Why the ISD isn't a Clone Wars SHIP (not Design)

[Ello]

Recent discussion has revealed that the ISD is a clone wars era design, leading to much dissapointment among me. (And people like me) So, like any true fan, I'm gonna argue like hell against it . The premises are as follows:

 

1. the ISD is a late clone wars design, first begun to be laid down around the Battle of Coruscant. This is critical.

 

2. The Old Republic was unable to fully mobilize its tech base, R&D, and manufacturing base, even through the clone wars.

 

Conclusion:

 

While the ISD was a clone wars era design, it wasn't actually built in any signifigant numbers until about ten/fourteen years later

 

Argument:

 

The ISD is a late era clone wars design, and thus the first spaceframes were being laid down just around the Battle of Coruscant. It was to be the ship that won the war, a highly capable battleship for fleet actions, a local control center, a flagship for smaller vessels, and a carrier in its own right. However, production was just getting started when it hit a wall--the glut in repairs caused by the unprecedented Battle of Coruscant. Even afterwards, the KDY shipyards continued to work mainly on the proven VenSDs and the VicSDs. If the Republic could just push hard enough, it could roll up the Seppies. There was no time to troubleshoot a new (and unprecedented) design.

Then came Utupau, and the Jedi Rebellion. (Yes, I know, not a Rebellion--but it was that way for KDY!) Suddenly, the war was over. No more need for battleships, because there were no more fleet actions. No more need for local control center--most of the available ships were being sent out on antipiracy and loalty insurance patrols. No need for flagships, because the patrols were at most in fours. And no need for carriers at all--or at least not massive ones. Again, fleet carriers only belong in fleet engagements. So the orders came down from the top. Make lots and lots of VicSDs. Start retiring the VenSDs (truly fleet carriers). The ISDs can come later. It would also be at this time that the planned class name was changed from "Imperator" (a martial but somewhat democratic name: victorius general, in Latin) to "Imperial," reflecting the Emperor's priorities.

 

With the slow, most ISD spaceframes were broken down, and converted into VicSD spaceframes--a fairly easy change. Then came the technological windfall from Mustafar. The Seppies had always had better R&D, and now it was available to the Republic. This would be plugged back into ISD plans, causing a lot of redesign.

 

True, Palp wanted big ships fast, but he always did. And he did appreciate that the best way to go about it would be first to own the planets and shipyards, then to complete the revving up of the tech and industrial bases, and then build a lot of ships. So, finally, ten years later, when an ISD could function as a VicSD (in terms of manuverability, build time, industrial requirements, self reliance, deployment times, etc) plus 700 meters and an absurd number of turbolasers, they began to roll out of the shipyards again. The few old ones, the ISD 0's, if you will, were refitted heavily, and the normal ISD came about. The rest is history.

 

(caveat to account for the Dark Lord book coming out in novemeber)

 

Of course, an ISD would be an impressive conveyance, and the few "ISD 0" would be dispensed to those such as Lord Vader

[zare]

It seems that many designs that saw heavy usage during the Rebellion/Galactic Civil War have their roots at Clone Wars era. Same goes for capital fleet ships.

 

Many designs existed years before Clone Wars (i mean how to explain great number of Acclamators only months after the Geonosis). I mean mass production is one thing but to have an operational fleet in no time you must have blueprints, designs ,projects , resources and facilities already active or at least ready to deploy at moments notice.

 

If we take that the all Syfo-Dias conspiracy took place years before Geonosis, and taking into account that R&D facilities (in our world) always look ahead it is possible that basic designs for future battleships (and by that i mean both ISD etc) existed maybe even after year or two of Clone Wars. Later it only comes to applying to what proved itself in combat, what proved to be efficient, and what proved to be a great minus in class design.

 

According to the informations from (guide to vessels and ships printed in late 90's) Victory SD was a new generation star destroyer deployed near the very end of Clone Wars. Also it was the last destroyer-class capital ship with ability to enter planetary atmosphere (something Acclamator and Venator classes were more than able because their main role, among others, was providing heavy blaster and missile fire for ground troops). Loosing this ability proves a radical change in strategy/tactics. Instead of landing troops with direct fire support of these large battleships, now it is spossible to obliterate the surface with blaster fire from a greater distance and thus clear the path for invading force (remember the NJO and Wedge's suprising tactic of massive orbital bombardement of Yuuzhang Vong troops and positions).

