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  1. In Memory of LAJ_FETT: Please share your remembrances and condolences HERE

Games The NEW (12th) Jedi Draft!!- Return Of The Revenge Of The Draft (now in progress!)

Discussion in 'Star Wars Community' started by heels1785 , Jul 5, 2013.

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  1. Mikaboshi

    Mikaboshi Force Ghost star 6

    Registered:
    Jul 12, 2005
    Excitement building. Hopes rising. Nerves nerving.
     
  2. DarkEagle

    DarkEagle Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Jan 10, 2009
    Meh- wouldn't have changed the outcome :p
     
  3. DarthIntegral

    DarthIntegral JCC Baseball Draft/SWC Draft Commish star 9 VIP - Former Mod/RSA VIP - Game Host

    Registered:
    Jul 13, 2005
    You wouldn't like me when I'm angry ...
     
  4. KenKenobi

    KenKenobi Chosen One star 6

    Registered:
    Jul 11, 2002
    The Undercard-- Sora Bulq vs. Kar Vastor

    Kar Vastor is a beast. When he met Mace Windu on even terms, they beat the **** out of each other...and it ended with Mace unconscious. When they met the final time, Mace tells himself-- Shatterpoint is almost exclusively from Mace's perspective after all-- that he'd never be able to beat Kar. Like DarkEagle said, it took a conveniently placed vibroshield and a technological exploit to end the fight. That's not to knock Mace's ingenuity in the moment, but it also means it's not a knock on Vastor's fighting ability either.

    The "power in the jungle" bit we talked about already-- Kar's appearance in Shadows of Mindor definitively establishes his power outside the realm of Haruun Kal. Luke Skywalker explained that around him "the Force swirled a storm of darkness unlike any Luke had experienced since the Emperor's death."

    Sora Bulq, on the other hand, basically gets punked by comparison. He can't hang with Dooku, he can't hang with Mace, he has to sneak up on Oppo Rancisis. He has no vibroshield here. He has a lightsaber that will not be as effective against Kar's weapons, utilizing a style that Kar's already seen hand-to-hand and defeated.

    I'm taking Vastor in this one.


    The Main Event-- Sithperor vs. Anakin Skywalker

    I don't think Anakin Skywalker suffers from a Cleveland-like failure to come through. The LeBron parallels are powerful, and cut me deep, but he's honestly the anti-Cleveland. He's got so many rings he almost needs his own building in the Jedi Hall of Fame to house them-- dismantling Dooku, embarrassing everyone in the Metalorn crisis, forcing god-like beings to their knees, crushing Ventress every weekend to the point they needed K'Kruhkian excuses for her to survive, etc.

    What he suffers from is more like George Lucas Syndrome. Which could really mean a lot of things, but specifically here that Lucas creates a character who sounds like an idiot, even acts like an idiot...and yet is a complete and total badass.

    Palpatine plays him hard Mikaboshi, you're right (honestly Yoda & co. play him hard too, but that's a discussion for another day). He sounds like a moron when he talks. The way he handles things in RotS-- in AotC for that matter-- are stupid. But these are, in general, life decisions. Not battle decisions. When he's in battle, he rarely loses. He's one the greatest on-the-fly combatants on record, coming up with plans that always seem crazy and then end up legendary. He approaches waging war like he's painting the Sistine Chapel.

    Sithperor is a manipulative son of a nerf-herder though. And while I don't think he's gonna pull strings on Anakin Palpatine-class, it's not like he's limited to manipulation-- anyone who throws around Revan can't be a pushover in the power department. In his first appearance in a Draft, and despite my personal feelings on how they continued the KotOR storyline, he's established himself as a legitimate force. With time to prepare he might also complement himself with knowledge that could bubble a few of those life decisions to the surface.

    If there's another NBA analogy for Skywalker here-- and I almost can't believe I'm saying it, but whatevs-- it's Shaq. Devastatingly powerful. Dominant. Nigh unstoppable when he's on. If you really challenged him at his prime, and he really cared...wow. At the same time, he's easily distracted by other priorities. Sometimes content to rely on raw, natural talent. In an all-time list he's 1st Round easy...but not 1st Overall, when had the potential to be.

