Star "Dreadnaught" vs. Star "Destroyer"?

[Stofsk]

FWIW, 'Dreadnought' was originally a RN battleship with few, large-calibre guns, compared with its contemporaries, hence Hurgans dictionary quote above. 'Dreadnaught' is an older, pre-Clone Wars Republic warship, smaller than, IIRC, Star Destroyers and Cruisers, Frigates, etc.

Isn't it called a 'Dreadnaught-class Star Frigate'? I got that from somewhere, not sure where...

[Knife]

FWIW, 'Dreadnought' was originally a RN battleship with few, large-calibre guns, compared with its contemporaries, hence Hurgans dictionary quote above. 'Dreadnaught' is an older, pre-Clone Wars Republic warship, smaller than, IIRC, Star Destroyers and Cruisers, Frigates, etc.

Isn't it called a 'Dreadnaught-class Star Frigate'? I got that from somewhere, not sure where...

EGVV say's its a 'Dreadnaught Heavy Cruiser'. At 600m in length.

[Trytostaydead]

I forget where I read this, but I heard dreadnaughts were actually a pretty inferior ship for its size and supposed capabilities. with plenty of design flaws.

[Firefox]

HMS Dreadnought of 1906 (the one for which gave its name to the type of warship) didn't have any flaws that I'm aware of. Her armor was comparable to other capital ships of the day (superior in some cases, but inferior to the HMS King Edward VII, completed in 1905, in terms of turret/barbette armor). Hell, Dreadnought was *better* than all previous warships, utilizing steam turbine propulsion instead of reciprocating engines, allowing greater speed and reduced vibration.

[Aaron]

HMS Dreadnought of 1906 (the one for which gave its name to the type of warship) didn't have any flaws that I'm aware of. Her armor was comparable to other capital ships of the day (superior in some cases, but inferior to the HMS King Edward VII, completed in 1905, in terms of turret/barbette armor). Hell, Dreadnought was *better* than all previous warships, utilizing steam turbine propulsion instead of reciprocating engines, allowing greater speed and reduced vibration.

In addition her large battery of main guns allowed her to bring more firepower onto an enemy. Although two of the turrets were oddly placed of the sides of the ship.

[Firefox]

Apparently, that was done because of concerns that superimposing the turrets (as was done in subsequent capships) would make life hell for the gun crews operating in the lower turrets, with the one overhead firing its battery. Of course, this didn't turn out to be the case, especially considering they rarely fired in such a condition.

I'd say that's the only real flaw in Dreadnought's design, since she couldn't bring her full armament to bear in any situation, including full broadside.

[Trytostaydead]

HMS Dreadnought of 1906 (the one for which gave its name to the type of warship) didn't have any flaws that I'm aware of. Her armor was comparable to other capital ships of the day (superior in some cases, but inferior to the HMS King Edward VII, completed in 1905, in terms of turret/barbette armor). Hell, Dreadnought was *better* than all previous warships, utilizing steam turbine propulsion instead of reciprocating engines, allowing greater speed and reduced vibration.

I was talking about SW dreadnAughts.

[Firefox]

Ahah. Didn't see the distinction made. Apologies.

[Trytostaydead]

Ahah. Didn't see the distinction made. Apologies.

And yeah, the Dreadnought did help in part to usher in WWI by essentially restarting the arms race between the BE and Germany by almost nullifying every other ship out there. Before the Dreadnought, the Germans had almost zero chance to keep up with the British in terms of naval fleets, but with the introduction of the Dreadnought as the premiere fighting ship it gave them quite an opportunity.

[Knife]

I forget where I read this, but I heard dreadnaughts were actually a pretty inferior ship for its size and supposed capabilities. with plenty of design flaws.

I was talking about SW dreadnAughts.

I don't see why? From the EGVV again;

The standard Dreadnaught in the Imperial Navy was not significantly different from the original ship the Old Republic had used. The ship maintained ten turbolaser cannons, twenty quad turbolaser cannons, and ten turbolaser batteries.

So depending on how you view it, she has atleast 30 emplacements of various sizes and either those put into 10 batteries or an additional 10 batteries ontop of all that.

She's less than half the size of a SD and just about half the weapon's emplacements *granted she doens't have the heavies*.

On speed, in sublight the EGVV mentions that she's just slower than a Victory and she has a Class II hyperdrive.

Physically, about one third of the ship is the big ass engine block, she looks sturdy enough *no weak neck or anything* and genreally has nice lines.

