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

It does look like it from my outline, but by its location, it certainly cannot be so. By my squinting, it's angled extremities almost suggest a Bunkerbuster, but it lacks the other signs of that class, not least of which is the illuminated bridge. I toyed with the idea that it could be Quasar Fire, but I don't think so. Too flat on the ventral sides for a Pelta, I think. .

The longer I look at this image, the more strange new ships I find:

 

Oh, okay, that's useful.

Aye, I didn't mean to imply that all this was on one card - I just didn't want to confuse everyone by giving them extra information like Kin Kian's name. The "at the Battle of Endor" reference is on the "Gray Squadron One" card too, which adds weight to the squadron command - but I think you've provided a continuity save for that (this is a plane designation rather than a callsign), and, in fact, for everything except the two-seater Y-wing.

And that is easier to solve individually, even if any answer we can offer as fans is pure hypothetical headcanon - e.g. for some reason like a lack of torps, Salm went home to change his Y-wing mid-battle, and borrowed a Rogue Squadron pilot to act as rear gunner.

Wow, there's a lot in there. I recognize that spike across the middle (which looks intriguingly alien), but not any of the others. Those pods above are a really neat design. That's definitely a whole class of ships, too!

- The Imperial Ewok

 

That's the attention to detail I look for when I come to the Jedi lit forums guys. *slow clap*
We're still a ways out from the KOTOR era being explored, but it would be nice to hear more about the origins of the "Endar Spire" class Republic cruiser. Last I'd heard it was hand dropped as a modern version of an ancient design, but I'm not sure if there was any other history added to it.

 

Thanks for sharing. You're making me very nostalgic, too.

I love your T-Types, btw.

I actually like the idea that Salm and his wingman came back to Home One and swapped to their twin-seaters, borrowing other returned pilots as their gunners, even though I blatantly just made that up. That allows us to add Kin Kian and Karie Neth to the Rogue Squadron roster during the battle.

However, I'd failed to realise (or probably just forgotten) that Telsij and Kin Kian were actually preexisting characters from the Rogue Squadron storyline, who were completely incompatible with the screencap pics which the CCG used for them (Telsij Cayr is the female Y-wing pilot who gets shot up by Fel at Brentaal and later insists on shaking hands when he defects, Kin Kian being her Sullustan rear gunner - this is where that puzzling note that the human Kin Kian was a "former member of Aggressor Squadron" in the CCG comes from; the Sullustan Kin Kian served as the gunner on Aggressor Seven at Brentaal IV)...

Karie Neth, meanwhile, is a NPC from Rebel Assault - that, at least, is not apparently problematic...

Oh, this is ludicrously complicated...

The origins of the "vertical hammerhead" concept go back to 1995 and the Heir to the Empire comic, where Fred Blanchard created this design, described as a "Class VI freighter":



(... something of a wreck, but still intended as a movie-era ship; a Rebel-supporting sister-ship was given a backstory in a magazine piece...)

Then, in original Knights of the Old Republic (2003) video game, set nearly 4,000 years earlier, a design was introduced for the Endar Spire, which shares the basic "vertical hammerhead" concept:



(... did they really still do concept art for games by hand as recently as 2003?)

Then, in 2005's New Essential Chronology, a picure of the "Class VI freighter" (seemingly a new picture rather than a photomanip of an existing image) was used for a ship at the Battle of Koros Major, around a millennium before the time of the KOTOR game:



(... note the addition of a bridge?!)

Then, in 2006, Darth Bane: Path of Destruction referred to the Republic using "Hammerhead-class capital ships" as recently as 1,000 BBY, which was perhaps just a loose visual callback to the Endar Spire, but attested to the longevity of the concept in some form...

(... this one doesn't have a pic!)

Then the Knights of the Old Republic Campaign Guide in 2008 subsequently identified the ship from 5000 BBY as a Praetorian-class frigate, and affirmed that the original "Class VI freighter" was indeed an adaptation of this absolutely ancient design.



