#sith magic

[archeo-starwars]

Star Wars Tales of the Jedi - Dark Lords of the Sith Issue #3

[gretchenzellerbarnes]

"anakin would've never turned to the dark side had qui gon lived." utter. bullshit. not only is this particular hot take an insult to obi-wan it completely robs anakin of his agency, because at the end of the day it was anakin's decision to pledge his loyalty to palpatine and to destroy everything that the people he loved held dear. that's what makes anakin skywalker such a compelling character, and as darth vader a tragic and iconic villian... because he did this to himself.

[amarcia]

listen but if some sw writer really leaned into the science of midichlorians we could have a force user sect that is given access to the force after specific trials and by using the scientific process of introducing the midichlorian microbes into the body, some kind of top secret guarded procedure of their leaders - or whatever

[suja-janee]

Given that bi han canonically has said “you turned Kuai Liang against me” he would no doubt say some edgy shit like

“YOU UNDERESTIMATE MY POWER”

[kwillow]

From your recent post, you mentioned how Theo would potentially favor a partner who could bear a child with him to continue his bloodline. But with Theo being...Theo, could he use magic to impregnate someone willing to birth his child? Bonus: none of that icky physical touch!

Hahaha, an intriguing thought, but unfortunately for Theo, the magic in this world doesn't work that way. Someone asked something similar of his mother, and she couldn't get away with a magic baby either:

I think he'd also be mortified to ask someone to carry his child for him even if it was an arrangement completely without physical contact. One, he'd feel it would be wrong if it wasn't in the bonds of marriage, two, even with permission and the assurance of no regret whatsoever he'd find it morally dubious as he would be demanding literal labor in an intimate and painful way (childbirth ain't easy), three, the thought of all the physical realities and indignities of impregnating someone would still freak him out even if achieved at a distance, and four, this man is not equipped for single fatherhood.

[thegreenhalf]

"George Lucas? He sounds cool"

Noticed, seeing the theatrical rerelease of Phantom Menace, how many characters start out pretending to not be themselves...

...but it isn't just Phantom Menace...

...or the prequels....

...or even just Star Wars, as American Graffiti heads know:

This is just how George Lucas operates.

And for bonus points:

[maulfucker]

Yeah yeah jedi Maul au we've all seen him. But what about senator Maul au. Representing Dathomir, a neutral world like Mandalore that is still somewhat hostile to outsiders. Wearing fancy clothes that show a bit too much skin for the cold climate of Coruscant. Falling in hate at first sight with Padmé, the only other senator who brings a gun to the senate floor "just in case". The two of them having a weird rivalry because Maul doesn't trust the Jedi and is neutral in a lot of subjects that Padmé is a vocal defender of.

[lifeanddeathcustoms]

I cursed the darkness… for I was not strong enough to use it to break my chains.… so I turned my eyes to the light, to pretend that I was free.

[roseaesynstylae]

Just imaging Delta Squad going on missions with various Jedi and realizing that ordinary clone troopers are made out of pure beskar if they can handle this insanity on the regular.

[dathomirdumpsterfire]

~Chapter 3: Haunted, Hunted, & Other Fun Hobbies~

[Ao3 link below the read more, at the end.]

It begins the day after Maul makes his return to Dathomir. 

The sith is elbows deep in datapads trying to gain background knowledge on the Crimson Dawn's next venture: an escargot farm, of all things, for a particular breed of shellfish. One that acts as a nearly universal aphrodisiac when eaten. Vos had declared the market for it 'an untapped niche' with projected gains in the 'I could buy a moon every other year' category. 

He already has a planet. Dathomir is more or less his, but Maul thinks he might like a moon or two. Besides, one never knew when they might need a spare astral body in his line of work. Perhaps for trade, perhaps for crashing into things. He is flexible. 

One minute he is reviewing zoology documents made by a mon calamari, and then gently, like a cloud over the sun, he is being watched.

His spine straightens and the sith pulls his sense of self tight to his skin, guarding himself while attempting to observe the observer. The presence slips through his fingers, but he too slips through theirs. They go round and round like two predators in the night, stalking each other through the flow of the force. 

Eventually the feeling fades, and Maul is left alone in his office space, perturbed. He waits an hour or more, patient and wary, but the sensation of being sought does not return.

He exhales heavily through his nose and returns to reading about aquarium keeping, stopping only to make snacks, refresh the tea pot, and stretch his back.

