Imperium of Man vs Galactic Empire.

[Serafina]

I've seen SW artillery, as in howitzers with indirect-LOS trajectories, in the Clone Wars cartoon. And weren't those AT-PTs, or whatever those walkers were in AOTC, capable of firing projectiles? Hailfire droids can fire from long-ranges too, as can Juggernauts.

None of them match the ability to bombard several squaremiles for days with tank-busting firepower,

Artillery, precise? Hah

Yes, modern artillery is pretty precise. Heck, IoM-Basilisks can hit individual moving tanks many kilometers away with some reliablity.

The Juggernauts in Kashyyk, for one. Hell, the deployment of the droid army in Geneosis. AOTC showed us walkers being dropped from orbit and enterng the battlefield while fighters and LAATs engaged enemies in both air and ground, while SPHAT batteries fired long-range beam artillery on large and hard targets like the Seperatist ships, while clone troopers did whatever, and Acclamator ships came in from orbit to disgorge troops and/or do battle. It wasn't JUST infantry alongside walkers. That engagement showed a whole CRAPLOAD of cohesion in all theaters of combat, from infantry to friggin' starships, from airborne assets to artillery.

Still nothing to match an equally strong enemy advancing with an armored formation.

The walkers were pretty much a joke - low mobility and with inadequate weapons. Also, they are pretty big targets.

The LAATs are good gunships, but the enemy did not have sufficient AA-capacity and no opposing aerial assets.

The SPHATs are the biggest joke in that assault - they were not even able to support their troops (against the enemy line of battle) on completely flat terrain. They are most likely designed to take out enemy landing crafts and low-altitude starships, but they are nopt artillery in the conventional sense.

Against an equally strong armored guard force, the clonies would have been ripped to pieces.
Most tanks can mount mulit-purpose guided missiles, so you have much better AA-cover. Put in some Hydras and most of your gunships will be shot down.
Your only means of taking out any vehicles aside from the gunships are your AT-TE walkers with their main guns. Due to their relatively small numbers (compared to the size of that army), low ROF and vulnerability (cockpit/joints/unarmored turret), they will loose an armored engagement. Since they also transport troops, you will also loose some of your infantry.
So you are left with your clone troopers, which apparently did not carry that many AT-weapons and thus will get ripped apart by the tanks and then mopped up by the infantry.

You know what, i think i will start a thread about that replacement-battle.

[Shroom Man 777]

I'm in no way familiar with SW ground hardware, so I'll bow out. I do think that the IG has the advantage when it comes to ground warfare, since SW tanks are seriously shit.

Oh well.

I guess they'll have to stick with chucking seismic detonators at IoM ground formations then.

EDIT:

And thank goodness my basic argument is proposing what's basically a galaxy-wide strategic bombing campaign. Not a galactic ground invasion. Screw Army Strong. Go AIR POWER! This's what Shep'd go for, anyway!

[Srelex]

I'm in no way familiar with SW ground hardware, so I'll bow out. I do think that the IG has the advantage when it comes to ground warfare, since SW tanks are seriously shit.

Oh well.

http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Heavy_As ... Juggernaut

That qualifies as shit, eh?

[Grandmaster Jogurt]

I don't recall that mentioned in the movies, maybe the novels, but I'm unsure. If any thing, the movies were vague on the time scales.

Personally I find it hard to believe that though. But then again, Star Wars is riddled with inconsistencies here and there.

The trips from Tatooine to Alderaan in ANH and Coruscant to Mustafar in RotS both also imply trips that are hours long at the most. The Falcon reached Alderaan minutes after Han finished his escape from the pursuing Star Destroyers and Palpatine managed to get to Vader while the latter was still crawling around in the ash. I can't think of any instances of hyperdrive travel at all in the movies where long travel times are implied and every instance I can remember fits well with very quick transit.

Any inconsistency that I can see is in the EU.

[Simon_Jester]

The Falcon reached Alderaan minutes after Han finished his escape from the pursuing Star Destroyers...

Excuse me; I must be confused. How do we know this again?

[Connor MacLeod]

The Falcon reached Alderaan minutes after Han finished his escape from the pursuing Star Destroyers...

Excuse me; I must be confused. How do we know this again?

