All Jedi that Defeated Darth Vader in Legends

Darth Vader was the Empire’s deadliest weapon against the Jedi. In the two decades after Order 66, he hunted down hundreds, crushing nearly all of them in battle. But every legend has its cracks, and Vader’s history has a few moments he’d rather erase — the times he lost.

These weren’t draws or close calls. These were moments when Vader was on the floor, cornered, or forced to retreat.

1. Celeste Morne — The Jedi Who Made Vader Back Off

Celeste Morne wasn’t even from Vader’s time. She came from the Old Republic, almost four thousand years before the Empire, working as a Jedi Shadow. Her role was simple but dangerous — track down dangerous Sith relics and keep them from corrupting the galaxy. One of those relics was the Muur Talisman, created by the ancient Sith Lord Karness Muur. This wasn’t just some trinket — it could turn living beings into rakghouls, vicious monsters under the wearer’s control, and it carried Muur’s spirit, whispering in the user’s mind.

Celeste knew it was far too dangerous to let anyone keep, so she sacrificed her freedom and sealed herself away in stasis inside Dreypa’s Oubliette. She stayed frozen there… until Vader opened it.

She woke up in a galaxy ruled by the Sith, with Vader standing in front of her. At first, he didn’t strike to kill — he wanted her as an apprentice. When she refused, the fight turned serious. Vader’s skill and strength began forcing her toward surrender — until she changed the game. Celeste tapped into the talisman’s power, not to serve it, but to weaponize it. In seconds, every one of Vader’s clone stormtroopers became rakghouls, their claws reaching for him, infection just one scratch away.

Even Vader couldn’t handle the swarm fast enough. Surrounded and facing a real risk of infection, he made one of the rarest decisions in his career — retreat. Celeste didn’t beat him in a straight duel, but she used the terrain, the numbers, and a weapon he couldn’t counter to take control of the fight.

2. Galen Marek — The Apprentice Who Outplayed Him

Galen Marek — better known as Starkiller — was no random Jedi. He was Vader’s own secret apprentice, taken as a child and trained for years. That training meant Galen knew every form, feint, and trick Vader used. But after being betrayed and seeing what the Sith truly stood for, he turned to the light and set out to stop his former master.

Their final showdown happened inside the almost-complete Death Star. Galen cut his way through Imperial forces to reach Vader and rescue Rebel leaders. The duel started as a stalemate — Vader’s sheer power and durability against Galen’s speed and precision. But then Galen landed a critical strike that completely shifted momentum.

From then on, Vader couldn’t recover. Galen read his habits, countered his patterns, and punished every opening, driving him back until the Dark Lord was on his knees, lightsaber down. And instead of striking the final blow, Galen turned to save Rahm Kota from the Emperor, sacrificing himself in the process. This was no lucky break — it was a clear win earned by knowing Vader better than anyone else.

3. The Kessel Eight — Wounding and Trapping Him

Not long after Order 66, Jedi Master Shadday Potkin had had enough of hiding. She gathered seven surviving Jedi for a bold strike and lured Vader to an abandoned spice mine on Kessel with false intel about Obi-Wan Kenobi’s location. Her hope was that Vader would arrive alone — straight into their trap.

When Vader appeared, the fight began instantly. He killed Sia-Lan Wezz in seconds, but the rest attacked together. Jastus Farr cut his back, Shadday disabled his lightsaber with a cortosis blade, Tsui Choi severed his saber arm, and Bultar Swan slashed his leg. In minutes, Vader had taken multiple serious wounds and was surrounded, disarmed, and bleeding. He actually surrendered.

But the victory was short-lived. Infighting broke out between the Jedi, and Vader seized the moment to kill Koffi Arana. The battle devolved into chaos, though the group still used the Force to hurl debris and crush and partially bury him under mining rubble. Badly injured and seconds away from death, Vader was saved only by the sudden arrival of the 501st Legion, whose blaster fire cut the Jedi down one by one.

For Vader, this was one of the closest calls of his life. The Kessel Eight didn’t just duel him — they wounded, trapped, and nearly ended him. Without reinforcements, the Dark Lord might not have walked away at all.