Fanclub <=*=> The New Sith Order =*= Return of the Sith <=*=>... v.5

I too recall the connection, and it even offers justification for the initial Pius Dea crusades - a strike back at the Hutts who felled 'Darth Xim.' I see the Alsakan Sith as being but a small elite ruling the planet left over from the 'Infinite Sith' and 'Darth Gorog,' and in a Beast Wars fashion, dissidents rebel against Sith rule, forcing the ruling Sith Lord Contispex to flee. I even speculated that through essence transfer, this same Sith was both Contispex I and his successors, initially only through progeny, but eventually body hopping into those not related to Contispex at all - and still, of course, retaining the identity and name of Contispex. Contispex lures a good half of the Jedi Order to the dark side, forming the Order of the Terrible Glare (which I'm sure would have sounded much cooler in the Sith tongue ) , and then the Alsakan, Jedi and numerous alien forces unite to end 'Pius Sith' rule.

Rur himself, as High Shaman of the Terrible Glare, may well be a Sith Lord in his own right; certainly the pyramidal structures of Garn and holocron-esque soul snares reek of ancient Sith to me. The combination of computer technology and the Force is very Rakatan as well, perhaps hinting Rur learnt these arts from Contispex and the Alsakan remnants of the 'Infinite Sith.'

Soa and his council of fourteen Sith were all slain in 3641 BBY on Belsavis. It'd be an odd thing indeed if there were only fourteen Sith aligned with the Rakata - more interesting, still, is that Soa was not aligned with the rest of his race, and while he was no doubt speaking hyperbolically (although maybe not, given a past history of literal interpretations e.g. Obi-Wan's "thousand generations"), Soa also claimed to have ruled one thousand planets from Korriban. The titles of two of these Infernal Sith, namely Yshaar Kael the betrayer of Adas and Luthro the Kinslayer, does indicate that Soa ruled post-Adas, yes, and that these Sith were traitors to their kind.

However, I remember Ulicus and I talking about the aspect of history repeating itself, with the pureblooded Sith being 'Dark Lords of the Rakata' before they degenerated into primitives who would then be subjugated by the 'Dark Lords of the Sith.' TOTJ Companion certainly supports an expansive pre-Jen'jidai Sith Empire, and the Dantooine droid's ignorance of the Sith can be explained as these Sith being the 'immortal gods of the Sith' to the Rakata, not the rulers of their Empire. What if there was an Infinite Sith Empire that engaged in a great war with the Celestials, stealing the Celestials' own workforce with the Killik Sith Lord, and when these Sith were defeated by the Celestials, it left a power vacuum, with no sufficiently strong Force sensitives to master the Star Forge, which quickly hastened the collapse of the Empire into civil war, with factions of Sith-aligned 'loyalists' such as Soa and his Infernal Council, degenerate primitives on Korriban (eventually unified by Adas), even human Sith (and yes, the TOTJ Companion indicates that the term Sith came to apply to other dark side Force users not of the species long before the Dark Jedi arrived) on Argai ultimately resulting in Xim, the Alsakan Sith... and then of course the remaining Rakata who rejected their 'Darths' and attacked the Sith on Korriban, only to be felled by the plague and slave revolts.

All very fanon-ny, of course, but I do think there's more evidence for the 'Infinite Sith Empire' than there was before, not less, and I do like the idea of a continuous thread of a Sith threat all the way from the first Sith civilisations around 100,000 BBY, through the Infinite Empire, through the Old Sith and then, with perhaps the remnants of Vitiate's Empire being united under Ruin, through the New and right up until their final revenge under Palpatine... and Darth Krayt, one supposes.

 

I know their is already a period called the Golden Age of the Sith during Marka Ragnos reign and the 1,000 years during which the Sith were thought to be extinct is called the Jedi's or Republic's Golden Age. However during this time the Sith were also able to considerably become more powerful than previous eras of the sith. The Ancient Sith were powerful but seem to rely a lot on artifacts and the Sith after them are more battle hardened and experienced in war but would succumb to infighting and other things. During the Rule of Two although the Sith were hidden from the galaxy much like the Jedi at this time they were able to understand and have more knowledge and train without worrying about war and the rule allowed the Sith to finally take over the galaxy. So would you say the Rule of Two era is the Sith's Golden Age?

Bardan Edit: Moving this to the Sith Fanclub.

 

I doubt the Sith would see it that way, given that to be a Sith is to hunger for personal power. They probably much prefer having a thousand planets under their control even if it comes witha war with the Jedi and the Republic.