This change of policy (we aint landing no more to enforce our will - if you arent listening we'll gonna blast you to the stoneage) is of course visible in all the imperial capital class ships.

 

ISD (as ships, not designs) came much, much later. According to the information from the net : supervisor of the Venator class project, Lira Blissex finaly saw the creation of ultimate battleship well after the war, when the new order started great armament programs. Basic design already existed - difference between Victory and ISD class being only size and those weird looking "wings" Victory used for atmospheric operations. Basic shape, weapon placement - it was all the same (only difference being again number of turrets). All the knowledge KDY accumulated during the creation of "wedged-shaped" ships (from Acclamator to Venator & Victory) resulted in ISD class.

[DarthFelth]

not to nit pick but KDY didnt make the Victory SD, rendili star drives did. I didnt know the ISD was a clone wars era ship (or meant to be) and i dont remember seeing it in the film(ep3) I remember seeing ships that it prolly evolved from and the ships Tie Fighters evolved from.

[Grand_Admiral_Thrawn]

I must admit I'm left wondering where your information came from. I've yet to see anything to support these claimes. Perhaps you could enlighten us?

[zare]

Blissex family seems to be behind every major construction move Lira Blissex is a daughter of Walex Blissex (among other things also worked on A-Wing and Delta-7). While father worked at Rendili corp, Lira worked at KDY. They both created two competing designs > Victory class (Rendiili - sorry ,my mistake) and Venator class starships (KDY) for the Republic forces, and shared diifferent political points of view > after empire was created, father aligned with rebels and daughter wih imperials. All this information you can find at this link.

I can only speculate that few Victory class destroyers were built during the clone wars but i remember what i read in Star Wars guide to vehicles and ships (don't know the right title) i bought few years ago (if you like i'll post ISBN here as soon i find it). In there it was said that this ship saw action at the end of Clone Wars because it came too late into production. So there must have been several ships operational near the beginning of Jedi purge and fall of the Republic. Also on the above mentioned link you'll find that these ships saw heavy duty with imperial fleet (at least before introduction of ISD). It is also stated in Star Wars Technical Commentaries at TFN that these ships were "...Standard destroyer vessel of the Galactic Navy during the waning years of the Old Republic.."

Based on designs of Acclamator, Venator and Victory, Lira proposed a completely new ship > ISD.

It is stated (link ain't on english) here

that Lira wasn't happy with the Venator design from the beginning, started design on another starsip class and, after Republic fell, used her infulence in Empire to push forward its development. These were future ISDs.

It seems that official star wars site now takes Venator as ISDs predecessor, and i can't find any entry for the Victory class, so i guess this part of history has changed, and thats the reason why the main starships in ep3 are Venators.

[Grand_Admiral_Thrawn]

Well, remember, there is twenty years between Episode III and Episode IV, so there is still a chance that the VSD is in there somewhere. If you look at the VSD in the Warlords mod you'll find that it's role really isn't the same as the ISDs. The ISD is a mobile turbolaser station, where as the VSD is intended for light ombat, or missile strikes. The ships we saw in Episode III were also more for assault than a tactical role.

[DarthFelth]

just how offical is that site anyways? Yes you can clearly see the ISD came from them ships but you can see it came from the VSD which you can see came from the Vendator. I mean it even has the same abilty to land.

[Grand_Admiral_Pellaeon]

http://www.answers.com/topic/star-destroyer

 

that page should help give the history of the star destroyer. I was going to act all clever and type it all out properly and give a history of the star destroyer but i choose not 2. Also this quite clearly proves that the ISD is a ship spawned from the Clone wars. Not that thats a bad thing, i find the venator class destroyer to be one hell ova cool ship. Though that may just be me.

[DarthFelth]

well to its dosnt prove that cos the ISD didnt come from that directly and its fan made (and i dont really trust fan made stuff). There is anouther Star Destroyer right at the end of the film which is clearly what the Imperator comes from.