    This is an incredible main-event. It's an incredible Finals match, really-- the last one I can remember with this cool of an ending was Jacen Solo vs. Mace Windu to determine Jedi Draft XIII (I'm just gonna continue using that because I'm excited for Super Bowl Sunday).

    So that's why I'm blacking this out for suspense.

    And then picking Skywalker. He's just so damn good in every category, and when a legend like Dooku was fighting for his life, Anakin wrecked him. A mentally-off Anakin, like a listless Shaq, might be more susceptible to an upset-- but this is primetime. And primetime Skywalker is breaking the backboard on this.

    Once again congrats to both of you, and despite Inty and I's votes, you both deserve it.

    heels1785, it's up to you.
     
    Jedi Knight Fett and Mikaboshi like this.
  5. DarkEagle

    DarkEagle Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Jan 10, 2009
  6. heels1785

    heels1785 Skywalker Saga + JCC Manager / Finally Won A Draft star 10 Staff Member Manager

    Registered:
    Dec 10, 2003
    Haha KK, you just had to do this to me, right? :p

    My votes are:

    Sora Bulq vs Kar Vastor

    If you look through my votes, I haven't trended favorably for Sora Bulq, so the vote for Vastor should not come as a surprise. Bulq is less skilled version of Quinlan Vos, the brooding emo Jedi who just can't figure out who they want to be friends with. I agree with KK almost entirely, the signature victory we have on the table for Bulq is almost less impressive than his fight to the death with Vos. On the other hand, Vastor is outstanding in his showing with Mace and defined by it, much in the same way Kas'im is with Bane. Vastor cruises and is home in time for dinner.

    --

    And finally, Darth Vitiate (prep) vs. Anakin Skywalker

    This one is tremendously difficult to envision, even moreso to judge.

    Lining up the key factors:

    Saber ability - significant lean to Anakin. Along with Obi-Wan, Leia, Jacen, and Luke, this is likely the most well-developed character in the SW Universe - we have tons of evidence of him snatching victory from the jaws of defeat, even at peak- on Cato Nemoidia in LOE, where I consider him at peak, and especially on the Hand against Dooku. Vitiate suffers from being a video game character, and a minor one at that, with some literary backstory added in - we do have back story on him, but not enough with the lightsaber.

    Force power - lean to Vitiate. That being said, the backstory we do have places him in the Sidious range in terms of a power ceiling that we rarely see (i.e. only with Sids, Luke, and Caedus). Anakin, as "the chosen one," is tremendously powerful, enough so to defeat the Ones - however, and this will come into play a bit later in my writeup, he is also notoriously reckless with that power. We have no evidence that Vitiate shares that trait, and given his lengthy existence in his position of stature, one has to believe that he also rivals Sidious in intelligence and craftiness.

    Feats - lean to Anakin. Again, there are more of them.

    Intangibles (prep, etc) - lean to Vitiate. Mikaboshi mentioned the essence transferral, which can be used to torture the very imbalanced Jedi Skywalker - big lean here with the prep.

    All square after those four. Comes down to two mitigating factors then - first, for Skywalker. Vitiate is not on Dromund Kaas - he is on Coruscant. From what I am led to believe, a lot of the power that he harnesses stems from manipulations he has made to that planet in particular, from centuries of feeding dark side energy into the atmosphere. While he will have prep, he won't have that kind of time to do the same thing within the Senate chambers.

    For Vitiate, we have Skywalker's recklessness. I want to point to one instance in particular in LoE, when Anakin is "at peak," and nearly kills himself and Obi-Wan with a force rage while chasing Dooku on Tythe, when he brings down the entire structure of a massive temple they believe him to be in. While this also may lend some insight into Skywalker's ability, when facing someone so manipulative, it also exposes his greatest weakness- even under the eye of his former master, he struggles to control himself when faced with someone who has threatened his family and taken him away from his wife. What happens when one of Vitiate's essences utters the word "Padme" - Anakin is likely thrown into a rage, which ends two ways - 1) Vitiate is carved into ground chuck before he can take another breath or 2) Anakin lets his defense down, in ways that Dooku might not have been able to expose on the Hand, but that a prepared Vitiate surely can. 49% of the time, the first option plays out..51% of the time, the second one does.

