Disruptors in Star Wars... a new twist?

watchdog · Post by **watchdog** » Mon Mar 23, 2009 5:50 am

I think that despite the SW disruptors having an effect similar to ST disruptors, you have to keep in mind what the text is claiming,; In effect it works similar to a blaster only it uses a huge amount of blaster gas as compared to a standard blaster, and it more tightly compresses the gas. That is a simplified description I'm quoting from the above text, very different from how phasers work.
As for Grevious armor, I believe the white parts are the duranium, I have no idea how well it could survive against a disruptor. I just thought it was kind of interesting that his armor is duranium and that it can supposedly survive a glancing blow from a lightsaber. I will look it up on Wookiepedia, it might be there as well.

watchdog · Post by **watchdog** » Mon Mar 23, 2009 5:58 am

Ok, from Wookieepedia; http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Duranium

Duranium

Duranium was a substance much stronger than either Transparisteel or Bronzium. It was extremely durable, light, and was capable of withstanding a glancing blow from a lightsaber; however, it also had a very high melting point, making it difficult to shape. It was however, fool proof against blasters and slugthrowers, only the continuous heat of a lightsaber able to melt through it.

and;

Behind the scenes
"Duranium" is also a strong substance in Star Trek, used in the construction of starship hulls in that universe; it was first used in the Original Series episode "The Menagerie," predating Star Wars itself by nearly eleven years.

This may be where I got the glancing blow info, but I'm sure that Grevios armor was said to be duranium, that is still in the visual dictionary.
Memory Alpha wiki does not say quite the same about their duranium http://memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/Duranium but it is interesting that in wars only the continuous heat of a lightsaber can effectively melt this stuff. Imagine if we could tie SW duranium in with ST duranium.

watchdog · Post by **watchdog** » Mon Mar 23, 2009 6:19 am

The wikis are sometimes unreliable because anyone can edit them, but even so you can sometimes find some interesting information there. For instance, compare the effects on starships from an ion storm on both Wookieepedia and Memory Alpha;

http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Ion_storm
http://memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/Ion_storm

This is exactly what I and others have been telling the warsies for years only to have them insist that there was some sort of difference between the ion cannon weapon and an ion storm.
The thing about that is the description of the cannon is simply a concentrated blast of ions and the storm is a region filled with ions, concentrated and otherwise.

ILikeDeathNote · Post by **ILikeDeathNote** » Mon Mar 23, 2009 8:16 pm

Duranium was a substance much stronger than either Transparisteel or Bronzium.

Roondar · Post by **Roondar** » Tue Mar 24, 2009 11:57 am

ILikeDeathNote wrote:

Duranium was a substance much stronger than either Transparisteel or Bronzium.

Nothing wrong with Bronzium. It clearly beats Ironium, Copperium and all of the Conreteoid alloys. Yes, alloys damnit :P

Mr. Oragahn · Post by **Mr. Oragahn** » Tue Mar 24, 2009 12:20 pm

Roondar wrote:Nothing wrong with Bronzium. It clearly beats Ironium, Copperium and all of the Conreteoid alloys. Yes, alloys damnit :P

Duralloys, man. One of the best using Thoughium, a component of Sturdisteel.

Post by **Jedi Master Spock** » Tue Mar 24, 2009 5:01 pm

I always assumed it was some medium-technobabble non-magnetic alloy that happened to have a bronze color. Perhaps not the most creative name, but still, not terrible.

watchdog wrote:This may be where I got the glancing blow info, but I'm sure that Grevios armor was said to be duranium, that is still in the visual dictionary.

Memory Alpha wiki does not say quite the same about their duranium http://memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/Duranium but it is interesting that in wars only the continuous heat of a lightsaber can effectively melt this stuff. Imagine if we could tie SW duranium in with ST duranium.

What's even more interesting is trying to figure out the relationships. Star Wars has duranium and durasteel; Star Trek has duranium and duratanium. Then there are other "tough" metals, such as Wars' lightsaber-deflecting phrik and Treks' nigh-indestructable tritanium.

It would be nice if we could say that duranium was the same thing across both universes, and it might actually be possible to compute some benchmarks by comparing the intensities of phasers and lightsabers, but any such analysis would be widely disputed.

watchdog · Post by **watchdog** » Thu Mar 26, 2009 8:52 am

Well the visual dictionary only claims that Grevious chest and teeth are made of duranium, the visual dictionary for the Clone wars doesnt mention duranium but only points to the shoulder armor and refers to that by another name (dont have the name right now).
As for the bronzium, well it's pretty obvious that they make up stuff that is meant to be seen as the in-universe version of stuff we are familiar with. I seem to recall one of the novels refering to a beverage called coffine, pretty obviously meant to be the SW equivalent of coffee.
Sometimes a hot dog is just a hot dog.

Roondar · Post by **Roondar** » Thu Mar 26, 2009 11:55 am

watchdog wrote:Well the visual dictionary only claims that Grevious chest and teeth are made of duranium, the visual dictionary for the Clone wars doesnt mention duranium but only points to the shoulder armor and refers to that by another name (dont have the name right now).
As for the bronzium, well it's pretty obvious that they make up stuff that is meant to be seen as the in-universe version of stuff we are familiar with. I seem to recall one of the novels refering to a beverage called coffine, pretty obviously meant to be the SW equivalent of coffee.
Sometimes a hot dog is just a hot dog.

Well then, I sure hope that SW duranium beats bronzium then. If it's meant to be 'bronze but sci-fi sounding'...

