The Terran Dominion vs. The Galactic Empire

[Lord_Gareth]

In this corner, the Terran Dominion as led by Arcturus Mengsk! Well-equipped, well-lead, and possessed of some limited super-tech and psionic powers.

In this corner, the Galactic Empire as led by Palpatine!

The two forces encounter each other in an unowned system that contains vast reams of material resources that both sides deeply desire; thus, planet-destroying tactics (though not necessarily surface-destroying ones) are out of the question. Each side's goal is to establish a hold in this system and drive the other side out.

Ready?

GO!

[Innis Cabal]

One Star Destroyer is enough to destroy a Battlecruiser completely. The number ratio and other ships the Empire has, the fact Star Wars has Faster then Light Travel....there's no contest here.

[Lord_Gareth]

The Dominion is not, however, lead by morons. They have access to cloaking technologies and are known for favoring smaller, stealthier strike forces in the past; Mengsk and his commanders are intimately familiar with the power of a saboteur. Once it became established (probably fairly quickly) that the Empire is going to win any head-on fight, the Dominion isn't going to be fighting head-on anymore. Why? They're doomed to failure.

Keep in mind that the Dominion has extensive experience fighting foes that are more numerous (the Confedarcy) and well-supplied, have better technology (the Protoss) and/or are hive-minded alien horrors (the Zerg) and, in fact, managed to wage war on all three at once. Even now that they ARE the oppressive evil empire, they've proven some serious nuts to crack, especially on the ground - and on the ground I think their capabilities far outmatch the Empire, which has a tradition of complete stupidity when it comes to surface tactics.

[HalfTangible]

Odin, siege tanks and even just plain Dominion Marines (cuz unlike stormtroopers they aren't <completely> stupid) will curbstomp anything the empire has on the ground. That leaves space battle.

Vikings are more than a match for tie fighters in terms of strength, but the tie fighters have greater manueverability and numbers. I think the ties win, simply because the vikings are slow in manuverability and they use slow-launching missiles instead of lasers.

Wraiths with cloaking make it a bit more in favor of the dominion, but the tie fighter's superior numbers and manuvering capability renders being unable to be seen mostly irrelevant. I call that one a tie. ("you've been waiting your whole life to use that one, haven't you HT? :smallannoyed: Just to say 'i call that one a tie' when refferring to a tie fighter in a fight.")

Battlescruiser VS Star Destroyer is a bit trickier since the exact specs for a SD is not given as far as i know, so i'll work with what i know. A BC's Yamato cannon has a pretty good case, but it can also be argued that the SD's shields give it an edge for structual integrity. However, the BC as far as we know doesn't have ships it can deploy on short notice. The SD does, in the form of tie fighters which can wear down a BC - kill it with bug bites, so to speak. So unless the BC focuses exclusively on it, I call SD.

Don't get me wrong. I prefer SC to SW. But SW has such absurdly powerful crap that a head on fight is suicide.

So. In a tactics oriented fight?

Dominion, hands down. Most of the ships in SW are incapable of cloaking, and so many units in SC can that the empire won't even know what hit them ("That was even worse!") In addition, the dominion has a grasp of tactics that the empire cannot match (unless you count the emperor himself, in which case it's even) so yeah, a full frontal assault will be Empire but almost anything else will be dominion.

[Neoseanster]

Gonna have to give this one to the Galactic Empire, no contest. It's just a matter of scale. On the one hand, the Terran Dominion is two dozen, maybe three dozen worlds at most... on the other, the Galactic Empire has a million. If we want to use a more conservative estimate, lets just say tens of thousands.

No matter what way you cut it, they just have far, far greater resources at their disposal. If they really want that world, enough so that they're willing to devote even a significant percentage of what they have at their disposal to it, and their only competition are the Terran Dominion, they *will* take it, and there will be nothing the Terrans can do about it.

If you change the rules of engagement a bit, and limit each to a set amount of resources they're willing to spend on the endeavor, then things are a *bit* more balanced, but I think the Empire still has too much of an advantage in terms of firepower on their capital ships... a star destroyer would probably make mincemeat of even multiple battlecruisers. The Terrans would probably have the advantage on the ground, but I don't think it would be enough of an edge to make up for their total space inferiority, especially given that the Empire could employ orbital bombardment from their star destroyers.

[Fjolnir]

This is a complete and total one sided fistfight, however the TD would probably ally with anti-empire elements within the galaxy and assist in making the rebellion more than a small group of people who are foolish enough to think that they can fight a galactic empire on their own terms.

This is assuming we aren't moving the entire universe over, then we'll just see the ghosts being used to attract the zerg to factory worlds and the empire will have a very bad thing on their hands...

[Mando Knight]

In this corner, the Galactic Empire as led by Palpatine!

Here's your problem, right there. By the time of the Battle of Endor, it's estimated that there were several hundred Super Star Destroyers of various design, in addition to thousands of Imperial-class Star Destroyers. If Palpatine really cared about getting the planet, it would be quickly surrounded by an assault fleet near the size of Death Squadron (or indeed, Death Squadron itself).

Furthermore, the Siege Tank, Odin (a hero unit), and Thor heavy units all have their parallels in the Empire, primarily in the form of the titanic AT-AT, which a competent commander (and there are some in the Empire. General Veers and Grand Admiral Thrawn, for instance) with a battle fleet can deploy in fairly large numbers (see: Hoth, Blizzard Force, Thundering Herd) if need be. Infantry is countered by the AT-ST. Long-range artillery is countered by orbital strikes, bombers, fast anti-vehicle weapons (2M repulsor tank, AT-ST groups), or AT-ATs. Yes, you can destroy the AT-ATs with sustained heavy weapons fire or tying them up or getting lucky and hitting just the right spot, but the group that managed to take them down in the movie was an elite group of pilots in its own right, and games like Rogue Leader and Dark Forces go out of their way to make the player a one-man killing machine (that is, a hero unit).

Finally, cloaking in SC2 isn't perfect by any means. Sensor sweeps will reveal cloaked units, cloaked units can't attack, Terran cloaks drain energy from their users, and not every unit can be cloaked. All in all, they can be useful for setting up surgical strikes and surprise attacks, but those alone won't be enough to keep an Empire known for its willingness to glass over a planet or city that won't behave. The only reason Hoth was spared that fate was due to the massive planetary-grade shield generator powered by a salvaged dreadnought core blocking any chance for orbital bombardment.

[MammonAzrael]

Nevermind the fact that I believe Star Wars tech vastly outpaces Starcraft tech in pretty much every conceivable way, you're letting Palpatine play here.

Game. Set. Match. (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Force_storm_%28wormhole%29)

For a more fair match, I'd give control of the (limited) Galactic Empire fleet to a Grand Admiral, probably Thrawn 'cause he is awesome like that. And remove the question of the Force altogether. Otherwise there is no way the Terran Dominion would have a chance to grab the system that the Empire wants that badly.

I still believe that the TD has no chance, as their tech is seriously lacking. Even playing the Resistance angle, being subtle and sabotaging where they can, they still lose. As that puts them on the defensive and basically guarantee's the GE's ability to mine the system of whatever resources they're looking for.

[Don Julio Anejo]

A much more interesting thread would be Terran Dominion against the UNSC.

Sure, cloaking helps tactically, but to use it you actually need to be able to do some damage to the Empire.

[ShneekeyTheLost]

As the Empire does *NOT* have Jedi (and only Vader and the Emperor are force users at all), the Ghosts will have a *SIGNIFICANT* advantage, both in terms of complete stealth and sniping tactics, and in terms of being able to Lockdown Empire Mech (and Empire ground is *VERY* mech-heavy)

Dominion marines would turn Stormtroopers into a fine red mist. Marines are in powered armor. Remember the cutscene with Raynor and his drunken buddy in a marine suit? Easily two feet of height, augmented servos, has a freekin' gun bigger than the stormtroopers are tall... no way in effin' hell are the stormtroopers gonna be able to walk away from marines, particularly not an M&M ball. Heaven help them if the Dominion pulls out Firebats or worse, Marauders.

So in a ground combat, the Dominion would definately have an advantage. Not only are their ground troops just plain better, but they've got medics providing in-field support, making it nearly impossible to actually kill them before the medic's power source is depleted. AT-AT's are Lockdown'd by ghosts, then destroyed by Siege Tanks.

In the air, suborbital, Dominions have a very distinct advantage. Goliaths are very nasty anti-air units and seeking missiles pwn tie fighters, since their primary advantage is being able to dodge. Wraiths also have seeking missiles, and the ability to cloak, making it impossible for Tie to lock them up on tracking while they get blown out of the sky. BC's can go sub-orbital, unlike Star Destroyers, while the only sub-orbital unit the Empire really has are Tie fighters or transports.

In space, the fight is more balanced, however unless the Emperor or Vader are personally there, they've got a real problem. Ghosts can Lockdown, or simply infiltrate and assassinate leaders. Ghosts can also EMP Pulse, which will drop their shielding (and yes, Emperial shields drop to EMP, because that's the whole purpose of the Ion Gun). All the Dominion suborbital are also space units, so they've got BC's and Wraiths to deal with, as well as Vikings. They also have one thing that will also make things work much easier... Science Vessels. If you aren't familiar with the tactic, it's called The Eraser. Basically, they have AE usage which can swat down the clouds of TIE which are certain to be deployed. If it can swat down a swarm of Mutas, it can swat down a swarm of Tie.

Granted, there is the matter of scale. Mengsk has one system, the Empire spans Parsecs. However, I think the Dominion can easily be a tough enough nut that the Empire will decide to go elsewhere rather than risking putting enough troops to guarantee victory and thus possibly move them away from where they will be needed to suppress the Rebel Alliance.

God help all, both the Dominion and the Empire, if Raynor and Skywalker get together...

[Mando Knight]

As the Empire does *NOT* have Jedi (and only Vader and the Emperor are force users at all)

Incorrect on the lack of Force Users. There's numerous Dark Side orders and cults ruled by Palpatine. Just because there's only two Sith doesn't mean there can't be more than two Darksiders, after all.

Jerec (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Jerec) and his group, the Inquisitorius (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Inquisitorius), and even Luke Skywalker's future wife (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Mara_Jade_Skywalker) were all trained to use the Dark Side of the Force to serve the Emperor's will.

[Lord_Gareth]

A much more interesting thread would be Terran Dominion against the UNSC.

Sure, cloaking helps tactically, but to use it you actually need to be able to do some damage to the Empire.

"It's an empty ship, sir."

*Six hours later, SD blows from the inside as the cloaked ghosts inside the ship plant their tac nuke and leave with any relevant data*

Re: the UNSC, I demand thread, sir! I DEMAND THREAD!

[Knaight]

If the numbers were at all even I would have to give this to the Dominion. They are much subtler strategists, much better tacticians, and certainly have quite dangerous technology. Marines would shred stormtroopers, Siege Tanks could take down AT AT and AT ST units due to superior range. In space, Wraiths are going to cause major damage, and insertion of Ghosts into currently landed Empire ships will cripple the fleet. Even the Battle Cruiser should do major damage, though its quite a small ship really, and several would have to be fielded to equal large Empire ships. Which is reasonable, given even tonnage and manpower. Were the numbers even, The Dominion would win heavily.

The numbers aren't even. They aren't even close to even. The Galactic Empire is massive, eventually they will be victorious. It is simply going to be an extremely expensive win given the size of the enemy force. Its not as if the Empire has anything against winning expensively if they have to, and the scale enables that.

[dgnslyr]

The problem is scale. On the galactic level, the Imperial forces ROFLstomp the Terran Dominion. Imperial space vessels are far larger and more numerous than Terran Battlecruisers. Of course, the Imperial forces are notorious for stupidity, so that should be mentioned.

In a smaller space skirmish, with most of the larger vessels out of the picture, things begin to even out a bit. The Imperials use TIE fighters, bombers, and Interceptors, all quite fast and maneuverable, but all very fragile. The Terrans have Vikings, which have obscenely long-ranged missiles and Valkyries, which love to eat up flocks of light, fragile vessels for lunch. Wraiths have their cloaking, which could do some sneaky damage.

On the ground, however, the fight is much more even. While both Space Marines and Stormtroopers are well equipped, stormtroopers, like the rest of the Empire, are notorious for stupidity, particularly their poor marksmanship. The Dominion has drug-abusing neurally-resocialized gun-toting rednecks. They shoot fast and run fast when they abuse drugs. They have Marauders, which are similar, except they're better armored and hit armored vehicles harder. There are Medics, who have magic healing rays, and Firebats, who set things on fire.

On the ground, the Dominion is much better equipped. Just make sure you can find a good reason why the Imperial Fleet is tangled up. A swarm of flying worms would do nicely. :smallwink:

[Mando Knight]

In a smaller space skirmish, with most of the larger vessels out of the picture, things begin to even out a bit.
With the Empire, they're never out of the picture, unless you're up against fighters like the TIE Defender or the Imperial Missile Boat. In which case small enemy craft don't really stand a chance. All three series of TIEs that made it into full production (/ln fighter, /sa bomber, /In Interceptor) are carrier-based craft, so you're generally looking at something at least the size of an Acclamator-class assault frigate holding them.

[ZeroNumerous]

On Ghosts and Cloaking: Cloaked units are detected by turrets and observers. Active scans of the area detect cloaked units. I see no reason to believe that an active scan from Star Destroyer's sensors would fail to detect ghosts.

[dgnslyr]

With the Empire, they're never out of the picture, unless you're up against fighters like the TIE Defender or the Imperial Missile Boat. In which case small enemy craft don't really stand a chance. All three series of TIEs that made it into full production (/ln fighter, /sa bomber, /In Interceptor) are carrier-based craft, so you're generally looking at something at least the size of an Acclamator-class assault frigate holding them.

What about a "convenient" flock of flying worms and flying squids that just so happen to be nearby? :smallamused:

Yeah, any space battle with the Star Destroyers involved will ROFLstomp the Dominion so hard it's not even funny. Barring Imperial Stupidity (tm), of course.

[Forum Explorer]

I would give this to GE.

The Dominion might be able to cause some initial problems and mabey even steal a couple Star Destoyers. But that would just attract the attention of Vader or Thrawn. With one of them at the head of a full Imperial fleet they would just smash the Dominion without doubt.

[Knaight]

Yeah, any space battle with the Star Destroyers involved will ROFLstomp the Dominion so hard it's not even funny. Barring Imperial Stupidity (tm), of course.

Regarding imperial stupidity, there are two very significant factors. The Empire isn't used to having an enemy that is at all threatening, look at what the Rebellion did despite its side. The Dominion is used to fighting superior forces. This seems to suggest a concentration of dumb errors on the Empire's side.

[Don Julio Anejo]

Re: the UNSC, I demand thread, sir! I DEMAND THREAD!
Challenge accepted, my good sir!
I now demand a high five! :Barney:

[Tazar]

This is an interesting one, to be sure.

Star Destroyers will flatten Battlecruisers in terms of size alone; however, Terran ground forces will absolutely roll the Empire's. Marines, Siege Tanks, Goliaths, Medics, and Thors combine to make a very bad day for the Stormtroopers on the ground. AT-ATs are supposedly among the most intimidating ground units the Empire can deploy, and they can't even shoot at anything that's not in like a 180 degree arc to the vehicle's front. It's a complete joke of a vehicle.

Furthermore, Ghosts will rip apart the Imperial command structure as they are assassins with which the Empire can't really compete.

Also, Wraiths with their ability to cloak and continue fighting would prove quite potent, as the Empire will have no practical way to detect cloaked vessels. It's pretty clear that Star Wars sensors can't detect anything cloaked, so saying that their sensor sweeps would somehow be able to reveal Dominion cloaking is rather unsubstantiated. The only Dominion stuff really able to detect cloaked vessels are massively powerful sensor arrays or dedicated scientific ships.

In my opinion it basically comes down to whether Wraiths can somehow be configured to enable the Dominion to use them to take down capital ships effectively. Perhaps delivery of nuclear warheads?

Regarding SSDs, I'm pretty sure there were only like 6 or 12 of the Executor-class ones made? Don't know about any other random EU kinds, but there certainly weren't hundreds of the ones Vader uses.

[Lord_Gareth]

If you crack open the manual (as the novels don't get into space combat much), you'll note that the Wraith was originally designed by the Sons of Korhal as a Space Superiority Fighter, intended to exploit the weaknesses of capital ships - hence why their air-to-air attack is so damn nasty.

[Tazar]

If you crack open the manual (as the novels don't get into space combat much), you'll note that the Wraith was originally designed by the Sons of Korhal as a Space Superiority Fighter, intended to exploit the weaknesses of capital ships - hence why their air-to-air attack is so damn nasty.

In that case I think the Dominion's got a definite chance in space, then. Star Destroyers have a canonically established vulnerability to snubfighter attacks, and cloaking Wraiths will be quite hard to stop.

Battlecruisers would have to stay the hell away from any kind of actual fleet engagement though. That will not end well, given the sheer size and mass of Star Destroyers if nothing else.

[Knaight]

Battlecruisers would have to stay the hell away from any kind of actual fleet engagement though. That will not end well, given the sheer size and mass of Star Destroyers if nothing else.

I'd suggest close air support, but that strikes me as completely pointless overkill, the Dominion has ground battles well under control. That said, it could be of some use in taking out buildings.

[Tazar]

I'd suggest close air support, but that strikes me as completely pointless overkill, the Dominion has ground battles well under control. That said, it could be of some use in taking out buildings.

Yeah, as we see in Brood War, BCs can get quite far down into the atmosphere. That might be an interesting way to use them; get them way down into the planetary atmosphere, where Star Destroyers won't really be able to safely fire at them, and either fire back up into space or bombard imperial troops on the surface.

[arguskos]

I'd suggest close air support, but that strikes me as completely pointless overkill, the Dominion has ground battles well under control. That said, it could be of some use in taking out buildings.
The mighty Battlecruiser... reduced to a crappy and expensive siege tank. The issue here is that SDs *can* shell planetary surfaces, and an atmospheric BC isn't going anywhere real fast, making it a big dumb target for SD turbolaser fire. Bad idea, IMO.

Also, we're neglecting a very VERY interesting component of Dominion technology: drone tech. See, Ravens are remotely controlled, and are not very large. If a cluster of them was piloted very close to a Star Destroyer, they could perhaps lay down a number of auto-turrets in compromising positions (see: the Falcon could *land* on a SD; why not an auto-turret?), they could do some serious damage. Imagine: four auto turrets taking out the shield generators for a Star Destroyer, all without loss of life or even serious risk, as the smaller and quite likely faster Battlecruisers play a game of keep away with the SD while the Ravens perform their roles as sappers.

And, what about the Science Vessel? Still in use by the time of the Dominion, it's abilities could be quite handy. Automatically fixing nearby ships? Throwing EMPs at stuff (since it was clear they could do such during the Brood Wars, not 5 years prior to the events of Wings of Liberty, surely they still could with a little retrofitting)? Invaluable.

[Tazar]

If the BC is deep in a planetary atmosphere over an Imperial army and moving about, SDs might not be able to fire without risking unacceptable collateral damage to the planetary surface or to their troops, which is interesting.

That's a good point about vessels; I don't know what kind of provisions Star Wars ships have for EMPs, but they seem quite susceptible to Ion Cannons which appear to run in a similar vein.

[hamishspence]

Regarding SSDs, I'm pretty sure there were only like 6 or 12 of the Executor-class ones made? Don't know about any other random EU kinds, but there certainly weren't hundreds of the ones Vader uses.

Over the space of the entire Empire, only 13 Executor-class Star Dreadnoughts were confirmed as constructed- and several of those were after the Battle of Endor.

Others- not sure- but given that the ISD is considered the "mainstay" of the fleet, and responsible for most of its combat power (and that there were about 25000 constructed- maybe 30000 at most) its unlikely that the total amount of "Super Star Destroyers" would have been numerous enough that their combat power approaches that of the ISDs.

Info as to the minimum size of "Super Star Destroyers" is a bit contradictory. In a 1984 splatbook, it stated that the Executor class was "five times larger than any Star Destroyer"- this has been interpreted as 5 times longer, and used to place the maximum size of a "non-Super" Star Destroyer as 3.8km, and the minimum size of a "Super Star Destroyer" as 3.8 km.

However- in Star Wars Technical Commentaries- the smallest known Super Star Destroyer- the Allegiance from Dark Empire, which closely resembles the Imperial-class Super Star Destroyers escorting the Eclipse, and is probably of that class, is estimated as 2.2 km long.

So- potentially- the smallest "super star destroyers" could be only 2.2 km long- compared to the 1.6 km of the ISD.

[Tazar]

Yeah, I thought there were only 12, but someone was saying there were hundreds of them earlier in this thread.

[Closet_Skeleton]

Dominion marines would turn Stormtroopers into a fine red mist. Marines are in powered armor. Remember the cutscene with Raynor and his drunken buddy in a marine suit? Easily two feet of height, augmented servos, has a freekin' gun bigger than the stormtroopers are tall... no way in effin' hell are the stormtroopers gonna be able to walk away from marines, particularly not an M&M ball. Heaven help them if the Dominion pulls out Firebats or worse, Marauders.

A marine is a not bigger target than the ones Stormtroopers keep barely missing.

Shots from a storm trooper rifle blow chunks out of walls. For all their armour marines die very quickly without their magic medics, who are game mechanics. In Star Wars games a portable tub of bacta can heal you, in the films you need to bathe for several hours in a tank of the stuff.

Marines are also way worse trained than Stormtroopers, who aren't anywhere near as bad as their out of universe reputation.

[hamishspence]

Yeah, I thought there were only 12, but someone was saying there were hundreds of them earlier in this thread.

Hundreds of "super star destroyers" maybe- but most of those will be Star Cruisers only a little larger than an ISD. The Allegiance, one of the smallest, is estimated as 2.2 km long by Curtis Saxton- and appears to be the same type as the "Imperial-class Super Star Destroyers" escorting the Eclipse in the comic Dark Empire.

Only a small proportion will be Star Battlecruisers, even less will be Star Dreadnoughts- and only a few of those Star Dreadnoughts, will be Executor class (which are significantly more powerful than the rest).

After the battle of Yavin, the Emperor ordered the creation of superlaser-equipped Star Dreadnoughts- but only three were ever complete enough to be active.

They were Eclipse, the Eclipse II (both heavier than the Executor), and the Sovereign (possibly slightly lighter). The first two took nearly 10 years to complete and were began very shortly after Yavin,
the 3rd (Sovereign) was the first of a set of 4, and saw service (possibly still incomplete) with Warlord Zsinj before returning to Byss.

