Are TIE Fighters REALLY that bad? (Fleet Junkies welcomed)

Way to assume I was referring to all TIE models, when I consistently refer to normal/standard/regular TIEs. NOT the advanced. NOT the interceptor. NOT the Defender. Next time, if you are going to try to refute one of my positions, actually wait until I comment on it, k? I didn't say anything about an X-Wing being superior to an TIE Interceptor, I challenge you to show where I did. My comments are only regarding X-Wings versus the normal TIE fighter. But, an A-Wing is superior to the Interceptor in acceleration, so there. Since you couldn't bother yourself to find out which TIE fighter I was talking about, it is YOU who are in fact, quite wrong. All your opposition to my points is based on Interceptors, when, I never tried to claim X-Wings were superior to them. Pay attention next time.

 

He said "TIE/ln", not "TIE/In".

 

Which, on this board, actually look different, so there's no excuse for slipping up.

 

I admit, I confused TIE/ln with TIE/In. However, TIEs do not have a 600G advantage, and the Star Wars Wiki backs me up. Its 400. But, the percentages aren't that big. TIEs are 1.10 times as fast. that means if an X-Wing goes 100, a TIE can go 110. Whoopdeedoo. the Star Wars Wiki says TIEs have acceleration rate of 4100, X-Wings 3700. When you divide 4100 by 3700, you get 1.108. I will even be generous, and make it a 1.11X speed advantage. So, a TIE is a one and an eleventh again as fast...hardly "blatantly superior". Given the constant speed changes required in a dogfight, a TIE Fighter could hardly exploit its very minor speed advantage. In a straight line race, a TIE would have the advantage in speed, I will grant you that. But again, dogfights aren't races, they are tests of skill and survivability.

Now, I am sure that some of you will point to the MGLT specification listed here:
http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/TIE_Fighter for the TIE, listing it as 100MGLT, and say that the X-Wing is only capable of 80 MGLT, because of this link:
http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/T-65_X-wing_starfighter

but, before you do that, check out this link:
http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Megalight
Same website has contradictory information regarding the top speeds of TIEs and X-Wings. The X-Wing page says they go 80, yet, when you look at the page that tells you what MGLT means, it says they go 100, same as the TIE. Going by MGLTs, either the TIE had a speed advantage, or they were tied. Since the website contradicts itself, it can hardly be completely trusted on the subject, can it?

But, if we insist on trusting the site, as its where the Star Wars Databank links to, then the X-Wing is even better in comparison...I had completely forgot about countermeasures, which is another advantage X-Wings have over TIEs, in that TIEs don't have any. While they had limited torpedoes because of lack of supply, the X-Wing page shows that X-Wings were capable of carrying up to 6, with 3 per launcher. It also states that TIEs have to be modified in order to carry torpedoes and missiles, which would make any such TIE non-standard, and thus non-applicable.

So, you still have the X-Wing being almost as fast as , or equal to TIE speed, depending on your source, twice the laserpower of a TIE, with torpedo ability the TIEs don't have, with shields the TIEs don't have, with countermeasures the TIEs don't have, with hyperdrives the TIEs don't have, a life support system the TIEs don't have, and yet, I am expected to believe that between pilots of equal skill, a TIE is the superior fighter? Its marginal speed advantage does not make up for its plethora of weaknesses. To quote the Star Wars Databank:

TIE fighters were typically employed en masse to make up for their shortcomings. Speedy and maneuverable, these fighters are nonetheless fragile. Though hard to hit, even a glancing blow can destroy a TIE.

Though TIEs presented a formidable challenge to pirates and civilian craft, the skilled pilots of the Rebel Alliance made short work of them in combat. The Alliance workhorse, the T-65 X-wing starfighter, continually bested the TIE in numerous engagements.[/b]


Lets look at that a second, k? They are deployed en masse to make up for their shortcomings. So, the Empire acknowledged that pound for pound, the TIE Fighter was not a superior Fighter.

The fighters are fragile. Now, I don't know about you, but would you buy a car that got totaled because of a fender bender, or would you rather have a car that tough enough to be able to withstand fender benders? I would rather have a car that doesn't crumple under the least of impacts...

