Exar Kun and Ulic-Qel Droma vs Darth Bane and Darth Zannah

Master Azronger wrote:@lorenzo.r.2nd @Sith Archivist Bane does move a moon in the short story Bane of the Sith (or rather, plans to, as he deemed his powers great enough to play with  planets like tennis balls) but it predates the actual Darth Bane trilogy in which those events are retconned.

It's never said he actually moves the moon. He considers it but that's it.

Kun solos

Ulic shit qel droma solos.

RhoyneDelta wrote:PoD Bane was well-read enough in the sith texts that Darth Andeddus holocron was considered basic in comparison,

Given Exar Kun instantaneously absorbed the full knowledge of Freedon Nadd. Which made him immediately 'super-powerful'. Andeddu hasn't got shit.

RhoyneDelta wrote:yet amulets and trinkets were considered negligible amps compared to his power,

Given Darth Sidious, infinitely beyond Bane, is 'restless' per his own words[Book of Sith] knowing that major amulets still remain to be found. It's likely that Bane just found junk stuff.

RhoyneDelta wrote:scaling way above one of the "worst monsters to ever rise from the darkside of the force" who dominated thousands of highly trained siths minds

Sounds okay. Ajunta Pall enthralled the entire Sith species which at the time had an entire culture based on highly advanced Sith sorcery. The most basic requirement of which was willpower. Then the Exiles breed with those Sith and for two thousand years they breed out weakness and breed in raw power in the Force. That's when we get the likes of Naga Sadow who Freedon Nadd was far more powerful than before he murdered him and spent the next century growing much stronger. Then after all that Nadd ends up being subservient to Marka Ragnos on the Sith spirit council which is led by Ragnos himself.

Then we get Exar Kun as of the duel with Ulic who has supplanted Nadd's power, is bestowed Ragnos' spiritual power upon being crowned Dark Lord of the Sith and all sorts of different major growths before we get to the final battle of Yavin IV and Exar Kun drains thousands of Massassi to increase his power. At which point he's far more powerful than Ood Bnar, who was a match for Ossus Kun who wiped out Vodo and Odan, who were both more powerful than Thon who whilst suffering near-death exhaustion contains the greatest accumulation of dark side power ever on Jedi record which would include everything Freedon Nadd ever did on Onderon. And Kun is also declared the GOAT Sith more than once at this point.

Yeah, scaling over Kaan ain't gonna cut it.

RhoyneDelta wrote:and whose underlings were awing Kyle Katarn,

They awed Kyle in the context of Sith rituals who would yes be a comparative novice next to them in such applications of Sith magic.

RhoyneDelta wrote:dominating Ka'sim who was "Maybe the greatest swordsman ever."

Emphasis on maybe.

RhoyneDelta wrote:before nearly immediately getting a "master killed" amp and decades of growth on top of that, scaling above the devestation of Umbria,

Simply not true. PoD Bane(which is the one she's experiencing) is never compared to Ambria favorably. It's stated his raw power is unlike anything she's felt before. Which on the surface might seem like it's saying Bane > Ambria ritual but it isn't. And we know it isn't because Zannah manipulates energy purely drawn from Ambria itself and Bane's literally defenseless.

RhoyneDelta wrote:post-prime nearly managing to dominate Zannah (a person with greater potential than his own) with Essence Transfer something considered extremely difficult by Palpatine and Valkorion.

Which he as you said fail to accomplish. Meanwhile Exar Kun after having his power extinguished by a wall of light summoned by the combined powers of Nomi, Thon, Cay, Sylvar and 'all the known Jedi' in an 'unprecedented' gathering. Then spending 4,000 years going 'half-mad'. Is simultaneously capable of binding the spirit of Luke Skywalker and outright possessing Kyp Durron who despite having his raw power at its full might couldn't resist him despite being across the galaxy. Which Kyp himself then admits wouldn't matter. Such was the strength of Kun's grip on him.

RhoyneDelta wrote:Named as one of Palpatines most powerful predecessors in Book of Sith.

So was Sorzus Syn.

RhoyneDelta wrote:Outdueling Zannah who can foresee and analyse countless scenarios simultanously.

That's something even the likes of Brianna the Handmaiden can do.

