Saga Does R1 justifies other Star Wars superweapon failures?

In Rogue One, we see that the DS1 structural flaw was part of a long planned vengeance by Galen Erso, and not a mere engineering accident.

I believe only the high-ranking imperials, the ones close to The Emperor and Vader, were the only ones who got to know about that debacle. Also, those arrogant and deceitful imperials would not go out and just yell to the whole galaxy something like "Hey guys, our super weapon was heavily flawed. We screwed up!", letting the whole Imperial echelon know of the reactor failure. That would have caused fear and mistrust among Imperial ranks, leading politicians and other important imperial men and women to dissatisfaction with the Empire because of that huge failure.

So, believing this was kept secret, I think Starkiller base, constructed 30+ years after the Death Star by Imperial remnants (First Order) using old Imperial data, must have had the same flaw, since it was not disclosed by the Empire 30+ years before.

One could say the same about DS2, but since Vader and the Emperor were there, they would not have allowed this. Plus, it was still under works, so it's more acceptable that it blew up. It had immense structural gaps yet to be constructed, so Rebel ships flew through it easily.


Anyway, what do you guys think?

 

In my headcanon, SKB's power system was utterly different from the DS's, which is where Galen left the chink in the armor. The expository technobabble was also very different, so I'd say it was a similar vulnerability, but not the same flaw.

 

I'd have to rewatch TFA to compare Starkiller's flaw with the others, but the reason DS2 was also 'easily' destroyed was that it wasn't completed by the time of events in ROTJ. It was a really rushed project, i'd imagine various security mechanisms were either incomplete or not operational, by the time the rebels attacked.

RO does justify the destruction of DS1, and Catalyst as well since I've heard that it explains Galen himself convinced imperials to use thermal exhausts system on the DS on purpose, it's possible that, when they started building the DS2 they followed the initial DS plans, and maybe unwillingly made the same 'sabotage' by themselves. An imperial officer does tell Tarkin 'we've analysed the situation maybe you should evacuate' in ANH, but then all of them die there so..

 

The thing to remember about DS2 is, Palps intended it to be bait for his trap. He wanted it to be conspicuously vulnerable so that the rebels couldn't resist going in for an all out attack. Galen purposely made DS1 flawed, and Sheev purposely made DS2 flawed.

 

That's right. The one thing Palpatine left out of the equation: Ewoks.

 

Sheev was getting his Force predictions all wrong that day. But yeah, he did facilitate its destruction. Should have waited for the thing to be completed.

The Starkiller Base…sigh.

 

The plot of Rogue One I'd say makes the Alliance failing for the Emperors bait that much easier to understand as well.

Honestly I think SKB should be been played up more as a "Deathstar on the cheap" that was inherently unstable.

 

It is hard to find an in-universe explanation to the SKB, isnt it?

 

The SKB's flaw is different from the DS flaw. The former has a surface structure (the thermal Oscillator) which contains the essentially vacuumed Star within the planet. If destroyed, the energy of the Star bursts out.

 

Well, I personally wish they hadn't shoved it into Episode VII, but the ship sailed a long time ago.

As for the Death Star II, as others here have said, as well as our favorite Rebel admiral, Palpatine did design it as a trap. Furthermore, we have to consider that the station was in a more vulnerable state due to its construction. The entire Rebel attack plan was designed around somehow finding a way to navigate within the superstructure in order to hopefully destroy its reactor core. When you think about it, that in itself was quite the gamble.

 

It's a very interesting idea. Obviously, the point of the second death star was the trap set by the Emperor himself, so the priority was obviously on the construction and completion of the weapon over the station itself.
Furthermore, the completion of the first death star took somewhere around 20 years to complete (between 19 and 24 at max). This is evidenced by the final scene of ROTS where it can be seen that construction has somewhat started, and completed in Rogue One with the first testing.

2 scenarios emerge.

1. The Empire had already begun construction of another (the second) death star. This may have been the case as it would have explained how far construction had gone in the 4 years between O BBY and 4 BBY. The empire would have already acquired another/enough kyber crystals to power the weapon, and spent years building both the station. This would also have aided the imperial governors across the Empire as two stations= 2 places at once.

Also, the fault from the first death star could still be found on this station unless otherwise corrected, but the rebels don't use this fault to destroy it.

