The Official Alpha, the ARC Troopers and the Commandos Thread

Yeah but if it had been in RotS then it would have been right? And my question was whether it was or wasnt in the movie so I thought best to be on the safe side.

So, again, what happened to ARCs post war. Im sure the Empire prefered 'human' leaders and not just sorta half clone, half human commanders.

Unless the Mos Eisly troops with shoulder pauldrons are meant to be ARCs. That would be cool. And they arnt allowed to personalise their armour as much because of the sort of uniform Empire. Plus there arnt any colour-designated 'legions' anymore. All troopers seem to all be the same, besides specialised types. I mean, they are only sub-diveded by specialisation, and not into various legions.

A24

 

The ARCs will probably be too old to be stormtroopers in ANH-era.

No one knows what will happen to them post-ROTS. Their destinies have yet to be written!

 

In the Visual Dictionary, it says that the original ARCs trained by Jango train other ARCs. Sulry the ARC-trained ARCs will train more ARCs. And if the clones have new sources (which I have only just yesterday been converted to the idea of) then what's it matter whether an ARC is a Fett clone or another clone, so long as he hasnt had any changes but growth-acceleration. That plus the training is what makes an ARC an ARC. And both are accomplishable.

Though Im sure the traing program will have changed a bit from the original one given by Fett over time, itll still be based on it and have the same basic ideas, plus improvements from experience.

A24

 

Hard Contact has some Clones going to retirement homes- I would bet that ARC troopers would be destined for the same, or be used to train newer soldiers.

 

The shoulder pauldrons seen in use by the Empire aren't ARC pauldrons. The ones used by Stormies are used to signify rank or specialization.
I don't remember exactly what the rank colors were but here are the colors I remember:

White: Private?, Visual Dictionary

Black: Sergeant?, Visual Dictionary

Orange: Field trooper (Sandtrooper, etc.) also may be rank (Visual Dictionary)

Red: Repeater trooper (Jedi Knight game)

Yellow: Railgun trooper (Jedi Knight)

Blue: unknown, seen in a Gamer story

Feel free to correct my errors.

 

"The shoulder pauldrons seen in use by the Empire aren't ARC pauldrons. The ones used by Stormies are used to signify rank or specialization."

True, but the trend would seem to come from the ARCs, as we see them used to specify both rank (commanders) and specialization (Tank crews) on units that have recieved ARC training in the GAR. Its a nice connection between them and the troops who originally inspired that part of their design.

 

True, true. I assume that the stylized armor seen on the Clone Commanders and their troops was standardized after RotS to plain, shiny white; the pauldrons were also probably downsized at this time into the version seen in the OT.

Looking back through some sources, it turns out there are two types of pauldrons used by the Empire: smooth (like the sandtroopers's in ANH) and sectioned (like the ARCs'). I wonder what the difference is.

 

http://www.galactichunter.com/absolutenm/templates/full_article_template_1.asp?articleid=4284&zoneid=2

 

Ok, I tried to inculde a spoiler with that black background thing but dont no how to do it... Tried two things. Do I even need to bother with that anymore? Surely people will only be in this thread if they arnt bothered about spoilers?

I can PM you with the trick your talking about with the black background, but with the current restrictions on EpIII spoilers it may be best that you didn't know it if it was a potential EpIII spoiler. It could get you at the worst banned for a while if it's an EpIII spoiler that's not in one of the offical EpIII threads. However, if it's a spoiler for something else, you can still use it.

 

Not to forget: The empire has its own ARC-Trooper: ISF-Trooper.

 

Not familiar with them - where were they shown?

There's also the Imperial Storm Commandos; I said it earlier in the thread, but I like how the organizational/armor lineage works out now:

ARC -> BARC -> Storm Commando (and scout trooper armor)

 

ISF-Trooper:
Imperial Special Forces Trooper.

They were seen in X-Wing: Battleground Tatooine and mentiones in X-Wing: Bacta War. I don't know if they were mentioned anywhere else, but they seemed to be pretty tough guys.

The Storm Commandos seemed to be the descendants of the Republic Commandos.

ARC -> ISF
|
V
BARC -> Scout Trooper (-> SC (armor))

RC -> SC

Clone trooper -> Storm trooper

 

I like Anamiac's thinking on the ARC issue.

Can there be more ARC troopers?

