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Darth Vader (cs_zoltan) vs Darth Plagueis (Aurbere)

cs_zoltan

By cs_zoltan
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cs_zoltan

cs_zoltan

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Force Power

 

 

Darth Plagueis is a powerhouse, no question about that. You could count on one hand how many mortal force users are more powerful than him overall. Vader is not one of them, still I'll show you why it won't matter. Duels involve a heck lot more than just raw power, and while in that department Vader is Plagueis inferior, he more than makes up for it in other areas.

 

Control vs Control

 

In combat related Control powers the only thing Plagueis might be superior to Vader is endurance. With his midiclorian manipulation he could heal almost any injury, and he could even almost shrug off TPM Sidious' lightning. During the Maladian attack he suffered serious injuries yet he could keep on fighting.

Vader is no slouch either. He could will himself back to life, survive impalement, explosions. And he could use healing to support his damaged body.

 

In short, they are both tanks. While Plagueis likely has better healing, Vader has the help of his armor, making him more durable and it also contains chemicals. Also being half cyborg means losing a limb would be just an annoyance, not a serious injury.

 

In terms of speed all Plagueis has is the generic "blur" and dodging high number of blaster shots. In contrast Vader has the better teleporting feats. He appeared to teleport to Ferus Olin who has his own teleporting feat, while the later was amped. He also marked Vader superior to every jedi bar Yoda. That would include Mace Windu and Obi-Wan Kenobi as well. The former could punch Kar Vastor 6 times before he could react on a dark side nexus while injured, being described as his speed was invisible, while Vastor's was "only" blinding. And Kenobi could deflect blaster fire from an army of droids (similar level of feat to Plagueis' dodge feats), and appeared to teleport to Dooku.

And this was all shortly after Vader's transition into his suit, before 24 years of improvement. By RotJ he's likely a lot faster than that. Which should suggest that despite Plagueis vast raw power, Vader is faster.

 

Regarding strength Plagueis in a weakened state could crush skulls, break through armor, and with a single kick he could break spines. Vader similarly while weakened could shatter a crystalline pillar. The weight of a dozen man couldn't even move him. With his opening strike he jarred TFU Galen's entire arm and almost disarmed him with it.

 

While it's speculative who is actually stronger, since we haven't seen the full extent of Plagueis augmentation, Vader's strength should be more prominent based on his fighting style.

 

Sense vs Sense

 

Well there's not much to say here. The only relevant part is precog, which neither combatant has a lots of feats of, or accolades. Vader could predict Starkiller's Juyo in their second duel, Starkiller being immensely powerful and fast and Juyo being random and unpredictable makes it really impressive. But we can't really presume that Plagueis couldn't replicate that feat, so this part is pretty irrelevant.

 

Alter vs Alter

 

Vader's most prominent display of power comes in the form of TK. Since he was unable to use lightning he diverted all his attention to TK mastery.

In this field Plagueis' best feat is in a weakened state he could practically atomize Maladian assassins. But this is something Vader matched. 18 years before his prime Vader could disintegrate Lyleks equally casually. Lyleks are not only way bigger than Maladians, but they have blaster resistent armored carapace. Since he went through several noted power growth after this occured, it should make up for Plagueis' injuries and mark him as the superior TK wielder.

 

Vader could also lift and crush an AT-AT before his prime, collapse a cathedral while injured and being pre-prime. He also demonstrated precision by catching ships mid-flight, crushing a jedi's hearth, and telekinetically assaulting Luke Skywalker.

 

Alter vs Control

 

While determining who can lift the bigger rock (or in this case who can atomize the bigger rock), is all nice and well, it's more important how it translates into combat scenario. More importantly against another force user.

 

Lightning vs Vader: Plagueis has potent force lightning, as expected of someone of his tier. But how effective would be against Vader? Well I'm gona assume in this instance that Vader didn't manage to block it with his saber, that'd be too easy.

Lots of people assume that Vader has a weakness to lightning, because of his death and the fact that he has mechanical parts. Well this is wrong.

