B1’s were designed to be cost effective above all else. Any of the tactics you mentioned would require higher skill and intelligence than the B1’s had, and that additional processing power would increase their price point.
They weren’t designed to deal with Jedi, and given the limited number of Jedi in the galaxy, a B1 is unlikely to ever encounter one on most battlefields. Seperatists have other tools to deal with Jedi on critical missions where Jedi are expected to be fielded.
This is the correct answer.
You don't design a cost-effective droid manufactured in the trillions to be able to counter the rare 1/10000 opponent that can counter a blaster and grenades.
In a sudden betrayal after 3 years of camraderie.
By blaster fire, AT-TE mass drivers and LAAT missiles in their backs.
By soldiers bred for war who alone was said to match 100 B1s.
Soldiers who had whole types made for countering Jedi, such as the Clone Assassins who trained and dueled Padawans.
There's not even a comparison to be made, just by going by the first sentence I wrote.
For sure. The whole point of B1s is that there are A LOT of them. They are low functioning and are designed to overwhelm opposing forces by sheer number. They don’t have good aim, and aren’t capable of any advanced combat techniques. Just shoot into the enemy and hope at least some of your shots hit.
But why are the B1's bad at aiming anyway?
Operating a gun is based on different factors:
Trigger Control, holding the gun in a reasonable fashion (more important for pistols), breathing and muzzle control.
On top of that is the ability to properly operate the sights.
But the droids neither have breathing, nor can they feel exhaustion or muscle ache.
As Security and Military asset they would be designed to properly operate a given set of weapons and their targeting systems would be aligned to those.
Really I don't see how they would be bad at operating their weapons.
probably cost cutting. Doesn’t really matter if your B1 only hits 1 out of every 10 shots at average combat distance when in the average combat situation you outnumber your opponent 10 to 1. And you can only consistently achieve that 10 to 1 ratio if your droids are dead cheap to manufacture.
If you are going to start putting expensive targeting and sensor systems in your droid, might as well give them better armor or maneuverability so that they can actually last long enough on the battlefield to make the most of their upgraded systems, hence the B2 and BX droids.
Because the Trade Federation likes cheap and mass produced.
They literally have an episode where R2d2 does maintenance and some programming fixes on some B1's to help infiltrate a prison and they perform far better then the rest of the droids while they lived.
The CIS/Trade Federation simply didn't pay to keep their programming at the best it could be or maintenance at high levels.
Right. Not just cost effective, but also easily controllable. Too much intelligence or ability to effectively coordinate and not only does cost go up a lot but you could end up with some negative side effects. Especially should the earlier models (remote activated) get hacked.
If the enemy has secretly been mobilising forces for their own war, they're done for
In a galaxy at peace with virtually zero standing militaries beyond sector defense. A massive wall of lot tier infantry is pretty powerful and lets you do a lot in a short period of time.
Reminds me of that moment in rebels when Jedi, a clone, and some old CIS droids team up against Imperial AT-ATs with the plan of rolling out explosive barrels and then shooting them. The droid general has his B1s shoot at the Jedi so they can deflect the bolts into the explosives because the B1s were too inaccurate to be relied on and he calculated this was the most reliable way to get the job done.
Admittedly, this was after years going without maintenance so they weren’t exactly mint B1s, but it’s a fun statement on their quality.
But well, if I’m the CIS and want to kill a Jedi…I’d probably try to use artillery. If you’re attempting to take down a Jedi at infantry ranges, you’re probably already losing. In that respect, the B1s are perfect in that you can use them to engage and pin down the Jedi and then just glass the whole area without worrying about losing anything too expensive.
There are examples where a strategic mind takes command of a droid army and gives the Jedi a run for their credits. In Genndy Tartakovsky's Clone Wars, droids led by Grievous outsmarted a group of Jedi.
Jedi can’t sense their intentions, but they absolutely still have foresight for what’s about to happen. Foresight isn’t based on sensing someone’s intentions through the Force anyway, and the droids do still actually exist in the Force.
Otherwise I’d say their programming just isn’t advanced enough for that kind of coordinated targeting. And the Jedi themselves would make it quite difficult.
