Could the Death Star survive a hit from it's own superweapon

[Alyeska]

The DS could never survive a Super Laser blast.

Lets just assume for the sake of argument that the DS can direct all of the energy channeled into the superlaser into its shield systems as well. Its a simple matter of surface area. The shield must defend a greater area then the super laser can strike. There is no possible way for the DS to defend against a superlaser blast. Any superlaser blast will simply punch right through the DS shields with relative ease.

[Slartibartfast]

I thought the same thing. But then we have the "you need less energy to power shields than to fire a laser" thing, which I don't exactly buy... there still would be a shitload of surface area to protect, and the exact mechanics aren't known, but we have as a base that shields don't protect perfectly from an attack of a like-powered ship.

[Ender]

The DS could never survive a Super Laser blast.

Lets just assume for the sake of argument that the DS can direct all of the energy channeled into the superlaser into its shield systems as well. Its a simple matter of surface area. The shield must defend a greater area then the super laser can strike. There is no possible way for the DS to defend against a superlaser blast. Any superlaser blast will simply punch right through the DS shields with relative ease.

I don't follow what you are saying here at all. I see you are trying to relate to intensity, ok, but beyond that, no.

[YT300000]

The DS could never survive a Super Laser blast.

Lets just assume for the sake of argument that the DS can direct all of the energy channeled into the superlaser into its shield systems as well. Its a simple matter of surface area. The shield must defend a greater area then the super laser can strike. There is no possible way for the DS to defend against a superlaser blast. Any superlaser blast will simply punch right through the DS shields with relative ease.

I don't follow what you are saying here at all. I see you are trying to relate to intensity, ok, but beyond that, no.

He's saying that the energy gets spread around when it's put into a shield, because it needs to cover huge amounts space. Since the superlaser blast is very focused, it will easily overpower the area of the shield it strikes, and go through. If the shield doesn't cover the whole front half of the DS, but is concentrated in one place, it would be able to stop the blast, but the superlaser gunners would just aim away from that spot.

[Ender]

The DS could never survive a Super Laser blast.

Lets just assume for the sake of argument that the DS can direct all of the energy channeled into the superlaser into its shield systems as well. Its a simple matter of surface area. The shield must defend a greater area then the super laser can strike. There is no possible way for the DS to defend against a superlaser blast. Any superlaser blast will simply punch right through the DS shields with relative ease.

I don't follow what you are saying here at all. I see you are trying to relate to intensity, ok, but beyond that, no.

He's saying that the energy gets spread around when it's put into a shield, because it needs to cover huge amounts space. Since the superlaser blast is very focused, it will easily overpower the area of the shield it strikes, and go through. If the shield doesn't cover the whole front half of the DS, but is concentrated in one place, it would be able to stop the blast, but the superlaser gunners would just aim away from that spot.

Yes, I understood he was speaking about the intensity, what I didn't get is his basis for it because all we have ever sen is lower limits

[tharkûn]

I doubt it could survive but I don't think the evidence is conclusive. "Sheilds" are not physically required to exert energy. Think about a simple plywood sheild of Roman make. Energy comes in as kinetic energy on a sword, smacks the sheild and the swords rebounds. Most of the kinetic energy goes into the rebound and most of the rest goes into deforming the sword and shield. It requires zero energy to deflect energy. A shield simply needs to exert force, not necessarily do work and consume energy.

Same thing here. The minimum needed energy to deflect a DS blast is zero. Of course given real world inefficiency a crapload of energy is not going to be reflected/deflected and has to be dealt with. Hence I suspect the heat bleed alone would overcome the DS.

Alderaan's sheilds failing actually mean jack didly squat. Alderaan has at least 3,600 times more surface area (using a 200 km wide DS and a 12,000 km wide Alderaan). It might be economical to give an already ludicrious expensive, one of kind super weapon the absolute best sheilding money can buy because you have the entire empire footing the bill while Alderaan can't afford to feild 3,000 times as many sheild generators when a single planet funds the effort. Additionally Alderaan's shields predated the death star threat so they had no real incentive to build such powerful sheilds, the DS might have been designed with an eye towards others replicating the superlaser (I mean if the Hutt's can build one ... it might be prudent to work on counter measures). The DS should be a FAR tougher nut to crack than Alderaan.

