Clone Wars series (SPOILERS)

[Saxtonite]

Sorry, I'm afraid not. I think it's in the big battle after the Rogues go undercover, as vague as that may be.

Thank you then.

[Darwin]

arguably that is true..hmm. Don't those ion cannons only really affect electrical stuff; being drawn to electrical equipment that is on and shields, leaving everything else alone? But the idea of electrical shock is possible too

While ion cannons are supposed to be for disabling electronics, I find it kind of hard to believe that it would be so clean as that. If I was somehow floating in space and caught in the path of the broadside ion cannon, I highly doubt I would come through it with only my digital watch harmed. You might be safe with hundreds of thousands of tons (in case of the medical ships), to tens or hundreds of millions of tons of Venator around you, but a space fighter is a different level entirely.

IIRC, Mara Jade caught the edge of a fighter or capship ion cannon blast after ejecting from her Headhunter in one of the Thrawn Trilogy books and its effects were fairly severe.

[NecronLord]

Yeah, IIRC, Mara was lucky to have lived through being in a pod hit by a capship ion cannon. And... I liked that. Particularly the bits of the Malevolence's railways (which reminded me a little of the Doombringer... I think Dark Forces had something similar on the Excecutor too. IIRC, Jedi Academy had something like the 'energy binders' between train trucks, also.)

I liked that, despite the ship being on the run, they acknowledged the difference in mass making the Venators unable to harm the Mal.

Also... "Hello there!"

[charlemagne]

Also... "Hello there!"

Hehe, while most of the time the droids' comments are a nuisance, "That was impressive!" after Obi-Wan unleashed his awesomeness an the droids made me chuckle aloud.

Edit: spelling

[NecronLord]

It was nice to see a Jedi actually use TK on a visibly shielded droideka. I was beginning to wonder if they could.

There was a new Super Battle Droid variant there, with a single, large cannon on its arm... Though I think anyone who played 'Star Wars Galactic Battlegrounds' (and that's not really a reccommendation, it wasn't terribly good) might recognise it as the upgraded confederate footsoldier (predictably called 'heavy super battle droid') from that; it's probably coincidence (both designers wanting something with more firepower) ending up independantly producing a similar design though.

[Darksider]

It was nice to see a Jedi actually use TK on a visibly shielded droideka. I was beginning to wonder if they could.

There was a new Super Battle Droid variant there, with a single, large cannon on its arm... Though I think anyone who played 'Star Wars Galactic Battlegrounds' (and that's not really a reccommendation, it wasn't terribly good) might recognise it as the upgraded confederate footsoldier (predictably called 'heavy super battle droid') from that; it's probably coincidence (both designers wanting something with more firepower) ending up independantly producing a similar design though.

The large cannon versions are also present in Republic Commando as well. I believe they're also up-armored as well, based on how damn hard it is to kill them. They're probably some kind of heavier variant used for heavy assaults.

Also, Galek Fyaar's ship was called the Doomgiver not doombringer

[Darwin]

There was a new Super Battle Droid variant there, with a single, large cannon on its arm... Though I think anyone who played 'Star Wars Galactic Battlegrounds' (and that's not really a reccommendation, it wasn't terribly good) might recognise it as the upgraded confederate footsoldier (predictably called 'heavy super battle droid') from that; it's probably coincidence (both designers wanting something with more firepower) ending up independantly producing a similar design though.

The large cannon versions are also present in Republic Commando as well. I believe they're also up-armored as well, based on how damn hard it is to kill them. They're probably some kind of heavier variant used for heavy assaults.

We've seen 3 kinds of B2 battledroid so far in Clone Wars, which is great. the standard with twin repeating blasters in one or both forearms, the up-armored model with a left-hand blaster cannon seen in the latest episode and in Republic Commando, and I also recall seeing another heavy-weapons variant in the battle at Toydaria.

[FSTargetDrone]

I like how Grevious reacted when Dooku asked him about the Malevolence, just before the ship was destroyed. Grevious didn't make an excuse or rant about the Jedi. He just turned Dooku's transmission off, without a word.

[Darksider]

I like how Grevious reacted when Dooku asked him about the Malevolence, just before the ship was destroyed. Grevious didn't make an excuse or rant about the Jedi. He just turned Dooku's transmission off, without a word.

Well, we know he survives through to Revenge of the Sith, so I wonder how he gets back into Dooku's favor.

[Desdinova]

Is anyone else really amused at the fact that every crewman on every Republic warship seems to be a Fett clone?