 

Interesting read that site, i had forgotten about half the Executer class destroyers about. Also to be fair i will never take a site seriously if it even mentioned a SSD being 8km long (and any form)

[Grand_Admiral_Thrawn]

Hmm, that site also states than an SSD is about 17.6 km in lenght, whereas all official sources peg it at about 12.8 km. I'm sorry, but I just can't trust a site that makes claims like that, based only on visual comparisons.

[DarthFelth]

ohh i agree that its 17.6km long, but any site thats mentions

 

Iron Fist - This ship was the flagship of Warlord Zsinj's fleet. It was the symbol of the warlord's power, and he used it to terrorize worlds into submission. Iron Fist was eventually destroyed over the planet Dathomir. Originally HIMS Brawl. Offical literature and source material implies that this ship may have been of the postulated 8,000 meter class, rather than of the 17,600 meter Executor-class. There is an ongoing and often heated debate as to what length and class to ascribe to this vessel.[/quote0

 

it mentioned the 8000km long, thats enough to make me hate the site

[Grand_Admiral_Pellaeon]

fine then i didnt really read it properly, i'll try the main star wars site next time. Oh and the ship at the end is still the Venator destroyer, it just has the red markings taken of it, something to do with the emperors dislike of nice colours or somein more star warsy.

[DarthFelth]

looked slighly different to me, hope you didnt get that info from a fan site

[Ello]

Sorry--Been off for a while

 

In order

 

Zare (#1)

 

I agree that the acclamator was in the works for a while. Even though (based on a series of random quotes/WAGs) KDY can build an ISD in about three months, and the acclamator much sooner, they undoubtably had a lot of R&D/debugging time. The VicSD was also probably designed say 2-3 yrs pre Geonosis, but would have been pushed in much faster--some of the Seppie ships were huge, and acclamator destroyer variants just weren't up to it.

 

While the ISD was the first to be unable to enter the atmosphere, it was coming for a while. The only reason VenSDs are at Eastport in RotS (no, I'm not sure that it's Eastport, but that's the biggest one, right?) is because of a repair glut. It must be a hell of a time bringing them into the atmosphere .

 

Third, I don't think that bombardments are actually a viable troop landing strategy. Why? Because the enemy would normally know that it's coming, and just has to move into a position that the ground troops have to take intact. Borleias is unusual for several reasons: 1) the Vong had no idea that the ISDs were designed to pound the crap out of the ground, too, and 2) the NR controlled the orbitals but the Vong still had forces on the ground and 3) (related to 2) the Vong were the agressors but they reinforced ground troops w/o taking the space first. These all stem from the fact that the Vong are extragalatic. BDZs aren't rare, they were happening in the Sith Wars. And they ain't pretty. Granite runs like water, sand becomes instant glass, anything hit explodes or is smashed into oblivion. The heat produces enough atmospheric concussive force to crack the strongest bunker. Nothing lives through them, and so as long as the enemy remains in an important location, a bombardment is impratical. And if there are no places like that, than ground combat is pointless anyway

 

Fourth: Of course the final ISD design was approx. 10 PE. But the original plans were on the board, and probably a few trial spaceframes were being built before Coruscant, if only b/c the ISD was a battleship, and the clone wars had a lot of fleet combat, massive smashing

 

Zare #2

 

I think that a lot of VicSDs were built in the clone wars, and indeed they predated VenSDs, but we don't see a lot of them, b/c we don't see many fleet battles described in great detail, and Coruscant we see the starfighter perspective, and so we get the VenSDs--the carriers. Finally, as to VicSDs being cut out of the official loop--they were never there in the first place. They still exist, and are a stronger predecessor than the VenSDs, but b/c of the movie content, the VenSDs are more officially recognized

 

Darth Felth

 

just how offical is that site anyways? Yes you can clearly see the ISD came from them ships but you can see it came from the VSD which you can see came from the Vendator. I mean it even has the same abilty to land.

 

Actually, the VicSD predates the VenSD, it just lands because that's what nearly all of the ships up to that point do.

 

Also, I disagree about the length, but let's not argue.

[Ello]

Oh, one more thing. They are the same. Check the official site venator page. (http://www.starwars.com/databank/starship/republicattackcruiser/index.html) The top pic bar shows the "Star Destroyer white" color scheme Venators

[zare]

On the above mentioned link it says :"...By the end of the film, the Star Destroyers lack color altogether, symbolizing the Empire's emergence over the Republic...." (behind the scene section of Venator class description),so those are Venator class starhips in the end.

