not a starwars geek's definitions
Situated in the heart of the galaxy, Coruscant was the seat of government for the Galactic Republic and the Empire that supplanted it. Over thousands of years of civilization, the planet has been entirely enveloped by cityscapes and urban sprawl. Immense skyscrapers reach high into the atmosphere, and stretch down deep into the dark shadows. Crisscrossing the skyline are streams of unending repulsorlift traffic. Even in the depths of night, Coruscant is alive with glittering lights and rivers of traffic, a bustling megalopolis that refuses to sleep.
Some of the most important decisions, affecting the lives of trillions, have been made on Coruscant. It has long been the center of government, and the site of residence for the galaxy's Supreme Chancellor. From a towering high-rise overlooking a gleaming range of mountainous edifices, rulers such as Valorum and Palpatine have carefully plotted the future of the Republic.
Though the Chancellor steered the government, issues were ultimately settled in the cavernous rotunda of the Galactic Senate. Thousands of Senators and galactic representatives from the far-flung worlds of the Republic would debate pressing issues and push forward countless agendas.
As Coruscant was the center-point for decisions affecting the massive engines of commerce in the galaxy, it was also a nexus of graft and corruption. Vast fortunes were spent to ensure that corporations were allowed to operate without profit-stunting restrictions. Entities such as the Trade Federation and the Commerce Guild held incredible sway over the inner workings of Coruscant politics.
Removed from this corruption and encased in a gleaming tower was the Jedi High Council. Coruscant was home to the Jedi Temple, and the august order was answerable to the Supreme Chancellor himself.
A quite different world exists beneath the shimmering surface of the city-planet. In the lower levels, where sunlight never reaches, is a haze of artificial lights and flickering holograms, promising entertainment catering to a myriad of alien species and the full spectrum of morality. Citizens from above and below intermix in countless establishments offering escape, anonymity, jubilation and more than just a hint of danger.
Some of the most important decisions, affecting the lives of trillions, have been made on Coruscant. It has long been the center of government, and the site of residence for the galaxy's Supreme Chancellor. From a towering high-rise overlooking a gleaming range of mountainous edifices, rulers such as Valorum and Palpatine have carefully plotted the future of the Republic.
Though the Chancellor steered the government, issues were ultimately settled in the cavernous rotunda of the Galactic Senate. Thousands of Senators and galactic representatives from the far-flung worlds of the Republic would debate pressing issues and push forward countless agendas.
As Coruscant was the center-point for decisions affecting the massive engines of commerce in the galaxy, it was also a nexus of graft and corruption. Vast fortunes were spent to ensure that corporations were allowed to operate without profit-stunting restrictions. Entities such as the Trade Federation and the Commerce Guild held incredible sway over the inner workings of Coruscant politics.
Removed from this corruption and encased in a gleaming tower was the Jedi High Council. Coruscant was home to the Jedi Temple, and the august order was answerable to the Supreme Chancellor himself.
A quite different world exists beneath the shimmering surface of the city-planet. In the lower levels, where sunlight never reaches, is a haze of artificial lights and flickering holograms, promising entertainment catering to a myriad of alien species and the full spectrum of morality. Citizens from above and below intermix in countless establishments offering escape, anonymity, jubilation and more than just a hint of danger.
by not a starwars geek November 29, 2004
Get the Coruscant mug.After abandoning their headquarters at the Massassi outpost on Yavin 4, the core group of the Rebel Alliance established Echo Base on the Hoth. Alliance engineers worked non-stop to adapt their technology to withstand the subzero temperature extremes of the frigid ice planet. When the technicians were unable to get the T-47s functioning in time, the Rebels domesticated the indigenous tauntaun for use as a patrol mount.
The nerve center of Echo Base was its darkened command center, where General Rieekan issued orders to the rest of his troops. Here, Alliance scanner operators carefully monitored incoming data from the scattered sensors placed by Rebel scouts in the Hoth wilderness.
Protecting Echo Base was a powerful energy shield strong enough to deflect Imperial bombardment. When the Empire arrived in the Hoth system, the Rebels erected the shield, forcing the Imperials to engage in a ground battle. The Rebels speedily evacuated the personnel and equipment they could aboard Rebel transports with starfighter escorts, offering covering fire for the fleeing ships from a massive ground-based ion cannon.
