The Size of the Droid Army "Retconned"

[Edi]

That's something which isn't mentioned in Traviss' and Kaufman's Insider article which again shows they didn't pay attention to the movies.

Did you ever think they were? Since all this Non-Clone War (3,000,000 UBER-SPECIAL-FORCEZ) crap started, they repeatedly went against the canon. The EU is ridden with errors; the Clone one just got so much attention because it's easy-to-see and atrocious. Simple mistakes like size & scale, drawn features of ships get a lot less treatment. Aside from the Executor, the AT-AT, DS etc. get a lot less attention.

Well, the first thing that comes to mind is that the movies, as the prime source, should be examined. In any case, I looked over this again, but the figures were slightly off for the Kamino clone ground and the march on the Jedi Temple in ROTS. However, I looked at the Coruscant Parade Ground at the end of AOTC and I made the following observations:
The large formations of clones is consisted of clone soldiers standing in columns of 26 and rows of 24 = 624 clone soldiers (Dr. Saxton made the same observation here: SWTC - Clones: Parade Ground

The troops marching up to form the larger formations are marching in columns of 13 and rows of 12 = 156 clone soldiers (it's possible to see during the camera pan in the lower right corner).
Hence, a battalion is most likely to consist of 624 men. Since 624/156=4, a company seems to consist of 156 clone soldiers. However, that seems difficult to break down into smaller units, but the GAR order of battle doesn't match the movie evidence (at least not at the time of the start of the Clone Wars).
I'll look into this more closely later.

EDIT: Slightly off-topic, but here's a new thread started by dp4m in which he asks how the Acclamators got to Kamino if they were manned by clones... Oh brother:

+http://boards.theforce.net/Message.aspx ... t=23832301

I've not read any of the Clone Wars EU at all, but 156 soldiers to a company is quite workable. Five platoons of 28, with four squads of 7 (NCO & 6 troopers). The 5x28 number is 140, which leaves 16 men for company command, battlefield messenger, medical support, logistics and reserve duties. Realisticallyh that 16 would break down to about a half squad's worth of fire support with a heavy weapons platform, 4 platoon commanders and one messenger per platoon for another 4. This would mean about 12 out of 16, so the other four would be company CO, CSM and a couple of medics (unless the medics are embedded one to a squad). Or the last two would be vehicle drivers so the CO and CSM can concentrate on running the company.

This setup has the added benefit of preserving the canonical six trooper squads and a squad leader.

That company composition is actually loosely based on a Finnish army military police company setup. They have 28 man platoons. I don't remember it quite exactly, though I should, seeing as I was an MP during my conscription, but I winged it from that base number.

The problem with trying to come up with a sensible force composition for SW units is that too many fans are used to thinking of the USMC based fireteams of four men and squads of 12 based system. I don't know if the US Army also has that 4-3-12 setup, but it is not the only possible one by any means. It's just a bit too easy to fall into the trap of assuming that only the things you're familiar with apply, which has sometimes been reflected in discussions of this type.

Edi

[DPDarkPrimus]

The Clone Wars era squads were 8-10 clones, plus the squad commander. This was stated in one of the old RPG books, and made canon by the AOTC ICS books, where it's stated that clones march in columns two squads long (and if you look at the little white dots marching, you see they are 20 long).

I was trying to figure out the squad size a while back so I knew the proper numbers to divide my clone action figures into.

[The Dark]

The troops marching up to form the larger formations are marching in columns of 13 and rows of 12 = 156 clone soldiers (it's possible to see during the camera pan in the lower right corner).
Hence, a battalion is most likely to consist of 624 men. Since 624/156=4, a company seems to consist of 156 clone soldiers. However, that seems difficult to break down into smaller units, but the GAR order of battle doesn't match the movie evidence (at least not at the time of the start of the Clone Wars).
I'll look into this more closely later.

156 works with the minimum size of 6 established in the movies. That would be 26 units of 6. Take out two for the HQ/command unit (or possibly a "heavy weapons" unit of some sort, since we're talking company level), and you get 24 line units. That could either break down to 4 units of 6 "teams" or 6 units of 4 "teams," either of which is feasible.

[Fire Fly]

Does anyone know if there was ever a mention of the ratio of defective clone trooper to good was?

[Mange]

Fascinating... Fans doing a much better job based on what actually can be seen in the movies.

A small observation of a shocking example of minimalism, from Triple Zero, we learn that the Clone Intelligence Units mentioned by Palpatine in ROTS were six null-ARCs. It gets worse and worse...

