Oh that’s easy, for you see, that copy was in possession of Vader’s daughter, and Vader knew (thanks to the Force) that that copy would end up in the hands of his son, so he had no choice but to track it down, if he was going to find his son, join forces with him and overthrow the Emperor. (I really hope to Og that Lucas doesn’t lurk here, because if we does, and he sees this, we are so screwed.)
Bryan Ekers, odds are the blue prints would be broken up into several different files. One for the electrical system, one for the HVAC, etc., etc.
Ah, you’ve hit on a key point that most viewers miss. Star Wars is described as transpiring “long ago, in a galaxy far, far away”; obviously at a time when the universe was young and expanding fairly quickly. Both the time and distance scales were compressed and conflated, hence Han Solo’s comment about making “the Kessel run in less than 12 parsecs” and the ability of Millenium Falcon to limp to a neighboring star system without a functioning hyperdrive. In reality, the scale of the Star Wars universe (as compared to our modern-day measurements) was about 1:10000 or (likely) greater. This also explains the wooshing sounds of TIE fighters and the apparent aerodynamics in free space–the density of free gaseous matter was comperable to Earth’s atmosphereic pressure. Lucas had to be very careful during filming lest an errant breath flatten his exactly-to-scale models. The “forest moon” of Endor was actually a hardboiled egg, dyed green and left over from Passover. And the Endor scenes, which are often mistakenly thought to have been filmed in the Northern California Redwoods NF were actually filmed in the overgrown backyard of local cranky old lady and collectible stuffed creature fetishist Edna Beatrice Steptoe of Akron, Ohio, giving the true origins of the now-maligned Ewoks. (Lucas was originally going to use dwarf capuchin monkeys made up to look like Wookies but owning to budget constraints due to increased demands from Alec Guinness and Harrison Ford to continue to speak the wooden, cliche-ridden dialog couldn’t afford to rent the animals and pay for SPCA oversight so he ended up using wind-up stuff toys instead.)
Similarly, Battlestar Galactica took place only shortly after the condensation of matter from the quagma, which explains why the Cylon fighters were always “microns” away from the Galactica-led fleet. While in todays measurements this would suggest that they were right up against the hull, in the timeframe of the series they were actually quite distant. The entire series, in fact, took place in a volume no larger than a shoebox and using only the amount of energy needed to power a transistor radio.
Now, for my next trick, watch me pull an elephant out of my hat. “Again?!?”
They can’t be that essential, however, since Luke says, “I’ve lost R2!” and yet is still able to fly the X-Wing well enough to make the money shot and then fly back to base afterwards.
That was always my take, too, on all the myriad Star Wars games where different characters are stealing Death Star plans. Probably, at least some of these plans were just sort of “useless” in the end—they described the DS’s command and control systems, or the armor plating, or the arrangement of turbolasers defences around the main gun. At best, they might been just good for determining how they couldn’t attack the DS. At worst…“Ten Mon Cal agents lost their lives getting this data from an Imperial contractor, and one of our best commando/starfighter pilot/mercenaries risked his life delivering it to us. And now, after we decrypt it…what the hell? ‘Manual Override Controls for Internal Waste Disposal Chambers’? Aw, DAMNIT! What the hell good is that going to do for anyone!?”
Say, a quick thought on Droid starfighter pilots…it might have to do with intelligence.
Assuming it wouldn’t be impossible to build a droid with the smarts and skill to be a really good starfighter pilot—that’s not so far-fetched, I wouldn’t think—it might have been too expensive or difficult for the Rebels to get their hands on such droids. But, if it wasn’t, there might be another problem…most droids are basically slaves in the SW galaxy, right? Well, a droid smart enough to be a human-level pilot might resent being sent on probable suicide missions, which could badly affect his performance. And a droid stupid or conditioned enough to gladly fly to his death might not make a good enough pilot to risk an expensive and hard to replace starfighter on.
Possible that R2 was automatically regulating all the various systems on the ship, similar to how someone can be totally unconcious but still manage to keep a pulse and a breath going. It’s also debatable how much an astromech droid DOES in normal space flight, possible he just served whatever role a co-pilot would in a two-seater, managing things the pilot COULD take care of himself, but would rather not mess with, in addition to reaching out and fixing stuff outside of the cockpit.
I thought that astromechs were there to (1) repair in-flight damage and (2) act as the hyperdrive navacomputer for small ships like the X-Wing. So, good thing that Luke only needed to fly to Yavin 4, and not go into hyperspace at the end of the movie.
To return to the subject of the OP, a recent historical document discovery explains how the Rebels got the plans for the DS I. Interesting to note, that apparently Tarantino was either aware of this document while he was making Pulp Fiction or else the Force is strong in him.
Vader says additionally, that transmissions were beamed to her ship, suggesting that Leah was the upper contact of a vast network of spies. A fact that could be used against her in the council of planets. Spying is something that every country does and all countries frown upon.
In the column “For” droid pilots, Threepio was piloting Lukes speeder. So I’m guessing basic piloting software would be pretty much standard issue if it was on a protocol droid.
[spoiler]…We see 3PO acting as Padme’s pilot, and commenting that he’s “starting to get the hang of flying.” Granted, it’s a glorified RV, not a starfighter, but it’s still a starship proper.
I just wonder if piloting software is built into him, was loaded on “after market,” if Anakin was running low on protocol droid subprocessors and just Frankensteined in some pilot-droid brains during 3PO’s construction, or if his 3PO’s brain is just advanced enough that he can simply be taught to fly a spacecraft, like any other person.[/spoiler]
I wondered about that. Also: (Episode 3 spoiler) If he was memory wiped at the end of the movie, what portions of his memory would that affect? This might be more relevant in 3PO’s case since he’s certainly nonstandard. If his brain is indeed learning things, then he would have to lose all of that too.