As the transports retreated, the Rebel ground forces and snowspeeder squadrons covered their escape by delaying the Imperials for as long as they could. Rebel troopers dug into snowy trenches, blasting at the incoming Imperials with turret-mounted laser cannons and blaster rifles. The Imperial walkers were unstoppable. The Rebels were routed and Echo Base was overrun.
The nerve center of Echo Base was its darkened command center, where General Rieekan issued orders to the rest of his troops. Here, Alliance scanner operators carefully monitored incoming data from the scattered sensors placed by Rebel scouts in the Hoth wilderness.
Protecting Echo Base was a powerful energy shield strong enough to deflect Imperial bombardment. When the Empire arrived in the Hoth system, the Rebels erected the shield, forcing the Imperials to engage in a ground battle. The Rebels speedily evacuated the personnel and equipment they could aboard Rebel transports with starfighter escorts, offering covering fire for the fleeing ships from a massive ground-based ion cannon.
As the transports retreated, the Rebel ground forces and snowspeeder squadrons covered their escape by delaying the Imperials for as long as they could. Rebel troopers dug into snowy trenches, blasting at the incoming Imperials with turret-mounted laser cannons and blaster rifles. The Imperial walkers were unstoppable. The Rebels were routed and Echo Base was overrun.
by not a starwars geek November 29, 2004
Get the Echo Base mug.When stationed on Hoth, the Rebel Alliance modified T-47 airspeeders to become snowspeeders, fast flying conveyances for patrol and defense of their hidden base. It took some doing to keep the crippling cold from permanently grounding their airforce, but Rebel ingenuity overcame the relentless Hoth elements.
The T-47 airspeeder is a small, wedge-shaped craft with two forward-facing laser cannons. In its rear arc is a harpoon gun fitted with a heavy-duty tow cable. The snowspeeder is a two-man vessel, with a pilot and rear-facing tailgunner.
The main Alliance snowspeeder unit at Echo Base was Rogue Group, led by Luke Skywalker. This unit was tasked with delaying the thundering Imperial invasion force long enough for Rebel command to evacuate Echo Base.
The Imperial taskforce consisted of AT-AT walkers. The snowspeeder laser cannons were ineffective against such heavy armor, and Luke Skywalker turned to a tactic of desperation. He ordered his pilots to employ their harpoons and tow cables to ensnare the walkers' legs. Wedge Antilles and his gunner, Janson, were the first to successfully entangle a walker. With its legs roped, the walker's raw strength brought it crashing down, where the Rebel snowspeeders were able to get a clear shot at its weaker neck column.
The T-47 airspeeder is a small, wedge-shaped craft with two forward-facing laser cannons. In its rear arc is a harpoon gun fitted with a heavy-duty tow cable. The snowspeeder is a two-man vessel, with a pilot and rear-facing tailgunner.
The main Alliance snowspeeder unit at Echo Base was Rogue Group, led by Luke Skywalker. This unit was tasked with delaying the thundering Imperial invasion force long enough for Rebel command to evacuate Echo Base.
The Imperial taskforce consisted of AT-AT walkers. The snowspeeder laser cannons were ineffective against such heavy armor, and Luke Skywalker turned to a tactic of desperation. He ordered his pilots to employ their harpoons and tow cables to ensnare the walkers' legs. Wedge Antilles and his gunner, Janson, were the first to successfully entangle a walker. With its legs roped, the walker's raw strength brought it crashing down, where the Rebel snowspeeders were able to get a clear shot at its weaker neck column.
by not a starwars geek November 29, 2004
Get the Snowspeeder mug.Mos Espa is one of few port cities on Tatooine, born out of the desert and built piece by piece over many years. Domed buildings protect the citizens against the glare of the twin suns and the scorching heat. Among the dwellings, workspaces, and commercial operations of many bizarre kinds there are also entertainment areas, including some of colossal scale. The famed Mos Espa Grand Arena can can hold an audience almost as large as the city's entire population.
Most of Mos Espa's inhabitants are settlers and subsistence earners who scratch out a meager living as best they can. The only real wealth in Mos Espa is tied up in gambling and off-world trade, especially in the lucrative black market beyond the trade laws and controls of the galactic government.
