Thrawn

gb2/tv/

>>14508153
>Were the Thrawn books literally the ONLY good books

No, but it's the common opinion amongst people who haven't read all that much of the EU and just the Thrawn books, or read a few shit ones and deemed everything shit.

It's like how you'll see people say
>Yeah man just stick with the 0079 movies, watch Zeta, skip ZZ, watch CCA and then Unicorn. Everything else is shit except maybe 08th MS Team and G Gundam.
But they haven't actually seen ZZ, or any Late UC or AU.

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>>14508153
No.

The Dark Horse comics were pretty good too. But those were pretty niché. And no longer legally available ofcourse after Disney.

>>14508153
I don't think most people are pissed that the EU was decanonized, anon

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>>14508221
> And no longer legally available ofcourse after Disney.

I just wanted to call bullshit on you because I bought the omnibus a few years ago and all other EU books have been republished as "Star Wars Legends", but... They actually are out of print and going for insane prices.

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>>14508221

I really liked the KoToR comics

>>14508250

you can get them digitally off comixology for what that's worth to you.

the marvel books have been terrible.

>>14508225
Seriously. I remember catching a thing on NPR some years ago (before the buy-out) where they were talking about the EU and it made me physically ill.

> Did you know there are Star Wars -books-? That Han and Leia got -married-? And had KIDS?!
> And now let's talk to so-and-so who makes sure it all stays canon and cohesive! He has a giant spreadsheet...

>>14508153
>Were the Thrawn books literally the ONLY good books in the Star Wars EU
No, there were also the X-Wing books ("I, Jedi" included). And the Revenge of the Sith novelization should be required reading for any Star Wars fan.

What about that Lukee thing?

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>>14508250
Yeah I'm seeding a Dark Horse Star Wars collection pack, so it's still available through piracy.

Fuck Disney.

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>>14508294
Same with Evangelion merchandise.

Some of the Star Wars expanded universe is good (like Kyle Katarn) but much of it is shit.

>>14508225
Wookiepedia threw a massive shitfit.

>>14508221

Several of the games were good too, like the TIE Fighter and X-wing games, though the Starfighter games are good too from what I hear. Dark Forces, KoToR and the Commando games are good too from I recall/gather. The radio dramatisations of the original trilogy are great too, better than the films in some ways even. As a franchise there was a lot if dross, but it had good bit of gold in a variety of formats too if you looked.

Darth Plagueis was a good book.

>>14508348

Both KotoR games are good, but they're very different and in some ways might as well not be connected. TOR has badly written characters and well-written ones, it depends entirely on what character story you're playing.

Star Wars is like the only franchise that got consistently good licensed games. There are way more good Star Wars games than bad ones.

>>14508354
>Star Wars is like the only franchise that got consistently good licensed games. There are way more good Star Wars games than bad ones.
It helped that most of them were done in-house by Lucasarts who was one of the best western developers/publishers of all time.

>>14508354
The Chess one wasn't so hot though (but did have amusing animations).

>>14508390

It was just wizard chess with SW characters, let's be fair.

>>14508268
>I really liked the KoToR comics

Me too.
Miller is a decent SW writer.

>>14508396
battle chess, I mean

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>>14508406

I just wish the EU reboot didn't happen till after we got one last Knight Errant series to wrap things up.

>>14508268
I love the KoToR comics too. Probably has the best and funniest cast in any Star Wars story.

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>>14508208
But ZZ is shit.
Late UC is also mostly shit.
AUs are more miss than hit.

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>>14508513

Gryph is literally my favorite SW character period

>>14509033

Is that paper money?

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>>14509000
I rest my case

>>14508153
>tfw I've never read the Thrawn trilogy
tempted to go give it a shot, I've been looking for something good and sci-fi to read lately that I haven't read a dozen times over

>>14508153
considering the fact that the EU was so fucking big, it's pretty much guaranteed that large swaths would be shit
>>14508345
wookiepedia spent ages obsessively cataloging everything, and then mostly everything was consigned as non-canon
I can imagine that'd sting pretty badly for them.

>>14509045
I dare you to make a case for ZZ being good. I goddamn dare you.
That shit nearly made me quit Gundam all together. The only people who "like" it are the ones who convinced themselves that it was some epic Tomino trolling.

>>14508153
No, they are just at the top of everything. Almost anything written by not just Zahn but JMM, Stover, Luceno, Alliston, and a few other authors stand out for the novels. Anti-EU detractors tend to very heavily focus on things they don't like.

Worst example of this is KJA, who not only buttfucked Star Wars' Expanded Universe but also Dune on top of that. The Jedi Academy Trilogy when I first read it as a small kid was amazing, same with his Darksaber novel and some of the short stories he edited in the Star Wars Tales anthologies. But when I was older and revisited them, I found almost everything he touched to be mediocre at best.

Its hilarious how an originally awful KJA originated Exar Kun was detested for what said ancient Sith Lord represented in KJA's origin works yet when several competent comic writers were given a tackle and offered to give Kun a backstory in the Tales of the Jedi series, it instantly redeemed Kun's character and made him one of the most popular EU characters in the Star Wars fandom period.

Other crap like Children of the Jedi or the Crystal Star also stand out but its more the former was just boring and didn't feel like Star Wars and the latter was completely out of character where a weird disturbance in the Force and the effects of some disrupted star causes Luke to go suicidal and out of character the entire novel. And yet there's still a lot of criminally underrated stories in EU that flesh out the franchise: Courtship of Princess Leia, X-Wing novels (ignoring Stackpole's massive X-Wing power level wank), NJO in my opinion and I understand why Lucas Arts went where they did with Del Rey taking over to have a darker and bleaker universe, Dark Empire comics, Crimson Empire comics, Star Wars Tales, Republic comic + Clone Wars tie in mini-series, Knights of the Old Republic, Empire, Rebellion, Vector, etc...

>>14508153
ROGUE SQUADRON

>>14509603
>(ignoring Stackpole's massive X-Wing power level wank)
Stackpole gonna Stackpole.

MAN MADE LIGHTNING
EXPLODING FUSION ENGINES

>>14509618
CORRAN HORN
SUPER COP
ACE PILOT
JEDI KNIGHT

>>14509664

Outside the cop bit you might as well be describing Luke, who he was obviously basing Horn heavily on.

>>14509677
Except for the part that Corran literally gets to be whatever Stackpole wants him to be and this is the main reason why his character is so polarizing in EU.

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>>14509683
>>14509677
>>14509664
Reeeey Fiiiight!

Rey was just Luke with smaller tits and thus did not compromise the storytelling with pandering, but rather mirrored the original.

>>14509683

Luke was whatever Lucas wanted him to be too, so I've no idea why you think that's a difference. I understand he's polarising, I just don't think there's much difference between him and Luke. Personally I didn't care much about him one way or the other, and found the cast of Wraith Squadron far more engaging. Even in the Rogue Squadron books there were other, more memorable characters, like Faleen Sandskimmer.

>>14509709
You can't compare him with Luke. Luke is the chosen one and Luke abadoned being an Alliance soldier the moment his Jedi training became his main focus. Corran gets inserted retroactively into events to further hype him.

>Corran is ZA BEST AFTER WEDGE
>Corran gets to tell Exar Kun to fuck off in I,Jedi
>Corran is magically the second best duelist in the order after Luke facing the Janessari
>etc...
Corran is wanked by Stackpole in the same way although not as far as Kyp was by KJA. He nigh borders on Sue territory. I don't even know why you bring up that one dude, Corran was essentially one of the literal primary characters in the Rouge and Wraith Squadron books.

>>14509692
We already had another whole thread yesterday discussing Rey's bullshit, please don't bring her up again here.

>>14509721
Don't forget Stackpole even did a short story where Corran got to be buddy cops with an undercover Thrawn who was impersonating Jodo Kast. That's the biggest issue with Corran, Stackpole basically says he's buddies with every major character or somehow rubs shoulders with the top characters.

>Thrawn
>Xizor
>Vader
>Exar Kun
>Isard

Its honestly borderline ridiculous.

>>14509721

Corran also forgot about being a cop as soon as he could become a pilot, and put that behind him in favor of Jedi stuff once he he got some notice. He only went back in I,Jedi because he felt Luke's methods too slow and not for him.

Which parallels Luke abandoning Yoda to save his friends as a rash, but ultimately successful move in Empire. It took some working out there, but it took it in Horns case too from what little I recall.

Also, I brought up Sandskimmer for the exact reason I stated: because I found her more memorable. Turns out she's a Rogue though, so under Allston, not Stackpole. Qrrg, Horn's wingman was more memorable as well though, at least in my case, since I found his alien culture's naming precedents (you only get a name when you perform a deed deserving recognition, with the use of an I reserved for only the greatest deeds since it implies everyone recognises you) interesting. Horn himself is meh, but I don't find him guilty of anything more than Luke is as a character.

>>14509766
Ooryl a best wingman. No doubt.

>>14508457
>Star Wars: Knight Errant by the author of Star Wars: Knight Errant.

>>14509766
>but I don't find him guilty of anything more than Luke is as a character.
One is a self insert who gets thrown into everything because of Stackpole's hubris and glorification of his pet character, the other is the primary protagonist of the franchise.

If you can't tell things apart between Luke and Corran then I feel sorry you lack the empathy to see the difference but he is a terrible character who feels like a classic Sue:

- able to do whatever he wants
- whenever he wants
- however he wants
- inserted into events he wasn't originally part of and constantly glorified by his creator

Its almost like I said, as bad as KJA trying to push Kyp being more powerful then Luke. At least once Del Rey took over other authors fixed Kyp and Stackpole put the breaks on Corran to make him less ridiculous.

His character is a bad pastiche of Luke.

>>14509806

You don't need empathy to see a difference in character or how they're treated. That would be based on comprehension if anything. I can see what you mean just fine. I just don't care. Nor do I think it's a big difference.

>>14509603
I will never understand why people thought Crystal Star was bad. It lays entirely why things were happening the way they did. Hethrir and his genocide story was one of the first instances of the Empire's evil really being fleshed out, and it introduced the concept of Emperor's Hands.

>>14509898
Because half the cast is literally written out of character?

>>14509603
Not to mention almost all of the games are EU.

>>14510000
Classics to me would be for the best:

Dark Forces I
Dark Forces II: Jedi Knight + Mysteries of the Sith (was literally so GOAT even PC Gamer admitted it was the best PC game of all time until Half-Life dethroned it and still one of the greatest PC games to this day)
Tie-Fighter
X-Wing vs Tie-Fighter/Balance of Power
X-Wing Alliance
Shadows of the Empire
Rogue Squadron
Rebellion
Jedi Knight: Jedi Outcast
Jedi Knight: Jedi Academy
Battle for Naboo
Episode 1: Podracer
Star Wars: Demolitions (basically Twisted Metal meets Star Wars)
Episode 1: Starfighter
Starfighter II: Jedi Starfighter
Empire at War + Forces of Corruption (absolutely amazing vanilla, even better with mods)
Galactic Battlegrounds I and II (no reskinned AoE II game should be this fucking fun or addictive)
Jedi Power Battles
Rogue Squadron II: Rogue Leader
Republic Commandos
Battlefront I
Battlefront II
Other Battlefront side games


Am I missing anything?

Also for depression; Tie-Fighter had a sequel game in the works along side the original sequel to Republic Commandos both get axed for Force Unleashed I's abortive failure of a sequel, Force Unleashed II. And the kick ass looking Darth Maul game got cancelled once the engine was built and a technical demo was made to showcase what it could do.

As well as 1313.

>>14508208
I read over 50 Star Wars EU books as a lad and Thrawn is the only one id even consider going back to read. And I still wouldnt care to do so
You probably think Hunger Games is good you shit eater
Killing the EU was the only good decision Disney has made so far

>>14510245

I don't really disagree, but Im also not autistic enough to care. Cannon or not I still love my comics. They don't magically stop existing and there's no sense in arguing over wether or not fictional events really happened.

that said I generally think the new EU is far worse. marvel has no idea what they're doing and are really trying to fuck up the brand.

Darth Vader does not quip.

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>>14510280
Only when it suits him anon. fuck off there's no pun there

>>14509838
No but you do need common sense, different anon but Corran is petty much a cookiecutter shit house tier EU OC and I have always hated him for being that.

>>14510245
I know of plenty EU comics and books I'll stick after the shit with that twilight tier garbage nonsense we got from Wendig with Aftermath or the retarded insultingly bad Vos/Ventress book.

>Shatterpoint
>Cestus Deception
>Medstar Duology
>Labyrinth of Evil
>Luke Skywalker and the Shadows of Mindor
>Truce at Bakura
>Courtship of Princess Leia
>Black Fleet Crisis Trilogy
>Darth Bane Trilogy
>Darth Plagueis

Just a handful I can name that shit on your belief but whatever. Also fuck you for comparing anything of the various books in EU penned by the likes of Salvatore, Stover, Luceno, Alliston, Kube, Jackson Miller, or DK to Hunger Games.

>>14508153
They are decent and a good entrypoint if you want to read the EU for whatever reason.. RotS's novelization is surprisingly good, Plagueis is alright too. Shadows of the Empire was great.

I have a soft spot for Yoda: Dark Rendevous but its probably not really good at all.

