Age-Old Question

[JayzusB.Christ]

...to borrow one of Tharg's best letter headings.  I'm sure I've done this before, but I was having a think about how old characters who aren't Dredd night be, even though they don't operate in real time like the good judge.

Sinister and Dexter were both 28 during that story where Dexter is at the shrink. Now, I know Sinister is kind of dead or something but leaving that aside,a lot of stuff has happened since then.  Early forties maybe?

Johnny Alpha, according to a very old back cover, was 30 when he died, unlikely as it seems. Assuming that to be true, and that he didn't age when he was buried, he wouldn't be more than mid-thirties. Again though, that seems highly unlikely.

Sláine I think was only 19 or so when we first met him, so was probably 23-25 when he became king, even if all those years of homelessness had put years on him. So, 30 or so after his seven years. He couldn't have been over 40 at the end of his saga.

Dante was in his twenties at the start of his saga. 40 at the finish maybe?

14 posts to go before 10,000...

[Trooper McFad]

I don't have any answers but would be glad if anyone can answer the age of Rogue Trooper at the start - I was always interested in what "age" were GI's considered war ready. I know their growth is accelerated early on but how many actual years/months training do they go through before they faced the quartz zone

So what is their body/physical age and their actual living age (date out of the pod)

[broodblik]

In the world of comics I actually do not see the age of characters, in so many cases most of those characters has been rebooted/reset/re-image so many times that age for me is not an important factor. I just want a great story.

[JohnW]

I was always interested in what "age" were GI's considered war ready.

Milli-Com Memories (progs 318-322) makes it fairly clear that Rogue was twenty when he was dropped into the Quartz Zone. All the GIs in training are denoted by a letter and number – the number signifying their age. Rogue and the boys are referred to as 'Year Twenty Squad'.
As for the letters, Rogue is designated Trooper R, Gunnar's Trooper G, and we can suppose that they gave themselves their names based on these designations and whatever small distinctions clones might have.
'Hey, Trooper H – seeing as you never take your helmet off we're gonna call you Helm.' That sort of thing.


Anyway, we can infer that the Genetic Infantry was organized into 26-man squads, but probably more like 24-man squads (I and O usually being left out for being too like one and zero), and that one squad was brought up to operational status every year (otherwise there'd have been stacks of GIs answering to the name of R20 or something).
Thus, taking military age to fall in a range of, say, 18 to 35, we can accept that between 432 and 468 GIs were sent to fight the Kashan Legion – which might help explain how things turned out.

If, on the other hand, there were multiple squads per year, and they retained the alphabetical designation, then multiple letters would have been used, which would likely have resulted in GIs having more elaborate nicknames, or perhaps just surnames.
So, for instance, Trooper B, Year Eighteen Squad K, would be designated BK18 and, given the nominative determinism beloved of the regiment, would probably eat up to eighteen Burger King meals a day. Either that, or his mates would know him as Barry Kennedy.
I dunno.
You'd have to ask Gerry Finley-Day, who doubtless thought all this through.

[Dash Decent]

What do you think happened to each wave of men once they were brought to operational status?  Were they dispatched to Nu Earth or held on Millicom station until all the GIs were ready?  The Quartz Zone Massacre day always seemed to me to be the first time any of the GIs had been launched into action, and all at once, so I assumed they'd all be the same age.

The GIS couls possibly have been deployed in waves, then recalled by Millicom Command for the mass Quartz Zone drop.  That would give scope for a one-off prequel series, telling the tale of an operational squad of GIs.  The story could show how very effective they really were once in the field, with the Southers making colossal advances and the panicked Nort High Command ordering the traitor General to do something to stop them.  He comes up with the QZ drop scheme, convincing the other Southers that they need to mass there in force (perhaps negotiating with the Norts to move some important asset there as bait, with the Norts being angry and reluctant) then finally passing the details to the Norts, ending it roughly where RT starts.

[JohnW]

The Quartz Zone Massacre day always seemed to me to be the first time any of the GIs had been launched into action.

