Extremely flawed SW military?

[CaptJodan]

They could as well leave the barrier in place. Imagine they just leave the door open after that....

You can't even seem to decide if this is a door or a single bar. Regardless, you're adding a not insubstantial obstruction in a space that was probably going to be used for something else when the station was fully constructed. This material wasn't part of the original plans.

You conveniently ignore the fact that they could as well have just cancelled 500m² of the outer hull to have the men for the barrier and nobody would notice. Also, I can't imagine it would take so damn long and so many people to install a 'bar'. A bar is just as fine as a door, it blocks ships from getting in.

Who said they were working on the outer hull to complete the station in time? Given what Palpatine wanted the station for, it's obvious that the superlaser was the part of the station that needed to be finished before the fleet arrived. Most of the engineers were probably working furiously on that, not the outer hull.

Of course the superlaser area is finished, because it is critical and had to be finished quickly, it was their priority. And that's imo why it has these gaps all over the place where the superlaser isn't.

Why thank you for agreeing with what I just said above. If the superlaser was their priority, already sacrificing hull for the laser, as well as power systems to support it, conduits, computers, sensors, and whatever else was needed for its operation, it's not likely they were hard at work on the hull.

I still can't get over the absurdity of your claim here. But Channel72 does a good job displaying it.

For example, corporate giants like IBM and Microsoft have invested millions of dollars into designing incredibly complex software systems, only to have them exploited by some lone hacker who discovered a buffer he could overflow.

That's right, kids. IBM and Microsoft are inherently incompetent. (actually, the analogy doesn't completely hold. In order for that to happen, we have to have the CEO of Microsoft leak a way to get to the program before it's completed, then dare the hacker to penetrate it when only one or two layers of defenses are put into place because the programmers didn't have time to finish all the firewall codes.)

[Norade]

after both command vessels were destroyed

On the ground they were taken by total surprise and had the most power vehicle in the immediate area turned against them after all others were destroyed.

Strategic and tactical fail in both cases. If you have an entire galaxy to pick your equipment, training methods and elite from, I'd expect them to do better than that.

Did you miss the part where Palpatine designed it all to fail after his death?

So, you fire multi-TT blasts at the exposed unshielded core until it explodes then even if it means sacrificing a capital ship to do so.

If the door or bar is 20km inside the DS behind a turn, I doubt you could reach it even if you ram the Home One right into the vent.

Yes, and that 20km turn would be 100% solid and turbolasers would do nothing to it... right.

No, your spies do that you retarded too lazy to search sack off monkey ass.

Well it doesn't matter if it were plans or if a spy told them. I doubt that if you really want to, you would not be able to install a door or metal bar deep inside some vent secretly.

Hey asshole, I got news: Your spies can all go fuck themselves if I have 10 guys work on this, supervised 24/7 and turn em into space junk once they're finished. Also, I'm sure there's no way of telling if somebody can be trusted and is loyal or not. It's not like the SW universe has advanced technology and should have something trivial like a better lie detection method. Which you don't even need if you kill them off after the work is done. And it is done quickly if you have Vader come by once a day or so.

If they have so many spies everywhere that they can't even install a fucking metal bar, I really wonder how the shitty thing could actually fire in the first place, without having the 100 spies on the station do some sabotage during the battle. Or prior to the battle....

How much fucking time did they have to patch up the likely many paths into the core. You make it seem as if there is only a single path leading in as opposed to us just only seeing one path. How fast can men put up bars/doors or whatever? I'm interested to hear how you think it could be done.

Or them wearing armor that is bright white because they have no need to hide?

That's the stupidest piece of bullshit I have ever read. A soldier thrown into battle is just a dumbass if he really goes there in a white suit. There are situations and functions where a well visible armor or uniform makes sense. And that's NOT the battlefield. Except, of course, you really find stupid assholes which love to get killed easily.

Except when you're a special police force you want to be visible, the main army would be the Imperial Army or Imperial Naval soldiers, not the fucking Storm Troopers.

Perhapes another shielding station would have needed to be the size of the Death Star so they were forced to use a planet?

Since when do planets create shields? It's still machinery doing that. And it doesn't look like an over 160km large structure to me. Or any structure at all that couldn't be put inside a ship. It's not like there are no 20km large ships flying around.....

If, as theorized, shield generators need to absorb the kinetic impact of high energy shots then that generator and the machinery to power it needs to rest on rather large mass to counter balance the Death Star. It's just one explaination, but the shield generator could need to be attached to a large mass.

Your plan revolves around putting up barriers in multiple entry points to the Death Star that they would then have to remove after the battle was over, all while the station was already being protected by a planetary shield. Not surprisingly, I see you conveniently ignored the entire point that getting the station even operational enough for Palpatine's plan was near impossible, made possible only by Moff Whatever's "redouble our efforts". Your brilliant strategy not only makes no sense, there was probably also no time to implement it. But I'm sure that's the fault of the engineers for not budgeting time for the whims of the Emperor. Oh wait, I forgot, the Emperor is the one who gives them their time table.

They could as well leave the barrier in place. Imagine they just leave the door open after that....

You conveniently ignore the fact that they could as well have just cancelled 500m² of the outer hull to have the men for the barrier and nobody would notice. Also, I can't imagine it would take so damn long and so many people to install a 'bar'. A bar is just as fine as a door, it blocks ships from getting in.

Yes, just tack on a chunk not in your plans to the highly engineered Death Star... That's fucking rich. Also you don't just cancel a layer when you're project is coming along nicely and your boss says, I need the super laser online and ready to fire test shots for date X. To ensure this goes faster please send away all non-super laser related crew while this is done. Also, first you say door then bar, just fucking pick one.

This would imply, or at least suggest that the missing pieces would be uniform throughout. It wasn't. The Death Star superlaser area was pretty much completed, but you had massive gaps in the "southern hemisphere" as well as the whole "east" side (your picture may vary). Doesn't look uniform to me.

Of course the superlaser area is finished, because it is critical and had to be finished quickly, it was their priority. And that's imo why it has these gaps all over the place where the superlaser isn't.

Yeah, and those gaps likely meant many ways to reach the core.

[Ritterin Sophia]

*sigh*

Armor-

1)If you are designing armor to protect against blaster fire, why would it automatically be armor good enough for kinetic weapons? We don't know how it works, probably disperses energy across the plate or something, but that doesn't translate into being rock proof, or spear proof, it is supposed to be blaster proof.


2)It doesn't need to be blaster proof either, perhaps being blaster proof is impossible for man sized armor. Perhaps they just have SW version of flak jackets, something designed to lessen the effect of blaster fire, to make a hit more survivable. In which case, making armor that gives you a better chance of survival doesn't necessarily mean rock proof, or spear proof.

No it's not. According to Ghosts of Tatooine and and the Young Jedi series, Stormtrooper armour is indeed invulnerable to most kinetic energy penetrators. What Stormtrooper Armour does is provide environmental and protection against extremely proliferate blaster pistols, with the likes of Han's DL-44 being specifically noted to be one of the few pistols with sufficient firepower to overcome it. A blaster rifle or heavy blaster pistol is more than effective against ST armour.

3)Why is it white and why do they wear it all the time? Why not? It is apparently their uniform. When on duty, they wear it. We have yet to see, in a movie, the Stormtrooper barracks, we have no idea what the wear and do not wear on their time off. But they wear it because they are symbols of Imperial strength, and white is probably a way to both make it obvious who they are and what they represent and to erase individuality, they are part of the Imperial machine.

They wear camo depending on their function, guards and police apparently wear white, as do arctic combat units, and urban.

[Vympel]

No it's not. According to Ghosts of Tatooine and and the Young Jedi series, Stormtrooper armour is indeed invulnerable to most kinetic energy penetrators. What Stormtrooper Armour does is provide environmental and protection against extremely proliferate blaster pistols, with the likes of Han's DL-44 being specifically noted to be one of the few pistols with sufficient firepower to overcome it. A blaster rifle or heavy blaster pistol is more than effective against ST armour.

We have contradictory information on that. There's that comic that's a clear Zulu homage where their armor gets penetrated by spears, which comes immediately to mind. EU can't get its facts straight, have to come up with rationalizations for discrepancy, yay.

