Many of the most memorable moments in the Star Wars franchise are the epic battles in space between starships loaded with exotic weapons. In this second part of a planned 3-part series we will examine the history and progress in space combat and it's possible future. As usual only the films will be considered "canon" sources.
Episode I: In the dying years of the Galactic Republic Most cargo and life-forms are transported across the galaxy by Freighters, medium-size starships equiped with Hyperdrives that enable ships to enter another dimension and cross vast distances near-instantly. The Trade Federation blockade a planet with large capital-class battleships to control trade. The Federation depends largely on computers and droids to run their ships. Their Battleships sport heavy Turbolasers, Droid fighters, large troop transports and a very strong deflector shield. The battleships are circular rings built around a central orb that can land on a planet and reacend to the orbiting ring. The Federation also deploy Droid Control ships, battleships that can remotely operate an entire army of robot infantry and tanks from orbit. Naboo builds starships that share a sleek, silver aesthetic. Their Royal transport, a luxurious freighter-class ship, was able to bypass a blockade because it carried a full bay of R2-series astromech droids that repaired the ship on the go. It is surprising that no other ships use this, seeing how useful it could be. Naboo Starfighters are "Short Range" fighters, incapable of hyperspace combat. They carry blaster canons, photon torpedoes and Gungan-type energy shields. They seem prone to overheating.
Episode II: Jedi starfighters have special features like Hyperdrive rings, spare part canisters, stabilizer flaps and communication dishes that can send holographic messages halfway across the galaxy. These enhancements pale in comparison to the Mandalorian death machine Slave I. It boasts dual rapid-fire blaster canons, seismic charges (powerful asteroid-shredding depth-charges) and a payload of "smart missiles" that can track fast and agile targets with great precision.
The Republic Receives powerful new Battlecruisers to carry their clone army. These triangular ships are ancestors to the dreaded Star Destroyer and are truly formidable in their own right. They carry batteries of huge blaster canons, (reminiscent of old earth sailing ships) and a powerful laser in its ventral hangar. Unlike other starships, which keep their starfighters and transports in ray-shielded bays on the starboard and port sides, the clone Battlecruisers keep their support craft in a central bay running the length of the ship, protected by massive double retractable blast plates.
Episode III: The battle of Coruscant showed great advances in starfleet combat as the Republic battled the Separatist Alliance. The Separatists built sleek battlecruisers fitted with broadside canons, extendable drive flaps, emergency booster engines and metal blast plates that can cover the bridge and cargo bay's in an emergency. The Vulture Droid Starfighter was given "smart" missiles that could disperse buzz droids to tear apart starships, hack and shut down their online systems. The new Tri-fighter is an effective space-supremacy starship.
The Republic starfighter has an extra gunner's position to fire a rear blaster canon and S-foils.
Rogue One: Starship combat changed again when the Rebel Alliance rose to confront the tyranical Galactic Empire. The Rebellion cobbled together a fleet that mixed old Hammerhead corvette's and slide-wing dropships with a new generation of sleek Mon Calamari support cruisers. Rebel Y-wings, bomber craft loaded with ion and conventional torpedoes could completely disable a capital ship.
The X-wing was and is the most versatile starfighter ever built. With quad laser canons, photon torpedoes, extendable s-foils, ejection seats, deflector shields and targeting computers. But their most important innovation is a built-in hyperdrive which allows the X-wing to launch attacks across vast distances without depending on support ships or needing to refuel.
The Imperial TIE fighter is possibly the fastest manned ship in the galaxy and comes in many variations. It is also exetremely manueverable and sports two rapid-fire blaster canons.
Imperial Star destroyers, the most intimidating capital ships in the Galaxy, also revolutionize warfare as deeply as the X-wing. Banks of turbolaser turrets, squadrons of TIE fighters, strong deflector shields and Lambda-class drop ships bring the might of the empire to bear on any resistance. The Victory I class was capable of operating within the orbit of a planet in a close-support role, while the Victory II class, twice as large and sporting powerful ion engines, could catch speedy blockade runners. The Tractor beams could lock onto a freighter starship and pull it in, no engine could break out of the artificial gravity field and the captured starship could not go to lightspeed and enter hyperspace.
Episode IV: Another technology that changed space warfare was tracking a ship along its last known trajectory to follow it through hyperspace.
The crowning military achievment of this age was the Death Star, a gigantic battlestation defended by TIE fighters, turbolaser turrets, tractor beams and sporting a huge death-laser powered by Khyber crystals that could fire a single reactor for an explosion equal to the yield of a nuclear weapon. A full strength blast could destroy an entire planet. Despite its long charge time, slow impulse movement in realspace and fatal exaust port weakness, the Death Star threatened to change to balance of power in the galaxy and extinguish the Rebellion.
The Millenium Falcon is the size of a freighter, but it is extensively modified for enhanced performance and versatility. Its uni-engine gives it speed comparable to TIE fighters and lightspeed capabilities. It's two rapid-fire quad-blasters provide point defence against starfighters. It's systems are redundant and easily repaired.
Episode V: On the planet Hoth the Rebellion built an Ion canon that could disable a orbiting capital-class starship. The Rebellion are pioneers in using Ion technology to even the odds. Imperial starships use probe droids to search vast areas of space with limited manpower. Tie-bombers, a response to the rebel y-wing, can carpet bomb starships and ground targets with proton blasts.
Admiral Needa once mentioned a "Cloaking device" which smaller ships could not utilize. There is no other mention in contemporary lore of cloaked starships. This is a fascinating technology that could be brought up some time in the future.
