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On January 16 2016 06:15 FuzzyJAM wrote:
Yeah, I always heard the Thrawn trilogy was great and meant to read it some time but never got round to it. Still worth reading, would you say?
But some of the stuff I've heard about - the weird Yuuzhan Vong aliens, say - sounds straight terrible.
The yuuzhan vong were awesome villains. They were a different sort of villain that star wars hadn't had (no more repeating super destroyers), were unique and was a fun series.
I still get sad over the book Star by Star. Some of the books are bad, most are decent - really good. It's my favorite series. I personally enjoyed the EU books more then I did the movies.
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Am I the only one who liked the Rule of two/darth Bane series from the EU? I guess I had a thing for Sith since Kotor, but I really liked all three books.
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On January 16 2016 06:37 Yoav wrote:Show nested quote +On January 15 2016 20:13 SkrollK wrote:On January 15 2016 19:06 levelping wrote:
... Ren is show to have taken a shot to the gut from a mini-rocket launcher... Do we really want to down this path again ? Come on, Wookie bowcaster are know to be like heavy blasters. They can just blow someone's up to 3-4 meters away while exploding, and can just instakill any human-ish life form in a direct shot. So why the fuck did Kylo Ren took a direct hit and then was able to run/fight/whatever ? Answer... PLOT ARMOR !!!!! This is sooooooooo lazy storytelling it nearly makes me mad.. They could have just : - make Chewie just miss slightly so it hits some kind of idle piece that hit Ren and wounds him. - make Chewie hit him but he just deflects badly with lightsaber and get hit by some debris that wounds him. - or it just opens the floor under him and he nearly falls, wounding his leg while falling. - ... You can just have thousands of ideas better than mines by just spending 1min thinking about it. Instead of what they just build up Chewie's weapon during the whole movie and then, it fires on Ren, and then you tell yourself : "Why the fuck did stormtroopers die when they were hit ? Why didn't they just run and fight after that little shitty weap fires ? It makes no sense." Except that comparative resistance to physical damage is a well-established Jedi trait. Vader straight up takes Han's very powerful DL-44 to the hand and doesn't seem to so much as care. Luke takes a blaster to his hand without any preparation and yelps, but is ultimately ok. Leia takes a hit that would kill most anyone but survives somewhat wounded. In the PT, Obi-Wan shrugs off numerous sources of damage in the fight with Jango Fett. The Jedi Jango kills in the arena takes several blaster hits before going down. In the new movie Rey's tree collision should have killed or paralyzed her and she did just fine. Honestly, there are very few force traits that are better established.
Edit your sentence on Vader's hand taking a shot of blaster please 
For the other examples given, I'll give it my POV :
- I don't remember when this happens, before or after having his mechanical hand ?
- IDC which shot your are talking for Leia. The one during the Endor's mission ? If that's the one you talk about, I never thought it was a direct hit. To me, it's just a blaster shot exploding on the door just before her, and it's the explosion that wound her. But I can understand where you come from.
- From the Jango's fight, yeah, I do agree but I might add that I always found this moment a little bit off : to me, even tho Mandalorian are insanely good BH/hunters/fighters, Jango should have never been able to fight back to Obi-Wan like a did.
Plus, I might repeat myself here but a bowcaster is significantly more powerful than a blaster, be it the modified version of Han's DL-44.
But it's true that I never saw the resistance to pain as a Jedi/Sith trait. It's definitely a worthy explanation to me.
~~
@other people :
When I spoke about plot armor I didn't meant it was a bad thing. Hear me out : I understand the concept and being a writer myself, I understand the comfort it gives and sometimes the obligation one's have to use it.
BUT, to me, it's just that someone's writing a story have to use it respecting two things :
- use it in the less blatant way.
- use it the less you can, ever.
So, in the end, what I was just saying is that I think that for this moment, there was a dozen of better ways to write that moment, and even some that carried zero ambiguities.