 

I see your point while many of the past Sith Empires always fall eventually they were pretty successful in fighting directly with the Republic, and even the likes of the Brotherhood of Darkness took control of large parts of the galaxy.
Anyway do you think another reason Palpatine's reign as Emperor might not be considered a golden age is because although he was a Sith ruling the Empire it was not technically called a Sith Empire? I know that might sound like a stupid reason but during the previous Sith-Republic wars, the galaxy knew who the Sith were and they were able to insight fear into the hearts of Republic citizens, in the Darth Bane books the Republic military refer to the Brotherhood as darksiders, and the in Tales of the Jedi the people on Onderon refer to Freedon Nadd and his followers as darksiders, even in the Book of the Sith Palpaine writes the name of his apprentice Count Dooku is enough to incite fear into the Republic's citizens so do you think the Sith fed off the fact they were greatly feared by the Republic and the Jedi were usually the only ones who could stand up to them? Your thoughts?

 

The New Sith Wars was supposedly a 1,000 years of conflict and war. I know a lot of it is vague but we know the war was started by Darth Ruin and ended with the Brotherhood of Darkness's Destruction. I don't think the Brotherhood of Darkness was in the war since the beginning of the conflict, and the New Sith were never really a Empire in the same way as previous sith establishments. We know Ruin and the Jedi who followed him to the darkside as well as the Sith clans Ruin united waged war against the Republic initially but once Ruin's followers found out how insane he was and how mad he was for power they betrayed and killed him which would explain why the Brotherhood don't use the title Darth. Anyway the New Sith Wars are confusing to me since it's supposed be a 1,000 year conflict yet were left so much in the dark about it. We know little about how it started and we know very well how it ended but I wonder if Ruin's sith followers fell apart in the beginning how did the Sith manage to continue fighting for another thousand years?

 

The ancient Sith's use of artifacts is s more an example of their superior knowledge of the Force, not an indication of weakness. It's a return to this glory age of arcane wizardry that Darth Bane the religious fanatic seems to so desire in Jedi vs Sith, encouraging ancient ritual over what he called "dirt general" fighting, and his reverence for the ancient knowledge over anything the Brotherhood were teaching is evident in Path of Destruction.

Obviously one can't entirely trust Kreia's adoration of the ancient Sith and her statements regarding their superiority (from their combat prowess making the Jedi and Sith of the day seem as children playing with toys, to the even more terrifying statement that even Darth Nihilus had not mastered Force drain in comparison to his forebears, and of course the mere facts that Sion and Nihilus learned their unique powers from the ancients' teachings on Malachor), but as far as IU sources go, she's certainly more of a learned Jedi historian than Tionne.

The Banite Order is built entirely upon the rather mundane training of the Brotherhood of Darness, and a few scraps of ancient power in the form of Revan and Nadd's holocron, with an outlier in the form of essence transfer. Even this somewhat unimpressive assortment of dark side knowledge is destroyed by Darth Gravid, and it's telling that we see nothing like Zannah's sorcery or essence transfer thereafter, not that this is entirely a bad thing, as it forced the Sith to get innovative - Tenebrous' Bith science merged with farsight, a (failed) attempt to create a disease to cut the Jedi off from the Force, maxichlorian possession and midichlorian manipulation being good examples.

I always see Golden Ages in terms of knowledge and mastery of the Force, since I interpret the Sith as caring more about becoming dark side gods than mundane political power (Palpatine's greatest failing, IMO), however even if we go the route of counting planets and counting years then the Old Sith Empire seems to still win out, with 2,000 years of unparalleled absolute rule as deities over the Stygian Caldera and outliers such as Malachor V, and after defeat in the Great Hyperspace War, we see it come to rule 10-20% of the galaxy for around 1,600 years and then take over the majority of the galaxy for at least several decades after that.

If you're going to isolate a Golden Age, I think the entire span of the ancient Sith Empire, 7,000-3,600ish+ BBY, is your best bet. The New Sith Empire is said to have rivalled or surpass the previous Golden Age, and in my headcanon it certainly is worthy of that claim, but we just don't know enough about it to compare it to other Empires. Either way, I have more respect for it than Palpatine's Empire or Krayt's Empire, which are Galactic Empires with varying degrees of Sith political presence rather than Sith Empires, and more respect for both of them than the thousand years of underground activity of the Rule of Two - I mean, what good's a millennium of planning, when the end result is a failed attempt at a Sith Empire than lasted only a couple of decades?