(... though these don't look quite like the "Class VI freighter" any more! )

And then The Old Republic (released in 2011) went and introduced a newer version of the Praetorian design known as the Thranta-class corvette, which has been depicted across the period from about 4000 BBY to at least the 3600s BBY:



And then of course in 2015 REBELS introduced the Sphyrna-class corvette, another movie-era ship which is an explicit and overt homage to the Endar Spire design, and squares the circle by bringing a derivative of the Knighst of the Old Republic design back into the era of the original "Class VI freighter":



(... confused yet?)

Then a variant of this design has shown up in Rogue One:



(... and in considerable numbers as a background ship in the Ep.IX trailer...)

Did I, um, forget anything...?

Anyway, what does all this mean?!

Your guess is as good as mine!

Whether or not the Endar Spire was directly inspired by the "Class VI freighter" is hard to say (the basic idea of "take the blockade runner and flip the hammerhead command pod upright" could have been arrived at separately)... but nonetheless, the two types have been grouped into the same lineage of ships, and we have a total confusion about the chronology of the designs...?

Purely hypothetically, we could suggest that the "Class VI freighter" should actually be reinterpreted as the Sphyrna-class design from REBELS, while the original Blanchard design can be retconned as the Praetorian-class frigate of 5,000 years earlier, the founding ship of a long lineage of designs?

I could go with that... Blanchard did give us magnificently impressionistic Noghri, after all...



(... the guy on the left is actually about the size of a Jawa, but he's about as intimidating as an AT-PT!)

- The Imperial Ewok

 

Could the second one from top left be TCW's cgi model of Ventress' Fanblade fighter?

 

It seems like the Class VI freighter would be resolved by treating it as a category or rating than an actual class. Maybe a catchall term for all ships with a certain range of cargo capacity, crew complement, and powerplant? The actual spaceframe wouldn't matter, could be a drug up old relic refitted for cargo runs instead of combat, but is considered a Class VI for customs and tax purposes.

 

@AdmiralNick22

An update on ship count and a speculation about my "MiniMonCal"

Spoiler

Spoiler

*I have included the wings folded for the width

1 = MC75/New MC (11)
2 = MC80A (5)
3 = Neb-C (22+)
4 = Bunkerbuster (25+)
5 = Hammerhead (23+)
6 = Pelta (12+)
7 = CR-Vertical (6+)
8 = Consular Gunship (10+)
9 = Neb-BF (14)
10 = MiniMonCal (9+)
11 = Vakbeor (15)
12 = Dornean Gunishp (4)
13 = Neb-B (2)
14 = Not-Bunkerbuster (2)
(not all the ships are visible in this one shot)

 

As many as 21 MC80 wingless? What's your source for that? Unless you see that many in one shot (which I'm 99.99% sure you don't), it's impossible to know how many are duplicates. I base my numbers on the following shot:



Red = CR90 corvettes (3)
Yellow = Neb-B escort frigates) (2)
Purple = Dornean gunships (2)
Green = Medium transports (14)
Pink = MC80 wingless (6)
Orange = MC80 Home One (8*)

Now, we can DEFINITIVELY state that a minimum of 26 Mon Cala cruisers were at Endor. Based on simply counting the 24 above plus the two vaped by DSII, Liberty and Nautilian. Granted, we basically know that at least some were lost in combat with the Imperial Navy, but our true, low end number is 26.

Let's dig into this image a bit more. For the 6 MC80 wingless, it is also clear that the 3 on the right are "upside down". The VFX in this shot has a few wonky things. For example, the 8 MC cruisers I circled in orange are all clearly cut outs of the bow forward view of either the wingless model or Home One model. Four of those cut outs (remember, most of these were pictures glued to the matte painting behind) have two white engine glows. Those big engines are like the HO-type ones, so myself (and a lot of other folks who love to analyze this shot) assume that they are that type, just done kinda sloppily/quickly by LFL to fill the shot. The other four cruisers have no glows, so they are either bow shots OR shots intended to be from the stern, but engine glows were forgotten. So these could be argued to be wingless or Home One. Even if they are intended to be wingless cruisers, our max seen in one single frame is 10 cruisers.

