A couple of years ago I did one of these topics discussing Imperial ranks, and I landed on advocating for Himser's effort at rationalising them. Since then I've become dissatisfied with pretty much everything around the Imperial military, so having decided to use the Smacksart templates to try and hammer it all into something that makes sense to me I thought eff-it and did my own version of the ranks as well.

Enjoy the results of my obsessiveness, maybe someone else will get some use out of it:

I'll go into some of my reasoning, but I left it until after the pics so people with a low tolerance for Saxonite blethering don't have to subject themselves

For the ranks I'm using the colour conventions established with R1/Solo/Rebels, but I'm ignoring a couple of specifics(the Galen Erso/Ops Colonel rank from the behind the scenes on R1, because it doesn't fit the pattern and because they didn't even follow it themselves - Erso gets a 4Yellow-1Red in the film, not 5Yellow-1Red as they said; and the assignment of 3Blue-2Red to "Captain" as a rank for the Navy, because that doesn't jive with the fact Kallus confirms 3Primary-2Secondary is Commander rank and because I prefer keeping Captain as a rank for the other branches) and added a wee embellishment(technically all the one-block ranks should be "Ensign", but using Midshipman for Navy and Subaltern for Ops feels more thematic and when all of them were actual ranks IRL they were equivalent). I'm using Himser's setup of the double-row red-over-blue bars for appointed/tasked ranks, because once they decided to feature them in Rebels and some of the nuCanon comics, the old(bad, but it existed) explanation that they were a post-Yavin reworking of Imperial ranks didn't hold up anymore.

For the template designs, my main goal is to see an end to the parade of Overly Specific Troopers we've been getting. As a rule, if one of the new Trooper types is wildly divergent from the norm, I've tried to use context clues within the canon to make them into examples of a branch of the military, rather than taking every single thing as unique and specific as Pablo & Co seem determined to. I couldn't find a use for the Shore Trooper design despite quite liking it(especially in proper white rather than beach chique colours) because it's just too specific - when your basic Stormtrooper armour can with minimal modification be used underwater, on active lava fields, and even in the vacuum of space then the idea it's going to struggle with above-average humidity levels seems a bit farcical. And yes, I know the thematic callout is to tropical dress in IRL militaries, but those exist because the only way for a fabric uniform to be tolerable in hot humid climes is to make it with lighter fabric and less of it, it doesn't have a climate-controlled undersuit like ST gear. And yes, "snowtroopers", but it's been evident for a while that despite the name it's more of a general purpose "hostile environment" armour set - flametroopers use it so it's resistant to both extremes of temperature, it's been deployed to post-blast Jedha so it can clearly handle particulates and other atmospheric nasties and so on. Shore Troopers are superficially similar conceptually, but the comparison doesn't hold up.

One choice I expect some people will be puzzled by is the Imperial Intelligence uniform, my logic goes like this: I didn't care for the notion that the ISB white jacket uniform was now just a generic "intelligence officer" uniform, and I dismissed it out of hand when I dug into the cite notes on the wook and realised the whole notion is based on reading words to the effect of "a uniform worn by members of the intelligence community" to mean "members of the intelligence community wear this uniform" and combining that with "and this other book confirms Imperial Intelligence are part of the intelligence community(uh-duh), so they must wear the white ones"(not kidding, that chain of logic is laid out right there in the cites), when the initial phrase could just as easily be read as "the people wearing the uniform are members of the intelligence community", which the ISB are. A perfect example in fact of the ludicrously exclusive way of thinking that defines the way the lore people approach the Imperial military - before long we'll be getting Pilots-The-HCVw-A9-Turbo Tank-But-Only-Every-Other-Thursday Troopers. As to why I went with the grey and black rather than the more common fanon approach of all-black - firstly, in nuCanon all-black is already used by Stormtroopers, Naval Security, and "staff officers"; secondly, the only depictions we do have of anyone associated with Imperial Intelligence in nuCanon in a uniform are Galen Erso's olive-grey with pale mint-grey accent panels getup after he joins the Tarkin Initiative(which is under Advanced Weapons Research, which is managed by Imperial Intelligence), and the Information Office department seen in Rebels which wear a unique jumpsuit variant in the same grey tone that show uses for all the standard Imperial uniforms; and thirdly(finally), there's those brief shots of background extras on the Death Star in ANH wearing a grey jacket with black trousers and cap which haven't been given any specific association in nuCanon or elsewhere, and while that appears to be a lighter grey colour and probably actually was, those olive tunics are renowned for being the original version of that white&gold/black&blue dress meme, changing perceived colour and tone radically based on lighting or the colour grading of a scene, so to me it hits "eh, close enough" territory. It also seems fitting - the [colour] tunic with black trousers and cap does echo the ISB uniform a bit, while using the standard officer olive-grey for the jacket colour seems fitting for the organisation also(properly?) known as Military Intelligence.