RhoyneDelta wrote:A prodigy who actually got to refine and hone his talents for decades unlike Exar, smarter and more controlled than him as well.

Kun didn't need decades. He was legendarily masterful over Sith alchemy in ways Bane and Zannah combined couldn't dream of replicating. He had totally mastered sorcery in ways that the entire Banite line never knew anything about as shown when JA Luke who had learned everything Darth Vader knew who had full access to the entire Banite archive for decades.... was absolutely and completely defenseless against Exar Kun's sorcery.

RhoyneDelta wrote:Even while super-weakened and post-prime could still wrap himself in a lightsaber save cocoon in a split-second

Pretty sure Lord Scourge can do that, in another Karpyshyn novel, but cool.

RhoyneDelta wrote:and has great lightning feats like ashing a giant drexl, after just having maintained a huge protection bubble strong enough to tank atmospheric reentry for a prolonged period of time, early on into his career.

Lightning bursts from the excess energies of Freedon Nadd's tomb could ash full Sith Masters of the Triumvirate, one of the strongest collections of Sith ever in the entire mythos.

RhoyneDelta wrote:While post-prime Bane could still Soresu the rain away, Ood Bnar a scholar who did not even care about saber fighting and was not rooted into the planets power yet, briefly matched Exar, not long before his downfall.

He didn't briefly match Exar whatsoever. Kun came in smiling at him and the narrator straight up says he couldn't have stopped Kun in combat.

@RhoyneDelta wrote:PoD Bane was well-read enough in the sith texts that Darth Andeddus holocron was considered basic in comparison,

Given Exar Kun instantaneously absorbed the full knowledge of Freedon Nadd. Which made him immediately 'super-powerful'. Andeddu hasn't got shit.

@RhoyneDelta wrote:yet amulets and trinkets were considered negligible amps compared to his power,

Given Darth Sidious, infinitely beyond Bane, is 'restless' per his own words[Book of Sith] knowing that major amulets still remain to be found. It's likely that Bane just found junk stuff.

I think you missed the point why I brought up Andeddu, it's completely irrelevant if Bane only found junk, because he was still more knowledgeable than Andeddu and so perfectly aware of ancient sith artefacts. Sidious being restless is nice, but so what maybe he is a dedicated collector or he did not want other people to cause a ruckus with an artifact, after all his vison of the empire was one of a efficient, cohesive empire. Whats funny is that we actually know that Sidious Reborn was  specifically searching for one  of Kaans amulets to help regain strength, which also survived getting sucked into a wormhole, (it was implanted into Vaders glove which got sucked into a spontaneous wormhole created by the second Deathstars explosion) so if you go by Sidious you must think Kaan is impressive and again Bane passed him at the start of his career. (https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/Glove_of_Darth_Vader)

There is also further evidence against the amulets being shit given that Lord Odion existed not long before Banes time and he threatened to conquer the galaxy pretty much just with one sith artefact his helm which allowed him to control countless subjects across the galaxy. Later Kaan compelled thousands of highly trained sith from across the galaxy a feat similar to one which was used to hype up Krayt Reborn after his ressurection. Meanwhile Exar often gets credit for messing with some scanning technicians on Cinnagar lol

Vong Krayt also thought Bane still might have worthwhile information and politely asked the guardian of Banes holocron to give it to him, instead of just ripping the information from him, implying he would not have been able to do so easily.

Plus Exar and many of his deeds were really well-known during Banes time (even when Bane was a third-world miner he knew about Exars flashy entrance on Coruscant) and Dooku thought the contents of Darth Andeddus holocron were amazing.

Lady wrote:Sounds okay. Ajunta Pall enthralled the entire Sith species which at the time had an entire culture based on highly advanced Sith sorcery. The most basic requirement of which was willpower. Then the Exiles breed with those Sith and for two thousand years they breed out weakness and breed in raw power in the Force. That's when we get the likes of Naga Sadow who Freedon Nadd was far more powerful than before he murdered him and spent the next century growing much stronger. Then after all that Nadd ends up being subservient to Marka Ragnos on the Sith spirit council which is led by Ragnos himself.

