Why were there so few ships at the Battle of Endor

[Connor MacLeod]

Where in the ROTJ novelization does it say the Imperial fleet was the largest ever assembled? I've read it more than once, I don't recall that whatsoever. Now then:

- the Rebel fleet is stated in the novelization to extend beyond the range of human vision, which meshes quite well with the fact that we see many more ships at the end of the battle than we observe at the start

There was more than that I think - I was laways left with the impression from the ROTJK novel that the Rebels had at least hundreds of warships at Endor, despite the paltry few dozen the movie suggests.

Don't forget that the Imperials also encircled the Rebels with (at least?) two separate groups of ships to trap them against Endor, according to the novelization.

- the novelization states that the Rebel fleet was the entirety of the Rebel fleet.

Thats what I hated about the movie. If we went by what the movie says, the Rebels had a few dozen or a few hundred warships in their entire fleet.

I sorta figure now that the battle for Endor might have been waged across the entire system (I suppose they would need to patrol and scout the entire system to provide secrecy for the Death Star's constrruction.)

Also, this sort of makes the "Endor Holocaust" more believable, ,as well as the idea that the Rebels could down the Executor (Could you really believe that a few dozen warships, most of which are smaller than a Mon Cal cruiser, could take it down themselves if the Executor is really as powerful as implication suggests?)

[Praxis]

No, I just realize that in order to reconcile the huge numbers cited in EU with what we see on screen, one has to jump through hoops.

Depends what EU you're reading.

Star by Star has thousands upon thousands of capships, a large number of them ISD class, in one massive battle over Coruscant, with a gigantic three layer minefield encircling the entire PLANET of Coruscant (destroying thousands of capital ships that try to penetrate- thats millions of mines there, to encircle an entire planet several times over!) and a two-layer planetary shield under that which takes over ten thousand Vong ships pounding on one section AND several thousand ships being rammed into it.

Now THAT'S good EU reading

[Connor MacLeod]

Its also worth keeping in mind that what we see in the movies is only a small part of the battle - we simply cannot witness every single thing going on at any given instant, so we end up missing much. And the novelization describes alot of things we don't see (the attack on the communications ship, the pincer attack, ,etc.) so its quite possible there were more ships present at Endor than we saw onscreen. And at the ranges the battle occured at, alot of the smaller, more numerous ships would not be readily visible admist the Star Destroyers and Executor neccesarily, either.

[Connor MacLeod]

No, I just realize that in order to reconcile the huge numbers cited in EU with what we see on screen, one has to jump through hoops.

So what? There's tons of shit in the canon and EU that your average analyst is expected to "jump through hoops" to explain (more for the EU than canon, ,grranted.) You act as if this particular incident were somehow an extrarordinarily difficult one to reconcile, when in reality it isn't.

[Gustav32Vasa]

Where in the ROTJ novelization does it say the Imperial fleet was the largest ever assembled? I've read it more than once, I don't recall that whatsoever. Now then:

- the ROTJ radio drama says its the Imperial sector fleet, not the novelization. There is *no* support for the absurd notion that this cluster of ISDs constituted the bulk of the Empire's ISDs
- the Rebel fleet is stated in the novelization to extend beyond the range of human vision, which meshes quite well with the fact that we see many more ships at the end of the battle than we observe at the start
- the novelization states that the Rebel fleet was the entirety of the Rebel fleet.

I mean shit, I contributed to the ROTJ canon database on the main page months ago. Please read it.

I dont know, I've searched the novle and cant find it either , I was sure it was from the novel.

[Stofsk]

I dont know, I've searched the novle and cant find it either , I was sure it was from the novel.

Is it possible you mistook it for the Rebel description, which said it was the largest gathering of ships - the total of the entire Rebel Fleet - ever assembled?

[Gustav32Vasa]

I dont know, I've searched the novle and cant find it either , I was sure it was from the novel.

Is it possible you mistook it for the Rebel description, which said it was the largest gathering of ships - the total of the entire Rebel Fleet - ever assembled?

Could be. Does this mean I've got to reread KJA books to make sure I havent more misquotes?

[Stofsk]

Could be. Does this mean I've got to reread KJA books to make sure I havent more misquotes?

Absolutely. Now hop to it, soldier. And don't let me catch you slackin' off either, or it's off to the stockade with your sorry butt. There's a good lad.

[VT-16]

So much for the idea that the Rebels were holding back cruisers for Raynor's Raids, which existed only in his imagination.

While history has recorded much of the activities of the core group of Rebels attached the Alliance High Command, the efforts of the many sector groups scattered throughout the galaxy should not go forgotten. These groups, the Sector Forces, proceeded with feint attacks, spreading the Emperor's forces thin, and giving the heart of the Alliance time to regroup and develop its final thrust against Palpatine.