2. The Empire had not started the construction of DS2. This would make sense as they would have no serious need for another one as long as the original was still functioning, and the rebellion was still kinda small. This would explain the emperor's focus on the functionality of the weapon over its construction as a whole. The timeline would account for the lack of both structural integrity and gaps in the station that the rebels exploited. However, the structural weakness established in R1 would not exist.

Because the rebels didn't use the original weakness found in the first death star, it isn't known whether or not it was there.
Just an idea.

 

Scenario number 2 seems more likely to me. 2 death stars being simultaneously constructed is just overkill. And the movies make it clear that the Empire's faith was put on the DS1.

 

BadCane wrote

Also, those arrogant and deceitful imperials would not go out and just yell to the whole galaxy something like "Hey guys, our super weapon was heavily flawed. We screwed up!", letting the whole Imperial echelon know of the reactor failure. That would have caused fear and mistrust among Imperial ranks, leading politicians and other important imperial men and women to dissatisfaction with the Empire because of that huge failure.

That's an interesting subject you touched here. Now, undoubtedly, the Alliance propagated the destruction of the first Death Star as another victory (and apparently the one making another 1,026 star systems join the Alliance according to the first draft for ESB), but how did the Empire react to that and how did they try to downplay this particular success of the Alliance?

They probably called it "fake news", but later (and once Lord Vader had been recovered, knowing the location of the hidden base) somewhat fixed it by providing irrefutable evidence that they had learned the location of the Rebels' hidden base and driven the Rebels from there.

 

In the Leia canon comic book it's told that Yavin was evacuated right after the medal ceremony we see in ANH.

 

BadCane

The prologue of ESB appears to disagree:

Imperial troops have driven the Rebel forces from their hidden base and pursued them across the galaxy.

I think the context is crystal clear, i.e. Imperial troops approached or landed on Yavin IV and thus "drove" the Rebel Forces from their base. If this doesn't reflect in the comic then it's incompatible with absolute canon, i.e. the film.

 

a weapon that big must have some kind of... thermal oscillator

we'll go in and hit that oscillator with everything we've got

 

Putting all you eggs in one basket is usually a bad idea.
Here's this one big deadly thing that we put all our efforts into. The enemy has no choice but try and destroy it. If they fail, they lose massively. If they succeed, we lose massively.

It's putting everything onto the flip of a coin.

 

^ That's exactly what General Taggi (despite the competition for his starfleet) was concerned about during the Death Star conference in ANH.

 

Not just in head canon. Star Wars Complete Locations, which goes into what makes Starkiller Base tick, confirms your assumptions.

 

Why are you citing the first draft of ESB when the finished film barely resembles it? The first draft can't POSSIBLY be considered canon. You have no business referring to it in discussion as if it were.

Now, if you can refer to a source that IS canon that backs that up, that's different. But I can't think of one.

 

Pfluegermeister

May I suggest you hold your horses before you plow any further?

Here is an excerpt of the original George Lucas ANH prologue from the January 1, 1976 draft (before the final screenplay from March/April):

Striking from a fortress hidden among the billion stars of the galaxy, rebel spaceships have won a crushing victory over the awesome Imperial Starfleet. The EMPIRE knows that one more such defeat could bring a 1,000 more solar systems into the rebellion, and Imperial control over the galaxy would be lost forever.

The final screenplay also identifies General Willard as the commander-in-chief of the Rebel Forces.

Here is an excerpt from the first ESB draft of Leigh Brackett:

WILLARD​

Since we destroyed the Empire’s Death Star, many more systems have found courage to join the rebellion. At the last count, 1,026. But as you see, we’re widely scattered and still vastly inferior in ships and men. This base, if we can establish and hold it, is strategically placed for….​

What a coincidence. Lucas predicted a 1,000 more to join the Alliance after another defeat of the Empire and it's 1,026 after the destruction of the Death Star.​

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While the final version of ESB noticably differs from the first draft provided by Leigh Brackett, I consider all the background information in these early scripts to be legit and genuine as it apparently came straight from George Lucas.​

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And since George Lucas Canon identifies "elements originating with Lucas in the scripts" as canon, I see no reason whatsoever why I should doubt the legitimacy of these and instead believe in the conjecture several EU contributors came up with. I'm first and foremost interested in the OT Star Wars Universe as envisioned by George Lucas.​

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Telling me "You have no business referring to it" is therefore rather inappropriate.​

 

In other words, your personal preferences trump everything else. And I'm supposed to honor a personal preference as fact?

Please.