ROTS novelization extract: Firepower quantification time!

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ROTS novelization extract: Firepower quantification time!

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INTRODUCTION: The Age of Heroes
The skies of Coruscant blaze with war.

The artificial daylight spread by the capital's orbital mirrors is sliced by intersecting flames of ion drives and punctuated by starburst explosions; contrails of debris raining into the atmosphere become tangled ribbons of cloud. The nightside sky is an infinite lattice of shining hairlines that interlock planetoids and track erratic spirals of glowing gnats. Beings watching from rooftops of Coruscant's endless cityscape can find it beautiful.

From the inside, it's different.

The gnats are drive-glows of starfighters. The shining hairlines are light-scatter from turbolaser bolts powerful enough to vaporize a small town. The planetoids are capital ships.

The battle from the inside is a storm of confusion and panic, of galvened particle beams flashing past your starfighter so close that your cockpit rings like a broken annunciator, of the bootsole shock of concussion missiles that blast into your cruiser, killing beings you have trained with and eaten with and played and laughed and bickered with. From the inside, the battle is desperation and terror and the stomach-churning certainty that the whole galaxy is trying to kill you.

Across the remnants of the Republic, stunned beings watch in horror as the battle unfolds live on the HoloNet. Everyone knows the war has been going badly. Everyone knows that more Jedi are killed or captured every day, that the Grand Army of the Republic has been pushed out of system after system, but this --

A strike at the very heart of the Republic?
An invasion of Coruscant itself?
How can this happen?
It's a nightmare, and no one can wake up.


Live via HoloNet, beings watch the Separatist droid army flood the government district. The coverage is filled with images of overmatched clone troopers cut down by remorselessly powerful destroyer droids in the halls of the Galactic Senate itself.

A gasp of relief: the troopers seem to beat back the attack. There are hugs and even some quiet cheers in living rooms across the galaxy as the Separatist forces retreat to their landers and streak for orbit --

We won! beings tell each other. We held them off!

But then new reports trickle in -- only rumors at first -- that the attack wasn't an invasion at all. That the Separatists weren't trying to take the planet. That this was a lightning raid on the Senate itself.

The nightmare gets worse: the Supreme Chancellor is missing.

Palpatine of Naboo, the most admired man in the galaxy, whose unmatched political skills have held the Republic together. Whose personal integrity and courage prove that the Separatist propaganda of corruption in the Senate is nothing but lies. Whose charismatic leadership gives the whole Republic the will to fight on.

Palpatine is more than respected. He is loved.

Even the rumor of his disappearance strikes a dagger to the heart of every friend of the Republic. Every one of them knows it in her heart, in his gut, in its very bones --

Without Palpatine, the Republic will fall.

And now confirmation comes through, and the news is worse than anyone could have imagined. Supreme Chancellor Palpatine has been captured by the Separatists -- and not just the Separatists.

He's in the hands of General Grievous.

Grievous is not like other leaders of the Separatists. Nute Gunray is treacherous and venal, but he's Neimoidian: venality and treachery are expected, and in the Viceroy of the Trade Federation they're even virtues. Poggle the Lesser is Archduke of the weapon masters of Geonosis, where the war began: he is analytical and pitiless, but also pragmatic. Reasonable. The political heart of the Separatist Confederacy, Count Dooku, is known for his integrity, his principled stand against what he sees as corruption in the Senate. Though they believe he's wrong, many respect him for the courage of his mistaken convictions.

These are hard beings. Dangerous beings. Ruthless and aggressive.

General Grievous, though --

Grievous is a monster.

The Separatist Supreme Commander is an abomination of nature, a fusion of flesh and droid -- and his droid parts have more compassion than what remains of his alien flesh. This halfliving creature is a slaughterer of billions. Whole planets have burned at his command. He is the evil genius of the Confederacy. The architect of their victories.

The author of their atrocities.

