Force Vs. Magic.

[Xondoure]

The Light Side of the Force is another thing that bothers me. The Force is a pure concept of the unity of life. The Dark side is being selfish and careless with it. A Light Side is really just silly.

Edit: Or in other words, balance is what the "light side" is all about. So when the Light Side is maintained the Force has balance, because that's the central concept.

[snoopy13a]

The Light Side of the Force is another thing that bothers me. The Force is a pure concept of the unity of life. The Dark side is being selfish and careless with it. A Light Side is really just silly.

Edit: Or in other words, balance is what the "light side" is all about. So when the Light Side is maintained the Force has balance, because that's the central concept.

Isn't the Light Side simply an EU creation. I think Yoda and Ben simply refer to "the Force." "The dark side" is implied as the perversion of the Force. So, I think you're basically right.

Also, at the end of the Return of the Jedi, Luke and Leia are the only known people who can use the Force, and neither has fallen to the dark side. So, Anakin does bring balance to the Force, albeit not in the way the Jedi Council had hoped.

[Philistine]

That's what Lucas claims now, anyway. But the first time that was even hinted at as Lucas's intention was in the DVD commentary on the PT - it's not established on-screen. Remember all the WTFing about the prophecy in TPM? Nobody knew why "bringing balance to the Force" was something the Jedi would want to do, given that there were many "light side" Jedi and a maximum of two "dark side" Sith.

ETA: And of course, the fact of a "Dark Side" necessarily implies there's another Side that's not Dark. Which would be Light. It's not an unreasonable assumption.

[Xondoure]

That's what Lucas claims now, anyway. But the first time that was even hinted at as Lucas's intention was in the DVD commentary on the PT, though - it's not established on-screen. Remember all the WTFing about the prophecy in TPM? Nobody knew why "bringing balance to the Force" was something the Jedi would want to do, given that there were many "light side" Jedi and a maximum of two "dark side" Sith.

ETA: And of course, the fact of a "Dark" side necessarily implies there's another side that's not Dark. Which would be Light.

Darkness is the lack of light. But in this case I think the intention was that the dark side was the lack of balance and unity between living things.

[Philistine]

The problem is that logically there cannot be a "Dark Side" unless there's also a "Light Side." Because whatever else the alternative to the "Dark Side" may be, it is necessarily Lighter than the Dark, and it is a Side of the totality rather than the totality itself because it does not include the Dark.

Fundamentally, the problem is Lucas trying to have it both ways. He created a setting with an explicit Good and Evil dualism - the characters are even color-coded so you can tell which are which just by looking! - in the tradition of the old pulp serials, and then retroactively trying to cram a fistful of non-dualistic Eastern philosophy into it. But you just can't get to a non-dualistic place after you've explicitly, canonically identified the Dark Side with Evil.

[Traab]

The Light Side of the Force is another thing that bothers me. The Force is a pure concept of the unity of life. The Dark side is being selfish and careless with it. A Light Side is really just silly.

Its like the light side and the dark side of electricity imo. A man made distinction that honestly doesnt exist. Sure I could use electricity to light and heat homes, provide entertainment to the masses, or I could use it to torture bunny rabbits and set fire to kittens, but electricity is neither good nor evil, its how I use it.

[Devonix]

One thing that bugs me with cannon is how some people will say one thing is cannon, and another thing is non cannon.


Why don't they just accept them both as cannon, just seperate ones.

EU is cannon for EU discussions

Movies are cannon for movie discussion.

[Soras Teva Gee]

I don't agree that Lucas "has to" have read Zahn's novels. I'd certainly say he should have, since he (or at least, his agents) approved it as the First Official Star Wars Fiction in about a decade. And I'd also say it would have been useful for him to have done so, since it might have given him some feel for what his audience thought about the OT/expected from the PT (things like "in a binary-morality setting like SW, of course the Dark Side of The Force is balanced by a Light Side - so talking about 'bringing balance to the Force' is not going to be well received" or "obviously the Clone Wars involved the Galactic Republic fighting desperately to hold off the endlessly-replenished forces of Eeeevil Cloners") - if nothing else, so he could make it clear that the was intentionally subverting those expectations instead of appearing to blunder.

