Where are the missile ships?

[lPeregrine]

lPeregrine have you even looked at how a PD system works, the idea is put up a wall of something to prevent a missle from getting through to your ship (since in SW fighters are not really threatening to cap ships).
If you look at any modern destroyer and you will see they have a PD system for eliminating missles and fighters by firing at 3000 rpm, now it stands to reason that SW would have a PD system on cap ships, like an ISD, which can eliminate missles designed to hurt them.

Apparently you haven't looked at how they work, because you don't get that "point defense system" is not the same thing as "no missiles will hit". No matter how good your point defense is, fire enough missiles at it an it'll be overloaded.

I'm not disputing the idea that point defense systems exist. Just the idea that they exist, but every time we see missiles hit a ship, it's because the crew hasn't bothered to turn it on.

You've also convienently forgoten that in the battle with the Lusankya the Rogues also had a ISD and a Alderanian War Cruiser which call me crazy constitutes Capital Ship support.

Which changes things how? The ship went from shields holding to front shields down and heavy damage in one salvo. The hull damage alone is proof that missiles are effective when they hit.

WOTC states that the VSD's 80 concussion missiles are its PRIMARY weapons. Furthermore, they're "assault concussion missiles" designed primarily for planetary bombardment, and aren't used very often in ship-to-ship combat. These missiles were such a pain in the ass to use that they were completely removed from the VSD II, which relies on more traditional turbolaser weaponry.

Whatever the rpg stats might call them, the VSD still mounts the 80 missiles, lots of turbolasers, a hangar, etc. And if as you say, they aren't used very often, that makes them the secondary weapons. The ship has enough other weapons that it's effective in a battle even without using the missiles.

The VSD that brought down Home One's shields was probably lucky to even hit the ship, and probably blew its entire load in doing so.

Have you even looked at the relative sizes of those two ships? A VSD is 900m, vs. Home One at over 3,000m. If a ship that much smaller can do that much damage, that alone shows that missiles are far from useless.

[Cykeisme]

What are the stated yields of the various common types of missiles in Star Wars, compared with the yield of a heavy turbolaser?

Btw, SoD aside, the X-Wing novels (and the sim games, before those) are known for "wanking" the capabilities of starfighters to a significant degree.

[Perseid]

You've also convienently forgoten that in the battle with the Lusankya the Rogues also had a ISD and a Alderanian War Cruiser which call me crazy constitutes Capital Ship support.

Which changes things how? The ship went from shields holding to front shields down and heavy damage in one salvo. The hull damage alone is proof that missiles are effective when they hit.

Yes in a book that wanks a starfighters capabilities it takes a War Cruiser shooting the Lusankya's engines, an ISD bombarding it with TL fire, and something like 80 frieghters and a little over a dozen fighters lauching missles to bring down one section of the shields (the missles would number something in the region of 200) on a poorly fought, crewed and maintained SSD.

Yet in another book of that series (one of the Wraith squadron books) it takes the combined firepower of 24 squadrons of starfighters in a line to make the shields on the Iron Fist flicker for a few seconds, IIRC, (no major hull damage despite warheads punching through) and that was with 576 warheads hitting the same area.
Not exactly an ideal solution for taking out cap ships if you ask me.

Mr CorSec wrote:
lPeregrine have you even looked at how a PD system works, the idea is put up a wall of something to prevent a missle from getting through to your ship (since in SW fighters are not really threatening to cap ships).
If you look at any modern destroyer and you will see they have a PD system for eliminating missles and fighters by firing at 3000 rpm, now it stands to reason that SW would have a PD system on cap ships, like an ISD, which can eliminate missles designed to hurt them.


Apparently you haven't looked at how they work, because you don't get that "point defense system" is not the same thing as "no missiles will hit". No matter how good your point defense is, fire enough missiles at it an it'll be overloaded.

Yes a PD system can be overloaded, however to do so is extremely difficult given on our current ships (going by what i've had to study myself for an abortive attempt at officer training with RN) the radar system tracks several dozen targets at once (can't remember exact number) but the defences on RN destroyers are good enough that 2 phallanx (PD) guns are deemed enough to defend the ship and it's area within a carrier group. Other defences are of course in place for anti-air etc. but for PD one phallanx on each side of the ship is enough.
Try firing anti-ship missiles through a wall of lead, your missiles won't get through. Properly fought SW ships would use the same principle.

I'm not disputing the idea that point defense systems exist. Just the idea that they exist, but every time we see missiles hit a ship, it's because the crew hasn't bothered to turn it on.

Of course they never bothered to turn them on in a space battle, none of the rebel cap ships use missiles so PD guns are no good in a slugging match and just take up power, and rebel fighters are dogfighting with your own fighters so they can't get off shots, and you don't want to fire a PD gun with a TIE nearby since there wouldn't be much left.

If they'd turned on the PD guns when Lusankya faced off against the Rogues it would have been over in 5 minutes, and so no epic end to the story, no "We're Rogue Squadron, cap ships can't hurt us", so the writers simply forget that a warship like that would have PD guns, and therefore allow the Rogues to have their character shields working at full power (i.e no PD guns work).