Anyway, let the nitpicking commence

Wow, looks great! Thanks for sharing.

As another person who obsesses over the Imperial rank structures and is irritated to no end by the overspecialisation and inconsistency of the stormtrooper corps, this is great! I'm especially a fan of the re-designation to Imperial Marines and Imperial Rangers, makes a whole lot more sense.

Regarding the Shoretroopers, I've taken to classifying them as more of defence/emplacement stormtroopers, just taking the "coastal" out of the "coastal defence stormtrooper" designation. The somewhat lighter armour on the lower half would make sense in this role, as if they are primarily deployed in defensive positions in Imperial facilities e.g. trenches, mortar batteries, weapon emplacements etc. then the extra armour is somewhat redundant compared to a more assault-focused infantry and so some can be sacrificed in exchange for improved dexterity, agility, comfort, etc.

The other aspect that I've somewhat changed in my "head canon" is their rotational deployment status. I personally thought this was a bit silly and instead think it works better as a rank based designation, where veterans are conscripted into. This somewhat makes sense with what we've seen in R1 with standard shoretroopers acting as unit leaders for standard stormtrooper squads, showing that they are considered as a higher rank and/or more experienced than regular TKs.

Either way this is fantastic work and I really appreciate this cohesive and logical rank structure that I can use to ensure my army has a coherent, underlying structure!

10 hours ago, Atromix said:

As another person who obsesses over the Imperial rank structures and is irritated to no end by the overspecialisation and inconsistency of the stormtrooper corps, this is great! I'm especially a fan of the re-designation to Imperial Marines and Imperial Rangers, makes a whole lot more sense.

Regarding the Shoretroopers, I've taken to classifying them as more of defence/emplacement stormtroopers, just taking the "coastal" out of the "coastal defence stormtrooper" designation. The somewhat lighter armour on the lower half would make sense in this role, as if they are primarily deployed in defensive positions in Imperial facilities e.g. trenches, mortar batteries, weapon emplacements etc. then the extra armour is somewhat redundant compared to a more assault-focused infantry and so some can be sacrificed in exchange for improved dexterity, agility, comfort, etc.

The other aspect that I've somewhat changed in my "head canon" is their rotational deployment status. I personally thought this was a bit silly and instead think it works better as a rank based designation, where veterans are conscripted into. This somewhat makes sense with what we've seen in R1 with standard shoretroopers acting as unit leaders for standard stormtrooper squads, showing that they are considered as a higher rank and/or more experienced than regular TKs.

Either way this is fantastic work and I really appreciate this cohesive and logical rank structure that I can use to ensure my army has a coherent, underlying structure!

Thanks man.

You know, it's funny how things go, because your idea of dropping the "coastal" part has sparked a notion in me based on going the opposite way and leaning in hard, hah

What do you think about making them soldiers of the Army's Maritime Division? Not regular crew or officers, who I'd probably envision using space Navy-style jumpsuits and normal uniforms, but an actual small-m marines force. Like, drop all the existing "lore" around them and recontextualise the armour design as the battledress of that sub-branch's infantry. Lighter gear to facilitate working on and around ships and water, the unique helmet maybe has a rebreather in there that lets them swim underwater, but more on the level of IRL dudes with snorkels rather than full on diving gear. Having them be outside the Stormtrooper Corps even makes me comfortable sticking with the cool but decidedly not-stark-enough-for-stromies colour choices. What's holding me back on that notion is the naming, what would the force be called given Imperial Marines exist and have always been a Stormtrooper thing.

6 hours ago, Yodhrin said:

Thanks man.

