Was ahell of a lot better than Ep7 thats for sure.

Kinda surprised nobody from Rebels popped up. Just Syndulla name drop and a VCX that i probably wouldnt have seen if i didnt know it was there so i weas looking lol.

Also, 2SO is effin' awesome. Almost every time that robot spoke i laughed.

"Did you know that wasnt me before firing?"

A'ight, I'm glad I'm not the only one miffed that an ISD went down like a punk.

....in my headcanon those were Victories... even though I can clearly see they weren't.

The Devastator hyping in and doing work was much more satisfying.

and bad CGI is jarringly bad, but that's a discussion for another day.

why in the chuffing hell was she smiling? Why were they even docked? What did she have to be so **** chipper about? Or was that just bad CGI-urgery freezing her face that way

Anyone spot Chopper in the film? They sent him to England for Celebration but didn't appear there. Rumor has it he was there for a cameo in R1.

Did any one catch what Bail Organa said about contact his former friend something about a Jedi and how he trusted her with his life

The Jedi was obi wan, the her was leia

Did any one catch what Bail Organa said about contact his former friend something about a Jedi and how he trusted her with his life

I dont remeber the exact wording, but he basically said, "My daughter will handle it."

General Syndulla was a character in Saws hide out was he not? There was a CGI Twillek sitting at a table looking very much like him.

I like the George Lucas homage of having force worshipppers called Wills.

BTW does anyone have a name or picture of the trooper carrier Tie Striker?

@all, it would have been nice to see a more one-sided Space Battle. It seems to be a huge waste of time building these SD if they can't even handle a company of Y-WINGs and a TUGBOAT.

Perhaps you missed the sh1tl0ad of rebel capital ships that those two star destroyers had to deal with? I counted at least 5 frigates, same number of CR-90s, a lot of hammerhead ones, the big new rebel capital ship... and my numbers are quite conservative. All those ships weren't probably just looking pretty. They were firing turbolasers at the destroyers.

Plus I saw X-Wing squadrons attacking the star destroyers' shield generators and blowing them up.

Then, and only then, came the group of Y-wings with ion torpedoes to disable them.

The space battle looks spot on after my 23 years of playing the X-Wing PC simulators. The star destroyers are great at keeping a civilian fleet under control thru fear. But they are not invulnerable against a party of capital ships and bombers doing exactly what is needed to knock them out.

The hammerhead part was just a bit of sadism by the Rebel admiral, even if effective at destroying the shield gate.

Also, as others say, it was a surprise attack. It caught the Empire with their pants down. They weren't expecting an attack. They didn't even have a proper enemy until that day.

(I ran out of my daily likes)

and bad CGI is jarringly bad, but that's a discussion for another day.

why in the chuffing hell was she smiling? Why were they even docked? What did she have to be so **** chipper about? Or was that just bad CGI-urgery freezing her face that way

This and this!

Hera also got a name drop. Right after the scene when Bail left Mon Mothma and it cut to Jyn out in the hangar with Cassian, over the base comm you can hear "General Syndulla, report to the briefing room, General Syndulla, report to the briefing room."

Wouldn't General Syndulla more likely be her father, Cham?

Wedge got a name drop though.

I heard Captain Antilles name mentioned but not Wedge Antilles. Captain Antilles was the Captain of the Tantaive IV

That's 72 TIE craft total, including boarding craft, bombers, and fighters. So we're talking 48 fighters per Star Destroyer.

Y-wings! Dropping bombs! Firing Ion torpedoes!

See FFG? THIS is what Y Wings should be doing, not being super-dogfighters with TLTs or BTLA4 nonsense. Bombers and torpedo boats. Yes, that means they'd have a more natural home in Epic games than in 100/6 but you know what? It's better that way. Not everything needs to be crammed into 100/6 dogfights.

