Tracked Vehicles Instead of Walkers...

[LordShaithis]

Putting your direct-fire weapons on what amount to stilts to gain a longer line-of-sight is rather preposterous, compared to just mounting indirect-fire weapons.

I mean if you want a ground vehicle to deal with theater shields ala Hoth, how about a rolling missile battery that gets under the shield and immediately launches an alpha strike on the generator?

Jamming my ass. Give your missiles visual sensors, program them with the location of the generator, have them get their bearings from the sun or local geography, and let them fly to the target that way if need be. While you're at it, program them with the ability to make evasive manuvers to increase their survivability against whatever air defenses the enemy has.

If any schmuck farmer can buy sentient droids from junk-dealers on an armpit of a world like Tatooine, then there's no reason the Empire can't have intelligent missiles.

EDIT: And while I'm at it, the AT-AT? Jeez, a couple little AP guns on the sides and bottom, maybe a light AA gun on the roof, and it's instantly far more formidable.

[Winston Blake]

Putting your direct-fire weapons on what amount to stilts to gain a longer line-of-sight is rather preposterous, compared to just mounting indirect-fire weapons.

I mean if you want a ground vehicle to deal with theater shields ala Hoth, how about a rolling missile battery that gets under the shield and immediately launches an alpha strike on the generator?

A missile carrier would have fewer stowed kills, whereas a blaster rifle can fire hundreds of shots on a fist sized energy cell. Blasters can be dialed up or down as the situation requires (Maximum firepower!). Missiles have an upper limit on yield and dialing them down has no effect on the cost per kill. Blasters can conserve energy by using lower firepower, or they can fire a few shots that surpasses the yield of a general-purpose missile (LAAT style).

Considering cost, a modern Tomahawk cruise missile carries a450 kg HE warhead and costs $1.3 million USD. The Mk 84 bomb delivers 429 kg and only costs $3700. So for every Tomahawk, 350 Mk84's could be produced. Blaster cannons don't even need shells to be designed, manufactured and transported - you just need to recharge their energy packs.

What I'm arguing is that missiles would certainly provide greater capability (non-line-of-sight engagement), but at the great cost of versatility (the AT-AT works just fine for counter-insurgency) and, well, cost. In order to destroy the shield generator, a missile carrier would have to carry missiles powerful enough to match the energy delivered when Veers gave the order for 'maximum firepower'. What if such powerful missiles were so big/costly that you could make several AT-ATs for every missile carrier?

Jamming my ass. Give your missiles visual sensors, program them with the location of the generator, have them get their bearings from the sun or local geography, and let them fly to the target that way if need be. While you're at it, program them with the ability to make evasive manuvers to increase their survivability against whatever air defenses the enemy has.

It could be done, but how many times could you fire a blaster cannon for the same cost, with equivalent yield per hit and greater versatility/stowed-kills?

EDIT: And while I'm at it, the AT-AT? Jeez, a couple little AP guns on the sides and bottom, maybe a light AA gun on the roof, and it's instantly far more formidable.

Here's a idea: what if you made those AP and AA guns on turrets that could detach and drive away. They'd vastly extend the capabilities of an AT-AT strike force by providing far-ranging recon, herding ambushes and enabling overlapping crossfire. Well, you can achieve all that by adding AT-STs to the strike force, and you don't have to spend gazillions upgrading AT-AT hulls and control systems.

The AT-AT is crap as a do-it-all one-vehicle army, but it's fine as an assault gun intended to be used with combined arms tactics.

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

Putting your direct-fire weapons on what amount to stilts to gain a longer line-of-sight is rather preposterous, compared to just mounting indirect-fire weapons.

I mean if you want a ground vehicle to deal with theater shields ala Hoth, how about a rolling missile battery that gets under the shield and immediately launches an alpha strike on the generator?

Jamming my ass. Give your missiles visual sensors, program them with the location of the generator, have them get their bearings from the sun or local geography, and let them fly to the target that way if need be. While you're at it, program them with the ability to make evasive manuvers to increase their survivability against whatever air defenses the enemy has.

If any schmuck farmer can buy sentient droids from junk-dealers on an armpit of a world like Tatooine, then there's no reason the Empire can't have intelligent missiles.

EDIT: And while I'm at it, the AT-AT? Jeez, a couple little AP guns on the sides and bottom, maybe a light AA gun on the roof, and it's instantly far more formidable.

I always envisioned upgrading the AT-AT into something of a battlewagon, with repeating blasters on the legs to deal with infantry, and a couple of heavy laser cannons on the sides, AA on the top, missiles here and there...

Won't have much space left for anything else though.

[FOG3]

Considering cost, a modern Tomahawk cruise missile carries a450 kg HE warhead and costs $1.3 million USD. The Mk 84 bomb delivers 429 kg and only costs $3700. So for every Tomahawk, 350 Mk84's could be produced. Blaster cannons don't even need shells to be designed, manufactured and transported - you just need to recharge their energy packs.

What I'm arguing is that missiles would certainly provide greater capability (non-line-of-sight engagement), but at the great cost of versatility (the AT-AT works just fine for counter-insurgency) and, well, cost. In order to destroy the shield generator, a missile carrier would have to carry missiles powerful enough to match the energy delivered when Veers gave the order for 'maximum firepower'. What if such powerful missiles were so big/costly that you could make several AT-ATs for every missile carrier?

Why would they need to be more powerful/expensive then the missiles on the Clone Gunships? Those things were doing just fine against starships, and when you look at the exit hole size and apparent bay for the proton torps the one carried on a X-wing are smaller then a Sidewinder. In short you're trying to beg the question to have the missiles analogous to those carried by Clone Gunships, and similar to those carried by Vulture droids cost more then the cost of AT-ATs and their crews you are liable to lose to conduct the same mission one guided missile can conduct. I'm not buying that.

AT-ATs being good for counter insurgency is BS. How many streets are you going to fit that thing in? Try taking up the biggest boulevards completely by itself further encouraging dissent, if it can go at all. So unless you're hiding something up your sleeve that leaves heavy handed burned earth policy, which will only encourage them all the more. Seems as how your hot on cheaper via blaster, if they don't have theater shields why can't an orbiting starship do the blasting and smaller conventional transports that aren't nearly as juicy targets do troop transport. No big resource intensive, only does one job in a halfway sane manner AT-ATs needed.

Lots of transports inbound is in many ways it's own defense, as was seen with the Hueys in Nam and the OpFors AA response to getting swarmed by them.

It could be done, but how many times could you fire a blaster cannon for the same cost, with equivalent yield per hit and greater versatility/stowed-kills?

Rounds it never fires in the field, and that will contribute to it blowing up and taking out it and its crew in the all too likely [against people that actually are properly armed] are just excess waste.

The AT-AT is crap as a do-it-all one-vehicle army, but it's fine as an assault gun intended to be used with combined arms tactics.

Which is not how we see it used. I stand by my AC-130 and A-10 equivalents being better and more versatile in that role. Monsturously huge, virtually immobile targets die and aren't where they are needed when they are needed, and that's exactly what an AT-AT is.

[Anguirus]

Well, I think we have a little miscommunication here. I was referring to the top-most weapon, not the heavy turret on top of the cockppit. So we are actually saying the same thing here.

