Gungans VS Borg

[General Brock]

Implied where? Upon seeing an image of the generator, Ozzel dismisses it as a smuggler or pirate base. While Ozzel is an bumbler/rebel sympathiser he wouldn't say that if it was utterly impossible for pirates to possess a device like that.

Would he? He obviously isn't in the habit of reading reports, just looking at pictures. This is the sort of cartoon admiral 'good guy' pirates in sci fi fly rings around.

Yes, a large permanent structure produces a shield with wider coverage than a small portable generator. Who'd think?

The Gungans haven't demonstrated the ability to construct (or grow?) a shield generator of that scale.

As a fighting force, Clonetroopers have always been superior to battle droids. That's what they were designed for! This doesn't change the fact that these exact same droids were used against the Republic, and the Republic clearly did not win every battle.

Also, the droids not being independant of their mothership doesn't affect their battle ability one bit. Their behaviour was already autonomous in TPM.

Being all turned of at once isn't going to affect their combat ability?

Clone troopers are still human beings; they are no better and perhaps in some ways worse than Jango Fett. A cut above ordinary men, not supermen. Their training, weapons and armour made them deadly beyond their physical capabilities.

If human soldiers weren't better than droids in the first place, the Separatists could have simply defied the Republic authorities openly rather than build overwhelming numbers in secret. As far as I can tell, the Republic navy is predominantly non-clone organic. The Clone armies countered droid numbers and higher rate of replacement, but couldn't possibly have been the only Republic forces.

The fact that B1 droids aren't as individually powerful as a Clonetrooper doesn't automatically relegate them to being half-assed police bots no matter how many times you yell that it does.

A bot with a gun is a bot with a gun, and B-1 bots are consistantly bad whether programmed for police actions against Gungans, or as infantry against Clones. They won't duplicate stormtrooper boarding actions in ANH against non-cloned Alderaanian naval troopers with the same numbers.

[General Brock]

And here's me thinking they are named thus because they are droids designed to go into battle. Silly me.

They are designed to go into battle. As cheaply as possible. The culture of adversarial policing likes that kind of paramilitary chic.

You appear to be confusing flimsy with flexible. Is there any particular reason why mass-produced battle droids must be bulky?
Even though they're designed to fold up for easy storage?
Even though part of their role is to be able to fit inside TF tanks?
Speaking of which, why are you ignoring the fact that the TF had tanks, transports and light weapons platforms when all the Borg have is melee troops?

Because Lucasfilm said so? That was the explanation given for not replacing B-1s with Supers; the extra bulk and other enhancements for meaningful strength made them too costly compared to B-1 foundries.

The outcome of my scenario relied on large numbers of Borg closing to melee range on a lunar colony.

On an open field, Borg replaceing TF... well first, they would not be cut down by their own reflected blaster fire. Gungan theatre shields and personal shields negated the tanks, but barely covered the formations; Borg can beam down and close from all directions right at sheild's edge. They don't need the transports or wheels to get close.

The TF tanks made victory easier and faster, only after the sheild came down.

[Civil War Man]

Would he? He obviously isn't in the habit of reading reports, just looking at pictures. This is the sort of cartoon admiral 'good guy' pirates in sci fi fly rings around.

Piett brought it up largely because they had been coming up empty until then and that the location of the settlement was unusual.

PIETT: I think we've got something, sir. The report is only a fragment from a probe droid in the Hoth system, but it's the best lead we've had.
OZZEL: (irritated) We have thousands of probe droids searching the galaxy. I want proof, not leads!
PIETT: The visuals indicate life readings.
OZZEL: It could mean anything. If we followed every lead...
PIETT: But, sir, the Hoth system is supposed to be devoid of human forms.

Vader came to the conclusion that it was the Rebels pretty quick, but of course he is in the top 2 of the list of Most Powerful Force Users in the Galaxy.

Clone troopers are still human beings; they are no better and perhaps in some ways worse than Jango Fett. A cut above ordinary men, not supermen. Their training, weapons and armour made them deadly beyond their physical capabilities.

