Weak blasters in TPM...

[Dillon]

I've been meaning to post this for a while now.

I don't know if anyone else has noticed this, but during the blaster fight in the hangar in TPM, multiple blasts hit the walls and don't cause any damage, other than a slight scorch. In fact, even the laser cannons on Anakin's N-1 barely damage the floor and a crate he hits when he's firing on the Droidekas.

The most logical conclusion seems to be that the walls and floors in the hangar are just tough. This would make sense, considering it's a spacecraft hangar, however, I'm unable to come up with an explanation for the crate Anakin hits, that suffers no noticable damage.

Anybody else have any ideas about this?

[Darth Wong]

I've been meaning to post this for a while now.

I don't know if anyone else has noticed this, but during the blaster fight in the hangar in TPM, multiple blasts hit the walls and don't cause any damage, other than a slight scorch. In fact, even the laser cannons on Anakin's N-1 barely damage the floor and a crate he hits when he's firing on the Droidekas.

The most logical conclusion seems to be that the walls and floors in the hangar are just tough. This would make sense, considering it's a spacecraft hangar, however, I'm unable to come up with an explanation for the crate Anakin hits, that suffers no noticable damage.

Anybody else have any ideas about this?

I'll have to watch that scene again. But keep in mind that this is a universe where Luke Skywalker crashes an X-wing into a swamp and doesn't even have to fix it to fly away again, and where an AT-AT whose footsteps shake the ground 10 miles away can step on a snowspeeder and barely crumple its cockpit canopy. They seem to have a lot of absurdly strong materials laying around.

[Vympel]

Re: the hangar bay scene, it's probably akin to what the AOTC novelization describes about Boba using Slave I- he depleted the energy packs in only two shots, he obviously didn't give them any time to charge. Anakin's inept fumbling was probably even worse.

[Cyborg Stan]

One idea about the hanger in TPM was that the blasters on the fighter weren't up to full power, due to safety reasons. This is in-line with the fact that the thing was so automated that the first thing it did was take off and fly to the battle itself.

[Connor MacLeod]

Re: the hangar bay scene, it's probably akin to what the AOTC novelization describes about Boba using Slave I- he depleted the energy packs in only two shots, he obviously didn't give them any time to charge. Anakin's inept fumbling was probably even worse.

Or he intuitively scaled the yields to just enough to breach the shields. There WERE other people in there, and there's no way of telling what a random shot might have done in there.

[SpacedTeddyBear]

Maybe the interior walls are made to withstand a lot of damage, given that there are quite a few fighters stored in that one hanger. Accidents do happen.

[Mad]

This reminds me of another scene in TPM that bothered me. When they were fighting in the hallway with all the [apparently] marble columns, a number of blasts hit the columns but do nothing but give surface scorch marks.

This is in contrast to the original trilogy, where such a gunfight would have blasted chunks out of the columns and filled the room with smoke.

[nightmare]

I was going to start a new topic about this, but since it's a small thing and blaster related, what the heck. I'm looking thourgh DH previews, when I noticed this comic

The interesting part in my view is the scorch marks on the Stormtroopers.

[Vympel]

Well, even though technological stagnatation is in effect in SW, seemingly, there's still lots of room for variation. The differences can easily be explained:

TPM

- Royal Naboo Security Force:

Glorified police. Lightly armed, obviously used mainly for ceremonial and body-guard purposes. If their blasters have the kind of capability demonstrated by Imperial E-11s, they certainly don't use it.

- Trade Federation:

Basically "muscle" for imposing their will on enemy worlds. The Republic itself has no military (see "Military Creation Act") aside from the security forces of the individual members, it seems, and they rely on the Jedi for support. Mass produced overwhelming numbers with lightly armed weaponry for that purpose is fine. They don't need heavy duty firepower to take out some glorified cop.

AOTC

Grand Army of the Republic:

- Massive firepower, including primary armament of huge rifles which can blast droids to smithereens, not just knock them over (as seen in the TPM firefights). Heavily armoured soldiery, full armor, air and artillery support

Separatist forces

- Standard battle droid force augmented with more armour, new artillery, and more heavily armed super battle droids (super battle droids) with high rate-of-fire weaponry.

ROTS

Armies stay largely the same. Republic Clonetroopers undergo a cosmetic helmet change and start to carry more carbines similar to the E-11 in battle [these were always present, see the AOTC: VD], but the massive DC-17 is still very much in attendance. The war is winding down, but it's not over.

Imperial era

Needless to say, the Separatists were wiped out and the Grand Army of the Republic probably became the Grand Army of the Empire. Imperial troops traded in their massive DC-17 rifles as standard armament for something more compact for their new role (massive droid armies having left the galactic scene)- but still with a lot of power to spare. However, they still had plenty of larger weaponry in attendance- see the armament of Sandtroopers on Tatooine and Stormtroopers on the Death Star- the DLT-19 heavy blaster rifle (Chewie's gun in the detention block, listen for the massive, AT-ST type sound it makes when it fires, also carried by Sandtroopers and Stormtroopers) the DLT-20A, also listed as Imperial armament in the OT:VD (see IG-88 carrying it in ESB), the T-21 (converted Lewis, carried by Sandtrooper on Tatooine'), and the unidentified rifle that's a converted MG-15.

