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This is the picture in question. Notice the Exacutor Star Dreadnought in the foreground and the Eclipse prototype in the backround. Based on my eye the eclipse is signifiacntly bigger than the ESD.

Foun at Gamespot

Errr.... I feel like an Idiot but I can't see the Eclipse... (unless it's that big shadow towards the top of the picture)

Yes its the big black thing at the top.

I think I might buy Empire at War just to see this during the game

and isn't the DE-length of 16 km higher in canon-priority than a game ?

No shit, the Eclipse is twice as long a Super. Fuck, I don't even like star wars, and I know that.

could be the 8 km length returning, also judging from the size of the ISDs to the Executor

(no calculation, only an estimate)

EDIT: fixed Typo

Dominus Atheos wrote:No shit, the Eclipse is twice as long a Super. Fuck, I don't even like star wars, and I know that.

I don't remember 16 KM being twice as long as 19KM, but that might be math that's causing me the problem there.

And regardless of what a game shows, Dark Empire gives a smaller size, so unless there's some very interesting rationlization, this gets dumped out with other bizarre game notions.

That really depends on how long Executor is, though. If she's not 19km as she should be, then it's not a concern. We'd write it off as another erroneous game. EaW isn't exactly accurate with regard to scaling and the like.

If she is 19km, then Eclipse might have to be rescaled too. It depends.

and isn't the DE-length of 16 km higher in canon-priority than a game ?

Not if they retcon it to be even bigger. Fortunately, there is no visual certainty either way in the Dark Empire books, so this type of upscaling is reasonable. 8)

I did some quick measurements in The Gimp and the ESD seems to be about 10 times the size of the ASD directly on top of it. What's the official size for an Acclimator?

752 meters long?

Bear in mind, sizes can be scaled by players in the game.

Raesene wrote:could be the 8 km length returning, also judging from the size of the ISDs to the Executor
(no calculation, only an estimate)
EDIT: fixed Typo

Take a closer look at the Executor's bridge tower and the Imperators surrounding it. Many of Imperators towers are quite larger than the Executor's ie much closer to the camera than the Executor.

Soontir C'boath wrote:

Raesene wrote:could be the 8 km length returning, also judging from the size of the ISDs to the Executor
(no calculation, only an estimate)
EDIT: fixed Typo

Take a closer look at the Executor's bridge tower and the Imperators surrounding it. Many of Imperators towers are quite larger than the Executor's ie much closer to the camera than the Executor.

good point - I never tried to scale by picture seriously before, and only considered the closet SDs

The destroyers off the starboard bow are Victories, which have a smaller conning tower and can also not be used for scaling directly ?

VT-16 wrote:752 meters long?

Bear in mind, sizes can be scaled by players in the game.

They can? So a screen like this could be manufactured simply by jiggling the scaling settings?

Erm, the ships can be scaled? How?

I know that in the vanilla edition of EaW the ISDs are undersized. People have made (unofficial) mods to resize them, but I was under the impression they rescaled the models.

Either way, I don't know if EaW: FoC has rescaled the ISD correctly or not.

Each ship/ground unit has a scale line in their XML file that controls their size, its easy to have Tie Fighters the size of Star Destroyers or Ewok giants by just editing the text file number.

The Executor in EaW (although the exp pack has yet to be released) can't be to scale as the maps just plain wont fit. The mods that have added a SSD can have the ship in game at scales size but it wont fit on even the largest map, and even scaling it down to just double the length of a SD still makes it sluggish and impractical as a game unit.
Also in EaW big ships like the Eclipse/SSD appear considerably below the normal game axis (an attempt at 3D!) which is the only way to even attemt to get these units to fit.

1. Last I checked game visuals were several meters below the bottom of the totem pole where canonicity is concerned.
2. As there's no way to tell wether the Eclipse or the alleged Executor is closer to the camera what are you basing the relative sizes on, DK?
3. I can see one and a fraction engines visible on the alleged Executor. From this angle we should see either a lot more or none of them (I'm a little hazy on how far the engines protruded).

