Sorry Tune and Canino,. got caught up in the Kaggath stuff.

Nevermind. Forget it. Obviously pointing out a major hole in your opponent's leadership that could basically end the Kaggath in 100 posts is a no-go. BUT I stand by the fact that it was not a good leadership choice for that reason and if this were realistic, IG-88 would stage a coup in a heartbeat. Still, I question IG-88's ability to create a hivemind in the hours (max) before the space battle. Heading out for the evening.

I was being theoretical. Like a faction with HoS Yoda, SiC Vader, and Sith Brotherhood as Major Ground Force. Wound not end well for Yoda.

I was under the impression that leadership needed to mesh well together. Giving IG-88 an army of droids but still expecting him answer to a biological is like giving Vader an army of Sith and still expecting him to answer to a Jedi.

This wouldn't be defection. It would be betrayal. A coup. After the power transfer, he would still fight AiR. But the Kaggath would be over when Jerec dies.

Yeah, I'm not buying this droid hivemind. It's never been done before effectively, even by the CIS. If such a thing were possible, the CIS would have developed it instead of those commander droids. You said you wanted IG-88 to do this? All IG-88 does is download "sentience" into other droids, which might make them smarter, but wouldn't create a hivemind. And if the IDD WANTED IG-88 to make a hivemind... he'd go for it and stage a coup with his new servants. Just like that, clean the illogical organics (including Jerec) from the slate and continue the fight.

But what I'm saying is that when AiR fighters are dogfighting with IDD fighters, it will be firing blindly into a mass of flying ships. There's no way to ensure that you don't hit one of your own fighters.

A note on the Allegiance-class battlecruiser. THAT has no fighter defense at all. And, if you want your flagship to be able to pound the enemy ships, you've gotta give it an opening to do so. So if the Vengeance is going to be firing at the smaller ships of AiR, that leaves it exposed to two things. Firstly, the fighters, as I mentioned. But secondly, and more importantly, to Yaret-kors. The Vengeance suffers from the same bridge weakness most Star Destroyers do. Fire a couple Yaret-Kors at it, watch them pass through the shield and turn the bridge into slag, and it's done for. If other ships get in the way to block the Yaret-Kors, burn them down too. And then no more heavy turbolasers. Or Trench.

I'm not sure where you're getting 1/3 of all fighters are bombers. More like 1/10. And I'm not saying dartships will throw themselves at the IDD fleet. But when there are +3500 fighters swarming over the battlefield, good luck determining which are friend and which are foe and then actually being able to hit the foe. It's not that easy.

I think it's a mistake comparing the ground forces one on one. Obviously the Voxyn will not be going up against the Dark Troopers. And we're not supposed to discuss ground until later! But you did it first. So. The issue for the IDD here is the environment. Those treads aren't going to get the Persuader's very far on the big cityworld. The Phase III Dark Troopers also have an issue with their missiles. In such a tight fighting space, using missiles during battle could easily blow up some Phase I/II and/or hurt the other IDD vehicles in the impact radius. Firstly, if the Leviathans can't fit, neither can the OG-9. Those are huge and need TONS of space to move those legs. Secondly, I see no evidence that they can cling to walls. In fact, they're quite cumbersome. Shall we not use game mechanics? Neither the Phase II or III have jet packs, and I'm not sure where you're getting the speed boost from for the Phase I. The Phase II DO have jump packs, which allow them to fly up into the air for maybe two seconds, but nothing more. I fail to see how IG-88 would augment these in any way. Killiks also have natural exoskeleton armor and can carry blasters of vibroblades.

On the contrary: Yaret-kors were extremely good anti-fighter weapons. Both those equipped on larger ships and smaller ships. They could completely ignore the shields of starfighters and melt through their hulls. Skiprays are well known for their many, many missiles. However, dovin basals, the defense for these ships, are basically mini-black holes that can easily suck in those missiles, making them useless. This ship is also a cross between a starfighter and a light warship, carrying six yaret-kors itself. If this does work, AiR already has a system like this set up over all of it fighters. Hey now. I read up on your ships. They don't have 72 fighters each. They have BETWEEN 24 and 72, 72 being the max. So the average would be 48 fighters per ship. The issue is, Vindicator Heavy Cruisers have LIGHT turbolasers. And, if I am not mistaken, it takes a LOT more than LIGHT turbolasers to take down a Vong ship, of any type. Consider this. In the Battle of the Murgo Choke, the killik nests battled the Galactic Federation of Free Alliances at the command of Nek Bwua'tu. Bwua'tu failed and his ship was captured by killiks. Killiks are no joke in space, and it seems they are very good at boarding parties. Especially on Star Destroyer-type ships.

\o/ Yay! Feel free to play both sides. I will be attempting to (kinda) do the same thing, giving credit where credit is due to Silenceo's faction. And I hope you actually read Red Harvest (and can give me some insight into Project I71A), because I sure didn't!

