6 hours ago, Daronil said:

Umm...he beat Yoda in RotS - Yoda ran from the fight, if you remember. He successfully hid his origin, intentions, and powers from the entire Jedi Order for over ten years. He took down three Jedi Masters in about 2.5 seconds and was only just defeated by the Grand High Wizard Mugwump Swordmaster of the Jedi Order. He then handily took out Darth Maul and Savage Oppress without breaking a sweat.

I really don't think Palpatine's reputation is overblown...

I'd say Yoda was winning until the unlucky fall, and he ran from clone troopers after he lost his saber and got hurt in a fall that would have killed a normal human many times over... if palpatine had fallen like yoda he'd just be dead. But despite that one point of contention, palps was crazy powerful.

9 hours ago, EliasWindrider said:

I'd say Yoda was winning until the unlucky fall, and he ran from clone troopers after he lost his saber and got hurt in a fall that would have killed a normal human many times over... if palpatine had fallen like yoda he'd just be dead. But despite that one point of contention, palps was crazy powerful.

Exactly Yoda was more powerful just unlucky, Palpatine isn't a weakling he's just not the most powerful dark side user ever.

3 hours ago, Shlambate said:

Exactly Yoda was more powerful just unlucky, Palpatine isn't a weakling he's just not the most powerful dark side user ever.

He might not be the most powerful Force user ever, but Dark Sider ? I'd say, yeah, he was. ?

6 minutes ago, Tramp Graphics said:

He might not be the most powerful Force user ever, but Dark Sider ? I'd say, yeah, he was. ?

I would argue Vader, because he was engineered by his master to never overtake him. Giving his suit a weakness to strong electric current kinda does that.

21 hours ago, Daronil said:

Umm...he beat Yoda in RotS - Yoda ran from the fight, if you remember. He successfully hid his origin, intentions, and powers from the entire Jedi Order for over ten years. He took down three Jedi Masters in about 2.5 seconds and was only just defeated by the Grand High Wizard Mugwump Swordmaster of the Jedi Order. He then handily took out Darth Maul and Savage Oppress without breaking a sweat.

I really don't think Palpatine's reputation is overblown...

I agree with all of this. What do we mean by "power" here? If it is just combat ability, Palpatine was on the order of Yoda. But, as you say, he confounded the vision of the most powerful Jedi in the galaxy for a long time. He used his own visions of the future to engineer the take over of the Republic, something no other Sith has been able to do. He foresaw Vader's potential and neutered him.

Yes, he failed to attain immortality before dying, but he had a seriously good run. One could argue that Obi Wan, Yoda, and Anakin's ascension to Force Ghost was something above and beyond anything Sidius managed. But I don't see the argument that Palpatine was anything other than one of the most powerful force users ever.

EU certainly favored Palpatine as being a total badbutt. Force Sorms and serial immortality via clones bodies were pretty high-end dark side abilities.

I also feel that the Jedi might have not been up to the mustard. Mace took Kit and two Knights, yet they died quickly. A Jedi Knight or even a master wasn't at the level of a Sith Lord, and while mace seemed a cut above the others, it equally could have been a ruse.

edit: ops, hadn't meant to post yet. Busy

The real reason Vader didn't let Luke just kill the Emperor right then and there?

It quite simply wouldn't have been dramatic enough.

Heck, you could say that Vader doesn't actually rescue his son because he experiences a sudden and powerful call to the light.

Instead, throwing out the allegiances he's held for the past two decades at the absolute last moment and sacrificing his life to save his son by destroying his evil wizard master in a storm of lightning and blue flame has to be the most dramatic thing he could have possibly done in that situation.

After all, this is the same guy shut off his life support and held his breath for minutes just to scare the crap out of a bunch of Rebel troop in Rogue One, who made his appearance on Malachor by floating down using his TIE Advanced as a chariot/platform, who earlier that same season used his ship to single-handedly decimate a Rebel fighter squadron. His time in the Clone Wars as Anakin is littered with instances of him being dramatic for the sake of drama.

If there's any one thing that's truly left of Anakin Skywalker in the cold, armored shell that is Darth Vader, it's his near-instinctual drive to do the most dramatic thing possible ?