Star Wars for Dummies Thread

[Talon Karrde]

Although I like to think I know a lot about Star Wars I know I have "a lot to learn"

I'm creating this thread for questions of any kind for stupid people (i.e., me.)

Here's my first question. I know someone was saying in another thread that the Hiroshima Atomic Bomb equaled a force of 20 kilotons. He then said 1000 kilotons equaled a megaton. Then take anothers quote that an ISD's single volley would be 1,875,000,000 megatons. How is this possible? Is this saying the nuclear war is taking place in every space battle? How would a planet hold up for even a second under bombardment?

[Master of Ossus]

The firepower of an ISD is immense, but it takes far more energy than that to destroy a planet (like the DS did). An ISD is capable of annihilating life on a target world, but even its firepower is insufficient to destroy a world altogether, except over a VERY long time frame (even then, it might be impossible. I will have to check on that, and it will take a long time for me to do that math). To be honest, I have no idea how the poster came up with that firepower for a volley from an ISD. There are many figures for how many weapons an ISD has, and there is significant speculation on the firepower of many of its weapons, but the figure does seem fairly reasonable, given the firepower of Acclamator HTLs.

Yes, this is essentially saying that nearly every battle in SW has thermonuclear exchanges going on. Remember, though, that the firepower of the weapon dropped on Hiroshima was very large, but it was insufficient to destroy life in the city. It was insufficient to destroy all complex life in the city. In fact, it was really just a large bomb. In order to wipe out all life on a planet, one must first melt the entire crust uniformly to a depth of more than 1/2 mile. The energy requirements for this are spectacular--higher even than the firepower of an ISD in several volleys, but that is what is going on during a BDZ. The firepower of an ISD is enough to cripple an eco-system in a single shot, but not enough to wipe out life (even on a fairly local scale), without numerous shots.

Also note that the WWII era-nuclear weapons were not nearly the most powerful weapons designed on Earth to this point. Hydrogen-bombs were orders of magnitude more powerful.

[Subnormal]

This doesn't make to much sense, enought power to destroy large amounts of life on a planet, and yet the Millenium Falcon gets nailed multiple times and still continues to fly, damn thing must have a nice shield, or the Imps are really stupid.

[Master of Ossus]

This doesn't make to much sense, enought power to destroy large amounts of life on a planet, and yet the Millenium Falcon gets nailed multiple times and still continues to fly, damn thing must have a nice shield, or the Imps are really stupid.

There are a couple of things going on when the Falcon withstood those hits.

First, the Falcon does have excellent shields, as do nearly all shielded SW ships. These shields tend to be in the high kiloton range for starfighters, and the Falcon's appears to be much better.

The second and more important factor is that the Falcon was not under attack from all of the Star Destroyer's weapons. The ship's main heavy weapons (Heavy Turbolaser Batteries, or HTL's), were not firing at the Falcon. In fact, we never see these weapons firing during the movies. Only the relatively small point-defense weapons were striking the ship. A single HTL shot would have vaporized the Falcon, but the Empire was not shooting to kill, at the time.

[Subnormal]

Rendevous point on Hoth, why wasn't it blasted to smithereens, I mean the Imps blew the shields genorators away. Yet we see no blasts are we to suspect that the Ion cannon dissalbed an entire Imperial fleet. I mean probes, sensors, or reconisiance vehicles could of spotted them. I believe the AT- ATs have speeder bikes they could of had some form of forward scout, and yet they leave the small rebel group get away. Sorry if you don't mind answering these questions, they maybe dumb, but I never heard any answers to them before, and this is a Dummies tread.

[Master of Ossus]

This is actually a good question to which I do not know a definitive answer, I can only speculate.

1. It may have been that the Empire did not care. They were primarily interested in routing out the base. This is unlikely, as they should have worried that the Rebels were escaping with their equipment, even if it was relatively insignificant.

2. It may have been that the Empire did not know where the rendezvous point was. Again, this is unlikely, as the ISD's should have been able to locate the rebel ships on the ground, especially since they were powered up and some of them were moving from there to orbit.

3. It may have been that they were worried about destroying their own troops. This is much more likely, as those were elite ground-units on Hoth, at the time. On the other hand, it seems somewhat unlikely that turbolasers must be used at such high powers that they would pose a danger to Imperial forces, if properly targetted. I rate this far more likely than 1 or 2, but still unlikely.

4. Most likely, Vader knew or believed that Luke might have been on the ground. His consistent objective throughout the movies after ANH was to capture Skywalker, knowing that to capture Skywalker would be to eliminate almost all threats to Palpatine and the Empire. Thus, Vader likely would not have tried to kill Luke, and may have ordered his forces not to fire at the area. This is the most likely explanation I can come up with, though there may be some other one that is even better that I am not thinking of.