But. Lucas in interviews has been extremely dismissive of the EU. He's made it clear that as far as he's is concerned, only the material he creates is Real Star Wars. I think it's unfortunate, and that this attitude does a disservice to everyone involved - including Lucas himself - but at the end of the day, it is his IP.

You know I don't think its nessecarily as dismissive as it seems on the surface. I would not be surprised to learn that when the Thrawn Trilogy was being plotted, licensed, and so forth that at some point Zahn or a go between actually asked Lucas for a some basic bullet points on the timing, sides, and so forth.

The real problem is that Lucas changes his mind. A lot. Who here thinks Anakin Skywalker sounded like a teenager when Ben Kenobi is talking about him in SW? Qui-gon Jinn anyone? So anything Lucas might have said behind the scenes in the late 80s he probably had a "better" idea for when it came to actually making the prequels. He never learned to stop revising his own damn material, and doesn't have anyone to stop him from doing so because he has complete control.

And Lucas himself also only seems to barely ever acknowledge that he's written himself into a whole. I'm rather surprised Jimmy Smits made the final cut of RotS, he's really only there because oh-wait Leia has to end up on Alderaan at the end so we get this ineffectual guy running around for an 1/8th of the movie accomplishing little.

Course he can't exactly admit this so he has to pooh-pooh the EU he allowed in the first place because it made him money and drummed up interest for the Special Editions/Prequels.

[Jayngfet]

I don't agree that Lucas "has to" have read Zahn's novels. I'd certainly say he should have, since he (or at least, his agents) approved it as the First Official Star Wars Fiction in about a decade. And I'd also say it would have been useful for him to have done so, since it might have given him some feel for what his audience thought about the OT/expected from the PT (things like "in a binary-morality setting like SW, of course the Dark Side of The Force is balanced by a Light Side - so talking about 'bringing balance to the Force' is not going to be well received" or "obviously the Clone Wars involved the Galactic Republic fighting desperately to hold off the endlessly-replenished forces of Eeeevil Cloners") - if nothing else, so he could make it clear that the was intentionally subverting those expectations instead of appearing to blunder.

But. Lucas in interviews has been extremely dismissive of the EU. He's made it clear that as far as he's is concerned, only the material he creates is Real Star Wars. I think it's unfortunate, and that this attitude does a disservice to everyone involved - including Lucas himself - but at the end of the day, it is his IP.

Even in being dismissive Lucas has shown to have at least a working understanding of Zahn's OC's and plots. I mean even by TPM it'd become a cornerstone that's important for a lot of EU stuff. He can be dismissive but he certainly isn't ignorant. There's a big difference between saying something isn't important enough to take seriously and isn't important enough to even look at on this scale.

Also, on the "Light Side" argument, I find the main problem to be that "Light Side" is an extremely stupid name for it. That's really the main issue here I think.

[Philistine]

But what else would you call it, once ANH established that Dark Side=Evil? "Light Side" is the logical, natural oppositional force (heh) to "Dark Side."

[Tiki Snakes]

But what else would you call it, once ANH established that Dark Side=Evil? "Light Side" is the logical, natural oppositional force (heh) to "Dark Side."

The Dark side is not the opposite of the force, it is a distortion, a perversion of it. (Keyed to what would otherwise be negative but natural emotions etc).
It makes the Force assymetrical and unbalanced by existing, hanging off one side of it as it does. Therefor, removing the darkside of the force from the equation brings balance to the force.

Except not, cause that's all just my own headcanon but you get the idea.