No miscommunication. There IS a heavy repeating blaster turret atop the rear cockpit, that is a physically larger weapon. However, all literature agrees that the primary and most powerful weapon on the craft is the very top-most turret.

Which has line-of-sight to everything that's not dangerously close.

I always envisioned upgrading the AT-AT into something of a battlewagon, with repeating blasters on the legs to deal with infantry, and a couple of heavy laser cannons on the sides, AA on the top, missiles here and there...

I imagine the AT-HE is very similar to that. Mind you, I think the AT-TE is an excellent design, but the conjectural AT-HE is probably similar to it design-wise, while closer to the tonnage of the AT-AT.

[Darth Wong]

The AT-AT is crap as a do-it-all one-vehicle army, but it's fine as an assault gun intended to be used with combined arms tactics.

Which is not how we see it used.

We saw it used only in a highly unusual situation. They wanted to capture Luke alive, so they were reluctant to simply bombard the shield into submission (a tactic which would have also kept them from launching transports). They wanted to take the base intact by sending in forces under the theatre shield, but we don't know what kind of aircraft they had at their disposal; it's not as if they bothered bringing any troop transports with them. Sure, ISDs and SSDs carry onboard military forces but this is a minor function at best, and one cannot expect them to necessarily have a full complement of all the different kinds of vehicles they might need or want. If their only air support was TIE fighters, they can't exactly taxi. Someone would have to build something to ferry them through the shield boundary while maintaining ground contact.

You cannot reasonably conclude from this incident that AT-ATs are always intended to be used with no support from other kinds of units.

[Winston Blake]

What I'm arguing is that missiles would certainly provide greater capability (non-line-of-sight engagement), but at the great cost of versatility (the AT-AT works just fine for counter-insurgency) and, well, cost. In order to destroy the shield generator, a missile carrier would have to carry missiles powerful enough to match the energy delivered when Veers gave the order for 'maximum firepower'. What if such powerful missiles were so big/costly that you could make several AT-ATs for every missile carrier?

Why would they need to be more powerful/expensive then the missiles on the Clone Gunships? Those things were doing just fine against starships, and when you look at the exit hole size and apparent bay for the proton torps the one carried on a X-wing are smaller then a Sidewinder.

I don't think the LAAT missiles would have had the range, targeting ability, evasive ability or firepower to destroy the shield generator. The original proposal was for an AA-dodging unjammable cruise missile. I'll just mention here that visual sensors can be 'jammed' with blinding lasers, which we have today.

Evidence that they were doing just fine against armoured starships? IIRC they couldn't do jack against the Fed ship armour. If you're talking about knocking out the Techno Union ships, I'm pretty sure those were unarmoured (hell their fuel tanks are external). I don't have access to my ICSs to check.

ANH proton torpedoes fire just a conical unguided warhead, and even those are described as so expensive that the Rebellion could only afford a handful. X-wing laser cannons firing many, many shots (with at least 60GJ per shot) were no problem.

In short you're trying to beg the question to have the missiles analogous to those carried by Clone Gunships, and similar to those carried by Vulture droids cost more then the cost of AT-ATs and their crews you are liable to lose to conduct the same mission one guided missile can conduct. I'm not buying that.

The Rebels couldn't field weapons that even came close to damaging AT-AT armour. If it wasn't for Luke's special escapades, they wouldn't have even damaged any. The Empire wanted troops inside Echo Base, and the existing AT-AT transports had more than enough protection and firepower to knock out the shield generator and deliver their troops.

Essentially, what's the point of designing/manufacturing/transporting uber-cruise-missiles when your transports can do the job already?

AT-ATs being good for counter insurgency is BS. How many streets are you going to fit that thing in?

Yeah, because all those hidden Rebel bases the Empire was searching for were in cities, right? "Counter-insurgency" =/= "urban warfare".

Try taking up the biggest boulevards completely by itself further encouraging dissent, if it can go at all. So unless you're hiding something up your sleeve that leaves heavy handed burned earth policy, which will only encourage them all the more.

Taking up the biggest boulevards? Have you seen TESB? AT-AT's are only about 10.6m wide, from toe to toe.

Seems as how your hot on cheaper via blaster, if they don't have theater shields why can't an orbiting starship do the blasting and smaller conventional transports that aren't nearly as juicy targets do troop transport. No big resource intensive, only does one job in a halfway sane manner AT-ATs needed.

Emphasis mine. I don't understand that last sentence, but what makes you think they don't use orbital strikes when there's no theater shield? This doesn't support replacing AT-ATs with uber-cruise-missiles at the Battle of Hoth.

It could be done, but how many times could you fire a blaster cannon for the same cost, with equivalent yield per hit and greater versatility/stowed-kills?

Rounds it never fires in the field, and that will contribute to it blowing up and taking out it and its crew in the all too likely [against people that actually are properly armed] are just excess waste.

What? The AT-ATs fire lower power cannon shots throughout the battle, making explosions everywhere. The uber-missile can only destroy one target.

Evidence that a charged energy pack is able to explode, explode vigorously enough to 'take out it and its crew', and further, so vulnerable that 'properly armed' people are 'all too likely' to cause it to explode? Note that the best insurgency the galaxy can muster (Rebels) is still a pipsqueak compared to Imperial forces.

The AT-AT is crap as a do-it-all one-vehicle army, but it's fine as an assault gun intended to be used with combined arms tactics.

Which is not how we see it used.

Watch TESB. There are AT-STs escorting the AT-ATs.

I stand by my AC-130 and A-10 equivalents being better and more versatile in that role. Monsturously huge, virtually immobile targets die and aren't where they are needed when they are needed, and that's exactly what an AT-AT is.

In assaulting Rebel fortifications, AT-ATs don't die because in SW, the balance between Imperial armour and insurgent firepower is overwhelmingly on the Empire's side. Rebels don't have any RPG-like weapons that can kill AT-ATs the same way real-world insurgents kill tanks.

How do your CAS equivalents deal with theater shields? Sorry if this came up during the A6 vs AT-AT section, I didn't read most of that. If this needs to continue and is based on arguments there, I'll go back and read it all. Also, if that's necessary, then I suggest reading my post on the AT-AT as an assault gun (not a tank/IFV/SPH), if you haven't already.

So an AFV is virtually immobile compared to an aircraft. What do you expect? Imagine Bradley IFVs are assaulting a base to capture it, and are invulnerable to all enemy fire, and have enough firepower to destroy anything in their way. Would you propose replacing them with humvees + A-10s simply because A-10s are more mobile?

[Anguirus]

ANH proton torpedoes fire just a conical unguided warhead

Umm...since when are "10000G turn" proton torpedoes unguided?

I think the relevant point is that despite propulsion and guidance systems, SW technology can fit a nuclear-equivalent weapon in a missile smaller than a Sidewinder. Hence, the ability to shoot a lot of small missiles can be a significant addition to a vehicle's firepower. In addition, we've seen how ridiculously effective Hailfire units can be, scoring one-shot kills on heavier vehicles.

ANH proton torpedoes fire just a conical unguided warhead, and even those are described as so expensive that the Rebellion could only afford a handful

A relative handful, surely. You'll rarely hear of an X-wing being equipped with fewer than six. Regardless, the immense disparity between the resources available to the Empire and to the Rebellion mean that they can almost certainly afford a mix of missiles and energy weapons on whatever vehicle they care to equip them with.

