—Karen Traviss, from her October 8 2005 sw.com blog,
—"Colonel Olrik" from www.stardestroyer.net explaining why Traviss'
The bad blood between Karen Traviss and STAR WARS fans she has labeled "Talifans", began in September of 2005, with the publication of "The Guide To The Grand Army" in STAR WARS INSIDER #84, co-written by Ryan Kaufman. The article established that only 3 million clones in total fought in the Clone Wars. Traviss and Kaufman engaged STAR WARS fans on the Literature message board of TheForce.net for feedback about the article. As Traviss now tells it, she was driven off the boards by negative "Talifans". The actual truth of the matter disagrees with the fiction writer.
Just received the PDF of the Grand Army feature for Star Wars Insider #84, due out next month, co-authored with jedi_haiku [Ryan Kaufman]. It's a lovely thing to behold.
I love seeing the artwork. It's a really sharp-looking spread. Chris Trevas is the artist, and has done a lusciously clonetastic job.
jedi_haiku and I are standing by for the inevitable wave of arguments that will follow the article, but we did it to set down the continuity about the clone army and put an end to a few debates. Common sense tells me this will never happen, and that folks wouldn't find it much fun if it did. But it does give us the ability to brandish the document, repel all boarders, and yell: "Because we bloody well say so!"
I love continuity. Did I mention that?
—Karen Traviss, from her LiveJournal blog taking credit for the "3 million" retcon.
Thanks - I needed a reminder that there are a lot more people out there who'll just read it and not hunt me down on various boards to flame me. (Not that I get flamed that much, but you're an easy target if you're daft enough to ID yourself on the boards as an author...)
And Ryan, of course. I'm not taking the rap for this alone. Be a team player - it diffuses the blame*.
(One of the many fine lessons I learned from Dilbert.)
—Karen Traviss, from the same LiveJournal blog.
September 17, 2005: Traviss and Kaufman began the "Guide To The Grand Army" thread at TheForce.net's message boards. The article suggested that the entire Clone Trooper army consisted of only 3 million troops. Fans with math and logic skills above the amoeba criticized this number, (a reaction which Traviss and Kaufman knew would occur), which resulted in Traviss and Kaufman leaving the thread two days later after trying to defend the three million clone wars number they established.
Gladiuus: Sorry, ED, but the minute that you start to try and rationalize it all by saying "it's just a space fantasy," you utterly shatter the sense of verisimilitude that is so integral to STAR WARS
. Yes, it's science fiction; yes, it's make believe; but like all good stories the universe is internally consistent. A Jedi can levitate objects, but isn't immortal. People can travel faster than light in starships, but can't shoot laser beams out of their eyes. And a mere three million clones is simply not anywhere close enough to make any sense.
Ignore for a second how incredibly, unbelievably outnumbered they are by the Separatist battledroid force. Look, for example, at Coruscant, a world with a population of one trillion. Many sources have shown that toward the end of the war clones were used as homeworld security and military police personnel; that they were ubiquitous on the capitol. For this to be possible, imagine how many clones would have to be stationed there-- even if there were a million clones based on Coruscant, they would still be outnumbered a million to one by Coruscant's citizens. Hardly ubiquitous.
Here's another way to look at it: as it currently stands, the clone army is only 30 times the size of the number of American troops stationed in Europe as of 2000 (AD). When the United States deems it necessary for a hundred thousand troops to be stationed in on a friendly continent during peacetime with no hostile powers nearby, doesn't it seem a bit ludicrous to expect a mere 30 times that number of troops to be able to effectively fight a galactic scale war across at the very least thousands of planets-- all the while functioning not only as infantry, but as police, pilots, and capship crews as well?
—Reactions to the "The Guide To The Grand Army" article in STAR WARS INSIDER #84
—Ryan Kaufman (quoted in context) from the "TheForce.net" thread regarding the "Guide To The Grand Army" article
Shortly after this, Traviss and Kaufman left the thread. Traviss supporters claimed she and Kaufman were "driven off" by impolite posters who were "attacking" them. The fact is, no attacks against Traviss or Kaufman in that thread exist, something even Traviss supporters grudgingly admit to in hindsight. Karen Traviss however, decided to fictionalize the truth from that day forward, claiming all sorts of dastardly deeds by "Talifans".