The other 3 were still under construction when Byss was destroyed. The destruction of Byss took out the Eclipse II and all four Sovereign-class ships.

The Eclipse was destroyed earlier, when Palpatine (in clone body) lost control of a Force Storm, which turned on him, consuming him and his ship.

[warty goblin]

Marines are also way worse trained than Stormtroopers, who aren't anywhere near as bad as their out of universe reputation.

Yeah, Stormtroopers are really good. I mean their door breaching procedure seems to be:

1) Take a long time opening the door. You want to make sure the other guy has a good chance to stack up.

2) Walk through the door, firing slowly and without cover.

3) What grenades?

Then there's the bit where they insist on wearing white armor in a green forest. Excessive tactical intelligence this does not indicate.

It is also instructive that in Attack of the Clones, the clone troopers advance towards the droid position in a firing line. You just don't do that against enemies with automatic or semi-automatic weapons.

[Lord_Gareth]

A marine is a not bigger target than the ones Stormtroopers keep barely missing.

Shots from a storm trooper rifle blow chunks out of walls. For all their armour marines die very quickly without their magic medics, who are game mechanics. In Star Wars games a portable tub of bacta can heal you, in the films you need to bathe for several hours in a tank of the stuff.

Marines are also way worse trained than Stormtroopers, who aren't anywhere near as bad as their out of universe reputation.

That armor shrugs off high-velocity explosive spikes (Marine shots), friggin' psychic lasers (Protoss) and whatever psuedo-organic compounds the Zerg are using to tear through metal (phlebetium). Storm Trooper shots aren't anything they haven't seen before. While Marines may not be heavily trained, they make up for it with technological enhancements in addition to the availability of stimpacks. Not to mention the aforementioned four-inch exploding spikes.

[Eldariel]

With the Empire, they're never out of the picture, unless you're up against fighters like the TIE Defender or the Imperial Missile Boat. In which case small enemy craft don't really stand a chance. All three series of TIEs that made it into full production (/ln fighter, /sa bomber, /In Interceptor) are carrier-based craft, so you're generally looking at something at least the size of an Acclamator-class assault frigate holding them.

Isn't Missile Boat just a Wraith with limited ammo and no cloaking field (and Wraiths can launch attacks without breaking their cloak)? Both have double missile launchers and wraith has three lasers to Missile Boat's one.

[HalfTangible]

Furthermore, the Siege Tank, Odin (a hero unit), and Thor heavy units all have their parallels in the Empire, primarily in the form of the titanic AT-AT, which a competent commander (and there are some in the Empire. General Veers and Grand Admiral Thrawn, for instance) with a battle fleet can deploy in fairly large numbers (see: Hoth, Blizzard Force, Thundering Herd) if need be. Infantry is countered by the AT-ST. Long-range artillery is countered by orbital strikes, bombers, fast anti-vehicle weapons (2M repulsor tank, AT-ST groups), or AT-ATs. Yes, you can destroy the AT-ATs with sustained heavy weapons fire or tying them up or getting lucky and hitting just the right spot, but the group that managed to take them down in the movie was an elite group of pilots in its own right, and games like Rogue Leader and Dark Forces go out of their way to make the player a one-man killing machine (that is, a hero unit).The problem with comparing AT-ATs to... well, anything is that they can't move worth a damn. The Odin's got it's problems but at least it can TURN!

The Odin was a prototype, and the thor was made by Raynor's Raiders. The dominion has Odins, which have the firepower to destroy entire bases ALONE. Shooting off an At-At's legs doesn't seem all that farfetched for something with that much firepower in it's main guns.

Furthermore, if you want to assume the empire brought ships to ground level you must also assume the dominion has done so.

Palpatine wants the planet, not to keep the dominion from having the planet. He won't bombard and thereby ruin whatever value it has.


Finally, cloaking in SC2 isn't perfect by any means. Sensor sweeps will reveal cloaked units, cloaked units can't attack, Terran cloaks drain energy from their users, and not every unit can be cloaked.

What? Cloaked units can attack whenever they bloody please, if they have an attack to use!!

[pita]

Let's not forget Lockdown. I don't think it has a size limit, and I think it pretty much annuls any use for Star Destroyers.

[Reverent-One]

Furthermore, if you want to assume the empire brought ships to ground level you must also assume the dominion has done so.

Not if the Empire is winning the space battle.


Palpatine wants the planet, not to keep the dominion from having the planet. He won't bombard and thereby ruin whatever value it has.


The two forces encounter each other in an unowned system that contains vast reams of material resources that both sides deeply desire; thus, planet-destroying tactics (though not necessarily surface-destroying ones) are out of the question. Each side's goal is to establish a hold in this system and drive the other side out.


The important part is bolded.

[Mando Knight]

Shooting off an At-At's legs doesn't seem all that farfetched for something with that much firepower in it's main guns.
It would take some time, however (the AT-AT has frigate-rated armor), and the walker almost never operates alone, and is almost always deployed in groups. Odin can't (Thors can, but they're not as strong).

Palpatine wants the planet, not to keep the dominion from having the planet. He won't bombard and thereby ruin whatever value it has.
He can, and he will. Especially if the value of the planet is some kind of mineral. In fact, there's an instance in SW canon where the Empire broke the "contains vast reams of material resources that both sides deeply desire; thus, planet-destroying tactics are out of the question" statement: Aeten II was shattered by the Tarkin superlaser to grant the Empire access to deeply buried stygium crystals, (hyper-) rare and valuable crystals used to generate the Galaxy's only perfect starship-based cloaking systems. (Other cloaking devices in Star Wars are either double-blind and too power-hungry for most starships, or somewhat imperfect personal stealth-enhancing cloaking devices.)

[Tazar]

It's also very important to note in regards to stormtrooper blasters that Princess Leia takes a direct hit on her bare arm from one at close range and doesn't suffer any kind of significant injury.
That speaks volumes for the effectiveness of stormtrooper lasers.

AT-ATs are a joke; just shoot the neck, it's a critical point on the vehicle AND more weakly armored than the rest of it. Boom goes the dynamite.

Alternatively, you can just get forces behind them and laugh at their utter inability to do anything to combat you. Or you can land Marines on the top with Dropships. Or do anything, really; AT-ATs are a very poorly designed vehicle with terrible fields of fire.

If AT-ATs have frigate-rated armor, how come they can't break through a crappy tow cable?

[hamishspence]

And what's "frigate rated armour" anyway- a metre of a metal a bit ( a lot?) tougher than steel? A foot? More? Less?

[Tazar]

And what's "frigate rated armour" anyway- a metre of a metal a bit ( a lot?) tougher than steel? A foot? More? Less?

Given how small Star Wars frigates are, I'd imagine that's not saying much. "Frigate-rated" armor in wet navy terms is not exactly impressive, and the size discrepancies between SW capital ships and frigates are much greater.

[Mando Knight]

It's also very important to note in regards to stormtrooper blasters that Princess Leia takes a direct hit on her bare arm from one at close range and doesn't suffer any kind of significant injury.
That speaks volumes for the effectiveness of stormtrooper lasers.
On the other hand, the same weapon has been seen to take a hole out of a wall, and another shot OHKOs R2, and the weapon is also used to kill stormtroopers effortlessly (when in the heroes' hands) and mow down the security team of an entire high-priority Rebel vessel with minimal casualties (during the boarding of the Tantive IV).

AT-ATs are a joke; just shoot the neck, it's a critical point on the vehicle AND more weakly armored than the rest of it. Boom goes the dynamite.
Yes, it's a weakness. However, you need to outflank the walker in order to reliably target it, as otherwise it will likely just turn its head to block your line of sight, then shoot you with its cannons (which, though small compared to the vehicle size, are just one step below turbolasers... which the walkers do get outfitted with after Endor). Since the walkers operate in a staggered formation with AT-STs to guard them from close-range assault, it could prove difficult, especially if a leader such as Veers or Thrawn was at the helm of the operation.

Alternatively, you can just get forces behind them and laugh at their utter inability to do anything to combat you.
AT-STs often flank the AT-ATs for just that reason. Also, AT-ATs are capable of turning and moving surprisingly quickly for their bulk and walking mechanisms.

If AT-ATs have frigate-rated armor, how come they can't break through a crappy tow cable?
Hero units (Literally. Skywalker's Rogue Squadron was the only source of downed walkers on Hoth in G-canon, and in C-canon the others were taken down by Dash Rendar and Renegade Squadron). Also, the cable was likely a durasteel (or similar material) cable with high tensile strength. After the Battle of Hoth, Veers wrote up some additional tactics and proposed changes to the walker design to avoid that happening again... likely involving AT-STs shooting out the cables, focusing on anything trying to trip up the walker, and standing put with the legs spread while the opponent cabled up the walker, then move the legs together and walk over the fallen cable.

And what's "frigate rated armour" anyway- a metre of a metal a bit ( a lot?) tougher than steel? A foot? More? Less?

Given how small Star Wars frigates are, I'd imagine that's not saying much. "Frigate-rated" armor in wet navy terms is not exactly impressive, and the size discrepancies between SW capital ships and frigates are much greater.
I was using the term loosely, as a term to describe ships sized between corvettes (such as CEC CR90 corvettes like the Tantive IV) and full capital ships (i.e. Venator-class Star Destroyers, MC80 cruisers, or ISDs), which is how much of the SW galaxy treats the term (for example, the Nebulon-B Frigate, the Victory-class Star Destroyer, and Alliance Assault Frigates are all occasionally called frigates... though only the Nebulon-B should be a "frigate" while the others are "cruisers"). For a land vehicle, having armor plating like that is fairly impressive. It's probably between half a meter and a meter thick armor of durasteel and composites, and is capable of shrugging off turret fire (simply interrupting its walking motion when hit), or most anything short of heavy artillery (sources: Star Wars Encyclopedia and Star Wars: Behind the Magic) as far as ground forces go. Unless you shoot the neck or underbelly, which are more vulnerable, but still probably about as armored as a light or medium tank (respectively).

[Tazar]

Hero units?

Anyways, it's child's play for the Dominion to simply drop armored units behind an Imperial force with Dropships. Dominion does rapid-insertion stuff like that all the time, and Dropships are capable of carrying Siege Tanks, Goliaths and Thors.

Regarding blasters, no matter what they do to walls, I think it's pretty clear that their lethality in anything besides a direct hit to a vital area is quite low; if you shoot an unarmored person, like the Tantive IV guards (why were they unarmored, anyways?) or a stormtrooper (close enough to unarmored, :smallwink: ) in the chest or head they'll die, but anywhere else will be only a minor injury, likely. And R2 is not permanently damaged by that blaster shot.
Gauss rifles do a lot more actual impact damage and will likely have a much higher degree of actual fatalities as compared to minor injuries. When you add the ability of Medics to instantly regenerate Marine armor with nanobots it ends pretty poorly for stormtroopers.

And oh yes, Veers, the tactical genius who apparently can't even tell his walkers to stand still if cabled so they don't fall over and die. He leads an assault against an enemy with literally no weapon capable of damaging his forces and loses a significant amount of his troops. Forgive me for not being impressed.

[Mando Knight]

Hero units?Rogue Squadron. Like the Odin walker, they're classified as "hero units" whenever they appear in a strategy game: they can take and deliver more punishment than a normal unit of their type, and can turn the tide of battle all on their own.
And oh yes, Veers, the tactical genius who apparently can't even tell his walkers to stand still if cabled so they don't fall over and die. He leads an assault against an enemy with literally no weapon capable of damaging his forces and loses a significant amount of his troops. Forgive me for not being impressed.He was up against Rogue Squadron without orbital support, and only lost a few AT-ATs and assorted light vehicles. Considering what else the Rogues are capable of, I am impressed.

Also, regarding dropships: AT-AAs (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/AT-AA), if not TIE swarms. Pretty difficult to get aircraft behind enemy lines when they're attacked by dedicated anti-air assault platforms. Sure, they're weak on their own against ground assault, but it's a mobile combined electronic warfare/missile-based air defense system.

[Fjolnir]

The thing is, the empire should have went with the AT-AA model for ALL of their armored walkers, because it's almost logically arranged for a war vehicle. I can see the AT-ST being taller to give it better all terrain movement but the AT-AT should have been lower and given more armament...

Also, I do love that wookiepedia and memory alpha will link me to articles like "Screwdriver" and "Hammer" as related articles in reference to almost anything...

[Tazar]

Rogue Squadron. Like the Odin walker, they're classified as "hero units" whenever they appear in a strategy game: they can take and deliver more punishment than a normal unit of their type, and can turn the tide of battle all on their own.He was up against Rogue Squadron without orbital support, and only lost a few AT-ATs and assorted light vehicles. Considering what else the Rogues are capable of, I am impressed.

Also, regarding dropships: AT-AAs (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/AT-AA), if not TIE swarms. Pretty difficult to get aircraft behind enemy lines when they're attacked by dedicated anti-air assault platforms. Sure, they're weak on their own against ground assault, but it's a mobile combined electronic warfare/missile-based air defense system.

He was up against Rogue Squadron flying modified civilian airspeeders that couldn't damage AT-ATs, back in the days before Rogue Squadron was famous for doing crazy things or had all of its notable members. Plot armor carries no weight here, sorry. Literally all Veers had to do was order his walkers to stand still and no one would have died, but he didn't even think of that.

Being good pilots doesn't mean that Rogue Squadron's T-47s are tougher or more damaging than anyone else's, in any case. "Hero units" have no bearing here; this is a background discussion, not a gameplay balance comparison.

AT-AAs take down T-47s fairly quickly; how they would do against Dropships armored for space combat is another question entirely. The armor on T-47s is crap.

[Knaight]

[AT-AT armor is] probably between half a meter and a meter thick armor of durasteel and composites, and is capable of shrugging off turret fire (simply interrupting its walking motion when hit), or most anything short of heavy artillery (sources: Star Wars Encyclopedia and Star Wars: Behind the Magic) as far as ground forces go. Unless you shoot the neck or underbelly, which are more vulnerable, but still probably about as armored as a light or medium tank (respectively).

The Terran siege tank is pretty much heavy artillery. It has better range, far better mobility, far better speed, and can blow AT-AT units to pieces. In addition, the Terran Dominion can take down AT-AT units with infantry. Marines have the equivalent of anti-tank weaponry, considering their armor and all, each AT-AT can be locked down by one Ghost, run under by a handful of marines, and shot to pieces. Four infantry troops per AT-AT should do it.

For that matter, the Dominion has infantry troops designed against vehicles. The Marauder can certainly do plenty of damage. Then there is the Reaper. AT-AT units can't even fire upwards, all Reapers have to do is land on them.

In short, heavy ground forces are massively biased towards the Dominion side. Now, lets look at light ground forces. The Empire has stormtroopers and speeder troops. Marines can cut down Storm troopers just fine, there is a massive difference in rate of fire, and Marines have heavier armor besides. Speeders on the other hand can run circles around Marines, without any issue. That said, both the Vulture and the Hellion is more than a match for several speeder troops, particularly the Hellion.

Any Empire victory on the ground is going to be because of vastly superior numbers, which they have. Individually, their forces are absolutely pathetic.

[pita]

I think the power of Ghosts is being underrated.
They can shut off all and any machinery around them.
Think about that, when you talk about AT-ATs, AT-STs, Planet Destroyers, Basestars, Deathstars, or whatever other ships the Empire can muster.
Consider Nova's power: She can kill everyone around her with a thought. Read Starcraft: Ghost: Nova. If the Dominion brings her into play, they will have won, easily.

[hamishspence]

I think the power of Ghosts is being underrated.
They can shut off all and any machinery around them.
Think about that, when you talk about AT-ATs, AT-STs, Planet Destroyers, Basestars, Deathstars, or whatever other ships the Empire can muster.
Consider Nova's power: She can kill everyone around her with a thought.

How often can either of these techniques be used though- don't they take a lot out of the user?

[Mando Knight]

back in the days before Rogue Squadron was famous for doing crazy things or had all of its notable members. Plot armor carries no weight here, sorry.

Not famous for doing crazy things? Lacking its notable members? It already had the only side character (Wedge Antilles) to be a veteran of all three episodes of the OT, quite an achievement for a guy in a Mauve Shirt position, as well as Luke Skywalker, AKA Son of Skywalker (to the Emperor and Vader, at least) and the Kid Who Killed the Death Star (to EVERYONE), serving as Rogue Leader at the time. On top of that, a third future Rogue Leader, "Hobbie" Klivian, was in the group, as well as Wes Janson. They'd also flown dozens of other missions already, since the Rogues were formed around the two surviving members of Red Squadron shortly after Yavin, and Hoth was three years later.

Just who the hell do you think they are? They're the guys who did the impossible and kicked the Empire to the curb! Across the vastness of space and time, when the Galaxy speaks of Ace pilots, they refer to one team! The Great Rogue Squadron! (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nOikMxVgsp8)

[Knaight]

Just who the hell do you think they are? They're the guys who did the impossible and kicked the Empire to the curb! Across the vastness of space and time, when the Galaxy speaks of Ace pilots, they refer to one team! The Great Rogue Squadron! (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nOikMxVgsp8)

They were also driving civilian vehicles. What they have done in space is one thing, one would expect them to shred just about any Dominion fighter fleet as well, barring a successful Wraith ambush. On the other hand, their attack on Hoth damaged them, had it been Siege Tanks and Vultures they were fighting instead of AT AT and AT ST units they could have done nothing. For that matter, a ghost-marine team would probably take them down as well, they are driving around, stop suddenly, then get blown to pieces.

On the space note, for all of the advantages the Empire has, the Dominion has fighter superiority. Sure, the Empire can field several Tie fighters for every Wraith, and given that Wraiths don't fire seeking weaponry, Tie fighters can dodge shots. If it were only Wraiths and Battlecruisers the Tie fighter could inflict major damage. However, it isn't only Wraiths and Battlecruisers, the Terran's also have access to the Valkyrie. Each Valkyrie can rain rapid fire seeking missiles onto a squad of Tie fighters, and the Valkyrie is reasonably well armored, and can thus deal with Tie fighter shots. Its only capital ships where the Empire has an advantage.

[Tazar]

Not famous for doing crazy things? Lacking its notable members? It already had the only side character (Wedge Antilles) to be a veteran of all three episodes of the OT, quite an achievement for a guy in a Mauve Shirt position, as well as Luke Skywalker, AKA Son of Skywalker (to the Emperor and Vader, at least) and the Kid Who Killed the Death Star (to EVERYONE), serving as Rogue Leader at the time. On top of that, a third future Rogue Leader, "Hobbie" Klivian, was in the group, as well as Wes Janson. They'd also flown dozens of other missions already, since the Rogues were formed around the two surviving members of Red Squadron shortly after Yavin, and Hoth was three years later.

Just who the hell do you think they are? They're the guys who did the impossible and kicked the Empire to the curb! Across the vastness of space and time, when the Galaxy speaks of Ace pilots, they refer to one team! The Great Rogue Squadron! (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nOikMxVgsp8)

Um....
Even if they're as amazing as you're apparently touting them to be (despite the fact that they're 4 named characters and 8 expendable mooks on Hoth), the fact remains that Veers had no excuse to lose ANY walkers there. All he had to do was order them to stand still after being cabled and they're fine. He couldn't even think to do that?

One would not expect Rogue Squadron to shred entire Dominion fleets, either. The Dominion has its own ace pilots just as the Empire and Rebels have theirs. But this isn't Rebels vs. Dominion, so I digress. I think you may be allowing plot armor to tint your viewpoint a little too much here, though.

[hamishspence]

Not just that, but he'd already lost walkers to hazardous terrain on Hoth (probably stepping on fragile snowbanks.

[Tazar]

Not just that, but he'd already lost walkers to hazardous terrain on Hoth (probably stepping on fragile snowbanks.

Wow, really?
Great general, my ass. :smalltongue:

[hamishspence]

Wow, really?
Great general, my ass. :smalltongue:

http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Maximillian_Veers

And, he'd already been shown the vulnerability to tripping by one Davin Felth- in order to preserve his career at that time- he had Davin Felth reassigned.

http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Davin_Felth

[Forum Explorer]

I don't think lockdown would work on capital ships. Or anything building size+

Afterall it can't be used on sheild generators or buildings.

On the ground the GE does seem to be at a disadvantage. Though they do have snipers and missle troops to help as well. (Though I think they only show up in the Battlefront games so I don't know if that counts) I think the AT-ST's would be the biggest problem for the Dominon. Its quick firing enough to counter Marines, and can move fast enough to disrupt tanks. Still ghosts could lock them down easy enough.

Cloaking is being overstated I think. The GE do have scanners on the Star Destroyers, plus you can fire at where the missles are coming from. It is a nice advantage but its not enough to defeat the GE. For Ghosts it would be pretty useful, especially dropping tatical nukes on the GE's ground forces.


However the biggest reason the GE wins is because of numbers. They outnumber all the zerglings that the Dominon has fought and they are better then zerglings.

[Tazar]

I don't think lockdown would work on capital ships. Or anything building size+

Afterall it can't be used on sheild generators or buildings.

On the ground the GE does seem to be at a disadvantage. Though they do have snipers and missle troops to help as well. (Though I think they only show up in the Battlefront games so I don't know if that counts) I think the AT-ST's would be the biggest problem for the Dominon. Its quick firing enough to counter Marines, and can move fast enough to disrupt tanks. Still ghosts could lock them down easy enough.

Cloaking is being overstated I think. The GE do have scanners on the Star Destroyers, plus you can fire at where the missles are coming from. It is a nice advantage but its not enough to defeat the GE. For Ghosts it would be pretty useful, especially dropping tatical nukes on the GE's ground forces.


However the biggest reason the GE wins is because of numbers. They outnumber all the zerglings that the Dominon has fought and they are better then zerglings.

Lockdown missiles can be used on battlecruisers and carriers, so yeah, it works on capital ships.

Cloaking is huge because Destroyers are so vulnerable to snubfighter attacks. Sneak up with a bunch of cloaked Wraiths, alpha strike the capital ships, and leave; that's all that needs to be done. Moreover, Star Destroyer sensor suites will not be able to detect cloaked ships; capital ships in Star Wars are not equipped with the sensor capacity to detect anything cloaked.

Regarding numbers, this wouldn't be the entire Empire fighting here, as it's just one system; just as the entire Imperium didn't fight the Tau in the Damocles Gulf crusade, this wouldn't be the entire Empire.

AT-STs will be easily countered by Vikings, Goliaths, Thors and Siege Tanks, that's not really a problem.

[Mando Knight]

Not just that, but he'd already lost walkers to hazardous terrain on Hoth (probably stepping on fragile snowbanks.