Not that I think A-10s and cruise missiles could have won on Hoth. Just pointing out the usefulness of SW missiles. Plus, you have to factor in that the Rebels had serious difficulty adapting their vehicles to conditions on Hoth. It's possible that few of the units available to Death Squadron were able to operate on the planet at all.

[NRS Guardian]

ANH proton torpedoes fire just a conical unguided warhead, and even those are described as so expensive that the Rebellion could only afford a handful

A relative handful, surely. You'll rarely hear of an X-wing being equipped with fewer than six. Regardless, the immense disparity between the resources available to the Empire and to the Rebellion mean that they can almost certainly afford a mix of missiles and energy weapons on whatever vehicle they care to equip them with.

Not that I think A-10s and cruise missiles could have won on Hoth. Just pointing out the usefulness of SW missiles. Plus, you have to factor in that the Rebels had serious difficulty adapting their vehicles to conditions on Hoth. It's possible that few of the units available to Death Squadron were able to operate on the planet at all.

According to the OT:ICS the X-wings at the Battle of Yavin were only armed with a couple of PT per craft, due to the fact that PTs were so expensive. Afterall something like 40 fighters were conducting an attack which means to arm all of them with just 2 PTs each would mean the Rebels needed to have 80 PTs on Yavin. Most other times we see Rebel operations except for the major attack on Endor the Rebels are using significantly fewer than 40 fighters. So they can probably afford to arm their fighters with full loads.

[VT-16]

conical unguided warhead

They are guided, otherwise the tactic at Yavin wouldn't even have been suggested in the first place (sharp downward change of direction and all).

[Connor MacLeod]

Missiles or rockets (or unguided shells) can be of use (and we've seen examples of all three as well as direct-fire energy weapons) but they are hardly an 'all-purpose" weapon.

- guided munitions (rockets or missiles or even shells) require some form of guidance: either some sort of droid brain (like Slave-1's missiles) or some sort of passive/active seeker head, or remotely controlled/guided from the launching platform. Problem is that makes them highly vulnerable to jamming, spoofing, or any other Electronic-warfare measure, and under a shield, the means of guidance are fairly limited (no GPS or satellite support, for example.)

- All of the above are vulnerable to interception. The ease or ability of interception will depend highly on how fast they move and in what manner they move - high speed projectiles (especially ones with engines) would be rather visible. This isn't even addressing other passive measures (tractor/repulsor beams, particle shielding, etc.) Venators were able to shoot down hailfire volleys in the ROTS novelization on Utapau, for example, as I recall.

- indirect fire will not protect you against air-borne vechiles (speeders, fighters, or gunships.)

[LordShaithis]

A missile carrier would have fewer stowed kills, whereas a blaster rifle can fire hundreds of shots on a fist sized energy cell. Blasters can be dialed up or down as the situation requires (Maximum firepower!). Missiles have an upper limit on yield and dialing them down has no effect on the cost per kill. Blasters can conserve energy by using lower firepower, or they can fire a few shots that surpasses the yield of a general-purpose missile (LAAT style).

Don't be stupid. Nobody is suggesting that the Empire should have abandoned blasters entirely in favor of missiles. What I'm talking about is something like artillery, that can be rolled under a shield and used to hit the generator without waiting for an APC to plod over and shoot it with direct-fire weapons.

In order to destroy the shield generator, a missile carrier would have to carry missiles powerful enough to match the energy delivered when Veers gave the order for 'maximum firepower'. What if such powerful missiles were so big/costly that you could make several AT-ATs for every missile carrier?

This is Star Wars, where even single-man fighters routinely carry multiple nuclear-yield weapons.

It could be done, but how many times could you fire a blaster cannon for the same cost, with equivalent yield per hit and greater versatility/stowed-kills?

See above. Any fighter-launched missile yields more firepower than was needed to destroy that generator, and the AI/guidance can't be too expensive in a universe where one can buy an astromech droid from a junk dealer.

Here's a idea: what if you made those AP and AA guns on turrets that could detach and drive away.

That would be fucking stupid.

They'd vastly extend the capabilities of an AT-AT strike force by providing far-ranging recon, herding ambushes and enabling overlapping crossfire.

They'd be off either "providing far-ranging recon" or getting blown to hell thanks to their light armor. Meanwhile some guy is taking out the AT-AT with a grappling hook, a lightsaber, and a hand grenade because the AT-AT itself has absolutely zero capacity to shoot at anything that isn't within the arc of it's forward guns.

Well, you can achieve all that by adding AT-STs to the strike force, and you don't have to spend gazillions upgrading AT-AT hulls and control systems.

"General, we can save the fortune we waste luxuriously equipping our Abrams tanks with machine guns as secondary weapons, and just have gun-carrying Humvees follow them around everywhere instead!"

The AT-AT is crap as a do-it-all one-vehicle army, but it's fine as an assault gun intended to be used with combined arms tactics.

Wish they had shown some of those tactics at Hoth. I mean this was Darth Vader's personal squadron, the cream of the Empire, and they were out looking for a rebel base to invade. You would think they might have been better prepared.

[Major Maxillary]

AT-ATs being good for counter insurgency is BS. How many streets are you going to fit that thing in? Try taking up the biggest boulevards completely by itself further encouraging dissent, if it can go at all. So unless you're hiding something up your sleeve that leaves heavy handed burned earth policy, which will only encourage them all the more.

Scorched earth is only used when you're retreating.

[FOG3]

I don't think the LAAT missiles would have had the range, targeting ability, evasive ability or firepower to destroy the shield generator. The original proposal was for an AA-dodging unjammable cruise missile. I'll just mention here that visual sensors can be 'jammed' with blinding lasers, which we have today.

Evidence that they were doing just fine against armoured starships? IIRC they couldn't do jack against the Fed ship armour. If you're talking about knocking out the Techno Union ships, I'm pretty sure those were unarmoured (hell their fuel tanks are external). I don't have access to my ICSs to check.

Sidewinders are very small missiles, think Maverick with the same sort of filler used in thermal detantors, seismic charges, proton torps, or concussion missiles. Otherwise you'd better give me a damn good reason why warheads can't be scaled up when we've already seen the limit on a pure fission warhead can be exceeded easily enough.

ANH proton torpedoes fire just a conical unguided warhead, and even those are described as so expensive that the Rebellion could only afford a handful. X-wing laser cannons firing many, many shots (with at least 60GJ per shot) were no problem.

I'll let you in on a little secret: our warplanes don't go out with full war loads most of the time either. When I say smaller then a Sidewinder I refer to the entire assembly including the large internal launcher thingy. I'd say they're around Stinger size even based off the size in the vehicle. By all rights you could make a MANPADS based around one. High grade thermal detonators are grenade size, cheap enough for easy civilian purchase in Dark Empire, and apparently pretty daggone light. I fail to see where there'd be any serious problem here.

Besides which we see what amount to expendable units in both of the Clone Wars armies with significant numbers of guided missiles, they can't be that fundamentally expensive to begin with and mass production cures most ills otherwise.

The Rebels couldn't field weapons that even came close to damaging AT-AT armour. If it wasn't for Luke's special escapades, they wouldn't have even damaged any. The Empire wanted troops inside Echo Base, and the existing AT-AT transports had more than enough protection and firepower to knock out the shield generator and deliver their troops.