Well usually you have different uniforms / armor for different tasks. When you're just hitting buttons in some room in the DS, there's no need to wear full body armor. But yes, it'd be quite speculative how duty in such armor feels like and what dresscodes the Empire might have. I just wouldn't like the idea of being unable to scratch my balls without reason

Dude, when was the last time you saw the movies? Stormtroopers never perform any technical functions, they're pure infantry. Every technical task we see anyone in the Imperial military perform is just an ordinary crewman or officer in a grey, black or green uniform.

[Temujin]

Yeah, those are all pretty much established points.

The stormtroopers really should be more terrifying. The soldiers from the anime Jin-Roh did the job. Completely outclassed the rebels in their story, seemingly unstoppable. Only drawback is our heroes couldn't survive tangling with stormtroopers that badass and effective.

I agree, those are some awesome armor kits, and surprisingly inline with some ideas I developed myself for a modern Earth equivalent stormtrooper. Is that pic from a live action adaptation, or something else?

[DotS]

For example, corporate giants like IBM and Microsoft have invested millions of dollars into designing incredibly complex software systems, only to have them exploited by some lone hacker who discovered a buffer he could overflow.

You can't compare code to a 'building'.

You can't even seem to decide if this is a door or a single bar.

Cause it doesn't fucking matter. Pick whatever you like, both solutions do the job. The bar would just be easier to install.

Who said they were working on the outer hull to complete the station in time? Given what Palpatine wanted the station for, it's obvious that the superlaser was the part of the station that needed to be finished before the fleet arrived. Most of the engineers were probably working furiously on that, not the outer hull.

When looking at a DSII image, it looks to me, as if they did large construction on parts which do NOT cover the superlaser, we even see lit windows and finished hull plating where there is no superlaser. Not exactly few I might add. Maybe Palpatine came up with the 'I want this shit functional in a week' crap rather surprisingly.

The point is: Take a random DSII image, remove a few pixels somewhere at the edge / border of the 'sphere', where no one would even notice. Or a bit hull plating. Is the DSII now less operational than before? To a point of being incapable of firing its superlaser? I highly doubt so. But what I know is, where I would have sent the guys which did exactly this part. The DSII should lack a bit hull, quarters for maybe 1000 stormtroopers, what the fuck ever, compared to the one we see above Endor, because the resources should have been put to proper core defense and protection.

And don't any of you come up with the fucking spies. Their asshole spies told em, that the station can't fire it's main weapon. So I guess it's not too hard to get bullshit-information to the rebels. Like 'there are large tunnels from the surface to the core which are just perfect for fighters to attack the core', just to have em smash against one of my infamous metal bars. Awww.

Yes, and that 20km turn would be 100% solid and turbolasers would do nothing to it... right.

If you don't even closely know what I'm talking about, I suggest you shut your face.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TGMvadAFqLQ#t=5m35s

If the timecode doesn't work, jump to 05:35

And if you now claim that it's the camera making this look like a turn, feel free to jump to 05:55. Here, I even got a timelink in case you're a lazy ass:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TGMvadAFqLQ#t=5m55s

And now you explain to me, how you have a rebel sized starship (the largest one is the Home One if I'm not wrong) rammed into that fucking shaft deep enough to fire somewhere near the area behind 05:55 before pulling the fucking cruiser out of the DS again so your fighters can enter.

Also, the Executor didn't look like it could smash significantly through the DS hull. How's a much smaller rebel cruiser gonna do that?

Except when you're a special police force you want to be visible

I didn't know they sent special police forces (which seem to be extremely large in size, which no special police force really is...) into larger battles. Usually you have your soldier fighting your battle, not your cop or SWAT team. To me it really always looked like the Stormtrooper is a soldier and not a cop.

Also, first you say door then bar, just fucking pick one.

I pick the bar. But actually it was meant for you to pick whatever fucking obstacle you can think of.

Yeah, and those gaps likely meant many ways to reach the core.

You imply that the core is pretty well accessed through the surface or the unfinished parts. But the core chamber doesn't look like it's having large gaps.

They wear camo depending on their function, guards and police apparently wear white, as do arctic combat units, and urban.

I guess they forgot to tell the guys on Endor

Dude, when was the last time you saw the movies? Stormtroopers never perform any technical functions, they're pure infantry. Every technical task we see anyone in the Imperial military perform is just an ordinary crewman or officer in a grey, black or green uniform.

Hitting buttons aren't technical functions. At least not always. I wanted to say that we always seem to see Stormtroopers fully geared up, while it seems there's not always the need for this.

I guess I'm making the mistake of applying real life military facts to the SW military. Well, actually it's not always a mistake. But I'm sure Lucas simply had no idea, he just said 'We need bad guys, the audience needs to distinguish the bad guys from the good guys easily and they need to fall in masses'. He most probably did not think about such more detailed things. Or where the Troopers put their rifles, cause I always see em CARRY the things, but rarely (never?) attached to the body. The Troopers arms will fall off after holding his stupid rifle in his hands for a whole day, let alone the next day.... Sucks to be a Stormtrooper on monday I guess.

Is that pic from a live action adaptation, or something else?

Yes, these guys look really badass I assume they are meant to look like modern Nazis. Their guns are all german if I'm not wrong and the helmet looks a lot like an SS helmet.

[Vympel]

Hitting buttons aren't technical functions. At least not always. I wanted to say that we always seem to see Stormtroopers fully geared up, while it seems there's not always the need for this.

And when exactly do you see Stormtroopers who are off duty or doing something that doesn't require them to wear their combat uniform?

I guess I'm making the mistake of applying real life military facts to the SW military. Well, actually it's not always a mistake. But I'm sure Lucas simply had no idea, he just said 'We need bad guys, the audience needs to distinguish the bad guys from the good guys easily and they need to fall in masses'. He most probably did not think about such more detailed things. Or where the Troopers put their rifles, cause I always see em CARRY the things, but rarely (never?) attached to the body. The Troopers arms will fall off after holding his stupid rifle in his hands for a whole day, let alone the next day.... Sucks to be a Stormtrooper on monday I guess.

What are you even talking about? Stormtroopers have holsters hanging from their belts for their carbines. Pay some more attention. And their larger weapons have slings. Just like real life. Not only is this complaint ridiculously petty, its also flat wrong, and bizarre given there's no such thing as "rifles attached to the body" in real life.

[Lusankya]

For example, corporate giants like IBM and Microsoft have invested millions of dollars into designing incredibly complex software systems, only to have them exploited by some lone hacker who discovered a buffer he could overflow.

You can't compare code to a 'building'.

So what? Buildings - even major projects - can and do collapse sometimes because the design team didn't see something as a credible threat.

Take the Twin Towers, for example. They collapsed because the design team didn't foresee the possibility of fuel-laden 747s being flown into them. A few years later, when the engineer in charge of the WTC was put in charge of designing the World Financial Centre in Shanghai, he rectified said problem, and created a design that can theoretically stand up to a 747 impact. Live and learn. (Unfortunately, the World Finance Centre is just as ugly as the Twin Towers; it is, however, more durable.)

And really, when you think about it, it seems pretty obvious that if a fuel-laden 747 flies into a Very Tall Building, then the building will fall down; it's just that back in the 90s, nobody ever thought anyone would actually do that.

Same can go for the Death Star.

[CaptJodan]

You can't compare code to a 'building'.

Blanket statement with no reasoning. Watch this. "Yes you can." See how fun this is?

Cause it doesn't fucking matter. Pick whatever you like, both solutions do the job. The bar would just be easier to install.

There are any number of reasons why it matters from an engineering standpoint, including reasons you yourself cite, such as ease of installment and lack of moving parts. And a sufficiently small "bar" isn't going to stop an A-Wing pilot, now is it? Those ships are diminutive and can just go around.

When looking at a DSII image, it looks to me, as if they did large construction on parts which do NOT cover the superlaser, we even see lit windows and finished hull plating where there is no superlaser. Not exactly few I might add. Maybe Palpatine came up with the 'I want this shit functional in a week' crap rather surprisingly.

No shit, that's exactly what it looks like. Otherwise we would have seen something like the Death Star Prototype from the EU, which consisted of a basic structure of a sphere and the giant laser and that's it. It's pretty clear that Palpatine didn't set the DSII plans on the table with his engineers and say "I want this station to be used in a rebel trap. Make the super laser functional and disregard everything else". It's state of completion speaks highly that it was intended to be finished before being used, until Palpatine decided he wanted it used for his trap.