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>>14508153
>>14508153
The Dark Horse comics were god tier.
Clone Wars, KOTOR, Empire, Dark/Crimson Empire, Tales of the Jedi and Legacy, were based.

They were to a large extent responsible for actually getting me into comic books
and I hate what Disney has done to them and what they are doing to the franchise.

They have completely destroyed the established canon because "muh continuity"

For what a shit new movie, kiddie cartoon show, and comics produced by the worlds worst comic book company

TLDR: They have replaced the EU which was partially shit with a completely shit "new EU".

>>14510280
>Darth Vader does not quip.
I FIND YOUR LACK OF FAITH DISTURBING.

APOLOGY ACCEPTED, CAPTAIN NEEDA.

WE WOULD BE HONORED IF YOU WOULD JOIN US.

I AM ALTERING THE DEAL. PRAY I DO NOT ALTER IT FURTHER.

I HOPE SO FOR YOUR SAKE. THE EMPEROR IS NOT AS FORGIVING AS I AM.

>>14508153
>Were the Thrawn books literally the ONLY good books in the Star Wars EU because they're the only ones people seem to keep praising while calling the entire rest of the EU shit, yet everyone seemed pretty pissed that the whole EU was decanonized

>the glove of darth vader

Mofferences, Trioculus, SPIN, it's all great

>>14508153
The original Star Wars Battlefront plot stuff wasn't bad, especially 2.

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I actually stopped caring about Star Wars.

>KOTOR
>Tales of the Jedi
>Kyle Katarn
>Mara Jade

That was the real Star Wars for me.

>>14510245
Actually the Hunger Games IS good for a young adult novel. Compare it to shit like Harry Potter.

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>>14509045

If it doesn't happen at least before 1500 BBY then it's crap and that's being generous.

>>14508153
The Thrawn Trilogy being put on a pedestal above the rest of the EU is in large parts because of nostalgia. And I don't mean that in a dismissive or demeaning way.

They were for all intents and purposes the first EU material (there was prior things, but they weren't organized or done with any view towards greater world building) so they were working off a clean slate - no continuity clutter, no masses of material or characters that needed to be honored or referenced, it's concepts weren't treading familiar ground, etc.

A major thing is that they were a 'mature' expansion of Star Wars - more sci-fi concepts (in truth: technobabble), more political machinations, more moral grey versus the original trilogies good versus evil. I would have seen the original trilogy when I was about 6, the Thrawn trilogy started coming out when I was 13. It was gold to me then, even though if I read it now it would probably read exactly like something that was meant to appeal to 13 year olds. Which is fine.


There were other good books, and and ones a level below good that were still passable. But the EU reached a size that there was also a whole lot of shit that floods out the good pieces.

Let's say I want to read the EU books, but only the good ones. Which ones are the must-reads and which ones are the must-skips?

>>14510990
Stop bullshiting, I read that shit as a kid from Scholastic growing up and that entire Young Reader's line of novels were fucking awful, even my 10 year old self understood this.

>>14511206
What technobabble? Star Wars largely stayed away from this concept in EU, can you point me to a novel or comic or game that has technobabble in it? And you know what the funny thing is? The majority of readers of adult EU novels are men and women between their 20s to 40s.

That was the primary fanbase of EU.

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when is best jedi going to appear?

Is there a torrent with a suggested list of reading material? I remember looking for the KOTOR comics a while back, and they all got hit with takedowns.

>>14511936
Probably after he says its ok, but thos'll look good. After they turn Sith ofcurse

>>14511942
Ask /co/ I would tell you but I'm fucking lazy and have shit to do then waste 2 hours making a recommendation list of Star Wars EU stuff.

>>14511936
Kyle is great but please don't fucking wank him. Its hard enough keeping the stupid CHUCK NORRIS tier jokes away to take him seriously at this point.

>>14511942
Not sure about comics but for novels you can search for "Star Wars ebooks" on TPB or Kat and there'll be something.

As for suggested list:

Anything by Timothy Zahn
>Thrawn trilogy
>The Hand of Thrawn duology
>Outbound Flight
>etc.

Anything by Matt Stover
>The Episode III novelization
>Shatterpoint
>Luke Skywalker and the Shadows of Mindor
>etc.

Anything by James Luceno
>The Rise of Darth Vader
>Darth Plagueis
>etc.

The X-Wing series
>Rogue Squadron series by Stockpile
>Wraith Squadron series by Allston

The New Jedi Order (gets a lot of hate because people didn't like the concept of the Yuuzhan Long, but on the whole it was largely pretty well executed, much better than much of the schlock that came before, and much better than the schlock that came after)
Notable entries:
>Vector Prime
>Dark Tide Onslaught/Ruin (Michael J Stackpole, ties into Rogue Squadron)
>Agents of Chaos Hero's Trial/Jedi Eclipse (James Luceno, ties into the Han Solo Trilogy)
>Star by Star (ties into the Young Jedi Knights)
>Enemy Lines Rebel Dream/Rebel Stand (Aaron Allston, ties into Wraith Squadron)
>Traitor (Matt Stover, ties into Rogue Planet)
>The Unifying Force (James Luceno)

Miscellaneous oneshots or miniseries
>The Truce at Bakura
>The Han Solo trilogy
>The Bounty Hunter Wars trilogy
>Kenobi
>Republic Commando (but just the first one or two)
>I, Jedi (read this instead of the godawful Jedi Academy Trilogy, actually skip anything by Kevin J Anderson)
>Darth Bane series
>Coruscant Nights
>Millennium Falcon (save it for after the NJO)
My personal reading order would be

>Thrawn trilogy
>X-wing series (except Mercy Kill)
>I, Jedi
>Han Solo trilogy
>Bounty Hunter Wars trilogy
>Hand of Thrawn duology
>Survivor's Quest/Outbound Flight
>The New Jedi Order (all of it)
>Darth Bane
>Darth Plagueis
>Republic Commando
>Shatterpoint
>Dark Lord trilogy (Labyrinth of Evil/ROTS/Rise of Darth Vader)
>Kenobi
>Luke Skywalker and the Shadows of Mindor
>Millennium Falcon
>Mercy Kill

>>14512028
>>14511942
As for comics read the Dark Empire comics, the Crimson Empire comics, the KOTOR comics, Dawn of the Jedi, and Legacy.

>>14510280
>They don't magically stop existing and there's no sense in arguing over wether or not fictional events really happened.

Same, it's why I've never cared about canon as a whole much.

>>14510976

The last 2 really don't seem like quips.

>>14512028
I found a copy of Heir to the Empire, and I read this one book about the sith attacking Lukes temple. It was the one with the jedi tree. Seemed good enough.

>>14508153
How badly is Disney going to nerf Thrawn?

>>14512061

Let's face it, you have to nerf him a LITTLE. Thrawn was written to be so perfect that he had to be destroyed from within, he was impossible otherwise.

>>14512071
unstoppable otherwise*

>>14512071
>>14512073
Thrawn was never written that way.

>>14512080

Admittedly I haven't read the Trilogy in over a decade, but didn't he run circles around the republic with his strategies? Didn't Zahn himself admit he wanked him pretty hard?

>>14512028
>>14511990
>>14512051
Neat, i'll look into it.

>>14512061
Supposedly they have Zahn on board to make sure he's accurately portrayed.

Which if you ask me probably means that he won't be the omniscient infallible god that is his reputation both in-universe and out.

As Zahn pointed out in the Hand of Thrawn duology, acting as if literally everything is some kind of trap or trick or has otherwise been planned in advance by Thrawn is more certain to destroy you than anything that Thrawn actually planned.

Much of his success was predicated on using existing technology in novel ways, like using Interdictors to coordinate precise microjumps on the battlefield, or using cloaking devices on asteroids as siege weapons, or using stolen mining units to board and seize NR Star Cruisers. And the other half of his success was studying "art" to understand how his enemies think, whether on a species level (like exploiting a species's inherent mental structural incapability of grasping a certain style of maneuver, or taking advantage of a species's monthly metabolic rate fluctuations), or on an individual level (studying art made by Bel Iblis or Akbar for example). He didn't succeed by being literally Imperial Jesus.

Also he knew when to punish his men for refusing to accept their failings in failure and when to reward them for innovative thinking even in the face of failure.

But at the end of the day he made a whole load of fuckups and jumped to mistaken conclusions and had actually just suffered a massive tactical setback right before he was assassinated.

>>14512085
No to either. Thrawn was handicapped by several rogue Imperial warlords refusing to lend aid in terms of manpower, warships, logistical support, and what not. He also recongized even consolidating what power he could, that the returned Sidious on Byss was withholding even more war material he needed and that he couldn't hope to match the New Republic in straight up slog fight when it came to attrition. So what Thrawn did was get most of the Katana Fleet, make extreme use of his Spacetroopers, pirates, and mercenaries, and start up the Spaarti Cloning devices so he could have the manpower in terms of Stormtroopers and fleet personenl to man his warships.

He IS considered one of the greatest military threats of all time to the New Republic because by virtue of being a Grand Admiral, he is one of the 13 greatest military minds in the Empire. Non-Zahn works in EU are the ones that further glorify Thrawn by showing him beating other Grand Admirals like in Tie-Fighter and so forth which say he wasn't just one of the best Grand Admirals but THE BEST one. Point was though, he made use with what he had, internal division in the New Republic's highest chains of command in its military and civilian leadership stratas, and out thought his opponents.

He still made mistakes but he learned from them. Zahn said his goal was to make a memorable antagonist who wasn't some uber powered Force-User.

>>14508208
OP never brought up Gendumb. Keep it to topic retard.

>>14512101

Am I misremembering, or didn't the majority of Thrawn's failures stem from him not killing someone when he should've? Niles Ferrier's screw up with the smugglers, C'baoth's control of the cloning facility, Rukh's betrayal, and Mara Jade assisting the New Republic could have been avoided if he were a tad more ruthless.

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>>14511936

Id love to see zayne again but anyone other than JJM wouldn't do him justice

>>14512101
>>14512103
Paelleon straight up states though that the Battle of Sluis Van would've still ended in an Imperial victory if Thrawn hadn't been assassinated. He outright says Thrawn was the one who "had the vision" and tactical and strategic ability to pull victory from the jaws of defeat.

And despite Paelleon's inherent bias for Thrawn as well as his general stance as a character whose not prone to hyperbole and is quite rational minded, I don't think he's bullshitting here. He's said as much over the years since Thrawn's death that the final battle would've ended for the New Republic in defeat if Thrawn hadn't been murdered.

But the gist of it is: Thrawn is part of the three with Darth Vader and the Emperor as being the scariest face of the Empire symbolically to the New Republic. The funnier part about is that people like Fey'la villify and compare Thrawn to Vader despite a certain Bothan being more guilty of war crimes and shady morality then Thrawn.

There's a scene where Thrawn has Rukh execute an Imperial bridge officer who was in charge of one of tractor beam projectors on the Chimera, his flagship Star Destroyer. The man was decapitated by Rukh on Thrawn's orders but the reason he was called wasn't because he failed to capture Luke Skywalker, but because he tried to pass off the failing on his superior and not live up to his mistake. We see this happen a second time when the man's replacement fails to capture Luke again but Thrawn actually congradulates the man for trying a theory he thought might work against Luke he had come up with.

One of the other cool things is Thrawn was the kind of antagonist who wasn't some insane monster. He didn't execute his subordinates for failures and rewarded those who thought outside the box and welcomed others to offer him advice.

>>14512085
>Admittedly I haven't read the Trilogy in over a decade, but didn't he run circles around the republic with his strategies?
I haven't read it in a while either, but as I remember what he did was

>Blew up a whole NR taskforce to steal a whole planet's library
>Stole some mining units and used them to try to steal a fleet of Star Cruisers, failed because he forgot to turn off the remote activation function
>Placed a big deposit of cash in Admiral Ackbar's account to get him investigated for corruption and divide the NR Fleet, which he could count on because he knew Bothan councillor Fey'lya would jump on it
>Decided that a captured Noghri commando who was blatantly lying to him was probably psychologically broken and reprogrammed by NR Intelligence to feed him false info, so let him go without a proper Imperial Intelligence interrogation, in spite of Pellaeon pointing out that the NR doesn't usually do such things, causing him to miss his biggest chance to uncover Leia's attempts to turn the Noghri
>Stole the Katana Fleet before the NR could get to it by simply paying a guy to tell him where it was while the NR squabbled over who should go get it
>Locked down Coruscant by making them think they had three hundred cloaked asteroids in low orbit instead of about twenty
>Used cloaks to pretend he had a super laser that could pass through planetary shields, causing a planet to surrender without a fight, which was eventually uncovered by a $20 camera recording
>Randomly guessed somehow that the NR was planning to hit Bilbringi shipyards to steal a Crystal Gravtrap even though everybody was telling him otherwise. No reasoning was given, he just knew somehow
>Underestimated how crazy Cbaoth was and overestimated the ysalamiri's capability to restrain him
>Was for some reason content to let Rukh continue being his sole bodyguard even though he was already suspecting the Noghri of being up to something

>>14512085
Actually no. Thrawn was mostly just extremely good at not doing stupid things for no reason. He didn't know everything or guess everything right: the start to the big chain of events that snowballed into his defeat was the product of his not knowing one little piece of information, that Leia was Vader's daughter. Even in the short term, Luke and Han and Lando were able to thwart Thrawn's plans just by being quick and clever themselves. The biggest danger in fighting Thrawn is starting to think that he really is an invincible genius who knows everything, because then you stop thinking rationally about how to fight him.

