StarDestroyer.Net BBS

Browsing through the SWTC I stumbled upon this:
"The hull number of the star destroyer Entor (CVS 1049) indicates either that in excess of a thousand star destroyers of this class have been built, or that this is the 1049th built by its particular shipyard."

The Entor is the Star Destroyer that was hit by an asteroid in TESB.
This is the first time I've come across an actual hull number of an ISD. Unfortunately, Dr. Saxton makes no mention of the source, and I can't find any other references to it.
Does anyone know where this registry number came from?

Lord Sander wrote:Browsing through the SWTC I stumbled upon this:
"The hull number of the star destroyer Entor (CVS 1049) indicates either that in excess of a thousand star destroyers of this class have been built, or that this is the 1049th built by its particular shipyard."

Not necessarily, as a registry number can logically skip randomly through the registry space to hide the true strength of the fleet.

In WWII, the Allies got the idea of deducing the number of tanks produced by the Germans by observing the serial numbers of mark V Panzer tanks they captured, and assuming that the Germans —being Germans— would logically number their tanks in order from 1 to N. Using this, they estimated that the number Panzers produced between June 1940 and Sept 1942 was about 246 per month. This estimate turned out to be almost spot on.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,,1824525,00.html

Emboldened by these numbers (the previous numbers on German production were gross overestimates), the Allies attacked the western front in 1944 and smashed the Panzers; a neat triumph of statistical analysis.

I imagine registries are no longer numbered sequentially to avoid an adversary doing the same trick on them... although given the dominance of the SW main spacies (Republic and Empire), they might not bother.

Wyrm wrote:I imagine registries are no longer numbered sequentially to avoid an adversary doing the same trick on them... although given the dominance of the SW main spacies (Republic and Empire), they might not bother.

Oh gawd. Don't give trektards and/or Karen Traviss ideas.

Wyrm wrote:Emboldened by these numbers (the previous numbers on German production were gross overestimates), the Allies attacked the western front in 1944 and smashed the Panzers; a neat triumph of statistical analysis.

Modern global satellite surveillance makes hiding military strength much more difficult (though not impossible). That brings up a question; in Star Trek there are installations (e.g. the Argus Array, a 'subspace telescope') that can spy on planetary surfaces over a range of at least several light years and generate images at least comparable to a current commercial LEO satellite. They can detect uncloaked fleet movements at a range of at least light years. Do SW powers have comparable or superior long range surveillance capabilities, other than cheap long-range probe droids?

Starglider wrote:Do SW powers have comparable or superior long range surveillance capabilities, other than cheap long-range probe droids?

IIRC during the Yuuhzan Vong War an Executor-class was able to pound a Vong Worldship over Coruscant from the other side of the system.

General Schatten wrote:IIRC during the Yuuhzan Vong War an Executor-class was able to pound a Vong Worldship over Coruscant from the other side of the system.

That scene is more useful for establishing turbolaser range than sensor capability. Frankly we could locate and hit a worldship from the other side of a solar system with current sensor technology, if we had a sufficiently accurate mass driver that could shoot at a significant fraction of c. By 'long range surveillance' I meant 'at least several light years'.

EDIT: It may be that there's just never been the motivation to build such a thing in SW. In Trek there's a cold war with well defined neutral zones and fortified borders, which you can't just send a starship across to check out a planet directly. Being able to spy on installations and fleets over a few light years range is a useful capability. AFAIK there's never been a time where a similar capability would be strategically useful in SW. If the telescope had a range of tens of thousands of lightyears that would be very useful though. I know the Vong were discovered by an ExGal station at a fairly long range, but I don't know the specifics; anyone got the book (Vector Prime I believe)?

General Schatten wrote:

Starglider wrote:Do SW powers have comparable or superior long range surveillance capabilities, other than cheap long-range probe droids?

IIRC during the Yuuhzan Vong War an Executor-class was able to pound a Vong Worldship over Coruscant from the other side of the system.

It was a Mon Calamari capital ship, actually. Although that event demonstrates highly refined sensor technology, I don't believe it correlates to the surveillance technology that Starglider discussed (that capable of accurate, remote observation over light-year distances).

Edit: A bit late...

