question about the opening of ANH

Kuciwalker · Post by **Kuciwalker** » 2006-12-11 04:14pm

Why did the Tantive IV even bother to fire on Vader's Star Destroyer? (Obviously it makes the movie scene much better, but apart from that.) It seems that a Corellian Corvette isn't going to do much of anything and it's best off just running as fast as it can.

Darth Servo · Post by **Darth Servo** » 2006-12-11 04:24pm

Yeah, I was thinking the same thing. Shooting back didn't exactly help their coverstory of being "a councilor ship".

Isolder74 · Post by **Isolder74** » 2006-12-11 04:47pm

Since they were already being shot at, I guess the issue is moot. They may have been shooting back on the chance they could hit and damage a gun enplacement or to try and blind the gunners with the best shots as them.

dworkin · Post by **dworkin** » 2006-12-11 04:52pm

Could be just hoping for a shot to knock out the sensor globe or something and then escape while the SD's still blind.

It's a pretty feeble hope but probably better than sitting in Fire Control and flipping the bird at the Devastator.

Bounty · Post by **Bounty** » 2006-12-11 04:55pm

Probably the same reason why they tried to fight back the boarding party despite their ship being clamped down.

Is the inside of an ISD's hangar shielded? If not, firing the guns would have stopped the ISD from tractoring in the ship (for fear of having her blast apart the hangar) thus buying a few more minutes...they weren't expecting reinforcements, were they?

Darth Garden Gnome · Post by **Darth Garden Gnome** » 2006-12-11 06:12pm

No, but Leia did need to get the plans out of there (both the part they transmitted and the physical copy inside R2). Presumably, escape was impossible and they were stalling for as much time as they could.

IceHawk-181 · Post by **IceHawk-181** » 2006-12-11 06:20pm

The Corellian Corvette can do no damage to the Imperial Star Destroyer, however maintaining a constant rate of fire would force the Devastator to do all the work. Any Shuttles or Transports launched to do an immediate boarding of the vessel would be shot down rather quickly.

Captain Antilees was stalling boarding for as long as possible I’d guess.

Big Orange · Post by **Big Orange** » 2006-12-11 06:29pm

Bounty wrote: Is the inside of an ISD's hangar shielded?

Perhaps not shielded but almost certainly armoured up, with the bulkheads and docking bay doors thickened up to withstand potential munitions explosions of incoming/outgoing ships (like TIE bombers, armed shuttles and gunboats). Either way the ISD's underbelly docking areas look like weak points, so they probably installed point-defence turbo laser emplacements, inner shielding and extra interior armour plating.

Aasharu · Post by **Aasharu** » 2006-12-11 08:48pm

Bounty wrote:Is the inside of an ISD's hangar shielded? If not, firing the guns would have stopped the ISD from tractoring in the ship (for fear of having her blast apart the hangar) thus buying a few more minutes...they weren't expecting reinforcements, were they?

THREEPIO: Did you hear that? They've shut down the main reactor. We'll be destroyed for sure. This is madness!

Wouldn't Tantive IV's guns have been powered by the main reactor? If that is the case, then they couldn't have shot into the hanger.

Big Orange · Post by **Big Orange** » 2006-12-11 08:56pm

Well they likely have shut down the ion engines, hyperdrive and exterior turbo lasers, but the enviroment support, interior lighting and deck gravity was still (mostly) operating.

Batman · Post by **Batman** » 2006-12-11 08:59pm

Aasharu wrote:
Bounty wrote:Is the inside of an ISD's hangar shielded? If not, firing the guns would have stopped the ISD from tractoring in the ship (for fear of having her blast apart the hangar) thus buying a few more minutes...they weren't expecting reinforcements, were they?

THREEPIO: Did you hear that? They've shut down the main reactor. We'll be destroyed for sure. This is madness!
Wouldn't Tantive IV's guns have been powered by the main reactor? If that is the case, then they couldn't have shot into the hangar.

As Tantive IV does indeed not fire a single shot after that comment that seems like a reasonable assumption.