>>14512139
>The biggest danger in fighting Thrawn is starting to think that he really is an invincible genius who knows everything, because then you stop thinking rationally about how to fight him.
Boy, everyone sure was embarrassed when they nearly conceded the whole Empire of the Hand to a guy in makeup wearing contact lenses pulling shit out of his ass half the time and taking orders from a literally who stormtrooper the other half.

>>14512135
>>14512118
I like how several decades later towards the end of the NJO Bel Iblis attacks Bilbringi, finds that all communications are down so he can't call the Imperial Navy in to coordinate with them, and decides "that's it I've had enough of Bilbringi fuck this place"

>>14509603
>Its hilarious how an originally awful KJA originated Exar Kun was detested for what said ancient Sith Lord represented in KJA's origin works yet when several competent comic writers were given a tackle and offered to give Kun a backstory in the Tales of the Jedi series, it instantly redeemed Kun's character and made him one of the most popular EU characters in the Star Wars fandom period.
Those "several competent comic writers" are Tom Veitch and the exact same Kevin J. Anderson. And it was KJA who wrote Exar Kun's backstory for the comics. And it was KJA who co-wrote "Dark Lords of the Sith", and wrote "The Sith War" on his own.

The "instant redemption of Kun's character" you're talking about was written mostly by KJA (and in some part by Veitch), not some "several competent writers". Doesn't change the fact that KJA is a terrible hack.

>>14512061
I just hope they don't give him some ignominious death and that he lives on like Maul.

>>14512135
Thrawn was able to manipulate's C'boath's insane clone despite him taking over the entire crew of the Chimera with his Force powers.

>>14512186
KJA didn't write Tales of the Jedi. He was an editor and a passive one at that.

>>14510034

>Tie Fighter Sequel was canned for TFUII

I AM SO FUCKING ANGRY RIGHT NOW.

>>14512279
>Thrawn was able to manipulate's C'boath's insane clone despite him taking over the entire crew of the Chimera with his Force powers.
Yet underestimated him because while he was busy at Bilbringi, C'baoth had actually successfully seized control of the Wayland storehouse, and could have compromised the whole clone army because of how similar their mental patterns were making it easy for him to control them en masse. Even if Thrawn had survived and won the Battle of Bilbringi he would have had to deal with half his fleet suddenly no longer answering to him.

>>14512405
There's no indication C'boath's powers were THAT great that he could seize control of entire crews in radically distant locations from him, only the Chimera's itself. He had difficulty simply coordinating different parts of Thrawn's assault forces across the galaxy when utilizing his battle meditation power to bolster their fighting abilities. While Thrawn did underestimate C'boath, he would've been able to deal with C'boath.

Remember for one his stock of Ysalamiri countered Force powers. He could've cajoled and manipulated C'boath again. Also don't forget such exertions from C'boath took it out of him afterwards, he usually found himself drained and tired using his power in such a way basically.

>>14512156
Remind me what that story was?

>>14510034
God Republic Commando was fucking great. That rumor that a Republic Commando sequel was going to be announced for E3 had me frothing at the mouth.

Guess it'll sit on the shelf of NEVER GON HAPPEN with that Crimson Skies sequel I'm waiting for.

>>14512832
Which story? Are you talking about the Heir to the Empire trilogy or the Hand of Thrawn duology?

>>14512279
>KJA didn't write Tales of the Jedi. He was an editor and a passive one at that.
Source: your ass. He has sole writing credit for Golden Age, Fall, Sith War, Redemption, and co-writer credit with Veitch for Dark Lords - that's 80% of the Tales of the Jedi series. Are you making up some conspiracy theory that he stole somebody else's work as his own, or what?

>>14512871
The one where:

>Boy, everyone sure was embarrassed when they nearly conceded the whole Empire of the Hand to a guy in makeup wearing contact lenses pulling shit out of his ass half the time and taking orders from a literally who stormtrooper the other half.

>Paelleon
>C'boath
I know they're fictional names, but if you're gonna argue about a character, then not knowing how to spell said character's name doesn't help your case.

>>14508153
How is this /m/ related at all?

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>>14513032

>>14513032
Are you retarded?

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>>14513654
most likely

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>>14513918

>>14512139
Sounds like a Yang Wen-Li, if Yang was ruthless about executing subordinates that try to play the blame game without learning from their mistakes.

>>14512902
Hand of Thrawn. It was the "end" of the EU back in 1999 that saw one last attempt by the Imperial Remnants to take back the galaxy by having a genius stormtrooper, a scheming moff, and a famous actor pretend to be Thrawn returned from the dead and lead the Empire to victory. Basically the stormtrooper was one of the many clones Thrawn had made during the initial trilogy and manipulated the moff into thinking this was a good idea, while all along plotting to be the power behind the Thrawn and take over as the new Emperor. During this time, they took steps to make sure Pellaeon wasn't allowed anywhere near "Thrawn" and destabilized the New Republic with Laplace's Box, a record of how the Bothans engineered the genocide of an entire species by the Empire in exchange for political power and economic leverage. Of course, the version most people got was a forgery, including the names of powerful Bothan politicians.

Long story short, a small-scale civil war erupts in the New Republic over whether or not to hold the current Bothan government responsible and how to use the crisis to settle long-standing territorial issues among New Republic members while "Thrawn" starts attacking from the Imperial territories. It all falls apart though because Pellaeon thinks this whole thing is a sham and goes to Leia to negotiate a peace treaty between the New Republic and the Empire. Pellaeon shows up at a major Imperial fleet base where Talon Karrde, along with a bunch of smugglers, Errant Venture, and Rogue Squadron are all trying to raid a Imperial Intelligence database for a copy of the original Laplace'x Box and are losing the fight against "Thrawn" who "anticipated" this attempt and was waiting for them. Pellaeon reveals that Thrawn is an imposter, the stormtrooper is really an insane clone like C'Baoth, and that the New Republic has offered a peace treaty with terms favorable to the Empire.

Also, Luke and Mara fucked and decided to get married.

>>14514055
And it's revealed that there are clones of Thrawn gestating in tanks for decades hidden around the galaxy.

What brought this up?

>>14514055
>It was the "end of the EU back in 1999
Correction: It was the end of Bantam's run and the transition to Del Rey's more bleaker and darker but happily more relatively coherent and consistent take over.

It was Bantam's last hurrah and of course they wanted Zahn to do the final shout out. Also the Stormtrooper was a flawed clone of Thrawn, but he instead inherited a superior TACTICAL ability inside of a strategic one i.e. he coudl guide them to victory from battle to battle, but not the grand strategy of winning a war.

>>14514063
I think the worst part was that there was a fully maturing and near completed clone of Thrawn that dies through no fault of his own when Luke floods the cavern to save Mara. Also Tierce, the human Stormtrooper clone with Thrawn's genius, wasn't insane, just batshit loyal to Thrawn to the point that he would go against the current order to keep fighting.

Hence why Pelly says he was a flawed clone of Thrawn because he had the mind for tactical stuff but not strategic matters. Also don't know if I would call the Casaami (spelling?) Crisis an equivalent to Lapalce's Box in Unicorn. The main thing about the issue was the complacence of the past Bothan government and its ties to the Empire during the Clone Wars I think, that lead to the Caamasi's near genocide by destroying their shield generators on the planet protecting them.

Since Bothans are major founding group of the New Republic and Fey'lya was one of the previous Chief of States/Supreme Chancellors and also a morally ambiguous and somewhat politically corrupt individuals, it would have a shockwave effect toppling the New Republic internally.

>>14514219
Just a correction. Tierce wasn't a clone of Thrawn but a clone of an Imperial Guardsman. Thrawn did add an imprimt of his intelligence onto the clone as part of an experiment to create brilliant soldiers. The experiment was considered a failure because of the reason you stated.

>>14512028
This is a pretty comprehensive list. I'd like to propose adding to thr NJO the books by Greg Keyes (Edge of Victory duology and The Final Prophecy). They flesh out Vong society quite a bit abd introduce Vong characters that aren't frothing at the mouth religious fundies (Vua Rapuung was awesome)

>>14514238
Guardsman? As in Royal Guards?

>>14514246
Yeah, the red robed guys. The original Tierce served under Thrawn too but was stated as KIA before Bilbringi.

>>14514244
I'd like to add that NJO was personally my favorite series in EU and I generally understand completely where Lucas Books was coming from that they needed something new and novel to the series that wasn't a rehashed rogue Imperial warlod/Imperial remnant/ancient Sith threat/fallen Jedi student of Luke's for antagonists.

The books are generally solidly written and like >>14514219, unlike Bantam's era, Del Rey was focused on continuity from the start. Writers would get together with the editors and heads of Lucas Arts to sketch out story and character arts, plan events, and so on from NJO and onwards.

Its a 19 book series with at least one or two e-books and its honestly while taking EU to a much darker place is still quite riveting. Especially if you've read Crimson Empire I comic specifically before reading NJO. There's only like two books I consider below the general average quality of the series and one of them is by Kathy Tyers or whatever.

The Battle of Coruscant and entire novel in general of Star by Star will blow you away. Also prepare for mother fucking feels.

>>14512847
>God Republic Commando was fucking great.
This is a popular opinion,. May I ask what you liked so much about it? All those generic realism shooter elements disgusted the shit out of me. I don't think COD-like elements have any place in a Star Wars game. I mean reloading blaster rifles after a handful of shots, fucking really.

>>14510292
That dialogue is shit, I can't read this toss in the voice of James Earl Jones.

>>14514230
>wasn't insane
It's implied that he's a megalomaniac in the making because the Spaarti cloning process, while fast, is seriously flawed. That's why C'Baoth was insane, and why clones were removed from the Imperial Remnant.

>>14514256
NJO grew on me towards the end. The early books are still fucking trash because it doesn't make sense how the New Republic could fail so utterly, but after Balance Point it started improving. Interestingly, Balance Point was where Lucasarts stepped in and said
>NJO is fucked up, you're going to scrap your old plans right fucking now and replot the entire thing.

>>14514256
It was interesting that Star by Star basically confirmed Crystal Star's canonicity and then brutally murdered the cute centaur Jedi that it introduced. They should never have brought back Thul for Dark Nest though, even if he did get PTSD from his wife dying.

>>14514288
>modern CoD existing anywhere back in 2004

>>14514717
C'Boath was insane and already megalomaniac if not at least egotistical who was more or less at that point even as far back as Outbound Flight (the original Jedi Master), skirting with the dark side of the Force.

>>14514725
The early books weren't trash. In fact it makes complete sense because if you've read every single post RoTJ novel or comic, the New Republic is CONSTANTLY fucking falling apart at the seams unless Leia, Luke, Han, and their friends were running 24/7 troubleshooting dealing with genocidal xenophobic aliens, political strife, internal division, and what have you. Everything we have told us the New Republic was dangerously incompetent without the Skywalker/Solo family and friends protecting it.

It makes perfect sense.

>Ackbar is retired
>A certain semi-incompetent anti-Jedi Bothan is the Chief of State
>Vong weaving division of Outer Rim and Mid-Rim planets and inciting brush wars all over the galaxy

Nah, New Republic was so shit it couldn't even last 20 years even with Luke Skywalker punching out every threat to its existence up to that point. The Vong were simply the straw that broke the camel's back.

>>14514757
Also to fully flesh out where the New Republic stood right before the Vong War:

>Admiral Ackbar basically has to go into retirement because of his political rivlarly and personal hatred with Fey'lya
>Fey'lya being dangerously close to corruption and being a morally checkered individual who has shown he has some anti-human bias
>Fey'lya whose anti-Jedi and constantly throughout the time immediately before and even during the war for most of it before his death cut support and aid from the military to Luke's Jedi Order
>Fey'lya's grudge against Leia also blinded him to her fact finding mission and his dismissal of Vong coralskippers wiping out a fairly strong New Republic task force that consisted of multiple gunships, several corvettes and frigates and a flagship Mark II Imperial class Star Destroyer
>Fey'lya's constant interference with the military and refusal to sanction or support Jedi forces working with the military
>Rampant corruption becoming more prevalent in the New Republic's senate and the advent of the Peace Brigade; human and alien traitors to the galaxy who would basically sell the Jedi and anyone else out to save their skins
>Nom Amor basically being described in the first couple books of the war of having spent nearly 2 decades (exactly 18 years) from 7 years after RoTJ up to the Vong invasion in 25 ABY (18 years later) stirring up constant wars of racial conflict, political radicalism, and anti-New Republic separtaism.

So factor all this with the NR which can't really do shit without the main cast and their friends protecting or saving everyone and there's little reason to be surprised why the NR got its as reamed the first three years of the war.

