Was the Venator Class Superior to the Imperial Class Star Destroyer?
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- Опубліковано 30 лип 2022
- The Venator Class Star Destroyer performed admirably during the Clone Wars, yet just four years after it was introduced it was already being phased out for the newly minted Imperial Class Star Destroyer. Today we take a look at why this was a poor decision by the Galactic Empire Navy.
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yes I do think scraping the Venator was dumb. I think the two ships complement each other rather well in a total fleet as they have two different roles one is a front line battle ship and the other a carrier.
They could have stuffed thousands of TIEs in a Venator...not so flimsy when you have a giant swarm.
Much better that the quasar which kinda replaced it
Too bad Palpatine and Tarkin were too radical to consider such a reasonable decision.
Or at least actually replace it, I could understand not wanting to use a ship often known as a Jedi Cruiser, some folks would have... Hang ups.... About that. Not giving it a proper follow up design was stupid.
Ships have service life...You can't have a vessel sail for more than 50 years without it feeling the effects of age, corrosion, outdated systems, and battle damage. The Republic cruisers served it purpose and they were scrapped due to their end of service life.
"Old but not obsolete." - Old Man Terminator
Agree. And Vince I got a comment in saying a Better Battle Fleet for the Empire.
Some continue to age like fine wine
also said by old Rex.
As all the starfighters carried by a Venator were a lot larger than a standard TIE fighter. Just imagine how many TIE fighters could be carried by a Venator, probably double. Like up to 800 TIE fighters coming out of a Venator. That would be terrifying.
Must be hell to live there though. More fuel to store, more ammunition to store, more food for the crews, more pilots and mechanics but less space, probably more stain on air filters and water cleaning.
@@christianholzschuh6853 Considering the cultural reasons for the adoption of the TIE, the fact the most ISDs II TIE compliments where understrength, and the logistical nightmare that would be having a venator having an all TIE compliment, you can safely see why the Venators where not chosen as the main capital of the Empire.
Maybe it could have had a place on less orthodox admirals fleets such as Thrawn, but considering they where going to fight the Von and the rebels, I see little utility for an assault carrier, that money would be better spent on smaller, PD oriented or torpedo oriented ships to support mainline ships.
Well Tails there Are much more advance Types of Fighters that came later on Like the XG-1 Star Wing.
Or 300 ties with say 100 tie interceptors and 100 tie advanced, 50 tie bombers, and 50 tie defenders. 600 total, less logistic needed but far more capability and still cheaper than an ISD with all the fighters
@@eationlewis9348 Theres room for 120 more Eation.
The thing is, these two ship models actually complement eachother quite well.
Venators could bring the fighter capacity needed to fully defend an Imperial, and the Imperial could bring in the firepower needed to destroy any capital ship it faced.
So it IS a shame the Venator was completely replaced, but then again, the new Empire wanted to seem like something new, and more powerful than the Republic before it. So getting rid of the Republic symbol of warfare for this newer, bigger and more powerful Imperial symbol was kinda what the motivation was.
Not to mention the fear factor an Imperial Star Destroyer represented.
After all, the Venator was a large warship in it's own right, but the Imperial was even larger. Hell it was so large that other factions rarely if ever had anything that could seriously threaten a Venator, even less so an Imperial. And when the Empire's main ship is something that even alone, is dominating any engagement, THAT gives it a fear factor only eclipsed by larger vessels ALSO owned by the Empire.
I mean, the Tarkin Doctrine is basically Sith 101...
Meanwhile, the Black Sun in 'Empire at War: Forces of Corruption': "Haha Venator spam go brrr!"
Seriously, Venators spam is broken. You are truly lacking nothing when you decide to dump everything into Venator spam. The only problem a Venator-only fleet might have is with long range bombardment, which coincidentally the Black Sun ALSO has with repurposed Lucrehulks...
Thank goodness the Black Sun isn't as powerful in canon as they are in that game, otherwise yeah, they'd win.
@@TarsonTalon isn't the black sun a crime syndicate?
@@ntfoperative9432 *You'd be surprised by what you can find and purchase at the black market.*
A shame, if you would see a full complement of starfighters coming from a Venator like a swarm of pissed off giant hornets, you would be very scared. The Empire would have liked to see that mentioned in the Tarkin Doctorine.
Both ships are good.
Venator as a carrier and star destroyer as a battleship
But for the time from the empire the venator would be better then the Star destroyer because much point defense laser cannons
I don't think these are legit
@@77zarick the comment above yours is 100% a scam. Any time you see something like that report the comment.
Edit: notice spelling errors in the channel name and that it doesn't have a check mark next to it. Those indicate that it's not a real certified channel. UA-cam probably won't do anything about it, but we can try.
Not all the Venators were scrapped. There were a few left in the Imperial era, serving under the imperial Navy.
@@williamalfonso1373
I know
@@williamalfonso1373 but the hard question is which
Before the video starts i want to say this: The ISD isn't dumb, it just wasn't implemented. The ISD was meant to be something like a mobile forward operating base. Where you could occupy a planet using the ISD as a central hub. The problem was that it wasn't implemented that way. Instead it was used as a mainline battleship, which it could've been great at had Palpatine not tried to fight a war that already ended. Had the Empire invested in more light cruisers then the ISD wouldn't have had any problems. But it tried to be something it wasn't and because of that they lost the war.
More Venators, Arquitens, Gladiators and actually GOOD fighters. I mean, the Empire already had Jump Capable long range patrol fighters like the ARC-170 and Y-Wing, yet instead they go for the false economy of the TIE Series, which are dirt cheap individually, but cost an absolute fortune in replacing them AND their pilots.
@@weldonwin It had to be that way sadly,because we were making the trilogies in reverse order😊
@@weldonwin i agree, the empire even had the opportunity to adopt the x-wing at one point but instead went with the tie
The TIE was designed with Sith ideals, basically a zero, lighter and faster, a weapon formidable in the hands of well-trained and force-sensitive pilots, but a death trap for everyone else, inspired by the jedi fighters of old, it's adoption was cultural rather than anything else.
The X-wing is a P-51.
