Imperial Guard superior to SW armies?

[Shroom Man 777]

you forget. After the Clone Wars the Empire arose, they're going to need cheap army labor somehow. Space Illegal Immigrants probably can be cloned for a pittance, and then the originals hired as well for even more of a pittance (because they have to show up better than their clones, or something.) That would be more SpaceAmerican I'd think, and it would explain alot about Stormtrooper accuracy, given SpaceAmerican training methods (at least in a corporate mindset, which probably would be more accurate the Galactic Emp-err SpaceAmerica)

But where's the massive unemployment?!

Well, after JANGO: FIRST BLOOD, the Empire could start hiring cheap army labor, and so you can have John Jango sent to Kashykk to rescue some POWs. And then in the third movie, he can be sent to Tattooine and he can blow up a Hind LAAT with exploding arrows and some shit.

Then in Jango 4, otherwise known as JOHN JANGO he can go to Endor and like rip the throats out of Ewoks and disintegrate them into bloody gibs with an E-Web or some shit.



I don't think you understand. I didn't come to rescue Jango from you. I came here to rescue you from him.

Well, we all appreciate your concern Vader, I will try to be extra careful!

I'm just amazed he allowed any of your posse to live.

Is that right?

Strictly speaking, he slipped up. You're lucky to be breathing.

That's just great. Vader, you came out here to find out why one of your machines blew a gasket!

You don't seem to want to accept the fact you're dealing with an expert in guerrilla warfare, with a man who's the best, with guns, with vibroblades, with his bare hands. A man who's been trained to ignore pain, ignore weather, to live off the land, to eat things that would make a womp rat puke. In the Clone Wars his job was to dispose of enemy personnel. To kill! Period! Win by attrition. Well Jango was the best.

[Connor MacLeod]

Ah but there's the brilliance of the idea. REmember those early quotes I mentioend showed MASSIVE CASUALTIES on the part of any invading military force. Like Renatasia. Or that bit where the clones took 3/4 losses taking a hill from the separatists. THat shows IMPROVED EFFICIENCY OVER TIME. The GE actually improved on the Republic in that regard.. reaching near perfect efficiency.

Not only would unemployment be minimized, but you wouldn't have to worry about retirement or pensions or even health benefits.

And as an added bonus, the corpses probably could be ground up into hypermatter. Or something. Soylent hypermatter. Or the dead clones would be recycled as raw constituent matter for the fresh illegal immigrant clones you cook up in your cloning labs.

That seems like a sound, Galactic Empire-friendly approach to things, doesn't it?

[Shroom Man 777]

Seriously though, an introspective look into post-war Clonetrooper life would be awesome. Droids would line up at the starports and spit oil at them and call them factory-killers and shit. Normal people would still treat them differently, cause they're freaking clones trained for war and born to kill. Nobody would want them. After the Clone Wars, nobody would need them too. They'd be outcasts in a galaxy that shuns them. They'd be men apart.

[Connor MacLeod]

Think of the savings in logistics. If all your Clone troopers die on the battlefield defeating the enemy, you don't have to worry about carrying food or fuel or ammo ro anything like that. Hell maybe you oculd engineer them to explode like the scourges from STarcraft (or the infested Marines) when they die for maximum economic benefit.

And then after the battle, all you need is transport for all the corpses and organic matter you recover from the battlefield (which you could pay droid labor to do) as well as the clone's old equipment, and then zip across the galaxy in HOURS to pick up a whole fresh batch of lcones to dispatch to the next war (which accounts for the hourly replacement rates.)

[Shroom Man 777]

Maybe the cloning process isn't even the traditional "grow some dude from embryo up" thing, but merely involves some Frankensteinian acccumulation of organic matter, recombinating them and then activating them into life, like any other automata, where the only difference is that the machines are not borne of steel but of flesh.

They could still clone normally, with the whole growth acceleration shebang, but they could use this Frankenstinian sin against nature methodology to recycle dead Clones.

[Connor MacLeod]

Naw. They can clearly clone metal bones and stuff. I mean looka t Vader. It was in the canon! SW humans clearly are born with metal plates.

This also means we can clone our own turbolaser ammunition. Clone the trooper, freeze them in carbonite, and shoot them out of the turbolaser at nearlightspeed. GIGATONS.