Then we get Exar Kun as of the duel with Ulic who has supplanted Nadd's power, is bestowed Ragnos' spiritual power upon being crowned Dark Lord of the Sith and all sorts of different major growths before we get to the final battle of Yavin IV and Exar Kun drains thousands of Massassi to increase his power. At which point he's far more powerful than Ood Bnar, who was a match for Ossus Kun who wiped out Vodo and Odan, who were both more powerful than Thon who whilst suffering near-death exhaustion contains the greatest accumulation of dark side power ever on Jedi record which would include everything Freedon Nadd ever did on Onderon. And Kun is also declared the GOAT Sith more than once at this point.

Yeah, scaling over Kaan ain't gonna cut it.

Ajunta Pall enthralling the sith species is irrelevant since we know that he worked with Sorzus Syn, Romulus Dreypa, Xo Xaan and Karness Muur together and schemed extensively to overthrow the sith leader and be revered as gods, there is no implication of the massive telepathic feets Kaan accomplished and we know that even after enthralling them the exiles were still heavily impressed by a lot of the ancient sith adavancements and techniques. Of course without willpower he would not have accomplished this but so what. Also if you wanna discount Kyle Katarn you also have to admit that the ancient sith Pall comquered having sick rituals does not necessarily translate to their power directly. It's like saying Cortes witht he help of his followers enthralled the aztecs despite them having a very advanced astronomy knowledge and accounting system. (which this is argueably inspired by what with the whole siths having pyramids and human sacrifices, making them think the foreign invaders are divine thing, with the help of local myths) Plus most of the sith species is just drones and workers. Also Andeddu was part of the later generation whose power and knowledge had grown and was still considered basic shit even by PoD Bane standards.

I was under the impression that when speaking of Exar we are not talking about his featless ghost form-post-Massassi draining which got immediately squashed down again. Also that version had his powers multiplied by a circumstancial amp from the Yavin pyramid, Dorsk 81 mentioned the pyramid was a major factor of why he could grab and push a fleet of 16 stardestroyers in orbit, before his oneness amp, where he shoved them to the other side of the end of the solar system. Anyway I am speaking under the assumption that we are dealing with prime-human Exar.

Lady

@RhoyneDelta wrote:dominating Ka'sim who was "Maybe the greatest swordsman ever."

Emphasis on maybe.

If you are maybe the greatest of all time that heavily implies you are a contender or at least not vastly below the best of all time.The sentence would not have been included for no reason.

Lady wrote:

@RhoyneDelta wrote:post-prime nearly managing to dominate Zannah (a person with greater potential than his own) with Essence Transfer something considered extremely difficult by Palpatine and Valkorion.

Which he as you said fail to accomplish.

Post-prime Bane failed in dominating Zannah, but he came extremely close as seen by her inheriting his twitch and that was despite Bane having to concentrate despite the insane pain from Zannahs tendrills which was more extreme than getting cooked inside orbalisks trying to kill him. So not only could he have well-succeeded under different circumstances, but it's also notable that he managed to close the distance towards Zannah. With Zannah focussing purely on the tendrills it's perfectly likely that Bane could have killed her and won the duel, but he was just so injured by the tendrills that he wanted a replacement body. Palpatine did not even dare attempt to take over DE Luke and Valkorion was not confident in dominating the outlander. His willpower was such that he was the sith spirit chosen to tempt Yoda the greatest jedi in TCW.

Plus even a total mental/willpower midget compared to Bane, namely Kopecz actually had a pretty insane pain tolerance/willpower feat in his last stand.

Exar also had the advantage that a saber staff was extremely novel and almost unheard of during his time, but Bane is extremely faimiliar with saber staff, even unusual ones. Exar was a pioneer but the downside is that he would be nowhere near as sophisticated or trained with it as Ka'sim.

Lady wrote:

@RhoyneDelta wrote:Named as one of Palpatines most powerful predecessors in Book of Sith.

So was Sorzus Syn.

Yeah and she was also pretty damn badass, while she served under Ajunta we know that she was working on an amulet twice as strong as the Muur talisman so it is perfectly possible for her to have blazed past him, after all she was the one who immerse herself into the darkside knowledge of the ancient sith after the conquering. She also escapes a couple of superiority quotes saying "strongest lord of the sith since such and such" by virtue of being a Lady of the Sith. Sidious might have counted the creatures she created and commanded, including leviathans, as part of her power which would make it totally understandable for her to be listed here, after all even some of her relatively early creations are still extremely important in any era, like the Muur talisman.

