ANTE-INFANTRY BATTERY

Anti-infantry batteries use precision targeting computers to direct high energy blaster bolts into the heart of advancing enemy infantry formations, inflicting heavy casualties and destroying support equipment. The popular DF.9 anti-infantry system delivers far more firepower than do heavy repeating blasters such as the E-web abd often is used in conjunction with ant-vehicle batteries to protect military bases, spaceports, and other strategic facilities.

The DF.9 laser cannon has an optimal range of three kilometers and a maximum range of sixteen kilometers and so the DF.9 can decimate an enemy infantry unit long before the soldiers can return fire. Capable of firing once every three seconds, the DF.9 uses an energy beam to scatter explosive energy over an eight meter radius impact point allowing a single blasr to destroy an entire squad. The armoured, proton-shielded turret rotates 180 degrees, but the fixed-position emplacement means the weapon cannot be moved easily from location to location. The crew of three consists of the gunner, a targeting computer technician, and a technician who monitors and regulates power flow from the generator.

ATGAR 1.4 FD P-TOWER

Antivehicle artillery pieces are permanently placed defensive laser cannons designed to destroy enemy vehicles such as landspeeders, airspeeders, and repulsortanks. They vary widely in size and energy output, ranging from massive CoMar G-OO3 Tri-Tracker units to small inexpensive systems such as he Atgar 1.4 FD P-Tower.

The dish-shaped Atgar P-Tower offers a single light laser cannon with on optimal range at up to two kilometers and o maximum targetable range of ten kilometers. In this older weapon design, the P-Tower's primitive galven circuitry and focusing lens produce a low-power energy beam that is dangerous only to lightly armoured repulsorcraft such as landspeeders and airspeeders. The armour on AT-AT walkers and repuisortanks can easily deflect its bolts. Though the energy beam strikes instantly, the outdated targeting computer cannot accurately predict high-speed airspeeder manoeuvres, and so scoring a hit is difficult for all but the most experienced gunners. In practice, the P-Tower has often proved more effective against stormtroopers than against Imperial vehicles.

The P-Tower's platform rotates 360 degrees, providing a full field of fire, white light armour plating protects the forgetting computer and he small Atgar C-6 battery, which stores enough energy for eight shots. The P-Tower uses an outdated firing system: the battery must charge the weapon's sixteen micropower routers (placed evenly around the outer edge of the dish) and eight energy conversion cells. A result, the weapon needs a full ten seconds to build up adequate charge, the result being an exceptionally low fire rate. Additionally) a single burnout in any at the sixteen converters disables the weapon, making it prone to failure in combat.

The P-Tower has a crew at three support members while the main gunner handles the portable fire control computer, which has a readout screen and a small joystick for aiming, The weapon provides no protection for crew members, forcing them to stand out in the open, exposed to enemy fire.

ENERGY CATAPULT

A rather primitive device used by Gungans to throw devastating energy balls over long distances. The Gungan catapult utilizes a torsion-action arm, which lifts and hurls the plasma energy balls.

Despite their seemingly simple design, the catapult can rapidly fire a number of energy balls with impressive accuracy. Handcrafted weapons, Gungan catapults display the ornate style and organic appearance common to all Gungan products.

ION CANNON

Iron cannons are similar to laser cannons, but their energy beams, which appear to be standard loser blasts, actually disable the targeted ship's electronic and computer systems instead of causing physical damage. Ion energy blasts overload and fuse circuitry, blowing out computers, flight control systems, sensors, shields, and weapons even life-support and communications systems are damaged.
While low-powered bolts may cause only minor system failures, a powerful blast can cripple a ship for several minutes. As internal electronic systems short out streams of blue lightning play across control panels and electronic interfaces.
Since ion blasts are unimpaired by energy shields, ships have no defence against them short of reconfiguring their shields and this would make the shields useless for absorbing standard laser blasts.

Aboard capital ships, ion cannons may be as numerous as turbolasers, Imperial Star Destroyers have sixty Borstel NK-7 ion cannon emplacements, while Mon Calamari Star Cruisers carry nearly two dozen ArMek SW-7 ion batteries. The original Death Star's defences included 2,500 ion cannons, while Death Star II had double that number.

Star Destroyers use gunnery control stations to concentrate fire from several ion emplacements against a single target, and so they often disable a target vessel with the opening volley. The ionisation effect lasts long enough to allow assault crews to board and capture the stricken vessel, although some Star Destroyer commanders use the ship's tractor beams to hold the ionised vessel immobile so that it can be destroyed by turbolaser blasts before it sends out a distress signal.

