Reason I do not think Empire go war with UFP

[bz249]

No one knows exactly where hypermatter comes from, but extraction from hyperspace is one possibility.

And it really doesn't make sense for Tibanna gas to be rare and mined on only a few worlds considering you've got a galaxy worth of ships and people whose weapons for the most part are based on Tibanna gas. Thinking logically, if Bespin were one of the few places that Tibanna gas could be mined you'd have to consider that a very important strategic resource, and thus expect the presence of a signficant imperial fleet to protect it. Instead its considered a nothing special mining operation flying under the Empire's radar, at least until the MF shows up.

Isn´t hypermatter coming from black holes (or mined in areas close to black holes)? If yes than it should be abundant in the MW also, even though the extraction infrastructure is lacking. But building it up should not be a problem after the Empire have come.

Or it is retconned and hypermatter is something else in the actual canon?

[Eternal_Freedom]

On the topic of Tibanna gas, I can't recall where I read it (it may have been the Thrawn trilogy) that it's not exactly rare, but only a handful of places like Bespin (And Kril'Dor in Jedi Knight: Jedi Academy) produce the really high quality stuff.

Kinda like crude oil I geuss. Plenty of it, but if you want the finest sweet light crude, there's only a few places to go.

[TheHammer]

On the topic of Tibanna gas, I can't recall where I read it (it may have been the Thrawn trilogy) that it's not exactly rare, but only a handful of places like Bespin (And Kril'Dor in Jedi Knight: Jedi Academy) produce the really high quality stuff.

Kinda like crude oil I geuss. Plenty of it, but if you want the finest sweet light crude, there's only a few places to go.

That doesn't make any sense. If Bespin were one of the few places you could get it, or if it was of signifigantly high quality, then it hardly would be entrusted to what is a essentially a small business run by a con man. The original trilogy implies that Bespin is some small back water world that for the most part goes un-noticed by the empire. That's why Lando has been able to operate there, undisturbed for the most part, and why Han thought it would be a good place to hole up for a while.

Anyone have a canon source for citing how rare it supposedly is? All I've seen is that its commonly found in gas giants.

[Darth Tedious]

According to Wookieepedia, Bespin is the only source of naturally occurring spin-sealed Tibanna in the entire galaxy.
It also says the stuff only occurs in the presence of Beldons, which are native to Bespin, and have only been exported to a few other planets.
Both articles site the 'Galaxy Guide 2: Yavin and Bespin' as a common source, if anyone has a copy, confirmation would be handy.

If this information is indeed accurate, Bespin was the only source of high-quality Tibanna in the whole GFFA, whether it makes sense or not. It's entirely possible that Lando was able to operate under the radar because he kept exporting his quotas to Blastech for weapons production, so the Empire never felt a need to supervise.

[Metahive]

As for hypermatter, according to Wookiepedia hypermatter consists of tachyonic particles taken from hyperspace. That would imply that theoretically it can be harvested at any place where hyperspace is accessible, yet in the CW episode The Zillo Beast we are shown that extraordinarily important "fuel" is pumped up from the ground on certain few planets. Maybe the harvested tachyons have to be combined with some special liquids to be safely usable, like nitroglycerine has to be made into dynamite for convenient handling?

[Imperial528]

Is it stated what the fuel is for in the episode? Since non-capital ships have fuels other than hypermatter, such as, IIRC, vulture droids and TIE fighters, and other smaller craft. I've never found out what the fuel is called though.

[Serafina]

Tibanna Gas occurs on many plants across the Galaxy. The stuff from Bespin is only special because it is "spin-sealed" naturally - it is possible to "spin-seal" it artificially, but that process is expensive.
Tibanna Gas is also mostly special because it is a better fuel for blaster/turbolaser weapons than some other stuff that can be used. It has to be "spin-sealed" in order to work like that - applications for non-refined Tibanna are hyperdrive coolant and even just plain heating/cooking gas.
It's therefore obvious that it is hardly a rare resource, and just the "spin-sealed" gas is uniquely useful - and normally expensive to produce, except on Bespin.

It's kinda like having an oil well that pumps out high-quality diesel/kerosene/gas instead of crude. Profitable and rare, but not giving you something you can't acquire in any other way.


That would also explain why the Empire did not care that much about Bespin, but the Rebels did:
The Empire has simply more than enough resources that a single source of cheaper Tibanna would not really matter. The much smaller, poorer Rebellion would profit greatly from it.
It's like having a single field that magically grows wheat without any work being necessary - a great blessing to a farmers family, insignificant to a rich landlord.