Is Ramming Really So Uncommon?

[Jim Raynor]

Most people, including Mr. Wong, believe that SW battles are similar to naval battles during the battleship era, when fighting was carried out from long range with powerful and accurate weapons capable of hitting any ship before it could get close. Tactics like ramming were rendered completely useless. While I generally agree with this evaluation, there is some evidence of ramming in SW. In the canon ROTJ novelization, the Rebels loaded up transports with explosives with the intention of ramming them into Imperial warships. Also, in Dark Force Rising, Han destroys an ISD by ramming a Dreadnaught into it. How do you pull off attacks like these when standard starship weapons are capable of easily destroying any ramming ship before it gets close?[/i]

[Kazuaki Shimazaki]

Nobody said ramming does not work at all. Even today, given the right tactical situation, a ramming CAN occur. In ROTJ, you will notice that they are specially loaded with explosives, and thus it is more like turning a ship into a huge protorp. Obviously, a protorp the size of a ship, even if it is somewhat less efficient in its detonation, would be a real significant threat to an enemy vessel.

With the Peremptory, she was half-knocked out by the enemy Dreadnaughts with their ion cannon. Otherwise, she would have dodged that Dreadnaught and that would have been that. If you are really dizzy, it is kind of hard to punch or dodge the guy trying to ram you.

[omegaLancer]

There are many incident where colliding ship just bounce off each other shields.. It seem that the only collision that seem to work, is when the ship being struck shield have been drop or almost out... As in the Hand of Thrawn when the MF accidentily collide with a pursuing fighter, when it occur the MF shield were down to 20% and MF surivived the collision, but was damage...

[Wicked Pilot]

With the Peremptory, she was half-knocked out by the enemy Dreadnaughts with their ion cannon. Otherwise, she would have dodged that Dreadnaught and that would have been that. If you are really dizzy, it is kind of hard to punch or dodge the guy trying to ram you.

Not quite. If I remember correctly, the Peremptory arrived to reinforce the Jucicator. The Peremptory was fully capable when it was rammed. But considering that the Katana Fleet was unmaned and not doing anything, the captain of the Peremptory probably saw no threat in getting close to the vessels.

[Jim Raynor]

If I remember correctly, the Imperials were WINNING the battle decisively up until the Peremptory was rammed.

[His Divine Shadow]

Not quite. If I remember correctly, the Peremptory arrived to reinforce the Jucicator. The Peremptory was fully capable when it was rammed. But considering that the Katana Fleet was unmaned and not doing anything, the captain of the Peremptory probably saw no threat in getting close to the vessels.

Oh very quite you, you... Dirty red commie scum!

Pg. 433-434: Lando stared at him... and slowly, a smile of his own appeared.
"Right," he said slyly. "Right. This is the Katana fleet. And we're aboard the Katana."
"You got it," Han told him. Taking a deep breath, mentally crossing his fingers, hti) eased power to the drive.
The Katana didn't move, of course. But the whole reason the entire Katana fleet had disappeared together in the first place-
"Got one," Lando called out, hunching over his sen- sor display. "Bearing forty-three mark twenty."
...
"Here goes," Han said; and threw the throttle control wide open. There was no way the Star Destroyer could have missed seeing th-e Dreadnaught bearing down on it, of course. But with its electronic and control systems still being scrambled by Bel Iblis's ion attack, there was also no way for it to moVe out of the way in time. Even from the Katana's distance, the impact and ex plosion were pretty spectacular. Han watched the expanding fireball fade slowly, and then turned to Luke.

(ref: Dark Force Rising)

[Wicked Pilot]

If I remember correctly, the Imperials were WINNING the battle decisively up until the Peremptory was rammed.

I don't have the book, so bear with me if I make to many mistakes...


The New Republic was at first outmached by the Judicator, but then Karrde arrived with his fleet (probably one or two smaller vessels like corvettes and some fighters), followed by Bel Ibis with his fleet of (I think six) Dreadnaughts. By the time the Peremptory showed up, all the Judicator's fighters had been wiped out, and it was sustaining damage from the New Republic and it's allies. The Peremptory's showing up turned the tide of battle into the Emire's favor. It started to engage Ibis' Dreadnaughts (which it probably could have beaten) but was destroyed before it could really get into the fight. The Judicator, being shot to hell and lacking fighters, was forced to flee.

There, straight from the memory of a book I read five years ago.

[Asst. Asst. Lt. Cmdr. Smi]

On the subject, a wedge-shaped design with a narrow front could hurt an enemy vessel the same way knife cuts butter, but it's more of a last-resort thing to me. The Eclipse had a strong bow to ram enemy ships effectively without damaging itself.