And his durasteel grip has closed upon Palpatine. He confirms the capture personally in a wideband transmission from his command cruiser in the midst of the orbital battle. Beings across the galaxy watch, and shudder, and pray that they might wake up from this awful dream.

Because they know that what they're watching, live on the HoloNet, is the death of the Republic.

Many among these beings break into tears; many more reach out to comfort their husbands or wives, their crèche-mates or kin-triads, and their younglings of all descriptions, from children to cubs to spawn-fry.

But here is a strange thing: few of the younglings need comfort. It is instead the younglings who offer comfort to their elders. Across the Republic--in words or pheromones, in magnetic pulses, tentacle-braids, or mental telepathy -- the message from the younglings is the same: Don't worry. It'll be all right.

Anakin and Obi-Wan will be there any minute.

They say this as though these names can conjure miracles.

Anakin and Obi-Wan. Kenobi and Skywalker. From the beginning of the Clone Wars, the phrase Kenobi and Skywalker has become a single word. They are everywhere. HoloNet features of their operations against the Separatist enemy have made them the most famous Jedi in the galaxy.

Younglings across the galaxy know their names, know everything about them, follow their exploits as though they are sports heroes instead of warriors in a desperate battle to save civilization. Even grown-ups are not immune; it's not uncommon for an exasperated parent to ask, when faced with offspring who have just tried to pull off one of the spectacularly dangerous bits of foolishness that are the stock-in-trade of high-spirited younglings everywhere, So which were you supposed to be, Kenobi or Skywalker?

Kenobi would rather talk than fight, but when there is fighting to be done, few can match him. Skywalker is the master of audacity; his intensity, boldness, and sheer jaw-dropping luck are the perfect complement to Kenobi's deliberate, balanced steadiness. Together, they are a Jedi hammer that has crushed Separatist infestations on scores of worlds.

All the younglings watching the battle in Coruscant's sky know it: when Anakin and Obi-Wan get there, those dirty Seppers are going to wish they'd stayed in bed today.

The adults know better, of course. That's part of what being a grown-up is: understanding that heroes are created by the HoloNet, and that the real-life Kenobi and Skywalker are only human beings, after all.

Even if they really are everything the legends say they are, who's to say they'll show up in time? Who knows where they are right now? They might be trapped on some Separatist backwater. They might be captured, or wounded. Even dead.

Some of the adults even whisper to themselves, They might have fallen.

Because the stories are out there. Not on the HoloNet, of course -- the HoloNet news is under the control of the Office of the Supreme Chancellor, and not even Palpatine's renowned candor would allow tales like these to be told--but people hear whispers. Whispers of names that the Jedi would like to pretend never existed.

Sora Bulq. Depa Billaba. Jedi who have fallen to the dark. Who have joined the Separatists, or worse: who have massacred civilians, or even murdered their comrades. The adults have a sickening suspicion that Jedi cannot be trusted. Not anymore. That even the greatest of them can suddenly just . . . snap.

The adults know that legendary heroes are merely legends, and not heroes at all.

These adults can take no comfort from their younglings. Palpatine is captured. Grievous will escape. The Republic will fall. No mere human beings can turn this tide. No mere human beings would even try. Not even Kenobi and Skywalker.

And so it is that these adults across the galaxy watch the HoloNet with ashes where their hearts should be.

Ashes because they can't see two prismatic bursts of realspace reversion, far out beyond the planet's gravity well; because they can't see a pair of starfighters crisply jettison hyperdrive rings and streak into the storm of Separatist vulture fighters with all guns blazing.

A pair of starfighters. Jedi starfighters. Only two.

Two is enough.

Two is enough because the adults are wrong, and their younglings are right.

Though this is the end of the age of heroes, it has saved its best for last
Turbolaser bolts powerful enough to vaporize a small town. So, what's a bunch of realistic assumptions to give us a figure for vaporization of same in a single bolt?
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Post by Spanky The Dolphin »

I think the wording allows for enough room for such an act to involve more than one bolt.