We don't. Mike's never even gone past hours at most for hyperdrive, the highest being a few hours (ROTS with Anakin's trip to Mustafar). Hell, the Galaxy gun projectiles, which supposedly had a supremely faster hyperdrive (class .75 supposedly, although the NEGW&T says it rivals the Falcon's hyperdrive) and took "hours" to reach the edge of the galaxy from the deep core (EGW&T). As a matter of act, as I've pointed out before, none of the movie speeds neccesarily translate into "standard" speeds at all (as in, all ships in SW travel at roughly similar speeds. That's a gross over-simplification.) Rather its an indication of potential, and we should logically infer that SW ships take hours or days to cross interstellar distances (Depending on make and quality of hyperdrive, travelling conditions, availability of nav data from various sources, whether its a civilian or military ship, etc.) It also doesn't factor in things like hyperdrive range, and what may or may not be incorporated as tradeoffs in design (ISDs for exapmle have a class 2 hyperdrive, whereas VSDs have a class one. And there's the short range of the Venator vs the Acclmaator, for another example.)

I'd really love to see the evidence for "minutes".

Moreover, this doesn't address any of the issues I brought up with WRT Hyperdrive in the 40K galaxy, either. I'd love to know how Hyperdrive equipped ships are going to navigate through or around the Eye of Terror, Maelstrom, or any other warp anomaly that litters the 40K galaxy, nevermind anything else I brought up. A really rapid "bomb everything fast" campaign sounds nice but again is ridiculously simplistic (someone mentioned "logistics" but never really went into any depth in that regard other than "speed".)

And I dont understand why people are jumping to ground warfare without addressing the strategic situation. Tactics come after that, not before.

[Norade]

Moreover, this doesn't address any of the issues I brought up with WRT Hyperdrive in the 40K galaxy, either. I'd love to know how Hyperdrive equipped ships are going to navigate through or around the Eye of Terror, Maelstrom, or any other warp anomaly that litters the 40K galaxy, nevermind anything else I brought up. A really rapid "bomb everything fast" campaign sounds nice but again is ridiculously simplistic (someone mentioned "logistics" but never really went into any depth in that regard other than "speed".)

And I don't understand why people are jumping to ground warfare without addressing the strategic situation. Tactics come after that, not before.

I would assume that given the ability to wage war across the galaxy that waging war through a wormhole located at an arbitrary point wouldn't be much more of an issue. We know they have massive supply ships such as the [url=http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Super_Transport_XI]Super Transport XI[/quote] that should be able to supply large forces with relative ease. Granted these are unarmed and considered to be extremely sluggish vessels. However that said these sluggish vessels are still able to move at a speed that is on the upper end of what 40k has been shown to move at.

You also have to prove that the warp effects ships in hyperspace, it isn't our job to disprove the warps ability to effect this mode of transit.

[Bloody Chaplain]

Destroying Terra and releasing the Emperor from his mortal connection might trigger something interesting however...

There is of course the Emperor's tarot too..

Unless of course the death of the Emperor does what many of the government think it will do, which is remove the light from the beacons and leave mankind without any sort of FTL travel.

As to the continued navel problems I don't think that the GE would be able to withstand a Space Marine boarding party. I think that if a battle-barge were to board a SD, or SSD, it would end up in the hands of the Imperium. Though my figures were off about the Imperial Navy's size, (I had actually heard those figures from a person at my hobby shop when I began playing, and never heard anything to the contrary so I assumed it was true,) I know there are about 3,000 SM battle-barges in the Imperium, with the rest of their escorts and so on as well.

Similarity I have more accurate numbers for the total amount of ships within each segmentum. If there are, lets say three to five, sectors to each segmentum, then each has 50-75 ships. Which would put the total number of damage doing ships at about 1,300 for the Imperial Navy. I find this number unreliable as the SM would have far more ships, and they don't have nearly the resources that the Navy does. I should have more accurate numbers soon.

As to the combined arms warfare, I don't think anybody should ever reference Geonosis. The clones formed a skirmish line, and literally walked, what appeared to be more than five to six hundred meters, to attack a formidable army of lifeless robots. If that doesn't scream stupid I don't know what does. Even with super efficient combined arms, (which they were not as someone said,) smart military doctrine does not state that you should send your men out IN FRONT OF YOUR ARMOR, across vast open ground. Even the worst war zones where the Imperium is forced into trench warfare they aren't even that stupid, and they don't even claim to be an elite fighting force.