It was a treacherous ice flow, and none of the walkers were directly under Veer's supervision at the time. Colonel Starck (the commander of the group going through the flow) was an idiot that wanted to impress Vader by running a sneak attack through the valley.

[Tazar]

It was a treacherous ice flow, and none of the walkers were directly under Veer's supervision at the time. Colonel Starck (the commander of the group going through the flow) was an idiot that wanted to impress Vader by running a sneak attack through the valley.

So Veers, the overall commander of the ground attack with control over all ground forces, allowed one of his officers to subordinate him and lose his forces in the process?

Doesn't look good any way you look at it.

[Knaight]

I don't think lockdown would work on capital ships. Or anything building size+

In setting, several lockdown vulnerable targets are building sized plus. It works on Colossi, it works on the Mothership, and it works on both Science Vessels and Battlecruisers, all of which are bigger than several types of buildings completely immune to lockdown. It just doesn't appear to work on immobile targets.

[Forum Explorer]

Lockdown missiles can be used on battlecruisers and carriers, so yeah, it works on capital ships.

Cloaking is huge because Destroyers are so vulnerable to snubfighter attacks. Sneak up with a bunch of cloaked Wraiths, alpha strike the capital ships, and leave; that's all that needs to be done. Moreover, Star Destroyer sensor suites will not be able to detect cloaked ships; capital ships in Star Wars are not equipped with the sensor capacity to detect anything cloaked.

Regarding numbers, this wouldn't be the entire Empire fighting here, as it's just one system; just as the entire Imperium didn't fight the Tau in the Damocles Gulf crusade, this wouldn't be the entire Empire.

AT-STs will be easily countered by Vikings, Goliaths, Thors and Siege Tanks, that's not really a problem.

But a Star Destroyer is much bigger than a BC or Carrier.

True enough, I'll leave that one to someone with better knowladge of Star Wars to defend.

Also a good point.

There some varients of the AT series that I'm too lazy to look up. (hopefully someone will do it for me and save me the trouble :smalltongue:) They could cause some trouble as well. Like the spider ones or the ?tripods? :smallconfused:

The speeders could sneak attack the Dominons bases, disrupting resource gathering and blowing up supply depots. (Though that would require a compentent leader :smalltongue:)

[Tazar]

Yeah, MT-AT or something? I think I know the spider one.

I'd still be inclined to give the Dominion the ground advantage, because they do have Vultures and Hellions as fast skirmishng units. And Spider Mines. ^^

The Empire's undoubtedly got an advantage in space, it'd basically come down to whether cloaked Wraiths can take down Star Destroyers.

[Forum Explorer]

Can the Dominion use its entire force to try and take this planet? Because otherwise I think the GE can make it too difficult to claim the planet first.

Yeah the Dominion would be better on the ground, I'm just saying it wouldn't be a total curbstomp

[stcfg]

The empire has sensors that can detect cloaked ships (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Crystal_Gravitational_Trap). Force users can also detect cloaked ships.

Cloaked wraiths may other a nasty surprise but I doubt they will turn the tide against the numbers of the empire.

[Knaight]

But a Star Destroyer is much bigger than a BC or Carrier.

Not really. Scale is distorted heavily in game, but cut scenes and such indicate a fairly similar size. A Star Destroyer is bigger, but not by much, the Dominion can compete in space. Neither of them have an overwhelming advantage there, its not like The Dominion is trying to combat the Schlock Mercenary Fleetmind or anything, the Empire is within its reach.

[hamishspence]

This was raised in the Destroyer vs Battlecruiser thread-

http://starcraft.wikia.com/wiki/Bucephalus

and the Battlecruiser (SC2) is listed as 550 m- quite a bit smaller than the 1600 m destroyer.

[Irbis]

Terran ground forces will absolutely roll the Empire's. Marines, Siege Tanks, Goliaths, Medics, and Thors combine to make a very bad day for the Stormtroopers on the ground.

First, range of SW weapons is far superior to anything Terrans have (line of sight vs parabolic gun trajectory). Far superior fire-power, too, they level buildings, not have troubles with opposing vehicles. Second, SW vehicles have shields, that happen to laugh at any chemically operated guns. Third, stormtrooper armour happens to be nearly completely immune to small arms fire the marines have. Barring lucky hits, marines will little damage.

Hell, marines routinely lose to dog-sized animals with no armour at all!

Empire will stomp them even without noticing them.


AT-ATs are supposedly among the most intimidating ground units the Empire can deploy, and they can't even shoot at anything that's not in like a 180 degree arc to the vehicle's front. It's a complete joke of a vehicle.

As compared, to, say, Thor, Loki, Battlecruiser, Wraith, or a dozen other units with wonderful 0 degree arc (only fire straight)? :smallconfused:

Not to mention Thor-killing armaments with far superior range to that laughable array of mortars.


Furthermore, Ghosts will rip apart the Imperial command structure as they are assassins with which the Empire can't really compete.

Except, Empire does have cloaked commandos. The difference is, Empire's sensors do pick up ghosts, there are many examples of them picking cloaked units. Terrans most probably can't pick up superior Imperial stealth. Heck, let's assume they can, it's not like Empire needs them to win :smalltongue:


Also, Wraiths with their ability to cloak and continue fighting would prove quite potent, as the Empire will have no practical way to detect cloaked vessels.

You mean, except CGT arrays, sensors popular enough they were a part of whole ship class suites? :smallconfused:

Or just regular SW sensors, thousands of years ahead of Terran ones? It's like claiming Sopwith Camel was very difficult to spot by observers, therefore F-22 won't be capable of using its radars to nail it.


In my opinion it basically comes down to whether Wraiths can somehow be configured to enable the Dominion to use them to take down capital ships effectively. Perhaps delivery of nuclear warheads?

By teleportation? First, wraiths, then, missiles? It's the only way that will work, pretty much.


Regarding SSDs, I'm pretty sure there were only like 6 or 12 of the Executor-class ones made? Don't know about any other random EU kinds, but there certainly weren't hundreds of the ones Vader uses.

Executor-class, maybe not, other classes, yes.


It is simply going to be an extremely expensive win given the size of the enemy force.

Expensive? :smallconfused:

As in, tiny blip on one of the sub-sector's worth of MilOps budget? :smallconfused:

[hamishspence]

Except, Empire does have cloaked commandos. The difference is, Empire's sensors do pick up ghosts, there are many examples of them picking cloaked units. Terrans most probably can't pick up superior Imperial stealth. Heck, let's assume they can, it's not like Empire needs them to win :smalltongue:

Which? Personal cloaking devices are very rare:
http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Personal_cloaking_device
and irreplacable after the planet that supplied the crystals finally ran out.
http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Cloaking_device


You mean, except CGT arrays, sensors popular enough they were a part of whole ship class suites? :smallconfused:
Rare and very expensive- even the New Republic during the Thrawn War had to try and steal one to deal with their cloaked asteroid problem.

http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/CGT


Third, stormtrooper armour happens to be nearly completely immune to small arms fire the marines have. Barring lucky hits, marines will little damage.

http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Stormtrooper_armour
It says "almost impossible to penetrate with a slugthrower". But it is vulnerable to "armour-piercing ammo". And hits that hit the eye lenses, or the bodysuit.

And "able to stop a blaster bolt" is not that impressive given how little damage a bolt does to Leia's arm.

Zerglings have armour- hardened chitinous shell.

[Tazar]

The empire has sensors that can detect cloaked ships (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Crystal_Gravitational_Trap). Force users can also detect cloaked ships.

Cloaked wraiths may other a nasty surprise but I doubt they will turn the tide against the numbers of the empire.

Again, this is not going to be the entire Empire vs the entire Dominion; both forces will be roughly equal in size, as they're simply fighting over one system.

As far as detecting cloaked units go, as hamishpence has said, CGTs, which are very rare and impractical in a battle scenario, were needed to even have a chance of detecting cloaked units. Ship-of-the-line SD's don't have CGTs.

A slugthrower is like a modern pistol; Gauss Rifles are NOT slugthrowers.
Again, I cite the example of a blaster bolt that effortlessly penetrates stormtrooper armor failing to even seriously injure Princess Leia with a direct hit at close range. A gauss rifle round would have taken her arm off. Stormtrooper armor is easily penetrated by stormtrooper blasters, and stormtrooper blasters are kinda crappy in terms of penetrating force.

I meant 90 degrees with the AT-AT thing, and there's no way they can turn around as quickly as Goliath or a Thor can. It's just such an impractical design in every way.

Star Wars vehicles are also not shielded; that is a blatantly false assertion. AT-STs and AT-ATs are not shielded in any way. No offense, Irbis, but you seem kinda uninformed.

[Mando Knight]

Lockdown missiles can be used on battlecruisers and carriers, so yeah, it works on capital ships.
Possibly. I can't see any man-portable weapon instantly disabling anything that's over a kilometer and a half long from outside the thing, especially since the weapon has limited range in ground-scale combat. The Star Destroyer is larger than the weapon's range. Furthermore, its ability to lock down extremely large vehicles seems to be a gameplay element, since it can't lock down buildings that are smaller than the vehicles... something that doesn't make much sense. The EMP shot from SC2 makes more sense as an ability, but is nearly useless against Imperial forces since only a few carry shields at all.

Moreover, Star Destroyer sensor suites will not be able to detect cloaked ships; capital ships in Star Wars are not equipped with the sensor capacity to detect anything cloaked.
That's because starship cloaking in SW is advanced enough to evade or disrupt any sensors other than sensitive gravitic systems. Since cloaked StarCraft units are revealed by sensors, I'd assume that they aren't as totally concealing as the starship-grade cloaks used in Star Wars. (Personal cloaking also exists in SW, but is detectable by various sensors depending on the nature of the stealth device. The Crystal Gravitational Trap is only needed for total-stealth cloaking such as the double-blind hibridium (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Hibridium) systems or the ultra-rare stygium (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Stygium) systems)

Regarding numbers, this wouldn't be the entire Empire fighting here, as it's just one system; just as the entire Imperium didn't fight the Tau in the Damocles Gulf crusade, this wouldn't be the entire Empire.
An invasion fleet from the Empire would still be the combined might of multiple Star Destroyers-full of troops and equipment, each of which could carry up to 20 AT-ATs, 30 AT-STs, and 9700 stormtroopers, or the rough equivalent in other units.

[hamishspence]

Some ships have "sensor-stealthed armour" which might fall into the intermediate category- the ship is visible (though typically pitch black) but the stealthing may make it hard to target.

In The Last Command, it says the CGT was designed to deal with "sensor-stealthed" ships- which may mean stealth armour as well as cloaking devices.

The Executor-class Star Dreadnought Night Hammer/Knight Hammer, was covered in stealth armour.

Person stealth, a la Ghosts, include:
http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Stealth_field
http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Shadow_stormtrooper

Maybe Wraiths would get something like that?

[stcfg]

Again, this is not going to be the entire Empire vs the entire Dominion; both forces will be roughly equal in size, as they're simply fighting over one system.


This doesn't make sense. The Empire that built the Death Star, a space station powerful enough to one shot planets, would not send an equal force to fight an enemy. They would send an overwhelming force, it's their style.

Besides, if they expect to hold a system important to the empire for any significant period of time, it will eventually turn into the entire Dominion vs the entire Empire.

[Forum Explorer]

This doesn't make sense. The Empire that built the Death Star, a space station powerful enough to one shot planets, would not send an equal force to fight an enemy. They would send an overwhelming force, it's their style.

Besides, if they expect to hold a system important to the empire for any significant period of time, it will eventually turn into the entire Dominion vs the entire Empire.

I think I mentioned something to this matter earlier. The Dominion could win initially but then the Empire sends in some serious reinfocements lead by a competant leader.

[dgnslyr]

Hmm, my biggest question in all this is who will be commanding the two forces? Are we talking about a typical Imperial general vs. a typical Dominion general, or will the Terran forces be commanded by, say, BoxeR?

Also, Imperial Star Destroyers captains will feel small and inadequate when they see the facial hair on the Dominion Battlecruiser captains, impairing their ability to fight even more. Hey, all those giant Star Destroyers might just be there to compensate for something, you know. :smallamused:

[Mikeavelli]

First, range of SW weapons is far superior to anything Terrans have (line of sight vs parabolic gun trajectory). Far superior fire-power, too, they level buildings, not have troubles with opposing vehicles. Second, SW vehicles have shields, that happen to laugh at any chemically operated guns. Third, stormtrooper armour happens to be nearly completely immune to small arms fire the marines have. Barring lucky hits, marines will little damage.

Hell, marines routinely lose to dog-sized animals with no armour at all!

Empire will stomp them even without noticing them.


What Empire are you talking about? You're certainly not talking about the one from Star Wars. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_Wars_Episode_VI:_Return_of_the_Jedi)

[Irbis]

Um....
Even if they're as amazing as you're apparently touting them to be (despite the fact that they're 4 named characters and 8 expendable mooks on Hoth), the fact remains that Veers had no excuse to lose ANY walkers there. All he had to do was order them to stand still after being cabled and they're fine.

He was ordered to reach the shield generator and blew it up. He did it in record time, sustaining small losses, and massacred the enemy.

Meanwhile, Terran dominion officers do all kinds of fancy manoeuvres, then lose to rebellions rabble, or, even worse, dogs.

Wait, who is incompetent here? :smallamused:


Which? Personal cloaking devices are very rare:
http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Personal_cloaking_device

Rare.

Let's check: Terror Troopers, (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Terror_Trooper) Shadow Stormtroopers, (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Shadow_stormtrooper) Storm Commandos, (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Storm_commandos) Shadowtrooper, (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Shadowtrooper) Dark troopers, (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Dark_trooper) and a few more units, hundreds of thousands of troopers, all had them. Yeah, very rare :smallamused:

Heck, many big non-Imperial organizations had access to them, between them Bothan spies and Corporate Sector.

They were "rare" even 4.000 years before the Empire, when every sith, jed, and most of their spec-ops personnel had one. Rare indeed :smallamused:


and irreplacable after the planet that supplied the crystals finally ran out.

Aaaand, not counting megatons of crystals already on the market, it was blown up, opening supply for a few more millennia.


Rare and very expensive- even the New Republic during the Thrawn War had to try and steal one to deal with their cloaked asteroid problem.

http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/CGT

"Even"? New Republic bac then had mere 10% of the Empire's territory, and lacked CGT because Thrawn sabotaged them! If you follow that link, you'll find a few scout ships classes, used both by Empire and (later) NR, running in tens of thousands of units.

Yeah, it is as "rare" as the above.


http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Stormtrooper_armour
It says "almost impossible to penetrate with a slugthrower". But it is vulnerable to "armour-piercing ammo". And hits that hit the eye lenses, or the bodysuit.

"AP" ammo, as 15 kg metal spear thrown by heavy-lifting droid's arm, so fast the stormtrooper haven't seen it? Made a small dent in a stormtrooper armour who had his back against the wall.

So, yeah, you can see how "effective" marines are going to be, save for already mentioned by me lucky hits, while every stormtrooper shot will penetrate their armour in return.


And "able to stop a blaster bolt" is not that impressive given how little damage a bolt does to Leia's arm.

The fourth most powerful force user in the Galaxy? Hell, let's go to ESB - then, they do nothing to Vader - it means they're harmless! :smalltongue:

Except, not, every single shot makes a hole larger than my fist in starship-grade armour. Terran Marines have plates less than centimetre thick on them in SC2 intro is any indication, so yeah.


Zerglings have armour- hardened chitinous shell.

Which can be easily cut by knife, as SC2 shows. It's not an armour in military sense at all. It is hardly any better than boiled leather, yet, Terrans lose to this.

I rest my case.


As far as detecting cloaked units go, as hamishpence has said, CGTs, which are very rare and impractical in a battle scenario, were needed to even have a chance of detecting cloaked units. Ship-of-the-line SD's don't have CGTs.

They have as many as they want, considering Empire controlled all CGT arrays in the galaxy, at least a few tens of thousands, if not hundreds, and deployed them where they wanted.


A slugthrower is like a modern pistol; Gauss Rifles are NOT slugthrowers.

No? Tell me, what it is (http://images1.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20100728000522/starcraft/images/thumb/f/fc/U238DUAmmoBox_SC2_CineFireFury1.jpg/630px-U238DUAmmoBox_SC2_CineFireFury1.jpg), then?

Yeah, that's right, 8 mm slugs marines use. Scaaary stuff :smalltongue:


Again, I cite the example of a blaster bolt that effortlessly penetrates stormtrooper armor failing to even seriously injure Princess Leia with a direct hit at close range.

Leia. It is as valid as Vader example above. That is, not at all, as they leave dozens of fist-sized holes in the walls in the movies. Routine trumps one exception.


A gauss rifle round would have taken her arm off.

As in, leave tiny flesh wound like today's rifles? :smallconfused:


Stormtrooper armor is easily penetrated by stormtrooper blasters, and stormtrooper blasters are kinda crappy in terms of penetrating force.

Every single shot is as powerful as grenade. They literally flash-boild kilograms of metal.

Meanwhile, Terran marine lugs around upgraded AK-47 with a bit more powerful ammo.


I meant 90 degrees with the AT-AT thing, and there's no way they can turn around as quickly as Goliath or a Thor can.

Maybe check that scene where Veers sidesteps his AT-AT to quickly kill two snowspeeders? :smallconfused:

They just seem to move slowly because they're big, they are going more then 80 km per hour. They're in fact, faster than any SC2 heavy vehicle, no matter if we check official or in-game stats.

Oh, and even without that, they outgun them - Veers points at heavily armoured shield generator, presses button, it vaporizes. From three kilometers. Target larger than squadron of Thors stacked together.


Star Wars vehicles are also not shielded; that is a blatantly false assertion. AT-STs and AT-ATs are not shielded in any way. No offense, Irbis, but you seem kinda uninformed.

Well, except both games showing the battle, Galactic Battlegrounds, and Shadows of the Empire, do in fact point out that they can have shields, it being a relatively quick and easy upgrade. There are whole AT subclasses with them, especially later models. Base models might not have them, but once they notice the need, they can upgrade them pretty much instantly. Want a dozen sources supporting this? :P

In fact, leading AT-AT in ESB shows shield-like blaster shot dispersion once hit by ground rebel cannons, and one of the leading fanon theories why they were easier to kill after tripping was that the shield-generator was disabled by impact.

You were saying? :smallamused:

[warty goblin]

A slugthrower is like a modern pistol; Gauss Rifles are NOT slugthrowers.
Again, I cite the example of a blaster bolt that effortlessly penetrates stormtrooper armor failing to even seriously injure Princess Leia with a direct hit at close range. A gauss rifle round would have taken her arm off. Stormtrooper armor is easily penetrated by stormtrooper blasters, and stormtrooper blasters are kinda crappy in terms of penetrating force.


Only if you make the reckless and baseless assumption that weapon effect is without variance. This however is pretty much without basis in any form of reality of which I am aware. As it stands there is a large body of evidence in all the movies that blasters kill people just fine. That one shot did not is more evidence that with a sufficiently large sample one gets results on the far ends of the bellcurve (aka exactly what one would expect) than that the weapon is insufficiently powerful.

Also all that the Terrans using gauss rifles tells us is that they used a series of ring shaped electromagnets firing in sequence to accelerate a projectile. In terms of effectiveness this means exactly nothing. What matters with a weapon throwing physical projectiles is fast a round is, how massive it is, and its ballistics upon impacting a target.

[Forum Explorer]

Never thought about Leia useing the force to deflect that shot but I don't think that counts. Mostly because she was completly unaware of her abilities and the fact of the Jedi not being able to perform the same trick at the height of their power.

And 4th strongest isn't that good when there is about 7 force-users in the whole galaxy at the time. :smalltongue:


Also where do we see them shoot through space ship grade armor? I can only think of the scene where they shot at the Falcon and did nothing.

[Mikeavelli]

Meanwhile, Terran dominion officers do all kinds of fancy manoeuvres, then lose to rebellions rabble



What. (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/FlatWhat)

Your entire argument depends on ignoring the movies entirely (which is all most people are familiar with, and frankly, all that really matters) - and accepting the ridiculously overpowered expanded universe. Especially the points of the EU that directly contradict the movies.

[Mando Knight]

Never thought about Leia useing the force to deflect that shot but I don't think that counts. Mostly because she was completly unaware of her abilities and the fact of the Jedi not being able to perform the same trick at the height of their power.
Force Users have been known to activate abilities they didn't even know they had before. Being the daughter of Anakin Skywalker and recognizing Force telepathy from her brother before she was even aware she had Sensitivity are two more counts in her favor.

And 4th strongest isn't that good when there is about 7 force-users in the whole galaxy at the time. :smalltongue:
There were still around a thousand... it's just that 99% or so of those were either in hiding, unaware of their power, or loyal Imperials.

[Forum Explorer]

Force Users have been known to activate abilities they didn't even know they had before. Being the daughter of Anakin Skywalker and recognizing Force telepathy from her brother before she was even aware she had Sensitivity are two more counts in her favor.

There were still around a thousand... it's just that 99% or so of those were either in hiding, unaware of their power, or loyal Imperials.

Still you never see anyone but Vader do that trick, and Vader is encased in the best armor the GE can provide.


I know. But I don't think Leia would be consider 4th most powerful if you count all of them. Maybe having the potential to be the 4th most powerful but there were alot more who were more powerful or had the potential to be more powerful. (The witchs, Kip, and Mara Jade)

[hamishspence]

"Even"? New Republic bac then had mere 10% of the Empire's territory, and lacked CGT because Thrawn sabotaged them! If you follow that link, you'll find a few scout ships classes, used both by Empire and (later) NR, running in tens of thousands of units.
http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/LightStealth-18_Reconnaissance_Ship

Where does it say "tens of thousands of units"?

[Irbis]

In The Last Command, it says the CGT was designed to deal with "sensor-stealthed" ships- which may mean stealth armour as well as cloaking devices.

In fact, it can detect anything with even a bit of mass, as it does rely solely on gravitational field changes sensing.


Maybe Wraiths would get something like that?

That would be my guess, seeing as the only side with true stealth fields were protoss, and even those were detected by sensors.


Only if you make the reckless and baseless assumption that weapon effect is without variance. This however is pretty much without basis in any form of reality of which I am aware. As it stands there is a large body of evidence in all the movies that blasters kill people just fine. That one shot did not is more evidence that with a sufficiently large sample one gets results on the far ends of the bellcurve (aka exactly what one would expect) than that the weapon is insufficiently powerful.

Pretty much this.