I understand your point obviously, but I'm not a big fan of such writing. In my view changing the name of some object is fine but it'd be nice if it's not too obvious that the writer just can't come up with anything, well, good.

Bronzium just sounds silly :P

And yes, tons of ST technobabble is the same way - silly. The only series to ever get technobabble right was, of course, Red Dwarf. Witness this exchange about their 'time transporter' after it stops working:

Rimmer: Do you think it's because the subspace conduits have locked with the transponder calibrations and caused a major tachyon surge that has overloaded the time matrix?
Kryten: Ah, no, sir. I've just been jabbing it too hard.

ILikeDeathNote · Post by **ILikeDeathNote** » Thu Mar 26, 2009 8:20 pm

Roondar wrote:
I understand your point obviously, but I'm not a big fan of such writing. In my view changing the name of some object is fine but it'd be nice if it's not too obvious that the writer just can't come up with anything, well, good.

It's called "The writers are lazy hacks with no imagination who want to sound exotic." Otherwise known as Berman & Braga Syndrome.

And yes, tons of ST technobabble is the same way

THAT'S EXACTLY THE PROBLEM! It quickly delves down to being silly-sounding technobabble, whose only purpose is to pad out a script in the cheapest and easiest way possible. Just watch any of Chuck Sonnenberg's reviews on Sci-Fi Debris on YouTube and you'll see exactly what I mean.

Mr. Oragahn · Post by **Mr. Oragahn** » Thu Mar 26, 2009 11:28 pm

Grievous' hand was made of duranium, his face plate made of armorplast.

EDIT: oopsy. These facts are from the ROTS novelization btw.

watchdog · Post by **watchdog** » Sat Mar 28, 2009 9:27 am

Armorplast, thats what the Clone Wars visual dictionary said his shoulder armor was. Even though all of his armor looks alike, the regular visual dictionary (the one for the movies) did claim that his chest and the two pointy fang-like things on his face plate was duranium.

Airlocke_Jedi_Knight · Post by **Airlocke_Jedi_Knight** » Fri Apr 03, 2009 9:53 am

Here is a passage that I thought you guys might find interesting:

GALACTIC WARSHIP OCEAN, OFF FONDOR

Chimaera cut a swath through the battlefield and headed straight for the Anakin Solo, firing turbolasers.

"They always say that Daala tore up the strategy books." Niathal was still assessing the strength and fire-power of the eclectic fleet that had just fallen into her lap. Her immediate guess was that she now had 30 percent more hulls than the Moff-Jacen fleet, as she now thought of it. "She looks as if she's going to ram him."

"I'd get out of her way, "Makin said.

Several other commanders in Jacen's fleet must have had the same idea. They broke off attacks and headed for the Anakin Solo. There were now a six warships converging on the Chimaera, and Niathal tried to guess Daala's strategy. One advantage of having a completely unexpected and di-verse fleet suddenly emerge in theater was that it plunged everything into chaos, and each commander had to pause and take stock-but that included Daala's allies. It was crowded space. Niathal had an impression of an ancient maritime battle on Naboo, when ships had been packed too close together to move or fire safely.

"Yes, she's going to turn as late as she can, "said Niathal.

"Even so, I wouldn't be the frigate on that bearing there."

"Did she say Maw Irregular Fleet?"

"She did."

One destroyer bearing down on Chimaera's port beam appeared to be targeting her bridge, and a cruiser was on an intercept course from starboard. Chimaera opened fire on both simultaneously, with apparently little effect, and held her course.

"What was that, Vio?" Niathal asked. "Turbolaser?"

"Unknown, ma'am."

"This isn't the time to admire what she's had done in refit, but I haven't seen anything like that. Sensors? Tell me what Chimaera's got by way of armaments. I just hope this isn't some massive bluff and she's just scrambled every-thing from the breakers' yard, because Jacen will sense that very fast."

Niathal, still monitoring the developing collision, moved to watch one of the holocam feeds from the remotes near-est the Anakin Solo. Chimaera was letting smaller vessels take pot shots at her, which her shields shrugged off, and then she simply targeted the same two vessels that she'd returned fire upon moments earlier.

Niathal waited for signs of impact. What she saw instead was the hull of one ship deforming and then simply burst-ing apart like a bag of grainmeal, with no accompanying explosion. The aft section was intact, but there was a large enough hole in the hull to span five decks, maybe more, and expose compartments to vacuum.

It was an oddly silent, unfit end for the cruiser. It rang a bell with Niathal.

"Oh, I think Daala's brought some of her toys with her, "Makin said. He'd been watching in silence.

"Yes, I do believe she has some novel weapons." Niathal commed the Maw flagship. "Ocean to Chimaera thank you for your assistance. Are you armed with unconventional weapons?"

"Ocean, confirm that, we have metal-crystal phase shifters.... among other things."

There is your Metal Crystal Phase Shifter in action. Comments?

ILikeDeathNote · Post by **ILikeDeathNote** » Fri Apr 03, 2009 5:04 pm

Airlocke_Jedi_Knight wrote:Here is a passage that I thought you guys might find interesting:

GALACTIC WARSHIP OCEAN, OFF FONDOR

Opps, stopped reading there. Unless it's Zahn I don't read EU ;)

Airlocke_Jedi_Knight · Post by **Airlocke_Jedi_Knight** » Fri Apr 03, 2009 8:06 pm

It was a passage relevant to the phase shifter discussion, as it actually describes its affects, I thought it might be useful.