Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (12/16/16) *SPOILERS*

Collector Freaks Forum

Help Support Collector Freaks Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
Although the whole Ion Cannon thing does raise the question - since it's so effective why isn't it the default weapon of choice for all spacecraft?

Probably for the same reason that an RPG isn't the default weapon for all real life infantry. Different situations call for different weapons.

In some cases like this one they could prefer to destroy a craft rather than disable it. Considering how effective it was at completely disabling a star destroyer, it may be too heavy and powerful for a smaller fighter craft where maneuverability would be an advantage.
 
Tom Hanks says 'I don't get it'.

An RPG isn't a default weapon because of collateral death it can cause - the ion cannon simply disables ships, no? Pretty handy. Keep them from killing you...then you can kill them at your leisure.
 
Tom Hanks says 'I don't get it'.

Okay well then going back to your original question:

Although the whole Ion Cannon thing does raise the question - since it's so effective why isn't it the default weapon of choice for all spacecraft?

Then I would say this: We can simply assume that it isn't an option for all spacecraft. The only time ion weapons are seen in SW are the big ground cannon on Hoth and then the Y-Wings in RO. Maybe ion cannons require a lot of bulk and energy. Not something that can be condensed and fitted onto X-Wings and A-Wings. And if the Rebellion said "okay fine we'll use nothing but Y-Wings then" the Empire would make short work of them with their fast and agile TIE Fighters.

So not too unlike WWII aerial warfare they have the heavy bombers, interceptors that protect the bombers, and so on.
 
Good. We need a director that respects the entire story and doesn't just cherry pick and make a "greatest hits" movie to placate tired and irrational fanboys.

And there'll be more of the same from Trevorrow: "I don't want to ignore any of it, and I respect all of it."


No KryptoSlush actually makes a really good point. Instead of placating tired and irrational fanboys by having Vader silently slaughtering all those Rebel fleet troopers they could have been much more respectful of the prequels by having him say "Hi!" and "Nice to meet ya!" every time he killed someone. Then when Leia escaped with the plans he could have been all "OOPS, not good."

You must've forgotten his slaughter of the separatists in ROTS. Yes, he was Darth Vader by then, only without the armor.

The incongruity of Anakin and Vader is one of the prequel bashers' main sore points. But you must understand, "he ceased to be Anakin Skywalker and became Darth Vader". Two different characters - and the more different, the more dramatic the transformation.
 
Last edited:
You must've forgotten his slaughter of the separatists in ROTS. Yes, he was Darth Vader by then, only without the amor.

The incongruity of Anakin and Vader is one of the prequel bashers' main sore points. But you must understand, "he ceased to be Anakin Skywalker and became Darth Vader". Two different characters - and the more different, the more dramatic the transformation.

That...won't work for me. That sounds like a retro-fitted rationalisation for plain crappy writing of the character IMO.

However, TFA has already ruled itself out of my head-canon and I doubt the new trilogy can recover so I personally won't mind whatever Prequel references they choose to put in The Last Jedi and Episode 9 be it Darth Plageus, force ghost Haydakin etc etc.

Then I would say this: We can simply assume that it isn't an option for all spacecraft. The only time ion weapons are seen in SW are the big ground cannon on Hoth and then the Y-Wings in RO. Maybe ion cannons require a lot of bulk and energy. Not something that can be condensed and fitted onto X-Wings and A-Wings. And if the Rebellion said "okay fine we'll use nothing but Y-Wings then" the Empire would make short work of them with their fast and agile TIE Fighters.

So not too unlike WWII aerial warfare they have the heavy bombers, interceptors that protect the bombers, and so on.

Yyyeah...but there seems no reason that large capital ships couldn't be outfitted with Ion weapons....maybe I should Wookipedia the subject. It could be along the lines of what Jye said:

You obviously have no knowledge what it takes to harness the power of Ion.

The propulsion magnetic resonance trajectory ratio is a *****.

:lol
 
Last edited:
Rogue One Vader moving, swinging and twirling that lightsaber was eerily similar to hooded Hayden Vader. Swap out hacked up Rebels with hacked up Jedi kids and the Separatists and you have pure poetry.
 
Yyyeah...but there seems no reason that large capital ships couldn't be outfitted with Ion weapons....

Ohhh, why don't Star Destroyers and things have them, gotcha. Um, uh, maybe because the Alliance and Empire have a gentlemen's agreement that that'd be cheating? :D

Otherwise yeah, there's probably some EU reason why the big ships just don't all use ion cannons but I don't feel like looking it up either. :lol

TFA has already ruled itself out of my head-canon and I doubt the new trilogy can recover so I personally won't mind whatever Prequel references they choose to put in The Last Jedi and Episode 9 be it Darth Plageus, force ghost Haydakin etc etc.

