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It always seems that the Sith have the upper hand against the Jedi, even though since the 'Rule of Two', there are only two Sith and countless Jedi. So is the dark side of the Force stronger than the light?

Or is it due to the fact that the dark side is more chaotic and aggressive, so it's more useful in battle?

Also by stronger I mean, as in battles and overall use of the force during duels.

Null
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    No, no, no. Quicker, easier, more seductive. – bitmask Dec 12 '14 at 16:20
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    "Yes they are" - Emperor Palpatine. – Valorum Dec 12 '14 at 16:22
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    How are you going to measure strength here? In some duels, Sith defeat the Jedi. In others, the Jedi win. Clearly, there is no inherent "stronger", even in battles. – phantom42 Dec 12 '14 at 16:29
  • Jedi have crushed Sith lots of times. – user931 Dec 12 '14 at 16:43
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    Given the conflicting results in the duels throughout the Star Wars universe I think this is ultimately going to boil down to opinion. Jedi have defeated Sith -- even strong ones -- many times but Sith have defeated Jedi -- again, even strong ones -- many times as well. VTC as opinion-based. – Null Dec 12 '14 at 16:45
  • i would say that since the jedi ultimately win in the end over and over again, they have the slight advantage. – Himarm Dec 12 '14 at 17:52
  • The Sith have been extinct for a millenium... - The Jedi believed the Sith were extinct... They got sloppy, meanwhile the Sith kept increasing their strength while hidding... So in the timeline of the movies, the Sith are stronger... But it hasn't been always like this... – LcSalazar Dec 12 '14 at 18:13
  • @Himarm - Well, the Sith won at the end of Episode 3. The Jedi at the end of Episode 6. Sounds like a tie. – Oldcat Dec 12 '14 at 19:27
  • @Oldcat the jedi had just been in power for over 1000 years by the time episode 1 happens, and the sith take over for a mere 30-40 years, followed by a resurgence of the jedi. it has been on and off between jedi and sith control over the last 100k years, however the jedi from my count has had control the longest. – Himarm Dec 12 '14 at 19:40
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    That's what the Jedi thought. Having the Sith running the Senate kind of leads you think you might doubt their credibility. – Oldcat Dec 12 '14 at 19:42
  • @Himarm Technically yes, the Jedi controlled for over a thousand years. BUT, the Sith planned everything that happened starting with Darth Plagiues (excuse the spelling). The Sith had it all planned out. So were the Jedi Really in control? – Roberto Medrano Dec 12 '14 at 19:44
  • @Oldcat you beat me to it lol – Roberto Medrano Dec 12 '14 at 19:45
  • @RobertoMedrano my point is that was a 100ish year old scheme(happening during the 1000 years of peace), that got the sith back in power for about 40 years, at which point vader and dark sidous die, and the sith are again out of power. – Himarm Dec 12 '14 at 19:47
  • Plus Black is a better color than a dirty beige. Uniforms tell the tale. – Oldcat Dec 12 '14 at 19:47
  • @Himarm - but are they? Aren't there zillions of Sith baddies in the Extended Universe, one for each story? Won't their be a few in the new movies to sell toys and wield red light-sabers with hand guards? – Oldcat Dec 12 '14 at 19:49
  • and if you look at the history during the old republic stuff, the sith had been in hiding for thousands of years(before showing up with a massive fleet taking over most of the universe only to be defeated eventually by the jedi to then go into hiding for thousands of years) – Himarm Dec 12 '14 at 19:49
  • arguably the biggest weakness of the sith is their lack of trust, towards eachother, they typically undermine their own schemes to further personal goals, and kill rivals ect. so at the end of the day a sith run organization will never stand up against a jedi org for the long haul. darth plaguos learned the secret of cheating death, instead of learning it from his master, sidous kills him. wups. the emporer was killing luke, basically securing their victory for the forseeable future, only to have vader kill him. every time man. – Himarm Dec 12 '14 at 19:52
  • This is in no way opinion based, and is quite precisely answered for pre-ANH (preqiel era) Jedi and Sith in ROTS novelization by Yoda. – DVK-on-Ahch-To Dec 12 '14 at 20:46
  • @Himarm The Jedi Order had been around for ~25,000 years by the time The Phantom Menace took place. So saying "over 1,000 years" is a bit misleading. – TylerH Dec 15 '14 at 19:21
  • @TylerH during much of that time was a constant persist war between the sith and jedi, which the galaxy split down the middle, such as the stories that encompass the old republic. however, as of about 1000 years ago the sith rule of 2 went into effect i believe ( aka the sith were crushingly defeated) and the jedi have enjoyed almost uninterupted peace from the sith. – Himarm Dec 15 '14 at 19:50
  • @bitmask True. When I think of Palpatine, I think seductive. Mmmmmmmmhmm. Especially post-lightning. – corsiKa Jan 14 '15 at 18:50
  • @corsiKa: I find your lack of quotes-knowledge disturbing. – bitmask Jan 14 '15 at 19:15

