The full-scale superlaser was built in the Death Star and was used six times-it was first used during a Rebel raid on the Death Star, when Rebel agent X2 used the yet-unfinished superlaser to destroy one of the escorting Star Destroyers, then it was fired once with four percent power to destroy the Fortressa, a Lucrehulk-class battleship under Rebel control, three shots were fired as a secret test shortly after, to destroy the prison planet Despayre, and another shot with full power to destroy Alderaan and demonstrate the Galactic Empire's strength, with the superlaser shot being powerful enough to completely overwhelm the planetary shield of Alderaan. " Now witness the firepower of this fully armed and operational battlestation! Fire at will, Commander." ― Emperor Palpatine In 2 BBY, Galen Marek traveled through one of the firing tubes in the superlaser dish during the Battle on Death Star I, causing structural damage in the process. Finally, the first full-scale superlaser was installed in the first Death Star battlestation, becoming its primary weapon. This model became known as the Death Star prototype. The proof-of-concept model of the superlaser was built at the Maw Installation in the Kessel system. During development, the Composite Beam Superlaser was developed after initial plans regarding the Concave Dish Composite Beam Superlaser ran into development problems, although the problems in the latter weapon ended up fixed, thus rendering the former weapon unnecessary. As early as in 19 BBY, shortly before the foundation of the Galactic Empire, Supreme Chancellor Palpatine sent the 501st Legion to retrieve a Mygeetan energy crystal that was later utilized as a power source of the Death Star superlaser in Project Hammertong, a top secret research program to develop a fully operational superlaser. The idea was later realized by Bevel Lemelisk, as well as by Geonosian weapons engineers. The use of such massive and terrifying weapons to inspire terror on the citizens of the Empire became the core of his Tarkin Doctrine. The concept of the superlaser, Emperor Palpatine's most frightening weapon, was born in the mind of Grand Moff Wilhuff Tarkin. " What Ki-Adi-Mundi didn't know, however, is that our unit of the 501st was really after a Mygeetan power source that the Chancellor wanted for his superlaser." ―Anonymous 501st clone trooper Due to its focusing lenses and beam intensity, the energy wasted was extremely low, leading to a very long shooting range, up to 2,000,000 kilometers (over six light-seconds). In such cases, the amount of energy involved was so great it would generate minuscule space-time singularities, sending part of the target's mass into hyperspace and generating a massive shock wave from high-energy tachyons from hyperspace.
The Death Star's superlaser, for example, could destroy any capital ship with less than 10 percent power, crack a planet open to the core with two 30 percent shots and blow it to pieces with a full-charged fire. Īs any powered weapon, it drained the amount of energy required to use, resulting in different energy outputs.
The energy delivered into a target was so great that it could cause the target's atoms to split into matter/antimatter pairs and annihilate themselves, creating hundreds of miniature singularities while generating a powerful surge capable of rupturing the barrier between normal space and hyperspace. Unlike turbolasers, it pulled energy from a massive hypermatter core, converting the energy present in hyperspace into highly unstable particles that were tremendously destructive in normal space. The superlaser was composed of several exotic matter beams accelerated and amplified by gigantic focusing magnetic lenses and coils, producing a single powerful beam.