Hence why they did so well against the droids.

If human soldiers weren't better than droids in the first place, the Separatists could have simply defied the Republic authorities openly rather than build overwhelming numbers in secret. As far as I can tell, the Republic navy is predominantly non-clone organic. The Clone armies countered droid numbers and higher rate of replacement, but couldn't possibly have been the only Republic forces.

Clones were the only Republic force, but they made up the bulk of it. Keep in mind that the Separatists were building the overwhelming numbers in secret so when they finally played the secession card, they would have enough troops to terrify the Senate into inaction. They didn't count on the possibility that a secretive puppet master would have been spending the previous ten years building an army specifically designed to eventually wipe out the Jedi. It's not so much that the B-1s were shit, it's that the Clones were designed to fight on a level that the droids couldn't match.

A bot with a gun is a bot with a gun, and B-1 bots are consistantly bad whether programmed for police actions against Gungans, or as infantry against Clones. They won't duplicate stormtrooper boarding actions in ANH against non-cloned Alderaanian naval troopers with the same numbers.

By the logic you have been using, a TIE Fighter is a piece of shit because a single TIE Fighter won't do well against an X-wing. Or, to use a real life example, a Sherman tank is a piece of shit because it probably can't survive a one-on-one fight with a Panzer. This of course discounts the actual intended use of these military units, which is to use superior numbers and cheap replacement of losses to overwhelm a given opponent.

I do find the progression of this thread interesting. It started with generalizations of the Gungan species as a whole based entirely off a single exile from their culture, plus taking the TF's belief that the Gungans are a backwards people (though they knew almost nothing about them other than they were the indigenous people) and inflating it to the point where the Gungans are millenia behind every other in universe civilization. When confronted with the Gungan military using their own tech to fight the Trade Federation military and not being instantly wiped out, the goal then shifts to trying to paint the Trade Federation as also being millenia behind every other in universe civilization in an attempt to validate the original assumption that the Gungans are, too.

[General Brock]

... Had they been as weak as you are trying to cast them, the original battle droid design would have been phased out long before....

To add further, it seems that the CIS relied on an all-droid military, meaning that many support and service roles, not all requiring great strength and durability, were performed by droids.

The B-1 model is a Gi able to operate machinery designed for an array of organics, so is useful without a blaster outside combat, an advantage the other battle droids of the CIS don't have.




(That would be Gi, with a capital 'G' and very small 'i' in variable fonts).

[Civil War Man]

Clones were the only Republic force, but they made up the bulk of it.

This should read "Clones were not the only Republic force, but they made up the bulk of it"

[CaptJodan]

snippy all over

Are you going to bring any proof that the Borg could penetrate Gungan shields in the first place? Again, I point to the fact that living matter can be badly harmed or may not penetrate at all (See "Ray Shields" in ROTS). Borg forcefields are unlikely to have the power necessary to protect them as we're still talking orders of magnitude more power that these theater shields create than the Borg can withstand. We have plenty of examples of energy not passing through shields like these, so even raising their shield might prevent passage.

[TC Pilot]

Isn't it the same technology used to encapsulate the Gungan city? And it didn't seem to kill the grass the shield landed on.

[CaptJodan]

Isn't it the same technology used to encapsulate the Gungan city?

No. They may operate somewhat similarly, but seem to operate on different principles.

The Gungans have mastered energy field technology for a number of uses. Their underwater citites employ hydrostatic fields to create large bubbles of atmosphere within which they dwell. Similarly, Gungan ground troops carry portable frames which generate a protective energy field capable of deflecting blaster fire. In large-scale combat, giant Gungan shield generators can create an immense umbrella of protective shield energy that can stop laser bolts and physical objects with great kinetic energy.

