Complete novelization analysis- spoilers
Posted: 2005-04-04 11:43am
This is mainly to deal with two aspects: technology, and the inevitable dumb fuck nitpickers (you know who I mean, the "why didn't they just slag everything AROUND the Rebel base on Hoth" people) who will try and poke holes in what is most likely the tightest plot I have seen in a novel.
Sensors: another reference to the widespread ECM used in Star Wars battles.
*The signal Anakin is referring to is Supreme Chancellor Palpatine's homing beacon
Computers & Androids: Anakin's artificial arm could be fitted with pain sensors, but it isn't, in this case the pain he feels-
The Force: is the Force, sensing the presence of Count Dooku, who took most of his arm from him.
One can imagine that some would inevitably claim that this passage is "contradicted" by what we will see in the film, except for the fact that there is no way we are seeing the entirety of the battle over Coruscant, and that actual battle at close range does not preclude engagement ranges of hundreds of km for ships elsewhere in the battlespace.
Sensors: the above is a very interesting insight into C&C technology in Star Wars- having the seemingly mundane windows of the General's Quarters actually be a sophisticated computer view system that can compress and simplify matters for the force commander is invaluable.
Ground Combat: Dooku's cloak is not simple cloth, but actually a form of armor.
Naval Tactics: Attacking ships place themselves in enemy ships routes of escape to prevent a run up to a hyperspace jump.
Sensors: "microjumps" are used to confound the ability to track a ship in hyperspace.
Regardless, this quote proves also that the "shroud of the Dark Side" has affected Jedi power in its entirety, not just aspects of it.
Sensors: the bridge of Invisible Hand is equipped with the same kind of "view wall" as in the General's Quarters.
Sensors/Ground Combat: the composite-beam turrets of LAAT/i's are accurate enough to intercept Hailfire droid missiles, which we know have extremely erratic guided trajectories from the Geonosis ground battle.
Sensors: Star Wars has gravimetric sensors sensitive enough to detect the difference in mass within the neuranium.
Ground Combat: A canonical reference to hovertanks (presumably using repulsorlifts like landspeeders) used by the Grand Army of the Republic. This may be a reference to the TX-130 Sabre-class "fighter" tank.
Ground Combat: The AT-ST, or an earlier version thereof, was used in the Clone Wars. It is plausible that the other walkers and vehicles seen in the Clone Wars also remained in the Imperial arsenal for some time.
Ground Combat: Clonetrooper units deploy seeker droids to assist in reconnaisance and the acquisition of targets. These are probably similar to the model seen in use by the Stormtroopers searching for the droids in A New Hope.
Ground Combat: canonical reference to the vision aid devices present in Clonetrooper (and by extension, Stormtrooper) helmets.
1. Ships can run in a reduced emissions mode to reduce their detectability to enemy sensors.
2. This reduced emissions mode includes scanning.
3. Scanning can be modulated to "tight beam", presumably to minimize the above risks.
4. The Tantive IV can not only detect an escape pod roughly 200,000km away- but it can also check a database to see what the target is, identify it precisely, scan for lifesigns, and determine what kind of life it is, to the point of detail in this case that is most assuredly not a Wookie.
As always Mike is free to take what he wishes from here to put up on the canon database on the main site, though I don't know what Mike's position on spoilers is.
Misc: canon reference to Coruscant's orbital mirrors.p. 1 wrote:The artificial daylight spread by the capital's orbital mirrors is sliced by intersecting flames of ion drives and punctuated by starburst explosions; contrails of debris raining into the atmosphere become tangled ribbons of cloud.
Naval Weapons: turbolaser bolts (of indeterminate origin) are capable of vaporizing a "small town". We don't know how big a small town is in Star Wars, but if were to assume our own standards, the firepower for these bolts would be at least in the multi-megaton range.p.1 wrote:The shining hairlines are light-scatter from turbolaser bolts powerful enough to vaporize a small town.
Size & Scope: The Separatist forces have slaughtered billions and burned whole planets during the Clone Wars.p. 3 wrote:General Grievous, though-
Grievous is a monster.
The Separatist Supreme Commander is an abomination of nature, a fusion of flesh and droid- and his droid parts have more compassion than what remains of his alien flesh. This half-living creature is a slaughterer of billions. Whole planets have burned at his command.