I wonder how much cloned-carbonite ammo it would take to power the Death Star?

[Shroom Man 777]

Metal bones? Oh my god.

John Jango will go "snikt bub!" and those metal bones will stick out of his hands and he can totally stab people in the face.

Obviously these metal bones are non-magnetic and made out of different Star Wars metals so Magnetonetic fields won't be able to manipulate them.

[PainRack]

I notice you completely ignored my request for sources/proof as to the deployment state of the forces they deployed to Geonosis. so let me ask again, where is the evidence as to the status of the Clone forces deployed to Geonosis prior to the battle? You're making the claim, you back it up.

I'm not making a "positive" claim here. I'm assuming the Clone Army is not actively loaded up on the transports, with all the tanks, gunships loaded, armed and equipped on the transports........

Based on what? Because we saw those clone troopers drilling on the parade ground in the AOTC movie.
If anything, the burden of proof is on you to assume that the Clone army has stowed away its gear, armed and loaded and is ready to deploy at a moment notice. We did see clonetroopers boarding a starship but that's about it. Hell, as it is, we KNOW from Karen Traviss that Clonetroopers were mobilised and boarded the starship after Kenobi visit, so that isn't it either.

So you're saying they took over 50% casualties against an enemy they achieved complete surprise against, they had near-total air superiority against (nto to mention kicking the ass of in space), and was seeking to escape? You claim that's impressive proof of deployment speed. To me, it looks like they rushed into the battle without preparation or planning (which basically fits with the whole "Jedi are not warriors" bit) and suffered massive casualties as a result. Apparently all that planning they executed to take out the hangar facilities left them a bit lacking in the "actually fighting on the ground" department.

I'm saying that an army of 100 thousand soldiers, managed to achieve complete surprise against an enemy force of millions of droids based on escaped droids alone, managed to accomplish total air superiority, engage and disable the entire space /aerial defences with no preparation whatsoever in just hours of preparation and an hour or so of execution.

Seriously, your arguments is akin to saying that the Luffwaffe losses of 30% in France showed that they were not superior in the air compared to the RAF and French Army air force.

If all your trying to say is "Star Wars can move its ships across the galaxy really fast" - big shock, we knew that. My example about the massive casualties beingf replaced on an hourly basis certainly implies that too, yet it's not something you exactly want to proclaim from the rooftops, is it? And you are referring to the Hangars that were taken out by Acclamators and Clone commandos? How exactly were those located again? (bearing in mind that despite this the ICS mentions thousands of fighters being deployed to break the blockade in orbit.)

Speed is not all I'm referring to. The US ability to produce, sustain and move huge armies and fleets in World War 2 is not due solely to its industrial and economic strength, its was backed up by an impressive logistic system that allowed the US to project its strength and power.

THAT is what I'm referring to. The Clones speed in command, or their OODA cycle is obviously extremely fast based on their ability to cobble up a plan that engaged/disabled the Geonosian air/space defences and forcing a beachead. We saw exactly how "weak" they were relatively, because the Seperatists large numbers allowed them to escape Geonosis with several droid armies intact, as the GAR was unable to interdict every core ship and army on the ground or in space.

The Clones logistics, and this is tied to their operational speed is also extremely fast because they were able to respond to Yoda call and deploy an entire army in hours. Its not as if this is somehow "alien" to Star Wars. We know that Master Yoda was able to muster and deploy clone armies to Kashyaak within days. We know that NR forces were able to muster up squadrons of starfighters along with significant ground and engineer support against the warlords and Grand Admiral Thrawn within hours.

[Shroom Man 777]

Uh, the Clones got fleets of warships and transports and armor and artillery and aircraft mobilized within hours. So yeah, they were ready to deploy at a moment notice.

[Connor MacLeod]

From what I gather its just his impression (or interpretation, take your pick) from the movies, sources, or whatever that the clones are doing or capable of what he says they are.

Of course if we're just going to go by impressions, then I can just reiterate my opinions. Such as, for example, the "tactical genius" shown by the army at Geonosis was to notice where all those thousands of fighters were coming from, and directing the gunners to SHOOT THERE, and then dispatch clone ninjamandos to make sure everything stays all sabotag-ed.