You know, it's funny how things go, because your idea of dropping the "coastal" part has sparked a notion in me based on going the opposite way and leaning in hard, hah

What do you think about making them soldiers of the Army's Maritime Division? Not regular crew or officers, who I'd probably envision using space Navy-style jumpsuits and normal uniforms, but an actual small-m marines force. Like, drop all the existing "lore" around them and recontextualise the armour design as the battledress of that sub-branch's infantry. Lighter gear to facilitate working on and around ships and water, the unique helmet maybe has a rebreather in there that lets them swim underwater, but more on the level of IRL dudes with snorkels rather than full on diving gear. Having them be outside the Stormtrooper Corps even makes me comfortable sticking with the cool but decidedly not-stark-enough-for-stromies colour choices. What's holding me back on that notion is the naming, what would the force be called given Imperial Marines exist and have always been a Stormtrooper thing.

That's a pretty good idea actually, as for naming, I'd keep it simple, along the lines of something like "Imperial Maritime Security" or something along those lines.

The change in shoretrooper armor could easily be a matter of production contracts. Either Krennic, being the rich, particular man that he is, put out a new defense contract to be fulfilled by a manufacturer for xyz reasons, or when Palpatine restructured he let armorers put out bids for new protective gear. This is why we only see them pre ANH and in Mandalorian in the outer rim. If you think about it, clone trooper armor is now largely useless both for symbolic reasons and most likely technology and fit. It's likely a limited production bid could have been accepted before the empire went with normal stormtrooper armor by and large. Shoretrooper armor has a more different design aesthetic and less size restrictions. This speaks like a different manufacturer to me. This kind of thing happens all the time.

According to the wiki, being a shoretrooper is a temporary assignment and rank. It could also just be a kind of merit appointment. Who'd expect heavily protected Scarif to be attacked? I'm against the snorkel marine idea. Wearing armor isn't conducive to swimming, snorkel or not.

15 hours ago, Ilostmycactus said:

The change in shoretrooper armor could easily be a matter of production contracts. Either Krennic, being the rich, particular man that he is, put out a new defense contract to be fulfilled by a manufacturer for xyz reasons, or when Palpatine restructured he let armorers put out bids for new protective gear. This is why we only see them pre ANH and in Mandalorian in the outer rim. If you think about it, clone trooper armor is now largely useless both for symbolic reasons and most likely technology and fit. It's likely a limited production bid could have been accepted before the empire went with normal stormtrooper armor by and large. Shoretrooper armor has a more different design aesthetic and less size restrictions. This speaks like a different manufacturer to me. This kind of thing happens all the time.

According to the wiki, being a shoretrooper is a temporary assignment and rank. It could also just be a kind of merit appointment. Who'd expect heavily protected Scarif to be attacked? I'm against the snorkel marine idea. Wearing armor isn't conducive to swimming, snorkel or not.

Regarding the "shoretrooper" concept generally - I think it's a silly explanation they came up with. Either it's a genuine specialism, in which case making it a temporary rotational assignment is bizarre within the logic the canon people are attempting to lay out where the Empire is a military where every individual vehicle has a unique and uniquely equipped corps of drivers dedicated to them; or it's a rare temporary assignment, in which case the notion that it would have its own entirely unique set of armour designed for it is also bizarre given we have a template for how the Empire handles such duties - it modifies the basic armour. It even does that for a lot of dedicated specialisms, but still, definitely for the "occasional duty" stuff - magmatroopers, sandtroopers etc.

As to the "different manufacturers" concept, I don't agree. Firstly, the Empire doesn't have the same relationship with the people making their gear as a modern government does with defence contractors. ST armour and its variants are designed in-house by the Department of Military Research, and then manufactured to that given spec by either factories controlled directly by the military themselves or by companies that have been fully or partially(by the inclusion of loyalists with veto power on the boards) nationalised. In the canon, Shoretrooper armour must necessarily exist because the Imperial hierarchy decided it should exist, directed the DMR to develop it, and then instructed that it be manufactured, it can't be the result of simple variation due to contract tendering because that doesn't happen.

