ISD Firepower

[Jedi Master Spock]

Here I estimated, based pretty much wholly on TESB asteroid blasting and the size and rates of bolts seen fired in the OT, that an ISD has an observed sustained rate of fire of around 23 TW - 84 PW, with individual bolts of up to 100 megatons being reasonably likely. (The lower estimates are based more strictly on asteroid blasting bolts and their observed rates of fire of at least 1-2 bolts/second for the mid-range bolts, the higher on speculated increases in firepower based on rare but large bolts every five seconds or so.)

I myself readily accept that this may be substantially lower than the maximum sustained firepower; after all, we do not observe ISDs in a bombardment role.

In the links section of that page, you will find a reference to an estimate on Stardestroyer.net that places the instantaneous power output of a heavy turbolaser bolt to be 2.8 exawatts, with an individual bolt yield of up to 44 megatons. Based on the 5 shots per second and 1/15th second duration used on that site, this amounts to a generous 930 petawatts; on the shields page, figures are given implying an output of 7.8-500 petawatts.

Saxton, in his SWTC, has of course estimated "at least" 500 exawatts based on his interpretation of Base Delta Zero, and the ICS books imply around 3-5 orders of magnitude of further increase.

As discussed here, in providing public justification for his retcon of Saxton-related materials, Sarli recently called Saxton's firepower estimate as off by what adds up to three orders of magnitude, i.e., 500 petawatts.

Before I am called to carpet for my low estimates, the estimate is given of "gigawatts minimum" for Star Wars beam weaponry, and references to "terawatts" are not uncommon in the EU, particularly within the X-Wing series.

I am interested in seeing what your thought are on three aspects of ISD firepower. "Normal" bolt strength, i.e., the mid-sized bolts commonly seen fired at the Falcon. Maximum bolt strength i.e., presumably the ~500m* bolt seen in ROTJ. Peak sustained output - how much can the ISD deliver on average in battle or bombardment?

*500m assuming a 1600m ISD; you may scale down appropriately if you prefer a smaller Star Destroyer.

[Dragoon]

Gigawatts to petawatts seems reasonable enough to me. I reject the ICS and Saxton.

[Lord Edam]

I've always subscribed to low-GT for the heaviest weapons, based on the few times we've seen the aftermath of planetary bombardment in EU

assuming 10 heavy cannons at 1GT each firing every five seconds, and 100 average cannons at 1/10th that (or about 100MT) able to fire once a second, you're looking at just over 10GT per second, which rounds off to exawatt scale.

Even if you give the average cannons 10MT each you're still looking at an average of about 5exawatts if they can fire once per second.

so low-end exawatt seems reasonable - devastating on a local scale, threatening regionally, but you'd need a lot of ships to cause major problems for anything larger than a small moon.

[Mr. Oragahn]

As discussed here, in providing public justification for his retcon of Saxton-related materials, Sarli recently called Saxton's firepower estimate as off by what adds up to three orders of magnitude, i.e., 500 petawatts.

He claimed figures being 1000 times too high.

Though I've seen an ISD deliver low MT against asteroids, I think it could be possible, eventually, to unleash a fully powered blast around 4~12 exawatts, though there's no direct evidence of such an ability in the higher canon.

Without such a level of support, I wouldn't insist too much though.

Then I wonder when someone will make use of the "Death Star TL scaled down" argument (yes yes, the EU calls it a TL).

[Jedi Master Spock]

Well, that one - IIRC - is usually claimed in the yottawatt range.

Frankly, I have no problem with the low exawatt range in theory (after all, my estimates for total ISD power generation fall in that range)... but it's awfully hard to justify more than hundreds of petawatts of sustainably applicable firepower in contrast to what we see on screen. It's a stretch to estimate the largest bolts as being 100 MT based on that, and another stretch to assume that a Star Destroyer can keep churning out those bolts at rates in excess of 2 per second.

I'm willing to stretch a little here, but when it comes to taking a best guess, stretches on top of stretches don't really play a role.

In some ways it's pretty amazing how much variability there is in what people think of as ISD firepower - each one of those categories represents three whole orders of magnitude, and all but one of those categories have votes already.

[Nonamer]

After thinking about this question for a bit, I've came to the realization that only in the prequel trilogy did GL actually get the VFX power to create what he wanted in terms of graphics. I think it is fair to say the prequel trilogy should carry the most weight in regards to estimating ISD firepower.

The opening sequence of ROTS shows weapon systems much less powerful than what is claimed elsewhere. The most powerful weapon used in that entire sequence was a hanger bay gun that suggests a power of low single digit terawatts, and no more.