TIEs are good enough to fend off pirates and civilians, who are going to be poorly trained, but skilled Rebellion pilots made short work of them. Short work...not that X-Wings struggled, but short work seems to imply that head to head, X-Wings tend to smoke TIE Fighters pretty quickly. Isn't that what "short work" generally means? If you make "short work" of someone, it means you dominated and killed t

 

Hey, its not my fault that all of the official sources imply that compared to X-Wings, TIEs suck. I am just waiting for a single official source to claim that TIEs are superior overall, that's all. My position wasn't that TIEs were completely useless, but that head to head, it does not compare favorably with an X-Wing, and I have yet to find anything official from Lucasfilm that says otherwise. Against an equal number of X-Wings, TIEs are at a disadvantage, because of the inherent weaknesses of the design. You have to be a better TIE pilot in order to kill an X-Wing than an X-Wing pilot has to be in order to kill a TIE.

The Rebel Fighters in ANH weren't trying to dogfight much. Their mission wasn't to eliminate the TIEs, their mission was to drop a torpedo down the exhaust shaft. Considering that according to TheForce.Net's own sources,

http://theforce.net/swtc/ds/hangars.html

the Death Star had 1831 TIEs available, against what, a few squadrons of Rebel X-Wings and Y-Wings, if they had concentrated on dogfighting, they would never have gotten near the trench. Even superior fighters like X-Wings cannot hope to outfight over 1800 potential TIEs. They were racing towards the trench to fulfill their mission. And, considering half of the Rebellion pilots were in slower Y-Wings, the rebel pilots were vastly outnumbered, I think they gave a good accounting of themselves.

 

Yes, but as X-Wing: Rogue Squadron (the Stackpole novel, since I'd wager it's not the only entity with that title) mentions that the TIEs don't maneuver nearly as well in atmosphere as in space, and since the TIE is a very specialized fighter, I figured there might be a comparable vessel optimized for atmospheric operations. Clearly not.

Didn't the Alliance just steal their X-wings a few weeks before Yavin? They didn't exactly have skilled X-wing pilots at Yavin. They had generally skilled pilots (many of them Imperial defectors or would be Imperial defectors) flying very new fighters. I'd suggest you look at a different battle, but outside the chaos of Endor and the absurd skill unbalance in all the engagements covered in everything Rogue, I doubt there is a good example of this quote.

 

The original TIE apparently was equipped with weaker lasers (3D on the WEG scale, as opposed to 5D for the TIE/ln).

Anyone who'd flown in the popular T-16 Skyhopper was essentially trained on the T-65B X-wing starfighter. Their controls and performance were quite similar. A few simulator flights to iron out the differences, and you were ready to go.

 

Fer the love of waru... a lack of hyperdrive, shields, aerodynamics, or a warhead system are not detriments.

Grand Admiral Thrawn thought the lack of shields was a ridiculous flaw.

Also, the more and more advanced the Empire got, the more that their ships started to resemble X-wings.

TIE Advanced= Hyperdrive, Shields, Bombs.

 

The problem with those stats is you're looking at them from a video game point of view.

In X-Wing Alliance the difference certainly was irrelivant like you say.

In reality though we're talking about space where what matters is acceleration, there isn't any air resistance to create a maximum velocity, thus why we have ships going past lightspeed. A 10% difference in acceleration means a lot more than a 10% difference in maximum velocity.

This is where the flight simulator games have created a lot of misconceptions about physics in space. It's quite easy to see in a lot of older sources. The novels do seem to have stopped talking about maximum velocities more recently though and sourcebooks such as the New Essentially Guide to Vehicles and Vessels have remembered to only list accelerations.

For as totally wacked out as the Force powers were I actually felt the Clone Wars cartoon series had a rather fresh approach to space combat with the starfighters whooshing around chaotically, which with no maximum speeds is likely what would happen. The Death Star novel has been quite amusing also with the short scenes where we see TIE Fighters training and read about them travelling hundreds of clicks in a heartbeat.

When things aren't limited by velocity cap offs things really do get quite interesting. Taking some entirely arbitrary figures, if a ship reaches 100 km/h 10 seconds sooner than another ship it will reach 1000 km/h even sooner. If you're hitting 1000 km/h 100 seconds sooner you'll have achieved an immense advantage (keep in mind these are entirely arbitrary figures, the relationship won't be linear like that so it probably would actually be more than 100 seconds). The 10% benefit grows exponentially the higher the speeds the ships reach. It's a rather mind-boggling benefit actually.

 

Also, the more and more advanced the Empire got, the more that their ships started to resemble X-wings


You must be being deliberately obtuse. It's nothing to do with "advancement", but due to the declining position of the Empire. In effect they lost the advantage they held against the New Republic, and had to switch tactics to mirror the Rebel Alliance.

