What are Stormtroopers

Ender · Post by **Ender** » 2004-01-05 02:59am

1) Latest SW: Empire comic makes it very clear that the stormtroopers are clones. Presumably, merging with the Pax Empirica story the stormies are so used to being called clones they assume that people are mixing them up with the old clonetroopers and politely don't say anything. The behavior fits because every soldier that has ever existed and ever will exist knows that you never contradict your superiors, just smile and nod and bitch about them later,

2) Mara's statement could be colored by spending significant time in the outer rim. Remember, to those people the clones were the bad guys trying to take over the galaxy and they were defending themselves and their rights.

Illuminatus Primus · Post by **Illuminatus Primus** » 2004-01-05 07:04pm

The best proof for Mara's statement is quite concise.

Virtually no one knew the Stormtrooper ranks were filled with GeNodes.

They act superficially like real people, and line-shuffling and slight differences in appearance make the ranks seem, at a glance, normal. Don't forget that there still are some exceptional recruits, and they can be shuffled in to hide this more.

Cloning was entirely banned by the Galactic Empire, and well, the NRI sucks. Really, really bad.

They never take off their helmets much, especially in front of normal people (the Tantors, exceptional recruits allowed into the Stormtroopers, were not allowed to share the same quarters are their compatriots and never saw them without their helmets).

The Stormtroopers' role meant there'd rarely be oppurtunuties to analyze the bodies by anyone.

The GeNodes can probably go down as one of Palpatine's best hushed secrets.

Also, one should keep in mind that the GeNodes probably have high-quality standards, are still quite expensive, and presumably with their-style cloning, take one year minimum to mature.

Thrawn's trick is really impressive even with GeNodes, because he can grow a perfect duplicate Stormie with the combat skills and tactics of an Imperial Royal Guard inside a week.

HMS Furious · Post by **HMS Furious** » 2004-01-12 11:58pm

I'm not certain if anyone has adressed this, but I don't think they're clones. Listen to their voices as heard in the films. If they were clones, they would all sound exactly alike, barring disease, injury, etc. However, they all have different voices, suggesting different individual people. That being said, there is no evidence that, if they are indeed clones, that the Empire is using a single clone template for their stormtroopers.
Another observation in support of the "non-clone stormtrooper army" is that all the stormtroopers are of a different height.
This really is a thorny issue!

Illuminatus Primus · Post by **Illuminatus Primus** » 2004-01-13 12:00am

HMS Furious wrote:I'm not certain if anyone has adressed this, but I don't think they're clones. Listen to their voices as heard in the films. If they were clones, they would all sound exactly alike, barring disease, injury, etc. However, they all have different voices, suggesting different individual people. That being said, there is no evidence that, if they are indeed clones, that the Empire is using a single clone template for their stormtroopers.
Another observation in support of the "non-clone stormtrooper army" is that all the stormtroopers are of a different height.
This really is a thorny issue!

I covered all of this. Not only are there multiple clone lines, but check out a pair of identical twins sometime. They never have identical heights or voices.

Post by **K. A. Pital** » 2004-01-14 09:10am

I suppose the Stormtroopers are a mix of clones and recruits.
The recruiting was described in post-Endor EU books, so there is really no reason to deny it.
But the cloning seems to be George's POV - he has stated that a few times.
So in canon matters the troopers are most probably clones.

But, as it ever happens, it seems that George's POV has changed with making of the prequels. I don't like the prequels, the medichoreans and the stormies=clones idea.
George didn't show that in the OT. All the books after OT don't say the storms are clones. But. Probably when starting the PT concept developing, George intoduced the storms=clones concept and claimed he had it from the beginning (au yeah, if he wanted that to be so, he could have identical voices for the troopers in the OT - no problem).

Knife · Post by **Knife** » 2004-01-14 11:39am

Probably when starting the PT concept developing, George intoduced the storms=clones concept and claimed he had it from the beginning (au yeah, if he wanted that to be so, he could have identical voices for the troopers in the OT - no problem).

Your operating from the false assumption that because the Stormies are clones, they have to be all from the same template. That doesn't need to be the case. A variety of templetes could be used to give a Stormtrooper Corps with varrying heigth and voices as well as other visual differences.