[General Brock]

snippy all over

Are you going to bring any proof that the Borg could penetrate Gungan shields in the first place? Again, I point to the fact that living matter can be badly harmed or may not penetrate at all (See "Ray Shields" in ROTS). Borg forcefields are unlikely to have the power necessary to protect them as we're still talking orders of magnitude more power that these theater shields create than the Borg can withstand. We have plenty of examples of energy not passing through shields like these, so even raising their shield might prevent passage.

Well, it doesn't hurt the Gungans when they pass through it, does it? They don't have sealed armour. Unless Gungan warfare consisted of standing under opposing theatre shields, hurling insults until one party gets bored or the shield battery goo runs out.

[General Brock]

Piett brought it up largely because they had been coming up empty until then and that the location of the settlement was unusual...

'A Rebel base?' can't help but jump out as a possibility. Ozzel didn't even want to check it out. Even if it wasn't the main Rebel base, an investigation with at least a follow-up probe should have immediately followed. If he was a Rebellion sympathizer, he wasn't a very discreet one.

Clones were the only Republic force, but they made up the bulk of it. Keep in mind that the Separatists were building the overwhelming numbers in secret so when they finally played the secession card, they would have enough troops to terrify the Senate into inaction. They didn't count on the possibility that a secretive puppet master would have been spending the previous ten years building an army specifically designed to eventually wipe out the Jedi. It's not so much that the B-1s were shit, it's that the Clones were designed to fight on a level that the droids couldn't match.

A second or third class droid filling last class B-1's role could be made, but wasn't by the TF. The Senate may or may not be intimidated. A human being can only be tweaked so far physically.

Republic troopers would do what Clones would not; question Order 66 long enough to alert the Jedi to trouble and likely defy it when it came out of the blue. Clone effectiveness against battle droids comes from weapons, armour, and training the Regular forces surely must have have in measure, the crucial difference being capacity for mindless loyalty to Palpatine, not innate combat effectiveness. Otherwise, prepositioned droids from foudaries secreted all over the galaxy would have overwhelmed conventional forces before the initial batches of Clones could deploy after Geonosis.

By the logic you have been using, a TIE Fighter is a piece of shit because a single TIE Fighter won't do well against an X-wing. Or, to use a real life example, a Sherman tank is a piece of shit because it probably can't survive a one-on-one fight with a Panzer. This of course discounts the actual intended use of these military units, which is to use superior numbers and cheap replacement of losses to overwhelm a given opponent.

Battle droid loss ratios were a lot worse than Ties and Shermans. I did account for the intended roles; B-1s are are junk even as chaff.

I do find the progression of this thread interesting. It started with generalizations of the Gungan species as a whole based entirely off a single exile from their culture, plus taking the TF's belief that the Gungans are a backwards people (though they knew almost nothing about them other than they were the indigenous people) and inflating it to the point where the Gungans are millenia behind every other in universe civilization. When confronted with the Gungan military using their own tech to fight the Trade Federation military and not being instantly wiped out, the goal then shifts to trying to paint the Trade Federation as also being millenia behind every other in universe civilization in an attempt to validate the original assumption that the Gungans are, too.

I'm trying to avoid temporal centrism as a measure, and my impression of Gungans is not based on Jar Jar, if only because I try to forget him. The Gungans and Trade Feds, or for that matter the Borg, are not millenia behind the Republic. Neither are they up to its capabilities in military technology. They could adopt the standard of quality, though not quantity or scale, but won't.

The Gungans are bound by experience, ceremony and tradition formed by a different kind of warfare and cultural environment centred on their one planet. That worked fine until contrasted against a different type of warfare formed over millenia outside Gungan experience. They can't duplicate millenia of different experiences, but they don't have to; they need only adopt the discrete lessons. As of TPM, Goo-ball atlals are quaint, blasters are better, and Gungans don't have blasters in the Grand Army despite centuries of contact with the Naboo humans.

The Trade Feds are bound by Republic law and their own non-military priorities not to meet Republic military standards. Their 'army' can police under the shadow of the Republic. If the TF somehow confronted the Chiss, a separate political entity from the Republic not as advanced in quality or quantity, the TF would lose. The TF fields a contrivedly inferior standard of Republic technology the worst possible way, with lessons learned tempered by placing cost effectiveness ahead of military effectiveness.

