Talk:Rank insignia of the Galactic Empire/old version

Wouldn't the highest rank in the Imperial Starfighter Corps., just like Grand Admiral and Grand General, be Grand Marshall? On a similar subject, what about the Imperial Marine Corps.? (Air Force or Field Division)
 * I suppose that Grand Marshall would be the highest rank, but until we find a source for it, we can't add that. Cmdr. J. Nebulax 20:28, 29 Sep 2005 (UTC)

Okay. Let me know when you do.
 * Well, you could also look for a source as well. I doubt there is any source, however. Cmdr. J. Nebulax 22:52, 7 Oct 2005 (UTC)

Without any source of a Grand Marshall, it has to be omitted. By the way, is anyone working on fixing this page? There a LOT of OOU stuff imbedded into the article. Great Wikipedia article, horrible Wookipedia article... Esplin 17:41, 4 Jan 2006 (UTC)

Gallery
How about moving all the rank badges to Gallery of Imperial rank insignia or something like that? Admiral J. Nebulax 14:45, 7 Jan 2006 (UTC)
 * Uhh... I wouldn't recommend that. Most of them are fanon in one way or another. Some other Wookieepedians will no doubt despair to hear that I'm working on a thorough revision of this page...

In the mean time, though - a few questions:
 * Anyone interested in me throwing what I've written so far onto a /temp page?
 * Is the rank of Bast or Cass ever given explicitly in any canon source?
 * Does anyone have a list of alterations made to rank insignia in the SEs?
 * Does anyone have any official source for the supposed "blooper" with rank badges in RotJ? I know the badges are different; I'm just sure this wasn't at least partially deliberate....

Thanks! --McEwok 00:05, 14 Jan 2006 (UTC)
 * Oh lordy, lord...should I prepare myself for another edit war between you and VT-16? QuentinGeorge 00:20, 14 Jan 2006 (UTC)
 * It's interesting to note that Curtis Saxton has removed a bunch of the Saxton-conjecture information that used to be on his rank/insignia pages. --SparqMan 00:31, 14 Jan 2006 (UTC)
 * Oh? What, in particular? At least on a cursory inspection, all the little quirks that make me frown mildly while reading are still there (the most obvious being to rhetorically dismiss a lot of perfectly workable C-canon and to ignore several instances in ANH of officers with no rank cylinders); though that said, even if it is largely about fitting evidence to a fan-theory, it's still a massive resource, and an impressively-written argument: I can respect the intelligence, even if I disagree with it. --McEwok 16:19, 14 Jan 2006 (UTC)

Be afraid... be very afraid...
I've just thrown up a temp page for the rewrite. The icons need to be re-done, and the EU sections need to be wrestled into comprehensibility (it all makes sense - it's just hard to explain it!)... but I thought I'd better put it online... --McEwok 00:19, 19 February 2006 (UTC)
 * This, I have to say, is an impressive work. I may not always agree with your ideas, but this is just nice. All so-called "Pro-Saxton" and "Anti-Saxton" viewpoints aside, this particular topic has been overrun by speculation for a long time, and if you can make some sense of the far-flung bits of evidence then more power to you. &mdash;Darth Culator   (talk)  18:46, 19 February 2006 (UTC)
 *  Thank you. And you've not even seen the digest of every rank insignia I've been able to find drawn or described yet. Actually, it's really quite simple; by and large, the novels, comics and RPG have used the ranks and insignia laid out by WEG in The Imperial Sourcebook, which are based primarily off ESB, and which could maybe even have been taken from movie production notes...
 * All that said - criticism and suggestions are still welcome. This is still very much a work in evolution. And if anyone has official evidence that there really was a blooper in RotJ, that would be great! --McEwok 23:44, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

Tie Fighter Rank Structure
"Given that the flight simulator ranks appear overly simplified and combine Navy and Army titles indiscriminately, most Star Wars sources consider the TIE Fighter ranks to be contradictory and this rank system is generally ignored." - The New Republic Naval rank structure used in the X-Wing novels/comics appears to follow the rank convention, and from what we see of the Imperial Navy in the book, it seems to follow it as well. If that's the case, shouldn't the language of the article reflect the reality of the situation? I wouldn't consider that rank system "generally ignored" if it is consistently and continually used throughout a nine novel and thirty-five comic series. Basilisk 01:01, 13 April 2006 (UTC)

