Lit Does SWTOR's Sith Empire Add Up/Make Sense?

My understanding was that it was made up of remnants of a prior Sith Empire that had a large amount of Sith blood that tended to be force sensitive. They also took around ~ 20 years to reach their destination. Doesn't that imply that they likely numbered in the low millions at a maximum as the sheer logistics of food and water would be quite difficult. The Sith Empire's members seem to lean towards disliking other races with perhaps the mixed exception of the Chiss which reduces their ability to grow by absorbing other groups and their treatment of their citizens does not inspire more to join which seemingly makes the Sith Empire something that would be very dependent on it's force users

The Sith Empire we meet in game however is mostly not force sensitive and mostly looks Human. Apparently most of the Empire has a least a portion of Sith Blood but it's not very high as they aren't force sensitive and don't really display any traits. Not only that but the Sith that do have force powers that we meet in game are constantly backstabbing and infighting.

Kaas's Population according to the game is in the millions which implies it's either a very desolate capital or the Sith Empire doesn't have that many people.

We also are hinted that the Sith Emperor wants to cause lots of death for his rituals but he passed up on the biggest chance for deaths when he did not blow Coruscant to bits.

Revan claims he worked to delay the Sith invasion but, it seems with the Sith's lack of numbers that it is an unnecessary and possibly damaging effort if the Sith were actually increasing in forces over time.

So, what is up with the Sith Empire am I missing something or do none of the expressed plans make sense and none of the numbers add up.

 

Even as someone who likes the game: no, it really doesn't.

 

It seems contingent on how many survivors gathered at the end of the war, more than anything.

 

TOR's backstory kind of falls apart if you look at it too long, but that's how Bioware is these days. During the lead-up to the game, when there were a lot more mysterious things and we could just speculate, it wasn't quite as bad, but the codex entries haven't helped much.

Its space fantasy so remnants of the Sith Empire wandering through space for years until finding Dromund Kaas isn't that bad, by these standards. Basically some Sith and a lot of Sith Empire citizens escaped, wandered around until they reached Kaas then spent centuries building stuff up. The Revan novel adds that the Sith Emperor knew about Kaas beforehand and so probably only revealed it once everybody was desperate enough.

Mostly its just Bioware puffing up their Sith Empire as the bestest, strongest ever. The backstabbing doesn't help, as you'd think that kind of society would collapse sooner, but meh, its a fantasy game. Heck, half the time it seems like the Sith are stronger and would be winning the war but the Sith are literally too busy backstabbing each other to fight the Republic.

The Revan novel didn't help the background much either- KotOR II made it sound like the True Sith were far away, deep in the Unknown Regions, with no easy hyper-routes, but in-game its pretty easy to reach the Core Worlds. Its a game mechanic, but it makes it look silly that the Republic and Sith didn't encounter each other sooner. One class storyline touches on that, but when Revan finds Dromund Kaas, they're basically just sitting around doing nothing except slowly expanding in their corner of the galaxy. When the Exile follows his footsteps, she panics a bit since the Republic is in a dire state after KotOR II so if the Sith had invaded then, the Republic would have been finished. So the fact that no one bothered to check up on how the Republic was doing for years after is pretty stupid, but they were going for an MMO more than a cohesive story.

Revan being linked to the Sith Emperor's mind for a few centuries can explain the somewhat vague strategy of the Sith Empire, but it doesn't excuse how generic the plot is often. The basic goal of Sith is take over the galaxy, and to do that, that means destroying the Republic, which means they'll get revenge for earlier defeats. The Sith Emperor plans to become a god, but was never sure why he didn't do that sooner, since most of the late-game Jedi Knight story is preventing a massacre on a few planets. Forget if the game mentioned those specific planets had certain criteria (right galactic placement, or temples there or what), rather than just bombarding Dromund Kaas. The Imperial citizenry wouldn't be happy, but the Sith Emperor probably had more than enough fanatical followers who would blow up the Imperial capital on orders.