I do love this though:

If anything, the burden of proof is on you to assume that the Clone army has stowed away its gear, armed and loaded and is ready to deploy at a moment notice. We did see clonetroopers boarding a starship but that's about it. Hell, as it is, we KNOW from Karen Traviss that Clonetroopers were mobilised and boarded the starship after Kenobi visit, so that isn't it either.

So I have to disprove your speculation now? Let's reiterate:

But on the other hand, Geonsosis also display the sheer combat readiness of the Clone Army. I went through this before, but an army that took only hours to load up its heavy equipment and mobilise manpower, get to the combat theatre, plan an invasion with miminal intelligence and preparation and then systematically smash the Seperatist air/space defences, the C3 system and force an ground invasion within hours is extremely impressive.

That was your original claim that triggered this, Painrack. I demanded proof, you haven't provided any, just more quibbling.

[Simon_Jester]

Oh yeah. Back on the Jango thing again. Okay, so Dooku contracted him to kill Padme. Dooku also contracted him to bear the seed of his grotesque progeny on Kamino. But... what the hell was he doing on Geonosis? I mean, aside from being a cheap plot device so Obi-Wan could find the Seperatist stronghold, why did Jango have to go to Geonosis and see his employer also meeting with Seperatist head honchos?

Was Dooku deliberately turning Jango into a huge ass loose end, so that if he got captured in his assassination missions, he'd not only reveal the Sith plans to kill Padme and Sith plans to make a clone army, but also Sith plans with the Seperatists?

The dangerous link between Kamino and Geonosis wouldn't exist if Jango didn't go to Geonosis for no reason!

Well, Jango is being used by Dooku as a contract killer, and probably handles all kinds of shady deals and shit for Dooku. Maybe he even has other underworld contacts Dooku uses, too. There are plenty of reasons why Dooku would want to bring Jango in for a meeting face to face, rather than doing all his communications remotely, especially since Dooku has Jedi powers and can sense the emotions and real thoughts of someone who's working for him if he can get close enough to them.

If we go with your theory, maybe Dooku needs to bring Jango in for psycho-whatchamajiggy every few weeks to make sure the disparate parts of his brain don't reassemble or whatever.

Also, every secret plan needs a certain number of couriers and agents who can be trusted to know the whole plan- people who can run errands for Dooku to any of the numerous minions and factions he's manipulating, for instance. Jango may be one of these men: a top-level enforcer who has his fingers in a lot of the 'Sith mafia's' businesses, as it were, because he's the guy Darth Capo trusts to handle things and get shit done.

You'll also note that Jango wasn't contracted directly to kill Padme- he just shows up to whack the person who was hired to kill Padme, to keep them from talking.

Seriously though, an introspective look into post-war Clonetrooper life would be awesome. Droids would line up at the starports and spit oil at them and call them factory-killers and shit. Normal people would still treat them differently, cause they're freaking clones trained for war and born to kill. Nobody would want them. After the Clone Wars, nobody would need them too. They'd be outcasts in a galaxy that shuns them. They'd be men apart.

The Empire would probably just keep them in the army- they're more badass than any soldiers the Empire can actually recruit, after all. And the Empire does need lots of troops to subdue all those planets they're enforcing harsh government over- I feel bad for the stormtroopers who got told they had to go enslave the Wookiees again.

[Shroom Man 777]

Uh. He also gave the person hired to kill Padme those mutant centipedes to kill Padme.

You were worried that if Jango knew about a hypothetical Clone attack plan on Geonosis, that he might tell he Seperatists. But... what if the Clone attack plan on Geonosis was formulated precisely because when Jango visited the planet, he was also taking notes and using the targeting data for the Clone exercises? He might not be a risk of fucking the clones in Kamino over, because he's fucking the Geneosans over. Besides, those clones are his kids.

Maybe eventually the Empire will downsize its Clone armies? Certainly after the huge ass galactic wars are done, there would be some layoffs and downsizings.

EDIT:

If we go with the whole psycho-schizo-forgetto-thing, then Jango's being on Coruscant and Kamino and Geonosis in a span of few days, and playing part in three crucial high-risk Sith schemes, becomes more palatable since he's got all sorts of memetic and mentallic intrusion countermeasure electronics softwares and shit in his brains to prevent compromisation.

[Connor MacLeod]

Maybe eventually the Empire will downsize its Clone armies? Certainly after the huge ass galactic wars are done, there would be some layoffs and downsizings.

