Thread: Viper versus;
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Old October 17th, 2005, 06:11 PM   #6
Damocles
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Originally Posted by Centurian Draco
The Starfury and the TIE are only usable in space and don't have atmospheric capabilities. Whilst the others are usable in both situations, only the Thunderbolt seems to have effective control surfaces, so that would probobly prove desicive in atmosphere.
Have you forgotten inertia is directly proportional to mass?

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Since drag/resistance is negligable in space, and weight/size also really doesn't matter (apart from soaking up the destructive force of the weapons), the control surfaces on the Starfury would be useless, as would the X-wing's whole 'open wings' to attack, 'close wings' to go faster thing.
What control surfaces on the Starfury(Aurora model)? It is a pure rocket.

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The Viper seems to be the fastest, managing light speed or near light speed with conventional thrust, but having engines that seem to make it more like a Jet Fighter with reverse.
I have seen reverse thrust used on the Viper on screen, but where is this enormous delta vee? Even with turbo, the rate of advance has averaged ten lengths per second in port starboard aspect as seen on screen. So what is the citation?

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The Raider is in the same league, but not as fast, and without the same level of reverse thrust that the Viper enjoys.

I have never seen the Raider reverse on screen, ever.
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The X-Wing IMHO would be V slow comapered to the Viper/Raider, as it's only marginally faster than the TIE is, in SW, but with FTL star-drive (non combat), it also seems to only have forward thrust (perhaps reverse of some limited type like the Raider).
The X Wing's hyperdrive gives it an enormouse maneuver advantage as it can FTL skip attack.

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The TIE would be a slow boy with it's twin ION engines as we understand them providing the kind of constant gentle push that would be of more use to deep space probes than fighters, so even if you imagine them as prodiving the kind of thrust a modern military Jet has (which is a stretch) they are a candle against the blow-lamp of the Viper or Raider. It doesn't seem to have any thrust nozzels apart from the two little ones at the rear so even with vectored thrust, it's not got reverse.
Despite the idiotic Lucas' science claims(ION engines?) the onscreen evidence shows the TIE to be a fair match as a rocket against the X Wing; if, like the X Wing unmaneuverable. It is faster as it is seen to overtake X Wings it pursues. This fits in nicely with its observed rate of advance as measured against a time count.

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The Starfury would be slow compared to the top two (possibly about the same as an X-Wing), but with so many thrust nozzles, it would be very nimble.
The rate of advance for the Fury is as previously posted. Have you noticed something about television and film? The motion speed is set by the camera object track speed? Too fast a rate of advance in a static shot and the image filmed is blurred. This shouldn't be a problem with CGI but the CGI crowd has to contend with scan line image refreshing as opposed to the frames film exposed per second that the film bunch has to contend with optically when they film models so they have theior own built in blur effect. In either method you get a streak effect if the rate of advance for your image in a static shot exceeds the refresh rate. So you get slow explosion effects, people running across screen at half speed(TV) and unless you match tracking motion with the image you get blur effects. That partially explains why all those spaceships look so SLOW on film.

That is why all these fighters seem to move between five and ten lengths per second rate of advance.

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As for the weapons, you can only assume that all would have weapons that would easily destroy a fighter, and even the light shields of the Viper, X-wing, or Advanced Raider, would only protect them from a glancing blow/single hit. All seem to have energy weapons except for perhaps the Starfury which seems to fire some kind of explosive projectile (correct me if I'm wrong) So with that in mind, the Starfury might find that the fastest ships were simply too fast to hit, and were to fast to chase.
Again what onscreen evidence suggests this slow rate of advance for the Fury?

As to the Fury's weapons, this is an explanation for how particle bolters work on a Viper. I assure you that the Fury could carry the same;

http://forums.colonialfleets.com/showthread.php?t=12061

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The TIE looks great but I think is not really practicle when you start to break it down. I think it would be left for dead by the BSG fighters, and would be outmanouvered by the Starfury.
The TIE actually is a more realistic design than the X-Wing. Where it fails is putting its rockets off the centerline of thrust mass and putting those idiotic solar panels(I consider the panels to be heat radiators) in a position where the panels obscure pilot vision.(Though in a true space fighter I would use a transparent bubble canopy of at least 240 degrees forward globular view or put the pilot in an armored capsule and have TV inputs that gave the pilot a clear unobstructed view of the battle space around him in all aspects, showing him all targets either on a kind of super radar screen or as an actual picture of the situation(ANALOG).

In such a context, those idiotic TIE radiators should have been mounted as wraparound panels on the tail of a tadpole shaped fighter. The sphere head would carry the pilot the guns and the life support/control. That spine tail would carry the reactor, the heat radiators, chaff pods, RCS(The thing is a ROCKET!), the ION engines and the fuel. Matte black it would be hard to see and hard toi hit in that configuration. But nobody knows the first thing about engineering when it comes to designing "cool" spacecraft.

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SO! My Death by degrees list is:
In Space.
Viper (way ahead)
Raider
(big gap)
X-Wing/Starfury/Thunderbolt
TIE
Fury(has the maneuver edge as well as the speed equality, plus better pilots and harder hitting weapons)
Viper and Raider closer than you think.

X-Wing has its own unique advantage in its hyperdrive.
TIE-incompetently designed and poorly armed.

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In Atmosphere.
Thunderbolt
Viper/Raider (Raider gets some points for having more drag)
X-wing
The X-Wing has shown atmospheric flight though I suspect like the Thunderbolt it is a dog in air combat.

The Thunderbolt is still essentially a rocket with stub wings. It is a pig in an atmosphere of little use except as a bomber.(as seen on film). In an air to air the Viper will eat it alive. The Raider likewise would, air to air, give the Thunderbolt a hard time!

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In space, it would be like the minefield in the Nova-matagon (journey to Carrillon). The Vipers would be coming soooooo fast that the others would appear to be almost stationary, and they'd simply blow them to Frack with Laser Torpedos.
This must be a book reference for the screen evidence does not support this observation.

ADDENDUM; Laser torpedoes? That is physically impossible. You might have a plasma encased missile misnamed as a "laser torpedo" but that is essence an unguided rocket or mine and should be so described.

Best wishes;
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