ErikB said:

Let's just say the Rebels are the good guys and the Empire are the bad guys and leave at that.

mouthymerc said:

Yeah, but we torture people and we assassinate people and we kidnap people and detain them without trial and we prosecute aggressive wars against countries for possibly not the most noble of reasons, and I think an unfortunate subtext of the whole thing is that it matters less who is the good guy than who can fuck up peoples shit the best.

So, in closing,

If you as a GM think SWAT teams are cooler than Bank Robbers, you really, really need to be running a game where the players are SWAT guys foiling bank robbers.

(And SWAT teams don't have to be cooler than bank robbers. Look at Heat or Public Enemies or Kayne & Lynch or Leon or The Killer or all the other crime movies.)

Because as a player there is nothing less fun than a game where the GM just wants to use the PCs as a punching bag for their pet NPCs. I've played that game a lot. 

And if there are to be moves to update Star Wars view of how Superpower vs. Insurgents and their Hokey Religions conflicts work to more modern sensibilities, I would be much more comfortable if the focus was on 'With great power comes great responsibility' than 'With great power comes great opportunities to force choke a bunch of dudes like Darth Vader'.

So all in all, I'd like to play a Rebel, but only if I can play Legolas vs. Orcs. If you are thinking more of having us play an untrained, illiterate Pashtun peasant with a rusty AK-47 crudely converted to bolt action and no front sight vs. the USMC, in what ways do you expect we will find that entertaining?

--

For the record, do people in this thread think Stormtroopers are cooler than Rebels, or Rebels are cooler than Stormtroopers?

ErikB said:

I think you are involved in a completely different discussion than everyone else. 

Doc, the Weasel said:

Well humour me, and tell me if you think Rebels are cooler than Stormtroopers, and if so, why. 

Same question to everyone else.

Doc, the Weasel said:

Yes. That being said, Rebels all the way! And just because I think the Rebels are cooler does not mean I think the imperials are inept. Nor does thinking the Imperials are capable grant their position any moral authority. If your point is Rebels are cooler, thus Stormtroopers should not be a threat, I don't see how the one leads to the other. 

cparadis said:

It is more about how they go about generating the threat. Most people prefer to be The Elite rather than The Horde, so it is more pleasing for peoples egos to have the threat they face be provided by there being large numbers of inferior enemies rather than a smaller number of superior opponents.

Slike, the 300 Spartans may have lost, but people still think the Spartans are cooler than the Persians. 

And from a practical point of view, if your party consists of four dudes, and there is an unending horde of stormtroopers with more reinforcements on the way, it is probably sensible that the PCs are better than the troopers.

ErikB said:

This is full of assumptions I do not agree with, and I see no evidence to support.

No one is saying PCs are "the Horde." even if Stormtroopers are "the Elite" PCs can still be elite. 

You may personally like facing hordes of mooks, but I believe a party fighting a single dragon is a time honored RPG trope, so I don't think your assumptions about large number of inferior enemies versus small number of superior enemies is correct. 

Not really sure what the Spartans have to do with this discussion … Are the Spartans like the Imperials because they are a professional army trying to protect their established government or are they like the rebels because they are "elite?"

Your final point begs the question. If it is four people versus an unending horde of stormtroopers it is only "sensible" that the PCs are better than the troopers if you assume the PCs are going to win. If you don't assume the PCs are going to win it is neither more nor less sensible to have the Stormtroopers be better soldiers. 

cparadis said:

Sure, but the dragon equivalent is Darth Maul, not a battledroid.

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TheDragon

And, yknow, if you and your three mates rob a bank, hordes of police and swat dudes will descend on it. So they can't all be The Dragon.

Thank you for agreeing with me that it is not the case that people unanimously prefer facing numerous inferior opponents versus a lesser number of superior opponents. I think there are a lot of assumptions here based on creative agenda. I respect people who want stormtrooper mooks in their games, it's just not a game I would want to play in, because those are not the stories I want out of a Star Wars RPG. At the end of the day players and GMs should choose to make the stormtroopers that fit the story they want to play. If that's a story about murdering thousands of stormtroopers, make them mooks. If it is a story where stormtroopers pose a real threat to people then don't. 

Part of the problem is that Stormtroopers don't come in small numbers. Well, unless you set up IEDs to ambush patrols, but did I mention I really, really don't want to play Al-Qaeda?

So I dunno. I tend to think in terms of films and books and games, so maybe people could talk about the kinds of stories the would like to see. How would you like to see Rebel/Stormtrooper interactions go?

ErikB said:

This discussion wasn't about Rebels vs Stormtroopers. 

Frankly, this board should be talking about Scoundrels vs Stormtroopers. Rebels is the next game.

It works with soundrels as well. A bank robbing crew like the Dillinger gang or the McCauley crew from Heat or the Ex Presidents from Point Break or The Jokers crew from The Dark Knight or Kane & Lynch or the guys from The Heist are likly to be far more dangerous than rebels are.

And I cannot help but notice that you did not answer the question.

Scoundral vs. Stormtroopers?  Why any question?

Clearly, there exists one canonically correct answer to this.  One Scoundral -- only if he's cool -- can screaming rush about two or three no problem.  When said Scoundral -- even if he's cool -- brashly rushes into a room full of them, the Stormtroopers win.  Well, that is, if the mooks could hit anything, they'd win.

But, they can't see.  Because all of the elite stormtroopers have been sucked up to become Storm Commandos or Royal Guards.  And then elite Royal Guards have all been sucked up to become Sovereign Protectors.

There's the Imperial training: mook shoots at jawas until he can hit one.  If he can't hit one, he's enlisted into the Emperor's elite brigade of "Heroes of Yavin Hunters."  If he can hit one, he's sent after elderly moisture farmers.  If he can hit them, then they're promoted to Storm Commandos to see real action against other soldiers.  If he can't hit them, then they're enlisted into the Emperor's private guard.  They do this, because their guns are immediately taken away and they are tasked with standing around all day guarding the most dangerous being to ever have lived in the entire history of the universe.  See, they think they're becoming more elite, but the reality is that the guy who can hit womp rats is about the best there is.

This should answer everyone's question satisfactorily?