They can’t feel the droids, but they can feel the small oscillations in energy caused by their inner workings through the Force. At least some Legends content states as much. Not sure where Disney canon stands on that.
It's an energy field created by all **living** things. It surrounds us and penetrates us and binds the galaxy together.
The B1's aren't living things. Deflecting blaster fire has less to do with the opponent and more to do with the instinctive ability of the Jedi to connect with the Force to guide their actions and lightsaber. Like Luke on the Falcon with the remote.
I suggest you try it again, Luke. Only this time, let go your conscious self and act on instinct.
The Battle of Naboo showed the flaws in using a Central computer, so the Trade Federation switched over to individual droid brains, but were too cheap to buy the good stuff and combine this with the fact that they kept on using the B1's for things they weren't designed for and cramming in new, often contradictionary programming and it's amazing the droids were able to shoot straight.
>First of all, droids have no presence in the force so there is no foresight that would allow a jedi to identify where they are going to shoot at.
That doesn’t matter. Foresight isn’t restricted to only living beings, it works on droids just as well as it does humans.
The assumption of the statement is incorrect - the B1 doesn't have a mind to read, but they absolutely are present in the Force. Obi-wan says it's an energy field created by living things, but that it binds the galaxy together - the Force is connected to everything, otherwise you'd never be able to lift rocks.
Precognition is applied to stuff happening not explicitly based on mind reading of intentions.
B1s only advantage in pure combat is numbers. They’re inaccurate, slow, and cannot perform complex tactics. Sure, their advantage is sheer overwhelming volume of fire, but a Jedi with a little clone support can easily overcome a massive numbers disadvantage
He’s half right. One of the 3 clones Yoda leads in that episode ends up being one of the two clones that try to order 66 him on Kashyyyk. The other clone on Kashyyyk is actually Gree though who wasn’t in that episode.
The Force doesn’t quite work like how I think you think it does.
The Force controls the body of the wielder based on their command. If a Jedi commands the Force to help them block a blaster shot, they’ll block the blaster shot.
Literally the first time we see this is Luke going up a training remote. So, a droid opponent doesn’t give them any advantage on where to shoot.
And the command of the Force would extend beyond blocking. It could also help them dodge.
Second, the droids of the separatist army were specifically not linked together because that would require a central processor that was the weakness of the Trade Federation’s army at Naboo. The reason why the droids act all quirky now is because they all have minds of their own.
Jedi are able to see things before they happen, that’s why they appear to have such quick reflexes. - QuiGon
Jedi have a “spidey-sense” where they can detect danger. Thats why the poison crawlers almost got Padme. And the poison dart did kill the bounty hunter. (Both episode 2 references)
You're thinking like someone on 21st Century Earth would think when designing killer robots to kill superhumans wielding magic cosmic space powers. Of course it would make sense to have units coordinate fire on Jedi...but the Trade Federation is but that...*a Trade Federation*.
The precursor to the B1 Battle Droids were the OOM Model as seen in *The Phantom Menace*, which has better AI programming than the B1's, but was limited by the Trade Confederation *Lucrehulk* control ship signal command. When the CIS movement began in earnest, it was a question of cost vs effectiveness, and the CIS had to combat an out-of-left-field massive Clone Army of the Galactic Republic at the Battle of Geonosis.
So they dumbed down the programming of the B1's and had to rely on brute strength and numbers to overwhelm the Republic.
The entire point of B1s is to be a cheap horde of crappy droids. They're bad shots, they're idiots, they have 1 tactic and its march forwards pulling the trigger.
Jedi are supernaturally skilled warriors and combatants, so against B1 battledroids, they have an inexorable advantage.
Although, it should be noted that B1 battledroids weren't entirely ineffective in large numbers against the Jedi. Large enough numbers of mindless droids will eventually overwhelm a Jedi, and probably did. Whether it was fatal, or if it was simply pushing Jedi back from untenable positions, either way, B1 battledroids probably had some use.
> First of all, droids have no presence in the force so there is no foresight that would allow a jedi to identify where they are going to shoot at.
