane mad, despite everything else he has shown capable of enduring, and fully expecting the technique and preparing for it beforehand with study and precautionary mental barriers. Zannah’s power then effectively doubles after inheriting Bane’s strength at the end of the novel, making her spells twice as potent as they already were, and their intensity increases over time passively, a process which Zannah can expedite actively (link). So in order to resist her spells, Exar Kun and Ulic Qel-Droma would need to possess mental fortitude capable of enduring telepathy roughly equivalent to dominating 8000 Sith Lords, which is what Darth Zannah packs with her sorcery. Anything less and the spell becomes much more difficult to overcome, and the longer the spell goes on, the harder this task becomes.
LIGHTSABER DUELING
We can scale Darth Zannah’s dueling prowess from her brief skirmish with orbalisk Bane. Bane at that point would have been superior to Kas’im, who is able to blitz trainee Bane. Orbalisk Bane however was not able to do the same to Zannah, so given that trainee Bane would be blitzed by an inferior swordsman to the one who wasn’t able to blitz Zannah, it would indicate her prowess with a blade outstrips the same trainee Bane’s who was able to humiliate Sirak, even as of Rule of Two. Her improvement from there to Dynasty of Evil is a bit harder to gauge, but I would say that it’s an entirely reasonable assumption to place her around Kas’im’s level by then.
And unlike you suggest, Zannah is entirely capable of being on the attack. She would have casually overwhelmed Johun Othone and Set Harth with an offensive flurry (link), and considering the showings you have thus far brought up for Exar Kun and Ulic Qel-Droma have been rather lackluster, it’s safe to say she’d outmaneuver them with the same kind of ease.
SUMMARY
"This is the way of our Order. An individual may die, but the Sith are eternal."
As has hopefully become clear by now, Exar Kun and Ulic Qel-Droma are sorely outgunned in this fight. Darths Bane and Zannah are simply in another league.
From a strictly martial standpoint, what you presented for your team is woefully inadequate to reach the top of the seven-step skill hierarchy I laid out where some gaps between steps are stomp or blitz-tier differences. Even Sirak has most of Kun and Qel-Droma’s feats and accolades matched if what you have shown is the best they have. As it is, Bane and even Zannah would completely tool your team in a duel, and factoring in other Force abilities, it gives both Bane and Zannah the option to erect a lightning cocoon to create space between their assailants and themselves should they ever get disarmed of their lightsabers, which is incredibly unlikely in itself (link). Zannah also only needs a split second to initiate her spells of madness, and I don’t see how either one of your team would last more than a few moments before being permanently incapacitated. Small breaks like that happen all the time in lightsaber duels, and Zannah could create that opening herself with a lightning cocoon anytime she wants as I pointed out.
If the contest ever comes to a pure Force bout, your team is equally screwed. Bane and Zannah have a much wider pool of Force techniques to draw from than Kun and Qel-Droma, and pretty much know counters to most of what the team is bringing to the table, since they’re educated in most of the same abilities through their mutual source of knowledge in Freedon Nadd. Darth Bane is also enormously more powerful than Kun, unless you can prove that the latter is capable of feats equivalent to planetary firestorms, consuming all life on a world, one-shotting PoD Bane+ tier people who were mused by the Huntress to have internal power greater than the devastation of Ambria etc (for the record, just because Bane possesses power equivalent or greater than some of these feats does not mean he is capable of planetary destruction himself, much in the same vein you don’t see Grand Masters Luke or Yoda slaughtering worlds despite having power in excess of Darth Nihilus and in league with certain iterations of Darth Sidious; but the fact still remains Bane’s personal power is up there with these feats, so you better not try to lowball with his struggle to use drain in combat or create a small death field, when even Lord Kaan - someone Bane is vastly superior to - was capable of draining 2000 Sith and 100 Jedi at once (link); he simply lacks skill in drain-related techniques, but it’s not a reflection of his overall power level which is much higher). And then we have the fact that Bane surpassed the need for Sith paraphernalia, which in my view is a solid piece of evidence that Bane is more powerful than Exar Kun, no matter what feats or scaling bring up for the guy. Then there’s Zannah, who’s twice as powerful as Bane. As I see it, she wouldn’t even need her sorcery to one-shot either of your team members. I wouldn’t be surprised if even Bane could ragdoll them honestly. The disparity in feats is just too massive.
Even if your guys managed to destroy Bane's physical vessel, he could still invoke the ritual of Essence Transfer as a last resort. Seeing as the willpower feats for Exar Kun and Ulic Qel-Droma are nowhere near Bane's, unless you manage dig up something great, it is likely he would succeed in dispelling either of their personalities and hijacking their bodies for his own. The remaining person would then be ganged up by two combatants - a situation where he has no hope of prevailing.
Yeah, it's good. Just one thing: how can Bane possess power on par with planetary feats if he isn't capable of performing them? I don't understand the logic there. Though you'll probably explain this in the next response, so whatever.
Yeah, it's good. Just one thing: how can Bane possess power on par with planetary feats if he isn't capable of performing them? I don't understand the logic there. Though you'll probably explain this in the next response, so whatever.
I already gave an analogy: you don't see Luke or Yoda razing worlds despite being capable of contending with Sidious. Certain abilities like lightning and telekinesis don't have the highest destructive capacity, which is why they can't be used for planetary devastation like drain or storm can.