Aasharu · Post by **Aasharu** » 2006-12-11 09:34pm

So, it's probably safe to assume that the Tantive IV's guns were not the self-powered turbolasers I keep hearing about.

Darth Servo · Post by **Darth Servo** » 2006-12-11 09:35pm

Aasharu wrote:Wouldn't Tantive IV's guns have been powered by the main reactor? If that is the case, then they couldn't have shot into the hanger.

Except we know that SW cap ship guns have independent backup power sources.

Darth Yoshi · Post by **Darth Yoshi** » 2006-12-11 10:08pm

Perhaps the Corvette doesn't have the same redundancy as a dedicated warship.

Kuciwalker · Post by **Kuciwalker** » 2006-12-11 11:26pm

Or even as a dedicated warship, perhaps it's just not big enough to really fit all that redundancy.

I always assumed the firing stopped because of the explosion.

Bounty · Post by **Bounty** » 2006-12-12 04:52am

Wouldn't Tantive IV's guns have been powered by the main reactor? If that is the case, then they couldn't have shot into the hanger.

Well, yes - that's what I figured. Antilles kept firing because as long as the Tantive was spitting out laser blasts it may not get tractored in. Once the main reactor shut down, the guns stopped (as did the engines, I presume) and the ship was pulled in.

I always assumed the firing stopped because of the explosion.

As did I. Either the backup energy systems didn't have enough power to do any real damage, or the gunnery crews were scrambled to the docking hatch to hold back the boarding party.

The Silence and I · Post by **The Silence and I** » 2006-12-13 02:17pm

I would have thought firing those weapons would only drain power that could otherwise have gone to the engines, for increased maneuverability and acceleration. Why the captain thought firing power hungry blanks (let's face it, unless the standard shield model is very inaccurate those shots were ineffective as blanks) would buy more time than running faster and more nimbly I don't know. Keeping in mind he can always fire his weapons once inside the hanger--firing before being tractored in has no effect on his ability to fire after being tractored in.

Mad · Post by **Mad** » 2006-12-13 03:45pm

The Silence and I wrote:I would have thought firing those weapons would only drain power that could otherwise have gone to the engines, for increased maneuverability and acceleration. Why the captain thought firing power hungry blanks (let's face it, unless the standard shield model is very inaccurate those shots were ineffective as blanks) would buy more time than running faster and more nimbly I don't know. Keeping in mind he can always fire his weapons once inside the hanger--firing before being tractored in has no effect on his ability to fire after being tractored in.

Perhaps the captain hoped that forcing the Devastator to keep its shields up would hamper it more than it would hamper the Tantive IV?

Also, individual shots can partially penetrate shielding under certain circumstances. As I recall, this occurred in I, Jedi, where a much smaller ship's weapons managed to cause minor bleedthrough damage to the surface of an ISD in its opening attacks. (The ISD responded by literally coring the other ship.) This being the case, any damage to weapons emplacements, tractor beams, or senors would make the Devastator's capture job more difficult, even if it's unlikely that even one weapon emplacement would be disabled.

LaCroix · Post by **LaCroix** » 2006-12-14 05:10am

Possible reasons:

1. We know that SW ships open "holes" in their shields to fire through.

A sustained suppression fire on a gun wuold have the chance of a lucky hit if the bolt hits the gun at the exact time of shooting. so, they might be hoping to damage guns.

2. Boarding ships cannot be used as long as they are shooting.

3. To tow the ship into a hangar, the ISD must open a large enough hole in its shields. Nothing you may want to do when the target ship is firing its barrels red-hot.

After destruction of the main reactor, fire ceased and the propulsion was at least heavily compromised. Thus, caption was possible.

I believe auxilliary reactors would be channeled into propulsion, to evade the inevitable, but there shouldn't be enough power for guns. Also, the hit might have damaged the powerlines to the gun settings.

The lifesupport and gravity wer still online, I believe those systems have an independent and highly redundant power supply. We have no evidence of lifesupport failures in other part of the ship, but the visible parts were still under gravity and pressurized. (at least for the time until capture).