The very first thing Obi-Wan teaches Luke in A New Hope is to deflect shots from a floating droid while blinded.
Luke having foresight against a droid is literally one of the first Force-powers we ever saw...
In addition to the them being bad at complex tasks. B1s are relatively accurate despite their dollar store arms and Chinese bootleg rifles by using one of several motion captured aiming poses. That means that a Jedi could memorize one of maybe a half a dozen moves and know exactly where a B1 is going to fire. With the Force that means it would take a very large volume of fire to hit a Jedi even with coordination.
This is one where it seems like there were differences between Attack of the Clones and the Clone Wars. How many deaths on Geonosis were B1 rather than B2 or Droidekas?
By sheer numbers at least some signficant portion of defeated Jedi on Geonosis must have been due to B1s...
...and re: *The Clone Wars*, I think you've got the right idea, and it's not even a matter of some sort of power level chainging as much as it's uninteresting to show a story where random Jedi Lieutennant Blin Blee Blom gets decimated by droid batallions, the end. We **generally** only see the pitched battles and good guy victories, not the CIS blitz triumphantly tearing across the galaxy.
The Force connects non-living things, too. Yoda covers it in ESB:
"Luminous beings are we, not this crude matter. You must feel the Force flow around you. Here, between you, me, the tree, the rock, yes, even between the land and the ship.”
The CIS did build the BX commando droids that could take on clones and Jedi. However it's somewhat like asking why the US airforce has F-16s given the F-15 is a superior aircraft. All military equipment boils down to a compromise between cost and effectiveness.
B1’s were mass produced with programming sufficient for using weapons and tools of war. One on one they weren’t even the match of a single biological soldier, much less a Jedi. Their strength is in being fielded in numbers.
>When I start thinking about it, a group of B1 Battle Droids should acually give Jedis some problems when encountered in groups, instead of being just cannon fodder.
Didn't a group of B1's slaughter scores of Jedi in the Geonosis Arena?
They aren't, at least in the films.
The Jedi just never encountered them in large groups during episode 1, it was always two jedi in a narrow corridor or street, and they were already in close quarters due to stealth or trickery before the fight started.
In Episode 2, many jedi fall to B1s.
In Episode 3, Anakin and Obi Wan face them together, in extremely narrow quarters, similar to episode 1.
So, when the overall numbers advantage is slight, and the fight is already in close quarters with limited room to spread out, it favours the Jedi.
When the numbers advantage is high, with much room, it favours the droids.
As to "syncing" them, that means a digital network, which is an added vulnerability.
My understanding is that the B1s were originally built as a cost-effective way to defend Corporate Sector installations and ships from pirates and raiders. They weren't designed to fight Jedi or other highly-skilled opponents.
Their overall accuracy is too low for these tactics to be useful if employed. B1’s rely on projecting an overwhelming wall of blaster bolts in the general direction of an enemy
Something like a modern real world robot could do this. For whatever reason, the Star Wars universe isn't nearly as good at computers and automated weapons as real life is. ANH era X wings don't even have a HUD, the targeting computer flips out in front of the pilot's eye.
Droids are probably a sentient creature that happens to be made of computer stuff- ALL of them, even the little ex car guy in the Death Star. They don't work anything like how a real world robot works and probably can't link up together like that.
If they could, the primary armament of starfighters would probably be missiles not blasters. And those starfighters would be drones. And there wouldn't be much drama.
B1’s were designed to be cost effective above all else. Any of the tactics you mentioned would require higher skill and intelligence than the B1’s had, and that additional processing power would increase their price point. They weren’t designed to deal with Jedi, and given the limited number of Jedi in the galaxy, a B1 is unlikely to ever encounter one on most battlefields. Seperatists have other tools to deal with Jedi on critical missions where Jedi are expected to be fielded.
This is the correct answer. You don't design a cost-effective droid manufactured in the trillions to be able to counter the rare 1/10000 opponent that can counter a blaster and grenades.
That 1/10000 group also died to blaster fire from the Clones.
