I always assumed (and played with it as a kid as such) that the rotating body around the cockpit had to do with creating a larger firing circumference. Which would equate to more damage or chance of damage to the enemy. Sort of a "spiral death blossom" effect.

It'd make sense if the ship spun around the cockpit rather than the cockpit spinning on its rotor and the ship remaining completely still relative to its engines. The only purpose of a cockpit rotor is to jam at maximum at the worst possible time.

Also I never thought of something as I read a few replies above in there not really being a reason to build a Deathstar when you already have things moving at, or in the case of the Falcon's boasted .5 past, light speed. Imagine a Star Destroyer, of which the Empire has more than a few, smashing into a planet at light speed. I assume that might be akin to the doomsday asteroid theory no? Destroying a planet's surface to some degree but leaving in possibly intact to be terra formed or used as a natural resource.

The nature of hyperspace is such that it stops working if you drift too close to a mass shadow, hence Interdictors. That's why you can't hyperdrive into a planet. You can hyperdrive so close to a planet/star/black hole that you have severe issues not hitting it, but you won't hit it at lightspeed.

Not that the EU doesn't ignore that detail from time to time.

I always assumed (and played with it as a kid as such) that the rotating body around the cockpit had to do with creating a larger firing circumference. Which would equate to more damage or chance of damage to the enemy. Sort of a "spiral death blossom" effect.

It'd make sense if the ship spun around the cockpit rather than the cockpit spinning on its rotor and the ship remaining completely still relative to its engines. The only purpose of a cockpit rotor is to jam at maximum at the worst possible time.

Also I never thought of something as I read a few replies above in there not really being a reason to build a Deathstar when you already have things moving at, or in the case of the Falcon's boasted .5 past, light speed. Imagine a Star Destroyer, of which the Empire has more than a few, smashing into a planet at light speed. I assume that might be akin to the doomsday asteroid theory no? Destroying a planet's surface to some degree but leaving in possibly intact to be terra formed or used as a natural resource.

The nature of hyperspace is such that it stops working if you drift too close to a mass shadow, hence Interdictors. That's why you can't hyperdrive into a planet. You can hyperdrive so close to a planet/star/black hole that you have severe issues not hitting it, but you won't hit it at lightspeed.

Not that the EU doesn't ignore that detail from time to time.

I think in the fluff it says the rotor was a big problem. It would get stuck in one postion and stop people from landing them.

That's if we don't just go with " its all made up" which is not as fun.

There are many instances where artificial horizons and orientation are important in the EU and in plenty of other sci-fi, too. You can call it a cop-out if you want—of course it's all made up—but a lot of rationalization has been done already for those interested, so you don't need to sweat it.

It's also worth considering that the B-Wing saw plenty of atmospheric combat where a real horizon was in play.

IIRCC the race that developed the B-Wing lived in an asteroid belt and all their ships did this to avoid collisions with small rocks. The pilot had nothing to do with this rotation it was controlled by automatic sensors. Sorta like adapted cruise control on cars today.

It was the Mon Cal that came up with the B-wing design, admiral Ackbar being the head of the project.

The Mon Cal are aquatic so it makes sense to have a cockpit that can be set to a predetermined horizon, its important for an undersea vessel to know where the surface is at all times.

This design is also fairly logical in space too and makes the B-wing one of the best star wars designs for real world physics, the pilot needs to be at the center of gravity during a turn and the B-wings design supports this design requirement
The cockpit doesn't rotate, the ship rotates around the cockpit.

It was manufactured by Slayn and Korpil, which is a Verpine company. The Verpine are an insectoid race that lived among asteroids as Rambler recalls correctly. Ackbar was the lead on the project, though.

That's another thing about the rotating cockpit: You'd have your sight cut off at random intervals as the body rotated the canons through your vision, providing only about 90 degrees of rotation where your sight isn't blocked. (roughly)

That's another thing about the rotating cockpit: You'd have your sight cut off at random intervals as the body rotated the canons through your vision, providing only about 90 degrees of rotation where your sight isn't blocked. (roughly)

I mean, look at the HWK. You can't even see out the front of that thing.