—Ryan Kaufman (quoted in context) contradicting himself seven months later (4/15/06) posting as "jedi_haiku" on Karen Traviss'LiveJournal blog
Less than a month after Traviss left the TFN, she fled to www.starwars.com, where her VIP status and her befriending of a moderator called, "The Dark Moose", guaranteed that she could goad fans and speak down to them without any fear of a response in kind. Traviss took full advantage of this.
October 2005: A disturbing post from Traviss on her LiveJournal blog (which has since been removed) disturbed many fans:
October 1, 2005: Karen Traviss continues her defense of the 3 million clone numbers with a starwars.com blog called, "Why Maths is a Slippery Slope in the GFFA" (which has since been removed). This is the first known claim by Traviss that she is being flamed somewhat over this.
—Traviss commenting on her blog responses
October 2, 2005: Traviss' first use of the term, "Talifan" to describe her critics on her LiveJournal blog.
She thanks Dark Moose for "riding to my rescue in the Talifan Wars". This is likely a reference to threads and member blogs on SW.com discussing the clone number issue that were heavily moderated.
October 6, 2005: Karen Traviss writes the blog, "Angels Pinheads and Inquisitions" on starwars.com.
One comment on this blog which was immediately deleted, (but was saved by the fans), was deemed as "flaming" a VIP, by moderator The Dark Moose. It was this user's only post in the whole affair, and it was sufficient enough cause in The Dark Moose's eyes to ban said poster from a service he paid to use. Here is the response; email me if you find a flame in the following post:
Banned Poster: Well, energy is measured in joules, not watts.
Now to the meat of it:
I'm one of the techie fans you complain about above. However, I didn't get all worked up. the numbers in your article didn't mesh, but so what? It put you in the same league as Tim Zahn: Numbers are all wrong, but the writing was so good it didn't matter, we just spackle the stuff later.
This blog changes that perception. A lot of us have been and are in those situations. I've just returned from a middle east deployment. Some of the folks who you talk with here and at TFN are struggling to make ends meet with the recession. I'm still waiting to hear word on a techie from Katrina, and another 3 from Rita.
Yet we still do this. Because it is a displacement activity. Focusing on and getting a bit of joy out of fandom can be the only thing that keeps you from breaking down in a really stressful situation. As a military expert, you should know that because its well known that that is how troops deal with things - displacement.
Your response seems to have been to compare us to a bunch of blood thirsty psychotics (Inquisition), and Ryan's is to state we are shallow and fear introspection.
Well, you've lost me as a customer now. Which is too bad because I was looking forward to 000. I don’t expect you will loose (sic) any sleep over that, but I think the statement needs to be made – insult the customer, and some of them won’t buy your product.
This blog (which has since been removed) was the major turning point between the fans and Traviss. "Tech-minded" fans felt that they were being insulted by Ms. Traviss on the way they choose to enjoy STAR WARS. This wasn't helped by Traviss also casting aspersions about the mental illnesses these types of fans must have, and their apparent inability to distinguish between fiction and reality. This blog is regarded as the point that clone discussions on various Star Wars related webboards became more heated and more focused on Karen Traviss herself.
October 15, 2005 The "Making the Boards Safe for Ms. Traviss's Return: An All-Around Pledge of Good Conduct" thread appears on TFN. "Tech-minded" fans are accused of driving/keeping Karen Traviss off the boards with rude and insulting behavior. When repeatedly challenged to present evidence of anyone flaming either Traviss or Kaufmann on TFN, none is found or presented.
March 31, 2006: The video, "Die Lucas Die" hits Youtube.
Interestingly, the video doesn't generate one blog from "The Dark Moose"
April 10, 2006: Star Wars Insider #87 publishes "Odds" by Karen Traviss. Most tech-minded fans consider this an obvious self-serving retcon intended to lower the canon number of droid soldiers which had previously been quantified as quadrillion or quintillion in sources such as "Lord of War" by Abel Pena, and the "Inside The Worlds Of Attack Of The Clones" by DK.
