Lit Fleet Junkie Flagship- The technical discussions of the GFFA (Capital Ships thread Mk. II)

You both could be right.

If the only thing you are afraid of hitting is a star or a nebula...something we can see...then chances are you can skate right through. While 400 billion stars is a lot, when you have to cover millions of light years of space, and the stars mass shadow only covers a tiny fraction of that, and while everything is in motion, so are you...all objects in the galaxy have an orbital motion, and while it may be faster toward the core and slower on the rim, the vast bulk would obey relative speeds in relation to their neighbors. The real challenge of such a journey would be from traveling straight through the core.

Conversely, our modern understanding of dark matter, which has developed after Star War's tropes were established, could make the journey much more unlikely just because of the sheer scale of what is unknown. If there are masses out their the size of a star that are undetectable by nature, the danger there is perilous, and leads to the logic of the star lanes. Now Dark Matter, to this point, has played little role in Star Wars simply because the science is still new and I think it is a little more confusion then the writers want to introduce to the space opera at this point. But if they wanted to pull that card, it could easily make hyperspace travel far more dangerous. As is, the long used standby is star wars is simply "the unknown"...rogue plants, comets, debris from destroyed star systems, etc. And just because a nav computer gives you a green light on your course does not mean something unexpected couldn't pull you out. In fact, the sources are filled with instances of getting yanked from hyperspace.

The one thing that leans this more toward the perils of travel through the galaxy is just what Tusken38 said:

Pretty much all hyperspace travel is an effort to reach a destination (I could see myself doing an endurance run and seeing just how long I could stay in hyperspace...but then one wonders if a nav would allow you to enter hyperspace without assigning an "exit".)

Since you are always trying to reach "something"...a planet, a solar system, a nebula, there is going to be something in the path, even if just at the very end. In truth, I often thought of hyperspace travel very similar to flying in our world, where the most terrifying part for any pilot is the landing...the likelihood of an issue in hyperspace is nearing the final destination.

Example: Let's say you are in hyperspace on your way to Yavin 4. Now depending on how you approach the system, you may be able to come out of hyperspace right over Yavin 4 with no issue. But maybe your course would require you to flying through Yavin itself (the gas giant)...perhaps then you must alter course long before to approach the system from another angle...or, like the Falcon and DS in ANH, you drop out on the far side of Yavin and transit around the gas ball before reaching your destination. Even worse, you enter the system on the far side of the Yavin star from the gas giant and the moon! What about another planet in the system between you, the star, the gas giant, and the moon.

As long as you want to get somewhere, there will likely be something in the way.

 

Another fun question: repulsorlift engines are generally defined as working against a planets natural gravity field. When a starfighter is maneuvering about a capital ship's hanger bay, are its repulsorlift engines working against the artificial gravity generated throughout the ship (most likely), is it being handled by internal tractor beams, or is some other method of lift being emplyed?

 

I'm inclined to think tractor beams.

 

How come?

 

Hmm, well probably easier just to let the mothership's tractor beam handle everything instead of the pilot trying to match the movement of the ship and all that. And I'm thinking there's probably space-only fighters that don't have repulsorlifts at all...in which case a tractor beam would be the only option.

 

All of the above?

I think the simplistic explanation of repulsorlifts is it "reverses gravity"...well yes...that is what what you want it to do.
How it defies gravity could be something other then simply "find gravity and repel it... ...somehow".

Maybe "repulsorlift technology" is more of a system of tech, rather then just a single tech gizmo. We know there are "repulsor coils"...that is how the tech is generally described physically. A coil screams "magnets" to me...so perhaps the coil creates a magnetic repulsion to counter gravity. At the same time, if a magnetic field isn't strong enough to provide lift, you could turn to thrusters and stabilizers to separate you from the ground and maneuver about.

Point is, these technologies may not be as much about "reversing gravity" as they are "Provide seperation from other objects, no matter the force applied"...so the tech works planetside, or shipside, or anywhere else that you might want to get close to, but not touch.

 

Interesting. I dunno, every scene that I can recall leads me to believe starfighter (or shuttle or whatever) repulsorlift engines work the same in a capital ship hanger as they do on a planet's surface or atmosphere. Particularly Poe and Finn's escape form the Finalizer in a TIE/sf that would not have had a tractor beam assisted taxi out into space.

Except that reuplorlift tech has been fairly well defined: https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/Repulsorlift

 

According to an edit on Wookieepedia (I don't own the book so can't confirm), 'Star Wars: Battles that Changed the Galaxy' says that Moff Gideon's light cruiser is an Arquitens-class cruiser.

Which was kinda obvious, but you know common sense is weird.

Edit: Ah, someone with the book confirmed it in the dedicated thread on this forum.

 

Wait, why do they need a source to explicitly spell out in text that this particular ship belongs to this class? Wasn't it always "okay it looks like an Imperial-class Star Destroyer, so it probably is one"?

 

I don't know what Wookieepedia's policy on this is. But what if the new book had instead said Gideon's ship was an Arquitens Mark 5, or a unique prototype made to replace the Arquitens or something? (For the record apparently the book says it's a "modified" Arquitens, probably because of slight design differences I know others in this thread have mentioned.)

Like how in ROTJ there's a ship that's "obviously just a Star Destroyer, only the FX guys forgot to add in the docking bay". But sourcebooks retconned it into the Tector class.

