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[Urist McScoopbeard]

You do appear to be correct. As the Super Star Destroyer appeared to tank THREE hits from hyperspace'd Star Destroyers, you would think Snoke's Ultra-Super-Mega-Star-Destroyer would be able to shrug off one antiquated rebel transport-turned-capital ship.

[Putnam]

the one posted is from the EU, i.e. not canon

[Urist McScoopbeard]

the one posted is from the EU, i.e. not canon

Well unless shields have been retconned I will take it as a prime example.

[Kot]

When Leia went flying in space, another pretty important character died - Admiral Ackbar. Literally with not even a footnote. This allows Holdo to be inserted, and while I'd like to say that it is the sole reason, another might be Ackbar's voice actor death not long ago, but then... it didin't stop Leia, did it? Also, you'd have to consider how hilariously politically incorrect would it be for a character named Ackbar to do the suicide maneuver.

Well unless shields have been retconned I will take it as a prime example.

But then Millenium Falcon goes under the base shields in previous movie so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯.

EDIT: Also, when she is about to ram, everyone notices what she is doing and understands what she is doing. This implies everyone realizes that you can hyperspace ram a ship.
But nobody ever does it? It's not even a matter of "ships to costly to waste ramming" or "gotta suicide", because you could make dedicated rams that would be relatively cheap and suicide doesn't seem like a problem for many Star Wars groups, and even then, droids.
It is really problematic because guerilla groups such as Resistance should then do it way more often.

[hector13]

Why though? You’d need to build entire new ships every time you wanted to do it, it’d probably be cheaper to use, like, actual weapons.

I’m sure there was a droid rights movement or something in the EU, too :p

Edit: it’s not as though Holdor really had a choice at that point. Hux made it abundantly clear he wasn’t taking prisoners, blowing up ships that he could just as easily have captured.

The ship was lost whether or not she warped through Snoke’s ship.

[Kot]

Why though? You’d need to build entire new ships every time you wanted to do it, it’d probably be cheaper to use, like, actual weapons.

Compare the size of the Resistance ship and the Snoke's flagship.
It's also apparently unavoidable, could potentially have nearly unlimited range, you could bombard planets with it (why the hell even bother with Death Star), and most importantly - you could do it to inflict heavy losses in a fight you'd lose otherwise. They don't even have to be ships or even big, you can as well replace or just suplement existing weaponry with hyperspace torpedoes that get through shields (which would be incredibly useful in this situation for First Order, as they could have just battered the Resistance ship engines with bunch of those) and deal a lot of damage.

I’m sure there was a droid rights movement or something in the EU, too :p

Fair enough, but then I'd have hard time imagining Sith, Hutts or w/e giving a lot of shit about droids as they batter enemy fleets into oblivion with hyperspace projectiles.

[hector13]

What would be the point in hyperspace torpedoes though? It’d be more effective to pack the space that would be hyperdrive engines with more explosives, presumably.

This makes planetary bombardments a pointless thing, especially since the examples we see in the movies are of turbolaser barrages, effectively limited only by the size of your rechargeable power source. Why make specialized weaponry for it when you have that?

As for unavoidability: the singular example we have of this is of two ships who were, by standards of open space, right next to each other. The attacking ship was tiny, the attacked ship effin’ huge. By the time they realized what she had planned, they had no chance of moving out the way.

Unlimited range is more of a problem, and unlikely even for hitting planets. You’re trying to hit tiny points which are moving through space in three dimensions from trillions of miles away. An effective range would be tiny.

[Kot]

What would be the point in hyperspace torpedoes though? It’d be more effective to pack the space that would be hyperdrive engines with more explosives, presumably.

Bypasses shields.
Goes so fast you can't dodge it.
Pretty much impossible to be shoot down once it goes, something what "more explosives" regular torpedoes/missiles are prone to.

This makes planetary bombardments a pointless thing, especially since the examples we see in the movies are of turbolaser barrages, effectively limited only by the size of your rechargeable power source. Why make specialized weaponry for it when you have that?

Bypasses shields.
You can basically do it from the other side of galaxy.
Also, Star Wars turbolasers aren't exactly lasers, since they still work on exactly the same principle as blasters, which, despite it being mostly old lore, I think canonically still use Tibanna gas or some other "ammo", which means they are still limited by ammunition, rather than power sources.
The "specialized weaponry" argument is kinda dumb, as all of the weapons are specialized. I'm not implying some kind of hyperspace torpedo would be "I win!" button, but rather a logical and useful extension of arsenals of Star Wars armies, with it's own uses and downsides.

As for unavoidability: the singular example we have of this is of two ships who were, by standards of open space, right next to each other. The attacking ship was tiny, the attacked ship effin’ huge. By the time they realized what she had planned, they had no chance of moving out the way.