EDIT: Based on what can be seen at the end of AOTC, I made a small Order of Battle for the smaller units for fun (only fighting soldiers, no HQ units etc.):

Revised Order of Battle for the Grand Army of the Republic:

Tactical subunits:
Squad: 8 (heavy weapon squads: 7)

Platoon: 39 (four regular squads plus one heavy weapon squad)

Tactical:
Company: 156 (four platoons)

Battalion: 624 (four companies)

Then perhaps the rest can pretty much follow the Imperial OoB.

[Coalition]

Does anyone know if there was ever a mention of the ratio of defective clone trooper to good was?

Attack of the Clones Visual Dictionary, p 37, Data File in bottom, 1st of 2 notes in the "Data File":

The Kaminoan cloners recondition an average of seven aberrants for every two hundred clones produced, maintaining superb standards.

[apocolypse]

Oh, goody.

It will all be on the line of "Palpatine sent 1 clone to planet X, everyone thought it was a billion because of mass-media, it's a POV thing yadda yadda", I guess.

And I'm sure there will be a couple of questions along the lines of, "Oh Ms. Traviss, how do you find time to create such amazing works of literature while maintaing such a busy life?" To which she'll respond about how difficult it's been lately with the constant threats and harrasment from the "talifans".

Because you just know that any of the "real" questions, such as "Ms. Traviss, why do you insist on clinging nearly religously to a completely disproven number that even your own fans don't take seriously?" will never see the light of day.

[Edi]

Fascinating... Fans doing a much better job based on what actually can be seen in the movies.

A small observation of a shocking example of minimalism, from Triple Zero, we learn that the Clone Intelligence Units mentioned by Palpatine in ROTS were six null-ARCs. It gets worse and worse...

EDIT: Based on what can be seen at the end of AOTC, I made a small Order of Battle for the smaller units for fun (only fighting soldiers, no HQ units etc.):

Revised Order of Battle for the Grand Army of the Republic:

Tactical subunits:
Squad: 8 (heavy weapon squads: 7)

Platoon: 39 (four regular squads plus one heavy weapon squad)

Tactical:
Company: 156 (four platoons)

Battalion: 624 (four companies)

Then perhaps the rest can pretty much follow the Imperial OoB.

You can't really leave out the command and control at the company level and expect the units to work. Assuming logistics and resupply is handled by outside units, you still need a few people coordinating the overall situation at the company level, so it's not realistic to put them all into the squads. If the unit is infantry, transport has to be handled by an outside unit, or there would be one light APC vehicle per squad with one clone driving it and the other six being groundpounders. Or if it has more mounted, clone controlled weapons, that would probably work out to driver and one or two gunners and a fireteam of four.

There's also the possibility of having a vehicular squad as a separate part of a platoon, basically you've got one squad to operate two medium sized vehicles that can each provide transport and heavy weapons cover for two squads. Even with the 28 man Finnish MP platoon based structure, this works out, since you divide up the fifth platoon and its four squads to each of the other four and get a mechanized clone company. It'd also leave the command and control structure with platoon commanders, messengers and company command intact without switching anything around. You eliminate the need for separate heavy weapons squads, since the APCs would provide all the heavy weapons capability the infantry would need and would be available at the platoon level. Unless you're fighting in a built up area, in which case the rules change anyway.

Edi

[Mange]

Fascinating... Fans doing a much better job based on what actually can be seen in the movies.

A small observation of a shocking example of minimalism, from Triple Zero, we learn that the Clone Intelligence Units mentioned by Palpatine in ROTS were six null-ARCs. It gets worse and worse...

EDIT: Based on what can be seen at the end of AOTC, I made a small Order of Battle for the smaller units for fun (only fighting soldiers, no HQ units etc.):

Revised Order of Battle for the Grand Army of the Republic:

Tactical subunits:
Squad: 8 (heavy weapon squads: 7)

Platoon: 39 (four regular squads plus one heavy weapon squad)

Tactical:
Company: 156 (four platoons)

Battalion: 624 (four companies)

Then perhaps the rest can pretty much follow the Imperial OoB.

You can't really leave out the command and control at the company level and expect the units to work. Assuming logistics and resupply is handled by outside units, you still need a few people coordinating the overall situation at the company level, so it's not realistic to put them all into the squads. If the unit is infantry, transport has to be handled by an outside unit, or there would be one light APC vehicle per squad with one clone driving it and the other six being groundpounders. Or if it has more mounted, clone controlled weapons, that would probably work out to driver and one or two gunners and a fireteam of four.

There's also the possibility of having a vehicular squad as a separate part of a platoon, basically you've got one squad to operate two medium sized vehicles that can each provide transport and heavy weapons cover for two squads. Even with the 28 man Finnish MP platoon based structure, this works out, since you divide up the fifth platoon and its four squads to each of the other four and get a mechanized clone company. It'd also leave the command and control structure with platoon commanders, messengers and company command intact without switching anything around. You eliminate the need for separate heavy weapons squads, since the APCs would provide all the heavy weapons capability the infantry would need and would be available at the platoon level. Unless you're fighting in a built up area, in which case the rules change anyway.

