Star Wars Expanded Universe Space Battles

[Saxtonite]

The novel was pretty explicit in that there was little experience with that type of combat, though it also stated that the scale of the vessels was larger here than in previous attempts. Presumably the vessels in the Clone Wars were less advanced or merely less powerful than in the Battle of Endor. It is also likely that many of the vessels at Endor were better optimized for capital ship combat.

My best guess is Ackbar didnt get much info on how the battle of Coruscant was when he was Tarkin's slave (fighting against separatist holdouts was likely different than the second battle of coruscant). Also the novelization version of the Battle of Coruscant says a lot of those ships were battling each other from thousands of kilometers distance. Even if there were case of them being in point blank range like in the movie.

For example the general in charge of the Yavin 4 base (Dodonna it was spelled I think) was one of Obi-Wan's fleet commanders, while he's called "commander Dodonna" the phrasing suggest a position rather then rank since they refer to his flagship and a commander(rank) wouldn't be in charge of a fleet of Venators, hell a commander wouldn't in charge of a single Venator, suggesting he's captain or probably a low level flag-officer (commandore or similar) and he's not the only one.

Remember Dodonna was one of the commanders of the "Victory fleet" alongside Terrinald Screed when they chased and fought the Bulwark Fleet of Dua Ningo around 'Sector Zero' (Alsakan, Anaxes, Ixtlar, etc). And after the Clone Wars he was one of the imperial military leaders who conquered a lof of the Separatiat holdouts from 19-17 BBY.

so when the clone wars came it's quite possible that both sides were making up tactics on the go

It's odd that they didn't then do the "fight like the last war" thing before they adapted their tactics. Given there -are- holos and thousand year old battles don't exactly die, they're still there.

Since I haven't seen the Clone Wars stuff, I'll just comment on the close range ROTS fight. It's worth noting that the close quarters slugging match was forced on both sides as they were trapped under the planetary shields. So it wasn't a conscious choice but rather what circumstances dictated.

From what I remember, the Republic forced the Confederates under the shields - in order to keep Invisible Hand from escaping. The extra reinforcements arrived later.

Yep, he uses that at Coruscant to hammer a Golan-II. Bel Iblis recognizes the tactic but he isn't in time to warn the Republic commanders (Admiral Drayson IIRC).

It was a Golan III, to be nit-icky (they were said to be bewtter at taking damage in general)

Te catch is that for about two seconds the ship that's pulled out of hyperspace has no shields up and is unable to do anything due to the shocked of the transition.

I am assuming that wouldn't be the case in this situation as the imperials know they'll be dropped out of hyperspace quicker than normal and ships can have their shields on before dropping out (The Falcon after all rends to drop out of hyperspace with shields up, shoen by ANH novelization)

The New Republic uses a similar tactic as a contingency when they took Coruscant. They deploy an interdictor on the outskirts of the system with gravity wells on. Once the shields on Coruscant were knocked out, they shut down the grav wells to let the fleet through. Quite clever really.

Context for those unaware: It was so that if the shields on Coruscant did not fall, the New Republic fleet would not run straight into the shields - so the interdiction field would keep them in the outside of the system. Though that seems a bit...awkward to see such a large fleet there. I wonder if they'd just blockade the world otherwise wiht the shields up and easily force a surrender).