Lit So I guess we have a multiverse of sorts?

No duh. That's why I find it interesting.

 

So what if the Empire won at Yavin but Luke survived?

 

Star Wars Infinities: A New Hope is built on this.

 

Iron Lord is correct. Star Wars infinity did answer the question.

However, that can't be the only version, can it?

I say if Empire were victorious, then Luke would be disillusioned with the Force. Eventually he will become something like Heir to the Empire era Mara Jade. Force sensitive but untrained and hating the galaxy.
Having never even met Tarkin or Vader face to face, he would not even know whom to hate. He goes back to Taatooine to be a moisture farmer, because that's the only thing he knows how to do.
One day, Jabba sends his henchmen to collect "tax", and Luke kills them. Forced to run into the Jundland Waste, Sliven's sandpeople clan saves him, and provide transportation off planet, asking Luke to take away Tahiri Veila because reasons.
Then Luke and Tahiri travel the galaxy on adventures or just survive so go become "father and daughter" pirates.

 

Luke would still have Obi-Wan's voice talking to him, and likely urging him to go to the Dagobah system, even earlier.

He saw Vader from a distance fighting Obi-Wan- but that was enough that he recognised him on sight in all subsequent EU and newcanon meetings. Makes sense that he'd recognise him in "Infinities-verse" meetings too.

 

What if Luke killed Vader on the second Death Star and accepted Palpatine's offer of apprenticeship?

 

The shield depot on Endor would still be blown up and the DS 2 would still be destroyed.
However, The Emperor and Darth Luke would probably be able to escape before the whole thing blew. Then it would just be a conventional battle. The Executor would still be gone. But all the other ISD would still be there. Luke pilots the Emperor to one of the ISDs (Chimaera?). ISDs vs Rebels for two days until....Ackbar calls for retreat. Imperial fleet decimated but victorious. Bombards everything on Endor. Princess Leia dies in the bombardment along with Chewie. Ewoks extinct.

 

Assuming Lando and company are killed before they reach the main reactor, I'd think the empire would prevail.

 

What if Lando and company (or it doesn't have to be Lando and company, just some Rebels (Wedge, Thane Kyrell, etc) take out the reactor (The damn DS2 isn't finished)?
So it's going to be a pretty even fight until the Emperor does his battle meditation thing.

 

See I like the idea of the Empire being Speciest, even though as you said it would be more practical to allow aliens to serve in the military. It's just that I think there's no good reason for the Empire to share our real world prejudices. In universe it comes across as impractical even by the standards of an organization that built 2 moon sized space stations. Out of universe, it makes the symbolism too obvious.

As for Tarkin, I don't think his ordering the destruction of Alderaan was about his hatred beating out his sense of practicality. I think it was more to show the difference between his philosophy and Leia's. Tarkin is of the school of thought that "Fear will keep the local systems in line. Fear of this battlestation." It doesn't matter if he could have interrogated Bail and other Alderaanians. In his mind, once he shows that the Empire can and will destroy any planet it chooses, fear will stop any future rebellions. Meanwhile Leia says "The more you tighten your grip Tarkin, the more star systems will slip through your fingers". Leia believes that the more the Empire shows its brutality, the more planets will rise up against it. Ultimately the destruction of Alderaan may cause some planets to capitulate to the Empire, but it causes many more to take up arms against it. In the end it's about Hope vs Fear, and Leia's philosophy is shown to win the day.

 

FFS.

FFG don't form views on canon or not. FFG don't operate in canon.

They write books for roleplaying games which, by virtue of the fact that the player characters are not canon, are also acanonical.

That certain people buy them to wilfully misinterpret stats, try and assign importance to the fluff, or waste their money on a few drawings is great for FFG in terms of revenue, but a totally ancilliary market. Those people do not, have not ever, and will not matter to FFG from a development or content point of view. It's a stated fact. They, and we the gaming community, are happy for you to buy the books but if you want to comment on them, you need to actually understand them properly. Which is to say, unlike in these two posts (and Iello, you should know better).

FFG's interest, as expressed by FFG themselves, is to provide roleplayers with the mechanical aides to shape and moderate their games. They don't actually care if it's canon or not. They aren't trying to worldbuild like WEG had to. FFG devs have said this innumerable times. Hence why the SOLE purpose of creating Arbooine was for the roleplaying game and not for the planet to be in any other media.

Please, Lit people, stop applying utterly wrong standards to FFG born. It's frustrating having to correct this at every turn. FFG aren't WEG. WEG never set out to be the backbone of the EU either. But you can't apply a lit-nerd WEG lense (which is, a fundamentally mistaken lense) to FFG.

But stop mentioning FFG and canon like they're somehow relevant to each other. They're not.

 

What would happen if the Yuuzhan Vong won the war?
What would happen if Starkiller never die and meet Luke?
What would happen if Kreia destroyed the force during the Old Republic?
What would happen if Mara Jade killed Luke during the Episode VI?
What would happen if the Rakata wins the war and defeated the Je'daii?

 

What's your deal? All anyone is saying is that FFG takes material from both Legends and Canon.

And I read FFG books for the lore and I don't care if "the gaming community" thinks I'm not doing it right.

 

*Sigh*

You know people are probably wrong when they start swearing.

I'm getting the feeling that some people are bent on "Canon are the greatest! DESTROY ALL (Legend)EU! Must make Canon PURE!

