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Originally posted by: Darth Simon
the redundency never really bothered me...i mean now i look at it and am like, the Empire is pretty stupid...think they could have come up with something better except..."damn, they blew up our 'invincible' battle station...what will we do?" "I know we can build a new one that is more vunerable." "Why, thats just crazy enough that it might work...get right on it"

My assumption and opinion:
DS2 was not more vulnerable than DS1, the Alliance simply knew its location while it was under construction.
If they had found DS1 while it was still under construction at Despayrne, it would have been far more easy to destroy.
Likewise if DS2 had been completed when it was attacked, the Alliance would have no chance, at least not in a space battle. The vulnerable exhaust ports was replaced with small exhaust slits which were all over the surface.