This is the Star Destroyer the Empire Needed

[@Rocket_Ninja]

Gladiators with TIE Defenders and TIE Advanced would have been a match made in heaven for Imperial Navy

[@entilzha1283]

In Star Wars Armada TTG, that was my killing combo against those pesky fish people

[@GGBlaster]

I think that the Empire still needs some kind of long range starfighter. It doesn’t have to replace the TIE line, it just needs to take up the role of long range patrols and reconnaissance.

[@islaymassive1530]

Well they had Gozantis. A bit more crew intensive but also more capable and longer enduring. Also really damm cheap on upkeep and procurement

[@nightwolfnordberg9476]

And skiprays

[@mattheww.6232]

They had the TIE gunboat but didn't want starfighters with hyperdrives due to defection. Plus they treated the TIE series like a mess trays, swappable, semi-disposable and no pilot got attached to their equipment.

[@nicholasstamets1475]

And Assault Gunboats

[@dragonblaster-vu8wz]

To be honest, a smarter decision would be to make fleets with a combination of Imperial, Gladiator, and Victory class Star Destroyers. The Imperial could act as the command ship, Gladiators could eliminate the need for useless Gozanti ships, and Victory ships could lead the charge with sheer firepower

[@fsdf4311c]

Agree

[@zachtan]

So basically, the imperial navy is pretty much the space IJN or Hochseeflotte, large enough to support an Alfred Mahan style “decisive battle” by(1) winning space battles, (2) facilitating blockades, and (3) conducting invasions, but insufficient to enforce imperial authority over all sectors.

[@Mrstarwars541]

What would be the perfect Imperial fleet?In my opinion it would be an Onager for long range engagements with 3 ISDs for just blowing capital ships up with 3 gladiators and an Interdictor class ISD which would be a Sector fleet that insanely smart Admirals like Thrawn could command

[@GhoodVibez]

Allan has an epic voice

[@who2999]

See having more Gladiators would have made more tactical sense, but that wasn't really Palpatine's goal. More ships mean more captains and skilled ranking personnel exercising their free will and judgement, which means the empire would have been less monolithic in it's command structure. Palpatine wanted to unify and oppress the people of the galaxy and the empire wasn't designed to just be a mechanism for subjugating non-military people in the galaxy it also wanted to oppress the people within the military itself, consigning more people into seeing themselves as nothing more than faceless drones propping up the will of the emperor as absolute. That was the whole idea of the Death Star, had is succeeded it would have meant having one absolute power weapon needed to maintain control over a large population through the use of fear of total eradication. As we see in the clone wars, Palatine didn't really care who won battles, he was playing chess with the emotions of the people of the galaxy.

[@crazyeyez1502]

Turbo laser system might be big, but look up cutaways of ww2 battleship turrets. Then factor in ammo storage spaces.

[@RoboFloyd]

This takes my breath away

[@RoboFloyd]

Also first 🫴

[@dogloversrule8476]

The empire should have gone with a mix of Gladiator class Star Destroyers & Carrack class Light Cruisers. Between them they would have plenty of firepower to take on pretty much anything they might have to deal with

[@johnpatz8395]

My big problem with the Imperial Navy has always been how moronic it's "advancements" were. Look at any warship at the time of Pearl Harbor, compared to even 1 year later and you'll find that virtually all US naval vessels took on the look of hedgehogs as they were bristling with AA. But in about 20 the empire actually removed the only weapons effective against the enemies they've been fighting for 2 decades. Seriously, WTF?!?

[@johnkronz7562]

I think the bigger problem with a March of the gladiators is how many more pilots and fighters would be needed. The logistics would get clownish.

[@johnpatz8395]

True, but if they built fighters that survived longer than a single engagement, they would need far fewer pilots.

[@davidbirr2718]

Clever play on words, there. (For anyone who doesn't know, "Entrance of the Gladiators" by Julius Fučík is a bit of marching music that's become associated with circus clowns.)