Although on second thought, Bane might be capable of the global firestorm as he is proficient in pyrokinesis...
@azronger: Well, Yoda and Luke are Jedi, so that's due to their morals. Also, if Bane is that powerful, wouldn't that mean that Plagueis and Tenebrous can devastate multiple planets at once? And I don't remember him being proficient in pyrokinesis, just one quote stating he can use it, IIRC.
EDIT: you didn't specify Bane couldn't do that with certain powers anyway.
ILS' respect thread is incredibly outdated. @Kurk you may want to refresh your knowledge of Kun using other sources tbh. Skimming my arguments on KMC may do you well.
@azronger: No there isn't, and no one has ever done it afaik. Though, as Jedi, they should neither study nor learn any planet devastating power anyway. Regardless, can Bane devastate a planet with certain powers? What you said in your post seemed to indicate he can't in general, despite supposedly having power on that level. Imho, he should at least require a ritual to do so.
The problem with Bane's Ambria scaling is that Drew in pretty much any novel, never focuses on the nexus as a source of greatly differentiating circumstances. Something he himself states that he leaves open for us to discuss. So I am really not sure how seriously Cognus' POV should be taken. Then again, I wouldn't personally expect anything less than an extremely powerful Sith Lord being more powerful than a nexus.
The biggest problem with the scaling, is that much of that planet surface wrecking energy, was clearly dissipated in that destruction. The strike of a nuclear blast is going to be far more powerful than the residual energy leftover across eons. Then we have to account for all the Sith spirits that would be counted for in Lake Natth's power. Spirits that were put there as a result of the planetary destruction.
Just wanted to let you know I'm about 25% complete with the response. My goal is to have it out by late Thursday before I leave town for a week. I know there's no technical time limit, but I don't want to drag this debate out longer than late September.
Update 7/27
I've elected not to rush the rest of my post during the time while I wait for my flight just to meet my own arbitrary deadline. Expect a response before the double-digits of August.
This will serve as my first response to Azronger’s powerscaling of Darth Bane & Zannah. I will incorporate rebuttals against his arguments into my own arguments for Exar and Ulic rather than separate the two into their own sections. This will allow for a better sense of flow and tie everything together.
Before starting, let me take a moment to express my appreciation for Azronger’s craftiness. It took me a few reads to adequately take in all of his post as I found myself laughing uncontrollably initially at the claims he was piecing together through wanking “worthy of recognition in the archives of [Comicvine]”.
“Brave, but foolish…”
—Count Dooku, Attack of the Clones
The case for Bane starts with an analysis of power growth from his time in the Sith Academy up until his death. Azronger starts by utilizing the noted power-growth Bane experiences when wearing the orbalisks, which is fine in itself, but his argument became entirely unreasonable upon comparing the power induced by two orbalisks to that of the entire Sith Brotherhood.
You claim that the power Bane inherited from the initial two orbalisks that affixed themselves to his back and chest allowed him to experience a surge of power that was beyond that of anything he had felt before. You then included the reference text to suggest it would surpass the combined power of the Brotherhood of Darkness. Now, I could waste time by dwelling in semantics, authorial intent, etc, but I’d much rather put an end to this ridiculous claim with a simple line of logic.
We know that Bane left Dxun with only two orbalisks affixed to his body. Ten years later, his entire body was completely encased with dozens, if not hundreds, of the parasitic creatures. So if the power of only two was enough for him to experience a surge of power beyond that of hundreds of Sith, having dozens more attached to him would mean that he would now be wielding a godly amount of power, right? The combined strength of The Brotherhood of Darkness was capable of destruction on a planetary scale—first with Bane’s ritual and then the thought bomb which ultimately took the lives of thousands of force sensitive individuals. As of Rule of Two, Darth Bane’s strength in the force would be exceeding this power tenfold-plus. Even after removing the orbalisks, his power would still grow beyond what it was in RoT as you say yourself. So, call me skeptical, but I find it a bit odd that Bane would be in possession of power surpassing that of tens of thousands of Sith, capable of wiping out planetary life, yet never utilized more than the smallest fraction of such power. One might think that having access to the power of all of Lord Kaan’s Sith times ten would mean a strike-team of four featless Jedi wouldn’t pose a threat, or that a team of lay mercenaries wouldn’t be able to defeat Bane. Furthermore, we know that Bane’s justification for “working in the shadows”—keeping the Sith’s existance from the Jedi hidden—was to gain power indirectly as he knew they were no match for the combined efforts of the Jedi. Again, your version of Bane would be wielding power capable of wiping out thousands of Jedi in an instant, yet chooses not to. Furthermore, this omnipotent iteration of Bane would still struggle against the four featless Jedi on Tython and lose to lay mercenaries. You will need to come to one of the following conclusions:
1. Bane is incredibly incompetent in wielding his omnipotent power in any sort of combat setting (meaning your argument about it being advantageous is a moot point)
2. Bane does not possess power surpassing that of The Sith Brotherhood
Interpreting the power surge Bane experienced by the orbalisks to exceed that of Kaan’s army is entirely unreasonable.