 

Regarding the size of SSD, together with movies and EU it seems that ship-sizes changed also. So if you have an old reference (or a site whose author used old reference) well... I mean only few months back you could see Victory class destroyer entry on official site. Now there is only Venator class. (Star Wars databank > SSD > behind the scenes >"... The size of a Super Star Destroyer has vacillated in numerous publications, starting with an eight-kilometer length in 1984's A Guide to the Star Wars Universe. The latest measurements peg the craft at about 12,800 meters. The miniature used for The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi was 282 centimeters long..." ).

 

Regarding the artillery preparation of landing zones. I agree that you cannot take out troops with long-range and devastating artillery if they are near the critical points that need to be taken intact. But :

(a)In any assault it is of gravest importance to do "hot-zone preparation". Reason for this is very simple. Even if you are going against highly-spirited and motivated enemy shell-shock is your greatest friend. Lets just take WW2 as example > US troops in Pacific always had heavy fire support (at best situations New Jersey class ships with their devastating 406 mm guns - these ships retired only recently after they served through all conflicts in exactly this role from 1940s) that pounded enemy positions (in this case Japanese). OK, i agree that enemy does know where the attack will take place, but complete suprise in real situations is impossible, if you have an enemy worthy of mentioning. Also, i agree if the enemy is deep underground, in bunkers, well..it depends from what material these bunkers are made, but this will shake them, inflict great damage to everything left in open/unprotected/lightly armoured and keep their heads down (you can't put everything underground). In this process you can level down radar, radio and EW installations, but most importantly you will affect morale of troops (car-size shell does that to people..... simple mortar round does it, lets not mention energy beam striking from heaven). Also there is a great posibility that you will clear area of any possible mines, obstacles and stuff. After that you can move in with your troops.

If you don't have ground troops you can't do anything. After all thats why all great armies have dedicated units for such tasks (marines, paras etc). But they need heavy fire-support for situations when they are confronted with heavy resistance. This can be provided by ground artillery but at later stages, when the breach is secured and assault forces can move more inland.

No matter how advanced technology is, without ground troops you cannot take the ground. Everything else is only in support role.

If assault troops don't have this they will end up like German paras on Crete > with great casualties and (at best) Pyrric victory.

(b) Unlike Old Republic forces whose main goal was policing the teritories (and thus making landing ability important), Imperial forces used terror tactics of reprisal against rebels or those marked as such (how else to explain Alderaan and Daala's attack on Mon Calamari homeworld). For these operations Empire needed ISD-like ships able to obliterate (parts of ) the surface of rebel planets where needed (without need for troop landings) to prove how Long hand of Imperial justice can reach everywhere.

 

Also, just to mention it, on the link i gave (non-english) all informations are taken from official Star Wars databank, so i guess those information are official (until next revision ).

[Ello]

Yes, artillery support for LZ's are important, but ISDs aren't the ship to provide it. They have horribly innacurate weapons--well, not innacurate, but so devestating its hard to control them. A Lancer Class Frigate, for example, has lots of laser cannons (as opposed to turbolaser), with a far lesser blast radius. So it can actually take out enemy targets, as opposed to simply smashing the countryside. But hot LZs like that are also less common than you think, b/c there's simply no hope. The enemy knows that the ISD can and will dissocociate them at the molecular level. He gives up on it. So the times when an ISD can help clear an LZ AND the enemy commander doesn't surrender are few and far between

[zare]

You're right on that Ello. I know i would surrender in that case, and maybe later lead on rebel guerillas

 

I don't now is it worth making a new thread, so i guess this is as good place as any > I have noticed a strikecraft named Howlrunner I-7 . What interests me the most is the fact that it is Imperial craft, but made by Incom corp (x-wing manufacturers and as far as i know rebel aligned corp). Also i was unable to find data about this specific fighter. To me it looks like cross between TIE and rebel snowspeeder

Is there any available data about this ship on net, and was it ever described in any guide?