Traviss virtually gloats over the reaction she expects the the short story to receive on her LiveJournal blog, and starwars.com.
From GalacticSenate.com:
Two more comments by Travis concerning "Odds":
—Traviss, from blog comments (which have since been removed) from starwars.com
"Odds" attempts to retcon the already established history of the Clone Wars by asserting that battle droid production numbers were false information, and portrays the War as nothing more than "brush fires" in small, spread out sections of the galaxy. The short story also alleges that the War wasn't actually active the entire three years of the conflict, and that Mace Windu and the entire Jedi Council are aware of this false information. "Odds" opened up a new front in the flamewar.
Traviss' non-canon story completely contradicts George Lucas' view of the Clone Wars, where he wrote in the prologue to the novel "Shatterpoint" that the Clone Wars were galaxy-wide, and raged for three long years.
The Clone Wars
For a thousand years, the Old Republic prospered and grew under the wise
rule of the Senate and the protection of the venerable Jedi Knights. But as
often happens when wealth and power grow beyond all reasonable proportion,
an evil fueled by greed arose. The massive organs of commerce mushroomed in
power, the Senate became corrupt, and an ambitious senator named Palpatine
was voted Supreme Chancellor. Most disturbingly, the Dark Lords of the Sith
reappeared, after a thousand years of seeming absence.
In the midst of this turmoil, a separatist movement was formed under the
leadership of the charismatic former Jedi, Count Dooku. By promising an
alternative to the corruption and greed that was rotting the Republic from
within, Dooku was able to persuade thousands of star systems to secede from
the Republic. Unbeknownst to most of his followers, Dooku was himself a Dark
Lord of the Sith, acting in collusion with his master, Darth Sidious, who,
over the years, had struck an unholy alliance with the greater forces of
commerce and their private droid armies.
The turning point came when Count Dooku lured the unsuspecting Jedi into a
trap on the desolate planet of Geonosis. Having just discovered the
existence of a clone army that had been secretly commissioned for the
Republic ten years earlier, the Jedi were well prepared when they confronted
the Separatists on Geonosis. But their victory in that heated battle was
pyrric. It would prove to be merely the opening salvo in a war that would
spread like fire across the galaxy and engulf thousands of star systems in
the legendary Clone Wars.
Having already been granted emergency powers in the face of the growing
threat, Chancellor Palpatine used his ironclad grip on the Senate to seize
even greater authority, all in the name of security. To address the urgent
military needs of the Republic, he enlisted the Jedi Knights as generals to
command the Clone Army. The Jedi valiantly accepted their assignment, though
never having served as military commanders, they were unaccustomed to the
wages of war. Their ranks, once sufficient to serve as the guardians of
peace and justice, were spread perilously thin in the face of this
unthinkable challenge. Their relationship with Palpatine grew strained. At
the same time, they felt their own power waning even as their most promising
new apprentice completed his training and stood poised to fulfill his
destiny as the Chosen One who would bring balance to the Force.
The Clone Wars raged for three long years, tearing the Republic apart and
spawning countless tales of heroism, bravery, treachery, and betrayal as
both sides fought to defend their ideals. As dedicated as the Separatists
were in their resolve to create a new order to replace the failing Republic,
the Jedi were equally determined to preserve the Republic and defeat the
Sith, who they understood all too well were the masterminds of the
Separatist movement. They still believed in the Republic, still deemed it a
Republic worth saving. Their faith, which gave them superhuman strength in
the face of mind-boggling power of the enemy, had yet to be shaken.
So what version of the Clone Wars are the fans supposed to believe? The minimalist version Traviss' "Odds" portrays, or the galaxy-wide conflict George Lucas has always meant them to be?
Leland Chee, Database Content Administrator, and "Keeper of the Holocron" for Lucas Licensing, was asked the following on the starwars.com message boards:
The above conclusively proves that the Clone Wars as envisioned by the creator of the STAR WARS saga himself, is the highest form of canon, and that the facts in "Odds" are null and void.