Well I did go through the Saga edition stuff the other nite.. IIRC there was one bit where only 1/3 the stormtrooper corps was clones (and only a fraction of that is actually Jango stock clones) and the rest were all recruits. Conscripts even. And more conscription for the Imperial army.

[Shroom Man 777]

Do the clones have accelerated aging? Do they get retired?

Maybe some places hate clones for their role in Order 66, and for their role in the war in general, and any clone that goes to those places get retired. Like, those guys can train agencies of guys to kill illegal clones, and in honor of the Jedi they call them, Saber Runners.

*eats at a cantina*

"He say you Saber Runner."

"Tell him I'm retired."

But yeah, I already made a shitload of references. I'll rest now.

EDIT:

Yes. Han Solo totally used to be a Saber Runner, explaining why he's so good with killing stormtroopers with a blaster.

[Connor MacLeod]

As I understand it yeah, the accelerated aging they had was pretty much "always on" - IIRC there was some big subplot in the Traviss novels where they had to hunt up some Kaminoan to help them deactivate it or something. Kinda limits the viability of clones, but then again that "years and years of training" isn't exactly an advantage either. Especially when you end up throwing them away like meatdroids.

Edit: And saber runner. took me a second there to figure out you were talking about Blade runner and not saber rider:

.

Which made me think of


Richard Sharpe in power armor.

Which in turn made me think of Richard Sharpe in power armor leading the Grand ARmy from AOTC to take over Mordor instead of Geonosis. And still getting 50% casualties.

[Shroom Man 777]

Man, that makes them even more like Replicants. Accelerated cellular decrepitude. Nexus Six. Roy Jango and his friends will have to find their Kaminoan maker, and gouge out his eyes, and pre-smuggler Han Solo will have to hunt them down and shit. Saber Runner!

[Connor MacLeod]

Damn you for replying before I get my interesting stream of consciousness-ness insanity fully realized!

*shakes fist*

[Todeswind]

Uh, the Clones got fleets of warships and transports and armor and artillery and aircraft mobilized within hours. So yeah, they were ready to deploy at a moment notice.

In fairness weren't they pretty much getting prepared for combat at a moment's notice for however long (days / months / years / whatever ) that Palpatine was engineering the war to happen? They may have mobilized what Palpatine (via Jedi whats-his-name via Obi Wan) had secretly amassed for the Republic to use in a matter of hours but considering that a majority of the war was "pre-scripted" as much as he could manage it seems like that should be taken with a grain of salt.

It isn't as though the Clone troopers weren't provided with training by someone who had intimate knowledge of the forces they would be fighting, as well as the locations and dispositions of those forces. Palpatine designed the entire situation to make absolutely sure that there would be a conflict, if not on Geonosis then on another separatist world. Order 66 is a clear example that Palpatine could, and did, imprint them with commands to make sure that the clones would conform to the war as he scripted it.

It isn't so much a matter of "hours" that they mobilized in as a matter of hours to accomplish a plan created over a substantially longer period of time.

Edit: corrected sentence structure.

[Connor MacLeod]

Well when you really get down to it, its not a simple matter of "good/bad" - theres lots of nuances and details in there.. plenty of room for good and bad. And the clones can do alto of stuff right and still get plenty of stuff wrong (and as I said, its forgivable for them to get stuff wrong, because they're basically re-learning war from the ground up.)

but I'm extremely skeptical of the idea you can call this SUPER DUPER COMPETENT military planning when they take massive casualties in the process and only at most achieve part of their objectives (The Separatists manage to get away as did much of the fleet and droid forces they had loaded onboard their ships. Dooku certainly got away as well.) About the only thing you really can say from it is.. it was fast. But that's not really a great shock either considering we know what hyperdrive speeds are capable of.

Edit: I would also add that Windu's actions in the Jedi arena only compounded the problems, since it necessitated Yoda and the clones diverting assets to airlift their asses out of a situation they themselves got themselves into by fucking up... and this was also part of the "plan" agreed upon beforehand.. again not terribly brilliant (but understandable given the "peacekeepers not warriors" thing for the Jedi too.)

[Shroom Man 777]

@ Tode:

Exactly. You've said it more concisely and more coherently than I could or did, with less mutated yetis, but yeah. I agree with you.