[DarthFelth]

yeah i was wrong about the venerator class however the SSD is clearly 17.6km long not. Anyways who says the VSD predates the the Venerator (or whatever its called). A fan site? a fan site that says the SSD is 12km long perhaps? Just by looking at the VSD and ISD you can see they are much more related than the other ships.

[Ello]

Zare:

 

yep, the Howlrunner is an Incom design. it was designed around the time of the reborn emperor. Incom was an Imp. Company, but when the Emperor tried to nationalize it, the designers fled and joined the rebellion. So the corp sort of split (i think) you can find out more in the old Essential Vehicles, and also in http://hangarbay.tripod.com/td-i7.html

 

Darth Felth:

 

1) Look, let's just not argue about SSD length. There's valid ideas on both sides, strongly held beliefs, and NO POINT in arguing. So SHADDUP already. Sarcasm won't convert me.

 

2) Just by looking at the VSD and ISD you can see they are much more related than the other ships.

 

So what? Related doesn't mean direct sucession. The Venator SD and the Victory SD fufill very different missions, and the Vic's is closer to the ISD. On the other hand, the VenSD mission is more closely related to the acclamator, so it looks more like that. And finally, the VicSD was designed by Walex Blissex, while the VenSD and ISD were designed by Lyra Blissex, his daugter. The Vic was built by Rendili (which threatened to seceed in the later war) and the VenSD and ISD were built by KDY. At the time of the clone wars, Rendili is going out and KDY is coming in. So the relation doesn't show direct progression. Furthermore, b/c the designs are so similar, Lyra probably got the idea from VicSD concepts sketches--and nourished it for a while. Read Zare's above post[/i]

[zare]

Only thing i can say is that the source for great deal of data regarding starships is official site and (to some extent at least) Star Wars Technical Commentaries at TFN.

 

Problem is that at certain points (such as ship firepower, size etc) this data differs in some degree. Even official site states that the first "official" data stated that SSD was 8km long, this was taken as true by official guides. Of course this has changed in the coming years but it is known thing how people take changes right

 

Regarding Victory class this is a quote from Essential guide to ships and vehicles (1996) : ".. The Victory was designed near the end of the Clone Wars, and these ships formed the core of the space fleet after that turbulent era..." Being built (VSD and ISD) by the members of the same family it is more than obvious they share much in common.

Now you can't find anything on VSD ships on official page. For ISD it is said it entered service much much later.

 

For SSD (from the same source > here filed as Executor) goes the following "... At 8.000 meter long , it was the largest traditional starship constructed by the Imperial Navy..." (and this is official material published by Lucas).

So i agree with Ello that (although interesting ) argument about this is IMO fruitless.

 

So to disregard fan pages (at least those serious ones) because they contain old data....... aint that a little bit harsh

 

 

Btw what do you mean by :"..the SSD is clearly 17.6km long not.." . I thought you were stating it was ~18km long ?

 

Ello :

 

Thanks for the link. I'm glad that this page lives on. I used to visit it about a year ago but very great deal of links wasn't working and there were no pictures (even now tactics link doesn't work) Tnx again.

[Ello]

Zare:

 

You're welcome

 

And I agree. I think that actually, some fan sites are more reliable, because we're so damn dedicated. While they have the source of the data, they don't pore over the way we do. Take the TFN encylopedia. Its got stuff I've never heard of. Lucasfilm doesn't stand a chance.

[DarthFelth]

isnt 18km 17,6 rounded off? (ohh how pathic, its not even funny). It has been proven that the SSD is 17.6km long by comparing film rels, etc (to be fair i dont care what the 0. of the km is).

 

ello, please shutup, and read my post more carefuly, i am firm believer in the SSD being 17.6km, am i am saying that site you quoted for the the republic ships isnt that great a source when it is saying that executers come in 2 sizes. (You will find that the offical length was change to 12. something because 8 wasnt long enough when to compared to ISD's anyways)

 

Using common sense on the relation between a VSD, ISD and VenSD and what we know. One point, i already said the VSD was made by Rendili (was it you i corrected earlier?)