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On January 16 2016 17:24 SkrollK wrote:Show nested quote +On January 16 2016 06:37 Yoav wrote:On January 15 2016 20:13 SkrollK wrote:On January 15 2016 19:06 levelping wrote:
... Ren is show to have taken a shot to the gut from a mini-rocket launcher... Do we really want to down this path again ? Come on, Wookie bowcaster are know to be like heavy blasters. They can just blow someone's up to 3-4 meters away while exploding, and can just instakill any human-ish life form in a direct shot. So why the fuck did Kylo Ren took a direct hit and then was able to run/fight/whatever ? Answer... PLOT ARMOR !!!!! This is sooooooooo lazy storytelling it nearly makes me mad.. They could have just : - make Chewie just miss slightly so it hits some kind of idle piece that hit Ren and wounds him. - make Chewie hit him but he just deflects badly with lightsaber and get hit by some debris that wounds him. - or it just opens the floor under him and he nearly falls, wounding his leg while falling. - ... You can just have thousands of ideas better than mines by just spending 1min thinking about it. Instead of what they just build up Chewie's weapon during the whole movie and then, it fires on Ren, and then you tell yourself : "Why the fuck did stormtroopers die when they were hit ? Why didn't they just run and fight after that little shitty weap fires ? It makes no sense." Except that comparative resistance to physical damage is a well-established Jedi trait. Vader straight up takes Han's very powerful DL-44 to the hand and doesn't seem to so much as care. Luke takes a blaster to his hand without any preparation and yelps, but is ultimately ok. Leia takes a hit that would kill most anyone but survives somewhat wounded. In the PT, Obi-Wan shrugs off numerous sources of damage in the fight with Jango Fett. The Jedi Jango kills in the arena takes several blaster hits before going down. In the new movie Rey's tree collision should have killed or paralyzed her and she did just fine. Honestly, there are very few force traits that are better established. Edit your sentence on Vader's hand taking a shot of blaster please For the other examples given, I'll give it my POV : - I don't remember when this happens, before or after having his mechanical hand ? - IDC which shot your are talking for Leia. The one during the Endor's mission ? If that's the one you talk about, I never thought it was a direct hit. To me, it's just a blaster shot exploding on the door just before her, and it's the explosion that wound her. But I can understand where you come from. - From the Jango's fight, yeah, I do agree but I might add that I always found this moment a little bit off : to me, even tho Mandalorian are insanely good BH/hunters/fighters, Jango should have never been able to fight back to Obi-Wan like a did. Plus, I might repeat myself here but a bowcaster is significantly more powerful than a blaster, be it the modified version of Han's DL-44. But it's true that I never saw the resistance to pain as a Jedi/Sith trait. It's definitely a worthy explanation to me. ~~ @other people : When I spoke about plot armor I didn't meant it was a bad thing. Hear me out : I understand the concept and being a writer myself, I understand the comfort it gives and sometimes the obligation one's have to use it. BUT, to me, it's just that someone's writing a story have to use it respecting two things : - use it in the less blatant way. - use it the less you can, ever. So, in the end, what I was just saying is that I think that for this moment, there was a dozen of better ways to write that moment, and even some that carried zero ambiguities.
Star Wars is so blatant with the plot armor that Storm Trooper aim is the base line for the genre.
It's not a very subtle series.
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Stormtrooper aim is a joke because people somehow don't realise that they were intending to miss in ANH despite it being blatantly stated twice.
In Cloud City there's an argument they should have scored some hits they didn't, but they were running whilst trying to hit a running target so I don't think it's particularly egregious.
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I desperately wanted them to invert the stormtrooper aim trope.
I got quite excited when the very first shot fired in the entire movie was a long-range direct hit on one of the village defenders on Jakku, but they then went back to being incompetent for the rest of the movie.
There's also that moment during the attack on Takodana where Finn's running around with Luke's lightsaber looking for another weapon. The moment he gets his hands on a blaster he does this ridiculous backhand spin shot and takes a dude out, and you go, "alright, now we'll see what he can do with something he knows how to use," but the very next thought is, "hang on, he's a stormtrooper..."
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On January 16 2016 18:03 FuzzyJAM wrote:
Stormtrooper aim is a joke because people somehow don't realise that they were intending to miss in ANH despite it being blatantly stated twice.
In Cloud City there's an argument they should have scored some hits they didn't, but they were running whilst trying to hit a running target so I don't think it's particularly egregious.
Stormtrooper aim would be a joke if they'd only miss all the time in ANH, but they also miss every shot fired at the main cast in ESB (while the main cast gets lots of hits in in the same chase) and "the elites of the empire" utterly loose to a bunch of teddybears equipped with spears in ROTJ.
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United Kingdom13775 Posts
To be fair, as the weapons were designed I could see the teddy bears winning by sheer numbers.
Were the stormtroopers to use automatic weapons which don't exist in Star Wars for some reason, the story would be quite different.
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On January 17 2016 02:40 LegalLord wrote:
To be fair, as the weapons were designed I could see the teddy bears winning by sheer numbers.
Were the stormtroopers to use automatic weapons which don't exist in Star Wars for some reason, the story would be quite different.
Dunno, looked to me like the stormtroopers forgot that their job is to guard the generator and split up to chase teddies into the jungle, which led them into all kinds of traps. The teddies used divide and conquer, they have literally 0 ways to destroy an AT-ST without traps. While the stormtroopers are trying to chase we see Han and Leia try to get into the shield generator, the only important objective for both sides on Endor.
So yeah the "elites" got outsmarted by neolithic teddybears.
