ST Tracking a ship through Hyperspace?

I am not intending to make this thread a flamers paradise, however if it does go that way, it would not bother me one bit. I am trying to make some sense of what looks like an error, one that usually happens when someone tries to make a story in a universe that they don't get. The characters in TLJ lead us to believe that tracking a ship through hyperspace is unheard of it. I believe words such as "specialized tracking" and "new tech" are used. Is that so? Tell me, do you guys remember this?




Obi-Wan tracks Slave 1 "through lightspeed," from Kamino to Geonosis.

In Star Wars Rebels season 1 Gathering Forces, the Ghost is tracked by the Grand Inquisitor "through Lightspeed."

But lets be more obvious Vader and Tarkin track the Falcon "through lightspeed" in a New Hope.

So, I need some help is it the Resistance characters or the director that's never heard of a "tracking beacon" or "homing beacon?"

 

I was totally fine with this plot device, but my caveat is that I feel it should be highly specialized, rare technology. I think it would be irritating to imagine that there is no way for a ship to escape from another, provided they both have "fuel". So used in this context, fine. But I would hate to see it abused in future installments.

 

I was more confused about how the ships were out of range of the FO. Was it that what they were firing was being lost to the vacuum before it could reach the Resistance ships? How was it being lost to the vacuum? Or was it that it couldn't travel fast enough to reach the Resistance ships?

Something is wrong with the science here, or feels like it is. I tried to not nitpick over it too much.

I really agreed with Hux. They have like all their impressive ships and they can't find a way to destroy the Resistance in space?

 

Clearly it isn't rare. In Rebels they scanned the Ghost and found the tracker.

 

Rebels also showed that if you realize you're being tracked using a beacon you could find and destroy or jettison the beacon to solve the problem. In the Last Jedi they track the ship without a plantable homing device, which is new technology.

 

one of the captains tells Hux that the Resistance ships are lighter and faster, and therefore can stay out of range

 

When Jyn is on Scarif looking for the Death Star plans, she come across a file called Tracking Lightspeed (I think that's what its called, ill have to watch again.)

 

Darth_Accipiter, you might not have realized this, but they just put themselves in a corner with this concept. If you can track any ship without any kind of tracking device then as long as the hyperspace tracker is on the movie would never end. Of course it did, only because Holdo blew up their ships.

 

Right but the laser fire they are shooting at them would go at its own velocity and things just keep going in a vacuum. So is the vacuum cooling off what they are firing causing it to dissipate? Is it that they can't give it fast enough velocity when they fire it? Is it that the Resistance ships will have too much time to move away from the laser fire? Why can't they send torpedoes at fast speed? It's all very strange.

Oh also "lighter and faster" makes sense more with gravity. I mean the Resistance ships may be faster, but I am not sure why being lighter matters.

 

The Devastator tracks the Tantive IV through lightspeed.

 

coughwhereinDarthChiznukpickeduponthereferenceandIdidnotocough

 

I think the difference is that pre "The Last Jedi" tracking thru hyperspace required a tracking device to be secured aboard a ship in order to keep tabs on it. In "TLJ" he First Order appeared to have developed some type of enhanced sensor array and the computing power to determine a ships destination.

What does bug me a bit is that only one ship at a time can use this tech. Maybe it needs to be the lead ship in a fleet so that it can scan for slight alterations in space time left by a ship traveling at superlight speeds. Sort of like Warp trails and subspace eddies in Star Trek

 

Exactly though I imagine it required a huge amount of computing power and intuition. The tech in TLJ was brand new

 

oncafar I just assumed the energy in the weapon would dissipate by the time it reached the Resistance ships

 

Too bad they didn't explain the difference. No tracking device was even mentioned when the Devastator tracked the Tantive IV. I still don't see the difference.

 

There's a moment in episode I which might explain this.

Gunray: My lord...it's impossible to locate the ship! It's out of our range!
Sidious: Not for a Sith.This is my apprentice, Darth Maul. He will find your lost ship

Either the Tantive IV jumped within The Devastator's range or Vader tracked them using unscrupulous Sith methods. Maul could sense the Jedi, so he had that advantage there, but Vader is more powerful than Maul and possibly could have other undisclosed sith tactics.

 

All your other examples involve a beacon on the tracked ship. The Resistance are aware of no beacon, so are surprised that they're being tracked through hyperspace.

In the event of the Tantive IV, it's explained that they were tracking due to damaged engines, so a unique case.

 

You could always track a ship through hyperspace via tracking device (tarkin and vader did it ANH). Its never been a thing where ships can just be tracked outright. The reason its never been like that is because the rebels would have no way of fighting the imperials if they can't use guerrilla warfare. TLJ just had a sloppy writer who didn't give his plot a second pass or a second thought.

 

In Rogue One it was revealed that the Empire had been working on the technology.

 

The devastator used a combing method to track the tentive. By the time ESB rolled around the imperials were using viper droids to comb possible jump trajectories.

 

The torpedo option wouldn't involve dissipating at all because it's an object. Just fire faster than the Resistance ships are going, the torpedo will keep going at that velocity (Newton's 1st law) until it hits. Surely the FO fleet has A LOT of fire power and can launch a lot of torpedoes making it impossible to avoid them all.

Anyway I should avoid nitpicking this because it doesn't matter but it just is confusing!

 

oncafar, I thought they would just send starfighters to finish them off, unless those were out of range as well?

 

Everything is out of range!

 

I agree with one of the other comments, Jango was tracked via a tracker planted on the ship just like the Falcon was in Star Wars. This, however, is totally new tech that doesn't involve planting a tracker.

I saw somewhere online that Jyn Erso saw plans for hyperspace tracking in Rogue One so it's a very cool tie in to Episode 8.

 

The guns weren't out of range, but were just ineffective against the strong shields of the Raddus at that range.