Hoth -> Bespin trip?

Kuciwalker · Post by **Kuciwalker** » 2006-12-23 09:07am

Without hyperdrive it ought to take the Falcon a really long time to get to Bespin from Hoth. Has this ever been resolved? I've always assumed that the fleet had been searching nearby systems, and the Falcon had been attached to the Star Destroyer for at least one hyperspace jump already. Is there an official explanation?

Post by **NecronLord** » 2006-12-23 11:21am

My favourite rationale is that the Falcon went relativistic, and it actually took them a few years or so 'normal time' to get there, hence how Luke's nearly finished his training by the time they do. Others are that the Falcon has a backup, much slower, FTL drive.

Batman · Post by **Batman** » 2006-12-23 11:26am

NecronLord wrote:My favourite rationale is that the Falcon went relativistic, and it actually took them a few years or so 'normal time' to get there, hence how Luke's nearly finished his training by the time they do. Others are that the Falcon has a backup, much slower, FTL drive.

I prefer the relativistic travel idea, myself. While the backup hyperdrive is supported by the EU, it would have to be atrociously slow compared to the standard one for Luke to have enough time to get any training worth mentioning in.

SCRawl · Post by **SCRawl** » 2006-12-23 11:31am

A theory with some legs is that the Falcon was attached to the Avenger for one or more jumps, and detached only when they were relatively close to Bespin. This goes closely with the OP's theory.

Personally, I prefer the theory that the Falcon spent weeks (or, more likely, months, from the ship's POV) at high sublight speed, but I can't give it any more weight than the next guy's theory.

To partly answer the OP's question, yes, it's been discussed at some length, but never, to my knowledge, resolved officially.

Post by **K. A. Pital** » 2006-12-23 11:33am

A few months up to a year on relativistic speeds sounds most likely. Luke would've at least received some training during that time.

Post by **Ghost Rider** » 2006-12-23 11:38am

The real problem is we have to balance, how long it would take for them not to take on supplies and such.

Saying the time for Luke to get real training is a poor term since Luke was being made into something else the a traditional Jedi of the Old republic. We've seen in the EU and even the PT comparisons...he had far less esoteric knowledge of the Force then many of his former peers, even if he rivaled them in terms of power.

So the consensus that it was through some means that took only a few months is usually the byline without making some weird ideas that the Falcon made pitstops along the way.

Post by **K. A. Pital** » 2006-12-23 11:47am

What could've been days for the Falcon could've been months for Luke.

Batman · Post by **Batman** » 2006-12-23 11:48am

Ghost Rider wrote:The real problem is we have to balance, how long it would take for them not to take on supplies and such.

Um-high relativistic speed & time dilation? Several months for Luke does not mean several months for Han & co.

Post by **Ghost Rider** » 2006-12-23 11:51am

Stas Bush wrote:What could've been days for the Falcon could've been months for Luke.

I understand and easily acknowledge that. I'm just saying you base it upon the resources on the Falcon, not upon the nebulous thought of training time for Luke, since what comparison do we have?

If we say he only got the rough basics compared to the PT...he fares better then even the chosen one.

If we say he got year to years.....then he aged extraordinarily well, given his enviroment and the complete lack of any comment by even the Alliance command of his whereabouts.

Post by **Ghost Rider** » 2006-12-23 11:53am

Batman wrote:
Ghost Rider wrote:The real problem is we have to balance, how long it would take for them not to take on supplies and such.
Um-high relativistic speed & time dilation? Several months for Luke does not mean several months for Han & co.

Yes, no duh.

But adding the tag on line of this being needed for Luke's training is pointless diversion since his training is either completely fucking abyssmal or better then anyone in the galaxy given who he went against. His abilities were above and beyond virtually any Padawan and he progessed from barely using TK, to being able to stand up to Darth Vader, but we see enormous holes in his knowledge in anything but combat.

I am commenting that it is better to look at it from the Falcon's perspective and not give much what Luke's training is.

Patrick Degan · Post by **Patrick Degan** » 2006-12-23 12:32pm

Given the timeframe illustrated in the movie, it seems unlikely that the MF spent months in relativistic travel going from one star system to the next. Going by what we know of the star densities in our galaxy, you'd be stretching things generously to grant that Hoth and Bespin (or Anoat) would be conveniently located 5 ly apart or so.