In fact, "Odds" doesn't seem to be written with the best intentions for the STAR WARS Expanded Universe. Some critics say it was written by a bitter author who couldn't compete with an honest debate over the clone numbers, and decided to use her position to concoct a self-serving story for her own ends. Witness Traviss' reaction on starwars.com when a poster mistakenly labeled "Odds" a "fan-fic":
Here are a few reactions to "Odds" from TheForce.net and Stardestroyer.net.
April 10, 2006: On the GalacticSenate.com forums, Traviss twice accuses her critics of sexism: "Every argument I see that I - and Ryan, too - but it's obviously more rewarding to attack a woman)" and "This final comment isn't directed at you, but is a general observation about the tone of the attacks on me since last September: they are highly emotional and gynophobic." Traviss fails to acknowledge that she alone fanned the flames of outrage with numerous goading blogs and comments, while Ryan Kaufman bowed out of the whole affair. By playing the "gender card", her detractors consider this another unfounded attack on their persons, since the fact of her gender was never an issue.
Stardestroyer.net denzien Mike Blackburn, (Master Of Ossus) posted the following rebuttal:
Please keep one thing in mind. Every word I write - short fiction and novels - is checked and explicitly approved by LFL. Period. So any suggestion that this is some agenda of mine slipped past LFL is frankly ludicrous. I mention that because someone e-mailed me to point out one person is saying exactly that. If the mighty multi-million LFL bends to my whim...maybe I need to ask for more money and free Hasbro stuff, because I seem to have influence I never knew I had.
* that the army on Kamino was now “nearly one million strong”, and that the cloning centre could make millions more - not that it had. (And only millions - not billions, quintillions or any other figure.)
* Lama Su the Kaminoan PM says to Obi Wan: “...200,000 units, with a million more on the way.” On page 54, it cites the 1.2m number.
* And...there’s a clear mention on page 63 of clones training local militias on planets, “making it possible for a handful of clones to trigger a planetwide uprising”.
There’s a mention of millions - not billions - of Spaarti clones appearing towards the end of the war - which fully supports my retcon as in the Vader stories, where the clone production is expanded to meet Palps' push of occupation upon Ep III - not the war for the previous three years. (Although that "millions" is still a little low for my tastes for a galactic army of occupation - which is a very different task to fighting the orchestrated and controlled Clone Wars.) There are several mentions of small forces throughout the CW section in the NEC, and “hundreds of...troopers” each week arriving injured at the RMSUs. If your theory was correct, there'd be thousands - no, millions crowding into them each.
1. He did a decent thing for me, once, and I respect him for that. I have ZERO respect for you.
The fact that he happens to be a man is irrelevant.
As for going with hard data, you've also ignored statements from the ICS--the most objective and definitive source of numbers in the SW universe--apparently because you don't like them.
My job is to explain that. LFL writers retcon all kinds of things.
But it's not my problem. All I have to do is to make a credible fiction bridge between the numbers from AOTC, the novels and so on and the guides/ cross sections/ features end of the scale. I'm not interested in orthodoxy or the One True Way. If it continues to consume folks, they should take it up with LFL, not me. I'm going to carry on making the pieces fit.
April 13, 2006: What little chance of peace that existed between Traviss and her critics vanished with the appearance of this LiveJournal blog (Which has since been removed). This is Traviss' second infamous post where she wishes violence to her critics:
These missives, showing that the author wants to strangle and shoot her critics, had the effect of drawing in people that previously had no interest in the clone number debates, but found Traviss's statements bewildering and distressing.
April 14, 2006: The satire video, "Talifan!" hits Youtube.
Created in response to Karen Traviss recent blog post, Talifan! is a film intended to satirize (albeit lacking any subtlety) the whole Traviss affair. However, Traviss and her supporters saw it as a violent "revenge fantasy" and point to it as an example of what a Talifan is and the extreme lengths they go to.
May 2006: Flexing their newfound and unchecked power, Traviss and The Dark Moose continue to goad and persecute fans showing any hint of criticism on starwars.com. Traviss' online demeanor runs the gamut from smug gloating to hysterical persecution.