[Imperator Galacticus]

I forget where I read this, but I heard dreadnaughts were actually a pretty inferior ship for its size and supposed capabilities. with plenty of design flaws.

You probably heard it from the Imperial Sourcebook. It started its service record even before the Clone Wars and was originally planned to be phased out by the Empire. Its vices included things like slow speeds, weak shielding, low firepower, and well...just about everything, really. The only reason it was spared was because the Empire found it more cost-effective to refit the ships instead of building totally new ones.

[Stark]

ISDs were probably the largest ships the Imperial Fleet used for independed operations: its likely you wouldn't see anything larger appear in orbit over your average planet unless there was a major fleet battle in the offing. I agree that they were probably designed to be true DDs, but ended up 'showing the flag' all over the place.

Irritatingly (since Venators are apparently SMALLER than ISDs) I would have assumed after the Civil War ships would have decreased in size, since the GE has no real enemies that can field large ships. There's no REASON to have SDNs like Executor or Eclipse, since there's no powerful, organised opposition. In this situation, since even the Mon Cal couldn't build many ships larger than ISDs, ISDs would be all that was required to enforce rule. If you follow me.

[SCVN 2812]

Irritatingly (since Venators are apparently SMALLER than ISDs) I would have assumed after the Civil War ships would have decreased in size, since the GE has no real enemies that can field large ships. There's no REASON to have SDNs like Executor or Eclipse, since there's no powerful, organised opposition. In this situation, since even the Mon Cal couldn't build many ships larger than ISDs, ISDs would be all that was required to enforce rule. If you follow me.

The only problem is that the Empire itself is its own enemy. However long it takes to get over the hero worship of Palpatine following his leadership of the Republic to victory over the Separatists in the civil war and start chafing under the harsher and less democratic governing, it is bound to happen and the Empire needs the ability to overwhelm rebelling worlds quickly. In a galaxy where guerilla fighters can get ahold of weapons capable of disabling an ISDII in 2 shots and the means to power them, you need big ships and a lot of them. What would a rich and affluent planet like Corellia be able to field? Enough firepower to necessitate the existance of an order of battle beginning rather than ending with the ISD in case such a world would choose to go rogue.

Extreme wealth can go a long way, the major powers of the Seperatists were organizations like the Intergalactic Banking Clan and The Trade Federation, these powers in spite of a massive disadvantage in territory size, were able to fight the rest of the galaxy for what? 3 years or more before finally being done in.

With 25,000 ISDs, each ISD would be responsible for oppressing I mean policing an area 600 light years across in a galaxy of 100,000 light years if I remember the math right. Scaling upwards, if a mass of Executors equal to the ISDs were built, there would be 1 Executor covering 6000 lightyears. The ability to utterly overwhelm the defenses of even the richest and most powerful systems is the only way the Empire would survive as its rule starts to get more Sith Lordian with the passing of the years.

[Aaron]

It's also possible that the Emperor had forseen the coming of the Vong, and part of the massive fleet was in preperation.

I haven't read the EU beyond the Zahn trilogy so I could be way off base.

[Vympel]

Extreme wealth can go a long way, the major powers of the Seperatists were organizations like the Intergalactic Banking Clan and The Trade Federation, these powers in spite of a massive disadvantage in territory size, were able to fight the rest of the galaxy for what? 3 years or more before finally being done in.

It's important to note that part of the reason they lasted so long was almost certainly because Darth Sidious was playing the GR against the CIS so that he could achieve his objectives, namely (in no particular order)

1. The corruption of Anakin Skywalker to replace Count Dooku (Dooku had greater power and wisdom, Anakin obviously is a lot less wise but with the potential to be very powerful, and more easily manipulated). Using Anakin's feats in the Clone War, including his deeds in Episode 3 (no spoilers) to massage his ego and put him in the proper position etc.

2. The culling of the skilled Jedi ranks by their acting as "Generals" in the Clone Wars, and also possibly using them as a scape goat for the Clone War in its entirety to justify his later hunting down and destruction of them.

3. The accumulation of sufficient political power in a time of galactic crisis to entrench himself in his position permanently.

All of these meant a short victorious war was out of the question.

[Illuminatus Primus]

I've always thought that the term destroyer was used as a name as opposed to class designation. A stardestroyer like a sun crusher.

That changed with Saxton assisted with the most recent EU manual. The ISD is now considered a destroyer. This means that aproximately 99% of the Imperial fleet is made up of Frigates or smaller.

