Saberfighting -- Force or skill?

The fourth one is evil. Just trust me. It's evil.

ARa
(Sniffling, sick and studying Latin today...)

 

this is off topic but is ther a reference thread for the EU lit forum, im looking for something but need that to find it

 

For the person who said Kyle has experience of 1000 years or something like that... Methos has been fighting with swords for 5000 years. So experience isn't the question here...

Ara
(Immie-wannabe, Isard-wannabe, PoL-wannabe..

 

Oh, we don't know, but Tal could of been reincarnation of a some previous jedi, . For all we know he hails back to one of the first jedi, .

 

I disagree with the "muscle memory" thing. Do I believe it's possible for one's muscles to in effect memorize moves and such? Yes. But not to the extent that they can pick out the proper defense to counter a certain move. I believe that certain things become a sub-conscious memory. In otherwords, you get to know them so well that you don't think about what needs to be done to do them. They just become automatic. Such as playing the drums or pedaling a bike.

What do you need to do to pedal a bike, aside from getting on and putting your feet on the pedals. Well, basically it would seem a lot like walking. In a sense, you're pumping your legs up and down in a circular motion. Muscles will remember this, true. But it takes a sub-conscious message from the brain to tell them what to do.

You can loose your memory, yet I don't think that you ever truely loose it. I think that it gets locked away in some part of the brain and remains there. But to loose any memory merely means, in my POV, that we loose the connection in the brain that allows us access. Folks can temporarily loose their memeory and after a time they get it back. So their brain manages to reconnect the links to those memories. Permanant memory lose, whether total or partial, would mean that the brain is unable, for whatever the reason, to reconnect the links with that memory.

Yet the sub-conscious would seem, in this POV, to be able to access things that the conscious can not. This would allow someone to do things that they have no memory of learning when they loose their memory. I think that's more what happens in terms of Vos being able to fight when he can't remember how to. Consciously, he has know idea how he does what he does. But sub-consciously, he taps into the memories that the conscious mind can not.

 

60% force 40% skill.

 

I'm not sure that percentage works that well when one considers that Ulic is still very good with a lightsaber when he is blocked from being able to use the Force.

 

90% force 10% skill. hte force quickens you makes you move faster makes you stronger. the skill only makes you able to do more moves and helps you keep your opponent off balence.

also force helps you to read an enemies minde anticipate his moves. this is why i think that jedi are really great hand to hand fighters. if they punch you they could knock you through a wall.

 

Absolutely both.

An example of "Force" would be Jacen vs. Anakin in Vector Prime. It stated that even though Anakin practiced more with the saber, Jacen beat him because he was more in tune with the Force.

More specifically, RAS used the words "at peace" with the Force to describe Jacen. As Gandolf already points out, there is also a time for skill; which remarkably, Jacen also exemplifies in Balance Point.

 

As I said once already, the percentage thing just doesn't seem to work as well when presented with the case of someone (Ulic Qel Droma) who has been blinded to the Force and still proves to be an excellent duelist with a lightsaber.

 

I'm tempted to lean towards both, like most of the thread has been. However, more skill and less Force can be equal to more Force and less skill. On the one hand, you may have extreme sword skill, but very little Force to guide it. On the other hand, you may have a great amount of Force power, but not enough skill to pull off enough techniques. It's better to have an equal amount of both, like Darth Maul and Darth Vader had.

However, skill is a very important factor. I don't doubt that a normal swordsman could defeat a Jedi- this is clear with the Yuuzhan Vong bit. When I look at a lightsaber fight, it's a lot more than just slash, stab, block, counterslash, dodge, slash, stab. Samurai in Japan were trained to draw and slash all in one movement (iaijutsu/battoujutsu). Applied to a lightsaber, that would be extremely deadly and very creative, and might catch even a Jedi off guard. Now, although a Jedi could rely on his Force senses to fight a Force-blind opponent, that wouldn't always work. A Jedi uses the Force to "read" or predict an attacker's movement. Not entirely possible- only second and third-rate swordsmen ever show their feelings of anger in battle. An opponent who doesn't scream war cries or snort hot air, with just one key expression (a smile or a stern glare), would have the potential to defeat a Jedi with the right techniques.

Before you say "oh, Vader's face was never showing, and Luke beat him", keep in mind two things. One- that's in the script, and it'd be pretty lame if Vader got Luke with, say, stepping to the side, spinning in a slash, and cutting Luke's noggin off right there. Two- Vader was a Force user, with Dark Side power flowing through him, but he only had what looked to be fencing ability. It was the same slash, stab, counterslash, dodge, dodge, slash thing ad nauseum. Vader also had that respirator working against him, since it was obviously straining when Luke attacked him with that surge of power. Reverse thing with Maul- great skill, but he was a Dark Sider working with feelings of hate. Didn't bode well for him.

So I'd be aiming more towards swordsman skill. Unless a Jedi/Sith decided to cheat and use Force pushes or lightning, they'd probably stand on equal ground with a swordsman as good as, for example, Miyamoto Musashi, one of Japan's legendary swordsmen, who killed most of his early opponents with nothing but a wooden sword. A Vong answer to him would be the Jedi's worst nightmare in terms of lightsaber-to-coufee/amphistaff combat, in my view.