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>>14514768
And to finally conclude my posts here, the main point of Nom Amor and other Vong sleeper agents was to spread out the New Republic's military as widely as possible so it wasn't concentrated in any major strategic points in the Outer Rim or close to where the Vong began their invasion from the extra-galactic corridor. So you have this clever fucker stirring up small scale wars, uprisings, social disorder, and anarchy all over the Outer Rim, distracting the Jedi and New Republic military, who are too spread thin to do anything but send a small naval task force and that ends up getting annihilated in the first battle with the Vong.

Oh yeah and given their bio-technological weapons and use of pseudo-singluarties that mimic the properties and nature of black holes for propulsion and shielding technology which can do shit like rob a starship of its shields, and its really little wonder why the New Republic had difficulty facing the Vong much less why with all the incompetence in the political heart of Fey'lya's cabinet and highest levels of the Senate how the very thing that supplanted the Empire fragmented and died with Fey'lya after the fall of Coruscant.

>>14514783
>>14514768
so really the problem is just bothans

>>14514288
If getting down into the trenches and messing up some Droid's day while doing grunt-ass shit doesn't appeal to you I could see why you would have such a shit opinion.

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>>14514757
>>14514768
>>14514783

You know, despite it's flaws, you have to admit that the old EU's New Republic rates a bit better on the 'Government's too dumb too live' scale than the new Disney Canon's 'Hey, let's keep our military down to a single fleet clustered around a single planet and get rendered completely irrelevant once a bad guy blows it up!' New Republic.

>>14514864
More like Fey'lya was the problem. Guy was the Job Trunicht of Star Wars.

>>14514972
>You know, despite it's flaws, you have to admit that the old EU's New Republic rates a bit better on the 'Government's too dumb too live' scale than the new Disney Canon's 'Hey, let's keep our military down to a single fleet clustered around a single planet and get rendered completely irrelevant once a bad guy blows it up!' New Republic.
Probably the difference is that in the new canon, they were able to force a peace settlement early on, so the NR fleet had less time to grow really large and more time to be scaled back. Meanwhile in the EU the war against the Empire and various Imperial offshoots continued for another couple of decades, necessitating a strong New Republic Navy.

>>14514972

Much as Fey'lya was a dick, I really liked his death scene. The fact that he refused to surrender to or work with invading enemies made up for a lot of his shittiness to me. He might have had some shitty principles, but he stuck to them when threatened.

>>14515227
Eh, you'd think that with an early peace settlement that the NR would maintain a sizable defense fleet to guard against an Empire that still potentially retains significant military might (unlike the old EU, the Empire in Disney canon didn't seem to get torn apart by warlordism). Unless there was some kind of arms reduction part to the peace treaty. Then again, it's completely unclear right now what happened with the Empire post peace treaty, like if an Imperial Remnant state exists separately from the NR and First Order during the time of TFA.

This really is one of my main issues with TFA. The world building was atrocious.

>>14515258
I agree. Unlike Trunicht, when it came to the end, he had the guts to stick to his principles and meet his end with dignity. Too bad that this Fey'lya didn't show up earlier. The Vong might not have gotten as far as they did.

>>14515258
true

>>14515342
>Unless there was some kind of arms reduction part to the peace treaty.
Yeah because we can TOTALLY expect the New Order to keep to that promise.

>>14515342
>>>14515227
>Eh, you'd think that with an early peace settlement that the NR would maintain a sizable defense fleet to guard against an Empire that still potentially retains significant military might (unlike the old EU, the Empire in Disney canon didn't seem to get torn apart by warlordism). Unless there was some kind of arms reduction part to the peace treaty.
IIRC it was heavily ideologically motivated, they wanted to scale back the power of the central galactic government in favor of stronger autonomy for individual systems, attempting to remove much of the power that Palpatine consolidated during his time as Supreme Chancellor (remember that the Old Republic didn't even have a military at the time when the Separatist movement was building)

>>14515442

There had not been a galactic war for a thousand years, they saw no need for an army.

>>14515455

Sorry, not a thousand. Since the formation of the Republic, so 25,000 years

>>14515458
Actually the Old Republic is explicitly stated in Episode II to be a thousand years old. The Old EU explained the discrepancy with Obi Wan's 'thousand generations' line using the Ruusan Reformation. I don't know what Disney canon's explanation is, if any.

>>14515455
>>14515458
>he honestly thinks this line will hold ]
Also comments in the prequel trilogy about the existence of the Sith tells us there were wars in the past before the Jedi thought the Sith became "extinct".

>>14515522

The Sith Wars never conflicted with anything in the EU, people genuinely did belive the Sith were extinct for millenia.

>>14516101
I'm not saying anything about a conflict. The original line in the Expanded Universe was that the Jedi have served the Republic for over 25,000 years, the film in PT says something about thousand generations and EU reworded the statement so neither contradict.

My point though was in the film, they don't say the Republic was "always" at peace, they imply there hadn't been any major wars in the galaxy since the assumed extinction of the Sith a thousand years before.

>>14515355
The problem is that NJO basically rewrites Feylya's character. In the old EU he was a war hawk and always wanted a strong military that could defeat the Empire and take heavy losses.

>>14516824
It doesn't rewrite him considering he's a massive asshole who more or less is one step away from constantly giving the Jedi the boot to the ass throughout the war and him being a gigantic prick regardless.

>>14516824
>and always wanted a strong military that could defeat the Empire and take heavy losses.
In the Thrawn Trilogy he literally said that to a politician the only use of the military was as a tool for political power.

>>14516824
He was still a warhawk. Fey'lya's even more far right-winged, conservative, nearly blatantly anti-Jedi, and would've used overwhelming military force for example to settle the Rhammolian crisis if not for Leia intervening to go on a peace mission.

Legacy of the Force and Fate of the Jedi had some pretty good books in them

>>14517421
Fate is good on its own but stands out even more considering its right after Legacy. But Legacy is tainted solely by how KT nearly ruined Jaina, the character assassination of what was supposed to be the emergence of Darth Caedus with Jacen Solo's fall to the dark side, and more importantly absolutely made fuck all sense with her bullshit continuation of her stupid Clone Commandos and Mandalorian wank which leaves Legacy pretty checkered. What Dennings and Alliston did were good but half the time the two were doing damage control on the nonsense Traviss added.

>>14517486
And I can't add how botched and ruined she did to EU with the awful death and final fight of Mara vs Caedus. Fuck her.

I liked the one book where we meet a clone of the villain (Isard), who is enlisted to hunt down herself.

I actually felt bad when the clone learned she was a copy, screaming in anguish before she was subsequently killed.

The author didn't really exploit or explore the revelation much at all, it just happens for a few sentences.

Still, it is a pretty sad moment. It drives home the clone is doomed by circumstances she can't even control.

For all the flak the Black Fleet Crisis gets, I feel there is a gem buried in it.

The last stand of Polneye, the only "Purged" world that fights back against the villains. It's quite sad. They have no chance, but they fight anyway.

It happens in the first book.

>>14517663
Sounds like one of the SWTOR novels where a Sith apprentice is revealed to be a perfect clone of the real girl, whose mother created basically a pseudo-army of Force resistant semi-biologically driven war droids and ends up killing the real version of herself and continuing down the Sith path.

>>14517691
What flak does it get? Its generally considered a sleeper hit to a lot of EU fans because its more heavily war focused. The only weird shit was the sub-plot about Luke and Leia's mom which turned out to be a dead end. It gave a lot more information in general about how far flung and wide spread the Empire's navy was, and Nil Spaar was a fantastic villain.

I actually opened up a 200 pound box of books just to dig out Star By Star and read it again. It's so satisfying.

Does /m/ have any suggestions on bookshelves that are small and easy to fit into odd spaces? I don't have the storage space for all my books and plamo.

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>>14518315
Put your model kits on your books.

>>14512118
>the reason he was called wasn't because he failed to capture Luke Skywalker, but because he tried to pass off the failing on his superior and not live up to his mistake.
He was being scapegoated for failing to counter an advanced technique when his training was barely adequate to operate the tractor beam under ideal conditions. He was quite right to tell Thrawn to go fuck himself. Blue boy underestimated the risks of failing to allot sufficient time for training his conscripts. Blue boy fucked up. The scene could have been somewhat salvaged with an offhand comment to Palleon admitting his mistake and the operator's punishment being merely a way to motivate the others (with the objection and subsequent murder being conveniently more efficacious) but as-written Thrawn just comes across as a self-important twat throwing a hissy fit because someone dared stand up to him.

>>14518846
He was adequately trained, he just failed to act according to training and tried to pass his failure off on someone else.

>“Yes, sir—but what happened wasn’t my fault.”

>Thrawn’s eyebrows arched, just a bit. “Explain.”

>Pieterson started to gesture to the side, changed his mind in midmotion. “The target did something with his acceleration compensator that killed his velocity vector—”

>“I’m aware of the facts,” Thrawn cut in. “I’m waiting to hear why his escape wasn’t your fault.”

>“I was never properly trained for such an occurrence, sir,” Pieterson said, a flicker of defiance touching his eyes. “The computer lost the lock, but seemed to pick it up again right away. There was no way for me to know it had really picked up something else until—”

>“Until the proton torpedoes detonated against the projector?”

>Pieterson held his gaze evenly. “Yes, sir.”

>For a long moment Thrawn studied him. “Who is your officer?” he asked at last.

>Pieterson’s eyes shifted to the right. “Ensign Colclazure, sir.”

>Slowly, deliberately, Thrawn turned to the tall man standing rigidly at attention with his back to the walkway. “You are in charge of this man?”

>Colclazure swallowed visibly. “Yes, sir,” he said.

>“Was his training also your responsibility?”

>“Yes, sir,” Colclazure said again.

>“Did you, during that training, run through any scenarios similar to what just happened?”

>“I. . .don’t remember, sir,” the ensign admitted. “The standard training package does include scenarios concerning loss of lock and subsequent reestablishment confirmation.”

>Thrawn threw a brief glance back down at Pieterson. “Did you recruit him as well, Ensign?”

>“No, sir. He was a conscript.”

>“Does that make him less worthy of your training time than a normal enlistee?”

>“No, sir.” Colclazure’s eyes flicked to Pieterson. “I’ve always tried to treat my subordinates equally.”

>>14518898
>"I see.” Thrawn considered a moment, then half turned to look past Pellaeon’s shoulder. “Rukh.”

>Pellaeon started as Rukh brushed silently past him; he hadn’t realized the Noghri had followed them down. Thrawn waited until Rukh was standing at his side, then turned back to Colclazure. “Do you know the difference between an error and a mistake, Ensign?”

>The entire bridge had gone deathly still. Colclazure swallowed again, his face starting to go pale. “No, sir.”

>“Anyone can make an error, Ensign. But that error doesn’t become a mistake until you refuse to correct it.”

>you will never have a Chiss gf

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>>14511206
>more sci-fi concepts (in truth: technobabble)
>more political machinations
>more moral grey versus the original trilogies good versus evil
This sounds very familiar.

>>14518911

Except it was done well, because Zahn understands the basic concepts of dialogue and character development, as well as how to structure a narrative.

His writing can be a bit too dry and military-wank for my tastes, but his Thrawn books are years ahead of the prequels.

>>14518911

Familiar, except not shit.

>>14518911
There was hardly any technobabble in the Prequel Trilogy or the Zahn books. The most you have in the latter was the explination and exposition for how the stygium crystals made ships cloaked and the mechanics behind Thrawn fucking with an entire species mindset to pull off his phantom teleporting turbolasers under their planetary shield curtain.

>>14518977

I don't think they mean technobabble in the "reverse the polarity of the flux crystal capacitors" kind, more that the original trilogy were basically fantasy movies, while Thrawn trilogy following on from them was significantly more science fiction based.

>>14518315
if you've got an Ikea in range of you they have a lot of small bits of furniture you can do stuff with

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>>14515355
Actually Trunicht died for his principles as well.

He admitted that the only thing he cares about is himself. He doesn't give a flying fuck who runs the galaxy so long as he is at the top of the pyramid. His ego IS his guiding principle.

Trunicht is basically my anime idol and I hate it when people talk badly about him.

Remember that nobody could outsmart him conventionally. Even Reinhardt couldn't do anything about him. They had to resort to murder to get rid of him.

Trunicht would have gone far in the new empire.

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>Always two, there are no more no less a Master and an apprentice.
>one that holds power
>and the other that craves it
The Rule of Two created by Darth Revan and latter refined by Darth Bane

>>14518898
>>14518902

Fun fact: both characters, Cris Pieterson and Ensign Colclazure, are result of two fan winning a charity auction to get their names in the book. The fan (Colclazure) also won the right to decide if Pieterson should live or die.

The first time I read that scene, I thought a little out of character for Thrawn, but seeing now, I think Zahn wrapped it perfectly.

>>14519085
Rule of Two wasn't created by Revan, it was simply formally recognized by him. I'm still hapy Filoni at least reintegrated the Sith Code from EU into the new reboot canon.

>>14519085
>>14520624
I always thought the Rule of Two was stupid personally.

I prefer when the Sith have empires that are actually full of Sith.

And then it gets kind of dumb and confusing when you add stuff like inquisitors (not really Sith except yes they fucking are) or secret apprentices that sort of break the rule anyway, rendering it pointless.

