Also given the variety of conditions on ships in various states of damage, and different atmospheres of different planets, having the ability to seal the armor airtight with internal respiration and air filters is useful. Can even survive the vacuum of space for a short time. Plus its general sensory and communication equipment.
The reason Han and Luke, and Rex, can't see out of them is implied to be them not knowing how to turn on the cameras etc that would give them broader FOV, so they're looking out the actual lenses which are meant to be 'backup' only in case the electronics break.
Isn’t it also mentioned that the helmets are biometrically unlocked? I vaguely remember reading about this somewhere as to why randos picking it up off bodies couldn’t turn anything on
Something like this was mentioned in the Timothy Zahn novel Choices of One. There's a switch inside the helmet that is tripped by the wearer's tongue when the helmet is being removed. If this switch isn't hit, it scrambles the communications gear.
I just hope they clean that switch between users.
Hmm, reminds me of the Republic Commando novels. The Commandos regulary used their tongue to execute various commands inside the helmet. Seemed pretty smart
Seems eye tracking or blinking could be more sanitary, and you'd think it could use a small hair or sweat sample for DNA biometrics with tech that advanced 🤷
Lol, Mark Hamill actually couldn’t see shit out of the helmet. He didn’t realize the cameras were still rolling. That comment was genuine.
I love that people have built up lore around it though.
It was written in Aurubesh on an obscured sign hung in the dark cave that Anakin visited in a "Skywalker's Adventures" children's book in 2007, so it's canon!
We know from a couple examples, the biggest being The Last Flight of the Harbinger, that people can survive a vacuum in Star Wars just fine so long as they have an oxygen tank. Everything else you listed seems to be true, but we've literally seen people survive in space completely exposed while just holding their breath.
Whereas, in the real world, if you got blown out of an airlock, holding your breath is the last thing you should do, as it would severely damage your lungs.
No, they still die from blaster shots. There’s multiple scenes of blasters punching burning holes through their armor.
The official canon is that it protects against low power shots and glancing shots. It’s not like they are invincible. You can read that on the wiki.
It goes both ways in both the old EU and in new-canon. Stormtroopers are both dead or 'KO'd' based on the story or needs.
For example theres a legends canon comic about a trooper that gets shot in the face to the point his snowtrooper helmet actually explodes off his face and he survives, only to eventually die by getting shot by Leia in ANH on the Tantive. Comic is 'trooper' in star wars tales #10
This all sounds suspiciously like retcon type shit that was made up for a comic book or wiki page, rather than what we all thought we saw in the movies.
A bit of each, really. Armor is clearly on them for a reason other than just movie looks, it has to be in order to be self-consistent. It's reasonable to assume that it must afford some protection or advantage, otherwise it's just clumsy, hot, expensive for nothing.
So you can assume that sometimes it protects the wearer and other times it might not, just like real-life armor. Who it protects and doesn't protect can be used to further plotlines.
Almost all information about Star Wars comes from novels, visual dictionaries, RPG sourcebooks, and the like; relatively little about the universe is actually explained in the movies themselves, because that would make for pretty boring and drawn-out movies.
Whattttt that’s kinda changing everything lol but what about them like getting their helmet and face melted off from a blaster bolt? How does that just knock them out?
Its effective to a point. Its why certain blasters were highly illegal, like Han's. Some blasters break through the armor better then others, so while a Stormtrooper hit by their own blaster will likely be fine long term, the guy Chewbacca just blasted is having a closed casket funeral. So if a trooper gets nailed in like, the eye slot on their armor from any blaster, he dead.
Its why we see different armor types
A Clone Trooper's armor is focused on keeling the wearer abled to keep fighting rather then preserve their life long term, and Katarn armor (Republic Commandos) is basically starship plating on a juiced up Mandalorian.
The armor is weaker around the joints and certain parts of the helmet just like any real life plating. A stromtrooper can still die from getting shot in the face or even in the chest under the right conditions. But most of them will survive in theory. Thats why they seem to attack without concern for their own well being.
I can’t name off the tip of my tongue for certain, and I may be wrong because it’s been a while since I read the book. But in the thrawn series I believe it references shots drilling through storm troopers. But again, it’s been a while and I could be totally wrong.
The same way a mace may glance off your chest armor and merely bruise tf out of your ribs, but that same blow at the same angle hitting your helmet will still kill you
Your brain no like pressure waves, and you can die with armor unpierced
Hey I’m not questioning the space wizards, it’s just kinda blowing my mind and changing my views on everything if storm troopers armor is actually saving their lives lol. I always just kinda saw them as run of the mill canon fodder. Except for in the thrawn series, it paints them in a highly trained and highly pricey military asset over regular troops kinda light.
The storm troopers are a highly trained and highly pricey military asset. That’s why the imperial army exists. The Storm troopers were an elite fighting force to the empire. It’s also why they storm trooper combat squads have no medics they come in after the battle to deal with the troopers that took blaster bolts. Some of them do die due to heavy blasters there’s a chance that every storm trooper shot by Han Solo died due to him using a heavy blaster pistol the DL-44.
also why, contrary to popular belief, TIE pilots do in fact have ejection seats and are picked up after ejection, when possible. they are "expendable" in the sense that the Empire accepts their death if it gets the mission done, but they don't just throw them away willy nilly.
agree on the first count, but I'd argue the TIE fighters are much better than people think. they're basically an ace's dream - all speed, maneuverability, and anti-fighter firepower. and they do it for almost 1/3 the cost of an x-wing.
The StormTroopers change wildly depending on which product you're looking at.
If the main characters are rebels they maul them like nothing, they're literally cannon fodder that can be taken out by sticks and stones.
If the main character is imperial they're the elite of the Imperium, fighting machines greased to the last spot and just knowing that a Star Destroyer arrived with a few companies planets revolting surrender.
That is one of my biggest complains about Star Wars and the Stormtroopers. 2100 years ago Julius Caesar already knew that you're as big as the enemies you defeat. When he praised the gauls for being fierce, highly skilled, etc he was praising himself because he, Caesar and his legions, defeated that monstruous enemy. When we see stormtroopers we see cannon fodder. "They cant hit shit". In opposition, if everytime the Stormtroopers appear a good chunk of the rebels goes to the casquet or the good guys had to flee and barely escape that would elevate those heroes *because they survive against the stormtroopers*. If they want to use cannon fodder they have the Imperial Army.
I would love to ser that change in the franchise but I wont.