Also all that the Terrans using gauss rifles tells us is that they used a series of ring shaped electromagnets firing in sequence to accelerate a projectile. In terms of effectiveness this means exactly nothing. What matters with a weapon throwing physical projectiles is fast a round is, how massive it is, and its ballistics upon impacting a target.

It's worse - the picture I showed shows ammunition pretty much identical to that of 30 year old G-11 battle rifle. It means they can't even build a true gauss rifle and that the majority of energy still comes from chemical propellant. Given the size of the bullet, I'd be honestly surprised if it carried any more energy than modern 12.7 mm or (at best) 14.5 mm anti-material rifle - while that it is impressive by today's standards, it is nothing in SW universe, heck, we have body armour capable of stopping this today.

[The Glyphstone]

When do marines lose to dogs, anyways?

Creatures the size of dogs - if you mean Zerglings...just because they're the approximate size of a large dog doesn't invalidate them from being genetically hyper-engineered killing machines. Based on the description of their combat tactics, they're more like psychotic miniature armored kangaroos with clawed feet and a scythe in each hand. Losing to one of those, one-on-one, isn't a huge strike against someone.

[Forum Explorer]

When do marines lose to dogs, anyways?

Creatures the size of dogs - if you mean Zerglings...just because they're the approximate size of a large dog doesn't invalidate them from being genetically hyper-engineered killing machines. Based on the description of their combat tactics, they're more like psychotic miniature armored kangaroos with clawed feet and a scythe in each hand. Losing to one of those, one-on-one, isn't a huge strike against someone.

And generally the marines win one on one fights. Those zerglings come in hoards.

I can't comment on the Dominon's guns I don't know the details of their weaonry but I doubt that if the blasters are more effective (which I doubt) then the Dominion would just steal some and start mass producing them. Or steal a single SD and get enough equitment and data to make this a much harder fight for the Empire.

Also I think the Dominon are used to fighting nastier opponents. The Zerg and Protoss are much worse (except for size) then anything the Empire faced and the Dominion held their own agianst them.

I think the only reason that the GE would win this is because of its sheer size. It has the rescources of a galaxy at its disposal vs a small group of gurrialla fighters that use spies and heroes to win. (wait does that sound faimiliar? :smalltongue:)

Still the GE would win if it took the Dominon seriously. Otherwise it would be close.

[Tazar]

Only if you make the reckless and baseless assumption that weapon effect is without variance. This however is pretty much without basis in any form of reality of which I am aware. As it stands there is a large body of evidence in all the movies that blasters kill people just fine. That one shot did not is more evidence that with a sufficiently large sample one gets results on the far ends of the bellcurve (aka exactly what one would expect) than that the weapon is insufficiently powerful.

Also all that the Terrans using gauss rifles tells us is that they used a series of ring shaped electromagnets firing in sequence to accelerate a projectile. In terms of effectiveness this means exactly nothing. What matters with a weapon throwing physical projectiles is fast a round is, how massive it is, and its ballistics upon impacting a target.

If you've read the Starcraft books, you know that Gauss Rifles make an absolute mess of people, and Zerglings, quite easily.

Regarding AT-ATs, I have the official vehicle guides, which are certainly more valid than gameplay evidence, and they mention nothing whatsoever about shield generators. Official vehicle guides > fanon theories and games.

Regarding Leia supposedly using the Force to stop a blaster bolt, that's simply nonsensical. She's completely unaware of her powers, so she can't use them to stop a blaster bolt, and the Force doesn't make you any more resistant to a blaster shot than anyone else, as Order 66 evidenced quite well. You can have the potential to be an amazing swordfighter, for example, but unless you're trained in those abilities you're going to be absolutely useless. Even if it's somehow subconsciously done, Vader has to raise his hand to deflect those bolts; Leia makes no motion whatsoever and has no time to react in any case.

And if blaster bolts are blowing chunks out of walls, why aren't they ripping apart the torsos of the Rebel troopers they hit? Or blowing apart the stormtroopers' armor? The "chunks out of walls" thing is clearly an eye candy benefit that is not substantiated by the effects of the weapons on humans, armored or otherwise, throughout the movies. What is substantiated is that blasters will penetrate armor fairly effectively but not do much more damage than a modern-day bullet to a human being, or armor.

Regarding cloaking:
Everyone is conveniently ignoring the fact that all space ships, Protoss and Terran, have sensors. Even the incredibly advanced Protoss capital ships can't detect cloaked units; it takes dedicated and sophisticated sensor arrays to reveal cloaked units, much like it takes CGTs in Star Wars.

[Irbis]

Never thought about Leia useing the force to deflect that shot but I don't think that counts.

She, despite being unaware, could use the Force. Just not as well as Jedi knight. 4 years earlier, on Death Star, she held for hours, under terrible stress, against both Vader's force-probe and the best interrogation techniques of the ISB. It is the only case in the entire EU someone held so long the interrogators gave up, even Jedi were broken from that.


Mostly because she was completly unaware of her abilities and the fact of the Jedi not being able to perform the same trick at the height of their power.

Energy dissipation (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Dissipate_Energy)? They can, easily.


Also where do we see them shoot through space ship grade armor? I can only think of the scene where they shot at the Falcon and did nothing.

On both Tantive IV and Bespin, which was essentially a big ship. They also tried to shoot through shielded armour of the Falcon, and would have succeeded had Han not destroyed that E-Web cannon before they fired.


Your entire argument depends on ignoring the movies entirely (which is all most people are familiar with, and frankly, all that really matters) - and accepting the ridiculously overpowered expanded universe. Especially the points of the EU that directly contradict the movies.

Ignoring the movies? :smallconfused: In ESB, Veers destroyed generator and drove broken rebels before him. In AHN, stormtroopers easily take rebel corvette against best or Alderaan/Rebel forces. Is there any other version?

As for where Terran commanders are incompetent idiots - well, there's the whole SC2 campaign, where Raynor makes idiot of of them, culminating in stealing their best combat vehicle and making idiot out of Mengsk by breaking his parade and kicking his arse on his throne-world.

Then there's General Warfield, Terran best general, who, like his idiot counterparts, insists on making full frontal charge against Char, which ends in almost-total massacre. Had not for Raynor, he would have lost 100% of his forces in landing, against dogs.

I'm pretty sure this kind of tactical skill will lose to the Empire 100% of the time.

Hell, remind me, when in SC or SC2 Terran dominion won anything when their forces were led by someone else than Raynor? I remember a constant string of catastrophic losses.


Creatures the size of dogs - if you mean Zerglings...just because they're the approximate size of a large dog doesn't invalidate them from being genetically hyper-engineered killing machines. Based on the description of their combat tactics, they're more like psychotic miniature armored kangaroos with clawed feet and a scythe in each hand. Losing to one of those, one-on-one, isn't a huge strike against someone.

It might be, but losing against psycho kangaroos when you boast you have power armour with thick plates, sensors, huge battle rifle, and enhanced strength, is, well...

Hell, their armour seems to be as useful as tissue paper, considering Raynor kills a Terran Marine with closed helmet by hitting said helmet with his fist.

That, and the Zerg don't have "warp" excuse of Tyranids, which means their bones are harder/sharper than Terran alloys, and the dog-sized animal is both stronger and faster than marine. It's the only explanation, considering armour always beats the sword made of the same metal, as it did in history.

[hamishspence]

And if blaster bolts are blowing chunks out of walls, why aren't they ripping apart the torsos of the Rebel troopers they hit? Or blowing apart the stormtroopers' armor? The "chunks out of walls" thing is clearly an eye candy benefit that is not substantiated by the effects of the weapons on humans, armored or otherwise, throughout the movies. What is substantiated is that blasters will penetrate armor fairly effectively but not do much more damage than a modern-day bullet.

Yup. It did say in the stormtrooper armour description that the armor won't stop a direct hit from a blaster bolt (maybe at near-point-blank range?)- and it won't stop an armour-piercing bullet, either.

As to the rifle itself:
http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/E-11_blaster_rifle
it has a maximum range of 300 m and an optimum range of 100m. Pretty short.



On both Tantive IV and Bespin, which was essentially a big ship. They also tried to shoot through shielded armour of the Falcon, and would have succeeded had Han not destroyed that E-Web cannon before they fired..

A door, is not the same as an outer hull. Nor is it clear that it was the blaster rifles that took the door down- they may have used cutters or explosives rather than simply opening fire on it.

And to say that the internal walls of Bespin corridors are "spaceship armour" is, I think, a stretch.

[Tazar]

Does anyone else see the logical flaws of accusing the Dominion of losing idiotically to a bunch of ragtag rebels to support an argument in favor of the Star Wars Empire? :smallconfused:

Also, Ibris, Raynor was able to compromise that armor because he was wearing power armor himself. Kind of like how 40k marines wearing power armor can actually damage each other in fistfights.

Furthermore, Mengsk successfully lead the Sons of Korhal to rebellion against the Confederacy in Starcraft 1, winning a string of decisive victories.

It's glaringly obvious that the Tantive IV door is cut down, not shot; you can hear hissing and see glowing around the edges, for pete's sake.

[The Glyphstone]

That, and the Zerg don't have "warp" excuse of Tyranids, which means their bones are harder/sharper than Terran alloys, and the dog-sized animal is both stronger and faster than marine. It's the only explanation, considering armour always beats the sword made of the same metal, as it did in history.

What's the 'warp' excuse of Tyranids, out of curiosity? The Tyranid and the Zerg are actually very effective analogues of each other in general terms, at least - their only real difference is in 'command structure', and in motives. They're both biological-based warrior races who function by consuming enemies and evolving new genetic strains based on what they eat. I've never seen a claim that Tyranids are only effective because they're infused by warp energies - like Zerglings, their bones are harder/sharper than Imperium alloys.


And...wait a second, when did Tyranids become involved in this discussion at all? This is the Dominion vs. Empire thread, the Imperium is nowhere to be seen.

[Tazar]

I'd still really like to know how you can possibly claim that the Dominion, an organization spanning a few dozen worlds and faced with attacks from two incredibly powerful alien races, losing to upstart rebels is worse than the Galactic Empire, the galaxy-wide, iron-fisted, utterly unchallenged militaristic dictatorship, losing to a few thousand rebels...

As far as appalling incompetence goes, Tarkin refusing to launch TIE fighters, Veer not ordering his AT-ATs to stand still, and the Emperor not defending that damn exhaust shaft all rank pretty high on the idiocy scale.

[Forum Explorer]

That link you gave said it was rare to be able to stop a blasterbolt with training. I don't see how an untrained person could do it when caught by surprise. Its more reasonable to assume that the blaster was just down to dregs of its powercell.

As for withstanding the interrogation, that just shows Leia's strength of will. It also didn't seem to involve much physical damage as she could run and fight with the best of them immiditaly after release.

The stormtroopers lost to teddy bears with rocks and sticks. I think the 'dogs' are a bit more dangerous then that. :smalltongue:

As for the Dominion incompatence most of your examples suggest that Raynor is just brilliant. Mensk himself is pretty good, considering he started the Dominion single handedly while fending off both the Protoss and Zerg. (Ok he did have Raynor's help)


So they would have beat the space ship armor on the Falcon with heavy weaponry? :smallamused:

EDIT:
What's the 'warp' excuse of Tyranids, out of curiosity? The Tyranid and the Zerg are actually very effective analogues of each other in general terms, at least - their only real difference is in 'command structure', and in motives. They're both biological-based warrior races who function by consuming enemies and evolving new genetic strains based on what they eat. I've never seen a claim that Tyranids are only effective because they're infused by warp energies - like Zerglings, their bones are harder/sharper than Imperium alloys.


And...wait a second, when did Tyranids become involved in this discussion at all? This is the Dominion vs. Empire thread, the Imperium is nowhere to be seen.

Well the SC universe is just a much toned down version of Wh40K anyways. :smalltongue: But yeah nothing is mentioned about using the warp to fuel their blades it just sheer numbers, strength and sharpness.

Though there are some huge differences between Nids and Zerg. The biggest being command structure the other being speed. Nids are crazy fast on the invasion to the point of planets not even getting off a distress beacon.

[Tazar]

I don't think it's even that the blaster was down to dregs of energy; these are the "Emperor's best troops", there's no way they would be using an ineffective weapon. It's been repeatedly demonstrated that blasters, while effective if they score hits in vital locations, don't inflict much collateral damage; the hit on Leia's arm is pretty consistent with this.

That's another moment of appalling stupidity; the "Emperor's best troops" lose to teddy bears. :smallconfused:

So, either the Emperor's best troops are appallingly bad at fighting, or the Emperor chose utterly awful troops to deploy to the surface. Either way, very, very stupid.

[Mikeavelli]

Ignoring the movies? :smallconfused: In ESB, Veers destroyed generator and drove broken rebels before him. In AHN, stormtroopers easily take rebel corvette against best or Alderaan/Rebel forces. Is there any other version?


The one where the Emperor's elite troops lose against Ewoks.

{Scrubbed}

[Mando Knight]

The capabilities of the Rebels have to be examined before discarding the Empire entirely. They were like the American rebels during the Revolutionary War... except you replace George Washington with a young psychic warrior whose father throws George III down a reactor core despite being the latter's Most Trusted General.

[The Glyphstone]

The capabilities of the Rebels have to be examined before discarding the Empire entirely. They were like the American rebels during the Revolutionary War... except you replace George Washington with a young psychic warrior whose father throws George III down a reactor core despite being the latter's Most Trusted General.

That would make the American Revolution a hundred times more awesome.:smallbiggrin:

[Tazar]

The capabilities of the Rebels have to be examined before discarding the Empire entirely. They were like the American rebels during the Revolutionary War... except you replace George Washington with a young psychic warrior whose father throws George III down a reactor core despite being the latter's Most Trusted General.

Simply comparing equivalent resources makes it a no-brainer, no matter how good the Rebels are.
Imagine if it was the American Revolution, all over again, except Britain controlled the entire rest of the planet, and then controlled thousands of other planets as well. That's the resource difference here.

I have to agree with the "t-word" explanation here, there's simply no other reason for such blatant disregard of facts. Accusing the Dominion of being ridiculous because it loses to upstart rebels just screams of that.

[Fjolnir]

The zerglings are using something similar to this (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horseman%27s_pick) in essence. They've got bones as strong or stronger than the power armor and the attacks put all their mass down on a single point, which CAN penetrate armor as tough as the metal it's made from. This plus multiple attacks, makes jarhead a sad panda...

[Irbis]

If you've read the Starcraft books, you know that Gauss Rifles make an absolute mess of people, and Zerglings, quite easily.

If you want, I can find you a few examples from the EU where blasters completely vaporise people. I limited myself to the core of both universes, as you plainly can't win against SW EU. :smallamused:

Plus, making the mess - were the people in question unarmoured? If so, we can replicate this feat today, with 60 year old AK-47.


Regarding AT-ATs, I have the official vehicle guides, which are certainly more valid than gameplay evidence, and they mention nothing whatsoever about shield generators. Official vehicle guides > fanon theories and games.

Better than movie evidence which suggests so?

Still, [shrug], the Empire plainly has shields on vehicles of similar size, meaning they could quickly adopt them, not that they need to - At-At has better range and armour than virtually any SC vehicle.


Regarding Leia supposedly using the Force to stop a blaster bolt, that's simply nonsensical. She's completely unaware of her powers, so she can't use them to stop a blaster bolt, and the Force doesn't make you any more resistant to a blaster shot than anyone else, as Order 66 evidenced quite well.

The same order where Jedi take more than a dozen shots to die? Shots that kill armoured men in one shot?

Nonsensical or not, that's what the canon plainly shows, even if we disregard the possibility she was shot with low-power blast, to capture her. It was standing order for all stormtrooper units back then.


And if blaster bolts are blowing chunks out of walls, why aren't they ripping apart the torsos of the Rebel troopers they hit? Or blowing apart the stormtroopers' armor?

Simply: Stormtrooper armor (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Stormtrooper_armor#Protective_measures)has various defensive measures, including Blast Energy Sinks for everyone and ray shielding for veterans/NCOs/officers. Every shot that hits them is dissipated/reduced from "certain death" to "wound, maybe heavy". The armour is designed to save wearer's life.

The same concerns rebels - they have blast-proof vests with sinks, yet, in their case, the armour is less durable and they do die after hit in most cases.

Armour actually designed to stop threats - yup, it might be inconceivable for SC Marines :smalltongue:


Everyone is conveniently ignoring the fact that all space ships, Protoss and Terran, have sensors. Even the incredibly advanced Protoss capital ships can't detect cloaked units; it takes dedicated and sophisticated sensor arrays to reveal cloaked units, much like it takes CGTs in Star Wars.

So? They have Terran grade sensors. It's like saying decimetre-long wave radar from 1940 is as good as millimetre radar from 2010 with computer signal processing. The difference in technologies between SC and SW is far greater than that, btw, and even if standard SW sensors can't easily nail SC ships, they have sensors SC can't fool at all.


Yup. It did say in the stormtrooper armour description that the armor won't stop a direct hit from a blaster bolt (maybe at near-point-blank range?)- and it won't stop an armour-piercing bullet, either.

See above - ST armour is virtually immune to grenades, slugthrowers, melee weapons, even those held by abnormally strong users, like wookies or droids - you literally need anti-materiel bullet to pierce it, not hand-held.


As to the rifle itself:
http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/E-11_blaster_rifle
it has a maximum range of 300 m and an optimum range of 100m. Pretty short.

The movie version? It's not rifle. It's carbine (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/E11_carbine). And, the 300 metres is human limit, present in all modern rifles as well. Add scope, and the range surges.

True blaster rifles, like A280 (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/A280_blaster_rifle), can literally boil marine in his own armour.


A door, is not the same as an outer hull. Nor is it clear that it was the blaster rifles that took the door down- they may have used cutters or explosives rather than simply opening fire on it.

They used rifles set to continuous beam to cut the door, then detonated explosive to fragment it.


Does anyone else see the logical flaws of accusing the Dominion of losing idiotically to a bunch of ragtag rebels to support an argument in favor of the Star Wars Empire? :smallconfused:

Let's see: Dominion loses to everyone. Even dogs. All the time.

Empire? Kicks rebellion around when and where it wants. The only two losses they sustained in the movies were not to the rebels. They lost to Jedi, being with supernatural abilities. The most powerful in the Galaxy, I might add, despite lack of training.


Also, Ibris, Raynor was able to compromise that armor because he was wearing power armor himself. Kind of like how 40k marines wearing power armor can actually damage each other in fistfights.

It's a failure of the design, then, as stormtroopers are actually immune to melee weapons. Heck, modern armour makes you immune to these. A bit more thought, and they wouldn't make the entire front half of the helmet thin glass that could be pierced by pencil, they would have reinforced it. They had carrying capacity to spare.


Furthermore, Mengsk successfully lead the Sons of Korhal to rebellion against the Confederacy in Starcraft 1, winning a string of decisive victories.

Yeah, when he was led by Raynor. Just as I mentioned. Before that, and after, all he did was to lose. Heck, in Brood War, he ends up being the Emperor of 2x2 metre cell. Astonishing rate of success, I'd say :smalltongue:

[Tazar]

Aren't zerg claws kind of like 40k monomolecular blades, as well? I don't recall exactly but I feel like I've read something saying they are especially sharp in some way.

Mengsk is not "lead" by Raynor in Brood War; Raynor is the subordinate and follows Mengsk's battle orders. He's a soldier, not a leader.

[Lord_Gareth]

Keeping in mind as well that Raynor has experience with tactical situations and leading operations and strike forces, can afford to retreat, and knows all of Mengsk's tricks because he worked with the man. In fact, Mengsk taught him quite a few of them, as Raynor was simply a marshal working for the Confederacy before that time.

Re: gauss rifles - the ammunition are stated in the SC1 manual to be spikes that fire in four-round bursts. Armor piercing, explode upon impact after a few nanoseconds' delay. The weapons are designed to punch through power armor and, eventually, vehicular armor (though it should be noted that marines vs. tanks still has predictable results; the weapon designers just liked overkill).

The Ghost's rifle uses gauss technology as well, but fires explosive canisters rather than straight-up spikes. Longer range, slower firing rate.

[Tazar]

http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/E-11_blaster_rifle

Zero mention of "continuous beam" settings here; where do stormtroopers shoot continuous beams?

And Irbis, please tell me, which Jedi were flying spaceships or on the ground at the Battle of Endor, a resounding defeat (in space and on the planetary surface) for the Empire?

If you can provide evidence that SW sensors are more advanced than Starcraft ones, I'll believe you, but simply asserting that Star Wars tech is better because it's older is patently false.
Furthermore, the Protoss, a race more advanced than the Star Wars universe, cannot detect Terran cloaked units without sophisticated and dedicated sensor arrays. Protoss capital ship sensors CANNOT pick up wraiths. As Carriers are every bit as advanced as a Star Destroyer, and Protoss are an incredibly old civilization, Terran cloaking technology is clearly not as bad as you make it out to be.

[Forum Explorer]

I don't remember any Jedi taking a blaster shot to the torso and surviveing. I do remember them getting gunned down it what seemed to be overkill amounts of shots though.

And I think the biggest threat from the Dominion would be them taking and adapting their technology where necessary to quickly get up to grade. I mean within a few years of fighting the zerg they develop a device to counter them.

The 'dogs' are the weakest zerg unit. Sure some marines die to them but only when there are alot of them. Even today our troops would lose to a few hundred sucidal dogs armed to kill with no will of their own.

[Tazar]

Yeah, Irbis likes to repeatedly cite the Dominion as losing to "dogs" while both ignoring all the evidence presented for how lethal Zerglings are, disregarding the fact that it's never just Zerglings present on a battlefield, and overlooking the fact that zerglings attack in utterly overwhelming numbers.

Any battlefield with zerglings will be filled with hydralisks, lurkers, mutalisks, roaches, and ultralisks.

The whole point of the Zerg is that they never operate alone, they are a hive mind and attack coordinated as such.

[hamishspence]

The movie version? It's not rifle. It's carbine (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/E11_carbine). And, the 300 metres is human limit, present in all modern rifles as well. Add scope, and the range surges.

According to the Stormtrooper article, the rifle, not the carbine- is standard issue. Where's the evidence that the movie troopers are using the carbine version?

Nor does it say that this is the human limit- and that its range can be boosted with a scope. It simply says "Maximum range 300 metres"- this may be a limitation of the particle beam itself.

[Mikeavelli]

Simply: Stormtrooper armor (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Stormtrooper_armor#Protective_measures)has various defensive measures, including Blast Energy Sinks for everyone and ray shielding for veterans/NCOs/officers. Every shot that hits them is dissipated/reduced from "certain death" to "wound, maybe heavy". The armour is designed to save wearer's life.

