When it comes to eliminating the Second Death Star, I think simply having the first one survive is by far the better option. It’s much more feasible and strays a lot less from canon. Instead of vaporizing instantly in ANH, it shatters into chunks. In RotJ, it would simply be rebuilt in a similar fashion to the Skywalker Saber or Kylo’s mask in TRoS.
The idea I was running on with my in-limbo edit was that in the Battle of Hoth, there would be a failed Trench Run, using footage from ANH with Gold Leader’s failed trench run. This would damage the Death Star, but not destroy it. They might think in RotJ it’s down for a while, but turns out that it wasn’t!
This was also half so that I wouldn’t have to replace every shot of the Death Star in RotJ, something I might be able to do now, but I don’t think I could have pulled it off in 2017 when I first had the idea of 2018 when I actually started on it.