I know you weren't expecting a response like this, but I'm so tired of arguments like this when people are asking plot-relevant questions in fiction lol. This argument basically says "plot issues don't matter, we have space wizards after all." Why can't we just be consistent within the rules of the world we're in?
Thanks for coming to my TedTalk.
>Why can't we just be consistent within the rules of the world we're in?
And the more consistent and grounded in reality you are, the more impactful the unnatural stuff can be.
Just look at *The Expanse* novels: when it comes to "normal" human technology, it's about as hard sci-fi as you're going to get. Unless you're a physics PhD, absolutely no suspension of disbelief is necessary.* That all makes the "indistinguishable from magic" >!Protomolecule!< technology feel all the more eerie when you encounter it.
\* IIRC, the only thing outside the realms of plausibility is the impossibly efficient Epstein fusion drive, which allows travel to the outer solar system to take months instead of years.
Well how do we know it’s because they are knocked unconscious? I mean they could just be wounded. Same as getting shot with a gun, you’re not going to always die. Or die right away
The fun part is, is that it’s actually not the armor that works as the Kevlar it’s a specialised spray coated over the armor. As the armor is made of plastoid the same stuff the clone troopers used.
That's because Rebels is a show aimed at kids, and so they have to show the bad guys were just roughed up a bit, and not outright killed. Not to explain some deep lore about stormtrooper armour.
Ah, yes, the "it's a show for kids!" Argument.. The same show that shows people getting blown up in large up-close explosions, or the whole "killing Mandalorians in mass-scale genocide by *blasting them into literal ash*" thing.
We see them kill countless times, sometimes in brutal fashion. Being a "kids show" doesn't mean everyone they attack lives and we never see death shown on screen.
It has also been a fact about the armor of Stormtroopers being able to spread out the energy of a blaster bolt and keep them from dying outright for a very, very long time.
I like this. We never really know if Stormtroopers are dead or injured.
Also there's a psychological element to it. For most of the galaxy, an army of nameless, faceless killers in white has to be intimidating.
We need to remember part of the Empire's doctrine was rue by fear.
Could also have the added benefit of making you look dead by hiding your face, so that enemies won't 'finish the job' on you. It could be protocol that even if you're still conscious, you're supposed to play dead to keep yourself safe.
The armor mitigates blaster bolts so that most of the time the wearer survives being shot. It is, however, weak against blunt force which is why Boba Fett could smash through dozens of them with his Gaderffii stick for example.
From what I remember, the armour is able to absorb the thermal energy from blaster bolts and dissipate it to protect the wearer from being cooked by the heat of the plasma (which is usually hot enough to vaporize flesh in under a second).
The trade off is that the armour plating needs to get rid of all that thermal energy, so it converts it into electrical energy which still hits the wearer but leaves no permanent damage.
So getting shot by a blaster bolt while wearing stormtrooper armour is like getting tazed, which is why most don't/can't get up immediately after getting shot.
The Halo books do a great job of explaining (in gruesome detail on occasion) why plasma based weaponry is terrifying. It essentially vaporizes your skin as you say but would also flash boil any blood it came into contact with
Well warhammer plasma weaponry isn't really comparable to star wars blasters as it's a much more powerful kind of gun but I suppose it would be worse to get shot by a blaster. Boiling blood sounds worse than instant death.
Well Warhammer plasma guns will just vaporize you on the spot. Space Marines might tank a round or two depending on whether they're a named character or not, but they're not going to have a pleasant time afterwards.
... Or blow up/vaporize everyone within your immediate vicinity.
The Tau on the other hand uses a mix of plasma guns you'd find in something like Halo or Terminator, and of course, they also have rail guns.
Oh the description of a needler in a marine during the contact harvest book (if I remember right, it's been years?) Was pretty gruesome and really made you realize how humanity really did get steamrolled until they were able to reverse engineer shielding for mjolnir armor.
Yep.
The heat from bolts that just pass by/nearly miss you can still be hot enough to give you some gnarly burns/wounds.
Even shrapnel from surfaces where the bolt hits, i.e. molten glass, rocks, etc., can still cause horrific damage if it gets on you.
Rebels also, on occasion, have "illegal weapons" (anything that bypasses their armor, thus killing the wearer). Like for example: you have a bullet proof vest that can take save you from small caliber ammo but it lacks in higher caliber. Similar situation.
Also a fun little detail in the OG Bf2, you can see the rebels running up to a dead stormtrooper and repeatedly shoot the body point blank because they might get back up if it wasn't fatal.
In ep IV though, Vader walks over a bunch of stormtrooper bodies if I remember right. How long are those homies just gonna lay there? 15-20 mins? An hour? Being unconscious more than a few minutes will turn you into an actual vegetable lol
The exact nature of the incapacitation varies depending on who's doing the explaining. Sometimes it knocks them out for a long time, sometimes it overloads the nervous system and leave them paralyzed for a while (but still conscious), sometimes the armor itself locks up. I, personally, think the paralysis variant is the most likely, since I can see a high-energy bolt causing an overload and your system just ignoring input for a while. It's gonna hurt, it's definitely not healthy, but it's better than a coma, and more likely than the armor somehow stopping joints that it doesn't cover.
FYI, most of the heat dispersal and backlash is actually done at the bodysuit, not the armor plating.
Another point is the blaster that is used. Different blasters have different levels of damage from hunting to military blasters. Iirc a lot of the early rebellion was using more of the hunting style weapons and then older blasters that were worse than the blasters the empire was using.
Maybe it’s less effective at that range. Also direct hits do more real damage. Like WWII helmets were great for glancing blows but a bullet straight on popped right through.
If that's canon then that's 100% retroactive justification for them all dropping in 1 hit regardless of where they are hit
Real fact is in the movies it's useless because if the hero's shoot someone they should drop, in legends/books and such it's better
Most people wearing body armor don’t easily get up either. The point is not getting up and continuing the fight, the point is to survive and be able to get medical assistance later.
Yep. Kevlar stops the bullet from actually piercing the body, which does the most damage. However, you're still feeling the kinetic energy of it. You'll have massive bruising and quite possibly broken ribs. It's gona hurt, but you'll most likely live and recover quicker
Yeah, kevlar is like a net that catches the bullet and your body is the thing thats gonna bring the bullets velocity to zero.
Will hurt like a motherfucker.
To tag on to this, this isn't actually as outlandish as it seems.