 

Actually, I would say that as the Empire shrank, the more use it actually had for multi-role fighters. During the Galactic Civil War, even there was a squadron of TIE Defenders patrolling in deep space, they would never be able to jump a flight of Rebel starfighter at a rendezvous point simply because there's so many such places to hide. The Defenders may as well just fly alongside the convoy they're supposed to protect, in which case normal TIEs would do just fine.

By the time the Remnant has switched places with the former Rebel Alliance, then things start to change.

 

What I'm really interested in is, what changes were made in the TIE interceptor over the TIE fighter. While the Clone wars and subsequent Galactic civil war prompted a revolution in military engineering, technology couldn't possibly have advanced enough that the interceptor could gain more firepower and speed without a massive upgrade in cost.

 

Very true...all true...but the interceptor was never made to "replace" the original TIE...the Interceptor was a introduced specifically to counter new rebel models like the A-Wing.

It was an upgrade that was expensive...and yet they still cut corners on things like shields.

The actual percentage of TIE interceptors in the overall production of TIE fighters is small...all models other then the original TIE have been relatively small in number by comparison. (perhaps only Predators, if we assume them to be the general starfighter of the new empire.)

Now as the empire was in decline...these more productive models were treasured, which is why we see them more often then the standard TIE...but production was significantly smaller as well. Perhaps by the time of the Remnant, there were no original TIEs in production...but even so, all the Interceptors, Defenders, Advances probably wouldn't equal 10% of the original TIE force.

The Interceptor was the first hint of the Empire cracking from the philosophy or cheap single-purpose craft.

 

Actually wouldn't the TIE Advanced x1/TIE Avenger be the first hint of it? Or do you mean in a widespread manner? The Interceptor took some design elements from the Advanced, IIRC (the bent wings most notably).

But the "Empire had more purpose for Multi-role craft as they shrunk" doesn't hold water: The TIE Avenger, TIE Defender, and Assault Gunboat were all invented and produced (to one extent or another) at the height of Imperial power (The missile boat as well but I consider that "specialized"). There were clearly some contingents of the Imperial Navy that believed in multirole starfighter capabilities and were powerful enough to get at least limited production of such craft pushed through. Though did we ever get anything approaching total numbers for Avengers and Assault Gunboats? Clearly they were far less numerous than Interceptors, but even something with 1/10th (or even 1/100th) of the production of regular TIE or TIE/In fighters is potentially hundreds of thousands of fighters (if not more).

I'd be willing to bet the Empire probably had more Assault Gunboats (and maybe even TIE Avengers) than the Rebel Alliance had if they combined all their Starfighters together.

 

It certainly shows that the Empire was dedicated to testing improvements...but if it wasn't for Vader's personal use, it wouldn't have seen further service. Prototypes are well and good...but even the TIE Advanced didn't truly have a role other then "hyperspace capable".

The TIE interceptor was a "reaction" design...whereas the models that came before it were simply models created to fulfill hypothetical assignments irregardless of conditions faced (TIE & TIE BOMBER certainly most notable) The Interceptor showed that the Empire philosophy of building a theater-general, mission specific craft was simplistic at best. The interceptor shows that even the Empire had a limit to the "throw as many as you can out there until we win" mentality...They rethought Zergling tactics.

As redesigns became less about specific mission parameters and more about general "what can this thing do in x,y,z situations and locations , we start seeing more craft of complexity and cost.

 

Except the TIE Advanced evolved directly into the TIE Avenger, which did see some degree of production. Going off of the X-Wing/TIE Fighter games, even the TIE Advanced itself had more than one prototype, as I recall.

 

Yes, but I don't think anyone is saying the opposite either. Everyone has said that TIEs were ORIGINALLY designed with certain aspects in mind, mainly the ability hunt in packs. They put up a squadren at Yavin to keep the X-Wings busy after they started hitting flak emplacements. If they had put all 1800 TIEs into the air they'd be running into each other. All the TIEs at Yavin had to do was keep the X-Wings busy from blowing turrents until the DS vapourized the planet.

And we still see TIEs taking out Rebel fighters. Over half the force falls to generic TIEs. Darth Vader gets a few in the trench (and, istr, at least one in the trench goes down to Vader's wingman). It was hubris that hurt the Empire at Yavin, but then again even the Rebel pilots weren't too keen on the plan.

The second the pilots started diving for the trench, Vader came out and really started wasting them. It seemed like the X-Wings had several goals including taking out the guns (maybe along the trench) and then diving for the trench when things were clear enough and they had a good angle on it.

Again, after the Empire began taking losses they started pouring money into different weapons programs, but politics scuttled some of them and hubris damaged other and economic realities damaged still others if we go off the info on various attempts to crete TIE Advances and things like the TIE Phantom.

