Luke Skywalker vs Viun Galaan: context and circumstances

The fight at the end of the novel fate of the jedi: backlash is one of the most discussed one in the community and commonly brought up to praise Kyle Katarn and Kyp Durron, since Luke states they are equal to a sith lord who was able to compete with him. But did Galaan truly contend with Luke? If he did, that would easily place him as a top tier, given how powerful Luke is. In this blog I will analyze the fight itself ,and the circumstances sourrounding it in order to draw a conclusion. 

Brief analysis of the fight itself 

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First of all, here is the entire fight ( at least the part where Luke is involved in, since there are other sequences where it is told from Ben’s, Vestara’s or Dyon’s point of view) : 

Luke and Gaalan hurtled together, green lightsaber blade crashing on red, a blow that would have thrown any two lesser Force-users back half a dozen meters, but the two of them were unmoved. The female Sith beside Gaalan struck at Luke, but he merely adjusted the angle of his blade against Gaalan's to catch her attack. Luke kicked, forcing the woman back; she fell, rolling into a backward somersault and coming up on her feet.

[…]
Gaalan struck at Luke, high, low, a series of subtle and sophisticated blows that would have bewildered any lesser duelist. He was good; Luke gave him that. He might have been a match for an expert swordsmaster such as Kyp or Kyle Katarn. He would have been too much for a comparatively diffident duelist such as Cilghal, or even Luke as he had been back at Sinkhole Station, at low ebb in physical and mental strength.
But Luke, despite recent exertions, had had time to recover. He parried each of Gaalan's blows, and his ripostes-his blade skittering off Gaalan's and thrusting now at the Sith Lord's face, now at shoulder or knee or torso-came increasingly close to touching flesh.
Luke smiled at the man.
Backlash

1. After an epic exchange of words, Each combatant draws his lightsaber: Luke initially engages Galaan in a contest of strength, so great that it would have “thrown any two lesser force users back half a dozen meters”. As such, we can immediately see that Galaan is quite skilled with physical augmentation, since he could generate enough strength to send a “lesser force user” flying several meters, which is rather rare. Furthermore, the book uses the word “ any” , which points to anyone below Luke and Galaan
   
   
2. After this,a sith woman accompanying Galaan comes to his aid. Unlike Galaan, Luke dismisses her casually with a single kick, unlike Galaan, whom he appears to have some difficulty with. 
   
   
3. Luke and Galaan continue their duel: Luke praises his opponent, who is attacking him with quite “sophisticated blows”, and even goes as far as to say that he would have beaten him had Luke been as he was on sinkhole station. This is particularly impressive since that version of Luke ( while extremely tired) was able to defeat a team of 15 Sith (link) , including the likes of Olaris Rhea and Vestara Khai.
   
   
4. Despite this, Luke quickly starts pressuring Galaan, to the point where his lightsaber comes “increasingly close to touching flesh” . Realizing Luke’s superiority, Galaan decides to flee. Although Luke attempts to hold his ship with the force, Galaan menages to counter Luke’s power and escape (link) . 
   
   

Overall, the duel is not very long, and it’s clear to me that Luke is above Galaan by a fair margin. Having said that, Galaan clearly appears to be contending with Luke. 

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Another element that tends to be forgotten when this fight is discussed are the the circumstances surrounding it.

1. First of all, Dathomir, even in legends, is confirmed  in various sources, such as empire at war, to be a dark side nexus ( link). This would mean that Galaan was operating beyond his normal power, but it would’ve also hindered Luke since, as we have seen on numerous occasions, such as Yoda on vjun and Luke/Jaina on Dromund Kaas( link) dark side nexuses are capable of weakening a light-side force user. This would mean Luke,unlike his opponent, was at a disadvantage. 
   
   
2. Secondly, although the book states that Luke had had time to recover, I do believe he was still a bit tired after his experiences in the maw. In fact Luke fought the nightsisters during his stay on Dathomir ( link). Furthermore the description in the book points to Luke having recovered only in part. 
   

