Bad design in Star Wars

[Simon_Jester]

It is pointless in the context of instant kill which the person I was quoting was implying. Didn't I point out that all it can do is make them have to repair it?

Yes, and "instant kill" isn't the context I've been talking about, and I contend it is the wrong context to consider that attack in, because the whole concept makes vastly more sense in another context- such that it could plausibly be ordered by a competent general who remembers his high school physics.

Now in order to hit the reactor that is in the middle they have to attack the station when it is incomplete enough to fire something into the center. The only viable target at the point of construction of the Death Star when it was attacked was the external hardpoints of the Superlaser.

Again, I speculate that the Rebels didn't realize how far along the construction was, probably because they had trouble getting good real time intelligence on the site. We know the site was fairly well secured from an intelligence standpoint, at least in terms of making it difficult to leave. The Rebels managed to smuggle saboteurs into the site, but that's not the same thing as being able to get information out.

[Isolder74]

I am only contending that the attack was never considering the reactor a target at all, nothing more. Without the knowledge of the shaft that allows a potential attack on it, there would be no reason to even think they can even target it. They therefore must have been after a mission disable objective.

[Simon_Jester]

If they knew the armor belt was completed (so that there was no angle of attack to the reactor), you are right. I submit that they may honestly not have known, and considered the reactor (along with other parts of the station on the interior) valid potential targets before going in.

If the main reactor was not powered up, I doubt destroying it would have obliterated the station; it would still be a delay and only a delay in construction. But it would be a delay, and I think that's a reasonable goal for them to shoot for. They could have plausibly hoped to achieve it given the information they'd be likely to have.

[Isolder74]

Unless a major portion of the station, as in the Death Star 2, was incomplete, it would be stupid to assume that they'd have any shot at components in the center. Even if the armor plate wasn't in place the only thing that they'd be able to target would be the massive emitter system of the superlaser and the engines and hyperdrive.

Hoping for anything else would be folly.

[The Romulan Republic]

And we almost never see them. Their numbers are very, very small - in the low dozens, if even that. Whereas there are at least 25000 ISDs and probably millions of smaller craft. The ratio of the ISD to the smaller craft is far more like the Battleship to destroyer ratio of early 20th century navies than the ratio of ISD to Dreadnoughts.

I don't think we have any way of knowing exactly how many their were. Their are a lot of classes of ships in between ISDs and the real Dreadnoughts, but its true we don't see them very often, at least not in large numbers (a notable exception being the Clone Wars-era Lucrehulks, but those are CIS and are in any case classified as battleships, not cruisers).

Also, there is a lot of confusion, with ships such as Home One being listed as battleships (you may have been correct on this point it seems), while larger vessels are then listed as heavy cruisers (ie, the CIS's Subjugator class). Given the general confusion, the definition of "Battleship" or "Cruiser" seems to be somewhat hard to pin down. So I won't argue the point any further.

In any case, its kind of irrelevant to the rest of this discussion.

Yeah, probably. I am arguing Star Destroyer levels, going by the MonCal being described as Cruisers and IMO ISDs are heavy cruisers.

I could probably buy the Rebels having several hundred standard, ISD-level cruisers, even if there's no incontravertable canon evidence that this was the case. It is indeed hard to see how they could have survived without at least that, though its still difficult to see why they would only send such a small fraction of their fleet to a battle as critical as Endor. So I could also believe them having a much smaller force (on the order of a couple Sector Fleets). There's nothing in canon that I'm aware of which completely overrules either possibility.

*Shrug* Like I said above, none of this makes sense.

I think it makes some degree of sense if the Mon Cals actually had a planetary shield as well as a reasonably strong fleet for a single system or sector, and the Empire's forces were spread thin dealing with a lot of other problems.

The Venators. They fulfill all purposes of the ship of the line.

Fair enough. I was thinking of the Imperial era, while the Venators were mainly deployed in the Clone Wars. However, it is true that they are not only being used as ships of the line, but appear to be often the only capital ships in Republic task forces. Which is odd, since one on one there are plenty of CIS ships that outclass a Venator (ie the rather common Lucrehulks and also the Subjugator class).

Meh. I don't think we are going to agree on this one. At this point we are just shouting at each other.

Its an entirely different argument really, though I maintain that there is a good case for ISDs being fairly average ships.