Now these forces need something to fly them to their battlefields, don´t you think? And "the heart of the Alliance" doesn´t sound like "the entire naval force of the Alliance", now does it?

[Vympel]

The ROTJ novelization is quite clear- with that in mind, the forces that gathered at Sullust must've included those groups.

[Rommie2006]

Since EU writers tend to be mediocre at best, they never grasped the concept of supply and demand. If something becomes commonplace, it is cheapened. So they hype up vast fleets of tens or hundreds of thousands of large warships to look impressive, even though this contradicts what you infer from what's onscreen (or is implied by the movies).

1) ROTJ implies that this is an all-or-nothing gamble for the Rebellion, so every large ship they can muster is used. That's why their fleet at Endor is mostly made up (numberswise) of frigates, blockade runners and transports -ships that are completely outclassed by any model of Star Destroyer.

2) If that's pretty much all the Rebellion has, why is the Emperor's fleet so small?
a) He's stupid.
b) He's overconfident.
c) He was speaking figuratively when he said "Bring my fleet to the far side of Endor."
d) His fleet was just his personal fleet the and the other 24,960 ISDs were unavailable.
e) some combination of a-d

True. But I think having only a few dozen SD and the SSD to bait the rebels to attack was the main reason behind it, on top of his overconfidence and stupidity.

or...

f) Maybe those thirty or so ISDs were the bulk of his top-of-the-line ships. Maybe Palpatine didn't have tens of thousands of ISDs and in fact, most of the Empire's fleet was made up of much smaller ships with the heaviest, most powerful ships assigned to guard key areas and to form roaming strike forces. With hyperdrive that can cover the entire galaxy in hours and weapons that can wipe out the surfaces of most planets, and the only real resistance coming from two score assorted Rebel ships, why build 25,000 ISDs and enough SSDs that any hack EU writer can pull one out of his ass in a futile attempt to give his lame story some credibility?

Man. I cant believe I'm reading this kind of SW FUCKING BULLSHIT on this particular section of the forum. 30 ISDs the bulk of his top-of-the-line ship? LOL!!! ROTFLMAO!!!
My friend, a conversative estimate done indicates that the Galactic Empire had at least 25k ISDs, on top of the ten of thousands of capital ships of other classifications. Are you deluded enough to believe that the fucking Empire ran the galaxy with a couple dozen of ISDs and that 30 ISDs constitute a significant portion of his fleet? Man I'm laughing so hard that I cant sit up straight!!! For god's sake, a fucking sector fleet have several dozen ISDs, and they are fucking thousands maybe millions of sector controlled by the Imperials.
And ISD as top-of-the-line ship? Is this a joke? An ISD is probably way at the bottom of the Imperial fleet hierachy. You know what Destroyer classification is? The imperials had cruisers, carriers and battleships that were MUCH larger than a puny ISD, so it is definitely not top-of-the-line. In fact, an ISD can be best describe as the "grunt" starship of the Empire. It excels at nothing in particular, but vs small nuisances it can get the job done without an overdeployment of force, and vs large threats, they can work in groups and eliminate the threat.

I know this is as much an artistic argument as a military one, but if the Rebels have all these thousands of fighters and other ships (as in EU), why the fuck weren't they at Endor? If the Empire has 25,000 ISDs, why not 100 of them at Endor -if for no other reason, to launch more fighters?

Every time some EU writer faps up astronomical numbers of warships, he inadvertently cheapens what was awe-inspiring in the movies, he also creates hiccups in the story where there were none before.

For the record, I dont think EU writers raked up the figures of warships. Actually I think they sorely underestimated the imperials fleet count,

[Gunhead]

Rommie what the hell have you been smoking, and where I can get some?

ISD is top of the line. I recall no canon instances the Empire having bigger and better ships than the ISD in great numbers. ISD is the workhorse, it's a platform for force projection. Anyway the word "destroyer" in ISD is not it's class. Imperial would be, just like Victory is in Victory Star Destroyer.

All frigates, cruisers, corvettes and actual destroyers are smaller than the ISD.

-Gunhead

[Vympel]

Rommie what the hell have you been smoking, and where I can get some?

ISD is top of the line. I recall no canon instances

Problem No. 1. We are not restricted to the canon. And going by the canon, the Imperial Star Destroyer is the smallest warship observed. See Dark Empire for ships much bigger than a standard Imperial Star Destroyer that are relatively common, in particular, the Alleigance, which has an unknown class.

the Empire having bigger and better ships than the ISD in great numbers. ISD is the workhorse, it's a platform for force projection. Anyway the word "destroyer" in ISD is not it's class. Imperial would be, just like Victory is in Victory Star Destroyer.