 

But the advance didn't see service use until awhile after the interceptor. Though it's design (as I'm sure most of the designs were) was forged in the Imperial period, it's not until post Endor most see service...by which point the philosophy had changed.

 

I do think you have to look at the rather short time frame that the Imperial were dealing with. The were basically throwing out well over at least one decade of accepted military wisdom to create a host of new ships, and every seperate program was probably competing for cash (look at the current flack over the next gen rifle for the US military).

They simply didn't have the time to get new prototypes tested and pushed into service, especially when the hubris of the Moffs and Admirals as well as those with the budget strings were probably fighting them every step of the way.

 

Well we know all about TIEs vs. the Alliance starfighters.

So just what did they design the TIEs to handle?

Could they best an Eta-2, a Delta 7, ARC-170, V-wing?

An N-1? Droidfighters?

Presumably the TIE was trialled against some of these...at some point a grouping of them had to be able to overtake these old models...right?

Or...is the TIE a bargain basement craft, design for no capability to be a theater-superiority fighter?

Perhaps the "interceptor" descriptor is telling, even for the original TIE...it was never intended to best fighters...only get in the way long enough for bigger guns to do the work.

TIE pilots were the suckers of the universe...because the principle on which their ship was built...was cannon fodder.

 

No, actually. I didn't consult my copy of TIE Fighter, X-Wing vs. TIE Fighter, or XWA, I got those numbers from Starwars.com's databank. I deliberately didn't use the video games as proof, preferring something more official.


In X-Wing Alliance the difference certainly was irrelivant like you say.

Umm...ignoring the obvious flaw in your argument that if TIEs ION engines could accelerate that fast, then the Star Wars galaxy would have no reason for separate hyperdrives...If you look at the Star Wars evidence, Starfighters do have a hardcapped speed limit. Find me one official source, a technical manual, something from Starwars.com, anything with the Lucasfilms stamp of approval, that says that starfighters can approach the speed of light without a hyperdrive. X-Wings have them, TIEs do not. Further, explain to me how if TIEs can go lightspeed, because of the acceleration, etc, how its possible that they don't run out of fuel? Its a small fighter. All that propulsion has to come from somewhere.

and yet, TIEs cannot achieve lightspeed without a hyperdrive, and the Millennium Falcon had to take it slow (giving Luke time to train with Yoda) when getting to Cloud City because its hyperdrive wasn't working. Again...speedcap limits.

That's actually not true.
http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/TIE_Interceptor
TIE Interceptors were the new fighter force of the Empire after the Battle of Yavin, but it seems that test models were frequently seen in space battle prior and during that time.

Emperor Palpatine, knowing the superior abilities of the TIE Interceptor, as well as its relatively low cost, had planned to replace all standard TIE Fighters with Interceptors. By the Battle of Endor, TIE Interceptors filled 20% of the total Imperial Starfighter Corps, and overwhelmed many Rebel fighters.

So, Palpatine originally intended to replace TIEs with Interceptors. By the time of his death, and the subsequent collapse of the Empire, they simply hadn't finished with the job yet. You don't replace every TIE at once, you gradually phase them out, replacing TIEs for Interceptors unit by unit, squadron for squadron, as Sienar can produce them. Not every TIE plant is automatically going to be fitted to produce Interceptors, the factories would have to be upgraded too. So, by ROTJ, the process had begun, but due to the logistics involved, was only 1/5 of the way through.

 

I'm not sure it was strictly built to counter a design, but instead to supply the pilot corps with a cheap, mass produced fighter capable of being rolled out to an expansionist Empire that was fielding everything from Frigates to ISD's.

TIEs seem to have not been made to stand toe to toe with enemy fighters, but to overwhelm them with numbers (was there any enemy capable of fielding a fleet to stand against an ISD and TIE swarm?) and to allow the ISD's, frigates, cruisers, and missle boats to take out hard targets.

Again, it's a very different military strategy, but one that served the Empire for over two decades...or at least one, we see the Empire using ARC-170's in DARK TIMES for example, so the whole military model was based on using capital ships to take out any enemies up to and including planetary defenses.

Even in the X-Wing novels, where things are skewed towards X-Wings with elite pilots at the controls, it take a fleet of frieghters with torpedo launchers attached to even cripple an enemy ISD/SSD.

Sure, X-Wings COULD attack capital ships, but their survival rate wasn't exactly too great.

On the Imperial side you had missle boats and Skiprays (Skipblasts?) and a few other heavy craft to take out hard targets.