[Flipside]

Good point, it'd be nice to have 'light' torps for things like Escort Shuttles

[StarSlayer]

Speaking of ordinance i have a application question  

Are you planning on making the damage effects variable depending on the situation?  Specifically a quick volley of torpedoes from a snubbie squadron all hitting at once has a better chance of overloading a capital ship's shields then firing in ones and twos?

[chief1983]

Also, Luke's proton torps could make that umpteen thousand G turn because he was controlling them with the force.  They probably would have missed in a normal situation.

[CountBuggula]

Also, Luke's proton torps could make that umpteen thousand G turn because he was controlling them with the force.  They probably would have missed in a normal situation.

Wait, I thought it didn't need to actually go down the tube...wasn't the point that it just needed to hit the right spot to "create a chain reaction" that would eventually lead to the reactor?  The reason the first torpedo didn't work wasn't because it didn't make the turn, it was because it "just impacted on the surface."  He missed.

So...maybe there are volatile gasses in the exhaust port from the main reactor that would ignite when hit by the missile, which would then spark a chain reaction of explosions all the way down into the reactor core.  No super G missile turn required.

[chief1983]

Well whether it was required or not, that's what we saw.  They definitely turned and entered the shaft.

[DarthWang]

He used the Force to aim, not to control the torpedoes

[General Battuta]

He used the Force to aim, not to control the torpedoes

Um, how do you know? It's not like Obi-Wan was all 'use the force TO AIM, Luke!'

[Narvi]

Luke could barely use the Force to grab his lightsaber in ESB. He doesn't even know that you can move objects with the Force at this point. The only training he's had is with the 'guiding your actions' bit of the Force. Do you really think he was capable of exerting thousands of gees of force on two moving objects? If he could do that, why didn't he duplicate the feat with his emboggened X-wing, or his lightsaver?

Those missiles did that on their own. The rebels expected them to, otherwise they would have approached (or tried to approach) at a slightly less impossible angle. Luke just used the Force to fire at the appropriate moment when the missiles' AI could maneuver in correctly.

[Flipside]

Or photon torpedoes are unguided in-flight and simply ricocheted down the exhaust tube on impact because of a timed fuse. Or there's some kind of magnetic field over the exhaust entry that pulled them down, or if they hadn't done that, then the Empire would have won in the first movie and there would have been no more revenue for George from the other 5...

That's why it's pointless trying to work out technical details from a movie. After all, as I mentioned earlier, if Ray Shielding was the only thing that prevented them using lasers, how did they plan to get the lasers down the tube?

[CountBuggula]

Well whether it was required or not, that's what we saw.  They definitely turned and entered the shaft.

I still claim it was volatile gasses (which would explain why lasers could've worked).  What you saw that appeared to be them turning after entering the shaft was an optical illusion caused by the ray shielding.

[TomShak]

Clearly having torps that could turn 90 degrees in an instant would not exactly be ideal from a gameplay point of view ...

There is a possible explanation that would satisfy both camps. Which is that torpedoes and missiles do have very good maneuverability, but the sensors onboard them can't track small fast moving craft like X-Wings or TIE-Fighters. For example, small fighters might have strong ECM systems on board that confuse torpedoes/missiles. Coupled with the fighters high maneuverability this makes it very hard for the torpedo to track a fighter.

However, against a largely static target ECM doesn't do much good, since the torpedo just needs to go where it was told. This means that torps would still be effective against larger and slower moving targets. On the death star trench run the torpedo could be pre-programmed to make a 90 degree turn at the appropriate moment (perhaps detecting the heat of the exhaust vent), because the death star is largely static.

ECM would explain many things ... such as why capital ships generally rely on turbo lasers for fighter defence rather than on missiles ... why all star fighter battles are laser based ... and probably many other things.

[CountBuggula]

Clearly having torps that could turn 90 degrees in an instant would not exactly be ideal from a gameplay point of view ...