@@vitmartobby5644 There is also the Sith ideal of "Excel or Die" where in the Imperial Navy there was a kind of institutional Darwinism. Pilots start with the basic TIE-L/N which is a death trap. Those who survived their first tour got moved up to flying Interceptors or bombers and those who survived flying those slightly better and more specialized death traps, would get promoted again to flying the likes of TIE Avengers and then Defenders. As a result, only the very best of the best pilots got to fly the very best ships, because they were the only ones left alive.
Retiring the Venator over time has made little sense to me. The Empire went from fighting a war to maintaining peace. The ISDs made little sense they tied up so material and resources into something that was meant for battle and intimidation through looks alone. More Venators or at least smaller versions would have a better a tactical choice for patrolling the galaxy and suppressing “piracy” and would have been intimidation through capabilities. A ISD cruiser or destroyer still would be needed but it would have to be smaller and have better point defense systems at the cost some offensive firepower but something the size of the Venator would be more than enough for the job plus it’ll need a smaller crew. The only real issue with the Venator for the empire would the increased demand for fighter pilots but that could fixed with a less toxic training program and they already have a cheap and effective TIE design that is surprisingly able to be redesigned to fit multiple purposes albeit with limited hyperdrive capabilities.
yep, there's the intimidation of facing a vessel you can never hope to survive confronting, and then there's the intimidation of facing a vessel you can't win against and which you also can't escape from because they have three counterparts tightening the cordon
Yeah. Like a Guardian, or a Victory.
something like moff gideon's light cruiser with a more advanced weapons system would've been a game changer for the empire
i would have just used the acclimator, the victory., Arquitens-class command cruiser
and the procursator-class star destroyer as a main multi-functional patrol fleet but i would still have venators and star destroyers as priority or attack fleets for more impornt places to guard or attack plus I would also put more focus on Fighters and interdictors.
Speaking of the TIE figher, I also feel like going form a shielded medium carrier fighter with excellent in atmosphere capabilities that was the Z-95 and ARC 170, to a smaller TIE fighter was a mistake. Production of Z-95 and ARC-170's wasn't an issue, as they already had a bunch of them, so the cheaper cost of the TIE didn't come into play, and the Z-95 had more favorable or equal weapons, sheilds and maneuverability. The only benefit I see to the TIE is its smaller size allowed you to cram more into a hanger.
The truth is that the Venator was depicted as a ship the goodies use, and was therefore shown being heroic and successful, whereas the ISD was the ship of the bad guys which means it was shown being beaten by the good guys.
It's a shame that the Rebel Alliance never used those Venators since they take whatever they can get from Clone Wars era weaponry, vehicles and technology (Republic and CIS) to fight the Galactic Empire.
I would’ve used a Venator to house the Rebel leaders
Didn't have the manpower to crew them IIRC.
The Rebels, however, did take smaller Clone Wars era ships and tech whenever they could.
But they had the man power for Mon Calamari Cruisers? 🤔
Hera's flagship was acclamator class
@@mbogucki1 Mon Cal cruisers took up less manpower than Venators.
Personally I think the victory was the right answer. Smaller, less crew intensive, still had an air wing.
And can fire off a crapload of missiles
@@generaljimmies3429 precisely, thus even in the exceedingly unlikely event it came across something it could not handle 1v1 the ordnance gives it the options the weapons batteries don't. Couple them with more advanced variant TIEs in smaller numbers and well there's your net for strangle hold control.
What would have been even better would have been pairing the Victory class with the Venator as well. They would've made a rather deadly combo together, the massive amount of starfighters would've easily helped out in a situation where the victory is outmatched.
@@MrRexsaber thats actually how they were meant to be. The Victory was made to replace the Acclamator as the mainline sister ship of the Venator.
venators sheer count of fighters is leagues better
Have to nitpick two things: the Death Star was actually the Emperor's idea (and in the Disney canon Tarkin was initially opposed to it up until he saw the damn thing worked as advertised, at which point he decided to run with it), and the Imperial Star Destroyer was designed during the Clone Wars, with a few even entering service in the last days of the war (their operational debut being the Battle of Coruscant, when they were scrambled as part of the first wave of Republic reinforcements).
My take on the ISD is that it was supposed to be a flagship design, normally supposed to fight ALONGSIDE the Venator and its starfighters and the Tector and its far heavier firepower but also more capable of stand-alone missions than either of them... Then the Empire took over, and we know the rest.
Disney cannon? I think you mean non cannon. Disney shall never be considered cannon after they fucked up space Jesus.
The Imperial Star destroyer did not appear during the clone wars. You are thinking of the Victory class destroyer. Why would it be called "Imperial" class before the Empire is established? That is just silly.
@@justin1730 Because it was renamed. The class was originally named Imperator.
Both types were designed and first fielded during the war.
@@HUNKMrDeath-lt7kq What does artillery have to do with what is canon or not canon to a franchise?
@@HUNKMrDeath-lt7kq Yep, we're still doing this. We're still doing the whole "Disney sucks, LMAO" bandwagon, because we've got nothing to do except be damn miserable. Wouldn't it be more productive to move on than constantly whining about certain creative choices?
ISD is a better Battleship, but Venator is a better Carrier. All a Venator would have to do is keep its distance, let it’s fighters overwealm the ISDs TIEs and Interceptors, and then let it’s bombers take out or cripple the ship. Then, once suitably weakened, the Venator could close to provide extra fire support if necessary.
The deciding factor using this strategy, would be in the fighters/bombers and pilot skill the Venator used vs the TIEs. Venator would have greater numbers, but I could not be certain if numbers of Clone Wars Era fighters and bombers alone would be enough to beat the TIEs and Interceptors.
TIE interceptors are not to be underestimated, and even normal TIE fighters are pretty underrated. They are ment to screen the ISD and to protect it so it can focus entirely on devastating everything in its path
it would be enough. Imperial pilots are very well trained, but the ships they use are really subpar. To be fair, their weaknesses were so apparent because the Rebel fighters were just so much better, but still, considering that most republic fighters are at least somewhat better than Imperial, and the sheer numbers of them, yeah, Republic wins. Even if the Venator is destroyed, the fighters will take out the ISD.
Doesn't need to be clone Wars era fighters, the X-wing isn't much bigger than a headhunter, and venators could house hundreds of those bad boys!
@@kirillzakharov7336 imperial fighters aren’t as bad as most people think. You’ve seen the battle of Yavin?