May 5, 2006: Traviss and The Dark Moose take their dog and moose show on the road, going to friends' websites posting about their Talifan crusade. The first stop is Bryan Lambert's "You Are Dumb" website, where Karen Traviss herself leads Lambert by the nose into the whole Talifan affair, thus doing what she accuses "Talifans" of doing.
Traviss also announces on starwars.com that TheForce.net began editing posts with impunity which have any negative criticism of her:
The result is a one way misinformation campaign for Traviss' cohorts taking up her Talifan cause, leaving any dissenters without an opinion:
May 26, 2006: Traviss finds another ally in Lee Goldberg,
when she and Dark Moose resurrect a year-old post on his website to cry victim about Talifans. Goldberg deletes entries refuting Traviss and Moose.
May 30, 2006: Having supped from the Traviss teat, Bryan Lambert begins his Talifan tirade with a two day essay on his website. The denziens of Stardesteoyer.net rip Lambert's opinion pieces into shreads in a thread titled, Most retarded "Talifan" criticism ever.
June/July 2006: Karen Traviss blog posts on both LiveJournal and SW.com that reference the clone numbers, Talifan, or threats of garroting or trachea-ripping mysteriously disappear...
Some find this a strange occurrence, especially for a self-described "journo". (Read this interview here, where Traviss repeats the word "journo" which some speculate may be Mando'a for "hack", no less than eight times in one interview.) On her LiveBlog, she's had this to say about internet facts:
Another interesting and ironic quote by Traviss can be found here:
June 3, 2006: "TALIFAN!" SE hits Youtube, a higher-res version of the original, with new added scenes of mayhem. This one is unique in that at the end of the movie, the definition for "asshat" is revealed to be "The Dark Moose". This prompts a reaction from the starwars.com moderator that no George Lucas assassination comedy on Youtube ever did. Moose rallys his sock puppets in an effort to get "TALIFAN!" SE temporarily pulled from Youtube by inventing scenes of graphic violence that never actually appeared in the video.
June 8, 2006 The Dark Moose uses his moderator position on the official STAR WARS website to post a libelous blog describing the violent content of both versions of "Talifan" that again, have never appeared in either video. Moose equates the satire to influences of Columbine proportions, while further lying to his readers by telling them not to bother looking for the film online. Fans who have never seen the video accept the lies contained in the blog hook, line, and sinker, and voice their outrage.
Jun 20, 2006 The Dark Moose posts a blog about a soldier killed in Iraq, who was also a Star Wars fan. One fan, DarthVicomte, voices a dissenting opinion about the war in Iraq, and questions whether soldiers should be lionized or held up as "better" Star Wars fans than the rest of the community simply by participating in a controversial war.
The Dark Moose retaliates by disagreeing with DarthVicomte, and accusing him of "borderline trolling." When DarthVicomte defends his opinion, Dark Moose summarily "temp-bans" him.
The fan was a member of a Star Wars blogging group known as The Pitiful Little Band. Members of this blogging group came to the defense of DarthVicomte, because they saw his treatment as being unfair for simply expressing his opinion. Some of these people were temp-banned as well.
The PLB try to take this latest power play by The Dark Moose in stride, and on their own website, mock the whole situation in a Filk song to the tune of the Firefly theme:
Take Darth Vader
Have no place I'd rather be
The song above mentions Karen Traviss' initials, since the Traviss/Dark Moose clique is becoming infamous to everyone except, apparently, the owners of starwars.com. This is enough of an outrage in Traviss' eyes to, once again, cry out that she's being attacked by a dissident group of Star Wars fans.
Jun 27, 2006: Karen Traviss posts the starwars.com blog, Attention-seeking for beginners. In it, she mocks the group, compares them to the "Talifans", and then accuses them of the highest crime of all: Mentioning Karen Traviss in a filk song.
When the PLB discovered that one of their favorite authors were comparing them to the dreaded "Talifans", it became a catalyst for the destruction of that group. Most couldn't understand Traviss' wrath. Many virtually begged forgiveness, and left the PLB over it. The PLB even changed its name from, The Pitiful Little Band, to The Pathetic Little Blog in an act of self-flagellation. Eventually, the core of the PLB went underground, fearing further retaliation for things said outside of starwars.com. DarthVicomte summarily quit starwars.com altogether.