Armour may not be conducive to swimming by IRL logic, I agree, but it is A Thing in Star Wars - both the Clone Army and the Stormtrooper Corps had variant armour for underwater ops(and in both the old EU and nuCanon they were variants of an existing basic armour type rather than a wholly unique new design like Shoretroopers - Scout in EU, regular ST armour in nuCanon). Space doesn't have "drag" IRL either, but it does in Star Wars, there are lots of nonsensical things in the setting by IRL standards, so I look more for internal consistency than compatibility with external logic. Which brings me to the final issue I have with Shoretroopers - and the variant troopers generally, which drove me to this effort which in any circumstances but lockdown would undoubtedly be a huge waste of time - is that they undermine one of the core, in-setting and out, thematic elements of Stormtroopers and one of the major things that set them apart from the clone army(ironically) : uniformity. Clones had an endless parade of specialised types of troopers, many of them bred to their purpose, and on top of that they customised gear and added unit colourschemes and personal markings. Stormtrooper, by contrast, were meant to be a faceless mass of white death; gun one down, another identical sterile indoctrinated white killer steps forward to take their place, endlessly. That one trait was how they could still be scary as an adversary no matter how much they had to job to the heroes in cartoons or be made fun of by LulRandumb directors in The Mandalorian. The more Disney insist "the whole Imperial military are Stormtroopers, all of 'em, everywhere" while simultaneously coming out with more and more unique designs, the more that thematic underpinning is undermined, and the more they really do just start to look like jobbing cartoon baddies who're no real threat to anybody.

I like the designs themselves plenty, so this is my way of having my cake and eating it.

18 hours ago, Yodhrin said:

Regarding the "shoretrooper" concept generally - I think it's a silly explanation they came up with. Either it's a genuine specialism, in which case making it a temporary rotational assignment is bizarre within the logic the canon people are attempting to lay out where the Empire is a military where every individual vehicle has a unique and uniquely equipped corps of drivers dedicated to them; or it's a rare temporary assignment, in which case the notion that it would have its own entirely unique set of armour designed for it is also bizarre given we have a template for how the Empire handles such duties - it modifies the basic armour. It even does that for a lot of dedicated specialisms, but still, definitely for the "occasional duty" stuff - magmatroopers, sandtroopers etc.

As to the "different manufacturers" concept, I don't agree. Firstly, the Empire doesn't have the same relationship with the people making their gear as a modern government does with defence contractors. ST armour and its variants are designed in-house by the Department of Military Research, and then manufactured to that given spec by either factories controlled directly by the military themselves or by companies that have been fully or partially(by the inclusion of loyalists with veto power on the boards) nationalised. In the canon, Shoretrooper armour must necessarily exist because the Imperial hierarchy decided it should exist, directed the DMR to develop it, and then instructed that it be manufactured, it can't be the result of simple variation due to contract tendering because that doesn't happen.

Armour may not be conducive to swimming by IRL logic, I agree, but it is A Thing in Star Wars - both the Clone Army and the Stormtrooper Corps had variant armour for underwater ops(and in both the old EU and nuCanon they were variants of an existing basic armour type rather than a wholly unique new design like Shoretroopers - Scout in EU, regular ST armour in nuCanon). Space doesn't have "drag" IRL either, but it does in Star Wars, there are lots of nonsensical things in the setting by IRL standards, so I look more for internal consistency than compatibility with external logic. Which brings me to the final issue I have with Shoretroopers - and the variant troopers generally, which drove me to this effort which in any circumstances but lockdown would undoubtedly be a huge waste of time - is that they undermine one of the core, in-setting and out, thematic elements of Stormtroopers and one of the major things that set them apart from the clone army(ironically) : uniformity. Clones had an endless parade of specialised types of troopers, many of them bred to their purpose, and on top of that they customised gear and added unit colourschemes and personal markings. Stormtrooper, by contrast, were meant to be a faceless mass of white death; gun one down, another identical sterile indoctrinated white killer steps forward to take their place, endlessly. That one trait was how they could still be scary as an adversary no matter how much they had to job to the heroes in cartoons or be made fun of by LulRandumb directors in The Mandalorian. The more Disney insist "the whole Imperial military are Stormtroopers, all of 'em, everywhere" while simultaneously coming out with more and more unique designs, the more that thematic underpinning is undermined, and the more they really do just start to look like jobbing cartoon baddies who're no real threat to anybody.

I like the designs themselves plenty, so this is my way of having my cake and eating it.

The 2 listed armor contractors were only consumed by the state in 11bby. That's 11 years to rogue one. Not too long a time for an individual contractor's work to still be in circulation. And, as I've said, shore troopers are likely a mixture of pet project/loyalty group of Krennic, who was no doubt always vying for personal and program dominance with other moffs. And it's not like military research programs don't fund pointless programs and then change directions in real life. Bad batch will likely give more insight on the change in equipment.