Essentially, what's the point of designing/manufacturing/transporting uber-cruise-missiles when your transports can do the job already?

Cruise missile was someone else's idea, so I'll let him defend it. Of course, you seem to be ignorant of why we use TacToms instead of just slews of dumb bombs. You didn't even compare it with a iron bomb with tail kit for crying out loud. What are you some kind of LWF fanatic that doesn't get why PGMs are such a revolutionary thing?

If you'd limited yourself to didn't field you'd be correct. Couldn't isn't, especially if Anquarius' reference to quad laser cannons being able to blow them away in DE is legit.

Yeah, because all those hidden Rebel bases the Empire was searching for were in cities, right? "Counter-insurgency" =/= "urban warfare".

Yeah if we change the wording in mid discussion we can dodge it, huh?

Main Entry: in·sur·gen·cy
Pronunciation: -j&n(t)-sE
Function: noun
Inflected Form(s): plural -cies
1 : the quality or state of being insurgent; specifically : a condition of revolt against a government that is less than an organized revolution and that is not recognized as belligerency

Them being out in the open where I can deploy everything on them is the absolutely best case scenario. You want to sell something for counter insurgency Ops it had better be able to operate in urban terrain at the very least. If you'd limited yourself to against rebels hiding on practically uninhabited worlds with theater shields instead of the versatility wank you'd have been fine, but someone felt the need to claim they were oh so versatile which they aren't by far.

Taking up the biggest boulevards? Have you seen TESB? AT-AT's are only about 10.6m wide, from toe to toe.

And this defeat my point how? Challengers (the British MBT) have issues with this with a fraction of the width and for some magic reason AT-ATs won't?

How do your CAS equivalents deal with theater shields? Sorry if this came up during the A6 vs AT-AT section, I didn't read most of that. If this needs to continue and is based on arguments there, I'll go back and read it all. Also, if that's necessary, then I suggest reading my post on the AT-AT as an assault gun (not a tank/IFV/SPH), if you haven't already.

I already went over this when I brought up the idea independent of that nonsense earlier. They have wheels they can just taxi through the shield before taking off. Because I'm not in the mood for some BS about their rough and short runway capability not being a proven capability I'll let you chew on the fact a C-130 can land, take off, and taxi around a fleet carrier with no catapault, hook, or ground crew assistance with room to spare and a full load. They can and have also operated in deep mud, which is a lot less permissive to operations then extremely flat and hard packed ice.

If the speeders can fly under the shield so can they.

So an AFV is virtually immobile compared to an aircraft. What do you expect? Imagine Bradley IFVs are assaulting a base to capture it, and are invulnerable to all enemy fire, and have enough firepower to destroy anything in their way. Would you propose replacing them with humvees + A-10s simply because A-10s are more mobile?

We're not talking modern AFV velocities, we're talking WW1 tank speeds here, which were never really acceptable. See previously in thread I've beaten on this enough already and I'm not interested in humoring your ignorant strawman.

AT-ATs being good for counter insurgency is BS. How many streets are you going to fit that thing in? Try taking up the biggest boulevards completely by itself further encouraging dissent, if it can go at all. So unless you're hiding something up your sleeve that leaves heavy handed burned earth policy, which will only encourage them all the more.

Scorched earth is only used when you're retreating.

Quick someone tell the Mongols that Genghis can't do it because Major Maxillary says so and Soviets while you're at it.

[TithonusSyndrome]

A missile carrier would have fewer stowed kills, whereas a blaster rifle can fire hundreds of shots on a fist sized energy cell. Blasters can be dialed up or down as the situation requires (Maximum firepower!). Missiles have an upper limit on yield and dialing them down has no effect on the cost per kill. Blasters can conserve energy by using lower firepower, or they can fire a few shots that surpasses the yield of a general-purpose missile (LAAT style).

Don't be stupid. Nobody is suggesting that the Empire should have abandoned blasters entirely in favor of missiles. What I'm talking about is something like artillery, that can be rolled under a shield and used to hit the generator without waiting for an APC to plod over and shoot it with direct-fire weapons.

If you're talking about some kind of shell-lobber, those are easy enough to intercept and destroy with modern lasers.

[LordShaithis]

If you're talking about some kind of shell-lobber, those are easy enough to intercept and destroy with modern lasers.

No, I'm talking about droid-brained missiles. Read the rest of the goddamn post.

[Winston Blake]

ANH proton torpedoes fire just a conical unguided warhead

Umm...since when are "10000G turn" proton torpedoes unguided?

My mistake, I was imagining a flak-dodging kind of missile.

I think the relevant point is that despite propulsion and guidance systems, SW technology can fit a nuclear-equivalent weapon in a missile smaller than a Sidewinder. Hence, the ability to shoot a lot of small missiles can be a significant addition to a vehicle's firepower. In addition, we've seen how ridiculously effective Hailfire units can be, scoring one-shot kills on heavier vehicles.

I agree that adding Hailfire launchers to AT-ATs would significantly increase their firepower. The question is: When you're only dealing with clawless ragtag guerillas and your basic transport can already do the mission, why bother pouring money into new capabilities?

I admit that I initially forgot about the fact that LAAT-style missiles can carry nuclear yields focused into a 2º cone, and was instead basing my ideas off the impacts shown in AOTC. Note that even though the LAAT missile equipment takes up much more space than an AT-AT's guns, they have fewer stowed kills (LAAT cutaway in ICS, "We're out of rockets").

ANH proton torpedoes fire just a conical unguided warhead, and even those are described as so expensive that the Rebellion could only afford a handful

A relative handful, surely. You'll rarely hear of an X-wing being equipped with fewer than six. Regardless, the immense disparity between the resources available to the Empire and to the Rebellion mean that they can almost certainly afford a mix of missiles and energy weapons on whatever vehicle they care to equip them with.

IIRC in the attack on the Death Star, the Rebellion could only afford a single pair for each X-wing. Anyway, my point was just that (for equivalent damage etc) missiles cost a lot more than blasters.

The Empire isn't fighting the big Clone Wars any more - if general purpose variable blaster cannons do the job, nobody's going to bother implementing more powerful yet more specialised and expensive missiles. (Of course the real reason missiles aren't common in the OT is simply because Lucas based it off WWII).

[Winston Blake]

[snip blaster advantages]

Don't be stupid. Nobody is suggesting that the Empire should have abandoned blasters entirely in favor of missiles. What I'm talking about is something like artillery, that can be rolled under a shield and used to hit the generator without waiting for an APC to plod over and shoot it with direct-fire weapons.

What I'm saying is that the lack of such weapons can be rationalised by noticing that the existing AT-ATs didn't need the extra capabilities of a special new missile carrier in order to complete the Hoth mission. From the point of view of an Imperial administrator a few years before the Battle of Hoth, they may well have thought "We don't need missile artillery, our assault guns can handle any skirmishes with this pitiful little band of guerillas". Which they could, except of course the Rebels had Luke Skywalker on their side.

In order to destroy the shield generator, a missile carrier would have to carry missiles powerful enough to match the energy delivered when Veers gave the order for 'maximum firepower'. What if such powerful missiles were so big/costly that you could make several AT-ATs for every missile carrier?

This is Star Wars, where even single-man fighters routinely carry multiple nuclear-yield weapons.