The same concerns rebels - they have blast-proof vests with sinks, yet, in their case, the armour is less durable and they do die after hit in most cases.

Armour actually designed to stop threats - yup, it might be inconceivable for SC Marines :smalltongue:



Ewoks.




See above - ST armour is virtually immune to grenades, slugthrowers, melee weapons, even those held by abnormally strong users, like wookies or droids - you literally need anti-materiel bullet to pierce it, not hand-held.


Ewoks.




Let's see: Dominion loses to everyone. Even dogs. All the time.

Empire? Kicks rebellion around when and where it wants. The only two losses they sustained in the movies were not to the rebels. They lost to Jedi, being with supernatural abilities. The most powerful in the Galaxy, I might add, despite lack of training.


Ewoks.



It's a failure of the design, then, as stormtroopers are actually immune to melee weapons. Heck, modern armour makes you immune to these. A bit more thought, and they wouldn't make the entire front half of the helmet thin glass that could be pierced by pencil, they would have reinforced it. They had carrying capacity to spare.



Ewoks.

[Irbis]

What's the 'warp' excuse of Tyranids, out of curiosity? The Tyranid and the Zerg are actually very effective analogues of each other in general terms, at least - their only real difference is in 'command structure', and in motives. They're both biological-based warrior races who function by consuming enemies and evolving new genetic strains based on what they eat. I've never seen a claim that Tyranids are only effective because they're infused by warp energies - like Zerglings, their bones are harder/sharper than Imperium alloys.

What? :smallconfused: Pretty much all bigger Tyranid creatures use warp to power themselves and their weapons. One example - boneswords (http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Bonesword). Even WH40K writers are not mad enough to put muscles against technology, they need to give them edge to actually let them win.

Which makes SC marines losing to dogs that much more sad.


I'd still really like to know how you can possibly claim that the Dominion, an organization spanning a few dozen worlds and faced with attacks from two incredibly powerful alien races, losing to upstart rebels is worse than the Galactic Empire, the galaxy-wide, iron-fisted, utterly unchallenged militaristic dictatorship, losing to a few thousand rebels...

They did not.


Tarkin refusing to launch TIE fighters

As I said, uber-Jedi, had it been normal pilot, Tarkin would have been right.


Veer not ordering his AT-ATs to stand still

As I said, he was ordered to blow up the generator. He did, trampling the rebels into the ground. Loss of 2 AT-AT meant nothing to him, he would have lost tactically if he stopped.

Plus, it was one-hit wonder tactic, next thing Empire did, IIRC, was to bolt cutting edges to forward legs, and the problem was solved.


the Emperor not defending that damn exhaust shaft

He did.


As for withstanding the interrogation, that just shows Leia's strength of will. It also didn't seem to involve much physical damage as she could run and fight with the best of them immiditaly after release.

As I said, Leia done the impossible. Only the protagonists of other books lasted the fraction of time she did. She even had nightmares about the experience for years. But, she held. Against Vader and most brutal tortures ISB had to offer.


I don't think it's even that the blaster was down to dregs of energy; these are the "Emperor's best troops", there's no way they would be using an ineffective weapon. It's been repeatedly demonstrated that blasters, while effective if they score hits in vital locations, don't inflict much collateral damage; the hit on Leia's arm is pretty consistent with this.

You don't see why best troops might not mindlessly shot everyone, but appraise the target, see she was wanted, and adjust accordingly? :smallconfused:

They're not 'pray and spray' style troops.


The one where the Emperor's elite troops lose against Ewoks.

We must have watched a different movie, as I remember they took a few casualties, then ewoks literally broke and begun running, pursued by the stormies. Hell, Han Solo and Leia surrendered.

The fact that successful imperial commander was busy with making sure the rebels cannot infiltrate again, and haven't noticed the sliver of face of the AT driver visible was a bit different wasn't his fault, as without Chewbacca, a wild card, they wouldn't be capable of capturing it. It was literally one in a million stunt.


Zero mention of "continuous beam" settings here; where do stormtroopers shoot continuous beams?

"Continuous beam (http://images3.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20100627030152/starwars/images/thumb/a/aa/Mara_execute.JPG/251px-Mara_execute.JPG)" setting is so widespread you can find it even on smallest pistols. In fact, it was so widespread that Mara often used it in MJ:EH instead of her lightsaber when she had to leave as little suspicious traces as possible.

I didn't find pictures on the net, but if you goggle "Mara Jade: Emperor's Hand" comic (at least a dozen examples) or "Shadows of the Empire" (where Boba uses it against other bounty hunters) you'll find links to a few sites where you can see for yourself. I recommend reading them anyway, they're good :smalltongue:


And Irbis, please tell me, which Jedi were flying spaceships or on the ground at the Battle of Endor, a resounding defeat (in space and on the planetary surface) for the Empire?

You mean, besides the fact that Luke killed Palpatine, which broke his Battle Meditation technique and deeply schocked his own side? :smallconfused:

See the TIE crashing while pursuing the Falcon in the Daeth Star? It was backlash. Had the meditation hold for a few more minutes, they would have been all shot down.


If you can provide evidence that SW sensors are more advanced than Starcraft ones, I'll believe you, but simply asserting that Star Wars tech is better because it's older is patently false.

Ferret-class vessel (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Ferret-class_reconnaissance_vessel) are stated to scan the planet surface down to subatomic particles. From orbit. I wasn't able to find a quote, though, you'd need to google/borrow that book for yourself.


Furthermore, the Protoss, a race more advanced than the Star Wars universe

Um... Except... they're not. There is not even one feat of their tech the Empire cannot replicate, which is simply not true the other way around.

Protoss are far inferior to SW, sadly.

[Fjolnir]

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_727Oy4w4Obo/S4PN25ltEtI/AAAAAAAAAok/RPCjnD5BBqY/s320/004.+ewoks.jpg
The bane of the empire.

Though they were helped by Han Solo's dog...

[Tazar]

Irbis, can you direct me to the Empire's mass-teleportation technology?

Can you direct me to the psychic link the Empire has created between its entire citizenry?

How about the devices the Empire has to literally store someone's personality and memories?

You've also consistently ignored the fact that Zerglings are never the only Zerg unit on a battlefield.

The TIE pursuing the Falcon would have been shot down by the turrets anyways (and why were there not static defenses in the shaft?), and ordering the individually cabled AT-ATs to stop moving in order to avoid destruction would have actually increased Veer's chances of succeeding at his mission. There is literally no reason for those walkers to have been destroyed.

But primarily, please acknowledge the fact that Marines don't lose to dogs; they lose to these.
http://ui18.gamespot.com/1297/ultrahires_2.jpg

Also, how do you defend the claim that the Empire did not lose to rebels?

[Irbis]

Any battlefield with zerglings will be filled with hydralisks, lurkers, mutalisks, roaches, and ultralisks.

Ok, dogs, and also bears, elephants, and cows.

Hmm, doesn't seem to sound much better :smalltongue:


According to the Stormtrooper article, the rifle, not the carbine- is standard issue. Where's the evidence that the movie troopers are using the carbine version?

Difference between the two, is, between others, lack of stock. Which was the case in the majority of examples, IIRC.

Plus, in any sane system, even "rifle" version of the E-11 would have been called carbine, the "carbine" one being actually more like submachine gun.


Nor does it say that this is the human limit- and that its range can be boosted with a scope. It simply says "Maximum range 300 metres"- this may be a limitation of the particle beam itself.

Note that they carry E-11 in close quarters, on patrol duty. When you see stormtroopers outside, on Tatooine, they're carrying DLT-20As (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/DLT-20A_blaster_rifle), or actual E-11s rifle (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/E-11s_sniper_rifle) variants, with far longer range and stopping power.


Ewoks.

Yaaawn :smalltongue:

You have to lend me your version of SW someday, it seems to be quite different from what Lucas made.

[Forum Explorer]

Guants don't use warp, Carnifexes don't use the warp, Mawlocks don't use the warp, harpies don't use the warp, gargoyles don't use the warp. While warp tech exists in the Nid armies the majority of it doesn't. Even the boneswords are a special weapon that generally are only found in elite units of the Nid armies.

Please adress the points we've made about the zerglings. Actrually show me an example of the stormtroopers killing a buch of insane rancours or something like that.

We did see Ewoks kill stormtroopers in close combat. So the armor is much less effective then what you've said.

The Leia point I kinda forgot what I was arguing there. (I think it was that the interrogation methods were mostly physcological, mental or drug based not breaking bones or that sort of thing.)

I don't see why the stormtroopers would see a sabatogers in the middle of battle and decide that it would be a good decision to not kill them.

The Protoss can teleport with 100% accuracy, have body shields on everything, and can have basic troops create psycic storms. While most of these can be found in the GE its never as wide spread as the Protoss have.

[Tazar]

Elephants and cows, hmm?

http://www.gamereplays.org/community/uploads/post-23723-1266958717.jpg

http://starcraft.incgamers.com/gallery/data/530/medium/wallpaper-452266.jpg

http://homepage.mac.com/cheethorne/Starcraft/images/lurker.jpg

http://i589.photobucket.com/albums/ss337/Fallhammer/queen.jpg

http://ui18.gamespot.com/1297/ultrahires_2.jpg

http://images1.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20100215094932/starcraft/images/e/e4/Roach_SC2_Cncpt2.jpg


Protoss troops and weaponry is more advanced than Empire weaponry, their buildings are more advanced, their transportation is more advanced. Lightsabers are standard equipment for Protoss, even the most basic Protoss soldier has Force-like abilities, and they have personal energy shields.

Similarly, if Imperial tech is so great, how is an AT-ST destroyed by logs?

[Mikeavelli]

You have to lend me your version of SW someday, it seems to be quite different from what Lucas made.

The Return of the Jedi is not really a film, it's a love song dedicated to the idea of how everything you've said about the Star Wars universe is inconsistent with what we've seen in the movies.

Stormtrooper armor is clearly not invulnerable to all the things you say it is, blaster energy is clearly not dissipated by armor (otherwise the unarmored ewoks would have been blown in half!), etc.

[warty goblin]

If you've read the Starcraft books, you know that Gauss Rifles make an absolute mess of people, and Zerglings, quite easily.

So what?


And if blaster bolts are blowing chunks out of walls, why aren't they ripping apart the torsos of the Rebel troopers they hit? Or blowing apart the stormtroopers' armor? The "chunks out of walls" thing is clearly an eye candy benefit that is not substantiated by the effects of the weapons on humans, armored or otherwise, throughout the movies. What is substantiated is that blasters will penetrate armor fairly effectively but not do much more damage than a modern-day bullet to a human being, or armor.
For essentially the same reason why a stimmed up Marine runs faster than a Wraith: medium limitations and design intentions. The Star Wars movies are, at their darkest, PG-13, and you simply can't get by with shredding torsos short of a hard R. Lucas was making a cheesy adventure movie, not Saving Private Skywalker. Expecting that level of realism from the Star Wars movies makes about as much sense as expecting Starcraft to model armor penetration based on range and angle of impact. It's simply not what either are trying to do.

[Tazar]

So what?


For essentially the same reason why a stimmed up Marine runs faster than a Wraith: medium limitations and design intentions. The Star Wars movies are, at their darkest, PG-13, and you simply can't get by with shredding torsos short of a hard R. Lucas was making a cheesy adventure movie, not Saving Private Skywalker.

Regardless of the rating constraints, what happens in the movies is what happens in the movies.

The later ones got VERY graphic at some points, and they still don't feature blaster bolts blowing anyone apart.

My point with the Gauss Rifles is that they actually do more damage to a human target with a hit than a stormtrooper blaster does...

[warty goblin]

Regardless of the rating constraints, what happens in the movies is what happens in the movies.

The later ones got VERY graphic at some points, and they still don't feature blaster bolts blowing anyone apart.

My point with the Gauss Rifles is that they actually do more damage to a human target with a hit than a stormtrooper blaster does...

By that logic what happens in the game is what happens in the game. In which case Starcraft loses hideously because even their artillery has a range of a few hundred meters tops.

[Tazar]

By that logic what happens in the game is what happens in the game. In which case Starcraft loses hideously because even their artillery has a range of a few hundred meters tops.

Not true, actually; you can't compare a game and a movie in that sense, as a game has balance constraints, while there are no truly similar parallels in movie design. Ratings don't operate the same way.

Again, in Episodes I-III we see people chopped in half, cut apart, and have their skin burned off; if it was intended by the directors that blasters should have that kind of power, we would have seen it.

Also, I strongly suspect we wouldn't want Starcraft game balance to enter into this, as in that case you'd quickly have Marines downing capital ships. :smallwink:

[Forum Explorer]

Whatever the visual effect is the fact is that a shot to the torso seems to relibly cause instant death. So they don't blow apart in a spray of gore, there still just as dead, just as quickly.

[Tazar]

Whatever the visual effect is the fact is that a shot to the torso seems to relibly cause instant death. So they don't blow apart in a spray of gore, there still just as dead, just as quickly.

I'm not arguing that, blasters are clearly efficient at killing via direct hits; I'm just trying to point out that saying they're manifestly more powerful than a gauss rifle simply isn't true, as documented by both weapons' effects on armored and unarmored opponents.

[Forum Explorer]

I'm not arguing that, blasters are clearly efficient at killing via direct hits; I'm just trying to point out that saying they're manifestly more powerful than a gauss rifle simply isn't true, as documented by both weapons' effects on armored and unarmored opponents.

Is the guass rifle the one used by ghosts or marines? Cause I think the blaster might be stronger then the marines gun. Not as much as others have stated but enough to make a difference in a fight.

[warty goblin]

Not true, actually; you can't compare a game and a movie in that sense, as a game has balance constraints, while there are no truly similar parallels in movie design. Ratings don't operate the same way.


No. Building a game around artificial, designed balance is a decision, not a necessity. Anybody who has played any sort of combat simulation, whether infantry, vehicle, company or theatre level can tell you this, simply because these games aren't.

Designing around balance is in fact exactly the same sort of decision as how violent to make your movie: it's about what sort of product you want to make and what audience you are targeting.


Again, in Episodes I-III we see people chopped in half, cut apart, and have their skin burned off; if it was intended by the directors that blasters should have that kind of power, we would have seen it.


All of which are vastly less bloody than the effect of even a small caliber bullet on flesh, or what actual burns look like.

[Tazar]

No. Building a game around artificial, designed balance is a decision, not a necessity. Anybody who has played any sort of combat simulation, whether infantry, vehicle, company or theatre level can tell you this, simply because these games aren't.

Designing around balance is in fact exactly the same sort of decision as how violent to make your movie: it's about what sort of product you want to make and what audience you are targeting.



All of which are vastly less bloody than the effect of even a small caliber bullet on flesh, or what actual burns look like.

My point is, they could have simulated the effect, even with smoky explosions with no actual blood (like when bolts hit walls), if they wanted to indicate that blasters were that powerful. They didn't.

Obviously a combat simulation is going to be as realistic as possible; it's a simulation. RTSs are most often inherently very unrealistic as a genre.

[Irbis]

For the guy asking why Ewoks don't explode in the shower of gore - really? :smallconfused: You're asking this about PG-13 movie? That is, for kids? :smallconfused:

You have a charred corpse on which camera focuses for 15 seconds playing sorrowful music, which is the closest they could get to showing ewoks being fed into a meatgrinder and still retaining the rating, and yet, you ask why they make it even more drastic? Why? They already shown their ass being kicked as harshly as they could.


Irbis, can you direct me to the Empire's mass-teleportation technology?

Can you direct me to the psychic link the Empire has created between its entire citizenry?

Palpatine can easily do both of those using the Force. He specifically made sure no one else can.


How about the devices the Empire has to literally store someone's personality and memories?

Holocrons. Tech 6.000+ years old.


The TIE pursuing the Falcon would have been shot down by the turrets anyways

Except, in RotJ, even shaken Imperial pilots were not shot down and were destroyed by blast while pursuing Falcon out of the DS. Not-shaken ones kill Falcon before it fires.


(and why were there not static defenses in the shaft?)

Uh... You're really asking why there are no defences in a shaft that will be completely inaccessible in a few weeks? :smallconfused:

Modern ships also have no turrets inside.


There is literally no reason for those walkers to have been destroyed.

How many are destroyed in that way? One? :smallconfused:

You know, simple surprise?

How about Warfield killing 100% of his forces by frontal charge? That would have been the equivalent of Vader ramming every single of his Star Destroyers into rebel shields with no effect at all.


But primarily, please acknowledge the fact that Marines don't lose to dogs; they lose to these.

Is that a fan image? :smallamused:

Tell me, please, how it even hits the marine with these appendages? :smallconfused:


Also, how do you defend the claim that the Empire did not lose to rebels?

Because it did not? :smallconfused:

Both victories rebellion can claim were a singlehanded work of Luke, just as every victory of the Dominion was the handiwork of Raynor in SC canon :smalltongue:


Guants don't use warp, Carnifexes don't use the warp, Mawlocks don't use the warp, harpies don't use the warp, gargoyles don't use the warp.

You very conveniently missed all the units that actually do, down to having psychic powers, and the whole warp-based synapse thingy.


Please adress the points we've made about the zerglings. Actrually show me an example of the stormtroopers killing a buch of insane rancours or something like that.

Bunch of insane rancors. How about Battle of Maridun? (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Battle_of_Maridun_%28Galactic_Civil_War%29) Small Imperial convoy, half military, half civilian, faced tens of thousands of vicious, intelligent Amani, species so resilient they can even survive being hacked in half (in fact, two of them would regenerate from that), far more durable and intelligent than Hydras or Zerglings, and armed with blasters to boot - the convoy held through three days of vicious combat, stormtroopers being forced to scavenge the ammo from killed enemies to replenish.

The result? Little force kicked so much butt the entire planed coved in submission and decided to pay tribute to the Empire.

Then, there's pacification of Kashyyk, Wookies also being far more dangerous than Zerglings. Empire won that one despite numerical disadvantage.

Had SC marines tried to both of these, they would have been torn apart in 5 minutes.


We did see Ewoks kill stormtroopers in close combat. So the armor is much less effective then what you've said.

How many? One? :smallconfused:

One that was swarmed, IIRC, and hit in the joints. Plus, a few more in traps. That's all.


The Leia point I kinda forgot what I was arguing there. (I think it was that the interrogation methods were mostly physcological, mental or drug based not breaking bones or that sort of thing.)

They threw everything they had, including Sith sorcery and direct brain nanoprobing. All failed.


I don't see why the stormtroopers would see a sabatogers in the middle of battle and decide that it would be a good decision to not kill them.

Officers. They killed regular members of the team no problem.

All this proves Stormies can think ahead and are far better troops than marines.


The Protoss can teleport with 100% accuracy, have body shields on everything, and can have basic troops create psycic storms. While most of these can be found in the GE its never as wide spread as the Protoss have.

Read: their infantry does not have ranged attack, being forced to club enemy with his bare hands, the shields are so weak they have less HP than terran/zerg units, so called "basic troops" being equivalent of Jedi masters, and the rest being highly situational.

It's like showcasing Empire's capability by setting up Emperor's Hands as basic troops and secret techs as common ones.


Elephants and cows, hmm?

And? Draw a cow with glowing eyes and little spikes on skin, and it will be as terrifying as most of these should be :smalltongue:


Protoss troops and weaponry is more advanced than Empire weaponry, their buildings are more advanced, their transportation is more advanced. Lightsabers are standard equipment for Protoss, even the most basic Protoss soldier has Force-like abilities, and they have personal energy shields.

Read - they have one neat trick, where rest of their stuff is hopelessly mediocre by SW standards, therefore they're more advanced! :smallwink:

I'm waiting for proof psi-blade can cut anything more than tinfoil, Zealots have any force abilities, and, sorry, stormies mostly also have shields, and those protect from far more serious threats than Protoss ones do.

Protoss, in fact, don't seem to be that dangerous beside most optimal environment, as all you need to kill one (even supposed master) is to take batteries out of his blade, as then, a lone bear easily kills them, shields and force abilities notwithstanding.

The mere fact Terrans and, what worse, Zerg, give them run for their money, shows, in fact, they're not much ahead the other races.


Similarly, if Imperial tech is so great, how is an AT-ST destroyed by logs?

Normally - the exact same way the Vulture or Golith would have been destroyed. Kinetic energy doesn't care what carries it.

In fact, in SC, you see vehicles destroyed by spit and claws, not huge, cleverly placed logs :smallamused:

[Tazar]

I'm not even going to bother responding to your arguments because you have consistently ignored every fact you have been shown throughout this entire thread.

Kindly at least consider the posts of others before you post.

[Forum Explorer]

The first words I read in that article were "The battle was disastrous for the Imperials, with much of their forces wiped out" Still a decent example of how the Imperial officers handle pressure. :smalltongue:

As for the Wookies, I wouldn't say they are more lethal then the zerg. Mabey indivdual zerglings but lets see them handle a couple hundread thousand at the same time.

I'm not positive but I think those images are bonuses won from the game, or extras something along those lines. (maybe promo material? :smallconfused:)

The examples I gave were of lethal units that don't use the warp. Yes the Nids have warp using units and very scary powers. That wasn't the point I was trying to make. (oh and I forgot the Genestealers, Lictors, Rippers swarms, and probley a few more as well.)

A think it was a unit of 3-5 stormtroopers taken out by about a dozen or so Ewoks. It just shows that close combat is effective against that armor. So you have to go for the joints. That's so common I think evolution has come up with that fighting stratgy as well.

Cut off the head and the body falls is a common stratagy. Escpecially used agianst insurgant groups. Unless the stormtroopers were order to take them alive I don't see why it was a good decision to take them alive. Or use a stun shot to knock them out instead of wounding them.

The Emperor's teleport isn't as good as the Protoss's. As for the Protoss infantry not using guns... well I've been wondering that since the first game. :smallamused: Its likely due to balance.

[Tazar]

Don't bother, he's just going to ignore everything you say.

[Forum Explorer]

Don't bother, he's just going to ignore everything you say.

Now, now don't ruin my fun. :smallwink:

[Irbis]

I'm not even going to bother responding to your arguments because you have consistently ignored every fact you have been shown throughout this entire thread.

Kindly at least consider the posts of others before you post.

I have responded to every argument raised. To sum up, the only noticeable ones why Empire would lose were A) Ewoks, despite battle being won only by Han's trick, B) High Templars/Archons being somehow basic troopers, in the same way Vader was a breed of common officer, C) Veers being stupid because he hadn't had premonition the rebels had a completely new tactics and lost 2 out of 20 walkers he had to this, while completely crushing the opposition and reaching all goals he had to fullfill.