1 Answers1

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The reason the Dark Side tends to appear stronger has two reasons. In the old trilogy, we first see Obi-Wan duel Vader. Obi-Wan loses (intentionally) but I would find it difficult to argue who has the upper hand. The more interesting are the other duels, which are always fought by Luke on the light side. Luke has a lot less training than Vader and is no match for the Emperor. This has purely skill reasons, he just never had the chance to practice lightsaber dueling and was regarding the Emperor, well he just didn't expect that.

So it looks like the light side is weaker because of a sampling error. We just don't see enough fights between Jedi and Dark Side practitioners.

This of course set the expectation of what a fight should look like and in an attempt to exploit the old trilogy for its nostalgia as much as possible, Lucas made the new films continue on the same line.

Meat Trademark
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  • And the prequels? A handful of Sith killed almost all members of the Jedi Order and took over the galaxy. – Null Dec 12 '14 at 16:34
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    @Null To be fair, it was two Sith and an entire army of Clone Troopers versus the Jedi, with the bonus of having the element of surprise. – phantom42 Dec 12 '14 at 16:36
  • @Null: I covered the prequels in the last paragraph. – bitmask Dec 12 '14 at 16:37
  • Yes but the Jedi didnt see it coming, because Sidious was able to mask the powers of the dark side with the force. – Roberto Medrano Dec 12 '14 at 16:37
  • Sidious used "bad-plot-writing-excuse-card #78" – bitmask Dec 12 '14 at 16:38
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    Yoda also lost against Palpatine. – user931 Dec 12 '14 at 16:38
  • @phantom42 Correct, but the movies make it clear that the dark side is clouding the vision of the Jedi, which allowed the Sith to deceive them. It's a meta-strength of the dark side, so to speak, so arguably the Sith are stronger than the Jedi by that metric. – Null Dec 12 '14 at 16:40
  • @bitmask I don't think you covered much of the prequels there. There are a lot of duels in the prequels between Jedi and Sith of varying levels of training. Maul defeated a Jedi Master but lost to a Padawan, for example. Sidious the Sith Master defeated the Jedi Master Yoda. How do these outcomes tell us which side is stronger? – Null Dec 12 '14 at 16:42
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    @SachinShekhar And since the two were the leaders of the Jedi and Sith, respectively, one could argue from that outcome that the Sith are stronger. – Null Dec 12 '14 at 16:43
  • Also yoda was far past his prime, while his force abilities where powerful his body was starting to become old and frail, we see he dies of basically old age about 30 years later. while mace windu, a jedi in his prime did best palpatine in a saber fight. – Himarm Dec 12 '14 at 17:49
  • @RobertoMedrano another key point, is that being only 2 sith, its much easier to mask their presence since it wasn't large. and their really isnt anything to compare this too, as the jedi numbered in the 100s and why would they try to mask their presence. – Himarm Dec 12 '14 at 17:51
  • @Null If one Sith, working part time, can cloud the minds of the entire Jedi order and block their access to the force across the whole galaxy, this kind of implies the Sith are stronger. Then Palpy used the rest of his time to work the Senate, train a series of apprentices, bamboozle Jar-Jar.... – Oldcat Dec 12 '14 at 19:45
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    @Himarm - it's still debatable whether or not Palpatine intentionally lost against Windu in that instance. After all, his potential death is what finally pushed Anakin over the fence, and after that he pretty handily defeated Windu with little effort. – Omegacron Dec 12 '14 at 20:08
  • @Omegacron yes though windu had just lost his hand and saber and was basically blasted out of a window not exactly a crushing defeat by palpatine, more like simply pushing someone out of a window. – Himarm Dec 12 '14 at 20:21
  • @Oldcat I don't think bamboozling Jar-Jar took that much effort. And if the Galactic Senate was anything like real-life legislatures, they spent most of their time not working. – KSmarts Dec 12 '14 at 20:32
  • @Oldcat, Why cloud the minds of hundreds of people when you can just put a metaphorical invisibility cloak over yourself and your student? The latter seems like it would be a lot easier. – Brian S Dec 12 '14 at 20:44
  • Didn't Palpatine do both? Did the Jedi ever detect a Sith or one of his apprentices until they whipped out a red light saber? – Oldcat Dec 12 '14 at 21:41
  • @Null, Maul fought against two Jedis at the same time and had killed the first and defeated (by sport standards) the second. – Gill Bates Dec 27 '15 at 12:31