[Alyeska]

Yes, I understood he was speaking about the intensity, what I didn't get is his basis for it because all we have ever sen is lower limits

Ender, its simple math. The logical assumption is that the DS produces the vast majority of its energy solely for the Super Laser. Even assuming that the DS could put ALL of its energy into its shields, it can not possibly produce enough protection to even hope to stop a Super Laser blast.

Remember here, typicaly Star Wars ships have a threshold level. You breech the threshold and you either punch a hole right through the shields or disable all the shield emitters in that region. Either way, the shot is going through relatively unhindered. Given the intensity of the shot compared to the intensity of the shield we can easily state the shield can not bleed off enough energy to even remotely hope to defend the Death Star.

[Ender]

Given the intensity of the shot compared to the intensity of the shield we can easily state the shield can not bleed off enough energy to even remotely hope to defend the Death Star.

And here is my point: we know fuck all about the dissapation rate and intensity of the shield. All we ever saw was a lower limit. We have no idea what it is truely capable of. Alderaan was able to hold off for a fraction of a second, and the DS has more energy to give to its shields, has a better heat dissapation mechanism, and has a tougher base material.

I am not saying that it will survive. I am saying we don't know enough to glibly say "no".

[Ender]

Given the intensity of the shot compared to the intensity of the shield we can easily state the shield can not bleed off enough energy to even remotely hope to defend the Death Star.

And here is my point: we know fuck all about the dissapation rate and intensity of the shield. All we ever saw was a lower limit. We have no idea what it is truely capable of. Alderaan was able to hold off for a fraction of a second, and the DS has more energy to give to its shields, has a better heat dissapation mechanism, and has a tougher base material.

I am not saying that it will survive. I am saying we don't know enough to glibly say "no".

[Alyeska]

Given the intensity of the shot compared to the intensity of the shield we can easily state the shield can not bleed off enough energy to even remotely hope to defend the Death Star.

And here is my point: we know fuck all about the dissapation rate and intensity of the shield. All we ever saw was a lower limit. We have no idea what it is truely capable of. Alderaan was able to hold off for a fraction of a second, and the DS has more energy to give to its shields, has a better heat dissapation mechanism, and has a tougher base material.

I am not saying that it will survive. I am saying we don't know enough to glibly say "no".

Dissapation rate is totaly irrelevent. SW shields are work along the same basic principles. One of those being that if you hit the shield with too much energy the shield itself fails (entirely in the case of fighters and by sections for larger ships) and the shot procedes towards the target unhindered.

[Ender]

Given the intensity of the shot compared to the intensity of the shield we can easily state the shield can not bleed off enough energy to even remotely hope to defend the Death Star.

And here is my point: we know fuck all about the dissapation rate and intensity of the shield. All we ever saw was a lower limit. We have no idea what it is truely capable of. Alderaan was able to hold off for a fraction of a second, and the DS has more energy to give to its shields, has a better heat dissapation mechanism, and has a tougher base material.

I am not saying that it will survive. I am saying we don't know enough to glibly say "no".

Dissapation rate is totaly irrelevent. SW shields are work along the same basic principles. One of those being that if you hit the shield with too much energy the shield itself fails (entirely in the case of fighters and by sections for larger ships) and the shot procedes towards the target unhindered.

Dissipation rate is another term for the threshold. So since we don't know it, you cannot state the shot will overcome it.

[Alyeska]

Dissipation rate is another term for the threshold. So since we don't know it, you cannot state the shot will overcome it.

Actually we can state with relative certainty that the threshold is far below the maximum power output of the Death Star.

Tell me this. Have you ever heard of shields with a higher threshold then the shields can sustain in energy?

As it stands, the math states the DS shields could not sustain a SL blast. Anything else is nitpicking.

You lost the battle Ender, move on.

[Ender]

Dissipation rate is another term for the threshold. So since we don't know it, you cannot state the shot will overcome it.

Actually we can state with relative certainty that the threshold is far below the maximum power output of the Death Star.

Tell me this. Have you ever heard of shields with a higher threshold then the shields can sustain in energy?

Yes. Padme's ship is given a threshold higher then what it can produce. No suprise there, its well established by the films that shields can dissapate more then they need to power them, else Hoth and the Gungan's would have fried.

As it stands, the math states the DS shields could not sustain a SL blast. Anything else is nitpicking.

No, there is zero math for it.

You lost the battle Ender, move on.

Don't be condesending.