[@chrisheitstuman6360]

I would have gone Victory class backed up Vindicators. You can buy 3 to 1 Vics per ISD with good firepower and enough carrying capacity (vehicle cube storage) for something like 815 TIE fighters, and it can make a lot of ships take pause. Then the Vindicators, 600m ships that you can have 3 to 1 Vindicators per Gladiator, which amcan also carry a wing of TIEs, cheap to operate, quick enough with a good srtbof weapons to deal with anything until you need the firepower of a Vic. 25 light turbs, 20 quad light turbolasers, not something to sniff at for. Less crew, less cost, more starfighters, more ships.

[@raininglogic]

Something I’ve noticed throughout history is that empires that don’t continue to conquer other nations don’t last long. What if the empire had actually worked on conquering new territories and galvanized the populous behind expanding imperial glory.

[@johnpatz8395]

Excellent point, and I hadn't considered that. This is probably why so many governments like to keep their people at each other's throats. If leftist won't even talk to any that data disagree, they surely won't team up with right or centerists to fight the government, no matter how authoritarian it becomes.

[@Pastry656]

Personally I’d go with the Liberator-Class Cruiser. Tho I’d definitely add more quad laser cannons to it… And I think it looks slightly better. c:

[@NoneOfanyonesbusiness]

Palpy was a politician, and he had no real understanding of ships. He was definitely not an economist either, lol. Palpy surrounded himself with yes-men after the formation of the Empire, so he really didn't have anyone to give him countering opinions other than Vader, who was obsessed with hunting fugitive child-kidnapping monks with light swords. In an ideal situation, he would have found a guy who was both a yes-man who also understood tactics and warships, but Palpy didn't tend to surround himself with competent people. Occasionally, as a sort of bug in the system, people like Thrawn managed to make it close to him, but they were the exception to the rule.

[@marcuslagergren5632]

The Gladiator is my favorite of all imperial ships 😎

[@johnpatz8395]

I've long said the empire's fleet is. moronic. Think about it this way, they Empire fought a growing rebel insurgency, consisting of snub fighters and a few frigates, for roughly 20 years. Okay, how did the empire change between the Imperial 1 & 2 class of their battleship? They removed the weapons that felt with snub fighters and frigates. WTF?!? If you want to see what really happens, compare the AA weaponry on the battleship at Pearl Harbor on Dec 7 1941 to even the same repaired battleships 3-4 years later. What you'll find is after Pearl Harbor, US ships started looking like hedgehogs they would mount every AA gun they could.

[@maudrysilvain5905]

A parallel that can be made would be with the US mass-produced carriers, the Casablanca-class, also known as Jeep or Kaiser carrier, a small, totally unassuming carriers that would go on to allow a much easier win of the war (for those of you who know, yes, it was carriers of this class who was part of the mythical Taffy-3 last stand), it was extremely cheap to make, with a record of more than 50 ships built in 2 years, which mean an output of 2 carriers a month. Heck, even its first role was an escort carriers, for when heavier carriers like the Venator-class (akin to the Essex/Yorktown-class) wasn't available or not cost-efficient enough to bring to bear into a fight Also, regarding those hangar capabilities, it seems that, a compliment of 24 fighters might just a little too few considering the large unless we are talking highly independent, large and with prolonged reconnaissance capabilities, like the Xg-1 starwing, the Skipray blastboat or even, a relic of the old republic, the ARC-170 that could scout and come back to their carriers to move the small battle group into position

[@darthbane5357]

5:56 subtitles: Imperial Clan Stardust Shore

[@Callsign-Wildcard]

Thank you for covering my favorite Imperial warship. In recent stuff like Squadrons it showed Quasar fires and Gozantis being used as rapid-response and lightning raid platforms, a role the Gladiator would've been superb at since it can also stand and fight better than the other two. Knowing the Empire the Gladiator probably was disfavored because it wasn't built by the right people with the right connections to top Imps.

[@alicekryze]

Ok but that ship combined with a tie defenders or other ships like it would have been an absolute game changer. It would basically make it to where the empire truly could be omnipresent and arguably much better at suppression. The rebellion is inevitable but with a naval strategy like that it would maybe mean the empire is able to better defend and ramp up its power and presence. If you also got rid of the Death Star and added that money and resources to the pile too that would also be insanely effective but is also highly unlikely

[@RFDN0]

The likely reason Palpatine was focused on the death star is because he likely would have used it as his thrown and just destroyed other planets that rebel. He likely was okay with having all other life in the Galaxy gone.