Weapons: flak weapons are employed against fighters at the Battle of Coruscant.p.13 wrote:
Anti-fighter flak flashed on all sides. Even louder than the clatter of shrapnel and the snarl of his sublight drives ...
Computers & Androids: Droids can pick up personality traits from other droids.p.13 wrote:"Arfour", he said on the internal comm, "can't you do something with the inertials?"
The droid ganged into the socket on his starfighter's left wing whistled somehting that sounded suspiciously like a human apology. Obi-Wan's frown deepened. R4-P17 had been spending too much time with Anakin's eccentric astromech; it was picking up R2-D2's bad habits.
The Force: another reference to Jedi using the Force to assist their piloting.p.13 wrote:New bursts of flak bracketed his path. He reached into the Force, felling for a safe channel through the swarms of shrapnel and sizzling nets of particle beams.
There wasn't one.
Computers & Androids: Self-explanatory.p.15 wrote:The blew past the tri-fighters, looping in evasive spirals. The dorid ships wrenched themselves into pursuit maneuvers that would have killed any living pilot.
The Force: Jedi can engage in maneuvers that would kill an ordinary human pilot.p.15 wrote:For merely human pilots, this would be suicide. By the time you can see your partner's starfighter streaking toward you at a respectable fraction of lightspeed, it's already too late for your merely human reflexes to react.
But these particular pilots were far from merely human.
Computers & Androids: the reflexes of tri-fighters operate at c.p.17 wrote:He had the Force to guide him through, and the tri-fighter had only its electronic reflexes- but those electronic reflexes operated at roughly the speed of light. It stayed on his tail as if were dragging it by a tow-cable.
Naval Weapons: Eta-2 Actis cannons are powerful enough to vaporize an entire Tri-fighter.p.18 wrote:Obi-Wan hit maximum drag on his intact wing, and his starfighter shot into a barely controlled arc high and right as Anakin's cannons vaporized the last tri-fighter.
Computers & Androids: astromech droids perform scanning functions, probably through the ship's systems that the pilot is too busy to bother with.p.20 wrote:"Artoo, where's that signal?"*
From his socket beside the cockpit, R2-D2 whistled and beeped. A translation spidered across Anakin's console readout:
SCANNING. LOTS OF ECM SIGNAL JAMMING.
Sensors: another reference to the widespread ECM used in Star Wars battles.
*The signal Anakin is referring to is Supreme Chancellor Palpatine's homing beacon
Misc: in AOTC it was Obi-Wan that had been Anakin's father figure. Now it's Palpatine.p.21 wrote:Today wasn't about dodging lasers and blasting droids. Today was about the life of the man who might as well have been his father: a man who could die if the Jedi didn't reach him in time.
Anakin had been late once before.
Communications: the ECM is so heavy that he cannot get a transmission beyond a starfighter right next to his.p.23 wrote:"Have your droid tight-beam a report to the Temple. And send out a call for any Jedi in starfighters. We'll come at it from all sides."
"Way head of you." But when he checked his comm readout, he shook his head. "There's still too much ECM. Artoo can't raise the Temple. I think the only reason we can even talk to each other is that we're practically side by side.
"And Jedi beacons?"
"No joy, Master." Anakin's stomach clenched, but he fought the tension out of his voice. "We may be the only two Jedi out here."
Computers & Androids: R2-D2 has been extensively modified and upgraded over his lifetime, from extra tools to his behavior.p. 34 wrote:Even flying blind and nearly out of control through the middle of a space battle, Obi-Wan could not avoid a second of disbelief at the bewildering variety of auxiliary tools and aftermarket behaviors Anakin had tinkered onto his starfighter's astromech, even beyond the sophisticated upgrades performed by the Royal Engineers of Naboo. The little device was virtually a partner in its own right.
The Force: Jedi can use the Force to manipulate circuitry as much as more mundane items (like the elevator brakes Anakin stopped in Attack of the Clones).p.36 wrote:Reaching into the Force, his mind followed the starfighter's mangled circuitry to locate and activate the sublight engines' manual test board. With a slight push, he triggered a command nomrall used only in bench tests: full reverse.
p.42 wrote:The hand of jointed durasteel inside his black glove clenched so hard that electronic feedback made his shoulder ache ...