The Borg are restricted by their belligerance from easily obtaining SW standard military technology. They could otherwise buy or barter for it, learn it, and add its technological distinctiveness to their own. They can even visit slave markets for biological disticntiveness. However, they won't, because their means define their ends and they conquer soley to be able to conquer.

[CaptJodan]

Well, it doesn't hurt the Gungans when they pass through it, does it?

I don't know. Perhaps you'd like to show the screenshot where a Gungan passes through their theater shield unharmed. Since there isn't such a screen in the movie, I'll assume you're just grasping at straws here.

And it didn't seem to kill the grass the shield landed on.

Sources I read suggest that it's a radiation issue, at least with personal shields. Not necessarily going to kill the grass in the first five minutes. Whether such radiation would be fatal to Borg is undeterminable.

[Stark]

In TPM didn't they use multiple shield gens, which created a 'sum' shield, only the outermost surfaces of all? If so a Gungan shield walking up to another would open a hole, allowing an attack. Or were there seperate interlocking domes?

I thought Gungans used those balls because they could penetrate the shield whereas blaster fire wouldn't.

[General Brock]

Well, it doesn't hurt the Gungans when they pass through it, does it?

I don't know. Perhaps you'd like to show the screenshot where a Gungan passes through their theater shield unharmed. Since there isn't such a screen in the movie, I'll assume you're just grasping at straws here.

And it didn't seem to kill the grass the shield landed on.

Sources I read suggest that it's a radiation issue, at least with personal shields. Not necessarily going to kill the grass in the first five minutes. Whether such radiation would be fatal to Borg is undeterminable.

... So, Gungan warfare consisted of not breaching each others theatre shields to fight in melee combat with electropoles. Those atlals behind a shield-wall, and cavalry, were just for show as well, since the screen does all the killing for them, and isn't actually there to deflect catapult goo....

Given that spaceborne Borg live in ships with forcefield walls, somehow I also doubt that a little radiation that won't noticeably affect grass is going to hurt them.

[CaptJodan]

... So, Gungan warfare consisted of not breaching each others theatre shields to fight in melee combat with electropoles. Those atlals behind a shield-wall, and cavalry, were just for show as well, since the screen does all the killing for them, and isn't actually there to deflect catapult goo....

The "Gungan Grand Army". I haven't seen any evidence that the Gungans have been fighting amongst themselves for some time.

Given that spaceborne Borg live in ships with forcefield walls, somehow I also doubt that a little radiation that won't noticeably affect grass is going to hurt them.

And of course forcefields for Trek and Wars operate exactly the same way, so you can make such a blanket idiotic statement.

[The Original Nex]

B1s are not weak. They are able to hold their own in unarmed combat against members of the Gungan Grand Army. And stupid as they may look, Gungans appear to have considerably superior muscle power to humans. Witness Jar-Jar being able to jump a rediculous height from standing.

An alien with what might be specialized muscles, and even lighter organic composition allowing it to jump high; they never demonstrated super strength fighting skills against humans. Jar Jar eats flying insects; fast twitch response doesn't equate physical power.

Just to clear up these ludicrous brainbugs regarding B1s being "flimsy." The AtoC Novelization makes it clear that one on one, a clone trooper is EQUAL to a B1 Battle Droid, and the B2s OUTMATCH the clones. It is through superior GROUP tactics that the clones gain the advantage. So STOP with this "Battle Droids are weak RAR!!" idiocy.

[CaptJodan]

In TPM didn't they use multiple shield gens, which created a 'sum' shield, only the outermost surfaces of all? If so a Gungan shield walking up to another would open a hole, allowing an attack. Or were there seperate interlocking domes?

In one particular shot it does look like two domes connect and don't flow to the ground, indeed opening a hole to other shielded sections without them being seperate entities.