When you factor in how ships may differ between comic book, animation, and live action, sometimes it can be hard to tell what's supposed to be a new variant and what is just artistic license or a mistake.

 

Seemed to me more like "FX guys specifically removed the docking bay".

The 8 ft ISD model has the docking bay on it as standard - they covered over the bay and removed the reactor globe for a few shots of "Falcon skimming underside of Destroyer" - and the covering was removed and the globe put back for all later scenes and when the model went on display.

 

Well there were size discrepancies based on how the Sentinel class shuttles docked in Rebels and how many TIEs it carried compared to what was shown with Gideon's Light Cruiser and a Lambda shuttle actually landing inside in The Mandalorian.

Unless of course they are retconning that the Arquitens as shown in TCW and Rebels are larger ships with more carrying capacity...which I am not against.

 

The Imperial Gozanti in The Mandalorian is clearly modelled on the Rebels one - but it's subtly different - I don't the the railing was present on the side of the original, and the rear turret is somewhat more low-set. This may be a case of "cartoons just have slightly less detail - are slightly stylised".

I think the Sentinel is slightly broader than the Lambda, and the Lambda was a very tight fit - so the Lambda fitting, doesn't mean that the Sentinel docking between the bow prongs rather than in the bay, is a plot hole.

 

Just a friendly reminder that the Gozanti is a CEC / Gallofree Yards product... as Imperial as it may be, you clearly see it is not a KDY product no matter how grey they paint it. No Gozanti is like any other... like CEC with its YT lines or Gallofree with its highly modular Transports.

 

Someone here (I believe) did some visual size estimates and Gideon's cruiser is roughly the same length as the size given for the class in several sources.

The length is too long for how the ships appear in Clone Wars/Rebels as some have pointed out, but it fits the Mandalorian.

 

It is also what has been stated as canon for carried ships. IIRC...the Arquitens was stated to be able to only carry 3 fighters and Gideon's carries what looks like a full squadron of 12 plus those landing craft.

 

Though tbf, we're frequently seen Corellian Corvettes modified to carry some number of fighters without being declared a new class.

 

Oh, since we were discussing docking tubes back here...when I was going through Force Heretic III, it mentioned that the Falcon was connected to the mobile communications base via a flexible docking tube. Well that makes a heck of a lot more sense...I can't believe I didn't think of that. It would certainly reduce the chances of this happening.

Then again, this is the universe with massive bottomless pits and no guardrails, so.... ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

 

Found some fun bts images from Droids. Nelvana's various concepts with color designs, some of which were recolored before animation started.

Mon Julpa's Command Ship: https://i.imgur.com/PywSLM9.jpg
Tammuzan Ship: https://i.imgur.com/LY84z5a.jpg
Imperial Ore Transporter from the Great Heep, later named as the Omega-class freighter: https://i.imgur.com/WIWDFmV.jpg
Butterfly Drone, Governor Koong's droid fighter: https://i.imgur.com/S43Bldu.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/pqkqzm5.jpg
Fossil Vessel: https://i.imgur.com/2thGEzu.jpg
Fuel Transporter: https://i.imgur.com/SR4cUKr.jpg
Stratto Driver: https://i.imgur.com/ruajIPz.jpg
Ore Freighter: https://i.imgur.com/2bDKz5F.jpg
Ion Torpedo, the proton torpedo onboard the Demolisher: https://i.imgur.com/csDxJSB.jpg
The Dianoga, Kybo Ren's pirate ship: https://i.imgur.com/IEhZf2u.jpg
Hunter Ship: https://i.imgur.com/SCdVBzI.jpg
The Tammuzan spaceport: https://i.imgur.com/yEen3c9.jpg
Prison Ship: https://i.imgur.com/YWhdr8g.jpg
The Corsalys: https://i.imgur.com/MQtXCYb.jpg
Coralys's cargo hold: https://i.imgur.com/TyCr8iF.jpg
Droid fighter, same as the IG1000: https://i.imgur.com/C3I8yBg.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/wovc2Z9.jpg
The Argo Moon: https://i.imgur.com/zZxQgHW.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/E7FQJ2O.jpg
Passenger Liner: https://i.imgur.com/gaog8oj.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/BLExTdm.jpg

 

Oh wow, very cool. I didn't even notice some of these designs, even when I went through deliberately looking for interesting designs a few years back.

Is it just ships, or is there concept art for other things available as well? Creatures, characters, environments etc?

 

A lot of great designs here. Too bad there's no concept art for the Demolisher.

 

Oh yes, there’s other as well. I’ll try to get some posted in the ground vehicle thread, and in the tv board for Droids. There’s character, creature and some environment art I found. Apparently, someone was selling a lot on eBay.

 

Awesome! Thank you so much, this is great stuff.

 

I'm looking at the Legends section for X-wing starfighter on Wookieepedia, and under the"T-65 series" section the first entry is the "T-65 X-wing" with no extra letters or numbers denoting a variant. Is there actually such a ship? Reading that page, it kinda seems like it's a catch-all for all the other T-65 variants.

 

I was under the impression that the T-65 denoted the initial prototypes, with the T-65B then being the model that went into production. However, I can't recall a source for that. Perhaps someone else can shed some light?