It's "class" is not the issue. Not to get into an interminable debate about what a Star Destroyer actually is, "Star Destroyer" actually does mean something. The "Star" prefix means that even the lowliest ship you can imagine, lets say "Star Frigate"- is more powerful than a regular ship- for example- the infamous Dreadnought.

All frigates, cruisers, corvettes and actual destroyers are smaller than the ISD.

-Gunhead

Exactly, since they don't have the "Star" prefix. See the AOTC ICS and OT ITW. The Executor-class is a Star Dreadnaught, and there are references to the Praetor-class Star Battlecruiser, Mandator-class Star Dreadnought and Procurator-class Star Battlecruiser. Among other "Star" vessels, the ISD is indeed a destroyer. It's only an impressive vessel among ships that don't have "Star". The Venator-class in Episode III looks to be another Star Destroyer. The Acclamator-class isn't a "Star" ship of any kind, however. It's just a big arse military transport. Though there's also the Star Galleon.

(For those who can't spot a pattern, yes, they all end in "-or")

And that's why I'll still call the "Imperial Star Destroyer" Imperator-class, even though it has precisely zero canon standing.

[Gunhead]

Well I choose to remain skeptical. At least until I see EP III on the screen.

Then again, I have a hard time believing they'd stage an ambush using only their picket ships, because that's what a destroyer is, without having more than one real battleship around. Of course these can be of screen and we never see them, but since seeing is believing....

-Gunhead

[Mange]

I believe that the fleet in ROTJ could be the entire fleet Vader commanded by the time of ROTJ (in any case it's clear it's not the entire Imperial fleet).
It's clear that the Executor isn't a unique vessel, but that there's actually quite a large number of Star Dreadnoughts. From ROTJ:

LUKE:"Vader's on that ship."
HAN: "Don't get jittery, Luke. There are a lot of command ships."

Again, they don't identify the Executor in a way that would indicate that it's unique to Vader.

[PainRack]

Its not about the ISD being a picket ship. Its more about the ISD being the "normalised" standard. While there may be classes of ships which are similarly produced in large numbers, we can effectively see that the ISD is the standard of power by which the Imperial Navy judges itself. The navy doesn't consider how many Neb B frigates, how many carrack class cruisers it has in a fleet. It considers how many ISDs it has instead.

Its more than likely that vessels larger and more significant than the ISDs are produced in limited production number runs, whereas the ISD is a continous production model, always being produced with little differences from one vessel to another, as opposed to its larger, more significant vessels.

As for the ISDs at Endor, the radio as well as Truce at Bakura Sourcebook both agrees that the Imperial Sector fleet was gathered at Endor, with no other reinforcements other than Death Squadron assigned. This explains why the fleet seen was so small, and can be rationalised as being too adminstratively difficult to assign vessels from other sectors without being noticed. Remember, even the Emperor foreknowledge didn't tell him when the Rebels will attack, and tying up large numbers of other Imperial forces in the region will let the cat out of the bag sooner or later.

[Rommie2006]

Rommie what the hell have you been smoking, and where I can get some?

ISD is top of the line. I recall no canon instances the Empire having bigger and better ships than the ISD in great numbers. ISD is the workhorse, it's a platform for force projection. Anyway the word "destroyer" in ISD is not it's class. Imperial would be, just like Victory is in Victory Star Destroyer.

All frigates, cruisers, corvettes and actual destroyers are smaller than the ISD.

-Gunhead

Apparently, you have not smoked the good stuff.
Come let me share this site with you all:
www.theforce.net/swtc
Refer to the section on the Warships of the Empire (something lidat). They is a very comprehensive catalogue of known warships of the Empire. Be warned it is long. And for the record, ISD classification is a Destroyer. It's not just a name, it is a classification.

[Rommie2006]

Its not about the ISD being a picket ship. Its more about the ISD being the "normalised" standard. While there may be classes of ships which are similarly produced in large numbers, we can effectively see that the ISD is the standard of power by which the Imperial Navy judges itself. The navy doesn't consider how many Neb B frigates, how many carrack class cruisers it has in a fleet. It considers how many ISDs it has instead.

Its more than likely that vessels larger and more significant than the ISDs are produced in limited production number runs, whereas the ISD is a continous production model, always being produced with little differences from one vessel to another, as opposed to its larger, more significant vessels.

As for the ISDs at Endor, the radio as well as Truce at Bakura Sourcebook both agrees that the Imperial Sector fleet was gathered at Endor, with no other reinforcements other than Death Squadron assigned. This explains why the fleet seen was so small, and can be rationalised as being too adminstratively difficult to assign vessels from other sectors without being noticed. Remember, even the Emperor foreknowledge didn't tell him when the Rebels will attack, and tying up large numbers of other Imperial forces in the region will let the cat out of the bag sooner or later.

