Death Star and Despayre- return of the technobabble

[Vympel]

The usual suspects have been crowing for some time that the Death Star's destruction of Despayre in the novel of the same name proves that the Death Star doesn't really have the power to destroy a planet, and it uses unnamed technobabble to do so.

They base this claim on the novel relating how the Death Star fires on Despayre, three times at supposedly 33% power each time - with only the third shot shattering the planet violently (the first ignites the atmosphere kills all life on the planet causes ground quakes etc, the second causes massive cracks to appear in the planet etc)

One 'theory' advanced is that the successive beam strikes infuse "hyperspace superlaser exoticness" into the planet until the third shot breaks the 'threshold' required to destroy the planet - by bringing in energy from elsewhere.

Obviously, the aim is to show that the energy to shatter the planet is coming from anywhere as opposed to the reactor, and 33% power having successively more catastrophic effects is claimed to be proof of this.

IMO, this is obviously out and out total bullshit. The novel itself, and every other source, explicitly indicate that the energy to destroy a planet comes from the Death Star's reactor. Nowhere else. You'd think that some source would mention the fantastic energy-from-hyperspatial-rift-or-whatever-nonsense required to destroy a planet, no?

So, what's the parsimonious rationalization? One I thought of is that if you read the novel - it never actually explicitly says that the shots are 33% each. It implies it by saying - before the test firing - that the engineers thought they could get 33% power every hour or two with a fast capacitor charge, but its never confirmed.

Thoughts?

[Stark]

To not even explode the planet at all means these shots must be pretty low (but it sounds like they are in an increasing sequence). It sounds more likely they were just slowly ramping up the weapon to gather data and test it, which seems pretty rational to me. The first shot sounds like Eclipse-level, which might be a well known benchmark for these kind of weapons.

[Connor MacLeod]

Who's resurrecting this old argument agian? I swear anytime I hear about Death Star its because some troll is bending over backwards desperately to pretend that novel means something other than what is blatnatly obvious. The novel flat out STATES in multiple ways that its brute force, but there's always feigning ignorance on that.

Anyhow, any and every attempt to use hyperspace as some sort of technobabble "shortcut" will always fall flat on the basis of existing canon for one simple fact: they invariably assume access to hyperspace (nevermind travelling in it) takes little or no energy to accomplish. But there's absolutely NO evidence of this, and quite a bit of evidence to the contrary (there wouldn't be hyperdrive ranges for one thing, there's the energy an ISD expends in its hyperspace jump, etc.) The fact that this "theory" fails to explain where the energy comes from (or fails to provide evidence or a convincing argument as to why jumping to hyperspace should be a zero-energy feat)

Besides, if they're shooting "exotic hypermatter" into the planet, that means that hypermatter reactions with matter are matter-energy conversion process, as outlined in the ANH novelization. which hardly helps their argument now does it (I believe Mike has made this point in the past before when someone tried a similar argument.)

[Vympel]

Just a clarification - this is mainly about Despayre and the best explanation for the test-firing, not the attempts to distort the 'hyperspace boost' provided by the reactor in general.

[Vehrec]

Well, I would think that steadily ramping up the power of test-firings would be something they could very certainly be doing. They have previously established the ability to fire off only single percent values of planet-cracking power. It makes more sense than technobabble exoticness sticking to the planet. If that was the case, and any level of exoticness was naturally occurring or generated by normal hyperspace activity, there would be planets and suns blowing up all the time.

[Ritterin Sophia]

Who's resurrecting this old argument agian?

L33teltard and Oragahn.

[TC Pilot]

The usual suspects have been crowing for some time that the Death Star's destruction of Despayre in the novel of the same name proves that the Death Star doesn't really have the power to destroy a planet, and it uses unnamed technobabble to do so.

Yeah... sorry I brought that up again and bailed on the thread not long after...

[Vympel]

LOL, you're the smart one. There's only so much stupidity one can take. I've reached my threshold and don't plan on bothering to post again.

[Vehrec]

Its an interesting survival tactic. Become so stupid that your chief opposition can't bear to oppose you and flees.

[Batman]

Its an interesting survival tactic. Become so stupid that your chief opposition can't bear to oppose you and flees.

Interesting, yes. Effective, no. In places where you can actually get AWAY with that you wouldn't have to resort to that sort of tactics to begin with.

[Connor MacLeod]

Just a clarification - this is mainly about Despayre and the best explanation for the test-firing, not the attempts to distort the 'hyperspace boost' provided by the reactor in general.

What explanation? They're basically regurgitating the "mysterious unknown mechanism" theory Darkstar has been using all along, they just covered it with some highly speculative hyperspace technobabble. They don't specify where the energy is coming from (Hyperspace? Where's the proof? And why is this somehow not relevant to power generation or weapons technology?) and just hope people won't notice they're trying ot pass off their rampant speculation as the ONLY answer.

We have three different firings with wildly disparate results. We have Motti saying the weapon is highly theoretical. We have lots and lots of evidence the DS does not operate on technobabble chain reaction mechanisms but on brute force (even in the Death Star novel itself, which is why those people go to tremendous lengths to contort it to mean something other than what it does.)