As an aside, I do not mind answering these questions to the best of my ability at all. This thread was created for that expressed purpose, and I enjoy the thought that some of these provoke. Please feel free to ask anything, though remember that some questions may be un-answerable.

[SPOOFE]

Remember, the bulk of seeming Imperial ineptitude seen in the movies was due to a desire to capture rather than destroy. At the beginning of ANH, they wanted to capture the Tantive IV. In TESB, they wanted to capture as many rebels - well, IMPORTANT rebels, anyway - as they could... probably also why they were using low-powered, disabling shots on the Falcon (hey, if YOU were trying to keep that thing alive, wouldn't you treat it like it were as fragile as fine china?).

[Subnormal]

Wasn't vader instructed by The emperor after the battle of hoth to capture and turn Skywalker, didn't think it was on his mind when he attacked the planet, I thought his main goal was to capture the rebels and destroy the base. I may be wrong It's been a while since I saw ESB.

[His Divine Shadow]

This doesn't make to much sense, enought power to destroy large amounts of life on a planet, and yet the Millenium Falcon gets nailed multiple times and still continues to fly, damn thing must have a nice shield, or the Imps are really stupid.

They where trying to capture the falcon, wich is why they fired so many flakbursts around it.

[His Divine Shadow]

Rendevous point on Hoth, why wasn't it blasted to smithereens, I mean the Imps blew the shields genorators away. Yet we see no blasts are we to suspect that the Ion cannon dissalbed an entire Imperial fleet. I mean probes, sensors, or reconisiance vehicles could of spotted them. I believe the AT- ATs have speeder bikes they could of had some form of forward scout, and yet they leave the small rebel group get away. Sorry if you don't mind answering these questions, they maybe dumb, but I never heard any answers to them before, and this is a Dummies tread.

What, you mean blasts from space?
Vader and the gang where down in the base when the shield was down and the Falcon was taking off, I don't think doing an orbital bombardment with their forces down there would have helped.

[Subnormal]

Not a bombardment, I never suggested a bombardment, I just said the rendevous point could of been blasted to smithereens. And seeing as the Rendevous point is a possible far distance away, one or two ISD blast could of destroyed the area, according to the figures. And as Ossus or someone stated they could lower the Laser settings to cause less damage. I always thought lasers and blasters fired in direct beams, I don't think there would be any effect on Vader in the bunker.

[Doomriser]

Actually, yes, we do see HTLs in the canon trilogy. In ROTJ, what do you think those huge white explosions are that are visible all the way from the Emperor's throne room? They are HTLs impacting the shields.

We also see an actual HTL bolt. A Mon Calamari cruiser fires a 2 km long bolt that instantly destroys an unshielded Star Destroyer. There is a video capture avaliable if you are really curious.

Turbolasers are _directed energy_ weapons which means that the full force of the impact (or abround 99% of it) is directed forwards towards and into the target as opposed to being radiated in all directions like a nuclear bomb. That is why turbolasers don't look like multi MT/GT weapons even though they can have the same effect.

The Falcon was probably under fire from light turbolasers or even laser cannons. The laser cannons on an Acclamator-class are 6 MT. The Falcon could probably withstand several blasts from that weapon since it is ~40m long and equipped with heavily upgraded, military-grade shielding.

About Hoth, they didn't send speeder bikes because they could have been blasted to pieces by the rebel artillery. More importantly, we never saw any repulsorlift vehicles - ever in the entire trilogy - cross a theatre shield. I think only 'grounded' walker vehicles can.

[His Divine Shadow]

Actually, yes, we do see HTLs in the canon trilogy. In ROTJ, what do you think those huge white explosions are that are visible all the way from the Emperor's throne room? They are HTLs impacting the shields.

Actually, I would like to elaborate on that, what we see is the bolt impact, the phsyical bolt, and it's delfected by the particle shields, the C beam is absorbed by the shields, wich is why shield impacts will never look anything like multi-GT or TT explosions.

Turbolasers are _directed energy_ weapons which means that the full force of the impact (or abround 99% of it) is directed forwards towards and into the target as opposed to being radiated in all directions like a nuclear bomb. That is why turbolasers don't look like multi MT/GT weapons even though they can have the same effect.

I think it helps if one thinks of them as lasers.

[David]

For those "dummies" out there~


Q. I heard Luke did turn to the Dark Side. Is that true and when didi it happen?


A. Luke turned to the D side in the Dark Empire comic book series. The New Republic defeated Thrawn and soon realized the Imperial Remnants seemed to be pulling back together. Luke decided that the only way to learn who was behind this would be to pretend to defect, and he was taken to the new Imperial capital of Byss. There he met the new Emporer, who turned out to be the clone of the original. Luke decided the only way to beat the resurrected Emporer would be to learn the Dark Side and use it against the Emporer.