So how costly do you think it would be?

Impossible to say exactly. But even a couple of Sector fleets, combined with any ground-based defenses and any other allied Rebel forces at Mon Calimari, might be able to inflict some serious casualties on a 200 ISD fleet.

You accuse the EU of minimalism but do not think the empire at the height of its power had enough forces left to replace 200 ISDs? Really?

I don't think that. I think it would be possible for them to pull together a 200 ISD force, but not nessissarily ideal. This hypothesis relies on the Empire already being spread rather thin.

Also, there is nothing inconsistent with the above statement. The only reason one might have to seriously entertain the possibility that 200 ISDs would be a significant force for whatever reason is because the EU is unfortunately both minimalist and canon.

Of course, the Empire should probably have been capable of producing a hell of a lot more ships than the 25,000 Star Destroyer number suggests, so this is another thing that doesn't really make sense.

Two of the possibilities you raise were posted by me, so I do not get what repeating them is supposed to accomplish. As for the rest of your post, see above.

Well, I would agree that the neutrality idea combined with Palpatine using them politically provides about as good an explanation as any. The point that you seem to be avoiding, however, is that this would somewhat justify the Mon Cal's survival even with a smaller fleet.

Well yeah. Either the Imps are idiots, the MonCal are idiots or the MonCal had a strong enough fleet to prevent an attack. Take your pick.

My preferred explanation is that the Mon Cals had both a large fleet for a single system (a couple sector fleets at least) and also a planetary shield, and that while the Empire had a much larger force out their, most of that was tied down patrolling the Galaxy, dealing with other rebellious factions like the Hapans, or being held back as a reserve. Therefor, sending a force large enough to garuntee victory against the Mon Cals, while possible, would have been a significant drain on the Imperial fleet's offensive capabilities/reserves, and the Empire preferred to accept the story of Mon Cal neutrality until the Death Star was finished (when they could then easily blow them away with one shot). Its not a great explanation, but it seems to make the most sense of any of the various options discussed here.

Ultimately, the problem is either rationalizing how the Mon Cals could have survived with such a small fleet, or else how they could have built such a massive fleet with such limited resources. Not really easy to make sense of.

[Simon_Jester]

Unless a major portion of the station, as in the Death Star 2, was incomplete, it would be stupid to assume that they'd have any shot at components in the center. Even if the armor plate wasn't in place the only thing that they'd be able to target would be the massive emitter system of the superlaser and the engines and hyperdrive.

Hoping for anything else would be folly.

Again, I think, given the attack profile, that they did expect (or hope) that a major portion of the station was incomplete. Or that there would be important construction equipment near the Death Star hull that was not under armor and was therefore vulnerable. They may have honestly expected this if they didn't realize how far along construction was, for instance. Similar intelligence screwups have happened in real life, when people use fairly good logic to come up with reasonable conclusions based on faulty information.

And we almost never see them. Their numbers are very, very small - in the low dozens, if even that. Whereas there are at least 25000 ISDs and probably millions of smaller craft. The ratio of the ISD to the smaller craft is far more like the Battleship to destroyer ratio of early 20th century navies than the ratio of ISD to Dreadnoughts.

I don't think we have any way of knowing exactly how many their were. Their are a lot of classes of ships in between ISDs and the real Dreadnoughts, but its true we don't see them very often, at least not in large numbers (a notable exception being the Clone Wars-era Lucrehulks, but those are CIS and are in any case classified as battleships, not cruisers).

Also, there is a lot of confusion, with ships such as Home One being listed as battleships (you may have been correct on this point it seems), while larger vessels are then listed as heavy cruisers (ie, the CIS's Subjugator class). Given the general confusion, the definition of "Battleship" or "Cruiser" seems to be somewhat hard to pin down. So I won't argue the point any further.

Suggested definition: "cruisers" are designed to cruise, with long endurance, a weapons mix optimized for deep raiding, and high versatility. "Battleships" are designed to fight battles on a large scale between major opposing fleets, or between a major fleet and a fixed defense position. They will generally be larger than a typical cruiser, and will often be more specialized for a particular combat role (like the Lucrehulk, which is more or less a carrier as I understand it).

Some cruisers will be exceptionally large- "supercruisers," if you will. But they are still fundamentally designed to cruise, not to go head to head with the most massive orbital defenses and with more specialized warships of equal tonnage.