As to Armor, AT-ATs are like giant WWI tanks. They basically have the same armament as a AT-ST. I think the third largest Titan is similar to an AT-AT. Roughly same sized, armored, and slow, but at least they have several different weapon types. Similarly, the IG has tanks that are roughly the size of a city block (whether this is true or not is not the point, the point is they are large,) that can withstand a nuke.

Also, while some have said that the Imperium has no droids, they do. Servo skulls and cherubs. They did have things similar to human like droids at one point, but they turned on man, nearly wiping us out, and have been heresy ever since. (Though the Adaptus Mechanus has the STC for them.)

Shroom Man keeps saying that they could do the same thing that the US did to the Japs in WWII. The problem with this, I see, is that once inside the 40k galaxy, the resources of the only really damaging ships, the SD and SSDs, would run out quickly and would take incredible losses while attempting to do so. Remember, most Imperium Escort ships are the same size as a SD, and when the pattern of agri and industry worlds is relized, they'll have a hell of a time trying to make your analogy of American WWII strategic bombing work.

If three SSD showed up with several hundred SD, the fight would be one sided. If the fleet around the second death star tried to fight a sector fleet, I don't think the Empire would do so well, and the Imperiums superior boarding tactics, SM not IG, would have Empire tech soon falling into the hands of the Imperium.

A likely scenario I think, would be the Empire sending in a large fleet of a dozen or so SSDs followed by at least a hundred or more SD to wipe out a segmentum fleet. Probably taking heavy losses, heavier if a SM strike fleet is present, and doing so to deliberately take out the Navel power of the Imperium. Small fleets would still exist, and the ability to land forces on worlds would not be completely culled, though extremely dangerous for the Transport ships.

I don't think bringing up either of the two death stars is a good idea, seeing as how the rebelion took both out, and the Imperium could easily bring ten times as much to bare on those targets.

If I am correct, mankind was able to use a more advanced version of FTL before our first fall, and the Tau and Eldar have two completely different ways of travel. I think hyperdrive would see common use in Imperium ships given two or three years after the capture of one.

On a truly unrelated note, is it true that there are over 3 trillion SDs?

[Night_stalker]

That can't be possible, a SD is 1,600 meters long, and has a total crew requirement of 37,500 and it takes 5,000 at the minimum to run it effectively. Even the Imperium would be hard placed to find enough manpower to operate them all, plus the costs in both material and cash would bankrupt anyone and leave who knows how many planets tripped down to the bedrock!

[Srelex]

As to the continued navel problems I don't think that the GE would be able to withstand a Space Marine boarding party. I think that if a battle-barge were to board a SD, or SSD, it would end up in the hands of the Imperium. Though my figures were off about the Imperial Navy's size, (I had actually heard those figures from a person at my hobby shop when I began playing, and never heard anything to the contrary so I assumed it was true,) I know there are about 3,000 SM battle-barges in the Imperium, with the rest of their escorts and so on as well.

Not necesserily. ISDs tend to carry a vehicle complement. We see in the movies that SW ground vehicles can utterly vaporize armored targets--in Episode I, the equalivent of a police car (a Naboo speeder) vapes most of a heavily armored AAT, and of course, there's E-webs, disruptors, and rocket launchers. In some circumstances, an ISD can be quite capable of combating a Space Marine boarding team, depending on the size.

As to the combined arms warfare, I don't think anybody should ever reference Geonosis. The clones formed a skirmish line, and literally walked, what appeared to be more than five to six hundred meters, to attack a formidable army of lifeless robots. If that doesn't scream stupid I don't know what does. Even with super efficient combined arms, (which they were not as someone said,) smart military doctrine does not state that you should send your men out IN FRONT OF YOUR ARMOR, across vast open ground. Even the worst war zones where the Imperium is forced into trench warfare they aren't even that stupid, and they don't even claim to be an elite fighting force.

Not applicable, as this is the Empire, not the Republic. The Imperium can also resort to dumbass tactics, as the Dawn of War intro shows.

Shroom Man keeps saying that they could do the same thing that the US did to the Japs in WWII. The problem with this, I see, is that once inside the 40k galaxy, the resources of the only really damaging ships, the SD and SSDs, would run out quickly and would take incredible losses while attempting to do so. Remember, most Imperium Escort ships are the same size as a SD, and when the pattern of agri and industry worlds is relized, they'll have a hell of a time trying to make your analogy of American WWII strategic bombing work.

Given the massive gulf between 40k and SW speeds, that's uncertain. You alo have to demonstrate how quickly Imperial supplies would run out--I'm sure the Empire isn't so stupid enough to forget the concept of resupplying.