 

http://hangarbay.tripod.com/td-isd1.html

 

from your site, says the ISD was the successor of the VSD, maybe you should read your own sites abit more clearly. Zanes above points are made invalid because his source has the wrong length for the SSD. This leaves a question, what else is wrong? The VenSD and ISD are nothing alike and infact from what is seen in the films use different weapons. I see nothing in common other than a slight wedge and SD in name. Also being made by the same company dosnt mean direct sucession?

[Ello]

I didn't mean to be offensive when I said SHADDUP. I was irritated for other reasons, and I felt that you were bringing in the 17.6 km at all times, even when not particulary relevant. I'm sorry if I made it seem like I wasn't interested in your ides or like I was trying to shout you out.

 

Okay. Now, to business. DarthFelth, your argument. is invalid b/c 1) it is all based on the premise that the SSD is definitely 17.6 km long, and I don't accept that and 2) you argue that if any site has any invalid data all of the site is therefore unusable. Even if that data was offical Lucasfilm data that film reels don't agree with.

 

I never said I used hangarbay as my source for the ISD. Frankly, I don't remember what site I use, and it was probably more than one. I look for a lot of pics of ships on google, and end up going thru an absurd number of chatrooms.

 

Finally, "sucessor" does not mean anything about direct proceedance. For example, the Mediator battlecruiser is considered the sucessor to the MC80, even thought the MC90 came between. The VenSD has a mission objective much more similar to that of an Acclamator. It pacifies LZs (Source: Microseries chapter 22) and deployes fighters. It thus has a different design philosophy from the VicSDs and ISDs, and so the ISD is the sucessor to the VicSD in terms of design even though the VenSD came between them

 

I don't understand why you said "The VenSD and ISD are nothing alike and infact from what is seen in the films use different weapons. I see nothing in common other than a slight wedge and SD in name."

That's my point. Feel free to correct me if I'm misinterpreting this.

 

One last thing. I'd like to define "sucession" as I have been using it. I use it to mean how one design develops out of another. This can be regardless of time difference between them. The Dreadnaught class heavy cruisers used c. 50yrs BBY are the design sucessors to the Invincible Class Dreadnaughts used 3000yrs BBY in the Alsakan conflicts, despite the fact that the two shared no common designers, building companies, affiliations, or time period.

[zare]

DarhFelth i don't know why are you being so rude, and taking this so bloody serious.

 

I don't think anyone knows for sure the length of SSD - as of tommorow Lucas may decide it was never built and make another version of the movie where you will have boxy-looking ship crashing on deathstar, or maybe just a smaller version of it - like that Borg ship - and KDYs official website is currently offline (it says clearly under construction).

So until their catalog is back on-line i can say i don't trust anybody about SSDs length,and only after interview with Mrs. Blissex i will be assured about correct VSD/ISD relation (if she doesn't kill me like she tried her father).

 

I said what i mean > all the data change all the times. Official site states that, you can take every older technical guide and you will find different data (SSD increasing size every few years, ships missing and new ones popping in their place) but hey its everchanging universe - didn't they kill few characters that we never thought that could die, let alone age.

 

And, yeah, there are people as stubborn as you are regarding the size of SSD (but they weren't that much exclusive regarding sites as you are) - they don't want to hear this ship being larger than 8km because that was the size stated originaly and size given in RPG games rules of that time (i think it was West End Games - not sure & don't have those). Many of those guys don't want to change data on their respective websites because of it.

 

To say that all sites that have "wrong" measurement are totaly wrong and can't be taken serious is IMHO totaly wrong. How about you telling us your sources, and by doing that bring light to us and bring us out of darkness of ignorance.

 

Oh, yeah just a few more remarks :

 

1) It was me you corrected about VSD (and if you read my second post you'll see me admitting my mistake)

2) It wasn't me but your writing being funny. What you said "...the SSD is clearly 17.6km long not..." although said in a Yoda manner, is that SSD is NOT 17,6km long , and thats why i asked you about it (forgive me, my mistake for doing that).

3)I can argue about the main reason of changing SSDs length so often. According to some sources main reason was Eclipse class, that was very huge (2 times the size of SSD if i am not wrong) so they adapted and changed the size of SSD. But hey, maybe somebody made a decision while drinking coffee in the morning and said something like "hey, how about we double the size of that.... whats-its-name... ship. I mean its gotta be huuuge". That will remain one of the misteries of this world.