A few years back, Abel Pena and I wrote an article for Star Wars Gamer magazine in which we laid out the names and identities of the Emperor's twelve Grand Admirals.

The concept of the Grand Admirals was created by Timothy Zahn in his novels Heir to the Empire, Dark Force Rising, and The Last Command. Zahn's key villain, the blue-skinned Grand Admiral Thrawn, was the last of a breed, and Thrawn was heretofore unknown to the Republic (so by default, the 13th Grand Admiral). But who were the others? Zahn didn't say, other than to state that by the time of Thrawn's reemergence 5 years after ROJ, all the other Grand Admirals had been "accounted for" by the New Republic. A few later sources named some of the other Grand Admirals, but nobody had assembled them all in once place.

It was fun pulling together the article. It was less fun when Star Wars Gamer was cancelled and the article went unpublished. Abel and I eventually repurposed most of the content for Star Wars Insider, but lost in translation were the RPG "crunchy bits" -- the stats that allowed the readers of Star Wars Gamer to incorporate the Grand Admirals into their role-playing games.

I'm not going to post the stats because I think we calculated them wrong anyway, but I thought the "equipment" lists were kind of cool.

Here's the unpublished (and thus unofficial) list of the Grand Admirals' stuff. Man, they sure love their comlinks and code cylinders!

Grand Admiral Tigellinus
Equipment: Blaster pistol, comlink, code cylinder, pendant (canted circle), Imperial-class Star Destroyer Avatar.

Grand Admiral Batch
Equipment: Comlink, code cylinder, datapad, blaster pistol, stygium splinter, Imperial-class Star Destroyer Meniscus.

NOTE: "Meniscus" is a type of lens, which we thought was appropriate since Batch was responsible for invisibility research.

Grand Admiral Zaarin
Equipment: Comlink, code cylinder, datapad, blaster pistol, Imperial-class Star Destroyer Glory.

Grand Admiral Teshik
Equipment: Built-in blaster cannon, code cylinder, comlink, datapad, Imperial-class Star Destroyer Eleemosynary.

NOTE: "Eleemosynary" means "supported by charity." (I had to look that up in the dictionary and have no idea how it relates to Teshik, so that must have been one of Abel's.)

Grand Admiral Syn
Equipment: Blaster pistol, charm (Sacred Way), code cylinder, comlink, Imperial-class Star Destroyer (The Fi; later renamed Silooth).

NOTE: "Fi" is Old High Galactic for "son" (a bit of trivia from the old Marvel comics). "Silooth" is the name of a Sith animal.

Grand Admiral Makati
Equipment: Blaster pistol, code cylinder, comlink, ring (Corusca-gem), Imperial-class Star Destroyer Steadfast.

Grand Admiral Grunger
Equipment: Code cylinder, comlink, riot gun, Super-class Star Destroyer Aggressor.

Grand Admiral Il-Raz
Equipment: Comlink, code cylinder, COMPNOR handbook, datapad, blaster pistol, Imperial-class Star Destroyer Emperor's Disciple.

Grand Admiral Pitta
Equipment: Comlink, code cylinder, datapad, blaster pistol, electrum-plated surgical scalpel, Imperial-class Star Destroyer Impenetrable.

Grand Admiral Takel
Equipment: Bag of glitterstim, blaster pistol, code cylinder, comlink, Twi'lek slave girl, Zeltron cafarel, Imperial-class Star Destroyer Magic Dragon.

NOTE: Takel was portrayed as a drug user, hence the bag of glitterstim spice and Abel's decision to name his Star Destroyer Magic Dragon, which as Peter, Paul and Mary (or at least Meet the Parents) can tell you, has a reputation for hidden meaning. It killed me to cut this gag.

Grand Admiral Declann
Equipment: Comlink, code cylinder, lightsaber, blaster pistol, Imperial-class Star Destroyer Recondite.

NOTE: "Recondite" can mean "concealed, hidden," which seemed appropriate for the moody Declann.

Grand Admiral Grant
Equipment: Comlink, code cylinder, datapad, blaster pistol, Imperial-class Star Destroyer Oriflamme.

NOTE: "Oriflamme" means an inspiring symbol, named after the red flag of the Abbey of Saint Denis in France.

Grand Admiral Thrawn
Equipment: Comlink, code cylinder, blaster pistol, datapad, Imperial-class Star Destroyer Chimaera.

Dan
(writing projects and current releases)