The Scale of Star Wars Battles

[Torjesgo]

It's really mind boggling when you take a step back and think about it. I mean, single countries on Earth pump out dangerous war machines. Now it's not only a planet doing it, but multiple planet spanning nations gearing up for war.

Look at an Imperial II-star destroyer. 37,000 people just on that when that sucker pops. That's a baseball stadium suddenly up in smoke!

I'm not looking to create bleeding hearts in any way, I've destroyed my fair share of stuff through roleplaying in the past. It's just one of those things that I know I don't think about a great deal when waging combat. It is a scale that doesn't have a precedent. Just a mind boggling thought.

How much do you think about the real scale of things? Really someone in control of a single warship is a force to be reckoned with. The logistics and all that is just fascinating to try and wrap one's thoughts around for the massive scale of not only naval engagements but ground fighting.

No particular board based event brought this up, just something that I've thought about before and am curious how often, if at all, others think about the scale of what they're really roleplaying in or if it's hardly given a passing glance?

 

[Hawke]

When you fight upon a galactic scale a single digit may be quite inconsequential. Now this applies up the upper hierarchy of course. If your say, me for example. I nearly have 2000 troops under my command. Sounds like a lot to most but not them, I'm simply a logistic with my ship. Now to myself I care for everyone of those folks. Its my ship, they're my crew. I don't know them all by name but I care.
It kinda depends where you are on how much you may care. And a variaty of other factors. Really Hawke would not care that 50000 troops were just slaughtered on some planet. She'd care more though if it was 50000 between them and her though, lol.
I'll leave this though. When talking of war on a galactic scale it says what it needs to.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k6mZZiI4ShQ

 

[Akio Kahoshi]

I've glassed a planet or two in my day, and probably sent more people to their deaths in battle than most countries on Earth have people.

 

[Aithne Charr]

I think about the scale all the time, but what we do isnt even large. Let me point you to the battle of... Battle of ThonBoka. The one with a fleet of 500 capital ships, not to mention the smaller ships in that battle and the amount of fighters that likely were there. In short, what we do is nothing compared to canon battles.

 

[Akio Kahoshi]

I think about the scale all the time, but what we do isnt even large. Let me point you to the battle of... Battle of ThonBoka. The one with a fleet of 500 capital ships, not to mention the smaller ships in that battle and the amount of fighters that likely were there. In short, what we do is nothing compared to canon battles.

Yet.TM

 

[Verz Horak]

I've glassed a planet or two in my day

Arbiter? Is that you?
@[member="Akio Kahoshi"]

 

[Akio Kahoshi]

Just a proper Imperial officer who's been a part of a Base Delta Zero operation now and then. @[member="Verz Horak"]

 

[Valiens Nantaris]

What if they threw a war and everyone came?

The scale is actually quite small for most of these wars, considering the vast size of the Empire and the amount of people it has.

Endor for instance had less than 50 Imperial Star Destroyers present. Consider that there were at least a million worlds in the Empire, and that all told, there couldn't have been more than a few million in that entire campaign.

Or to look at it another way, the Clone Army was smaller than the forces Nazi Germany assembled for Operation Barbarossa.

I think that's more the writers having trouble with the scale of space and war in such an environment.

 

[Akio Kahoshi]

Star Wars battles have always been smaller scale than they should be.

Consider. Initial wave of clone troopers was 200,000, with a million more nearly ready. That's 1,200,000 clones making up the entire Republic Army. To cover hundreds of thousands of worlds. Logic. There is none.

 

[Valiens Nantaris]

At the peak of the wars, they numbered 3 million.

BUT, to be fair, these were just the elite troops. Millions of other non clones were involved as garrisons, ship crews etc.

But yes, it is smaller, but if you get too big it's too difficult to actually conceptualise for us.

On the other hand, the power of orbital bombardments and the like discourages large land battles (which is another issue with Star Wars in general), and favours smaller missions for specific objectives. But that's OK, since you have an entire galaxy to fight over, the loss of one planet is usually not fatal.

 

[Jak Sandrow]

They said troops, right?

They may have actually meant troupes. Which is a considerably large number. Making 1 000 000 troops into an actual 10000000000... troops. I dunno.

 

[Molgus]

What if they threw a war and everyone came?

But isn't that sort of the Time War, billions of Timelords and Daleks where destroyed in that. (Reference to doctor who btw guys)

 

[Valiens Nantaris]

Yarp, we got the reference.

They said troops, right?

They may have actually meant troupes. Which is a considerably large number. Making 1 000 000 troops into an actual 10000000000... troops. I dunno.

A troupe is a group of actors or circus performers. I doubt even the glorious clone army could be described as that.

 

[Jak Sandrow]

Yarp, we got the reference.



A troupe is a group of actors or circus performers. I doubt even the glorious clone army could be described as that.

I thought maybe there were other definitions. Okay!

 

[Vorhi Alestrani]

Wouldn't that be more of a glorious clown army?

I'll see myself out.

 

[Valiens Nantaris]

That's the Republic army in KOTOR.

 

[Siobhan Kerrigan]

The real reason Saul Karath defected. He just didn't want to wear the clown uniform.

 

[Valiens Nantaris]

Damn straight.

 

[Jsc]

There are a lot of things wrong with Star Wars and it's Mythological Space-Logic. Sound in space comes to mind and the genre's other zany counter parts. Haha. But, meh? Best to shy away from these and just go back to being a little kid in the movie theater going 'Wow!'. So many explosions!

I mean. If Zeus can shoot thunder bolts, Hercules can conquer giants, and Beowulf can wrestle monsters nakedl? I'll probably forgive a little craziness on George Lucas' part. Just another reason fleeting is weird'ness.

 

[Captain Larraq]

I typically play Warhammer 40k. So, compared to that, Star Wars is actually rather mundane when it comes to the scale of warfare.

That being said... I'd rather go to a different planet than endure a real SW scale war.