I think there were 2 Nebulons, 3-4 corellian corvettes, 2-3 dormean gunships (the braha'tok or however you spell it), plus a couple of hammerhead corvettes and GR75 transports. The Mon Cal ship (identified as the Profundity in the visual guide, a MC-75 cruiser) is 1,200 metres in length and appears to be one of the first mon cal ship ever retrofitted for military duty and it's armaments (sourced again from the visual guide) aren't even half that of an ISD. That's not an especially big fleet, honestly, made of mostly small ships that would maybe be able to stand toe-to-toe with one ISD - but two should be wrecking house.

Honestly, going off from pretty much everything ever written about Star Destroyers in the old canon - the two stationed above Scarif should have been able to decimate the rebel fleet. Couple that with the obvious fighter advantage - Red, Blue and Gold squadron,possibly Green squadron too - so 24 x-wings and 24 y-wings tops - against a massive swarm of TIEs (the station's garrison on its own appeared to be at least twice the size of the rebel squadrons, if not way more). Fighting against Star Destoryers was always a delaying action in the games you mention - you needed to hold them off long enough for your fleet to complete its task and jump out. The fact that those are games and a single x-wing could take down an ISD by itself is more an indicator of game mechanics, than of the actual battle capabilities.

What Vader and the Devastator do at the end - that's what a Star Destroyer is. He comes in and in less than a minute wrecks a Nebulon, a couple of corvettes and the Profundity is immobilised and ready to be boarded. The battle shouldn't have been exactly one-sided . . . but from what we saw it was looking like an almost easy rebel victory.

Nah man, you've got a rebel fleet that ounumbers the Imperials by at least five to one, with the element of surprise and superior morale. I'm surprised those ISDs even had time to raise their shields, let alone scramble the crews to battle stations. Half of them probably had to wake up and get their pants on before they even left their cabins, let alone ran along the hundreds of metres of corridors to their stations. These weren't experienced crews in a situation of battle readiness, they'd never even BEEN in a battle before, as far as they were concerned there wasn't even an enemy fleet anywhere in the galaxy to do battle with! Then suddenly there's dozens of enemy ships pounding them senseless and fighters tearing them up with ordnance strikes...

And even with all those advantages the rebels took significant casualties, and then as soon as the Devastator enters the fray the odds tip 100% in favour of the Imperials. It took everything the rebels had to drop those two ISDs.

The space battle was *brilliant*.

Did I mishear two Stormtroopers on Sharif mention something like "The T-50 has been discontinued." in a quick bit of idle banter? Reference to an older, previously nonexistent model of X-wing?

Did I mishear two Stormtroopers on Sharif mention something like "The T-50 has been discontinued." in a quick bit of idle banter? Reference to an older, previously nonexistent model of X-wing?

Pretty sure they were talking about the T-16 Skyhopper. The ship that Luke sold in order for him and Obi-Wan to buy passage to Alderaan. It was a throwaway line in A New Hope with Luke complaining that ever since the T-16 was discontinued it was impossible to get a good price or something along those lines.

Anyone spot Chopper in the film? They sent him to England for Celebration but didn't appear there. Rumor has it he was there for a cameo in R1.

I didn't, but someone else did

http://screenrant.com/star-wars-rogue-one-cameos-secrets/?view=all

He can be seen rolling past Mon Mothma when she’s informed of the newly invented “Rogue One’s” mission to Scarif

Pretty sure they were talking about the T-16 Skyhopper. The ship that Luke sold in order for him and Obi-Wan to buy passage to Alderaan. It was a throwaway line in A New Hope with Luke complaining that ever since the T-16 was discontinued it was impossible to get a good price or something along those lines.

Luke was talking about his X-34 landspeeder, not his airspeeder.

http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Landspeeder

"Look at this. Ever since the XP-38 came out, they just aren't in demand."

"It'll be enough." ―Luke Skywalker laments the low selling price of his landspeeder to Obi-Wan Kenobi.

The conversation on the Death Star between stormtroopers:

"You seen that new VT-16?"