Yep, they can bring back all that crap, say that "Skywalker" is just a nickname, reveal that Rey had no father OR mother, whatever. I'll tune in as long as I've got a few hours to kill on new SW stuff but I don't know that I'll consider any of it to "count" from here on out.
 
Last edited:
Ohhh, why don't Star Destroyers and things have them, gotcha. Um, uh, maybe because the Alliance and Empire have a gentlemen's agreement that that'd be cheating? :D

Holy crap, I know something about Star Wars that khev doesnt. :panic:

Star Destroyers usually do have ion cannons, (or at least important star destroyers) in fact, in TFA we see them used on Poe and Finn when they escape in the TIE. from Kylo's destroyer the "Finalizer" which has more than 1500 turboblasters and ion cannons.

More info here: https://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Finalizer
 
Holy crap, I know something about Star Wars that khev doesnt. :panic:

Yeah, I don't really delve too much into wiki explanations and things like that. So you can easily trump my knowledge when you bring all those references into the equation.

I mainly stick to what is said or implied within the films themselves and then like to come up with my own theories/explanations to fill in the blanks. Otherwise I just find that Star Wars as a whole plays too fast and loose with its internal logic to really make definitive arguments one way or another. I find that it all comes down to preference and how you personally want to interpret things.

Things like "why weren't ion cannons used, why didn't Tarkin use the DS to just blow up Yavin 4 instead of orbiting it" and so on all apply.

Obviously if someone likes the movies they'll handwave away those actions whereas if they don't they'll write them off as mistakes, plot holes, etc.

Even in Rogue One K-2, Jyn, and Cassian all come to the decision that they need to beam the plans up to the fleet as a result of being trapped inside the shield, except that the only way to beam the plans up is to blow a hole through the shield which obviously means they would no longer be trapped and wouldn't have to beam them up at all. They could just fly a ship through the hole as originally planned.

Someone who didn't like the movie could say that their reasoning for beaming the plans becomes moot and that it's just a contrived scenario. I like to think that they just made a heat of the moment tactical error since they were literally improvising their next steps on a second by second basis at that point. K-2 is all about statistical odds (which the film showed time and time again) and it was also established that he speaks the first thing that enters his mind. So as far as I'm concerned K-2 decided that if there is an active space battle just outside the shield gate that it would be best to beam the plans regardless at that point rather than risk adding another escape craft to all of the chaos up above. So K-2 makes the suggestion and Jyn and Cassian quite literally run with it to their ultimate peril considering that no one could have foreseen that Tarkin would nuke the site from orbit.
 
Last edited:
Even in Rogue One K-2, Jyn, and Cassian all come to the decision that they need to beam the plans up to the fleet as a result of being trapped inside the shield, except that the only way to beam the plans up is to blow a hole through the shield which obviously means they would no longer be trapped and wouldn't have to beam them up at all. They could just fly a ship through the hole as originally planned.

Someone who didn't like the movie could say that their reasoning for beaming the plans becomes moot and that it's just a contrived scenario. I like to think that they just made a heat of the moment tactical error since they were literally improvising their next steps on a second by second basis at that point. K-2 is all about statistical odds (which the film showed time and time again) and it was also established that he speaks the first thing that enters his mind. So as far as I'm concerned K-2 decided that if there is an active space battle just outside the shield gate that it would be best to beam the plans regardless at that point rather than risk adding another escape craft to all of the chaos up above. So K-2 makes the suggestion and Jyn and Cassian quite literally run with it to their ultimate peril considering that no one could have foreseen that Tarkin would nuke the site from orbit.

Didn't think of that. Hmm.

My rationalisation would be that beaming the plans up was safest option rather than risk physically flying up there and maybe getting shot out of the sky or otherwise blown up (with the plans on board their ship) in the space battle above. By the time Jyn and Cassian make it back to the ground the Death Star has arrived and has fired on the planet, they figure they won't have time to escape so they don't even try....right?
 
Didn't think of that. Hmm.

My rationalisation would be that beaming the plans up was safest option rather than risk physically flying up there and maybe getting shot out of the sky or otherwise blown up in the space battle above. By the time they make it back to the ground the Death Star has arrived and has fired on the planet, they figure they won't have time to escape....right?

Yep, that's my take. Especially with the broadcast tower being directly above the vault, I think it just made much more sense to them at that point to just beam the plans up rather that risk fighting their way out of the complex, running across the beach, flying a ship through TIE squadrons (basically doing everything that the first teaser showed :lol.)

Also their original plan of escaping by ship was under the assumption that there'd be no rebel fleet to beam them to in the first place.

After they sent the plans they only had to discreetly make their escape with much less urgency...until they saw the approaching blast wave.
 


Write your reply...
Back
Top