Ion cannons also can be potent starfighter weapons. During the early days of the Galactic Civil War, Rebel Y-wings and B-wings often used them to disable Imperial freighters and capture them with their cargoes intact. As a result Alliance's soldiers received the best equipment the Empire could buy, while the captured ships supplemented the Alliance's meager cargo fleet. Fighter attacks utilitizing ion cannons also helped the Alliance capture combat star-ships, including many at the Nebulon-B escort frigates and Corellian corvettes that formed the backbone at the Rebel fleet before the arrival of the Mon Calamari Star Cruisers.

Ion cannons are popular among privateer and pirate fleets for the some reason. they give raiders the highest odds of capturing ships- and their valuable cargoes undamaged. These weapons are also favoured by alien species known as the Ssi-ruuk, who attacked the Imperial world of Bakura shortly after the Battle of Endor using their ion cannons capture Imperial and Rebel vessels alike.

PLANETERY ION CANNON

Planetary ion cannons are powerful ground weapons that produce intense energy beams that can reach low orbit and disable even the largest capital ships. As with smaller ion weaponry, a planetary ion cannon causes no physical damage, instead fusing and blowing out circuitry aboard the target ship and knocking out its drives, weapons, shields, computer systems, and other electronic systems.

At a cost of five hundred thousand credits per emplacement, ion cannons are prohibitively expensive, even for many planetary governments. The Kuat Drive Yards v-150 Planet Defender, which was used at the Rebel Alliance's base on Hoth, is a typical planetary icon cannon.

The v-150 consists of a spherical permacite shell, and its power is supplied by a massive reactor that normally is buried nearly forty meters below ground level. When it is activated, it takes several minutes to manoeuvre the ion cannon into position on its rotating base, while the blast shield retracts, exposing the cannon. A crew at twenty-seven soldiers is needed to operate the weapon and handle its targeting computers.

Ion cannons often are used to supplement planetary shields, which take several minutes to activate and are impractical to maintain at all times because of their tremendous energy demands since enemy ships often appear without warning, planets rely on ion cannons and similar weapons, such as planetary turbolasers, to provide covering fire until the shields can be raised.

Each ion cannon emplacement has a limited fire vector, meaning that it can protect an area no more than a few hundred kilometers square. For this reason, ion cannons are placed close to vital facilities such as military bases, planetary shield generators starports, and major cities. Ion cannons are also limited by a low fire rate at one volley per six seconds and multiple weapon emplacements or shields must be provided to ensure complete protection from orbital attacks and planetary landings.

QUAD LASER CANNON

Quad laser cannons are nearly identical to the standard laser cannon although they are primarily found aboard starships. Many draw energy directly from the starship's power core and incorporate power cycles to increase each of the four turret's output. High volume gas feeds the custom modified laser actuators with large energization crystals are also features on advanced models.

The quad laser cannon aboard the Trade Federation battleships have four turrets capable of firing simultaneously or in any sequence the gunner desires. However, because these large weapons were simply added to pre-existing cargo ships, which were not designed to support powerful laser cannons, the battleship have a limited field of fire with many "blind spots"

Han Solo mounted two quad laser cannons on the Millennium Falcon. These guns can fire with the help of a gunner or a targeting computer.

SONIC CANNON

Arms manufacturers for the highest bidders, the Geonosians were no strangers to exotic and advanced forms of weaponry. They employed advanced sonic technology to project discrete globes of concussive energy at their targets. The Geonosians employed both hand-held and turret-mounted versions of their sonic cannons.

The standard sidearm of the Geonosian soldier uses oscillators to produce a devastating sonic blast. The energy is enveloped in a plasma containment sphere shaped by emitter cowls that channel the sonic beam. This stabilizes the sonic effect until it impacts against its target, resulting in a powerful omnidirectional blast. Large-scale Geonosian sonic cannons can be deployed as platforms, wherein the two or more Geonosian gunners allow the advanced targeting computers of the cannons to do most of the work.

SUPER LASER

The Death Star's prime weapon unleashed unthinkable levels of raw energy capable of tearing apart entire worlds. That energy began deep inside the gargantuan station, and was eventually channeled into an array of eight tributary laser cannons. The beams from these cannons culminated into a central blast directed from the eye-shaped concavity in the Death Star's upper hemisphere. Teams of highly skilled Imperial gunners manned advanced control stations, managing the titanic weapon.

