User blog:Bane7670/Rank Insignia Plaque Guide

In my research of various Star Wars reference works, I've taken an interest in those little colored chest plates seen in the Star Wars films and other media, particularly in the context of the Galactic Empire. Many a Wookieepedian have tried to find some level of consistency between ranks and the various insignia plaques that appear with them. There's been a bit of inconsistency due to a variety of plaques not always matching their preestablished ranks. Here I will make an officially Unofficial Guide to the Rank Insignia Plaques and attempt to make some degree of sense out of all these shiny badges, combining material from Canon, Legends, and Fanon material.

Galactic Republic
The Republic military arose with the creation of the Grand Army of the Republic at the outbreak of the Clone Wars, adopting much of the military structure from the original Judicial Forces as well as the Kaminoans' own initiatives. Command structures were revitalized and rank insignias resumed production to accommodate officers of the new Grand Army. However, very few clone officers utilized them as the Kaminoans already provided the clones with HUD glyphs and colored armor flashes to denote different ranks and there were very few non-clone officers below the rank of colonel at the time. Attention to non-clone officers was centered largely in the navy which, up until that point, had been the Republic's only need for military service.

Army
Insignia plaques were sometimes adjusted to match roles rather than ranks on certain occasions, such as out-of-armor duty rotations in the navy.