Haradim

So it truely is an Imperial superweapon In all seriousness, the point is probably that it is a major SW icon, and that blowing up planets is not only fun at times, but may well be a viable strategy if you can pop a few of them without hindering your long-term plans. Why go to all the effort and cost to capture a well-defended ground map when you can just destroy the whole thing in a grand fashion? That's a very Imperial mindset.

Star Wars was never meant to be more realistic. It's a story about a tiny handful of underdogs that overcome a tyrannical evil and restore peace to an entire galaxy by killing a mere two people and taking out an oversized "invincible" superweapon (for the second time). It was only after the EU got into full swing that the situation became more complex than that, but that theme of conquering all evils through heroism, sacrifice, and doing the right thing remained in play until at least the NJO novels, which had a specifically darker theme. Realism in Star Wars is likely not something you will see much of on any project backed by LA. It has always been about Heart beating Fist, no matter how ludicrous it seems when you take the time to analyze things.

I'm not certain (and can't test it right now), but I think Quicktime's PictureViewer also supports .tga's. I don't encounter that format very much, though. It's generally intended for higher-end graphical content. It may have been picked because those files are easy to write, and support high color depths, compression, and transparency.

Don't discount the power of heroism and being amongst the "good guys". In Star Wars, that goes a long way - against all odds (and "realism"), the Galactic Empire fell largely because of it - and a lot of luck/destiny -, despite the fact that the Empire could have crushed its foe quite handily if it really committed itself to it. In that sense, it's not unreasonable that a unit of Rebel soldiers could stand up to a unit of Stormtroopers. A Rebel player just needs to remember that their equal-ish or somewhat better infantry are not going to hold up against the more numerous and better reinforced enemy. This is quite in line with the SW universe as portrayed in the movies, books, and other sources. I will also note that one can assume the Alliance has not only trained their own troops as much as possible (likely with first-hand experience), but has gone to lengths to recruit soldiers already skilled in the ways of war, which may be another way to explain why they fight on more or less equal terms.