Cybernetic Implants?

[Darth Ruinus]

I was just browsing through the Cybernetics area of Wookieepedia, and lots of those implants look quite useful in combat, but lots of them are from KOTOR.

I was just wondering, how widespread is the use of cybernetics in SW? I know that one dude in Cloud City has those Borg Construck Aj^6 upgrade, but, I figured it would make sense that Stormtroopers or Imperial personnel would have some of those things.

So, are they used in the military? Are they "rare" (which sounds stupid in a place as advanced as SW) or hard to make?

[Eris]

They're not hard to make: We see mass industry of precision mechanical components all the time with droids. Realistic limbs might be harder, but we still see them used medically quite a bit: Luke's hand, most obviously, but multiple instances in the EU as well.

It seems like at least some of the paucity (although maybe they're just all as unidentifiable as Luke's hand) is just an anti-droid prejudice ("We don't serve their kind here!"), maybe as a hold over from the Clone Wars.

[Darth Servo]

They seem to be the standard cure for amputation and there is probably a large need for such things given amputation seems to be one of the prefered means of passification of the Jedi and Sith.

[NeoGoomba]

Thrawn was considering Fleet-wide implementation of borg implants if his Mount Tantiss idea was unfeasable, so the possibility of wide-spread use has been considered already.

[wjs7744]

I don't think that's what he means. It sounds like he's talking about cybernetics to augment soldiers abilities, not prosthetic replacements for lost limbs.

[Lord Pounder]

Thrawn was considering Fleet-wide implementation of borg implants if his Mount Tantiss idea was unfeasable, so the possibility of wide-spread use has been considered already.

Do you have a quote on that? My reading of the Thrawn books was that Borg implanting the crew to a combat computer was a bad idea as was dependant on factors beyond Thrawns control. A Borg needs to be hooked up all the time from what I read but Thrawns Fleet used the Force technique only when absolutely necessary.

[Darth Ruinus]

I don't think that's what he means. It sounds like he's talking about cybernetics to augment soldiers abilities, not prosthetic replacements for lost limbs.

Yes, thats mainly what I am asking. It only makes perfect sense to do so, but Iver never heard of such a thing.

Or, would Force Users use such thingss too?

[Boeing 757]

I don't think that's what he means. It sounds like he's talking about cybernetics to augment soldiers abilities, not prosthetic replacements for lost limbs.

Yes, thats mainly what I am asking. It only makes perfect sense to do so, but Iver never heard of such a thing.

Or, would Force Users use such thingss too?

If you're talking about cybernetic augmentation in a manner similar to say, that done in David Weber's Dahak universe books, I don't believe anything like that tech has been shown used by either the Republic or the Empire. However, just because it hasn't been shown does not mean that it does not exist. After all, cybernetics is very common in SW and just as others have mentioned it has been employed in different areas in SW, so it's not like the technology isn't there.

[Connor MacLeod]

We can conclude safely from the existence of Vader and Grievous alone that cybernetic augmentation exists, but there is plenty of supplementary data in the old WEG stuff (maybe in WOTC as well.) The WEG stuff though had some fairly obvious game-balancing attached to the enhancements in the form of drawbacks (I recall some sort of enhancement that would vastly improve the nervous system and reactions, but it made you kinda twitchy or some such.) - but we could ignore that as usually being some sort of rogue or outlaw doctor or hardware rather than "proper/legal" stuff. There have been a few obvious "EU" examples of augmented soldiers (the TIE pilot Qorl had a droid arm with greatly-enhanced strength, for example) and there have been Cybernetic "dark troopers" (though IIRC thats from some game, so the canonicity of those may or may not be disputed.)

That said, the augmentations probably aren't THAT common for several reasons:

1.) Generally, there's no reason. Much in the same vein that the Empire could field massive droid armies of super-droids, or equipping armies with massed power armour, or Kyle-Katarn style personal shielding over evey single trooper, or fleets of millions/billions of warships, there has never been any motivation/need for it (the Rebellion never warranted that kind of output.) Stormtroopers and other soldiers are generally sufficient for the needs of the galaxy at the current time.

2.) There are probably alot of restrictons on those sorts of things. Some may be ethical (as noted, some augmentations seem risky, depending on who does them. On top of that, ,what would one do with some super-soldier after the war is over?) or financial (it probably would be expensive, same way with power armour.) and there are probably alot of taboos involved (much as there are with droid armies and clones. I imagine we could trace that to General Grievous and perhaps later Darth Vader.) Indeed we do see that some cybernetically-enhanced people seem to endure prejudice, at least in the EU (Vader being "less" or "unnatural" because he's mostly machine.)

There's also probably alot of self-interest (cybernetic troops, like droid armies, would be something of a nasty advantage over others, so there probably is alot of control exerted in their creation. I doubt anyone wants Palpy, for example, fielding armies of cybernetically augmented troops any more than they want him fielding massed droid or power armoured troops, or fleets of billions of ISDs.)

[Gullible Jones]

They might also be weary of hooking up AIs to living organisms that could (potentially) use the Force.