It's also a freighter, and it's got to be a huge distraction having those canons keep moving into your vision.

Also I never thought of something as I read a few replies above in there not really being a reason to build a Deathstar when you already have things moving at, or in the case of the Falcon's boasted .5 past, light speed. Imagine a Star Destroyer, of which the Empire has more than a few, smashing into a planet at light speed. I assume that might be akin to the doomsday asteroid theory no? Destroying a planet's surface to some degree but leaving in possibly intact to be terra formed or used as a natural resource.

The nature of hyperspace is such that it stops working if you drift too close to a mass shadow, hence Interdictors. That's why you can't hyperdrive into a planet. You can hyperdrive so close to a planet/star/black hole that you have severe issues not hitting it, but you won't hit it at lightspeed.

Not that the EU doesn't ignore that detail from time to time.

Where exactly is the B in the B-Wing?
I get the letters in the A, X & Y-Wings designation, but there is nothing vaguely B like in the B-Wing.

Mind you the E-Wing is also a curly one.

IIRCC the race that developed the B-Wing lived in an asteroid belt and all their ships did this to avoid collisions with small rocks. The pilot had nothing to do with this rotation it was controlled by automatic sensors. Sorta like adapted cruise control on cars today.

It was the Mon Cal that came up with the B-wing design, admiral Ackbar being the head of the project.

That is partially incorrect.

Admiral Ackbar was part of the project, but it was developped by Slayn & Korpil, a Verpine company.

The Verpine are an insectoid race inhabiting the Roche Asteroid Field

Where exactly is the B in the B-Wing?

I get the letters in the A, X & Y-Wings designation, but there is nothing vaguely B like in the B-Wing.

Mind you the E-Wing is also a curly one.

I prefer the B to stand for Blade, as the the B-Wing looks a bit like a sword (with crossguards) in attack configuration.

I don't see the 'B' otherwise in the craft ;p

The E-Wing ... kinda looks like an E, viewed from above?

I always assumed (and played with it as a kid as such) that the rotating body around the cockpit had to do with creating a larger firing circumference. Which would equate to more damage or chance of damage to the enemy. Sort of a "spiral death blossom" effect.

It'd make sense if the ship spun around the cockpit rather than the cockpit spinning on its rotor and the ship remaining completely still relative to its engines. The only purpose of a cockpit rotor is to jam at maximum at the worst possible time.

Also I never thought of something as I read a few replies above in there not really being a reason to build a Deathstar when you already have things moving at, or in the case of the Falcon's boasted .5 past, light speed. Imagine a Star Destroyer, of which the Empire has more than a few, smashing into a planet at light speed. I assume that might be akin to the doomsday asteroid theory no? Destroying a planet's surface to some degree but leaving in possibly intact to be terra formed or used as a natural resource.

The nature of hyperspace is such that it stops working if you drift too close to a mass shadow, hence Interdictors. That's why you can't hyperdrive into a planet. You can hyperdrive so close to a planet/star/black hole that you have severe issues not hitting it, but you won't hit it at lightspeed.

Not that the EU doesn't ignore that detail from time to time.

Doesn't Han say something to Luke about navigation a plot for hyperspeed is nothing like dusting crops, he may hit a planet or bounce off a supernova ... something like that. That would indicate that the only failsafe is the data within the navigational computer .. and its ability to plot an appropriate course. Nothing else.

Oh guys, stop trying to make sense of it - you'll never be able to because it wasn't designed to make sense! It was designed, very successfully, to look cool!

Where exactly is the B in the B-Wing?

I get the letters in the A, X & Y-Wings designation, but there is nothing vaguely B like in the B-Wing.

Mind you the E-Wing is also a curly one.

I prefer the B to stand for Blade, as the the B-Wing looks a bit like a sword (with crossguards) in attack configuration.

I don't see the 'B' otherwise in the craft ;p

The E-Wing ... kinda looks like an E, viewed from above?

As for the E wing, it's mainly because it was too hard to pronounce { wing.

Where exactly is the B in the B-Wing?