Response to “Embodiment of Power”
The first paragraph continues to power-scale Bane, placing him above his Rule of Two self, which by itself is not an argument for why he would win. I did take interest in your argument for Bane’s physical condition in Dynasty of Evil surpassing that of his younger iterations. I agree with you that a physically fitter opponent can still be overpowered or outsped by one who is inferior provided that they are significantly stronger in the force, but this can only happen under conditions where the younger, more physically fit opponent is significantly inferior to their decrepit opponent’s strength in the force. Additionally, the decrepit force user’s stage of physical degradation would be a determining factor as the more “broken down” your body is, the more of your own force reserves would be spent on holding together/compensating for your physical handicaps than being spent actually surpassing the opponent.
I disagree with you that Bane would be in his physical prime as a combatant in Dynasty of Evil, and that he would only be past his theoretical prime. There are several indicators to suggest otherwise:
- The text bothering to mention Bane’s aging and his physical tremors repeatedly throughout the novel at all suggests that it is relevant to his abilities as a combatant. To include these descriptions of his failing body if they truly had no impact on his combative ability would be irrelevant and a waste of the reader’s time. The author clearly included them for a purpose.
- It is explicitly stated that Bane’s physical capacities in conjunction with his force-augmented abilities result in his light-saber form being less effective than it had been in the past, albeit slightly:
“He leapt high in the air, his lightsaber arcing above his head before
chopping straight down in a blow powerful enough to cleave an
enemy in two. His feet hit the hard surface of the courtyard stones
with a sharp, sudden smack as he landed. Bane still moved with fierce
grace and terrifying intensity. His lightsaber still flickered with
blinding speed as he performed his martial drills, yet it was the merest
fraction slower than it had once been.
The aging process was subtle, but inescapable. Bane accepted this;
what he lost in strength and speed he could easily compensate for
with wisdom, knowledge, and experience. But it was not age that was
to blame for the involuntary tremor that sometimes afflicted his left
hand.”
- Dynasty of Evil
- We know that throughout Dynasty of Evil Bane sought out a new, younger host body to replace his own failing one. One of his cited reasons for wanting to conduct this essence transfer was his fear of Zannah exploiting his decrepit body as a means to defeat him in combat:
“He had tried to conceal the tremor from his apprentice, but Zannah
was too quick, too cunning, to have missed such an obvious mark of
weakness in her Master.
Bane had expected the tremor to be the catalyst Zannah needed to
challenge him.Yet even now, with his body showing undeniable
evidence of his growing vulnerability, she seemed content to maintain
the status quo. Whether she acted out of fear, indecision, or perhaps
even compassion for her Master, Bane didn’t know—but none of these
traits was acceptable in one chosen to carry on his legacy.
There was another potential explanation, of course—yet it was the
most troubling of all. It was possible Zannah had noticed his
deteriorating physical abilities and had simply decided to wait. In five
years his body would be a ruined husk, and she could dispatch him
with virtually no risk.”
You make the claim that Bane is only out of his theoretical physical prime, but the text states otherwise. It is referring to Bane’s holistic physical abilities in conjunction with his force augmentation, not just the former. Darth Bane as of Dynasty of Evil suffers from senescence and tremors that he himself cites as being indicators for Zannah to kill him with less difficulty. A theoretical decline in combat abilities, by definition, would not be as such.
I will not argue that Exar Kun is Bane’s superior in knowledge of the force. Obviously the latter, by Dynasty of Evil, would have been studying the dark-side for several decades while Kun would have only had a crash course under Nadd and whatever he learned on his own during his few years of reign. If there is one, I do not see this difference in knowledge as being truly significant in a combat setting. Essence transfers, rituals, and other obscure force abilities are rarely utilized in combat effectively as they tend to require more effort on the part of the practitioner than fundamental, basic move-sets (e.g telekinesis). Evidence to support my claim rests in Zannah’s final duel with Bane. Her use of the eccentric tendrils ability, despite being outside of Bane’s realm of knowledge, was not utilized initially. Zannah only called upon this ability as a last-ditch-effort after she accepted Bane would soon overwhelm her if something desperate wasn’t attempted. Furthermore, this eccentric ability required Zannah’s full concentration and was quite risky as it hampered her ability to focus on actual combat, leaving her at risk of incapacitation. If Bane knows something than Exar doesn’t or vice versa, I highly doubt it would be employed in any orthodox fashion due to the reasons I described. Both combatants tend to utilize proven, simple force abilities in combat. There is no reason to believe they would deviate from this norm in a combat setting between the two.
While I did say I wouldn’t be arguing Exar > Bane in force knowledge, I’d like to dismiss any ideas of Kun being a novice practitioner of the force. While there is the possibility of Bane knowing things Exar does not, the same argument can be spun the other way. Sources imply that future generations of Sith missed out on Kun’s amassed knowledge in the force, implying he discovered new secrets Bane would not have known:
The dark knowledge of the Sith teachings died with Kun, it is extremely unlikely that any records survive, either on Yavin IV or elsewhere.
- The Jedi Academy Sourcebook
Again, I do not believe this would give Exar any sort of combative advantage over Dessel. Both tend to favor simple, but proven/effective, abilities in combat rather than eccentric ones. If you believe that Bane possesses some sort of combative advantage because of his knowledge, the burden of proof is on you. Simply citing his access to holocrons does not explain why they would be significant it combat aside from speculative “new” abilities.