I don't think bringing up either of the two death stars is a good idea, seeing as how the rebelion took both out, and the Imperium could easily bring ten times as much to bare on those targets.

The first death star was only taken out because the rebels had the plans and also because Luke had access to a ethereal force. The second wasn't even technically finished.

If I am correct, mankind was able to use a more advanced version of FTL before our first fall, and the Tau and Eldar have two completely different ways of travel. I think hyperdrive would see common use in Imperium ships given two or three years after the capture of one.

Uh, no. Even if I be very generous and assume that the Imperium does somehow reverse-engineer hyperdrive in short order, refitting their naval assets to accomodate it will be...problematic.

[Ghost Rider]

That can't be possible, a SD is 1,600 meters long, and has a total crew requirement of 37,500 and it takes 5,000 at the minimum to run it effectively. Even the Imperium would be hard placed to find enough manpower to operate them all, plus the costs in both material and cash would bankrupt anyone and leave who knows how many planets tripped down to the bedrock!

Because aside from a gut feeling, you'll provide proof, correct?

[Srelex]

In regards to fleet numbers, I'm fairly certain that the Empire does not possess trillions of ISDs, it is canon that both the Republic and the CIS were able to construct fleets of millions in short while during the Clone Wars, and as the Empire has superior industrial capacity to both it stands to reason that it can ramp up its fleet numbers quickly if it so chooses.

[Night_stalker]

Wookiepedia is my source, Ghost Rider.

[Srelex]

Wookiepedia is my source, Ghost Rider.

He means proving that constructing such a number of ISDs isn't feasable for the Empire, I think.

[Connor MacLeod]

I would assume that given the ability to wage war across the galaxy that waging war through a wormhole located at an arbitrary point wouldn't be much more of an issue. We know they have massive supply ships such as the [url=http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Super_Transport_XI]Super Transport XI

that should be able to supply large forces with relative ease. [/quote]

How many does it take? how much supplies are required? How many ships/crews/etc are needed for this and how long will it take them to execute the campaign? I'm not even going to comment on that in the face of larger ships being mentioned or used, or how the Imperium routinely uses ships that big or bigger as simply landing craft. (40K Military transports get as large as 15 to 60 km, by contrast. Civilian transports can be anywhere from 1 km long to several km long. Such as the Essene from Eisenhorn.)

I've had an inkling of how complex the issue of SW warmaking and logistics is on a large scale because folk like Ender have been working on it for ages. It's gone all over the board and its not neccesarily as simple as "they can build DS = WIN!" There's lots of little details to work out.

Moreover, this isn't "GE vs Feds" - the reason why logistics is sucha minor issue there is because the Feddies are so incredibly overmatched that there's no possible way that it matters. You don't need to work out the logistics for large scale military operations when you only need a fraction of your forces (even without overwhelming firepower advantage) to win a war.

Granted these are unarmed and considered to be extremely sluggish vessels. However that said these sluggish vessels are still able to move at a speed that is on the upper end of what 40k has been shown to move at.

Proof?

You also have to prove that the warp effects ships in hyperspace, it isn't our job to disprove the warps ability to effect this mode of transit.

... since when the fuck did hyperspace become trans dimesnional? Have you forgotten that objects in realspace AFFECT objects in fucking hyperspace? planetS? stars? Black Holes? gravity? Nebulae? Do I really have to point out something that's pointed out on the accompanying website, SWTC, and in the fucking movies themselves?

And do I *really* need to point out that many warp phenomena like warp storms actually extend into real space? I named the Eye of Terror and the Maelstrom explicitly for crying out loud.

Seriously, do I have to spell out even this most basic of details??

[Night_stalker]

Wookiepedia is my source, Ghost Rider.

He means proving that constructing such a number of ISDs isn't feasable for the Empire, I think.

Who needs a source for that, it's logic. Remember a SBD is about 1.93 meters tall. We have no idea about weight but let's say about 190 pounds. Out of that, I would have to say about 75% of the weight is the durasteel. a 1,600 meter long vessel will need considerably more amounts of metal to make it, and the best way to get it is to strip mine which means enitre planets have to be striped of all metals, down to the core itself, just to make all those vessels.

[Srelex]

Wookiepedia is my source, Ghost Rider.

He means proving that constructing such a number of ISDs isn't feasable for the Empire, I think.