Why should that be alarming in a state where there are no foriegn powers, only internal factions?

[Alyeska]

I've always thought that the term destroyer was used as a name as opposed to class designation. A stardestroyer like a sun crusher.

That changed with Saxton assisted with the most recent EU manual. The ISD is now considered a destroyer. This means that aproximately 99% of the Imperial fleet is made up of Frigates or smaller.

Why should that be alarming in a state where there are no foriegn powers, only internal factions?

Never said it was.

[VT-16]

Since we see a more traditional destroyer in ROTJ (the bulbless, hangarless one), is this type of ship included in the "25 000 destroyers" statement, or is it just for Imperial Mk. I and II's? And what of other destroyer-classes in the EU (Allegiance, Harrow etc.)?

[Vympel]

The quote is 25,000 Star Destroyers. This may well include Venator-class, Victory-class, Imperator/Imperator Mk II class, the "hangarless" ship in ROTJ, and the "Communications Ship" in ROTJ- if the "hangarless" and "Communications Ship" are not, in fact, the same ship.

[VT-16]

I doubt they are, the bridge made for the Comm ship is too big to belong to a standard 1.6 km destroyer (See Technical Commentaries).

Thanks for the clarification on the numbers, that does put alot of classes under one umbrella.

[Gorefiend]

I personally always assumed that Star Destroyer was just the name of the design lineage, because it sounds really scary and menacing. ;P Hmm…. I’ll get out my favourite in sw quote about star ship naming and classing anyway.

http://people.freenet.de/swrs/ships.jpg
(form WEG Rebel Alliance Sourcebook)

It then goes on classing the ships into star fighters, patrol crafts/ fast attack vessels, corvettes, frigates and cruisers. And the official star wars site also calls star destroyers cruisers.

Marauders have also been called anything from corvettes offer frigates to cruisers and carracks have been called cruisers or gun ships etc.

There really does not seem to be a fixed pattern to star wars ship classing

The quote is 25,000 Star Destroyers. This may well include Venator-class, Victory-class, Imperator/Imperator Mk II class, the "hangarless" ship in ROTJ, and the "Communications Ship" in ROTJ- if the "hangarless" and "Communications Ship" are not, in fact, the same ship.

hmm.... from the WEG role-playing sourcebook I always assumed they were talking about "imperial" star destroyers.

[VT-16]

"imperial" star destroyers.

Sigh, every destroyer in the Empire is an Imperial Star Destroyer. Which is why using that instead of Imperator as a class-name is silly. The Imperial-class Star Destroyer is more a mix of carrier, cruiser and destroyer, filling different roles.

And there´s a difference between Cruiser and Star Cruiser. They are on different scales, so to speak. Even among different forces, different scales are used, like a Mon Cal Star Cruiser being much much smaller than an Imperial Star Cruiser.

[Gorefiend]

imperator is even worse a name ^^" just for the sound of it
hmm... in the rasb they place everthing under cruiser from carrack to super star destroyer. i still think their is no fixed classing system and they just go of calling there ships what they wan't to, or the author of the sources want's to

[Alyeska]

"imperial" star destroyers.

Sigh, every destroyer in the Empire is an Imperial Star Destroyer. Which is why using that instead of Imperator as a class-name is silly. The Imperial-class Star Destroyer is more a mix of carrier, cruiser and destroyer, filling different roles.

You are making a nitpick of the extreme. When people say Imperial Star Destroyer, the meaning is clear and you know that.

[VT-16]

imperator is even worse a name ^^" just for the sound of it
hmm...

I actually like Imperator, it reminds me of the Roman Empire, just like Preator.

i still think their is no fixed classing system and they just go of calling there ships what they wan't to, or the author of the sources want's to

That´s the thing, it´s the authors who often don´t know what they are writing about who causes problems like this.

There is a more solid effort in the newer publications (read, those who don´t just copy WEG material) to refer to more proper classes, ie. mentioning Procurator-class Star Cruisers, Preator-class Star Battlecruisers, Mandator- and Executor-class Star Dreadnoughts.

Most of the ships from WEG sources could be classified as Frigates or Cruisers (note no Star prefix).

You are making a nitpick of the extreme. When people say Imperial Star Destroyer, the meaning is clear and you know that.

Just as I know a Japanese Cruiser is really a Japanese-class Cruiser?

If it says Imperial Star Destroyer and nothing more, it could entail all the different Star Destroyer-classes in the Imperial Navy. And there´s plenty of them.