[Darth Yoshi]

Looks like the design of the Star Destroyers has more than just psych-war value.

[Kazuaki Shimazaki]

On the subject, a wedge-shaped design with a narrow front could hurt an enemy vessel the same way knife cuts butter, but it's more of a last-resort thing to me. The Eclipse had a strong bow to ram enemy ships effectively without damaging itself.

L/D ratio is too low, I'll say. The Star Destroyer is IIRC perhaps 400m wide at the base of the triangle for 1600m long. It would be better if it is a 10L to 1W situation, or at least 8:1.

[Ender]

In the canon ROTJ novelization, the Rebels loaded up transports with explosives with the intention of ramming them into Imperial warships.

Could you post the quote? I don't remember this bit, particularily in light of the fact that the rebels didn't know the warships would be there.

[Master of Ossus]

There are other examples of ramming, also. For instance, long ago the imaginatively named Robot Ramships were used to soften up enemy fleets before the two sides actually engaged in combat. In Truce at Bakura, Solo plans to ram a Ssi-Ruuvi picket ship with the Falcon, and in Dark Force Rising Skywalker uses an OR dreadnaught to ram an Imperial ISD. Note that in all of these cases this was considered a very unconventional tactic. The first example was from a very old age, and the other two were desperation moves, undertaken by a side with substantially smaller resources engaged in battle.

[Jim Raynor]

In the canon ROTJ novelization, the Rebels loaded up transports with explosives with the intention of ramming them into Imperial warships.

Could you post the quote? I don't remember this bit, particularily in light of the fact that the rebels didn't know the warships would be there.

Sorry, I don't have the book with me right now. Can anyone else here provide the quotes?

[faded]

Ramming is good. But not when you are in the ship. Duh.

[Master of Ossus]

Ramming is not the most powerful attack available to SW ships. It is not even close. Instead, it is used in last ditch situations: when other weapons have already been spent, when their power is running out, or if they are dead anyway and want to take one last target with them. It is actually considerably less powerful than even starfighter scale weapons, but it is used occasionally in dire circumstances.

Note that this is unlike ST or B5, when ramming attacks are actually considerably more powerful than the other weapons available to most ships.

[Darth Yoshi]

Ramming is not the most powerful attack available to SW ships. It is not even close. Instead, it is used in last ditch situations: when other weapons have already been spent, when their power is running out, or if they are dead anyway and want to take one last target with them. It is actually considerably less powerful than even starfighter scale weapons, but it is used occasionally in dire circumstances.

Note that this is unlike ST or B5, when ramming attacks are actually considerably more powerful than the other weapons available to most ships.

Says a lot about hulls and shields when ramming isn't a powerful tactic.

[Master of Ossus]

Actually it says more about the weapons systems involved. The fact that ramming is only used when most or all of a ship's other weapons have been used indicates that their weapons are far more powerful than turning the entire ship into a weapon. This indicates a firepower:mass ratio far in excess of many other sci-fi universes, but relatively consistent with modern battleships and aircraft carriers, which are usually equipped with nuclear payloads.

[Vertigo1]

There was also another ramming incident when the Lusankya plowed right into a Vong worldship. Pissed me off cuz I rather liked the Lusankya.

[Master of Ossus]

There was also another ramming incident when the Lusankya plowed right into a Vong worldship. Pissed me off cuz I rather liked the Lusankya.

That was also a reasonable course of action, though. The weapons on Lusankya were needed elsewhere, and the ship was too much of a liability to keep around. The destruction of a world ship was the best they could hope to accomplish with the thing.

[Vertigo1]

There was also another ramming incident when the Lusankya plowed right into a Vong worldship. Pissed me off cuz I rather liked the Lusankya.

That was also a reasonable course of action, though. The weapons on Lusankya were needed elsewhere, and the ship was too much of a liability to keep around. The destruction of a world ship was the best they could hope to accomplish with the thing.

True. Pity the "Starlancer" project was a ruse. The idea of the NR rebels (referring to the rebellion against the NR started in "Rebel Dream") with FTL weaponry is quite appealing.

[Darth Yoshi]

It wasn't supposed to be FTL, was it? I thought it supposed to have propagated at TL speeds.

[Master of Ossus]

It wasn't supposed to be FTL, was it? I thought it supposed to have propagated at TL speeds.

It was sort of both. It was supposed to fire a beam into hyperspace, which then exited hyperspace back into real space when it approached the target.

Of course, it really doesn't matter since the thing was never designed to work in the first place.