The education of Darth Vader

this is a topic that as has bugged me for quite a while. how much sith training did Vader received? i'm talking about sith lore, history, techniques, etc. Looking at published sources i get the feeling that Vader didn't have that much of sith training when compared, for example, with Darth Zannah in Rule of Two. For example, in the Death Star novel there is a part when we are inside Vader's head and he is thinking and i quote: "...The war would be over, and Vader would finally be free to resume his studies of the dark side in earnest. He had much to learn...". I mean he's been Palpatine's apprentice for some 18 years and still "had much to learn"? Did he ever used any sith holocron? Perhaps he forgot those holocrons he took from the Jedi Temple when he sacked it...
and this begs another question: how in the blazes did he managed to train a secret apprentice, that was a "Sith apprentice in all but name" if he had that much to learn...?
what do you guys think?

 

Actually, it's pretty much been stated that Darth Vader would mop the floor with Darth Zannah and the other Dark Lords that preceded him. 80% of Darth Sidious is actually pretty much stronger than any other Sith Lord that has ever walked the universe. Furthermore, Darth Vader was trained for 20 years in the ways of the Dark Side and furthermore was constantly studying the Dark Side in order to find some ways of curing his body.

Darth Vader was confirmed to routinely consult with Sith holocrons, had his armor filled with Sith Alchemy (that he practiced to a certain level), and recieve lessons from his master on the Dark Side.

DV was a Renassiance Man and let's not forget that Obi Wan found time while training Anakin to go from a chump to the most powerful Jedi Master in the Order after Yoda and Mace.

When Vader says "Still has much to learn" he's basically commenting on a universal maxim. Palpatine himself believed he still had much to learn and spent 6 years studying the Dark Side in earnest from ROTJ to DE. Furthermore, he'd already quit ruling the Empire to continue Dark Side study by ESB.

 

i'm not saying that he wouldn't completely destroy most of the sith prior, and after him for that matter, because he is so much more powerfull in terms of force power than all of them. i'm just saying that we dont actually "see" those lessons and the study that he does of the dark side. at first sight it would appear the he is not so trained in the sith arts as he should be

 

Actually, it's pretty much been stated that Darth Vader would mop the floor with Darth Zannah and the other Dark Lords that preceded him. 80% of Darth Sidious is actually pretty much stronger than any other Sith Lord that has ever walked the universe. Furthermore, Darth Vader was trained for 20 years in the ways of the Dark Side and furthermore was constantly studying the Dark Side in order to find some ways of curing his body.

Too bad he never managed to get over to Kamino to clone his parts....................

 

Lord Vader is rarely portrayed as amazing as he should be, IMO.

Of course, I'm a huge Darth Vader fanboy....

 

I have a psuedo-scientific theory that explains that: Vader couldn't clone replacement parts for himself because he was exposed to radiation on Mustafar that started his DNA mutating. By the time replacement parts are finished growing, Vader's DNA is already incompatible with them. Lucas once-described Vader as a mutant so there is some G-canon loosely backing it up.

 

Er, C19, the context of that quote was pretty explicitly "suited Vader was a mook like Maul and Dooku" rather than "suited Vader was the most amazing thing ever"

 

but it would still kick Anakin "the chosen one" Skywalker's butt all the way back to Tatooine

 

I don't say I necessarily agree with it...

I suppose knowing that Vader was once AOTC Anakin makes me take the character a lot less seriously.

 

How was Anakin "spoiled"? For the first nine years of his life he was a slave who was regulary beaten by his owner and after being freed from that was part of an order that didn't allow personal possessions. How is that spoiled?

 

The only type - duh.

 

Not in a material sense. I think he was indulged because he was so brilliant. As Obi-wan said, he became arrogant. Instead of being grateful to be on the council at so young an age, he was insulted that he wasn't the leader of it. Materially, he was really repressed, i understand, but I'm speaking more of a feeling of entitlement and specialness. I know the Jedi didn't help it by giving all this leeway int he first place and the "chosen one" title doesn't do wonders for humility, and is also a burden. He had a lot of mixed messages, and Obi-wan indulged him, letting him take the lead often. The jedi until AotC, pretty much lived well, in nice trappings, with unlimited expenses paid, they didn't own anything, but they also wanted for nothing. Anakin ofter felt guilty of his soft bed and excellent education, when his mom was still a slave. It's like a poor little rich boy. In RP, the Jedi Order gave Obi-wan 3 BILLION credits to spend on a ship that was basically custom made for Anakin, at 12.

 

Anakin wasn't insulted because he wasn't made leader of the council, he was insulted that he was on the council and not given the rank of master along with his appointment. If anyone truly spoiled anakin, it was Palps, imo.

 

When I read the title of this thread, I thought it was referring to Anakin's basic elementary education: reading, writing arithmetic etc. Being a slave on Tatooine, I imagine he didn't have much time for studies. I wonder where he learned his basic skills?

 

In the RotS novelization, Anakin was enraged that he wasn't made a Master when he got a seat on the Council, but he was more mad about not being able to access those secret Sith stuff the Jedi keep locked up, that only Masters can look at, so that he might have a better chance of saving Padme if and when she ended up dying. In the movie, it was probably more pride that he wasn't appointed a Master, but in the novel, Obi-wan was still keeping a rein on Anakin's dragon, so to speak, so that after Anakin temper tantrum, he was ashamed about his tantrum.