Remember that there was a time when "cruiser" and "battleship" did not just mean "medium warship" and "large warship." Not every battleship needs to be able to defeat every cruiser, and in a setting where ship movements are as potentially fluid as in Star Wars, cruisers might reasonably be vastly more numerous than battleships (and capable of massing to defeat battleships if need be).

[Thanas]

The Venators. They fulfill all purposes of the ship of the line.

Fair enough. I was thinking of the Imperial era, while the Venators were mainly deployed in the Clone Wars. However, it is true that they are not only being used as ships of the line, but appear to be often the only capital ships in Republic task forces. Which is odd, since one on one there are plenty of CIS ships that outclass a Venator (ie the rather common Lucrehulks and also the Subjugator class).

Which has no bearing on Republic/Imperial doctrine - they clearly view them and the successor ISDs as ships of the line.

You accuse the EU of minimalism but do not think the empire at the height of its power had enough forces left to replace 200 ISDs? Really?

I don't think that. I think it would be possible for them to pull together a 200 ISD force, but not nessissarily ideal. This hypothesis relies on the Empire already being spread rather thin.

An empire that is so thin would not survive. You are talking about an empire that cannot suffer the loss of less than 1% of its forces without running into serious troubles.

Also, there is nothing inconsistent with the above statement. The only reason one might have to seriously entertain the possibility that 200 ISDs would be a significant force for whatever reason is because the EU is unfortunately both minimalist and canon.

If you do not think them as significant, then you are of course welcome to make the case for the MonCal having even larger forces.

Well, I would agree that the neutrality idea combined with Palpatine using them politically provides about as good an explanation as any. The point that you seem to be avoiding, however, is that this would somewhat justify the Mon Cal's survival even with a smaller fleet.

It would not. Neutrality is only worth a damm if you can stop other powers (read:the empire) from destroying you at a whim when you are supplying the Rebels with MonCal Cruisers. Or if your fleet is so large that the abscence of some cruisers and at least one battleship cannot be traced.

[PainRack]

So how would you classify the Tector then? And the Nebula really is not that much of a surprise given that it is a much younger design that arrived what, 20 years after the original ISD?

Depending on its capabilities, either a light or a heavy cruiser. As for 20 years, there is something called technology stasis and the Nebula sacrifices "some", IMO way too little capabilities to achieve its abilities. Roles and doctrines, or simply access to resources might had changed the scale of starship combat but the NR was not significantly more powerful than the Empire.

This flies in the description of the OR needing several Victories/Venators to destroy a Lucrehulk. However, this does not reply to my main point - whenever we see Venators/ISDs, they fulfill the role of ships of the line - in all of the EU and in all the movies, they are the primary capital ship. And the novelization even calls them heavy cruisers, iirc.

Doesn't the Venator features a lot of starfighters and relatively lighter armament when compared to the Lucrehulk.

As for the novelisation, they are simply called Imperial Cruisers. Note also that Han Solo was supposed to have tangled with the "Big Correllian ships", which suggest a class superior to that of the ISD and common to the Empire counter-smuggling efforts.

Larger vessels in the role of the heavy cruisers/battleships may very well have been produced in much smaller production runs and had limited runs, as opposed to the common ISD.

As SOTL, there are more than one way to classify SOTL. Given the existence of the Executor as a Dreadnought class and the existence of the Firewave Destroyer and other classifications of ships such as the Viscount and etc, the ISD may very well have been on the lower end of the firepwoer scale.

[Thanas]

This changes very little in the main argument - the main role of SOTLs is to stand in the line of fire and be the capital ships of the fleet. Nowhere does the firepower argument relate to the fact that they are employed in the role of Ships of the Line. Just because some Ships of the Line are more powerful than others does not change anything - one can observe the same thing in the navies of old, where ships that were more than 3x as powerful as others still fought alongside/opposite the others. Granted, the power differences are way larger in Star Wars, but this does not change the fact that the ships are used as battleships. Even in the battle of Coruscant (ROTS), they were the mainstay, while smaller ships like the Carracks fulfilled the duties of destroyers.