Anakin barely heard him. He stared down at his black-gloved fist. He opened his fist, closed it, opened it again. The ache from his shoulder flowed down to the middle of his bicep-
And didn't stop.
His elbow sizzled, and his forearm; his wrist had been packed with red-hot gravel, and his hand-
His hand was on fire.
But it wasn't his hand. Or his wrist, or his forearm, or his elbow. It was a creation of jointed durasteel and electro-drivers.
"Anakin?"
Anakin's lips drew back from his teeth. "It hurts."
"What, your replacement arm? When did oyu have it equipped with pain sensors?
I didn't. That's the point."
Computers & Androids: Anakin's artificial arm could be fitted with pain sensors, but it isn't, in this case the pain he feels-
The Force: is the Force, sensing the presence of Count Dooku, who took most of his arm from him.
Sensors: the ECM being used in the Battle of Coruscant was specifically tailored to permit receipt of the homing beacon signal.p.43" wrote:"I guessed. Do you think Grievous couldn't have found Palpatine's beacon? It can hardly be accident that through all the ECM, the Chancellor's homing signal was in the clear. This is a trap. A Jedi trap.
Naval Weapons: ships above Coruscant were exchanging fire at distances of hundreds of kilometres, with weapons travelling at near c. Whether those weapons are turbolasers is probable, given that the "commander's view" of such combat was that the ships seemed joined together by "pulsing cables of flame".p. 45 wrote:The vast semisphere of the view wall bloomed with battle. Sophisticated sensor algorithims compressed the combat sprawled throughout the galactic capital's orbit to a view the naked eye could enjoy: cruisers hundreds of kilometres apart, exchanging fire at near lightspeed, appeared to be practically hull-to-hull, joined by pulsing cables of flame. Turbolaser blats became swift shafts of light that shattered into prismatic splinters against shields, or bloomed into miniature supernovae that swallowed ships whole ...
Within that immense curve of computer-filled carnage, the only furnishing was one lone chair, centred in an expanse of empty floor. This was called the General's Chair, just as this apartment atop the flagship's conning spire was called the General's Quarters.
With his back to that chair and to the man shackled within it, hands folded behind him beneath his cloak of silken armor-weave, stood Count Dooku.
One can imagine that some would inevitably claim that this passage is "contradicted" by what we will see in the film, except for the fact that there is no way we are seeing the entirety of the battle over Coruscant, and that actual battle at close range does not preclude engagement ranges of hundreds of km for ships elsewhere in the battlespace.
Sensors: the above is a very interesting insight into C&C technology in Star Wars- having the seemingly mundane windows of the General's Quarters actually be a sophisticated computer view system that can compress and simplify matters for the force commander is invaluable.
Ground Combat: Dooku's cloak is not simple cloth, but actually a form of armor.
Misc: the entire Battle of Coruscant is an obvious trap for Anakin & Obi-Wan. Stating something this obvious is required for the misguided inviduals who will know doubt be polluting the internet within hours of the release of the film with their inane, ignorant second-guessing of everything that happens.p.45-46 wrote:"Lord Tyranus, Kenobi and Skywalker have arrived."
"Yes." Dooku had felt them both in the Force "Drive them towards me."
"My Lord, I must express once more my objections-"
Dooku turned. From his commanding height, he stared down at the blue-scanned holoimage of Invisible Hand's commander. "Your objections have been noted already, General. Leave the Jedi to me."
"But driving them to you also sends them directly toward the Chancellor himself! Why does he remain on this ship at all? He should be hidden. He should be guarded. We should have had him outsystem hours ago!"
"Matters are so," Count Dooku said, "because Lord Sidious wishes them so; should you desire to press your objections, please feel at liberty to take them up with him."
Misc: The Battle of Coruscant also serves to further demonize (and eliminate) General Grievous' from the picture.p.46 wrote:He sighed. Grievous had his uses; not only was he an able field commander, but he would soon make a marvelous scapegoat upon whom to hang every atrocity of this sadly necessary war. Someone had to take that particular fall, and Grievous was just the creature for the job. It cetainly would not be Dooku.