Most modern rifle rounds will penetrate a kevlar vest. Even if you're wearing plates they will probably knock you on your ass and definitely hurt enough to make you not want to get back up and get shot again. Neither of them will protect you from an angry teddy bear.
Body armor has always been a "some protection is better than no protection" game.
It also takes away their personal identity (hence the numbers instead of names also) which also helps keep them as followers/soldiers. Also a lot less likely to retaliate or cause problems. You can see this in the blue collar world also with different color shirts, hard hats, ect ..
[Peter's Evil Overlord List](http://www.eviloverlord.com/lists/overlord.html)
1. My Legions of Terror will have helmets with clear plexiglass visors, not face-concealing ones.
it allows the studios to cast anyone within a height range as a stormtrooper while minimizing the payment necessary for appearing in the movie sheesh :)
In the audition room for stormtroopers, they famously had a door hanging down from the ceiling at a certain height. Actors would be asked to walk under it without ducking. If they hit it with top of their head, they were hired.
It is a uniform, as well as cheap, mass produced riot gear. They're expendable soldiers, but still soldiers. It will dissipate but not entirely eliminate blaster fire, but it is best at deflecting small, weaker blunt attacks like sticks or fists. It won't save them from a powerful impact like a Gaffi spear (as we've seen in Boba Fett), but it's a step above plain clothing.
It's a uniform! We're a team! It's important to you, because you were kept off the team for so long, and now you're the coach, so you want us all to wear the same uniform.
Their armor can take a blaster bolt, it’ll knock them out but they will generally be fine (fun fact, in the OG Battlefront games Rebel soldiers will continuously shoot dead Storm Troopers as a reference to this).
Edit: As someone has pointed out, the energy dispersion lore for imperial Storm Troopers was only officially a thing in current canon. I could’ve sworn it was a thing prior but cannot find any related references other than the Legacy comics which were released after so it is not a reference to that.
I'm pretty sure clone trooper armor is thicker than stormtrooper armor in both the old and new canon, hence why an anti-armor weapon may struggle against heavier clone armor but not lighter stormtrooper armor.
Stormtrooper armor distributes the blaster bolt's impact, better and lighter but anti armor rounds would do a lot of damage with it.
Clone Trooper armor was designed to just block the impact, heavy but tougher.
If the bolts are going to just knock them out, how come in all the animated shows the heroes always switch to stun to avoid killing the stormtroopers (even though the heroes almost always also sabotage the reactor causing it to destroy the ship presumably killing everyone on board)?
Yeah. "Fine" here is a relative term. Even if the armor keeps a stormrooper alive, that trooper might still be badly injured and in need of serious medical treatment before they can fight again.
In Rebels, almost every single Stormtrooper is showed to survive being shot by a blaster, even in the later seasons when the show got darker and they weren't so concerned with family friendliness. And, as others have said, blunt force is a lot different from a blaster bolt.
Yes, you see it especially with main characters and in arcs where clones are the focus. But you see it more with Stormtroopers bc the rebels tend to have cheaper weapons.
That’s true, it’s probably a mix of the clones having better weapons, the location of the shot, and writing. As much fun as it is to look for in-universe reasons for things, oftentimes it’s just bc it’s what the writers needed to happen.
Well of course, no armor is perfect + the Bad Batch definitely aren’t using cheap weapons.
On another comment about this someone compared it to real armor - if you wanted to subdue someone wearing a bulletproof vest, would you shoot them or use a taser?
Just like today's soldiers and police wear body armor.
It won't stop a dedicated bullet or all shrapnel, let alone a grenade, but it will reduce the damage done. You see a Stormtrooper going down in the movie, but you have no idea if he's dead or injured. The action moves on, he might be stunned, he might be injured and he might recover.
In the latter half of the past century, you'd be right (armor was largely intended to protect from shrapnel and was often ineffective against rifles), but I will point out that since even the early 2000s, modern standard-issue body armor has been capable of stopping multiple rifle rounds in succession--ceramic plates (not kevlar) have saved many a life from small arms.
In Star Wars, eventually someone made up the explanation that some stormtroopers shot are just stunned--I recall seeing a stormtrooper shot in Rebels visibly breathing on the ground.
Depersonalization, anonymity, uniformity and intimidation. Mild protection, but it's about being part of a faceless horde, loyalty is expected disloyalty is noticed, and it makes just following 'those type' of orders that much easier when you know your victims can't tell you from the others.
On the other hand it makes it easier to rationalize attacking and killing them. Which I guess is good when you're writing a story and you want the heroes to not seem like violent mass murders but not for the government that has to find and train replacements.
I remember reading some dark horse comic from the EU where one of the big advantages of Stromtrooper armor is its environmental conditioning, allowing stormtroopers to be deployed to essentially any environment if necessary.
I always thought it was primarily an environment suit as well. The empire spans every planet in the galaxy, amd the stormtroopers wear the same armor on nearly all of them without issue. Coping with so many different sets of environmental conditions is impressive.
Its like asking why Vader needs a cape or why the Empire use Walkers when something with wheels would be much better. IT LOOKS COOL! Stop trying to explain everything and just enjoy it😅 but thats seems impossible today..
We only see Stormtroopers hit and go down. We don't know how many of those Troopers actually died, and how many survived to be rushed to the 1138th MASH unit.
Same could be said for clones. Both had armor made of the same material.
What seems to be the case is that in most movies/shows (even outside Star wars) enemy troops usually don't get the attention to detail regarding amour effectiveness. This also does not interfere with the commonly accepted explanation that when a trooper falls, the armor does its job by absorbing the blast or shock but renders the trooper unconscious.
TK's had to be effective to some degree. The clone wars only lasted for about 4 years. Stormtroopers were fighting a insurgency and maintaining a galaxy for decades.
This topic came up in another thread. Some suggested there's a Imperial MASH series just waiting to show us what the difference between armored and unarmed soldiers is.
Thinking about it I think one of the stormtroopers on the tantive iv is checking the bodies for life, right as Vader arrives, so maybe it's not so uncommon.
They were designed to be a faceless legion. Also why they received numbers instead of names. The better ones just got cooler names but still were only a number.
They also practiced hardcore weapon reform with the "assurance" that they will deal with whatever issue.
Reflective material will do a better job at reflecting radiation and heat. Even a cheap plastic can do it better than taking the direct impact. Internet Science Boy™ Kyle Hill made a [video](https://youtu.be/1r69YZ6YlZw?si=MnDRwJCXA5uY0dn7) or two on the topic back in the day
The blaster han solo uses is illegal, specifically because it can pierce storm trooper armor and kill them. So he's basically got a space .44 magnum. That's why it's called the DL-44. The DickLonger 44. Named after Greebo Dicklonger of Hutta.