[Isolder74]

wrote:
Unless a major portion of the station, as in the Death Star 2, was incomplete, it would be stupid to assume that they'd have any shot at components in the center. Even if the armor plate wasn't in place the only thing that they'd be able to target would be the massive emitter system of the superlaser and the engines and hyperdrive.

Hoping for anything else would be folly.

Again, I think, given the attack profile, that they did expect (or hope) that a major portion of the station was incomplete. Or that there would be important construction equipment near the Death Star hull that was not under armor and was therefore vulnerable. They may have honestly expected this if they didn't realize how far along construction was, for instance. Similar intelligence screwups have happened in real life, when people use fairly good logic to come up with reasonable conclusions based on faulty information.

Faulty information or not it would have been a major stretch for them to have expected any part of the reactor to be a viable target. If they got there and found that there was a way to strike at it nice side benefit. Otherwise the main objective had to have been the exterior equipment of the Superlaser and the Death Star's Engines and Hyperdrive. Access to the reactor being available nice but that couldn't have been the primary target of the operation!

You keep side stepping the point!

[bz249]

Of course, the Empire should probably have been capable of producing a hell of a lot more ships than the 25,000 Star Destroyer number suggests, so this is another thing that doesn't really make sense.

Construction is one thing controlling is another. Palpatine wanted firm control one-man over his Empire and fleets having millions of capital ships may be very difficult for him to manage.

So far this is the only somewhat rational idea why having such a low number of capital ships for a galactic power. (the Empire is clearly outgunned by a combined force of the other players)

[Tiriol]

Of course, the Empire should probably have been capable of producing a hell of a lot more ships than the 25,000 Star Destroyer number suggests, so this is another thing that doesn't really make sense.

Construction is one thing controlling is another. Palpatine wanted firm control one-man over his Empire and fleets having millions of capital ships may be very difficult for him to manage.

So far this is the only somewhat rational idea why having such a low number of capital ships for a galactic power. (the Empire is clearly outgunned by a combined force of the other players)

Outgunned? By whom? There aren't enough major forces in the galaxy to outgun the Empire. The only reason the Rebels became the New Republic after the Battle of Endor was that the might of the Imperial Starfleet fragmented badly when various warlords and competing coalitions fought for power in absence of Palpatine or any clear successor.

The Hapans were contained within their own little empire, the Hutt Space was all but entirely subservient to the Empire, the Corporate Sector WAS entirely subservient (Imperial forces violated the CorSec space whenever they pleased), the Ssi-Ruuvi Imperium was a distant, local threat in the Unknown Regions, the Chiss were also in the Unknown Regions and the Rebel fleet wasn't powerful enough to challenge the entire Starfleet. It was the Empire that outgunned everybody else, not the other way around.

[CaptHawkeye]

To be honest the idea that the Empire DOESN'T operate huge battlefleets of roving, Executor-size dreadnoughts has always seemed silly to me. They can build the Death Star, more than 1 at a time, and over the course of a few months. They MUST have a "Grand Fleet" or "Combined Fleet" somewhere. We just never see it because the Empire isn't going to pull its huge, expensive battlefleet out of harbour just to patrol random systems looking for Rebels. (Remember everyone, Fleet in Being!) The only reason the Death Star was used for that purpose was because it was for propaganda. That and Tarkin saw the existence of the Rebel Alliance as a personal insult.

That is to say, I consider the term "Star Destroyer" to be literal. I do believe Star Destroyers are in fact, just DDs.

[Thanas]

To be honest the idea that the Empire DOESN'T operate huge battlefleets of roving, Executor-size dreadnoughts has always seemed silly to me. They can build the Death Star, more than 1 at a time, and over the course of a few months.

More than 1 at a time over the course of a few months? Eh?

They MUST have a "Grand Fleet" or "Combined Fleet" somewhere. We just never see it because the Empire isn't going to pull its huge, expensive battlefleet out of harbour just to patrol random systems looking for Rebels. (Remember everyone, Fleet in Being!) The only reason the Death Star was used for that purpose was because it was for propaganda. That and Tarkin saw the existence of the Rebel Alliance as a personal insult.

Azure Hammer Command or the Black Fleet would certainly qualify as large fleets. And even they had ISDs as mainstay of the fleet.

That is to say, I consider the term "Star Destroyer" to be literal. I do believe Star Destroyers are in fact, just DDs.

And your argument for that is....?

