Disclaimer before the eminent debaters of the forum attack: I am, as I have shown before, a Warsie (quite an extreme one, I would think, by certain people's standards). I do not endorse such an idea as is presented in the title and its implications; it was chosen purely for shock value. What I would rather see is a way to explain this.
Due to significant VS debate regarding SW over the last couple of weeks or so, I have been rechecking the SWTC. On Saxton's pages for the literary sources (and specifically, the one analysing the Tales of the Bounty Hunters anthology), I found the following:
This is not the usual function we see from "inertial dampers" that merely protect crew and components from the effects of huge accelerations, but it actually seems to lower the inertia of the ship as such. Taking this at face value, it looks like this does say that some technology that screws with inertial mass (similar to what we see in, say, Stargate SG-1 or the Lensman books) does in fact exist in SW. Does this lend more credibility to Sarli's (still non-canonical) bullshit?p. 60 wrote:When Boba Fett again refused to answer, IG-88 increased his speed to tolerance levels, narrowing the gap between his ship and the Slave I. He rode tight in the bowshock from Fett's ship. But suddenly, in a remarkable move, Boba Fett activated his inertial damping system, slamming his descent to a halt in the atmosphere of Tattooine. The stress and power required for such a maneuver utterly trashed his hyperdrives. IG-88 zoomed past him, unable to squelch his velocity sufficiently. He brought the IG-2000 to a halt in less than two seconds- directly in the targeting cross of Fett's ship.
Additionally, something in this passage looked familiar to me, so I did another check, this time on my own collection of old books. And I was right; as it went, it turned out that the KJA anthology is not the oldest sources where this stuff appears. It goes back all the way to the old WEG game and their Galaxy Guide 5: Return of the Jedi supplement. Although in that book, the quote looks a little different:
[quote=""Dark Voyage to Tatooine," p. 31,"] At that moment, Fett activated the Slave I's unique inertial dampening system, abruptly halting the craft's speedy descent, though at the cost of destroying the ship's hyperdrive engines. The IG-2000 swept past in an instant, directly into the path of Slave I's weaponry.[/quote]
Since the original source describes the technology as "unique," one would assume that it is not present on most major warships. Or that would be my conclusion, at any rate. So in any case it would not support the crap that all SW vessels have this.
Any thoughts from anyone else?
(EDIT: Minor corrections in grammar and presentation.)