 

The New Sith Empire was certainly a superior entity compared to all previous Sith establishments except for the Old Sith Empire, though. Yes, it was a fledgling Empire beset with infighting during the first few centuries of the New Sith Wars, but it'd give Revan and Malak's Sith Empire a run for its credits. The Battle of Mizra is a great turning point; by this time the Sith have got their excrement together, and the resultant Empire is vast indeed, with the Republic comprising just a slice of the Core, and the Sith apparently controlling more of the galaxy than Vitiate's. Then it collapsed into fiefdoms by around 1,100 BBY, and Sith activity retreated to the Outer Rim.

 

I'd rather not put too much stock in Kreia's statement. She was specifically talking about the lightsabre techniques of the ancient Sith. Even tho she herself is old enough to remember a time when lightsabres still needed power cords. Naga Sadow and Ajunta Pall used swords.

 

Well, Kreia was a Jedi historian with a whole lot more knowledge than Tionne Solusar, so I think one should respect her statements' accuracy more than, say, the entire contents of Jedi vs. Sith: The Essential Guide to the Force (which the average Lit fan would take as absolute fact).

And the exact quote is "If you were to face an ancient Sith Lord in combat, you would learn that we are as children playing with toys compared to the prowess of the old masters." It is within a dialogue tree started by Kreia lecturing on Tulak Hord, true, but unlike as Wookieepedia presumes, her line isn't actually so specific as to refer to only Tulak Hord or only lightsaber combat. Sith magic and Sith swords, being the more common weapons of the ancient Sith, can be contained within this statement.

Furthermore, this is but one of many examples of Kreia outright stating or heavily implying the ancient Sith were overall superior. A theme throughout the game is that the abilities of the true Sith are "not Jedi [tricks...], not Jedi at all," unlike the bulk of the Sith who were reborn within the Republic who were relying on more conventional Force powers (from Revan to even Exar Kun), and that these ancient powers are resurfacing as the ancient Sith slowly return to power.

Sion learned the techniques of pain that gave him functional immortality, and Nihilus learned the techniques of hunger, all ancient Sith secrets gleaned from Malachor V. One example quote regarding that second hallmark ability of the ancient Sith: "It is a technique that has been lost for some time, not seen since the days of the ancient Sith. They can use it to consume other Force sensitives, and at the highest pinnacle of power use it to consume anything that lives. The blind seer... her Master has harnessed this technique, and he is rapidly approaching the height of its power. I fear he may even rival some of the ancient Sith."

 

It's interesting how in Tales of the Jedi, the abilities of the Sith clearly aren't Jedi abilities. You don't see Jedi chanting spells, creating illusions, hypnotizing Senators, draining Massassi, etc. I wonder if Nihilus's and Sion's abilities are related to the abilities that Exar used to heal himself on Korriban and drain the Massassi.

 

Indeed. I think Chris Avellone was the Luceno of video games and certainly did his research, far more than Karpshyn. The aesthetics and muted tones of KOTOR II are something of a cross between KOTOR and TOTJ, and there's nothing quite like the opening menu and its stone buttons in conjunction with the Kreia and the Dark Side theme to invoke ancient Star Wars.

Kun learns the technique from Sadow's secrets on Yavin IV, clearly indicating Sadow knew of planetary-scale Force drain although likely relied on ritual and alchemy to accomplish it. I'm willing to bet a fair bit that Avellone gleaned that the ancient Sith were proficient with the technique and may even have developed the Nihilus character around this.

Furthermore, TOTJ Companion goes out of the way to separate conventional Force powers, even dark side techniques like Force storm, from ancient Sith magic. And one thing oft overlooked about the Companion is that it ascribes every single Force power and Sith magical technique contained within to Freedon Nadd; yup, Nadd was capable of DE Palpatine-esque Force drain, and Force storm, and while there's a lot of contradicting accounts of exactly why Nadd left for Onderon, the original comics and the TOTJ Companion indicate Nadd fled being unable to destroy the reigning Dark Lord, from who he learned merely a fraction of power. Whether or not Nadd destroyed Sadow's spirit (TOR Timeline videos would suggest certainly not), or killed a hibernating Sith Lord thus resulting in Sadow becoming a spirit, or fled without being able to defeat his Sith Master as per the original interpretation, the implication is clear:

Nadd, who survived death not as some poor haunting ghost but a powerful spirit with unparalleled mobility and ability to influence the physical world, who could drain planets just as Palpatine did to Byss and create Force storms was quite inferior indeed to the Sith of the ancient Sith Empire whose scraps of knowledge he learned after their heydey was over and the Jedi had destroyed and repressed most of their secrets.

