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Using the Star Wars RPG rules and the Star War movies to get a proper comparison between the two; I think the Space Marine is heavily favored to win.

Intercepting a bolt round with the lightsabre or force blocking it with the hand will still kill the jedi through the concussive forces of the detonations. In the Outcast Dead just being near a bolt detonation was enough to pulp human bodies.

The lightsabre will likely have some difficulty getting through power armor. Material in the star wars universe offers resistance to it, whereas a chainsword will have absolutely no difficulty in cutting an unarmored human in half.

 Shlazaor wrote:
But lightsaber pwn chainsaw easy. I agree though any comparison would need to be made with fun in mind and not winning an objective debate.

Perhaps, but there are people in the star war universe that have survived being struck with a lightsabre. Not many can make that claim against a chainsword, especially when wielded by a space marine. Power armor would offer resistance to the lightsabre even if it is just the press of vaporized material pushing against the lightsabre as it cuts into the power armor - remember that material does offer resistance to lightsabres; they aren't magically, 'cut through anything swords no matter what', weapons. Considering the chainsword which is crafted from adamantium, if there is even a millisecond resistance when the lightsabre cuts through the chainsword when the combatants collide their weapons, then the jedi just had his sword arm completely destroyed by the forces generated by the marine. Also the spray of loose teeth would be a severe hazard to the unarmored jedi. But, based on what I know about the lightsabre I think I am being fairly generous in thinking the jedi would be able to cut through the marine's armor and sword in a period of time that would impact a melee - which would likely be under a second.

Ignoring the “chosen ones” outliners with the jedi; the average jedi versus average space marines, I think the marine is the clear favorite in the battle.

 Lynata wrote:

Grunt13 wrote:Power armor would offer resistance to the lightsabre even if it is just the press of vaporized material pushing against the lightsabre as it cuts into the power armor - remember that material does offer resistance to lightsabres; they aren't magically, 'cut through anything swords no matter what', weapons. Considering the chainsword which is crafted from adamantium, if there is even a millisecond resistance when the lightsabre cuts through the chainsword when the combatants collide their weapons, then the jedi just had his sword arm completely destroyed by the forces generated by the marine. Also the spray of loose teeth would be a severe hazard to the unarmored jedi.

I don't think that the "merely" 1 inch thick plating of Space Marine power armour absolutely has to offer that much resistance against a lightsaber when we remember how easily entire Battle Droids are sliced in half within eyeblink. We'd have to compare material properties, which is when we delve into pseudoscience and fanwank, again making it impossible to come to an objective outcome. Similarly, both the lightsaber as well as a chainsword being of roughly equal length, why should the Jedi "lose his arm" if he just disables his opponent's weapon? The intense heat of a plasma blade could just melt the internal mechanics of the chainblade together; you won't see metal teeth flying anywhere as both sides of the cut will be a mass of superheated slag, rather than preserving the rails along which the teeth are dragged by the motor.

Lightsabres are slowed by material, just rewatch the fight scene in Star Wars 6, handrails are able to interfere with the blade swings. There are other examples in the books, movies, and tech manuals explaining that the lightsabers will be slowed by what it is cutting through, the denser the substance the longer it takes to burn through. Most battle droids are nowhere near as durable as power armor as they are slain by the same weapons that sometimes fail to kill normal humans.

Lightsabers could get through marine armor given time. In the star war universe there exist material which could contest lightsabres for long durations. People armed with this material in the form of a sword could engage in prolong combats with the jedi. I believe that power armor would grant a fairly decent level of protection against a lightsabre even if it was just a second or two of deflection. Also one inch (I believe that is just the armor coating the exoskeleton) of super dense material translates into a lot of pressure once that material in vaporized. It would be like pushing a stick through 300 mile per hour wind (guestimate on my part). A lightsabre would have to work it’s way through power armor, whereas a chain sword would have no problem with the jedi’s robes.

The speed and strength of the marines swing would transfer that energy directly to the jedi if the chainsword held for even a fraction of the second on contact - which based on what I know about the lightsabre is a decent expectation. If someone was to stand by a high speed train track and struck it with a baseball bat as it soured past him, a double amputation on the idiot’s part could be expected. That is assuming that the jedi maintains a grip on the lightsabre, otherwise the chainsword and lightsabre, both would be driven into the jedi. I believe that the Adamantium that the chainsword is made up of will survive contact with the lightsabre long enoght for the battle to be resolved. But let’s say the lightsabre is able to easily sever the chainsword.