[General Brock]

And of course forcefields for Trek and Wars operate exactly the same way, so you can make such a blanket idiotic statement.

Space is full of deadly radiations, forcefields protect from them, ST shields being less reliable at the job.

Unlike other ST aliens, Borg ships don't have solid hulls completely protecting them and unlike Gungans, Borg work in hard vacuum wearing little more than they usually do.

[General Brock]

B1s are not weak. They are able to hold their own in unarmed combat against members of the Gungan Grand Army. And stupid as they may look, Gungans appear to have considerably superior muscle power to humans. Witness Jar-Jar being able to jump a rediculous height from standing.

An alien with what might be specialized muscles, and even lighter organic composition allowing it to jump high; they never demonstrated super strength fighting skills against humans. Jar Jar eats flying insects; fast twitch response doesn't equate physical power.

Just to clear up these ludicrous brainbugs regarding B1s being "flimsy." The AtoC Novelization makes it clear that one on one, a clone trooper is EQUAL to a B1 Battle Droid, and the B2s OUTMATCH the clones. It is through superior GROUP tactics that the clones gain the advantage. So STOP with this "Battle Droids are weak RAR!!" idiocy.

B-1 battle droids that face clones were improved since TPM. Since their joints are electromagnetically held together, the TF probably sprung for stronger mags after noticing they didn't do to well against the Gungans without their blasters.

[General Brock]

The "Gungan Grand Army". I haven't seen any evidence that the Gungans have been fighting amongst themselves for some time.

They haven't; the Databank says the army is for tradition and for ceremony. The end of fighting amongst themselves probably allows for a unitary standing army.

[General Brock]

In TPM didn't they use multiple shield gens, which created a 'sum' shield, only the outermost surfaces of all? If so a Gungan shield walking up to another would open a hole, allowing an attack. Or were there seperate interlocking domes?

I thought Gungans used those balls because they could penetrate the shield whereas blaster fire wouldn't.

I don't know. Memory won't serve, and neither will Youtube clips to that level of detail. Its been too many years since I sat through TPM or read the book, and I don't have copies. Youtube also stalled, so what happened at the Gungan staging point draws a blank.

It looked like one generator per Gungan formation, 2 separate formations, facing four or five phalanxes of droids. The combat mostly took place under the shield but may have spilled beyond its boundaries.

An online script indicates the droids penetrated the shield before the engagement took place, and it stands to reason that all combat would have centred about the generators, which cover a small area, as I remembered.

Nothing on inter-shield reaction. No idea if the goo-balls can penetrate the shield; the bowling balls hit the tanks less spectacularly than I remembered with an ion-canon like effect.

[brianeyci]

I don't want to get into this debate but just one little nitpick CaptJordan it's really irrelevant what the mechanism of the shield is, just the effect. IIRC the B1's walked through the shield, and there's ray and particle shielding in SW. So to me it seems as if the Gungans deployed their ray shielding and didn't have theatre particle shielding. Arguing "that isn't how wars shields work" is just silly. Look past the superficial differences in shields like their different colors and they're just force fields. I'm pretty sure Borg could walk through the Gungan theatre shielding. It's a reasonable assumption since B1's walked through it and Borg can exert at least as much force as those.

So what would happen is the Gungans hide out underwater, and the Borg don't go there so the end. Why the fuck would the Gungans mass a huge army overland like they did in TPM anyway? There's no painted face queen to save this time.

[NecronLord]

An alien with what might be specialized muscles, and even lighter organic composition allowing it to jump high;

Oh I considered that. Specialised muscles would be surely be used in any gungan fighting style, (seen how many kicking moves humans have in various martial arts, to take advantage of superior leg muscles (relative to arms)?) making that an irrelevant objection, and Jar Jar can't be that much lighter than a human, especially given his height.

