Searing a continent or cracking the crust of a planet (both descriptions attached to the Eclipse superlaser IIRC) are both more practical than that weapon being 2/3 the power of the DS's superlaser. The recoil alonewould propel the ship backwards at a rate that would greatly overwhelm the counter-thrust the engines could possibly produce, unless the ship were extraordinarily dense. (technically, this is also a problem for the 1st and 2nd Death Stars too, but not nearly as much of a problem as it is for a a ship less than 20 km long.) The implied power generation, accelerative, and fuel-density implications are likewise ludicrous when compared to the Death STars.Jim Raynor wrote:The EGTVV explains that the Eclipse's superlaser can only shatter the crust of a planet, which makes a lot more sense. It still says it's 2/3 as powerful as the DS, but given that explanation of its abilities, a good rationalization would be to just throw out those numbers as no-math BS that the EU writers pulled out of their asses.Spanky The Dolphin wrote:IIRC, the Dark Empire Sourcebook said that Eclipse's axial superlaser was a third as powerful as Death Star I's, which is absurdly beyond the amound of power the ship should actually be able of generating.
Of course the DESB also says Alderaan didn't have a planetary shield, ,and it makes up a lot of technobabble for superlasers penetrating planetarry shielding and whatnot, so its not like that is the MOST nonsensical tidbit frfom that book (in a technical sense, at least.)