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On January 17 2016 02:45 Blackfeather wrote:Show nested quote +On January 17 2016 02:40 LegalLord wrote:
To be fair, as the weapons were designed I could see the teddy bears winning by sheer numbers.
Were the stormtroopers to use automatic weapons which don't exist in Star Wars for some reason, the story would be quite different. Dunno, looked to me like the stormtroopers forgot that their job is to guard the generator and split up to chase teddies into the jungle, which led them into all kinds of traps. The teddies used divide and conquer, they have literally 0 ways to destroy an AT-ST without traps. While the stormtroopers are trying to chase we see Han and Leia try to get into the shield generator, the only important objective for both sides on Endor. So yeah the "elites" got outsmarted by neolithic teddybears.
So... Storm troopers are my Heroes of the Storm team mates that always overextend?
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On January 17 2016 02:52 Morfildur wrote:Show nested quote +On January 17 2016 02:45 Blackfeather wrote:On January 17 2016 02:40 LegalLord wrote:
To be fair, as the weapons were designed I could see the teddy bears winning by sheer numbers.
Were the stormtroopers to use automatic weapons which don't exist in Star Wars for some reason, the story would be quite different. Dunno, looked to me like the stormtroopers forgot that their job is to guard the generator and split up to chase teddies into the jungle, which led them into all kinds of traps. The teddies used divide and conquer, they have literally 0 ways to destroy an AT-ST without traps. While the stormtroopers are trying to chase we see Han and Leia try to get into the shield generator, the only important objective for both sides on Endor. So yeah the "elites" got outsmarted by neolithic teddybears. So... Storm troopers are my Heroes of the Storm team mates that always overextend?
Yeah russian doto pub players. Never heard of objective based gaming before. While the players Solo and Organa splitpush like crazy your mates loose 4v3 under their base-towers. Stormtroopers in a nutshell.
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Canada11350 Posts
@StrollK
I have only seen plot armour used as a concept in the negative sense. I think it is an inherently negative term as the implication is that all these characters should have died, but didn't because 'plot.' It's a meta term that is similar to idiot plotting (where characters, for no reason, suddenly act stupid to make the plot work) or if 'the characters read the script' which is where there is insufficient motivation for the characters to make a set of actions, thus it is only because the script dictates they do X next, then it must be done.
In the narrow sense, plot armour it can be an decent critique of unexpected character immunity- causing a break in secondary belief. However, these days, I observe that the term is wielded widely- a hammer for every problem- to describe any character that lasted a decent amount of time and hasn't died yet. In which case, almost every characters has 'plot armour'... until they don't. The default expectation seems to be a swift death for all (very likely because the zeitgeist is works like GRRM's). If a character carries on living, then accusations of 'plot armour' starts rearing up.
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United States42692 Posts
I think the battle of Endor shouldn't be canon. It was clearly a mistake to have a native tribe of savages who believe a random robot is their God somehow save the galaxy by defeating the mighty empire with rocks while having no idea what they're doing or what the stakes were. The whole scene, from concept to execution, is a complete fucking mess. It leads us into hypothetical questions like "why weren't the Ewok gliders dropping rocks used for the assault on the Star Killer base given they're clearly some of the resistance's most zealous and effective shock weapons?" or "given the established weakness of storm troopers to rocks and spears why are comparable methods of transferring kinetic energy, such as automatic rifles, not used more?".
You can't have the galaxy spanning high tech empire lose to Ewoks and then never mention that again as if it's a perfectly reasonable thing that just happened.
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United Kingdom13775 Posts
Then again, so is the idea that a giant space station has a glaring weakness that can be exploited by a one-man fighter, and that said weakness would have been noticed by all of no one in the many years that it took to build that station but was instantly discovered by a small rebel organization. Teddy bears are more logical than that.
A real military would have discovered that issue, built a tighter defense, patched it, and would have run drills to make sure that that could never have happened.
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People normally miss the fact that the Ewoks mostly get slaughtered in anything close to an even fight, and most of their plans (dropping rocks, rope traps, etc.) don't actually work. Generally they only do anything when they vastly outnumber the stormtroopers. Given that blasters are less effective than our own weaponry, it doesn't seem all that crazy that Ewoks would defeat stormtroopers (with Rebel back up) when they outnumber than 10:1 or whatever. What doesn't really make sense is that there aren't 100,000+ troops stationed on Endor. I suppose the argument could be that the Empire was trying to keep it secret or something though, IDK.