Post by **K. A. Pital** » 2004-01-14 12:01pm

I think, Lucas said they were particulary Boba Fett's clones, not just clones. And if he wanted to make this concept clear (as if it was relevant to the OT like he says) he could have done it.

McC · Post by **McC** » 2004-02-02 03:16pm

Illuminatus Primus wrote:...was initially composed of 200,000 combat troops...another 1,000,000 clones...

I'm pretty sure that someone must've brought this up before, but does it actually state anywhere that "units" must mean individual clones? 1,200,000 seems like an awfully small number of troops to start a galactic army with. The use of "units" could mean military units, and thus many clones could be a part of one unit. I just did a search in the Archive board (yay, I can search the Archive board now!

), and a few people seemed to bring it up in a couple threads, but no one seemed to reply to this idea. The scene where this figure is quoted in the novel is entirely consistant with the movie, and the only reference I've seen to refute this idea is Shatterpoint (which I haven't actually read, just seen the quotes of). Any thoughts on this, anyone?

Slartibartfast · Post by **Slartibartfast** » 2004-02-02 04:28pm

Lazy Raptor wrote:I think by "indoctrination" he mains trained from birth, like Universal Soldier or something to that effect.

Universal Soldier weren't trained from birth. They were trained from death. Har har

Rogue 9 · Post by **Rogue 9** » 2004-02-02 05:02pm

Necromancer.

Illuminatus Primus · Post by **Illuminatus Primus** » 2004-02-02 07:02pm

McC wrote:
Illuminatus Primus wrote:...was initially composed of 200,000 combat troops...another 1,000,000 clones...
I'm pretty sure that someone must've brought this up before, but does it actually state anywhere that "units" must mean individual clones? 1,200,000 seems like an awfully small number of troops to start a galactic army with. The use of "units" could mean military units, and thus many clones could be a part of one unit. I just did a search in the Archive board (yay, I can search the Archive board now! ), and a few people seemed to bring it up in a couple threads, but no one seemed to reply to this idea. The scene where this figure is quoted in the novel is entirely consistant with the movie, and the only reference I've seen to refute this idea is Shatterpoint (which I haven't actually read, just seen the quotes of). Any thoughts on this, anyone?

ItWoAotC and Shatterpoint, as well as the Star Wars: Republic comic series all insist the original production line was 1.2 million troopers.

No worries. ItWoAotC also clarifies that countless millions are on the way.

McC · Post by **McC** » 2004-02-02 08:00pm

ItWoAotC?

Post by **Ghost Rider** » 2004-02-02 08:06pm

McC wrote:ItWoAotC?

Inside
The
World
Of
Attack
Of
The
Clones

McC · Post by **McC** » 2004-02-02 08:25pm

Ah...that a book? I haven't heard of it before now.

Post by **Ghost Rider** » 2004-02-02 08:38pm

McC wrote:Ah...that a book? I haven't heard of it before now.

Yup...nice book in the vein of the ICS.

Here's an amazon link

Post by **Vympel** » 2004-02-03 01:36am

"Countless millions"

I like the sound of that.

FTeik · Post by **FTeik** » 2004-02-03 05:48pm

Illuminatus Primus wrote:I'm going to ask Vympel to add this to the stickys for ALREADY DEALT WITH subjects.

Pax Empirica -- The Wookiee Annihilation quotes...

Pax Emperica says explicitly that 40% of all stormtroopers had Strander's face.

4 out of 10 Stormies were clones of a single line--this is pre-OT, but keeping in mind GL's statements and Decipher cards--the Empire didn't suddenly stop mass-use of clone stormtroopers.

One has to wonder how many templates there are, if 40% belong to the same line.

Kurgan · Post by **Kurgan** » 2004-02-18 06:18am

IIRC, the AOTC novel always states that the 1.2 million refers to individual soldiers, not divisions or squads or anything like that.

So it seems the general retcon is that the Stormtroopers ARE CLONES, they just aren't all clones of the same person (ie: Jango).