Some say the Exiles are trash because they are sub-Star Forge level, but it is to be noted that they fell to the darkside in part because of the Star Map (which is indeed way below the Star Forge) but that was also many, many years before their prime. Plus the Star Forge even brought down the Rakatans who have feats against the Ones and such. The guy who managed to control the Star Forge, Malak, is also in one source stated to be stronger than Exar and while he did lose against Revan if his end is any indication he was significantly conflicted during the fight, facing his old mentor whom he still wanted to reach out to and whom he always had a inferiority complex towards after Revan had just stolen his hot sith apprentice Bastilla from him and was powered by the power of love. Plus KOTOR 2 has taught us that just because the hero/video game protagonist won against the final boss, after a long gauntlet of challenges, does not mean he was more powerful after all Traya was still more powerful than the Exile.

Furthermore it's logical to assume that Palpatine estimate would be more reliable the closer a figure is too him on a timeline and the less ancient it is so even if Sorzus was somewhat of a misplacement that does not mean Bane is.

Lady wrote:Simply not true. PoD Bane(which is the one she's experiencing) is never compared to Ambria favorably. It's stated his raw power is unlike anything she's felt before. Which on the surface might seem like it's saying Bane > Ambria ritual but it isn't.

Maybe it is though, if you are so quick to disregard quotes I don't see why I should even care about Plagueis musings of the ancient sith being better. Maybe Banes assumption that even though the ancient sith could do more large-scale shit he was comparable to them in other areas was true and Plagueis was false, after all a lot of knowledge was lost with Gravid and even if Plagueis is generally more knowledgeable and smart everyone makes mistakes, notably Plagueis thinking he is too smart for Banes RoT and then falling to it. Anyway Bane was post-prime when he fought Zannah and just because it is mentioned that she drew from the power in the ground does not mean she did not add her own power or used sith sorcery to transmute that power into a more dangerous form, her darkside tendrills could also fully disintegrated her opponent while Exar blasting Luke with his could not finish him off or damage his body. Plus it is unknown if the energies that lay dormant had not grown stronger over time or otherwise changed, simply put PoD Bane is above the cataclysm.

Lady wrote:

@RhoyneDelta wrote:A prodigy who actually got to refine and hone his talents for decades unlike Exar, smarter and more controlled than him as well.

Kun didn't need decades. He was legendarily masterful over Sith alchemy in ways Bane and Zannah combined couldn't dream of replicating. He had totally mastered sorcery in ways that the entire Banite line never knew anything about as shown when JA Luke who had learned everything Darth Vader knew who had full access to the entire Banite archive for decades.... was absolutely and completely defenseless against Exar Kun's sorcery.

Darth Vader having access to all of Sidious knowledge is dubious, plus a lot was lost with Gravid. In I Jedi it is also described that Lukes spirit and connection to the force is compromised because he is reeling from almost going fully to the darkside in DE, it's explored in that scene where Corran Horn beats up JA Luke in a serious sparring match. JA Kun could also feed upon Gantoris, Streen, Kyp and the nexus. Lukes body and spirit being seperated was due to the combo attack with Kyp and his vast potential used to it's fullest by Exar on top of the power multiplying pyramid against a Luke that had fallen into despair, far moreso than when he was beaten by Corran (inb4 just sparring, yes he held back tk, but they were both heated and very serious during the exchange), operating at 1% willpower and unwilling to use his darkside knowledge. it's not implied to be something that Exar has to permanently invest power in to maintain.

Kun being declared the GOAT does not cap future sith below him and even then a lot of the quotes seem to moreso apply to his era. He contolled Kyp because Kyp was stumbling into the darkside with no control over his emotions, no knowledge or training in resisting anything and he embraced Exars influence at times.

Lady wrote:

@RhoyneDelta wrote:While post-prime Bane could still Soresu the rain away, Ood Bnar a scholar who did not even care about saber fighting and was not rooted into the planets power yet, briefly matched Exar, not long before his downfall.