The point is: Take a random DSII image, remove a few pixels somewhere at the edge / border of the 'sphere', where no one would even notice. Or a bit hull plating. Is the DSII now less operational than before? To a point of being incapable of firing its superlaser? I highly doubt so. But what I know is, where I would have sent the guys which did exactly this part. The DSII should lack a bit hull, quarters for maybe 1000 stormtroopers, what the fuck ever, compared to the one we see above Endor, because the resources should have been put to proper core defense and protection.

So now the engineers should be Force users who see the future of what Palpatine wants before he even suggests it. You're just making shit up at this point. We see massive sections of the station independent of the superlaser that are complete. Apparently you think all of that was done between the time Palpatine ordered that it be ready for his trap and the time we first see the Death Star, rather than what was completed prior to Palpatine springing this idea on his engineers.

[CaptJodan]

Same can go for the Death Star.

We actually see this exact same thought process of the engineers of the second Death Star. The identified weakness of the original exhaust port (which, it must clearly be reiterated, was a miracle of the Force that it was even successful. We saw a computer guided shot fail in the attack.) was corrected for by incorporating numerous, but much smaller exhaust vents throughout the station's structure in various locations, ones far too small for a torpedo or anything else to get into. Thus, had the Death Star been...you know...not under fucking construction, there would not have been any way to reach the core from the outside.

DotS would expect your post 9/11 skyscraper buildings to be able to withstand a fuel laden 747 strike on a building that's still only 60% complete. Otherwise the engineers are incompetent.

[Ritterin Sophia]

We have contradictory information on that. There's that comic that's a clear Zulu homage where their armor gets penetrated by spears, which comes immediately to mind. EU can't get its facts straight, have to come up with rationalizations for discrepancy, yay.

We don't know the composition of those spears, for all we know they're naturally forming durasteel stalactites/mites.

bizarre given there's no such thing as "rifles attached to the body" in real life.

I just had the weirdest image of my head of a US Soldier sticking his rifle onto one of the dozens of velcro spots of his ACU...

[Norade]

For example, corporate giants like IBM and Microsoft have invested millions of dollars into designing incredibly complex software systems, only to have them exploited by some lone hacker who discovered a buffer he could overflow.

You can't compare code to a 'building'.

Yes you can.

You can't even seem to decide if this is a door or a single bar.

Cause it doesn't fucking matter. Pick whatever you like, both solutions do the job. The bar would just be easier to install.

They both, might to the job, that bar wouldn't work if you used an AI drone missile or even just a missile the is programed using scans out the tunnel and can avoid the bar. The only real issue is that such a thing might take more time to pull off so flying in was the first choice.

Who said they were working on the outer hull to complete the station in time? Given what Palpatine wanted the station for, it's obvious that the superlaser was the part of the station that needed to be finished before the fleet arrived. Most of the engineers were probably working furiously on that, not the outer hull.

When looking at a DSII image, it looks to me, as if they did large construction on parts which do NOT cover the superlaser, we even see lit windows and finished hull plating where there is no superlaser. Not exactly few I might add. Maybe Palpatine came up with the 'I want this shit functional in a week' crap rather surprisingly.

Yes, that last bit is exactly what we're saying. It looks like even wastes of space like you can eventually learn.

The point is: Take a random DSII image, remove a few pixels somewhere at the edge / border of the 'sphere', where no one would even notice. Or a bit hull plating. Is the DSII now less operational than before? To a point of being incapable of firing its superlaser? I highly doubt so. But what I know is, where I would have sent the guys which did exactly this part. The DSII should lack a bit hull, quarters for maybe 1000 stormtroopers, what the fuck ever, compared to the one we see above Endor, because the resources should have been put to proper core defense and protection.

And don't any of you come up with the fucking spies. Their asshole spies told em, that the station can't fire it's main weapon. So I guess it's not too hard to get bullshit-information to the rebels. Like 'there are large tunnels from the surface to the core which are just perfect for fighters to attack the core', just to have em smash against one of my infamous metal bars. Awww.

Yes, because the engineers knew they would need the extra time, hell for all we know they did build to smaller to meat the deadline so go fuck yourself. Not to mention they may have still needed access to the core, just because it works doesn't mean it works well and a bar means that you can't get your core repair and trouble shooting craft in to makesure the damn thing will still work after the battle.

I would imagine secrecy around the main weapon is a bit more well guarded than secrets about hull construction.

Yes, and that 20km turn would be 100% solid and turbolasers would do nothing to it... right.

If you don't even closely know what I'm talking about, I suggest you shut your face.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TGMvadAFqLQ#t=5m35s

If the timecode doesn't work, jump to 05:35

And if you now claim that it's the camera making this look like a turn, feel free to jump to 05:55. Here, I even got a timelink in case you're a lazy ass:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TGMvadAFqLQ#t=5m55s

And now you explain to me, how you have a rebel sized starship (the largest one is the Home One if I'm not wrong) rammed into that fucking shaft deep enough to fire somewhere near the area behind 05:55 before pulling the fucking cruiser out of the DS again so your fighters can enter.

Also, the Executor didn't look like it could smash significantly through the DS hull. How's a much smaller rebel cruiser gonna do that?

You missed the part where it would be shooting turbolasers at the exposed inner hull and the fact that the shield was still up when the Executer smashed into the DSII. Also, what do you need fighters for when you can fire turbolasers into the exposed core? It's not as easy to get a capital ship into position during the battle, but if fighters couldn't do it we know the rebels would have tried.

Except when you're a special police force you want to be visible

I didn't know they sent special police forces (which seem to be extremely large in size, which no special police force really is...) into larger battles. Usually you have your soldier fighting your battle, not your cop or SWAT team. To me it really always looked like the Stormtrooper is a soldier and not a cop.

In ANH they were used to board a civilian ship, search for droids, and serve as guards for a large installation. That is all guard duty/police work not war fighting so it hardly matters.

In ESB they were part of Vaders own personal task force and had a great showing.

In RotJ they were rear guard for an installation that nobody else was loyal enough to guard.

But because they look like soldiers to you it must be so...

Also, first you say door then bar, just fucking pick one.

I pick the bar. But actually it was meant for you to pick whatever fucking obstacle you can think of.

As explained above it was likely that such gaps were needed for ongoing work to the core, after all you can get the core and super laser ready to fire if you can't work on them. Of course retards like you don't think or shit like this...

Yeah, and those gaps likely meant many ways to reach the core.

You imply that the core is pretty well accessed through the surface or the unfinished parts. But the core chamber doesn't look like it's having large gaps.

I really don't give a shit anymore if there is one way in or a million for reasons stated above it may have needed to be open anyway.

They wear camo depending on their function, guards and police apparently wear white, as do arctic combat units, and urban.

I guess they forgot to tell the guys on Endor

Perhaps they simply didn't have the right camo stored aboard their ships and were waiting for a shipment to arrive. Dumber things have happened in real life.

Dude, when was the last time you saw the movies? Stormtroopers never perform any technical functions, they're pure infantry. Every technical task we see anyone in the Imperial military perform is just an ordinary crewman or officer in a grey, black or green uniform.

Hitting buttons aren't technical functions. At least not always. I wanted to say that we always seem to see Stormtroopers fully geared up, while it seems there's not always the need for this.

I guess I'm making the mistake of applying real life military facts to the SW military. Well, actually it's not always a mistake. But I'm sure Lucas simply had no idea, he just said 'We need bad guys, the audience needs to distinguish the bad guys from the good guys easily and they need to fall in masses'. He most probably did not think about such more detailed things. Or where the Troopers put their rifles, cause I always see em CARRY the things, but rarely (never?) attached to the body. The Troopers arms will fall off after holding his stupid rifle in his hands for a whole day, let alone the next day.... Sucks to be a Stormtrooper on monday I guess.

Yet these storm troopers have slings and holsters... Somebody is an idiot.

[jollyreaper]

Except that as you increase the ability of the enemy you do the same to that of the heroes as well, but I guess retards don't think before they type.

Might I kindly suggest you cram it up your ass sideways?

How about the fact that the station needed to vent waste heat and gases... That and they never even considered an attack by ships so small to be a threat. Vader only had any idea, because of the force.

That kind of oversight is possible when wars haven't been fought for a while. The primacy of the airplane was not fully appreciated until WWII started. The machine gun rendering frontal attacks completely suicidal wasn't appreciated until long after it was proven in WWI. Miscalculations in military projects are possible, especially when dealing with prestige projects in dictatorships. All that being said, the exhaust port remains an incredible oversight. If it's obvious enough to discover with a cursory analysis of the plans, it makes you wonder why it wasn't fixed, especially when the seemingly obvious solution would not be expensive. Put a blast shield over it. Only open it when venting is needed. They were able to correct this flaw in the second Death Star.