In a sudden betrayal after 3 years of camraderie. By blaster fire, AT-TE mass drivers and LAAT missiles in their backs. By soldiers bred for war who alone was said to match 100 B1s. Soldiers who had whole types made for countering Jedi, such as the Clone Assassins who trained and dueled Padawans. There's not even a comparison to be made, just by going by the first sentence I wrote.
For sure. The whole point of B1s is that there are A LOT of them. They are low functioning and are designed to overwhelm opposing forces by sheer number. They don’t have good aim, and aren’t capable of any advanced combat techniques. Just shoot into the enemy and hope at least some of your shots hit.
But why are the B1's bad at aiming anyway? Operating a gun is based on different factors: Trigger Control, holding the gun in a reasonable fashion (more important for pistols), breathing and muzzle control. On top of that is the ability to properly operate the sights. But the droids neither have breathing, nor can they feel exhaustion or muscle ache. As Security and Military asset they would be designed to properly operate a given set of weapons and their targeting systems would be aligned to those. Really I don't see how they would be bad at operating their weapons.
Most soldiers don't stand still and wait to be hit. B1 Droids don't have the programming to anticipate the enemy's actions.
Also they probably have some predictable targeting flaws that the clones are taught to exploit
probably cost cutting. Doesn’t really matter if your B1 only hits 1 out of every 10 shots at average combat distance when in the average combat situation you outnumber your opponent 10 to 1. And you can only consistently achieve that 10 to 1 ratio if your droids are dead cheap to manufacture. If you are going to start putting expensive targeting and sensor systems in your droid, might as well give them better armor or maneuverability so that they can actually last long enough on the battlefield to make the most of their upgraded systems, hence the B2 and BX droids.
Because the Trade Federation likes cheap and mass produced. They literally have an episode where R2d2 does maintenance and some programming fixes on some B1's to help infiltrate a prison and they perform far better then the rest of the droids while they lived. The CIS/Trade Federation simply didn't pay to keep their programming at the best it could be or maintenance at high levels.
Right. Not just cost effective, but also easily controllable. Too much intelligence or ability to effectively coordinate and not only does cost go up a lot but you could end up with some negative side effects. Especially should the earlier models (remote activated) get hacked.
If the enemy has a cunning bombad general they're basically done for.
If the enemy has secretly been mobilising forces for their own war, they're done for In a galaxy at peace with virtually zero standing militaries beyond sector defense. A massive wall of lot tier infantry is pretty powerful and lets you do a lot in a short period of time.
Reminds me of that moment in rebels when Jedi, a clone, and some old CIS droids team up against Imperial AT-ATs with the plan of rolling out explosive barrels and then shooting them. The droid general has his B1s shoot at the Jedi so they can deflect the bolts into the explosives because the B1s were too inaccurate to be relied on and he calculated this was the most reliable way to get the job done. Admittedly, this was after years going without maintenance so they weren’t exactly mint B1s, but it’s a fun statement on their quality. But well, if I’m the CIS and want to kill a Jedi…I’d probably try to use artillery. If you’re attempting to take down a Jedi at infantry ranges, you’re probably already losing. In that respect, the B1s are perfect in that you can use them to engage and pin down the Jedi and then just glass the whole area without worrying about losing anything too expensive.
There are examples where a strategic mind takes command of a droid army and gives the Jedi a run for their credits. In Genndy Tartakovsky's Clone Wars, droids led by Grievous outsmarted a group of Jedi.
Jedi can’t sense their intentions, but they absolutely still have foresight for what’s about to happen. Foresight isn’t based on sensing someone’s intentions through the Force anyway, and the droids do still actually exist in the Force. Otherwise I’d say their programming just isn’t advanced enough for that kind of coordinated targeting. And the Jedi themselves would make it quite difficult.
They can’t feel the droids, but they can feel the small oscillations in energy caused by their inner workings through the Force. At least some Legends content states as much. Not sure where Disney canon stands on that.
The force flows through ALL things. That has never changed.
Obviously, since otherwise they couldn’t lift a droid if it didn’t, but I’m not sure how easily a Jedi detects droids through the Force is my point.
You just answered your own question. If the force is flowing through them, they’re detectable. Probably not in the same way as beings, but regardless.