Dathomir's red star sinks below the horizon. Domir takes with it the light that had been coming in from the floor-to-ceiling windows, leaving the spectacular view of the sunrise canyon in deepening purple hues. Maul takes this as his cue to end the day.

The sith stalks out of his simplistic office, and heads to the end of the hallway. The decor transitions from plasteel to roughly carved redstone at the doorway, from the soft orange glow of sodium-vapor bulbs to flickering oil lanterns and magelight. He had appointed the bedroom den at the end of the hall with far more dathomirian aesthetics than the modern office space. 

Some furniture he had been able to scavenge from the temple, mostly of carved stone, though there were a few precious wooden pieces left unburnt by the droid army among them. A small table, a few mismatched chairs, and a hefty trunk. The rest of his furnishings Maul had collected from offworld. 

The result is… functional. Quiet and dark. The bed space is large and comfortable, partially carved back into the wall for extra protection. Nowhere is too open. Everything he wishes to be reminded of has a place to sit, somewhere he can see. 

Dim candles light all the cracks and corners without hurting his eyes. There are books and scrolls to read, an orb recovered from his mother’s temple, projects to tinker with in idle moments. It is… good, he thinks. Though he might reorganize his memory items again. Later. 

For now, he plans to undress, bathe, and-

w

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                      r                                                      ?

                                     y       o       u           ?

Maul whips around, expecting a physical presence, but there is no one and nothing there. He coats himself in a basic spell of obfuscating mist and draws his force presence close to his hearts, under his skin. 

The observer tries to catch him up with a searching pattern that feels like smokey claws and gossamer hairs, winding ribbons and closing jaws. Threads, deceptive in their affectionate creeping. 

"One?" he rasps in the empty hallway, "No… more. Several." 

There are so many aspects of force trying to locate him that surely it must be a ritual, fueled by multiple people. Four or five, at bare minimum. He would guess it was his former master's doing, but surely Sidious would not need to look for him so much as come for him if he decided to spare the effort. 

So who? Who?

But to look with that part of him which can See is to open himself, and Maul is not certain of the wisdom in letting this coven of force users near him just for the chance to find them.

Sweat beads on his scalp, dripping down and sliding off his chin. The effort to remain untouchable, hidden from these hunters, is intensely taxing, but the force vibrates in warning whenever he starts to slip.

Then, suddenly, he is alone again. 

He waits, just as before, shoulders high and breathing hard as he remains watchful. The air remains still, lacking that dark innervation. Maul falls back against the wall, and presses the heel of a palm to his forehead. The effort has earned him a headache and shaking fingers. 

The sith returns to moving down the hall, but changes destination. His den, while comfortable, is not the most secure location available here. That title goes to his mother's sanctum, riddled with runes and steeped in ichor fueled protections. He has not yet deciphered the nature of even half of the witch-made wards from the books and murals that remain of her teachings. 

Maul slips into the sanctum, touching his chest where once her spirit had anchored itself. 

"Mother," he begins, searching for an acceptable explanation for intruding. "I seek… shelter, in your sanctum. I am hunted by a power unknown, and the force warns me to avoid its touch." 

That is an understatement. The force buzzes with indistinct warning, a vibrating drone so deep and ubiquitous it feels physical. Bumblebees underwater, crawling anxiety like marching ants. 

No reply comes. He counts that as permission.

The sith goes to sit on the stone floor at the center of grooved patterns and runes. He will meditate now and gather his strength, assuming that eventually-

It returns! So quickly the threads descend again.

Vitriolic green light bursts to his left, then forward, then above him. Sharp eyes survey the room as sections of sigils light and dim along the walls, like fireworks. The grooves in the floor begin to fill with-

"Ichor," he murmurs, watching the luminous waters fill in the circling patterns. He cannot identify the source of where it flows from. 

This… is not magick Maul has witnessed before. Savage had, reluctantly, described his own rituals, and the healing the Nightmother had done for Maul after Lotho Minor, but this is… different. Carved into Dathomir’s living stone, commanding the planet’s power even in the absence of a witch to direct it. It is wonderous.

The feeling of being looked for slides away from him with so much more ease, and he sighs in relief.

Maul ends up sleeping there, curled in on himself on the stone floor. Every few hours the cloying tendrils return again, and he wakes to watch the wards and push away the hooks that stretch for him.

It is only after a week of being chased back to his mother's room, day and night, that he realizes he is trapped on Dathomir until the hunt is ended. Until he ends it. To do that, he will have to learn to hide all on his own. Without becoming an unhinged, sleepless mess incapable of hunting these new enemies.

