Info on Tie Interceptors, interesting pic

[AL]

Hi everyone I'm new to this but I have some info, that you may find interesting. Go to the Star Wars Technical Commentaries page and click under the miscellaneous technicalities, click battle of Endor. Then scroll down until you find Pics from the view of the intital Imperial formation from the view of the Falcon. Picture number one shows a Tie Interceptor firing from its chin mounted guns. Look and see, I though that may interest some of you.

[Smalleyjedi]

whoah

[AL]

I just saw and read a thread discussing tie fighters. I just wanted to add this thought, that maybe the 10 laser cannon theory is not so far fetched after all. With star wars technology being so advanced it could be very possible.

We could use the p-51 example. This world war two fighter had at least six cannons, 3 per wing. With all its ammo and weight of the guns, it was still a very fast fighter and had an extended range, able to escort the bombers to Berlin.

Now, using star wars tech for the tie interceptor, we have a fighter with stronger engine than the standard tie. Its fuel cells or power cells, greatly improved and cannons added to make it a leathal killer/hunter. The guns would be made of a light weight material and their size maybe being 20mm each. Its possible, but I would like to know your thoughts on this matter.

[Kreshna Aryaguna Nurzaman]

Agreed. Many of the arguments against TIE Interceptor's 10 cannons based on assumption that there's no power increase in Interceptor's generator compared to standard TIE.

Those "against 10 laser cannons" argument only consider 2 possibilities:
- either the power generator will be drained significantly; or
- 10 laser cannons individually must be less powerful than TIE Fighter's laser cannon

Both possibilities imply that there's no point installing 10 laser cannons on TIE Interceptor (you must accept either power drain or less powerful cannon each).

Yet, there's no reason to say that TIE Interceptor's power source is no more powerful than those of TIE Fighter.

TIE Interceptor is more advanced than TIE Fighter, so it is possible that it can carry more cannons without extra burdens. The only difference will be cost, but that's the same reason why F-16 Fighting Falcon is more expensive than, let say, F-5 Tiger.

[Cpt_Frank]

Hmm, take 2 squads of TIE interceptors and they'll take down a GCS.
With ten canons each they should be capable of doing so.

[Mr Bean]

If Cpt_Frank they had enough to power them

Yes TIE/In Can have Six Cannos, Four in the Wing-Cut outs and two in the chin hardpoints

Generaly they don't because the extra two cannons reduce its speed and manvrablitly by a big enough factor to make the extra two cannons not worth it

We've already been over this

As for the Ten Cannon theory, we went over that to, Besides the fact a TIE/IN could not physical carrly the extra four without retro-fits, The fact it would make it slower and less manuvrable than a Y-Wing.... Makes it quite useless
I for one would not want to sit in a slow, un-shielded craft even if I had twenty cannons on board, know that it would only take ONE shot to kill me

[Smiling Bandit]

MR Bean, do you have any prrof of that assertion? I'd be very interested in a source providing hard evidence of the Power-to-Weaponry and including engine output, etc.

[Mr Bean]

MR Bean, do you have any prrof of that assertion? I'd be very interested in a source providing hard evidence of the Power-to-Weaponry and including engine output, etc.

Personal TIE/IN for the Ship elite that have four lasers and the underpart is used for a Hyperdrive are much slower and manvrable than a TIE/IN in fact slower than a Y-Wing by all EU sources

Thrawn put shields on TIE/IN bascily made them as manvrable as TIE fighters but shielded and not very strong

Basic Conservation of Matter
Do you notice and huge heatsinks on the TIE/IN for all that extra energy its not using to be vented?
No?
Thats because like most miltary vechials it produces just enough power for what it needs to do, Shoot the Guns and Move the ship and keep the Intera compsator running, If you place aditona drains on it you trade off in other areas

Simple Logic.