With this weapon, the Death Star reduced Alderaan to rubble. It never had a chance to fire again, as the Rebel Alliance was able to destroy the station at the Battle of Yavin. It wasn't long before the weapon was resurrected in an improved form aboard the second Death Star. This second cannon could target capital ships and its power yields could be managed to support frequent firing. Many key Alliance warships were vaporized by the Death Star during the Battle of Endor.

The Death Star's superlaser was a triumph of combat engineering. Though the concept of culminating laser beam amplification had existed in the latter days of the Republic, the sheer scale of the Death Star's prime weapon is staggering. For optimum performance, the superlaser was manned by 168 Imperial gunners, with at least 14 soldiers manning each of the initiator lasers. The majority of the Death Star's interior volume was dedicated to housing and supporting the superlaser. The weapon's heart drew power directly from the station's raging hypermatter core, converting and amplifying the colossal powers into focussed energy.

The eight tributary laser beams converged at a central amplification nexus. The outer perimeter of the superlaser dish also had four back up lasers should any of the eight fail. The lens of the cannon (colloquially known as "the Eye") was built around an immense amplification crystal. The superlaser's power needed recharging between blasts, limiting the number of firings per day. The weapon could produce a blast scaled to destroy capital ships at a rate of one per minute. The superlaser could only fire planet-destroying yields once per day.

With the amount of research and resources allocated to the superlaser project, its little wonder this weapon was not allowed to die with the destruction of the Death Star. As refinements in the technology were carried out aboard the Tarkin weapons platform, the second Death Star was developed. Though the second never saw completion, its operational superlaser performed commendably during the Battle of Endor. Even after the Battle of Endor, the threat of superlaser technology returned to haunt the New Republic. The original and functional concept model of the Death Star emerged from Maw Installation, but was quickly defeated. A new but ultimately ill-fated generation of Eclipse- and Sovereignclass Star Destroyers featured axial superlasers that, while not able to obliterate a planet, could sear a planet's entire surface. Even the ambitious Hutts launched a woe-filled caper to secure a superlaser with the development of their disastrous Darksaber project.

TURBOLASER

The most common capital ship weapons in the galaxy, turbolasers are large-scale energy weapons carrying enough punch to cut through the shields and thick armour plating of modern warships. Banks of turbolasers, coordinated through computerised fire-control systems, deliver sustained volleys of energy. Imperial Star Destroyers claim sixty Taim & Bak xx-9 heavy turbolasers, while even small capital combat starships carry a few of these weapons.

Turbolasers are two-stage supercharged laser cannons. The small primary laser produces an energy beam that enters the turbolaser's main actuator, where it interacts with a stream of energised blaster gas to produce an intense blast. The energy bolt's destructive power is incredible, and the barrel's galven coils focus the beam, providing a range that is double or triple that of conventional laser cannons. Turbolasers also can target planetary surfaces for devastating ground bombardments.

Turbolasers draw so much power that each one has its own dedicated turbine, and multiple capacitor banks supplement the turbine's power feed. The power core regulates energy flow, bleeding off excess and blocking power surges that could cause the turbolaser to explode. Turbolasers use a delay of at least two seconds between shots to allow the capacitors to built up an adequate charge.

Just as with other energy weapons turbolasers generate a tremendous amount of waste heat. The Taim & Bak XX-9 turbolasers kept aboard Star Destroyers have three separate cryosystems. Each laser barrel has a cooling sleeve, while a large cooling units placed behind the laser actuator.

Turbolasers utilize computerised fire control systems to target capital ships across vast distances in deep space though starfighters are fast enough to evade the fire from these bulky weapons. Star Destroyers rely on TIE fighters or laser cannons to handle enemy fighters.

Taim & Bak XX-9 turbolaser emplacements use servoactuated turrets mounted outside the ship and are protected by a meter of quadanium steel hull plating. Crew stations and the main turbine are located inside the ship. The earlier XX-8 design features a taller tower that can hold both he turbine and the crew stations.

Turbolasers require intensive maintenance along with frequent replacement of cooling sleeve Components, galven tube circuits and energisation crystals. A burnout of any of these components can knock the weapon off-line, while a critical failure can head to an explosive overload, destroying the weapon and killing the crew.