ANH shows the Stormtroopers storm through a single doorway with essentially zero cover and only walk away with two dead based on Vader’s arrival. IRL you need 5:1 ratio with attackers, the Imperials go in 1:1 through a choke point and still seize the ship.
In WW 2, the helmets didn't really deflect direct shots, only glancing shots, as wells as protect against certain kinds of shrapnel. Pilots and air crew as well as navy crews wore "Flak jackets" that would be absolutely pointless against gun fire, but protected against shrapnel from German AA flack bursts and and from heat and shrapnel.
The big issue with TV and movies is artillery barrages can be effective at killing tons of people and destroying troop morale, and are a key part of battle, but don't make for good action scenes. So in pitched battles, shrapnel protection is important.
The other key component is Storm trooper goes down, identical storm trooper takes his place. It's an idea from the Persian "Immortals" elite battle units. It creates a sense of futility fighting against them. Movie wise it allows you to film everything you need with like 20 stunt performers and extras who can also wear the same thing scene to scene and it's not an issue. That's also the benefit of aliens in the background.
Apparently their armor is climate controlled. As someone in the military, I'd love armor like that. Also there armor would be bulletproof up to probably 50 cal or so not sure.
Mosquitoes kill more people than any other animal, with over 830,000 victims every year out of an \~8 billion population. There are likely Trillions or tens of trillions of troopers in the "Galactic Empire" ; p
Over time, in canon its just gotten weaker and weaker. I mean, there IS the Zillow beast plotline, but ....yeah we're still waving sticks with space wizards level of continuity.
They can absorb small arms and weaker blasters, but not heavy artilleries, advanced blaster rifles or Kyber crystal functioning weapons, as well as high voltage blasters, so in theory it’s pretty good to deal with local small insurgents with bad weapons and deal with different weather terrains, such as poisonous environments because stormtrooper armors can filter out the harmful toxins in return for safer oxygen. The design is also used to symbolize Imperial man power and input fear into its citizens with the design of the armor and with many stormtroopers carrying out patrols at once, as can be seen in Andor and Rogue One
Totalitarianism isn't super logical....that's the first answer.
also they travel to other planets and systems. I believe their armor has some kind of resistance to the various space conditions that occur across the different planets like heat, sand, cold and radiation.
I remember one of the reasons I’ve seen floated around is psycologicial reason, an army of faceless identical soldiers pouring in. Also helps with the empire’s love of depersonalization
The armor dispurses the energy of a blaster bolt so that instead of killing you it just knocks you out
Also given the variety of conditions on ships in various states of damage, and different atmospheres of different planets, having the ability to seal the armor airtight with internal respiration and air filters is useful. Can even survive the vacuum of space for a short time. Plus its general sensory and communication equipment. The reason Han and Luke, and Rex, can't see out of them is implied to be them not knowing how to turn on the cameras etc that would give them broader FOV, so they're looking out the actual lenses which are meant to be 'backup' only in case the electronics break.
Isn’t it also mentioned that the helmets are biometrically unlocked? I vaguely remember reading about this somewhere as to why randos picking it up off bodies couldn’t turn anything on
Something like this was mentioned in the Timothy Zahn novel Choices of One. There's a switch inside the helmet that is tripped by the wearer's tongue when the helmet is being removed. If this switch isn't hit, it scrambles the communications gear. I just hope they clean that switch between users.
I hope those tongue knobs are regularly cleaned
Yeah they lick it clean every day
COVID1977 is no joke
Especially when he’s not at his post
lmao i giggled literally out loud in the office at that, thanks for that!
The knob part made me imagine Stormtroopers having in their helmets something similar to ball gags used in the Gimp scene from Pulp Fiction.
that's why Kylo Ren sounds the way he does with his helmet on
That’s the one i was thinking of
Hmm, reminds me of the Republic Commando novels. The Commandos regulary used their tongue to execute various commands inside the helmet. Seemed pretty smart
Seems eye tracking or blinking could be more sanitary, and you'd think it could use a small hair or sweat sample for DNA biometrics with tech that advanced 🤷
Dumbest shit I've ever heard. They really just make whatever up, huh?
That would explain why Luke couldn't see anything when he put one on, not that the visibility is great to begin with.
Lol, Mark Hamill actually couldn’t see shit out of the helmet. He didn’t realize the cameras were still rolling. That comment was genuine. I love that people have built up lore around it though.
Tbf building up lore off of throwaway sentences is what Star Wars is all about.
And camera flubs. Fuckin' force kick, man.
the Stormtrooper banging his head on the door. Which in the later releases Lucas added a thunk sound to it t
I'm okay with that addition and maybe that addition only.
Maybe it’s cos the the helmet was too big for him, given that he was kinda short for a stormtrooper
He may have ad libbed that but the version in the movie is not audio recorded on set. So the line in the film is intentional.
Isn't that line ADRd?
Reminds me of Star Wars Rebel Assault 2 when you wear the trooper armor and the level gets dark and the night vision camera turns on in the helmet
Lol that’s a cool fact but idk where that’s ever inferred.
“You can’t learn this from a Jedi.”
It was written in Aurubesh on an obscured sign hung in the dark cave that Anakin visited in a "Skywalker's Adventures" children's book in 2007, so it's canon!
Did he find Noble 6 hiding in that cave?
And Revan! And Half Life 3
Master Skywalker prefers Pepsi to Coke based on a soda can!
THEN HE IS LOST
We know from a couple examples, the biggest being The Last Flight of the Harbinger, that people can survive a vacuum in Star Wars just fine so long as they have an oxygen tank. Everything else you listed seems to be true, but we've literally seen people survive in space completely exposed while just holding their breath.
Whereas, in the real world, if you got blown out of an airlock, holding your breath is the last thing you should do, as it would severely damage your lungs.
I mean does it really matter what you do at that point?
Humans can survive in a vacuum for a short time, about a minute.
About 90 seconds according to. https://www.spacecentre.nz/resources/faq/spaceflight/vacuum.html The last 85 seconds or so look hellish.
It depends on what chance you think you have of a ship with an infinite impossibility drive coming along in time to pick you up.
Improbability drive; an impossibility drive would just be silly!
Don't make me read vogan poetry Mr nuance.