Yeah, both types get a bad rep due to lack of shields, life support, large profile, and being basic fodder in every X-Wing game.
But Venator, in some sources, could carry over 400 fighters. Against the 72 of the ISD. It would still be hard for the TIEs, outnumbered 5 to one, even against ships 20 years less advanced.
And If, the Empire still used Venators, and had them stocked with TIE series fighters… Scratch one ISD.
I agree with this take. The Venator was one of the most revolutionary ship designs of its time and had many uses and was very versatile in combat or patrol. It may be weak in broadside combat, but as a carrier ship, it reigns supreme. It's also one of my most favorite Starship designs.
The video also failed to mention the amount of deck guns the Venator had to use in a broad side fight.
The Venator Class is always been my favorite since it has more defense.
venator and defense ? yeah no it has maybe a bit more anti starfighter guns but you aint tanking shit with star destroyers that half a ship of a structural weakness on their ventral side.
@@laisphinto6372 I guess you can technically say the venator has more utility not defence, because although having that massive hanger is a weakpoint it however does allow better starfighter control and the fact that it had 2 command centres one for the actual battle and one for the managment of the starfighters in said battle so if one gets taken out it doesn't fully disable the the whole fleet, unlike the ISD as it was usually alone due to its own fire power
@@rickychen3360 if one bridge is taken down the second will go down as well in like 10 seconds , without shields the venator bridges are an even more obvious and more fragile target
@@laisphinto6372 ...but it still operational just look at the clone wars tv show where anakin and R2D2 had to pilot their damaged venator to crash into the separtist blockade and it was missing one of its bridges and even was able to hold out not only during a hyper space jump but also being shot at by several other ships and still having shields and thruster capability s
@@rickychen3360 and you think an Imperator class star Destroyer is more fragile?
Love the venator, beautiful design and packs so many startighters!
Love this kind of "series" you are doing of comparing the shortcomings of the Empire vs the GAR. I would like to see you tackle the AT-AT vs the AT-TE. Personally the AT-TE was a significantly better design.
It was lower to the ground and had 6 legs which made it much more stable and couldn't be toppled over as easily. Along with this it had almost 360 degree protection with the front and rear turrets, along with the Mass Driver that could bring the pain to almost any target. Unlike the AT-AT that only had front facing weapons. Yes the infantry on board could open up the side doors and use mounted weapons but that also left the walker more exposed to damage to internal systems.
Its why fighting a war on fear or trying to control through fear can only get you so far. Weapons designed to efficiently intimidate will lose every time to weapons designed to kill efficiently.
the AT-AT and AT-TE as far as I'm concerned occupy different roles. ATAT is essentially a self propelled gun with heavier armour than most, and AT TE is an APC. Those ball turrets look good but you are pretty vulnerable if troops can get up to your flank
I think I remember reading somewhere that after Grand Moff Tarken and Emporer Palpatine realized how vulnerable the Star Detroyer was they started building the smaller Star Cruisers to make up for those weaknesses but their weren’t enough produced to effectively cover the weaknesses before the collapse of the empire.
Makes you wonder what a Venator mk 2 would look like? Personally I'd go for some Mon Cal inspired upgrades. Redundant shields, upgraded sensors for geared for long range barrages, improved sublight engines to get away faster, and maybe some improvements to the main hanger doors. It is still a well armed carrier so keeping distance would be preferable, though an escort of class 546 cruisers and Quasar fire carriers would certainly augment the strength of the battle group. But you would still need to keep your distance from a battleship. All three ships I mentioned are carriers of a sort. A wings from the 546, X, B and Y from the Venator and Quasar.
I always loved the Venator ever since I saw it in Episode 3. It always felt more interesting than the brute force of the ISD type destroyers and had so much more nuance in their deployment
I believe the Venator is an excellent ship. While I do think ISDs can work they should have been 2nd priority.
More Venators, fewer ISD's a ton of support ships.
The Venator Class was more of a star fighter carrier that also doubles as a destroyer. Whereas the Imperial Class is more than a destroyer and closer to a battleship. I’d imagine dozens of Imperial Class star destroyers escorting a fleet of Venator Class and Acclamator Class Cruisers if the Empire had continued to use these existing ship types.
What about covering the disaster at DeepSpace Besh? It was a really important event in the Rebel/Empire conflict and was the biggest Rebel defeat/Empire Victory outside of the battle of Hoth.
I always thought the Venator would have been a perfect fit for the rebellion to use as a mobile base of operations
It wouldn't fit the narrative the Rebellion in the beginning of the war did not stay inside those vinegar class started show us whatever belly and down as the not supposed to base they fly in do the damage fly away before help could arrive hit and run and he can say
Agree
For sure. Given the Rebellion mostly relied on FTL capable fighters it wouldn't even have to deliberately put itself in harms way.
Tarkin: "Oh, the Venator is a Destroyer, just not a Star Destroyer."
Allen: "Yeah, what's the difference?"
Tarkin: "Presentation!"
It actually surprises me that Palpatine gave the Republic a such capable military in the first place
His goal was to cripple the galaxy by throwing 2 powerful fleets at each other so that he could set up his empire with less eyes available to snoop on his secretive business
@@Lachie-bk5pp And also the more violence, death and destruction across the galaxy the stronger the grip of the dark side.
The venator is the best capital ship in all of fiction
It's bussin'
Venator is better in star fighter carrier The imperial Star Destroyer is better in firepower troop capacity and dogfight against ships it's size
Spoken like someone that doesn't know a shit about the subject.
The ISD, along with the Death Star, were the center-piece of the Empire's military strategy; The Tarkin Doctrine. The Empire's massive fleet of Imperial Star Destroyers were never meant to be used in a long war. They were meant to inspire fear in the empire. Fear of force rather than use of froce. And that is where the Tarkin Doctrine failed because the Star Destroyers were actually used, and the Death Star was actually used. And then the Empire learned that these massive hulking behemoths could be taken down by fighters firing torpedoes at them. It ended with the Death Star's being destroyed, and the Empire's logistics networks being raided by the rebellion. True the Empire could win any battle it fought, But it couldn't win a war, they relied on the Death Star for that.
