George Lucas on the Clone Trooper/Stormtrooper connection

[vakundok]

One thing came into my mind a few minutes ago:
The ANH (in its current form) seems to support that many stormtroopers are not clones. Remember the two stormtroopers on the DS who guarded the switch of the tractor beam. Their talking ('Have you seen the XP-38 yet?' -or something similar) shows that they had off-duty time when they can do (and actually do) what they want, so they were far more independent than kaminoian style clones.
In fact, I cannot imagine a clone guard talking due to be bored at all ...

[Peregrin Toker]

The supply of clones CAN be planned. Can the supply of thirteen years old orphaned children be planned?

Well, if the Empire cooperates with criminal gangs in order to keep the supply of orphaned children high, it would be able to plan the supply of orphans to some extent...

[vakundok]

The supply of clones CAN be planned. Can the supply of thirteen years old orphaned children be planned?

Well, if the Empire cooperates with criminal gangs in order to keep the supply of orphaned children high, it would be able to plan the supply of orphans to some extent...

Yes, it can be solved, however it is quite problematic.
To select the competent children (likely from several systems to avoid public attention), to research all their relatives, to kill the relatives in 'accidents', to conceal the children from local social systems and the most important thing is that it must be kept in absolute secrecy ...
Personally, I do not think it would worth the ~three years you can get.

[PainRack]

Why can't stormtroopers break and run? After all, they were conducting a routine patrol, bothered shitless when suddenly a lunatic charges them. Even if we assume that the natural flee instinct has been supressed( that will also mean that the natural flexibility, initative of clonetroopers are suppressed, making them worse off than droidtroopers), they're only human.

[Peregrin Toker]

The supply of clones CAN be planned. Can the supply of thirteen years old orphaned children be planned?

Well, if the Empire cooperates with criminal gangs in order to keep the supply of orphaned children high, it would be able to plan the supply of orphans to some extent...

Yes, it can be solved, however it is quite problematic.
To select the competent children (likely from several systems to avoid public attention), to research all their relatives, to kill the relatives in 'accidents', to conceal the children from local social systems and the most important thing is that it must be kept in absolute secrecy ...
Personally, I do not think it would worth the ~three years you can get.

Okay, I've gotta agree with you on that point. However, if Palpatine & co. decided on seizing all orphanages and using them for the purpose of recruiting troops, it would be just as good a way of acquiring brainwashed shocktroops as ordering them from Kamino. (although the accelerated growth thing resulted in the Kamino-made troops being ready-for-battle much quicker than the brainwashed orphans)

[vakundok]

Well, if the Empire cooperates with criminal gangs in order to keep the supply of orphaned children high, it would be able to plan the supply of orphans to some extent...

Yes, it can be solved, however it is quite problematic.
To select the competent children (likely from several systems to avoid public attention), to research all their relatives, to kill the relatives in 'accidents', to conceal the children from local social systems and the most important thing is that it must be kept in absolute secrecy ...
Personally, I do not think it would worth the ~three years you can get.

Okay, I've gotta agree with you on that point. However, if Palpatine & co. decided on seizing all orphanages and using them for the purpose of recruiting troops, it would be just as good a way of acquiring brainwashed shocktroops as ordering them from Kamino. (although the accelerated growth thing resulted in the Kamino-made troops being ready-for-battle much quicker than the brainwashed orphans)

Well, I do not know, but I think most orphans are under 10, so possibly it would have to be started even earlier and would be even more expensive than producing the same (yearly) amount of troopers by cloning. Besides, as I suggested, you can produce peaks (very large or small amount of troopers) whereas the orphaned children's (yearly) amount is largely constant.

[Illuminatus Primus]

This orphan theory is absurd.

Ockam's cuts it down as unnecessary. I see no evidence.

No less than 40 percent of Stormtroopers are clones of the Milo Strander line as of the conquest of Kashyyyk. Fact.

[Peregrin Toker]

No less than 40 percent of Stormtroopers are clones of the Milo Strander line as of the conquest of Kashyyyk. Fact.

Source?

[Illuminatus Primus]

I've posted the Pax Empirica: The Wookie Annhiliation quotes and stuff so many times I'm not going to bother searching the forum for you.

[Cyke]

The very basis of the "orphan" argument (that clones would cost more) isn't very sound.

Here in our reality, on Earth, it would probably be cheaper to field an armed force (of typical army size on Earth) by appropriating children, raising them and training them, rather than by any near-future cloning technology.