 

I suspect the ancient Sith were the epitome of Palpatine's bragging about the Sith being beyond the use of lightsabers - and there weren't any Jedi around to humiliate with mastery, either, making the weapon rather redundant outside of a Kaggath.

Personally, given the frequent references to the 'Heresiarchs' becoming 'Dark Lords' - plural - over the Sith people, and Pall's quote about the Sith infighting, I believe there were numerous Exiles who claimed the title. It's not as if Jen'ari had any precedent or tradition behind it, so it wasn't necessarily Exiles turning to infighting over "who's boss" straight away either, as they cooperated enough to build a great fortress in the presumably newly rechristened Valley of the Dark Lords. But eventually infighting did come, probably over the decision to return to Republic space or not.

I'm happy to think of Hord, Dreypa, Muur, Syn and Andeddu as all contemporaries and former Heresiarchs (hence the name Holocron of Heresies, perhaps?), with the implication that Andeddu hailed after this time with his studying the ancient secrets of Muur perhaps being subverted by the interpretation that he so learned only in the same way that Muur borrowed from the techniques of Sorzus Syn. I think Hord, Dreypa, Muur and Syn all left to fight the Jedi, and this conflict has perhaps been understated, with it painting the Sith as bogeymen to a sufficient degree to invoke terror in Master Ooroo two millennia later, and I'm sure Tulak Hord going all Nihilus on Yn and Chabosh could be a cause of this. They're nonetheless repelled, losing some members along the way e.g. Dreypa, with Hord returning to the Caldera and picking up the reins after Pall's death.

As for Andeddu, I'm very fond of the old Wherefore art thou Darth? speculation about different Sith ideologies and lineages (perhaps founded by the various different Jen'jidai Dark Lords), with Andeddu getting the Darth cult off the ground. I like to associate the Darth cult with the darr tah achieved by the Dark Lords who sealed their alchemically preserved bodies and spirits away in the Great Temple of Korriban, those who claimed they reigned for hundreds of years in Empire's End. I envisage a Shadow Council of immortal Darths working behind-the-scenes, with the Dark Lord and a Sith Council of lesser ari shouldering the political, day-to-day leadership responsibilities. Andeddu fled his contemporaries, perhaps before Hord bit the dust if their respective Dark Lordships didn't overlap/conflict too much.

Edit: In fact, interesting that Andeddu ruled from mortuary Korriban, not the capital Ziost - appropriate for an undead, immortality-obsessed Darth. One can perhaps presume Hord was reigning from Ziost, conquering and expanding the Sith Empire through the Stygian Caldera. Pall could have been a paranoid recluse who didn't even want the Sith expanding beyond Korriban and Ziost, and even if Hord failed in his efforts to conquer all of the galaxy, his philosophy was the dominant one in terms of subjugating other species and forming an Empire of over 120 worlds. This serves to make Hord, if he was indeed one who left against Pall's advice, look less, well, wrong.

Colonisation through Rakatan hyperdrives can account for outliers like Malachor V or Arkania. Gradually, the Sith Empire transitions into something resembling its portrayal in TOTJ, with widespread changes in racial composition through hybridisation (with Red Sith and human supremacist movements cropping up) and an influx of Tapani humans, and a system of one Dark Lord > Sith Council > scores of Sith Lords > Kissai > Massassi + Zuguruk > Grotthu. With the Great Hyperspace War and the imminent collapse of the Sith Empire, I can easily see the Darth cult taking a more hands-on role to save the Sith, hence the prevalance of the Darth tradition in Vitiate's reformed Empire. With so few pureblooded Sith left in comparison to the Golden Age the race gets watered down even further and we see a lot of cultural contamination as well until we're looking at an aesthetically and traditionally different Empire by the days of TOR.

 

I've long wished that Luceno edited the Bane trilogy. You've now given me another idea: for TOR to have been edited by Avellone. That would have been quite something.

The companion was definitely pushing things with its Nadd worship. I think TOTJ was supposed to feel like a serial, hence Nadd being a local threat and a failed Sith apprentice instead of a galactic threat and a successful Sith apprentice. If, however, the companion was telling the truth, I'm quite intrigued as to how powerful the likes of Naga Sadow, Ludo Kressh, and Marka Ragnos were. What sort of powers did they have? Might this be how Ragnos returned to rule the Sith during the Sith genocide, forsaw the rise of Kun, and time-travelled to Kun's time?

 

Yup. I think Luceno would have been far more faithful to the old dark side religious fanatic returning to curbstomp his younger, Sith-lite brethren that was Bane in JvS as well. And better yet, the KOTOR III Avellone and Obsidian were working on before it was cancelled! And Bioware could have still made their precious TOR, just set in the New Sith Wars.