This was, in fact, one purpose of the cataclysmic battle outside.
But not the only one.
The blue-scanned image before him now became nminiatures of Kenobi and Skuwalker as he had seen them so many times before: shoulder-to-shoulder, lightsabres whirling as they enthusiastically dismantled droid after droid after droid. Feeling as if they were winning, while in truth they were being chivvied exactly where the Lords of the Sith wanted them to go.
Culture: the Jedi Order has existed for 25,000 years.p.47 wrote:He was one of the most respected and powerful Jedi in the Order's twenty-five-thousand-year history, yet at the age of seventy Dooku's principles would no longer allow him to serve a Republic in which political power was for sale to the highest bidder.
Misc: the outline of Dooku's vision for the galaxy is really too long to insert here (pp. 50-52), suffice to say it is largely self-explanatory.p.50 wrote:"It will be," he said slowly, meditatively, as though he spoke only to himself, "an embarassment to be captured by him."
The voice that answered him was so familiar that sometimes his very thoughts spoke in it, instead of his own. "An embaraassment you can survive, Lord Tyranus. After all, he is the greatest Jedi alive, is he not? And have we not ensured that all the galaxy shares this opinion?"
"Quite so, my Master. Quite so." Again, Dooku signed. Today he felt every hour of his eighty-three years. "It is ... fatiguing, to play the villain for so long, Master. I find myself looking forward to an honorable captivity."
A captivity that would allow him to sit out the rest of the war in comfort; a captivity that would allow him to forswear his former allegiances- when he would conveniently appear to finally discover the true extent of the Separatists' crimes against civilization- and bind himself to the new government with his reputation for integrity and idealism fully intact.
Misc/ The Force: Sidious admitting the possibility that Anakin is potentially more powerful than he is.p.53 wrote:"He is powerful. Potentially more powerful than even myself."
The Force: a canonical distinction is drawn between mere Dark Jedi like Asajj Ventress and Lords of the Sith. It takes more than waving a red lightsabre around and being evil to be a Sith.p.58 wrote:"I have no doubt of that. Just remember that Dooku is no mere Dark Jedi like that Ventress woman; he is a Lord of the Sith The ajws of this trap are about to snap shut, and there may be danger here beynd the merely physical."
Design: Star Wars ships have active damage control that draws from a ship's power system.p.59 wrote:The ship shuddered and bucked with multiple torpedo burts, and the lights went out again; lighting was always the first to fail as power was diverted from life support to damage control.
Naval Weapons: Carrack cruisers and Dreadnaughts are present at the Battle of Coruscant and participated in the attack on Invisible Hand.p.89 wrote:When the last of the vultures had been converted to super-heated gas, the clone fighters peeled away, leaving Invisible Hand exposed to the full fire of Home Fleet Strike Group Five: three Carrack-class light cruisers- Integrity, Indomitable and Perseverance- in support of the Dreadnaught Mas Ramdar.
Strike Group Five had deployed in a triangle around Mas Ramdar, maintaining a higher orbit to pin Invisible Hand in Coruscant's gravity well ... and Indomitable was only a shell, most of its crew dead or evacuated, being run remotely by its commander and bridge crew; it swung unsteadily through the Hand's vector cone of escape routes to block any attempt to run up to jump.
Naval Tactics: Attacking ships place themselves in enemy ships routes of escape to prevent a run up to a hyperspace jump.
Computers and Androids: General Grievous has magnetized feet that can also grab, making him able to "stick" to any surface he wishes.p.90 wrote:The sole being on the bridge who is not strapped into a chair stalked from one side to the other, floor-length cape draped over shoulders angular as exposed bone. He ignored hte jolts of impact and was unaffected by the swirl of unpredictable gravity as he paced the deck with metal-on-metal clanks; he walked on taloned creations of magnetized duranium, jointed to grab and crush like the feet of a Vratixan blood eagle.
General Grievous: the features and attributes of this cybernetic killer explained.p.92 wrote:This is General Grievous.
Durasteel. Ceramic armorplast-plated duranium. Electro-drivers and crystal circuitry.
Within them: the remnants of a living being.
He doesn't breathe. He doesn't eat. He cannot laugh, and he does not cry ...