I was quite happily surprised with this video, you pretty much hit all the marks squarely on the head. A while back I was putting the ISD into perspective with a Nimitz-class supercarrier to find out it's about five times larger but had an airwing the size of one carrier. The manpower however on an ISD is very overmanned in comparison. Five supercarriers would have a crew of about 18,000 compared to the 37,085 of an ISD. For officers and enlisted, I used the U.S. Navy ratio of 4:1 and came up with 9,235 officers and 27,850 enlisted ship's crew.
Then you add in the 9,700 Stormtrooper detachment and assuming their airwing is the same size as a U.S. Navy airwing that would be about 1,500 officers and men. Now you're looking at over 52,000 people on an ISD. As for officers and enlisted, I used the USMC ratio of 10:1 and came up with 970 officers and 8,730 enlisted Stormtroopers.
I had to adjust the numbers a bit in Wookieepedia when it came to the pilots because they're not taking into account how a real squadron works. The current U.S. Navy pilot to plane ratio is 1.5:1 which gives you enough spare pilots for rotational purposes, when you have losses, injuries, sickness, down time, etc. Using the 72 TIE complement per ISD, at 1.5:1 would mean you have 108 pilots and not just 72. I used the 1.5:1 ratio for cruiser and shuttle pilots and walker and transport drivers as well. Do the math and subtract the totals from 1,500 and the remainder is the various support personnel for the airwing.
I got bored one night so I dusted off my squadron experience when I was in the Navy and worked on the numbers in the above paragraphs so I would stop thinking about it. 😁
Great video as always and looking forward to your next one. 👍✨🔥💥
I love the Venator purely due to the clone wars
I prefer the Venator. You talk about the Venator would need 5 of them to possibly go up against an imperial class without the aid of fighters. Yet an Imperial class has 9 to 10 times the crew. Now that would win 9 Venators against an Imp Star.
Normally Most Venators Are group into 5. So yeah.
To be fair, once I compared arnament of ISD and Ventaor. To my suprise, they had EXACTLY the same amount of guns, weapons, but Venator ruuled in amount of torpedo launchers. Taking into the acount that they may be few generations of guns difference between them (but still, I think that upgrades could be made for Venators during maintanence and reapirs after battles), taking into considerations strenght of hull and shield and higher maneuver ability of Venator, which would allow him to be always at the back of ISD... I would rather say that fight face-to-face without fighter, three venators could stand a chance agaist 2 ISD. And this is not a bad outcome, considering that Ventaros were primarly carries, it would be like guns from "Enterprise" could really harm "Yamato". However, we need to considerate price. One ISD costed around 4 BILLIONS credits, while Venator only 60 million. Which means that for the price of one ISD you could have over 60 Venators. Pus their aircraft wings. And I don't think that inflation was so rampart that their prices were similar. Heck, the amount of materials, their price in ISD would be enough to field 3 Venators.
The fact that Venator is 1/3 (give or take) the size of the ISD and the fact that Venator was less Armed, less durable and his Carrier class role was not needed, as the Empire created smaller fleetd that could be effective on its own.
ISD is just that. A single ISD can Patrol entire system and hold nearly anything that the presumed enemy (CIS remenants or Pirates)could throw at them, or hold them at bay for long enough for reinforcements can Come in.
The ISD was supposed to be deployed together with smaller auxilary units Such as Tartan cruisers, Raider corvetes, arquintens cruiser and so on.
And this aside, the main reason why Empire gave up on Venators (Although some Sector Officers still kept some in reserves) was the main reason they retired Clones. The Empire tried to separate it self from Republic
Love the vid and anything talking about the Venator. On a slightly unrelated note, I think you should do a vid about lesser known starfighters such as the Rihkxyrk, Ixiyen, and Vaksai by TransGalMeg Industries, Incorporated. They are unique fighters that could honestly contend with the best the Empire and Rebellion had to offer. I didn't find a vid of you making anything like this so if I missed it, many apologies.
Depends. When it comes to a war ship the venator was definitely more suited for planetary invasion, as it had more carrying capacity and a very well designed haul. (With the overhead opening for the hangar allows for maneuvers we see ahsoka do in the battle where she puts the venator on its side.) again you have to keep in mind this was war time and typically the fighting Ed more on the ground in the clone wars. As for the imperial star destroyer, these are capital ships made in peace time. Star destroyer’s we’re built for orbital bombarment. You gotta think about their purposes, and the times in which they were made.
I'd argue the best, most powerful ship of the line in Star Wars was the Lucrehulk
The more advanced carrier and battleship variants were truly terrifying in terms of either firepower or fighter compliment
This is a big reason why, pound for pound, I think the CIS military, in both ground and space, was far and away the most cost effective military in Star Wars history
Only draw back was they were slower then molasses, and could be outmaneuvered easily, making mobile warfare difficult. As a blockade ship, or garrison vessel, they are perfect
Depends what fighters you put on it, long range fighters such as the X-wing or ARC-170 would make it incredibly powerful, however with say literally everything except for like 2 models within the TIE series would not be that great for it, naval doctrine is entirely based on range, not firepower, and for carriers the range of whats on it is the range of the ship.
As always great content. From your friends across the pond 🇬🇧
Great video as always!
the two classes served different times and conditions:
The venator was when massive fighter forces applied the threat response. The Venator was an excellent carrier. It was not a good capital ship. Its cannons were not focused upon that role.
Many Venators were lost because of that usage (as a major capital ship - not a carrier)
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The ISD was designed to be an assault ship and hold a small amount of fighters. It was a carrier (to a point).
The empire wanted to "get rid of the old an in with the new". The doctrine changed, and the tools (forcing the doctrine) also changed.
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both were in their prospective times and usages.
I think both the Venator and ISD would work fantastic together. Keep the V's in the back, swarming enemies with starfighter superiority and the ISD's upfront smoking the enemy capital ships with octuple turbolasers.
P.S. Not to mention that improved Imperial Tech like the TIE Defender would be massively available as the cost savings from manufacturing the two ships side by side rather than only ISD's would make a single fleet unbelieveably destructive and deadly.
You are right. I'd love to see more of the Venator in future Star Wars shows.
I agree with your assessment. The Venator was a better Naval asset compared to the Big and shinny ISD. One thing I did not know was ISD's not having point defense turrets. Gives me a better understanding of "X-Wing - Balance of Power" making shield gen runs in a B-Wing. The plan was to first take out the fighters, then take out the shield generators and then finally take down the ISD.
