Toughest shield/armour THIS weapon can penetrate. AND. Is it broken?

[big_adventure]

Yeah, it's a bit like Killer Croc's "big rock", only in a situation where Killer Croc had to utilise an ICBM and a frickin' huge laser to mine the rock with which to hit Batman.

The means would make a much more efficient and effective weapon than the ends, ergo the means aren't justified.

...or having a complicated building-sized interplanetary communications setup and holographic film studio then ripping that apart as raw materials to send smoke signals.

[T51R]

To be fair, since the civilization's tech would have to be extreme to set up such a weapon, you could provide them with shielding and gravity manipulation enough to deal with the problems. The issue, though, is that if they can do that, this tech is a useless antiquated joke - shields will exist to totally no-sell the weapon, and even if only the owner of this weapon has that tech, they'd be taking a MASSIVE risk sending this thing into combat, since any damage to/failure of the shielding/grav-manipulation would turn their entire fleet into a chunk of rock in space. You'd be much better off just using the zetawatts of energy you are generating in a directed gravitic or energy attack on your enemy, rather than trying to launch this monstrosity at them.

I think that's the start of my problem when it comes to running with this concept; the level of tech isn't supposed to be all that high for the context itself. The kind of stuff that's been put forward above, no, its definitely way above the tech demands of the story.

[big_adventure]

I think that's the start of my problem when it comes to running with this concept; the level of tech isn't supposed to be all that high for the context itself. The kind of stuff that's been put forward above, no, its definitely way above the tech demands of the story.

Well, if you want to run with it that way, you could make it some kind of "precursor" society tech that they found and jury-rigged into service. If their tech level is low enough, maybe they wouldn't even be able to reengineer it to a more efficient purpose? You could have plot twists, like finding out it's really a mining vessel for smashing up comets or asteroids, or a fireworks-equivalent - they use it for blowing things up to make pretty sights. You could have in breaking down all the time, or just being generally unreliable, or having a peaceful AI with a developed sense of independence that controverts the warlike intentions of the new owners.