[SPOOFE]

Personal TIE/IN for the Ship elite that have four lasers and the underpart is used for a Hyperdrive are much slower and manvrable than a TIE/IN in fact slower than a Y-Wing by all EU sources

Welcome to the wonderful world of miniaturization. It is perfectly possible to shrink down the individual components in a laser cannon and still maintain the same amount of strength.

[Master of Ossus]

According to SWEGVV, the hardpoints for chin-mounted weapons still exist on the TIE Interceptor, but they are not used because the techs have yet to find a place for the additional power generators required to power them. I agree with this assessment. I (surprisingly) disagree with Saxon. I don't think that the TIE Interceptor has that many laser cannons. We have never seen them fired in the movies, and the explanation from Vehicles and Vessels makes more sense.

[Mr Bean]

Yes we know Spoofe but however Conservation of matter of the not wanting them to be one shot weapons is the problem

I'm just joking about the first part but the second
I'm serious

In X-wing Wraith Squadren thanks to a little accident we learn that the acutal WORKING Laser Cannon Compoents are under two meters in length, Its possible to still have a working X-Wing Laser cannon in a small(reltively speaking)package but to quote the mechanice who helped build it
Its only good for half a dozen shots at best

Yes they can be minturized SPOOFE, They HAVE, There is a point to anything and I don't think of the Empire could have mintuzied the cannon any more they would not have hestated to do it, Also SPOOFE you have to keep in mind this is not a gun or a computer, This is a big complex weapon that has HIGH ENERGY PLASMA as the final result indicating you have to former it somewhere before that and I don't know about you but I don't want to learn that in exchange for squesing an extra four cannons in the plasma convert and battery are now tin-foil and duck-tape to cut down on space
We are not talking about nice safe computers here SPOOF we have in essance a charged and directed High Explosive, Sure the parts can be minturized but unless you have better materials its not gonna matter much as just speculation on my part but I'm guessing the whole Plasma contament and saftly systems make up much of the gun

[Grand Admiral Thrawn]

According to SWEGVV, the hardpoints for chin-mounted weapons still exist on the TIE Interceptor, but they are not used because the techs have yet to find a place for the additional power generators required to power them. I agree with this assessment. I (surprisingly) disagree with Saxon. I don't think that the TIE Interceptor has that many laser cannons. We have never seen them fired in the movies, and the explanation from Vehicles and Vessels makes more sense.

http://www.theforce.net/swtc/Pix/zs/rotj/pincer5.jpg

Disagrees with you.


I like Saxton's theory of a special sub-type of 10 laser cannon Tie Interceptors for Endor, especially since they were also strafing cap ships and lots of fighters.

[Mr Bean]

Notice the lack of the extra four
Six I can see but Ten? they only way is to duck tape them on the wings and thats just not a smart idea to do

[Smalleyjedi]

I have no real conclusion here......ten cannons seems like too much more than what we have seen any fighter have......however, we now see that at least some of the endor Tie/In had at least six.....and the other four LOOK identical at least. I would think probobly normal ones have four, augmented ones have the full ten.

[Master of Ossus]

You are quite correct, GAT, the picture clearly indicates that I was wrong. I do not know how many weapons a TIE Interceptor actually mounts.

[Subnormal]

According to Starwars.com(the official source of the Force):

"Unlike the TIE fighter, the interceptor has four powerful laser cannons mounted on the tips of the dagger wings. "

Now It also says:

"Sienar crafted a space superiority craft with greater speed and firepower than the standard TIE/ln. For economic and training ease, Sienar retained the ball-shaped TIE cockpit and many of the control interfaces, but souped up the TIE's performance to impressive levels."

Which means the original weapons on the ball Cockpit the two laser cannons may also be added to the number, bringing the number up to a total of only 6. The objects that are in the center of the wing fold, right where the bracing arm hits the center of the wing. look to be Two laser cannons per wing, which would bring the number of two per wing bringing the total to 10, but they may not be. The Official site makes no mention of what the object is, nor whether they are laser cannons. The official site says this about the TIE INT: "Based on Darth Vader's x1 TIE Advanced prototype" Now if we review what this object is on Vader's X1 we will see as below that they are the wing mounts, if you compare them, carefully you will hopefully understand that the suppossed Pair of Laser cannons per wing are in actuallity just wing mounts that got cut back for visiblity but leaving the mount jut out, looking like a pair of cannons per wing, I would bet there are only 6 firable cannons.