I have a LONG thread I posted on Twitter back in March where I analyze most of the fleet shots. I tried to get rough numbers on the max of each class.

--Adm. Nick

 

The pic at the left of the row? Could be!

This is plausible... the problem is less the ship that appears in Heir to the Empire, which could be an anonymous wreck that simply "looked like a light freighter", rigged up for the trap, than the backstory of the specific spaceframe design and the way that's now been retconned.

I'd have to look into the sources again to be certain what the limitations are, and other explanations are possible - for example, perhaps Class VIs have a coincidental resemblance to Praetorians that leads to them being used as "extras" in holodramas, like T-6 Texans kept being used for Japanese planes in movies?

Awesome and brilliant!

Not sure I have anything useful to add.

More generally, though...

With regard to the ship above the Erevana that looks to be a Lancer-class pursuit ship, I've just realised what a dramatic difference there is between known ships which share this hullform, namely Assaj's Banshee and Ketsu's Shadow Caster... cockpit, gun pods, engines and docking module are all completely replaced between the two ships, leaving only the basic spaceframe - so that hull at least can easily accommodate the thorough refit of the type we see here without an actual change of designation...

Similarly, there's a significant difference been between the various GX1 short-haulers (Lux's Phoenix and the consular ship Valorous during the Clone Wars seem to have the same basic configuration, and this is also shown in concept form for a civilian shuttle in REBELS - not sure which episode - but the StarTours Starbus in REBELS updates the design of the defensive turret and engine cowling to match the design sketch done for Return of the Jedi, but completely deletes the lower-deck module and aft boarding ramp, leaving only a ventral cargo hatch, and inserts a cockpit boarding hatch for crew/passenger access; different Expanded Universe depictions also varied the lower-deck module, with both a sensor pod or gun turret being shown) - as such, the changes here don't seem too dramatic...

Although the scaling evidence that Ton_G cite suggests quite persuasively that this is a somewhat larger ship than a GX1 should be, analysing the changes can be rewarding - this version is evidently based on the Phoenix/Valorous CGI rather than the REBELS version, as there's a small sensor dish offset to port topsides (not a feature of the Jedi concept art) and a lower-deck module; the design actually seems to go to the trouble of reworking the lower-deck module to something close to the original Jedi depiction - the "sensor pod" per WEG - though the cockpit viewports have been suppressed, the forward hull contour appears to have been modified, there's a new low-profile gun-turret, and the rotating stabilizers have been replaced with pivoting Lambda-style wings (I am sure no-one intended these more powerful lift devices to remove the need for the small forward repulsorlift pack previously seen on the lower-deck module, and presumably used to "trim out" the extra weight, but that works neatly too)... so, if not for the scaling implications which Ton_G has helpfully analysed, I'd have definitely been prepared to see these as another upgrade of the existing hull...



EDIT: Admiral - we crossposted, and while I will be following this topic with great interest, I have nothing to add to the Endor capital ship numbers myself right now.

- The Imperial Ewok

 

Not sure where you are getting 5 MC80A from, ditto 11 MC75/New MC. You're saying that 3 more MC80A aren't in this particular shot and 4 more MC75? I love your work on this... but I'm not sure I understand slash agree with the numbers for the big MC ships.

--Adm. Nick

 

Checking my notes, the old KOTOR guide indicated that the "Class VI freighter" came from Rendili selling the design to CEC, which repurposed the capital ship.

I suppose to borrow a turn of phrase (from the under-appreciated Old Republic Encyclopedia), that the class VI represented 'various iterations' over the years - the "Hammerhhead" design is said to be flexible and modular.

I would also point out that the original designation of "Class VI freighter" did come from a French RPG magazine, not 'official canon' of the time (but certainly worthy of consideration in these days). Maybe an explanation is that the Class VI freighter was prevalent in the KOTOR and that this was a design reminiscent or an echo of the earlier model - considering the repetition of forms over the eras seems to be an ongoing theme in Star Wars, I think that it could work.