[Mike DiCenso]

Mr. Oragahn wrote:

Though I've seen an ISD deliver low MT against asteroids, I think it could be possible, eventually, to unleash a fully powered blast around 4~12 exawatts, though there's no direct evidence of such an ability in the higher canon.

When have we ever seen in TESB an ISD deliver low-MT firepower against an asteroid? The only way you can even come close to that is to assume ,as Brian Young did, that the flack bursts in the Avenger-Falcon chase scenes are 100 meter asteroids being vaporized. The ones being desroyed by the lone ISD earlier in the movie are far, far smaller than that; about 1-8 meters. At best you get tens of kilotons.
-Mikes

[Mr. Oragahn]

The only way Wars would have such pathetically weak weapons were if those very weapons were based on a technology and materials that do not enable massive power flux and no massive power build up, so despite being able to generate large amounts of energy, the guns could not fully exploit a decent precentage of it.

Maybe I'm too generous with Wars (which some would on the contrary consider to conservative), but there's a point where insisting that ISDs can't even drop something like a decent fraction of Tsar Bomba on their enemy's face is a bit hard to swallow.

[Mike DiCenso]

That's irrelevant, actually. That individual light and medium sized beam weapons on an ISD don't have a fraction, even combined, of the energy yeilds of the Tsar Bomba is hardly a problem. The RoTJ novelization makes it more clear that at least some TLs have low MT range firepower, thus an ISD with it's combined firepower could reach a signficant fraction of the Tsar Bomba yeild, or surpass it by some amount still is not outside the realm of possibility.
-Mike

[Mr. Oragahn]

If those turbolaser yields were so weak, they would not bother with them, and instead use focused nuclear warheads. I'm sure there'd be quite some room to store them on a 1.6 km long ship after all.

Otherwise, if today we could make a space platform just as long as an ISD, and filled with tens of launching tubes containing several low megaton level warheads each, we'd toast an ISD, easily.

I acknowledge the technological stagnation theory, but there are limits to what's credible and what is not.
They'd have not shifted to a complicated type of weaponry that can't even be rerouted if nukes were just as good if not largely better.

I fail to see which part of the ROTJ novelisation make it clear about anything of low megatonnage weaponry, and ROTS gave a figure that could be understood as a low end.

Unless you come with a theory about how all SW ships have systems that can easily intercept even a swarm of missiles, and thus make those weapons pointless and a waste of room, explaining the switch to TLs.
As such, you could say that even if TLs are much weaker, they're at least never stopped by any defense safe a force field or armour.

But again, that's absurd. We've never seen anything close to an interception system on SW ships, and at the ranges seen in the films, even unguided megaton projectiles would be the death of those ships.

[AnonymousRedShirtEnsign]

A TL that can shoot 1 MT equivalent rounds at 30/min is superior to a 10 MT nuclear missile because, one, it is cheaper, and two, it can continue to be fired, rather than needing to build another nuclear missile. It is a more sustainable type of weapon. It is the same reason the NAVY will switch from short range (~100km) cruise missiles to railguns, when they can.

[Mr. Oragahn]

A TL that can shoot 1 MT equivalent rounds at 30/min is superior to a 10 MT nuclear missile because, one, it is cheaper, and two, it can continue to be fired, rather than needing to build another nuclear missile. It is a more sustainable type of weapon. It is the same reason the NAVY will switch from short range (~100km) cruise missiles to railguns, when they can.

In an universe where fusion powers everything, where a guy in a poor sand house on Tatooine can have a very small fusion furnace, I find it odd that even the msot basic warheads would cost a lot.

TLs bolts aren't gratuitous either. Based on matter of some kind, that matter must also be extracted, refined, and go through a whole industrial chain before ending in a nice exploitable ammo pack. Not counting on the intricate elaboration of a TL, likely more complicated than a mere launch tube. A system which will also wear off after time, notably due to the immense heat treated inside it.

Plus in the end the gain is simply largely in favor of warheads. Why fight endlessly with TLs firing at 1 MT bolt each, when you can probably pack hundreds times that power in a warhead that will quickly destroy the enemy, thus shortly straightening the battle, and of course, minimizing damage on your side, that is, less costs on repairs, and even more, the chance to win easily, instead of literally loosing your ship because you fight with peewee guns and given a chance to your enemy to win.

As for cruiser missile vs railgun, the advantage is speed. However, when you look at the range which they fight at in SW, this argument makes itself automatically moot.

The other argument, as I said, would be an interception system, but we've never seen anything like that, and considering how unefficient capital ships are regarding snubfighters, with DCAs having piss poor results, making sure your swarm of multi megaton warheads hits its target would be a walk in the park.

If I really want to be picky, the RotS novlelisation is talking about long hairlines. The only kind of hairlines you would spot are the continuous blue beams fired from the hangar bays, probably from sort of SPHA-Ts parked there.

