Lit Jedi/Sith artillerists

Jedi and Sith are best known to either fight with a lightsaber on the ground or as starfighter pilots in space, starfighters not being artillery for the purposes of this question.
Here tanks can be regarded as mobile artillery. Were there Jedi/Sith whose primary combat specialty was artillery (e.g. missile launchers, turbolaser turrets)?
One would suspect Jedi/Sith artillerists to be more common in the old Sith Wars (1000-5000 BBY) than in the Clone Wars or in the Yuuzhan Vong/One Sith eras.

 

I'm sure they would be useful in that role but don't you think that would be waste of their talents. Firing of blaster fire at a distance and not leading/fighting in the front?

 

The Jedi are not military.

 

At least in the old Sith Wars there were Jedi/Sith capital-ship captains, and more often (or more centrally featured) admirals. Plus I find it difficult to fathom the large-scale Jedi-Sith ground confrontations of the old Sith Wars eras to be devoid of artillery.

Darth Bane isn't per se an artillerist but he did make innovative use of ordnance (7th Ruusan).

 

While the Jedi and Sith have taken on Army/Navy commissions in various conflicts, their roles have typically been as generalists responsible for overall strategy and command rather than any specialist duties. Interestingly the novel Knight Errant, set during the Republic Dark Age, features a mercenary artillerist who finds ready employment from the various Sith Lords of the region precisely because his skill set is so niche. Although a Jedi or a Sith artillerist is an interesting concept, an extremely specialist, high skill role such as that would require a lot of time spent reskilling, when they already have the skills to perform other military functions and have non-Force-sensitive experts available anyway.

 

Jedi/Sith Aces were equally high-skill specialists who would take just as long to re-skill. That said, I do not expect a whole lot of Jedi/Sith artillerists, or even Jedi/Sith as artillery commanders, and them being presumably a rare commodity would have rendered such people a valuable component of any Jedi/Sith-centric army. That's why they would have been interesting to either RP with or to write about.

But perhaps, who knows, such-and-such Jedi/Sith naval officer became mid-level from the gunnery ranks... just that I'm not sure whether there were any. Force-users seemed to be much more abundant on the battlefields of the Republic Dark Age than they were in later periods, and Jedi of that era were probably less likely to just be handed commands the way they were during the Clone Wars, army or navy.

I could have imagined a Padawan starting out a Republic Dark Age-era naval career as a gunner, and in later stages of said Padawan's career, earn the command of a capital ship that Padawan served on (perhaps by knighting time), the land equivalent being beginning a career as an artillerist and then earning mid-level army commands with battlefield gallantry, courage and other stuff that would reward, well, anyone doing such.

 

Well, their is such thing as mounted lightsaber combat, which is different http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Mounted_lightsaber_combat

 

I'd argue that while Jedi aces are indeed specialists, Force-sensitivity lends itself more towards better piloting due to heightened reflexes. That's an innate ability, as opposed to one developed over a long period of training and experience. Assembling and disassembling heavy artillery pieces, determing range, understanding the various types of ordnance, etc. is something you'd have to undergo training for, even if the Force may be helpful in that regard.

That said, the answer to your question is really dependent on why you're asking it in the first place. If it's just simple academic curiosity, then no, it hasn't been depicted or hinted at in any sources that I'm aware of. If you're asking because it's a concept you want to write or RP about, although no sources have had Jedi/Sith artillerists, there also haven't been any that flat out deny that they exist or rule out the possibility. There are a lot of things that have never been mentioned to exist in Star Wars that easily could if someone chose to write about them. I'd imagine that it's never come up before because no authors have ever considered or needed to write about it, since it's so niche.

 

The problem is you're looking at this question from the wrong perspective. Could a Jedi have also been an artillerist? Sure, maybe. Is it likely this was an area of Jedi skill? Not at all, given the overarching Jedi philosophy towards war and violence - a Jedi likely would not have specialized in largescale weapons of war because they're antithetical to Jedi training.

A Jedi who can also cook is not necessarily a Jedi Chef.

 

Makes about as much sense as a Jedi flamethrowerist (specializing in burning infantry alive), or a Jedi chemical weaponist (specializes in the creation and use of chemical weapons), a Jedi grenadier (just lobs grenades at people), or a Jedi kill-everyone-with-a-nuclear-bombist.

Hi, I'm Jedi Master Nuke. I specialize in wholesale destruction. You must feel the explosion flowing through you.

Hi, I'm Jedi Master of Artillery. May the windage be with you.


I think a Sith artillerist would be equally silly. It seems rather beneath their ambitions.

The answer is no.

A non-Force using artillerist in the Sith army, a Sith trooper, sure.

 

Palpatine was a Sith artillerist. He had the Galaxy Gun!

 

Knights are not military? And yes, for much of their history the Jedi were or acted as one. Compared to the twenty five thousand years of Galactic History, the thousand years following the Ruusan Reformations barely count.

 

Less "military" and more "police force". Sometimes aristocracy - in the time before the Ruusan Reformations, Jedi Lords were basically aristocratic rulers of planets.

 

We saw a jedi with bow and arrows in the Jedi vs Sith comic if I remember right.

 

Maybe a redone version would have the plasma bow used in TCW by the Nightsisters?

 

Bows and arrows and the equivalent aren't artillery though, not big enough. You could say though that every time a force user uses the force to launch large objects as makeshift missiles, they are using the force as an artillery piece. The kind of thing Starkiller does in TFU.

 

Kit Fisto in the Genndy CW series, seemed to be able to create armor-shattering "balls of air" underwater - which he used like he was a cannon.

http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Battle_of_Mon_Calamari_(Clone_Wars)

 

Yes just like that! That is force artillery!

 

If this is the reason for the OP's question, or if anybody else is inspired to do something like that do I suggest looking into some of the stuff Craftsmasons & Artificers can do In MAGE: the Sorcerers Crusade RPG for inspiration.

 

But are there Jedi military police? Are there Jedi human resource specialists? Are there Jedi CBRN specialists? ARE THERE JEDI TANK MECHANICS? ARE THERE JEDI PARACHUTE RIGGERS?


GUYS ARE THERE JEDI CHAPLAINS IN THE JEDI ARMY?

 

Explicitly and emphatically not. The opposite, if there can be such a thing.

Never. They fought alongside the military a number of times, though, and in the Clone Wars were given positions in the military that they did not want and that many of them bristled against.

 

Hahaha those were the dumbest things to come out of TCW. Bows that shoot lightsaber blades. It's just so godawful that it's funny.