He didn't briefly match Exar whatsoever. Kun came in smiling at him and the narrator straight up says he couldn't have stopped Kun in combat.

Ood Bnar did match Exar on-panel sure he did not have a chance at stopping him, but he could contend. Post-primes rain feat  is still a better saber feat then Exar needing time to defeat some scholar who does not even care for saber combat.

Lady wrote:

@RhoyneDelta wrote:Even while super-weakened and post-prime could still wrap himself in a lightsaber save cocoon in a split-second

Pretty sure Lord Scourge can do that, in another Karpyshyn novel, but cool.

I legit don't remember Scourge doing that, but okay, post-prime Bane was still extremely exhausted (having plotted routes through hyperspace, wrestled with Andeddus spirit, then fought assassins and got drugged, poisoned and tortured beforehand, plus he had to constantly spam his force powers since he did not have a saber and previously created dozens of force signatures, tore through durasteel doors, got slammed hard against the tunnel and so forth) when he did it and it sent Zannah catapulting far in the other direction. We see that even against a comparable opponent, with countless negative factors working against him, Bane can still manage to content well.

Lady wrote:

@RhoyneDelta wrote:and has great lightning feats like ashing a giant drexl, after just having maintained a huge protection bubble strong enough to tank atmospheric reentry for a prolonged period of time, early on into his career.

Lightning bursts from the excess energies of Freedon Nadd's tomb could ash full Sith Masters of the Triumvirate, one of the strongest collections of Sith ever in the entire mythos.

Even a strong sith master is typically easier to ash than a giant five-metre long drexl who naturally has a far higher resistance and who simply has many, many times more mass that you have to ash and again this was vastly pre-prime Bane and after he just put up a giant protection bubble for an extended period of time (while also dominating the drexl mentally), which was strong enough to tank entry into the atmosphere. Space is treated as a serious issue in Star Wars you rarely see force users float around in space for long times and then just land on another planet. We also know that Anderson the author that invented Exar intended Bane to have godlike power to where he could shove around moons and such.

Lady wrote:

@RhoyneDelta wrote:Outdueling Zannah who can foresee and analyse countless scenarios simultanously.

That's something even the likes of Brianna the Handmaiden can do.

Brianna was also a echani with echani training, precog was her specialty and it allowed her to content with Atriss a far stronger combatant, while DoE Bane quickly outdueled DoE Zannah a opponent of comparable power, who had specifically tailored her style for defense and against Bane. I also don't remember it being mentioned that Brianna could analyse so many scenarios at once.

The greatest Jedi duelist of Banes time Raskta Lsu, who killed hundreds of sith lords, was also echani and even while battle-meditated and while being aided by battle-meditated Valenthyn Farfalla and batttle-meditated Johun Othone they could not overpower ROT Bane who is slower and a worse duelist than DoE Bane, who is considerably below Prime Bane.

Lady wrote:Kun didn't need decades. He was legendarily masterful over Sith alchemy in ways Bane and Zannah combined couldn't dream of replicating.

With the temple of Lehon Bane also has a better telekinetic feat at the start of his career than Exar has period, as far as I know his best is raising a ship, possibly over the course of days and with help from machines or stuff like that. After the temple it's also remarked that Bane can deal with orbital attacks. Also even if Exar was the greater prodigy (which I am not convinced of), Bane was still insanely talented, blazing past everyone, being implied to be the legendary Sith'ari which many previous generations of sith going back all the way to the pre-Exiles sith were making a huge deal out of and so forth so if his prodigal talent was even close his decades of growth should superceed Exar growth. (although Exar using lightning for the first time is depicted as a few sparks in the pictures of galactic record, while Bane summoned a huge lightning storm with his first try in the academy)

This is especially with some of their early feats almost mirroring each other like growing reckless for more power after besting their rivals (although Bane could never get hurt by Sirrak like Sylvar did to Kun), dealing with loads of Tukata in the search for knowledge, slaying their mentor and ultimate duelist of the time (although I admit Exars defeat of Vodo is a bit more impressive, with freezing the senat and all) and so forth. Exar grew considerably but he still used trickery to beat Vodo and was sweating heavily in their rematch, of course he had the senate under a spell, but saying that Coruscant Exar would no diff Vodo whom he was previously relative to does not seem to be true, Exars growth is exaggerated at times. Other feats of his also are not super impressive like pushing Sylvar down briefly, without serious consequence, when later even forceless Ulic can hold off a raging Sylvar. A bookworm scholar contending for a time with sabers is consistent with that.