Response to Amulets
You argue that Darth Bane is more powerful than my team simply because he deems himself to be beyond the use of dark-side amulets while Kun and Qel-Droma utilized them. For this claim to be valid, several factors would need to be assumed to be true:
1. That Darth Bane is not speaking out of personal arrogance/overconfidence as Sith tend to do.
2. That all Sith amulets are created equal
3. That all Sith amulets directly add power to a force user’s already existing reserves rather than channeling it.
Of these three, I believe the third assumption is the least feasible to be true. Bane rejects Sith amulets as he believes they are “like a single drop of rain falling into the ocean of power he already commanded”. This of course insinuates that Sith amulets in themselves are merely a source of power/energy to tap into rather than tools that bend/manipulate a user’s own power in the force.
This assumption is false as Exar Kun and Ulic Qel-Droma’s amulets were not merely sources of power in themselves, but rather a channeling device to focus all of one’s power into a single beam:
“What Exar Kun understands is that the dark rage that fills his heart can be focusedin this amulet, unleashing tremendous energies.”
“Sith amulets are ancient relics created to focus and amplify a darksider’s power.”
“Yet in order for Sith practitioners to use their magic, they need a token or some physical object to help focus and channel their magic. That’s why Exar Kun and Ulic Qel-Droma use Sith artifacts.”
There is a fundamental difference between channeling one’s energies into a singular point to create an extremely concentrated “beam” versus simply adding a source of energy to one’s own. As the quotes from the scans you provide demonstrate, Kun and Qel-Droma’s amulets are different than those described by Bane in that they actually focalize a user’s own energies to create an immensely more powerful beam rather than serving as a source of power in themselves.
The same amplification (e.g tenfold amp) effect is provided regardless of one’s preexisting strength in the force. A one can go to a ten; a ten can go to a hundred. By definition, the type of amulet utilized by Kun and Qel-Droma would not be adding a “drop” to Bane’s ocean of power (like how the orbalisks did to Bane); it would be concentrating all of that power into a single point for maximum possible effect. Hence, Bane’s statement on Sith amulets can be dismissed out of ignorance, if not arrogance/overconfidence.
This being said, what Bane said could be applied to different Sith artifacts and trinkets which actually did serve solely as sources of power to drawn from (e.g those utilized by Haazen), but as proven, this is not the case with Exar and Uliq’s.
As for Bane potentially knowing, but rejecting, to construct the Sith amulet worn by Kun that was originally owned by Naga Sadow—we would need to:
1. Confirm that Sadow was the original creator of the amulet and not merely the possessor
2. That Bane would have, without a reasonable doubt, had access to this information and blueprints
3. That Bane would have been aware of this ability to concentrate his power, but had a legitimate reason not pursue it
Just having “had read upon Naga Sadow’s stuff” does not confirm these conditions.
As I read through the rest of your post, it should go without saying that the argument for Kaan’s Sith Brotherhood combined strength < 2 Orbalisks < Orbalisk Bane < DoE Bane has already been addressed at the very beginning of my response.
You conclude the section by making the claim that Bane is more powerful than Kun and Qel-Droma in the force, which is simply not true. I will address this entirely in a separate post.
Response to light-saber dueling
Bane only won against Kas’im by bringing down the temple with him still in it. This is hardly an indicator that Bane was his superior. Why does it matter how Bane defeated Kas’im you ask? Because we are analyzing his combative abilities to scope how he would fare against Exar Kun. Kas’im lost to Bane due to unfortunate environmental conditions. Would he still have lost had they been on open ground where Bane couldn’t collapse buildings on his foes in a “cheap move”? Kas’im was still the superior swordsman. If Bane was significantly stronger than him in the force, he would have broken his neck from the very beginning, like he did to Lord Qordis, rather than engaging what was in Bane’s mind a ‘foolish pursuit of honor’ (honorific combat).
If you truly believe that light-saber skill is irrelevant when one is significantly stronger in the force, then so be it. I shall focus my efforts in proving Exar > Dessel in the force rather than waste time on skill given that you’ve chosen to mitigate its importance.
The case for Ulic > Sirak
Your ABC logic at the end of this section is cute. My favorite is this:
“Mandalore the Indominable is a non-Force user”
Yes, and so were the mercenaries who Bane at his peak lost to lol.
Anyway,
I’ll make this easy for you to understand.
As effective lightsaber combatants:
Exar Kun = Ulic Qel-Droma (as cited in 1st post)
Jedi padawan Exar Kun > Vodo Siosk Baas (several hundred year old jedi master comparable to Yoda) > all of Baas’s other students (keeping in mind he’s gone through many due to his age)
Compared to:
Sith trainee Bane << Sirak
Newly appointed, young Dark Lord Exar Kun >> Vodo Siosk Baas
Newly appointed, young Dark Lord Bane < Kas’im
Established Dark Lord of the Sith Bane struggled against four featless jedi with the aid of Zannah. If defeating Vodo Siosk Baas is an empty accolade as you say here:
“Vodo-Siosk Baas may be the top dog of his era but you've presented nothing for the Jedi he's superior to so that's quite an empty accolade.”
…Then Bane struggling against four featless jedi on Tython must be a terrible embarrassment by your logic.
Vodo Siosk Baas was the top dog jedi for his era. He stated that Exar Kun was the most formidable combatant of all of his former apprentices, including the legendary Nomi Sunrider, who defeated Aleema—someone who Exar Kun one-shotted.
Baas, Sylvar, Nomi Sunrider, and a few other nameless jedi were deemed to be a more powerful force than the combined military defenses of Coruscant:
This would mean that a handful of jedi who Exar Kun or Ulic has defeated at some point were equivalent to (at least) several thousands of Republic troopers, gunships, ground attack vehicles, elite guards, orbiting atmospheric defense systems, etc.