In the other corner, we have people with hopelessly outdated ships and ground vehicles, still using chemical propellant in ammo, making every possible dumb mistake when commanding, including avoidable losses of whole armies and planets, who were losing to normal animals. And they would supposedly held again someone competent.

Really, all it took to bring them down was one drunken man, which is supposedly comparable to Palpatine losing to galaxy-spanning rebellion and the most powerful pair of Jedi in history. What.

[Forum Explorer]

B) High Templars/Archons being somehow basic troopers, in the same way Vader was a breed of common officer, .


If I can get 30 of them in a fight they aren't close to being as rare as Vader. :smalltongue:

[LordVader]

>avoidable losses of planets and armies
>Death Stars I & II

[Lord_Gareth]

Irbis, I've got to agree with them - your fanboy is showing, and it's showing hard. You also forget that re: the Starcraft campaigns the player is actually part of the game world; that "Commander" they keep talking to is you. Raynor is a figurehead; the actual combat leadership comes from the guy behind the keyboard, representing one of many skilled tacticians the Dominion keeps on board. You consistently tout extraneous Star Wars fluff and ignore the supplementary Starcraft material, act derisive to your fellow poster, and generally fail to debate in a polite fashion. We're attempting to have a rational discussion here, and I'd like to politely ask that you take a step back and attempt to do the same.

[Irbis]

If I can get 30 of them in a fight they aren't close to being as rare as Vader. :smalltongue:

Want a pic from RTS game with 30 Vaders? :smalltongue:


>avoidable losses of planets and armies
>Death Stars I & II

>As mentioned a million times - both were due to Luke and Luke alone, essentially a cheat code by the Alliance.


The first words I read in that article were "The battle was disastrous for the Imperials, with much of their forces wiped out" Still a decent example of how the Imperial officers handle pressure. :smalltongue:

So disastrous thay A) survived; B) the Empire lost 150 troopers permanently pacifying the planet and making it loyal.

Mengsk can only dream of such stuff.


As for the Wookies, I wouldn't say they are more lethal then the zerg. Mabey indivdual zerglings but lets see them handle a couple hundread thousand at the same time.

A) As intelligent as humans B) tough enough to take blaster bolt and fight C) strong enough to rip your arm off D) almost equal technologically to the Empire.

And, the Empire took on the whole race, billions of them. With much smaller force. And won.

Mengsk loses even when he has parity with dumb animals.


I'm not positive but I think those images are bonuses won from the game, or extras something along those lines. (maybe promo material? :smallconfused:)

Still, they don't resemble the canon material, so are as useful in this discussion as picture of 4-armed Vader.


Cut off the head and the body falls is a common stratagy. Escpecially used agianst insurgant groups. Unless the stormtroopers were order to take them alive I don't see why it was a good decision to take them alive. Or use a stun shot to knock them out instead of wounding them.

To cut the head, you need to interrogate someone who knows where the rest of the cells are, to root them out. Especially if the officer in question happens to be the leader of the entire alliance, with highest reward in history on her head. This could be a factor too, don't you think? :smallamused:

If only someone told Mengsk that, maybe he would have captured the Raynor instead of being kicked in the g'nads.

Stun has relatively short range, alas.


The Emperor's teleport isn't as good as the Protoss's.

One person, from one side of the galaxy to the other, no preparations needed, vs stationary, big apparatus that has a short range and has to be set up earlier.


As for the Protoss infantry not using guns... well I've been wondering that since the first game. :smallamused: Its likely due to balance.

There is not even one picture of such a gun, so sadly, against Empire, they would have been about as successful as Amani, except less, as they had cowering fire as well.

[Lord_Gareth]

There is not even one picture of such a gun, so sadly, against Empire, they would have been about as successful as Amani, except less, as they had cowering fire as well.

Dragoons. That is all.

[LordVader]

Wookies can rip a human's arm off, zerglins slice humans in half.

[dgnslyr]

Zealots do not use guns! Guns are the province of cripples and cowards who hide in metal shells! A true warrior's only two weapons are his blades and his mind! :smallamused:

Yeah, it wouldn't exactly be fair if the Protoss basic infantry could shoot. The only "basic" fighting unit that can shoot is the Terran Marine, which makes it a bit special.

[Tazar]

I'd like to clarify for anyone reading this thread who doesn't know much about Starcraft, so you don't get the wrong impression:

The Zerg are a sophisticated hive-mind lead first by a very intelligent manifestation of their collective consciousness, and then by the galaxy's most powerful psion. They are not "dumb animals".

That will be all.

[Irbis]

Irbis, I've got to agree with them - your fanboy is showing, and it's showing hard. You also forget that re: the Starcraft campaigns the player is actually part of the game world; that "Commander" they keep talking to is you. Raynor is a figurehead; the actual combat leadership comes from the guy behind the keyboard, representing one of many skilled tacticians the Dominion keeps on board.

Nope. It was mentioned/retconned in SC 2 that this "magistrate" the player is in SC 1 never existed at all - it was all Raynor's work. He was the commander who won SC 1 campaign, which was referred to me the whole time.

The only time Mengsk ordered anything in SC 1 campaign was to leave Kerrigan alone to die, after which Raynor rebelled. There was no tactician, all the tactics came from Raynor. Only later the role was taken by General Duke, than Warfield, who both lost every single battle we see them in campaigns/storyline.


Dragoons. That is all.

A tank is proof the foot soldiers have any ranged weaponry? How? :smallconfused:

IIRC, not a single Protoss foot unit has any kind of ranged damage, the only one is Templar's rare psi storm, and Tassadars mini-ranged psi attack. That's all, the rest of their footsoldiers do melee. How it is advanced, again?


Wookies can rip a human's arm off, zerglins slice humans in half.

Any proof? Their arms are for stabbing, not cutting, that won't make the Dominion look any better :smalltongue:


The Zerg are a sophisticated hive-mind lead first by a very intelligent manifestation of their collective consciousness, and then by the galaxy's most powerful psion. They are not "dumb animals".

Who happen to be not-controlled 99% of the time, mostly acting on their instincts. Said psion only oversees general strategy, not controls every single on as suggested.

[Tazar]

http://starcraft.wikia.com/wiki/Purifier

[Forum Explorer]

Plus while individual zerg are mindless they are all guided by an intellect smarter than any human. They don't act on instinct unless you kill all the overminds/cerebrates nearby.

I think in SC canon the high templer are a battle unit, not a hero unit like vader would be. Also I would like to see that picture, it sounds either hilarious or epic. :smallsmile:

I think those images are canon. Probely are what the zerg actrually look like if the graphic cards of most computers could show dozens of them moving all at once.

Considering they had Leia and let her go I fail to see what recapturing at that point was supposed to do. Also since it was in a major battle over the control of the force field that was protecting my superweapon. I think it would have been better to just take her and Han out as fast as possible.

I was talking about Arbiters, or Motherships which besides creating a cloaking field can teleport an enitre fleet to their location instantly.

[Tazar]

Definition of a Hive Mind (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Group_mind_(science_fiction))

"single consciousness occupying many bodies..."

[Irbis]

http://starcraft.wikia.com/wiki/Purifier

Both instances are specifically not-canon, sketches from cancelled sources.

Want to see what non-canon things SW can bring to the table, including teleportation and crazy powers from Marvel comics? :smalltongue:

Aaaand, let's see what it says there: it was cancelled because infantry with non-sucking ranged attack, unlike that of the Marine, though weaker than SW blaster, simply massacred the zerg. Which is what would have also happened if zerg/marines faced SW troopers. Thank you for essentially closing the thread for me :smalltongue:

[dgnslyr]

Is cut content canon? What about content from unreleased games? Anyway, Zealots solve the whole "melee range" problem by running really fast. Nobody says lightsaber-wielding Jedi are ineffective, right? Why an expensive upgrade is necessary to run at anything faster than a brisk jog is beyond me, but hey, it's a game.

[Lord_Gareth]

Okay folks, Protoss/Zerg really need their own thread at this point, aight? We're getting off-topic.

[Tazar]

http://us.starcraft2.com/features/protoss/zealot.xml

"Zealots focus their powers exclusively on the pursuit of war. Focus crystals in their heavy forearm units enable zealots to channel their strength of will into blades of pure psionic energy - their primary melee weapons. Using a limited form of precognition, zealots can even predict enemy movements, striking with deadly accuracy and dodging attacks by inches.

Some zealots have even developed the ability to turn their body into pure energy for a few microseconds. This allows them to move at lightning-fast speeds and strike suddenly against an enemy that thinks they are out of range."

{Scrubbed}

[Irbis]

"single consciousness occupying many bodies..."

And yet, even Hive Mind, which was far stronger than Kerrigan, needed lackeys in order to actually control his forces.

In fact, isn't it the reason why Kerrigan remained on Char for 4 years? That one planet worth of Zerg was all she could easily control?


Anyway, Zealots solve the whole "melee range" problem by running really fast. Nobody says lightsaber-wielding Jedi are ineffective, right? Why an expensive upgrade is necessary to run at anything faster than a brisk jog is beyond me, but hey, it's a game.

Can they also deflect bullets with their blades? :smallconfused:

If not, they might have a 'small' problems with running into a gunline. Also, as I mentioned - when Fenix's blade broke, he lost to a single weak zerg, despite being Protoss equivalent of Jedi Master. Somehow, that doesn't sound too good. Where were his powers/shields/stuff back then?

[Tazar]

Hydralisks are 8 feet of solid chitin & muscle; I fail to see how that's weak in any capacity. How would an unarmed stormtrooper fare against a Wookie?

Regarding the lackeys, who do you think controls the lackeys? It's the Overmind. He may use Overlords to relay commands psychically, but Overmind/Kerrigan is in direct command of each and every Zerg; this is inarguably established by novels. {Scrubbed}

Zealots don't need to deflect bullets; as I have indicated, they have shields to stop them, and Jedi-like abilities to dodge shots.

[dgnslyr]

Yeah, Zealots don't do so well against guns, which is why you need to Forcefield your opponent to keep the from getting away easily, and Charge helps for closing the distance. Those Psyblades also hit pretty hard in comparison to guns, though. Also, they're really durable. Like, quite literally nearly as durable as a Siege Tank. Besides, Zealots are basically grunts, cheap as far as Protoss units go and something you probably want to transition out of.

[Tazar]

Zealots do pretty well against Marines in the fluff, as a rule. Applying SC gameplay to fluff gets a little wonky, as Marines shooting down Battlecruisers indicates. :P

[Irbis]

Hydralisks are 8 feet of solid chitin & muscle; I fail to see how that's weak in any capacity.

Simply - it's just chitin and muscle. Biomatter has a host of deficiencies cold steel simply doesn't have, which means Marine's power armour should beat it every time. It doesn't. Ergo, it's weak.

Simple iron knife you have in your drawer beat any and all chitin, keratin, etc claws, talons in our world. Zerg are designed, true, but so can be armaments, and with much greater ease.


How would an unarmed stormtrooper fare against a Wookie?

Poorly. But, give him a gun, and he wins against a whole planet of wookies.

Give marine a gun, and he (mostly) loses, as SC 2 showed too plainly.


Regarding the lackeys, who do you think controls the lackeys? It's the Overmind. He may use Overlords to relay commands psychically, but Overmind/Kerrigan is in direct command of each and every Zerg; this is inarguably established by novels. {Scrub the post, scrub the quote}

Overmind>Cerebrates>Queens>Overlords... this awfully resembles normal chain of command, and makes no sense at all if he indeed "commands" every zerg.

Unless that "command" is in the same sense a president commands all his generals and soldiers, which I suggested.


Zealots don't need to deflect bullets; as I have indicated, they have shields to stop them, and Jedi-like abilities to dodge shots.

This 'dodging' seems to apply only to melee. But ok, let's assume it applies to ranged combat as well. Still, it changes nothing - stormtroopers can lay a wall of fire that leaves no place you can dodge to. It's like they killed Jedi in Order 66. Stormtrooper armour also has shields - one that stops much greater threats than a protoss one. Ergo, it's stronger, else Protoss would've been invincible. It also has energy sinks - can protoss blade hurt a stormtrooper before he or his friends kill Zealot from the range where dodging is impossible?

Even if so, for the Empire, even 5 Stormies lost for 1 zealot is a net gain. Stormies can be quickly replaced - zealots can't.

Sorry, I don't see even strongest SC faction, Protoss, winning anything against the Empire. You can say it's fanboyism, but it is the same "fanboyism" that will lead to my declaration modern Navy of XXI century will easily trump Nelson at Trafalgar.

[Tazar]

http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Dark_Lord:_The_Rise_of_Darth_Vader
Stormtroopers take heavy, heavy casualties attacking Kashyyk, until the Imperial fleet overhead begins orbital bombardment.

Again, you attack other posts yet fail to support your argument with facts.

Also, good luck beating a tiger in a fight with a kitchen knife.
http://labs.getloaded.com/images/thumbs_up.png

[dgnslyr]

I have a feeling we made be getting a bit sidetracked; this thread calls for Terran Dominion vs. Galactic Empire, not Protoss vs. Galactic Empire, interesting as that discussion may prove.

Getting on topic, what's considered "canon" for either side? For the Empire, the movies for sure, but which novels are considered canon and which ones aren't?

Likewise for the Terrans, what's considered an acceptable source? Novels, or the game?

This is important, because Stormtroopers are notorious for their horribly bad aim in the films, and Space Marines are notorious for being directly commanded by Koreans formerly serving in the air force to take drugs while briskly running and shooting.

[Tazar]

I have a feeling we made be getting a bit sidetracked; this thread calls for Terran Dominion vs. Galactic Empire, not Protoss vs. Galactic Empire, interesting as that discussion may prove.

Getting on topic, what's considered "canon" for either side? For the Empire, the movies for sure, but which novels are considered canon and which ones aren't?

Likewise for the Terrans, what's considered an acceptable source? Novels, or the game?

This is important, because Stormtroopers are notorious for their horribly bad aim in the films, and Space Marines are notorious for being directly commanded by Koreans formerly serving in the air force to take drugs while briskly running and shooting.

Canon for Star Wars is the entire EU, but when the movies contradict stuff in the EU (Stormtroopers having shields, for instance) the movies win.

For Starcraft, gameplay considerations have to be avoided entirely; lore, books and cinematics are your best source for relative power and such.

[Forum Explorer]

Even using spears and axes I still would bet on a bear winning a one on one fight. The bear might not survive the fight from its injuries but you would be carried out. Sure there are examples of people taking out wildlife with their fists or sheer awesome but those are rare exceptions.

The Protoss seem to be very impractical when it comes to using their technology. They are more advanced but they seem to struggle with the basics in fighting. (Like using weapons) :smalltongue:

Getting back on track. Using what I know of both sides GE would win but take inital heavy damage and would need to use a competent commander, as well as special equitment. Basically they would need to take the Dominion seriously and actrually use their advanced equitment and supiorer numbers in practical ways.

[Lord_Gareth]

Getting back on track. Using what I know of both sides GE would win but take inital heavy damage and would need to use a competent commander, as well as special equitment. Basically they would need to take the Dominion seriously and actrually use their advanced equitment and supiorer numbers in practical ways.

Even then, the GE moves slowly. All those administrators and chains of command make things cumbersome and leave them vulnerable to competent hit-and-run tactics and information warfare. They might eventually take the system, but at heavy losses and the remaining forces of the Dominion would have all manner of goodies to hand to the R&D department.

[Fjolnir]

I think we determined in the first page that the terran dominion would most likely eat orbital bombardments and die, unless they start stealing GE tech, going underground, and running a proper insurgency, possibly siding with the rebellion if they can break themselves down into insulated cells rather than trying to go and repeatedly butt heads with the empire...

Also Hydralisks launch pointed quills that are of a similar density and velocity as the marines own bullets, which are designed to penetrate marine armor, it's the equivalent of fighting a bear armed with a rifle, who knows how to use it, with a rifle of your own...

[Lord_Gareth]

I think we determined in the first page that the terran dominion would most likely eat orbital bombardments and die, unless they start stealing GE tech, going underground, and running a proper insurgency, possibly siding with the rebellion if they can break themselves down into insulated cells rather than trying to go and repeatedly butt heads with the empire...

Re-read the combat conditions in the OP. They're not going for total annihilation; there's a tactical objective to achieve.

[MammonAzrael]

Re-read the combat conditions in the OP. They're not going for total annihilation; there's a tactical objective to achieve.

Problem is that the tactical objective is long term. It is a wealth of mining, and the operation will require sustained effort and forces. There is no quick and dirty way about it. Since there is a vast amount of this material both sides want, and glassing the surface of a planet, burning off it's atmosphere, or anything like that, is viable, then it has to be some type of mineral resource. But one delicate enough to not survive cracking the planet open for quicker processing. Therefore the Dominion would have to continue operations while withstanding the Empire.

I don't see that happening. Do you?

[dgnslyr]

How much Imperial Stupidity(tm) do we assume?

[Forum Explorer]

Well the Dominion would get set up first and can remain mobile. However the Empire can use these moving factories that take up resources and quickly make tie fighters and tanks.

As for Imperial stupidity, considering how valuable this resouce must be, I would guess they would have a good leader in command. So only in lower level decisions would we see the horrible mistakes.

[Knaight]

First, range of SW weapons is far superior to anything Terrans have (line of sight vs parabolic gun trajectory). Far superior fire-power, too, they level buildings, not have troubles with opposing vehicles. Second, SW vehicles have shields, that happen to laugh at any chemically operated guns. Third, stormtrooper armour happens to be nearly completely immune to small arms fire the marines have. Barring lucky hits, marines will little damage.
The Siege Tank has a parabolic gun trajectory as well, and can fire out of sight. SW ground vehicles almost all have straight shots, even those that don't were well within visual range every time they were seen to start firing (Episode I), as for the shields laughing at chemically operated guns, there is contradicting evidence. AT ST units can be knocked over by a primitive battering ram (Ewoks), artillery fire is thus more than enough to damage them. As for stormtrooper immunity to small arms fire, the marines are firing depleted uranium bullets, with a gun that produces some recoil even against powered armor. Given that stormtrooper armor doesn't even protect very well against thrown rocks (Ewoks) or getting punched (Han Solo, Luke Skywalker), that should go right through.


Hell, marines routinely lose to dog-sized animals with no armour at all!

Empire will stomp them even without noticing them.
Said dog sized animals are the product of nothing short of a living weaponry program that was refined for eons. Among other things it produced creatures that can morph into buildings, animals that can move through deep space, and animals larger than elephants with burrowing capability, quickly. Then there are the living bombs. Synthetic armor may be missing, calling them unarmored is entirely inaccurate.



As compared, to, say, Thor, Loki, Battlecruiser, Wraith, or a dozen other units with wonderful 0 degree arc (only fire straight)? :smallconfused:
The Battlecruiser and Wraith, as space vehicles, can operate with a 0 degree arc much better than anything else, they have more than that in any case, though it only fires straight. That puts them on the level of Star Wars spacecraft, and puts the Valkyrie above it. However, given that it was the AT AT getting criticized, it can be compared best to the Siege Tank, which doesn't have a 0 degree arc. At all.



Not to mention Thor-killing armaments with far superior range to that laughable array of mortars.
If the Empire has space superiority, then they have superior range. Otherwise, consider the fights seen. Endor saw extremely close range combat, to the tune of 100 meters or less most of the time. Hoth wasn't quite that close, yet still only saw straight shots, placing a hard limit on whatever the horizon was. Then there is the visual indication of no shots over 1 km on the ground.


Except, Empire does have cloaked commandos. The difference is, Empire's sensors do pick up ghosts, there are many examples of them picking cloaked units. Terrans most probably can't pick up superior Imperial stealth. Heck, let's assume they can, it's not like Empire needs them to win :smalltongue:[/QUOTE]
Why are we assuming Empire superiority here? Their space engagements consistently occur at visual range, automatic point defense is completely and utterly pathetic, which suggests the sensor end as much as anything else, and then there are more direct indicators of unimpressive sensors. A small ship can hide by staying close to an Imperial ship, as seen in the movies. Their stuff really isn't all that great.

Now, the Galactic Empire is significantly higher technology than the Dominion, its simply that it is extremely poor at actually adapting it in any way. Its why so much of it is so primitive in a lot of ways, and its a significant part of why the Empire has the losses it does. Consider the rebellion that destroyed it, it was tiny, and frequently operated off low technology (Ewoks are the obvious case, but the use of tow cables in warfare is just as bad), but had resources used effectively. For all of the power the Empire has, its sloppy, its poorly applied, its inefficient, and it can be destroyed by a far inferior force. That's a great deal of the point really, that the attitudes of the Empire are what eventually brought it down. All of which means, eventually, that it won't do very well in its various engagements, and that the Dominion will be able to do a lot of damage. It just won't win.

[Lord_Gareth]

One wonders exactly how much damage the Dominion can do with a fighting retreat once they realize they can't win - could they discourage the Empire from pushing through their new system to try and crush this new foe?

[Knaight]

One wonders exactly how much damage the Dominion can do with a fighting retreat once they realize they can't win - could they discourage the Empire from pushing through their new system to try and crush this new foe?

In space, they can retreat primarily with non-Wraith units, keeping up a constant attack with waves of Wraiths. Considering the size of Imperial ships, this is somewhat damaging but mostly nothing more than suppression fire against Tie fighters.

On the ground, as long as cover from space is assured, its a different matter entirely. A retreating siege tank line coupled with spider mines will make life difficult for Imperial forces, while the Dominion won't be taking any installations this way they can at least make sure that pressing an attack against their actual forces is unwise. That doesn't mean squishier, economic targets can't be hit, and if space superiority falls to the Empire, which it very well may, considering logistics, ground forces can be wiped out.

[Lord_Gareth]

When the Wraiths can turn invisible and TIE fighters pilot by sight alone, why do people assume the Wraiths will bother engaging the little gnats when they can be crippling capital ships?

[Ubiq]

Since the Ewok thing keeps coming up, I want the people bringing it up to perform a little experiment. Go outside and find a rock about half again as large as your head. Now pick it up and lift it up over your head with one motion. Don't bend your knees or elbows either since Ewoks don't have that luxury. Ewoks are a lot stronger than your average human. Having a rock that size dropped on you is going to do a lot of damage even if you're wearing armor. If nothing else, it's going to jar your entire body if it doesn't simply slam the helmet down on your head and kill you.

Even then, the stormtroopers had recovered from their initial surprise from being attacked by a group that massively outnumbered them and were winning up until Chewbacca took over an AT-ST. Had the Empire sent all of their forces, it'd have been over pretty quickly since the Ewoks had nothing capable of damaging that AT-AT we saw on Endor earlier.