[Soras Teva Gee]

I've always considered the Dark/Light side division more of a doctrine then a feature of the Force itself. Which by description should be a rather neutral force. This isn't to say its not real division and Jedi and Sith are just competing sects, but that the Dark Side is more about the user, who can only use certain aspects of the Force safely. There's more then a few cases of Light-sided users with Dark side elements, Mace Windu for example, its just that tapping into elements like anger and aggression are inherently more dangerous to the user. Doing so would safely actually be more complex then normal Jedi use, but doing so quickly is the nature of it creating a feedback loop that gives us our Sith jerkassery.

tl:dr The Light-side is a proscribed pharmaceutical taken according to directions, the Dark-side is an illegal drug, the Force is Chemistry.

[Kyberwulf]

Okay, this is a good thread so far. I just wanted to ask, WHY do Wizards(it doesn't matter what setting) get the benifits of instaporting around the field and flying. Even if the setting doesn't warrent it. I am sure that wizafans would even make some convaluted way for Harry Dresden to do these feats.

[Soras Teva Gee]

Okay, this is a good thread so far. I just wanted to ask, WHY do Wizards(it doesn't matter what setting) get the benifits of instaporting around the field and flying. Even if the setting doesn't warrent it. I am sure that wizafans would even make some convaluted way for Harry Dresden to do these feats.

Because those are much more common to the magical settings. I'd hazard that even most settings have one or both availible to them. Well teleportation in a "shortening of the way" sense, actual tactical teleportation is pretty rare. Flight though goes back to myths and traditions like the flying carpet or Baba Yaga scooting around on a mortar curdling milk and knocking down churches just from flying overhead.

And the Dresdenverse totally supports flight mechanically. It would hardly be convoluted at all, use magic to apply a force greater then gravity's pull. Harry himself has tried it and uses force magic routinely. What keep wizards in the Dresdenverse a ground-pounders is that they don't ignore the potential complications, especially for learning to fly. Harry as we all know weak in fine control, and that's what flying requires. Which is why when he tried to learn how to fly he ended up crashing, or so he says. I suspect there was also burning involved.

Also flying is much less useful when anybody can have a gun.

[Kyberwulf]

Okay, another thing I wanted pointed it out, is the whole magic makes you immune to the force. Take for instance, the wizard flying around. It has been stated that a jedi would just have to Force pull them down. The counter arugument is that the wizard would just have to throw up a shield or just fly away.

I don't think it would work this way. Insofar as that the force isn't like wind or gravity working against you. Its your very atoms working against you. I don't think the shields wrap themselves around them and protects against them.

[Fragenstein]

Okay, another thing I wanted pointed it out, is the whole magic makes you immune to the force. Take for instance, the wizard flying around. It has been stated that a jedi would just have to Force pull them down. The counter arugument is that the wizard would just have to throw up a shield or just fly away.

One of the stated conditions of the Vader vs. Voldemort thread was that magic and the force were analogous. That meant force powers could be treated as spells in the Potterverse and spells could be treated as force powers in the counter.

Force TK was assumed to exert an energetic field to do the actual manipulating, which made it vulnerable to the numerous ways wizards had of deflecting such things. I can't say this is always going to be the case.

[Maxios]

One of the stated conditions of the Vader vs. Voldemort thread was that magic and the force were analogous. That meant force powers could be treated as spells in the Potterverse and spells could be treated as force powers in the counter.

Force TK was assumed to exert an energetic field to do the actual manipulating, which made it vulnerable to the numerous ways wizards had of deflecting such things. I can't say this is always going to be the case.

Yeah, I think Vader would win that fight.

[Xondoure]

Yeah, I think Vader would win that fight.

I'm of the opposite opinion. Too bad the thread is dead (except not cause it had started to run in circles.)

[Kyberwulf]

You say they where suppose to be analogous. That to me, suggests if the force creates a fire type effect, that the Wizards could have a defense against it. If the Wizards threw a Fire type spell, The force users could use the Absobtion ability. The agreed upon Analogous was put into effect so that it would just degrade into a, This spell.. Deflected, this power... deflected. Instead the whole Base source of the Force user is removed, and is turned into a weakened wizard of some type.