In comparison, Darth Bane was defeated by a handful of mercenaries.
“All in all, nothing you've shown for either of your team members places them any higher than Sirak, so it’s quite funny to think that they’d ever hold a candle to Darth Bane at his peak.”
Exhibit A
Qordis shrugged. "Sirak is the strongest student at the Academy. For now. Perhaps in time he will surpass Kas'im and me and all the other Sith Lords. Perhaps not."
Darth Bane: Path of Destruction
- It was insinuated that Sirak was inferior to all of the Sith Lords in Kaan’s brotherhood
Exhibit B
As the Jedi Watchman of Dantooine, Master Baas spends much of his time on the planet and trains multiple apprentices at a time. His strongest apprentice, however, is a young pupil named Exar Kun. Kun's skill with a lightsaber is so great that he claimed victory over his master many times when they sparred together.
- Jedi Academy Training Manual
- Exar Kun was superior to his own master, who in turn was deemed to be the strongest of his era.
Did Sirak ever win against Kas'im? No?
Being inferior to even the weakest of Kaan’s Dark Lords
VS
Being superior to the strongest jedi of your time
Exar = Ulic > Sirak
Response to Zannah
I am confused as to how you’ve reasoned that Zannah inherited double Bane’s power, but it doesn’t really matter since Bane was never wielding the amount you claimed early on.
Sorcery
As you’ve cited, Zannah clearly has a knowledge of dark-side sorcery that Darth Bane does not. Knowledge very much equals power, and we know that Zannah had access to secret texts that Bane did not:
“In addition to the tomes her Master had provided, Zannah had sought out her own sources of hidden Sith knowledge over the years. Practicing in secret, she had progressed far beyond Bane's expectations, learning new spells to unleash the dark side in ways he had never even imagined.”
These secret texts are presumably where she acquired her ability to conduct spells of madness, as it wouldn’t make sense for her to engage Bane with sorcery he was already familiar with. The paragraph you provided of Bane having some preparations against Zannah’s sorcery is just that: a holistic understanding of the ability. If Zannah had access to secret texts beyond that of what Bane provided and hence knew of, it would make sense for to have employed those attacks rather than something her master would have had an easier time defending against with his preexisting knowledge. With this said, it can be assumed that having a familiarity with dark side sorcery allows a user to better defend themselves against the intricate nature of the attack rather than resorting to simple “will-power”.
While Bane is certainly not wrong in stating that sheer willpower was a way of defending against sorcery, it certainly cannot be the only method of doing so. After all, Bane himself admitted he had no talent for sorcery, and that he had trouble grasping it. Someone with an incomplete understanding of something is not entirely credible. Because of this, we can conclude that Bane’s analysis of Zannah’s sorcery attacks when concerning his ability to defend against them is not absolute—meaning that other ways of countering dark-side spells likely exist.
And of course other methods do exist. As employed by Set, a force barrier is one way to stop attacks from ever reaching the defender’s mind:
“Zannah felt a small twinge of disappointment. She had hoped he
would be smart enough not to continue a battle he could not win.
As he drew near, she responded not with physical violence, but
rather with a powerful spell of Sith sorcery that attacked Set’s mind.
He tried to throw up a protective Force barrier in response, but
Zannah’s power shredded his defenses, leaving him completely
vulnerable.”
Now here, the book makes it pretty obvious that Zannah had Set outclassed in just about every category. Her superior power in the force allowed her to outright bypass Set’s conscious defenses—the only time she actually was able to do so. On Tython, the brute-like jedi she nearly died to only fell her to sorcery because he disengaged from the battle:
“The big man hesitated, casting a quick glance over toward the
others to see what had happened. Seizing the opportunity, Zannah’s
fingers flickered in strange patterns as she unleashed her Sith sorcery
at her foe.”
Similarly with Bane, Zannah could not engage her master directly with her power:
“Zannah was content to play along,
taking quick, careful steps backward over the soft, sandy terrain as
she began to gather her power.
The key was subtlety. She couldn’t let Bane sense what she was
doing or he would launch into another wild flurry of attacks, forcing
her to focus all her energy on keeping him at bay. She had to give him
the illusion he was controlling the action, when in fact she was only a
few seconds away from unleashing a burst of dark side sorcery that
would rip his mind apart.”
What these two passages indicate is that when faced with an opponent who is Zannah’s equal or superior in the force, she cannot directly utilize a sorcery attack to overwhelm her opponent’s defenses as she did with Set. Instead, Zannah is forced to rely on deceit or environmental advantages to find an opening when the opponent is not actively guarding against attack. These environmental advantages of course are entirely plot based and difficult to predict in a hypothetical battle. Theoretically, any opponent can gain the environmental advantage if the adversary is distracted or whatnot. As consistently seen in the Star Wars Legends continuity, an inferior force user will never be able to over-power or bypass the active defenses of a superior opponent. As I will explain in the closing argument of my post, Ulic Qel-Droma would not have issue with Zannah’s sorcery because a.) he has a far superior commanding of the force and b.) he has already familiar with the sith sorcery of Aleema—a far more impressive and powerful witch than Zannah.