Cloning new limbs for Vader would seem to be a simple answer, but maybe the technology wasn't that good (the EU hasn't been too clear on how good medical technology is at limb re-attaching). I mean, Anakin's arm was probably still lying around somewhere after Dooku cut it off on Geonosis, but instead he got a prosthetic, and it didn't look as advanced as Luke's. I think in one of the Essential Guides, there's a quote from someone that says they wonder if Anakin ever missed his original organic arm at all, that he probably prefered the prosthetic, given his aptitude with mechanical stuff. And then there's the possible excuse that Vader couldn't take off the suit, even just to attach an organic limb. Or that Vader's body was too damaged for new limbs. Or maybe Palpatine just didn't want to fix Vader's body that much, since the pain helped Vader's power. Though its still arguable whether Vader was weaker than Palpatine becuase of his injuries, because less organic stuff, or even if its partially psychological. Vader did have a lot of issues.

And Anakin's slave uprising was probably relatively benign, at least while Watto owned him. Watto wasn't exactly nice, but there were worse owners in Mos Eisley. And at the very least, Watto would like Anakin to be educated if only so Anakin could fix more stuff. And Shmi seemed intelligent enough, not educated, but not dumb either, so Anakin probably picked up a lot of stuff. And anything Anakin didn't know, he could probably have learnt at the Jedi Temple, and given Anakin's genius nature, he probably would've easily caught up with the other Padawans in a short time.

 

I like to think that Sidious was disappointed enough in his apprentice's state that he didn't want Vader to be the true successor to the Sith throne. He figured he had to keep him at arms length promising that they would find time to go teach him fun stuff in the back yard once the galaxy was in order. Of course, he probably did have to give him tidbits once in awhile to demonstrate that he DID have things that he could teach Vader yet.

After all, Vader gaining enough knowledge that he felt he could make a run at overthrowing his Master was about the worst case scenario for Palps. If he were forced to kill Vader he loses a strong apprentice, his top enforcer, and one of his better military minds. If Vader actually got lucky and somehow kills him, he leaves the galaxy in the hands of an apprentice he feels is not suitable to continue the Sith line.

Of course, I've always thought that Palpatine KNEW the son of Skywalker was out there somewhere and was waiting for him to surface.

 

Any Sith Lord that was highly skilled in Force Lightning and/or even Force Droid Disable(not sure if this power works on all electrical devices though) would make quick work of Vader's life support system.

 

i find that part of him not be able to take off the suit a little extreme. i mean what if the circuits of the suit short circuited or something malfunctioned? he would need some kind of backup. and what about personal higene? burned flesh to that degree would certainly rot away. yuck. and not be able to attach organic limbs? if they managed to attach cybernetic limbs to damaged nerves like that organic ones wouldn't be a problem. i mean we with our "limited" medical technolgy can do that for quite a while...

 

Regarding lightning, I must have imagined the part in AotC where Obi-Wan's lightsaber absorbs the lightning cast by Dooku.

This is a silly argument, anyway. "Force Lightning can kill Vader, so anyone decent with lightning can kill him!"

Uh, nope. No more than they can kill any other immensely powerful Force user with a lightsaber in hand. Force lightning kills the wholly organic just as dead. Oh, and good luck catching Vader without his lightsaber one day.

Regarding droid disable, I imagine this is where the "Force shield" that Force Users throw up in combat comes into play. Since Vader is undoubtedly in the top ten Sith Lords of history (and that's *without* a bunch of power amplifying Sith baubles *cough*Kun*cough*) it's going to take the vast majority a great deal of difficulty to penetrate it. There's also the issue of summoning enough concentration to perform such a specific attack when you've got the Dark Lord of the Sith hacking at you with a lightsaber.

Vader is the most prolific (individual) Jedi/Force Adept killer of all time. Or, at least, he's supposed to be. If it were that easy to beat down Vader, he'd have been beaten down.

 

If you say so. IMO...Darth Vader biggest power was the fear normal beings had of him, probably based on reputation. THe fact that Darth Vader became a crippled man forced to life in a life support suit would be no match for a Sith Lord. I also said "highly" skilled at Force Lightning like Darth Revan. He for example, would make quick work of Vader. A Force Shield only works for so long and do you really think his lightsaber would block Force Disable Droid as well? He killed many Jedi that were not taught the darkside force powers. He never faced a true Sith Lord...ever. I'm not doubting Darth Vader's lightsaber fighting ability, just that a force-strong Sith in conjunction with being highly trained in Sith powers would wipe the floor with him. Even Dooku would beat him....just like Dooku beat Obi-Wan twice and could have easily killed him in RotS after he caught him in the force, lifted him up into the air, tossed him against the wall, and dropped that heavy metal on to him. Obi-Wan beat a 100% healthy Darth Vader....yet Dooku could be Obi-Wan.

 

SIDE NOTE] Before anyone says, "Anakin beat Dooku"....lets remember that Anakin also caught Dooku off guard as he didn't think Anakin was that powerful yet and Dooku was being worn down by two highly skilled Jedi. Then again....that was a healthy Anakin and not the handicap Vader.

 

There's nothing wrong with catching your enemy off guard in a sword fight. It just makes defeating him much easier.