Before leaving to parts unknown, the core PLB bloggers discussed the affair as a final word (for now) on the subject:
Moose writes: Because, whether he knows it or not, he was borderline trolling. He posed a very provocative opinion repeatedly, knowing full well it was angering nearly everyone in there.
From the look of the comments on that blog, only Moose himself was offended and angered by Vicomte's comments. It appeared that the rest of the commenters disagreed with Vicomte, but respected his opinion and debated it.
Furthermore, I don't understand why one would take issue with Vicomte "repeatedly" posting a provocative opinion. Vicomte made a statement, Moose disagreed. Can we really expect Vicomte to back down in this situation and say "nevermind, Moose. I've just realized that my opinion is wrong and I'm going home to re-think my life"? Of course not. What's wrong with expanding upon his initial post in order to justify his position and respond to Moose's contrary statements.
I realize that one must tread carefully around the subject of Moose's blog and the comments it inspired. However, there is something about this situation that seems wrong. Vicomte never made any personal attacks against Moose; he stated a very controversial opinion. And like Luuke said, Vicomte's ideas may be controversial, but he is always honest and he believes what he says. In doing so, he challenges the conventional opinion, and forces us to think, to re-consider, and to find justification for our ideas. If this is "borderline trolling," why aren't we outlawing debates on SW.com altogether?
Again, I understand that the subject being debated was a touchy one. Yet it appears that the definition of "borderline trolling" is a very subjective one, and in this case, it was the justification for a punishment that did not fit the so-called "crime."
PLB2: Well, I'm a little late to the banning party...If that is what we can call it. More like a "power" party for Moose. Sorry Vicomte, I would have posted on the Forum for you...Alas, I had my head buried in work.
Vicomte, you could have gone into more detail about your comments, especially since it concerns a very sensitive subject. That being said, we live in a free country with freedom of speech. Obviously Moose does not get that. As a matter of fact, I sometimes feel that SW.com is his site, doing whatever the hell he wants to.
I've been wanting to write a blog about the Mod's on SW.com for a while now, but I'm having trouble formulating how to approach it. After all, I don't want to get perm banned for a site that *I* PAY for.
I'm glad this is over...And I know, Vicomte, that I can find you in here if *he* ever decides to perm ban you from SW.com.
Don't get me started on Bonniegirl...Nice, but...There is favoritism in blogville.
Jul 11, 2006: The Dark Moose posts yet another attack blog against the maintainers of Wookieepedia the online Star Wars Wiki resource. The blog was in response to..you guessed it...reservations Traviss and Dark Moose had over the opinions about Karen Traviss.
Phil Skayhan's Links:
It's not the Crime but the Coverup
Stardestroyer.net thread, The Size of the Droid Army "Retconned"
Clone Wars Hard Numbers: Starship Troopers
(which has now been removed) displaying her understanding of numbers and equations.
understanding of numbers and equations may not be her strong suit.
BEFORE THE STORM
Date: 2005-08-18 10:41
Subject: Pretty!
Security: Public
Mood: Mmmm....tasty
Later, she will tell fans to blame Lucasfilm, not her, for the numbers.2005-08-18 03:30 pm UTC
"President Sharky": Seriously this is the only way to try and rationalize these numbers. "Laybrinth of Evil" states that 200,000 troops is half of the Coruscant Home Fleet troops, meaning that there are already 400,000 clone troopers used simply to defend the capital. Not to mention that in addition to the Home Fleet's troops there are the many thousands of clonetroopers doing security duty throughout Galactic City. This immediately reduces the rest of the Grand Army to 2.6 million troops. Nearly all the major powers of the Second World War fielded more than that. Hell, Russia lost more men than that, and that was a conflict on a single planet that would only be moderately-populated by [STAR WARS] standards.
DARK FORCE RISING
Traviss: More to the point; did my equations balance? You know what my maths is like...
ISARDS REVENGE
"Writing that story was quietly satisfying."
"There's a lot to be said for laughing last..."
