Darth Hoth wrote:As to the original question, from Darksaber, it appears the superlaser is a quite complicated device, given that Durga needs not only the original Death Star plans to build his superweapon, but also one of its key designers (the designer in the pre-prequels continuity). Since the New Republic also appeared to hold the only surviving copy of the blueprints at the time, stored in Coruscant's formerly Imperial computer core, it's quite likely the technology was very restricted as well. The required combination of scientific genious and plans would thus be very rare, making mass production impossible after that point; presumably Imperial secrecy had done so earlier.
Just because he required the original Death Star plans and the staff of Bevel Lemilisk to build it does not mean that they are impossible to construct without it; would you go about building a battleship without hiring engineers with experience and consulting previous design's schematics, even if you had access to all the requisite technical knowhow?
Darth Hoth wrote:Ah, that explains it, then. Those aren't superlasers, though, merely composite beam lasers. They use similar projection technology, but the beams themselves are quite different in nature.
What are you talking about? There is nothing to suggest that superlaser is not simply parlance for megascale composite-beam energy weapons. They look the same and propagate at the same speeds. What evidence suggests the superlaser is something special, rather than in principle simply an immense composite-beam turbolaser?
Darth Hoth wrote:Seriously, though, there has to be a reason other than sheer inefficiency that they aren't more commonplace, since the Empire evidently can produce them very easily (without it even being noticed in the budget!). And for the Death Star, wasn't it the sheer mass, rather than the technology, that made it as expensive as it was? Super Star Destroyers wouldn't have that problem.
The cost is almost certainly due to the mass; the Death Star I was on the order of hundreds of millions of ISDs in mass (assuming relatively comparable density), and the Death Star II is on the order of tens of billions of ISDs. That's an enormous opportunity cost. Furthermore, its not that it is
called a superlaser which is responsible for its relativistically planetary-mass scattering firepower. It requires a reactor to generate the required power for such an event, and capacitors to store it, etc. A weapon operating on the same technical principles as the Death Star I superlaser but on the scale of an
Executor-class battlecruiser would require probably thousands of refuelings and endless-capacity capacitors with the main reactor running at full intensity for weeks. A Super Star Destroyer's reactor cannot generate the relativistic planetary-mass scattering (in spite of a deflector shield!) that the Death Star I's reactor can.
Darth Hoth wrote:2/3rds as powerful doesn't sound like "much less". Clearly there are other issues than just size that play a part. But of course, "superlaser" doesn't necessarily mean "planetcrusher" per se.
Its factually incorrect; the "searing continents" requisite firepower is on the order of at least a hundred billion times less than the firepower required to cause an event consistent with the destruction of Alderaan as depicted in Episode IV. The Death Star's main reactor is required to generate that firepower - the vessel is not for show, its a brute-force solution to its role: it is a really, really large warship with a really, really large reactor feeding a really, really large composite-beam turbolaser.
Darth Hoth wrote:I don't have any calculations to back it up, of course, but is the first point necessarily true? If the Death Star, with its myriad systems and powerful defences, gets enough power out of the reactor core we see in RotJ to both run as normal and fire superlaser beams every few minutes, would an Eclipse-class Super Star Destroyer have to recharge that long? Especially with its hugely inadequate normal weaponry...
The
Eclipse's normal weaponry is not inadequate, we lack adequate information regarding its intended role and expected opponents, and we do not know the target acquisition, firepower, and combat longevity etc. of its weapons, so we do not know its capability. The Death Star II generated Mon Calamari cruiser-obliterating blasts every few minutes. What would make you think they compared to the firepower required to scatter an Earth-like planet's mass at velocities close to the speed of light?
Darth Hoth wrote:The point with superlasers, as I understand them, is that they can break planetary shields, and do so instantly. IIRC from Wedge's Gamble, doing so with conventional weapons takes weeks/months,
It does so through raw firepower; the Death Star's beam is capable of projecting 1e22 megatons of firepower or higher on a very small area; this is considerably in excess of the firepower intensity which could delivered by any likely conventional fleet. That's why the Death Star was necessary, and why they need a fucking huge singular turbolaser mounted on a fucking huge ship.
Darth Hoth wrote:whereas the Eclipse could destroy a shield generator through its defences.
I doubt this, otherwise the bulk and firepower of the Death Star is stupid and useless. Even if we grant this, its through the power of technobabble.
Darth Hoth wrote:That would also explain why the NR is so afraid of Thrawn's ploy with invisible ships and Star Destroyers firing "through" shields in The Last Command - they think it's a superlaser, though none mentions it at the time.
This is circular logic. You assume that Thrawn's gambit reminds them of superlasers and then use it as evidence to support that superlasers = automatic shield penetration. Not to mention its a no-limits fallacy: "its called superlaser, it can beat any shield!!!shift+one!"