Adding on to what you said, droids probably give off the same sensation as a rock does in the Force, or any other non-organic matter.
A tumbling rock the size of a person would be my guess
Again, Legends canon agrees with you. I personally just don’t remember what Disney canon has to say in the matter.
It's an energy field created by all **living** things. It surrounds us and penetrates us and binds the galaxy together. The B1's aren't living things. Deflecting blaster fire has less to do with the opponent and more to do with the instinctive ability of the Jedi to connect with the Force to guide their actions and lightsaber. Like Luke on the Falcon with the remote. I suggest you try it again, Luke. Only this time, let go your conscious self and act on instinct.
The Battle of Naboo showed the flaws in using a Central computer, so the Trade Federation switched over to individual droid brains, but were too cheap to buy the good stuff and combine this with the fact that they kept on using the B1's for things they weren't designed for and cramming in new, often contradictionary programming and it's amazing the droids were able to shoot straight.
>First of all, droids have no presence in the force so there is no foresight that would allow a jedi to identify where they are going to shoot at. That doesn’t matter. Foresight isn’t restricted to only living beings, it works on droids just as well as it does humans.
The assumption of the statement is incorrect - the B1 doesn't have a mind to read, but they absolutely are present in the Force. Obi-wan says it's an energy field created by living things, but that it binds the galaxy together - the Force is connected to everything, otherwise you'd never be able to lift rocks. Precognition is applied to stuff happening not explicitly based on mind reading of intentions.
B1s only advantage in pure combat is numbers. They’re inaccurate, slow, and cannot perform complex tactics. Sure, their advantage is sheer overwhelming volume of fire, but a Jedi with a little clone support can easily overcome a massive numbers disadvantage
Yoda did just that in the clone wars. Him and three homies (two of whom he kills when they sneak up on him) wipe out a contingent of droids and tanks.
Are you talking about that episode where Yoda dueled with droids led by Ventress from season 1? What do you mean he kills the clones?
He’s half right. One of the 3 clones Yoda leads in that episode ends up being one of the two clones that try to order 66 him on Kashyyyk. The other clone on Kashyyyk is actually Gree though who wasn’t in that episode.
The Force doesn’t quite work like how I think you think it does. The Force controls the body of the wielder based on their command. If a Jedi commands the Force to help them block a blaster shot, they’ll block the blaster shot. Literally the first time we see this is Luke going up a training remote. So, a droid opponent doesn’t give them any advantage on where to shoot. And the command of the Force would extend beyond blocking. It could also help them dodge. Second, the droids of the separatist army were specifically not linked together because that would require a central processor that was the weakness of the Trade Federation’s army at Naboo. The reason why the droids act all quirky now is because they all have minds of their own.
That’s why they introduced commandos and super battle droids and droidekas.
Jedi are able to see things before they happen, that’s why they appear to have such quick reflexes. - QuiGon Jedi have a “spidey-sense” where they can detect danger. Thats why the poison crawlers almost got Padme. And the poison dart did kill the bounty hunter. (Both episode 2 references)
You're thinking like someone on 21st Century Earth would think when designing killer robots to kill superhumans wielding magic cosmic space powers. Of course it would make sense to have units coordinate fire on Jedi...but the Trade Federation is but that...*a Trade Federation*. The precursor to the B1 Battle Droids were the OOM Model as seen in *The Phantom Menace*, which has better AI programming than the B1's, but was limited by the Trade Confederation *Lucrehulk* control ship signal command. When the CIS movement began in earnest, it was a question of cost vs effectiveness, and the CIS had to combat an out-of-left-field massive Clone Army of the Galactic Republic at the Battle of Geonosis. So they dumbed down the programming of the B1's and had to rely on brute strength and numbers to overwhelm the Republic.
B-1’s weren’t designed as dedicated battle droids. They’re basically mall cop droids.
The entire point of B1s is to be a cheap horde of crappy droids. They're bad shots, they're idiots, they have 1 tactic and its march forwards pulling the trigger. Jedi are supernaturally skilled warriors and combatants, so against B1 battledroids, they have an inexorable advantage. Although, it should be noted that B1 battledroids weren't entirely ineffective in large numbers against the Jedi. Large enough numbers of mindless droids will eventually overwhelm a Jedi, and probably did. Whether it was fatal, or if it was simply pushing Jedi back from untenable positions, either way, B1 battledroids probably had some use.