And that's it. This would be machines able to shoot megatons if they wanted to.

[Nonamer]

A TL that can shoot 1 MT equivalent rounds at 30/min is superior to a 10 MT nuclear missile because, one, it is cheaper, and two, it can continue to be fired, rather than needing to build another nuclear missile. It is a more sustainable type of weapon. It is the same reason the NAVY will switch from short range (~100km) cruise missiles to railguns, when they can.

In an universe where fusion powers everything, where a guy in a poor sand house on Tatooine can have a very small fusion furnace, I find it odd that even the msot basic warheads would cost a lot.

TLs bolts aren't gratuitous either. Based on matter of some kind, that matter must also be extracted, refined, and go through a whole industrial chain before ending in a nice exploitable ammo pack. Not counting on the intricate elaboration of a TL, likely more complicated than a mere launch tube. A system which will also wear off after time, notably due to the immense heat treated inside it.

Plus in the end the gain is simply largely in favor of warheads. Why fight endlessly with TLs firing at 1 MT bolt each, when you can probably pack hundreds times that power in a warhead that will quickly destroy the enemy, thus shortly straightening the battle, and of course, minimizing damage on your side, that is, less costs on repairs, and even more, the chance to win easily, instead of literally loosing your ship because you fight with peewee guns and given a chance to your enemy to win.

As for cruiser missile vs railgun, the advantage is speed. However, when you look at the range which they fight at in SW, this argument makes itself automatically moot.

The other argument, as I said, would be an interception system, but we've never seen anything like that, and considering how unefficient capital ships are regarding snubfighters, with DCAs having piss poor results, making sure your swarm of multi megaton warheads hits its target would be a walk in the park.

If I really want to be picky, the RotS novlelisation is talking about long hairlines. The only kind of hairlines you would spot are the continuous blue beams fired from the hangar bays, probably from sort of SPHA-Ts parked there.

And that's it. This would be machines able to shoot megatons if they wanted to.

I think you're making a seriously unfounded assumption in in claiming that TL are difficult to produce. We know TLs are totally ubiquitous in SW, which means they can't be using exotic materials. It also means there's a huge industry in making TLs and TL ammo, which means economies of scale have likely greatly reduced costs from wherever they were originally. Maybe even the TL is the AK-47 of SW.

And there's more to a weapon system that simple firepower. Why do we use conventional bombs when we could use smaller and more powerful tactical nukes? Sometimes, a less powerful weapon is more effective with less collateral damage. Seeing how SW space battles tend to turn into knife fights, it may not be safe to constantly use nukes.

[Mr. Oragahn]

I think you're making a seriously unfounded assumption in in claiming that TL are difficult to produce.

They're clearly called to more complicated to create than a mere launch tube and a warhead that even wecan create.

We know TLs are totally ubiquitous in SW,...

Just like fusion plants. Descriptions make it sound like there's even one in any vacuum cleaner.

...which means they can't be using exotic materials.

No one said that exotic meant rare. There's that tibanna gas, which even certain EU sources and hidden clues in backstage info for the OT linked to antigravitationnal tech, besides being used... for weapons.

It also means there's a huge industry in making TLs and TL ammo, which means economies of scale have likely greatly reduced costs from wherever they were originally. Maybe even the TL is the AK-47 of SW.

The exact same would apply to warheads, especially with lower technologies. Crap, we can't even create TLs, we can't create droids, and we're barely having our first empirical tries at fusion.
Saying that those are common in Star Wars since ages would be a severe understatement.

Yet coming with warheads not able to, at the very least, easily match the Tsar Bomba, if not largely more, would be completely impossible, as per the numerous statements of this thread?

I completely agree that Wars has suffered from severe wank these years, which in return created an anti-wank movement.
But I think we should put those extremes aside and at least think about common sense for a minute, without wanting to offend anyone.

And there's more to a weapon system that simple firepower. Why do we use conventional bombs when we could use smaller and more powerful tactical nukes? Sometimes, a less powerful weapon is more effective with less collateral damage. Seeing how SW space battles tend to turn into knife fights, it may not be safe to constantly use nukes.

Of course, if they could produce warheads with a focus cone of 180° or less, this wouldn't be a problem. Plus it doesn't seem to make a difference, since the vast majority of energy bolts explode omnidirectionally.

[AnonymousRedShirtEnsign]

SW does use missiles, on its fighters and not on its capitol ships (at least none that are used during the films). Therefore, we should assume that their is an in universe reason (not Lucas likes WWII over contemporary warfare) for this.

I'll go out on a limb and say that TLs are several orders of magnitude more space efficient than missile silos. So that even if they aren't as powerful as shuttle sized warhead, TLs can be used for extended periods of time which is important in a military campaign.