Let me take a moment to point out the practical application of Zannah’s spells in a combat setting. We know that Zannah herself states that the utmost concentration is required to enact the spells of madness—any fault in focus results in the enemy breaking free:
“Zannah watched as Bane huddled against the ground, his lightsaber flailing wildly at invisible ghosts, but she didn't let her concentration falter. Bane's mind was strong; if she let up even for an instant he might break free of the spell.”
In this battle, a fault in concentration could easily occur as she would have to be aware of her surroundings as Bane and Kun fight it out. Putting all of her concentration into a spell leaves her exposed to an intervention by Kun.
Additionally, we also know that enacting these spells take a great deal of energy; in fact, Zannah described the process to be exhausting and limited to a single-use:
“The spell she had unleashed on Cyndra was powerful but
exhausting. Zannah doubted she’d be able to effect a similar reaction
in Paak before he ran her through with his blade. So instead of
sorcery, she turned to more conventional means to dispatch him.
Extending her shackled hands, she used the Force to draw the
lightsaber from Hetton’s lap, sending it flying across the room and
into her waiting palm. As the blades ignited she casually snapped her
restraints with a single thought.”
- RoT
Based on this, as well as the fact that Zannah tends to reserve her sith sorcery as a least ditch effort in all of her duels rather than utilizing it from the get-go, we can reasonably assume that performing such spells drains her significantly to where she would not be direct to employ them. If faced against Ulic Qel-Droma, Zannah would likely refrain from utilizing the ability unless a.) she was presented with a clear opening [e.g Ulic was distracted] or b.) she was facing imminent defeat through conventional combat methods. Like I said, we have never seen Zannah employ her sorcery at the start of duels, and we have no reason to believe she would do so in this fight.
Ultimately, one likely way she could face defeat is if Exar Kun defeats Bane before Zannah does Qel-Droma, and given her utilization of form III Soresu, I’d wager that this is a likely outcome. Ultimately, her form is based around endurance:
“Her style was
meant to prolong combat, exhausting her opponents as they tried to
penetrate her defenses. But each time she clashed with the oliveskinned
giant, she was the one forced to expend desperate, frantic
energy. Slowly, he was wearing her down.” - RoT
whereas everyone else in this battle is about brute-strength, rapid attacks. As I will touch on later, Zannah does not possess the skill nor the adequate form to defeat Ulic Qel-Droma in a light-saber engagement. Her Soresu grants her the ability to outlast the other forms in theory, and if this tactic is employed, she will fall once Exar Kun rejoins his apprentice after Bane is defeated.
On the topic of will-power
You went on length about Bane’s will-power; most of which stems from unreasonable power-scaling of Kaan’s armies as you did at the beginning of your response post. First off, you keep it ambiguous as to whether it is strength in the force that resists sith sorcery or pure mental strength. If it is the latter, I can find many inconsistences to invalidate such a theory.
First off, you need to establish whether there is a fundamental difference between defense against Kaan’s telepathy and Zannah’s spells of madness. Both are more or less a complete domination of one’s mind with the capabilities to influence the victim’s behavior. I’ve already established that Zannah’s sorcery will not directly dominate those who are not her inferior in their command of the force as their force barriers cannot be bypassed. In my mind, this is very similar to Lord Kaan’s mind control.
Bane described Kaan’s attempt to dominate his mind as “a rusted knife scraping against the hide plates of a Halurian ice-boar.”, suggesting that he did not overcome Kaan’s mind control through will power at all, but rather resisted it through some barrier—likely a force barrier. Given that the book establishes Bane as being Kaan’s superior in the force, it would make sense that latter’s attempts to dominate the former’s mind would be a futile effort as Bane’s defensive force barriers would simply be too powerful to overcome. As I went into detail earlier, this makes sense when see the case of Zannah dominating Set—a strong force user overpowering the active defenses of an inferior. In essence, a force user’s main defense against these mind-control spells is their own strength in the force, not their “will-power”. In my view, mental will seems to be a bizarre, inconsistent, last-ditch effort to fight the effects of mental domination after an inferior force user’s defenses have already been penetrated—not some force-related ability. Ultimately the significance of this is that Zannah cannot penetrate the defenses of Qel-Droma as he is the superior force user. Much like Bane could resist Kaan’s domination through force barriers, Ulic would be able to do the same.
Response to Zannah lightsaber dueling
You would’ve been better off not fighting this section at all. Using Zannah’s self-stated confidence in her ability to dispatch Set Harth—an ill-trained fallen jedi padawan who failed to defeat even a mere assassin (Huntress) [just like Bane, may I add]—or Othone—another padawan who was described as being a hindrance to his team on Tython, and who’s skill with a blade was described as minimal:
“over the past decade he had made only the most basic efforts to
maintain his skill with the blade. Instead he had focused his attention
on developing diplomatic talents.”
- RoT
Quote for Johun Othone’s clumsiness:
“And while Johun’s own clumsy efforts had actually seemed to
impede Sarro when they fought side by side, Raskta appeared to
thrive off his presence.”
Nobody is impressed by a well-trained Sith’s ability to dispatch jedi padawans. It’s laughable to believe you would even try to compare these two to Kun and Qel-Droma to argue Zannah could press her own offense.
Much like the prodigious Anakin Skywalker, before turning to the dark-side Ulic Qel-Droma was deemed to be the greatest jedi knight among the many thousands within the jedi order:
"Ulic was once our greatest Jedi Knight. Now he is our greatest shame."
–Sylvar
- Tales of the Jedi: Redemption
But Ulic Qel-Droma isn't just anyone; he's a Jedi, perhaps the greatest of his time.