[Stravo]

For those "dummies" out there~


Q. I heard Luke did turn to the Dark Side. Is that true and when didi it happen?


A. Luke turned to the D side in the Dark Empire comic book series. The New Republic defeated Thrawn and soon realized the Imperial Remnants seemed to be pulling back together. Luke decided that the only way to learn who was behind this would be to pretend to defect, and he was taken to the new Imperial capital of Byss. There he met the new Emporer, who turned out to be the clone of the original. Luke decided the only way to beat the resurrected Emporer would be to learn the Dark Side and use it against the Emporer.

I was NEVER thrilled with Dark Empire, though the art was cool and the storyline was alright it did two things which I despise in EU. First it used "Cloned bad guy returns" storyline....UGH. That = NO CREATIVITY. Didn't anyone care that by having the Emperor return it just invalidated Vader/Anakin's sacrifice in the end? That really pissed me off.

Two, Luke turning to the dark side. That whole idea just spat in the face of Luke's journey and growth in the OT. The whole point at the end of the story is that Luke although tempted like his father did not turn to the darkside. " I am a Jedi, like my father before me." The idea of Luke going over to the darkside completely wrecked the journey. LUKE LEARNED NOTHING. That pissed me off too.

Whenever the EU tries to explore subjects like what if the Emperor returned it makes me ill. As far as I'm concerned, the Emperor died on Endor due to the sacrifice of Anakin Skywalker in order to save his son and return to the light.

[Subnormal]

About Hoth, they didn't send speeder bikes because they could have been blasted to pieces by the rebel artillery. More importantly, we never saw any repulsorlift vehicles - ever in the entire trilogy - cross a theatre shield. I think only 'grounded' walker vehicles can.

Wasn't the Shield not knocked out, they could go anywhere.

[Akm72]

This is actually a good question to which I do not know a definitive answer, I can only speculate.

1. It may have been that the Empire did not care. They were primarily interested in routing out the base. This is unlikely, as they should have worried that the Rebels were escaping with their equipment, even if it was relatively insignificant.

2. It may have been that the Empire did not know where the rendezvous point was. Again, this is unlikely, as the ISD's should have been able to locate the rebel ships on the ground, especially since they were powered up and some of them were moving from there to orbit.

3. It may have been that they were worried about destroying their own troops. This is much more likely, as those were elite ground-units on Hoth, at the time. On the other hand, it seems somewhat unlikely that turbolasers must be used at such high powers that they would pose a danger to Imperial forces, if properly targetted. I rate this far more likely than 1 or 2, but still unlikely.

4. Most likely, Vader knew or believed that Luke might have been on the ground. His consistent objective throughout the movies after ANH was to capture Skywalker, knowing that to capture Skywalker would be to eliminate almost all threats to Palpatine and the Empire. Thus, Vader likely would not have tried to kill Luke, and may have ordered his forces not to fire at the area. This is the most likely explanation I can come up with, though there may be some other one that is even better that I am not thinking of.

As an aside, I do not mind answering these questions to the best of my ability at all. This thread was created for that expressed purpose, and I enjoy the thought that some of these provoke. Please feel free to ask anything, though remember that some questions may be un-answerable.

Or 5. The rebels, aware that as they would be vulnerable during the rendevous, could have rigged up a jamming field in the area to protect the last ships. This wouldn't stop a bombardment, but it would render it inaccurate, putting nearby Imperial troops and Vader himself at risk.

[Talon Karrde]

The question as to why the ISD's heavy turbolaser was not used on Hoth would be in my mind quite simple. To knock out the shields the Empire had to send numerous AT-AT's and AT-ST's. They would not risk the chance of destroying their own troops on the ground. Also, the Empire could not simply remove the troops and then fire because this would give the Rebel Alliance sufficient time to evacuate.

[Talon Karrde]

Wasn't vader instructed by The emperor after the battle of hoth to capture and turn Skywalker, didn't think it was on his mind when he attacked the planet, I thought his main goal was to capture the rebels and destroy the base. I may be wrong It's been a while since I saw ESB.

You are correct technically. Remember however, in the scrolling text before ESB begins it states Vader is "obsessed with finding Skywalker"

Also, with the scene aboard the Executor, Vader looks at the probes information and says, "That's it, the Rebels are there." And after Ozzel tries to warn Vader away he says, "That is the system, and I'm sure Skywalker is with them....." This would obviously show that he already is searching for Skywalker.