DoE wrote:Through the dark side he had access to near-infinite power.

Star Wars Fact File: Issue #85 wrote:Darth Bane. The most powerful sith lord for centuries. (This is as of 1000 BBY meaning PoD Bane)

Consider how according to fact File PoD Bane is the most powerful sith for centuries, implying it took the RoT many generations to surpass PoD Bane, but even if you read it as "in centuries" it's still damn impressive for pre-prime Bane.

I think I have made it pretty clear that I consider Bane to be considerably stronger, but even if he were not I would still trust in his ability to punch above his weight by virtue of his consistent cunning, use of the environment, extreme saber skill, monstrous willpower and pain resistance, as well as his ability to feed of the opponents emotions which he displayed to a considerable extent even before becoming conscious of his connection to the force and I think it is notable that Nadds spirit bullied Exar into truly falling while Bane embraced the darkside like almost no other.

I also wanna briefly mention just how far DoE Bane was beyond his prime, which is so far that he thought it made Zannah unworthy to be his successor period, after consistently being in awe at her potential and after investing decades into her, she let him grow too weak to the point where he felt it necessary to ditch her and his motor functions were actually decaying with an uncontrollable twitch, all of these things are far more than we get  a lot of times when someone is said to be somewhat beyond their prime.

George Lucas, the highest source of canon, always considered Bane to be a extremely powerful sith to the point where Bane's spirit was originally intended to be  a corrupting influence on the Son, in the Mortis arc. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HeluyPSnDQc ) while those scenes were ultimatively not included into the episodes this was not because of Lucas changing his mind about Bane, but merely him and Filoni disliking the concept of sith spirits. Since Lucas is the highest canon and everything else is according to the canon system merely a interpretation of his work, but I doubt people are gonna discount all sith spirit related feats and scaling (especially not Exar fans lol) so with the reason why he was not included being bullshit to the people of the forums there is no reason to doubt that Bane was considered top tier in Lucas mind, meanwhile he never seemed to care about Exar. If someone were to be  a Lucas pureist even better than that would result in all sith spirit scaling for Exar falling away.

Drew Karpeyhsyn wrote:As much as I loved writing about all-powerful Sith [Darth Bane & Vitiate] and Jedi [Revan]

Drew Karpeyshyn wrote:Unlike Revan or Bane, he isn’t one of the most powerful individuals in the universe.

Both George Lucas and Drew Karpeyshyn also present Bane and Revan as peers so if someone were to care about their opinions and has Revan above Exar, then they should also have Bane above Exar. Even Sidious holds Banes powers in considerable regard in the Book of Sith vowing to be it's last recipient he is not saying something like "the spark Bane started turned into a inferno that I will make good use of" or anything that implies a huge increase of power. Bane's power is still considered significant even at the end of the Rule of Two line, with the growth not being as massive as some claim, might have something to do with Bane being well-post-prime when he died, loads of knowledge getting lost with Gravid or the fact that Darth geans potential was reduced by her losing half her bio-mass, which Plagueis disagrees with but word of god and word of canon from George Lucas states otherwise. This also fits with Anderson holding Bane in extremely high regard, the Fact File entry, Ka'sim being possible the GOAT swordsmen, scaling from Kaan and his amulet, Banes extreme feats of telekinesis and swordsplay and so forth.

Sorry, having technical difficulties editing this thing, I am pretty technically illiterate. I also could not help but add a few additional arguments.

You can respond to specific snippets with the function. Would me it easier for me. Thanks.

Bane and Zannah probably die.

Exar solos

@LadyKulvax

Sorry originally I just wanted to edit the quotes better, but I ended up getting carried away and heavily expanding the post and know it's a way more elaborate case for why Bane beats Exar. I hope you did not perhaps already start a reply and know it does not fit or something like that, I originally intended to make it less work for you, but I think I might have done the opposite.