[Fragenstein]

You say they where suppose to be analogous. That to me, suggests if the force creates a fire type effect, that the Wizards could have a defense against it. If the Wizards threw a Fire type spell, The force users could use the Absobtion ability. The agreed upon Analogous was put into effect so that it would just degrade into a, This spell.. Deflected, this power... deflected. Instead the whole Base source of the Force user is removed, and is turned into a weakened wizard of some type.

Force Absorption had become a major point of contention. A wizard is able to set up wards and protective spells that act as magical force fields surrounding their entire bodies that require no further concentration.

Force users seem to be more limited in that they have to focus on the power being negated. A protected wizard is free to engage their opponent in many many ways. A Force user might devote most of their attention towards their own defenses.

Spells also don't have to be issued as points of slow moving energy like blaster attacks. Wizards, including Voldemort, can produce 'area effect' and other indirect attacks. It's possible that Vader wouldn't be able to Force absorb a fiery wave that came at him, silently, from behind.

Plus Vader can't teleport or teleport in reinforcements. He still loses.

This isn't thread necromancy, is it? Because, when you look at it, there's another power wizards have over force users.

[Kyberwulf]

That is one of my points I am trying to make. The force is in everything. Even inside that protective bubble. It could still be manipulated. Saying that the force has to obay laws of Magic, without Magic having to worry about anything of the force?

Btw, I didn't bring up any spacific person vs person. I am asking how the two abilities should interact.

[Flickerdart]

That is one of my points I am trying to make. The force is in everything. Even inside that protective bubble. It could still be manipulated. Saying that the force has to obay laws of Magic, without Magic having to worry about anything of the force?

Btw, I didn't bring up any spacific person vs person. I am asking how the two abilities should interact.

The Force might be in everything, but that doesn't mean you can use it in that way. If there were 5 million safes, and the wizard was locked in one of them, it doesn't matter if you know the combination to the other 4,999,999. Since defenses canonically exist against Force techniques, it is foolish to argue that the Force can penetrate protection like that.

[Fragenstein]

That is one of my points I am trying to make. The force is in everything. Even inside that protective bubble. It could still be manipulated. Saying that the force has to obay laws of Magic, without Magic having to worry about anything of the force?

That is an interesting observation, however. It takes the concept of the Force comprising a universal totality and makes it literal. The Force isn't just an energy field that obeys the Einstein/Planck defined rules of light-speed-transmission, but rather it's a subspace unity where the Force element within me is the same as the Force element within you.

No, not the same as. It would be the same. The Force presence in me is the literal same force element within you.

That means by manipulating the Force in my immediate vicinity, I can instantly produce changes in the Force of your vicinity. That would bypass any intervening barriers even on a quantum level because the entire sub-universe would operate by laws governed by sympathetic magic.

Force user would certainly have the edge if that were true. But then, why the need for light sabers or other trappings if the Force could truly be manipulated on such a fundamental level?

Actually, it would be more than a fundamental level. It would provide the very firmament of the fundamental level of the universe.

Btw, I didn't bring up any spacific person vs person. I am asking how the two abilities should interact.

Don't matter. That debate was epic.

[Soras Teva Gee]

The Force might be in everything, but that doesn't mean you can use it in that way. If there were 5 million safes, and the wizard was locked in one of them, it doesn't matter if you know the combination to the other 4,999,999.

Umm not really.

The point being made is that when Jedi move something with the Force it is implied sometimes (Yoda and the X-Wing would one exampl) they aren't say gathering a bunch of energy and exerting it, but actually willing the object itself to move.

So a shield is completely meaningless because there's conceptually nothing to be blocked because nothing has to cross it in the first place. A wall means nothing when there are as many invaders inside it as outside it.

To your example the Jedi would not need to know any combination since they would will the mechanics of the locks to move and open.

Mind you I don't know that that is how the Force is conceived to work in this context.

[Traab]

Umm not really.