- Star Wars: Tales of the Jedi: Dark Lords of the Sith #5 Solicitation
I already mentioned this one, but he among thousands of other jedi in battle, he was specifically targeted by droids programmed to prioritize the most formidable, threatening jedi to kill:
Unless we have reason to believe that the jedi order during this time period in Star Wars is significantly weaker than that of the prequel era and Luke era, we can conclude that Ulic—being categorized as being in the top 1% of jedi—is likely, at the very least, on par with other prodigious jedi like Mace, Dooku, Luke, etc. Again, your attempts to put him on the level of incompetent jedi padawans is laughable.
Zannah struggles against brute strength as shown against Sarro Xaj and Bane. She falls quickly to Ulic, hands down. Either some luck of the moment allows Qel-Droma to become distracted to where Zannah can attempt to utilize sorcery, or she dies.
Powerscaling Ulic Qel-Droma and the case for Ulic > Zannah force-wise
My first post focused a lot on Exar, so I’d like to focus more attention towards Ulic.
The Sith Talisman given to Ulic allowed him to focalize his powers to where he could become more powerful than Aleema Keto:
Just how powerful was Aleema?
Like Zannah, she was skilled at employing Sith illusions and exposing people to their worst fears. However, unlike Zannah, she was able to do so on a much larger scale, employ it on more than one individual at once, and not succumb to the fatigue of such spells like Zannah:
Dispatches several men through sith sorcery. It is also stated that Aleema had access to a book of ancient sith spells, suggesting that she too like Zannah is knowledgeable in an array of sith magic:
Unlike Zannah, Aleema has employed sith magic on planetary levels as shown when she projected numerous illusions of space grazers, tricking entire armies into believing their weapons are snakes, etc:
Again, she employs sith sorcery on a level far exceeding that of Zannah by projecting a fleet of ships:
A single blast from Aleema is powerful enough to reduce a person to a skeleton. Mind you, this was a feat by Keto while she was just a novice to Sith sorcery, so this is more of a representation of her power than skill:
Aleema was powerful enough to remove the core from a star and use it as a weapon against fleets of ships. It should be noted that Naga Sadow’s ship was being utilized as a nexus in this scenario, but it is still very impressive nevertheless when considering the unmeasurable power in the form of gravitational resistance a star has. Additionally, it should be said that Exar Kun was the one demonstrating the technique to Aleema, so it can be assumed that he too possesses this (literally) larger than planetary feat (keep in mind that suns on average are hundreds of times larger than planets):
Aleema completely out-classes Zannah in the magnitude of her Sith Sorcery and overall strength in the force. It is confirmed that Ulic is more powerful than Keto with the use of his focalizing gauntlet, and Exar Kun has in-fact one-shotted Aleema with ease, demonstrating just how powerful either man really is in comparison to Zannah. A single blast of pure dark-side energy from either Sith should be enough to incapacitate Rain for a while; especially when considering that there is no practical defense against such ability.
To really hit the nail on the head, I’d like to look at Qel-Droma’s augmentation feats as a representation of his power in the force.
Even as a novice jedi, Ulic manages to speed-blitz five of Warb Null’s force sensitive, dark-side acolytes in an even faster fashion than Darth Sidious did to the B-team. We know that he did this within microseconds because the blade of one of the decapitated soldiers has only fallen centimeters after Qel-Droma killed the lot:
Ulic then goes on to speed-blitz Warb Null himself:
It should be stated that Qel-Droma is on a dark-side nexus and hence at a disadvantage due to the dark-siders having the amp and Ulic being weakened.
Furthermore, it could be stated that in this instant Ulic Qel-Droma—still as a novice jedi many years before he would embrace the dark-side—moved at a far greater speed than that of Sheev Palpatine in Revenge of the Sith when examining the RotS novel:
"Saesee Tiin's head bounced when it hit the floor. Smoke curled from the neck, and from the twin stumps ofthe horns, severed just below the chin. Kit Fisto gasped, "Saesee!" The headless corpse, still standing, twisted as its knees buckled, and a thin sigh escaped from its trachea as it folded to the floor. "It doesn't..." Agen Kolar swayed. His emerald blade shrank away, and the handgrip tumbled from his opening fingers. A small, neat hole in the middle of his forehead leaked smoke, showing light from the back of his head."... hurt..." He pitched forward onto his face, and lay still." - Revenge of the Sith Novelization
Obviously leaving enough time for someone to gasp, speak a few words, and watch the body collapse before killing the next opponent has nothing against killing several other opponents before the original kill can even drop their weapon. Ulic even as a weakened novice jedi is a powerhouse of a fighter who’s augmentation rivals if not surpasses that of RotS Sidious. Zannah is horribly out-matched in just about every category.
Reinforcing Kun > Bane in the force
In both one-on-one combat situations as well as just overall demonstrated feats, Exar Kun has always made Bane’s most impressive feat look like the equivalent to a jedi mind-trick.
Kun was capable of physically and mentally freezing several thousands of galactic senators. The sheer magnitude of this feat is very impressive when considering that Darth Bane was never able to use his own force abilities to control non-force sensitives—even when his life depended on it. It is quite sad that a Sith Lord as powerful as you claim to be was not able to defend himself against a small group of mercenaries with the force:
This alone should speak the volume that Kun outclasses Bane, but we can keep going.