Vader's armor is actually an asset, not a weakness. His armor is insulated against lightning, this is something Vader likely upgrades every time he can, as noted in TFU II, when he upgraded his armor only a few days after Starkiller's escape. When Vader's armor gives up he is in a pretty bad shape, true. But he is likely in a better shape than someone who would've had to tank the same amount of lightning that ruined his suit. And even then he can sustain himself with the Force, at least up to 3 days as he demonstrated before.

And his death to RotJ Sidious is hardly a low showing. RotJ Sidious has the second most powerful lightning that Vader could encounter in a mtachup (behind DE Sidious), and it's something that any mortal Force User could die to (except Luke). Case in point Plagueis himself died to Sidious' lightning, which was a weaker incarnation of him than the one Vader died to. And while Plagueis wasn't in top shape, neither was Vader. He felt weaker than ever before because of his duel with Luke.

 

TK vs Plagueis: The only instance I recall when Plagueis was dominated was against TPM Sidious' lightning, so I'll focus on Vader here. Vader could telekinetically dominate Starkiller, demonstrated by him gripping Starkiller and hurling him aside without any evident strain. This is impressive when you consider how powerful Starkiller is.

A less powerful incarnation of Starkiller could tank TFU Sidious' lightning (which is superior to TPM Sidious'), and he himself has feats of dominating force users. The original on his second mission in TFU almost oneshotted Kazdan Paratus, who was said to be far more powerful than him (which was obviously not true, but demonstrates a lot of power if someone would make that claim). And he obliterated his own force sensitive clones. This might be even more impressive than either of the combatant's atomizing feat, since they were force sensitive.

Overall while Vader likely won't oneshot Plagueis, or flat out ragdoll him, he can break his defense now and then, either gaining the upperhand or even injure him to some extent.

 

 

Dueling

 

 

Well now Plagueis is in trouble. He has like one feat and one accolade. He was called a master duelist, and beaten a guy who knew his style in and out. One could argue that his place in the RoT would mean he is close to Sidious as a duelist, but let's not forget how much more powerful Sidious is than him, his dueling skills could be just as gaping. On the other hand Vader is approaching RotS Sidious tier as a duelist.

 

Vader is foremost a duelist, most often than not he engages his opponents with his lightsaber. He's an unparalleled duelist of his time with a bunch of impressive accolades and feats under his belt.

 

Before his suit he was the master of Form V Djem So, sitting between Dooku and Yoda skill-wise. Post suit he had to alter his style drastically and had to get used to the suit. At ANH he was called a shadow of his former self, yet still an unparalleled duelist. He defeated Ben Kenobi who was even then a formidable Soresu master. After ANH he improved considerably, being described as a far more formidable foe on Bespin than on the Death Star. And he reached his prime in RotJ.

 

He developed his own unique style, that incorporated every form (except Vaapad) built around Djem So. His defense was impenetrable to Starkiller, and his offense was dominating.

 

By RotJ he was likely close to his pre-suit self, meaning he was a Yoda tier duelist. Which is beyond Plagueis' paygrade.

 

 

Miscellaneous

 

 

Experience

 

Another area where Plagueis is lacking. As part of the RoT he had to stay hidden, his only duels with force sensitives can be counted on one hand. Vader on the hand has planty of experince with force users or otherwise. He spent a decade "adventuring" as Kenobi's padawan, fought in the biggest war the galaxy has ever seen, spent 20 years executing the Great Jedi Purge, and in his last 4 years he fought the Rebellion. He fought numerous powerful force users and great duelists, such as Ventress, Savage, Dooku, Kenobi, Cin Drallig, Galen, Luke. In short ever since he left Tatooine he was in constant fighting, which gives him a lot of experience.

 

Vader got burned a lot (no pun intended) over the years, and he learnt from all of them. Every defeat made him better. By RotJ he has such a vast amount of comabt experience that Plagueis would be hard pressed to surprise him or exploit any weakness.

 

Arena

 

Partly due to his experience, and partly due to his superior TK Vader can exploit the setting pretty well. There are plenty of objects to throw around. TIE fighters, droids, equipments. Vader demonstrated in-combat TK that he incorporated into his lightsaber sequence several times, like in his duel with Galen and Luke. Because of that, and his Sokan experience, I believe he can exploit the arena better than Plagueis could.

 

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