User blog comment:Sppople/Sauron vs. Darth Vader/@comment-4484220-20140308022759/@comment-4484220-20140313204102

I didn't say I thought Sauron couldn't lose his physical form with sufficient damage, nor did I say that such a thing wouldn't count as a victory for Vader. I was thinking of his body along the lines that you described. I merely stated that I think it likely that you have to do considerably more damage to Sauron to make him lose his physical form than you would need to do to a human body in order to kill it.

Magic users in Middle-Earth are both very complicated and very mysterious. A symptom of this being the tendency to only use their magical powers when faced against another magic user, or sometimes in dire situations. Take Gandalf for instance. He is very introverted about his magic; he rarely even uses it. He generally prefers to use his wit and swordsmanship to lead his fellowships and slay orcs, and only uses magic as a last resort. Even then, there are cases where he seems to prefer death over using his magic against non-magical enemies, such as in the battle of Pelenor fields. It's only against other magical beings that he's guaranteed to use magic. Melkor likewise has great magical power, even more so than Sauron. Yet when he was challenged to a formal duel with an opponent with no magical power, Fingolfin, he decided to fight like a regular warrior, only utilizing his superior strength and size. If Melkor had used his full magical power in the fight, he'd have been able to do away with the Elf King in a second. And Sauron even, in the battle against the Last Alliance, primarilly relied on his own physical strength and size, using no magic to fight against his non-magical enemies, unless you want to count his magical mace. Considering the fact that magic users from Middle-Earth tend to hold back their magic in most situations when up against opponents who have no supernatural power, I would not say Fingolfin holding his own against Melkor is necessarily proof that the power of Sauron is being overhyped. Also, the three times that Melkor beat Fingolfin down before finishing him, did he hit him with the Grond? Based on what I've heard, it didn't specify.

A large portion of the claims I made on Sauron's powers came from information available in this revision of Sauron's page on the LOTR wiki. In general, an assumption I make is that information on generally well-kept wikis like the Harry Potter, Star Wars, or in this case LOTR wiki are for the most part reliable due to being constructed and constantly patrolled by a large number of experts on the subject, even if citations aren't provided. Granted, I realize that this isn't a completely infallible technique, and in this case it's betrayed me. Not only can I not cite a source for the meteors or erupting volcanoes, but also I'm now wanting to guess that there isn't an official source stating that, since it looks like that information has been removed since then. I do not recall making any claims regarding regeneration powers, though.

That being said, Sauron still possesses dark magical power of great magnitude, power which I believe trumps anything Vader can do with the force. Much to my dismay, little cannonical information on these powers is provided, necessitating some level of speculation when it comes to evaluating his powers. And based on Sauron's large and terrifying presence, ability to create the One Ring which was nearly indestructible able to corrupt the purest of hearts, amazing deceptive skills, and influence from the general consensus of people who've spoken on the subject, I've inferred that Sauron's power surpasses that of Vader, making this an easy win for the former. I don't think anyone can prove this notion right or wrong, so this is probably going to have to come down to us agreeing to disagree.