B1 Droid AI and Starfighters vs. Capital ships

[Lord Relvenous]

Turbo lasers are NOT one cost weapons. The power they use is generated from hypermatter. Given the sheer unobtanium of that substance, it means they cost alot to fire.

What? Aren't hypermatter reactors used in almost everything, from warships to starfighters, so it can't be expensive to use or find. Its unobtanium to us, but not to them.

This. The materials for the turbolaser are one-cost, neglecting maintenance costs, which would also be present if they were using missile delivery systems. That is the cost I referred to. Energy is readily available in the Star Wars universe, meaning that the cost of producing this energy, while not neglible, will not even begin to overshadow the cost of using missiles as a main weapon system.

[Samuel]

Hypermatter is cheap? I thought it costs a bundle. Do we have any way of quantifying its cost?

[JointStrikeFighter]

Hypermatter is cheap? I thought it costs a bundle. Do we have any way of quantifying its cost?

Even a 2-bit smuggler like Han can afford to run a hypermatter fueled spaceship around the galaxy for not much more than 10,000 a trip.

[TK-984]

I wonder what the cost of a Star Destroyer making a jump to hyperspace (let's say from Tatooine to Alderaan) would compare to the cost of a fairly rigorous ship to ship sortie (factor out the cost of any non-hypermatter reliant systems, repairs, etc).

Wookieepedia seems to use the word "exotic" to describe the substance, which brings "rare" to mind. Though I don't know if the source material echoes that exact phrase.

[Seydlitz_k]

It's doubtful that missiles aren't used because they are too expensive. By that rationale, modern aircraft would still be prop driven and firing bullets. I'm pretty sure a Sidewinder missile is a lot more expensive than a 1,000 high caliber minigun rounds.

Besides, in any combat vessel the priority is to destroy as much of the enemy as possible, while surviving to fight the next day. I really doubt any military would not spend as much as possible on making sure they have the most high tech, useable, and destructive weapons, as well as having the best defensive technology and the highest survival rate (I think TIE's being cheap, mass produced craft with high death rates is EU wank BS. There is no way the empire would waste their money on training pilots, only to have them killed en masse unless they are on their last legs. In the long run, it will cost them MORE.)

Then we also have to assume that missile tech is something extremely exotic and/or difficult to produce. This seems hard to believe if we assume the galaxy has been at roughly the same tech level for 20,000 years

My money is still on highly effective countermeasures (Electronic, Flak, whatever) making missiles useless from ranges longer than roughly point blank. I would say it's the explanation which fits in best with Movie Canon and CW cartoon canon.

[Samuel]

Even a 2-bit smuggler like Han can afford to run a hypermatter fueled spaceship around the galaxy for not much more than 10,000 a trip.

Except we don't know how much that takes energy wise, and hence in hypermatter. We DO know how much it takes for firing turbolasers and they use ALOT of energy- those guns are 2.8 million TW for the big guns.

Of course, arguing about this is pointless due to lack of info. The Empire could simply have nationalized all the energy production facilities it needs and use robots and a closed system to keep costs minimal.

Most likely though, missiles aren't common due to the effectiveness of PD. The small guns on the Star Destroyers probably fill that role.

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

Last I checked, many warships still carry batteries of warhead launchers. I would imagine that they are still used, but as one pointed out, point defence weapons can be pretty accurate.

However, there has been some rationalisation that ship power drain can be pretty bad in long intense battles. That was the sort of rationalisation given for how ... badly the Lusankya performed at Thyferra.

[Connor MacLeod]

The Lusankya performed so badly at Thyferra quite likely because she lacked the facilities or industry to actually maintain that big a vessel. as I recall she had no shipyard capability, no manufacturing bases for making parts n shit. She basically assumed "Well, I have bacta, ,so I can get whatever I need" Like when she tried borrowing an interdictor. The Rogues even discussed slipping her substandard parts to fuck with her ships.