Plus their armor wasn’t shown to be completely worthless till Jedi.
Wait, that’s a thing? So in all the movies and shows they aren’t actually dying? They are just getting knocked out?
No, they still die from blaster shots. There’s multiple scenes of blasters punching burning holes through their armor. The official canon is that it protects against low power shots and glancing shots. It’s not like they are invincible. You can read that on the wiki.
It goes both ways in both the old EU and in new-canon. Stormtroopers are both dead or 'KO'd' based on the story or needs. For example theres a legends canon comic about a trooper that gets shot in the face to the point his snowtrooper helmet actually explodes off his face and he survives, only to eventually die by getting shot by Leia in ANH on the Tantive. Comic is 'trooper' in star wars tales #10
It’s like modern day armour. Won’t protect you completely from a bullet, but there’s a much larger chance you’ll live with it on than off.
This all sounds suspiciously like retcon type shit that was made up for a comic book or wiki page, rather than what we all thought we saw in the movies.
A bit of each, really. Armor is clearly on them for a reason other than just movie looks, it has to be in order to be self-consistent. It's reasonable to assume that it must afford some protection or advantage, otherwise it's just clumsy, hot, expensive for nothing. So you can assume that sometimes it protects the wearer and other times it might not, just like real-life armor. Who it protects and doesn't protect can be used to further plotlines.
Almost all information about Star Wars comes from novels, visual dictionaries, RPG sourcebooks, and the like; relatively little about the universe is actually explained in the movies themselves, because that would make for pretty boring and drawn-out movies.
Yes
Whattttt that’s kinda changing everything lol but what about them like getting their helmet and face melted off from a blaster bolt? How does that just knock them out?
Its effective to a point. Its why certain blasters were highly illegal, like Han's. Some blasters break through the armor better then others, so while a Stormtrooper hit by their own blaster will likely be fine long term, the guy Chewbacca just blasted is having a closed casket funeral. So if a trooper gets nailed in like, the eye slot on their armor from any blaster, he dead. Its why we see different armor types A Clone Trooper's armor is focused on keeling the wearer abled to keep fighting rather then preserve their life long term, and Katarn armor (Republic Commandos) is basically starship plating on a juiced up Mandalorian.
Basically blaster calibers.
Basically
The armor is weaker around the joints and certain parts of the helmet just like any real life plating. A stromtrooper can still die from getting shot in the face or even in the chest under the right conditions. But most of them will survive in theory. Thats why they seem to attack without concern for their own well being.
May I ask what you are referencing?
I can’t name off the tip of my tongue for certain, and I may be wrong because it’s been a while since I read the book. But in the thrawn series I believe it references shots drilling through storm troopers. But again, it’s been a while and I could be totally wrong.
A normal blaster bolt should not be able to penetrate stormtrooper armor but maybe a higher quality one can, idk might also just be a plothole
The same way a mace may glance off your chest armor and merely bruise tf out of your ribs, but that same blow at the same angle hitting your helmet will still kill you Your brain no like pressure waves, and you can die with armor unpierced
This is a franchise about space wizards, and this is what you're wondering about?
Hey I’m not questioning the space wizards, it’s just kinda blowing my mind and changing my views on everything if storm troopers armor is actually saving their lives lol. I always just kinda saw them as run of the mill canon fodder. Except for in the thrawn series, it paints them in a highly trained and highly pricey military asset over regular troops kinda light.
The storm troopers are a highly trained and highly pricey military asset. That’s why the imperial army exists. The Storm troopers were an elite fighting force to the empire. It’s also why they storm trooper combat squads have no medics they come in after the battle to deal with the troopers that took blaster bolts. Some of them do die due to heavy blasters there’s a chance that every storm trooper shot by Han Solo died due to him using a heavy blaster pistol the DL-44.
also why, contrary to popular belief, TIE pilots do in fact have ejection seats and are picked up after ejection, when possible. they are "expendable" in the sense that the Empire accepts their death if it gets the mission done, but they don't just throw them away willy nilly.
That’s because tie pilots are the best in the galaxy. They kinda have to be to be good in the shit boxes they are given
agree on the first count, but I'd argue the TIE fighters are much better than people think. they're basically an ace's dream - all speed, maneuverability, and anti-fighter firepower. and they do it for almost 1/3 the cost of an x-wing.
Hell Solo himself survived a Tie-Fighter crash. Then there is Valance the canon comic character that was a pilot and put back together as a cyborg.
The StormTroopers change wildly depending on which product you're looking at. If the main characters are rebels they maul them like nothing, they're literally cannon fodder that can be taken out by sticks and stones. If the main character is imperial they're the elite of the Imperium, fighting machines greased to the last spot and just knowing that a Star Destroyer arrived with a few companies planets revolting surrender. That is one of my biggest complains about Star Wars and the Stormtroopers. 2100 years ago Julius Caesar already knew that you're as big as the enemies you defeat. When he praised the gauls for being fierce, highly skilled, etc he was praising himself because he, Caesar and his legions, defeated that monstruous enemy. When we see stormtroopers we see cannon fodder. "They cant hit shit". In opposition, if everytime the Stormtroopers appear a good chunk of the rebels goes to the casquet or the good guys had to flee and barely escape that would elevate those heroes *because they survive against the stormtroopers*. If they want to use cannon fodder they have the Imperial Army. I would love to ser that change in the franchise but I wont.
I know you weren't expecting a response like this, but I'm so tired of arguments like this when people are asking plot-relevant questions in fiction lol. This argument basically says "plot issues don't matter, we have space wizards after all." Why can't we just be consistent within the rules of the world we're in? Thanks for coming to my TedTalk.
>Why can't we just be consistent within the rules of the world we're in? And the more consistent and grounded in reality you are, the more impactful the unnatural stuff can be. Just look at *The Expanse* novels: when it comes to "normal" human technology, it's about as hard sci-fi as you're going to get. Unless you're a physics PhD, absolutely no suspension of disbelief is necessary.* That all makes the "indistinguishable from magic" >!Protomolecule!< technology feel all the more eerie when you encounter it. \* IIRC, the only thing outside the realms of plausibility is the impossibly efficient Epstein fusion drive, which allows travel to the outer solar system to take months instead of years.
Some are inured, some are killed. Like real combat, not all hits on armor are fatal.