I don't think they would make the same mistake had there been a technologically advanced species on the planet. They're going to send in far larger numbers with much better equipment and, from what we've seen in the games, there's just no way the Dominion can complete with those numbers.

One of the few EU books that included a lengthy description of a planetary invasion was, of all things, a Lando Calrissian book from the early '80s. In it, the Centrality, a tiny client state of the Empire (along the order of a couple dozen systems and none of them significant on a galactic scale) whose largest vessels were frigates, invaded the Renastatia system. The first wave suffered something like seven million casualties (near a hundred percent if I recall correctly) with the next suffering half that and so on. It took something like five or six waves of roughly similar numbers of soldiers before the invasion was a success.

The Empire has about one hundred thousand times as many systems under its control as the Centrality had and the latter still managed to commit thirty to forty million troops to the invasion of a single planet. If the Empire is anywhere near as militarized as a jerkwater organization like the Centrality, it would have troop levels into the low trillions. Since the Dominion's largest planets have populations in the low billions, the Empire could lose a thousand soldiers for every Terran they kill and still win a war of attrition with billions of troops to spare.

[Fjolnir]

Even then, the stormtroopers had recovered from their initial surprise from being attacked by a group that massively outnumbered them and were winning up until Chewbacca took over an AT-ST. Had the Empire sent all of their forces, it'd have been over pretty quickly since the Ewoks had nothing capable of damaging that AT-AT we saw on Endor earlier.

What about the 2 logs on vines trap they used to pancake that AT-ST? If their armors are similar, a strike with that to its head would be pretty much the end of that particular fight, though I agree a body shot might not kill it...

Also the Ewok thing kept coming up because someone repeatedly claimed that the terran dominion forces lose to dogs, bears, and elephants; in reference to the zerg. The other side of that coin is that storm troopers have lost at least one fight to actual living teddybears, who instead of attacking them with severe genemodded weaponry and superior numbers, used rocks and sticks.

[hamishspence]

being tripped, might also do more damage to an AT-AT if it falls over on solid ground, rather than on snow as it did at Hoth.

I'd say the AT-ST probably has weaker armour- but not necessarily all that much weaker.

I could definitely see a similar weapon leaving a hefty dent in the AT-AT armour, though maybe not caving it in the same way.

[Reverent-One]

I'd say the AT-ST probably has weaker armour- but not necessarily all that much weaker.

I could definitely see a similar weapon leaving a hefty dent in the AT-AT armour, though maybe not caving it in the same way.

An AT-ST is a mere anti-personnel/scouting vehicle, meanwhile an AT-AT is more than twice it's size and is one of the most heavily armored ground vehicles the Empire has. Their armor should not really be similar. I'm reasonably certain a Snowspeeder's lasers pierced AT-STs armor at Hoth, while the AT-ATs just ignored them.

[hamishspence]

In 40K terms, that could be Penetrating Hit with snowspeeder, vs Unable to Inflict Glancing Hits, with AT-AT.

If the blasters on the snowspeeder are the equivalent of multilasers (STR 6) that would put a maximum armour value of 11 for the AT-ST, and a minimum armour value of 13 for the AT-AT.

Making the AT-AT tank grade (same as the frontal armour on a Predator or Vindicator) but not Titan-grade (AV 14- as high as it goes).

The AT-ST, in this paradigm, would have armour comparable to the frontal armour of a Rhino- and greater than that of a Sentinel Walker.

On Princess Leia resisting interrogation- it's described in The Rise of Darth Vader. She is injected, Vader grabs her, and starts pretending to be a Rebel who needs the info- then giving her Force illusions of pain after she resists.

The interrogation only lasts "a few minutes", then Vader leaves, deciding she has been trained in mental and physical disciplines- but still not aware of her Force-sensitivity. And Tarkin immediately decides, when Vader explains, to try "the other way".

Nothing is said about her "resisting interrogation more severe than any in history"- nor does Vader seem especially surprised or alarmed. It's not The Force that does it- just intensive training. And as I recall, Rebal operatives normally receive training to resist interrogation.

[Ubiq]

What about the 2 logs on vines trap they used to pancake that AT-ST? If their armors are similar, a strike with that to its head would be pretty much the end of that particular fight, though I agree a body shot might not kill it...


An AT-ST is a light infantry support vehicle and scout while an AT-AT is a heavily armored transport. The latter's armor is going to be a lot heavier as a result. Even then, it's going to be harder to get an AT-AT to follow you into position to set off that sort of trap.



Also the Ewok thing kept coming up because someone repeatedly claimed that the terran dominion forces lose to dogs, bears, and elephants; in reference to the zerg. The other side of that coin is that storm troopers have lost at least one fight to actual living teddybears, who instead of attacking them with severe genemodded weaponry and superior numbers, used rocks and sticks.

The Ewoks heavily outnumbered the stormtroopers so they had superior numbers as well and ambushed them besides. People comparing the zerg to random Earth animals aren't giving them enough credit, but people who argue that the Ewoks are just teddybears are ignoring that they're really strong and quite inventive.


being tripped, might also do more damage to an AT-AT if it falls over on solid ground, rather than on snow as it did at Hoth.

And how would they accomplish that exactly? They tried to trip an AT-ST and it simply dragged them along. An AT-AT would do the same. Even if they attached the rope to trees, it probably won't accomplish all that much since I can't imagine that a rope made of vines by local craftsmen would be as strong as a metal cable made in a factory.

[hamishspence]

A well concealed pit trap- it moves onto it, the walls of the trap collapse, causing the feet to drop sharply, potentially enough to tip the thing.

The Rebels used lots of explosives to cause it to tip over in a pre-Hoth battle though.

Tipping sideways, is quite possibly going to be easier than tipping forward.

Logs, stacked several logs deep, and set in such a way as they can roll sharply sideways when triggered when the walker is on the log trap.

Trees, lots of them, cut so that, when the walker passes alongside a big set of trees- they can be triggered to all topple sideways at once- slamming into the walker and possibly knocking it over.

Basically, all the AT-ST traps, scaled up and modified to compensate for the walker being quadrupedal.

Why try to puncture the armour when you can topple it?

[dgnslyr]

Hmm, the biggest thing the Empire has in their favor are Star Destroyers. Those things are vastly larger than anything the Dominion has to offer, and can probably ROFLstomp the dominion fleet in a direct engagement. Any space battle is highly dependent on whether the Dominion Wraith's cloaking field is sufficiently more advanced than the Imperial sensory equipment, or if Ghosts can infiltrate and sabotage the Star Destroyers. Otherwise, the Empire will dominate the skies, and can rain down fiery death if necessary.

On the ground, it's a different story. In the movies, Stormtrooper armor did nothing. Fully-armored stormtroopers die as quickly as lightly armored rebels and unarmored Ewoks. Leia survives a blaster bolt to the arm with minimal injury; either the blaster was set to very low power, or Leia's clothes are all made of Admantium, for that silky, light-weight feel and the durability that can't be beat. Space Marines, on the other hand, can survive several bursts from a Gauss Rifle without dying; either they have really good armor or really weak guns. Infantry to infantry, the Empire seems outmatched, and that's not even going into more advanced units.

[Tazar]

When the Wraiths can turn invisible and TIE fighters pilot by sight alone, why do people assume the Wraiths will bother engaging the little gnats when they can be crippling capital ships?

This.

Hell, the Dominion can fly Wraiths into the hanger bays of Imperial starships and fire directly into them.

Science Vessels are worth noting; Defensive Matrixes might enable the otherwise greatly outclassed Battlecrusiers to stand a chance against Star Destroyers.
Are there any EMP analogs in Star Wars? Destroyers seem susceptible to ion blasts, but that's a whole different kind of weapon IIRC.

If Destroyers are vulnerable to EMPs, a combination of EMP warheads and Defensive Matrixes on the cruisers might enable them to stand a chance toe-to-toe with destroyers, if even for a bit.

It's also important to keep in mind this will not be the entire Empire vs. the Dominion-the Empire is only going to commit a portion of its forces. To use a real-life analog, the Korean War didn't see the entire United States army bearing down on North Korea, just an appropriate amount for the size of the theater of war.

So numbers aren't really an advantage for the Empire here, both forces are going to be appropriately sized for a system invasion. The entire Imperial Fleet isn't showing up over one system.

[Fjolnir]

Ion Cannons?

[Tazar]

Ion Cannons?

Yeah, I'm just not sure if they work in a similar fashion.

If they do, it seems that Star Destroyers are quite susceptible to EMPs; that could prove rather fatal in a space battle.

EMPs to knock out shields and critical systems followed by close-in engagement by Battlecruisers, Valkyries, Vikings and Wraiths might very well be the way the Dominion could win space engagements.


Point-Defense drones are also capable of intercepting capital ship laser blasts, which is something to consider. Dominion PD is quite powerful.

[dgnslyr]

What happens when a Ghost tries to use Lockdown on a Star Destroyer?

[Tazar]

What happens when a Ghost tries to use Lockdown on a Star Destroyer?

The Ghost using Lockdown is an abstraction; capital ships would likely be equipped with lockdown missiles, which are basically an EMP strike in the first place.

Star Destroyer shields will also be a nonfactor due to EMPs, which will certainly knock their shields offline if nothing else. So both sides will be unshielded; Star Destroyers still win because of size if nothing else, but shields aren't gonna help them much.

[TSGames]

:smallconfused:

Isn't the Terran Dominion way too small to compete with the Galactic Empire?

[G-Man Graves]

The Ghost using Lockdown is an abstraction; capital ships would likely be equipped with lockdown missiles, which are basically an EMP strike in the first place.

Star Destroyer shields will also be a nonfactor due to EMPs, which will certainly knock their shields offline if nothing else. So both sides will be unshielded; Star Destroyers still win because of size if nothing else, but shields aren't gonna help them much.

Considering the fact that EMP has a blast radius, it could be argued that each shot could knock out multiple shields, considering the average imperial strategy seems to be "Bunch up all the capital ships next to each other". After that, just let the Yamato guns do their thing.

Why did people assume that the Empire had a space advantage, again?

[Lord_Gareth]

Fun fact; nuclear blasts cause EMP shockwaves.

[Tazar]

:smallconfused:

Isn't the Terran Dominion way too small to compete with the Galactic Empire?

We've been over this; the entire Imperial fleet is not going to be committed to take over a single system, just as, say, the entire US army didn't deploy to Korea during the Korean War. Both sides will send forces proportionate to the area targetted.

And yeah, the EMPs from nukes are another thing to consider. This basically comes down to whether or not Destroyers are EMP-shielded; if they aren't they are up a certain creek without a paddle.

[The_Admiral]

Considering the fact that EMP has a blast radius, it could be argued that each shot could knock out multiple shields, considering the average imperial strategy seems to be "Bunch up all the capital ships next to each other". After that, just let the Yamato guns do their thing.

Why did people assume that the Empire had a space advantage, again?

Gigaton level lasers

[Tazar]

Gigaton level lasers

Are both contradicted and supported by established canon.

Let's not get into this again, please.

[dgnslyr]

What would "forces proportionate to the area targeted" be? How many Star Destroyers does that mean? And how many vessels will the Dominion be sending to fight back?

[TSGames]

We've been over this; the entire Imperial fleet is not going to be committed to take over a single system, just as, say, the entire US army didn't deploy to Korea during the Korean War. Both sides will send forces proportionate to the area targetted.


:smallconfused:

So if they're both sending proportionate forces, doesn't that still leave the empire with an overwhelming number advantage?

[The Glyphstone]

:smallconfused:

So if they're both sending proportionate forces, doesn't that still leave the empire with an overwhelming number advantage?

Proportionate to the area targeted, not proportionate to their total forces. They'll each send what they consider sufficient resources to take and hold a single star system against active resistance/a competent opponent. How much that is remains debatable.

[Tazar]

What would "forces proportionate to the area targeted" be? How many Star Destroyers does that mean? And how many vessels will the Dominion be sending to fight back?

No idea, it just means numbers will be roughly equal on both sides.

If anything, the Empire will be spread more thinly, as they've got 25,000 Star Destroyers and a million systems to hold down. The dominion's got hundreds or thousands of capital ships and a few dozen systems at most.

[TSGames]

Proportionate to the area targeted, not proportionate to their total forces. They'll each send what they consider sufficient resources to take and hold a single star system against active resistance/a competent opponent. How much that is remains debatable.
So then, to give the Dominion a fighting chance, we are assuming that the system is viewed as more valuable to the Dominion than it is to the Empire?

[Tazar]

So then, to give the Dominion a fighting chance, we are assuming that the system is viewed as more valuable to the Dominion than it is to the Empire?

Not at all; you're missing the whole point of "proportionate to take over a system" here.

If anything, the Dominion's relative amount of military compared to its total amount of systems is actually higher than that of the Empire's. The Dominion is far more of a military state than the Empire.

[dgnslyr]

Completely absurd theory here, but what if you landed an SCV on a Star Destroyer and built a Barracks and started pumping out Marauders?

[DaedalusMkV]

Re: EMP weapons. Remember that the Ion Cannon that managed to completely disable a Star Destroyer was A: far larger and more powerful than anything which could possibly be mounted on a spacefaring vessel, and B: only possible because Admiral Ozzel was stupid enough to jump his ships into the system within range of said Ion Cannon, allowing it to hit them while their Shields were still down from the jump. It would have taken more than one hit for even a weapon as powerful as that to actually disable a Star Destroyer. Under normal circumstances, Ion weapons are only slightly more effective at defeating a Star Destroyer's shields than an equivalent Turbolaser.

Assuming that Ion weapons are roughly equivalent to EMPs (not a perfect assumption, but the best we have to go on), SD shields would be able to absorb quite a few EMP effects before the ship itself started to be effected. So "heh, one EMP wipes the shield and makes the Dominion win" is probably a pretty false statement.

Meanwhile, both main classes of Star Destroyer have access to multiple Ion Cannons which the Dominion has no significant protection from. Battlecruisers are not going to be able to accomplish much of anything against Imperial capitol ships, because they'll be completely disabled by about the time they get into combat range. They're going to need to use Wraiths, which should be able to evade detection until they reach missile range, at least, and Valkyries to engage the Imperial space force, because in a battle of the big ships, the Imperials are just going to slaughter them.

Overall, I think that the Empire probably has a decent advantage in space depending on how small of a force they have to bring to bare, while the Dominion has a similar advantage in land battles.

[G-Man Graves]

Completely absurd theory here, but what if you landed an SCV on a Star Destroyer and built a Barracks and started pumping out Marauders?

No, see, you would start building reapers. And never stop building reapers. And then you win.

[Tazar]

How does jumping affect shields?

If the Millenium Falcon can come out of hyperspace into an asteroid field with its shields up, a Star Destroyer certainly can.

Source on the fact that those Destroyers had their shields down?

Regarding EMP effects in Starcraft; Lockdown, which approximates the effect of an ion cannon, can be removed by a Medic. This indicates that the Dominion got anti-EMP technology from the UED invasion; ion cannons will prove ineffective at knocking out BCs for any length of time.

[TSGames]

Not at all; you're missing the whole point of "proportionate to take over a system" here.

If anything, the Dominion's relative amount of military compared to its total amount of systems is actually higher than that of the Empire's. The Dominion is far more of a military state than the Empire.
You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G2y8Sx4B2Sk)

It is true that the Dominion has a higher amount of military force per capita, as well as a much higher average rate of experience and competency in its soldiers. However, the Dominion is nowhere near the scale of the Galactic Empire. The Galactic Empire is at least an order of magnitude larger than the Dominion in sheer number of planets.

If the Dominion determines that it needs to send fifteen percent of its total forces to take the system(a rather substantial amount), and the Galactic Empire determines that it needs to send three percent of its total forces to take the system, then the Galactic empire probably has a numerical advantage. This is what it means to send proportionate forces. If the Empire and the Dominion both value the system equally, then it stands to reason that they would each send the same percentage of forces to secure the system, which leaves the Empire with a substantial numerical advantage any way you slice it.

The Dominion has the advantage of experienced and competent combat leaders. However, this situation seems to boil down to a rather Zerg like scenario: against that many numbers they are simply not going to win.

[dgnslyr]

No, see, you would start building reapers. And never stop building reapers. And then you win.

But stimmed-up Marauders hit harder. They also take less time to build and require less gas, which can then be used to build Medics. They're also not made of papier mache, though it's kinda irrelevant here.

[Tazar]

You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G2y8Sx4B2Sk)

It is true that the Dominion has a higher amount of military force per capita, as well as a much higher average rate of experience and competency in its soldiers. However, the Dominion is nowhere near the scale of the Galactic Empire. The Galactic Empire is at least an order of magnitude larger than the Dominion in sheer number of planets.

If the Dominion determines that it needs to send fifteen percent of its total forces to take the system(a rather substantial amount), and the Galactic Empire determines that it needs to send three percent of its total forces to take the system, then the Galactic empire probably has a numerical advantage. This is what it means to send proportionate forces. If the Empire and the Dominion both value the system equally, then it stands to reason that they would each send the same percentage of forces to secure the system, which leaves the Empire with a substantial numerical advantage any way you slice it.

The Dominion has the advantage of experienced and competent combat leaders. However, this situation seems to boil down to a rather Zerg like scenario: against that many numbers they are simply not going to win.


No, I'm perfectly aware of what it means, thank you.

Let's say you have a square mile of land. Would the United States Army need, or send, any more soldiers to secure that land than the British Army, despite being considerably larger? No.

Same principle applies here; amount of force required to take a system has literally no relevance whatsoever to overall force size. It'd be more like, say, five percent of the Dominion military versus like .01 percent of the Imperial military.

[dgnslyr]

No, I'm perfectly aware of what it means, thank you.

Let's say you have a square mile of land. Would the United States Army need, or send, any more soldiers to secure that land than the British Army, despite being considerably larger? No.

Same principle applies here; amount of force required to take a system has literally no relevance whatsoever to overall force size.

The similar-sized army argument only works with similarly thinking armies. The Empire has ships to spare, and it's clear they aren't familiar with the idea of "overkill" when the decided to build the Death Stars. It's a good argument for a more reasonable faction, but frankly, the Empire isn't famous for intelligence. I have a feeling they'll either send in a ridiculous fleet or just a single decrepit Star Destroyer out of overconfidence...

[TSGames]

No, I'm perfectly aware of what it means, thank you.

Let's say you have a square mile of land. Would the United States Army need, or send, any more soldiers to secure that land than the British Army, despite being considerably larger? No.

Same principle applies here; amount of force required to take a system has literally no relevance whatsoever to overall force size.

...

..........

This is true if you disregard the size of the opposing force.

If each side is trying to take the system and is only going to be fighting the natives, then, sure, this logic is quite correct. However, if someone is sending forces to a location to oppose you, then suddenly the size of your force does matter.

Let's go back to your example. Let's say that two nations both want to occupy the same stretch of land. To avoid politics, let's say Canada and Turkey are fighting over a square mile of land in Mexico. If we say that it takes only 100 soldiers to hold the square mile, then that will be true for both sides. Turkey realizes this and sends 100 soldiers. Canada, on the other hand, sends twelve-hundred soldiers. At the end of the day, there's going to be a square mile in Mexico that belongs to Canada.

[G-Man Graves]

You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G2y8Sx4B2Sk)

It is true that the Dominion has a higher amount of military force per capita, as well as a much higher average rate of experience and competency in its soldiers. However, the Dominion is nowhere near the scale of the Galactic Empire. The Galactic Empire is at least an order of magnitude larger than the Dominion in sheer number of planets.

If the Dominion determines that it needs to send fifteen percent of its total forces to take the system(a rather substantial amount), and the Galactic Empire determines that it needs to send three percent of its total forces to take the system, then the Galactic empire probably has a numerical advantage. This is what it means to send proportionate forces. If the Empire and the Dominion both value the system equally, then it stands to reason that they would each send the same percentage of forces to secure the system, which leaves the Empire with a substantial numerical advantage any way you slice it.

The Dominion has the advantage of experienced and competent combat leaders. However, this situation seems to boil down to a rather Zerg like scenario: against that many numbers they are simply not going to win.

You keep using that quote. I do not think it is relevant where you think it is relevant.

If we were talking about "What percentage of their total force each faction would send", then yes, your argument would be valid. But since we are instead talking about "How many soldiers would faction X send to secure point Y" it tragically has no bearing on the situation.

[Tazar]

The similar-sized army argument only works with similarly thinking armies. The Empire has ships to spare, and it's clear they aren't familiar with the idea of "overkill" when the decided to build the Death Stars. It's a good argument for a more reasonable faction, but frankly, the Empire isn't famous for intelligence. I have a feeling they'll either send in a ridiculous fleet or just a single decrepit Star Destroyer out of overconfidence...

The overall Imperial command structure appears quite competent, and I really don't see any reason for them to send an absurdly large fleet to absorb a single system.

Another good example here is the Imperium vs. the Tau; two armies that think completely differently, and if anyone is known for overkill, it's the Imperium. Yet they were unable to crush the pitifully small Tau empire because it wasn't the entire Imperium vs. the Tau, it was just a task force.

@Skami-In the long term, the Empire may dispatch huge numbers of troops if they feel like it, but in the short term it's going to be only a small task force.

I think the fact that only a dozen or so Star Destroyers are sent to take the primary rebel system speaks volumes for what is an "appropriate force size" for the Empire. They're spread so thinly that they aren't going to be able to dispatch huge amounts of ships to take a single system.

In regards to your Canada example, if the war only requires 100 soldiers, they're only going to send 100; see the war in Kuwait. The coalition army sent was roughly equivalent to the Iraqi army in size, despite the fact that the armies of the coalition nations were much larger.

[TSGames]

They're spread so thinly that they aren't going to be able to dispatch huge amounts of ships to take a single system.

Strangely enough, I would think that this would apply to the Terran Dominion as well.

[dgnslyr]

Maybe the "dozen or so Star Destroyers" are just because of George Lucas's budget? Eh, I probably give the Imperials too little credit for intelligence. I blame the Imperial Stormtrooper Marksmanship Academy for my thoughts on Imperial (in)competence.

On the other hand, though, maybe cockiness will result in an insufficient task force? But then pride would dictate a much larger second task force...

[Tazar]

Strangely enough, I would think that this would apply to the Terran Dominion as well.

25,000 ISD IIs to a million systems; hundreds or thousands of Battlecruisers to a couple dozen systems at most.

Nah, not so much.