As for the Death Star vent, it wasn't changed because it's an impossible shot for a computer. Luke only succeeds because he uses the Force, which is not something planned for - in ANH (before the prequels ruined everything) the Force isn't something most people have any idea about. Luke also only succeeds because Vader orders the towers to stop shooting and his own forces to only cover him: Vader wants a bit of fun, and the Rebellion would have failed if he had taken the threat seriously and considered the possibility of reinforcements at the exact wrong time (from his point of view). You could argue that, even with the fact that Luke benefiting from (a) Vader being a tool and (b) the designers not knowing about the Force, it still doesn't work that well, but eh... It's the only real plot hole in ANH - everything else I've heard is people not understanding the film.
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It's not true from the Empire's perspective, I think, that the exhaust port was only vulnerable to someone shooting it using the Force. That one guy said to Tarkan, "We've analyzed their attack, and there is a danger." Also, it wasn't Vader's ego. Another Imperial guy said to him "They're so small they're evading our turbolasers." That's why they switched to dogfighting.
Isn't the "plot hole" more of a special effects/convenience thing, where the Death Star should have actually launched thousands of fighters rather than just what we see?
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Yes, there was a danger - if the Rebels somehow get through the defence and get a perfect shot by luck (or, as we know, the Force). But the danger is utterly minuscule without the Force and without Vader. Actually, it's utterly minuscule even with that: if Han hadn't showed up, they would have failed, and there were many other things that needed to go just right. Now, would a real military have allowed even that on their multi-trillion space dollars station? No, probably not in reality, which is why it's technically a plot hole.
Those lasers must have had a decent chance of hitting or else they wouldn't have turned them off when Vader entered - the whole point was to turn them off because they might hit ships. The "evading" comment was to show that the Empire was finding it harder to hit because they were planning a defence for larger ships. The fighters have to be at least in part about Vader's ego, which really shows up when he orders the other ships not to fire.
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On January 17 2016 04:56 LegalLord wrote:
Then again, so is the idea that a giant space station has a glaring weakness that can be exploited by a one-man fighter, and that said weakness would have been noticed by all of no one in the many years that it took to build that station but was instantly discovered by a small rebel organization. Teddy bears are more logical than that.
A real military would have discovered that issue, built a tighter defense, patched it, and would have run drills to make sure that that could never have happened.
Do not mock me!
Many Bothans died to bring them the information!
(about the hole that was penetrated by the rebells! (I mean that of the deathstar not palpatine!))
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On January 17 2016 06:11 FuzzyJAM wrote:
Yes, there was a danger - if the Rebels somehow get through the defence and get a perfect shot by luck (or, as we know, the Force). But the danger is utterly minuscule without the Force and without Vader. Actually, it's utterly minuscule even with that: if Han hadn't showed up, they would have failed, and there were many other things that needed to go just right. Now, would a real military have allowed even that on their multi-trillion space dollars station? No, probably not in reality, which is why it's technically a plot hole.
I mean, the incidental things that happened in the movie like Han showing up at the perfect moment, those things don't speak to the actual problem of shooting the exhaust port with a torpedo, which the Rebellion seemed to think was possible because they launched an attack around that strategy. I don't see where the plot hole is, the point was the arrogance of the Empire, and since you're talking about Vader's ego I don't see what's inconsistent.
On January 17 2016 06:11 FuzzyJAM wrote:Those lasers must have had a decent chance of hitting or else they wouldn't have turned them off when Vader entered - the whole point was to turn them off because they might hit ships. The "evading" comment was to show that the Empire was finding it harder to hit because they were planning a defence for larger ships. The fighters have to be at least in part about Vader's ego, which really shows up when he orders the other ships not to fire.
Saying that the lasers had a decent chance of killing Darth Vader by accident doesn't seem to me like it redeems their accuracy (after the Empire deployed TIE fighters specifically because the lasers weren't doing enough).
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Yes actually the fighter and antifighter weapons of the empire are all very inaccurate.
These fighters don't seem to fly that fast. You see them fly along side normal star destroyers or calamary cruisers and they are it takes them ~4 seonds to pass them, so they are flying at about 700-1000 km/h.
At that speeds even todays earths anti air missiles/guns can shoot them down, so they should make star dust out of them in a split second using advanced technology and targeting computers.
Or maybe the emporer banned them because aimbots ....
... but nearly every action hero has more or less plot armor in every film. I mean the hero can't die in a hail of bullets or blaster shots 15 minutes into the movie (unless he is played by Sean Bean).
Good story telling makes the heroes come up with a daring well thought out plan, they train, they prepare they set up their stuff and with luck and skill we feverishly watch the outcome.
Bad story telling in my opinion is having the lead charcater just go somewhere without a plan and overcoming all the obstacles just because of gross incompetence of the enemy.
Thats why I like episode V, especially the beginning:
The rebells where prepared for the empire because they knew what they were most likley to face and with luck and skill they succeeded with their task of evacuating the base. The empire of course took the base, but most of the rebells escaped so it was a win for the rebells or at least a draw and not a complete failure for the empire either.
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EPT