[Ritterin Sophia]

We can conclude safely from the existence of Vader and Grievous alone that cybernetic augmentation exists, but there is plenty of supplementary data in the old WEG stuff (maybe in WOTC as well.) The WEG stuff though had some fairly obvious game-balancing attached to the enhancements in the form of drawbacks (I recall some sort of enhancement that would vastly improve the nervous system and reactions, but it made you kinda twitchy or some such.)

WotC has something similair in the Heroes Guide. First you have to have the Cybernetic Surgery feat, then there's a DC the surgeon has to beat on a Treat Injury check. Baseline prosthetics (this means no enhanced strength or naturally looking body parts) are fairly easy to install, requiring a DC 10 and a surgeon can take an automatic 10 on his check, (this means that a 5th lvl [lowest level you can get the feat] human expert [non-heroic technically proficient character] can expect to take 10 and get an 18). The problem is, if the doctor fucks up and fails the check you'll get side effects (hands, forearms, and arms cause trembling in the hands. Feet, knees, and legs cause limps. Eyes can have an alignment fuck up.) Then if the surgeon fucks up real bad (misses the DC of skill check by 10 or more) your body might reject it unless you pass a Fort Save (Same as DC), which will cause pain and may knock you unconcious because of pain.

The more advanced the prosthetic is, the more the problem is will cause if the surgeon fucks up. Eyes can have different kinds of sensors and appropriately problematic side effects (flare suppressor can have a sync error that fucks up hand-eye coordination, IR sensors can cause heat blindness, optical enhancers can have video engravings, targetting eyes can have a tracking error, and telescopic eyes can cause astigmatisms). Then there's the aforementioned Construct AJ^6 (psychosis), skeletal reinforcement (muscle fatigue), sensory packages (vertigo), subcutaneous comlinks (static disruption), tremor sensors (nausea), weapon mounts (power failure).

Another problem is that unless you get ion shielding on all your prosthetics (each needs it's own shield, thus making it more expensive and difficult to install), these prosthetics leave you vulnerable to ion weapons.

All these problems however can be fixed by having surgery done to fix them.

[wjs7744]

1.) Generally, there's no reason. Much in the same vein that the Empire could field massive droid armies of super-droids, or equipping armies with massed power armour, or Kyle-Katarn style personal shielding over evey single trooper, or fleets of millions/billions of warships, there has never been any motivation/need for it (the Rebellion never warranted that kind of output.) Stormtroopers and other soldiers are generally sufficient for the needs of the galaxy at the current time.

That makes perfect sense to me. I can easily buy augmentation for mercenary individuals, or perhaps spooks, but to equip billions of soldiers with them would just be pointless and wasteful.

[Knife]

Why would they go through all the trouble to install an inplant when you could just sling it off a harness in armor or whatever for military use?

Eye implants? Why not just use high speed google inside the helmet.

[Lazarus]

1.) Generally, there's no reason. Much in the same vein that the Empire could field massive droid armies of super-droids, or equipping armies with massed power armour, or Kyle-Katarn style personal shielding over evey single trooper, or fleets of millions/billions of warships, there has never been any motivation/need for it (the Rebellion never warranted that kind of output.) Stormtroopers and other soldiers are generally sufficient for the needs of the galaxy at the current time.

That argument only works so far. Certainly, it's not necessary for the Empire to build millions of warships, even though they could, but consider real world examples. The USA spends massive amounts of money and resources on military hardware which isn't used, and probably never will be, because it's hard to imagine a viable situation where a shooting war between the US and a nation with similar military capabilities could occur. Anti-aircraft batteries, submarines, ICBM's, ship-to-ship missiles...

The UK is still building hunter killer submarines at the cost of £3.5 billion each, which are utterly and entirely useless in actuality. Their only justification for existing is that if we stop building them, we'll lose the capability to build more. It is entirely possible, and indeed likely, that affluent governments will spend massive amounts of money on military procurement that has no practical use, but maintains a theoretical importance. This will apply to the Empire as much as any real world nation.

[wjs7744]

That argument only works so far. Certainly, it's not necessary for the Empire to build millions of warships, even though they could, but consider real world examples. The USA spends massive amounts of money and resources on military hardware which isn't used, and probably never will be, because it's hard to imagine a viable situation where a shooting war between the US and a nation with similar military capabilities could occur. Anti-aircraft batteries, submarines, ICBM's, ship-to-ship missiles...

The UK is still building hunter killer submarines at the cost of £3.5 billion each, which are utterly and entirely useless in actuality. Their only justification for existing is that if we stop building them, we'll lose the capability to build more. It is entirely possible, and indeed likely, that affluent governments will spend massive amounts of money on military procurement that has no practical use, but maintains a theoretical importance. This will apply to the Empire as much as any real world nation.

True, but doesn't that only apply to systems that were actually used in the past, or at least were really expected to be needed? It strikes me as a bit different to this situation, where any job an augmented soldier could do a war droid or a power armoured soldier could do instead, or in some cases are already handled by kit, e.g. night goggles make occular implants basically pointless. Of course, there could be another justification that I'm missing, but the situations don't seem quite the same to me.

