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What was Vergere?

  1. Sith Star Slayer LACWAC Mod of Peace, Justice & War

    @ Daft:
    I know, right?

    What was I thinking?
  2. darth dave Jedi Knight

    She was much to willing to cause pain to Jacen to be considered Jedi. She definitely used anything possible to break down and train him which is very "Sith like". She didn't seem to be as self serving as Sith, so I voted "other".

    I have to admit, it's been a long, long time since I've read NJO, so it's not very fresh.
  3. Jedi Ben Jedi Grand Master

    How can you say that she's an ambivalent character and also black and white?

    For myself, I find the continual ambiguity irritating, all it really says to me is no one had a clear plan for Vergere thus it ended up as the mess it was fated to become.
  4. JackG Jedi Grand Master

    That's an error on my part! It should read "its nice to have a character which isn't black or white"
  5. Jedi Ben Jedi Grand Master

    Heh, OK, typo.
  6. Icewolf Jedi Padawan

    I voted something else. She may have started out as a Jedi, but her time with the Yuzzhuan Vong must have changed her somehow, but she was still willing to save the lives of others and to sacrifice herself, which I think a straight Sith would not have done. The Yuzzhan Vong, with them lacking a connection to the Force, but being able to use animals and other living things that they created the way they did shows that there could have been scope for her to change into something else. With her also being a newly knighted Jedi, I suspect that she was still immature enough for them to have influenced her outlook and don't forget that with her going with them, she was also isolated from the rest of the Jedi Order and so would have lacked their guidance when she needed it.
    DarthDrew and Ghost like this.
  7. Ghost Jedi Grand Master

    Actually, if you read the LEGACY scene, Vergere seems to be saying "the new Jedi are growing very powerful, maybe they can restore order, but Krayt takes that to mean "the Jedi are growing strong, they'll be a threat to your plan." I think she just convinced Krayt that she was like him, so he'd be comfortable confiding in her, and she decided that he wasn't the one she was looking for and too consumed by the dark side.

    Why do you think that?

    She did only put him through the Embrace of Pain ,and implant the slave seed, because Nom Anor was ordering how to convert Jacen to the Vong's "True Way." I don't think she would have been that harsh if it was just her and Jacen, but she did turn the experience into a lesson for him. I don't think she's the paragon of the light side, but she's no dark sider. Vergere reminds me of a Star Wars version of Socrates... helping others find their own wisdom by continually asking them "why?"
  8. dp4m Jedi Grand Master

    1) Because many of her actions scream "Sith."
    2) Because her espoused philsophy either imitate or mirror exactly the internal-POV thoughts of Palpatine.
    3) Because she was confirmed to be able to speak Sith (dubious, but canonical).

    I'm also of the opinion, however, that Lumiya was not a trusted source on the matter. I firmly believed that she was espousing Sith prattle to Jacen through much of Traitor but that was within the textual boundaries of that book and other books based solely on Vergere's words and actions. It's seemingly pretty clear that this is the direction that Del Rey and/or LucasFilm wanted to go with the character (to remove the ambiguity) but if folks taking Lumiya's word (of all people!) as the gospel truth always seemed incredibly short-sighted.

    She passed the "duck test" (as Havac would say) plenty enough on her own.
  9. Havac Moderator of Your Temporary Lit Substitute

    The duck test normally isn't, "If it looks like a goose, walks like a goose, and sounds like a goose, it must be a duck."
    Ulicus likes this.
  10. dp4m Jedi Grand Master

    No, but her feathers were definitely duck-like. ;)

    "What's a duck?"
  11. Skywalker__Solo Jedi Knight

    I put other, but I highly doubt that she could be a Sith. She has staunchly claimed to Luke that she is a Jedi, and as we all know it's impossible to lie to a Jedi, with their special mind-reading talents. Vergere was posted to Zonama Sekot: upon learning of the Old Republic's destruction she may have believed that since she was never recalled, her mission is technically still continuing. She may view herself as a guardian of the Old Republic's legacy, even after its destruction, and therefore she retains her title of Jedi Knight and then teaches Jacen Solo about her ways in an attempt to revive the Old Republic?
  12. StarWarsFan91 Jedi Master

    She played a part in saving Han from those poison spores, and she saved Mara. Why would a sith do that? And that's just a few examples of her not acting "sithy" in the NJO.
  13. Sinrebirth SWC, ToR and EUC Mod-Imperator

    To build trust. Mara getting well means that she has a child. With that child, Lumiya gains more control over Luke by virtue of him needing to protect that child. Ben, for all intents and purposes, was the most useful tool Lumiya had in keeping Luke busy while she turned Jacen.

    Without Ben, Luke has zero reason to give Jacen the space Lumiya needs.

    Lumiya takes advantage of typical teenager-parent issues, complete with Luke falling foul of the attachment lesson, to weave elements into a galactic war... if the whole family had been unified against her, she would have lost pretty quickly. Using Corellia to isolate Han, using Ben to isolate Luke... fairly genius. Vergere helping the GA win the war simply sets them up for the next step; the Sith couldn't triumph in a galaxy where the Yuuzhan Vong won, could they?
    FireJade likes this.
  14. instantdeath Jedi Grand Master

    Vergere is obviously a Mandalorian.
    Dark Lady Mara likes this.
  15. Ghost Jedi Grand Master

    You are waaaay overthinking this, Sinrebirth. :p There's no way that Vergere or Lumiya could have possibly planned all that out.