If Jango was the original host, then can other hosts be considered for unmodified cloning? Will their offspring be true ARCs, or is "ARC" something tied inexorably to Jango's personality?

Also, "ARC training" came from Jango himself. That was what made it special. Did Jango ever write down his instruction techniques? Can it now be a "school" of ARC training, passed on?

These are interesting questions to consider.

 

Given all the backstory accumulating stating that ARCs have been training the various new clone specialists/NCOs/officers, it would be neat to see a story fleshing out what all they're teaching these guys

 

Also, "ARC training" came from Jango himself. That was what made it special. Did Jango ever write down his instruction techniques? Can it now be a "school" of ARC training, passed on?



I'm pretty sure that there are more ARCs being trained, maybe by other ARC Troopers. Someone more on top of this could probably explain it better, but ARCs are just Clones of Jango, receiveing the same type of training from each other, it's probably not going to differ too much.

 

Just a note, though: the Storm Commandos only came into existence about the time of the Battle of Yavin when the Rebellion got hot. Ergo, we have a major potential gap in the Empire's special ops capabilities if they had to resurrect the commandos nearly two decades after the Clone Wars. Perhaps the RCs and ARCs were disposed of in favor of more controllable, less independent line troopers, or as the US has often done historically they were simply disbanded because they didn't fight the way generals in their nice clean strategy rooms thought wars should go.

The Battleground: Tatooine operatives were Imperial SpecNavOps troopers, which are a joint Fleet/Imperial Intelligence project. They seem to be more in the ARC mold, but although they wear stormtrooper-like armor in the comic I don't believe they're actual troopers. Instead, they're sort of like the Navy's DEVGRU/Seal Team Six or Delta Force - small-unit elite special military operatives with advanced Intelligence training such as languages, disguises, and infiltration.

 

Something in me says the Empire dumps the ARC program, at least the "unmodified" clone portion of it. That's too many specialized dangerous individuals, with too much free will.

I think they rely on the stormtroopers to do everything (which is why they aren't as good against the Rebellion as the clone army was against the Separatists. Think about it.)

I think the ARCs are in for some rough times ahead. And I imagine the RCs got phased out pretty quick too. They were genetically obedient, but they were taught to be independent. Unpredictable.

 

Yeah, what good is an unstable pawn?

Hey Karen, do you know if they're anything special about The "Stormtroopers" under Darth Vader's personal command? I'd love to see you write a story about that from the Clones' perspective. How would they view him? What about some of the untold missions they did with him? Darth Vader numerous times has shown himself to be an effective and even "compassionate" leader of Clone soldiers. He has no qualms about ordering them to their deaths, but he also seems to have a strange attatchment to them. Maybe he feels a kinship to them as they are 'slaves' as he once was.

 

If the leaked game description holds out, Republic Commandos will become Imperial Commandos in the years following Revenge of the Sith.

What I want to know is, when do the clones/stormies move from an "everything" role to a marines/shocktroops role? When does the Imperial Army take over ground operations?

 

It occurs to me that troopers not bred specifically to unflinchingly accept all orders might not have been willing to participate in the extermination of the Jedi Order... We know for a fact that the Republic Commandos were willing to disobey orders when it suited them, and ARC troopers were supposed to be even more independent, no? I could easily see the rank and file stomtroopers being tasked with eliminating ARCs, commandos, and recruited troopers that were unwilling to murder their Jedi commanders.

Which would segue rather nicely into the whole plural Clone Wars idea wherein many clones went rogue and/or insane. I don't recall who it was that thought that interpretation up offhand, sadly.

*Edited to add the following*

Gladiuus:

According to an article on Gamespot.com, the leaked "Star Wars: Imperial Commando" information was a fake.

 

"Which would segue rather nicely into the whole plural Clone Wars idea wherein many clones went rogue and/or insane. I don't recall who it was that thought that interpretation up offhand, sadly."

I came up with a similar idea here: http://boards.theforce.net/message.asp?topic=18775059&replies=31

No one seemed to like it too much, but I still think the perfect fix for PT/OT Imperial military discrepancies would be a second clone war a couple of years after RotS. I don't know if I was the first to think it up though.

" According to an article on Gamespot.com, the leaked "Star Wars: Imperial Commando" information was a fake."

Ah. That's good news, actually; I didn't really care for the idea.