[NeoGoomba]

Do you have a quote on that? My reading of the Thrawn books was that Borg implanting the crew to a combat computer was a bad idea as was dependant on factors beyond Thrawns control.

I don't have the books anymore, but I distinctly remember him telling Joruus that he was "seriously" considering the use of borg implants before he stumbled upon Mount Tantiss.

[nightmare]

Why didn't anyone mention Lobot yet?

Anyway, wasn't there something about a game... was it BFII...? that featured cybernetic darktroopers...

[Lazarus]

True, but doesn't that only apply to systems that were actually used in the past, or at least were really expected to be needed? It strikes me as a bit different to this situation, where any job an augmented soldier could do a war droid or a power armoured soldier could do instead, or in some cases are already handled by kit, e.g. night goggles make occular implants basically pointless. Of course, there could be another justification that I'm missing, but the situations don't seem quite the same to me.

But war droids and power armoured troopers don't do the jobs of biological soldiers in the Empire, do they? Despite the fact it would probably be more efficient to use droids, and more effective to use power armoured troopers in some situations, the Empire chooses to use clones and recruits instead.

It is probably more desirable to use equipment rather than implants where possible, but there are going to be certain things implants can do that equipment cannot. If this were not the case, why would Lobot have implants?

Concerning military spending, first world nations pour considerable resources into military research in order to develop new weapons and equipment, and none more than the US. The issue is not that the useless assets were once conceivably useful and have simply continued to be produced, since the SW galaxy is more or less technologically stagnant. If combat implants can be done, they probably will have been at some point. It's not a matter of the Empire having to actually invent some.

[Ted C]

I was just browsing through the Cybernetics area of Wookieepedia, and lots of those implants look quite useful in combat, but lots of them are from KOTOR.

I'm inclined to dismiss a lot of things that appear only in video games, which include all kinds of widgets for game balance.

If you take KOTOR seriously, it can take repeated direct hits with a blaster or lightsabre to disable a human being, which is definitely not consistent with the movies. Why should we take all the other combat doodads from games into consideration, then?

[CaptainChewbacca]

Why didn't anyone mention Lobot yet?

Clearly you didn't read the first post in the thread.

Personally, I think lack of widespread OBVIOUS cybernetics is anti-droid bias.

[Darth Ruinus]

I was just browsing through the Cybernetics area of Wookieepedia, and lots of those implants look quite useful in combat, but lots of them are from KOTOR.

I'm inclined to dismiss a lot of things that appear only in video games, which include all kinds of widgets for game balance.

If you take KOTOR seriously, it can take repeated direct hits with a blaster or lightsabre to disable a human being, which is definitely not consistent with the movies. Why should we take all the other combat doodads from games into consideration, then?

No, I know that game mechanics are useless, for the reason you stated above, but the implants in KOTOR reminded me of the implants in the movies (Lobot, Dengar(?) Vader etc etc)

Besides, I think game items are canon, just not their effects. Like, some repeating blaster is real, but the game mechanics are obviously just that, game mechanics.

[nightmare]

Clearly you didn't read the first post in the thread.

Personally, I think lack of widespread OBVIOUS cybernetics is anti-droid bias.

Skimmed it, but "that one dude in Cloud City" didn't strike me. You may be on to a point though. The cyborgs we see are invariably the result of injuries - or in Lobots case slavery - and never conscious upgrades. Plus of course, this point was stated by Luke once. Arkanians and others with a different approach to cybernetics might be more prone to upgrade themselves... although in their case, they probably think they're perfect already.

[Havok]

Clearly you didn't read the first post in the thread.

Personally, I think lack of widespread OBVIOUS cybernetics is anti-droid bias.

Skimmed it, but "that one dude in Cloud City" didn't strike me. You may be on to a point though. The cyborgs we see are invariably the result of injuries - or in Lobots case slavery - and never conscious upgrades. Plus of course, this point was stated by Luke once. Arkanians and others with a different approach to cybernetics might be more prone to upgrade themselves... although in their case, they probably think they're perfect already.

Wait. What? Lobot is a slave? When did that happen?

[nightmare]

Clearly you didn't read the first post in the thread.

Personally, I think lack of widespread OBVIOUS cybernetics is anti-droid bias.

Skimmed it, but "that one dude in Cloud City" didn't strike me. You may be on to a point though. The cyborgs we see are invariably the result of injuries - or in Lobots case slavery - and never conscious upgrades. Plus of course, this point was stated by Luke once. Arkanians and others with a different approach to cybernetics might be more prone to upgrade themselves... although in their case, they probably think they're perfect already.

Wait. What? Lobot is a slave? When did that happen?

Well, to be precise he was an indentured servant, which is a little better than a slave, but...

[Lord Pounder]

I don't have the books anymore, but I distinctly remember him telling Joruus that he was "seriously" considering the use of borg implants before he stumbled upon Mount Tantiss.

Can anyone provide a quote on this because it's really not how I remember the first Thrawn Book. I thought he used the example of borg implants as a negative.