[Batman]

Excuse me, WHY must the Empire have a 'Grand Fleet in Being'? There were exactly ZERO military threats to Palpatine's Empire. Militarily speaking the Rebels were an annoyance even AFTER they killed the first Death Star. There's no reason the Empire MUST have massive battlefleets.

[Thanas]

Well, it's largest reserve fleets that we know of had 1 SSD and a whopping total of 56 smaller ships, mainly ISD.

[Batman]

What would they need massive reserve fleets FOR?

[CaptHawkeye]

A multi-million system star empire DOESN'T need a consistently large fleet to maintain order?

More than 1 at a time over the course of a few months? Eh?

Error, for some reason I thought DS1 and 2 were built at the same time.

That is to say, I consider the term "Star Destroyer" to be literal. I do believe Star Destroyers are in fact, just DDs.

The fact that Executor exists, indicating the Empire has a clear operational and design line between Star "Destroyer" and Star "Dreadnought". When you look at the Death Star, the EU's idea that Executor size vessels are difficult to build and sustain is absolutely ludicrous. They must have enough leftover income to build quite a few more. But I will give you that the Empire probably doesn't operate many battleships by the time of the GCW. Since their biggest opponent is the Rebel Alliance and its major arms supplier the Mon Cal. The Rebels need to be defeated in spirit and moral rather than strategically. The Death Star is potentially better for that job since it carries great political investment in its design and use.

Actually the Mon Cal build some pretty impressive capital ships themselves. Such as Home One. Home One wasn't near as impressive as Executor was, but its existence indicated to me that the Empire's opponents aren't exactly powerless either. It's even pretty clearly stated on numerous occasions that a design requirement of the Death Star was the ability to fend off attacking enemy capital ships.

Azure Hammer Command or the Black Fleet would certainly qualify as large fleets. And even they had ISDs as mainstay of the fleet.

Of course. They're just hunting Rebels I presume. What reason do they have to operate dreadnoughts as anything other than command ships? Given the Empire's enemies, ISD's are perfect for the job. You wouldn't expect the US Navy to hunt pirates with USS Iowa would you?

[Knife]

The very nature of the Clone Wars shows the size and scope of the Galaxy is large enough to provide the possibility for a large and dangerous enemy starfleet to be built and operated outside of a galactic civilization. A major industrialized sector can produce, obviously, a huge fleet of capable warships ie: Trade Fed, Techno Union, Mon Cals, Kuati, etc... The only problem is that the galactic civilization, while not purposely operating a huge fleet of battleships, can ramp up production fairly quickly and produce a shitload of warships a-la all the Venstars and other warships in the Clone Wars.

[Thanas]

Azure Hammer Command or the Black Fleet would certainly qualify as large fleets. And even they had ISDs as mainstay of the fleet.

Of course. They're just hunting Rebels I presume. What reason do they have to operate dreadnoughts as anything other than command ships? Given the Empire's enemies, ISD's are perfect for the job. You wouldn't expect the US Navy to hunt pirates with USS Iowa would you?

Do pirates have ships that can defeat a US Navy warship? Do pirates routinely destroy US bases and shipyards? Your analogy fails because the Rebels are far more threatening than pirates.

And Azure Hammer Command was definitely not a Rebel-hunting fleet. It was the main fleet protecting the core.

[PainRack]

This changes very little in the main argument - the main role of SOTLs is to stand in the line of fire and be the capital ships of the fleet. Nowhere does the firepower argument relate to the fact that they are employed in the role of Ships of the Line. Just because some Ships of the Line are more powerful than others does not change anything - one can observe the same thing in the navies of old, where ships that were more than 3x as powerful as others still fought alongside/opposite the others. Granted, the power differences are way larger in Star Wars, but this does not change the fact that the ships are used as battleships. Even in the battle of Coruscant (ROTS), they were the mainstay, while smaller ships like the Carracks fulfilled the duties of destroyers.

And how DO you quantify the difference between a heavy cruiser and a light cruiser? In the Imperial era, ISDs were mainly used to engage and defeat lighter vessels. Let's not forget that according to the hackneyed EU description, ISDs are on par with Mon Calamari Star Cruisers..... retrofitted merchant cruisers.

My main argument is that ISDs are light cruisers, not heavy cruisers.