 

I actually really liked the idea. It meshed very nicely with the Zahn-era works wherein the clones were "stony-faced duplicates" and "generally bad to mess with". The implications in my mind were that the clones were the bad guys from the Imperial perspective. Also explains why clones are on their way out in the Imperial ranks as of Endor (60% of stormtroopers as clones circa the Battle of Endor vs. 90% circa the Battle of Utapau). If you're afraid they'll go, "bat-**** ****ing loco," as the guys at Penny Arcade would say, you're most likely going to try and get more non-clones...

Anywho, I'm of mixed feelings about the "Imperial Commando" haox. On the one hand, I thought Republic Commando was arguably the worst Star Wars-themed shooter I've ever played, and one of the worst FPS games in general. On the other hand, the concept of actually trying to bring down Jedi was very innovative. Lots of promise. But only if it had a radically different game engine and was made by a different team altogether.

 

"(60% of stormtroopers as clones circa the Battle of Endor vs. 90% circa the Battle of Utapau)"

Whered you get them figures from?

I always thought the recruits wore leather pauldrons when in stormtrooper armour, but in the movies we never really saw this except in Mos Eisly, but they were sergents or whatever so they got better pauldrons. There was no need to see the plain leather pauldrons because recruits were generally wearing the 'Death Star Trooper' uniform (the first rank after graduation) and then they became officers. The locations we see in the movie just never call for this sort of destinction, but were there to be a battle like the one on Geonosis in the time of ANH I'd have thought we'd see both clones and recruits in armour.

But then, like I explained earlier, to think that maybe these are some form of ARC trooper instead of recruits at Mos Eisly. Now Im back to thinking theyre recruited sergents because of the view that ARCs are almost freaks, not clone, not human, and it's best to have a normal human as your "unpredictable pawn" than a super-clone specifically bred to be in the military. So the ARC were probably dispanded after the the Empire was certain it was in full control and had no need for them. (By dispanded, I mean killed )

And my spoiler turned out to be a Republic Commando spoiler. It was about Tarfull being saved by Republic Commandos.

Ryan_Kaufman, I dont think Jango's training techniques were written down, I meant that ARCs, having been trained in whatever way, were now living libraries of Jango's training, plus they could add their own experience to it. Perhaps this evolved form could have been written down and made more formal with the Empire, but I think the original was never made with detailed notes.

I think Storm Commandos are not direct decendants of Republic Commandos, as, like someone said, there was a 20 year gap. Then a similar force with no actual links was made (SCs).

Dont like the idea of a second Clone War, seems too EU-influenced. Except maybe Luke's line: 'My father fought in the Clone Wars?' suggests two or more, but also could just be another accidental PT-OT broken/distorted link. Like how Yoda taught Obi-Wan. Only he didnt exactly, only while he was in a clan and Obi-Wan took the personal guidence Yoda gives all Jedi, though he wasnt his Padawan as that sentance literally leads you to believe, see?

Also, whats a BARC? I take it its an Ep III spoiler to elabourate here, but a PM about it or a link somewhere would be good.

A24

 

Insider info: The "Imperial Commando" game was not a HOAX, per se... it was just never a game that was greenlit or put into production.

What ended up on the web was a sort of "consumer survey" about a possible game.

Calling it a hoax would be untrue, but calling it an actual game would also be false. Hence the confusion.

Sorry to that guy that thought that RC was the "one of the worst FPS." Jeez.... Man, worse than Daikatana?

That's a bit harsh, I think. Seriously, there have been some FPS games out there that are seriously bad. So bad even the development teams would say they were bad-- (I've been on a few games like that.)

Maybe RC wasn't YOUR cup of tea-- but how can you say it was "one of the worst." That implies a lack of quality that I think RC doesn't deserve. The team worked incredibly hard under immense pressure, and still managed to put in lots of nice touches like the Squad Commands, and some decent AI. That must count for something.

It's fine if you didn't like it-- I can understand that. Everyone has different tastes.

 

Ugh... DRL.

------
Also, whats a BARC?

BARCs are Biker Advanced Recon Commandos.
We really don't know what relation to ARCs they are (or I don't), but it seems like they'd be ARCs delegated to a more recon-oriented role. We see them in RoF, RotS, and other sources...

"Felucia BARC Escort 1"
"Felucia BARC Escort 2"
"Felucia BARC Escort 3"
"Kashyyyk BARC" [Kama]