    Darth Vitiate (prep) wins.

    We now go to a team battle. Any arguments for that team battle may be presented.
     
    Mikaboshi likes this.
  7. Mikaboshi

    Mikaboshi Force Ghost star 6

    Registered:
    Jul 12, 2005
  8. DarkEagle

    DarkEagle Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Jan 10, 2009
    Dang :p

    Well, we already had a team-battle between us and I don't think enough has changed since then to alter the call that Mika has too much power up top for me to overcome (if any of the judges feel different, let me know and I'll argue).

    Mikaboshi good game =D=
     
  9. DarthIntegral

    DarthIntegral JCC Baseball Draft/SWC Draft Commish star 9 VIP - Former Mod/RSA VIP - Game Host

    Registered:
    Jul 13, 2005
    KK, I LOVE the Anakin-Shaq comparison. Does that make Jacen Kobe? How far can we take this? Plo Koon is Darko, right?

    Also, I have a hard time disagreeing with DarkEagle's sentiment on teams, even if it means an anticlimactic end ...
     
  10. heels1785

    heels1785 Skywalker Saga + JCC Manager / Finally Won A Draft star 10 Staff Member Manager

    Registered:
    Dec 10, 2003
    I do as well, I think Mikaboshi's got teams locked down against just about anyone.

    And Coleman Trebor would be Mark Madsen.
     
  11. Mikaboshi

    Mikaboshi Force Ghost star 6

    Registered:
    Jul 12, 2005
    With all these basketball metaphors going around I want to know who is Metta World Peace?

    Yeah, a bit anti-climactic it seems. Though Anakin/Vitiate was a lot of fun. Loved the reasoning by the judges as well, the little extra effort made them fun to read and the suspense was a nice way to finish things off.

    Thanks for putting me through a good match DE, excellent team you had put together. Also, thank you judges and commish for sticking with it to the end and always putting up well reasoned votes. =D=
     
    DarkEagle likes this.
  12. heels1785

    heels1785 Skywalker Saga + JCC Manager / Finally Won A Draft star 10 Staff Member Manager

    Registered:
    Dec 10, 2003
    I think it was a great end to the draft. Congrats to Mikaboshi as a very worthy champion, and also to DarkEagle as a great runner-up.

    What I'd like to do now is start up the discussion thread for our next draft, and maybe look to start in a few weeks- got some new participants who'd like in, and I'd like to revisit a few things that we had to rush for time's sake (prep, Galen, etc, etc.)

    I'll try to get that discussion thread up over the weekend, tell your friends if they want in, that the band will be getting back together.
     
    SithOverlord101 likes this.
  13. Skywalker_T-65

    Skywalker_T-65 Jedi Grand Master star 6

    Registered:
    Nov 19, 2009
    Looking forward to it, and I'll certainly drop in the discussion thread (especially considering one of those subjects killed me (the way prep was set up tanking Jaden in some fights).
     
    Jedi Knight Fett likes this.
  14. The Great No One

    The Great No One Jedi Grand Master star 8

    Registered:
    Jun 4, 2005
    congrats mika. didn't think you could really lose overall with that silly top four you had.

    i'll probably judge this upcoming time, if we don't need someone to even things out here.

    a link to the discussion thread here would probably not go amiss, for those not certain where to find it.
     
  15. DarkEagle

    DarkEagle Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Jan 10, 2009
    Yeah, big thanks to Heels, Inty, and Ken for putting this up and sticking through till the end.

    I'll definitely weigh in on the discussion thread.
     
    heels1785 likes this.
  16. Jordan1Kenobi

    Jordan1Kenobi SWC Jedi Draft Champion star 6 VIP - Game Winner

    Registered:
    Sep 30, 2012
    Congrats Mikaboshi! And a big thanks to the judges. I can't wait for the next one :)
     
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