If we grant the MF an acceleration of 1km/sec^2, it would take two days to get her up to around .864c. This would mean that, coasting at that velocity, it would take 5.78 years to cover that 5 ly distance. Which means Luke would have been on Dagobah for nearly six years before sensing that Han and Leia were in danger. It means that Darth Vader would have been spending the last six years trying to find Han Solo and the Princess and waiting for Luke to reappear from wherever he was hiding. However, relativistic time contraction would only shave off around 2.5 years for Han and Leia on the Falcon. They'd either have had a baby or have killed one another in that time, assuming the ship's supplies hadn't run out before a year had passed ship-time.

Now, a bit more acceleration to get up to .985c would mean that shipboard time for Han, Leia and Chewie would amount to only 63 days or so. But to the outside universe, Luke would still have been on Dagobah for a bit over five years and Vader would have been twiddling his thumbs for all that time, and I don't think the Emperor would have tolerated that kind of delay, nor would too many of Vader's senior officers have survived having to apologise for failure.

The piggyback-on-a-stardestroyer theory or an emergency hyperjump system on the MF theory is far more reasonable, and I tend to shade toward the former myself.

Of course, a third possibility which very few people have ever considered is that Hoth VI and Bespin may be planets in a widely separated binary system and that the distance the MF had to cover was merely a few billion kilometres instead of several lightyears.

Kuciwalker · Post by **Kuciwalker** » 2006-12-23 12:40pm

Given the timeframe illustrated in the movie, it seems unlikely that the MF spent months in relativistic travel going from one star system to the next. Going by what we know of the star densities in our galaxy, you'd be stretching things generously to grant that Hoth and Bespin (or Anoat) would be conveniently located 5 ly apart or so.

It has to be much less than that. ANH to ROTJ spans 5 years. The Millenium Falcon can't have spent a huge chunk of that at relativistic speed.

Patrick Degan · Post by **Patrick Degan** » 2006-12-23 12:45pm

Kuciwalker wrote:
Given the timeframe illustrated in the movie, it seems unlikely that the MF spent months in relativistic travel going from one star system to the next. Going by what we know of the star densities in our galaxy, you'd be stretching things generously to grant that Hoth and Bespin (or Anoat) would be conveniently located 5 ly apart or so.
It has to be much less than that. ANH to ROTJ spans 5 years. The Millenium Falcon can't have spent a huge chunk of that at relativistic speed.

Precisely the point, which is why the STL transit theory is unlikely except if we're talking about two planets in a widely separated binary star system or the aforementioned piggyback or emergency hyperjump drive theories. But you'll never find two wholly different star systems close together at any appreciable distance away from the galactic core.

Post by **K. A. Pital** » 2006-12-23 12:56pm

But you'll never find two wholly different star systems close together at any appreciable distance away from the galactic core.

I thought it's obvious from the start, STL works if they're abnormally close (binary stars?), if not, however, then FTL jumps either on the reserve hyperdrive or on the ISD.

VT-16 · Post by **VT-16** » 2006-12-23 01:14pm

Isn't the backup hyperdrive basically set in stone by now? Which is why WEG had two hyperdrive ratings in their ship stats, one for the primary hyperdrive and one for the secondary (much, much slower).

Noble Ire · Post by **Noble Ire** » 2006-12-23 01:15pm

I recall a reference to the Millennium Falcon's consumables and life support capacity being only two months, thus making STL transit virtually impossible (this information may have come from an RPG guide book, so its canonicty may be questionable, even if it does make sense; a smuggler's ship really wouldn't need more than that kind of deep space capacity, considering the fact that it could traverse the galaxy a dozen times over in the designated span). That, coupled with the fact that there seems to be no change in the personalities and relationships of the ship's crew in the intervening time period makes a multi-year trip highly improbable.

I suspect that the Millennium Falcon was equipped with a short range, cumbersomely slow backup drive, with a Hoth-Anoat transit time of anywhere from a day to two months (the shorter end of the spectrum would probably be more likely; keep in mind, Boba Fett was following them for at least part of their journey, and it is unlikely that would have taken him very long to figure out where they were going and bring the news to Darth Vader).

