I had to take a while to organize my thoughts and respond to the critique offered by
Caarlyle Rausgeber
.
On the way the subs look, I can't really contest his assessment on how the subs look, because a lot of the time I focused on just getting it done and looking presentable.
But as to his other critiques I felt it necessary to explain my reasoning behind design choices...
As to the Robo-Skeleton look and how it seems out of place, I must reply that this does have a basis in Canon: They are meant to be updated versions of the
YVH-1 Droid. Droids originally created to kill a powerful enemy that heavily favors biotech, just like Laertia's droids, except much smarter, taking the preprogrammed taunts Lando Calrissian used for his droids to another level.
Now, as to making them smart, as well as a full army...well, Laertia's throwing out the rulebook on Droid armies, making them all smart as humans at least while still unable to rebel. I would have used a good image of a YVH Droid from somewhere other than wookieepedia, but couldn't find it (Your pictures also don't display to me) so I went with the closest I could find for it. And I figured, since the YVH is probably in of itself a shout out to Terminator, I felt it wouldn't hurt to essentially come full circle. Also, it's 800 years in the future. The classic Droid designs are still around, but it's inevitable in terms of IC logic that those designs would start to get replaced...there are already in this setting, many droids that don't look anything like classic star wars droids, and are often much smarter. Laertia is so desperate to stop the Bryn'adul, she made something capable of going to go toe with their infantry--thats why they seem so deadly to Standard troops, because they were built to fight infantry a lot stronger and tougher, but that would have ultimately been a fruitless endeavor for her if the army was not capable of out thinking their opponents. They had to be given logic, intuition, emotions themselves, because the mind is the most dangerous of weapons. They had to enjoy what they do and understand and appreciate it. No typical BX is going to be much use against such an enemy.
As for their attitude towards others, the 'dissing' you mentioned...that is strictly an IC thing. They do that because it's part of their Psychological Warfare programming... Laertia based their factory fresh personality somewhat on the mindset of ancient Mandalorian Crusaders (Making Laertia a sort of Ad Hoc equivalent of Mandalore to them), in which proving one's prowess in battle is one of the paramount tenants of their "Culture" so to speak. That's why they laugh and joke (even if out of pure sadism) to nearly everyone they meet: because when they war against Non-Bryn'adul, it's regarded as sport, with all the accompanying locker room trash talk. With The Bryn'adul it's serious. It's business. They use the NIO and the GA, (as well as the SJC) as their sort of teachers in how to wage war.
Also, I understand I need to get better at describing the positioning of Forces, can't really contest that, but please remember I only just got really into the hang of warposting, but as to display of actual tactics, I honestly believe that I
have been displaying this. In fact, I feel I went to great lengths to describe their tactics, and have demonstrated an evolution of them since their first appearance. They've made mistakes and paid heavily for failure.
When their enemies fight them for the first time in Generis, they essentially fight as Berserkers, with only minimal reliance on sabotage, they kill many due to their shock and awe tactics, but suffer immense losses once it's understood that shooting them in the head is the most reliable method of killing them. (This Berserker method resembles how Laertia fought when she was still a Jedi and had no or minimal back up).
At Ziost, They were deployed in larger numbers, and their encounter with the NIO and Guerilla warfare led them go implement it more heavily against their enemies. They were still berserkers but the results of Generis had started to shake them out of this mind set. They were learning to control their mindset, and got sneakier, experimenting with sapper and sniper duties more.
At Dubrava, their first real encounter with Bryn'adul, their experience against the NIO and the relative success of sabotage warfare, led to them partly mimicking NIO infantry tactics more and more.
Serenno: Battle hardened warriors, still in a transitional state between Berserker and Soldier, began to employ ambush and sabotage more effectively than before, but lack of artillery and back up cost them dearly.
Sarka: The Last Battle where Model 1's were ever used in numbers over a thousand, and the Model 1's worst defeat. Despite inflicting a catastrophic kill count and being introduced to Tunnel Warfare, they are forced to retreat, marking the last time the Droids employ Berserker tactics except at moments of extreme opportunity. This battle led directly to the Model 1's getting banned from Mass Production...the baseline Model 1, despite how effective it is, is ruled simply too dangerous to field as an army, and this starts the transition of the role as Spec Ops, Officers, Command and Advisory positions (The very role of The BX Droids you mentioned), and leads directly to the development of The Model 2, which learn slower, and have Weaknesses that make it more acceptable to mass produce as an army.
Csilla: Their first real experience with Starfighter Warfare. No enough to save Csilla, but the data taken from that battle was given to all Model 1's after, and they gained insight into slipping past shield defenses, though their Starfighter work resembled their original infantry work--berzerker like
Sev-Tok...The Revenge of The Nuetralizers. Every prior experience came together when they fought at the Militia's side against the Bryn'adul, revealing that, like, The Bryn'adul, they have come to favor a constantly advancing offensive, only rarely holding positions as absolutely necessary, resorting to extremely primitive methods of warfare to stay in the fight, along with terror tactics, such as torture, audio based Psychological Warfare, and codifying their serenading of an enemy as a chief means of Psychological attack, not hesitating to capture beasts of the enemy to use against them, constantly using the enemies own equipment and passing it to their allies, coming back as relentlessly as the Bryn'adul do, In essence, becoming a mirror of the ones they are sworn to destroy.
Vjun: Despite it being a defeat the droids realize they have a weakness at Defensive Siege warfare. They also experiment with animal warfare also
Krayiss: Another defeat. They are unable to fully suppress the rebellion due to lack of their own vehicles
Ziost III...They employed everything the NIO and GA taught them through constantly trying to kill them, essentially finally experimenting with full scale combined infantry, tank, starfighter and artillery warfare, their infantry using Roman Legion-like columns to advance, employing suppressing fire from the front rows and Sides, with parabolic weaponry in the back, their tanks very Light and very Mobile. They also made full use of booby traps, such as IED's mini-crab bombs and used less advanced battle droids like Combat dogs, sending them ahead to soak up fire and soften the enemy up before moving in. As before they favored constant advancement, and only occasionally employed Berserker tactics, marking their full transition to a professional army, albeit in a war already lost.
And as to your spell check critique, yes, you're right. I mess up sometimes. Not proud of it. But the misspelling of the droids was deliberate, one hundred percent. Done for the same reason Steven King let his book be called Pet Sematary---the wrongness of the misspelled word is supposed to leap out at you constantly.
Do I need to improve descriptions of where exactly my armies are positioned? Certainly. I will do my best to be more concrete on that. But I do feel that great lengths were taken to show their evolution in thinking in each invasion thread. But I nonetheless thank you for your critique, and hope I have adequately answered a few questions you or others had as to why I made them the way I do. And you are right, future subs need to look more crisp, but it's not exactly my best ability, Though I will try to improve.