In any case, my point is that the forces both sides are sending will be roughly equivalent in size. The task force sent to assault a major Rebel stronghold is about the size of a task force sent by the Dominion to secure a random alien artifact out in the middle of nowhere.

[TSGames]

Maybe the "dozen or so Star Destroyers" are just because of George Lucas's budget? Eh, I probably give the Imperials too little credit for intelligence. I blame the Imperial Stormtrooper Marksmanship Academy for my thoughts on Imperial (in)competence.
You're not the only one who thinks that the Galactic Empire has incompetent leaders. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VuK-aLSZtNo&feature=related)

[dgnslyr]

The task force sent to assault a major Rebel stronghold is about the size of a task force sent by the Dominion to secure a random alien artifact out in the middle of nowhere.

So no more than 200 Space Marines? :smallconfused: Am I missing something here?

[Tazar]

So no more than 200 Space Marines? :smallconfused: Am I missing something here?

IIRC, the task force the Dominion sent to Bhekar Ro under General Duke was something like 12 Battlecruisers and accompanying ground forces.

I'm talking about a book here, mind you.

[G-Man Graves]

So no more than 200 Space Marines? :smallconfused: Am I missing something here?

Sure is confusing game play mechanics for accurate representations of strength in here.

[dgnslyr]

IIRC, the task force the Dominion sent to Bhekar Ro under General Duke was something like 12 Battlecruisers and accompanying ground forces.

I'm talking about a book here, mind you.

All right, glad to have that issue cleared up. So a dozen or so Battlecruisers vs. a dozen or so Star Destroyers, with the accompanying support vessels of course. Hmm, this will be interesting.

[TSGames]

In regards to your Canada example, if the war only requires 100 soldiers, they're only going to send 100; see the war in Kuwait. The coalition army sent was roughly equivalent to the Iraqi army in size, despite the fact that the armies of the coalition nations were much larger.

I don't think the Galactic Empire has even one example of using minimalist strategies in a military engagement. The Dominion certainly does, and has to, because they are constantly fighting for survival against the swarm/Protoss/whoever hates them at the moment.

If the scenario is purely that both sides are unaware of the other and think they will be taking the system unopposed, then the Dominion will probably have a temporary advantage, due to experience and competency, rather than numbers(even though I can't really imagine the Empire not sending an overkill fleet to take the system). However, once a conflict begins and backup arrives, the Dominion probably isn't going to stick around for a loosing battle.

[Tazar]

As the battle would likely be decided both on the ground and in space in a matter of hours, the fact that the Empire has a greater reinforcement pool is somewhat irrelevant to the OP's question. The impression I got, at least, was that the OP is asking who would win an engagement over a system between forces of roughly equal size, not which faction would win if pitted against each other, which is why he specified a neutral "bubble system" in his original post.

Obviously the Dominion can't stand against the entire Empire, but I believe that the OP has realized and acknowledged this fact, given the specific thrust of his opening post.

[G-Man Graves]

I don't think the Galactic Empire has even one example of using minimalist strategies in a military engagement. The Dominion certainly does, and has to, because they are constantly fighting for survival against the swarm/Protoss/whoever hates them at the moment.


Perhaps if they had used overkill at either Yavin or Endor, they would have won. But they didn't. Pretty glaring examples. Additionally, a lot of the time with the domain it's less "fighting for survival" and more "We've adequately broken the back of your assault, now we're taking the fight to you."

[Lord_Gareth]

Question - is the Empire capable of settling or using a planet that's been rendered to glass or totally nuked from orbit? Because the Dominion is; in fact, their capital world was once purged of all life and is still an irradiated hell. The Dominion might be able to take the scenario simply by making the planets in question unusable to their enemy.

[TSGames]

As the battle would likely be decided both on the ground and in space in a matter of hours, the fact that the Empire has a greater reinforcement pool is somewhat irrelevant to the OP's question. The impression I got, at least, was that the OP is asking who would win an engagement over a system between forces of roughly equal size, not which faction would win if pitted against each other, which is why he specified a neutral "bubble system" in his original post.

Obviously the Dominion can't stand against the entire Empire, but I believe that the OP has realized and acknowledged this fact, given the specific thrust of his opening post.
I read it somewhat differently, mostly because of this:


Each side's goal is to establish a hold in this system and drive the other side out.

It's not a debate with who would win a war, but rather who would win a battle. If all the Dominion is after is an artifact, I think they would very quickly succeed in grabbing it a getting out while gettin's good. If there is an engagement though, I can't really see a reason why the Empire's fleet wouldn't call for reinforcements.

As for Yavin (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yavin#In_the_cinematic_series), this goes back more to military incompetency than anything else. Even then, the Empire didn't use a minimalist approach. And Endor? The whole 'It's a trap?' The rebels were getting massacred until the death star got destroyed. There was no shortage of ships on the Empire's side.

[EDIT]
@Lord_Gareth: Good point. I wouldn't put it past Dominion to do exactly that. However, it does assume that they brought a good amount of nukes with them. Is that standard for the Dominion taking a system when they do not foresee conflict?

[Lord_Gareth]

[EDIT]
@Lord_Gareth: Good point. I wouldn't put it past Dominion to do exactly that. However, it does assume that they brought a good amount of nukes with them. Is that standard for the Dominion taking a system when they do not foresee conflict?

After the Protoss glassed Mar Sara, everyone takes nukes everywhere.

[Tazar]

Actually, the Empire used an extremely minimalist approach at Yavin; at most one or two squadrons of TIEs were scrambled to engage the invaders. Equally, the Star Destroyer fleet at Endor was only a fraction of the Empire's total forces; while it was certainly large, it was not so large that the Rebel fleet wasn't able to scatter it following the Emperor's death.

Regarding nukes, yes, they are standard loadout for a Battlecruiser.

And if anything, the Dominion will be able to get reinforcements to the fight faster than the Empire, given their respective sizes and levels of bureaucracy. If the Dominion is sitting on jump points with nukes and EMPs at the ready, any Imperial ships warping in are gonna take a pounding.

[TSGames]

After the Protoss glassed Mar Sara, everyone takes nukes everywhere.
Then that may be one viable way to win the engagement or at lest to guarantee that the Empire does not win the engagement. The next question would be: 'Why would they assume that the Empire doesn't have the ability to deal the radiation?' If they are not assuming that, then how do they know that the Empire can't handle it?

I'm not disputing that this tactic would guarantee a worst cast scenario of 'no one wins' but I can't see why the Dominion would actually use it, when it's the norm for everyone they fight to have the ability to just ignore/endure radiation.
[EDIT]
@Tazar. I was under the impression that Terran ships traveled much slower that Empire ships. If this is true, why would Dominion reinforcements arrive quicker?

[Tazar]

Then that may be one viable way to win the engagement or at lest to guarantee that the Empire does not win the engagement. The next question would be: 'Why would they assume that the Empire doesn't have the ability to deal the radiation?' If they are not assuming that, then how do they know that the Empire can't handle it?

I'm not disputing that this tactic would guarantee a worst cast scenario of 'no one wins' but I can't see why the Dominion would actually use it, when it's the norm for everyone they fight to have the ability to just ignore/endure radiation.

Actually, I'd imagine the radiation would be quite devastating for the Protoss physiology, if not the Zerg; there's simply no ingame effect to represent it.

If the Dominion manages to seize space control of the system, it's going to be very difficult for the Empire to recapture it without sending an absolutely massive amount of ships. The support ships of the Dominion fleet are far more potent than those of the Imperial fleet.

[TSGames]

Actually, I'd imagine the radiation would be quite devastating for the Protoss physiology, if not the Zerg; there's simply no ingame effect to represent it.
Between Toss shielding and Zerg toughness, neither seem particularly bothered in any of the games or books that I've read. Maybe there is a good a example somewhere of them reacting adversely to high levels of radiation?

[Tazar]

Between Toss shielding and Zerg toughness, neither seem particularly bothered in any of the games or books that I've read. Maybe there is a good a example somewhere of them reacting adversely to high levels of radiation?

Radiation's never really addressed with Protoss in any of the books that I've read, but I can't imagine that their shields would do anything to keep out radioactive particles. It's very important to keep in mind that the Protoss evolved on what is essentially a lush jungle world using crystals for power; they would have no reason to become adapted to resisting the effects of radiation.

Zerg, on the other hand, are a different story. :smallbiggrin:

[TSGames]

Zerg, on the other hand, are a different story. :smallbiggrin:

Now that you mention it. A Zerg vs. Galactic Empire thread might be a bit better.

"Kerrigan, you will join me on the dark side!"
"No, you will join the swarm."

[G-Man Graves]

I was under the impression that Terran ships traveled much slower that Empire ships. If this is true, why would Dominion reinforcements arrive quicker?

Ships traveling at light speed are faster than warp speed (generally about light speed)? What.

[Tazar]

Now, I'm not sure if that one's been done yet, but it would indeed be interesting. :smallbiggrin:

[TSGames]

Ships traveling at light speed are faster than warp speed (generally about light speed)? What.
:smallconfused:
Hyperdrive is orders of magnitude faster than the speed of light. (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Hyperdrive)

[EDIT]
For swarm vs. Galactic Empire: infested Vader and infested Palpatine would be freakin' awesome.
[EDIT#2]
It apparently takes hours to warm up a Terran ship's engines for hyperdrive, and jumping quicker is considered extremely hazardous (http://starcraft.wikia.com/wiki/Warp_space#Terrans).

[G-Man Graves]

:smallconfused:
Hyperdrive is orders of magnitude faster than the speed of light. (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Hyperdrive)



Well, the movies are the highest canon. And here it is said to be light speed.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jsNv6c6chBA

[TSGames]

Well, the movies are the highest canon. And here it is said to be light speed.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jsNv6c6chBA
OK...he jumped to light speed. It's pretty clear from the rest of the movies that that is not the fastest the Millenium Falcon can go, if anything, it's probably the minimum hyperdrive speed.

[EDIT]
Also from the movies:
"She'll make point five past light speed (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XQqYSE9lhK8&feature=related)."

Whatever that means, it's clear that the Falcon can go faster than the speed of light.

[Ubiq]

A problem is that the stated fleet numbers never match what we see on the screen. If there were only 25K Star Destroyers, then wouldn't Han have had a much more surprised reaction to two of them showing up over a insignificant dustball like Tattooine? You shouldn't see that many ISDs in a hundred systems if the EU numbers are true.

Even if they are true and the Empire is vastly less militarized than the Republic was during the Clone Wars (which directly contradicts most sources), then that doesn't preclude the continued usage of Venators, Acclamators, and other Clone Wars vintage ships. The idea that there are only 25K Star Destroyers predates the introduction of the Venator to the continuity and there's nothing to suggest that people were including the old Victories in there either.



Basically, all the AT-ST traps, scaled up and modified to compensate for the walker being quadrupedal.

Why try to puncture the armour when you can topple it?

Unless they knock it flat on its side, it'll just get back up. They can lay flat on the ground and stand back up without problems. And considering it's sheer size, they'd have to clear out a lot to space to avoid it falling against a tree.


Well, the movies are the highest canon. And here it is said to be light speed.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jsNv6c6chBA

Han says that the Falcon make .5 past lightspeed, but we don't know what that means exactly. At any rate, we have plenty of instances where the characters are capable of crossing massive sections of the galaxy in a matter of minutes or hours; far more than the handful of references that suggest hyperdrive is merely traveling at the speed of light.

Among other instances, Mustafar is at least halfway across the galaxy from Coruscant and Palpatine manages to get there, grab Anakin, and make it back before the latter dies from his wounds. It's extremely unlikely that took more than a few hours at most.

[Lord_Gareth]

It's eminently possible that the Emperor was coming to Mustafar anyway and wasn't expecting to see his apprentice all messed up.

Re: fleet numbers, you are aware of the primary factor of Imperial Stupidity, right? Lucas doesn't know how to write any more than Stephenie Meyer does, which is why Han wasn't surprised and why Luke was angsting about Obi-Wan's death when Leia was more or less fine with the slaughter of her entire home planet.

[TSGames]

It's eminently possible that the Emperor was coming to Mustafar anyway and wasn't expecting to see his apprentice all messed up.

Re: fleet numbers, you are aware of the primary factor of Imperial Stupidity, right? Lucas doesn't know how to write any more than Stephenie Meyer does, which is why Han wasn't surprised and why Luke was angsting about Obi-Wan's death when Leia was more or less fine with the slaughter of her entire home planet.
I would never defend Lucas' alleged ability to write, but Leia had some time to cool down in her prison cell. I think most of her angsting took place off screen(thank goodness).

[The Glyphstone]

Radiation's never really addressed with Protoss in any of the books that I've read, but I can't imagine that their shields would do anything to keep out radioactive particles. It's very important to keep in mind that the Protoss evolved on what is essentially a lush jungle world using crystals for power; they would have no reason to become adapted to resisting the effects of radiation.

Zerg, on the other hand, are a different story. :smallbiggrin:

I'm trying to remember now - did a Science Vessel's Irradiate deal damage directly to Protoss HP ignoring shields, the way a Defiler's Plague ability did? If so, that'd be evidence supporting Protoss shields not blocking radiation - if not, that's evidence against it.

[TSGames]

I'm trying to remember now - did a Science Vessel's Irradiate deal damage directly to Protoss HP ignoring shields, the way a Defiler's Plague ability did? If so, that'd be evidence supporting Protoss shields not blocking radiation - if not, that's evidence against it.

IIRC, you are correct that it would ignore shields and damage the unit. However, I also seem to recall that it would damage Terran units, such as SCVs and marines as well; since these units are implied to not have any problem with background radiation from an entire planet being purged, it seems to imply that the science vessel's dose of radiation is far above what would be leftover from nuking a planet.

[dgnslyr]

Also worth noting is that Irradiate made people explode from all the radiation. That's a lot of radiation, much more than "normal" background radiation.

[Mikeavelli]

IIRC, you are correct that it would ignore shields and damage the unit. However, I also seem to recall that it would damage Terran units, such as SCVs and marines as well; since these units are implied to not have any problem with background radiation from an entire planet being purged, it seems to imply that the science vessel's dose of radiation is far above what would be leftover from nuking a planet.

Agreed, background radiation, even from a nuke, dissipates rather quickly. Even if they are being affected by it, the results would be radiation poisoning and\or cancer a few weeks/months/years (depending on the actual levels of exposure) down the line, rather than melting into goo, which is what the Science Vessel seems to cause.

[Lord_Gareth]

Thing is, the Dominion can operate on planets that can't support life period on a large scale, whereas the Empire cannot - each planet has to grow its own food somehow. If the Dominion completely makes the planets non-inhabitable, the Empire'd need to invest even more resources supplying any outposts to get the resources on them, which might not be seen as worth it.

Mind you, they might also then get it into their heads that the Dominion are jerks that need to die, but when the Zerg and Protoss will end up involved and all kinds of nastiness just breaks right the hell loose.

[TSGames]

Thing is, the Dominion can operate on planets that can't support life period on a large scale, whereas the Empire cannot - each planet has to grow its own food somehow. If the Dominion completely makes the planets non-inhabitable, the Empire'd need to invest even more resources supplying any outposts to get the resources on them, which might not be seen as worth it.
All very good points, but I don't think the Dominion would know that the Empire would have such trouble dealing with radiation. I suspect that they'd view nuking the planet as a waste of nukes and would probably save the nukes for engaging the Empire's fleet.

Also, just like you said, there's a good chance it would turn into a larger conflict between the two empires, at least if both side really want control of the planet.

[Lord_Gareth]

I suppose the Dominion would need to either observe the Empire colonizing one of the planets or else get a hold of some of their data to realize that nuking would be an option. They tend towards information warfare first - perhaps the aforementioned "empty escape pod" gambit?

[TSGames]

I suppose the Dominion would need to either observe the Empire colonizing one of the planets or else get a hold of some of their data to realize that nuking would be an option. They tend towards information warfare first - perhaps the aforementioned "empty escape pod" gambit?
They'd definitely have time for that in a larger scale conflict, but I don't see that as much of an option for a battle that will probably only last a few hours. Additionally, I can see the Dominion fleet detecting the shields of the Empire's fleet, and making incorrect assumptions about the Empire. I don't think information is an advantage for the Dominion in this battle.

[hamishspence]

It's eminently possible that the Emperor was coming to Mustafar anyway and wasn't expecting to see his apprentice all messed up.

Ships can also push much faster than their normal speeds- at a strain on the engines.

The Thrawn trilogy is one of the earliest to provide explicit speeds for various ships.

The Dreadnought (Class 2 hyperdrive) manages a speed of 3 light years per hour, and an X-wing travelling at the same speed "Point 4" travels the same distance a Dreadnought would in that time (1/2 light year in 10 minutes)

(at the time, Zahn was operating on the assumption that speeds count up, with Point 4 being standard for a Dreadnought, and Point 5 being a Victory Star destroyer pushing itself way past normal maximum)

Which, in the novel, was 127 light years per hour.

In the novel, the Emperor "puts his will on Vader" commanding him to "live"- so the Force may help to keep Vader alive longer. Plus, the Theta class shuttle is unusually fast. Assuming the Emperor was racing to Mustafar and back, the time frame may be much shorter than with normal starship cruising speeds.

[pendell]

Thing is, the Dominion can operate on planets that can't support life period on a large scale, whereas the Empire cannot - each planet has to grow its own food somehow.


Not necessarily. Remember Cloud City? It's in the atmosphere of a gas giant.

For that matter, I'd be surprised if Coruscant is self-sufficient; it probably requires a great deal of food imports everyday.

So I'm loathe to say the Empire can't make use of planets which are marginal or uninhabitable. It may be that they can but simply choose not to, as when you have a whole galaxy to choose from, there's no point in settling a marginal planet which will vacuum up resources while giving nothing in return, not unless there's something intrinsically valuable like Tibanna Gas or Spice to make the investment worthwhile.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[hamishspence]

For that matter, I'd be surprised if Coruscant is self-sufficient; it probably requires a great deal of food imports everyday.

And then some.

The whole concept of Corscant comes in for some pointed comments here:

http://www.irregularwebcomic.net/386.html
http://www.irregularwebcomic.net/393.html
http://www.irregularwebcomic.net/396.html
http://www.irregularwebcomic.net/417.html
http://www.irregularwebcomic.net/420.html
http://www.irregularwebcomic.net/428.html
http://www.irregularwebcomic.net/431.html
http://www.irregularwebcomic.net/434.html

Enjoy :smallbiggrin:

[pendell]

I DID. Oh, I DID.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[hamishspence]

And it's not the only planet or moon like that:

http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Ecumenopolis

[Knaight]

Obviously the Dominion can't stand against the entire Empire, but I believe that the OP has realized and acknowledged this fact, given the specific thrust of his opening post.

The question is whether they will have to. The Empire doesn't have any truly big enemies, that means smaller ones with the potential to grow will be noted as a bigger threat. If the Dominion, or more likely when the Dominion wins in a system with relatively even numbers, the Empire is going to have to take them out. Among other things, they have a functional magic that is comparable to the force, that sort of thing is just asking for an extreme response. Given recent discussion in the thread, the Empire has the capability to get reinforcements in quickly if they really need to.

[Tazar]

The question is whether they will have to. The Empire doesn't have any truly big enemies, that means smaller ones with the potential to grow will be noted as a bigger threat. If the Dominion, or more likely when the Dominion wins in a system with relatively even numbers, the Empire is going to have to take them out. Among other things, they have a functional magic that is comparable to the force, that sort of thing is just asking for an extreme response. Given recent discussion in the thread, the Empire has the capability to get reinforcements in quickly if they really need to.

Given the fact that the Empire fails repeatedly to apply overwhelming force against the Rebels, I think it's very doubtful they're going to be pouring thousands of capital ships in to fight the Dominion.

[Knaight]

Given the fact that the Empire fails repeatedly to apply overwhelming force against the Rebels, I think it's very doubtful they're going to be pouring thousands of capital ships in to fight the Dominion.

The Rebels have standard issue hardware though. The Dominion represents much more of a threat.

[The Glyphstone]

The Rebels have standard issue hardware though. The Dominion represents much more of a threat.

Plus, since they are a rebellion, they're harder to pin down. It's hard to coordinate thousands of ships against an enemy you have to find first, and attack 'in overwhelming strength' fast enough that they can't evacuate and run to hide somewhere else.

The Dominion, on the other hand, are an external military threat, with a clearly defined location. If the Empire did want to apply said overwhelming force, they'd actually have a target to aim at this time.

[Tazar]

Endor; the Imperial Fleet knew the entire Rebel fleet would be there, yet concentrated a force small enough to allow a Rebel fleet to beat it in ship-to-ship combat.

[The Glyphstone]

Endor; the Imperial Fleet knew the entire Rebel fleet would be there, yet concentrated a force small enough to allow a Rebel fleet to beat it in ship-to-ship combat.

The rebel fleet was getting its butt handed to them until Luke killed the Emperor. That's when everything went to pieces, since (apparently) the Emperor was directing the entire thing with Battle Meditation or somesuch, resulting in a near-total lack of coordination and utter chaos that the Rebels immediately capitalized on.

[Tazar]

The rebel fleet was getting its butt handed to them until Luke killed the Emperor. That's when everything went to pieces, since (apparently) the Emperor was directing the entire thing with Battle Meditation or somesuch, resulting in a near-total lack of coordination and utter chaos that the Rebels immediately capitalized on.

Fact remains, though, that the Imperial fleet there was close to the Rebel fleet in numbers; the Empire did not concentrate overwhelming force against a severe opponent. If they had, the Rebels would have lost nonetheless, battle trance or no.

Incidentally, where's that "battle trance" thing come from? I'm honestly curious, as I've heard of it before but never where it's from.

[G-Man Graves]

The rebel fleet was getting its butt handed to them until Luke killed the Emperor. That's when everything went to pieces, since (apparently) the Emperor was directing the entire thing with Battle Meditation or somesuch, resulting in a near-total lack of coordination and utter chaos that the Rebels immediately capitalized on.

So without the Emperor being directly involved, the Domain are much more likely to be victorious? Innnnnteresting...

[Demon 997]

Fact remains, though, that the Imperial fleet there was close to the Rebel fleet in numbers; the Empire did not concentrate overwhelming force against a severe opponent. If they had, the Rebels would have lost nonetheless, battle trance or no.

Incidentally, where's that "battle trance" thing come from? I'm honestly curious, as I've heard of it before but never where it's from.

Its a force power. I first saw it in KOTOR. In RPG terms its an buff for your allies. Tighter coordination, better planning, reflexes, etc

[dgnslyr]

I guess it's a case of We Cannot Go On Without You (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/WeCannotGoOnWithoutYou) when the Emperor died?