sounds like the hellbore wpns of the bolos.

space warfare is likely to most closely resemble sub warfare today. first guy to get a lock on the foe and fire probably won the fight. it's gonna be all about sensors, stealth and ew.

The idea that the combats depicted in ALL the STAR WARS movies have any bassis in reality is ludicris!

The rates of fire are abismal, Contrast a WW-II cruiser shooting hundreds of medium caliber shells per minute at multiple targets with Mile long ships shooting dozzens of missiles per minute, most of which miss their intended targets. Pick any single scene and go threw it fraim by fraim, counting the missiles, hits and misses. Current fourth generation fighters have Intigrated Fly and Fight software that gaurentees the first burst hits, not counting guided missiles that fly dozzens of miles before choosing which part of the target aircraft to impact!

 

Contrast that with visions of mile long ships 200M appart blasting away with broadsides, or fighters that do not beniffit from Intigrated Fly and Fight controles and guided "Smart Gun Launched Missiles" thus shooting hundreds of rounds while getting few hits. Star ships that are blind to the space arround then only a few miles away when the Falcon hide in plain sight behind the bridge with at least three and possable as many as six enimy ships which are inturn have so little capasity to maneuver that they colide with each other?

 

Right!

We had a good thread regarding military combat in space in here somewhere. It's important to consider that the technology drives the tactics. Something submarine-sized or larger in space will be fairly visible on a number of wavelengths out to ranges that far exceed your ability to know where it is now, as even a few seconds (several hundreds of thousand kilometers) would permit a target ship to significantly alter its position within a probability cone. Plus you would have countermeasures and counter-projectile systems. The longer range your offensive weapons are, the easier they are to engage. PAC3 vs Scud, for example.

youd have to have a constant 'drunkards walk' type of movement built in to the ship

close combat would have to involve salvos of unguided fire, sprayed in patterns like old ww2 torpedos.

to hide a missile engine exhaust , would it be feasable to have an unfurling umbrella deploy in front of the reaction nozzle?

i think that the submunition approach is the only practical one , as the missile reached close range a unitary missile would be too easy to kill

Star Wars uses military imagery as a back drop to the drama. Combat is based on what looked and felt good in other movies rather than logical working out of the interactions of the people and the tec. WW I fighter combat works better in this kind of film than automated beyond visual range engagements.