Temp page
Does anyone else think that the temp page, being more detailed than our current page, should replace the current version? Or am I out to lunch here? &mdash;Silly Dan (talk) 02:53, 27 May 2006 (UTC) I'm still working on the temp page, and I suppose the real question is whether we retain the current organization of rank/uniform pages. But if there's a view that the temp page is detailed enough for a straight swap already, then by all means go ahead! --McEwok 17:10, 26 June 2006 (UTC)
 * No, I agree: the temp page looks much better; though I wonder why it was created in the first place (why not just edit the main article?) RMF 03:00, 27 May 2006 (UTC)
 * Ah, I see, it looks like McEwok did a total rewrite. Still, it seems ready, though we should probably wait for input from McEwok before we replace it. RMF 03:02, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

Snowtroopers
Do we have any proof, that the Snowtroopers on Hoth are really Stormtroopers? I always had the impression, that the attack was carried out by the Imperial Army and that those Snowtroopers were simply regular army soldiers with arctic gear. If you look at General Veers' battle armor, it looks almost the same as theirs, just in imperial grey. It would explain why the Snowtroopers wear rank badges and not full stormy armor. Yaahg D&#39;sow 15:00, 30 July 2006 (UTC) The snow trooper in this example does not have a rank badge, but there are a few running around. Yaahg D&#39;sow 15:13, 30 July 2006 (UTC) Yaahg D&#39;sow 09:12, 31 July 2006 (UTC)
 * Snowtroopers are a branch of the Stormtrooper Corps, just like scout troopers and so on. Fleet Admiral J. Nebulax (Imperial Holovision) [[Image:Implogo.jpg|20px]] 15:03, 30 July 2006 (UTC)
 * Is there any official source on that? The Scout Troopers don't have rank insignia and wear the typical Stormtrooper armor, while the armor of the snowtroopers seems to be a variation of the regular army troopers' protection.
 * I put a copy of this into the Snowtrooper discussion-section.

Stormtrooper Armor Insignia
The main article notes the lack of armor insignia on Stormtrooper Battle Armor. Assuming the Stormtroopers themselves can tell rank (such as with a helmet transponder), wearing rank insignia simply tells the enemy who to shoot first. The shoulder boards are used on Tattoine because the troopers are running checkpoints and need to "tell" the populace which one's in charge. Remande 14:13, 31 July 2006 (UTC)
 * Well, the portrait pic in the main article about Snowtroopers clearly shows a Snowtrooper wearing an armor plate with a Lieutenant's or Captain's rank. That, and the similarities with the regular army gear made me wonder, if they were stormies at all. I have never seen any canonical source cleary showing them to be part of the Stormtroopers. If there is one, I shall be silent forever.........not. Yaahg D&#39;sow 11:34, 1 August 2006 (UTC)
 * "Cold Assault Troops (Snowtroopers)" are the first of the "Specialist Stormtrooper Units" discussed on page 105 of the Star Wars Sourcebook, with Blizzard Force being explicitly namechecked. The snowtroopers are also simply called "stormtroopers" in the ESB script. That said, your observation about the armour shared by Veers and Blizzard Force is sharp: there are a lot of Expanded Universe sources which show that this is the standard Imperial Army combat armour... and something very similar is also worn by the Galactic Marines in the cold and ice of the Mygeeto during the Clone Wars. At a guess, cold-weather stormtroopers simply adapted existing cold-weather version of standard Army combat armour, which had been around for a while, probably since the days of the Old Republic...
 * But that said, I should probably point out that I'm rewriting this entire page extensively here. --McEwok 10:24, 3 August 2006 (UTC)


 * It's a good explaination, that the snowtroopers going in with Vader were Stormtroopers (they shoot E-11s and have no badges), while the Captain in the AT-AT might be Army. It could just be the imperial arctic infantry gear, used by all kinds of corps. Yaahg D&#39;sow 12:50, 3 August 2006 (UTC)
 * Snowtroopers are a division of the Stormtrooper Corps. Snowtroopers are specially trained. Fleet Admiral J. Nebulax (Imperial Holovision) [[Image:Implogo.jpg|20px]] 12:54, 3 August 2006 (UTC)
 * Nevertheless, Yaahg D'sow has a point: unlike other stormtroopers, snowtroopers wear a variation of standard Imperial Army armour, which makes it possible that it's simply standard Imperial Army cold-weather gear, perhaps with minor variations. The Star Wars Sourcebook also says that snowtroopers tend to customize their equipment from standard to distinguish themselves: "Depending on the unit designation (Ice Storm, Snow Hawk, Wind Riders, Blizzard Force and so forth) each soldier wears slightly modifed and personalized armor". However, I'm not sure the fact that the officer has rank insignia is a problem in itself: Janek Sunber and the other officers of stormtrooper companies in recent issues of Empire and Rebellion have worn normal officers' uniforms and rank insignia... --McEwok 13:38, 3 August 2006 (UTC)