>>14520655
It makes sense both ways, man. The Sith are greedy, inward thinking, selfish, and believe others should serve them. Hence why they are Sith "Lords", and not like the Jedi "Knights", who live to protect and serve others. The Sith Order promotes competition, rivalry, and self-destruction because its general philosophy at its core is survival of the fittest. A Sith master can have a dozen acoloytes but the true Sith way would have them eliminate each other until the strongest, most powerful, and greatest of them remain to become his apprentice.

Bane's Sith Order takes this to the extreme and even is structured so that not only does an apprentice become more containably stronger since the dark side is concentrated into a small number of individuals, but actually has to surpass their master. Thus each generation becomes more powerful then the last.

Yes, I love the original Sith Empire and especially Vitiate's Revitalized Sith Empire because its a more orderly, formalized, and stratified Sith society but the Rule of Two is inherently superior to say, the Rule of One.

>inquisitors
They are Sith. The Inquisitors in Sidious's Empire are dark side Force-Users who are usually former Jedi who number among the Sith acoloytes. True Sith Inquisitors are still full on Sith Lords, they simply are more focused on politics and Sith sorcery and magical powers then full on combat like say a Sith Warrior or Sith Assassin is.

Those are all professions. Just like how a Jedi is a Jedi regardless if he goes on becoming a Guardian, Consular, or Sentinel which have their own career paths with Weaponmasters, Shadows, Sages/Seers, swordmasters, system guardsmen, etc...

>>14520655
Inquisitors are just a type of Sith. Its only outside the norm of Sith ranks because Palpatine's Empire isn't a proper "Sith" Empire, only Sidious and Vader themselves are full fledged Sith Lords. The majority of Inquisitors are either individuals with strong Force powers and sensitivity discovered right before or during the fall of the Republic or Jedi who rather turn to the dark side then die.

Jerec is considered the most powerful Inquisitor despite not being at the very *top* of the Inquisition, iirc he's a High Inquisitor rather then a Grand Inquisitor but a lot of the lore in EU states if Vader were to die, then Jerec was to be his first choice for a new Sith apprentice; well until Force Unleashed gave us Starkiller.

Either way, in every other Sith organization or empire, a Sith Inquisitor was a full on Sith Lord who preferred dabbling in the dark side to learn its secrets to immortality, power, and other arcane knowledge. Vader is considered a classic "Juggernaut" type, along side Bane or Malgus because they are the types who prefer fighting using conventional tactics with lightsaber and brute power which are not the same way that Exar Kun or Sidious do things.

>>14520655
You seem to forget that while Sith = Dark Side, dark side use =/= Sith. Inquisitors and people like Ventress, Savage and now technically Maul are not actual Sith (anymore in maul's case) because they do not directly follow the Rule of Two system with the current "Master" as their actual master with them officially as a Sith apprentice.

>>14520800
Maul is a full fledged Sith Lord, he's just not considered a member of Bane's Order of Sith: i.e. what Sidious and Tyranus represent during the Clone Wars or Sidious and Vader do again in the Empire's period.

Ventress was formally also Dooku's apprentice but Sidious told him to kill her because he feared her growing power would tip the balance for Dooku to betray him.

>>14517691
Chalk me up as another fan of the Black Fleet Crisis. I actually liked the parts that didn't focus on the OT cast more, mainly the parts that focused on the NR government and military. It was nice seeing the NR acting like an actual government rather than the cliche 'obstructive bureaucracy in the way of Our Heroes' and seeing the military transitioning from a bunch of guerrillas to a professional military.

>>14518147
The entire Lando part was essentially just filler. Also Luke's quest was sort of filler as well but at least tied into the main plot at the end. Luke and Leia also act a bit OOC at parts (like Luke thinking that all Jedi Master's need to act like hermits or Leia assaulting that minor diplomat who was an obvious patsy for Nil Spaar).

>>14521062
Luke thinking about going about that is perfectly reasonable given he only has Obi-Wan and Yoda for Jedi Masters he knows and both of them lived secluded lives as hermits. Luke also gives up this view by the second book anyway when he himself admits that Jedi have to be involved with the government to help protect the peace.

>Leia assaulting Spaar's stooge

To be fair, she assumed the dude was in out it given he was more or less Spaar's aide.

>>14516111
Well your average HUMAN generation is 20-25 years so the 25,000 years thing isn't wrong.

>>14518147
Black Fleet Crisis was disliked because the Yevetha are pretty much one-note Nazi analogues, Luke fucks a woman and doesn't marry her, and it's way too /k/. The K-Wing is literally just space A-10, and defies everything about how Star Wars starfighters are built and designed from the OT.

>>14522328
I keep forgetting 60% of the adult EU fandom is women

Is Disney using Thrawn in rebels or something. What is Zahn having to consult witg then for?

>>14522400
season 3 trailer brings the hype train destination Thrawntown

>>14519085
>The Rule of Two created by Darth Revan and latter refined by Darth Bane

you merely adopted the rule...

>>14520624
>>14519085
I'm pretty sure Revan didn't initiate the Rule of Two. He had armies of Sith under his command.

>>14522400
Rebels S3 and a new novel

>>14522695
No, he actually didn't. In KoTOR I, Revan has an army of Dark Jedi who want to become official Sith like Malak and Revan are. Malak even trains a secret apprentice in the form of Bandon or whatever the dude's name is while plotting to betray Revan after the top dog takes off his jaw in their spat driven duel. All of those dark siders you face in KoTOR I are literally fallen Jedi who are embracing the dark side and some forms of Sith training but they are not actual Sith.

Its the same thing with Palpatine and Vader being the Sith Lords in the Galactic Empire: sure Palpy has tons and tons of Force-Users in his organizaiton: Inquisitors, Hands, Prophets of the Dark Side, Dark Jedi, Assassins, and so on but they aren't actual Sith Lords.

That's why Revan believed in the Rule of Two, you can have a shit ton of strong underlings who can use the dark side of the Force but there should only ever be a single master and a single apprentice. And like someone else said, he didn't invent this rule, he simply formalized the concept and it left and impression on Darth Bane which was the main tenant of his Order of Sith Lords he founded about 2500 years later.

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>>14522695
>He had armies of Sith under his command.
None of them were Sith. Not even the "Sith" academy on Korriban actually produced Sith, it was a facsimile at best. Every single Foce-User you fight besides corrupted Bastilia, Bandon, and Malak are just Dark Jedi.

>>14523247
So what's the definition of a Sith then? All of them studied the Sith code and shit.

>>14527531
But there were only TWO Dark Lords of the Sith, formal true and blue Sith in the most puritanical sense of the term. Darth Revan was the Sith Lord and Darth Malak was his Sith Apprentice. Even Bandon only became a Sith himself after Malak believed he had killed Revan and took Bandon as his official apprentice.

Both Dark Jedi and Sith use the dark side of the Force but the difference is Sith have a codified system and tenants that define their powers, philosophies, and beliefs. The academy like that anon mentioned produced Dark Jedi or corrupt Jedi came there to more fully understand the dark side.

You wouldn't confuse Karakko, a legendary Dark Jedi master, with Darth Sidious, a full fledged Sith Lord would you?

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so while we're talking sith
with Pentagon Dark taking over as kung fu rudo sith master will he take on a new apprentice or will he keep Vampiro around as a toady for a while?

>>14527613
What the fuck are you talking about

>>14527595
>Both Dark Jedi and Sith use the dark side of the Force but the difference is Sith have a codified system and tenants that define their powers, philosophies, and beliefs.
I seem to recall that the system and tenets were taught at the Korriban academy or am I crazy?

>>14530197
They sort of were and weren't. Blame Bioware for not making it clear but the rest of EU and most the game identifies almost all the people you fight as Dark Jedi besides Malak and Bandon and later Bastila.

Remember how Ventress claimed she was a Sith because she used the dark side of the Force, wore all black, and hated the Jedi while Dooku lectured her on what being a Sith really actually was? I think that's the same idea with the Korriban academy.

If there's anything that can be said for the new canon, at least maybe they will end the old EU's ridiculous fixation with Corellia.

>>14512055
I'm sure that Vader suggesting that he is a forgiving man is a quip of some kind.

>>14530321
The Korriban academy wasn't just teaching people to go full ANGER HATE CHAOS though, IIRC they were instructed in the whole "through power my chains are broken" and authority through strength philosophy.

>>14531292
Yeah I know but the issue is the only actual "Dark Lords" were Revan and Malak. The rest of them are generally lumped under the whole "Sith acolytes" status. Hell SWTOR ups the ante even more on this with the Sith Inquisitor storyline on Taris where Ashara's ancestor who served as one of the major fallen Jedi Masters and became a Dark Jedi in Revan and Malak's empire was still only titled as such, he's not considered a Sith.

>>14531277
Corellia is Planet New York in Star Wars, so no they won't. And Dark Disciple was fucking awful with that Twilight tier romantic bullshit, Grievous jobbing even more, and Vos' Sue tier power level thanks to training with Ventress.

>>14508225
Not as pissed as when I watched the 7th ep.
But still EU is for me the real story, everything else is BLA BLA BLA I CANT HEAR YOU

>>14512061
Did you see ep 7??
There will be no Thrawn...
At this rate there will be no starwars either...
tfw disney just pop-out 2 sith lord and a noteven-trained-but-already Jedi out of nowhere
Next for sure they'll throw in some triplets of funny Ewoks with full Jedi powers and cringe-inducing jokes

TL;DR Thrawn is an exceptionnal part of the story, Timothy Zahn is my favourite SW author

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>>14508225
Speak for yourself, for a lot of people certain comics and novels were as integral to them in the lore as the films themselves. Thankfully at least the EU aspects in the film novelizations remain canon.

>>14532320
Same here. Yeah there was dumb shit but honestly the majority of it stems from Bantam's era of EU, and most of it can be traced to Kevin J. Andersen. Other issues were they had a lot of unknown sci-fi writers writing their own bits and pieces for random characters in the background during the pre-Del Rey days so you ended up with dumb shit in those various Star Wars novel anthologies; Tales from Jabba's Palace, Tales from Mos Eisely, Tales from the New Republic, Tales from the Empire, tec..Sure there was a gem here or there with what professional writers like Zahn or Stackpole or Alliston threw in but the rest were usually crap. Come to think of it most of my favorite novels are Del Rey but a few stand out in Bantam's time:

>Shadows of the Empire by Perry
>Jeter's Boba Fett Trilogy (really fucking good, fleshes Boba Fett, explains how he survives, great insight into Fett's character before KT ruined everything Mandalorian and Fett lore wise in her books and comics) by Jeter
>Courtship of Princess Leia by Wolverton
>Heir to the Empire Trilogy by Zahn
>Hand of Thrawn Duology by Zahn
>Black Fleet Crisis Trilogy by Kube-McDowell
>Almost all of the X-Wing novels (Rogue + Wraith Squadron) by Alliston (RIP) and Stackpole
>Second Han Solo Trilogy (some continuity fuck ups and snaffus but this is early in EU's existence by Zahn and weird shit like Fett having six fingers but its really good) by Crispin


>>14532359
Considering Episode V is set 35 years after RoTJ and 39 1/2 years after ANH; so basically 40 years later when Thrawn himself in the original EU/old continuity died 5 years after RoTJ, its not an issue for his character.

>>14532585
>Episode V
Typo: Episode VII*

>>14512028
>Coruscant Nights
Can anyone vouch for this? Never heard of it before but having looked it up the premise sounds intriguing.

>>14534181
Its really fucking good, its by Reeves.

>>14532585
>Yeah there was dumb shit but honestly the majority of it stems from Bantam's era of EU
I dunno anon. Legacy of the Force, Dark Nest, and Fate of the Jedi were all Del Rey.

>>14508153
thrawn is going to be in rebels s3

I don't read any Star Wars expended universe. So i have a question.

Why is his name a combination of Thrown and Prawn?

>>14537045

I'd like to answer your question with a question. Several even. Why are you asking such a stupid question? Why ignore the more obvious portmanteau of Throne and Pawn? Or is it Throttle and Dawn? Thrifty and Lawn? Why is your name a portmanteau of anonymity and mouse? Why is mine a portmanteau of Meet and Leviathan? Why do we even have words, man? What do they even mean? I mean, really mean? Think about it!

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>>14537121
I'm just wondering cause his name is funny. Don't shoot me.

>>14537271

And I'm just pointing out that most words are funny if you examine them and that it's pointless to start doing so.

>>14537121
>this assblasted over somebody making fun of your smurf husbando's name

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>>14536792
>>14508153
>thrawn is going to be in rebels s3
that shit is not thrawn. in the good novels, thrawn was outmaneuvering a superior force tactically and strategically. he was one element in a series of weaving plots around several characters used sparingly (rather than the other shit novels which served only to plot out each characters entire lifespan, what their kids did, what their parents did, what they had for dinner and when they went to the toilet)

in this shit, he is just gonna be a propped up villain whose only function is to make the proawtawgawnists look like mary sues and gary stues when they win.

its gonna be shit from a film/novel critic standpoint but probably okay/pallateable where directing and low-commitment entertainment is concerned.

>>14537300

Thrawn is a boring villain with an idiotic gimmick. I'm getting assume blasted over anon asking a stupid question and ignoring how silly a lot of words sound, not over Thrawn.