[Cabwi Desco]

I was thinking about this myself a couple of times.

In ANH two stormies are called aboard by han solo.
then we hear blaster shots,
kill shots NOT stun shots (thats a different sound effect).
but then when han and luke step off and into the rest of the hangar the armor is totally undamaged.
wheres the blaster hits like from ESB?

[Lord Revan]

I was thinking about this myself a couple of times.

In ANH two stormies are called aboard by han solo.
then we hear blaster shots,
kill shots NOT stun shots (thats a different sound effect).
but then when han and luke step off and into the rest of the hangar the armor is totally undamaged.
wheres the blaster hits like from ESB?

DL-44 to face at close range isn't gonna do any good even if leves your armor intact(, also Leia's shot in Tantive 4 didn't leave any marks to helmet of trooper did kill him.)

[avoidingthepo]

maybe the shots hit the troopers in the black joint areas and so there was no armor to scorch, but the skin underneath wouldve been gnarly

i mean han couldve purposely shot them in the neck to get a quick kill and if the armor was undamaged maybe he couldve sold it?

[Sharpshooter]

(Thinking very lightly)

Or perhaps what we heard wasn't the sound of the DL-44 firing, but that of the E-11s when the two troopers got jumped. It might be possible that they were subdued with a good whack to the back of the head or neck each, and the shots heard might have been reflexes or accidental discharges as they were struck and fell.

I'll have to get my brother to loan me his DVD so I can take a look at it - I think the two models sound fairly similar, but it's been a good while since I last saw the film.

[Burak Gazan]

It's definitely Solo's blaster firing -- one shot, then a double-tap. I always imagined he shot from the side after the troopers cleared the hatch, in either the neck or armpit/torso body glove regions. If the master plan was to impersonate troopers, then keeping the suits more or less intact is necessary

[Sharpshooter]

It's definitely Solo's blaster firing -- one shot, then a double-tap. I always imagined he shot from the side after the troopers cleared the hatch, in either the neck or armpit/torso body glove regions. If the master plan was to impersonate troopers, then keeping the suits more or less intact is necessary

Yeah, but where can he shoot them? If he shoots 'em in the torso or the head, the armor's ruined; if he shoots 'em in the neck, the body glove is burned and there might be fringe damage to the armor nevertheless; and even if the armpit could hide the damage, there still stands the matter of making the actual shots.

Of course, it's always possible that the neck was the target place, and then they just stretched out the glove a bit and scrunched down the damage part...

[Lord Poe]

Of course, it's always possible that the neck was the target place, and then they just stretched out the glove a bit and scrunched down the damage part...

Maybe, or Chewie grabbed them and held them as Han stunned them in the armpits at close range.

[Lord Poe]

(, also Leia's shot in Tantive 4 didn't leave any marks to helmet of trooper did kill him.)

Don't go by that idiotic comic of the event. In the movie, the trooper is hit in the chest. No mark because her little sporting blaster wsn't enough to penetrate the armor.

[Meest]

About the OP, I always thought it was R2 taking enough control to set the weapons low enough not to kill everyone in the hangar. The powering up theory makes sense too, since we see one fighter get punked by a tank with supposedly no shields up yet.

[avoidingthepo]

he couldve knocked them out first them removed the helmets and finished em off quick without any damage to the armor.


i mean that wouldve taken a little more time than the movie gives it but i think its plausable

[Elheru Aran]

he couldve knocked them out first them removed the helmets and finished em off quick without any damage to the armor.


i mean that wouldve taken a little more time than the movie gives it but i think its plausable

Han with a tire iron, Chewie with his hand, getting the two of them as they came in at the same time, then a quick yank of the helmets and a shot to the head? Sure, why not...

[IRG CommandoJoe]

I wonder what they did with the four Imperials they killed aboard the Millenium Falcon. You never see them again, even later when they rush onboard. I don't think they ever had time to dispose of them. When they were dressing as Stormtroopers, they couldn't toss them out because the Imperials from that room would've seen them. So where did the bodies go? Maybe they were thrown into the compartments.

[Burak Gazan]

I suspect when the Imperials were placing the homing beacon aboard the Falcon, they removed the 2 stormies, and the 2 hapless techs

[Lone_Prodigy]

Burak Gazan, wouldn't that tip them off? More likely, while sitting around inside the space slug in ESB:
"Hey, Chewie, do you smell something?"
"Ragrhagrhahahgura!"
"It sure as hell isn't mine! Wait a second... did you remember to take out the trash?"

[Burak Gazan]

Maybe, but you can see the greatly increased security presence around the Falcon after the station goes on alert -- plus the fact that the 2 troopers SUPPOSED to be on watch at the ramp are MIA -- somebody got their ass moving and checked things out, and the first thing they'd do is re-board the freighter

edit: PLUS the troopers that forced the door into the hangar bay control room, finding the 2 duty officers deceased

Tipping off is a little late at that point