Remember he is the one to suggest to the Emperor that "if he were to be turned, he would be a powerful ally." So apparantly the whole time he is thinking of and planning to turn his son.

[Master of Ossus]

This is actually a good question to which I do not know a definitive answer, I can only speculate.

1. It may have been that the Empire did not care. They were primarily interested in routing out the base. This is unlikely, as they should have worried that the Rebels were escaping with their equipment, even if it was relatively insignificant.

2. It may have been that the Empire did not know where the rendezvous point was. Again, this is unlikely, as the ISD's should have been able to locate the rebel ships on the ground, especially since they were powered up and some of them were moving from there to orbit.

3. It may have been that they were worried about destroying their own troops. This is much more likely, as those were elite ground-units on Hoth, at the time. On the other hand, it seems somewhat unlikely that turbolasers must be used at such high powers that they would pose a danger to Imperial forces, if properly targetted. I rate this far more likely than 1 or 2, but still unlikely.

4. Most likely, Vader knew or believed that Luke might have been on the ground. His consistent objective throughout the movies after ANH was to capture Skywalker, knowing that to capture Skywalker would be to eliminate almost all threats to Palpatine and the Empire. Thus, Vader likely would not have tried to kill Luke, and may have ordered his forces not to fire at the area. This is the most likely explanation I can come up with, though there may be some other one that is even better that I am not thinking of.

As an aside, I do not mind answering these questions to the best of my ability at all. This thread was created for that expressed purpose, and I enjoy the thought that some of these provoke. Please feel free to ask anything, though remember that some questions may be un-answerable.

Or 5. The rebels, aware that as they would be vulnerable during the rendevous, could have rigged up a jamming field in the area to protect the last ships. This wouldn't stop a bombardment, but it would render it inaccurate, putting nearby Imperial troops and Vader himself at risk.

Yes, that is possible. Another possible explanation, of course, is that they could not for either tactical or strategic reasons, their ships had moved out of range of the area. I should have mentioned that, but I dismissed it out of hand, as it was not supported by anything.

[IRG CommandoJoe]

quote:
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Originally posted by Doomriser:
About Hoth, they didn't send speeder bikes because they could have been blasted to pieces by the rebel artillery. More importantly, we never saw any repulsorlift vehicles - ever in the entire trilogy - cross a theatre shield. I think only 'grounded' walker vehicles can.
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There's more to it than that. They would be able to cross a shield because they would be transported inside of the AT-AT's. After the AT-AT's cross the shields, they would "kneel" down, open its bay doors, ramps would extend on both sides, and speeder bikes and snowtroopers would come out. But even if they were able to do that, the speeder bikes wouldn't work because the Empire didn't have the time to adapt them to the cold, like the Rebels did for their snowspeeders. And this might explain why there weren't any other various types of vehicles besides walkers, as well as TIE support. (Rogue Squadron II: Rogue Leader seems to disagree with this....) I wonder why the Rebels didn't use some of their shielded starfighters, though? Surely they had some to spare...right?

[IRG CommandoJoe]

Now that I think about it, this was a strategically brilliant place for the Rebels to hide out in.

[Stravo]

I wonder why the Rebels didn't use some of their shielded starfighters, though? Surely they had some to spare...right?

I think that it was fairly clear that they were short of fighters when the best they could do was provide two fighter escorts per ship, plus Rogue squadron was busy flying the speeders. The base was not a military stronghold, it was a staff headquarters, besides alot of heavy military equiptment would have drawn attention to the base. I think I read somehwere that they only had 2 or 3 squadrons of fighters avaialble at Hoth, so every fighter counted, it was for more important to escort the retreating transports then try to stop the AT ATs. Remember, they weren't trying to win the fight, they were trying to get the hell out of there.

[Master of Ossus]

They would be able to cross a shield because they would be transported inside of the AT-AT's. After the AT-AT's cross the shields, they would "kneel" down, open its bay doors, ramps would extend on both sides, and speeder bikes and snowtroopers would come out.

There is no evidence, in the movies or in the EU of shields on AT-AT walkers. Just armor.

Shielded starfighters would only be significantly more useful than snowspeeders if they had proton torpedoes--which are very expensive. Also remember that the Rebels were not even trying to evacuate their snowspeeders ("It will take quite a transport to evacuate a T47." "Well, forget all the heavy equipment...." T47's are snowspeeders). Perhaps they were just trying to use them one last time, knowing that they would have to be abandoned.

[SirNitram]

Not to mention that the explosion of a proton torpedo is likely going to cause serious blowback, even if it's mostly directed(IIRC, 98% directed. Probably wrong), probably incinerating the defenders.