It could even be she's been running low on fuel (or having to economize on fuel consumption)

[Connor MacLeod]

As for the "Why not use missiles" idea, there's some problems with missiles. The big problem is that you need some means to propel said missile, and the primary means of propulsion in Sw is an ion engine. But, a small missile cannot hope to achieve very high accelerations due to its smaller volume (and you have to consider tradeoffs on payload, guidance, etc.). And point defense , as mentioned, is a concern . So basically, such weapons will only be useful close up,. They do have the benefit of being able to carry shield-penetrating technologies (IE torpedo sphere) and their "guidance" gives them some advantage, (but not relaly a significant one in typical SW engagement ranges.) Its quite probable that many "missiles" receive most of their initial velocity from the launching ship and their propulsion is used for guidance/course changes (so its really just like a guided tank or cannon shell.) The rest will be basically just a glorified torpedo.

Payload is almost always going to be the primary concern, so you will naturally see fighters (and most small attack ships using torpedoes) needing to get very close (basically its just a guided bomb of some kind) because tehir warheads will be mostly warhead with only some guidance/propulsion.

The other big advantage of a warhead (longer range than beam weapons) is kind of irrelevant because SW capital ships as a rule don't need to manuver, tend to engage at very close ranges anyhow. And longer ranges are pretty useless due to hyperdrive (hyperdrive can allow for close engagement ranges, or it can be used to avoid very long range attacks if/when detected.)

CApital ships will use beam weapons because they're the most efficient weapon for the combat ranges they engage in, but missile/projectile weapons (as they exist/are employed in Star Wars) would still be used because they over compensating benefits as outlined above.

[Connor MacLeod]

Hypermatter is cheap? I thought it costs a bundle. Do we have any way of quantifying its cost?

Even a 2-bit smuggler like Han can afford to run a hypermatter fueled spaceship around the galaxy for not much more than 10,000 a trip.

Right. and all Hypermatter is of exactly equal quality and provides exactly the same energy output. Which is why there are starships that still use fusion, antimatter, etc..

Secondly, are you saying the Falcon runs on hypermatter. You have a source for this, because I don't see one looking into the ICS.

[Starglider]

Missiles are probably useful as a finishing weapon in fleet battles. If a capship has taken heavy damage, with shields, sensors and light weapons all heavily damaged or completely gone, then a missile salvo can easily finish it. The alternative is pouring turbolaser fire into it for another minute or two - not good when the firing ship has taken heavy damage itself, or when there are other targets that TL fire could be applied to.

[Illuminatus Primus]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't hypermatter the only known, likely high-density, low-volatility power source that is suited for the firepower and acceleration outputs of most of the starships we know of?

The EX-F dreadnought was an experimental test-bed for antimatter sources, but could this not be explained as an attempted substitute power source, akin to Nazi synthetic fuels late in the Second World War, as access to conventional liquids became constrained? And if so, would the nature of the EX-F suggest antimatter is not a first-choice, preferred fuel?

[Ender]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't hypermatter the only known, likely high-density, low-volatility power source that is suited for the firepower and acceleration outputs of most of the starships we know of?

The EX-F dreadnought was an experimental test-bed for antimatter sources, but could this not be explained as an attempted substitute power source, akin to Nazi synthetic fuels late in the Second World War, as access to conventional liquids became constrained? And if so, would the nature of the EX-F suggest antimatter is not a first-choice, preferred fuel?

Any annihilation energy source will do. Hypermatter just has the advantage of, being handwavium, not constraining us the way anitmatter or a singularity would.

[Illuminatus Primus]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't hypermatter the only known, likely high-density, low-volatility power source that is suited for the firepower and acceleration outputs of most of the starships we know of?

The EX-F dreadnought was an experimental test-bed for antimatter sources, but could this not be explained as an attempted substitute power source, akin to Nazi synthetic fuels late in the Second World War, as access to conventional liquids became constrained? And if so, would the nature of the EX-F suggest antimatter is not a first-choice, preferred fuel?