As there's no way to tell wether the Eclipse or the alleged Executor is closer to the camera what are you basing the relative sizes on, DK?

Because, in the game, this Tyber Zann character builds up a fleet and tries to steal the Eclipse prototype. If you notice, there's small pirate ships above the Eclipse and Zann destroyers firing those big plasma shots in the direction of the Imperial fleet. The Executor and the Eclipse are supposed to be on opposite teams in this scenario.

Either way, I'm sure the Eclipse will now be added to the OS databank in conjunction with the expansion pack's release, and we'll see what it says. Probably have a size upscaling to keep the Emperor's ship longer than Vader's. :P

Looking at this screenshot, it may be:

1. That this screenshot was taken in an earlier version of the game while they still had some scaling issues to work out.

2. The Developers may have incorrect information ala Impeial II's during ANH.

3. It may have been scaled up or down for gameplay issues.

Well, since you can haxxor the xml and it's a game (thus largely worthless), I'm with Batman. Meaningless, worthless, ignore it.

darthkommandant wrote:*snip*
This is the picture in question. Notice the Exacutor Star Dreadnought in the foreground and the Eclipse prototype in the backround. Based on my eye the eclipse is signifiacntly bigger than the ESD.

Well, to nitpick, we've always known the Eclipse is substantially larger -- deeper, wider, more massive -- than Executor-class ships.

But I take it you know that and are familiar enough with the "debate" about the latter's dimensions. You're more concerned with the ships' comparative lengths.

I see why. It does appear as if that Eclipse prototype is much longer than the Executor-class ship.

But I wouldn't pay it much mind for two reasons, one of which is key:

1 -- We don't know if this prototype is the same size as Palpatine's ship in Dark Empire.

Since this isn't Star Trek and we're not talking about the weekly Bird-of-Prey's scale, I'd wager the ships are the same size. However ...

2 -- ... and far more importantly, the scaling in those games is totally unreliable. Look at the size of those TIEs next to their motherships! (Note: it's not simply that all of the TIEs are much closer to the camera. Even when the fighters emerge from the Star Destroyers' main hangars and first maneuver into view, they still appear ridiculously large next to capships.)

Ignore the sizes. Ignore how the ships stack up against one another. Remember that a few dozen Y-Wings can take out an ISD in EAW The story in the game, if anything, might be pertinent; everything else is, as Batman said, buried somewhere deep down under the canon totem pole.

VT-16 wrote:

As there's no way to tell wether the Eclipse or the alleged Executor is closer to the camera what are you basing the relative sizes on, DK?

Because, in the game, this Tyber Zann character builds up a fleet and tries to steal the Eclipse prototype. If you notice, there's small pirate ships above the Eclipse and Zann destroyers firing those big plasma shots in the direction of the Imperial fleet. The Executor and the Eclipse are supposed to be on opposite teams in this scenario.

And this has which bearing on the relative distances of the two ships from the camera, pray tell?
And Stark agrees with me. I'm officially worried.

Yoda wrote:Looking at this screenshot, it may be:

1. That this screenshot was taken in an earlier version of the game while they still had some scaling issues to work out.

2. The Developers may have incorrect information ala Impeial II's during ANH.

3. It may have been scaled up or down for gameplay issues.

The devs have said the sizes are as they are for balance reasons, and so that the larger high poly models work fine on older computers. Its for specific game reasons. Besides, its insanely easy enough to mod the correct size into the game.

And this has which bearing on the relative distances of the two ships from the camera, pray tell?

Oh, I don't know, fleets facing each other, perhaps? :P

VT-16 wrote:

And this has which bearing on the relative distances of the two ships from the camera, pray tell?

Oh, I don't know, fleets facing each other, perhaps?

Over an established distance of...?