The Series 1 ISDs (Rogue One, A New Hope) did have a lot of point defenses. The Series 2 (Empire onward) had very few point defenses.
@@shraka still impractical. 😂
I've never really had much good to think about the Imperial Star Destroyers. Ever since I first seen what the GAR had I thought that it'd be awesome to integrate that of the GAR with what the Rebel Alliance had especially in terms of both of their navies.
the rebels would get slaughtered. the venator is outdated no matter how you turn it and the rebels had Something better anyway
The only problem I have when comparing ww2 tactics and modern jets to Star Wars is that somehow fighters pose a threat to the shields produced by a star destroyer. That doesn't make much sense to me. But it is what it is
In the alphabet squadron series of books the narrator says the b wings laser cannons alone had enough firepower to vaporize a mountain
Spitfire with rockets or better yet a dive bomber or torpedo bomber
When in doubt, blame the egos of Palpatine and Tarkin
I think the biggest hint as to the function of the ISD (and why it was a good ship for the function) is scene in Episode 4 where the admirals are discussing the Death Star and Tarkin says that the Imperial Senate was dissolved and regional governors were now in charge of their local systems.
In my eyes, the ISD was never intended to keep the peace or patrol star lanes - that would be the job of regional governors and their local militias. The ISD's job, instead, was to ensure that these governers stayed in line and obeyed the empire by ensuring that they would always be dominant against any ships that a local government could field Tarkin says that the Death Star would keep governors in line, but the Death Star can't be everywhere at once, so it makes sense that ISDs would do the job instead.
With that in mind, this would mean that the ISD would be facing some medium-sized vessels like bulk cruisers or frigates and whatever fighters and bombers they have in support if they had to face a regional governor that refuses to submit to imperial authority. When you consider this was the likely opposition facing an ISD, a battleship bristling with turbolasers and a compliment of fighters to mop up what would likely be second-rate fighters makes perfect sense. On the flip-side, if threats came up for regional governors that their militia could not handle, an ISD would operate alongside their fleet and so would be an ideal ship to provide firepower, fighter support and C&C support.
While a Venator could do all of the above, it might not be quite as powerful in defeating other fleets, and the cost of continually training significantly more fighter pilots (and their replacements, as a fighter-heavy docterine would assume many more pilot losses than crew losses for a heavily shielded/armoured ISD) as well as maintaing a much more capable and expensive fighter fleet would be even harder to maintain.
To use a modern-world analogy, you wouldn't send a carrier group to patrol local waters, you'd use local coastguard/police. And if, for some reason, you were worried these would turn against you, you would use a frigate/destroyer to keep them in line, not an aircraft carrier.
You know the Imperial Star Destroyer having so many design flaws and being entirely reliant on an extensive logistics network makes sense if you don't want your Star Destroyers to run off and the captain setting themselves up as a Tyrant. This is ignoring that this situation is insane and shouldn't be even considered a possibility in any sane political structure which the Empire clearly isn't.
That’s actually a good point wow. That’s exactly the type of nonsense a paranoid sith like Palpatine would be up yo
@@GenerationTech I have read that Palpatine actually _did_ set up the Empire in such as way that it would crash and burn if he died, even with contingency plans in place so that loyal officers would _accelerate_ its collapse.
All based on the logic of either _"If I can't have it, no-one will"_ or an Empire-wide _"You have failed me for the last time."_ Take your pick, they both fit his character.
@@vegeta002 sith meditation and other means through the force if my mind serves me right. But that was real canon i think
I have also seen the argument that the lack of hyperdrives on TIEs has a similar purpose, making it much more difficult for pilots to defect.
The issue that in both continuities that happens anyways.
I would have loved to see Trawn somehow gain access to a Venator, only to immediately instate it as his flagship and become a massive risk to the local Rebellion- resulting in a suicidal attack which succeeds in destroying the ship at immense cost.
Different mission goals. The Venator was meant to fight a war, and as such had to deliver troop transports, bombers, and heavy fighters to targets and provide support for them, as they encountered heavily armed resistance. The ISD was mainly for subjugating populations, where its fighter wing and troop transports were secondary to the immense amount of turbo laser batteries that could lay waste to whole cities from orbit.
Video idea for you, I was watching this and thinking how easy it would be to retrofit those Venators into other things. The well known retrofit is the Nebelion medical Frigate, or Dreadnoughts into Assualt Frigates. Yet I feel the Venator has much more potential:
* Factory frigate, all that hanger space turned into manufacturing of Star Fighters like the A, B and X Wings. I have always wondered where these where done. I just can't see the adhoc manufacturing that the books say working without something like this.
* Space Dock, the Frigate hanger underneath being able to construct Frigates. The Side Hangers and even possible the big hanger being ripped out to construct Corvettes. A mobile repair yard is something they lack.
I would love to see a whole video on this to expand the ideas.
The thing you need to keep in mind is the Clone Wars and the Galactic Civil War were fought using very different strategies. The reason a Venator carries something in the order of 350 starfighters is because the CIS generally used quantity over quality. Let's say you have a relatively small fleet of six Munificent backed up by a Provedence. Granted the Munificent doesn't have a hanger, but they were known to keep vulture droids in their "rafters". (and comparing the sizes of Munificent rafters to Provedence hangers I'm guessing they could hold around 80 each?) So that's over 600 vulture droids you have to contend with, and that's not counting Hyena bombers and Tri-fighters.
The GCW on the other hand was usually a few dozen strike fighters backed up by a handful of corvettes and frigates going after a lone target. Endor was really the only grand scale battle in the GCW, and that's because it was the majority of the rebel fleet.
Plus, Palpatine was a massive fan of the Tarkin Doctrine (it's basically Sith 101) so when presented with a practical multi-purpose carrier or a big impressive battleship it was inevitable he was going to choose the Imperial-class.
Anyway yeah, going one on one all the Venator has to do is sit at range and let her fighters disable the Imperial before going in for the final blow.
Er, no. That won't work. Turbolasers can hit you from orbit, so an ISD can just blow up the Venator before she launches all her starfighters.