Who needs a source for that, it's logic. Remember a SBD is about 1.93 meters tall. We have no idea about weight but let's say about 190 pounds. Out of that, I would have to say about 75% of the weight is the durasteel. a 1,600 meter long vessel will need considerably more amounts of metal to make it, and the best way to get it is to strip mine which means enitre planets have to be striped of all metals, down to the core itself, just to make all those vessels.

You do realise that is precisely what often happens in SW?

[Night_stalker]

yeah, but even the Empire can't sustain the crew requirements without resorting to slave circuits, or lots of automated gear, both of which aren't appeasing to them.

[Srelex]

yeah, but even the Empire can't sustain the crew requirements without resorting to slave circuits, or lots of automated gear, both of which aren't appeasing to them.

Proof of this? Show me population figures and some calcs.

[Ghost Rider]

Wookiepedia is my source, Ghost Rider.

Thank you for not saying shit, you dipwit. But let's break it down with this and your second statement.

Who needs a source for that, it's logic.

Because this statement by itself is useless when combined with your source.

Remember a SBD is about 1.93 meters tall.

Fine

We have no idea about weight but let's say about 190 pounds.

So instead of making an educated inference, you pull a number straight from your ass. You're saying a full grown man made of metal, will only weighs only 86 kilograms? Think on this one.

Out of that, I would have to say about 75% of the weight is the durasteel.

Why again?

a 1,600 meter long vessel will need considerably more amounts of metal to make it, and the best way to get it is to strip mine which means enitre planets have to be striped of all metals, down to the core itself, just to make all those vessels.

So from your inane statement you make a wild leap to your conclusion. This doesn't even follow your first so called statement of it being logic that you based your inference upon.

So again, you will provide something or just upping your post count, dumbfuck?

[Grandmaster Jogurt]

The Falcon reached Alderaan minutes after Han finished his escape from the pursuing Star Destroyers...

Excuse me; I must be confused. How do we know this again?

There's only a couple minutes between, "Well, you can forget your troubles with those Imperial slugs. I told you I'd outrun 'em," and, "Looks like we're coming up on Alderaan." According to the script this is all a single scene, so there shouldn't be any large gaps of time in between either. I'm not and never was trying to claim that the entire trip took only minutes, just this part, but if the beginning part of the trip took days Han would've been working in the cockpit for quite some time.

Rereading the script, I retract the claim you quoted above, as I had missed a line: "Anyway, we should be at Alderaan about oh-two-hundred hours." This makes the second part of the trip taking a handful of minutes seem a bit far fetched, to say the least, but it does mean it's a matter of hours at most and "coming up on Alderaan" heavily implies it's not long.

And while this is just an indication for the Falcon, just as Palpatine to Mustafar is only for his shuttle, the fact that ISDs can credibly chase the Falcon means it shouldn't be that much faster than they are unless the ship being pursued is at a speed disadvantage.

[Night_stalker]

So from your inane statement you make a wild leap to your conclusion. This doesn't even follow your first so called statement of it being logic that you based your inference upon.

So again, you will provide something or just upping your post count, dumbfuck?

Do you have some grudge against me or something? I just make some decent, well thought out estimates, nothing solid mind you and I get lambasted for somehow NOT following logic, which doesn't even make sense. Use your head, even if the Empire strip mined every planet of every molecule of metal, it would need to either reassign a lot fo the metal to make new shipyards and gear to build their new fleet, or just wait while the existing shipyards try and make trillions of vessels, which takes God knows how long.

[Bloody Chaplain]

As to the continued navel problems I don't think that the GE would be able to withstand a Space Marine boarding party. I think that if a battle-barge were to board a SD, or SSD, it would end up in the hands of the Imperium. Though my figures were off about the Imperial Navy's size, (I had actually heard those figures from a person at my hobby shop when I began playing, and never heard anything to the contrary so I assumed it was true,) I know there are about 3,000 SM battle-barges in the Imperium, with the rest of their escorts and so on as well.

Not necesserily. ISDs tend to carry a vehicle complement. We see in the movies that SW ground vehicles can utterly vaporize armored targets--in Episode I, the equalivent of a police car (a Naboo speeder) vapes most of a heavily armored AAT, and of course, there's E-webs, disruptors, and rocket launchers. In some circumstances, an ISD can be quite capable of combating a Space Marine boarding team, depending on the size.

I don't understand how a vehicle compartment would help. Space Marines board against these things, that are designed to kill them, and still pull through with minimal casualties.