>>14537045
Why is Lando's name a combination of Lance, Andy, DOTA, and Nando's?

>>14536703
Fate of the Jedi was great. So was Dark Nest, only thing you can be right about is Legacy and that is entirely because of Karen Traviss ruining the narrative completely with a bullshit one-woman story about Boba Fett, his dumb granddaughter, and focusing absolutely on her awful Fett/Clones/Mandalorian plot line.

>>14537332
t. KJA

>>14538009

Oh please. His books are boring and forgettable too. Disliking Thrawn doesn't make me him or a fan of him. You gonna accuse me of being Karen Traviss next or something? That guy who wrote Aftermath? How many strawmen are you gonna prop up?

>>14538017
>strawmen

>>14537314

Turns out you can do more in several hundred pages of printed text than thirteen episodes of an animated season.

The mind recoils in awe at such a profound revelation, I know.

>>14538024

Your right, I should have said ad hominem.

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>>14537988
Such a shame.

>>14519070
>Trunicht is basically my anime idol and I hate it when people talk badly about him.

But he's a terrible person and basically everything wrong with modern politicians.

>>14538111
>modern
It's always been like that

>>14538086
I'm not making an argument so I'm not making an ad hominem either, my fallacy spouting newfriend.

>>14537643
>Fate of the Jedi was great.
The concept of the Lost Tribe was interesting, and the scene where like a dozen of their best fighters all try to fight Luke Skywalker and his son at once and get blown the fuck out was funny. Other than that Fate of the Jedi was kind of wacky and mostly the only good it did was to reverse Karen Travis's mischaracterization of Daala as anything other than a brain damaged war criminal, retcon the reason for Jacen's random turn to stupidity, rescuing Tahiri's character, and setting the stage for a companion book continuing the story of Wraith Squadron. The trade off was that we were made to put up with Abeloth.

>So was Dark Nest
Dark Nest was infuriating to read because half the plot just boils down to "Killiks are literally retarded" and the goddamn Shadow Academy.

>Legacy and that is entirely because of Karen Traviss ruining the narrative completely with a bullshit one-woman story about Boba Fett, his dumb granddaughter, and focusing absolutely on her awful Fett/Clones/Mandalorian plot line.
Alema Rar's entire subplot was also an excruciating test of patience, as was Jacen's lack of self awareness. Anakin Skywalker was tricked into becoming evil by Sheev and Matt Stover managed to sell it, Jacen just kind of blundered into being evil because he was a dumbfuck.

>>14538161
Fate of the Jedi was absolutely fine, it was both a required sequel series because Legacy of the Force couldn't work on its own for the aforementioned reasons of Traviss completely fucking everything up. There is a literal lack of progress and stagnation in each of KT's three novels in the series because she does not carry forward the united story or plot line with Jacen's fall so much as she wants to buffer it with an entirely separate sub-plot involving the Fett clan, Mandalorian wankery, and call backs to her Clone Commando OC donut steel super heroes who did no moral wrongs. The Lost Tribe was great, Luke being Luke again was great, his adventures with his teenage son was great, Jaina returning to her pre-LoTF characterization and bond with Jag was great, Han and Leia's antics were great, it wasn't perfect but it stands as a masterpiece after the blunder of LotF.
>Dark Nest was infuriating
It was a lesson on cultural relations being strained by essentially two diffierent species having vastly different and alien understandings of personal space and self-awarness. The Killiks are literally sentient bug people who don't understand that they are a threat because they can not moderate their breeding or borders and encroach on everything. Jacen's highlighted gradual fall to the dark side or rather his embracing of it was well done and so who was Luke sticking with his Unified Force belief.
>Alema Rar's subplot
She was kept alive for a reason for this, what else did you expect them to do with her? Have her character hyped as a side antagonist after NJO and Dark Nest storylines just to die off in the first novel?
>Jacen's lack of self awareness
Traviss' fault.
>Jacen just kind of blundered into it
Look man, that's bullshit. I'm not a fan of LotF either but that's ridiculously simplifying the whole issue.

>>14538134

You don't have to be making an argument for it to be an ad hominem response. Attacking the arguer rather than the actual argument in any way is an ad hominem response.

>>14538131

Democracy as we have it now is a relatively recent concept. No one blames a god-king for having an ego.

>>14538567
Yes you do, because you implied I was debating him, I wasn't. There was no debate, so no that shit isn't flying.

>>14538634

You don't have to be debating someone to call them names or attack them, which is what an ad hominem response is.

>>14538650
An ad hominem is a personal attack on the debater to invalidate their position, rather then attacking their argument. I'm not arguing anything, ergo it is not an ad hominem.

Misusing fallacies is pretty fucking awful. Especially when you are so insensible you don't know how to properly use them in the first place.

>>14538161
>>14538514

Traviss was certainly a contributing factor to why LOTF sucked, but she wasn't the sole reason. LOTF had other reasons for being bad, among them:
- the plot was just a shitty rehash of the Prequel Trilogy ('but our separatist are called the Confederation, not the Confederacy, totally different!');
- Alema Rar (not everyone shares your fetish for disfigured, half-bug Twilek girls, Denning);
- excessive grimdark (Did we really need a scene where they shoot off the arms and legs of the nice Jedi songstress lady?);
- Darth Jacen was a lame and uninspiring villain, even when not written by Traviss;
- For Jacen to get as far as he did, literally everyone else in the galaxy has to act like a fucking retard ('Hey, Jacen is dressing up like Darth Vader and torturing people! Could he have gone evil?' 'Nah, it's just a phase he's going through. Hey, I've got a great idea! Let's have him train our impressionable teenage son!')

>>14539128
>- the plot was a rehash of the Prequel Trilogy
That was the intention. Jacen becoming a Sith Lord was him doing everything of his own will and volition. He rationally let himself fall to teh dark side and become a Sith Lord, unlike his grandfather who was seduced to it, he was a planner like Sidious, not a brawler like Vader, etc...
- Alema still had to serve some purpose, I don't see the problem here.
- Excessive grimdark? That was the entire point, and its nothing compared to NJO which had frequently gorey deaths. Teenaged kids getting their faces turned into molten slag filled craters? A prisoner being diced into thousands of meaty chunks by a Force web of dark side energy. Del Rey said from the start the new plan was for a darker Star Wars, I don't see why your bitching about this 8 years after its already been going down.
- Darth Caedus was cool until Traviss ruined him; usage of Flow Walking and Battle Meditation to get the jump on his opponents is how those powers should be used
- You're simplifying it. Skywalker family literally has everyone and their mother basically running around wearing all black, rolling with special elite units, and having a shit ton of political and military influence.
- Why do you neglect to ignore the dumbest thing with Jaina deciding to go train under Fett instead of the Grand Master of the Jedi, Luke fucking Skywalker, to fight her brother? Which of course, is what KT wrote.

I said LoTF wasn't great even without factoring KT's involvement but it was certainly passable if you ignore her shit.

>>14539128
>- For Jacen to get as far as he did, literally everyone else in the galaxy has to act like a fucking retard ('Hey, Jacen is dressing up like Darth Vader and torturing people! Could he have gone evil?' 'Nah, it's just a phase he's going through. Hey, I've got a great idea! Let's have him train our impressionable teenage son!')
Luke and Mara deciding that an internship with the Space NKVD would be great work experience for Ben aside it's worth remembering that Jacen was supposed to be a renowned war hero and the son of renowned war heroes one of whom was once the Chief of State so to the average person he commands respect and authority and they may not question him too hard when he decides that going full police state is the best way to deal with Corellia.

>>14539128
First, you do know that Alliston straight up stated in one of his last interviews that the entire purpose of LotF was to have a mirror of the Clone Wars with the Galactic Civil War and that Caedus would learn from the mistakes of Vader and Sidious. My issue was that KT absolutely fucked everything after the promising start with Dennings and Alliston's books and derailed the series so much they spent more time backpedaling to make sense of her dumb shit then progressing the story the way it should've gone.

Also both Jaina and Jacen were particularly famous due to their role in fighting and ending the Vong War. Jacen defeating Omini, Jaina being the Sword of the Jedi, and both are the nephew and niece of Luke Skywalker, hero of the first Galactic War.

Also doesn't hurt that the Galactic Alliance Guard was filled with Imperial leaning humans who had favorable views on Vader and paralleled that with Jacen/Caedus. The biggest problem to me was after Caedus' death, was that they should've prevented him dying to keep him for Fate with Abeloth.

I can not STAND Krayt at all.

>>14508153
I will never be won over by the decanonization of the EU until the Disney movies are decanonized

>>14539222
>and both are the nephew and niece of Luke Skywalker, hero of the first Galactic War.
Not to mention the son and daughter of Han Solo, hero of the Galactic Civil War, and Leia Organa Solo, hero of the Galactic Civil War, orphan of Alderaan, and former Chief of State.

>>14538514
>It was a lesson on cultural relations being strained by essentially two diffierent species having vastly different and alien understandings of personal space and self-awarness. The Killiks are literally sentient bug people who don't understand that they are a threat because they can not moderate their breeding or borders and encroach on everything.
The Killiks are literally retards who can't see the dark nest because "durr plot"

>>14542922
That was because Lomi Po was using the fucking dark side of the Force along with her Force connection with the Dark Nest to completely shield the Dark Nest from UnuThul's awareness. Remember how each time Luke and the others tried to make him aware of this he didn't believe them because he couldn't FEEL the Dark Nest?

>>14542971
Yeah, and it was infuriating because the plot basically hinges on killik thought patterns being constructed to mean that they're dumbfucks who can't conceive of what they can't perceive.

>>14543268
It was constructed on the fact that we know that dark siders can cause a haze or obstruction to other Force-Users i.e. Jedi/Non Sith senses so they can't comprehend or understand what was going on. Then it was compounded by the fact the Killiks emit their own natural interference in the Force and cause a sort of hazy radio-wave like jamming, add those two together and its perfectly reasonable why UnuThul has no idea what's going on and being so mentally warped by the trauma of the failed mission in Star by Star, his psychological damage, and what not and it at least makes sense why the Killiks are difficult to deal with.

The ending was still awesome and you know it.

>>14543388
>Star by Star
>failed
it did exactly what it was meant to.

>>14537314
I'm pretty sure Thrawn will be Tarkin/Vader combined and only show up for one episode during the season premiere before fucking off.

>>14536703
All Del Rey and all Troy Denning, according to sources. He was basically the head of Star Wars meta plotting at Del Rey and it was his idea, after NJO, to have Jacen fall to the Dark Side.

>>14538161
Daala wasn't a brain-damaged war criminal. She was basically a pragmatic and powerful woman who managed to avoid being a stupid warlord after she realized she was 20 years out of date in her initial appearance. That the writers basically completely turned the universe on its head to make her Chief of State of the GA isn't Daala's fault as a character but the writers for shoehorning in a character that didn't fit what they needed. Pellaeon or Soontir Fel would've fit way better for their purposes.

>>14538514
Killiks were literally retarded.

>>14538514
So Killiks are space Mexicans, right down to the their drug addictions?

And Fate of the Jedi was terrible because it introduced Abeloth, undid everything we had to suffer through the NJO for, and had the stupidest Sith Lord in decades.

God, I fucking hated Alema Rar in Dark Nest and everything that followed.

I cannot believe that 343 handed the reigns of Halo's story and canon over to Traviss.

>>14545627
>Soontir Fel
Man, imagine if it had been the Empire of the Hand summoned at the end of Revelation to save the day instead of bloody Daala.

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>>14510034

Star Wars: Rebellion

>>14545619
That's what I'm thinking too. He'll be a one off episode character to remind everyone why the empire wrecked the rebels before Luke

>>14545539
The Jedi Strike Team wasn't supposed to lose 90% of the Jedi on its mission.

>>14545635
Fate of the Jedi was fine, friend. Star Wars EU was coming to an end, there was no more credible threats after Sidious had been banished to the netherworld of the Force, Jacen/Caedus was dead, and Exar Kun's spirit destroyed for good. They needed a big bad of ridiculous proportions and power to be a threat to Luke. Have you noticed after Sidious and Exar Kun went down and before Jacen because Caedus, there was no credible threats to Luke. Almost every book has Luke running around distracted or something so he won't wreck the big bad at the start of the story.

If you don't like Abeloth, that's your prerogative but don't tell me Fate of the Jedi wasn't a breath of fresh air after Legacy of the Force. We got a proper reworking of Jacen's fall, explanation for why it happened and Jace's reasons, and the revelations about the Architects/Celestials.

>>14545623
He said something about being influenced about Stackpole who was still absolutely pissed off over Anakin being killed off over Jacen.

>>14546011
I'd heard they'd actually planned for Anakin to go bad, and decided not too as it'd be a little too on the nose to have Anakin's grandkid, also called Anakin, go evil as well. So they switched the borthers.

>>14546059
>I'd heard they'd actually planned for Anakin to go bad, and decided not too as it'd be a little too on the nose to have Anakin's grandkid, also called Anakin, go evil as well.
I thought it was that they were originally planning on Anakin being the one who had the whole "Unifying Force" revelations instead of Jacen, but they were told no because there would be too many Anakins. The dark side ideas came later.