Episode VI: To assault the Second Death Star the Rebel Alliance assembled their strongest spacefleet. The capital ships were mostly light cruisers and support ships. D, A and X-wing starfighters comprised most of the fleet's offensive power. In contrast the Imperial starfleet was composed of Star Destroyers bristling with turbolasers, fielding hordes of TIE fighters which were not heavily armed enough to destroy rebel capital ships with their light laser canons, instead attempting to destroy the rebel starfighters.
The Second Death star, while still under construction, could target individual cruisers with its unstoppable death-laser, could recharge it's weapon quickly and was protected by a planetside energy shield.
Episode VII: The New Order refitted old imperial assets with cutting edge technology to give them the upper hand in their attempt to conquer the galaxy. They field atmospheric Assault Landers (Very similar looking to Higgins boats used during the D-day landings) Armed with automatic canons and searchlights to deploy troops planetside in minutes. Elite TIE fighters are armed to the teeth with blaster canons, missiles and mag-pulses, with a gunner focusing on the fight while the pilot steers. Redesigned Star Destroyers have heavier Turbolaser Turrets (Single instead of dual-barrel) and Ventral canons mounted on their undersides which, when charged, can fire four "smart" missiles at very nimble targets.
Starkiller base was built into a cold planet and can drain the energy of an entire sun into itself, staying stable with a massive thermal oscillator, before firing it out into multiple beams that can vaporize an entire system of planets and all nearby orbiting ships. The beams travel at lightspeed and have no range restrictions.
The Resistance countered these revolutionary developments by upgrading standard X-wing starfighters with small improvements like a drop-down point-defence gun and a blaster rifle for the pilot.
Episode VIII: Warning spoilers
The First Order fleet sent to destroy the Resistance fielded several Mandator-class Dreadnoughts. These huge ships were covered in thick armor and packed, in addition to turbolasers, two heavy orbital canons that once charged could demolish a planetside base or capital ship in a barrage of energy bolts. They are mounted ventrally. The flagship of their fleet was the gigantic Mega-class Star Destroyer, built like a B-2 stealth bomber. This thing is many times larger than, and built to build and repair, conventional star destroyers. It also carried a device capable of following a starship through hyperspace, which has obvious implications for anyone trying to escape a superior force. And of course what I think is the most interesting development in the history of Star wars warfare, Lightspeed Ramming.
The Resistance used SF-17 starfortress's. (an obvious ripoff of the B-17 flying fortress. A single bomber carries enough proton bombs to destroy a capital ship with a single good bombing run. But the ships are ridiculously slow, fragile and prone to erupting in unexploded ordinance when destroyed that will devastate other ships in the formation.
Breakdown-lets discuss shields, fuel, astrodroids, Astroids and the future of warfare.
There are several types of planetary shields. One protects an entire planet but is fueled by an orbiting ring to allow passage through and the shield fails if the ring is destroyed. Another can protect a portion of a planet. It is impervious to any bombardment and can be turned on and off to allow the passage of ships. On Yavin a single shield generator protected the entire moon and the battlestation in orbit. Starkiller base was protected entirely by shields, but starships going at the speed of light could penetrate them. As planetary shielding goes, it is getting better all the time, but there is always a flaw in the system so far.
All spacecraft require Fuel To fire their Ion impulse engines and hyperdrivers. Short-Range fighters cannot travel far on their own fuel and are moved to the battlefield in carriers or used for planetary defence.
All non-Empire/Separatist Starfighters have a slot for a R-series astromech droid that can conduct emergency repairs, boost power to subsystems and disable autopilot functions.
ASTEROIDS are a significant hazard to starships. Fields of these floating rocks can cream fighter craft, damage capital ships and impair communications and hyperspace jumps.
Why is space combat in Star Wars always at such short range? (Aside from the fact that it is entertaining.) The primary weapon of most starships is the Turbolaser, a oversized blaster that fires a bolt of plasma. The plasma moves at sub-light speeds (as opposed to a true laser) and loses power the further it travels.
To hit any target reliably and with effect starships must get close to their target. Computers in Star Wars seem like primitive 80's technology that cannot track targets without a crew operating the weapons platforms.
So Where is space warfare going? Capital ships seem here to stay. They are versatile, useful for planetary bombardment, troop transport, ground support, conventional battle with turbolasers and the capacity to transport cheap sub-lightspeed starfighters. On the flipside they are slow, complex, vulnerable to starfighters if unsupported and exessively expensive to build and maintain. But perhaps the future of war is squadrons of hyperspace-capable starfighters like X-wings, able to strike from across the galaxy, armed with Ion torpedoes and conventional weapons to disable and destroy larger ships.
But to take and hold planets it is desirable to have a mobile base, an eye in the sky. If I was to build a spacefleet to conquer the Galaxy I would avoid any fancy (and expensive) planetsized superweapons.
I would build small battlestations to orbit worlds under my control, supported by a task force of Heavy cruisers equipped with R2-class astromech droids for repair work, tractor beams and turbolaser batteries. And maybe a couple of those cloaking devices.
But the primary focus would be on a fleet of versatile Starfighters and bombers, outfitted with hyperdrives, "smart" missiles, seismic charges, ion torpedoes and buzz droid bombs to destroy the enemy capital ships.
My fleet would not confront strong enemy fleets, but send a task force with a junky old freighter and use it as a hyperspace missile to one-shot enemy capital ships.
Thats it. I hope you found this essay Useful.
Soon I hope to publish my final essay piece, planetside warfare in Star wars.
Perhaps soon I will write a short story also
Please comment and let me know what you thought. Also, did I get anything wrong?