Now imagine if that was from an ambush, or better yet, against a relatively stationary target like a planet or Death Star, but from very far away.
And the ships weren't "right next to each other", the movie made a point that the Resistance was too far away for First Order "turbolasers" (which now apparently curve in space so...) to get their shields penetrated (which is something I'm just gonna suspend my disbelief for), so First Order just decided to pursue until Resistance runs out of fuel. That seems like it is a distance much further away than at which regular combat would take place, which means that hyperspace weapons at very least are unavoidable at slightly further away than distances where regular combat would take place.
Hitting enemy ships with multiple smaller hyperspace projectiles also means you're attacking something very big with something very tiny, even if enemy ships aren't as big as Snoke's private ride.

Unlimited range is more of a problem, and unlikely even for hitting planets. You’re trying to hit tiny points which are moving through space in three dimensions from trillions of miles away. An effective range would be tiny.

You have to realize that the whole thing that enables hyperspace travel is a computer that basically calculates a path through space that doesn't hit anything on the way. The only thing you have to achieve is try to hit the thing at the end of the road instead of dodging it too.
Also, if what you're saying is true, how the fuck would anyone arrive at their destinations? The planets are tiny points moving through space in three dimensions from trillions of miles away, how does anyone manage to jump exactly next to them? Why is that easier than jumping right into them?

[Urist McScoopbeard]

Hyperspace torpedoes were a thing in the EU, and they pretty much destroyed planets. They were fired by the Galaxy Gun.

Also, even normal torpedoes bypass shields in Star Wars. Shields work kinda similar to DUNE shields, where something going slow enough will pass through the shield, but high velocity projectiles will get fried.

[Kot]

Hyperspace torpedoes were a thing in the EU, and they pretty much destroyed planets. They were fired by the Galaxy Gun.

No. That's the point. The Galaxy Gun fired projectiles through hyperspace, but that was only a mean of transport - they carried regular (well, "regular", it was pretty special payload, but payload working in realspace) to target system, whereas the projectiles resumed flight and hit with normal speed. Due to this the projectile had to be heavily shielded so it couldn't be shot down before impact.
Hyperspace torpedoes would not have this problem.

Upon exiting hyperspace and homing in on its target, the projectile's automated defenses would activate to deter enemy forces. Automated laser cannon turrets exchanged laser fire with warships while thick armor plating and powerful energy shields deflected even the most advanced ion cannons and turbolasers.

Also, even normal torpedoes bypass shields in Star Wars. Shields work kinda similar to DUNE shields, where something going slow enough will pass through the shield, but high velocity projectiles will get fried.

But they can be shot down. Hyperspace torpedoes can't. That's the point, they might be more expensive than regular weaponry, but there is no real defence against them.

[Putnam]

the one posted is from the EU, i.e. not canon

Well unless shields have been retconned I will take it as a prime example.

i'm not sure you understand what "not canon" means

[Urist McScoopbeard]

listen, I will never accept Disney canon.

[Madman198237]

Hyperspace ship of death is dumb, and utterly breaks all logic in all of Star Wars' combats for all time.

You just preprogram a nice recon Y-Wing's navicomputer with a straight path in hyperspace, and BOOM, no more freakin' Death Star. Don't need to put a torpedo through the exhaust port if you can just hyperspace your happy way through the entire dreadnought and the rest of the fleet in a zigzag pattern, striking some enemy ships up to three times with a single cruiser. I COULD be mistaken, I've only seen the movie once, but that's how it looked (And others who saw it agreed with me). But come on now, the whole point of hyperspace is that it avoids anything without strong (Possibly only natural) gravity, and travels much, MUCH faster than light.

It is disgusting that they name-dropped Ackbar just so he's dead, even though he could EASILY just have been off doing Discount Rebellion Resistance things in the Outer Rim.

Luke randomly Force-ghosting himself was ALSO pretty stupid. Though I must say the projecting-from-across-the-galaxy was pretty cool, a nice nod to Luke's powers (Especially compared to Ren's/Rey's, as it is very much like them being able to see each other and touch each other even across the galaxy, isn't it....yet Ren remarked that the effort required to do so would kill either one of them, if I recall correctly.)

Anyways, a lot of that movie really, really annoys me. I don't actually hate it, but I certainly don't love it either.

[Urist McScoopbeard]

I mean, aside from shield and size difference fuckery, the hyperspace suicide was not a bad concept. One of a few moments that I thought really added to the Star Wars franchise in a meaningful way.

A Y-Wing hyperspace suiciding probably wouldn't do all that much damage.

[Madman198237]

But it could, couldn't it? I mean, why not? The one single cruiser plowed through a super-dreadnought and a bunch of Star Destroyers...and killed them all. A single Y-Wing should be more than enough to disable a Death Star superlaser.