He is built to dominate. The ceramic armorplast plates protecting limbs and torso and face can stop a burst from a starfighter's laser cannon. Those indestructible arms are ten times stronger than a human, and move with the blurring speed of electronic reflexes.
Propulsion: a canonical reference to hyperspace "microjumps".p. 110 wrote:He had no fear for his own life; his specially designed escape module was preprogrammed to take him directly to a ship already primed for jump. Mere seconds after he sealed himself and the Chancellor within the module's heavily armored hull, they would be taken aboard the fleeing ship, which would then make a series of randomized microjumps to prevent being tracked before entering the final jump to the secret base on Utapau.
Sensors: "microjumps" are used to confound the ability to track a ship in hyperspace.
Shields & Forcefields: Ships can employ harmful ray shields as internal security measures.p 112 wrote:A sheet of shimmering energy suddenly flared in front of them, blocking the corridor on the far side of the intersection they were trotting across, and Obi-Wan stopped so short that Anakin almost slammed into his back. He reached over and caught Palpatine by the arm. "Careful, sir," he said, low. "Better not touch it till we know what it is."
Obi-Wan unclipped his lightsabre, activated it, and cautiously extended its tip to touch the energy field; an explosive burst of power flared sparks and streaks in all directions, nearly knocking the weapon from his hands. "Ray shield," he said, more to himself than the others. "We'll have to find another way around-"
But even as he spoke another sheet shimmered into existnece across the mouth of the corridor they'd just left, and two more sizzled into place to seal the corridors to either side.
They were boxed in.
The Force: Obi-Wan feels stronger for some reason as he, Palpatine and Anakin are being taken before Dooku. This may be the "will of the Force"- or it's Palpatine strengthening Obi-Wan by withdrawing the "cloud"- since Grievous plans to kill both Kenobi and Skywalker. While Palpatine clearly wants Kenobi dead, as evidenced by his and Dooku's discussing their plan earlier and his telling Anakin to leave Obi-Wan behind, Obi-Wan is probably useful for getting them out of the predicament with the ignorant Grievous while keeping his cover intact and his propsective new apprentice alive.p. 120 wrote:Somehow, mysteriously, the cloud that had darkened the Force for near to a decade and a half has lightened around him now ... to allow him this moment of clarity, to return to him the full power of the light, if only from the moment; he does not know why, but he is incapable of even wondering. In the Force, he is beyond questions.
Regardless, this quote proves also that the "shroud of the Dark Side" has affected Jedi power in its entirety, not just aspects of it.
Naval Weapons: the overloading electro-staff was only capable of breaking the transparisteel of the view wall because of a previous laser cannon hit.p.129 wrote:The Jedi leapt, and Grievous hurled the overloading electrostaff- but not at the Jedi.
He threw it at a window.
One of the transparisteel panels of the view wall had cracked under a glancing hit from a starfighter's cannon; when the sparking electrostaff hit it squarely and exploded like a proton grenade, the whole panel blew out into space.
Sensors: the bridge of Invisible Hand is equipped with the same kind of "view wall" as in the General's Quarters.
Design: prudent safety measures.p.130 wrote:On the bridge, a blast shield had closed over the destroyed transparisteel window ...
Naval Weapons: Coruscant is equipped with a surface-defence umbrella.p.132 wrote:The dayside surface of the capital planet was shrouded in smoke from a million fires touched off by meteorite impacts of ship fragments; far too many had fallen to be tracked and destroyed by the planet's surface-defense umbrella.
Misc: Mace states the obvious.p. 151 wrote:Mace shook his head. "Nothing is certain. But this raid- the capture of Palpatine had to be an inside job...
Misc: Anakin's motivation for being so angry at being denied the rank of Master.p.194 wrote:All that mattered was Mastery.
All that mattered was Padme.
This was a gift beyond gifts: as a Master, he could access those forbidden holocrons in the restricted vault.
Misc: Agen Kolar and Mace Windu are extremely skilled lightsabre duelists. This makes Sidious' defeat of them (as well as Kit Fisto and Saesee Tin) even more impressive.p.236 wrote:Which would leave Mace and Agen Kolar- both among the greatest bladesbeings the Jedi Order had ever produced- here on Coruscant in case Sidious did indeed take this oppurtuniy to make a dramatic move. Not to mention Anakin, who was a bigade's worth of firepower in his own right.