In the time of the Republic, slavery persisted in Mos Espa, though the despicable trade was outlawed elsewhere. An entire section of the city's outskirts had been transformed into a Slave Quarter. Live slaves functioned more as prestige possessions than cheap laborers, and owners parted with them only reluctantly. Slaves could even find themselves used as capital in business transactions. The true powers in control of Mos Espa were the Hutt gangsters, who found slavery a useful institution for their purposes, and Tatooine's remoteness allowed them to practice their illegal ventures.
Most of Mos Espa's inhabitants are settlers and subsistence earners who scratch out a meager living as best they can. The only real wealth in Mos Espa is tied up in gambling and off-world trade, especially in the lucrative black market beyond the trade laws and controls of the galactic government.
In the time of the Republic, slavery persisted in Mos Espa, though the despicable trade was outlawed elsewhere. An entire section of the city's outskirts had been transformed into a Slave Quarter. Live slaves functioned more as prestige possessions than cheap laborers, and owners parted with them only reluctantly. Slaves could even find themselves used as capital in business transactions. The true powers in control of Mos Espa were the Hutt gangsters, who found slavery a useful institution for their purposes, and Tatooine's remoteness allowed them to practice their illegal ventures.
by not a starwars geek November 30, 2004
Get the Mos Espa mug.An intimidating armored assault vehicle, the All Terrain Tactical Enforcer (AT-TE) saw its explosive debut on the battlefields of Geonosis, at the start of the Clone Wars. Specialized Republic drop ships carried the lumbering walker craft into the thick of combat, unleashing them to crawl inexorably toward enemy fortifications.
The walker features six articulated legs for propulsion. The legs are low to the ground, which reduces the walker's top speed but does provide it with increased stability. The body of the walker consists of two armored halves connected by a flexible sleeve that increases its mobility on the field.
The front of the walker is lined with four ball-turret laser cannons, while a single heavy projectile cannon is turret-mounted on the vehicle's dorsal surface. Its rear fire arc is protected by a pair of laser cannon turrets. Though the walker's armor can easily deflect small arms fire, tanksmasher rockets can pierce an AT-TE's armor and destroy its complex propulsion mechanisms.
The walker features six articulated legs for propulsion. The legs are low to the ground, which reduces the walker's top speed but does provide it with increased stability. The body of the walker consists of two armored halves connected by a flexible sleeve that increases its mobility on the field.
The front of the walker is lined with four ball-turret laser cannons, while a single heavy projectile cannon is turret-mounted on the vehicle's dorsal surface. Its rear fire arc is protected by a pair of laser cannon turrets. Though the walker's armor can easily deflect small arms fire, tanksmasher rockets can pierce an AT-TE's armor and destroy its complex propulsion mechanisms.
by not a starwars geek November 29, 2004
Get the AT-TE mug.Located in the Hoth system is a chaotic asteroid field filled with dangerous swarms of colliding rocks. Stray bodies from the field get caught in Hoth's gravity well, and enter the ice planet's atmosphere, becoming meteorites.
If the threat of being crushed by massive asteroids is not enough to deter the most foolhardy pilot, the asteroid field is also home to dangerous lifeforms. At least one unbelievably huge space slug has made a home out of one of the larger asteroids. Furthermore, the field is infested by mynocks, leathery-winged energy parasites that attach themselves to passing ships and then chew on the power cables.
The odds of successfully navigating an asteroid field are approximately 3,720 to 1. Han Solo, never being too concerned with the odds, recklessly plunged the Millennium Falcon into the field to escape Imperial pursuit after the Battle of Hoth.
If the threat of being crushed by massive asteroids is not enough to deter the most foolhardy pilot, the asteroid field is also home to dangerous lifeforms. At least one unbelievably huge space slug has made a home out of one of the larger asteroids. Furthermore, the field is infested by mynocks, leathery-winged energy parasites that attach themselves to passing ships and then chew on the power cables.
The odds of successfully navigating an asteroid field are approximately 3,720 to 1. Han Solo, never being too concerned with the odds, recklessly plunged the Millennium Falcon into the field to escape Imperial pursuit after the Battle of Hoth.
by not a starwars geek November 30, 2004
Get the Hoth Asteroid Field mug.Within three years of the Death Star's demise, the Galactic Empire again proved its evil nature with the construction of a second Death Star in a remote region of space. Fortunately for the galaxy, the Empire never completed this monstrosity. Word of its construction was spread through the Rebel ranks by Bothan spies. The Alliance was able to pinpoint the exact location of Death Star's construction, and mount a pre-emptive strike to destroy the station.