But that's just me. Not saying it is, just that it can be read that way.
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Post by Darth Wong »

A nuclear blast will only vapourize that which is in its fireball; the rest gets burned or blown apart by shockwave but not vapourized. So if you take that passage literally, you would have to guess the size of a small town and then figure out how much of a blast you need in order to generate a sufficiently large fireball.
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Post by Vympel »

It's nice to note that the Jedi Interceptors flown by Obi-Wan and Anakin still have hyperdrive rings, too.
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Post by NecronLord »

Where'd you get that from? I thought the novellisation was out on the second of april? :?
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Post by Lord Revan »

I would say it's from Hyperspace.
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Post by Meest »

I like the public knowledge angle that's implied in the passage. People viewing the battle on the Holonet and Grievous being a known "monster" that wipes out planets :lol:. I wonder if this perspective will be shown in the beginning of Episode 3. One thing that I think is different is that they mention the Republic is actually losing? I thought the Separatists were backed into a corner and kidnapping Palps was a desperation move.
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Post by NecronLord »

I wonder just how much of a backwater Tatooine is...

Luke: Anyway, there's this guy called Kenobi out there... My name's Skywalker.

And no one bats an eyelid.
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Post by Spanky The Dolphin »

NecronLord wrote:I wonder just how much of a backwater Tatooine is...

Luke: Anyway, there's this guy called Kenobi out there... My name's Skywalker.

And no one bats an eyelid.
That's because nobody cares or remembers, really.
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Post by NecronLord »

Spanky The Dolphin wrote:That's because nobody cares or remembers, really.
It'd be like being called Rommel, and never having anyone comment on the other one.
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Post by Spanky The Dolphin »

But nobody cares or remembers.

Are we even aware if the common public, particularly those out in the boonies of the Galaxy, even knew what Jedi were involved in the Clone Wars?
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Post by VT-16 »

If the Jedi are portrayed as traitors, public opinion will quickly turn against them. This hero-worship of the Jedi are probably a fad, just like Pokemon. Here today, gone tomorrow. :P
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Post by NecronLord »

Spanky The Dolphin wrote:But nobody cares or remembers.
No one remembers the Clone Wars. Right. Or even the name of the guy who rescued the Emperor from the Evil Seperatists.

Are we even aware if the common public, particularly those out in the boonies of the Galaxy, even knew what Jedi were involved in the Clone Wars?
All of them. But if Kenobi and Skywalker are mega warriors known to everyone on the holonet, you think they'd be forgotten in fifty years? They're the childhood heroes of Luke and Leia's generation. And yet Luke didn't even know his father (who he knew as Anakin) was in the Wars. Conclusion. Tatooine is even more of a hole than we thought it was.
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Post by Spanky The Dolphin »

Okay, I see. I would agree.

I mean shit, only a small portion of the planet's northern hemisphere is remotely habitable...
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Post by VT-16 »

Luke: Oh, my father didn´t fight in the wars, he was a navigator on a spice freighter.

Obi-Wan: That´t what your uncle told you.


If we combine this dialogue with the "hero-status" of Obi-Wan and Anakin in ROTS, you could make a case that Luke (being the eager Holonet-user that he was, according to ITW:OT) would have read about them over the years, and naturally asked his uncle if his father was the same as the war-hero on the old Holonet-broadcasts. By the time of ANH, his uncle´s version of the story would have been so intrenched, Luke just wouldn´t think otherwise.
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Post by Chris OFarrell »

I agree. Kenobi and Skywalker turned into Holonet heros of THIS scale? You would think people like Luke, who is always looking to the excitment and adventure on Tattoine would know instantly who he is. Or that Han or Chewie (though Chewie becomes a question mark in ROTS) would have heard the names.