    Even Palpatine didn't plan that much in detail that far ahead, or base his plan on so many variables.

    Which actions scream Sith? She's not 100% lightside, but she's not a dark-sider.

    Where did Vergere's philosophy seem similar to Palpatine's? Also, not everything Palpatine thinks/believes has to be inherently Sithly.

    Why does it matter if you can speak Sith or not? I would hope that most Jedi learn the basics of Sith. And I'd like to know where the RPG (I think that's where it came from) got their information, or if they just made it up.
  16. GoodValors Jedi Master

    Weridly, Dawn of the Jedi has made me start looking at Vergere as a bit of a throwback to the original Je'daii Code where the nature of the Force wasn't as cut and dry as the later Jedi Order chose to view it.

    Which, indirectly, is where there's a curious parallel with the origins of the Sith, given the original Exiles didn't start out hating the Jedi, but (like Vergere) from genuinely wanting to see the Jedi understand the Force better.

    In the Exiles case, they fell to the dark side; but in the Je'daii's case, they were something else... much like Vergere. Did she simply see the Order's stagnation before the Clone Wars as testament to what the Je'daii said happens when you fall too far into the light and stray out of balance?
  17. DarthDrew Jedi Padawan

    I hope this discussion appears in the new boards. I don't have much of an opinion, now, because my wife is still reading Outbound Flight and I have two other books to read right now. *sigh*.

    Knee-jerk reaction? She's very much an Other. She was Jedi. She's not Sith, by any stretch, IMO. She is twisted, to use an Obi-Wan expression, but she's not evil. She's grown beyond the "dogmatic, narrow view of the Jedi." (Dogmatic: Characterized by an authoritative, arrogant assertion of unproved or unprovable principles.)

    And, that's truly what they became! The Old Republic Jedi were blinded by that view. It had become rote and they weren't looking outside it (well, Qui-Gon was...). Luke's Jedi, also, became dogmatic until they got shaken up by Caedus.
  18. RebelJoseWales Jedi Master

    It seems to me that she certainly considered herself to be a Jedi to the very end, though neither the OJO she left nor the NJO would likely be willing to accept her actions. That doesn't make her automatically a Sith, though (as the only source we have IU for that had every reason to be lying), and it doesn't mean she automatically isn't a Jedi any more. She was out of contact with the Council or any other Jedi for decades, and had to continue operating on her own initiative and heading, but she's far from the first Jedi to do so. Remember when Corran Horn went on that whole undercover rescue mission in I, Jedi? His infiltration was pre-planned, and he was able to link back up with Skywalker fairly quickly, but he was still stuck on his own, infiltrating a hostile organization and acting on his own judgement without direct contact with the Order. Vergere's sojourn with the Vong was a good deal more impromptu, and she ended up outliving both the Council that had originally directed her and the OJO itself, but all evidence points to her still trying to make the best of it and continuing to operate in the interests of the Jedi (as she saw them) against the Vong.
  19. darth dave Jedi Knight

    So she just put him through the Embrace of Pain and implant the slave seed.

    Her training of Jacen gave him the power and knowledge to fight the Vong, but it's a matter of do the ends justify the means. She mentally broke him down and tried to build him in her image. Her methods are very un-Jedi like and more Sith like. A true Sith would have never allowed themselves to be subjugated to the Vong in the manner that Vergere did. I still vote "other".
  20. Erich Jedi Knight

    I said it in the official boards and I'll say it here.

    Vergere started out as a Jedi. That's undeniable.

    Did she discover Palpatine's real identity? Debateable.

    Did she meet Darth Krayt? She met A'Sharad Hett while he was still a prisoner. He became Krayt after he escaped.

    Did her presence and actions, or lack thereof, have an impact on A'Sharad Hett? Yes.

    Was she a Sith? Was she a Dark Jedi? Did she exhibit some tendencies of either? A definite yes for the third one. Tendencies of the Sith.

    She practically admitted that during her time with the Vong, she came to realize that the Republic and the Jedi she knew, as well as the Jedi Code, would be unable to stop the Vong. She knew she had to embrace a different means of fighting them, and the Sith way seemed more likely to defeat the Vong. Perhaps that was why they didn't invade during Palpatine's reign. The galaxy would have taken bad hits, but not as many nor as grievous as it did under the NR. But she knew the dangers of the dark side. So she embraced both and found a means of walking both paths without falling, like Ulic Qel-Droma did.

    That's why I vote "other". She was a Jedi who embraced the Sith way at times. If she was a Sith, she was one who embraced the Jedi way at times. Regardless of what she was, I also said this before and I'll say it again - what she said to Luke during their conversations in Destiny's Way make far too much sense for anyone to dismiss it casually and declare outright that she was either a Dark Jedi or a Sith.
    RC-1991 likes this.

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