Kun has one-shotted/rag-dolled Odan-Urr and has over-powered Vodo Siosk Baas. Again, these two were compared to being the Yoda/Mace/GM Luke of their time (same sources/scans as in my first post). Even if you want to severely low ball this accolade and place Baas & Urr at sub-Dooku level, it doesn’t invalidate the fact that these two grandmasters were stomped by someone who would presumably be leaps and bounds above them in the force to perform such feats, making Exar Kun at the bare-minimum on Dooku’s level.
Odan-Urr in particular was proficient in the creation of holocrons, which of course requires tremendous skill in manipulating sub-atomic manipulation—something Bane struggled to do for years causing him to doubt his own power in the force:
Exar Kun’s power surpassed that of someone who possessed the ability/power to do something Darth Bane could not for a long time.
Exar Kun destroyed Freedon Nadd’s spirit casually with a blast of dark-side energy. How powerful is Freedon Nadd?
Powerful enough to where Bane doubted his own power in comparison to Nadd (Keep in mind that Exar Kun is solidly above Nadd):
“Was his command of
the dark side somehow less than that of the ancient Sith Lords like
Freedon Nadd?
It was an uncomfortable line of speculation, but it was one Bane
forced himself to consider. He had read the histories of the great Sith
Lords; many were filled with feats almost too incredible to be
believed. Yet even if these accounts were true, even if some of his
predecessors had had the ability to use the dark side to destroy entire
worlds or make a sun go nova, Bane still felt that his power measured
up to the described abilities of many of those who had successfully
created Holocrons of their own.”
-RoT
If Bane was doubtful that his own power could be compared to that of Freedon Nadd—someone who was inferior in power to Kun—I’m not sure how Bane would stand a chance in battle.
TL;DR
In the end, it comes down to this:
Kun was stated to be more powerful than any other jedi existing during his time. Of the tens of thousands of jedi, none could touch him:
She discovers the accounts of the Great Sith War, and learns that though Kun was far more powerful than any one other Jedi of the time, a combined force had defeated him.
- The Jedi Academy Sourcebook
On the contrast, Bane was not more powerful than any one jedi. He struggled against a featless strike team sent to destroy him—even though he had the advantage of orbalisk armor which would have greatly augmented his power in the force, physicals, endurance, and the aid of his apprentice.
Kun was so powerful that he did not dwell in the shadows like Bane to slowly amass power through indirect means. Instead, he outright slaughtered the jedi as he stood unmatched. Only after all the jedi managed to join forces, only after the entirety of the Republic’s armies amassed was Kun able to be defeated. Tens of thousands of jedi; hundreds of thousands of soldiers, gunships, etc, etc:
"Though Kun had enormous power, it seems that the key was that the other Jedi combined their might. They fought together as a unit where all the pieces fit together, as components in a much larger machine powered by the Force."
- Star Wars Jedi Academy Trilogy Volume 3 - Champions of the Force
Bane was taken down by his own lightning and later by non-force sensitive mercenaries. Even if your claim of him possessing all of the power of Lord Kaan’s army is true (which it’s not), it means absolutely nothing if Bane is grossly incompetent at wielding that power.
It took Bane his entire life to learn the essence transfer technique while Kun managed to learn it within the few short years he was a Sith. You claim that Bane has a superior understanding of the force but that’s simply not true as Kun was stated to have died with secrets of the dark-side that would never be discovered.
Kun was so prodigious at light-saber combat that he pioneered his own light-saber design and accompanying technique—utilizing it with scary success to where he never lost a single duel.
Bane on the other hand was a brute-force type fighter who’s actual technique was described as being aggressive, vulnerable, and less refined that of Sarro Xaj—a completely featless jedi knight.
“He had to guard against her counterattacks,
his style less aggressive so he didn’t leave himself vulnerable. Even
though his technique was more refined than her Master’s, she’d been
able to withstand his assault … so far.” – RoT
This same type of pioneered style would put Bane at the disadvantage much as he was against Kas’im with his own secret fighting style. Like I said before, Bane & Zannah lived in an era of secrecy where political prowess was valued over raw combat. Exar and Ulic, on the other-hand, lived in an era where direct combat was required just to survive during a time of war. They likely have far more experience than either Banite Sith in the actual art of combat and are far more conditioned physically.
Finally, with the light-saber advantage not in their favor, Bane & Zannah would have to rely on their force powers to win this fight, which in many Star Wars battles is hardly ever the determining factor due to combat range usually being up-close where light-sabers are needed. Even then, my team severely out-classes yours.
Ulic is more powerful than Aleema who’s feats as a sorceress outstrips those of Zannah.
Kun has one-shotted many jedi with his force-powers, including the two grand-masters of his era in addition to Aleema & Sylvar. Bane has never rag-dolled a single-jedi and couldn’t even save his sorry self from being captured by lay mercenaries.
Your turn. I’m happy to allocate to you the time I took for this post ?
@kurk: I'll resume my studies in the next few days, so don't expect a rebuttal to drop immediately. And by that I mean it may possibly take multiple months for me to reply, as Star Wars will take a backseat. I don't plan on quitting this debate, though. I will respond eventually. Just giving you a heads-up that it will take time.
@azronger: As do I, but I don't use school nor work as an excuse to post-pone multiple months. No need for dissertation papers; just throw out your main arguments and cut-down on the wanking and I think you'll do just fine :)
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