What happens when an active chainsword is destroyed two feet from an unarmored man’s face by a lightsabre can be largely conjectured. But, in almost every examination I can think of, it comes out poorly for the jedi. The lightsabres use heat to cut through substances, this method is very dangerous when faced with a chainsword. If the lightsabre was able to sever the chainsword via transferring heat to chainsword near instantaneously thus saving the jedi from any transfer of kinetic force: having a super heated hunk of slab in such proximity is lethal and the jedi could likely fry himself; the severed section of the sword is still being carried towards via momentum which would still kill the jedi; intercepting the chainsword would likely have the jedi being sprayed with the molten pieces of the teeth the lightsabre severed from the chainsword (when you convert the spinning teeth of the chainsword to molten metal, that material will then spray everything in front of it); and destroying an active motorized machine two feet away from an unarmored human being would be fatal for many other reasons.

 Lynata wrote:

(on a sidenote, I would also assume that chainsword teeth are affixed to a chain, and would remain this way even if the weapon is cut apart rather than flying loose all over the place - even if they'd have an opening out of the blade's housing)

Operating on the belief that the lightsabre have the ability to cut through any material instantaneously or near instantaneously (something I do not subscribe to). When the lightsabre intersects the chainsword which is rotating teeth at rather extreme speed the lightsabre would cut through quite a number of individual teeth before striking the body of the sword. These severed, molten, teeth would likely end up in the jedi’s face. Also destroying the chainsword could result in the weapon exploding. Also broken chain weapons have sprayed their teeth in the books.

 Lynata wrote:

Grunt13 wrote:When the lightsabre intersects the chainsword which is rotating teeth at rather extreme speed the lightsabre would cut through quite a number of individual teeth before striking the body of the sword. These severed molten teeth would likely end up in the jedi’s face.

I would think that those few teeth that do pass through the lightsaber's blade do not just melt, they'd evaporate. At least we don't see much in terms of molten metal when the Jedi hack through legions of Battle Droids etc.

If the lightsaber was to heat the material of the chainsword to the point that it "evaporates" than it just flash vaporized it. Converting a gram of metal into a gas through heat would subject the jedi (and any likely any unshield human in the nearby area) to a lethal amount of heat and vaporized metal.

"A lightsaber blade was a mass-less form that neither radiated heat nor expended energy until it came into contact with something solid. The power of the energy blade was so great that it could cut through almost anything, although the speed through which it cut depended on the density of the subject." - Wookiepedia
http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Lightsaber

4 minutes into the video, handrails deflect lightsaber strikes.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1RFvAeSJgjc

 Lynata wrote:

Grunt13 wrote:If the lightsaber was to heat the material of the chainsword to the point that it "evaporates" than it just flash vaporized it. Converting a gram of metal into a gas through heat would subject the jedi (and any likely any unshield human in the nearby area) to a lethal amount of heat and vaporized metal.

Since you've already quoted WP:
"The field contained the immense heat of the plasma, protecting the wielder, and allowed the blade to keep its shape."

Not sure why a small cloud of vaporised metal rising up from the impact location should harm the wielder, tho.

Also, I'd rather work with "proper" quotes from an actual book, as wikis - and I have written up wiki articles myself in the past - may not be all that accurate. For example, whilst I do not actually doubt that material density (marginally) affects the speed at which a lightsaber can cut through something, that quote too is unsourced and thus may well be just fan speculation. Similar to the speculation that Space Marine armour might or might not evoke such an effect.

Grunt13 wrote:4 minutes into the video, handrails deflect lightsaber strikes.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1RFvAeSJgjc

I well remember that scene, but that changes nothing on what I said.
Here's a speculation of my own: We could assume that the handrails were perhaps laced with phrik or cortosis, or somehow magnetised in a way that it would affect the containment field emitted by the hilt. Movie pseudoscience go!