The leaked information was all a ruse. The scheming Emperor Palpatine engineered the Rebellion's discovery of the Death Star in the hopes of trapping the growing Rebel fleet. The second Death Star would not be as vulnerable as the Rebels believed.
To ensure that the Death Star would destroy the lured Alliance fleet, Palpatine entrusted the supervision of its final phase of construction to his Sith apprentice, Lord Darth Vader. Vader motivated the Death Star's commander, Moff Jerjerrod, to see that the battle station was operational when the Emperor arrived for his inspection tour.
The second Death Star was not a complete sphere. Though much of the battle station's recognizable shape was visible, there were huge sections of exposed superstructure and visible skeleton. To protect the half-completed and immobile station during its construction, the Empire projected an immense deflector shield from the nearby forest moon of Endor. The shield was strong enough to protect any breach from both capital and starfighter-class ships.
The Alliance sent a commando team to land on the moon and deactivate the shield generator while the Rebel fleet emerged from hyperspace to destroy the station. Unlike the previous Death Star, whose reactor core was accessible only from a two-meter wide exhaust port, the second Death Star's heart had to be destroyed by actually flying into the superstructure and detonating the collosal power plant.
The commando team was waylaid by Imperials and the Rebel fleet arrived to find the deflector shield intact. Worse yet, the superlaser was operational, and began destroying Rebel Mon Calamari cruisers with each blast. General Lando Calrissian came up with a daring and foolhardy tactic to engage the Imperial fleet at point-blank range, thus limiting the Death Star's available targets.
Aided by the native Ewoks of Endor, the Rebels were able to infiltrate and destroy the shield generator complex. With the shield down, General Calrissian led the Alliance starfighters into the inner recesses of the Death Star. There, he and Wedge Antilles loosed a volley of ordnance that began an immense fireball that tore apart the station.
Emperor Palpatine's body was consumed in the explosion. The Imperial fleet never recovered from the fiasco. What was to be the Rebel Alliance's demise instead turned into, the death of the Empire. As firey fragments of the battle station burned away in Endor's atmosphere, the celebratory cheers of freedom rang throughout the forests, and indeed, the entire galaxy.
The leaked information was all a ruse. The scheming Emperor Palpatine engineered the Rebellion's discovery of the Death Star in the hopes of trapping the growing Rebel fleet. The second Death Star would not be as vulnerable as the Rebels believed.
To ensure that the Death Star would destroy the lured Alliance fleet, Palpatine entrusted the supervision of its final phase of construction to his Sith apprentice, Lord Darth Vader. Vader motivated the Death Star's commander, Moff Jerjerrod, to see that the battle station was operational when the Emperor arrived for his inspection tour.
The second Death Star was not a complete sphere. Though much of the battle station's recognizable shape was visible, there were huge sections of exposed superstructure and visible skeleton. To protect the half-completed and immobile station during its construction, the Empire projected an immense deflector shield from the nearby forest moon of Endor. The shield was strong enough to protect any breach from both capital and starfighter-class ships.
The Alliance sent a commando team to land on the moon and deactivate the shield generator while the Rebel fleet emerged from hyperspace to destroy the station. Unlike the previous Death Star, whose reactor core was accessible only from a two-meter wide exhaust port, the second Death Star's heart had to be destroyed by actually flying into the superstructure and detonating the collosal power plant.
The commando team was waylaid by Imperials and the Rebel fleet arrived to find the deflector shield intact. Worse yet, the superlaser was operational, and began destroying Rebel Mon Calamari cruisers with each blast. General Lando Calrissian came up with a daring and foolhardy tactic to engage the Imperial fleet at point-blank range, thus limiting the Death Star's available targets.
Aided by the native Ewoks of Endor, the Rebels were able to infiltrate and destroy the shield generator complex. With the shield down, General Calrissian led the Alliance starfighters into the inner recesses of the Death Star. There, he and Wedge Antilles loosed a volley of ordnance that began an immense fireball that tore apart the station.
Emperor Palpatine's body was consumed in the explosion. The Imperial fleet never recovered from the fiasco. What was to be the Rebel Alliance's demise instead turned into, the death of the Empire. As firey fragments of the battle station burned away in Endor's atmosphere, the celebratory cheers of freedom rang throughout the forests, and indeed, the entire galaxy.
by not a starwars geek December 4, 2004
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