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[Cpt_Frank]

Ok, we have now: official sources describing 4 cannons on the wingtips
a scene where the TIE/In fires from the chin mounted canons AND
in almost every ROJ scene, the TIE/In fires from the cannons mounted between the wingtips.
That makes a 4-2-4 configuration for the TIE Interceptor, that means 10 canons in total.

[Cpt_Frank]

Ok, we have now: official sources describing 4 cannons on the wingtips
a scene where the TIE/In fires from the chin mounted canons AND
in almost every ROJ scene, the TIE/In fires from the cannons mounted between the wingtips.
That makes a 4-2-4 configuration for the TIE Interceptor, that means 10 canons in total.

[Patrick Ogaard]

It is canon that in the majority of cases in RotJ, interceptors fired only their four wing-mounted cannon.

It is, going by the little screenshot, that at least one interceptor is capable of firing at least one cannon from its chin mount. That does differ from the standard firing pattern of the conventional TIEs, which always fire twin salvoes from their chin mounts.

A reasonable assumption, albeit just an assumption, is that the Empire's military procurement is similar in concept to that of the US military. US military procurement is often based on a high/low concept: buy a small number of expensive high-end weapons systems capable of multiple tasks, balanced by a large number of low-end (austere) weapons systems that dispense with the bulk and expense of all the nice-to-have stuff. After all,

The standard 4-gun Interceptor may be the "austere" version, incorporating more powerful engines and more efficient (and expensive) heat dissipation panels than the cheaper "bowtie" model, allowing reduced panel mass and simultaneously more engine power available for four guns.

The 4 + 2-gun Interceptor would likely sacrifice its speed gain, bringing it back down to the available engine power of a conventional TIE. It would then make sense for those upgunned models to be deployed together with conventional TIEs, since their flight performance would match that of their conventional cousins while providing much more firepower. TIE squadron leaders would likely be happy to have such an Interceptor, allowing them to successfully engage heavier targets (and a dead target won't shoot back). Regular Interceptor squadrons would obviously avoid such slowpoke Interceptors like the plague, since they would endanger the squadron's speed.

The 4 + 2 + 4-gun Interceptor, finally, seems like it would fill an operational role for the Imperials the same as that of the Rebel B-Wing: capital ship assault. The added load of 4 guns firing from the wing notches would have to further reduce the Interceptor's available acceleration, but the firepower would doubtless be useful in point strikes against capital ship installations. Considering the operational role, the wing notch guns would likely be ion cannon, though additional blaster/laser units would be just as possible. A 10-gun Interceptor would likely be dead in any engagement with more maneuverable fighters, however, since speed kills. Speed and maneuverability should still be comparable at least to a Y-Wing, quite enough to engage capital ships and have a chance of coming out alive.

[Cpt_Frank]

TIE Interceptors for capship assaults? Sorry, but that is just as nonsensical as is the rest of this whole 'snubfighter-capship-killer' thing which was brought up by some EU writer idiots like Stackpole.

[Admiral Griffith]

Agreed. Many of the arguments against TIE Interceptor's 10 cannons based on assumption that there's no power increase in Interceptor's generator compared to standard TIE.

Those "against 10 laser cannons" argument only consider 2 possibilities:
- either the power generator will be drained significantly; or
- 10 laser cannons individually must be less powerful than TIE Fighter's laser cannon

Both possibilities imply that there's no point installing 10 laser cannons on TIE Interceptor (you must accept either power drain or less powerful cannon each).

Yet, there's no reason to say that TIE Interceptor's power source is no more powerful than those of TIE Fighter.