Edi

Yes, you're right of course. I intended this as a very basic outline for the fighting troops of the tactical subunits and units based on the ending of AOTC (which appeared only to include regular soldiers with the officers outside the formations. C&C etc. would come on top of that) while still maintaining continuity with the earlier published CW RPG material.

EDIT: Hmm, I seem to have misremembered. There are indeed officers standing in the formations.

EDIT 2: IMO this was an interesting take:
+http://fandom.swnsu.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=63.

[K. A. Pital]

Re-readinging the old comics.

Republic "Battle of Kamino" issue has the following statement from a Mon Calamari CIS defector:

The Federation's forces are suffering - our bankroll, too. If we don't shut down Kamino, the Republic will have a limitless supply of troops

And I don't think he meant "limitless 3,000,000"

[Seydlitz_k]

I can't believe anyone can think an army of 3 million could take over a whole galaxy. What morons There are more systems in the galaxy then there are clones!

As for an estimate on how many clones there actually were, I have a new estimate based on the AOTC. When Obi wan arrives, there is the famous "first 200,000 units ready with a million more well on the way" line, but when Obi Wan is about to leave (When he goes to transmit the message to Courascant, just before fighting Jango) the Kaminoan Ton Wee tells Obi Wan to tell the republic "To come see the first battalions". It might be a bit of a long shot to assume they meant battalions when they said units, but it also makes sense. I mean, it has been noted that whenever the clones are parading, especially in the big AOTC parade at the end, they are formed into battalions. Perhaps they were created in those units as well?

200,000 battalions (Taking the 624 number) would be an intial batch of 124.8 million clones, which if we assume there are 50 million planets in the republic would give us about 2.5 million clones per planet. And if there were about 3.2 million clones in the battle of Munnilist, the numbers would make sense.

If I can get my hand on AOTC, I think I'll also try counting the amout of clones being grown per disc thingee in the cloning facility. Maybe they are grown in an amount that would fit in with other things observed this far.

[Mange]

I can't believe anyone can think an army of 3 million could take over a whole galaxy. What morons There are more systems in the galaxy then there are clones!

As for an estimate on how many clones there actually were, I have a new estimate based on the AOTC. When Obi wan arrives, there is the famous "first 200,000 units ready with a million more well on the way" line, but when Obi Wan is about to leave (When he goes to transmit the message to Courascant, just before fighting Jango) the Kaminoan Ton Wee tells Obi Wan to tell the republic "To come see the first battalions". It might be a bit of a long shot to assume they meant battalions when they said units, but it also makes sense. I mean, it has been noted that whenever the clones are parading, especially in the big AOTC parade at the end, they are formed into battalions. Perhaps they were created in those units as well?

200,000 battalions (Taking the 624 number) would be an intial batch of 124.8 million clones, which if we assume there are 50 million planets in the republic would give us about 2.5 million clones per planet. And if there were about 3.2 million clones in the battle of Munnilist, the numbers would make sense.

If I can get my hand on AOTC, I think I'll also try counting the amout of clones being grown per disc thingee in the cloning facility. Maybe they are grown in an amount that would fit in with other things observed this far.

Yes, I've also been thinking along those lines as battalions are most often referred to.

Alternatively, on the Kamino parade ground, we see clones marching in formations consisting of 9 columns and 10 rows=90 clone soldiers. Perhaps that constitutes a unit in Kaminoan terms? This would mean that the initial batch of 200,000 units consisted of 18,000,000 clone soldiers which was followed by 5 batches of 90*1,000,000=90,000,000 for a total of 108,000,000 clone soldiers for the batches that were completed first. It's still very much on the small side, but it's manageable.

EDIT: From the AOTC DVD online depth commentary (regarding the clone troops at the Coruscant parade ground):

These clones are now being shipped out to the new battlefronts, as the thousands of Separatist worlds must be reined back into the Republic. The war would span about three years before it ends.

Yep, shipped out to the non-clone Clone Wars.

[Hot Hands Harry]

In AotC I noticed that clones were being loaded onto Acclamator. This is when Obwan was inspecting units of the clone army.

Why were clones being loaded onto Acclamator’s now. They haven’t been ordered to move out and the Kameno cloners have no reason to believe that Obwan was going to order a immediate roll out.

Unless this is normal procedure and the clone are stored at another location. We know that they put them in cryo when not in use to maximize there life span. So what I think we are seeing is finished clones board there ship are put in cryo and put some were else to wait for the order to activate.