Any annihilation energy source will do. Hypermatter just has the advantage of, being handwavium, not constraining us the way anitmatter or a singularity would.

Exactly. Antimatter has all the normal constraints of hyper-dense matter, and doubled with the problem IT IS ANTIMATTER, so it'll annihilate with anything if it splatters open, and that's apparently what happened at Anx Minor.

[Swindle1984]

Missiles are probably useful as a finishing weapon in fleet battles. If a capship has taken heavy damage, with shields, sensors and light weapons all heavily damaged or completely gone, then a missile salvo can easily finish it. The alternative is pouring turbolaser fire into it for another minute or two - not good when the firing ship has taken heavy damage itself, or when there are other targets that TL fire could be applied to.

In Return of the Jedi, we saw an apparently intact Star Destroyer take a turbolaser hit and explode. Obviously, the SD was unshielded when it was hit, and we don't know how much damage the ship had taken (since we only saw it from one angle), nor do we know whether or not the SD exploded simply because the turbolaser was that powerful or if the reactor was hit, but once the shields are down capital ships seem pretty vulnerable to turbolaser fire.

[Samuel]

In Return of the Jedi, we saw an apparently intact Star Destroyer take a turbolaser hit and explode. Obviously, the SD was unshielded when it was hit, and we don't know how much damage the ship had taken (since we only saw it from one angle), nor do we know whether or not the SD exploded simply because the turbolaser was that powerful or if the reactor was hit, but once the shields are down capital ships seem pretty vulnerable to turbolaser fire.

Not really. The type 2 Star Destroyer has more firepower than the type 1, but gets the power from weaker shields. To compenstate, it has tougher armor. If armor was so pathetic, they couldn't have made the tradeoff. It is obviously not as good (it can only cover a single section), but of comparable quality.

Note- wookiepedia disagrees with me, saying mk 2 is better in every way. Anyone have a primary source?

[Ba'al's Thunderbolt]

My money is still on highly effective countermeasures (Electronic, Flak, whatever) making missiles useless from ranges longer than roughly point blank. I would say it's the explanation which fits in best with Movie Canon and CW cartoon canon.

This seems fairly certain. The sources pretty much unanimously agree that proton torpedoes and concussion missiles slightly outrange the effective engagement envelope of starfighter-scale energy weapons (which, presumably, would include the point-defense energy mounts on capital ships as well). The effectiveness the TRD tactic seems to be predicated on the fact that starfighters are launching relatively small missiles with high acceleration rates from very short ranges, degrading the performance of point defense systems by massively reducing the time for target acquisition and tracking.

Even at that, reading between the lines of both film and EU sources, it seems clear that starfighters are mostly a threat to capital ships if those ships are operating in isolation. Their efficacy in large scale fleet engagements seems to be greatly reduced, presumably because large numbers of capital ships operating in formation create interlocking fields of fire that are much more difficult for starfighters to penetrate. This seems to be born out by the evidence of Endor, where the Rebel fighters mostly serve to finish off cripples and were largely ineffective in their attacks against the Imperial fleet prior to Ackbar's near suicide run breaking up the Imperial formation. This may also explain why many larger Imperial capital ships - designed with the experience of the large-scale fleet engagements of the Clone Wars in mind - seem so woefully unprepared to engage starfighters without fleet support.

One would almost have to assume that, if starfighters, with their maneuverability and living pilots (shown to be almost invariably superior to in-universe AI programs) have a hard time penetrating the defensive fire of an in formation fleet, then capital scale missile weapons (which would almost certainly be less maneuverable or at least less 'creative' in their maneuvers than starfighters) would have little chance of penetrating that same fire without massive salvo densities (that may or may not even be achievable). To penetrate those defenses with capital scale missiles, you'd almost have to equip them with a whole crapload of drive endurance, a super-advanced AI, and, probably, shields. At which point, they'd cost about as much as a starfighter, but with nothing like the same cost-effectiveness (since starfighters are weapons you expect to use and get back to use again, while missiles are, by definition, single use weapons). Which leads us to the final argument against primary missile armament for capital ships.

