I Sense Much Wank in You
According to a Hasbro collectibles page on StarWars.com, the "ARC-170" fighter (the proto-X-wing from RoTS) has shields capable of withstanding 5E16W. Or, in other words, 50,000,000,000,000,000 (fifty quadrillion) joules per second.
That's 12 megatons each second.
Rumor/speculation on the other side of the aisle suggests that this was intended to appear in Saxton's Episode III Incredible Cross-Sections book. This, of course, would makes sense in the context of his work on that children's book series, where comic-book logic is used ahead of what is seen in the film.
(For instance, Saxton's Episode II ICS had left us with the terrible contradiction of pea-shooter fighter weapons that were supposed to be able to threaten ships that shot weapons 200,000,000 times more powerful, 600 GJ weapons that could produce questionable footing and little else, and so on.)
But this "correction" simply doesn't work. How are we possibly supposed to believe that an X-Wing-esque fighter would have shielding this strong? Naboo fighters from 13 years prior could be knocked down by very-much-sub-kiloton tank rounds, with droid fighters having even weaker apparent effect . . . TIE fighters from 20+ years later could barely scuff asteroids with their missed shots. And even Slave I, a vessel much larger than most fighters, could . . . three years prior to our first view of the ARC-170 . . . barely make low-gigajoule yields. Hell, even starship-attacking Republic gunships weren't even scratching the kiloton range.
Indeed, the highest movie-based fighter firepower claim I can recall prior to the ICS books was 60 GJ per shot, or about 14 tons of TNT. And yet, here we've got EU materials basically claiming that 850,000 shots from highest-movie-calc weapons might just barely start to wither these fighter shields?
It's quite absurd, though of course the StarDestroyer.Net crowd is eating it right up, ignoring any inconsistencies.
(No doubt the trick is their magic neutrino systems they've been talking about lately, which can magically transfer EM and heat energy into neutrinos instantaneously. This is their pet theory to explain why we can't see multi-megaton blast/thermal effects in atmosphere during the AoTC battle even when ship hulls are being blasted wide open. This theory is quite nifty, until you realize that it's also absurd to think that this magic system will continue to operate even as the ship is being blown to giblets. But, hey, maybe it's the natural order of the SW universe in their view, since the TIE-shot asteroids must evidently have it, too. It's no more absurd than their other theories, like natural metal implants in Vader's neck.)
Of course, this throws any claim of EU technological consistency right out the window . . . just check the Obsidian Order pages for details on kilojoule fighter weapons, and then check out the Saxtonian modern EU. It's quite an entertaining dichotomy, and would make for an amusing article on the evolution of EU wankage.
It's good to follow the Lucas/LFL canon policy so that absurdities like this aren't our problem.
That's 12 megatons each second.
Rumor/speculation on the other side of the aisle suggests that this was intended to appear in Saxton's Episode III Incredible Cross-Sections book. This, of course, would makes sense in the context of his work on that children's book series, where comic-book logic is used ahead of what is seen in the film.
(For instance, Saxton's Episode II ICS had left us with the terrible contradiction of pea-shooter fighter weapons that were supposed to be able to threaten ships that shot weapons 200,000,000 times more powerful, 600 GJ weapons that could produce questionable footing and little else, and so on.)
But this "correction" simply doesn't work. How are we possibly supposed to believe that an X-Wing-esque fighter would have shielding this strong? Naboo fighters from 13 years prior could be knocked down by very-much-sub-kiloton tank rounds, with droid fighters having even weaker apparent effect . . . TIE fighters from 20+ years later could barely scuff asteroids with their missed shots. And even Slave I, a vessel much larger than most fighters, could . . . three years prior to our first view of the ARC-170 . . . barely make low-gigajoule yields. Hell, even starship-attacking Republic gunships weren't even scratching the kiloton range.
Indeed, the highest movie-based fighter firepower claim I can recall prior to the ICS books was 60 GJ per shot, or about 14 tons of TNT. And yet, here we've got EU materials basically claiming that 850,000 shots from highest-movie-calc weapons might just barely start to wither these fighter shields?
It's quite absurd, though of course the StarDestroyer.Net crowd is eating it right up, ignoring any inconsistencies.
(No doubt the trick is their magic neutrino systems they've been talking about lately, which can magically transfer EM and heat energy into neutrinos instantaneously. This is their pet theory to explain why we can't see multi-megaton blast/thermal effects in atmosphere during the AoTC battle even when ship hulls are being blasted wide open. This theory is quite nifty, until you realize that it's also absurd to think that this magic system will continue to operate even as the ship is being blown to giblets. But, hey, maybe it's the natural order of the SW universe in their view, since the TIE-shot asteroids must evidently have it, too. It's no more absurd than their other theories, like natural metal implants in Vader's neck.)
Of course, this throws any claim of EU technological consistency right out the window . . . just check the Obsidian Order pages for details on kilojoule fighter weapons, and then check out the Saxtonian modern EU. It's quite an entertaining dichotomy, and would make for an amusing article on the evolution of EU wankage.
It's good to follow the Lucas/LFL canon policy so that absurdities like this aren't our problem.
posted by G2k at 7:26:00 AM
5 Comments:
Since very few SW weapons take an entire second to transfer their energy to the target, it would take far less than twelve megatons to knock out an ARC-170s sheilds if the energy is transfer quickly enough.
Fair enough, but the big mamma-jamma guns of Slave 1 were rated at 2 kilotons per shot in the Ep2:AoTC ICS book, and IIRC they were the most powerful beam weapons of any small ship or fighter listed.
In order for 2kt/shot and 12Mt/sec to equal out, the Slave 1 shot would have to dump all its energy into the shield within something like one six-thousandth of a second (0.00016736s).
At 24fps, we'd never see the bolt hit. But if you remember the asteroid-field chase scene in AoTC, we get a close shot from beside/near the cockpit of Obi-Wan's fighter looking forward as his ship gets tagged from behind. This makes it plain that the energy delivery was not at such a speed, and of course the bolts during that AoTC battle were some of the fastest, shortest, and most rapid-fire bolts ever observed.
In other words, as far as the EU is concerned, there's no way in the world that Slave 1's beam weapons could affect the ARC-170 fighter, and as of AoTC Slave 1 was (IIRC) the most powerful small vessel around.
In short, it's a YAEUI (Yet Another EU Inconsistency).
Given the fact Tie-Interceptor lasers cannot vaporize R2-D2 12MT would be IMPENETRABLE!
That's how fast the energy would have to be delivered if the guns were to destroy an ARC-170 in ONE SHOT from guns that fire at around four shots per second. O_o
it would need throusands of shots per second to even come close to the shielding
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