Size and Scope: Senators (in this case, Chi Eekway speaking) represent entire sectors, not simply planets.p.237 wrote:"I speak directly only for my own sector, of course, but I can tell you that many Senators are becoming very nervous indeed. You may not know that the new governors are arriving with full regiments of clone troops- what they call security forces. We all have begun to wonder if these regiments are intended to protect us from the Separatists... or to protect the governors from us.
Misc: it's the end of the Clone Wars, and Alderaan doesn't have armed forces or a planetary defence system (which Bail distinguishes between)- this is a far cry from 19 years later, when Alderaan has defences as strong as any in the Empire (according to Vader), and has produced its own model of gunships that were present among the Rebel fleet at the Battle of Endor. We also know from Tarkin in the ANH novelization that Alderaan was the primary source of Rebel munitions.p.239 wrote:"That's the last thing any of us wants," Bail said with a disapproving look at Senator Eekway. "Alderaan has no armed forces; we don't even have a planetary defense system. A political solution is our only option."
Computers & Androids: the quality of high-end combat droids in Star Wars.p.285 wrote:Three MagnaGuards, each with a double-ended weapon that generated an energy field impervious to lightsabres, each with reflexes that operated near lightspeed, each with hypersophisticated heuristic combat algorithims that enabled it to learn from experience and adapt its tactics instantly to any situation, were certainly beyond Obi-Wan's ability to defeat, but it was not Obi-Wan who would defeat them; Obi-Wan wasn't even fighting. He was only a vessel, emptied of self. The Force, shaped by his skill and guided by his clarity of mind, fought through him.
Sensors: the Hailfire droids only got to fire for 2.5 seconds before they were destroyed by the Vigilance (a Venator-class Star Destroyer).p.288 wrote:While twilight enfolded the sinkhole, over the bright deser above assault craft skimmed the dunes in a tightening ring centred on the city. Hailfire droids rolled out from caves in the wind-scoured mesas, unleashing firestorms of missiles toward the oncoming craft for exactly 2.5 seconds apiece, which was how long it took for the Vigilance's sensor operators to transfer data to its turbolaser batteries.
Thunderbolts roared down through the atmosphere, and hailfire droids disintergrated. Pinpoint counterfire from the bubble-turrets of LAAT/i's met missiles in blossoming fireballs that were ripped to shreds of smoke as the oncoming craft blasted through them.
Sensors/Ground Combat: the composite-beam turrets of LAAT/i's are accurate enough to intercept Hailfire droid missiles, which we know have extremely erratic guided trajectories from the Geonosis ground battle.
Ground Combat: the DC-15 blaster rifles of Clonetroopers are capable of fully-automatic fire. Since they can only be holding and firing the weapon one-handed, they are likely using the DC-15S carbine model, rather than the larger DC-15A seen in universal use on Geonosis.p 289 wrote:Streamers of cable brushed the outer balcony of the control center, and down them slid white-armoured troopers, each with one hand on his mechanized line-brake and the other full of DC-15 blaster rifle on full auto, spraying continuous chains of packeted particle beams.
Size and Scope: as expected, Palpatine speaks of numbers so large they're beyond reckoning for the population of the galaxy.p.291 wrote:"Look out there, Anakin. A trillion beings on this planet alone- in the galaxy as a whole, uncounted quadrillions- and of them all, I have chosen you, Anakin Skywalker, to be the heir to my power. To all that I am."
Misc: an example of the kind of ridiculously dense materials available for frivolous sculpture in the Star Wars galaxy. Which a lightsabre can cut through, given time.p. 320 wrote:As a Jedi shuttle settled to the landing deck outside, the shadow sent its mind into the far deeper night within one of the several pieces of sculpture that graced the office: an abstract twistof solid neuranium, so heavy that the office floor had been specially reinforced to bear its weight, so dense that more sensitive species might, from very close range, actually perceive the tiny warping of the fabric of space-time that was its gravitation.