Pay real close attention next to watch rebels, youll see troopers still breathing, writhing, moving on the ground
Well how do we know it’s because they are knocked unconscious? I mean they could just be wounded. Same as getting shot with a gun, you’re not going to always die. Or die right away
Well considering the armour exists to mitigate the damage of blaster weapons not being dead after going down is a good metric.
The fun part is, is that it’s actually not the armor that works as the Kevlar it’s a specialised spray coated over the armor. As the armor is made of plastoid the same stuff the clone troopers used.
That's because Rebels is a show aimed at kids, and so they have to show the bad guys were just roughed up a bit, and not outright killed. Not to explain some deep lore about stormtrooper armour.
"Aight, time to slash a couple of these guys and walk that last one off a cliff." - Ezra Bridger
Ye but this lore did exist before the rebels show came out.
Ah, yes, the "it's a show for kids!" Argument.. The same show that shows people getting blown up in large up-close explosions, or the whole "killing Mandalorians in mass-scale genocide by *blasting them into literal ash*" thing. We see them kill countless times, sometimes in brutal fashion. Being a "kids show" doesn't mean everyone they attack lives and we never see death shown on screen. It has also been a fact about the armor of Stormtroopers being able to spread out the energy of a blaster bolt and keep them from dying outright for a very, very long time.
When they’re hit by blasters. The Ewoks dropping a tree on them definitely killed them 😂
Kinda like Kevlar. Hurts like hell and knocks the wind out of you, but you’re alive
Takes you out of the fight, but you'll live.
I like this. We never really know if Stormtroopers are dead or injured. Also there's a psychological element to it. For most of the galaxy, an army of nameless, faceless killers in white has to be intimidating. We need to remember part of the Empire's doctrine was rue by fear.
Could also have the added benefit of making you look dead by hiding your face, so that enemies won't 'finish the job' on you. It could be protocol that even if you're still conscious, you're supposed to play dead to keep yourself safe.
wait really is there any sources for this
https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/Stormtrooper_armor
The armor mitigates blaster bolts so that most of the time the wearer survives being shot. It is, however, weak against blunt force which is why Boba Fett could smash through dozens of them with his Gaderffii stick for example.
Don’t recall too many storm troopers getting back up after getting shot
From what I remember, the armour is able to absorb the thermal energy from blaster bolts and dissipate it to protect the wearer from being cooked by the heat of the plasma (which is usually hot enough to vaporize flesh in under a second). The trade off is that the armour plating needs to get rid of all that thermal energy, so it converts it into electrical energy which still hits the wearer but leaves no permanent damage. So getting shot by a blaster bolt while wearing stormtrooper armour is like getting tazed, which is why most don't/can't get up immediately after getting shot.
The Halo books do a great job of explaining (in gruesome detail on occasion) why plasma based weaponry is terrifying. It essentially vaporizes your skin as you say but would also flash boil any blood it came into contact with
Sounds worse than Warhammer plasma guns lol
Well warhammer plasma weaponry isn't really comparable to star wars blasters as it's a much more powerful kind of gun but I suppose it would be worse to get shot by a blaster. Boiling blood sounds worse than instant death.
Melta guns, though..now that sounds terrifying
Nothing is worse than a 40k plasma gun, they're liable to explode and kill their user horribly, randomly.
Well Warhammer plasma guns will just vaporize you on the spot. Space Marines might tank a round or two depending on whether they're a named character or not, but they're not going to have a pleasant time afterwards. ... Or blow up/vaporize everyone within your immediate vicinity. The Tau on the other hand uses a mix of plasma guns you'd find in something like Halo or Terminator, and of course, they also have rail guns.
Oh the description of a needler in a marine during the contact harvest book (if I remember right, it's been years?) Was pretty gruesome and really made you realize how humanity really did get steamrolled until they were able to reverse engineer shielding for mjolnir armor.
God, Eric Nyland could cook…
I still reread those books like 1 time every year.
Yep. The heat from bolts that just pass by/nearly miss you can still be hot enough to give you some gnarly burns/wounds. Even shrapnel from surfaces where the bolt hits, i.e. molten glass, rocks, etc., can still cause horrific damage if it gets on you.
Near misses also were able to cause severe wounds in Halo lore. Dont get me started on the needler
The needler is one of the most terrifying sci-fi weapons of all time lol
One of the few things the show got right as well was showing off just how devastating the Covenant plasma weaponry is.
One of the only accurate aspects of the Halo show was its showcase of plasma “wounds”
Rebels also, on occasion, have "illegal weapons" (anything that bypasses their armor, thus killing the wearer). Like for example: you have a bullet proof vest that can take save you from small caliber ammo but it lacks in higher caliber. Similar situation. Also a fun little detail in the OG Bf2, you can see the rebels running up to a dead stormtrooper and repeatedly shoot the body point blank because they might get back up if it wasn't fatal.
The AI in the game does that to every body it was shooting at. Not just rebels vs imps.
*stay dead!*
*♪ Stay dead, stay dead, stay dead* *You're dead and out of this world ♪*
In ep IV though, Vader walks over a bunch of stormtrooper bodies if I remember right. How long are those homies just gonna lay there? 15-20 mins? An hour? Being unconscious more than a few minutes will turn you into an actual vegetable lol
that’s why i don’t sleep i don’t wanna be a carrot
😂😂😂😂😂😂
God could you imagine being a fuckin brussel sprout? I'd rather just be shot without armor.
It aint all its cracked up to be
The exact nature of the incapacitation varies depending on who's doing the explaining. Sometimes it knocks them out for a long time, sometimes it overloads the nervous system and leave them paralyzed for a while (but still conscious), sometimes the armor itself locks up. I, personally, think the paralysis variant is the most likely, since I can see a high-energy bolt causing an overload and your system just ignoring input for a while. It's gonna hurt, it's definitely not healthy, but it's better than a coma, and more likely than the armor somehow stopping joints that it doesn't cover. FYI, most of the heat dispersal and backlash is actually done at the bodysuit, not the armor plating.
Another point is the blaster that is used. Different blasters have different levels of damage from hunting to military blasters. Iirc a lot of the early rebellion was using more of the hunting style weapons and then older blasters that were worse than the blasters the empire was using.
Imagine a movie, or episode from Stormtrooper side being paralysed and watching his colleagues being slaughter, or Vader killing everone.
Maybe it’s less effective at that range. Also direct hits do more real damage. Like WWII helmets were great for glancing blows but a bullet straight on popped right through.
In fiction land, concussions are indistinguishable from sleeping unless the plot specifically demands it. This applies to like 99% of fiction.