The cost of missile armament is probably prohibitive, both monetarily and in combat terms. The sources pretty much unanimously treat concussion missiles and proton torpedoes as if they were substantially more expensive than energy mounts on a shot-for-shot basis. Then there are the opportunity costs of missile armaments. Every missile launcher you put on a ship is a turbolaser battery or point defense mount that you can't include. This would make ships with a missile-based primary armament significantly more susceptible to enemy missiles and starfighter attacks (it is worth noting in this context that the Broadside-class missile cruisers are said to almost never be deployed without escort vessels). Missile armaments are, of course, space intensive, and the combat endurance of primarily missile-armed capital ships would presumably be lower than similar vessels armed mostly with energy mounts.

[Ba'al's Thunderbolt]

On Lusankya:

Reading between the lines, it seems likely that Lusankya was being operated by a skeleton crew, and without anything remotely approaching its full fighter complement, with obviously disastrous results for point defense efficiency.

Also, in case you haven't noticed, Rogue Squadron has magical super infinite powers.

[Bilbo]

Maybe the droids acted stupid because the Nemodians were cheap and used cheap AI and they liked feeling superior by having themselves catered to by morons? My guess would go more towards the cheap side. The leaving of a single ship in orbit to run on the droids in Phantom Menace shows that economics took centerstage over military thinking with them from the start.

[Isolder74]

Maybe the droids acted stupid because the Nemodians were cheap and used cheap AI and they liked feeling superior by having themselves catered to by morons? My guess would go more towards the cheap side. The leaving of a single ship in orbit to run on the droids in Phantom Menace shows that economics took centerstage over military thinking with them from the start.

It really does make sense considering what the Trade Federation Battleship was suppose to be, a converted heavy lift freighter. The longer those ships sit on the blockade the longer they aren't making them any money.

[Ender]

Starfighter vs. Capital ships

Watching the 2nd episode in the Malevolence story arc, if we assume that missiles are less powerful than lasers, than their is a problem with what the Y-wings acheive.

I don't know if this has ever come up in the EU (I'm guessing it's probably been considered around these parts?), but I'm pretty sure so far it's always been assumed that Star Wars missiles are just warheads with rockets attached. Considering what our current day missiles and our anti-tank rounds can do, might it not be fair to guess that Star Wars missiles are more advanced?

There is some evidence for shield penetrating properties, but to make blanket statements about missiles is folly. Some are annihilation based explosives, some are bomb-pumped energy weapons, some deploy buzz-droids. They come in all varieties.

From the game X-Wing Alliance we know there is such a thing as an Ion Pulse warhead, a missile which with one shot disables a fighter.

Why is it not possible that standard anti-capital ship missiles have similar technologies? Why can they not be similar to modern day HEAT rounds, and operate in various stages?

It is quite possible, we don't know either way.

For example, the missiles the Y-Wing's launched could by a 3 stage warhead. The first stage is some sort of Ion pulse, which temporarily weakens or disables local shields. Once this is done, a third stage that works on similar principles as a HEAT round could create a hole in the hull armour which would focus the blast from the explosives carried by the missiles into the interior of the capital ship, causing significant local interior damage.

Of course a single missile would not be enough to significantly weaken the shields of a capital ship, which is why to attack the bridge of the Malevolence Anakin needed the whole squadron. If each Y-wing launched a pair of missiles simultaneously, that would mean 20+ missiles unloading ion charges onto the shields at the same time, and even if 19 of those warheads get stopped by the shields (Which would place extra load on them), chances are one would likely get through and cause significant interior damage.

A better point here is that they were shooting at an ion cannon about to fire. Ion cannons shoot plasma, which is physical. Shields need to be dropped for physical things to pass through. The shields in that area were likely either down or weakened as they were about to be dropped.