>>14546059
I never heard that theory. The original intention was to have either Jacen or Anakin die off mid-way or late into the New Jedi Order series. Like someone mentioned before and earlier in the thread, Del Rey's take over of the Star Wars books was meant to draw in a darker and bleaker universe. Hence why so many old characters were being killed off. Sue Roetini or whatever her name was, was the chief editor and executive for Star Wars novel plot lines and the head of the Story Committee with EU. Lucas got involved and said they should switch it to Anakin because he was worried that Anakin Skywalker would be unfavorably compared with Anakin Solo.

This pissed off Stackpole who felt it was a waste and thought Jacen should've died off instead but honestly, it made sense because NJO was always mainly Jacen's story.

>>14546011
>sending Jedi
>to fight voxyn, a species designed to kill Jedi
>which were engineered from vornskrs, a species that hunts Jedi
>over Mrykr, a planet that historically has been bad news for Jedi
I don't know what the Young Jedi Knights were expecting

>>14546126
>>14546125
>>14546059
What most post-NJO interviews have said is that Lucasarts sent Del Rey a list of characters they couldn't kill. Anakin Solo and Chewbacca were not on that list. Ergo, they decided to kill off Anakin in Star by Star for that emotional heft.

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>No one mentions the Jedi Apprentice and/or Jedi Quest series

>>14511936
So, Mara Jade is really this shitty chara?

>>14546126
>because NJO was always mainly Jacen's story.
Jacen in the early NJO was such an infuriating dickhead seriously.

>>14547122
And they only made it Jacen's story after Destiny's Way, which is when Lucasarts stepped in and told Del Rey it was too dark, too gritty, and not Star Wars enough.

>>14547107
She only showed up in, what, five books? I thought Akanah was a better love interest for Luke.

>>14547084
Anakin and Jacen were both slatted to die, but it was only going to be one or another. Lucas himself was the vote breaker and Anakin got the axe.

>>14547088
The ones by Jude Watson were great. The ones written by KJA were goofy.

>>14547128
That's wrong. It was that way from the start, the issue is that the other writers kept reverting Jacen to his pre-Star by Star and Traitor characterization and ignoring his growth.

>>14547145
No, idiot. Mara is in a LOT of books.

>>14547145
>Akanah was a better love interest
Please sudoku.

>>14547204
Books or comics?

>>14549338
Mara appears in every single major post-RoTJ EU book and most comics. Akanah is originally a one-hit wonder from the Black Fleet Crisis trilogy and only gets referenced a few times in later novels before the NJO series, name dropped a bunch more times in the NJO series, and then doesn't show up till the Swarm War/Dark Nest trilogy, and finally again for both Legacy of the Force and Fate of the Jedi.

She has nothing on Mara. On top of that, Mara being one of the most iconic and popular universal faces of EU along side Talon Karrde, and Thrawn. Mara was also somewhat designed wise based off Briae or whatever that chick's name was in the old Marvel Star Wars comics who became Lady Lumiya.

>>14550363
Also to add, Luke has had numerous flings and one-shot affairs with female love interests up until Mara.

>short fling with Leia
>the purple space chick in Marvel Star Wars (pre-DH)
>Shira Brie (chick who becomes Lady Lumiya and Vader's first proper Sith apprentice, basically is a female Vader after the accident left her needing huge augment and cybernetic surgery to survive)
>Gaerial Captison (technically first proper love interest in EU for Luke chronologically speaking but they end up agreeing it wouldn't work in the long term; he does become her daughter's god-father)
>Teneniel Djo (Force-Witch from Dathomir, first infuated with Luke, then both Luke and Isolder)
>Jem
>Callista (hated her)
>Akanah
>Mara Jade (based somewhat off of Shira Brie physically, most popular lover of Luke to date and most popular girl in EU)

>>14550363
I totally forgot that Mara showed up during the Jedi Academy trilogy. She was also in the Corellia trilogy but I remember nothing about what happened there besides Thracken Sal-Solo showed up.

If you look at the list on Wookiepedia, Mara Jade shows up in these pre-Caamas Crisis:
>Heir to the Empire
>Dark Force Rising
>The Last Command
No surprise there, that's where she first shows up and helps the Rebels beat C'baoth.

>Dark Apprentice
>Champions of the Force
Part of Luke' search for new Jedi apprentices, helped beat Exar Kun.

>I,Jedi

>Children of the Jedi
>Darksaber
Shows up but wasn't a love interest because Callista.

>The New Rebellion
Total fucking shit book. To this day I don't understand what was going on or why it was important.

>Ambush at Corellia
>Assault at Selonia
>Showdown at Centerpoint

At least in the EU novels, she wasn't presented as a love interest until the last two, Specter of the Past and Vision of the Future.

>>14550437
Isn't that the point? He had a bunch of women on his dick but Mara was the one recurring character who showed up with Force powers until they decided to put them together. Tenenial would've been a lot more fun, I think.

>>14551466
The love interest sub plot with Luke was already hinted at from the Heir to the Empire trilogy considering she was already a classic tsundere for him. That's not even factoring the NJO, Dark Nest, and Legacy series following the end of the Hand of Thrawn series.

>The New Rebellion
It was weird but still vastly better then Children of the Jedi, Dark Saber, Crystal Star, Planet of Twilight, or any KJA books. Only thing KJA is good for is Force-User power levels.

>>14551858
>That's not even factoring the NJO, Dark Nest, and Legacy series following the end of the Hand of Thrawn series.
The problem with that is that that's after their romance. If we just look at it from an EU novel-reader's perspective, there aren't a ton of books where you get hte same sort of romantic entanglements Luke had with other women, like Gaeriel. But all those others were very clearly limited to their own authors' stories, whereas Jade ended up showing up a little bit more.

>>14553334
Speaking as someone who hasn't read PA in a while...holy shit, what happened to the art?

>>14553385
Tumblr happened. That's the typical Tumblr style for art these days

>>14553385
The original two don't work on the comic anymore and haven't for quite some time.

>>14553385
Gabe got sent/bought a Microsoft Surface 2, and uses the Surface exclusively now for everything art-related.

>>14512103
Well, he was explicitly the only non-human Grand Admiral in a notoriously human-centric Empire. Which is not to say that the others were all bullshit political appointees, but surely Thrawn had to establish a reputation for genius and getting results to a greater degree than any of the others just to get the job.

I hope the Chimaera returns too.

>>14555035
Since it's Thrawn we'll likely have the Admonitor, because Chimaera was Palleon's ship, Thrawn only flew his flag on her.

>>14553385
Tumblr. Gabe's art peaked in 2006 or 2007 and has sense gotten sloppier, shittier, and worse over time in general.

>>14555086
>>14555035
I hope Zsinji shows up at some point too.

>>14555204
>I hope Zsinji shows up
He's already a Disney villain anyway, or at least he is a man who aspires to being one.

>>14555299
He had a lot of charm and depth as far as antagonists go, which is why he got expanded from the Courtship of Princess Leia novel to being one of the primary long running main big baddies in the X-Wing books.

>fat as fuck
>was incredibly gifted at learning and mastering a variety of languages
>despite his physical inabilities the man was a prodigy to logistics and administrative duties in the same way Thrawn was to strategy and tactics
>master of psychology
>subverted various corporations and businesses to becoming fronts to funnel money and capital into his private wealth and to fund his private military after he went rogue once he reached the rank of Admiral before the Battle of Endor
>even Thrawn and Isard were wary of him
What I love about Zsinji wasn't that he was a genius in military matters but that his talent laid in deception; fomenting civil unrest in New Republic worlds and systems, heavy reliance and mastery of espionage and terror tactics. Hell the fucker even had his own private elite variant of Stormtroopers and Tie Pilots known as Raptors.

>>14555309
>his talent laid in deception; fomenting civil unrest in New Republic worlds and systems, heavy reliance and mastery of espionage and terror tactics.
And business. His economic empire extended well beyond the nominal borders of his fiefdom.
He also knew to pick his battles which is why the NR spent more time chasing after Iron Fist than actually fighting it.

>>14555360
Yep. Don't forget for a long period of time both the Imperial remnant and New Republic were dwarfed by Zsinji's private empire and both had to conspire together and work against him both militarily and economically to defeat him as at his peak, he had numerous Super-class Star Destroyers, entire fleets of the most advanced Star Destroyers and other warships and entire sectors and systems were paying him for protection while he got top of the line researchers, engineers, technicians, and specialists for his pet projects. Dude was a fucking genius.

>>14555389
>numerous Super Star Destroyers
Wasn't it just Iron Fist, and that one he managed to steal from KDY for a brief period before the Wraiths blew it up?

>>14555425
Razor's Kiss?

According to Wookipedia Zsinj isn't even human.

>>14555810
Wookiepedia is retarded. Zsinji in EU is a literal hugely overweight and corpulent human.

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>>14555810
>>14555922
???

>>14555973
I know, that's why I'm saying its dumb. He's a human, I have no idea where this "he isn't a human" thing coming from. Unless there's some magical retcon where fat humans are retconned into being a separate species of Near Humans, like how they made Yun's character in Jedi Knight a near human species who have physical signs of Down's Syndrome.

>>14555973
>>14556065
>>14555922
Zsinj is only half-human. His father is a Fondorian shipwright; Fondorians are a near-Human species with purple blood and no body hair.

>>14555425
>>14555536
He also had two SSDs orbiting Dathomir is Courtship of Princess Leia.

>>14556079
He's primarily human though. One of the times he got injured he was bleeding red blood like a normal human. I guess his mother's genes are more dominant then his father's then.

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>>14545627

Even if I don't share the sentiment, I can sort of understand the reasoning behind hating Anderson, or hating Natasi Daata. At some point, the writers decided Daala was given the curse of survival: to have a reoccurring face that can always be trumped up as some sort of threat, since the other 98% of Imperial military leaders are REQUIRED to die when they fail. That seems more the fault of lazy writing, than Daala specifically.

That aside, the primary things I remember about Daala:

>Left for two decades in an isolated research division with a small (increasingly out of date) naval contingent. Follows her orders to the letter, developing a (broken, lazily-written) powerful superweapon and promptly missing out on the last twenty years of adaptation of naval doctrine. Defeated (because she's an Imperial).

>Strikes out on her own, and rather than obliterating herself in a useless minor conflict with the Republic, singlehandedly ends the Warlord era by convening the warlords and, when they fail to come to a settlement, murders them.

So, by doing this, Daala literally saves the Empire. She doesn't send it on the victory path like Thrawn did (before HE lost), but she literally extends the conflict by at least a decade (until the Camaasi Document Crisis and the war ends?).

>Loses (because she's an Imperial and frankly, not brilliant) and peacefully steps down to install Pellaeon as commander-in-chief of the navy.

Probably puts the single most capable, flexible officer alive in charge of the Navy (as oppose to doing something stupid and wasteful, like dragging him with her into a firestorm of failure).

That's most of what I remember of Daala. After that, it seems her primary purpose is to serve as the go-to whipping girl for the Jedi and the Republic (again, by virtue of the survivor's curse) whenever some idiot tyrant villain is needed. No fleet or superweapon? Get her elected to high office so she can fight the Jedi again, well into her seventies.

>>14559639
You're forgetting how she lost 60 something odd Victory-class Star Destroyers and fucking Super-class Star Destroyer over Yavin 4 against a tiny Rebel fleet. The ONLY decent thing she ever managed was torturing Han and Kyp for information when they stumbled on the Maw installation and killing off a bunch of Imperial warlords.

He wanted her to be like Isard or Zsinji or Thrawn but she is comically inept in general as a military commander.

>>14559639

Frankly I was under the impression that the whole "brain damage" meme came from a need to justify 1) why she kept surviving and 2) why she never won rather than the actual reasoning--the curse of being the reoccurring villain. She certainly wasn't a genius, and missing twenty years of combat experience to oversea development was only going to make that worse, but even then she was just one officer in a legion naval leaders who made stupid, overconfident mistakes--there's literally a dozen Imperial commanders who'd have brain damage too, the only difference being they were all thrown on the pyre like firewood, and Daala survived.

They're still using her as a whipping girl when she's seventy because, hey, the Jedi gotta kill someone, and apparently Pellaeon is off limits. Lazy writing, I'd guess. By this point, she's not even that unique--there are a few other women shown as commanders of star destroyers, at least one woman appointed to moff, and even a few other admirals (who are post-ROTJ appointments, I think). Hell, she was the second woman to rule the Empire, behind Isaard, who easily outranked her even before that as Director of Imperial Intelligence. Aside from her habit of surviving, she's fairly un-unique.

The one exception seems to be the otherwise irrelevant 'Planet of the Twilight', which I think was supposed to finally close the book on Daala and spare her the fate of spending the next few decades as a Jedi dart board with magically unlimited resources: she "retires" as the commander-in-chief of a insignificant tiny pro-Imperial planetary government on Peduccis Chorios. For someone who lost a few decades of her life living in isolation for the military, it seemed a fitting end--but the EU had to march on anyway.

That's how I saw it anyway. She's no genius, she's not even that good (as a military commander), though she was apparently the only one to realize the need to end the warlord era, and appoint someone more competent to replace her.