[Alyeska]

Yes. Padme's ship is given a threshold higher then what it can produce. No suprise there, its well established by the films that shields can dissapate more then they need to power them, else Hoth and the Gungan's would have fried.

And was this orders of magnitude above the actual power rating? And have you actualy thought this line of reasoning through? If this is so, all a ship has to do is ramp up its power to the shields and its completely immune from enemy fire. Yet this doesn't happen.

No, there is zero math for it.

Coulda fooled me. What with the fact that we can determine the relative surface area of the DS shielding and compare it with the surface area of the super laser blast. Then we can determine the relative intensity. Oh yes, its very clearly math.

Don't be condesending.

Then don't argue such an idiotic position. Fuck, under your reasoning the DS can't even destroy planets because they can obviously crank out more power and put up better shields then the DS. Alderran alone disproves your entire premise.

[Ender]

Yes. Padme's ship is given a threshold higher then what it can produce. No suprise there, its well established by the films that shields can dissapate more then they need to power them, else Hoth and the Gungan's would have fried.

And was this orders of magnitude above the actual power rating? And have you actualy thought this line of reasoning through? If this is so, all a ship has to do is ramp up its power to the shields and its completely immune from enemy fire. Yet this doesn't happen.

Yes, it would be totally immune if it had perfect heat transmission capabilities. They don't, so shields can be worn down by shots less then the dissapation rate.

No, there is zero math for it.

Coulda fooled me. What with the fact that we can determine the relative surface area of the DS shielding and compare it with the surface area of the super laser blast. Then we can determine the relative intensity. Oh yes, its very clearly math.

You need to show that the intensity has anything to do with it still.

Don't be condesending.

Then don't argue such an idiotic position. Fuck, under your reasoning the DS can't even destroy planets because they can obviously crank out more power and put up better shields then the DS. Alderran alone disproves your entire premise.

the fuck it does. There is not a chance in hell a planet can put out better power then a space station designed from the ground up to crank out that much power. Basic rules of thermodynamics mean that the waste heat produced would get dumped somehow, and on a planet that means radiating it out into space. But there are limits as to how fast that can occur, and coupled with the efficiency of the materials, used in star wars, that puts a limit on generating capability. Meanwhile, the Death star, being an artifical construct, can be designed from the get go to adequatly disperse heat, meaning that the limits are based off engineering. And we know for a fact they accounted for this.

On top of that evidence points to planets using fusion to provide power while the Death Star uses the far more energetic reactions to produce power.

There is a reason that their starships are characterized with producing more power then entire civilizations Alyeska, its because there are limits to what you can do on a planet and have it still be habitable.

[Connor MacLeod]

As far as I can tell, intensity would only matter if we knew how much energy on a given area (square meters, square centimeters etc.) is required to penetrate the DS's shields, or could calculate it. But we don't (again, to my knowledge) so I can't see how the intensity matters (we might be able to come up with any figures for intensity for the superlaser, but without a corresponding figure/upper limit incident for the Death Star's shield, the intensity of the Superlaser doesn't tell us much.)

For that matter, any "intensity" estimates could be questionable becaus e we couldn't be certain of the "area" of the superlaser bolt (the glow does not neccesarily indicate the true width of the beam, neccesarily.)

[Connor MacLeod]

Addendum: the above said, I dont think its likely the Death Star could neccesarily shrug off a maximum-power shot.

Given how the AOTC ICS handles shield outputs vs reactor outputs for most vessels, shield outputs tend to be well within an order of magnitude (either way) of the reactor outputs. In fact, the AOTC ICS suggests that its more likely that shield output is roughl y 3-5 times less the reactor output (if we use the Acclamator or Trade Fed core ship for comparison, especially.) Ironically, this 3-5 times figure is quite consistent with the "25% of reactor output channeled to shields" quote from the ISB, I find.

I should also point out that I am not saying that shields draw X percentage from the reactors, even though thats what the ISB novel implies - I'm simply pointing out that there appears to be a consistent ratio between the two.

Regarding the silver senatorial B2 - while shielding is graeter than the reactor output here (twice that, IIRC), that isn't neccearily unusual - exceptions can occur, as the Imperial Assault Shuttles IIRC have a shield output equal to over 60% of th eir reactor output) - this is an exception ratehr than a rule, by all evidence. In any event, its still within the "order of magnitude" range I pointed to.