Neuranium of more than roughly a millimeter thick is impervious to sensors; the standard security scans undergone by all equipment and furniture to enter the Senate Office Building had shown nothing at all. If anybody had used an advanced gravimetric detector, however, they might have discovered that one smallish section of the sculpture massed slightly less than it should have, given that the manifest that had accompanied it, when it was brought from Naboo amoung the then-ambassador's personal effects, clearly stated that it was a piece of soild-forged neuranium.
The manifest was a lie. The sculpture was not entirely solid, and not all of it was neuranium.
...
The darkness within the sculpture whispered of the shape and feel and every intimate resonance of the device it cradled. With a twist of its will, the shadow triggered the device.
The neuranium got warm.
A small round spot, smaller than the circle a human child might make of thumb and forefinger, turned the color of old blood.
Then fresh blood.
Then open flame.
Finally a spear of scarlet energy lanced free, painting the office with the color of stars seen through the smoke of burning planets.
Sensors: Star Wars has gravimetric sensors sensitive enough to detect the difference in mass within the neuranium.
The Force: the act of war further "thickens" the cloud that limits Jedi perception- the same cloud or "shroud" referred to by Yoda and Mace Windu that was limiting the ability of the Jedi to use the Force back in Attack of the Clones.pp. 348-349 wrote:It's not a thrilling climax; it's not the culmination of an epic struggle. Just the opposite, in fact. The Clone Wars were never an epic struggle. They were never intended to be.
What is happening right now is why the Clone Wars were fought in the first place. It is their reason for existence.The Clone Wars have always been, in and of themselves, from their very inception, the revenge of the Sith.
They were irresistible bait. They took place in remote locations, on planets that belonged, primarily, to "somebody eles". They were fought by expendable proxies. And they were constructed as a win-win situation.
The Clone Wars were the perfect Jedi trap.
By fighting at all, the Jedi lost.
With the Jedi Order overextended, spread thin across the galaxy, each Jedi is alone, surrounded only be whatever troops he, she or it commands. War itself pours darkness into the Force, deepening the cloud that limits Jedi perception. And the clones have no malice, no hatred, not the slightest ill intent that might give warning. They are only following orders.
In this case, Order Sixty-Six.
Hold out blasters appear in clone hands. ARC-170s drop back onto the tails of Jedi starfighters. AT-STs swivel their guns. Turrets on hovertanks swung silently.
Clones open fire, and Jedi die.
All across the galaxy. All at once.
Jedi die.
Ground Combat: A canonical reference to hovertanks (presumably using repulsorlifts like landspeeders) used by the Grand Army of the Republic. This may be a reference to the TX-130 Sabre-class "fighter" tank.
Ground Combat: The AT-ST, or an earlier version thereof, was used in the Clone Wars. It is plausible that the other walkers and vehicles seen in the Clone Wars also remained in the Imperial arsenal for some time.
Ground Combat: a glimpse of the weaponry used by the heavy-weapons operators of a Clonetrooper company- T-21 repeating blaster rifles (also used by Stormtroopers in A New Hope, on Tatooine), guided shoulder-fired torpedoes, and proton grenade launchers capable of indirect fire.p. 349 wrote: Cody had coordinated the heavy-weapons operators from five different companies spread over an arc of three different levels of the sinkhole-city ...
He raised his comlink. "Execute."
On that order, T-21 muzzles swung, shoulder fired torps locked on, and proton grenade launchers angled to precisely calibrated elevations.
"Fire."
Kenobi, his dragonmount, and all five of the destroyer droids he'd been fighting vanished in a fireball that for an instant outshone Utapau's sun.
Visual polarizers in Cody's helmet cut the glare by 78 percent; his vision cleared in plenty of time to see shreds of dragonmount and twisted hunks of droid raining into the ocean mouth at the bottom of the sinkhole.
Cody scowled and keyed his comlink. "Looks like the lizard took the worst of it. Deploy the seekers. All of them."
Ground Combat: Clonetrooper units deploy seeker droids to assist in reconnaisance and the acquisition of targets. These are probably similar to the model seen in use by the Stormtroopers searching for the droids in A New Hope.
Ground Combat: canonical reference to the vision aid devices present in Clonetrooper (and by extension, Stormtrooper) helmets.