Anyway, SWTOR and FFG games are games. There are those who just want a good time playing them.

 

I love how you've managed to manufacture this cadre of people who hate Legends. We're all on a Star Wars Literature forum -- everyone here likes Legends.

 

well why are they keep on saying SWTOR ruins everything then?

 

Because they aren't? Like, they're saying it's hard to make a clean break from Legends when SWTOR and FFG muddy the waters of what is Legends and what is canon. That's not calling for a crusade.

 

Well im a big fan of Legends Star Wars and i dont like SWTOR
I say it for the treatment that they gave to Revan and the Exile in the lore and I do not like the technology of this time It feels very advanced to be considered part of the Old Republic

I ignore the Old Republic in my headcanon

 

Exactly. If you read the Revan novel you quickly realise that the Meetra Surik character is NOT "The Exile" from KotoR II. Despite being the same person, their characters are so different that the only way to explain it is to say they are in different universes.

You can say the same thing for the technology and style. You could have a different KotoR I & II universe that is in the same universe as Tales of the Jedi comics. So the Ebon Hawk looks like a sailing ship with lots of masts and solar sails, lightsabres still have power cords, and people wear ancient style clothes. Like wise you could have a Tales of the Jedi in the same universe as the KotoR games, where the Daragons wear much more Star Wars like clothes and the Starbreaker12 looks more like the Millennium Falcon. The story events and characters personality being identical in the two different universes.

 

Allow me to suggest a way to minimize your frustration at constantly feeling the need to "correct" the rest of us: don't.

If FFG generates new lore in the process of creating RPG material, there's absolutely nothing out of bounds in discussing whether that lore is canon, Legends, something in-between, or neither. Despite your contention that only a properly accredited member of "the gaming community" such as yourself has the wisdom to understand RPG books "properly," you do not have the authority to either answer that question definitively nor berate those who ask it. FFG not taking a position on the matter doesn't mean there isn't a position that can be taken.

 

FFG's recent decision to remove Bothans and their legends visual appearance from a game book release in Germany seems to go against what you are saying Ender. I do agree that what you say is how it should be with FFG, neither legends nor canon, but using material from both to give players options in making their own universes. But for FFG to reject a part of legends like this without a replacement, means they prefer canon. What is your view on this?

 

Stop getting things so utterly, spectacularly, plane-crashingly wrong and I won't need to.

The OP made a clear distinction - a point of conflicted canon is raised by SWTOR. The OP then said FFG was both EU and canon. This is emphatically an incorrect reading of this and is driven, contextually, by the non-gaming members of this forum making themselves wilfully ignorant of the publicly stated intent of RPG and FFG alike.

FFG devs, including Keith Kappel as recently as Episode 102 of the Order 66 podcast, have made their views on canon clear. It's immaterial to their designs. Kappel, discussing why groups like Baran Do sages were in Disciples of Harmony, said his goal is to empower GMs to tell stories regardless of what's canon or not.

They operate intentionally outside of canon, which means they are neither bound by it nor creating to it. There are numerous examples of this which prove it, from dev statements to inconsistencies on planets like Geonosis.

I don't care if you people want to overspend on books for purdy pictures and the associated warm and fuzzies. But when FFG state "canon is meaningless to our product', just don't ****ing ignore it!

No I don't think you could reasonably conclude they "prefer canon". Corran Horn is an E-Wing pilot in the X-Wing game. The Moldy Crow is an X-Wing ship with Jan Ors AND Kyle Katarn as crew cards. They're all not canon, doesn't mean FFG think they are our ought to be.
The "decision" as such is on German printings only and without FFG explanation. Given what Pablo said it sounds like Disney, not FFG, made the call because remember, the AOR starter still has that Bothan in it - Arkhan. It just says "his species" where it used to say "Bothans".

 

A lot of those ideas are actually interesting.

I love what ifs.

 

I was under the impression that the AOR Beginner's Game doesn't include Arkhan's character sheet, he's a free bonus character available for download on the FFG website. (Maybe they included him in the German version of the AOR Beginner's Game?)

Anyways the facts that:

A) This Bothan Purge has only been reported in Germany
B) Arkhan is still referred to as a Bothan in the character sheet available on the FFG website

proves that either this is the most incompetent Orwellian Edit in history, or that the German publishers have acted independently of FFG. I'd lean towards the second option, it wouldn't be the first time. The Polish version of The Galactic Atlas had a reference to the Empire of Zakuul that wasn't in any other version.

FFG didn't edit out the Geonosians in "Long Arm of the Hutt" even after Canon made the Geonosians extinct. It's galaxy maps still call "Moraband" "Korriban" (though the TFA Beginner's Game version, in addition to adding planets from TFA, did remove Zonama Sekot). And the Core Rulebooks (at least the two I've read) have a "You can choose to follow Star Wars Canon, or not, do whatever is the most fun for your group!" message. With these examples in mind, I highly doubt FFG would condone editing out Bothans (to the point that reportedly even pictures are gone) over a reinterpretation of the Bothans that may or may not even happen!

 

You missed my point. Let me say it more directly. FFG can take whatever position they wish on the canonicity of the lore they produce, but it's not their decision. Lucasfilm decides that material's canonicity, not FFG. I guarantee you that when FFG produced Chronicles of the Gatekeeper, they didn't send Story Group a little note along with it saying "now remember, you're not allowed to use Arbooine in any other media!"