I meam for all intents and purposes, with Vaders birth and Obi going into hiding, they both died. I could see Palpitine giving them a splended send off over the holonet with thanks to the last 'two true Jedi, who died fighting against their own in service of the Republic' or something. But come on.....
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Post by Spanky The Dolphin »

Chris OFarrell wrote:I could see Palpitine giving them a splended send off over the holonet with thanks to the last 'two true Jedi, who died fighting against their own in service of the Republic' or something. But come on.....
I don't think so. I personally expect almost instant demonisation of all Jedi with the rise of the New Order.
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Post by Lord Revan »

Spanky The Dolphin wrote:
Chris OFarrell wrote:I could see Palpitine giving them a splended send off over the holonet with thanks to the last 'two true Jedi, who died fighting against their own in service of the Republic' or something. But come on.....
I don't think so. I personally expect almost instant demonisation of all Jedi with the rise of the New Order.
I think Palpatine would make Jedi tragic villians ("whom in their arrogance fell into a separtist trick and became traitors to the Republic/Empire, but Anakin Skywalker and Obi-wan Kenobi remained loyal and found out this scheme and when Mustafar to comfront the defeated separtist leader, who refused to surrender and ambushed the Jedi and it is belived that both of last true Jedi were killed in the Battle"), this would allow him to keep hero stories Clone wars (just down play the part of the jedi a bit), but get rid of remnants of the Jedi order.
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Post by NecronLord »

In other news, this has really wetted my appitite for the novel.
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Post by Chris OFarrell »

Spanky The Dolphin wrote:
Chris OFarrell wrote:I could see Palpitine giving them a splended send off over the holonet with thanks to the last 'two true Jedi, who died fighting against their own in service of the Republic' or something. But come on.....
I don't think so. I personally expect almost instant demonisation of all Jedi with the rise of the New Order.
Its not that easy. This isn't 1984. The Jedi have been pumped up for YEARS as the Heros of the republic. The Novel makes it sound like Obi and Ani are poster heros every person in the republic knows. Overnight turning them into the number 1 enemy of the state is a bit of a streach I think.
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Post by CJvR »

Given the size of the SW universe there must be millions of Skywalkers/Kenobis running around. Also Tattoine isn't even part of the Republic during that era, although the Empire annexed it at some point possibly as an excuse to maintain the post war military.
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Post by Elfdart »

Because the stories are out there. Not on the HoloNet, of course -- the HoloNet news is under the control of the Office of the Supreme Chancellor, and not even Palpatine's renowned candor would allow tales like these to be told--but people hear whispers. Whispers of names that the Jedi would like to pretend never existed.

Sora Bulq. Depa Billaba. Jedi who have fallen to the dark. Who have joined the Separatists, or worse: who have massacred civilians, or even murdered their comrades. The adults have a sickening suspicion that Jedi cannot be trusted. Not anymore. That even the greatest of them can suddenly just . . . snap.
:wtf:

Is this just in the book, or did I miss an episode of Clone Wars?
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Post by NecronLord »

CJvR wrote:Given the size of the SW universe there must be millions of Skywalkers/Kenobis running around. Also Tattoine isn't even part of the Republic during that era, although the Empire annexed it at some point possibly as an excuse to maintain the post war military.

There are only 10,000 jedi.
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Post by Vympel »

There was a brutally effective propaganda campaign. Look at Han, he dismissed the Jedi as "simple tricks and nonsense", when he was well old enough to remember the Clone Wars happening.
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Post by Old Plympto »

Elfdart wrote:
Sora Bulq. Depa Billaba. Jedi who have fallen to the dark. Who have joined the Separatists, or worse: who have massacred civilians, or even murdered their comrades. The adults have a sickening suspicion that Jedi cannot be trusted. Not anymore. That even the greatest of them can suddenly just . . . snap.
:wtf:

Is this just in the book, or did I miss an episode of Clone Wars?
Depa Billaba's story was told in Shatterpoint; Sora Bulq, in the Dark Horse Comics Republic series, IIRC.
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