The validity of the argument of cost also comes into question.
Common to both clones and non-clones would be the cost of feeding, housing and training.
However, since clones grow faster, the cost of feeding and housing them would be much lower.
The remaining factor that has been used is that the cost of the actual cloning procedure would be high, but this cannot be established, since the Empire might have very cost-effective methods of producing large numbers of clones (low cost per unit). In fact, it's more likely that clones would be VERY cheap to produce for the Empire.

In Star Wars, their technological base is much more advanced in many different aspects, not to mention the capabilities of the Empire's massive industry.
It wouldn't take much of a stretch to believe that the same industrial capabilities that allow them to manufacture their fleets of starships also allow them to churn out clone soldiers.
Lowering costs through mass production- industrial efforts scale very well.

[Ender]

One of the things that having clones is nice for is that it explains the custom fitting of the armor better. Having several copies of the specific custon tailored set of armor gets really fucking expensive. And while they have phenominal production facilities, they also have a jagnormous number of stormtroopers.

If you only have to build a few seperate lines of armor because they are all clones, things just got alot fucking cheaper.

[Illuminatus Primus]

GeNodes also appear to have rather short growth periods and require little to no training and programming after popping out of the tank, fully adult and ready to be popped into the white armor.

[Peregrin Toker]

However, since clones grow faster, the cost of feeding and housing them would be much lower.

Possibly, but creating the clones in the first place is extremely expensive.

The remaining factor that has been used is that the cost of the actual cloning procedure would be high, but this cannot be established, since the Empire might have very cost-effective methods of producing large numbers of clones (low cost per unit).

Explain why the Empire might have more cost-effective methods, and provide evidence for your claims of cheap cloning methods in The Empire.

It wouldn't take much of a stretch to believe that the same industrial capabilities that allow them to manufacture their fleets of starships also allow them to churn out clone soldiers.
Lowering costs through mass production- industrial efforts scale very well.

Yes - but doesn't most humans consider such mass-cloning to be morally repulsive, thus leaving the cloning to be done by species whose cultures don't give them qualms about mass-producing clones?? (eg. Khommites, Lurrians, Kaminoans)

And if the mass-production of armies are left to a few obscure species, doesn't this only serve to make the process more expensive on the galactic scale??

[Illuminatus Primus]

Does it really matter?

Stormtroopers are no less 40% clones and probably much more than half clones.

Live with it.

EDIT: Spaarti clone cylinders were administered by Imperials, and there's no evidence the GeNodes are produced by a specific species.

[vakundok]

Simon H. Johansen:
Excuse me, but why do you think the kaminoian style cloning is so expensive?
The costs of the normal cloning are similar to a normal baby, except: it requires a tank (as an artificial uterine) and it requires constant monitoring.
Since the kaminoian style is only produces the clones half time, it simply cannot be more expensive than twice the normal cloning. It requires 20 years to get a sizeable army (1.2 million) from Kamino. It is enough time for the other cloners to do the same, and it was said that it is not the first army they had created, so their unit price had to be competitive to that of normal cloners.

[Sea Skimmer]

The supply of clones CAN be planned. Can the supply of thirteen years old orphaned children be planned?

Its possibul to project the number that will be available with some accuracy, and when you consider the shear size of the Empire and the undermilitarized nature of it your going to have plenty of them.

[vakundok]

The supply of clones CAN be planned. Can the supply of thirteen years old orphaned children be planned?

Its possibul to project the number that will be available with some accuracy, and when you consider the shear size of the Empire and the undermilitarized nature of it your going to have plenty of them.

First of all, it not only depends on the sizes. Other factors: Local social system, local social attitude and the opposition to the Empire of the system. Even in the height of the Empire, only the first can be overriden. (Example: on silently opposing worlds any orphans would be immediately adopted only not to serve the Empire.)
Why do you think there are plenty of orphaned children within the Empire?

[Peregrin Toker]

Simon H. Johansen:
Excuse me, but why do you think the kaminoian style cloning is so expensive?

Well, isn't the growth-acceleration process supposed to be expensive??

And since the Kaminoans have the reputation for being the best cloners in the known universe, it's possible that they charge extra just because it's them who are doing it.

[vakundok]

And since the Kaminoans have the reputation for being the best cloners in the known universe, it's possible that they charge extra just because it's them who are doing it.