[@Glorymoon97]

I love this ship, it's my favorite ship in Star Wars.

[@JeffAM1986]

Hope a Gladiator makes it into Andor Season 2.

[@DrunkenShellback]

Papa Palpatine wanted as many people reliant on the empire for a job as possible. Reducing the amount of crew a ship would need wouldn't help that goal.

[@cloudmaan4035]

Gladiator Class is dope. I remember using them in an EU Star Wars Role Playing game I ran called Juggalos in Space.

[@jamesbodnarchuk3322]

Remember the Gladiator class as seen in droids

[@bigsarge2085]

Awesome.

[@cd5sircoupe]

4:15 From the top down view, I never noticed just how much the Victory's silhouette resembles the Python from Elite Dangerous. Gladiator being called a Star Destroyer kinda fits with what we saw from uh Mart in Rebels? He thought everything was an ISD. You mention the CR90 being some of the earliest command ships of the Rebellion, but what about the Pelta cruisers? They were a lot bigger than the CR90s, and Phoenix Home was originally a Pelta. The MonCal ships wouldn't overwhelm a Guardian? They're an analogue to the ISD with less guns & better shields... But yeah I agree the Guardian would be a better choice for what the Empire needed to do. The ISD is a butcher's cleaver whereas the Guardian is a surgeon's scalpel. The ISD clearly also didn't exactly fit with the role/type that the Empire needed it to fill for the period.

[@DetectiveLance]

Hell's Teeth, this guy designed the Gladiator AND the RZ-1, why didn't the Empire try harder to keep this guy in their employment?

[@evenodd3339]

Having a few imperial class star destroyers to engage “hot zones” in the galaxy while keeping mostly gladiators patrolling the sectors.

[@nickilraptor19_66]

You're welcome Allen, and thanks for all the compliments, much appreciated!

[@toodlepop]

"mah name...is alan."

[@nathanieljackson5554]

I was hoping for a video like this. It's unfortunate that we don't see what other types of capital ships the Empire employed on screen until recently but I guess that's a real world special effects issue. The Gladiator class is an intimidating craft. Would have loved to have seen that during the Battle of Endor.

[@eschatondesign7218]

I always thought something in the range of 500-600 meters would make for a perfect relatively cheap cruiser-class vessel meant to lead patrol flotillas of 4-6 smaller frigates. Nothing revolutionary, just something "good enough" and reliable enough for its intended role. Give it a well-balanced armament and at least half a wing of fighters (manned or unmanned), and you'll have something more than adequate for the job that you can simply produce more of.

[@kirtmanwaring3629]

They'd still need a better counter to the few MC cruisers I think, if that thing can hang in a long fight with an Imperial it can presumably take lighter more distributed hits from more Gladiators. Still mostly with you, they needed a more diverse fleet.

[@billyholland5156]

by this argument, modified Clone Wars era Acclamators would be even BETTER than the Gladiator! A FITH of the cost of an ISD with a crew of 700. imagine the room for 12,000 troops instead given over to reactors for more gun and shields, or to hangar space for 100 fighter craft! it would be amazing.

[@canisarcani]

honestly if i were the commanding officer of an anti rebel task force this ship would be my choice for the command ship. surround her with a few arquitens and some lancer class frigates and the rebels would have a VERY bad time.

[@appo9357]

Should’ve brought back the Harrower.

[@rostdreadnorramus4936]

Do the 100,000 Gladiators, then put the left over cash into things like small escorts or a better starfighter.

[@tylertenney16]

While the Gladiator is a nice ship, I personally prefer the Vindicator-Class Star Destroyer. May of had a slower hyperdrive, but when it can have up to 3x’s the fighters I feel the Vindicator is better.

[@carbin8601]

FINALLY, MY BABY GETS AN EPS.