I get the letters in the A, X & Y-Wings designation, but there is nothing vaguely B like in the B-Wing.

Mind you the E-Wing is also a curly one.

You can clearly see a capital B if you imagine all three wings cut off and look at it from the side. The cockpit forms the top half of the B and the body of the ship forms the bottom half. Take a look at the side view in this image:

I know it's called a B-Wing simply because the prop department for RotJ had "Ship A" and "Ship B" which just kind of turned into A-Wing and B-Wing, but my favorite in-universe explanation is "blade-wing."

As for the E-Wing, wasn't the E short for Escort? It was supposed to be the next step in fighter superiority, replacing the X and A by trying to be both; it could escort bombers, assault fighters, and capital ships interchangeably. Or it was supposed to, anyway.

IIRCC the race that developed the B-Wing lived in an asteroid belt and all their ships did this to avoid collisions with small rocks. The pilot had nothing to do with this rotation it was controlled by automatic sensors. Sorta like adapted cruise control on cars today.

Was it a Verpine design? I know Ackbar's involvement in its creation is well known but if the bug people are the real muscle behind it then a crazy design may make more sense. As for auto-rotation I would expect there to be three flying modes at best: landing, fixed flight (at the top of the t), and automatic. There's no way a pilot would be adjusting that on the fly much less in the middle of a fight.

I never saw the B-Wing's body rotating around the cockpit for any purpose. My perception is that (like the X-Wing's S-foils) there are two positions: horizontal and vertical, cruise and attack. I also like to think that the pilot can select to fly horizontally or vertically (in relation to the cockpit) when in 'battle mode'

I'd like to raise another point about its design; its guns. Irrespective of the ships's position, its guns would only converge in front of the pilot if the pilot was constantly adjusting their angles (to converge at a specific distance in front of him/her). Most other SW fighters have their lasers placed equidistnat from the pilot. The B-Wing pilot would either have to adjust the laser angle throughout the battle OR learn to fire at objects slightly off centre to their position.

In the X-Wing games the guns automatically converged to the range the targeting computer determines. If you weren't locked on anything then the guns would fire straight ahead on parallel courses. I know I HATED flying the B-Wing in those games because of that cannon way on far end of the ship; that made lining up shots hard and that shot always seemed to arrive late. I also spent a lot of my hunting time without locking onto any enemy ship; no point in giving them the sensor warning that someone is on you. I had similar issues with the X-Wing but dual-linking those weapons helped give me the needed coverage. Of course when it came to busting up a mine field my ships of choice were the A and Y Wings because they were bore sighted very well on my flight path making snap shooting much easier.

I can see reasons for a rotating cockpit and if real world physics are considered I'd say there are even more. Perhaps an alternative question could be "why doesn't the YT-series use rotating cockpits?" Ships may want a "down" orientation when operating in a gravity well but in zero-G with an arbitrary down it shouldn't matter much.

In a tournament, can you play with a B-wing if it has been changed to the horizontal position?

In a tournament, can you play with a B-wing if it has been changed to the horizontal position?

Almost certainly. There were lots of examples of that sort of thing at Worlds. Ultimately it's up to your tournament organizer, but it's probably safe to assume that they won't have a problem with it.

I agree with Dagobah Dave, but be warned.

Check the "Has anyone actually seen a modified ship removed from play" thread (which is still on first page as I type this.)

There are some people who need a win so badly they will ask a Tournament Organiser to disqualify you for having a rotated B-Wing! (Or even a damaged ship)

In a tournament, can you play with a B-wing if it has been changed to the horizontal position?

Technically, no. It is a modified model and those are not specifically permitted.

Are you likely to be allowed to use it? Most likely yes but it may best to get permission first just in case someone wants to call you on it which may not be popular but appears to be within the rules.

The cockpit spins because a spinning cockpit makes for a cooler toy.

I prefer real science in my scifi but I must admit to always liking the visual of a spinning b wing.

Clearly the cockpit being turned 90 degrees imparts a massive advantage and you should not only be disqualified but have your models smashed, it's the only reasonable route to take.

LoL HoboJesus