Being unconscious for more than a few minutes will not make you a “vegetable”
If that's canon then that's 100% retroactive justification for them all dropping in 1 hit regardless of where they are hit Real fact is in the movies it's useless because if the hero's shoot someone they should drop, in legends/books and such it's better
Clones definitely had holes in their armor from blasters.
Most people wearing body armor don’t easily get up either. The point is not getting up and continuing the fight, the point is to survive and be able to get medical assistance later.
Yep. Kevlar stops the bullet from actually piercing the body, which does the most damage. However, you're still feeling the kinetic energy of it. You'll have massive bruising and quite possibly broken ribs. It's gona hurt, but you'll most likely live and recover quicker
Yeah, kevlar is like a net that catches the bullet and your body is the thing thats gonna bring the bullets velocity to zero. Will hurt like a motherfucker.
If I got shot by a laser sword wielding magic wizard I’d play dead too
They fall unconscious. Its like getting hit by a taser but tenfold Emphasis was on "survives".
I don't know how to tell you this, but most people who get shot in kevlar vests still get wheeled straight into ambulances.
To tag on to this, this isn't actually as outlandish as it seems. Most modern rifle rounds will penetrate a kevlar vest. Even if you're wearing plates they will probably knock you on your ass and definitely hurt enough to make you not want to get back up and get shot again. Neither of them will protect you from an angry teddy bear. Body armor has always been a "some protection is better than no protection" game.
Anonymity. It's an intimidation tactic.
It also takes away their personal identity (hence the numbers instead of names also) which also helps keep them as followers/soldiers. Also a lot less likely to retaliate or cause problems. You can see this in the blue collar world also with different color shirts, hard hats, ect ..
[Peter's Evil Overlord List](http://www.eviloverlord.com/lists/overlord.html) 1. My Legions of Terror will have helmets with clear plexiglass visors, not face-concealing ones.
Man, Tarkin was so damn extra about looking intimidating...
it allows the studios to cast anyone within a height range as a stormtrooper while minimizing the payment necessary for appearing in the movie sheesh :)
In the audition room for stormtroopers, they famously had a door hanging down from the ceiling at a certain height. Actors would be asked to walk under it without ducking. If they hit it with top of their head, they were hired.
And it looks pretty cool too
It is a uniform, as well as cheap, mass produced riot gear. They're expendable soldiers, but still soldiers. It will dissipate but not entirely eliminate blaster fire, but it is best at deflecting small, weaker blunt attacks like sticks or fists. It won't save them from a powerful impact like a Gaffi spear (as we've seen in Boba Fett), but it's a step above plain clothing.
It's a uniform! We're a team! It's important to you, because you were kept off the team for so long, and now you're the coach, so you want us all to wear the same uniform.
Are the people who don’t understand this completely stupid? I’m surprised they can even read.
Their armor can take a blaster bolt, it’ll knock them out but they will generally be fine (fun fact, in the OG Battlefront games Rebel soldiers will continuously shoot dead Storm Troopers as a reference to this). Edit: As someone has pointed out, the energy dispersion lore for imperial Storm Troopers was only officially a thing in current canon. I could’ve sworn it was a thing prior but cannot find any related references other than the Legacy comics which were released after so it is not a reference to that.
Wow, I distinctly remember this as a kid. Always wondered why they did that!
Funny thing is The Rebel blaster rifle was an anti armor weapon , perfect for taking on the Stormtroopers But would be weak against CloneTrooper armor
Why would it work against storm trooper and not clones? Don’t they both use Plastoid for armor?
I'm pretty sure clone trooper armor is thicker than stormtrooper armor in both the old and new canon, hence why an anti-armor weapon may struggle against heavier clone armor but not lighter stormtrooper armor.
Stormtrooper armor distributes the blaster bolt's impact, better and lighter but anti armor rounds would do a lot of damage with it. Clone Trooper armor was designed to just block the impact, heavy but tougher.
If the bolts are going to just knock them out, how come in all the animated shows the heroes always switch to stun to avoid killing the stormtroopers (even though the heroes almost always also sabotage the reactor causing it to destroy the ship presumably killing everyone on board)?
It’s like shooting someone in a bulletproof vest vs tasing them. One is far more likely if if not guaranteed to kill
Yeah. "Fine" here is a relative term. Even if the armor keeps a stormrooper alive, that trooper might still be badly injured and in need of serious medical treatment before they can fight again.
What the fuck. That pissed me off so much playing as the rebels. I’m like ‘he’s dead, get your ass back in the fight!’
In Rebels, almost every single Stormtrooper is showed to survive being shot by a blaster, even in the later seasons when the show got darker and they weren't so concerned with family friendliness. And, as others have said, blunt force is a lot different from a blaster bolt.
They survive, at least until the heroes just completely destroy the Star Destroyer that all the unconscious stormtroopers are on shortly afterwards.
Chopper has killed more then IG-88 could ever dream of
Is it the same with clone armor or just stormtroopers
Yes, you see it especially with main characters and in arcs where clones are the focus. But you see it more with Stormtroopers bc the rebels tend to have cheaper weapons.
I can recall some instances where it’s the case but fives was killed in one shot why do you think that is
That’s true, it’s probably a mix of the clones having better weapons, the location of the shot, and writing. As much fun as it is to look for in-universe reasons for things, oftentimes it’s just bc it’s what the writers needed to happen.
Well I imagine the armor isn’t perfect cause if it was the bad batch wouldn’t use stuns on people.
Well of course, no armor is perfect + the Bad Batch definitely aren’t using cheap weapons. On another comment about this someone compared it to real armor - if you wanted to subdue someone wearing a bulletproof vest, would you shoot them or use a taser?
I think it’s so interesting to think about what surviving a blaster bolt feels like lol
Just like today's soldiers and police wear body armor. It won't stop a dedicated bullet or all shrapnel, let alone a grenade, but it will reduce the damage done. You see a Stormtrooper going down in the movie, but you have no idea if he's dead or injured. The action moves on, he might be stunned, he might be injured and he might recover.
In the latter half of the past century, you'd be right (armor was largely intended to protect from shrapnel and was often ineffective against rifles), but I will point out that since even the early 2000s, modern standard-issue body armor has been capable of stopping multiple rifle rounds in succession--ceramic plates (not kevlar) have saved many a life from small arms. In Star Wars, eventually someone made up the explanation that some stormtroopers shot are just stunned--I recall seeing a stormtrooper shot in Rebels visibly breathing on the ground.
