Death Star plans The Death Star plans , codenamed " Stardust " by Galen Erso , were the blueprints of the first Death Star , an Imperial superweapon based on Geonosian designs . History . Clone Wars . The Death Star was designed by Geonosian s led by Archduke Poggle the Lesser , a member of the Confederacy of Independent Systems . During the Battle of Geonosis , he gave the plans to Count Dooku , who decided to ferry them to his master Darth Sidious , who would keep them safe . Dooku was intercepted by Obi - Wan Kenobi and Anakin Skywalker in his solar sailer ' s hangar , but defeated them and fled from Yoda by dropping a pillar on the two unconscious Jedi . Dooku met Sidious in the Works on Coruscant , and construction commenced three years later . Following the establishment of the Galactic Empire , Professor Galen Erso and his fellow scientist s made modifications to the plans while being guided by Director Orson Callan Krennic . Galactic Civil War . Stolen during the Battle of Scarif by the Rogue One squad at the cost of heavy Rebel losses , the remaining copy of these blueprints were transmitted to Prince ss Leia Organa ' s starship and into the hands of members of the Rebel Alliance , stationed aboard the " Tantive IV " . Unfortunately , as the ship arrived at Tatooine to ferry Kenobi to Alderaan , it was intercepted by the " Devastator " , and Organa , in a desperate gamble , entrusted the blueprints to the memory systems of the astromech droid R2 - D2 . He and the protocol droid C - 3PO were then sent in an escape pod to Tatooine , where they eventually ended up being purchased by Owen Lars , who gave them to Luke Skywalker to look after . R2 - D2 , however , determined to fulfill the mission given to him by Organa , tricked Skywalker into removing his restraining bolt so that he could seek out Kenobi . Luke , worried about his uncle ' s reaction , sought out R2 in the Jundland Wastes , where he was rescued by the very Kenobi that the R2 series astromech droid was seeking . The group returned to Kenobi ' s home , where Kenobi discovered that R2 - D2 was carrying a message for him from Organa explaining that R2 was carrying information vital to the survival of the Rebellion that needed to be delivered to Alderaan , but that the " Tantive IV " had been captured by the Empire . The group secured passage to Alderaan aboard the " Millennium Falcon " , pilot ed by Han Solo and Chewbacca . Upon the ship ' s exit from hyperspace at the planet ' s coordinates , however , they discovered that it been completely obliterated by the very vessel whose stolen plans R2 - D2 was carrying . The group managed to hide from the Empire and , in sneaking aboard the vessel to disable its tractor beam , found that Organa was being held prisoner there . The group , sans Kenobi , hatched a plan to rescue her , while Kenobi disabled the tractor beam . Though Kenobi was killed in a lightsaber duel with Darth Vader , the remainder of the group escaped and made their way to Yavin 4 . There , the stolen plans were brought to the leaders of the Rebellion as the Empire pursued the tracked " Millennium Falcon " to the location . Upon examination , the Rebels discovered the work of Galen Erso , a scientist forced to participate in the Death Star ' s design and construction : a subtle sabotage of the Death Star ' s design to include a flaw in the superlaser reactor by which a pressurized explosion would cause a chain reaction that would destroy the entire station . The Rebels determined the best way to reach the reactor was for a starfighter to fire proton torpedo es into a 2 - meter wide thermal exhaust port that led directly to the station ' s power core , and thus planned an attack with that objective , having observed the Death Star ' s defenses were built to withstand assaults from larger vessels . Although the target was considered a highly difficult one , and the resulting Battle of Yavin resulted in heavy casualties with Darth Vader coming within a hairsbreadth of defeating the attack ; Skywalker , with the aid of the Force , was ultimately able to fire two proton torpedoes perfectly into the port to destroy the Death Star . Behind the scenes . The Death Star plans were central to the plot of the , ultimately enabling the Rebellion to find a key weakness in the Death Star , allowing Luke Skywalker to destroy it . The plans were also seen in the prequel film , showcasing the early development of the Death Star , known at the time as the " Ultimate Weapon . " The means by which the Death Star plans were captured by the Rebellion was the subject of numerous , mutually exclusive stories in the Expanded Universe of " Star Wars " , later rebranded as " Star Wars " Legends , leading Pablo Hidalgo to comment that " . . . if you had to throw a dinner party and invite everyone who had ever stolen the Death Star plans , you ' d be surprised at how many place settings you ' d have to worry about " . The canonical theft is depicted in " " . The grid plan animations shown during the Rebel briefing for the attack on the Death Star late in " A New Hope " were an actual computer graphics simulation from the Jet Propulsion Labs ( JPL ) made by Larry Cuba and Gary Imhoff as part of a project for school at CalArts , and had been included during filming for " Star Wars " : Episode IV " A New Hope " ( then known as just " Star Wars " ) . Originally , the writers and staff planned to thank JPL for assisting in the graphics , but it was changed to the specific programmers ' names after one of the programmers , Mike Plesset , pointed out that JPL didn ' t even know their computers had been used . Interestingly , the images in Episode IV ( and consequently " Rogue One " ) contained in the plans feature the Death Star with its Superlaser in the equatorial zone , instead of the upper hemisphere . This is because in the early drafts for " A New Hope " , the superlaser was intended to be situated on the center of the equatorial trench , but was then repositioned to the station ' s " northern hemisphere " . However , the film crew forgot to notify Cuba and Imhoff to make the same change to their own designs , thus creating an on - screen blooper .