Alright so I'm nearly finished Revan and it says and I quote, The Emperor was no longer a memeber of the sith species; his power and immortality had transformed him into a being unique in the galaxy. While in countless other sources it says that he is human. Can some one clear this up. Thanks Edited May 17, 2012 by Malrus

He was a Sith, but I believe he has a habit of switching bodies.

Well, he was a hybrid for starters. His mother was human if I remember correctly. Secondly, after a time, he decided to hide his real body and start inhabiting the bodies of others to protect himself from being killed. If you couldn't reach his real body, you couldn't actually kill him, in theory.

 

 

So are you saying he has been changing bodies throughout a thousand years

Edited May 17, 2012 by Malrus

Been a while since I read Revan, but didn't it say he had become something more than Sith and not that he was no longer a member of the species?

 

When I read that I took it to mean the dark side ritual that wiped out everything including the Force on Nathema had him become so powerful that he was more than just the typical Sith and for lack of a better term, a demigod; not that he literally became something else.

 

The reason the Emperor is described as a human, Pureblood, Voss, young,old etc is because of his ability to use other bodies as his vessel, specifically as his Voice.

 

I am of a mind that the Emperor has been using decoy bodies for a very long time and no living being,except for Servant Two, has been in the presence of his original body in hundreds and hundreds of years. Being in his presence has warped Servant Two's mind and he is a bit strange, yet no other person who claims to have been in or thought to have been in the Emperor's true presence has shown these effects.

 

Given the Sith proclivity for murdering those above you for their power and position and the possibility from outside assassination, I don't think it's hard to believe that the Emperor used a decoy body around Scourge, the Dark Council and others. We do know he is terrified of dying so it makes since to not expose his true body to the possibility of death.

The Sith Emperor has his "children" which are his vessels to inhabit when he so chooses. They go through years of training to be ready when he needs their bodies.

 

Similar to Palpatine in the Dark Empire trilogy, Vitiate/Tenebrae can send his consciousness into a properly prepared body. With Vitiate, it's his "Emperor's Children". Palpatine used clones because they were faster and easier. But at the point of his ultimate defeat, only the selfless act of a mortally wounded Jedi Knight stopped him forever.

 

I get the feeling from their similarities that Vitiate is going to take such a sacrifice to defeat as well.

I have always thought that the Emperor participated in the big Dark Side ritual that destroyed Nathema, and, because of all the Dark Side power in him, was demented by the corruption of the ritual.