Something big

[evillejedi]

I did some mockups of the other major vessels from the byss shots and then added it to a scale chart file I keep around, besides some of the star dreadnoughts/ battleships and some really new stuff in comics and books I think this gets almost all of the daggerator vessels (and anything that is sanely capable of being modeled from dark empire)

http://warlords.swrebellion.com/junk/z.jpg

[Big Orange]

What is that third biggest vessel out the Executor-class (longest) and Ecllipse-class (bulkiest) Star Dreadnoughs, evillejedi?

[The Original Nex]

I'm guessing it's meant to be a Sovereign

[Thanas]

Your guess would be correct.

[fractalsponge1]

Working on the bulb, because placing windows is driving me nuts.



And some ridiculously large shots of the rest (really large):

http://fractalsponge.net/bigger/69.jpg
http://fractalsponge.net/bigger/70.jpg
http://fractalsponge.net/bigger/72.jpg

[fusion]

Working on the bulb, because placing windows is driving me nuts.
http://fractalsponge.net/bigger/73.jpg

I can't say that I like the squiggliness of the bulb... Even though each of the panels are huge (probably size of football stadiums), they seem too small too fine and have too much edges...

[fractalsponge1]

^I'll put an ISD next to the bulb, then we'll see if you think the edges are too fine still .

Mockup of the ventral area:

[Azron_Stoma]

I'm suddenly wanting them to do a Beowulf like CG movie of Vector Prime and have the Bellator and this type of ship (I personally am gravitating towards the name Illuminator Class, especially if you want to go for a less evil sounding name as you stated before) appear in it, would this and it's smaller cousin the Bellator fit in a Yuuzhan Vong war era Imperial Remnant?

would they have the political will/resources to develop it before the Vong show up? Presumably Intended to be used against the New Republic, but then they become invaluable against the Vong in classic Villian/Hero team-up vs Bigger Villian style. and a republic guy say something like "never thought i'd say this but, I'm glad you're on our side for once"

or is that a bit too cliche?

another option is to give it a red paint job and refer to it as the Crimson Blade II or an alternate version of the CB for an updated and more Accurate version of Wong's story Conquest (one where Warp Ramming isn't depicted as being useful, Borg are more helpless against the Empire, and the Shuttle crash into the AT-AT head doesn't even phase it) though granted, alot of the plot I think hinges on the Empire being slightly more vulnerable, (though still unstoppable, they can at least be harmed in that story)

I always fantasized about it being made into a 4 part CG miniseries (once again with Beowulf level animation)

I wonder what Patrick Stewart would think of that script, it's Definitely not what one would expect from a crossover, and would really shock people if it was made into that kind of miniseries (both in the sense of the fact that most people would prolly think it was a worse idea than freedy vs jason or aliens vs predator (which was only a bad idea in the movies, the comics and more importantly the games handled it alot better) but find out it's story is deep and unpredictable, not a simple minded good guys vs bad guys team battle.)

but hey, if he actually liked the X-3 script, It's practically a guarantee he would like that.



aaaanyhow I'm really going off on a wierd tangent, guess the sheer awesomeness of your work fractalsponge1 blew out something in my brain. and what I'm mostly trying to say is I WANT TO SEE THIS SHIP IN A MOVIE!

[Vehrec]

It seems unlikely that a dozen underdeveloped outer rim sectors could hold onto or build one of these monsters. Bellators would be likewise difficult to maintain and build, although a small surviving number might be carefully horded. In my book, most members of the class that were actually built probably were in the Deep Core for Palpatine's return and were destroyed in the events of Dark Empire.

[Thanas]

^Or destroyed in the self-destruct of the empire after that idiot Isard lost control. There were like, what, three full-blown civil wars during her reign and countless after she lost coruscant?

So yeah, the best hope for any surviving Bellator would be either in the Unknown regions (Possible, but doubtful, since Thrawn and by extension his empire did not have a SSD as command ship or at least we do not know about it - it may very well be the case that he only used the ISD Grey Wolf for core travel as he was more of a persona non grata there) or in the Remnant, which did field at least one SSD during the Vong era.

[fractalsponge1]

I tend to agree with Vehrec and Thanas. The Remnant doesn't seem to have the industrial muscle to pull something like this dreadnought off, at least not in any reasonable sort of time; maybe in a decade or so and at great cost to its other building programs. Though that depends on how easy you think it is to build large ships; Black Sword command had a shipyard that could handle Executors, Delvardus managed to build Night Hammer with the scrapings of some two bit tinpot empire, and DS2 was largely made onsite in the middle of nowhere. Assembly seems to hardly be a problem, complex components might be more limiting. All this changes, of course, if there were some kind of back-door support from KDY, like with the Eclipse, or if the Remnant starting using re-purposed World Devastators or the speculated DS2-style self-replicating manufacturing to churn out ship components.