[@janwitts2688]

600th like.. this type with tie interceptors and bombers (some striker? If specially required) and save the imperial and tector for actual invasion and fleet battles

[@awesome1365]

Gladiator when they don’t make the cut Are you not entertained

[@dotsmassacre]

Isn't the argument against missiles and torpedoes that shields basically nullify any effect that non energy weapons have? Hence the improbable balance between the use of energy fired weapons and their relative inflexibility in general deployment scenarios because, and we don't see this often, the combination of tractor beam and turbo lasers is like basically undefeatable, right?

[@vic5015]

One thing not accounted for, sort of, is that increased numvers of any ship will likely reduce the cost. That's just how economies of scale work.

[@stevelenox152]

Nice easement I was curious if the Empire had kept all of it's Acclamators and Venators would the Empire suvived longer instead of building ISDS. In my opinion the Acclamator would be used as a trooptrasport/landingcraft and the Venator would be used as a patrolship to warn anyone not to rebel against the Empire plus it has a huge hanger so it would just swarm the Rebels. Let me know what you think and if it is with doing a video on the subject.

[@emmashepard2070]

I would like a video breaking down, why they needed 40k+ people for a star destroyer. I'd expect they could be mostly empty. Ok can hold 72 tie fighters. Ok maybe 3 times that for crew on different shifts. Then have cooks, engineers, weapon techs, officers, ground troops, I feel could comfortably be in the 500 - 2000 range. But 40k+,what are they all doing. Have 10k just for the weapon systems, 10k monitoring the engines? Seems like an insane number, which would leave literally 10s of thousands twiddling their thumbs on a daily basis

[@vikuswavy5785]

Allen.

[@mattheweaton9111]

empire had several hundred thousand capital ships. A capital ship is a ship between 500-600 meters or over so Dreadnaught class heavy cruisers, Vindicator class heavy cruisers and Neutron star bulk cruisers would fit this ship type as well.

[@Aokitadamitsu]

The ISD mk1 and mk2 both had a place in the Order of battle, and it met the Tarkin doctrine of subjugation and fear very well.. That said if they had reduced the ISD number by 1/2 or 3/4 and supplemented that with 55k or 75k gladiators fully outfitted with fighters, it would have provided a ship that would pair nicely with Victory class starships and provided sector fleets with with more capabilities to cover more areas and likely would have stomped the rebels into goo

[@Aokitadamitsu]

ok and the drop from 40k crew to 1500 crew or 4500 crew at 1:4 break down would have saved an amazing amount on training time and cost.. Although the emperor used the navel training academy's as propaganda education camps soooooo what was the effect of putting that many people in uniform??

[@mattheweaton9111]

People do know there empire had tens of thousands of stardestroyes that outnumbers the Imperial right? If there were 25K of those then there were around 75k other variants

[@kageninja3749]

What if they made a detachable hyperdrive booster for TIE Fighters like the CW era Spirts? They could control who could and couldn't jump and might even have a remote shutdown in case of deserters.

[@literalsarcasm1830]

Why didn't capital ships ever use been weaponry? We know they had it. Hell, the LAAT had it at the beginning of the Clone War.

[@lordvader5756]

Why do we use Star destroyer as a separate class of ships? Isn't it just like a group of ships with the same triangle shape?

[@dotsmassacre]

Don't we see these kinds of deployments though appending the general record in like rogue one and the latter sequels with the first order, like diminished fleets of maybe only one or two Star Destroyers, like even the Snokes fleet is pretty small with basically one major ship and then a lesser support fleet... I feel like, we kind of assume because we see so often like armadas that the empire was always deploying armadas and so, leaving massive holes in open space or whatever... and I mean, complement of forces has to be a consideration because I mean, and Imperial Class ship like that had to have a sh*t ton more people on it... like 10s of 1000s more infantry and whatever...

[@tristonbacon3193]

how much more deadly would Thrwan be If he had several Venator calss star destroyers Added to his 7th Fleet And he used his Fleet for Is the testing grounds of the tie defender

[@BryonHendrix-cs8tm]

The imperial Navy focuses way too much on a single kind of ship. You need a few types

[@abarnwell9819]

One of the first

[@riparadis]

35th

[@Day_mann]

4th