The Hypercourse Ambush was a tactic used during the Clone Wars and Galactic Civil War when facing small raid fleets in space. It utilized one or more Acclamator-class assault ships, depending on their powerful hyperdrives, rated 0.6.
Details[]
Conditions[]
- The enemy fleet must be small enough for one or more Acclamators to destroy.
- The enemy fleet must be large enough to escape during any attempt to jump to hyperspace.
- The systems in range of a quick getaway hyperspace jump must be neutral or disputed territory.
Procedure[]
The tactic consisted of three stages:
- Forcing (or permitting) an enemy to retreat.
- Tracing the enemy escape vector and jumping along it with the assault ships.
- When using this tactic, the assault ships would withhold part of their starfighter complement in their hangars. Carrying their starfighters let the assault ships to retain their advantage.
- The fleet would usually corner the enemy to a limited range of hyperspace jump vectors, usually near a nebula or moon, so the enemy would have little choice in their escape destination.
- Arriving ahead of the enemy fleet and surprising the enemy when it reverts to realspace.
- Since Acclamator assault ships had a hyperdrive rating of 0.6, there were few starships in the galaxy that could outrun it in hyperspace.
- Most ships at that time had to have time to cool their hyperdrives, as multiple small jumps in a short time strained the pre-Battle of Endor ships.
Strengths[]
This tactic could be utilized effectively against:
- Reconnaissance fleets
- Pirate fleets
- Smugglers
- Medium-sized fleets that have relatively large ships (such as Munificent-class frigate) in a narrow hyperspace lane.
Weaknesses[]
This tactic was ineffective if the enemy could:
- Jump along many different vectors
- Defeat the Acclamators
- Outrun the Acclamator in hyperspace (an extreme rarity)
History[]
This tactic was devised by a tactician training on Corulag in 27 BBY, which suggested that Kuat Drive Yards should upgrade the hyperdrive units on its patrol vessels to a rating of at least 0.6. Upon the arrival of the Rothana Heavy Engineering Acclamator assault ships just prior to the Clone Wars, the tactic was tested by using several Acclamators to patrol the edge of the Outer Rim for pirate activity.
This tactic was used on the Blood Karvers a week before the Clone Wars, which Jett Worrap responded to by dumping the gang's cargo, a ploy that let them manage to escape, but enraged Jabba the Hutt to the extreme of sending bounty hunters. It was also used during the 1337 N00B5 raid on the Jedi Temple, but the 1337 N00B5 tricked the Acclamator Ovation into jumping to a territory that had just been scouted by a sizable Confederate fleet. After that, the tactic was used sparingly by the Republic, used only when the enemy could be cornered to jump along a definite vector to a neutral or uninhabited system.
A variant of this tactic was also used by the Chiss in 11 BBY.
Behind the scenes[]
A similar tactic can be used in Star Wars: Empire at War, if playing as the Rebels. If the Empire is playing defensively, and has few units guarding its remaining systems, it is possible to completely destroy a retreating Imperial fleet if it has a Star Destroyer, Death Star, or other large vessel (even an Acclamator, which is much slower in the game than in the canon universe) using this tactic with a small amount of X-wings and Y-wings (or B-wings in Forces of Corruption) jumping to the Empire's retreat destination ahead of the Imperial fleet. This is an ineffective strategy, however, if the Empire has Tartan cruisers remaining in its retreating fleet.