[lPeregrine]

What are the stated yields of the various common types of missiles in Star Wars, compared with the yield of a heavy turbolaser?

I don't remember ever seeing an exact number, but they are definitely on the same scale (at least for larger capital-scale missiles), if not more effective (a VSD taking down Home One's shields in one salvo suggests better power/size ratio than turbolasers).

Yes in a book that wanks a starfighters capabilities it takes a War Cruiser shooting the Lusankya's engines, an ISD bombarding it with TL fire, and something like 80 frieghters and a little over a dozen fighters lauching missles to bring down one section of the shields (the missles would number something in the region of 200) on a poorly fought, crewed and maintained SSD.

Actually, now that I've re-read it, the torpedo hits happen very early in the battle, before any of the other capital ships are described as firing on the SSD. While it's not unreasonable to think they got in a few shots, they weren't a significant contribution to the battle yet.

Yet in another book of that series (one of the Wraith squadron books) it takes the combined firepower of 24 squadrons of starfighters in a line to make the shields on the Iron Fist flicker for a few seconds, IIRC, (no major hull damage despite warheads punching through) and that was with 576 warheads hitting the same area.
Not exactly an ideal solution for taking out cap ships if you ask me.

And I never said it was. Fortunately the discussion is about capital-scale missiles, which have demonstrated the ability to kill capital ships. Starfighters are relevant only barely, because they establish a lower limit for what a hypothetical missile-ship could do.

Yes a PD system can be overloaded, however to do so is extremely difficult given on our current ships (going by what i've had to study myself for an abortive attempt at officer training with RN) the radar system tracks several dozen targets at once (can't remember exact number) but the defences on RN destroyers are good enough that 2 phallanx (PD) guns are deemed enough to defend the ship and it's area within a carrier group. Other defences are of course in place for anti-air etc. but for PD one phallanx on each side of the ship is enough.
Try firing anti-ship missiles through a wall of lead, your missiles won't get through. Properly fought SW ships would use the same principle.

How many targets can it fire on at once? How much ammunition does it carry?

And a "wall of lead" sounds nice in theory, but isn't as easy to produce as you make it sound. Putting up a dense enough wall, at a long enough range from the defending ship, is going to take a huge amount of ammunition. Those point defense guns aren't going to be firing for very long if they don't use a bit better aim. Especially since Star Wars missiles are often shielded against debris impacts, so even if your wall hits it, it might not be enough to stop it.

Of course they never bothered to turn them on in a space battle, none of the rebel cap ships use missiles so PD guns are no good in a slugging match and just take up power, and rebel fighters are dogfighting with your own fighters so they can't get off shots, and you don't want to fire a PD gun with a TIE nearby since there wouldn't be much left.

No, why bother powering up the point defense guns and having them ready for when/if the fighters finish their dogfights, so they can immediately fire instead of scrambling to activate them as the torpedoes are closing. Not only that, but as shown by all 12 fighters launching their missiles, they'd already broken off the dogfighting and started torpedo runs.

And of course we see just as little mention of them after the first salvo, when even the most incompetent crew would've activated them. The only reasonable conclusion is they were active, but just not mentioned directly.

If they'd turned on the PD guns when Lusankya faced off against the Rogues it would have been over in 5 minutes, and so no epic end to the story, no "We're Rogue Squadron, cap ships can't hurt us", so the writers simply forget that a warship like that would have PD guns, and therefore allow the Rogues to have their character shields working at full power (i.e no PD guns work).

And this violates suspension of disbelief, and is not a valid argument.

[The Jazz Intern]

Uh, why not use a missle boat? from what I remember on Starwars: x-wing allience,

load able{ 80 concussion missles, 60 proton torpedos, 40-50 space bombs (capital missles)

then, always in, 40 conncusion missles.
and the missle boat can maneuver in close enough that turbolasers will have a short time to intercept the missles before they hit.
hmmm.... looks like they already fixed your idea, Iperegrin.

[Ghost Rider]

Uh, why not use a missle boat? from what I remember on Starwars: x-wing allience,

load able{ 80 concussion missles, 60 proton torpedos, 40-50 space bombs (capital missles)

then, always in, 40 conncusion missles.
and the missle boat can maneuver in close enough that turbolasers will have a short time to intercept the missles before they hit.
hmmm.... looks like they already fixed your idea, Iperegrin.

You did read about what they are talking about and the fact that game mechanics do not count?

The missle boat is still a dumb idea, because it can be shot down....by starfighters. Sorta puts a damper on using it as some catch all.

As for power levels, Peregrine still has yet to prove one thing.

That it exceeds Turbolaser capability in any useful capacity. Just because a load a VSD knocked down Home One shields proves nothing. What time frame, and what capability was Home One's shields. Just blithering it means absolutely nothing.

[lPeregrine]

As for power levels, Peregrine still has yet to prove one thing.

That it exceeds Turbolaser capability in any useful capacity. Just because a load a VSD knocked down Home One shields proves nothing. What time frame, and what capability was Home One's shields. Just blithering it means absolutely nothing.