Post by **Surlethe** » 2006-12-23 01:56pm

Noble Ire wrote:I suspect that the Millennium Falcon was equipped with a short range, cumbersomely slow backup drive, with a Hoth-Anoat transit time of anywhere from a day to two months (the shorter end of the spectrum would probably be more likely; keep in mind, Boba Fett was following them for at least part of their journey, and it is unlikely that would have taken him very long to figure out where they were going and bring the news to Darth Vader).

Boba Fett's the wild-card (and yet another reason months-years STL travel is not feasible): if he knew where they were headed and they were traveling at STL, then why weren't they interdicted after a day or three by Vader's Death Squadron? If Fett manages to follow them into hyperspace, however, he could note their apparent destination, and get back to the Imperial fleet, letting the Empire arrive before the Millenium Falcon, as Lando notes in the movie.

Tychu · Post by **Tychu** » 2006-12-23 02:17pm

i really dont understand what you guys are arguing about.

in the ESB when Han and co. are in the Falcon he says the hyperdrive is leaking and he cant make the rendezvous and he needs to find a suitable planet. he never says that the hyperdrive is out just that it will be out.

and the fact that Leia and all of them are wearing the same clothes that they wore when they boarded the Falcon on Hoth says that they used the hyperdrive until it couldnt go anymore and they got to Bespin

SCRawl · Post by **SCRawl** » 2006-12-23 02:51pm

Tychu wrote:in the ESB when Han and co. are in the Falcon he says the hyperdrive is leaking and he cant make the rendezvous and he needs to find a suitable planet. he never says that the hyperdrive is out just that it will be out.

and the fact that Leia and all of them are wearing the same clothes that they wore when they boarded the Falcon on Hoth says that they used the hyperdrive until it couldnt go anymore and they got to Bespin

I think you're confusing TPM with ESB. I don't have the movies at my fingertips, but I'm pretty sure the hyperdrive was completely kaput (to use the technical term). If it was working, why didn't they use it to escape from the ISDs back on Hoth?

No, there was sublight travel of some significant distance. The only question is how far that distance was.

Post by **Surlethe** » 2006-12-23 02:58pm

SCRawl wrote:If it was working, why didn't they use it to escape from the ISDs back on Hoth?

No, there was sublight travel of some significant distance. The only question is how far that distance was.

That's a rather blatant false dilemma. If they had a much slower backup hyperdrive, as people have proposed, then they are a couple of possible reasons they wouldn't have used it on Hoth: it may take time to switch between hyperdrives; or they wouldn't have been able to outrun the ISDs anyway, so why waste the time? A backup hyperdrive would also resolve the rather improbable coincidence of a triple star system (Hoth + Anoat + Bespin), or, at the least, the need to place Anoat and Bespin within a few light weeks of each other.

SCRawl · Post by **SCRawl** » 2006-12-23 02:59pm

Surlethe wrote:
Noble Ire wrote:I suspect that the Millennium Falcon was equipped with a short range, cumbersomely slow backup drive, with a Hoth-Anoat transit time of anywhere from a day to two months (the shorter end of the spectrum would probably be more likely; keep in mind, Boba Fett was following them for at least part of their journey, and it is unlikely that would have taken him very long to figure out where they were going and bring the news to Darth Vader).
Boba Fett's the wild-card (and yet another reason months-years STL travel is not feasible): if he knew where they were headed and they were traveling at STL, then why weren't they interdicted after a day or three by Vader's Death Squadron? If Fett manages to follow them into hyperspace, however, he could note their apparent destination, and get back to the Imperial fleet, letting the Empire arrive before the Millenium Falcon, as Lando notes in the movie.

Every opportunity Vader's forces had had to capture the Falcon had ended badly for him. There was considerable risk in trying to capture Solo et al. if they're at the controls of a (more or less) functional ship, with the risks being (a) they get away again, or (b) they end up getting blowed up good by an over-zealous gunner. The best way to capture the rebels was the way they did -- by letting them walk into the trap.

SCRawl · Post by **SCRawl** » 2006-12-23 03:06pm

Surlethe wrote:
SCRawl wrote:If it was working, why didn't they use it to escape from the ISDs back on Hoth?