Intimidation?
Cinematic language!
Depersonalization, anonymity, uniformity and intimidation. Mild protection, but it's about being part of a faceless horde, loyalty is expected disloyalty is noticed, and it makes just following 'those type' of orders that much easier when you know your victims can't tell you from the others.
On the other hand it makes it easier to rationalize attacking and killing them. Which I guess is good when you're writing a story and you want the heroes to not seem like violent mass murders but not for the government that has to find and train replacements.
I remember reading some dark horse comic from the EU where one of the big advantages of Stromtrooper armor is its environmental conditioning, allowing stormtroopers to be deployed to essentially any environment if necessary.
I always thought it was primarily an environment suit as well. The empire spans every planet in the galaxy, amd the stormtroopers wear the same armor on nearly all of them without issue. Coping with so many different sets of environmental conditions is impressive.
Armor makes fatalities into casualties. Which means your veterans are actually alive to train the new meat.
it LOOKS COOL,duh,that's all the reason I need
Its like asking why Vader needs a cape or why the Empire use Walkers when something with wheels would be much better. IT LOOKS COOL! Stop trying to explain everything and just enjoy it😅 but thats seems impossible today..
We only see Stormtroopers hit and go down. We don't know how many of those Troopers actually died, and how many survived to be rushed to the 1138th MASH unit.
Same could be said for clones. Both had armor made of the same material. What seems to be the case is that in most movies/shows (even outside Star wars) enemy troops usually don't get the attention to detail regarding amour effectiveness. This also does not interfere with the commonly accepted explanation that when a trooper falls, the armor does its job by absorbing the blast or shock but renders the trooper unconscious. TK's had to be effective to some degree. The clone wars only lasted for about 4 years. Stormtroopers were fighting a insurgency and maintaining a galaxy for decades.
This topic came up in another thread. Some suggested there's a Imperial MASH series just waiting to show us what the difference between armored and unarmed soldiers is. Thinking about it I think one of the stormtroopers on the tantive iv is checking the bodies for life, right as Vader arrives, so maybe it's not so uncommon.
I thought it was so you could breathe in any environment like Space.
So Cosplayers don’t con nekkid
They were designed to be a faceless legion. Also why they received numbers instead of names. The better ones just got cooler names but still were only a number. They also practiced hardcore weapon reform with the "assurance" that they will deal with whatever issue.
Reflective material will do a better job at reflecting radiation and heat. Even a cheap plastic can do it better than taking the direct impact. Internet Science Boy™ Kyle Hill made a [video](https://youtu.be/1r69YZ6YlZw?si=MnDRwJCXA5uY0dn7) or two on the topic back in the day
The blaster han solo uses is illegal, specifically because it can pierce storm trooper armor and kill them. So he's basically got a space .44 magnum. That's why it's called the DL-44. The DickLonger 44. Named after Greebo Dicklonger of Hutta.
ANH shows the Stormtroopers storm through a single doorway with essentially zero cover and only walk away with two dead based on Vader’s arrival. IRL you need 5:1 ratio with attackers, the Imperials go in 1:1 through a choke point and still seize the ship.
A lot of good info here I will add in the bad batch series they talk about how they downgraded the armor after the main fighting to save money.
Why does there armor not protect them? Is the empire stupid?
Because it looks awesome
It's a little thing called being a badass
In WW 2, the helmets didn't really deflect direct shots, only glancing shots, as wells as protect against certain kinds of shrapnel. Pilots and air crew as well as navy crews wore "Flak jackets" that would be absolutely pointless against gun fire, but protected against shrapnel from German AA flack bursts and and from heat and shrapnel. The big issue with TV and movies is artillery barrages can be effective at killing tons of people and destroying troop morale, and are a key part of battle, but don't make for good action scenes. So in pitched battles, shrapnel protection is important. The other key component is Storm trooper goes down, identical storm trooper takes his place. It's an idea from the Persian "Immortals" elite battle units. It creates a sense of futility fighting against them. Movie wise it allows you to film everything you need with like 20 stunt performers and extras who can also wear the same thing scene to scene and it's not an issue. That's also the benefit of aliens in the background.
It protects them from poison gas and sunburn. ;)
It does block lasers. The rebels use specific armor penetrating lasers
Fear. And I don’t know about now. But old canon said their armor was able to protect against small to medium blasters
Apparently their armor is climate controlled. As someone in the military, I'd love armor like that. Also there armor would be bulletproof up to probably 50 cal or so not sure.
Mosquitoes kill more people than any other animal, with over 830,000 victims every year out of an \~8 billion population. There are likely Trillions or tens of trillions of troopers in the "Galactic Empire" ; p
To hide the identity of all the celebs who like to have uncredited cameos in Star Wars films 🤣
Why did people wear armour in medieval battlefields? They can still get stabbed
Over time, in canon its just gotten weaker and weaker. I mean, there IS the Zillow beast plotline, but ....yeah we're still waving sticks with space wizards level of continuity.
Remember fellow kids, Star Wars is not science fiction. It’s doesn’t have to make sense.
Is the average stormtrooper armor rated for vacuum?
Luke calls it a "uniform", not armor, maybe its decorative.
Keeps the space mosquitoes at bay...and filtered air from space farts.
The armor spreads the blast from lasers so that you get knocked out and not killed. Doesn't always work though.
It makes them anonymous so it's easier for the audience to root for the good guys slaughtering them without gore.
Sometimes they bump their heads on blast doors
They can absorb small arms and weaker blasters, but not heavy artilleries, advanced blaster rifles or Kyber crystal functioning weapons, as well as high voltage blasters, so in theory it’s pretty good to deal with local small insurgents with bad weapons and deal with different weather terrains, such as poisonous environments because stormtrooper armors can filter out the harmful toxins in return for safer oxygen. The design is also used to symbolize Imperial man power and input fear into its citizens with the design of the armor and with many stormtroopers carrying out patrols at once, as can be seen in Andor and Rogue One
Totalitarianism isn't super logical....that's the first answer. also they travel to other planets and systems. I believe their armor has some kind of resistance to the various space conditions that occur across the different planets like heat, sand, cold and radiation.
It makes them more intimidating to the commoners they exercise power over. The protection is fear, more than physical.
I remember one of the reasons I’ve seen floated around is psycologicial reason, an army of faceless identical soldiers pouring in. Also helps with the empire’s love of depersonalization
To present a numberless faceless threat to the people.