>>14559661

>60 star destroyers and a Executor-class

Yeah, that's what I meant by "loses". A bad defeat, but frankly the Empire seems to have those by the dozens--that does explain how you go from some ~30,000 star destroyers to a few dozen in 30 years, even when they're still building more of them during the whole time.

Shit, Zsinji last two (or three? How many were over Dathomir) Executor-class warships. By mass (though I doubt by cost) that's more than a hundred VSD right there, courtesy of even fewer Jedi.

Catastrophic defeats seem to be part of being an Imperial commander in those stories.

>>14559698

lost, not last. My fault.

In any case, at least two Executor-class ships, and an entire sector fleet from what I Remember.

>>14559698
The 25,000 to 30,000 ISDs is one of the textbook WEG era tier minimalist statements I fucking hate. The construction of the Death Star II alone in secret has its volume equivalent to material that could be used to construct 20,000,000,000 Star Destroyers.

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>>14559720

Honestly, it was just the number I remembered (and not even from where). It could be ten (or a hundred times that), or less if "star destroyers" are practically flexible vessels to be used across the entire galaxy for a whole range of duties. You might not need two or more destroyers to police every one of three million star systems if Carrack-class cruisers are good enough for the job.

On a side note, I fucking love the Carrack-class cruiser. As fast as an X-Wing fighter, punches well above its weight class, compartmentalized design for high crew survival, time-tested, reliable design that can be built at multiple shipyards. It'd probably be considered broken if it wasn't for its lack of fighter compliment (and maybe still is).

>>14559720
Isn't the new Disney canon even more minimalist than the old one? I mean, they seem to have the Galactic Empire collapse and get beaten within a year without the old EU's explanation of rampant warlordism and massive internecine conflict to explain where they're massive galaxy spanning fleet of warships disappeared to.

>>14563753

That seems to be the case--whether the Empire had 600,000 ships of the line, or 600, after the Battle of Endor, so far it sounds like after the Battle of Jakku, the Imperial Navy had something in the area of 1% of their post-Yavin military power after it. It effective ceased to be a military power (and then soon after, ceased to be a government at all).

Whatever was left after ROTJ, Jakku was the end of it--or at least that's what the new canon says. The whole deal with the First Order is that they had to rebuild from scratch (and apparently succeeded).

Seems kind of dumb, frankly, but maybe it'll make more sense with further explanation. Thematically the purpose seems to ensure the writers can't write a few decades worth of intra-Imperial warfare and ensure they go straight on to the new trilogy.

>>14563777
Sounds like whatever efforts the old story committee made to try to fix logistics in the EU, the new guys decided they just didn't care.

Like, how is it possible to lose 99% of the EU's immediate post-Endor Imperial Navy, back when virtually every system had at least one Star Destroyer, in a single battle?

>>14563866

Who the hell knows? It's one of the reasons i'm less annoyed at things like Daala using outdated tactics to lose an Executor-class warship, compared to some unseen conflagration that destroyed 99% of the Imperial Starfleet in a one-year period.

I'm almost certain that the new writers, or committee, took a look at the various retcons and logistical explanations for Imperial military projection pre and post-Endor--for example, the Pentastar Alignment--and said, "Get a load of this shit." And you can see where there reasoning is coming from: a large military government that avoided direct engagement with the New Republic for years, but by proxy buoyed the other Imperial warlords who did, and represented a large portion of post-Endor military hardware? It makes good sense from the million-star-destroyer-fleet standpoint, but an Empire that doesn't fight the Republic is no Empire at all to the new writers. Just some boring collection of conspiring bureaucrats, the worst of the EU from a certain perspective.

They'll probably use the simplest fix: retcon the size of the Imperial Navy. After doubling down on the idea that the New Republic completely replaced, not simply coexisted, with the Galactic Empire, even a hyper-militarized Empire with a hundred thousand destroyers is hard to square with a Republican Navy that only has barely a few dozen ships of the line that could be almost completely wiped out with destroying a half-dozen planets via the Death Star 3.0. That's valuable literature that would be wasted how the entire galaxy was apparently disarmed, or what happened to the largest military-industrial base in the known universe, that produced the Death Stars, that could be spent talking about Fin's parents or Luke's jedi school, etc.--and Disney sure as hell won't make a yearly movie about it.

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>>14564075

>Cont.


The Imperial Navy'll probably be retconned to a few hundred ships overall, with more emphasis on gigantic flagships that can be destroyed in a single stroke, than the +20 years of Imperial fighting against the Republic, alien kingdoms like the Hapans or whatever, and other Imperial fiefdoms that gradually ground down the fleet. They've already moved from there being four Executor-class ships to thirteen, right?

Or they have something else completely different in mind. Who knows? Maybe they'll handle it in a way that doesn't suck.

>>14563866
>>14564075

Wait, what?

Is this that hoi-polloi over Jakku or something else entirely?

>>14564088
>>14564075
I look forward to seeing how they try to explain the Galactic Empire maintaining its iron grip on the galaxy for decades with only a token Imperial Navy that can be lost in a single disastrous battle.

>Palpatine was making everybody stupid with the Dark Side

>>14564103

Never mind, it was Jakku.

But I suppose they had to streamline it, even if the way in which they did so beggars belief.

>>14564088
>The Imperial Navy'll probably be retconned to a few hundred ships overall

Technically this was the situation around the time the TTT was published. Remember 4-5 Star Destroyers and a bunch of smaller cruisers was considered a formidable force. And 200 smaller dreadnoughts + clone troops were able to steady the balance of power in favor of the Empire. It's only post-Dark Empire when you have these >10^3 number of ISDs and dozens of SSDs.

>>14564103
>Is this that hoi-polloi over Jakku or something else entirely?
Apparently in the new canon, after Endor the Rebellion declared a New Republic and kept fighting with the Empire for about a year, during which a bunch more Imperial systems acceded to the New Republic (while others just closed their borders) and they just kept winning and winning.

So the some Imperial bigwig decided to bring the ENTIRE Imperial Navy to Jakku seeking a decisive battle with the NR Fleet, and somehow magically the NR obliterated them.

After this the Imperial Remnant signed a treaty and decided to fuck off to the tiny corner of the galaxy that the New Republic left them, then fell apart.

So basically twenty years of EU bloody fighting between the New Republic and the gradually collapsing but still militarily powerful Empire was distilled into a single year.

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>>14564103

Unclear. Jakku is supposed to be the last "grand battle" the Empire ever fought (in the sense of fielding an Executor-class and numerous ISDs), after which the Imperial Navy was completely broken.

That means the ~99% of the Imperial Navy that wasn't at Endor was gone by the time of Jakku--not necessarily a problem until you consider it was only a year later. Hence the big difference between the old and new canon: the assumption that the galaxy-spanning hypermilitarized Empire could fight for decades (and even make a good show of it, despite massive losses) versus only one year, with only one mentioned decisive battle (so far).

It kind of sucks if you think the Empire could reasonably field hundreds of thousands of ships the size of an ISD (and millions of smaller ones). It sucks less if you think the galaxy is actually basically just a really big game of Star Wars: Rebellion, and the Empire only had a few dozen such ships at its height anyway. Seeing how the new canon has written out the Pentastar Alignment, the Empire of the Hand, Zsinj, and all the other minor empires, that's an easy assumption to make.

Given the desire for a completely blank slate, it's hard to blame them for writing everything out (if I could, I'd have written out the prequel films too). Though it's a little funny how they keep graverobbing the old EU when they made such a big deal of killing it in the first place.

>>14564109
It's explained in the Darth Vader comic. They basically used the Senate to gave maintain legitimacy and then swept it aside for the Death Star. Post-ANH the Death Star less Empire was the time apparently when the regime faced the greatest threat to its power.

>>14564130
So the most of the Empire didn't survive the Death of Palpatine whose personality held the Empire together.

>>14564134
>They basically used the Senate to gave maintain legitimacy
And how much does political legitimacy really count for if life in the empire sucks and you don't have a sufficiently strong military to hold everything in line and put down multiple simultaneous armed revolts all over the galaxy at once?

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>>14564109

It's interesting--One actually consistent theme across the shitstorm of the EU was political fallout between the 99.99% of the "secular" Imperial government--the carry-overs from the Old Republic like Pellaeon, Chiss like Thrawn and the Empire of the hand, various human and very-near-human principalities like Pentastar--and the 0.01% of the Sith Empire--the insane cult of Vader, the Emperor, Jerec, the Dark Jedi, and so forth.

The whole Empire gave the Sith two (or three or four) chances, after which it was done. The secular Empire fought for another decade or more on its own. The newer fiction like Pentastar and even things like the Empire of the Hand hammered in the point that after so many huge disasters, it was inevitable the Empire would start to scapegoat the Sith, correctly or incorrectly, and try and strike out on its own (and lose on its own). Bastion's that, isn't it? An Imperial capital completely devoid of Sith influence (at least before the insanity that was Legacy).

The new canon talks about that too, in the wake of Endor, as the Imperial cabinet has to consider that Palpatine's arrogance and religiosity could easily be blamed for everything that happened. But in this version, the Empire can't survive without the Sith: 2 years after Palpatine's death, and the Empire doesn't even exist. And the First Order, which comes closer to killing the Rebellion than the Empire ever did via their Super Death Star Alpha 3 Max, is literally forged around the cult of Darth Vader and led by a giant Sith hologram (as far as I can tell).

It seems to be hammering down a message: forget the Thrawn Trilogy, forget TIE Fighter, forget all that shit: the Empire cannot survive the Sith controlling it. It's just not sustainable, it's politically and strategically bankrupt, and the Sith are the only thing that can preserve the facade.

Which, you have to admit, is a consistent vision.

Meanwhile, the billion-planet Republic can't survive losing five planets.

>>14564179

Though admittedly, that struggle between two tyrannical visions--a secular Empire, and a hyperreligious Empire worshiping a Sith Cult--was probably just an explanation to help link a dozen differently-written stories together after the fact.

At least it was an interesting one.

>>14564174
I think you are discounting for how much people saw the Empire then as a continuation of the Republic, but with Palpatine as a leader for life and how genuinely popular Palpatine was for destroying the Separatists and putting the Jedi to Heel. It may have sucked, but comparatively better than the Clone Wars and the political instability that preceded it.

>>14564179
I suppose by taking that approach you could argue they're just keeping to the spirit of the OT by having the Force and the conflict between the light and dark be the meta driving force of everything, after the PT pissed everyone off with space taxes.

>>14564193
The idea of the secular Empire was a thing since the Thrawn trilogy chose to have its primary villain be an Imperial naval officer with no Force ability of his own.

>>14564202

I guess? Even in the OT, you get the sense--or at least I did--that the Empire sees itself as a legitimate government with a task at a hand, and the "ancient religion" of the Jedi and Dark Jedi had its day, but should get out of the way for the consummate military professionals and political leaders with their shiny new superweapons and ships. Practically ever seen with Tarkin seems to hammer that in, with him telling Vader to stop being such a manchild edgelord when a general criticizes his religion--the one that lost the war that put them all in power in the first place.

With ESB and ROTJ, the distinction is vaguer, especially as the Emperor actually comes on the scene and actually steers policy in the place of Wilhuff "Tell me about your Stupid Ancient Religion" Tarkin. But by the PT, the whole space taxes fiasco just turns out to be a ridiculous scheme for the Dark Jedi to give their light counterparts a discreet middle finger, so long as no one realizes Senator Palpatine is the Galaxy's Most Wanted with bad lighting and a funny voice.

In any case, people liked TFA (more than I did anyway). So clearly the idea of an even SITHIER Empire has its appeal.

>>14564221

True--it's clear that Thrawn gives zero shits about the Sith cult, or the Jedi Order, and is using C'Boath as a tool to be disposed of.

But the actual idea of a Sith-skeptic Empire--or even one that actively seeks out to dismantled the Sith the way they did the Jedi, as oppose to treating them as surprise VIP leaders whenever they climb out of their holes in the ground--is more recent I think.

Before that, every Dark Jedi was basically Jerec, who could expect an entire Imperial army group and flotilla at their disposal when they finished their meditation and decided to get themselves killed fighting the Rebels.

>>14564251
Authority presumably derived from Sheev, but then again
>I BID YOU DARK GREETINGS

>>14564315

One would assume that an enterprising Sith would be confronted by the same problems as any would-be warlord, courtesy of the Imperial Charter (?) lacking a clear path of succession in the event of the Emperor's death.

Sure, they can try and kill everyone in the way of them and the captain's seat on their shiny new Executor-class, but that just leads to more problems and more people to kill, and before long you're ruling over a smoking wreck of a space fortress and a few mostly-shot-up TIE FIghters.

>>14564244
>I guess? Even in the OT, you get the sense--or at least I did--that the Empire sees itself as a legitimate government with a task at a hand, and the "ancient religion" of the Jedi and Dark Jedi had its day, but should get out of the way for the consummate military professionals and political leaders with their shiny new superweapons and ships.
Superweapons and ships which were "nothing compared to the power of the Force".

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>>14519085
Technically, Bane is still canon. He just looks like this now.

>>14567730
Bane was always canon. He was created by Lucas directly and mentioned in the AoTC or RoTS novelizations as well, which even with the old EU continuity references remain canon in the reboot Disney continuity.

>>14567730
I guess they're really pushing the Samurai thing