It doesn't ruin the movie for me because it's very enjoyable. But it does give one pause to think. I think the biggest plot hole is the idea that Leia should head directly to the main secret base with her plans. Could have been justified if the Death Star was already on its way and so the only way to possibly save the base was getting there first and mounting a defense. But barring that, they should have gone anywhere else.

The other question is why the plans could not be transmitted long-distance if they could be placed within R2. Could be handwaved away if the plans are encoded in a special cryptographic reader whose outputs cannot be easily digitized. You're locked to using the physical media and reader unit until massive computers can be used for brute force decryption. I'm just spitballing here, of course. The plans for a battlestation would doubtless be huge but they have very advanced computer systems in the Star Wars universe. Even if they couldn't reasonably transmit the plans in one go, duplication and multiple couriers would seem reasonable.

Like them not being able to aim as claimed by idioys of course ignoring all the times when they can and do so very effectively? Or them wearing armor that is bright white because they have no need to hide? Yeah, really fatal flaws

Who's more the idiot, me or the one who can't even spell the word? The poor aiming isn't just claimed, it's demonstrated. Yes, our heroes have plot invulnerability but the Stormies still can't shoot well.

As for camo, there's not really any need for it on a ship. Planet-side, the question is whether their role is intimidation or proper warfare. I'd agree that most stormies are showing the flag so the white armor is about making the imperial presence felt. Camo gear would be justified if it was less police action and more open warfare.

You can also question the wisdom of shielding a battlestation from a base on a planet. Why not put the generators in orbit and ring the whole site with turbo-laser batteries? Lucas wanted a ground battle and wanted wookies, later changed to ewoks. The needs of the fictional technologies did not drive the plot, the plot dictated how the fictional technology would be used, often inexplicably.

Perhapes another shielding station would have needed to be the size of the Death Star so they were forced to use a planet?[/quote]

But it wasn't the size of the Death Star. It looked like a large satellite dish and the facility could be completely destroyed with demolition charges carried by a small commando team.

[jollyreaper]

Yeah, those are all pretty much established points.

The stormtroopers really should be more terrifying. The soldiers from the anime Jin-Roh did the job. Completely outclassed the rebels in their story, seemingly unstoppable. Only drawback is our heroes couldn't survive tangling with stormtroopers that badass and effective.

I agree, those are some awesome armor kits, and surprisingly inline with some ideas I developed myself for a modern Earth equivalent stormtrooper. Is that pic from a live action adaptation, or something else?

Just fans with entirely too much time on their hands.

[Norade]

Except that as you increase the ability of the enemy you do the same to that of the heroes as well, but I guess retards don't think before they type.

Might I kindly suggest you cram it up your ass sideways?

No, you may not.

How about the fact that the station needed to vent waste heat and gases... That and they never even considered an attack by ships so small to be a threat. Vader only had any idea, because of the force.

That kind of oversight is possible when wars haven't been fought for a while. The primacy of the airplane was not fully appreciated until WWII started. The machine gun rendering frontal attacks completely suicidal wasn't appreciated until long after it was proven in WWI. Miscalculations in military projects are possible, especially when dealing with prestige projects in dictatorships. All that being said, the exhaust port remains an incredible oversight. If it's obvious enough to discover with a cursory analysis of the plans, it makes you wonder why it wasn't fixed, especially when the seemingly obvious solution would not be expensive. Put a blast shield over it. Only open it when venting is needed. They were able to correct this flaw in the second Death Star.

It doesn't ruin the movie for me because it's very enjoyable. But it does give one pause to think. I think the biggest plot hole is the idea that Leia should head directly to the main secret base with her plans. Could have been justified if the Death Star was already on its way and so the only way to possibly save the base was getting there first and mounting a defense. But barring that, they should have gone anywhere else.

The other question is why the plans could not be transmitted long-distance if they could be placed within R2. Could be handwaved away if the plans are encoded in a special cryptographic reader whose outputs cannot be easily digitized. You're locked to using the physical media and reader unit until massive computers can be used for brute force decryption. I'm just spitballing here, of course. The plans for a battlestation would doubtless be huge but they have very advanced computer systems in the Star Wars universe. Even if they couldn't reasonably transmit the plans in one go, duplication and multiple couriers would seem reasonable.

The exhaust port was a flaw, just as tracks and weaker top armor are weaknesses on modern tanks. It also attacks of a weaker nature to disable or destroy a tank. They are known about by designs, and yet nothing has been done to full mitigate them. As for fixing the flaw in the second one, that was after they had experience with the first and was done not by a physical shield, but by making each vent smaller. Not to mention that having a data mining droid run over the plans and spot a flaw isn't a cursory look.

Long ranged transmission would presumably be done by holonet and that was fully in Imperial control. They would have spotted the message fairly quickly unless it was very, very, well coded and good code is expensive.

Like them not being able to aim as claimed by idioys of course ignoring all the times when they can and do so very effectively? Or them wearing armor that is bright white because they have no need to hide? Yeah, really fatal flaws

Who's more the idiot, me or the one who can't even spell the word? The poor aiming isn't just claimed, it's demonstrated. Yes, our heroes have plot invulnerability but the Stormies still can't shoot well.

As for camo, there's not really any need for it on a ship. Planet-side, the question is whether their role is intimidation or proper warfare. I'd agree that most stormies are showing the flag so the white armor is about making the imperial presence felt. Camo gear would be justified if it was less police action and more open warfare.

Oh look, retard doesn't know what a typo is. Idiot...

Also, by what standards do you claim they don't shot well? Please show me how they compare in accuracy to real life forces. I fucking dare you.

As for the armor, other ideas might be that against a technological equal they will spot you anyway so it's a waste of money.

Perhaps another shielding station would have needed to be the size of the Death Star so they were forced to use a planet?

But it wasn't the size of the Death Star. It looked like a large satellite dish and the facility could be completely destroyed with demolition charges carried by a small commando team.

Do note that I clarified afterward saying that, due to conservation of momentum, the shield may need to come from a source with equal or greater mass. Otherwise you could break the shield just by stressing the generator platform enough.

[Connor MacLeod]

1.) Why do the Stormtroopers suck so much? There seems to be not a single thing about them that would make them effective soldiers. All the mentioned things are posted with the fact in mind, that they can mass produce turbolasers for large battleships, strong enough to wipe out planets, so they should have nice military tech....

having the capability to do something does not equate the will to do it. The 2nd Death STar demonstrates they probably could build hundreds if not thousands of DS1s, yet we don't see them doing this either. Alot more factors than having the ability go into such decisions, and not all of them are neccesarily going to be rational.

a) Their armor

Why is it unflexible? It looks like you've a hard time to really effectively move in it. Most Stormtroopers we see in the movies don't seem to be too agile. That's not exactly a good thing.

This is incredibly vague and lacking any useful comparison. REal life armor is both heavy and bulky (especially with all the other gear) so I'm not sure what your baseline for comparison is.

Why is it white? Except for winter (and even then they have black parts on their armor) this is probably one of the worst camouflage colours you could pick. So why white? For identification, so you can tell these are official Stormtroopers? To make it short, I don't get why it's white. Even the squad on Endor wears white armor!

We mostly see the actual storm troopers onboard ships or deployed from ships. The only case where coloration is an issue is Endor, and that has far more trouble than the color of stormtrooper armor.

Besides, as noted we know that clone trooper armor can be camouflaged, so what's the problem?

Why is it worn all the time? I can see why you would want to wear a full budy armor with helmet which can do things like protect you from extreme weather conditions or even space. But why inside the Death Star?

Because it's their uniform, and when you are working you wear that uniform at all times? Besides which, considering the purpose of stormtroopers (to help maintain the security of the station, which entails carrying weapons and the possibility of getting into firefights) wearing armor even onboard makes sense. (you know, in case you get shot at.)

Most importantly, it fails every time we see it in action. I can't remember a single Stromtrooper who did not immediately fall down and obviously die after being hit by a handgun sized device. I know that in real life, protective vests don't protect you from all kinds of damage or calibers either. But they don't fail all the time. In SW, they do.

How do you know that any trooper who goes down is "dead?" pray? Some ST armor fails to be holed by blaster fire. Others take small holes. A few take very big holes. It's hard to judge the overall impact from that aside from "they don't get up", but that could be for any number of reasons (injury/incapacitation, secondary stun effects, etc.) That doesn't even factor in that the kind of blaster and the settings involved play a role (even a pistol shaped blaster can be fairly powerful, especially Heavy blaster pistols. Depends entirely on the design.)

