• givesomefucks@lemmy.world
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    7 months ago

    Isn’t it that Old Ben was thinking of highly trained clones and had pretty much no stormtrooper experience in decades?

    Like, he’d been living in a hunting the middle of a desert for 20 years intentionally staying away from anything dangerous.

      • ryathal@sh.itjust.works
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        7 months ago

        Or people are too dumb to understand decent writing. The storm troopers destroyed the rebels in the opening scene. They killed almost every fighter in the battle of Yavin. The only time they didn’t perform well is when intentionally letting Leia escape. Sure there’s plot armor, but there’s also an explanation for a lot of it.

        • Makeitstop@lemmy.world
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          7 months ago

          They also sucked in Mos Eisley. They aren’t trying to let them escape, nor are they trying to take them alive or anything like that. They completely give up the element of surprise by loudly shouting “blast them!” and then fail to hit anything despite having an entire squad of troops ready to open up on them.

          That said, ESB shows them as being competent, and the only shots they miss are from long range and against targets with good cover. Sadly, the same cannot be said of ROTJ, as basically everything the empire does on Endor is idiotic and makes them look incompetent.

          • Gabu@lemmy.world
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            7 months ago

            as basically everything the empire does on Endor is idiotic and makes them look incompetent.

            Which makes perfect sense, as by RotJ the empire had to rely on barely trained new recruits and recently promoted officials, because most of their veterans were dead - either by Vader-phyxiation, by “meetings with the Emperor” or straight up backstabbing.

            • Tbird83ii@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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              7 months ago

              Also… I assume quite a few of their best and brightest were on the first death star. That was a large station…

              • Gabu@lemmy.world
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                7 months ago

                Considering Tarkin, Sidious’ right-hand man, died in that explosion, I’d say that’s a safe assumption

      • SchmidtGenetics@lemmy.world
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        7 months ago

        Or maybe you don’t understand the difference?

        Clone troopers were highly trained and sometimes specialist trained clones of jango.

        In the other hand, storm troopers are human “recruits” that are trained by suboptimal clones or left over clone troopers.

        They are entirely different armies that were parts of mostly entirely different wars.

        • EdibleFriend@lemmy.world
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          7 months ago

          and you HONESTLY think that was the plan at the time? That the storm troopers he was thinking of was the clone wars? That was already canon back then?

          Or…did he just say ‘clone wars’ because it sounds spiffy and Lucas had absolutely zero thought put into it past that?

          • AnyOldName3@lemmy.world
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            7 months ago

            The plan at the time was what the film explicitly said. They were devastatingly effective at taking the Tantive IV. They were devastatingly effective at destroying the sandcrawler (to the point that they couldn’t disguise it as having been attacked by sand people). They were devastatingly effective at nearly hitting the protagonists enough times that they believed they were being shot at for real, when actually they were just being herded onto a ship with a tracker on it so they’d reveal the location of the rebel base they’d spend the first half the film failing to threaten or torture out of Leia. They were devastatingly effective at destroying the rebel’s attack force against the Death Star, and were seconds away from destroying Yavin IV and the rebel base on it when someone used supposedly-extinct space magic to make what the film had previously described as an impossible shot against a tiny target.

            The only time they miss is when the film says they did so on purpose.

          • SchmidtGenetics@lemmy.world
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            7 months ago

            Sure why not? The universe he created was meant to be explored and opened up, he specifically avoided hemming himself into situations. They did a good job avoiding most retconning until Disney took over.

            Sure lots was made up, but that’s literally what fiction is, so why are you upset about it…? Lmfao. This wasn’t a universe that was created for him like most other stories, it was a universe for others. Not everyone is going to understand the difference unfortunately though.

            He was also general during the war and led platoons of clone troopers, he knew what they were capable of first hand.

            • EdibleFriend@lemmy.world
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              7 months ago

              ah…you are taking this as an attack. thats why you think I’m upset. It’s all stupid fun dude. Pointing out stupid shit is just part of the fun. I like the movies as much as most of the people here.

              But my original point stands. Lucas always just kinda…said things. Then the fans come along and (mostly in the books that don’t count anymore) worked within what he said to flesh shit out for real. Then of course the prequel trilogy came out and he made up more shit to fit with what he said before. Some neat, like making the clone wars tie into the storm troopers…some we do not speak of.

              It’s not an attack on your fandom and nobody is upset :)

              • SchmidtGenetics@lemmy.world
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                7 months ago

                People who just say he didn’t think of x y or z back than, kinda miss the point, he thought ahead enough to leave it open to interpretation. So yeah it kinda is an attack, when you miss the authors intentions and inject your own…

                • EdibleFriend@lemmy.world
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                  7 months ago

                  Ah…well if you take it as an attack on your fandom I’m sorry my man. Maybe just try not to take these things so seriously? It was all stupid fun that you are trying to turn serious.