Maul faces this reality with easy acceptance. He has survived harsher challenges before, and will again. Mustafar, Lotho Minor, Hypori- the dark sustained him every time. 

This will end no differently.

[archeo-starwars]

Star Wars Tales of the Jedi:The Freedon Nadd Uprising

[inquisitor-apologist]

The thing about the Gray Jedi that doesn’t work is that you can’t be 50/50, that’s not how the Force works.

The Force is an incredibly simple magic system, honestly. Good people (Jedi) gain Good People Powers through working on themselves and helping people, and bad people (Sith) gain Bad People Powers by making themselves miserable and hurting everyone around them.

You cannot be a good person and have Bad People Powers like Force Lightning or whatever because those powers literally come from causing and exploiting people’s suffering. The Gray Jedi just don’t work because the Force is a dichotomy. There is the the Dark Side and the Light Side. You cannot be both, and if you could, well, being 50% evil is not a good thing, actually.

At best, you get something like the Bendu from Rebels where he’s just like, the worst kind of bystander. He has a ton of power and strength and he refuses to use it for anything, he lets everyone else be miserable, he lets the world get worse because he refuses to pick a side in a world that demands he have one. And at worst, you get Anakin Skywalker in RotS who is flip-flopping between light and dark, killing an unarmed prisoner one moment and risking his life and the Chancellor’s to save Obi-Wan the next. You get someone desperately unstable and uncontrollable who lashes out randomly and extremely destructively, pulling himself deeper into the Dark because he refused to choose a damn side.

Being 50% evil is either a step towards being 100% evil or it’s just… nothing. Utter passivity, refusal to do anything because it disrupts the ‘balance’ that never actually existed because good and evil are not equal. There’s no real nuance there, it’s a simple magic system, but that’s because it was made for kids! Look it up, GL has said all this before.

Anyway, yeah, being half evil kind of inherently precludes you from being a good person.

[antianakin]

In your opinion, could Merrin become a Jedi or is she better off as the only good Nightsister?

I'm honestly unclear as to whether we'd consider Merrin and the nightsisters "Force sensitive" or not. Like, I know that their magic is supposedly using the Force to some degree, but it's also pretty clearly demonstrably different from regular Force usage. I'm not certain if Merrin could use the Force the way a regular Jedi could, the way we know Ventress can, or if she's completely limited to "nightsister magic." I'm inclined to say that if she can't use the Force the way a Jedi can, she can't be a Jedi. Being a Jedi relies on being able to feel that connection and use it as a central aspect of their entire philosophy towards life. If Merrin doesn't have it, I find it difficult to believe she could truly acclimate to the Jedi way of life.

But let's set all of that aside and assume that magic IS Force sensitivity and Merrin could do all the things Cal can do (aside from psychometry) and is just choosing not to because she prefers magic. I think this is what you're actually asking me anyway, which is whether Merrin's PERSONALITY would make her suitable to being a good Jedi or not.

In general, I think she'd be okay. She certain seems to have the letting go aspect down by Survivor, something she was obviously struggling with more in Fallen Order. She's intentionally traveling around the galaxy so she can learn more about other people and cultures and learn to appreciate them. She sees Cal start to go dark and recognizes that this ISN'T HIM and that she WILL lose him to it if he keeps going this way. She works as a support for him for most of the rest of the game when he's struggling with that, reminding him of who he is and what their goal is. She clearly isn't overly attached to the people she loves because she's willing to leave Cal to work on what SHE needs for a while and she doesn't go ballistic when the Hidden Path is attacked. She works alongside the Hidden Path, helping get refugees to safety and working on finding a place everyone can live together in safety from the Empire. She'd probably have a fairly macabre sense of humor for a Jedi given how long she spent with the nightsisters and the abilities that her magic affords her, but in general I think she'd probably make a perfectly fine Jedi so long as we assume she's Force sensitive.

[r-h-e-t]

"Kind of like that but not really" is such a nothing statement, good lord.

The optimistic interpretation is that the part that is "different" is the part where Amidatelion can't freely swap bodies, since we know this differs from Reeve who can swap control between Cait Sith models with relative ease. Meaning that the part that is "sort of" like Cait is the part where Amidatelion's soul/being is housed within what would otherwise be an inanimate object.

[memyselfandtheemperor]

[astronaut-paradise]

Outfit (and wand) concepts for a magical girl au. I’ll draw them in proper at some point probably