This also assumes that it is possible to easily or effectively shield a person with mere physical matter against blaster fire without using thick or heavy armor, which would entail tradeoffs (weight and ability to move). Clonetrooper armor is suposedly more resilient but heavier, for example, so they can build it tougher. As I recall ST armor was meant to only make blaster hits survivable (up to heavy blaster pistol shots) not totally resist it. Which considering the kinds of damage they are capable of putting out does not seem unreasonable.

Not only against some handgun blasters, but even against rocks and the like. They build Death Stars, but they fail to develop a helmet which would protect it's wearer from a rock. Even a modern army helmet does that. Actually you can get smacked on the head with a rock and would not even fall over. Which immediately begs the question: Why do they wear it on Endor?

How big a rock and how fast is it moving in either example? Again you fail to make an accurate comparison by failing to account for the variables. You're basically trying to argue that if something fails ot protect against a rock of any arbitrary size it is a failure, yet you woudl not plausibly expect a helmet to protect a person against a boulder several feet in diameter would you?

To make things worse, it even looks like you can't store much stuff in it. I actually think that this armor is the worst armor I have ever seen, especially considering that it's state of the art armor of an Empire which controls an entire Galaxy and regularly builds ships which could punish entire planets with some teratons per second and can go through the galaxy in some.... hours or days, I don't know.

Why is it you keep feeling that your "opinions" qualify as accurate assessments? do you have research to back this up or is it all gut instinct? The former is meaingful, the latter.. is debatable. The ability to store or carry stuff would depend entirely on the role. (onboard a ship you clearly don't need to carry much. While in the field you clearly could carry more. Which is presumably, for example, why the Sandtroopers in ANH had transportation and backpacks and such.)

b) Their effectivity

What makes it impossible for soldiers of the major power of the galaxy to capture a hand full of people on their own strongest and largest base ever built (before DS II)? Why do they fail so terribly in any scene we see them? We see trained soldiers (trained by the largest military force ever) with military grade armor and weapons losing firefights to civilians which aren't even armored. That's implausible to say the very least.

Specific answer: in ANH Tarkin and Vader wanted to let the Rebels get away so they could be followed. Apprehending them would not achieve this. So either they deliberately used incompetent soldiers or the soldiers were ordered to put on a show. Take your pick.

General answer: Why are you generalizing about the broad performance of the storm troopers (or the Imperial military in general) from relatively few samples? Are you trying to say that the capabilities and performance (or even training) of a military force is always going to be consistently the same all the time and under every conceivable condition? I find that hard to believe. Incompetence or other negative qualities are not exactly unheard of in military forces, for whatever reason you choose to adopt (politics, inadequate or imperfect training schedules or regimes, etc.)

It's common knowledge that the Stormtroopers are ineffective. But why? The USA has the most advanced and strongest military in the world. And one of the largest ones. Still, their soldiers are very well trained.

so the US has completely and totally won and defeated every foe we've run across? Never made mistakes or fuckups of any kind? I'm honestly curious to know how you intend to draw a comparison betwene the two.

It gets even much, much worse when the 'elite' squad on Endor got it's ass handed by Ewoks. There are 2 possible options for this: The Ewoks are very damn good warriors. And I mean very damn good. Or the Empire's elite sucks. Maybe both, I don't know.... I'm also surprised that they didn't see any of the Ewok shit coming. Got no sensors? No reconnaissance? Nobody telling you that Ewoks worked for like 10 hours to set up their traps?

Elite by whose word? The Emperor's? Since when is the emperor an unbiased judge of military capability? He orchestrated everything at Endor to suit his whim (which included telling his own naval forces not to attack the rebels. Even, it seems, at the cost of their own lives.)

2.) The Death Star

The thing is made to annihilate worlds. Okay. So why does the world annihilator have an open hole which leads directly to the core? What does it do? Why is it unprotected? In the SD Wiki it's called an exhaust port. For what? Does that core generate gas, which has to be blown into space? Is it for cooling? For whatever it is, there is no reason to not have at least a crate on it. Or a door. Or at least metal bars blocking things like nasty proton torpedoes. I guess the designers were full of fail or something, because it's an obvious weak spot.

A weak spot covered by surface defenses and a fuckoff huge fighter screen, under a shield which can shrug off large scale fleet bombardments and the destruction of planets, and was exploited only through what amounts to be magic.. not exactly a easily exploited weak point without contrivance. And have you ever seen actual construction? In the town I live we have a bridge that was built across the Missisippi and it has a fucking weird ass curve in it because of such a glaring flaw in design. Yet they didn't start over from scratch despite this glaring flaw because it would cost alot more time and money to fix and it wasn't worth it. Cost Benefit analysis sucks, but such is reality. Numerous product recalls (even potentially fatal ones) can attest to this.

And once again, it gets worse, because Death Star II was improved... or not... This time, a proton torpedo wouldn't get through. It's no straight hole. Design flaw solved..... or not.... This time an entire ship can fly in. The very same kind of ship that killed off DS I.

Um. you do realize the DS2 wasn't fully built right?

No matter how you want to excuse this, by the DS being in construction, not ready, not expecting the rebel attack, having a large shield, or even expecting the attack, whatever. If you build something this large and this important for your military, you'd be the most stupid and most incompetent person ever doing this job if you, at no point, ever look at the previously destroyed Death Star and make sure they don't do something similar again. Imagine the Ewoks made a bonfire somewhere near the shield generator and it got out of control. Or they have a power outage. Ever heard of redundancy? They didn't even bother to build a second shield generator there. They didn't bother to have that shit done by a large, armored warship.

It's easy to say in hindsight what should have been done alot of times, but you either don't think it likely or just don't think about it at all. 9/11 comes to mind.

3.) The Executor / General ISD Design

How could the rebels bring the Executor down? If we take a look at the movie, it seems like they destroy the shield generators near the ISDs bridges. With some ease I might add. Eventually some A Wing dude flies his pile of junk into the Executor's bridge and it collides with the DS.

If these ships are so well armored and have so many and so powerful guns (and are not alone... at least not in Ep VI), how could the A Wing get through? More importantly, how could it crash into that bridge and cause total devastation? Shouldn't the bridge, which is on top and very easy to see and aim at, be well armored? At least against an object which flies against it? I'm not saying it has to take 5 nukes to the window, but all it suffers from is an impact of something which could as well have been an asteroid at a power failure or whatever. Shouldn't there be a second bridge for such a case, a failsafe system, something? We're talking about a 19km warship here, not a one-time razor blade you throw away after using it.

The A-wing didn't cause total devastation. According to the novelization of the movie and the movie itself, the Aw-ing was just one part of a much larger attack scheme (including other fighters as well as large warships) which would doubtlessly be targeting other parts of the ship (on top of which I recall it was already suffering from damage to its engines and manuvering system. The collision with the DS2 surface in fact indicates that there was some sort of damage to the engines that either manuvered it into the DS2, or allowed it ot be pulled down by the DS2's force fields or gravity or whatever. But this cannot be solely attributed to the A-wing.) Nevermind we dont know the actual destruction the A-wing caused (its unquantifiable) but again you ecounter design considerations. You can only armor something so much if you want to have an exposed view. REal life bridge towers aren't exactly heavily armred either now are they?) And a case could be made that no amount of armor alone could totally protect against sustained weapons fire so it doesnt matter where you put the bridge.

4.) The AT-ST

There is a scene which I found kind of disturbing in Ep VI. It's the AT-ST getting smashed by 2 tree chunks. They cause extreme deformation to the AT-ST and (if I remember correctly....) it blows up. Even if it doesn't, we can assume that this AT-ST won't ever see battle again.

..... can you really defeat that thing with cannon balls? It seems like you can.... Actually the AT-ST getting crushed seems even more fragile than a modern tank. Even today's Al Qaida could take this thing out.....

This is getting tiresome. If you are going to posit a problem, would you at least do the fucking analysis first? Did you even bother to consider the size of the trunks or the density of the wood needed to sustaint hem? The sort of mass and velocity those logs would have? That as a rule you tend not to heavily armor scout vehicles? Its not a bloody tank for crying out loud.

5.) The Tie Bomber

Why don't we see any effects caused by the bombs, except for a very short flash, when Han hid his Falcon in that asteroid slug? Shouldn't we see some explosions or craters or anything?

