Death Star?

[Kain]

Look, its really easy

 

1: Death Star planned out. Frame built. Rooms and walls constructed. Armor plated. Calibrated all devices(EVERY.SINGLE.COMPUTER on board had to be calibrated). Raising money to do all of that. A shield generator strong enough to encapsulate a small moon. It makes sense that it could take 20 years. Maybe more.

 

2: Death Star destroyed. That damn Skywalker boy ****ed the empire out of trillions of dollars. What are they left with? Scrapes and a broken frame. Damn it, Vader: Your boy is a pain in the Emporer's ass!

 

3: Death Star 2 construction begins. They've already done this before, so they know exactly how much its going to take in terms of manpower, money, and technical calibration. It's entirely feasable that it could be rebuilt in 10 years or less - if it was completely finished. But as we all know, huge sections were missing from DS2. It was basically just the laser and the required mechanisms. Nothing special. Which is why it only took 4 years the second time around.

[El Sitherino]

I'm deeply confused. At the end of RotS, we see the Death Star about half finished constuction.

Uh, no we don't, we see the skeletal structure half finished.

 

It's fine and dandy if it took 20 years to build. Hey, the thing's huge!

 

But then how do they explain why they can build a much BIGGER deathstar in a much shorter period (less than a year, between ESB and ROTJ)??

 

Ever build the lego Star Destroyer? It takes about 10+ hours to build the first time, second time it takes about an hour or two tops.

 

 

Plus as Prime said last time this was brought up, "Perhaps they had to jump through the political hoops since the senate had yet to be disbanded."

So yeah...

[JawaJoey]

1. What we see at the end of ROTS is far from finished. It's the frame, basically. Maybe 20% of the Death Star itself.

 

2. The first part (the frame) is the easy part. Which job would you rather have?

Build a big ball with a dent in it

or

Fill a big ball with it's own functioning power source, shielding, propulsion, defenses, life support, crew, and furniture, droids, ships, machines, and computers.

Which do you think would take longer?

 

3. The second time around, the DS was way easier to make. For the first one, not only was it the first one ever, nothing like it had ever been built before. The Senate was in existance, and the empire was on the rise, not already totally dominant. Plus, it had to be kept a secret (moreso than the second). For the second one, it only took a few Bothans to figure it out. For the first one, no one knew anything about it until "OH S**T they blew up Alderaan!"

The second time around, they'd already built one so they knew how to do it, they'd encountered the problems in construction, they know just how to get what they need, there is no possible senate interferance, and hiding it isn't as hard. The biggest concern of the Empire was the Rebellion, who at that time were on the run.

 

 

Basically, it all works out.

[TK-8252]

For the first one, no one knew anything about it until "OH S**T they blew up Alderaan!"

 

Actually, it seems most people DID know about the first Death Star. Probably didn't know that the thing could blow up entire planets, though.

[Darth Alec]

Really? Where do you have that from?

[TK-8252]

Because it seems the Rebels all know it, and considering that the Death Star was built by slave labor (Geonosians, Mustafarians, Utapauns, and of course WOOKIEES!) So it seems to me that it was no secret.

[RobQel-Droma]

Um, the Death Star was NOT close to being finished. Actually, the first time I saw ROTS, I thought that they had the Death Star black; I didn't realize that the black spots were places I was looking through the station. It was very far away from being done.

 

And I think most, especially the rebels, knew about the Death Star. The rebels sent spies out to get the readouts of the battle station, so they knew it was there. I think the destruction of Alderaan just kind of "woke up" the rest of the galaxy, and caused everyone to realize what the DT could actually do.

[Prime]

The first one was built when Palpatine still didn't not have complete control. The Senate still existed and we know there was some resistance. Politicians were still greedy and the beauracracy was still slow. So it is very likely that there were delays from supply and labor problems, protests, and the like. By ROTJ the Senate had been abolished and the Emperor had absolute control over everything. The "wheels" as it were would have been much greasier for him at that time...

[Kurgan]

Lucas knows us SW fans LOVE to resolve inconsistencies and plot holes through arguing. This was just his final gift to us...

[Kurgan]

Uh, no we don't, we see the skeletal structure half finished.