That's what I always presumed too, but your prequel idea sounds pretty scrotnig.*
How many classes of clones had Sergeant Barechest and Instructor Shirtless** put through weapons training by the time Rogue arrived?

*Or should that be escorting?
**Just staying true to the Finley-Day naming conventions

[Trooper McFad]

I was always under the impression that All the GIs were wiped out at the QZ (or so Rogue believed. So this would mean that all the waves would have been gathered for the Quartz drop.

However they were not the 1st "wave" of GIs to be massacred - I guide you to one of the best one and done Rogue stories "First of a few" written be Alan Moore (1884 annual).

You can argue that this 1st GI was not a Clone but he was blue and it's hinted that he has a Dog chip.

The time line they hinted at was Years & Years & Years so possibly decades before Rogue himself dropped onto Nu-earth. Which would give them time to grow and train the clones.

[Trooper McFad]

One thing that has crossed my mind between the Dreddverse & the Rogueverse is that both have cloning tech and taking that in Rogue's world you can transfer one personality to a new body and therefore potentially living forever would this be a way of saving Dredd becoming a true Robo Cop!

Unless he visits Nu Earth and the neverglade's 😳

[pauljholden]

One thing that has crossed my mind between the Dreddverse & the Rogueverse is that both have cloning tech and taking that in Rogue's world you can transfer one personality to a new body and therefore potentially living forever would this be a way of saving Dredd becoming a true Robo Cop!

Unless he visits Nu Earth and the neverglade's 😳

Wasn't mind / chips already part of Dredd's world? I seem to remember they existed prior to rogue who got the idea from a Dredd story.

[Jim_Campbell]

Wasn't mind / chips already part of Dredd's world? I seem to remember they existed prior to rogue who got the idea from a Dredd story.

Yep. Bio-chips were definitely in Dredd — they turned up in the Judge Child, Prog 164.

[Trooper McFad]

Fantastic that's why I love this board ask the question and someone somewhere has the answer to everything 👍🏻 😁

Unfortunately this brings to the table of a death (proper at least for 60 seconds) and a resurrection of Dredd and as much as I don't want to lose Dredd, Death & Resurrection stories don't hold up well. There's always a first!

However would you prefer a 150 year old Robo cop Dredd or a Regened 25 year old Dredd body with the experience of a 150 years of MC1?

[JohnW]

Sinister and Dexter were both 28 during that story where Dexter is at the shrink. Now, I know Sinister is kind of dead or something but leaving that aside,a lot of stuff has happened since then.  Early forties maybe?

Ray and Finny's age?
After all the time-slips and dimension jumps?
You might as well ask for a map of Downlode!

[And far away in the Pacific Northwest, a man thinks he hears the sound of a gauntlet being thrown down.]

[Funt Solo]

[And far away in the Pacific Northwest, a man thinks he hears the sound of a gauntlet being thrown down.]

I mean, maybe it could be done...

[Funt Solo]

Anyway, we can infer that the Genetic Infantry was organized into 26-man squads, but probably more like 24-man squads (I and O usually being left out for being too like one and zero), and that one squad was brought up to operational status every year (otherwise there'd have been stacks of GIs answering to the name of R20 or something).
Thus, taking military age to fall in a range of, say, 18 to 35, we can accept that between 432 and 468 GIs were sent to fight the Kashan Legion – which might help explain how things turned out.

Definitely the type of conversation I was born for. You're using the alphabet, there, which is fine - but what if they used an Excel-style system, and we just never met trooper AAA (known to his squad as Aaron A. Aardvark, naturally). What of the untold tales of trooper RT, known as Trooper Rogue Trooper, and involved in a little-known (special ops) debacle in which he tried to track down the second traitor general - in a story by the name of Rogue Rogue Trooper Trooper.

GG: Gunner Graham - keeps synthing piano tunes all the time.

[JohnW]

a story by the name of Rogue Rogue Trooper Trooper.

I think we can put Jaegir back in its box: this is all the Rogueverse needs from now on.