                  • SchmidtGenetics@lemmy.world
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                    7 months ago

                    Lmfao, your first comment was a literal attack on the fandom and the creator… of course you would claim that now since your knowledge was called out. Especially given something as simple as clone vs storm troopers… fucking hell…

          • Gabu@lemmy.world
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            7 months ago

            and you HONESTLY think that was the plan at the time? That the storm troopers he was thinking of was the clone wars? That was already canon back then?

            Considering the very first drafts mention “Sith” and George had the idea of midichlorians way back then, I wouldn’t ignore the possibility. Lots of things were either cut or went unmentioned until Episode I.

      • TropicalDingdong@lemmy.world
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        7 months ago

        Not just shit writing, but some of the worst.

        It’s wild the mental gymnastics people go through to convince themselves this series is good.

    • AnyOldName3@lemmy.world
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      7 months ago

      In A New Hope, the only time stormtroopers miss is when they do so intentionally, when they’re chasing the protagonists off the Death Star, and onto the Millenium Falcon, which has been fitted with a tracking device which they know will be taken straight to the rebel base. They easily overwhelm the guards on the Tantive IV at the beginning of the film even when only a few of them have made it through the breached airlock. The myth that stormtroopers miss comes from people not noticing the scene where Tarkin discusses intentionally letting the rebels escape so they can follow the tracking device back to their base.

      • Furbag@lemmy.world
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        7 months ago

        It’s sad that we don’t really get to see Stormtroopers at their peak outside of that one scene on the Tantive IV and that Disney nu-canon has essentially embraced the meme of them being inaccurate.

        I think the way the story is constructed clashes with the way movies are filmed for entertainment. We are explicitly told that the Stormtroopers are a force to be feared, and shown that exactly one time, but the narrative requires a bunch of nameless faceless mooks for the heroes to mow down during their action scenes because that’s more entertaining, so the Stormtroopers fill both roles and it gets muddled along the way.

        As for the Tusken sniper who took out Teemto on the podracing circuit, I’d chalk that up to a lucky shot. There were a few of them shooting, and it was a target rich environment, an he was the only one to get nailed in the engine and suffer a catastrophic failure despite it being a multi-lap race.

        • Gabu@lemmy.world
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          7 months ago

          But we did see the Stormtroopers at their peak. That was the Clone Wars. During the first few years of the empire, the Stormtrooper army was made almost exclusively of clones. As more regular people were added, their frightening capabilities slowly decreased until, by RotJ, the Empire’s army is made entirely of new recruits who promptly get their asses handed to them.

            • Gabu@lemmy.world
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              7 months ago

              Should I link you to every Star Wars book ever, or can you find them on your own? During most of the early Empire they were the same army. Some clones were in use up to episode IV. The 501st remained as Anakin’s particular army the entire time, from the end of EII to the fall of the Empire.

              • SchmidtGenetics@lemmy.world
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                7 months ago

                Oh my sweet summer child, the good clones trained the subpar clones from centex 2 that formed that army, they weren’t the original jango clones that were trained by the Kimonions.

                The Kamino clones took the roles the Jedi had, the ground troops are a mix of competitor clones not using original DNA, but mainly non-clone recruits. They are whollfully different armies.

                Ones literally under the republic, and the other under the empire.

                Storm troopers are not clones. Maybe take your own advice and read some of the books? I’m a third of the way through chronologically myself, which puts me in the middle of the clone wars.

                You’re just wrong on this one dude.

                • Gabu@lemmy.world
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                  7 months ago

                  You’re actually illiterate…

                  centex 2

                  Centax-2.

                  Kimonions

                  Kaminoans.

                  whollfully

                  Wholefully, but preferably wholly.

                  The Kamino clones took the roles the Jedi had, the ground troops are a mix of competitor clones […] Storm troopers are not clones.

                  You’ve just contradicted yourself. You somehow managed to do it in three sentences, no less.

                  • SchmidtGenetics@lemmy.world
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                    7 months ago

                    You only think I contradicted myself since you don’t understand the difference in the armies, and this discussion isn’t important enough for me to proof read my comment.

                    Kamino clones were basically non existent by that point since they were secretly being replaced by clones from centex. Ground troops include the grunts (storm troopers) officers and generals (centex clones) which is again, wholefully different than their trainers (kamino clones).

                    Storm troopers have never been clones and always been human recruits and you’re just too fucking stupid to comprehend the difference.

                    By the time what you’re talking even happened, any clones weren’t even jango clones, so they aren’t the same clone army, but they also aren’t grunts, that’s the recruited human storm troopers.

                    Can you provide any lore that says storm troopers are clones? This may help you figure this quite frankly extremely simple difference.

    • mrfriki@lemmy.world
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      7 months ago

      Regarding this I always wondered how Jedi are able to turn on/off their Jedi power in order to avoid being detected for so long

      • givesomefucks@lemmy.world
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        7 months ago

        I’m no star wars nerd, but if it’s midiochlorians, then they’re everywhere already.

        If the Jedi isn’t using/communing with them, it just blends into the background noise.

        So when they went into hiding, they went to cities where it got lost in the noise, or incredibly isolated where one Jedi still wouldnt register on a planet wide scale even if it’s Yoda.