Yeah I screwed that bit.

It could be done, but how many times could you fire a blaster cannon for the same cost, with equivalent yield per hit and greater versatility/stowed-kills?

See above. Any fighter-launched missile yields more firepower than was needed to destroy that generator, and the AI/guidance can't be too expensive in a universe where one can buy an astromech droid from a junk dealer.

I'm not arguing that it couldn't be done. I'm explaining why it may not have been, by showing that it would be more expensive and specialised than using blaster cannons. In peace time without a formidable enemy, it really may not have been worth it.

'Ha ha, Imperials are just stupid!' is a last resort explanation.

Here's a idea: what if you made those AP and AA guns on turrets that could detach and drive away.

That would be fucking stupid.

As would attacking an intermediate step in a thought-experiment.

They'd vastly extend the capabilities of an AT-AT strike force by providing far-ranging recon, herding ambushes and enabling overlapping crossfire.

They'd be off either "providing far-ranging recon" or getting blown to hell thanks to their light armor. Meanwhile some guy is taking out the AT-AT with a grappling hook, a lightsaber, and a hand grenade because the AT-AT itself has absolutely zero capacity to shoot at anything that isn't within the arc of it's forward guns.

Ideally the AT-ATs would destroy all the gun positions as they crossed the horizon while the AT-STs covered them. This would work best if the AT-ATs were very tall.

IIRC the lack of AT-STs later in the battle is attributed to them being destroyed. This can be rationalised by the possibility that Veers was ordered by Vader to speed up the attack. Since the AT-ATs were tough enough that they could leisurely pick off guns as they advanced, the accompanying AT-STs were sacrificed. The slow speed of the AT-ATs could be attributed to Veers focusing on taking out the guns as quickly as possible to help the AT-STs, while still advancing as ordered.

This also explains Luke's success in his David/Goliath move, since with the AT-STs, even a proto-Jedi superhuman (with all the right equipment including a very rare weapon), dropped by sheer chance into the right place at the right time would've failed.

Historically the custom-built fully armored assault guns usually mounted the gun or howitzer in a fully enclosed casemate on a tank chassis. The use of a casemate instead of a turret limited these weapons' field of fire, but provided a simpler construction that was cheaper to build and less prone to mechanical breakdowns. The increased space and reduced weight of the turretless design also allowed mounting a larger weapon and providing heavier frontal armor on any given chassis, and in most cases these turretless vehicles also presented a lower profile as a target for the enemy.

So the AT-AT's field of fire is pretty good for an assault gun. I propose that the AT-AT is in fact an AT-HE chassis, converted into a cheaper IFV/assault gun. After the Clone Wars, with the need for the Imperial military reduced to policing (stormtrooper garrisons on various worlds) and fighting gangs and guerillas, the AT-HE was phased out and the AT-AT remains. This fits well with the suggestion earlier that the AT-HE may have been like an AT-AT, but with more internal space taken up by guns all over, Juggernaut-style missile launchers, etc.

Well, you can achieve all that by adding AT-STs to the strike force, and you don't have to spend gazillions upgrading AT-AT hulls and control systems.

"General, we can save the fortune we waste luxuriously equipping our Abrams tanks with machine guns as secondary weapons, and just have gun-carrying Humvees follow them around everywhere instead!"

Assault gun, not tank. In fact, some assault guns didn't have any other armament but their gun. Many of those that did have a machine gun could only fire forward.

"General, we can improve the firepower of our self-propelled howitzers by modifying them to have omnidirectional machine gun coverage and AA guns!"
"Sure, maybe if we were fighting zee Nazis. I'll reassign some AA-equipped humvees for you."

The AT-AT is crap as a do-it-all one-vehicle army, but it's fine as an assault gun intended to be used with combined arms tactics.

Wish they had shown some of those tactics at Hoth. I mean this was Darth Vader's personal squadron, the cream of the Empire, and they were out looking for a rebel base to invade. You would think they might have been better prepared.

They had AT-STs and it may have played out as I described above. It's hard to be prepared against a superhuman making a literally unprecented kind of suicide attack and who then happens to get close enough by being shot down while carrying just the right equipment.

I think it's possible to rationalise the existence of AT-ATs. You seem to just want to point and jeer at the Empire.

[Winston Blake]

Sidewinders are very small missiles, think Maverick with the same sort of filler used in thermal detantors, seismic charges, proton torps, or concussion missiles. Otherwise you'd better give me a damn good reason why warheads can't be scaled up when we've already seen the limit on a pure fission warhead can be exceeded easily enough.

I concede that the focused nuclear-yield variant of LAAT missile warheads could destroy the shield generator.

ANH proton torpedoes fire just a conical unguided warhead, and even those are described as so expensive that the Rebellion could only afford a handful. X-wing laser cannons firing many, many shots (with at least 60GJ per shot) were no problem.

I'll let you in on a little secret: our warplanes don't go out with full war loads most of the time either.

Gee, thanks. The fact is that the Rebel X-wings only carried a single pair of torpedoes because they were so expensive, supporting my point that missiles are more expensive than blaster cannons.

When I say smaller then a Sidewinder I refer to the entire assembly including the large internal launcher thingy. I'd say they're around Stinger size even based off the size in the vehicle. By all rights you could make a MANPADS based around one. High grade thermal detonators are grenade size, cheap enough for easy civilian purchase in Dark Empire, and apparently pretty daggone light. I fail to see where there'd be any serious problem here.

Besides which we see what amount to expendable units in both of the Clone Wars armies with significant numbers of guided missiles, they can't be that fundamentally expensive to begin with and mass production cures most ills otherwise.

The only period in which we see missiles in common use is during the Clone Wars, the only full scale war in 25 000 years. Your explanation for this is 'Hur, hur, Empire stoopid'. My explanation is that only a superpower facing another superpower needs the capability provided by jam-resistant missiles, in a universe where the balance between ECM and ECCM lies well towards ECM:

Jamming

All Imperial starships, including the smallest one-man fighters, incorporate sensor jamming equipment. According to SWICS, advanced TIE fighters employ sophisticated sensor suites that "must overcome the extremely powerful jamming signals used by all combat craft". The DS also employed "hundreds of Kuat Drive Yards 220-SIG tactical jammers" that prevented the attacking X-Wings from being able to use their onboard sensors (ref. SWEGWT). And of course, the Imperial fleet broadcast so much sensor interference during the Battle of Endor that the Rebel fleet was unable to determine whether the DS2 shield was up or down until they destroyed the fleet's primary communications ship (ref. ROTJ novelization).

At very close range, high-powered sensor pulses can "burn through" jamming. This is why high-powered jammers inevitably reduce combat ranges to visual sighting ranges; it is impossible to target ships at long range through a blanket of white noise, but a combination of sensor targeting and manual control can be more effective at close range. Heavy starships and massive vessels like the Death Star can project such enormously powerful sensor pulses that they can increase their effective scanning range somewhat in spite of the jamming, but in a large battle the presence of literally thousands or tens of thousands of jamming sources (the fighters) can still make long-range targeting very difficult.

The Federation appears to avoid using jammers, most likely because they are reluctant to impede their own sensor arrays. This will confer another advantage upon us in battle; they are not accustomed to dealing with high-powered jamming.