TIE Interceptor is more advanced than TIE Fighter, so it is possible that it can carry more cannons without extra burdens. The only difference will be cost, but that's the same reason why F-16 Fighting Falcon is more expensive than, let say, F-5 Tiger.

actually, they could trade sheer firepower for firing rate.

[Subnormal]

Where is your evidence that says the TIE INT:

fires from the cannons mounted between the wingtips

I have seen none of the Ties in ROTJ fire from this position. I will back it with movie picture evidence.





Here also is an officially liscensed Schematic of the Tie Int from Essential Guide to Vehicles:
http://www.theforce.net/swtc/Pix/books/ ... nt-eg1.gif

And here is a picture from the movies screenplay dealing with the Tie Int:

http://www.starwars.com/databank/starsh ... bts_bg.jpg

[Patrick Ogaard]

TIE Interceptors for capship assaults? Sorry, but that is just as nonsensical as is the rest of this whole 'snubfighter-capship-killer' thing which was brought up by some EU writer idiots like Stackpole.

Temper, temper.

Seriously, I have so far successfully avoided Stackpole's uberfighter writings and the remainder of the EU stuff tending in that direction.

My assessment basically hinges on two things:

1. The existence of the B-Wing, which is by all accounts supposed to fill exactly the role I would envision for the 10-gun Interceptor. The B-Wing's weapons load is supposed to consist of two autoblasters, two torpedo launchers, three ion cannon, and a heavy laser cannon. My entirely conjectural 10-gun TIE interceptor loadout of six lasers and four ion cannon comes somewhere close, though it hardly goes all the way there.

2. The fact that multitudes of other fighters have permanently installed torpedo launchers despite the fact that such installations would be a completely useless waste of mass and volume unless the fighters carrying them were in fact intended to be able to engage capital ships and the wide assortment of ships larger than fighters but much, much smaller than an ISD. Mounting torpedo tubes strictly for a ground attack role seems entirely pointless, as an external hardpoint or two for ground attack packages would be a much more efficient means of providing a ground attack option.


The regular TIE fighter is obviously not designed to engage capital ships, even corvette-sized ones, except in huge numbers. If one needs hundreds of such fighters to take out even a small capital ship, just send a capital ship to do the job.

The standard TIE interceptor is just as obviously a space superiority fighter that is also not designed to take on capital ships. The four guns could pump out a bit more firepower than a regular TIE, but hardly enough to make a major difference.

The (currently still apocryphal) 10-gun TIE interceptor is a more realistic means of engaging small capital ships. A squadron of a dozen such TIE interceptors might actually be a reasonable match for a moderately armed corvette, though not too many of the interceptors look likely to come home. Similarly, that same squadron deployed against a cruiser would provide a distraction and allow the ISD deploying the heavy interceptors to target the cruiser at its leisure.

Considering the massive size disparity between Star Wars fighters and capital ships, it is obviously not realistic to expect a single squadron of even heavy fighters to be able to take out an ISD, though something sporty in the size of a Rebel blockade runner might explode after a few minutes of bombardment. And maybe not. After all, I'm not entirely convinced that a 10-gun model is really supposed to exist.

[David]

The Essential Guide to Vessels and Ships says that the TIE Interceptor has exactly four laser cannons, one at each tip of the solar panels ( or whatever the hell you want to call them). The two slots that are beneath the cockpit are the hardpoints for the original two lasers. They were left there in case the Imperial engineers ever managed to find room to put the extra power cells necessary to power them without slowing the fighter down.

[Master of Ossus]

The Essential Guide to Vessels and Ships says that the TIE Interceptor has exactly four laser cannons, one at each tip of the solar panels ( or whatever the hell you want to call them). The two slots that are beneath the cockpit are the hardpoints for the original two lasers. They were left there in case the Imperial engineers ever managed to find room to put the extra power cells necessary to power them without slowing the fighter down.

The videogames also give the TIE Interceptor four laser cannons, but the picture that GAT posted appears to show a TIE Interceptor firing a cannon from the chin position, just like in the original TIE/ln. This appears to override the official evidence.