You wonder how much of the Imperial Starfleet was lost at Byss. Certainly a decade of galactic disintegration and mass warfare would have culled the list, in terms of ships defected, appropriated by warlords, or major member states like Kuat, Anaxes, Corellia, or Tepasi, laid up or abandoned awaiting repair if not actually destroyed. Still, even if 75% of the fleet were lost, or rendered unserviceable, that's still a gigantic amount of ships available for Shadow Hand. Where'd those go? They can't all have been sitting in Byss orbit and lost. What about the fleets already engaged, building, or under repair? Would make for an amusing AU fic, actually; some surviving strategic forces commander taking a few World Devastators, the remnants of the Core Starfleet, and pulling a Kerensky and squirreling away in the galactic halo or satellite galaxies. Throw in a dash of revolutionary chaos and Great Powers intrigue in the Core, and after a few clones and World Devastators mature, and voila, a more credible a threat to the New Republic than the stupid Vong or the bannana republic warlords from Darksaber etc. In that scenario, it wouldn't even have to be direct conquest of every single world; simply hit the New Republic and its mobile forces hard enough that the major Core Worlds start figuring it's more worthwhile dealing with a reformed Empire than propping up a losing side that can no longer serve its security or ideological interests. Anyway, random rant, ignore that.

[Thanas]

^Well, we know the Remnant at the time of the Caamas crisis didn't field an SSD, but the Remnant of the Vong period (a mere half-decade later) fielded one.

I think a dreadnought is very unlikely to have survived the civil wars - the way the empire is set up, these are almost always command ships of important people, who were all killed off. Heck, the best the empire had at the end was a Vice-Admiral. Even their capital world during the time of Carivus only had ISDs as defending forces.

As for pulling a Kerensky - I don't know. Daala did something of the sort, but the fact of the matter is that you need a lot of support chains for those ships - Isard had enough trouble supporting one SSD, even when she had Thyferra's plentiful resources to fall back on.

I suggest Shadow Hand was also very, very costly - remember, unlike what Thrawn did (whittle away the reserves of the NR and then strike), Shadown Hand seemed like a full frontal assault on heavily defended systems. Casualties there must have been enormous, as suggested by the loss of high-profile and elite ships like the Chimaera.

[fractalsponge1]

Well, the Kerensky-ish fanfic idea depends on a few things - von Neumann manufacturing like World Devastators is one; I know there's some speculation about such things being political anathema post-Clone Wars, but really, it's total galactic war; why not take the gloves off? It's something Daala didn't have or was too stupid or shortsighted to use; in any event, Darksaber makes it sound like she pretty much took all the warlord assets, minimally integrated them, and then immediately attacked without building anything else. And that was a pretty tiny pool to begin with (I know this is Darksaber, but still), sounds like less than a Sector Group, minus Night Hammer. Given enough space and time, and a much larger initial pool of talent and active ships, I think the scenario could work.

Seems to me that, barring the AU diversion above, the only dreadnoughts or star battleship-class ships to survive are either in New Republic service or taken over by the major Core powers; what would Shadow Hand have gone after if not New Republic-aligned or leaning-New Republic Core Worlds with their own heavy defense fleets? Certainly doesn't seem like the New Republic itself at that time had the juice to stop a fraction of what was shown at Byss. With the disintegration of central control, it seems to me there's as much room for Imperial officers going warlord with their fleets as simply signing on as condottierri/household troops to the great powers in the Core, especially if recruitment for garrison forces was local to begin with.

Of course I talk like I'll actually write such a thing, which is preposterous for someone of my limited literary talent...

[Thanas]

Well, we know that the NR powers have the pesky little habit of keeping their heavy assets close to their homeworlds. So the total NR fleet available for offensive additions is a mere fraction of their total defence strength (as Wedge himself says in the Hand of Thrawn books). Therefore, the Imperial fleet might very well have been up against strong opposition in those heavily defended systems (like Duros, for example).

[fractalsponge1]

Fair enough, the fanfic scenario I have in my head relies on having access to a decent slice of the Imperial central forces, time and space to use World Devastators to build up, covert political and financial support from some elements of the Core Worlds, and a balance of power whereby the Core Worlds put together probably outmuscle, economically and population wise, at least, the nascent New Republic. Though it doesn't seem like a stretch to say that that was the case during the Empire as well. The New Republic doesn't have the military power of the Empire, and so depends much more on the contributions and goodwill of the major Core powers to maintain itself, much like the dimilitarized Old Republic before the Clone Wars. The military and political will and self-interest of those powers are the real target; without their support, the New Republic falls (in the absence of enough force to suppress them like the Empire had). Of course you'd have to do it quickly enough that full mobilization of the Core Worlds that do support the Republic swamps you in a war of attrition, but that's just an opportunity to write huge battles versus the New Republic mobile central forces, and lots of cloak-and-dagger manuevering in the galactic halls of power.