I don't know, since I wasn't the one who posted that incident and I don't know where it came from. The way it was posted sounded like it was 100% to 0% in one salvo of 80 missiles, but I can't be sure.

Of course we do have the incident involving a similar amount of missiles knocking down a barely (if at all) touched SSD's forward shields. Unless the Lusankya was so badly maintained and poorly crewed that its shield strength was less than an ISD a tiny fraction of its size, missiles have a useful amount of firepower.

And then there's various times where a VSD's missiles are shown damaging capital ships. I don't think any of those involved the VSD fighting without allies, but the effects described aren't that different from turbolaser hits.

Missiles may or may not have as much firepower as the equivalent turbolasers, but they're at least comparable, and definitely powerful enough to hurt a capital ship if they hit.

[Perseid]

Yes in a book that wanks a starfighters capabilities it takes a War Cruiser shooting the Lusankya's engines, an ISD bombarding it with TL fire, and something like 80 frieghters and a little over a dozen fighters lauching missles to bring down one section of the shields (the missles would number something in the region of 200) on a poorly fought, crewed and maintained SSD.

Actually, now that I've re-read it, the torpedo hits happen very early in the battle, before any of the other capital ships are described as firing on the SSD. While it's not unreasonable to think they got in a few shots, they weren't a significant contribution to the battle yet.

Just re-read that specific chapter in Bacta War now myself, the Freedom is described as moving into a position so that her port gunners can fire down on the Lusankya with the Lusankya performing a roll to present more of it's Ion cannons to the Freedom, this is while the X-Wings are dogfighting with the Thyferrians. So it's reasonable to assume the Freedom got off a few volleys before the X-Wings make their attack runs.

I don't recall Home One having her shields taken down by a VSD, however there is this statment in Isard' Revenge;

The Victory-class Stardestroyer, Emperor's Wisdom, had eighty concussion missle launch tubes on it. Any single salvo could bring down the Mon Cal cruiser's shields, leaving it open for raking fire from the ship's energy weapons.

Fortunately the discussion is about capital-scale missiles, which have demonstrated the ability to kill capital ships.

The only time I can recall a capital ship killing another capital ship with missiles is in Spectre of the Past. It is after Pelleaon has sent a message to Bel Iblis so that they can start peace talks to end the war.
Whilst waiting the Chimera is attacked by a Kaloth class battlecruiser and a couple of Corvettes, IIRC. During the battle Pelleaon uses a modified version of the A-Wing slash to destroy the Kaloth. He orders his Preybird fighters to fly in formation towards the battlecruiser and then orders a 2 by 5 spread of Torpedos to be fired along the same vector, which is enough to destroy the battlecruiser.

However this is against an old battlecruiser, which is no where near the level of a ISD, which is maintained by a pirate gang, well funded but still pirates. And to get the torpedos through Pelleaon had to hide them behind snub-fighters so the PD guns wouldn't pick them up and destroy them. Also this engagement was at TL range rather than at stand-off missile barrage distances.

[lPeregrine]

Just re-read that specific chapter in Bacta War now myself, the Freedom is described as moving into a position so that her port gunners can fire down on the Lusankya with the Lusankya performing a roll to present more of it's Ion cannons to the Freedom, this is while the X-Wings are dogfighting with the Thyferrians. So it's reasonable to assume the Freedom got off a few volleys before the X-Wings make their attack runs.

A few shots, maybe, but we see no mention of the Freedom actually firing until the shields are already down. And more importantly, we see no mention of damage. No "sir, shields down to 10%" comments, or anything like that. Whatever the capital ships had done up to that point was too low to be significant.

The Victory-class Stardestroyer, Emperor's Wisdom, had eighty concussion missle launch tubes on it. Any single salvo could bring down the Mon Cal cruiser's shields, leaving it open for raking fire from the ship's energy weapons.

Which proves two things:

1) A 900m half-obsolete VSD can take down the shields of a 3600m flagship, if its missiles hit. So capital-scale missiles can definitely have enough firepower to be useful.

2) Those 80 missiles are likely to hit in useful amounts. Bringing down the shields is stated as a realistic possibility, not "any single salvo could bring down the shields... but it wouldn't ever hit because the point defense guns would stop all the missiles."

Fortunately the discussion is about capital-scale missiles, which have demonstrated the ability to kill capital ships.

The only time I can recall a capital ship killing another capital ship with missiles is in Spectre of the Past. It is after Pelleaon has sent a message to Bel Iblis so that they can start peace talks to end the war.
Whilst waiting the Chimera is attacked by a Kaloth class battlecruiser and a couple of Corvettes, IIRC. During the battle Pelleaon uses a modified version of the A-Wing slash to destroy the Kaloth. He orders his Preybird fighters to fly in formation towards the battlecruiser and then orders a 2 by 5 spread of Torpedos to be fired along the same vector, which is enough to destroy the battlecruiser.

An actual kill isn't necessary to prove their effectiveness. We have enough incidents with missiles doing significant damage (blowing turbolaser batteries off the hull, cutting through hull armor, etc), so the fact that the kill shot hasn't been delivered by un-supported missile fire isn't a problem.