 

Ever build the lego Star Destroyer? It takes about 10+ hours to build the first time, second time it takes about an hour or two tops.

 

Plus as Prime said last time this was brought up, "Perhaps they had to jump through the political hoops since the senate had yet to be disbanded."

So yeah...

 

There are some problems with the lego analogy (you're saying it's easier the second time because you know how): first off, the massive difference in scale (not quite so bad if you accept the less accurate official figure of a 160 km station instead of "500 miles" as intended by the original model designers). So from 120 km to 160 km (or 160 km to about 900 km).

 

Then there's the problem of having to build larger and more powerful technologies to power it (shields, propulsion, power generation, defenses, superlaser). Scaling up the tech isn't just a matter of more metal, you also have to deal with larger scale power or more generators (however it happens to work), more defenses and life support, structural integrity, more computer systems, more trained personel/droids, etc.

 

Plus, unless all that junk was salvagable from the first explosion, you're still going to have to harvest and process all those materials required. It isn't simply a matter of (as in your lego analogy) taking it appart and building it a second time in the exact same manner from the same parts.

 

So the analogy would only work if they were disassembling the first death start and building an identical station from its parts.

 

The political angle makes a bit more sense as an excuse...

 

Though both stations were supposedly built in secret... even though in the case of the second the Emperor deliberately leaked the information to spies so as to use it as bait for his elaborate trap for the Alliance.

 

As far as the technology is concerned, remember those beam weapons on the LAAT's in AOTC? They act like mini-death stars! A bunch of green beams form into one larger beam and spews out destruction. Just scale that up many many times, with the power generation and waste heat regulation to back it up... build a mobile starbase around it and you have the Death Star! So I'd say it's not really a new technology, just a new application of an existing one, on a much larger scale...

[Prime]

Lucas knows us SW fans LOVE to resolve inconsistencies and plot holes through arguing. This was just his final gift to us...

If I was a filmmaker, I know I'd do it to us all the time.

[El Sitherino]

There are some problems with the lego analogy (you're saying it's easier the second time because you know how): first off, the massive difference in scale (not quite so bad if you accept the less accurate official figure of a 160 km station instead of "500 miles" as intended by the original model designers). So from 120 km to 160 km (or 160 km to about 900 km).

The difference in scale is of no matter, just change hours to years or so.

 

Then there's the problem of having to build larger and more powerful technologies to power it (shields, propulsion, power generation, defenses, superlaser). Scaling up the tech isn't just a matter of more metal, you also have to deal with larger scale power or more generators (however it happens to work), more defenses and life support, structural integrity, more computer systems, more trained personel/droids, etc.

Which still doesn't do anything, they can develop all the tech at the same time as when they're building, as you said in an advanced universe such as the one in Star Wars, surely it'd be possible.

 

Plus, unless all that junk was salvagable from the first explosion, you're still going to have to harvest and process all those materials required. It isn't simply a matter of (as in your lego analogy) taking it appart and building it a second time in the exact same manner from the same parts.

My analogy works well with brand new parts. *has a blue Star Destroyer made from the aqua lego sets from the mid 90's*

You don't have to disassemble, hell you can scale it up, it's just a matter of figuring out measurements, which takes about 5 minutes.

 

So the analogy would only work if they were disassembling the first death start and building an identical station from its parts.

Not exactly.

 

But anyway, if I recall the Death Star's structure was finished quite a bit before ANH, it was just they hadn't got the weapons systems up until the beginning of the movie. So perhaps they finished it rather fast but due to senate intervention they were delayed on the weapons system.

[The Doctor]

Ok, so I was wrong.

I guess I need to see RotS again already if I forget a detail like that:fist:

[Kurgan]

Don't feel too bad Doctor, it's a very short scene right near the end with no dialouge or action. Easily forgettable...

 

Well the trouble again with the Lego analogy is that a Lego toy is just a mass of plastic. It's not (at least not at the scale we're talking) subject to the vast structural stresses that a 160 or 900 km space station is subject to.

