Questions about the Hoth ion cannon

[Elfdart]

How big was it? Length, diameter?

If it was able to immobilize an ISD with two hits, why not mount it on a Rebel cruiser?

[Elheru Aran]

How big was it? Length, diameter?

If it was able to immobilize an ISD with two hits, why not mount it on a Rebel cruiser?

I'm not really sure on length/diameter, but it was pretty good-sized; at least the size of a respectable two-story building when the cannon was retracted into the main housing.

Regarding the cruiser question... the main reason planetary weapons are powerful is because you can supply them with a much larger power plant; what you see on the surface is only the actual weapon, not the total system. The ion cannon was undoubtedly fed directly from the base's reactor, allowing it to output massive quantities of energy in a few bolts, unlike a warship's reactor, which has to split power between shielding, propulsion, life support, and weapons. Just read any of the EU-- the fighters are always talking about redirecting power to the weapons, the shields, etc... simple, really. Just a question of delivering power. You could conceivably do that, but it wouldn't be worth it as you'd be using up most of your ship's power to make a few medium-powered shots, at most...

[Kazuaki Shimazaki]

To reinforce that previous point, supposedly the ITW has IDed the source of the new reactor. It was from a Praetor class Star Battlecruiser. That's a little big a power source for a MC80. Then there's recoil considerations.

[Kurgan]

I wonder if we'll see any ship based ion cannons in ROTS?

So far the Hoth Ion Cannon seems to be the only filmic example of one being used, even though the supplemental literature all postulates ion cannons on just about everything from fighters to bases to capital ships.

[Spanky The Dolphin]

Don't say "postulates," that sounds biased.

[Elfdart]

To reinforce that previous point, supposedly the ITW has IDed the source of the new reactor. It was from a Praetor class Star Battlecruiser. That's a little big a power source for a MC80. Then there's recoil considerations.

Too bad. It would have turned a Rebel ship into a GFFA version of a PT Boat: A ship with a punch way out of proportion to its size.

[Kurgan]

Don't say "postulates," that sounds biased.

I've written what I've written.

[Bob the Gunslinger]

How big was it? Length, diameter?

I'd say a 42 DD. But it was very cold, so there might be some variation.

If it was able to immobilize an ISD with two hits, why not mount it on a Rebel cruiser?

Not enough support.

[Stark]

Ahhh, Kurgans got a good point. Ion cannons? Where? Oh yes, EVERYWHERE! :rolls:

The sole canonical ion cannon is a massive immobile planetary defence gun powered by a battlecruisers powercore. Lets put some on Slave-1!

[Elfdart]

How big was it? Length, diameter?

I'd say a 42 DD. But it was very cold, so there might be some variation.

If it was able to immobilize an ISD with two hits, why not mount it on a Rebel cruiser?

Not enough support.

Maybe something that lifts and separates...

[GeneralTacticus]

The sole canonical <Superlaser> is <A planet-killing beam mounted on a 160km-wide battle station>. Lets put some on <Clone-trooper gunships>!

[Stark]

The sole canonical <Superlaser> is <A planet-killing beam mounted on a 160km-wide battle station>. Lets put some on <Clone-trooper gunships>!

Christ. DS laser kills planets, gunship laser kills infantry. Massive groundbased ion cannon temporaliy disables small Imperial warships; fighter based ion cannons... ... reduce pain while shaving? Make it easier to see in the dark? Its a question of scale, and a gun running off a massive battlecruisers powerplant disabling a fucking DESTROYER doesn't speak well for fighter-class guns, now does it?

[GeneralTacticus]

The sole canonical <Superlaser> is <A planet-killing beam mounted on a 160km-wide battle station>. Lets put some on <Clone-trooper gunships>!

Christ. DS laser kills planets, gunship laser kills infantry. Massive groundbased ion cannon temporaliy disables small Imperial warships; fighter based ion cannons... ... reduce pain while shaving? Make it easier to see in the dark? Its a question of scale, and a gun running off a massive battlecruisers powerplant disabling a fucking DESTROYER doesn't speak well for fighter-class guns, now does it?

Given the shields that the Hoth Ion Cannon would have had to overcome to disable an ISD, I'd say that just scaling the weapon down wouldn't work that badly. Say the fighter-mounted version is a million times smaller than the Hoth version (a number I pulled out of my ass, but is probably far too low; it would require the fighter-mounted version to be a hundred times smaller in every dimension, and that would make it man-portable), it would still be able to break kiloton-level shielding at the very least.