The Force: self-explanatory.p. 354 wrote:He clipped it back to his belt by feel, and- using only a minor exercise of Jedi discipline to suppress compulsive coughing, he contracted his diaphragm, forcing as much water from his lungs as he could.
Computers and Androids: Clonetrooper seekers obviously have self-preservation programming.pp. 357-358 wrote: He had walked only a few hundred metres before the gloom ahead of him was pierced by the white glare of high-intensity searchlights ...
Their searchlights illuminated- and, apparently, awakened- some sort of immense amphibian cousin of a dragonmount ...
The Huge Slimy Cave-Monster in question promptly opened jaws that could engulf a bantha and snapped one of the seekers from the air, chewing it to slivers with every evidence of satisfaction. The second seeker emitted a startled and thoroughly alarmed wheepwheepwheep and shot away into the darkness, with the creature in hot pursuit.
Sensors: a wealth of canonical information about Star Wars sensors.p. 359 wrote:Tantive IV swept through the Kashyyk system on silent running; this was still a combat zone. Captain Antilles wouldn't even risk standard scans, because they could so easily be detected and backtracked by Separatist forces.
...
"Bail stared through the forward view wall. Kashyyk was only a tiny green disk two hundred thousand kilometres away. "Do you have a vector?"
"Roughly, sir. It seems to be on an orbital tangent, headed outsystem."
"I think we can risk a scan. Tight beam."
"Very well, sir."
Antilles gave the necessary orders, and moments later the scan tech reported that the object they'd picked up seemed to be some sort of escape pod. "It's not a Republic model, sir- wait, here comes the database-"
The scan tech frowned at his screen. "It's ... Wookie, sir."
...
"Interesting." Bail didn't yet allow himself to hope. "Lifesigns?"
"Yes- well, maybe ... this reading doesn't make any ..."
The scan tech could only shrug. "I'm not sure, sir. Whatever it is, it's no Wookie, that's for sure ..."
1. Ships can run in a reduced emissions mode to reduce their detectability to enemy sensors.
2. This reduced emissions mode includes scanning.
3. Scanning can be modulated to "tight beam", presumably to minimize the above risks.
4. The Tantive IV can not only detect an escape pod roughly 200,000km away- but it can also check a database to see what the target is, identify it precisely, scan for lifesigns, and determine what kind of life it is, to the point of detail in this case that is most assuredly not a Wookie.
Propulsion: techniques used by a hyperdrive-capable craft to evade pursuit. Presumably these attempts worked.p. 360 wrote:Obi-Wan took General Grievous's starfighter screaming out of the atmosphere so fast he popped the gravity well and made jump before the Vigilance could even scramble its fighters. He reverted to real space well beyond the system, kicked the starfighter to a new vector, and jumped again. A few more jumps of random direction and duration left him deep in interstellar space.
Communications: Obi-Wan is able to patch in General Grievous' comm system into his Jedi comlink, then use the galaxy-wide Holonet system to call out to any Jedi, anywhere.p. 360 wrote:
While the starfighter's nav system whirred and clunked its way through recalculating his position, he punched codes to gang his Jedi comlink into the starfighter's system.
Instead of a holoscan, the comlink generated an audio signal- an accelerating series of beeps.
Obi-Wan knew the signal. Every Jedi did. It was the recall code.
It was being broadcast on every channel by every Holonet repeater. It was supposed to mean that the war was over. It was supposed to mean that the Council had ordered all Jedi to return to the Temple immediately.
Obi-Wan suspected it actually meant what had happened on Utapau was far from an isolated incident.
He keyed the comlink for audio. He took a deep breath.
"Emergency Code Nine Thirteen," he said, and waited.
The starfighter's comm system cycled through every response frequency.
He waited some more.
"Emergency Code Nine Thirteen. This is Obi-Wan Kenobi. Repeat: Emergency Code Nine Thirteen. Are there any Jedi out there?"
Computers & Androids: Anakin's droid arm is strong enough to punch out a door.p.376 wrote:The conference room door was closed. A barrier so paltry would be an insult to the blade; a black-gloved hand made a fist. The door crumpled and fell.
The Sith Lord stepped over it.
As always Mike is free to take what he wishes from here to put up on the canon database on the main site, though I don't know what Mike's position on spoilers is.