 

Does the "various iterations" line refer specifically to the Hammerhead design, though? Perhaps what CEC bought was essentially a patent concept? We know that the Defender in SWTORMMPORG was produced by a Rendilli subsidiary on Corellia, so perhaps there was a dispute between the Corellia and Rendilli over the "wide-bow/narrow-fuselage/docking-arms/engines" configuration, which was resolved this way...?

All of which is to say that your "repetition of forms" argument makes sense as these forms repeat anyway - what bothers me is more the repetition of some specific details...

I couldn't remember for sure if the "Class VI" designation was from another source (must be well over a decade since I looked into this), but I think you're right - although in this case, I think the backstory actually came from the artist and writer on the Heir to the Empire adaptation, and strictly speaking, no-one's at all sure what the canon status of the material is; back in the old days, we could not really dismiss the possibility that this was canon.

These days, I should add, my (essentially personal) opinion is that there is no metric for this stuff except everyone's personal rule-of-cool... but I do take your point that that makes everything potentially legitimate for homage purposes...

Although now I look at the pic of the Hearst (the other Class VI from the backstory piece), I see that there are enough differences - drives, forward hull, even the "Hammerhead" is different. Only the unusual oval docking arms and associated sensor turrets amidships are actually a straight match, and those don't appear in exactly the same configuration on any other representation of a Praetorian-class frigate.



So... (if anyone except me actually needs a random fan-theory to try to differentiate the two designs)... well, I already gave you the suggestion that this ship is basically a prop from a sci-fi movie ( ) or perhaps Thrawn had salvaged an old Praetorian somewhere (perhaps an amusing offer in his ship-buying spree that landed him the Katana Fleet?) which he mocked up to impersonate a genuine Class VI freighter in pursuit of some sort of plot - perhaps specifically to impersonate the Hearst in some off-screen ploy, or possibly just to have a generic "rustbucket freighter" for the trick to trap Luke...

in the reboot, of course, every relevant ship could simply become a Sphyrna-class corvette...

- The Imperial Ewok

 

@AdmiralNick22

I'll stand by the five MC80As. See what you think of these below:


Analysis:

 

I think #5 might actually be the Colossus

 

Wait so if I'm not mistaken, during the Galactic Civil War there were three Mon Calamari cruiser types: Home One, Liberty, and MC80a, right? Was the MC80a in ROTJ at all, or do we only have two variants on-screen?

 

In the legends rendering, yes. There is the Home One type, the winged MC80 and a wingless variant of the wingless type.

 

So...winged MC80 is the Liberty, and Liberty-but-with-wings-removed is the MC80a?

And new canon has Home One type renamed to MC80a, Liberty-type is now Liberty-class (but still a MC80 somehow?), and...does the Liberty-but-with-wings-removed still exist?

 

Remember, MC80 provided something of a catchall with oft-quoted uniqueness of each Mon Cala vessel. So yes, in Legends MC80 stood for Home One and the Liberty tyes while the wingless types were identified at MC80a-s. Canon calls the Home One type MC80A, like the legends MC80B. Personally, I think MC is more like a series with variations rather than a class outright if are to make sense of it, maybe constellation of specific technologies and approaches to design with scalable architecture. Since Mn Cala buildings and ships really seem to be interchangeable, in some cases, that might make much sense, with MC75s as building oriented designs and MC80s as space-only vessels. MC85s represent another set of principle, as pure warship. Just spitballing at this point.

 

I know I shouldn't double post. I am using @Hernalt's numbers from a few years ago. I went searching through the CT forum to find it. @Iron_lord might know where to find it.

 

So from the out-of-universe perspective, did they just have three unique Calamari cruiser models that they reused for different shots, and these became our three MC80 subtypes?

 

Hmm, I def agree with 4/5 of them. Good catches!

—Adm. Nick

 

I don't understand how everyone is blindly jumping onto the MC80 bandwagon, considering a massive portion of these ships'(especially 2&3's) hulls are completely obscured. They could be something else for all we know. I'd personally reserve judgement until we get a more unobstructed shot...