Yes, ISD is indeed the "normalised" standard for the Imperials. But I think you should note that the Empire can always up the standard to a more powerful ship at anytime, but was not done so due to the conditions at that time.
We know during the OT period, the rebel alliance was the main enemy. A bunch of ragtag saboteurs with a few capships. A few years before ANH, it is speculative that local systems n their puny fleets may have resisted the Empire. So the ISD was born. It was jack-of-all trades master of none.
It housed a full wing of fighters, capable enough to take on even big time pirates to small time rebels.
It could BDZ in one hour, sufficient to wreck havoc and make an example out of any rebellious world.
It had prefabricated bases and several regiment of stormtroopers and several dozen more vehicles, sufficient to overcome any backwater local garrison force and make a permanent Imperial presence.
And it was probably more resource wise to deploy smaller 1.6km ISD throughout the empire, as they were sufficient to quell any rebellion. Against a bigger threat, say a single mon cal cruiser, they can operate in small groups to get the task done.

So, my point is IF a greater threat like the Yuuzhan Vong suddenly came to strike during OT period, Palpy could have easily raked up the "standard" warship into a 3km long dedicated warship if he wanted to (or more). He had the technology and industrial capacity to do it (evidence Death Star), and would have if there was a greater extra-galactic threat. But sadly there was none, so that's y you see puny ISD flying round the galaxy.

[Gunhead]

Actually they could do a dedicated Battleship out of an ISD just by dumping all that extra crap out of there (like the AT-AT's+troopers). Use the extra space for more shields and power generators for even bigger guns. No need to make it 3km long. Nothing can take out an ISD with a single shot, just making it meaner and leaner would do the trick just fine. Even if something could take out an ISD with one shot, you could have more of them so losing one would be no biggie.

-Gunhead

[Rommie2006]

Actually they could do a dedicated Battleship out of an ISD just by dumping all that extra crap out of there (like the AT-AT's+troopers). Use the extra space for more shields and power generators for even bigger guns. No need to make it 3km long. Nothing can take out an ISD with a single shot, just making it meaner and leaner would do the trick just fine. Even if something could take out an ISD with one shot, you could have more of them so losing one would be no biggie.

-Gunhead

Haha yep true.

[Jim Raynor]

Actually they could do a dedicated Battleship out of an ISD just by dumping all that extra crap out of there (like the AT-AT's+troopers). Use the extra space for more shields and power generators for even bigger guns. No need to make it 3km long. Nothing can take out an ISD with a single shot, just making it meaner and leaner would do the trick just fine. Even if something could take out an ISD with one shot, you could have more of them so losing one would be no biggie.

-Gunhead

We actually see this in canon, although nobody talks about it. In ROTJ, the Millenium Falcon is seen flying past the bottom of an ISD, which doesn't have any docking bays. Link

[Robert Walper]

I've always wondered. Why were there so FEW ships at the Battle of Endor. If I remember correctly, the Imperials had 40 ISDs and the Executor. The rebels probably brought in around the same number of cap ships.

So why such a little amount.

One could argue the construction of the Death Stars taxed the Empire's ability to construct large fleets. Essentially, putting all their eggs in one basket.

[Robert Walper]

We actually see this in canon, although nobody talks about it. In ROTJ, the Millenium Falcon is seen flying past the bottom of an ISD, which doesn't have any docking bays. Link

Er...excuse me, but how is it determined this particular ISD is "upside down" relative to the others? Reviewing my ROTJ DVD, all the Imperial ships are "upright" relative to the others. Why would thus one feel the need to turn on this axis (and how do you prove this one actually has)?

[Ghost Rider]

I've always wondered. Why were there so FEW ships at the Battle of Endor. If I remember correctly, the Imperials had 40 ISDs and the Executor. The rebels probably brought in around the same number of cap ships.

So why such a little amount.

One could argue the construction of the Death Stars taxed the Empire's ability to construct large fleets. Essentially, putting all their eggs in one basket.

Given SoTE denies this and nothing in canon refutes, one would have to find proof in equal sources that says other wise.

[Robert Walper]

I've always wondered. Why were there so FEW ships at the Battle of Endor. If I remember correctly, the Imperials had 40 ISDs and the Executor. The rebels probably brought in around the same number of cap ships.

So why such a little amount.

One could argue the construction of the Death Stars taxed the Empire's ability to construct large fleets. Essentially, putting all their eggs in one basket.

Given SoTE denies this and nothing in canon refutes, one would have to find proof in equal sources that says other wise.

Well, I ain't gonna try backing that up myself. It was merely a off the cuff suggestion. *shrugs*