 

Even if you were to build your Lego ship, and then turn around and build another Lego ship that was six times larger, in 1/20th the time... it's still not the same. It doesn't have any active systems (correct me if I'm wrong) such as hyperdrives, shields, turbo lasers, engines, life support, etc, that need to ALSO be scaled up with the station. That's a massive technological hurdle, not just in building them but also in designing them. It's like the difference between building a one story brick house and building a skyscraper. Sure you have similar principles but many other factors relating to sheer size. It's not just a matter of more materials.

 

We're still left with the fact that it took 20+ years to build the first death star, and less than one to build the second, larger "more powerful" death star.

 

So it's not like building the same thing a second time. It's more like building a whole different 'nothing animal entirely (even if some of the basic technology is the same, you have to introduce new knowledge in order to manage the vast difference in size). Of course it's much easier if you go with the "official" numbers of the second DS "only" being 1.4 times bigger...

 

Some have argued that they were both started at the same time. We have no evidence in the films they did that, but then we don't have any real evidence in the film for any of the explanations offered so far. Lucas's off hand comment is thus as good an explanation as any. Don't mind us who might find it somewhat unsatisfying, of course.

 

My comments about SW being a technological advanced universe still stand. My contention is that it's odd that it takes this technologically advanced universe 20 years to build the first deathstar, but suddenly they jump to only one year to build a larger more powerful one. That implies either a huge leap in technology or something else we're not being told. Had Lucas simply left out the scene we wouldn't have this problem. Or if he'd put the words "18 years later" in the frame or something, that would have done fine too (the only problem then being Tarkin's lack of gray, but I'm sure Lowry Digital could do that in their spare time if asked, lol).

[JawaJoey]

As far as the technology is concerned, remember those beam weapons on the LAAT's in AOTC? They act like mini-death stars! A bunch of green beams form into one larger beam and spews out destruction. Just scale that up many many times, with the power generation and waste heat regulation to back it up... build a mobile starbase around it and you have the Death Star! So I'd say it's not really a new technology, just a new application of an existing one, on a much larger scale...

 

 

You just argued that making a bigger Death Star is a huge increase in difficulty and effort over a normal Death Star. You can't turn around and say that Death Star tehcnology was known and simple because the weapon firing system has been seen before.

 

I think that the difference between the weaponry of a gunship or artillery and a space station capable of destroying a planet is a bigger gap than the difference between a space station and a bigger one.

 

New application of an existing one is exaclty what making a bigger Death Star is, but you're aruging that the undertaking of a bigger Death Star is vastly more significant.

[Kurgan]

I know I did. I don't see that as a contradiction. It's a different sort of problem.

 

Were those 20 years building the first Death Star inventing new technologies, collecting materials? What? People above were suggesting that it was due to having to invent from scratch the superlaser. I contended that this technology existed already. They merely had to find a way to scale it up to the enormous size of the Death Star.

 

The EU is vastly contradicted on this point, because it aogy ts that the Death Star was a leap in technology invented by Qwi Xu and some other "geniuses" at the Maw Installation and built by Bevel Lemisk.

 

Instead we have the Geonosians design the thing, and Dooku takes the plans. Then it's already partially built 20 years before ANH. The first one is destroyed, and then (according to the official timeline which states that ESB takes place 3 years after ANH, and then ROTJ is one year later) suddenly the Death Star 2 is operational in 1 year. Now if we go by some EU sources like Shadows of the Empire, it's apparently even shorter than 1 year, but I couldn't quote you them since it's been ages since I've gone over that part of it and I have no idea if it's in any way been retconned.

 

If the technical problems were all hammered out by the time of the first Death Star's construction, and the delays were not due to some contrived excuse like political machinations or sabotage, etc. that is still an incredible leap. The adaptive technologies needed to account for the greater size would be great, but as to how long those would take to develope I have no idea. If the DS2 is only 1.4 times bigger, rather than 6 times bigger, this makes it much easier. But I would cut the design time maybe in half to be generous and that's still 10 years.