@@HolyknightVader999 you do understand space is really hella big, right? You can literally park your ship a hundred million miles away, release your fighters, do some basic evasive maneuvers, and you'll be fine. Even if turbolasers are traveling at the speed of light (to which I have my doubts as you can track them with the naked eye and licensed technical manuals describe them more like plasma weapons) it would still take about eight minutes for them to hit you at that distance.
@@pyronuke4768 You do realize that an ISD can speed up close to you like they did when chasing the Falcon in ANH, right? Or pull a Rogue One Darth Vader and pop out of hyperspace right in front of your fleet guns blazing? They can close the gap within seconds and blow you to hell.
Also, again with the fighters? A few corvettes or light cruisers would rip them to shreds.
@@HolyknightVader999 ok, a couple things. Fist of all, if an Imperial can lightspeed jump to the Venator, couldn't the Venator just turn and lightspeed jump away? I know they're not as durable, but they're still decently large and well armored enough they should be able to turn away. Plus most of her fighters are lightspeed capable so she wouldn't have to worry about picking them up right away.
Second, without a gravity well to ground them, ships in star wars have had a hard time predicting exactly where they'd come out, unless you have a force-sensitivie on board or an extremely plot convenient lightspeed tracker. This is seen throughout the Clone Wars show and Legends.
And finally, where the hell did the corvettes and light cruisers come from?!? I thought we were talking about a 1 on 1, not a fleet engagement?
@@pyronuke4768 So you're just running away? You do realize the ISD can just chase you based on your last known trajectory, right? Also, congrats, by running away, you've effectively abandoned the battlefield to the enemy and given them a quick win.
And look at how you're arguing. You're not arguing the merits of the ship, but on starfighters. And most starfighters during the days of the Venator could not punch through an ISD's shields. Y-Wings could, but as we've seen from the Malevolence episodes, they can get hit by turbolasers due to them being slow enough. So while your fighters can't hurt the ISD for shit, and your bombers got shot down by the ISD's guns, the ISD then gets within range and opens fire. You're toast.
Also, you're assuming that the 72 starfighters inside the ISD will just sit there and do nothing. Instead of holding your fighters at bay long enough for the ISD to sink the Venator.
I agree with you 100% and at the same time this sort of political waste is one of the most realistic things about the entire starwars universe.
Yup a lot of good lessons here, Star Wars can be a great way to make people more interested in how the real world operates.
I always liked the the Venator not just because of it's beautiful design, but that it is a battlecruiser and a carrier in one neat package. You're right about the Venator being a better ship during peacetime, I have imagined the ship being a nightmare for pirates. Fighters and bombers can lay waste to the raider vessels and the Venator's big guns can pound any large vessels the pirates may have.
Most star wars youtubers have little idea what military doctrine is, even fewer tie the Venator to America's naval aviation doctrine that literally changed WW2. Well done, I salute you.
I believe, it depends on situation
During the clone wars, Heavily armed ship was more appropriate for the Republic Navy rather than carriers to agaisnt CIS Navy which operated heavily armed ship therefore ISD was appropriate for the Imperial navy due to the lesson of the clone wars and Tarkin doctrine. On the other hand, during the Galatic civil war, the enemy of empire(Reble alliance)operated carriers and multiple fighters unlike CIS therefore Venators were more appropriate for Imperial Navy to agaisnt Reble alliance in order to intercept enemy fighters in massive numbers.
Ironic
Venator would have been a perfect escort carrier for the empire
Way perfect compare to the other Escort Carrier.
Bro you could fit so many fighters inside it that I feel people forget about it.
I always liked the Victory and Victory II Class Star Destroyers. They were able to enter into the upper layers of a planet's atmosphere to allow for more precise orbital bombardment.
Imagine the empire making venator like second to the imperial star destroyer I honestly believe able to change the war way quicker because the ventilator in my opinion you were able to have that be adaptable way better then the Star destroyer
Nope. The Rebels would just blow up your silly little Venators because they're not as heavily armed as the Star Destroyers.
@@HolyknightVader999 they wouldn't even get past the 200-300 Tie fighters a venator would be able to carry
@@jimbabwe6529 Corellian corvettes would tear those TIEs into mincemeat.
The Venator is the one ship I would choose over any other without any second thoughts. To me it's like the Battlestar Galactica it's not the most powerful ship in the fleet but as long as it's well handled you can accomplish a lot with it. Plus the amount of V 19's and ARC 170's and other smaller fighters and escort ships it can carry makes it far superior to the Imperial Star Destroyer.
I absolutely agree with you. There is one other option I thought of: sell the Venator to individual star systems with the (loyal to the Empire) Stormtroopers as a way to maintain allegiance to new Empire. This will allow individual star systems to patrol themselves and their sovereign space while allowing a 'back door' should that system try to join the rebellion.
0:42 Porpoise?? THE DOLPHINS ARE TALKING OVER!!
I think the Imperial probably fits better into Tarkin’s fear doctrine. It was a battleship and, more to the point, had more firepower for orbital bombardment. It was there to instill fear in planets by just looking overhead, whereas the Venator was designed as an assault carrier. It’s role implied deployment of an invasion force. I feel as though they’d be able to go toe to toe with a close margin of error though because of how many fighters the Venator could deploy. It would not be hard for those numbers to overwhelm an Imperial class’ defenses, and it’s own firepower was still formidable. Certainly it was more flexible militarily, even if it did not have the ISDs raw power.
It only needs a few squadrons of X-wings and heavy bombers to make an ISD go kaput. Now imagine if it faces a Venator that could house hundreds of fighters and bombers. The only chance for the IDD to win against a Venator is to closed the gap but if it could managed to do that, then the fighters and bombers would still swarm its ass. If and only if the ISD could go in close range. 😂
Everyone talks about how ISD's were logistical nightmares but when you look at real world carriers you'll see just how expensive those venators were to deploy. The fighters would add about 20 million to its cost before you add in the maintenance, the munitions, the fuel, etc... Add to that the ISD doubles as a troop carrier that escorts itself and deploying ISD's might be cheaper than those venators even when you add in the expense of maintaining its Tie fighter's particularly when you consider that Ties were designed to be cheap to maintain.
The Venators were also known as Jedi cruisers, and Palpatine who hated the Jedi didn't want a fleet of ships all known as Jedi cruisers. Jedi were heroes of the Old Republic and that brings hope, something he did not want.