        Like, as long as they weren’t in the space version of a subdivision, they wouldn’t stick out. It had to be one extreme or another.

        • Gabu@lemmy.world
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          7 months ago

          There’s also another option, which some Jedi did follow: completely cut yourself from the force. This results in being unable to use the force at all, but they still have all of their lightsaber training in a pinch.

      • VaultBoyNewVegas@lemmy.world
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        7 months ago

        The ahsoka novel actually partly covers this. Ben basically went into some form of deep meditation for decades.

        • frezik@midwest.social
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          7 months ago

          Is there any indication that force sensitive people can be detected at a distance at all?

          There are suggestions in Legends. The cave near Yoda is full of the dark side, and with Yoda living there, it looks neutral from a distance. There’s also a device found that can scan someone and show their “force aura”.

          Disney canon hasn’t gone that route. You can do a blood test for midichlorians. Jedi might be able to intuit someone’s force sensitivity by watching and testing them (as a Bad Batch episode recently did). But there’s nothing to indicate force sensitives can be detected at a distance, either by trained force sensitives or by technology.

          • Gabu@lemmy.world
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            7 months ago

            Is there any indication that force sensitive people can be detected at a distance at all?

            Loads of indication. Vader detects Luke at various points (and vice-versa). The very fact Sidious contacts Vader about Luke’s force abilities without being prompted is a strong indication he could feel it.

          • ZeroHora@lemmy.ml
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            7 months ago

            But at the same time, you had a lot of moments where Jedi felt the death of a loved one, or where Anakin Ahsoka/Obi-Wan/Yoda felt him going to the dark side.

      • Infynis@midwest.social
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        7 months ago

        They spend a lot of time practicing to expand their mind and feel the Force. It’s probably not too hard to figure out how to go the other way

    • NuXCOM_90Percent@lemmy.zip
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      7 months ago

      I haven’t watched Ahsoka or Kenobi yet (probably never will… for either) but wouldn’t one of those have resulted in Obi-Wan being familiar with stormtroopers over clone troopers?

      But also, watch stuff like Andor or Rogue One or even some of the more OT-era animations. Stormtroopers are still terrifying if you aren’t a protagonist with plot armor (that I guess is subconsciously using The Force to deflect shots). And this would have been less of a high stress battle and more an ambush/execution.

      But also? Obi-Wan is clearly kind of a manipulative asshole. He took Anakin’s son and basically trained him into an assassin to neutralize Vader and stop Palpatine. He also specifically did not tell Luke to maybe not have the hots for the cute princess hologram that he 100% knew was his twin sister.

      Why would he say “Well, this could have been an ambush by those random people who have a history of ambushing stuff and fucking shit up?” versus “oh yeah. This is The Empire. You should totally go stop Vader”. Also, he might be aware of the ethnic cleansing that Anakin did against the Tuskens and is extra trying to avoid a repeat of that.

      • wolfshadowheart@kbin.social
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        7 months ago

        Maybe he was worried that Luke would go down the same path his father would, so he kept things vague. That was always my take on Old Ben – he wasn’t really guiding Luke to do anything, it was the Force. “Luke, your father was actually a dangerous madman who slew younglings. In fact, is the right hand man, that academy you were joining? It’s Space Fascism, so definitely don’t go and join it to be with your father.” lol

        On the topic of the other two – Personally, I liked Kenobi. It has some sillier bits, but nothing IMO that isn’t easily explained (as an example, there’s a scene where young Leia is chased by mercenaries and she kinda dunks on them. People hate it. I think it was a clear example of her Force Sensitivity, so I don’t mind it at all.) Its main shortcoming for me was the villains could have been better and Reva was a bit predictable. I didn’t think she was as bad as the Internet did.

        Ahsoka… I wanted to like. It had a lot of potential, most of my issues were that it seemed like they were filming a video game, but since we’re not playing Ahsoka we end up just watching her interact with things we have no meaning for. Other than that, it was decent save for what they did to Sabine, which was just a disgrace to her character. Sabine was disappointing, over and over again. Overall, I think it has been my least favorite of the Star Wars shows as it has had the most visible quirks and awkward shots.

        As a continuation of that story it’s pretty decent and I’m excited for S2. But as a continuation of that story, the characters were not as strong as I felt they could have been. Time passed and people change, that’s fine. This wasn’t quite that though.

      • givesomefucks@lemmy.world
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        7 months ago

        That he was underestimating the Sand People?

        Doesnt it becomes clear pretty soon that he was underestimating the Sand People in general?

        Like, legit asking, it’s been at least a decade since I watched it.

        But the way I remembered it was Obi overestimating stormtroopers because he lead an elite squad of clone troopers, and underestimating the primitive natives, because in any fight with him and troopers against them, they wouldn’t stand a chance.

        Also highlighting how much has changed since he was involved in such things.

        Like, just because a character thinks something, doesn’t make it true. Obi is an unreliable narrator, but viewers are in Luke’s perspective thinking Obi has all that answers.

        Just from a story telling perspective it makes sense. And is far from the only example.