Large, high-powered Imperial jammers are often coupled with distortion field generators which can actually affect the maneuverability of starships, in addition to interfering with their sensors, as described in the following quote from General Dodonna during the Yavin briefing in ANH:

"Also, their field generators will probably create a lot of distortion, especially in and around the trench. I figure that maneuverability in that sector will be less than point three."

This passage suggests that high-powered jammers actually perform a secondary function of distorting the space-time continuum itself, thus making starship maneuvering difficult at best. As an aside, this is the probable explanation for the slow X-wing speed in the trench runs (along with the fact that the heavy jamming would have made it impossible to accurately target the port at higher speeds). The X-wings were travelling much slower in the trench than they did during their trip around Yavin to attack the Death Star.

During the OT missiles are seen very rarely, and the Empire has no formidable enemy, nobody with resources even approaching its own. The use of AT-ATs despite the possibility of guided missiles can be rationalised by considering that, while missiles are possible, the Empire can't justify the cost, complexity and labour of using them any more. Not when the biggest and best opposing force are pitiful guerilla raiders like the Rebels.

Essentially, what's the point of designing/manufacturing/transporting uber-cruise-missiles when your transports can do the job already?

Cruise missile was someone else's idea, so I'll let him defend it. Of course, you seem to be ignorant of why we use TacToms instead of just slews of dumb bombs. You didn't even compare it with a iron bomb with tail kit for crying out loud. What are you some kind of LWF fanatic that doesn't get why PGMs are such a revolutionary thing?

If I could have found one big enough, I would have compared it to an artillery shell. That would still have been too resource-intensive, since my point was that blaster bolts don't require any manufacturing/shipping etc, and hence are cheaper than complex autonomous missiles that are continuously destroyed. I don't know what point you thought you were attacking.

AT-ATs can do the job of assaulting a base of ragtag guerillas who can't get any equipment that can even damage them. Developing increased Imperial ground assault capabilities requires a 'Why?' not a 'Why not?'.

If you'd limited yourself to didn't field you'd be correct. Couldn't isn't, especially if Anquarius' reference to quad laser cannons being able to blow them away in DE is legit.

May I ask if English is your first language, or if you have any kind of mental condition like dyslexia?

Yeah, because all those hidden Rebel bases the Empire was searching for were in cities, right? "Counter-insurgency" =/= "urban warfare".

Yeah if we change the wording in mid discussion we can dodge it, huh?

Main Entry: in·sur·gen·cy
Pronunciation: -j&n(t)-sE
Function: noun
Inflected Form(s): plural -cies
1 : the quality or state of being insurgent; specifically : a condition of revolt against a government that is less than an organized revolution and that is not recognized as belligerency

What do you think quoting this achieves? It doesn't say anything about urban warfare there. Insurgents can be based in frozen wastes and jungles, not necessarily cities. Are you trying to say that fighting the Rebellion was an actual war? What would you call fighting guerillas recruited from the Empire's subjects, if not counter-insurgency?

Them being out in the open where I can deploy everything on them is the absolutely best case scenario. You want to sell something for counter insurgency Ops it had better be able to operate in urban terrain at the very least. If you'd limited yourself to against rebels hiding on practically uninhabited worlds with theater shields instead of the versatility wank you'd have been fine, but someone felt the need to claim they were oh so versatile which they aren't by far.

You're the one who assumed that counter-insurgency implied urban warfare, even though I was clearly referring to the Rebellion which certainly isn't based in cities. Carrying blaster cannons which can be manufactured and maintained for cheap, dialed to any yield, and which provide a huge number of stowed kills is more versatile than a rack full of cruise missiles. I say 'versatile' because even though 'general' is the antonym of 'specialised', it's ambiguous.

Taking up the biggest boulevards? Have you seen TESB? AT-AT's are only about 10.6m wide, from toe to toe.

And this defeat my point how? Challengers (the British MBT) have issues with this with a fraction of the width and for some magic reason AT-ATs won't?

Where did I say that AT-ATs would have no problem navigating streets? YOU said AT-ATs wouldn't even fit in 'the biggest boulevards' and I corrected you. Your point that AT-ATs would suck at walking through urban terrain is a strawman, since I never suggested AT-ATs for urban warfare.

How do your CAS equivalents deal with theater shields? Sorry if this came up during the A6 vs AT-AT section, I didn't read most of that. If this needs to continue and is based on arguments there, I'll go back and read it all. Also, if that's necessary, then I suggest reading my post on the AT-AT as an assault gun (not a tank/IFV/SPH), if you haven't already.

I already went over this when I brought up the idea independent of that nonsense earlier. They have wheels they can just taxi through the shield before taking off. Because I'm not in the mood for some BS about their rough and short runway capability not being a proven capability I'll let you chew on the fact a C-130 can land, take off, and taxi around a fleet carrier with no catapault, hook, or ground crew assistance with room to spare and a full load. They can and have also operated in deep mud, which is a lot less permissive to operations then extremely flat and hard packed ice.

If the speeders can fly under the shield so can they.

OK, so making CAS aircraft could be done. Now how would you sell that to an Imperial Appropriations Committee, with the Clone Wars long gone and no opposing forces left anywhere near the power of the Empire? Policing criminal activities and skirmishing with guerillas and gangs doesn't justify enabling new capabilities through developing powerful, expensive new systems. If not for Luke Skywalker and the hidden Rebel ion cannon, the AT-ATs would have been undefeated and no Rebel ships could've escaped.

You go on about how small nuclear yield weapons (missiles/mines) can be to kill AT-ATs. You even say they could fit in MANPADS. Let's assume there's no reason why missiles aren't commonly used. Why wouldn't that work even better against CAS aircraft? Your squadron of A-10s and AC-130s gets a face full of nuclear fireball as soon as it crosses the horizon. Now, in a Rebel-controlled battlefield full of jamming which nullifies missiles, snowspeeders would outmaneuver them and shoot them down.

The lack of CAS aircraft can be rationalised by a lack of armour, the kind of heavy armour that made snowspeeder blasters and Rebel gun emplacements utterly impotent against the AT-ATs. A-10s certainly can't carry MBT-level armour.

So an AFV is virtually immobile compared to an aircraft. What do you expect? Imagine Bradley IFVs are assaulting a base to capture it, and are invulnerable to all enemy fire, and have enough firepower to destroy anything in their way. Would you propose replacing them with humvees + A-10s simply because A-10s are more mobile?

We're not talking modern AFV velocities, we're talking WW1 tank speeds here, which were never really acceptable. See previously in thread I've beaten on this enough already and I'm not interested in humoring your ignorant strawman.

Ok then, let's limit these super-Bradleys to WWI tank speeds. Now would you rather replace them with A-10s? It could be done, but it's a matter of 'why?' rather than 'why not?'.

[nightmare]

No miscommunication. There IS a heavy repeating blaster turret atop the rear cockpit, that is a physically larger weapon. However, all literature agrees that the primary and most powerful weapon on the craft is the very top-most turret.

Which has line-of-sight to everything that's not dangerously close.

The so-called "primary" turret has a safety margin of 2 degrees forward if you keep it at 90 degrees. Sideways and rearwards is a bit better, but we're still talking about a gun that can't normally fire at ground vehicles. It also has a damage rating equal to the multi-barreled rear blaster cannon.