Overall, I do agree with your sentiment, though I believe that use of both the Venator and ISD might have been the best choice. Continue mostly using the Venator for its range and lesser logistical challenges and introduce the ISD as a pretty powerful escort, especially if enemy ships should come too close.
This is sort-of bit of-topic (but perhap related maybe), I've noticed in recent years on a meta-level (as in reboots and remakes of classic franchises) usually often with a younger audience, it seems to be or was the trend that it was assumed that the originals were in someway inferior to the new versions, regardless of how bad the newer version was and how popular the older version actually was, sometimes it seemed that the younger audiences would take offence to there even being an older or original version, attacking it without even seeing it or just look at the worst parts of the original without context, simply because it exists, fortunately sometimes some more open-minded younger people do take the time to view the original and actually enjoy it some even fall in love with those, even if in the fandom it or parts of it is not wall regarded, the best examples being (specifically) G1 MLP and especially Classic Doctor Who, it seems.
ISDs would be a great addition to the Republic Navy during the clone wars, clearing the field of large enemy capital ships and frigates and paving the way for Venators. But ISDs are a blunt weapon - powerful, yes, but only useful in this role of engaging heavy targets. Against the rebellion, that is hardly going to be situation to prepare most for. Rather, the mobility and diverse abilities of the Venator is excellent for taking on the rebellion.
However, it is possible that Palpatine expected stronger resistance to come from planetary governments, which would have the resources to construct large, defended bases and capital ships. In this case, it makes a bit more sense to have ISDs around, but scrapping Venators still seems like a mistake.
Couple things were left out of this.
First is that the Clone Wars was fought in the Republic between worlds separating from it and worlds loyal to it. This means supply lines were shorter. Much of the Galactic Civil War, took place in the Outer Rim. The Imperial Star Destroyer was to patrol the Empire’s frontiers as well. Not only did it have a to carry fighters but long range probes, a mobile prefabricated base, AT-ATs, and supplies to sustain operations for months if not years without resupply. Likely if it was deployed for short range missions, it could have carried more.
Second you’re missing out that it’s heavily implied the Imperial Star Destroyer had a much faster sub light speed. It was able to chase the Millenium Falcon in Empire, and in the Cantina Scene, when justifying his higher price, Han referenced how his ship could outrun Imperial ships as if it was an anomaly.
It’s likely that this ship served a role as a fast battleship that could get in close and do damage like we saw in Rogue One. If you go with Legends continuity, the Imperial Star Destroyer when there wasn’t plot armor around the New Republic Fleet, continued well into the Vong War, where it could both absorb a lot of damage and close with enemies and deal punishment.
If we stick with purely the movies, in the original trilogy we see ISDs keep pace with the Falcon in New Hope and Empire, which itself keeps pace with star fighters. In Return of the Jedi, the Emperor orders the Fleet not to attack, depriving the ISD of using their speed to maneuver around the Rebel Fleet, so it’s not really a fair comparison. In my opinion the Devastator showing up and wrecking the Rebels in Rogue One is probably a much more accurate representation of what would happen if a Imperial Star Destroyers shows up prepared to fight.
That’s not to say combined arms with support ships wasn’t important, but it played an essential role in the fleet as a capital ship that could 1) be expeditionary, 2) close with the enemy and tank for the fleet, and 3) bring heavy firepower to bear in a way no other ship in either Legends or Disney continuity could when it was commissioned, and be mass produced in quantities that the original MC-80s couldn’t match. Really the times you saw a Imperial Star Destroyer get wrecked, were when it needed to be for the Rebels to win.
Video idea: Nukes in Star Wars, such as usage of Nukes in the past, how nukes compare to common weapons, and stuff like how many nukes would it take to bring down an ISD
It's insane that after the end of a deviating war they destroy ships that could easily distribute desperately needed resources like food, medicine and all kinds of building materials. They could even land on a planet, taking away the necessity of flying smaller ships back and forth to load and unload.
Awesome video...I love this ship!!
0:44 ahhhhhh
The dolphins are attacking! Everyone, to arms!
It's still my favourite piece of Star Wars trivia that the thing that goes flying off to hit the ship at 1:11 is a kitchen sink, purely because of the classic "everything but the kitchen sink" phrase 🤣
For reference, this was stated by George Lucas during the Commentary for the Revenge of the Sith DVD commentary. When he first saw this scene he said the "you've got everything but the kitchen sink in this shot" line, so as a joke the SFX artists reworked the scene to add a kitchen sink.
I think the two classes would work great together. have a small fleet of an ISD, a Venator, and a screen of Arquitens and various frigates and you have a very well rounded fleet for many types of operations. the ISD can play the Tank, while the Venator can bring the swarm of Fighter coverage.
Great Video.
Greetings from Germany
Could you maybe do a video about unit sizes? Like how many stormtroopers were in a legion?
I love watching videos like this, I've always felt that Star Wars has been rather vague on technical aspects of ships and their weapons, especially when you compare it to Star Trek, in my opinion, a rather similar franchise with a lot of ship designs that appeared over the years and their weapons.
I have to say, the Venator and the Imperial Class 1 and 2 Star Destroyers were fantastic designs and extremely powerful. I do, however, have a preference for the Venator, especially it's sickass turbolaser cannons near the back by the bridge spires. I read a good book once that had cutaways and technical details on all the ships used in Revenge Of The Sith, it said that the turbolasers could be adjusted to either bang up or outright vaporize a target. They were powerful enough blow a Neimoidian blockade ship in a few shots when set to the maximum firing intensity! As far as seeing that in action, I loved the scene where a Venator (cannot remember the name of the thing, the Guajalara or something like that) did a straight up broadside attack on Grievous's flagship and put it into a straight drop out of orbit because of just much damage it could do in a broadside. Also, there's the beam cannon on the bottom of the ship that was able to blow the head of a Munificent class vessel off in one shot (that was shown at the beginning of this video I think, you could see a piece of debris come flying off the destroyed vessel and hit the destroyer, that little bit of shipwreck was actually a kitchen sink thrown in there as a joke by one of the ILM members)
The Imperial Class on the other hand, I like it too, it was really nice when it came to outright firepower with the 8 massive turbolasers and the other weapons. It could do planetary bombardment and destroy the surface of a planet in hours, not something I've ever heard of a Venator being capable off. Seems to me like it was made for one thing, complete annihilation of literally anything the guns could target.