The point being made is that when Jedi move something with the Force it is implied sometimes (Yoda and the X-Wing would one exampl) they aren't say gathering a bunch of energy and exerting it, but actually willing the object itself to move.

So a shield is completely meaningless because there's conceptually nothing to be blocked because nothing has to cross it in the first place. A wall means nothing when there are as many invaders inside it as outside it.

To your example the Jedi would not need to know any combination since they would will the mechanics of the locks to move and open.

Mind you I don't know that that is how the Force is conceived to work in this context.

On the other hand, that implies that a jedi could take control over something that was created by the wizards will and power. Sort of like taking over another jedis force jump to make him plant his skull into the ceiling. Thats why, for simplicities sake, we made them equivalent, so neither one has an intrinsic power over the other, or immunity. So a wizard cant stand there with a protego and yawn as the force user cant do squat against it, or a wizard wont find his own spells turned against him because the jedi is able to manipulate the energy that binds everything together and so he took control of the spell from the wizard.

[Flickerdart]

So a shield is completely meaningless because there's conceptually nothing to be blocked because nothing has to cross it in the first place. A wall means nothing when there are as many invaders inside it as outside it.

Except there are a ton of defensive techniques in the Force, so this cannot be true.

[Fragenstein]

Except there are a ton of defensive techniques in the Force, so this cannot be true.

Unless Force based defenses become a contest of wills as to who can effect the the greater change. Midicholorians become the medium through which we communicate our intentions to the force. The greater that communication, the more powerful a person becomes in manipulating the force.

A direct attack becomes an attempt to alter the force in harming a target, while the target attempts to defend themselves through a counter manipulation.

Force Lightning would cease to be a direct projection of Force energy itself and, instead, become actual electrical currents stimulated by manipulation of this Force conceived sub-space unity.

If magic is then limited to, at best, quantum level communications then it's going to be at a disadvantage. But then, as Traab said, they would cease to become analogies.

So it's still an interesting concept outside of the VvsV debate...

[Kyberwulf]

I know people want to reference Other threads like that. I don't mind a reference to them in passing, or to be use as examples. However I am NOT looking to ressurect any threads or versus battles. I wanted to open a thread to discuss why certain things are seen a certain way.

The need for Lightsabers is three-fold. For the Jedi its so they don't use the force itself to Harm living creatures. That I think we can agree on is a perversion off the force.
Having a Weapon that can cut threw most things is a great utility tool. :P
Lastly, I think when facing an opponent with similar powers and abilities it helps to have something to fall back on.

[Traab]

I know people want to reference Other threads like that. I don't mind a reference to them in passing, or to be use as examples. However I am NOT looking to ressurect any threads or versus battles. I wanted to open a thread to discuss why certain things are seen a certain way.

The need for Lightsabers is three-fold. For the Jedi its so they don't use the force itself to Harm living creatures. That I think we can agree on is a perversion off the force.
Having a Weapon that can cut threw most things is a great utility tool. :P
Lastly, I think when facing an opponent with similar powers and abilities it helps to have something to fall back on.

Heh, for some reason I thought vegan when I read the line about not using the force to hurt people. Sort of, how many degrees removed from directly using the force to harm someone makes it ok? I mean, with a saber you are using the force to speed your movements, to see a few seconds ahead and adjust your line of attack, to keep from cutting off your own limbs by mistake, etc. You are still using the force to kill someone, its just not being used to directly break the persons neck, but does that really make it ok?

[Kyberwulf]

I think they would still be Analogies... Cuase fire for fire .. Lightning for lightning, Energy for Energy. Just because Wizards don't have the same kind of power source as Force Users, that shouldn't mean you cut off the source of force Users power or contrive it into something Wizards have defenses already set up in place.

I don't remember which thread, but people where saying that Jedi's should be like a spellsword, or some other thing. If they where put into D&D. That got me thinking, what happen to using Psions as a reference. To take it further, there was a d20 Star Wars RPG you could use.