In "Therefor I am: The Tale of IG-88" by Kevin J. Anderson, from the book Tales of the Bounty Hunters, it explains a little bit about IG-88. IG-88, in actuality, is four droids who all share the exact same programming, thus making them essentially share the same consciousness. The IG-88 that we all know and love is IG-88B. IG-88B was assigned to become a bounty hunter while its other personas (IG-88A, C, and D) worked on their grander plan of eliminating life from the galaxy. IG-88B's work was meant to be a distraction to prevent Imperial authorities from suspecting his other schemes. The bounty hunter profession was merely a ruse to bide time until their ultimate plan could be launched. What does this mean? IG-88 isn't loyal to any organic. He doesn't need to be a bounty hunter and credits are no object to him. What IG-88 wants is power. The ability to destroy life, especially sentient life, throughout the galaxy. And now, the IDD has given him the perfect armada to do just that. IG-88 will quickly assume control of all IDD droids, similar to how he took over Mechis III in minutes. He will eliminate all IDD biologicals in much the same way as he did on Mechis III, instructing his now "sentient" droid followers to eliminate them with extreme prejudice. Jerec will die in the uprising. Or, if he does not, he will be factionless, without any droids to command. IG-88 seems like a good member of a droid faction. But not when the other leadership are the biologicals he's been waiting for a chance to eliminate.

So many arguments to make!!! Most of them are for ground though. So I guess I'll have to wait.

XD No worries. I'm still figuring it out too. Basically, from how I understand it, Shadow Droids are Dark-Side-Sensitive. Emperor Palpatine (or his clone, at least) used this connection to the Dark Side to command them through the Force. However, now Palpatine is gone, and two other powerful Dark Siders are left with Dark-Side-Sensitive droids. The question is, which one's commands will the droids follow?

I do think that the Shadow Droids will find it difficult to stay loyal to the IDD. They have the ability to access the Dark Side, which essentially made them extensions of Palpatine's will. The issue is that Jerec and Muur are both Dark Side users. This means that they could both potentially take Palpatine's place as the will that the Shadow Droids are extensions of. Obviously, I would argue that Muur's will is stronger. Jerec was considered almost as strong as Darth Vader (but not quite) by Tash Arranda,but as much as I love her, I'm not sure about her credentials to judge such things. Muur, on the other hand, was stronger than Darth Krayt. Considering the rankings of Darth Vader (#6) and Darth Krayt (#7) on the REAL Most Powerful Sith thread, I would suggest that Muur is more powerful. However, if the Shadow Droids are agents of the Dark Side, they will defect. Muur's faction is much more Dark Side than Jerec's. Jerec's mission, it seems, is one of preventing the plague from spreading. Muur is wanting to see the expansion of the Dark Side. Does this argument make sense to anyone other than me? Also, gonna stop with the new arguments until Silenceo returns.

I assume we're talking about the TIE/D automated starfighter, right?

My initial argument for space is centered around the fighters of both fleets. It seems that both factions are relatively even on fighter numbers, at least based on my rough estimates. But the quality is starkly different. The TIE/D is easily outwitted by sentient starfighter pilots. In the only battle in which the TIE/D were used, they had a huge numbers advantage and lost to sentient pilots (albeit very good ones). However, it was noted that their piloting ability never matched that of living pilots, and they were abandoned shortly after being put into use. Alternatively, killiks are connected to a hive mind, and can communicate with each other, basically brain to brain, while in combat. This gives the killik pilots not only the advantage of being sentient, but also the ability to coordianate their attacks much better than any pilots the TIE/D have ever faced. Coupled with the fact that the TIE/D no longer have the numbers advantage, and the fighter battle is soundly AiR's. And that's without even comparing armaments. The TIE/D only have two laser cannons, easily countered by the Coralskipper's dovin basals. Dovin basals are also good counters for missiles of the Skipray Blastboats. It is safe to say that the fighter battle is easily won by AiR.

Oh thank God. I thought I would have to deal with this thing. O_o

Beni, can you link me to which exact ship this is -> Allegiance-class battlecruiser [Vengeance]

Thank you! It's supposed to be scary. I was going to have this whole argument about enemy moral, but now that's pointless. *Sigh* From loving droid factions to hating them just like that.

First, you may be right that he didn't originally make them, but he can still summon them, regardless. This picture (from Murr's Wookieepedia page) shows him evoking a leviathan. Even if you don't buy that, Muur was an engineer of many Sith Spawn and basically the founder of Sith alchemy. Even if Muur didn't originally summon the first leviathan, it's obvious that he could create them. Second, I know Lomi Plo's abilities have already been and will continue to be under scrutiny. Basically, she fought Luke Skywalker and didn't die on multiple occasions. That in of itself is an impressive feat.

*bows* And I plan to.

Interesting that the IDD has the numbers advantage in space while AiR has the numbers advantage on the ground.

I got a little bit carried away.