Excuse me, WHY must the Empire have a 'Grand Fleet in Being'? There were exactly ZERO military threats to Palpatine's Empire. Militarily speaking the Rebels were an annoyance even AFTER they killed the first Death Star. There's no reason the Empire MUST have massive battlefleets.

Just because. Mon Mothma declearation of independence makes specific claim that the Empire military is maintained at a level way too high for mere civic duties.

[Thanas]

And how DO you quantify the difference between a heavy cruiser and a light cruiser? In the Imperial era, ISDs were mainly used to engage and defeat lighter vessels. Let's not forget that according to the hackneyed EU description, ISDs are on par with Mon Calamari Star Cruisers..... retrofitted merchant cruisers.

My main argument is that ISDs are light cruisers, not heavy cruisers.

Light cruisers, per definition, cannot stand in the line of battle.

ISDs do.

[fractalsponge1]

But ISDs cannot stand in the "battleline" alongside the likes of Giel's battleship, or Black Sword Command's Executor squadron, at least not without prohibitive losses or overwhelming numbers. They maybe be line ships for sector groups built around destroyers as primary units of force, but not for the strategic fleets of the Core. By size and power, they ARE DDs for the Starfleet that operates squadrons of ships like Giel's flagship, or Mandators, and their naming as using the same "Star" designation as the Mandator and Procurator suggests that they were designed with that kind of classification in mind. In reality, they were also often deployed as ships in situations where they became the principal components of a situational "line of battle"; i.e. a relatively underarmed 24xISD Sector Group. The distinction seems to be solely depending on what other ships are present. Seems like there's a case to be made for a dual system of "Star Xxxx" for the central Starfleet and whatever local definitions exist in the lower-case scale where Carracks are by weight and function the local "Star Cruisers" to an ISD's local role of "Star Battleship". Presumably a Star Cruiser like Anon1 from the Saxton catalogue would in a Sector Group context be equivalent to a Star Dreadnought for the central Starfleet.

Is there actually a hard and fast rule for "heavy" cruisers other than the arbitrary terrestial definition derived from the Washington Treaty? Or is it just a size difference within the traditional cruiser role, i.e. scouting, patrol, independent action, etc.?

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

Excuse me, WHY must the Empire have a 'Grand Fleet in Being'? There were exactly ZERO military threats to Palpatine's Empire. Militarily speaking the Rebels were an annoyance even AFTER they killed the first Death Star. There's no reason the Empire MUST have massive battlefleets.

The Yuuzhan Vong were a known threat even before the formation of the Empire.

And no military threats is nonsense. It was well established by the Hand of Thrawn trilogy that the Empire was constantly putting out bush fires of various size and magnitude, including planetary scale. The Imperial Navy had to constantly put out fires from time to time, never mind the random secessionist state, and the Empire had plenty of planetary conquest goals.

[Thanas]

But ISDs cannot stand in the "battleline" alongside the likes of Giel's battleship, or Black Sword Command's Executor squadron, at least not without prohibitive losses or overwhelming numbers. They maybe be line ships for sector groups built around destroyers as primary units of force, but not for the strategic fleets of the Core. By size and power, they ARE DDs for the Starfleet that operates squadrons of ships like Giel's flagship, or Mandators, and their naming as using the same "Star" designation as the Mandator and Procurator suggests that they were designed with that kind of classification in mind.

BUt is there any canon evidence for such squadrons existing? All we have is one Dreadnought as flagship, accompanied by many ISDs. The best we have is a three Dreadnought squadron (Black Sword), but the only real heavy unit we know of there is the Intimidator, the other are two dreadnoughts of unspecified design.

In reality, they were also often deployed as ships in situations where they became the principal components of a situational "line of battle"; i.e. a relatively underarmed 24xISD Sector Group. The distinction seems to be solely depending on what other ships are present. Seems like there's a case to be made for a dual system of "Star Xxxx" for the central Starfleet and whatever local definitions exist in the lower-case scale where Carracks are by weight and function the local "Star Cruisers" to an ISD's local role of "Star Battleship". Presumably a Star Cruiser like Anon1 from the Saxton catalogue would in a Sector Group context be equivalent to a Star Dreadnought for the central Starfleet.

If they even were numerous enough to serve as flagships, which I would dismiss based on the evidence of ISDs acting as sector flagships even for Grand Moffs.