Ritterin Sophia · Post by **Ritterin Sophia** » 2006-12-14 06:41am

LaCroix wrote:Possible reasons:

1. We know that SW ships open "holes" in their shields to fire through.

A sustained suppression fire on a gun wuold have the chance of a lucky hit if the bolt hits the gun at the exact time of shooting. so, they might be hoping to damage guns.

I thought they were only shielded to the outside, allowing fire to come through completely unphased when firing out....

LaCroix · Post by **LaCroix** » 2006-12-14 06:47am

General Schatten wrote:
I thought they were only shielded to the outside, allowing fire to come through completely unphased when firing out....

I was believing that they have a variable shield geometry, thus shooting through shields by opening a hole for a fraction of a second while the gun fires.

Mad · Post by **Mad** » 2006-12-14 09:40am

LaCroix wrote:I was believing that they have a variable shield geometry, thus shooting through shields by opening a hole for a fraction of a second while the gun fires.

I've seen sources that specifically mention that for projectile weapons like missiles, but I don't recall seeing any source discuss how energy weapons seemingly pass through shields.

Of the three theories I know of, my favorite is that energy shielding is one-way. (It seems that the entry vector has something to do with shield effectiveness since Han told Chewbacca to "angle the deflector shields" in ANH.)

The other two have already been mentioned here: the guns poke out of the shields or the shields are momentarily lowered.

It should be noted that in the incident I mentioned earlier, the ISD was not firing when it received the minor bleedthrough damage to its hull surface. Thus, lowering the shields to fire cannot explain why the damage occured.

Kuciwalker · Post by **Kuciwalker** » 2006-12-14 09:49am

I thought that "angling the deflector shields" would just strengthen the shields currently taking fire, lessening the chance of bleedthrough damage.

The Silence and I · Post by **The Silence and I** » 2006-12-14 01:53pm

LaCroix wrote:Possible reasons:

1. We know that SW ships open "holes" in their shields to fire through.

I'm not so sure we know this as a fact. I happen to disagree with the standard shield model, but AFAIK there is no definitive explanation for how energy weapons are allowed to fire.

A sustained suppression fire on a gun wuold have the chance of a lucky hit if the bolt hits the gun at the exact time of shooting. so, they might be hoping to damage guns.

The most they can hope for is to make their capture a little more expensive. They are not buying time by firing, indeed as weapon systems are power hogs I expect they are really loosing a great deal of engine power.

2. Boarding ships cannot be used as long as they are shooting.

Boarding ship cannot be used as long as they are capable of firing. There is a difference.

3. To tow the ship into a hangar, the ISD must open a large enough hole in its shields. Nothing you may want to do when the target ship is firing its barrels red-hot.

Also nothing you want to do as long as the ship can fire its weapons. Actually firing them prior to capture does not buy more time, in either case the ISD must disarm the Tantive IV.

So unless shields are less protective than the standard model suggests, I don't see a rational reason to sacrifice significant acceleration for no appreciable gain.

•A prudent ISD captain must raise shields even if the Tantive IV does not fire, because the Tantive IV carries weapons capable of harming it.
•A couple of quick shots by the Tantive IV would convince a less prudent captain to raise shields anyway--still no reason to continually fire those weapons.
•Boarding craft cannot be safely launched as long as the Tantive IV is armed--it does not need to fire a single shot before those craft are sent.
•Pulling the Tantive IV into the hanger is not safe as long as it is armed--it needn't fire a single shot to still be dangerous.
•Fully powering weapon systems taxes the available engine power and shortens time until capture, time which can be spent getting the information off the ship or preparing a more effective boarding defense or calling for help or trying to actually escape entirely.

The only reason I can think of for using their weapons is if they are caught in the tractor beam and may as well go all out--but in that case powering the engines is pointless (if the beam cannot quite hold them then you don't want to waste power on the weapons, escaping is more important, and if the beam can hold them then powering the engines is pointless--go Rambo on that ISD!).

Post by **Darth Wong** » 2006-12-14 01:59pm

Isn't it also possible that the gunners on Tantive IV simply opened fire of their own accord when battle stations were called and they were attacked, even though it made no logical sense to do so? There are plenty of incidents on record of real people doing futile things like firing small-arms at aircraft etc.