Perhaps the ion cannon charge up sucked enough of the power from the local shields enough so that a smaller amount of missiles could overload the shields and penetrate the hull to cause enough internal damage to overload the weapon system.

In terms of power produced by the ship and the maximum strength of the missiles (dictated by their size) we can safely rule that out.

This would also go to explaining why warheads are actually useful at all, and also why starfighters are still quite popular. A dedicated missile attack by enough starfighters could cause local damage to a capital ship, and while the starfighters alone wouldn't be able to take it out it would greatly help any friendly capital ships.

Warheads and starfighters are useful because they fill a specific role in combat. Missile allow for long range attacks and increasing the firepower of smaller craft beyond what it should otherwise be capable of. Starfighters vary by their design, but can be used for better detection, apprehending small craft, and most importantly for providing air support to ground troops.

I always thought the missiles and torpedoes were much stronger than regular shots, which is why they kept them in reserve in ANH.

It will vary with the type of missile and the type of laser. On starfighters, yes, a 100 kt missile is more powerful then a 1 kt laser shot. On capital ships this is not going to be the case.

If missles are so good, why don't capital ships use them exclusively?

Mass, limited number, ability to be shot down, weak compared to TLs, relative velocity issues, etc. They are useful weapons, but they have limits as well.

Warheads could be effected less by the deflection action of the 'deflector' shields than turbolasers

Gonna disagree there. While the active thruster would allow for a missile to theoretically correct its path, things with mass are far easier to deflect then massless quanta. For something with mass, force on a different vector is sufficient. For massless quanta, you are talking about warping space-time.

and might impart more kinetic energy in an attempt to overload the local shielding equipment ability to absorb shockwaves in the shield.

Firstly KE is insignificant compared to the energy released by the explosion. Secondly you mean momentum, not kinetic energy.

At long range the warheads could be targeted and destroyed (some of the capital scale missiles are larger than a star fighter by most indications so they would be able to be tracked and intercepted with some regularity and would take up significant space in warships) so their utility seems to be best when used against large targets that can't effectively destroy them(orbital and surface), for ultra long range stand off capability against moving targets (the missiles would get to a very high fraction of light speed very quick and would be able to track unlike TLs) and for get-the-fuck-away short range salvos. I've personally always wanted to see an SSD open up with its launchers on some poor ship that gets too close. (or just a visual of the torpedo sphere vs SSD battle over ?corellia?)

There is also the added punch component. Triple Zero had one nice moment when an Acclamator took out a Lucrehulk (presumably) coreship with a missile salvo as they decanted. Acting as force multipliers is their biggest advantage. When you have the logistics chain to back it up, being able to provide for wolfpacks of gunships to take out destroyers and cruisers is a solid plan.

Missiles don't destroy the entire ship. The function of turbolasers is to pump as much energy into a target as possible, while missiles seem to be a bit more...fine-tuned.

Depends on the missile and the target.

[Kartr_Kana]

A) Missiles are expensive, so expensive that the Rebels were unable to give their starfighters a full load at the battle of Yavin.

B) TRD is more X-wing series wank. A single starfighter squadron is not going to be able to bring down a capital ships shields by themselves. Shields capable of taking multiple teraton salvos aren't even going to twitch when hit by 24 100 kt - 10 mt torpedos. (note I don't have actual numbers for star fighter torpedo firepower, but unless you can show me that a proton torpedo*24=Imperator broadside levels of energy then I stand by this conclusion)

C) Armor is almost pointless in Star Wars, so once the Capital ships bring down the shields then fighters become useful to conduct precision attacks. Especially if the enemy ship rolls and places fresh shield arcs against its attacker the fighters can come around the back side and pick it apart.

D) IIRC the Ion pulse torpedo takes advantage of the dual nature of Star Wars shields. The warhead slips through the energy shields and then "fires" it's ion blast at the particle shields. The ion blast being an energy weapon in universe bypasses the particle shields and ionizes the area where it hit. According to one of the X-wing game manuals.