On the rails
1) You will find similar background interference in other fight scenes not just the handrails.
2) That requires us to believe the empire used the very rare elements for handrails in the first place.
3) The rails could not be made out of the phrik or cortosis because Luke was able to cut through it with a strong swing - the handrails just resisted severing instantly by the lightsaber.

By converting a metal to a gas you just generated an extreme degree of heat and vaporized metal that would kill everyone in the nearby area. A field protecting the user against the heat produce by the lightsaber's blade would not protect them against the heat of an object vaporized by the blade. The amount of volume a gas covers versus the amount of volume a solid covers is pretty extreme. If all the air in a large room was compressed into a dense solid it would likely be as smaller than a pea. Converting a solid to a gas does the inverse; it fills the room. The jedi would be sprayed and inhaling metal that is heated to an insane degree, well past its molten state.

The boiling point of steel is around 3000 C. Due to fact that it is being flash boil the temperature would be significantly higher as boiling point is where the material starts to convert between a liquid and a gas. This vaporize material would expand outwardly in a cloud covering the jedi and marine, the material would cool to a molten state, than to solid white hot state, than to cooler states until it reaches normal temperature. If the lightsaber vaporizes the chainsword teeth, the jedi is boiled to the bone, if the teeth are just turned to a molten state then the jedi would likely be sprayed due to the motion of the spinning teeth on the chainsword. If the teeth are neatly sliced from the blade the jedi would still be sprayed by the shards of metal.

I am of the opinion that a chainsword would survive repeated contacts with the lightsaber due to the fact that the individual teeth are only in contact with the lightsaber for a brief time so the heat is distributed throughout the blade minimizing the temperature change of a weapon that is probably heavily heat shielded due to the amount of friction it that would be generated on contact with armor, and also that it is made from an extremely durable material.

 Psienesis wrote:
The depictions of both cortosis and phrik indicate that it deflects lightsabers. In some sources, cortosis will actually shut a lightsaber off, sometimes momentarily, sometimes for several minutes (varies by source).

One thing that keeps popping up in this thread is exploding bolt rounds killing a Jedi with flying shrapnel. The explosive charge of a bolt-round is located behind the armor-piercing shell. If the Jedi has cut or deflected that away with the lightsaber, there's very little left for the explosive charge to create shrapnel out of. The exception to this would be Metal Storm fragmenting bolt-rounds, but those are hardly common-issue amongst Marine forces.
http://warhammer40k.wikia.com/wiki/Bolter_Ammunition

Can a lightsaber stop a physical round?
http://www.reddit.com/r/AskScienceFiction/comments/16dt1l/star_wars_what_would_happen_if_a_jedi_tried_to/

If a light saber hits an explosion round it would likely cause that round to detonate - if it is even able to cut through the bolt that is. Reflecting the bolt round would not work as the force behind the round surpasses the physical strength of jedi; and even if he could, stopping the bolts momentum entirely would likely trigger it to explode. The jedi would not be able to knock the bolt away like a tennis ball. Nor would he be able to handle the amount of boltfire the marine could unload upon him even if he could.

Concussive forces from the explosion would be enough to destroy the jedi. The lightsaber doesn't magically make material disappear; even if it is able to cut through the bolt round the explosion will still have the material of the destroyed bolt to spray in the jedi's face.

Plus from the pervious link:
“confirmed by wookiepedia- http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Slugthrower
For example, during the days of the Galactic Republic, mercenaries fearing an intervention by Jedi Knights used rapid-fire slugthrowers that were impossible to completely deflect, unlike blaster bolts.”

BlaxicanX wrote:

 Void__Dragon wrote:


It wouldn't melt. It would explode.

Prove it.

 Grunt13 wrote:
Plus from the pervious link:
“confirmed by wookiepedia- http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Slugthrower
For example, during the days of the Galactic Republic, mercenaries fearing an intervention by Jedi Knights used rapid-fire slugthrowers that were impossible to completely deflect, unlike blaster bolts.”

There is no source listed for that statement; calling it irrelevant would be an understatement.

And what exactly would the lightsaber do to the bolt round that would offer the jedi any real protection?