Was just wondering the last time I saw SW, but never bothered to actually ask anyone who might have an idea. Also it's the only SW forum I know, so....

How do you know those are bombs its dropping?

In short, you have a ton of "what ifs" based on what seems to amount to your own personal opinion mixed with a healthy dose of exaggeration. If you want to be taken seriously I suggest you go back and do an actual analysis (complete with numbers and stuff, just like on the website.).

[Adam Reynolds]

[quote]
[quote]
3.) The Executor / General ISD Design

How could the rebels bring the Executor down? If we take a look at the movie, it seems like they destroy the shield generators near the ISDs bridges. With some ease I might add. Eventually some A Wing dude flies his pile of junk into the Executor's bridge and it collides with the DS.

If these ships are so well armored and have so many and so powerful guns (and are not alone... at least not in Ep VI), how could the A Wing get through? More importantly, how could it crash into that bridge and cause total devastation? Shouldn't the bridge, which is on top and very easy to see and aim at, be well armored? At least against an object which flies against it? I'm not saying it has to take 5 nukes to the window, but all it suffers from is an impact of something which could as well have been an asteroid at a power failure or whatever. Shouldn't there be a second bridge for such a case, a failsafe system, something? We're talking about a 19km warship here, not a one-time razor blade you throw away after using it.
[/quote]

The A-wing didn't cause total devastation. According to the novelization of the movie and the movie itself, the Aw-ing was just one part of a much larger attack scheme (including other fighters as well as large warships) which would doubtlessly be targeting other parts of the ship (on top of which I recall it was already suffering from damage to its engines and manuvering system. The collision with the DS2 surface in fact indicates that there was some sort of damage to the engines that either manuvered it into the DS2, or allowed it ot be pulled down by the DS2's force fields or gravity or whatever. But this cannot be solely attributed to the A-wing.) Nevermind we dont know the actual destruction the A-wing caused (its unquantifiable) but again you ecounter design considerations. You can only armor something so much if you want to have an exposed view. REal life bridge towers aren't exactly heavily armred either now are they?) And a case could be made that no amount of armor alone could totally protect against sustained weapons fire so it doesnt matter where you put the bridge.[/quote]

There is also a real life precedent for flag officers remaining on the bridge of a ship and perishing as a result. In the Naval Battle of Guadalcanal two US rear admirals were killed while standing on the bridges of their cruisers, being the only two admirals to die in the war.

[jollyreaper]

Except that as you increase the ability of the enemy you do the same to that of the heroes as well, but I guess retards don't think before they type.

Might I kindly suggest you cram it up your ass sideways?

No, you may not.

Do it anyway. It could only improve your disposition.

[DatBurnTho11]

This is some pretty detailed discussion. Excellent job guys, but I have a question about one point that was made (I'm not even sure by which side)

The other question is why the plans could not be transmitted long-distance if they could be placed within R2. Could be handwaved away if the plans are encoded in a special cryptographic reader whose outputs cannot be easily digitized. You're locked to using the physical media and reader unit until massive computers can be used for brute force decryption. I'm just spitballing here, of course. The plans for a battlestation would doubtless be huge but they have very advanced computer systems in the Star Wars universe. Even if they couldn't reasonably transmit the plans in one go, duplication and multiple couriers would seem reasonable.

AFAIK, the Rebels stole/received the plans/technical specifications to the Death Star I, not a specialized attack plan indicating that they would use the weakness at the exhaust port. As such, if the Imperials intercepted the plans, they would not have gained any new information while if the Rebels received the plans, they might be able to use it to launch an attack against the station. So, I was wondering why the Rebels didn't just broadcast the plans without any decryption throughout the whole "holo-net" or whatever its called. Heck, even if non-aligned parties received the plans, it would only pose more problems for the Empire.

I can think of a few reasons why they wouldn't, but otherwise to me it seems like an oversight:
1) The Empire controls long distance communications (by controlling the relay stations or something) and no message would get far enough
2) The Rebel ship wanted to do this, but was not yet in range of the Rebel base they wanted to transmit the plans to (but I thought the "holonet" was galaxy wide, or perhaps this is in conjunction to #1)
3) This would alert the Empire that the Rebels would likely use the plans to the attack the Death Star and use it to mount a pre-emptive strike (Probably the weakest excuse, as the Empire should have known as soon as the plans were stolen that their security was compromised. I'm sure fingers would naturally point to the Rebels.)

Please continue with the discussion of the SW military, but I was just wondering about this particular point.

[DotS]

What are you even talking about? Stormtroopers have holsters hanging from their belts for their carbines. Pay some more attention. And their larger weapons have slings. Just like real life. Not only is this complaint ridiculously petty, its also flat wrong, and bizarre given there's no such thing as "rifles attached to the body" in real life.

Wookiepedia (?) stated, that not all have these holsters. Also, I can't remember many guns having slings, but yes, I'll pay more attention. Attached to body -> on your back, with that sling around your shoulder. Maybe not the best term, but I still think it kind of describes what I meant.

And really, when you think about it, it seems pretty obvious that if a fuel-laden 747 flies into a Very Tall Building, then the building will fall down; it's just that back in the 90s, nobody ever thought anyone would actually do that.

Weren't the WTC towers designed to withstand this kind of attack? It collapsed because of the heat. Not because of the impact itself (that too, of course, but not solely), because the things were still standing after the impacts.

And a sufficiently small "bar" isn't going to stop an A-Wing pilot, now is it? Those ships are diminutive and can just go around.

Depends on where and how you install them. Now watch out: How about TWO bars? Oh..... Didn't think of that, did you?

So now the engineers should be Force users who see the future of what Palpatine wants before he even suggests it. You're just making shit up at this point. We see massive sections of the station independent of the superlaser that are complete. Apparently you think all of that was done between the time Palpatine ordered that it be ready for his trap and the time we first see the Death Star, rather than what was completed prior to Palpatine springing this idea on his engineers.

None of this BS explains why there was no such plan to physically (!) protect the core in the first place, BEFORE Palpatine wanted his superpenislaser activated. Physically, because machinery creating shields and shit might fail for some reason.

But I guess there wasn't even the slightest chance that the rebels could attack this place before Palpatine went nuts. You know, the thing about guerilla warfare, which the rebels mainly rely on if I'm not wrong, is that your enemy doesn't see the next attack coming. I remember what happened the last time some guerilla tactics were successful. Have fun trying to get your bottle of water on an airplane these days But I guess after having an enemy (which is worth searching for, as seen before Hoth) which blew up your most expensive battle station, there's no need to expect another attack when you build another one.

DotS would expect your post 9/11 skyscraper buildings to be able to withstand a fuel laden 747 strike on a building that's still only 60% complete. Otherwise the engineers are incompetent.

I would expect the airplane engineers to install a door to the cockpit, which a terrorist cannot break with the shit he finds aboard or is allowed to bring with him, so the 747 doesn't even get the chance to strike my building. Oh wait...... They did that after 9/11..........

Yes, because the engineers knew they would need the extra time, hell for all we know they did build to smaller to meat the deadline so go fuck yourself. Not to mention they may have still needed access to the core, just because it works doesn't mean it works well and a bar means that you can't get your core repair and trouble shooting craft in to makesure the damn thing will still work after the battle.

Okay, so what's the problem with a door then? Or, let's say, bars which you can retract?

You missed the part where it would be shooting turbolasers at the exposed inner hull and the fact that the shield was still up when the Executer smashed into the DSII. Also, what do you need fighters for when you can fire turbolasers into the exposed core? It's not as easy to get a capital ship into position during the battle, but if fighters couldn't do it we know the rebels would have tried.

There are several disadvantages there.

1.) You might lose an important capital ship, while your ships are getting slained already

2.) Even if you ram the DS and actually manage to get the ship let's say a few 100m into the DS at one of these holes... Have fun firing at the exact spots which were ripped open on impact (can we assume the ramming ship gets trashed in the process of ramming, including the turbolasers which are now stuck inside the DS? Or do they have such good shields? Why didn't they kamikaze all the time then during Endor?). Eventually, while you fire for half an hour to get through the kilometers of Death Star which still are between your ship and the core chamber (or the last blast door, bars, whatever), you're a stationary, top priority target for a zillion fighters, bombers, capital ships and a fucking Death Star (if you're lucky enough that you actually have turbolasers in a place to actually fire where you want to, since large parts of your ship are damaged).