 

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An argument commonly used to address Luke’s apparent “low showings “ is that he tends to hold back his full power even when in the most desperate situations, fearing the repercussions it could have on him and everyone around him. However, although this is true in regards to Luke during the new Jedi order era, in fact he admits that in TUF ( link), legacy era Luke appears to be far more willing to use his full power than before. In fact , in the novel Inferno Jaina states that she probably had only seen a fraction of Luke’s power ( link). Yet in that same book, not much later, Luke, in an awe inspiring display of power, ruthlessly pins Caedus to his chair (link), leaving the young Sith visibly surprised and scared. This is obviously speculation,but I believe the author( Troy Denning ) purposely used Jaina’s statement as a hint at what Luke was going to do. And that is not an isolated instance: later he uses the force to crush Caedus’s starfighter( link) and it is stated that Jacen “got an idea of just how much power Luke could muster “, which further hints at Luke using a good portion, if not all, of his power. Obviously he didn’t kill Caedus because he cared about him, but that would not be the case with Galaan. Furthermore, the essential readers companion confirms that Luke and Ben where looking for more informations about the Lost Tribe, which is why they followed Vestara on Dathomir (Link). In that situation, it wouldn’t have made sense for Luke to hold back when he had a chance to learn more about those sith. Overall, although it is impossible to confirm with absolute certainty whether or not Luke was holding back or not, indications are that he wasn’t. 

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@The Ellimist

You might want to consider taking him on as your disciple

LOTL wrote:@The Ellimist

You might want to consider taking him on as your disciple

Why? 
Edit: oh I see now. I’m not good at formatting, especially on this new forum. I hope you enjoyed my blog nonetheless.

I made a few adjustments, now it should be fine

Nice work.

Pretty convincing.

mastercilghal wrote:

LOTL wrote:@The Ellimist

You might want to consider taking him on as your disciple

Why? 
Edit: oh I see now. I’m not good at formatting, especially on this new forum. I hope you enjoyed my blog nonetheless.

No, he's the go to NJO expert. You seem to be pretty interested in that,

It was a joke

Good job

@LadyKulvax @goat @LOTL thank you all.

Nice.

DC77 wrote:Nice.

Thank you. 
NJO for the win 

Nice work, though there are few things you might want to further elaborate on:

1. I think you should pay more attention to this part:

Fate of the Jedi: Backlash wrote:Gaalan struck at Luke, high, low, a series of subtle and sophisticated blows that would have bewildered any lesser duelist. He was good; Luke gave him that. He might have been a match for an expert swordsmaster such as Kyp or Kyle Katarn.

"Any lesser duelist" points to anyone below Luke (which is like 95% of the franchise). And yet Luke considered Gaalan as someone who only "might have been a match" (not would have been) for Kyp or Kyle, suggesting that the skill gap between Luke and Kyp/Kyle might be lesser than we previously thought.

2. I would like to see more examples specifically describing Dathomir as a dark side nexus. As far as I know, Empire at War is the only description of this kind. Most of those I've encountered describe Dathomir simply as a world which "atmosphere seems to crackle with life energy" (The Essential Atlas), "strong in life energy" (The Essential Guide to Planets and Moons), et. cet. We also need to take into account that majority of the Witches of Dathomir are either lightsiders or of neutral alignment, and the fact that Luke established Jedi Praxeum there. Plus, unlike with Dromund Kaas, neither Luke nor the narrator didn't really comment on Dathomir's influence on Luke's Force powers (unless I missed something).

3. I think you really should include Vestara's point of view in your analysis. There's an important part:

Fate of the Jedi: Backlash wrote:Vestara took her lightsaber in hand and ran, her speed boosted by the Force.

One Sith Saber was down, dead. This still should have been a lopsided match, Gaalan matching Luke, the first female Saber matching Ben, the second Saber overmatching Dyon and almost killing the Jedi washout instantly.

But Dyon was proving hard to kill.

Since Dyon was the only one who exceeded Vestara's expectations, it means that (from her perspective) Gaalan did match Luke long enough for Ben and Dyon to deal with their respective oponnents. The fact that she witnessed Luke's skills first hand on the Sinkhole Station makes her a credible source.

4. Gaalan's ability to contend with Luke is further reinforced by the fact he managed to counter Luke's TK:

Fate of the Jedi: Backlash wrote:Luke reached after it, a clear exertion of telekinetic Force power, then dropped his hand. He looked rueful. "He's countering my power." 

Thank you, but take into account i no longer agree with many of the things I said in this blog. For instance, I don’t think Galaan was matching Luke. Darish Vol, a far more powerful force user than a Galaan by scaling, is stated to possess, at best, much of Luke’s power so i don’t think there’s any reason to believe Luke was being serious with him (which is reinforced by his smile) and him later saying, in apocalypse, that Korelei was the first sith who actually worried him. As for the nexus, I think it is actually mentioned in the book, but that I’ll have to check out.

@MasterCilghal : really good post. This continue to rise the NJO era

Changed the name to make it more... interesting