That’s why they only had 200,000 Combat Units ready, they were being put away. The 1 million more units could be the defrost rate of the stored clones.

Any thoughts on this or am I crazy.

[The Dark]

These clones are now being shipped out to the new battlefronts, as the thousands of Separatist worlds must be reined back into the Republic. The war would span about three years before it ends.

From the quote:

There were "thousands" of Separatist worlds. To act the minimist, two thousand worlds. I'd go for three as a minimum (to me, two is "a couple thousand"), but strictly speaking any multiple would count.

The war spanned three years.

The "3 million" clones would need to average two worlds every day to capture two thousand Separatist worlds in three years. This assumes no counterattacks, despite the fact that we saw CIS forces involved in an invasion of Kashyyk. Particularly with the multi-month sieges mentioned in the Clone Wars cartoon, I find a pace of two worlds per day to be a bit overly optimistic.

[Jim Raynor]

We know for a fact that there must have been more, since in AOTC, Count Dooku spoke of 10,000 more worlds willing to join the Separatist cause in addition to all the worlds already controlled by the Trade Federation, Banking Clan, etc. This makes that 3 million number look even worse.

[Surlethe]

We know for a fact that there must have been more, since in AOTC, Count Dooku spoke of 10,000 more worlds willing to join the Separatist cause in addition to all the worlds already controlled by the Trade Federation, Banking Clan, etc. This makes that 3 million number look even worse.

In order for 10,000 to be a marginal number of worlds joining, it shouldn't be more than a tenth of the size of the current Separatists. This means that each single clone took and held something like 16000 additional square kilometers every single day of the Clone Wars. Unless, of course, the three million number is incorrect ... .

[IceHawk-181]

The three million numbers is not wrong, you people just don’t understand wars in the Star Wars Universe.
You only need to sabotage a factory, steal a security clearance card, or blow up a single Headquarters building to take over a planet.

I mean three million might be too much, we already know it only takes like a half dozen Arcs to do these things.
ARCS = TEH SPEciALZ


Any logical approach to the issue automatically disocunts the idea of a three million Clone Army being capable of holding a single planet, let alone an entire galaxy.

Even the sycophants over at TF.N have essentially conceeded the argument, they could never raise a logical response to the Canon evidence contrary to thier precious Travvisty, and have instead devolved what was an utter trouncing but a detailed and respectable debate into trolling and sniping.

Even dp4m, a moderator no less, is sniping at the thread, making accusations and then leaving without response. (Taking care to line edit my posts on the way out too.)

There is no logical defense to Karen's numbers, and we have demonstrated that countless times.

However, sycophants never paid attention to the actual debate anyways, so it does not really matter to them.

They're wrong and they don't care.

Ah, the joys of ignorance.

[The Dark]

We know for a fact that there must have been more, since in AOTC, Count Dooku spoke of 10,000 more worlds willing to join the Separatist cause in addition to all the worlds already controlled by the Trade Federation, Banking Clan, etc. This makes that 3 million number look even worse.

Obviously, but I was deliberately going as minimalist as possible to point out the absolute minimum.

To make the math simple, working under the time frame of three years, you essentially have to take one world per day per thousand worlds. You'd need a huge army to be taking 100 worlds a day.

[Mange]

Oh brother... One of the TFN managers open a thread about what retcon people don't like, however, one can't say the GAR numbers :

+http://boards.theforce.net/literature/b ... 3553/p1/?8

[Stark]

That's priceless.

[Jim Raynor]

Daniel, ít's "banned" because it can't be discuss without getting nasty and personal, which is frankly a very damned good reason.

I vaguely remember a one-post-each sound off thread where everyone simply said whether they were for or against the "3 million" number, without doing any arguing. However, I must have imagined that, because I can't find that thread anywhere.

[VT-16]

The only ones getting personal has been one specific author.

Just stop it already, stop the whole fucking discussion. All your points have been refuted time and time again. I'm just sick of seeing any reference to this debate now.

[Vympel]

Just stop it already, stop the whole fucking discussion. All your points have been refuted time and time again. I'm just sick of seeing any reference to this debate now.

Whoose points?

[Surlethe]

Just stop it already, stop the whole fucking discussion. All your points have been refuted time and time again. I'm just sick of seeing any reference to this debate now.

Whoose points?

I think he's ranting to Ms Traviss.

[VT-16]

Mostly TFNtards, but I think some of it can be applied to just about any faction as of now. Seriously, it's been explained and debunked from one end to another, why keep harping on it ad nauseum?

I just want this horrible ordeal to sink into obscurity, never to be mentioned ever again.