It also makes one wonder if those kind of few ships we see in the Endor battle could have really escaped the SD squadron and bombers and fighters there, get back to the DS and start engaging it once the shields were down. At least I can't remember any capital ships firing on the DS after the shield dropped, but we might have just not seen that (I still doubt they had the time doing it). Another question is, if they could really ram a capital ship in there. If so, after the first ram, the imperial forces would shoot the shit out of that piece of ship sticking out of the DS, so it can NOT reach the core by any means. And then they would be aware of the threat and make sure the next capital ship does NOT hit a 'vent' or whatever it was supposed to be. Or at least try, reducing the chance.

Hell, they lost capital ships AFTER they knew the DS was operational and AFTER they lost one by it's superlaser. Either the DS is quite good at aiming and can rotate and move at nice speeds, or these rebel capital ships fly like dead whales. Either thing isn't good if you want to hit a 20m hole with a 1km cruiser.

In ANH they were used to board a civilian ship, search for droids, and serve as guards for a large installation. That is all guard duty/police work not war fighting so it hardly matters.

In ESB they were part of Vaders own personal task force and had a great showing.

In RotJ they were rear guard for an installation that nobody else was loyal enough to guard.

But because they look like soldiers to you it must be so...

The civilian ship was captured by a warship. ALL these things are things a soldier does too. Plus police forces NEVER have large weaponry. I have NEVER seen a police battle tank or warship in my entire life. And I have pretty much never seen police forces being deployed in large numbers with heavy weaponry and tanks, fighting battles and guarding military stations and ships. Military stuff is guarded by military personnel. And not by police forces. The only waste of space seems to be between your ears, you little dumbfuck.

I might not be entirely sure about this, but I remember dialog about 'a battalion of his best men'. A battalion consists of soldiers.

As explained above it was likely that such gaps were needed for ongoing work to the core, after all you can get the core and super laser ready to fire if you can't work on them. Of course retards like you don't think or shit like this...

Yes, I hope that hole never gets sealed for some reason, because that would be the last time they see the core of their own fucking station. Design fail if you can't effectively reach the core without having large holes open to space.

Perhaps they simply didn't have the right camo stored aboard their ships and were waiting for a shipment to arrive. Dumber things have happened in real life.

Makes perfect sense, that you can send hundreds of thousands of people to a battle (the ISD squad at Endor), but fail at bringing your uniforms and even having it replaced after noticing you forgot it. Too bad there's no large space station or a friendly fleet around.

And no, I doubt dumber things have happened than elite soldiers not bringing their equipment or have it brought shortly afterwards.

Please show me how they compare in accuracy to real life forces. I fucking dare you.

Are you serious? If you're 20m away from a soldier firing on you, while you run, you'd be most likely kissing the ground within seconds. I'd say it takes less than 5, time needed to lift the rifle and aim included.

As for the armor, other ideas might be that against a technological equal they will spot you anyway so it's a waste of money.

If the enemy has this technological equal. Else you're just stupid.

Ever seen a modern US uniform? Ever wondered why it looks like pixel crap? It's to trick the brain to not recognize your shape. The human shape is a thing that your brain immediately notices very quickly and effectively. That's exactly what I want when I'm in a fight, or member of an elite team, or sent to a forest to surprise some terrorists. What I don't want is idiots seeing me WITHOUT ANY technology from 2km away.

Besides, as noted we know that clone trooper armor can be camouflaged, so what's the problem?

That they didn't do it.

Because it's their uniform, and when you are working you wear that uniform at all times? Besides which, considering the purpose of stormtroopers (to help maintain the security of the station, which entails carrying weapons and the possibility of getting into firefights) wearing armor even onboard makes sense. (you know, in case you get shot at.)

Valid argument. But don't confuse uniform with armor, because in real life, these are 2 very different things.

How do you know that any trooper who goes down is "dead?" pray?

I assume it, because no one of them gets up afterwards to chase some rebels. And I can't remember a single scene where a Trooper is knocked on his ass, but not totally 'dying' or losing consciousness or whatever they do when lying around. Maybe good opportunity for a nap...?

General answer: Why are you generalizing about the broad performance of the storm troopers (or the Imperial military in general) from relatively few samples? Are you trying to say that the capabilities and performance (or even training) of a military force is always going to be consistently the same all the time and under every conceivable condition? I find that hard to believe. Incompetence or other negative qualities are not exactly unheard of in military forces, for whatever reason you choose to adopt (politics, inadequate or imperfect training schedules or regimes, etc.)

Because we see them fail very often in the movies. That's why. Not once, not twice...

I don't think the Empire would have inadequate or imperfect training and so on. They're the leading military power, controlling pretty much everything. They should actually have the best trained army ever. They got plenty of people to teach 'Privates', they have plenty of experience and equipment, they should have plenty of space for training, an assload of money and tactics and strategies from more worlds than I have hair on my entire body....

so the US has completely and totally won and defeated every foe we've run across?

What do you want to tell me there?

Elite by whose word? The Emperor's? Since when is the emperor an unbiased judge of military capability? He orchestrated everything at Endor to suit his whim (which included telling his own naval forces not to attack the rebels. Even, it seems, at the cost of their own lives.)

The Emperor should be enough of a judge of military capability to know if the guys he's sending are elite troops or some Privates who enlisted yesterday.

In the town I live we have a bridge that was built across the Missisippi and it has a fucking weird ass curve in it because of such a glaring flaw in design. Yet they didn't start over from scratch despite this glaring flaw because it would cost alot more time and money to fix and it wasn't worth it. Cost Benefit analysis sucks, but such is reality.

I guess that curve doesn't increase the risk of that bridge going down somewhen.

It's easy to say in hindsight what should have been done alot of times, but you either don't think it likely or just don't think about it at all. 9/11 comes to mind.

Actually they expected something like this before 9/11. Also, if you ask me, the Empire seems more threatened by the rebels than the US territory by some bearded assholes.

How do you know those are bombs its dropping?

I'd expect things a BOMBER drops and cause a bang and a short flash on impact are some sort of bombs. Usually these are characteristics of bombs... Being dropped outta bomber...... flash and boom at impact....

[Vympel]

I'd expect things a BOMBER drops and cause a bang and a short flash on impact are some sort of bombs. Usually these are characteristics of bombs... Being dropped outta bomber...... flash and boom at impact....

I hardly think it would've been conducive to the Imperial objective - capturing the Falcon, to drop actual bombs in places where it could've been hiding. Clearly, they were merely trying to flush it out, not blow it to smithereens. Given the blue flash and the lack of any apparent effect, they may be some kind of ion weapon. If they wanted to cause some hurt, they could've just dropped the seismic charges Slave I used in AotC, no?

Wookiepedia (?) stated, that not all have these holsters. Also, I can't remember many guns having slings, but yes, I'll pay more attention. Attached to body -> on your back, with that sling around your shoulder. Maybe not the best term, but I still think it kind of describes what I meant.

They may not all have holsters, but we see those holsters a lot (ANH and TESB primarily). I imagine they must be standard issue equipment and certain Stormtroopers may simply elect not to wear them sometimes, preferring to carry the weapon. Perhaps because the E-11 could only weigh around ~3.3kg at most (weight of the Sten SMG from which it is based). By way of analogy, many SMGs come with attachment points for slings - not all soldiers elect to use them (including the Sten).

[PainRack]

To be honest, its is way too easy to show stupidity for the Imperial military, and frankly, ditto to the Clone/droid armies too.

Their penchant for taking prisoners in the heat of combat, Han and Leia at door. Aren't the Imps supposed to be the bad guys?
Their failure to properly disable said prisoners at Endor.Wire cuffs. We know stormies have them. Hell, if all else fails, grappling hooks.
Endor tactics.... no efforts to truly lay down a base of fire and re-establish the initiative. One has to wonder HOW they regained the initiative in the first place.... probably their armoured support and technological advantage.
In TESB, the disabling of the Leia party by Lando and the subsequent "take-over" of Cloud City, allowing a failed rescue attempt of Han by Leia and the escape of wanted Imperial fugitives such as Lando from Cloud City later.This even though an Imperial garrison has already been in place for security, shooting Threepio earlier on and Vader had planned to leave a force to maintain control.

ANh gets passes primarily because boarding actions and the tactical parameters(diplomatic ship, capture prisoners, recapture dataplans) explain the nature of the action. And the Alderaans were pacifists, explaining their initial stupidity in trying to establish a firing line.