Sammy where are you getting your stats for weaker shields on the Imperator mk 2? I can't remember a single source that says that.

Seydlitz-K TIEs are cheap to mass produce, but their not easy to destroy. At least not by the average pilot in the galaxy flying the most common kinds of ships. Yes Rebel pilots flying X-Wings, A-Wings and later E-Wings cut TIEs to shreds, but Y-Wings and B-wings are very vulnerable to TIEs and I'm not even going into Headhunters and Cloakshapes which seem to be the most common civilian fighters. TIE = shitty is probably the biggest Star Wars brain bug.

Oh and militaries are constrained by a budget and usually go with the lowest bidder. Just ask anyone who's served in the armed forces.

[Mad]

B) TRD is more X-wing series wank. A single starfighter squadron is not going to be able to bring down a capital ships shields by themselves. Shields capable of taking multiple teraton salvos aren't even going to twitch when hit by 24 100 kt - 10 mt torpedos. (note I don't have actual numbers for star fighter torpedo firepower, but unless you can show me that a proton torpedo*24=Imperator broadside levels of energy then I stand by this conclusion)

A coordinated strike of fighter-grade proton torpedoes of unknown yield can briefly down the shields of a Victory, but it's typically not long enough for fighters alone to capitalize on. (The ship would roll before the fighters can launch a second volley, then the shields will be back up and the ship would roll again.)

Again, though, we don't know the yield or the timing involved. We do know that if the timing is off, the shields stand a much better chance of holding up through it.

D) IIRC the Ion pulse torpedo takes advantage of the dual nature of Star Wars shields. The warhead slips through the energy shields and then "fires" it's ion blast at the particle shields. The ion blast being an energy weapon in universe bypasses the particle shields and ionizes the area where it hit. According to one of the X-wing game manuals.

It depends on the shield type, but, if anything, ray shielding should be under the particle shields. That way, when something detonates against the particle shields, the ray shields can handle the energy release. (Of course, ray shielding is volumetric, so this isn't a problem.)

[Kartr_Kana]

The Ion Pulse was simple how I remember the game manual describing it.

What do you mean by

ray shielding is volumetric

?

Ok I can understand smaller ships having their shields burned through, for a moment by a timed torpedo salvo from a squadron of fighters. The whole rolling out of the way is bullshit though. Against another capital ship that'd work since it wouldn't have the speed and manouverability to stay with the downed shields. We're fighters in a 3-D combat environment though, they can fly faster and maneuver better then the cap ship they're attacking. They'll be able to stay with the collapsed shield arc and launch follow up torpedo strikes. Probably first at shield projectors so that they'll stay down, then moving on to weapons emplacements, communications and engines.

[Mad]

What do you mean by

ray shielding is volumetric

?

Typical ray shields are a force fields. A such, they are three-dimensional. (The visible shimmer in an atmosphere is the point where air is affected by interaction with the shield.) This is taken from the Attack of the Clones Incredible Cross-Sections.

Ok I can understand smaller ships having their shields burned through, for a moment by a timed torpedo salvo from a squadron of fighters. The whole rolling out of the way is bullshit though. Against another capital ship that'd work since it wouldn't have the speed and manouverability to stay with the downed shields. We're fighters in a 3-D combat environment though, they can fly faster and maneuver better then the cap ship they're attacking. They'll be able to stay with the collapsed shield arc and launch follow up torpedo strikes. Probably first at shield projectors so that they'll stay down, then moving on to weapons emplacements, communications and engines.

That would depend on the distance from the ship when it begins rolling and on how long the shields are down (which apparently isn't long at all). The point of the scene I described from The Bacta War from the Rogue Squadron series of books was that going up against a Victory would be futile for the Rogues without support from a bigger ship, even if they could momentarily bring the shields down.