Prologue
by George Lucas
I'm very well aware that this is your topic, because last time you had all the rote arguments instantly ready that I've seen so many times on TF.N. It's hard to keep TF.N out of GS, obviously, so here's some illumination that you can take back via the reverse route. 
No one disputes the fact that your figures are official: what we are saying is that they are wrong. Just like the 8km figure for the Executor was official, but wrong. For your information - because nobody outside the LFL circulation list will have access to an official Holocron CD database - there are no hard numbers for clone troops in the whole database except the movie figures in the AOTC screenplay and refs to it. (Of course, when the material that Ryan and I write is added to the CD, there will be.) And you'll just have to take that from me, because the NDA we all sign bars us from sharing the CD contents. Are you trying to plead ignorance? And here's a direct challenge: find me a numerical source in the NEC that supports your view, and don't be selective. "Groaning with troops" will not do, I'm afraid. That's hardly precise description, and all the number junkies say they like precision. (I'm a number junkie.) So let's be consistent about that. Because I have the NEC too, and I've been through the whole CW section, the only references to hard numbers are: If that was the only method of treatment. As for your challenge, the "groaning decks" indicates that the troop-ships were filled to close to capacity. The assault ships are clearly Acclamators (which are colloquially referred to as "Republic Assault Ships"), and hundreds of them were used. This provides a lower limit of 200*~16000 troops, with the troop number taken from ICS. That's 3.2 million troops, Karen, and that doesn't count the simultaneous engagements at Hypori, Mon Calamari, and Dantooine, not to mention the dozens of other battles that were probably going on concurrently. Another battle involved 20,000 clone troops (there are 170,000 foreign troops in Iraq now, for scale comparison) and another where “hundreds” of droids fell. That's not even WWII numbers. There is no other mention of any clone numbers, nor indication of the numerical scale of the war, except that it ultimately “cost trillions of lives” - civilians on worlds that got chewed up and spat out in the crossfire and aftermath of war, because they’re not in the clone battles. You're talking about Jabiim, a backwater planet, in which Separatist militias (those forces you always ignore when claiming that non-clones soldiers for the Republic would balance out any discrepency) did most of the fighting. That's all in the NEC. That's true. And? I say again: find me hard data beyond the Saxton books. Find me any mention of numbers or scale in the EU books by Stover, Luceno and Barnes that go beyond thousands. Do some real counting in the CW cartoon. Listen to the soundtrack for numbers. Billions? Can you really count billions on screen? Please, just think about what you're saying there! You cannot count billions on screen. Your fallacy is the assumption that we have seen all of the Clone Wars, when any reasonable person will look at all of the present material and conclude we have seen only a tiny fraction of the battles.
"Lord of War" explicitly states "quintillions" of droids, and "billions" of fighters alone. Your interpretation of "groaning" is what - millions? Billions? Fully loaded. Quintillions? Groaning could just as easily be tens of thousands. That's true, but we also have a lower-limit of the number of ships involved, and we know that they were Acclamators. Every argument I see that I - and Ryan, too - but it's obviously more rewarding to attack a woman) have the "wrong" figures seems to be to be based on emotional arguments and assumptions. We professionals have to go with hard data. We have no choice. Ah, yes, an accusation of sexism. For the record, I don't attack Ryan for several reasons:
2. He backed off. You're the one who keeps plugging this figure. I don't see Ryan running around blogging, now, about how his fans are stupid for criticising him. I don't see Ryan running around now claiming that another author's work is invalid for the purposes of examining his own. Ryan isn't like you--he's not making excuses.And I actually built a spreadsheet for clone and droid numbers in years 1, 2 and 3 of the war. Few people know this, but I'm actually a number cruncher - I even studied accountancy at college, and I ran big budgets in my various jobs. I'm an Excel gal. So when people start throwing numbers back at me, I eat 'em up. Of course, the hard numbers are thin on the ground. Is this why you tossed out the ICS completely, as well as quotes from Lord of War? Is this why you whined that numbers don't matter and chastised "Talifans" for complaining? I said at the time this nonsense started up that there was a really obvious retcon - several, in fact - that the numbers in the books and the movies were so out of apparent balance with the "quadrillions" and upwards estimates in some other sources. Nobody spotted it. I still can't believe that. Only one reader came even close. (Heads up, people! Look around you. It's staring you in the face.) LOTS of retcons existed--all you had to do was state that "unit"=/=soldier. But you didn't. You totally blew off the fanbase.