Some dialogue touches on how its possible the whole war is just the Sith Emperor getting ready for godhood, but the Sith are so busy fighting each other, almost no Sith notices or cares what the Sith Emperor is up to. As Scourge puts it at one point, every promising young Sith he saw was either killed early, or co-opted by the Dark Council and dragged into the political games there. Leaving him desperate enough (and following a Force vision) of helping a Jedi to take down the Sith Emperor.

 

I don't know if it's reasonable to expect the society to crumble in the intervening time, even with the morals it espouses.

 

I merely find the notion a bit drastic. We've seen Sith societies hold together for more than a single decade. Perhaps more splintering could occur ala Darth Ikoral but with the Republic still existing and even with a large foothold in known space, I can't see the entire society breaking down. If only because it is so rigidly maintained and ordered. Something which I'd attribute, in universe, to addressing the very issue of preventing dissolution.

 

The whole twenty year Battlestar Galactica quest never made sense to me, given this is a galaxy where even in the TOTJ era you can zoom from the Deep Core to the Outer Rim in a few hours. Rather than making Vitiate seem divine, wouldn't it basically just make him seem like the most incompetent navigator possible?

 

In the Tales of the Jedi era, they relied upon hyperspace beacons instead of nav computers. The UR wouldn't have any (nor would Sith space, I suppose), so they'd presumably have to use the Force ability instinctive astrogation or some such.

 

I guess, I just dislike evil empires lasting that long. Still not happy about the Tribe on Kesh either for that matter. Sith are supposed to backstab each other, but there are certain rules to keep it in check too, such as at the Korriban academy you're not supposed to just blatantly kill other acolytes in broad daylight. Although with the war on, even those few rules go out the window (Xalek for instance).

There's some Sith loyal to their Empire, but also a lot who doesn't care if it all burns if they're not in charge too. Sure in theory they should be focusing on destroying the Republic but... yeah, if they weren't that greedy or shortsighted, they wouldn't be Sith.

And based on the... Timeline videos, it sounded like the old Sith Empire remnants just jumped randomly to escape the Republic, then wandered around, maybe resupplying here and there until the Sith Emperor goes that he has had a vision and then leads them to Dromund Kaas. When he knew all along, but it helps his image. Although considering how powerful he already was by that point, after draining Nathema, he really could have had a Force vision, so finding out it was just information manipulation is a bit disappointing.

 

Sure, Vitate knew where he was headed but, it is still a lot of ships and resources to reach the goal you'd be low on people.

Due to the Sith's usage of a direct combat style I'd think they have actually done worse vs the Republic after the Jedi Civil War. The Sith Empire would be fighting against Veteran Troops rather than people that haven't been in much of a war in their lifetimes and the Republic might have a Veterancy and Numbers advantage. The war factories would also already be working. Also, the Republic would be fighting against an enemy that just recently caused two massive wars. That would severely reduce the number of people that would consider helping the Sith. With the exception of those profiting off of the war I'd suspect that most corporations would not like the Sith due to the cost to their bottom line from the war. I'd think that it would be just as well that their aren't many Jedi around because I'd expect the military's actions to the Sith would be quite dark. Also the nearly Three Hundred years that Revan delayed the Sith likely increased the Sith's size compared to the Republic.

 

That's even worse, then, if your supposed Force God can't get you anywhere good to live in 20 years when the Daragons did fine on their own.

 

I think you're mistaking Korriban for Dromund Kaas. Or, at least, overstating the ability of the Daragons. Regardless, there's plenty of ways to manufacture or artificially prolong the "search" period.

 

Somthing that bottered me about TOR...
The Sith Empire and the TOR Republic ressembled the Galactic Empire and the PT Republic too much.
Either the citizens of the Galaxy skipped their history lessons or they were very fond of the return of a "Sith Empire".
The same logo, the same armor, the same weapons... It all looked a bit the same to me.
Apart from that, technology should also have evolved over 3000 years.

 

I think it is important to remember that the Sith Empire was not just the decedents of the survivors of the old Sith Empire. It has been established that they conquered a lot of worlds in the Unknown Regions, and were able to recruit from Republic worlds as well - even before they conquered anything openly several governments were more or less Sith puppets.