I always envisioned upgrading the AT-AT into something of a battlewagon, with repeating blasters on the legs to deal with infantry, and a couple of heavy laser cannons on the sides, AA on the top, missiles here and there...

Specialized > generalized.

I imagine the AT-HE is very similar to that. Mind you, I think the AT-TE is an excellent design, but the conjectural AT-HE is probably similar to it design-wise, while closer to the tonnage of the AT-AT.

Except for the top turret with exposed gunner. That sucks. Too many APLs, but that's not much of a problem.

I mean if you want a ground vehicle to deal with theater shields ala Hoth, how about a rolling missile battery that gets under the shield and immediately launches an alpha strike on the generator?

To how high altitude does the shield extend again? Artillery may not work. Aside from the more obvious answer that it was simply not available.

"General, we can save the fortune we waste luxuriously equipping our Abrams tanks with machine guns as secondary weapons, and just have gun-carrying Humvees follow them around everywhere instead!"

I expected that the concept of overspecialization would be lost on some. Ten years ago, quality meant a product that lasted significantly longer than expected, or significantly longer than its competitiors. Some customers were prepared to pay extra for this, but not all. Today, quality means right quality. Which is what the customer expects, when they expect it, lasting as long as expected. If the customer wants a machine that lasts ten years and is prepared to pay for it, building a machine that lasts 11 years is a waste. Similarly, you design a vehicle to do the job it is expected to do; no less and no more. Because anything else is a failure in cost-effectiveness. Sometimes you have a bit of wiggle room but the principle remains crystal clear.

Would the AT-AT be better with an AA turret? Sure. A missile rack? Sure. Some APLs? Sure. Why not make it able to fly, swim, walk, and turn into a freaking gorilla while you're at it? The point; you can add all those, but they don't come free. A vehicle should never, ever, be more versatile than it needs to be. Designing things that can do everything is both costly and ineffective. What you can argue about is how versatile the AT-AT needs to be. Is the current AT-AT design not versatile enough? Maybe. Even the Imperials saw fit to modify the design a little, based on experiences in the field. But some sort of do-it-all-jack-of-all-trades fortress? Oh no. It's a popular idea, but nothing more.

[Kartr_Kana]

ok I just read this entire thread and its confusing to say the least! Origional post was why did the Empire choose tanks on legs over treads. I think the best answer has been stated many times here. hight and terrain handling, you get better range on your LOS weapons and you can navigate obsticals that tracked cant. Oh and you cant throw a leg like you can a track

A5 VS AT-AT: AT-AT has greater range, but less firepower. Both in number of guns and power. maingun on the A5 is as or more powerful but have a shorter range. I dont care for the A5 its outdated in the extreme and I'm just going to say worse.

A6 vs AT-AT: Juggernaught owns AT-AT at everything more guns, more coverage, more troops, greater range, versaility, everything. Only problem is its most likely more exspensive and it takes up more room. AT-AT capable assault gun with integral troop support. With appropiate combind arms its just as effective as the A6, and you should have combind arms even with the A6. Cost wins out again.

Oh and yes you can jam sensors but not inertial guidance systems which the US Military uses as back up on the JDAM bombs and is almost as acurate. so ecm isnt a real worry when firing missiles at fixed posistions. and hailfires sure didnt seem to have any problems hitting mobile targets with whatever guidance they were using so ecm isnt such a big deal

[Cykeisme]

All good points, Katr_Kana, but I'd like to point out that even with inertial guidance, those hailfire missiles, if programmed at moment of launch, could have still hit the AT-TEs (at least most of the time).

It's also possible that the hailfire missiles had droid brains with visual sensors on them. Probably more expensive (significant cost increase considering the volume of missiles fired), but possible.

Those hailfire missiles certainly appeared to take erratic paths that look like they're intended to attempt to frustrate anti-missile fire, but I'm surprised the Republic vehicles didn't have some sort of point defense weapons, too.. or even attempt to improvise anti-missile fire.

[FOG3]

Gee, thanks. The fact is that the Rebel X-wings only carried a single pair of torpedoes because they were so expensive, supporting my point that missiles are more expensive than blaster cannons.

Watch him backpedal. From a missile that costs as much as multiple AT-ATs to merely blasters are cheaper then missiles. No shit, sherlock.

The only period in which we see missiles in common use is during the Clone Wars, the only full scale war in 25 000 years. Your explanation for this is 'Hur, hur, Empire stoopid'. My explanation is that only a superpower facing another superpower needs the capability provided by jam-resistant missiles

So you're saying I can make the missiles even cheaper, because I don't need to make them as jam resistant, which means I can use them more liberally when in the Clone Wars they already had lots of them on effectively expendable unit. Wow, that would utterly blow away your previous position, why on Earth would say something like that?

All Imperial starships, including the smallest one-man fighters, incorporate sensor jamming equipment. According to SWICS, advanced TIE fighters employ sophisticated sensor suites that "must overcome the extremely powerful jamming signals used by all combat craft". The DS also employed "hundreds of Kuat Drive Yards 220-SIG tactical jammers" that prevented the attacking X-Wings from being able to use their onboard sensors (ref. SWEGWT). And of course, the Imperial fleet broadcast so much sensor interference during the Battle of Endor that the Rebel fleet was unable to determine whether the DS2 shield was up or down until they destroyed the fleet's primary communications ship (ref. ROTJ novelization).

You speak of ECM as if it only works in the most crude forms possible, the Battle of Endor example indicates a little more elegance in operation then you seem to appreciate, but given you've already declared the Empire doesn't need "jam resistant" missiles, what your point?

During the OT missiles are seen very rarely, and the Empire has no formidable enemy, nobody with resources even approaching its own. The use of AT-ATs despite the possibility of guided missiles can be rationalised by considering that, while missiles are possible, the Empire can't justify the cost, complexity and labour of using them any more. Not when the biggest and best opposing force are pitiful guerilla raiders like the Rebels.

Whatever.

If I could have found one big enough, I would have compared it to an artillery shell. That would still have been too resource-intensive, since my point was that blaster bolts don't require any manufacturing/shipping etc, and hence are cheaper than complex autonomous missiles that are continuously destroyed. I don't know what point you thought you were attacking.

If you're saying used up, Tibanna gas, parts, etc will also be used up. It'd really have helped if you'd bothered to look back and find out what my position was as opposed to associating me with others.

AT-ATs can do the job of assaulting a base of ragtag guerillas who can't get any equipment that can even damage them. Developing increased Imperial ground assault capabilities requires a 'Why?' not a 'Why not?'.

Because it failed to achieve mission objectives in a mission unreasonably stacked in its favor due almost entirely to equipment limitations. I will cover this more in depth below.

If you'd limited yourself to didn't field you'd be correct. Couldn't isn't, especially if Anquarius' reference to quad laser cannons being able to blow them away in DE is legit.

May I ask if English is your first language, or if you have any kind of mental condition like dyslexia?

I could ask the same.

What do you think quoting this achieves? It doesn't say anything about urban warfare there. Insurgents can be based in frozen wastes and jungles, not necessarily cities. Are you trying to say that fighting the Rebellion was an actual war? What would you call fighting guerillas recruited from the Empire's subjects, if not counter-insurgency?