LFL allowed both sets of figures, and continue to do so. That is true, and the rest of them come up with ones that explain things. How could the "shoddy intelligence" have convinced GRIEVOUS that he commanded quintillions of droids (Lord of War)? I can tell you now that there will be frothing outrage from maybe three or four fans about Odds in the new Insider. That's unfortunate for them, but that was all cleared and expressly approved by LFL too. It's a blend of the real world they demand and real numbers, which they demand too. But somehow I don't expect any gracious apologies from them... You'll get none--you're an incompetent and spectacularly stubborn woman who apparently refuses to admit error under any circumstances.
I have no personal agenda over numbers, and if anyone cares to think about it a little, they'll see what a feeble claim that is. I don't care what the numbers are, because I get paid if they're single figures or infinity. My only concern is to make the stuff I get handed - the numbers that were there before I joined the team - fit somehow. I do a good job of it, too, and I won't apologise for that. You do a piss poor job of it, and dozens of fans could've done vastly better. So if you want to quote numbers at me, look at the ones that don't fit your personal belief as well as the ones that do, and ask yourself what a professional writer has to do to square that circle. I have to look at BOTH sets of numbers. If you have any further argument, address it to Lucasfilm. I didn't dream up either scale of numbers. But you're the moron who tried to reconcile two things that are irreconcilable, even though you knew or you should have known about the 12.8 kilometer debacle and how it solved nothing. This final comment isn't directed at you, but is a general observation about the tone of the attacks on me since last September: they are highly emotional and gynophobic. The language used is not the language of numbers and logic. Yet another allegation of sexism. For someone who doesn't care what other people say about her, you sure do spend a lot of time running away from your critics. And if you had bothered to respond to the early critics, who addressed you in "the language of numbers and logic" at, say, TFN (which you fled from at the barest hint of criticism while also disabling feedback and blocking civil fans' e-mails because they disagreed with you) then you wouldn't be in this mess. Yes, I'm a woman, and I've always done jobs that are largely the preserve of men. Calling me names based on my gender won't drive me out of any boys' club: it'll just make me dig in harder, and get more implacably logical. Is that what it's done so far? Would you describe dismissing critics as "Talifans" logical or classify it as name-calling? Would you describe this as being a logical response to critics--telling them that their complaints don't matter? I've spent way too much time addressing the aggressively-expressed obsessions of fewer than a dozen people. (I counted them at the time. Some have disappeared, I'm told, but I'll be generous with the estimate.) I think I've explained my position fully, and sourced it fully. And LFL are perfectly happy with it. I'm not going to waste any more time on it beyond a blog entry to accompany Odds, which is actually for the 100,000-plus Insider readers out there to help them examine the issues in SW and the real world. How many fando retards did you used to role-play with, you immature brat? Maybe a dozen? And don't let the door hit you on your way out of the numbers stuff. All I'm hearing is emotional and largely fact-free outpourings about what a very few folks think the numbers "should" be. That's fine. Free country and all that. Clearly it is your problem if you're trying to come up with "credible fiction." Your work is, apparently, only credible to you. And if you had bothered to go to any message boards that weren't carefully monitored to suppress criticism then you'd realize you have far more than "a dozen" detractors, some of which have apparently disappeared. 
SHATTERPOINT
TYRANT'S TEST
HARD CONTACT
CLOAK OF DECEPTION
LABYRINTH OF EVIL
Take my bathroom, take my beer
We've still got our spaceship here
We don't need no hyperspace fee
You can't take the blog from me
Make him blue
Give us all a ban or two
We'll take on Moose and KT
You can't take the blog from me
Since I found the PLB
You can't take the blog from me...
PLB1:You know, there's something about this "borderline trolling" which Moose keeps bringing up that makes me a bit uneasy.
"LINKS"
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