Cleaning up the Mandalorians - The Clone Wars

Mandalorian went for the highest bidder...

 

Only 40% of the Republic forces were lost at New Holstice, but that's irrelevant. I would just write off the Zaadja guys as a few less honorable mandos who went merc, or had some sort of quarrel with the Geonosians.

Alternatively, they could've been Cuy'val Dar, but it wouldn't make sense for them to go off solo like that.

 

The Cuy'val Dar theory is interesting, but do we know how many of Skirata's men were accounted for even a year or so after Geonosis? Triple Zero makes note of a few, but otherwise, it's an open bet as to who the mystery Mandos might be, assuming a non-CIS-sanctioned schism close to the end of the war.

Then again, we know that Alpha-Ø2 began recruiting former Death Watch personnel to his side for the Protector ranks...and what better way to take some petty measure of payback against Jango's "children" than to hit Republic facilities in a number of key strategic regions? Abel's mentioned that his druthers would be to place the Mando raids on New Bornalex and Kamino closer to 2 ½ - 2 ¾ years after the Battle of Geonosis, with the Norval II engagement occurring right around the time (or proximate to) the events of Revenge of the Sith. I'd certainly rate New Holstice as a major target, owing to the massive troop garrisoning, the turbolaser emplacements, and the Acclamator groups on station there. It was plainly a key Mid Rim nerve-point for the Republic, very likely its primary medical/triage facility for both the clones and Jedi, and for a different reason similar to Praesitlyn in significance.

As to why the Geonosians hit the Mandos on Zaadja -- or even what the kronk they were doing there in the first place -- the "Republic rapprochement"-angle could work, depending. Another faction of Republic-friendly Protectors institute a policy-shift? Whomever it was, it was different from months earlier, when supposedly having the Mandos strike at New Holstice and the others as a softening-up measure made tactical sense at the point in the war when it actually occurred (prior to "Show of Force"), and might've even presaged a greater commitment months later, when they started hitting bigger targets.

 

All we saw was armor. ANything cound have happend. They might not even have been Mandolorians-after, non-mandos have worn their armor before.

 

The Geonosians obviously got tired of the Mandalorians' obnoxoious attitudes and fragged them.

 

The Mandolorians were just all killed by Geonosians. It could have been many Geonosians, but by Geonosians. Accept it.

 

It'd be interesting to see a story about it, but I don't see why it needs any special explanation. Mandalorian-armor wearing soldiers have been fighting on both sides of the Clone Wars since they began. Jango fought for the CIS on Geonosis, Vau and Skirata joined the Republic Army soon after, Hokan served the Separatists on Quillara, etc, etc.

TC

 

Is it possible they died in battle and the Geonosians just used their corpses as building material, perhaps to reinforce those walls?

Well, I suppose not, as Zaadja was supposedly an unknown base...I rather enjoyed the theory posited a while back about clonetroopers disguised as Mandos infiltrating the Geonosian base.

 

"Actually, the road to Hell is paved with frozen door-to-door salesman.
On weekends, many of the younger demons go ice-skating down it."

-- Terry Prachett

You know, an earlier source states that the road to Hell is paved with the skulls of unbaptized infants. Now, what I am wondering is, were the skulls removed, or did Satan simply pave over them with the salesmen? Not that I think he actually did the labor, mind you, but I imagine he had some say in how his underlings went about it.

 

I thought most of them left, actually. I always assumed Skirata was the only one still in the GAR.

It's really not explicit.

That's concievable. They'd probably be using durasteel Mandalorian armor, since the beskar stuff would be too pricy.

If the road is heavily travelled, he'd have to periodically repave.

 

Still puzzling over why Mando was italicised every single time in Triple Zero, I say be patient. It's no the last commando book, and it's possible the third will bridge a few things more.

 

That would make the Geos hypocrites though? That buzzing noise they do is soooooo obnoxious

 

I'm sure that if you were insectoid, it would make perfect sense...

 

Beforehand's what I meant, yep, but I was also thinking that several of these grew disenchanted with the Kaminoans -- not unlike Skirata, but more hardcore -- gave up the GAR "lifestyle," and trekked out on their own private campaigns against the Republic, gathering sufficient Death Watch survivors or whomever to mount the raids that we saw in the comics.

Since Satan is supposed to be the epitome of the seven deadly sins, and "Sloth" is one of said sins, I would assume Satan would be too lazy to bother uprooting the skulls to replace it with the salesmen.

And since the skulls would be there to stabilize the salesmen, the younger demons would have a much steadier rink to ice-skate on.

 

I'd love it if there was some sort of FPS or RTS game made to retcon the entire Mandalorian campaign during the Clone Wars.

Nonetheless, I dont find it too far of a stretch for the Mandalorians to be beaten by Geonosians. Any beast can be taken down so long as you have the right technology/advantage and the Mandalorians are no exception. Aside from all of that, i dont see why anyone looks at defeat on the part of Mandalorians as a mark on their rep. To die in combat is a HIGHLY honored thing, even for the more current Mandalorians. Many Mando soldiers dont usually live to be very old.

 

Yeah, the Mandos aren't invincible, especially when there's bad intel like at Korda 6.

 

Or you have a weapon firing a contained blast of high-energy and a mini-hyper-sonic boom at your head

 

Seriously. Sonic blasters are badass. I wonder how many Mandos died just from internal injury, without so more than a few dents in their armor.

 

Yea, but i lean more towards the intel. Knowing Mandalorians they'd have found an effective means to evade the sonic blasts etc, you know what i mean? They're highly adaptable as you know.

 

"An effective means to evade the sonic blast"

Yeah, they'll just suddenly sprint faster than the speed of sound and dodge the enemy fire.

LOE showed us how effective ARC troopers (which, thanks to Traviss, are now Mandalorians) were at dodging Geonosian fire - a whole squad of them got taken down by a handful of Geos without killing a single one. Mandos =/= supermen, people, get it through your heads.

 

I'll chalk it up to a misunderstanding of what those things do. Sonic weapons are incredibly diffuclt to fight in close quarters. On Geonosis they tear through pillars. One of those big turrets could probably liquefy a person's head in his helmet. No disrespect to the Mandos, just...sonic weapons pwn.

 

Well, Anakin and Padme could do it, although the factory's a better dodging environment than a closed tunnel.

 

I maintain that the Mandos appear built into the wall. Whether they were killed there or not, I dunno, but it's slightly cool/disturbing to me to think that, like other insects, Geonosians will use whatever to sure up their hive.

 

It's a shame the Geonosians didn't turn out to be like the aliens-using captured prey & whatnot to incubate their young.

Yeah, if Padme can dodge a sonic blast, I think Mandos might be able to manage. Those blasts don't look super-speedy or anything.