"Yeah, some of the other guys were telling me about it. They say it's… it's quite a thing to see…"

It's not known what the VT-16 is in the newcanon, but Legends had it be a perimeter security droid:

http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/BT-16_perimeter_droid

Not him. That character, according to Rogue One Ultimate Visual Guide, is Beezer Fortuna - a relative of Bib Fortuna from Jabba's Palace, who dislikes his family's underworld connections, is politically minded, was inspired by Cham Syndulla's movement, was arrested as a seditionist, but freed in a raid by Saw Gerrara's forces, joining them.

The stormtroopers talking about the T15 being obsolete was a nod to stormtroopers talking about the cool new T16 in A New Hope.

Mt head anyone explanation for the Rebel's initial success agaisnt the star destroyers is a combination of surprise (as has been mentioned), but more so an issue of quality. The Empire had been on a pretty big expansion program, and there were probably lots of new ships with substandard crews, and perhaps equipment wasn't 100%. The Devastator, of course, would have a Crack battle hardened crew, which was highly motivated, and themselves had the element of surprise. They likely also had the best versions of all the hardware, with enough time training to work out the kinks and get the most out of the gear.

Mt head anyone explanation for the Rebel's initial success agaisnt the star destroyers is a combination of surprise (as has been mentioned), but more so an issue of quality. The Empire had been on a pretty big expansion program, and there were probably lots of new ships with substandard crews, and perhaps equipment wasn't 100%. The Devastator, of course, would have a Crack battle hardened crew, which was highly motivated, and themselves had the element of surprise. They likely also had the best versions of all the hardware, with enough time training to work out the kinks and get the most out of the gear.

The Devastator, according to Rogue One Visual Guide, was the last Imperial-I built before they started building Imperial IIs. Given that it "meets the exacting specifications of Darth Vader, who exhibits an affinity for cutting-edge warship design" it may have been modified compared to a standard Imperial I.

I've got no problem with the Rebel fleet's initial success in the space battle at Scarif. It's the same old, same old situation with Rebel vs Imperial engagements that we've seen in videogames, EU stories etc for over 20 years now. It's the hyperdrive-equipped Rebels who ALWAYS had the early advantage during these engagements, using hit and fade tactics to take out targets of opportunity before Imperial forces could effectively respond (and before reinforcements arrived).

Look at what happens again.

The Rebel fleet exits hyperspace and immediately begins the attack, with the Y-Wings, X-Wings and U-Wings immediately making a run for their objectives.

The Imperials, meanwhile, have to bring the lumbering Star Destroyers about to face the threat, and scramble fighter teams to respond.

By the time the Imperial fighters in the area are able to react and begin their engagement, Blue Squadron has already breached the planetary shield and X-Wings have already taken down one of the Star Destroyers' shield generators, leaving it vulnerable for the Y-Wing's Ion Torpedoes.

Despite these early victories, the longer the engagement goes on, the more it swings in the Imperial's favour. The Rebel's tactics become more and more desperate (ramming the crippled Star Destroyer). The remaining Rebel fleet is trying to bug out as Imperial reinforcements arrive (and go to town).

As far as canon and EU stories of Imperial/Rebel space battles go, this is pretty much spot on. Hell, this scenario is EXACTLY why we saw the Imperial arms race story in the X-Wing PC games, and the development of the TIE Avenger, TIE Defender and (yes) the Assault Gunboat: Rebel hyperspace assault /hit and fade tactics were having a LOT of success against Imperial forces.

As far as this games forum goes - someone tell me how two Imperial ISD I's would fare against a fleet comprising of a Mon Calamari Cruiser,escorted by a couple of Nebulon B Frigates and several corvettes in a game of Armada.

So in Rebels, we see Gozanti's carrying AT-ATs to the surface of a planet. But honestly, the new Zeta's look like they'd be much better at it.

it was a one-sided battle, once reinforcements arrived. If the 2 measily ISDs were capable of fending off the ENTIRE REBEL FLEET then what the frack to they even bother having a rebel fleet for? ISDs arent the largest ships they got by a loooong shot.

The fact that they had to resort to the hammerhead strat was baffling enough. I was expecting a focus fire order to get the result we had on the gate, not a ram.