There is a possible explanation that would satisfy both camps. Which is that torpedoes and missiles do have very good maneuverability, but the sensors onboard them can't track small fast moving craft like X-Wings or TIE-Fighters. For example, small fighters might have strong ECM systems on board that confuse torpedoes/missiles. Coupled with the fighters high maneuverability this makes it very hard for the torpedo to track a fighter.

However, against a largely static target ECM doesn't do much good, since the torpedo just needs to go where it was told. This means that torps would still be effective against larger and slower moving targets. On the death star trench run the torpedo could be pre-programmed to make a 90 degree turn at the appropriate moment (perhaps detecting the heat of the exhaust vent), because the death star is largely static.

ECM would explain many things ... such as why capital ships generally rely on turbo lasers for fighter defence rather than on missiles ... why all star fighter battles are laser based ... and probably many other things.

Hmm...interesting idea.  We know for sure that the A-Wing has been described as having a sophisticated jamming system, and Han uses a jamming system in the Millennium Falcon on several occasions.  I still have a hard time believing the missile could really make a 90 degree turn like that, but your other ideas definitely make good sense to me.

[Scourge of Ages]

Well whether it was required or not, that's what we saw.  They definitely turned and entered the shaft.

I still claim it was volatile gasses (which would explain why lasers could've worked).  What you saw that appeared to be them turning after entering the shaft was an optical illusion caused by the ray shielding.

If anybody cares, I really like the "optical illusion/chain reaction" theory.

[Mongoose]

...or we could go with the "Because Luke's the Hero" angle and leave it at that.

(And dear lord, brandx0.  You literally just broke my brain.  Dear lord...)

[Pred the Penguin]

...or we could go with the "Because Luke's the Hero" angle and leave it at that.

And how is that supposed to be implemented in a game?

[TomShak]

Code: [Select]

if (player_name == "Luke") {
     invulnerable = true;
     aimbot_enabled = true;
     dodgy_hair_style = true;
}


[EtherShock]

Wedge: That's impossible, even for a computer!
Luke: It's not impossible, I used to bullseye womp rats in my T-16 back home. They're not much bigger than two meters.

There's something Dodonna is saying during this but it's indistinct cause of the focus on Luke and Wedge. I wonder what he was saying.

Practice makes perfect. Although, there are probably some varying factors, traveling at blazing speeds in a military fighter, nerves, and of course, the Force helped him aim much more accurately than A) a computer could ever possibly do and B) a person not Force-sensitive.

It's also a moral about technology, how we should not depend on it entirely, but it has its place as a useful tool. There are some things technology will have a great deal of trouble replicating. For instance, we can develop a computer that can beat the world's greatest chess players but not one that can even play at a competitive level with your average-skilled Go player.

It all boils down to a storytelling concept known as "suspension of disbelief." The audience is at the edge of their seat with the rising tension of the story approaching its peak and just prior to climax, will accept just about any resolution the storyteller presents to be relieved of that tension. (See the ending of Jaws for a reality based example.) You'll find a lot of movie magic only works because the audience is able to suspend their disbelief.

It happened because it had to. Luke's the hero. You want an in-universe explanation: practice shooting womp rats and using the Force to aim. Case closed.

*Waits for innuendos associated with stages of storytelling*

The architects of this mod have the ability to change things as they see fit, provided the audience is willing to suspend their disbelief of any concept, both sound and outlandish.

[Pred the Penguin]

Used to play Go a lot.

Anyways, even though things can change a bit, we have yet to decide on something that feels "right."

[EtherShock]

It's a great game, isn't it.

Is it possible to have bad missiles too? For instance, you have a lock but there's random occurrences of them not tracking from time to time. I know this happens in real life sometimes. Obviously wouldn't work as well with torpedoes, since they track much bigger and less maneuverable targets.

[Renegade Paladin]

To me concussion missiles and proton torps were always anti-capital weapons, too slow to hit a fast moving starfighter.

Watched the movies lately? 



Going with an extremely conservative estimate of 1 km/sec for easy math, those torpedoes executed a 72,000 G turn.  If they have trouble with starfighters, it's not because they're slow.