I don't think TOTJ Companion's portrayal of Nadd was out of place with his portrayal in the comics. In fact, it's what established Nadd as a failed Jedi and failed Sith apprentice, really. The only problem is that TOTJ portrayed even a failed apprentice who had to flee before the might of an ancient Dark Lord as being a more powerful and influential Sith spirit than what we see in works since, and the Companion simply lists Nadd's Force powers as including Force storm and such. I support this; if a small-time Sith King is that powerful, then surely the ancient Sith Lords were truly godlike.

TOTJ followed the common fantasy trope of having ancient times being more magic-heavy and less technologically advanced, like Tolkien's Morgoth being greater than his successor Sauron. Avellone clearly picked up on this.

And yes, such perfect precognitive powers, influence over time itself and returning from beyond the grave all seemed to be things Veitch intended for the ancient Sith. Just as Bioware butchered the True Sith, Anderson's depiction of those ancient Sith (a mistake, I feel - I don't think the mystery of the Golden Age should have been revealed) was perhaps a mite underwhelming, and certainly changed Veitch's concept (sometimes for the better, as I personally liked the conversion of the Sith people from a seemingly human culture to the red-skinned species we all know and love). Nonetheless, Sadow's armies and fleets of astral illusions and his ability to induce supernovas are very impressive, and I think it's just scratching the surface of what the Ragnos-era Sith were capable of.

I must note that I don't think the Dark Lord who branded Kun and Ulic was Ragnos, though. Different apparel, and certainly not a Red Sith with a flesh beard but instead a white-haired human of Dark Jedi descent.

 

I really like Shar Dakhan's look, but Dakhan is clearly a Red Sith hybrid.

I suspect a neater explanation would be that this Lord was in fact Vitiate. Vitiate doesn't have a visual source for his original body so he may well have more human on the hybridisation spectrum, like Sadow, which would further explain the prevalence of humans and human supremacy in his reformed Sith Empire.

Having the True Sith being responsible for said harrying, the presence on Ashas Ree and the Great Sith War in addition to what we already know of their role behind the Mandalorian Wars, the War of the Star Forge and the First Jedi Purge would certainly serve to make the Old Sith Wars as cohesive as the New, as opposed to the 'Jedi finds a holocron' formula that dominated previously.

As per The Jedi Path, the Third Great Schism was influenced, perhaps instigated by the Sith, so Vitiate's would be the best bet. I'm curious as to the link between the Sith sorceress on Ambria and Vitiate, though; almost sounds like a failed Nathema ritual, really.

 

True. Would make sense of Gnost-Dural's speculation that the Ancient Sith do not support Vitiate, as seen in Vitiate's attempts to wipe out Sadow.

And we really need some better ways to distinguish all of these Sith! New, Banite, One is easy enough, but before 2,000 BBY, it gets messy. Heresiarch could work for the Founder Sith, but if we embrace our 'First Sith' concept, what then?

...could be... Ancient True Sith (pre-Jen'jidai/First Sith), Old True Sith (pre-Hyperspace War), True Sith (Vitiate's reformed Empire), Old Sith (all other post-GHW Sith)... but sounds a little clunky.

Also, what are your thoughts on the Sith sorceress on Ambria? Or the Sith spirit on Onderon who transformed Dovos?

 

Zorrixor believes that Sek'nos Rath settled on Malachor V and started the Darth sect.

I definitely agree with you on this. The Ovair/Gynt timeline video is the best part of TOR imo. I liked how rival Sith Lords were infilitrating the Jedi and possessing Jedi in order to fight each other.

Do they have wookieepedia articles? I'd love to learn about them.

 

I'm biased against Sek'nos Rath. He's closer to the TOR-esque Zeltron clone Sith rather than the simian TOTJ appearance - he even has five fingers, for Force's sake. And, of course, he's a Je'daii. If we were to isolate characters from the era as potential forebears of the Darth sect or the Trayus Academy, I'd look at the Killik Sith Lord, sometimes referred to around here as 'Darth Gorog.' It is my view that this Sith Lord Joined the Killiks in an effort to corrupt and steal the Celestials' primary servitor race and overthrow them, ultimately resulting in the Celestials driving the Killiks into the Unknown Regions and the Killik Sith Lord to Sarafur in order to end his influence over them.

And yes, they have Wookieepedia articles. "Spirit protector" and simply "Sith Sorceress" were the titles of the articles, if memory serves. Interesting the former predated the Great Hyperspace War, though, yet another confirmation that the Sith were present on Onderon long before Nadd.