The burden of proof is not on the people arguing against the lightsaber's usefulness in intercepting non-blasters rounds, but on the people who argue for it. Lightsabers have widely demonstrated their ability to intercept the slow moving, apparently massless, composed of basically the same energy, blaster shots. Proving that the relationship will carry through to other forms of projectiles falls to those attempting to make that case. Kryptonite won’t likely kill the hulk for example; and in the same vein of thought, why should people simply agree that a lightsaber could have any significant impact on a solid round without evidence to that effect - where is your proof?

People on Dakka arguing that the lightsaber wouldn’t be very effective against a bolter already made very generous concessions regarding the lightsaber's ability without the lightsaber crowd having to prove anything. The previous thread made numerous logical arguments using physics and common sense against the lightsaber being able to protect against normal solid rounds let alone bolt rounds. The general consensus of that thread, untainted by arguing for another combatant, is that the lightsaber would be a poor defense against any form of solid shot. We don’t have to disprove the notion that lightsabers would be effective against a bolt round any more than we have to find evidence to disprove the notion that Kryptonite will hurt the hulk - so far there is no evidence to disprove.

reposted:
http://www.reddit.com/r/AskScienceFiction/comments/16dt1l/star_wars_what_would_happen_if_a_jedi_tried_to/

BlaxicanX wrote:

 Grunt13 wrote:

And what exactly would the lightsaber do to the bolt round that would offer the jedi any real protection?

Vaporize it instantly, like it does to any other metal.

Then the jedi is dead three times over. Vaporization does not mean magically disappear; that the bolt round would not be harmlessly absorb into the lightsaber’s blade or disappear in a tiny puff of soot, like you seem to suggest.

1)
Kinetic energy. This is not magiced away because the matter changes states. The lightsaber would have to absorb the considerably force of the bolt round whether it was a solid, liquid or gas. The force of the round would still be transferred to the jedi. I would expand on this, but I consider it to be irrelevant considering the effects of vaporization. Also it seems to imply that the lightsaber was simply eating the bolt out of existence - that matter was completely destroyed with no ill effect to the person two feet away from said occurrence.

2)
Volume difference between the states:
liquid O2 has a density of 1140 kg/m3
gaseous O2 has a density of 1.29 kg/m3

That means when 1 m3 of liquid O2 is converted to a gas its volume balloons up to 884 m3. To give perspective to this, one thimble containing a volume of 1 cm3 of liquid O2 would fill an 2 meter by 2 meter by 2 meter volume in its gaseous state.

Steel has a boiling point 3000 C - I don;t know the boiling point of diamantine or deuterium or any other elements of the bolt round, but in order to vaporize the round it would have to be heated to past the boiling point of its most tempered component. The lightsaber would turn convert the .75 caliber bullet you could hold in your hand into a death cloud centered on him. This cloud would transfer its heat to the surrounding environment, which includes the jedi. He would also enjoy a thin molten steel coating as the metal/material “cooled” and “dewed” upon his skin. The temperature would diffuse outward fairly rapidly superheating the air and environment. I would dare to make a guess that anyone unshielded human within 3 meters would be dead, 5 meters horrible burned, 10 meters might walk away from it. But this scenario is unrealistic because:

3)
I said “cloud” in my previous statement, that was misleading. It gives the impression that bolt was gentle converted into vapor and dropped on the jedi. The reaction of flash vaporization would be extremely violent. People a mile away would look up to the sky and say, “Was that thunder?” There would be a significant explosion due to the rapid expansion of the bolt round into a mass of vapor.

“Vaporization” has become a joke in the sci-fi realms, the star trek wiki addresses that the “vaporization” setting for phasers isn’t really vaporization. As Kirk can flash a Klingon out of existence without killing everyone in the nearby area:

“Phasers at full power have been known to make their targets completely disappear, an effect often described as "vaporization", although it is never accompanied by the violent explosion and superheated cloud of vapor one would expect from vaporizing a target such as a human in less than a second.”
http://www.stardestroyer.net/mrwong/wiki/index.php/Phaser

I really doubt lightsabers would vaporized an entire bullet; where is your evidence for this event - a solid round vanishing on contact with the lightsaber. And there is no reason at all to insist that the bolt round would not detonate on contact with the lightsaber if the bolt was burn through or its course changed by being batted aside. One bolt round fired at the jedi would be a serious problem and boltguns fire in bursts.