No, there was sublight travel of some significant distance. The only question is how far that distance was.
That's a rather blatant false dilemma. If they had a much slower backup hyperdrive, as people have proposed, then they are a couple of possible reasons they wouldn't have used it on Hoth: it may take time to switch between hyperdrives; or they wouldn't have been able to outrun the ISDs anyway, so why waste the time? A backup hyperdrive would also resolve the rather improbable coincidence of a triple star system (Hoth + Anoat + Bespin), or, at the least, the need to place Anoat and Bespin within a few light weeks of each other.

If we accept as fact that a backup hyperdrive would take a prohibitive amount of time to activate, then yes, my dilemma becomes false. That's the only way it does, though; even if it's horribly slow, it's still FTL, which is something we know can't be tracked. Getting out of the way of the star destroyers was a rather large problem facing the rebels, and if it could be solved by going FTL instead of inside an asteroid field, well, I know which way I'd choose to go.

[Edited for diction.]

PainRack · Post by **PainRack** » 2006-12-23 03:12pm

Tychu wrote:i really dont understand what you guys are arguing about.

in the ESB when Han and co. are in the Falcon he says the hyperdrive is leaking and he cant make the rendezvous and he needs to find a suitable planet. he never says that the hyperdrive is out just that it will be out.

and the fact that Leia and all of them are wearing the same clothes that they wore when they boarded the Falcon on Hoth says that they used the hyperdrive until it couldnt go anymore and they got to Bespin

Because if that was the case, why the hell didn't they use that hyperdrive to escape from Death Squadron?

Patrick Degan wrote: Precisely the point, which is why the STL transit theory is unlikely except if we're talking about two planets in a widely separated binary star system or the aforementioned piggyback or emergency hyperjump drive theories. But you'll never find two wholly different star systems close together at any appreciable distance away from the galactic core.

We do know that SW fighters can easily accelerate to near c in the NJO. There is no reason to assume that the MF couldn't achieve this.

Especially if we argue that the backup hyperdrive was essentially something that allowed them to travel at something just past lightspeed.

Post by **Surlethe** » 2006-12-23 04:07pm

SCRawl wrote:Every opportunity Vader's forces had had to capture the Falcon had ended badly for him. There was considerable risk in trying to capture Solo et al. if they're at the controls of a (more or less) functional ship, with the risks being (a) they get away again, or (b) they end up getting blowed up good by an over-zealous gunner. The best way to capture the rebels was the way they did -- by letting them walk into the trap.

You know, there are very effective ways of neutralizing a (more or less) functional ship, as we saw in the beginning of ANH. I would imagine that the discipline on a warship would preclude the possibility of an over-zealous gunner, and there's always the risk of them getting away -- a risk which is admittedly small when you're chasing after them in a ship with better acceleration, better armament, and the ability to tractor them into the hangar.

If we accept as fact that a backup hyperdrive would take a prohibitive amount of time to activate, then yes, my dilemma becomes false. That's the only way it does, though; even if it's horribly slow, it's still FTL, which is something we know can't be tracked.

Are you certain of this? I thought the dialogue in ANH made it pretty clear that the ISDs were chasing the Falcon through hyperspace.

Getting out of the way of the star destroyers was a rather large problem facing the rebels, and if it could be solved by going FTL instead of inside an asteroid field, well, I know which way I'd choose to go.

[Edited for diction.]

It's obvious that they couldn't to to lightspeed inside the asteroid field because it was too dense. Hell, Vader couldn't even get a clear hyperwave signal in the field; why should we expect the Falcon to be able to jump to hyperspace without running into an asteroid.

Kuciwalker · Post by **Kuciwalker** » 2006-12-23 04:07pm

Lando said that the Empire arrived just before Han did. If they'd done an STL journey, why did the Empire wait that long?

My problem with the backup hyperdrive theory is that it's never mentioned. IMO Occam's Razor cuts it away and says they had to have piggybacked, assuming Bespin is too far away from Hoth for sublight to have worked. Also, the problem with "really large binary system" is that it would be an odd choice for a Rebel base then.

Also, just before the Falcon detaches one of the Imperial bridge crew says "if they went to lightspeed, they could be halfway across the galaxy by now." To me that, along with the alert all commands bit, implies they've been searching several nearby systems for the Falcon.