SPECULATION OFFICIAL: THE FIRST ORDER DISCUSSION THREAD

You mean Luke? He`s Human, not a Whills.

 

Quite possibly. What about the weird Mortis arc in TCW that is canon? Certainly has to do with beings on a whole other level with regards to Force powers, and has a much higher mysticism tone that anything else we've seen in canon, on at least the same level as the Five Priestesses arc.

These two arcs are only a few of the canonical references to other mystic beings/philosophies/orders surrounding the Force - I mean look at the Night Sister of Dathomir, the creation of Savage Opress, the Voodoo like attack on Count Dooku, etc - so there is definitely room for doing a lot in this area, even if it isn't necessarily the Whills - I just don't think we're going to go there in any Saga trilogies.

 

Looks similar to the elevator shaft in the Death Star hangar.

 

I agree, don't feel like those areas will be explored as much in the movies,
I really liked those parts of TCW it added a new dimension to the force

 

I choose Gran Admiral Thrawn.

 

So there’s a bunch of different Trooper Units the 1st Order employs. From what we know, two questions spring to my mind:

Most likely, there will also be Scout Troopers, but what will they look like in the new sleek design? When will they be shown on screen, if ever?! Those Bikerscouts in RoTJ where once one of my favorite designs!

Will there be a differentiation between Chrome Troopers (most properly the personal henchmen & guards of the upper echelons) and the SpecForces Troopers? Or will the Chrome Troopers just be a sub-division of the SpecForces, thus having access also to the SpecForce TIE variant like Captain Phasma?

Just for the record, here's a list of those units I think already confirmed:

• Stormtrooper
  
• Riot Control Trooper (simple Standard Trooper with Shield & E-batons?)
  
• Heavy Artillery Stormtrooper
  
• Flametrooper
  
• Snowtrooper
  
• Chrometrooper Captain

 

Do all officers and/or squad leaders of the different stormtroopers wear shoulder patches / epaulettes?

 

You mean like the fancy pauldrons of the Mos Eisley MP or the Desert Stormtrooper squads?

My guess is, that they try to establish these now as standard rank insignia for all of the Stormtrooper corps after they look so sharp on the Clonestroopers. I think they've done this already in Rebels.


orange/red = commanders and/or unit leader
white = sergeants / squad leader
black = enlisted trooper

--- Double Post Merged, Nov 18, 2015, Original Post Date: Nov 18, 2015 ---

 

Pardon my asking...what's usually below the enlisted trooper?

It never ceases to amaze me in what kind of desolate state original trilogy research still is after 38 (!) years following the release of ANH. If somebody could help me to establish a contact with John Mollo, I'd be very grateful, because he is apparently the only one who could shed some authentic light on the issue (of ranks).

Just because we only saw black, white and orange sandtrooper epaulettes on Tatooine these are all there is?

The second officer in the Hangar Bay 327 control room who got shot wore a red or orange single line rank plaque (but shorter than the blue one of the first officer), apparently or supposedly (original or fake?) illustrated in Star Wars Costumes.

Should there not be a blue epaulette to indicate the rank of lieutenant?

At least they got it right, that orange indicates the officer in charge (i.e. outranks white and black), I guess I got to be grateful for little things.

 

Maybe cadets?!

I assume they don’t have to wear the black ones all the time, just on special assignments.



But let’s see how this transfers to the 1st Order and their multitude of different unit types already known.

Will we really get to see more Chrome Troopers besides Phasma?

 

Update: It seems that the FO does not attach a black pauldron to every enlisted guy. In this scene, the distribution is more rare.

 

So how official is the above for TFA (I remember Dr. David West Reynolds suggesting in the OT Visual Dictionary that white stood for sergeant)?

 

Hm, for me its really hard to tell. Looking at this picture, they mix the numbers of Troopers within one line (a squad each?). Mostly 10 + 1 orange, sometimes 10+1 orange + 1 black, the 12 w/o any pauldron…
Also see my post above regarding the black ones.

 

Cadets



and below them are Space Janitors

 

This seems to suggest that both orange and black pauldrons / epaulettes indicate higher rank and/or military police (preventing the others from defecting...sorry, couldn't help this one). ;-)

 

And how does this even compare to the toy section where the white ones are leading the squads?!?



So far, none of them is showing up on any images from scenes including 1st Order troopers.

 

Yes, but we were thinking about this system might now transfer to the First Order. And that it was used very inconsistent in the OT, and only in ANH.

Back then, they just assumed that black was for the enlisted by the numbers, as there were more black ones than any other color with the Sandtroopers. But this was never confirmed officially anywhere, and the mass scene from starkiller base also lends doubts to the black = enlisted theory.

I think what Hija was hinting at is that then mostly every trooper has to wear the black pauldron if it would be mandatory for enlisted ones.


But besides pauldrons and ranks, what about the Scouts, Chrome Troopers and SpecForces (Shadow trooper?)?