So, not even taking their massive casualties into account, or the fact that they're supposed to be ground troops, the "Grand Army" of single working parent commandos would have a theoretical maximum of... (3,000,000/7,400) 405 Venators! What an impressive fleet! Oh, but... weren't there well over 1,000 Venators at the Battle of Coruscant alone! How ever will we reconcile this horrific discrepancy?!

[FSTargetDrone]

Well, we know he survives through to Revenge of the Sith, so I wonder how he gets back into Dooku's favor.

Of course. I didn't think that Grevious felt any particular concern for his own safety at the hands of Dooku or something, that he was trying to slink away unnoticed. I was just amused that he didn't even bother to respond to Dooku, as if he was just enranged by the good guys getting the better of him that he simply couldn't be bothered to reply to Dooku.

I kind of like the way Grevious walks around with his hands clasped behind his back, too. Not sure why, but it seems appropriate.

The B1 droids largely annoyed me again this episode.... Why... do.. they... need... to... act... like... such... buffoons? And the firehose thing, with the droid being tossed about...no, please, no more of that, ever, again. Ever.

[Saxtonite]

IIRC, Mara Jade caught the edge of a fighter or capship ion cannon blast after ejecting from her Headhunter in one of the Thrawn Trilogy books and its effects were fairly severe.

I believe that was due to losing all life support in that spacesuit in deep space.

I kind of like the way Grevious walks around with his hands clasped behind his back, too. Not sure why, but it seems appropriate.

That's body language, often Generals, Royals, etc use that posture when inspecting troops, etc. Often they stand straighter and 'puff out' or something.

EDIT: I know some in the UK Royal Family do that. Whether that's something that is "natural" to a lot of people or something that is learned and all that stuff I do not know.

[Darth Yoshi]

In the first Rogue Squadron novel, one of the Rogues is unlucky enough to intercept one of Borleias' planetary ion blasts. The fighter disintegrated. Considering that capital grade weapons are only several orders weaker than planetary weapons, it's safe to assume that fighter pilots hit by capital grade ion cannons are pretty much fucked, unless the cannons have been specifically dialed down to disable fighters or shuttlecraft for capture.

As for the Isard's Revenge incident:

[Wedge] kicked in a bit more throttle and brought the Defender up so he could shoot over the burning roadblock. He shifted from lasers to ion cannons and fired at the vehicle furthest back in the convoy. His initial shot fell short, but wreathed a gravtruck with blue lightning. It immediately grounded with sparks shooting from the undercarriage.

The guards who had been in the back spilled out, most of them jerking and twitching from the energy. One guard's clothes were smoldering. He stumbled into the street and the landspeeder following the gravtruck hit him when it swerved to miss the dead truck. The guard pitched up and over the speeder and landed in the road behind it, while the speeder went out of control and slammed into a storefront..

So no physical damage from fighter grade ion cannons, but definite energy leakage.

[Imperial Overlord]

I like how Grevious reacted when Dooku asked him about the Malevolence, just before the ship was destroyed. Grevious didn't make an excuse or rant about the Jedi. He just turned Dooku's transmission off, without a word.

Well, we know he survives through to Revenge of the Sith, so I wonder how he gets back into Dooku's favor.

He's doing his job. Being scary, committing atrocities, and losing the war. Remember Dooku's only pretending to try and win. It's all about giving Sidious a lock on power by scaring the fuck out of the Republic and killing as many Jedi as possible. Grievous's masters intend for him to die sooner or later.

[Pint0 Xtreme]

Heh. I have to say that the childish lines of the battle droids do not bother me very much at all. I think there's something sadistic and dark with having comical characters unleash suffering and death upon the Republic troops. I think this is why I didn't find the droids in ROTS to be all that bothersome. The first goofy droid lines were the vulture droids on the Invisible Hand before they took off to meet the oncoming fighters. And the subsequent scenes then included Republic fighter pilots screaming and dying.

[VT-16]

If the LEGO tie-in set is correct, there's gonna be an episode featuring a CIS Hyena droid bomber. If you think the B1's are awkward, get ready for annoying laughs, I guess?

I do like how some droids seem smarter than others, like the guy who warned his buddies not to fire on the Jedi when they have their lightsabres on.

[Braedley]

I do like how some droids seem smarter than others, like the guy who warned his buddies not to fire on the Jedi when they have their lightsabres on.

That's probably a result of not having their memories wiped often enough. There are definite advantages to remembering what happens when you try shooting at a Jedi, though.

[charlemagne]

That's probably a result of not having their memories wiped often enough. There are definite advantages to remembering what happens when you try shooting at a Jedi, though.

