StarDestroyer.Net BBS

Going through GG5:ROTJ, I came across a small story detailing an event during the Battle of Endor, Gambler's Run.

As the Millennium Falcon chases down two retreating TIE interceptors in the middle of the fighting, it runs into a Super Star Destroyer that appears to be different from the Executor (the latter is named in the book and this one isn't).

The vessel is described as having a main hangar bay that the Falcon flies straight up into, to escape laser cannons and tractor beams that are attempting to hit the ship. Now, from what I've seen, the Executor does have a "cavernous" hangar bay area like this one, but I thought that only had hangar bay openings located horizontally relative to the ship's axis. The Falcon enters the main hangar bay on this ship, vertically.

As they enter, the lasers stop shooting, naturally, but Lando figures it won't be long before the Imperials send a "geyser of TIE fighters" to destroy the Falcon, inside the SSD!

Throughout the action, the Falcon keeps moving through the ship, passing down a "tight access corridor running through the ship's myriad hangar bays". It then goes through one opening, into some kind of staging area, then another opening, but it scratches against a repair gantry first. Lando comments "There's that scratch I promised Han I wouldn't leave", so this obviously takes place before the DS II run.

Now, Lando's having fun joyriding inside this thing, but he's worried about getting out before the TIEs come to "smoke them out". Problem is getting past the SSD's batteries, but he decides to finally fire upon everything he sees inside the vessel (he hadn't before due to fear of getting trapped) while they turn around and fly out the way they came and create a huge fireball that obscures the Falcon. This works, and in seconds they're out of range of the ship's lower batteries.

I can't remember anything similar happening to the Executor, so it must be another ship. Thoughts?

Man, I remember that story: it was reprinted in The Movie Trilogy Sourcebook, which we own.

Let me go read it again and I'll get back to you later.

Since we only see such a huge ship in the form of the Ex in the movie, and the Falcon is described as chasing retreating TIEs, might this vessel have been a more dedicated fleet carrier forming up a rear guard behind the main Imperial fleet?

The main ventral cavity of an Executor is not sheltered enough to prevent vertical entry (link). Dr Saxton, by the way, simply assumes the incident occurred within the actual Executor:

[url=http://theforce.net/SWTC/ssd.html#hangar]here[/url]. Dr Saxton wrote:In Galaxy Guide 5: Return of the Jedi there is a description of an incident involving the Executor's docking facilities and the Millennium Falcon. At one point in the Battle of Endor, Calrissian found himself too close to the underside of the Imperial command ship. He briefly took cover in the main ventral cavity, flew into a hangar of some kind and through internal staging areas. The freighter made a hasty exit after firing on its surroundings to create a diversionary fireball. Unfortunately this account does not specify the exact location of Calrissian's hangar apertures.

Don't we usually complain about the Executor being undermanned with fighters compared to its potential available volume? What if this is the case and it isn't geared towards holding that many fighters, which in turn leads to this story being about another ship that is?

I guess my problem with it, is that it sounds like the Falcon was speeding through the vessel in one direction, so much that it would have run into the wall blocking off one of the engine areas behind the hangars if it was the Ex. Wish there was an actual cross-section of it now. :/

Just a random thought that might be of little relevance, and probably lower canonicty.. in Rebel Assault 2, the player flies a stolen TIE prototype through the hangar bays, service tunnels and superstructure of what is almost certainly an Executor-class ship.

Of course, this being Rebel Assault, the player chances upon the main reactor chamber during his escape, fires upon it and seriously damages it before conveniently finding an exit from the ship.. with the capship blossoming into a beautiful fireball shortly after the protagonists' dramatic escape. Heh.

The Terror?

Still weird that the story never once calls it the Executor, when the rest of the book does. It's just a Super Star Destroyer that Lando and Co. just happen to run into.