No. This only applies when the (finished) products are differentiable. Since it was not said that the genetic engineering that made the clones less independent was an exclusively kamioian technology, we can assume that Jango's one clone produced on Kamino is indifferent from Jango's other clone produced by other cloners.

Well, isn't the growth-acceleration process supposed to be expensive??

Yes. The growth accelerated clones must be more expensive than normals, otherwise the other cloners would go bankrupt.
How much more expensive?
I do not know, but hopefully, we will see. It depends on whether after the 20 years the production was planned to switch to normal clones or not. (Because after the period required by normal clones only the unit price counts.) So, if the production of normal (not accelerated) clones did not start at the same time as the known order, the unit price of a growth-accelerated clone must not be significantly higher.

[Sea Skimmer]

Why do you think there are plenty of orphaned children within the Empire?

Because in Star Wars people actually die in accidents until some serial sic fi universes. The Earth has about six billion people and about 100 million Orphans. Scale that to say a quadrillion, which is a high-end estimate for the population of just Coruscant and you get over sixteen point six trillion. Reject 90% of them for various reasons, age, physical condition, species and you've still got 1.6 trillion. That seems like an ample number of Stormtroopers to me given that the bulk of the Imperial ground forces are Army personal. It's enough to give 9700 man unit to well over a hundred million Imperators for example and Stormtroopers are suppose to have a non existent tail, which Star Wars driod's could make possibul.

And that just off the capital planet which the Emperor has full control of.

[Illuminatus Primus]

I still do not understand this garbage.

There is no evidence that orphaned children form the Stormtroopers. The Stormtrooper clones are not produced by the Kaminoans.

[vakundok]

Why do you think there are plenty of orphaned children within the Empire?

Because in Star Wars people actually die in accidents until some serial sic fi universes. The Earth has about six billion people and about 100 million Orphans. Scale that to say a quadrillion, which is a high-end estimate for the population of just Coruscant and you get over sixteen point six trillion. Reject 90% of them for various reasons, age, physical condition, species and you've still got 1.6 trillion. That seems like an ample number of Stormtroopers to me given that the bulk of the Imperial ground forces are Army personal. It's enough to give 9700 man unit to well over a hundred million Imperators for example and Stormtroopers are suppose to have a non existent tail, which Star Wars driod's could make possibul.

And that just off the capital planet which the Emperor has full control of.

Excuse me, but you compared the whole Earth to Coruscant. On Earth there are many local wars, diseases and starvation which produce orphans. On Corsucant they do not exist, so the relation cannot be used. Please use single countries (like Canada, Finland or Australia) as a base and count only fully orphaned children.
Otherwise, you are possibly right. So, maybe there are enough orphaned children to use at any time. But there are still the other problems: time, cost and independency.

[Sea Skimmer]

Excuse me, but you compared the whole Earth to Coruscant. On Earth there are many local wars, diseases and starvation which produce orphans. On Corsucant they do not exist, so the relation cannot be used.

Your claiming that diseases and starvation don't exists on Coruscant? That would be very fucking wrong. Armed conflicts are very common, or did you miss the fact there are whole sectors, which are basically run by gangs that pay off the authorities?

But there are still the other problems: time, cost and independency.

It's much quicker and far cheaper to train someone who acquired basic life skills on there own then to raise them from birth? Do you realize how much effort would be required to teach all those accelerated growth clones how to walk, read, write, drive and do about a million other things we learn as children? And it all has to be done in half the time with the addition of military training. That is not a cost effective proposition when you can find an ample support of persons who already have such skills and would require only the military training.

[Stravo]

It's much quicker and far cheaper to train someone who acquired basic life skills on there own then to raise them from birth? Do you realize how much effort would be required to teach all those accelerated growth clones how to walk, read, write, drive and do about a million other things we learn as children? And it all has to be done in half the time with the addition of military training. That is not a cost effective proposition when you can find an ample support of persons who already have such skills and would require only the military training.

Wouldn't flash imprinting of these skills address this issue?

[Peregrin Toker]

It's much quicker and far cheaper to train someone who acquired basic life skills on there own then to raise them from birth? Do you realize how much effort would be required to teach all those accelerated growth clones how to walk, read, write, drive and do about a million other things we learn as children? And it all has to be done in half the time with the addition of military training. That is not a cost effective proposition when you can find an ample support of persons who already have such skills and would require only the military training.

Wouldn't flash imprinting of these skills address this issue?

Hmm... Do any source make any guesses or claims about how expensive flash-imprinting is?