Lord Sander wrote:Browsing through the SWTC I stumbled upon this:
"The hull number of the star destroyer Entor (CVS 1049) indicates either that in excess of a thousand star destroyers of this class have been built, or that this is the 1049th built by its particular shipyard."

As everyone else has pointed out, registry numbers and even fleet/squadron numbers aren't consecutive. Hell, I've stayed in hotel rooms with four-digit numbers. Said hotel sure as hell didn't have thousands of suites.

USN hull numbers tend to be sequential but that's not true for all navies - in particular, the Russian Navy's hull numbers are also based on location.

Starglider wrote: Modern global satellite surveillance makes hiding military strength much more difficult (though not impossible). That brings up a question; in Star Trek there are installations (e.g. the Argus Array, a 'subspace telescope') that can spy on planetary surfaces over a range of at least several light years and generate images at least comparable to a current commercial LEO satellite. They can detect uncloaked fleet movements at a range of at least light years. Do SW powers have comparable or superior long range surveillance capabilities, other than cheap long-range probe droids?

Rogue squadron recon of Sernipdal was first preceded by the use of "gravitic" sensors to detect any Yuzhan Vong warships before they jumped into the system. Given the early stage of the war, its possible that this kind of capability was not developed specifically for the Yuzhan Vong.


Similarly, Kyp Avengers also pulled off navigational data to track smugglers and miscreants off satellites that tracked ships passing them by via hyperspace.

Not to mention the use of such interstellar sensors in Thrawn duology.

I have to look into the ROTS:ICS again, but I'm sure that it talks about lightyears of sensor-range for the sensors of the Munificient-class-frigates.

The Imperial Survey Corps can detect traces of technology from outside a system on a planetary surface.

We all know the Empire has more than a pitiful 1000 ISDs and that the number doesn't have to be sequential.
But does anyone know where this hull number came from?

Lord Sander wrote: We all know the Empire has more than a pitiful 1000 ISDs and that the number doesn't have to be sequential.
But does anyone know where this hull number came from?

The old Imperator diagrams with the incorrect size.

phongn wrote:The old Imperator diagrams with the incorrect size.

Ahh. Thank you.
Are those official?

FTeik wrote:I have to look into the ROTS:ICS again, but I'm sure that it talks about lightyears of sensor-range for the sensors of the Munificient-class-frigates.

The Imperial Survey Corps can detect traces of technology from outside a system on a planetary surface.

Actually I'm pretty sure its Light Hours.
And there are quite a few examples in the Thrawn Trilogy of Thrawn assembling his forces only a matter of light hours from major planets then jumping in, all without his ships being detected.

Well, space *is* really big. A light-hour is nothing to sneeze at, expecially in 3 dimensions.

Looked it up. Lightdays it was.

Lord Sander wrote:

phongn wrote:The old Imperator diagrams with the incorrect size.

Ahh. Thank you.
Are those official?

Apparently that's not the case. Mandel drew them, but they were never official.

Chris OFarrell wrote:Actually I'm pretty sure its Light Hours.
And there are quite a few examples in the Thrawn Trilogy of Thrawn assembling his forces only a matter of light hours from major planets then jumping in, all without his ships being detected.

Well, if we assume that it can take some time to scan a volume of space (or defending forces are operating under EMCON) even a jump-in of a few light hours can be "good enough" as long as you don't let so much time go that your giant engines signature finally reaches someone.

Hell, SW sensors might be suspect to sidelobing effects and other issues that allow warships to mask themselves at a distance.

Lord Sander wrote:Browsing through the SWTC I stumbled upon this:
"The hull number of the star destroyer Entor (CVS 1049) indicates either that in excess of a thousand star destroyers of this class have been built, or that this is the 1049th built by its particular shipyard."

The Entor is the Star Destroyer that was hit by an asteroid in TESB.
This is the first time I've come across an actual hull number of an ISD. Unfortunately, Dr. Saxton makes no mention of the source, and I can't find any other references to it.
Does anyone know where this registry number came from?

I think that was the Black Fleet Crisis trilogy when a scavenger ship finds the wreckage of an ISD destroyed during an evacuation of an Imperial world.

phongn wrote:Hell, SW sensors might be suspect to sidelobing effects and other issues that allow warships to mask themselves at a distance.

Perhaps this is why ISDs have two sensor lobes, as well as who knows how many other sensor equipment over the ship.