Heck, fuck. This could be why Jango used a fucking saber dart that could be traced specifically to Kamino. I mean, shit, if you're an assassin, if you want to hide your trail and make sure the enemy won't follow you around, you'll use a generic weapon that can be found anywhere, not a specific weapon that can only be found and traced to one specific place in the galaxy. And, shit, why did Jango head straight to Geonosis right after he met a Jedi who was obviously intent on following him after he so obviously left behind a saber dart that could be traced to Kamino? He wanted to lead Obi-Wan there, because it is part of the conspiracy! The Moon Landing Hoax sound stage was located on Geonosis, that's why!

But yeah, if I was an assassinoid, I'd use a Space Glock that just about any gang banger can find, not a unique limited edition director's cut penultimate class DVD that can be only found in one specific place ever. Which happens to be the same place I'm staying at, and where I am spawning a clone army out of my genes* in secret!

Why would anyone telegraph their location so obviously? Maybe Jango's secret shapeshifting Reptiloid Illuminati masters decided it was time to make Kamino and the clones not-secret anymore. Who knows.



*DOMINANT GENES! RECESSIVE GENES! SNAAAAAKE!!!! IT'S NOT OVER YET! THERE'S NO ESCAPE!

[Connor MacLeod]

I think its part of the GREAT Convention that prevents them from using the multi giga-teraton turbolasers to wipe out huge chunks of the planet that space droid armies are sitting on. Your assassins also have to use slow moving glowy bolt rifles to kill their enemies.

Kinda like how Supervillains are compulsively required to explain their plans in detail before they start the unneccesarily slow dipping mechanism.

[Shroom Man 777]

Those slow moving glowy bolt rifles move at multi-mach hypersonic speeds judging on how fast they managed to traverse the distance of the desert in AOTC! Look at these screencaps!

So the Jedi don't know where Kamino is because it got erased, but they don't care because there's no reason to look for Kamino. Until, dun dun dun, a Kamino saber dart hits a suspect, making the Jedi want to search for Kamino, and Kamino can't be kept supersecret forever, and so the Jedi search and eventually find Kamino around the same time Palps gets elected and around the same time he wants to begin a war that requires the Jedi using the clone army on Kamino and so around this time, the Jedi find Kamino and also find Geonosis (because, again, Jango LED them there) and anyway, Palpatine wants WAR.

Jango didn't have any Geneosis Saber Darts which the Jedis could trace so... he just flew straight to Geonosis after he got interrogated by a Jedi on Kamino. A Jedi obviously following him (yeah, I know, Jango tried to nuke Obi Wan with the seismic shit, but whatever).

[Todeswind]

but I'm extremely skeptical of the idea you can call this SUPER DUPER COMPETENT military planning when they take massive casualties in the process and only at most achieve part of their objectives (The Separatists manage to get away as did much of the fleet and droid forces they had loaded onboard their ships. Dooku certainly got away as well.) About the only thing you really can say from it is.. it was fast. But that's not really a great shock either considering we know what hyperdrive speeds are capable of.

You're assuming that the goal was to win quickly.

I never really got the sense that an efficient military campaign was to Palpatine's benefit. He needed the Republic to win, so that it would stay in tact and he could amass wartime powers but engaging in too efficient of a military campaign too fast removes the social pressures upon the senate to grant him greater and greater latitude in the powers he exercises. You don't give someone special "wartime powers" for a conflict that you believe will be easily won.

He needed them to win eventually but considering that he was the leader of both sides of the war it wasn't really that much of a stretch for him to win when he wanted one side to win or lose when he wanted one side to lose.

[Connor MacLeod]

Blaster bolts clearly have computer-controlled variable-yield-speed and autoaiming capabilities. This was provein in TESB when Saber Runner ford closed his eyes and fired, yet the bolts struck Vader's palm dead on despite the fact his pistol had elevated with recoil. SUPERIOR LOGISTICS.

I anticipate the Kaminoean saberdart has similar variable yield properties, but its bolt is invisible! That's supposed to be assassin stealth mode.. it sjust filled with a special kind of blaster gas to make it invisible.

[Shroom Man 777]

Hey, closing your eyes while firing worked on the Death Star, and that huge spherical mass of iron got vaporized. As they say, if you can dodge a wrench, you can dodge a ball.