[Stark]

Given the shields that the Hoth Ion Cannon would have had to overcome to disable an ISD, I'd say that just scaling the weapon down wouldn't work that badly. Say the fighter-mounted version is a million times smaller than the Hoth version (a number I pulled out of my ass, but is probably far too low; it would require the fighter-mounted version to be a hundred times smaller in every dimension, and that would make it man-portable), it would still be able to break kiloton-level shielding at the very least.

Thats entirely speculative. Canonically, there is no evidence that ion cannons can be made smaller. There is no evidence they *can't*, either, however since we don't understand the technology we can't go around saying crazy things like fighter-level ion guns. They're in the EU, it doesn't expressly contradict the canon, so they exist; they're just fucking stupid. Blue bolts? Disable without damage? Did these people even WATCH ESB? EU ion guns might be completely different; I'd imagine the ESB ion cannon would destroy a fighter with an actual hit.

[Kurgan]

What would you use a small ion cannon for? Well I guess if you're in a fighter and you want to disable rather than destroy another fighter or something...

Or have a bunch of fighters fire them at somebody. But yeah, pretty much. Cool if they've got 'em, but why don't they ever use 'em? Or why carry them at all if they're used so rarely?


Edit: Maybe it had something to do with disabling droids (so you can scavange the metal better?), but then that was 20+ years ago and these are all supposed to be "newer", since I assume we're talking OT ships here. If they're on the Death Star somewhere, sure we could have easily missed them, but to me the biggest argument for Ion Cannons on everything right now seems to be game balance.

[Kazuaki Shimazaki]

The sole canonical ion cannon is a massive immobile planetary defence gun powered by a battlecruisers powercore. Lets put some on Slave-1!

The only canon evidence where there is enough to draw a line suggests that weapons are massively scalable in SW. You can see that same greenish energy from the massive SL all the way to little TIE Fighters.

Honestly, I can't see how it is any crime to decide that the ion cannon can also be scalable. The film says neither way, most weapons techs are at least somewhat scalable, and we don't have enough knowledge to say why not.

The blue is pretty careless.

Ion cannons do cause some damage in SW official (see even Bacta War where the ion attack exploded at least a monitor and the system clearly cannot recover fully, suggesting something was fried in the Lusankya's ion attack). It is best not to take the "without damage" 100% literally and without limits - rather, take it with some rational limits. Obviously in an stupidly extreme situation like KDY-150 vs fighter, the fighter would die.

If you want to groan, I'd groan first at that stupid and contradicted-in-film idea about ion cannons getting free passes through shields. Fortunately, not everyone writing EU seemed to have taken that one seriously.

Or have a bunch of fighters fire them at somebody. But yeah, pretty much. Cool if they've got 'em, but why don't they ever use 'em? Or why carry them at all if they're used so rarely?

Not that many fighters IIRC carry ion cannon. The B-Wing does, and the Y-Wing and TIE Defender IIRC sometimes carry ion cannon. They are used against small ships. In Rebel Dawn, it was described how after using proton torpedoes against a corvette to down the shields in advance, they can use ion cannon to slowly paralyze it.

[Kurgan]

As far as scalability goes, you have a point. Those ball turret "superlasers" on the LAAT's look like mini Death Star blasts.

Then again, we're assuming that the Ion Cannon is similar to a turbolaser, which I suppose isn't so unreasonable since it "looks like" a red turbolaser bolt. These "blue" ion cannon shots seem to come from video games (and comics? I can't remember).

[Crazedwraith]

Ion cannons do cause some damage in SW official (see even Bacta War where the ion attack exploded at least a monitor and the system clearly cannot recover fully, suggesting something was fried in the Lusankya's ion attack). It is best not to take the "without damage" 100% literally and without limits - rather, take it with some rational limits. Obviously in an stupidly extreme situation like KDY-150 vs fighter, the fighter would die.

In fact this happened in the first X-Wing book, Borleia's Ion cannons are fring at the attacking fleet and Rogue 2 gets hit and Killed by one of the blasts.

[Stark]

I'm not saying they're not scalable; I'm suggesting they're not effectively scalable. See, I see BC -> disables DD. Whats a fighter going to disable? Would ion guns be effective without this massive power disparity? Then again, I can't remember if the BC powercore was running the gun and the shield or just the gun, so ignore me.