There is a channel called Sacred Cow Shipyards that points out that the Venator doesn't have a keel, making it structurally very weak.
and he is right
I've always loved the giant hangar door on the Venator. It defines the fact that this is NOT a battleship, it is NOT a frontline combat vessel, it's a carrier, sure, you could define it accurately as an assault carrier, but at the end of the day, it is still a carrier.
The Empire should have kept a few hundred of these around at minimum, buuuuutt... The Venator wasn't in actuality, invented during the original movies so... What will never be.
The Acclamator was the literal GOAT, almost as well armed as an ISD with some of the best point defense systems, *0.6* Hyperdrive (the Millennium Falcon has a .5)(some sources .75 but that’s still insanely fast), can carry 16,000 clones, 80 star fighters, & 84 armored vehicles like AT-TEs or SPHATs *OR* you can convert all that space into star fighter space (roughly 196 fighters) *OR* cargo space, BUT WAIT there’s more, the cost of a base Acclamator is only 30mil credits (Venators were 60mil & ISDs were 150), what’s more is that the minimum personal is get this, *only* 700 people, the ISD is roughly 2 Acclamators but has *1.8%* of of its crew there are ships smaller than it that require more, you might think that the ISD is meant for power projection but *the Acclamator can still do that* do you think the average Imperial citizen would notice, the Acclamator can also rapidly land & unload without relying on landing craft like the ISD or Venator(I’m not saying it doesn’t need gunships but it isn’t completely reliant on them)
They could have used the Star Destroyer like A380 airplane since both use the most fuel... It would have been the perfect thing for defending main trade and travel routes through the galaxy while Venators were deployed for the rest of the things.
I think the theory was supposed to be to spam a multi-purpose cruiser that was capable of force projection, planetary bombardment, fighter transport, and direct fleet engagement. The ISD is pretty good at all of those things, but it was held back by the lack of hyperdrive on its fighter complement (meaning it could only deploy fighters locally), its lack of point defense (meaning it couldn't perform a direct fleet engagement against a primarily snub-fighter enemy), and it's sheer cost and logistical footprint (meaning you couldn't have enough deployed to cover all mission needs). They'd have done better with a Venator II packing hyperspace-capable fighters (presumably a larger, up-gunned version of the Venator with an even larger fighter complement and more direct-fire artillery turrets) as the center of a task force mostly composed of Raider corvettes and similar ships (ideal for point defense, rapid strike missions, and other patrol or counter insurgency operations).
3:43 Now that you said about Deploying Fighters from the two Gates and bottom Docking bay I say just close the top Doors. And boom your good. Of course I did thought a special Force field if you do have to use the Main launching doors. Don’t forget V-Wings are included too.
The Venator class is comparable to an Essex class carrier of WW2 and the ISD is similar to the Yamato class in design. The Essex and Venator were versatile in design with a huge complement of fighters onboard and enough point defense weapons to defend themselves against enemy ships while the Yamato and the ISD were overkill vessels that wasted precious resources on a ship that had several design weaknesses.
What I really didn't understand is that the existence of hyperdrive technology were able to perfectly negate ISD's weaknesses. Why I never see an ISD jump directly into the middle of enemy formation and take advantage of its close range firepower is beyond me.
So far you are the only person I've seen in the past 5 years to mention the side hanger doors. Most people just assume the top hanger is all it has
I concur, illen...I mean Allen. great comparison video. \m/
after seeing the scrapyard in Jedi Fallen order , i wish there to be a anime or a game with a story where rebels steal a venator class ship from the scrapyard before it gets destroyed, with all the compliment of other small fighters inside the ship, with jedi related item in its storage, seeing things that the main character come across in the beginning of the game
I actually would love a standard Venator alongside a more battleship designed version of it. Bit more personal firepower and do away with the central hangar that opens up putting more armor there. Make the underbelly docking hangar the main hangar and the 2 small side hangars the secondary ones.
I just thought of a super sick scene. A prototype Imperial class star destroyer in a clone wars space battle similar to the opening of Episode III shitting on absolutely everything. It would be nice to see how powerful they would be against clone wars era frigates/capital ships
They should have used both in tandem it would cover their weaknesses the ISD could broad side threats and the venator could protect it from fighters
When Palpatine stated that the Star Destroyers are inspired the Harrower-class Dreadnoughts of the True Sith Empire, which ships are better between the two?
0:42 Porpoise? But you hate dolphins!
Absolutely clean. A flawless assessment of the weaknesses of the ship class and the Tarkin Doctrine. And what a waste of money not just mothballing, but scrapping a proven asset.
My favourite part of the Venator was the hanger in the middle of the thing. Was quite unique.
I do wish the sequels took the time to reveal the empires mistakes were actually galaxy brain plans.
As a carrier used in conjucton with the newer ships, it would have been devastating to the rebellion.
But, it would require serious anti fighter backup.
It is not a good direct fire ship.
As a carrier, it ranked the best.
Imagine 100 plus ties overwhelming rebellion ships.
Plus it had one of the best hyperdrive units that enabled it to get where it wanted rapidly, deploy fighters, then bombard cities from orbit..
I was not expecting this video to be a super-fast build mode.
I would lovr to see the New Republic using the Venator Destroyer and an Imperial Star Destroyer at their battles on the upcoming projects of Star Wars!
As has been noted before.
Venators as mobile airbases, or space carriers, for starfighters, would have greatly aided a Rebel Republic, as it could have been.
Just the logistical strike range of at least ... what, 300+ snub/star-fighters, would have been amazing!
And the irony is that even though TIE Fighters lack hyperdrives, the sheer swarm room available would have made the air group above Skarif look tame.
Great minds think alike.
There's actually a really good reason why the Imperials would've phased out the Venators.
TIE Racks. After all, every ship launched from a Venator was capable of landing on it's own gear, whilst TIE fighters required specialised Launch/Recovery racks for full efficiency. It's likely that when the idea was floated to refit Venators with said Launching racks it was seen as inefficient/impossible to fit the racks without radical changes being made to the structure of the Venator, at which point it was seen as easier to just retire them and build ships from the keel up to have the TIE racks.