Unless of course maybe the Stormtroopers are the (through normal sexual reproduction) descendents of the Jango clonetroopers. Is that a possibility? Of course that implies a massive breeding program and very fertile clones (the ones that survive... maybe they need truckloads of viagra too since they'd be old geezers...).

That is unless of course George someday decides to re-edit the OT to make all the troopers look and sound alike.

Hope this isn't too off topic, but...

Btw, did anybody solve the mystery of who got all of that Clone trooper equipment ready in time for the battle of Geonosis? (Ie: not just the armor and rifles, but also the Acclamators, LAAT's, AT-TE's, tanks, etc)

Did Kamino produce everything? And if not, how did Palpatine get it all produced in secret (since the clone army itself was secret)?

Sarevok · Post by **Sarevok** » 2004-02-18 08:35am

IIRC, the AOTC novel always states that the 1.2 million refers to individual soldiers, not divisions or squads or anything like that.

1.2 million seems too low a number for fighting a Galactic war. Perhaps it is the initial production batch.

Kurgan · Post by **Kurgan** » 2004-02-18 11:06am

That's what we all thought, which is why we all hoped it refered to groups rather than individuals.

Yeah, doesn't China have an army of 1 million troops? And that's just our backward Earth!

The Empire couldn't possibly hope to use that as a Galactic Army, what are they going to do, send one Stormtrooper to each habited planet?

In the movie they say .2 mill are ready now, 1 million on the way.

So there are a lot of theories. One is that the Stormtroopers are not the "regular army" (that's the Imperial Navy, the guys in black/gray) as many supposed, but rather a elite "crack force" or a private army fielded by the Emperor himself. Special Forces. This assumes that there are not as many Stormtroopers as we might have thought before the Prequels.

The other is that the clone deal was just a start up, and later they just threw recruits into Stormtrooper gear (the psychological effect and riot protection) and thus we had tons of stormies but not all clones.

And finally the idea (from the EU retconning) that better cloning methods came about and they whipped up a huge Stormie army in a very short time, way more than the Kaminoans were capable of and thus we have tons of 'em still.

So maybe it'll be explained in Episode III and the Episode III canon materials, but who knows...

I'm sure the EU will get it all ironed out once no more "pure canon" (except for the Lucas tweaks of the movies every 10-15 years) to contradict/confuse/complicate it.

Sarevok · Post by **Sarevok** » 2004-02-19 02:01am

It could also be possible Kaminos is not the only place producing clonetroopers. There might be many other planets producing clonetroopers.

Comosicus · Post by **Comosicus** » 2004-02-19 03:39am

Kurgan wrote: Hope this isn't too off topic, but...

Btw, did anybody solve the mystery of who got all of that Clone trooper equipment ready in time for the battle of Geonosis? (Ie: not just the armor and rifles, but also the Acclamators, LAAT's, AT-TE's, tanks, etc)

Did Kamino produce everything? And if not, how did Palpatine get it all produced in secret (since the clone army itself was secret)?

They were produced by a secret KDY subsidiary on Rothana:

The walker, like the rest of the clone army's heavy armor, was developed in secret at Rothana Heavy Engineering, a clandestine subsidiary of Kuat Drive Yards.

This also includes the Acclamators.

Kurgan · Post by **Kurgan** » 2004-02-19 03:50am

Edit: Answered my own question, nevermind.

Thanks!

Techno_Union · Post by **Techno_Union** » 2004-02-19 05:33pm

evilcat4000 wrote:It could also be possible Kaminos is not the only place producing clonetroopers. There might be many other planets producing clonetroopers.

Khomm was a clone world. But I am not sure if they were producing clones for the Republic.

Spanky The Dolphin · Post by **Spanky The Dolphin** » 2004-02-19 05:36pm

evilcat4000 wrote:It could also be possible Kaminos is not the only place producing clonetroopers. There might be many other planets producing clonetroopers.

I think by the time of Episode III, there are more than just Kamino manufacturing Clonetroopers, but still using the Jango Fett stock.

EDIT: Khomm is a pacifist world, IIRC, so I don't see them making clones for the Republic.

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What are Stormtroopers

Regarding Stormtroopers(or are they "Clonetroopers"

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