Scuba troopers, unlike shoretroopers, actually have scuba gear and equipment. You might as well say any stormtrooper could become X trooper if Y widget was added.

As far as shoretroopers not being suited enough to tropical environments, normal stormtrooper armor has been described as uncomfortable even in normal environments, climate controlled bodysuit or not. Shoretrooper armor is significantly less constrictive.

Why is the jumptrooper officer the only one to wear a rank-designator on his left shoulder?

On 1/7/2021 at 5:36 AM, Ilostmycactus said:

The 2 listed armor contractors were only consumed by the state in 11bby. That's 11 years to rogue one. Not too long a time for an individual contractor's work to still be in circulation. And, as I've said, shore troopers are likely a mixture of pet project/loyalty group of Krennic, who was no doubt always vying for personal and program dominance with other moffs. And it's not like military research programs don't fund pointless programs and then change directions in real life. Bad batch will likely give more insight on the change in equipment.

Scuba troopers, unlike shoretroopers, actually have scuba gear and equipment. You might as well say any stormtrooper could become X trooper if Y widget was added.

As far as shoretroopers not being suited enough to tropical environments, normal stormtrooper armor has been described as uncomfortable even in normal environments, climate controlled bodysuit or not. Shoretrooper armor is significantly less constrictive.

Krennic wasn't a Moff, as far as I'm aware. He was a red-bar Admiral later appointed as Director of Advanced Military Research, he wouldn't have the necessary civil authority to get something manufactured off his own back, so as I said, he would have had to persuade the Imperial hierarchy to adopt his pet project in your scenario and push it through all stages of development, all within the first six or seven years after the foundation of the Empire, when he was ostensibly laser-focused on manipulating Erso to weaponise his Kyber research and politicking his way to his later position. Not impossible, just IMO implausible. And more implausible still is the idea this stuff was just a different company's stab at ST armour which the Empire just kept using - the two companies you mentioned aren't implied to be the only places where ST armour is being produced, they were simply directly appropriated and merged after their leaderships were caught behaving treasonously, there's no indication they or anyone else wasn't working to the same core design spec that the DMR had already laid down, or that any design spec except for the one we know and recognise ever existed beyond prototype stages. The canon explanation for Shoretrooper armour is that it was purpose designed for use in tropical environments, which I find silly for the reasons I already listed above.

Regarding scuba stuff - yes? I'm not sure of your point here, they have full on scuba gear, so they can operate underwater for as long as their air lasts(indefinitely, if it's got a scrubbing and recycling system in there). That's not what I was proposing for my not-Shoretroopers, hence why I explicitly compared what I was proposing with the idea of scuba gear to illustrate them as being more limited than that. I'm also not getting your second point here - yes, "adding a widget" is exactly how most Stormtrooper variants happened pre-Disney(or rather, pre-Ainsworth legal case, in which they didn't so much shoot themselves in the foot as blow off their whole leg below the knee with a shotgun), and that's much more sensible for a galaxy-spanning authoritarian regime that relies on mass production to efficiently equip its vast armies and uniformity of appearance in those armies to reinforce their ideological teachings. So if, as your last point there says, regular ST armour is too restrictive for Shoretrooper duty, then the plausible way for the Empire to address that would be to take Scout armour - the widespread existing variant of armour already explicitly designed for additional mobility - and "add a widget", rather than create a whole new set of gear from scratch for an extremely niche and uncommon duty. That said, I'm not sure why it would be all that necessary - where are you reading about ST armour being uncomfortable? In both cases where we've seen Shoretrooper armour on screen there have been other kinds of soldier around seemingly doing just fine without specialist extra equipment.

On 1/8/2021 at 3:52 AM, SFC Snuffy said:

Why is the jumptrooper officer the only one to wear a rank-designator on his left shoulder?

No idea, that came in I think with the Rebels cartoon when they gave jumptroopers their new look with the tweaked helmet and shoulderpads, I included it because it's been consistent since then. I might change it in the next revision though anyway, since I'm probably going to have to mess about with the canon Shoretrooper ranks on my versions as they're dumb as well - why on earth would you put all the most identifiable bits of the Officer variant on the front of the chest and the left arm, facing towards the enemy rather than your own men? At least the "squad leader" variant's marks continue onto the right shoulderpad.