What part of Galactic Civil War and the Alliance to Restore the Republic is so hard for you to comprehend? Yes, it was a war, and your lame begging of the question doesn't change the ramifications of what is required to legitly consider a piece of equipment versatile in "counter-insurgency." As you've not brought forward a valid counter argument concession accepted.

You're the one who assumed that counter-insurgency implied urban warfare, even though I was clearly referring to the Rebellion which certainly isn't based in cities. Carrying blaster cannons which can be manufactured and maintained for cheap, dialed to any yield, and which provide a huge number of stowed kills is more versatile than a rack full of cruise missiles. I say 'versatile' because even though 'general' is the antonym of 'specialised', it's ambiguous.

If you are conducting counter insurgency you need to at least be able to conduct operations in urban areas as these are your centers of power, doofus. It's implied, you don't like it, don't BS with general terminology you're to ignorant to comprehend.

Taking up the biggest boulevards? Have you seen TESB? AT-AT's are only about 10.6m wide, from toe to toe.

And this defeat my point how? Challengers (the British MBT) have issues with this with a fraction of the width and for some magic reason AT-ATs won't?

Where did I say that AT-ATs would have no problem navigating streets? YOU said AT-ATs wouldn't even fit in 'the biggest boulevards' and I corrected you. Your point that AT-ATs would suck at walking through urban terrain is a strawman, since I never suggested AT-ATs for urban warfare.

You mean this?

Try taking up the biggest boulevards completely by itself further encouraging dissent, if it can go at all. So unless you're hiding something up your sleeve that leaves heavy handed burned earth policy, which will only encourage them all the more.

So you've stooped to lying to give yourself traction, doofus? Not to mention you're to ignorant to comprehend what I'm actually talking about, pathetic.

OK, so making CAS aircraft could be done.

I'm getting tired of this CAS nonsense. CAS is a role, and the mission I'm outlining is a Strike mission with potential SEAD, both of which the A-10 is known to be exceeding capable in doing.

Now how would you sell that to an Imperial Appropriations Committee, with the Clone Wars long gone and no opposing forces left anywhere near the power of the Empire? Policing criminal activities and skirmishing with guerillas and gangs doesn't justify enabling new capabilities through developing powerful, expensive new systems.

Fine no AT-ATs _period_ by the same exact logic.

If not for Luke Skywalker and the hidden Rebel ion cannon, the AT-ATs would have been undefeated and no Rebel ships could've escaped.

And if they'd all just instantly converted, there never would have been a fight. You already have the deck utterly stacked in the Imperials favor and you're still trying to cheat? So much for your confidence in the "effectiveness" & "versatility" of AT-ATs.

You go on about how small nuclear yield weapons (missiles/mines) can be to kill AT-ATs. You even say they could fit in MANPADS. Let's assume there's no reason why missiles aren't commonly used. Why wouldn't that work even better against CAS aircraft? Your squadron of A-10s and AC-130s gets a face full of nuclear fireball as soon as it crosses the horizon. Now, in a Rebel-controlled battlefield full of jamming which nullifies missiles, snowspeeders would outmaneuver them and shoot them down.

It wouldn't work better because the aircraft could manuever and actually effectively utilize ECM. The level of jamming you seem aware of isn't going to make the round not follows it's ballistic path which is sufficient against a target that can hardly be said to move. WW1 has solid evidence of this where many of the early tanks got knocked out by artillery once the shock wore off, despite they basically had to get a direct hit on them. They needless to say were a heck of a lot smaller, and had a lot more targetting issues the SW should.

The lack of CAS aircraft can be rationalised by a lack of armour, the kind of heavy armour that made snowspeeder blasters and Rebel gun emplacements utterly impotent against the AT-ATs. A-10s certainly can't carry MBT-level armour.

It can carry bigger, better deflector screens then a starfighter, which are the primary defense in the SW universe, not armor. As a matter of fact if I was really in the mood for a fight I could go further with that, but I'm not.

Ok then, let's limit these super-Bradleys to WWI tank speeds. Now would you rather replace them with A-10s? It could be done, but it's a matter of 'why?' rather than 'why not?'.

Limit? Clock them yourself, Luke's ability to use the Force at this point was between little and none, and the whole antics after he gets shot down clearly show just how slow they're going.

Furthermore don't call them Super-Bradleys, you sound like Sparks. Why would I use Aircraft/Airborne? Because doofus, if it didn't fail to slip your notice they utterly failed their primary mission objectives because they took so long that when they got there the base was practically abandoned, and the transports were already outside but apparently positioned such that the Imperials couldn't find them and neutralize them (Aerial recon would have been nice). Considering they used snail slow vehicles, you don't see the problem here, or why I'd pull the Aircraft/Airborne card as opposed to the Air Assault or Mechanizard card?

I'll quote myself in the first post on the previous page, because you're apparently to dense to have noticed:

Actually the mecha fixation could be said to have cost them the battle.

Picture if you will:
All AT-ATs are replaced by a 50-50 mix of AC-130s and C-130s
All AT-STs are replaced by A-10s
Any remaining transport volume goes towards more C-130s and A-10s
(All US craft upgraded/re-engineered to SW technology standard, naturally)

They do the drop, but now instead of having their painfully slow (watch how long it takes for the walker to close with and step on Luke's speeder, and notice how he's able to keep up with it) walkers go through the shields and plod towards the base we have our A-10, AC-130s, and C-130s taxi through the theater shield, and take off. So now instead of somewhere around 15 mph, we're looking at hundreds of miles per hour speed to get on to target.

A-10s would be loaded with DPICMs cluster bomb equivalents, and at least six AIM-9X equivalents (Concussion Missiles) on the wing pylons.

So now instead of slogging towards a prepared defense, while the snow speeders are able to knock out a few of the Empire's units, the Empire knocks out their defenses and shields before any of the Snowspeeders manage to get out of the hangar and are basically suppressed by the AC-130s. Afterall trying to fly out of that hangar once it's already covered by guns would be suicide. Not to mention I now also have loads and loads of paras streaming down onto the base.

Any power concerns would go doubly so for the much smaller starfighters. Not to mention these aircraft can go higher, without presenting as big a profile to target let alone a stationary one.

The only real mission AT-ATs can do is one like Hoth. They're too big to be effectively used in most terrain, and too slow for maneuver warfare. Attacking an enemy under a theater shield with the orbital ships suppressing attempts to flee is about all it can do. It's to slow and ponderous to be useful for much else. There job could be done just as well if not better by conventional Airborne, Infantry, or Mechanized units as all are significantly faster then the walkers.

I have already addressed and went over this, fool. The only way an AT-AT even works is if you have something like an orbitting fleet supressing them from just running/outmaneuvering, at Hoth we had the Elite of the Elite. As any competant guerilla knows, you avoid the frontline troops whenever possible and target the REMFs, supply lines, and otherwise except for the final push. AT-ATs can't keep up with anything we have let alone the common speeder.

You can save a bunch of money on manufacturing cost by producing stuff with a Safety Factor of 0.1, but it won't do the job it needs to do so you might as well have flushed it down the toilet.

[LordShaithis]

Don't be an idiot, Blake. The AT-AT is a transport, not artillery, and Luke Skywalker running up to any real APC would be blown into giblets, lightsaber or no.

[Kuciwalker]

You forget the Stormtrooper Effect and the strength of Luke's character shield.