Ion cannons may just be the planetary defence gun of choice (although I'm not sure how that would work, unless they are less interactive with atmosphere or something). Indeed, in SW they try and disable ships and don't use ion guns (ie Amidalas ship in TPM). Yes, ion guns essentially only exist because of WEG and fucking X-wing. Because you'd waste hardpoints on a fighter for guns you rarely use, and you'd use a Y-wing with ions instead of refitting a better ship. Blerh.

[Elfdart]

Boy, the more questions I ask about the Ion Cannon, the more answers I get, which only raises more questions...

Since there was no mention of lowering shields from the ISD that gets pimp-slapped over Hoth, is it safe to assume that its shields were up? If so, does the fact that the bolts from the Hoth gun weren't affected by shields mean that ion guns have some special ability to break through shields? If that's the case, could it be that maybe fighter-mounted ion cannons can do the same against fighter-strength shields?

According to WEG (I know, and I agree), the twin guns on the canopy of the Y-wing are ion cannons. If this kind of gun has some sort of shield penetration ability AND sends its victims spiraling out of control, then they are an ideal weapon -except that to be really effective, the fighter would need a tailgunner like on WW2 fighter-bombers and the ability to fire toward the rear of the ship. If Gold Squadron had tailgunners like that, the Battle of Yavin would have been over very quickly.

[Mr Bean]

According to WEG (I know, and I agree), the twin guns on the canopy of the Y-wing are ion cannons. If this kind of gun has some sort of shield penetration ability AND sends its victims spiraling out of control, then they are an ideal weapon -except that to be really effective, the fighter would need a tailgunner like on WW2 fighter-bombers and the ability to fire toward the rear of the ship. If Gold Squadron had tailgunners like that, the Battle of Yavin would have been over very quickly.

Except not all Y-Wings are two seaters with a tailgunner not to mention the fact that the Death Star had a few thousand ties to call on....

Not to mention it still had all those surface guns

[Stark]

Elfdart, the ion gun is powered by a far larger powercore than the ISD. It doesn't NEED super-shield-penetrating-uberness, it can simply be TOO POWERFUL for the ISD to deflect. IIRC, the first shot does hardly any of the purple crackling, but the second covers the whole tower. Kind of suggests it had to break down the shield, doesn't it?

And since regular starfigher guns kill starfighters in one hit anyway, why use ion cannons? Capturing can be done the same way it is done in the movies; dial down the power and damage them.

[Kazuaki Shimazaki]

Since there was no mention of lowering shields from the ISD that gets pimp-slapped over Hoth, is it safe to assume that its shields were up? If so, does the fact that the bolts from the Hoth gun weren't affected by shields mean that ion guns have some special ability to break through shields? If that's the case, could it be that maybe fighter-mounted ion cannons can do the same against fighter-strength shields?

Look at the frames in slow motion. You would realize that something was attempting to disperse the bolt, just that the bolt was too powerful. Of course, WEG never bothers to analyze the film in any detail, and jumped to the same conclusion you did.

[Kazuaki Shimazaki]

I'm not saying they're not scalable; I'm suggesting they're not effectively scalable. See, I see BC -> disables DD. Whats a fighter going to disable?

The BC can disable the DD in one shot, clean through its shields almost as if they don't exist (unless you use slow motion). The DD would no doubt take more time against another DD.

A fighter is going to disable an opposing fighter, or by working together, they can slowly work their way around a shieldless small ships, paralyzing systems area by area until there was nothing left. They would eventually be able to power back up, but it gives you a time gap where you can try to capture it.

Indeed, in SW they try and disable ships and don't use ion guns (ie Amidalas ship in TPM).

And of course, Devastator used TLs rather than ion guns. But then, they weren't trying to take it as intact as possible. They want to disable it, without thought to intactness of the entire hull. Accurate aiming is sufficient.

[UCBooties]

Ion cannons are used on bombers to help soften up shielded targets before dumpind the payload. They're used to help overload shields and disrupt electrical systems. They have also been used to take medium sized ships intact. They're useless whn facing capships, but fighter mounted ions do well against other fighters and moderately well against larger support craft. I'm not sure why the idea of scaling bothers you so much. It seems pretty simple that power decreases when the energy sources is decreased. Nothing in the EU has contradicted this, so why are you so stuck on this?