After the failure of Shadow Hand (though I don't think there's any indication about the result of the other major fleet operations besides Mon Cal), the imperial field should be fairly clear of major characters, so that leaves lots of room for new characters. Assuming 10 years to build up, the New Republic probably would have the first Viscounts up and running, and the New Class available in numbers. Pretty much an ideal set up for massive naval warfare with the iconic and best of the new designs in a strategic scenario much closer to parity (more like the Clone Wars than the first Civil War)

[Thanas]

Fractal, this is completely out of order, but I was wondering - might I trouble you for a shot of a capship missile launcher?

Like you did with the guns here.

[fractalsponge1]

Hm, the launchers only really makes sense in structural context, so here are a few shots where they're seen closer (heavy/strategic missile launch tubes):



Two quad-pack in the Bellator bow region (final version is two triple-pack instead of quad).



Tube cluster in Bellator trench.

And the turret pic is outdated (this one is too, but closer to current):


In order, left to right: back row: Quad 240-teraton, twin 720-teraton, single 720-teraton, single 720-teraton ball, quad 175-teraton, triple ball 175-teraton ion, quad ball 175-teraton, quad ball 240-teraton iron; foreground: octuple 32/40-teraton, quad 200-gigaton MTL

Let me know if those missile tube shots are ok - I can whip up a quick render with it closer up if necessary.

[Thanas]

No, those will be fine, thank you.
Could you answer another question for me?


What are the structures circled red? No need to bring up special pictures, I just want to know what they are.

[fractalsponge1]

Yeah so those are a bit tricky. They're unlabeled in the Venator ICS, but I assumed that they are external neutrino radiators. There are similar structures above and below the secondary engine mounts of an ISD.

[JointStrikeFighter]

Flap actuator?

[Azron_Stoma]

now when you give the number of barrels and the yield, is that the yield per barrel?

It would be interesting to see the ISD 1 turrets on that list and what their yields are, Double Ion and Double Turbo, as well as the 3 Tripple Turbo Axial guns mentioned in the ICS and the quad brim trench ones.

then there's the concept art for the single and dual turbos that were supposed to be dotted along the surface in ROTJ, but for budget reasons weren't shown in detail (they show up in Battlefront 2 as the beam turrets on moncals and ISDs though)

[fractalsponge1]

I'm using those figures as per shot, per barrel, per second. Lots of fudge factors there; for HTL, we only have hard numbers for the average power fed through the guns, not how that's parceled out (I could be wrong about this, if there are indications of HTL fire rate and power distribution in the canon or EU, please, someone let me know). Could be hugely destructive individual shots from capacitor power, delivered with much longer intervals, or a perfect per second, per barrel average of reactor power, or phalanx-level ROF with miniscule yield per bolt depending on how far power levels can adjust, no idea.

I'm using ECR's estimate that ISDI HTL are 175-teraton and ISDII guns are 32-teraton, which is at least a starting point. Based on the ISDII, the flank turrets at least seem common to all variants. Maximum for an ISD frame seem to be 4 heavy flank turrets, two heavy notch turrets, and three heavy axial turrets for HTL, in whatever combination of weapons you have available and want to bolt on. Reactor power is basically constant though, so rate of fire or space converted to capacitor volume will have to suffer depending on what fit is in place. Thus, while the axial and notch positions are plated over in Avenger, that doesn't preclude that particular ship being a variant, or the presence of other variants reinstating major weapons in those positions, at a cost to rate of fire due to the limits of the reactor. It's thus also possible that the Devastator is a variant that is relatively over-armed with heavy-caliber and slow-firing weapons, or that the big guns aren't 175 and are optimally used at 1 shot per second. Pretty much what you choose to believe really, since there's no hard and fast rule about the classifications.

The small single and dual turbos are probably LTL or MTL mounts, but there's not too much indication of scale in the sketches. SWTC mentions they were used as trench guns in Dark Empire, but I don't have any of those shots or information about how big they looked in them. Axial turrets from the ICS look pretty small, no idea about yield, possibly ISDII main gun-scale, if they are HTL at all.

Updates, prow region detailing, and the second shot is a linked 6400pixel shot (you are warned).

[Thanas]

So....superlaser mount at the bow or not?

[fractalsponge1]

^Haven't quite decided.

Some big renders (6400pix wide); lots of work on the ventral side:





11-12 million polys now, not removed the scratch layer yet so somewhere around that range.

Mounted and visible armament is ~880 petatons, ~352xISD, per volley, all arcs. Not quite done; should be close to 400x ISD. If there's too much to spare, mini axial superlaser is one solution .

I am leaning increasingly towards Assertor or Illuminator as a class name, with HIMS Wrath as the particular ship...

[Torben]

See, now that's what I think of when I think of Imperial Star Destroyer. I know, this is 400x an ISD, I'm simply talking about bristling with weaponry, sensors, and stuff. Not the lameass 8 turret model from the original trilogy - this is the kind of model we should be seeing whenever the opening credits roll. BTW, fractal, awesome work. Been following your stuff for a while now, and it puts my meager modeling attempts to shame.