I don't get how this
As to the combined arms warfare, I don't think anybody should ever reference Geonosis. The clones formed a skirmish line, and literally walked, what appeared to be more than five to six hundred meters, to attack a formidable army of lifeless robots. If that doesn't scream stupid I don't know what does. Even with super efficient combined arms, (which they were not as someone said,) smart military doctrine does not state that you should send your men out IN FRONT OF YOUR ARMOR, across vast open ground. Even the worst war zones where the Imperium is forced into trench warfare they aren't even that stupid, and they don't even claim to be an elite fighting force.

Not applicable, as this is the Empire, not the Republic. The Imperium can also resort to dumbass tactics, as the Dawn of War intro shows.

Actually I am talking about a front of the line, infantry force. That scene from the DoW intro is very true of SM combat doctrine, but not of the IG. Remember, these are two different forces, separate from one another. Neither has to listen to the other, and are more than capable of doing there own thing. Besides, compared to a normal human, a Space Marine is armor.

Shroom Man keeps saying that they could do the same thing that the US did to the Japs in WWII. The problem with this, I see, is that once inside the 40k galaxy, the resources of the only really damaging ships, the SD and SSDs, would run out quickly and would take incredible losses while attempting to do so. Remember, most Imperium Escort ships are the same size as a SD, and when the pattern of agri and industry worlds is relized, they'll have a hell of a time trying to make your analogy of American WWII strategic bombing work.

Given the massive gulf between 40k and SW speeds, that's uncertain. You alo have to demonstrate how quickly Imperial supplies would run out--I'm sure the Empire isn't so stupid enough to forget the concept of resupplying.

Again, they could resupply. But I don't think they can refit the destroyed SD in short order.

I don't think bringing up either of the two death stars is a good idea, seeing as how the rebelion took both out, and the Imperium could easily bring ten times as much to bare on those targets.

The first death star was only taken out because the rebels had the plans and also because Luke had access to a ethereal force. The second wasn't even technically finished. [/quote]

And you beileve that the rebels have superior intel gathering forces to the Imperium? Also, even though the second death star was only half finished, it was still destroyed by the rebels, who used a small task force of infantry to destroy the shield that was on a moon. I don't get why the Imperium couldn't destroy the moon, and then do the exact same thing as the rebels did.

If I am correct, mankind was able to use a more advanced version of FTL before our first fall, and the Tau and Eldar have two completely different ways of travel. I think hyperdrive would see common use in Imperium ships given two or three years after the capture of one.

Uh, no. Even if I be very generous and assume that the Imperium does somehow reverse-engineer hyperdrive in short order, refitting their naval assets to accomodate it will be...problematic.[/quote]

I relooked up my sources, the Imperium never had non warp FTL travel.

[Aaron]

If I am correct, mankind was able to use a more advanced version of FTL before our first fall, and the Tau and Eldar have two completely different ways of travel. I think hyperdrive would see common use in Imperium ships given two or three years after the capture of one.

On a truly unrelated note, is it true that there are over 3 trillion SDs?

Just a side note:

Tau FTL "skims the warp" and they cannot open their own portals. It's also a good deal slower then IoM warp. Thats my understanding anyways.

The Eldar can use the webway to travel without the warp but it doesn't extend everywhere.

Warp travel was quicker in the past, before the Eldar fucked everything up by birthing Slaanesh the warp was less turbulent.

[Srelex]

I don't understand how a vehicle compartment would help. Space Marines board against these things, that are designed to kill them, and still pull through with minimal casualties.

Vehicles have the firepower to take on Space Marines. That's how they'd help. Naturally, this all depends on what ship they're boarding, and the size of the boarding force, but SW infantry can possess the firepower to hold off Space Marines.

And you beileve that the rebels have superior intel gathering forces to the Imperium? Also, even though the second death star was only half finished, it was still destroyed by the rebels, who used a small task force of infantry to destroy the shield that was on a moon. I don't get why the Imperium couldn't destroy the moon, and then do the exact same thing as the rebels did.
.

The rebels have the advantage of knowing what to look for. Furthermore, it matters not when you're talking about targeting a meter-wide exhaust port. Also, so what if the rebels destroyed the DS? They were only there because Palps willed it, and whether the Imperium could even be in a position to attack Endor is another matter entirely. The point is, it is a prime example of Imperial industrial might, and when fully operational it would be quite a boon.