[CaptJodan]

Depends on where and how you install them. Now watch out: How about TWO bars? Oh..... Didn't think of that, did you?

You apparently continue to ignore the fact that there were multiple entrances to the core (shown, if nowhere else, then in the damned briefing), and the fact that they were on a fucking time table to complete the weapon before the fleet arrived. You just handwave it away by saying you know they had enough time to put these now multiple bars in.

None of this BS explains why there was no such plan to physically (!) protect the core in the first place, BEFORE Palpatine wanted his superpenislaser activated. Physically, because machinery creating shields and shit might fail for some reason.

Can you please take a moment to stop being a complete imbecile? Not every one of your arguments suck, surely you can pull it together for this one.

The DS was hidden from view, found only because the Emperor wanted it to be found. It was protected by a massive, impregnable shield that a fleet could not beat down. It was UNDER CONSTRUCTION, which apparently to you means "wall up everything essential against attack even if that wall prevents you from actually building the damned thing in a timely manner." Your solution is akin to installing massive chunks of steel around each section of a Nimitz class carrier while it's under construction so that no random terrorist bomber can get to it, all AFTER it's already protected by a modern carrier version of a u-boat pen. Every day Ben the Technician needs to go to work in the morning to work on getting the station complete, he has to either A, have these bars/doors/whatever disassembled. Or, if you're advocating an automatic system, then you've just placed a new complicated system in a section of the station that won't need that complicated system when the station is complete, wasting millions of credits and countless man hours installing this opening and closing door system that would only be needed for as long as the reactor was exposed which, at the rate they were building it, probably wasn't going to be long.

But I guess there wasn't even the slightest chance that the rebels could attack this place before Palpatine went nuts.

Space is fucking huge. Even with the truly awe inspiring supply chain that needed to be used to construct something that large, the Rebels didn't find the location of the battle station until the Emperor handed it to them.

Besides, you don't waste billions of dollars constructing defenses on "slightest chances". You identify the most likely possible threats, and you provide protection for that, preferably at low cost and something that won't royally fuck up your construction schedule. But you want the station completely impregnable before it's even completed.

But I guess after having an enemy (which is worth searching for, as seen before Hoth) which blew up your most expensive battle station, there's no need to expect another attack when you build another one.

Low and behold they did. They had an impregnable shield generator with enough troops guarding it to capture or kill any attempt at a commando style raid on the facility, all of which happened. I guess you expect the engineers to know about the Ewoks too.

I would expect the airplane engineers to install a door to the cockpit, which a terrorist cannot break with the shit he finds aboard or is allowed to bring with him, so the 747 doesn't even get the chance to strike my building. Oh wait...... They did that after 9/11..........

The planes in question are fully constructed objects actually operating. How does this apply at all to constructing something that will be useless in a few months and is actually blocking construction most of that time?

[DotS]

I imagine they must be standard issue equipment and certain Stormtroopers may simply elect not to wear them sometimes, preferring to carry the weapon. Perhaps because the E-11 could only weigh around ~3.3kg at most (weight of the Sten SMG from which it is based). By way of analogy, many SMGs come with attachment points for slings - not all soldiers elect to use them (including the Sten).

You wouldn't do that, unless you know that you're only armed for a very short time and will need your weapon. Else you will feel these 3,x kg after a while. The real shit starts when you have to do something requiring both hands. You will have to lay down your weapon or even leave it behind (imagine your buddy gets hit and you have to carry him). Good luck explaining to your head where your weapon is, which is one of the milder complications. It could as well be stolen (you kinda equip your enemy - bad, bad Trooper) or even picked up and used against you.

Space is fucking huge. Even with the truly awe inspiring supply chain that needed to be used to construct something that large, the Rebels didn't find the location of the battle station until the Emperor handed it to them.

Could the Empire be 100% sure that none of the infamous spies or even some relatives would say 'Hey... my brother is on this mission, they're building a station the size of a fucking country, but don't tell anyone..'? And even then they couldn't be sure that someone stumbles across it by accident. Did nobody live anywhere near Endor? Is there nobody flying around there? It's hard to believe when the SW galaxy is said to have so fucking many worlds.

They had an impregnable shield generator with enough troops guarding it to capture or kill any attempt at a commando style raid on the facility

Thank god they were prepared. Else they could have lost..............

I guess you expect the engineers to know about the Ewoks too.

The Empire must have known prior to the battle

and is actually blocking construction most of that time?

If it's a mechanic device, which you can retract, how is it blocking construction?

Or, if you're advocating an automatic system, then you've just placed a new complicated system in a section of the station that won't need that complicated system when the station is complete, wasting millions of credits and countless man hours installing this opening and closing door system that would only be needed for as long as the reactor was exposed which, at the rate they were building it, probably wasn't going to be long.

I totally don't get what's SO overwhelmingly complex about a door or retractable bars. Even today this isn't exactly what I'd call an overly complex machine.

Don't we see larger doors in SW at times? I can't remember a specific scene, cause I never sat there and thought 'Lets look at the hangar doors, they're awesome'. But then again, I highly doubt it's much of a problem to (simplified...) install 2 metal plates, a frame to hold em and machinery to pull em back / in place again. Every stupid hangar door does that flawlessly. Even the gas station around the corner has a variation of this kind of device

[CaptJodan]

Could the Empire be 100% sure that none of the infamous spies or even some relatives would say 'Hey... my brother is on this mission, they're building a station the size of a fucking country, but don't tell anyone..'?

What is this 100% sure business? Nothing is 100% sure in war. You make a risk assessment based on the likelihood of something happening. The Empire looked at the risk of someone learning about the DSII prior to it's completion, looked at it's security for keeping it secret and said "a shield generator is enough". Turns out they were right. No one learned of the station prior to the Emperor wanting it to be known.

How they were able to keep such a massive construction project secret for so long is one of those amazing mysteries, but you know what? It actually shows Imperial COMPETENCE that they were able to do it.

And even then they couldn't be sure that someone stumbles across it by accident. Did nobody live anywhere near Endor? Is there nobody flying around there? It's hard to believe when the SW galaxy is said to have so fucking many worlds.

A galaxy in general have so many fucking worlds. The SW galaxy has unknown regions of space, remote regions of space, unexplored regions of space, or places that just fall off the map without anyone noticing. Add to that the Empire was most likely trying to find a remote, hidden place to build the Emperor's massive ball of death, one well outside the normal hyperspace lanes and with no value whatsoever, then yeah, finding an area that no one stumbles across is certainly possible.

Thank god they were prepared. Else they could have lost..............

They were prepared. And they nearly won. Probably the biggest tactical (not strategic) failure in the movie was when Officer Dipshit sent reinforcement troops outside of the bunker without first asking for a ID code or something from the man transmitting the request. Without that guy sending "3 squads to help", the door would have remained closed, the shield generator would have remained secure, and the rebel fleet would have been blown out the sky. Construction could have continued without a labyrinth of useless bars or doors to remove.

The Empire must have known prior to the battle

Prior to the battle, the Ewoks showed no hostility towards them. Do you suddenly think a swarm of "name the closest animal you have at your house" is going to come and destroy your house any day now?

If it's a mechanic device, which you can retract, how is it blocking construction?

We get a fair look at a lot of the equipment inside the tunnel they flew through. There were pipes and conduits running all along through that area. I'm no engineer...I leave that to the professionals on this site, but I would think in order to create a functioning, reinforced door that can withstand multiple impacts of several tons of material (to say nothing of torpedoes or concussion missiles if the rebels decide to blast past the door) traveling at significant speeds, you would need a fairly hearty structural support system to support it. You'd need to bypass those giant conduits around the door somehow and place your super sturdy door on a frame or point in the tunnel that could withstand not only the weight of the door and the mechanisms for opening and closing it, but also the kinetic impact of shit hitting it. You can't just glue a door on some piping.

After all that, you may well have to dismantle the door once the station is closed up, because, hey, maybe that giant tunnel that was open for construction purposes might actually be needed for another purpose. Maybe part of it is being used for a corridor or a cargo bay or the Death Star brothel. The point is, you have to remove all the excess shit you built in there for all of a couple of months on the very slim chance that the Rebels could find the Death Star, know how to destroy it without the Emperor's guidance in getting the right information, and get past the well guarded shield (minus Officer Dipshit)*.

*This isn't to say that Officer Dipshit was the only weak spot in the whole operation. He was, though, unnecessarily incompetent.