The physical superiority of the average Gungan over humans can be seen clearly in the parade scene at the end of The Phantom Menace. Even the obese Boss Nass can easily manage to jump about two thirds of his body length without even being delayed for a moment by the impact. He then proceeds to practically dance up a flight of stairs. What's more, he does this without even bending his knees. Go on. Try it. Climb a ladder to four feet or whatever, and jump off, keeping your knees locked. The vast majority of humans, let alone ones carrying as much weight as he is, would be on the floor howling if they tried that.

And frankly, given that he sounds no lighter than anyone else, Jar Jar - the village idiot, not a professional warrior in the Grand Army - being able to easily jump fifteen feet into the air without a run up is... rather difficult to explain away without resorting to 'specialised' - IE superior - musculature.

[haard]

The Trade Feds had power on the lower end of the SW spectrum. They won because the Gungans were no match for a private police force designed to deal with low-level resistance.

You do say that a lot, and your evidence that the TF:s forces were on level with rent-a-cop, as opposed to being made up from the same units that conducted open warfare with the Republic is... what?

The Trade Fed forces were an in-house paramilitary police force. The Feds would have been better off with rent-a-cop security. From someone who could pragmatically balance combat effectiveness with cost effectiveness, and presentations of force with practical application. The combat algorithms of the battle droid are a poor mimickry of adversarial policing.

Their use in the Clone Wars was probably an 'army you have, not army you want' problem exacerbated by clueless leadership that didn't know what to want.

Still, they put up a good fight, eh? As The Original Nex said, they are stated as being equal to a clone trooper, and the only improvments on the B1:s are heigthened intelligence ability to operate independently of a 'master sigal' or whatever it was called.

Cheap Trade Fed droids were used as sentries to detect and contain opponents until the arrival of more powerful units, occupy a city like Theed on a planet defended by a smaller police-level force, and the invasion of Naboo was undertaken so as to minimize casualties and collateral damage. Police stuff, with a paramilitary edge.

Standard B-1s are effective only with overwhelming numbers. Police respond to miscreants with overwhelming force, displaying it to intimidate compliance. The Trade Fed advance on the Gungans was like riot police approaching demonstrators, not soldiers advancing on a defended position. (If their cheap blasters had a stun setting, maybe they wouldn't have suffered so many casualties to deflected blaster fire).

Russian WW2 infantry were also only effective in overwhelming numbers. Despite that, they were not a police force.

Standard B-1s were chaff screening better droids and were waay outfought by human soldiers.

Yet that is not what the novel tells us. How strange.

B-1s are even outmatched by military-grade Super Battle Droids, which Gungans never faced, and whose lack of residual 'protect property' police programing allowed them to shoot and swat aside B-1s in their line of fire in AOTC.

What? They are even outmatched by Super Battle-Droids? Color me shocked.

...police...swat...yada...

How are they a paramilitary police force? They are based on a Hunter-Killer droid, and made to make up the bulk of the TF:s droid army, and they are armed with the equi. Just because a military force does police work, it does not make it a police force. (US soldiers may do police work in the ME, but they would still slaughter Borg.)

[General Brock]

An alien with what might be specialized muscles, and even lighter organic composition allowing it to jump high;

Oh I considered that. Specialised muscles would be surely be used in any gungan fighting style, (seen how many kicking moves humans have in various martial arts, to take advantage of superior leg muscles (relative to arms)?) making that an irrelevant objection, and Jar Jar can't be that much lighter than a human, especially given his height.

I've been told that the Beijing Wushu team is divided into two specialties; the acrobatic, high-jumping forms team that can't hit as hard as the not-so-high jumping combat team, which can demolish a human being with one landed kick. They look distinctly different, the acrobats lighter and boxers bulkier in build.

I also saw Jar Jar jumping up and down on a battle droid, but not utilizing his muscles for any specialized kicking martial moves, nor did any other Gungan doing so.

[haard]

They are based on a Hunter-Killer droid, and made to make up the bulk of the TF:s droid army, and they are armed with the equi.

Should be:

They are based on a Hunter-Killer droid, made to make up the bulk of the TF:s droid army, and they are armed with the equivalent of assault rifles.