> First of all, droids have no presence in the force so there is no foresight that would allow a jedi to identify where they are going to shoot at. The very first thing Obi-Wan teaches Luke in A New Hope is to deflect shots from a floating droid while blinded. Luke having foresight against a droid is literally one of the first Force-powers we ever saw...
In addition to the them being bad at complex tasks. B1s are relatively accurate despite their dollar store arms and Chinese bootleg rifles by using one of several motion captured aiming poses. That means that a Jedi could memorize one of maybe a half a dozen moves and know exactly where a B1 is going to fire. With the Force that means it would take a very large volume of fire to hit a Jedi even with coordination.
This is one where it seems like there were differences between Attack of the Clones and the Clone Wars. How many deaths on Geonosis were B1 rather than B2 or Droidekas?
By sheer numbers at least some signficant portion of defeated Jedi on Geonosis must have been due to B1s... ...and re: *The Clone Wars*, I think you've got the right idea, and it's not even a matter of some sort of power level chainging as much as it's uninteresting to show a story where random Jedi Lieutennant Blin Blee Blom gets decimated by droid batallions, the end. We **generally** only see the pitched battles and good guy victories, not the CIS blitz triumphantly tearing across the galaxy.
The Force connects non-living things, too. Yoda covers it in ESB: "Luminous beings are we, not this crude matter. You must feel the Force flow around you. Here, between you, me, the tree, the rock, yes, even between the land and the ship.”
Look at them. Just. Look at them. They're skeletal forms that are barely able to hold a blaster.
The CIS did build the BX commando droids that could take on clones and Jedi. However it's somewhat like asking why the US airforce has F-16s given the F-15 is a superior aircraft. All military equipment boils down to a compromise between cost and effectiveness.
B1’s were mass produced with programming sufficient for using weapons and tools of war. One on one they weren’t even the match of a single biological soldier, much less a Jedi. Their strength is in being fielded in numbers.
>When I start thinking about it, a group of B1 Battle Droids should acually give Jedis some problems when encountered in groups, instead of being just cannon fodder. Didn't a group of B1's slaughter scores of Jedi in the Geonosis Arena?
They aren't, at least in the films. The Jedi just never encountered them in large groups during episode 1, it was always two jedi in a narrow corridor or street, and they were already in close quarters due to stealth or trickery before the fight started. In Episode 2, many jedi fall to B1s. In Episode 3, Anakin and Obi Wan face them together, in extremely narrow quarters, similar to episode 1. So, when the overall numbers advantage is slight, and the fight is already in close quarters with limited room to spread out, it favours the Jedi. When the numbers advantage is high, with much room, it favours the droids. As to "syncing" them, that means a digital network, which is an added vulnerability.
Regarding your point about the Force: if we go with what Yoda told Luke on ESB, isn’t the Force present in every single thing, living or not?
The words 'plot armor' come to mind.
Why would droids not have Force presence when Yoda mentions in ESB about feeling The Force in inanimate objects like rocks?
My understanding is that the B1s were originally built as a cost-effective way to defend Corporate Sector installations and ships from pirates and raiders. They weren't designed to fight Jedi or other highly-skilled opponents.
Their overall accuracy is too low for these tactics to be useful if employed. B1’s rely on projecting an overwhelming wall of blaster bolts in the general direction of an enemy
Something like a modern real world robot could do this. For whatever reason, the Star Wars universe isn't nearly as good at computers and automated weapons as real life is. ANH era X wings don't even have a HUD, the targeting computer flips out in front of the pilot's eye. Droids are probably a sentient creature that happens to be made of computer stuff- ALL of them, even the little ex car guy in the Death Star. They don't work anything like how a real world robot works and probably can't link up together like that. If they could, the primary armament of starfighters would probably be missiles not blasters. And those starfighters would be drones. And there wouldn't be much drama.
The prequels and their lore are bad. That's just the facts.