Earlier in the novel I recall they make a point of the gunner dude commenting how incredibly complicated and precise the formation of the superlaser beam was, and how important it was for everything to go right and all the time it would take to build up to it. The first two shots were basically "improperly aligned" or some such, so they only channeled part of the overall power into the weapon and it ended up weaker than it actually was. The excess energy buildup got bled off as waste heat by the radiators. That's why the recharge rate was approximately the same (and basically outputting the same level of energy in all three firings. They were testing the storage level of the capacitor despite it being able to only accumulate at about 33%, as I recall.)

[Lord Revan]

it was something like that and ironing out any major bugs from the system as technically the death star was finishing constructing rather then already finished (that being the reason they could get only 33% capacitor power to begin with), so it's far more reasonble that the shot was less then the predicted amount due ineffiencies and bugs in the system, hell they were still doing some non-critical interior construction (or at least so it was implied) when the DS blew up at Yavin IV (well not at that exact moment but you know what I mean).

frankly this sounds far more reasonble to me then some wierd technobabble explanation, after all even in real life it's not unheard of that high profile (and the death star was high profile) military project be officially "finished" until the weapon/ship/whatever was actually ready and all the bugs had been ironed out.

[DudeGuyMan]

So, what's the parsimonious rationalization? One I thought of is that if you read the novel - it never actually explicitly says that the shots are 33% each. It implies it by saying - before the test firing - that the engineers thought they could get 33% power every hour or two with a fast capacitor charge, but its never confirmed.

Thoughts?

So yeah, I'm just a newbie and don't usually debate this topic, but... uh... wouldn't it make a fucking shitload more sense to just assume that only the third shot was 33% power and the other two were something less? Rather than invent some form of superlaser magic that sticks to the planet between shots?

[adam_grif]

Can somebody explain to me why they're trying to make this argument? Do they think that somehow generating the energy at the point when the beam strikes the planet is less impressive or deadly than if the death star generates it in a reactor then pumps it into the laser? Does it really matter either way?

:/

[DrStrangelove]

Can somebody explain to me why they're trying to make this argument? Do they think that somehow generating the energy at the point when the beam strikes the planet is less impressive or deadly than if the death star generates it in a reactor then pumps it into the laser? Does it really matter either way?

:/

Yes because it means that SW is less powerful than X(usually ST with those two), and that ICS numbers are crazy and can be ignored.

[Formless]

Can somebody explain to me why they're trying to make this argument? Do they think that somehow generating the energy at the point when the beam strikes the planet is less impressive or deadly than if the death star generates it in a reactor then pumps it into the laser? Does it really matter either way?

:/

Yes because it means that SW is less powerful than X(usually ST with those two), and that ICS numbers are crazy and can be ignored.

Actually, no, because its explicit that the same technology is at work. So either way, the calcs would hold true. Besides, they are barking up the wrong tree. What they really have to argue against is the calcs based on the movies themselves that Wong and Saxton made even before the ICS, because those are based on the highest canon there is-- the movies.

[DrStrangelove]

Can somebody explain to me why they're trying to make this argument? Do they think that somehow generating the energy at the point when the beam strikes the planet is less impressive or deadly than if the death star generates it in a reactor then pumps it into the laser? Does it really matter either way?

:/

Yes because it means that SW is less powerful than X(usually ST with those two), and that ICS numbers are crazy and can be ignored.

Actually, no, because its explicit that the same technology is at work. So either way, the calcs would hold true. Besides, they are barking up the wrong tree. What they really have to argue against is the calcs based on the movies themselves that Wong and Saxton made even before the ICS, because those are based on the highest canon there is-- the movies.

I know this, unfortunately the retards in question have decided since is wasnt explicitly shown or stated in the movies it cant be true. If you want to see their epic trolling firsthand, go start an ICS thread on the technical debates section of SB. I'd say SFJ but they aren't the only ones there.

[Formless]

I know this, unfortunately the retards in question have decided since is wasnt explicitly shown or stated in the movies it cant be true. If you want to see their epic trolling firsthand, go start an ICS thread on the technical debates section of SB. I'd say SFJ but they aren't the only ones there.

If they only want to use the movies as evidence, then they are dishonest assholes for trying to use the book "Death Star" in their argument since it is, you know, Part of the EU. Of course, this is where Mike's calcs come in, since they are based entirely on the movies. They aren't as powerful as the ICS... but only because they represent the lower limit. A lower limit that is still more powerful than they want to admit.

As for SB... from what I've heard about the place, the internet would be a lot smarter if it got nuked from orbit or something.

[Ritterin Sophia]

As for SB... from what I've heard about the place, the internet would be a lot smarter if it got nuked from orbit or something.

Eh... SB is kind of a weird place. On the one hand insults are disallowed but you can passive aggressively act a douche all day long. They're smarter than the average internet goers (which isn't saying a lot) but they've got shitloads of conservative trolls out the ass, including one of the mods. That said it's a good place to go if you're tired of the echo chamber that is SDN.