 

So either the DS2 was in development a lot longer than they let on (the opening crawl of ROTJ makes it sound like it hasn't been in development long... perhaps 3 years MAX, if we toss out SOTE, reasonably...) and it's not "complete" in that the shell isn't completely built, but from what we can tell everything else seems to be working. I can't remember... was it mobile? I know in the novel they planned to blow up the Endor moon with it, but they wouldn't have needed to manuver to do that since they were already in orbit..... or else the time it took to create the first Death Star was unrelated to actual build time or technology development, as Lucas's joke implies.

 

It HAD to be. Otherwise it just doesn't make sense. If the DS2 took ten years to build, that's more believable. But honestly Lucas created this problem himself when he insisted on putting the partially complete DS in ROTS with a "young" Tarkin in the same scene. No explanation is going to work perfectly, but knowing the EU authors, they'll come up with a cheesy explanation and you can take it if you like it. Oh well!

[Kurgan]

PS: This will probably mark me as a huger nerd (than previously imagined), but from the EU we're lead to believe that a single Star Destroyer can render an (unprotected) planet UNINHABITABLE in about a day (or a number of hours, I can't remember if that was the figure for three ISD's or just one). Anyway, this "base delta zero" turns a planet into a mountain of slag, eradicating all life (except in deep planetary shelters).

 

So anyway, that's what they can already do. Granted, the Death Star makes the planet EXPLODE (planetary shield or not!) violently, which requires a huge amount of power.. especially since it does it all at once!

 

Yet we're lead to believe that the DS is not a chain reaction weapon. It doesn't use some "exotic trick" to make a planet blow up. Rather, it's just a "really huge" laser beam weapon, like the tiny one we see mounted on a LAAT 23 years prior in AOTC.

 

Now obviously to scale it up you need the control mechanisms, you need the power generation, and you need the waste heat dissipation and safety systems. The focusing apparatus needs to be larger. Those are the kinds of things you need to deal with in the Death Star. And you need to make it even bigger for the second Death Star. You're thinking it would be easier to make the jump from DS1 to DS2 than from LAAT laser to DS1. I agree. However, there's also suggestions that smaller super lasers were also built (in the EU). The Exclipse Class Star Destroyers supposedly had "mini super lasers" on them. There's also bits about miniature Death Stars ("battle planetoids" and "torpedo spheres") etc. Now granted, none of this is in the movies, and any of it could be retconned at any moment. But if we posit all sorts of transitional technological applications in progress or already complete long before ANH, then it isn't quite so amazing to think that "suddenly" they have the ability to shatter planets in a single shot. After all, the atomic bombs weren't a sudden leap in technology, they were based on all kinds of science that had been previously developed. Many say that building the first nuke was historically inevitable, simply because everything was ready to take the next step. Not an exact analogy, but still.

 

Anyway, I've rambled enough on this subject. Lucas has his explanation, and the EU is coming up with their's. Let's see if any of it makes any sense... thanks Lucas... for giving us nerds something to argue about once more!

[TK-8252]

There's also the Venator-class Star Destroyers in RotS that had "mini-superlasers" as well. During the opening scene over Coruscant you see one split a Separatist frigate in half with it.

[The Source]

I'm deeply confused. At the end of RotS, we see the Death Star about half finished constuction. How then, did it take 20 years to complete?

 

Sorry if this has been answered already. I didn't see an answer anywhere.

 

When I first answered your question, I haven't seen the Original Trilogy for a few years. You are right! Sorry man!

[The Doctor]

No problem. I forgive you for your ignorance:xp:

[Pho3nix]

The technology to make something that big was not advanced enough, the reason why Death Star II was completed so quickly, was probably because of new technology.

[Darth Dmitrius]

The Death Star was completed for almost five years I guess. Not because of new thechnology, but because of a lot of workers. After presenting Death Star I to the galaxy Empire had to get more workers. I think they planned to build the Second Death Star a long before Battle on Yavin. That's my opinion.

[The Doctor]

^Why? The Death Star was supposedly invincible. Why waste time, money, and effort building a second one if you already have one?

[RedHawke]

^Why? The Death Star was supposedly invincible. Why waste time, money, and effort building a second one if you already have one?

Superweapons are like M&M's you never are satisfied with just having one...

[El Sitherino]

Well... it took quite a while to move. Perhaps a few more would make the iron fist ruling a bit easier.