Although you could also think that they'd directly program stuff like "don't try to blast a Jedi facing you with an ignited lightsaber" into them.

[Darksider]

Meh, B-1s are cheap pieces of crap designed to overwhelm the enemy with vast numerical superiority. I doubt their initial programming is very intricate, but the way I see it is that most droid types aren't built sentient, but if they go long enough without a memory wipe, they can become sentient, like Artoo and Threepio.

That droid was probably the closest thing the confederacy has to a veteran, same with the droids on the Invisible Hand who were cheering on the Magnaguards, since it makes sense for grevious to crew his flagship with Veterans

[Connor MacLeod]

Ion cannon shots are much more concentrated and as a rule for large guns (like planetary defence ion cannons) have considerable energy in them. In the Rogue Squadron case, the ion bolt hit the Xwing accidentally and its actual target was an ISD, so its no wonder that the concentrated bolt obliterated the fighter.

The Malevoelence's Ring Of Doom, however, is an "area effect disable the fuck out of everything" attack and probably a weird projectile weapon of some kind Its designed to hit large areas on a target (more like an explosion in this regard) and that means that surface area will play a role in how much energy is delivered. IoW a small profile target like a Y-wing won't neccesarily absorb as much of the overall energy as a much larger ship (Venator)

On top of that, there's also the issue of settings. We know weapons including ion cannons have variable settings, and its likely the Malevolence can have "low power" and "high power" dischrages as well as altering the size/diameter of the ion ring (The latter can also be relevant since it would affect the intensity of the weapon - covering a larger area will mean spreading the energy over a larger area also, May not make much diff for large ships but could for smaller ones. A larger ring would also be harder to evade)

One may wonder why Grievous didnt use a higher output setting, but there are a number of considerations . First of course is that he considered the Y-wings a minor threat - he was concentrated on the medical facility. Firing a higher power burst may require power drawn from elsewhere, or a longer recharge time. There may also be cooling/aiming issues associated with a higher power burst (more recoil, more waste heat generated, which may slow down rate of fire.)

[Coalition]

The Malevoelence's Ring Of Doom, however, is an "area effect disable the fuck out of everything" attack and probably a weird projectile weapon of some kind Its designed to hit large areas on a target (more like an explosion in this regard) and that means that surface area will play a role in how much energy is delivered. IoW a small profile target like a Y-wing won't neccesarily absorb as much of the overall energy as a much larger ship (Venator)

Wouldn't a smaller target be affected more if that was true? I.e. two ships, one ten times longer, wider, and taller thanthe other. The first gets hit with 1 unit of energy from the blast wave. The second ship gets hit by 100 times as much energy, but has 1000 times the volume, meaning it overall takes less effect.

But if the ion weapon only needs to disable surface equipment (sensors, weapons, engine controls, etc), then size wouldn't matter. A sphere would be the optimum design when fighting that, but poor when fighting everything else.

[seanrobertson]

He's doing his job. Being scary, committing atrocities, and losing the war. Remember Dooku's only pretending to try and win. It's all about giving Sidious a lock on power by scaring the fuck out of the Republic and killing as many Jedi as possible. Grievous's masters intend for him to die sooner or later.

Good point.

[seanrobertson]

Also, the Ship is indeed massive. It's big enough to have it's own subway system. I wouldn't be surprised if it was within the 10-14 kilometer range.

Definitely massive, but see my post earlier in the thread. It might reach 10 km in length, but is certainly less than 14 km long.

[Azron_Stoma]

I'm more concerned about the Y-wings being able to do so much damage despite the shields presumably being up, torpedoes don't bypass shields like Empire at War suggests do they? and the torps can't be anywhere near strong enough to get through said shields.

nearest thing I can figure was that, in the "high powered shot" power is drawn from the shields to the point where even sections of the shield is shut down, the area behind the ion canon, maybe under the concept that it would be out of the line of fire (blocked by the ion canon itself) or that it's part of how the shield opens up to allow the shot to be fired.

also explains further why they switched targets from the bridge, the shielding on the bridge would quite simply be too strong for half a squadron to take out, even with power drawn to the Ion cannon and they were running out of time.

problem with using the WW2 shpeal about bombers vs capital ships is obvious, we all know that after WW2 large capships (except for carriers) fell out of favour, so why would they keep making huge cap ships (especially since ISDs are less carrier oriented than Venators) if bombers can take em out?

maybe clone war ships did have a vulnerability against bombers, which would explain the heavy use of carriers while galactic civil war era ships did not.

[VT-16]

Why would the shields be up when it's firing?