A broadly applicable lithography tool figure of merit will be presented and evaluated for present technologies. A comparison of the cost effectiveness of current lithographic technologies shows that a laser generated, soft x-ray plasma proximity stepper is superior to competing technologies for production applications at one micrometer and below. The technology developments that make a soft x-ray proximity stepper more cost effective than other high resolution lithographic technologies will be discussed. Soft x-ray exposure sensitivity data will be presented for conventional novolak resists and acid catalyzed high sensitivity novolak-based materials. Resist profiles from soft x-ray exposures of standard, novolak-based resists will be compared to simulations obtained from a modified version of SAMPLE. In addition, x-ray and optical aerial image contrast calculations from SAMPLE will be compared. Novel aspects of the patented, high brightness Hampshire x-ray source will be presented and a comparison to other x-ray sources will be made. Lastly, the preliminary performance of a stepper employing Hampshire's laser-based x-ray plasma source will be presented indicating the performance achieved to date.