As a whole, did Imperial fighter design made sense ?

Hey, I am a flattop guy myself. Give me CV-6 USS Enterprise any day of the week.

--Adm. Nick

 

Hey, if it is any consolation, I happen to think that the North Carolina-class battleships of WWII are one of the best looking warships in modern history.

Besides, I am more of a ship of the line and heavy frigate guy. Give me HMS Victory and USS Contitution any day.

--Adm. Nick

 

Another example of the fighter/capital ship dynamics, from the ROTJ novel:

ITWT points out opportunistic fighters target the Executor's tower once the capital ships have bombarded it and weakened its defenses.

A ship like the Malevolence has gun batteries too dense around the command tower to hit effectively. The bombers set to strike it, target the ion cannon instead and get in shots when it prepares to fire. Capital ships are at their weakest when lowering shields around a weapon that's about to fire. That's when a fighter/ bomber can excel. The Malevolence tower would also be vulnerable, when, ironically, dropping its local-area shields around the bridge to fire its AA-guns.

 

So, the topic . . . let's get back on it.

Yes, Imperial fighter design made a great deal of sense. As I once said here in the context,

 

It's just a shame the concept of TIEs having shields seem to have dropped off the radar almost immediately. You can see some shots between the TIEs and the Falcon in ANH that would imply the TIEs had shields and were meant to be the X-wing's equivilant back then, but the EU just went with "no shields". Which doesn't make sense when taking into account things like protection against micro-debris that could go right through an unprotected fighter.

 

Very much so, though at least Pellaeon has his TIEs refitted with shields after Endor.

You do realize their it a major space battle going on with thousand of TIE fighters out their covering their carriers, whilst also engaging rebel cruisers? Damaging the ImpStars before the fighters can pick them off would just makes far it easier for them to do it, just like when they attack the communications ship (properly the Avenger ) which has already been heavily damaged.

Whatever makes you happy, seining on how the bridge deflector tower actually gets destroyed by starfighters whilst shield in that area are still up it only makes sense if shields can be punched through before they fail completely, which makes fighters ever more effective.

PS: ITW actually states the navigation suit (included on in the domes on the top) is damaged by fighters which is why the guns mess up, not the guns having been destroyed by the Rebel fleet.

Also SOTG Saga Edition makes a clear point on how ships like the Executor are open to to swarm attacks, precisely because their anti fighter guns are lackluster and have to counter this with escort ships (-> TIE fighters).

*throws in the obligatory Executor bridge burning after hit by a A-Wing picture just for fun*
http://images1.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20111001153844/starwars/images/thumb/8/87/Rotj112.jpg/830px-Rotj112.jpg

Of course it is heavily protected, though funny enough if they attacked the ship from behind in TCW they would not have had to contend themselves with all the flak guns on the front end, which cost them a single Y-Wing and they were already on a fine attack run on the bridge, before they decided to change target to the ion canon.

You mean fighters can take down warships by swarm attacking them at weak points on their shields and hull? D: Who would have guessed that you would get around to agreeing what has been said all along. And they must also be a danger when not firing at them otherwise why bother with shooting at them, just out off spite? ;P

 

A Sophie's Choice of naval warfare! Frigates do have such neat, sleek lines. The Constitution is still gorgeous, and is arguably (gasp!) better built. On the other hand, Victory has to be the greatest warship of all time, and is a gorgeous example of being a big floating slab of guns.


Back to the point, we've spent all this time talking about TIE fighter design. Let us not forget what is, arguably, Seinar's worst design: the TIE Bomber. For something that is made to punch through the a fighter screen and launch ordinance in the face of anti-"air" fire, having no shields, bad engines, and a pronounced lack of maneuverability sure doesn't help.

 

They properly always had more of a ground attack bomber in mind with that ship (in which function they do serv well), or they just made them ?bad? for space battles to make sure more Skiprays would be bought. But alas that backfired and the Imperials really went with the TIE bomber, though if outfitted with torpedoes they properly are rather devastating missile platforms.

 

"You mean fighters can take down warships by swarm attacking them at weak points on their shields and hull? D: Who would have guessed that you would get around to agreeing what has been said all along."
I've never seen you say anything like that at all, just nonsense about how fighters can auto-kill capital ships and the latter being pointless by default, as if SW suddenly switched its internal logic and never should have created warships from the get-go. SW doesn't function the way you want it to, it does not have fighter-only navies, it has had warships and fighters from the first film (or novelization, since that technically came out first) and their existence has to be justified internally.

Warships are larger, more heavily armored and armed, starfighters are smaller, lighter, faster, weaker and more opportunistic. That's how the internal logic in SW apparently functions.

You never seemed to pay attention to what was said by others who didn't agree with you, pay attention to what evidence was presented or pay attention when others described the flaws in your own argument, so I eventually started ignoring your posts finding nothing of interest, just the usual minimalist claptrap I grew tired of years ago.

I had the same process with certain other debaters, one of which is now a co-author of Warfare and apparently had to actually listen to his opposition's viewpoints and presentation of arguments that countered his own. The opposition in this case being an actual author he had to work with and not just a faceless debater on a message board.

Given we're talking about a fictional universe that has technology that enables capital ships to stay viable for tens of thousands of years without switching over to fighter fleets only, I naturally disagreed with your fighter-centric logic and tried (in vain) to argue the flaws in that reasoning.

And they must also be a danger when not firing at them otherwise why bother with shooting at them, just out off spite?
Yeah, what idiot would try to destroy enemy units coming towards his own ship? What a complete moron would try defending against enemies instead of laying down and surrendering?

 

Öh no, never even alluded to anything like that.

It is justified internally and neither does SW work the way you would like it to.

Thanks for agreeing with me and they are not actually ?weaker?, just compact, which capital ships aren?t they are massive with crews of thousands, supplies stores, internal workshop, science departments, special waste disposal system, medical bays, and dozens off other complex system for various other functions.

Of course I do and present counter points or questions they seem to have not considered.

Then feel free to keep ignoring them. And random maximization which you seem to have to apply to everything does not happen in star wars either.

Lets wait and see what the book actually has in it, though seeing how Mister Fry loves to reference WEG I am certain you will hate the book anyway..

Star Wars fleet have mixed and matched capital ship and fighter functions for forever, each part having a purpose. Capital ships enable long time operations, occupations, bombardments, sieges etc, fighters offer flexible, mobile heavy fire power that can swarm attack capital ships if not countered by fighters or effective anti fighter weapons.

And the Rebel fleet is fighter centric as is the New Republic fleet, as are planetary militia fleets (like Naboo) and even the Empire when it comes to defending most installations, which they equip them with TIE fighters and don't station warships there. Hell the Death Star is actually a huge fighter carrier precisely because it can cover all capital ship functions itself, but not the function star fighters have.

No to quote you The Malevolence tower would also be vulnerable, when, ironically, dropping its local-area shields around the bridge to fire its AA-guns.

You directly implied that bridge would be invulnerable if it would not fire at the enemy and thus compromise shields, which if it were true would mean that not firing at approaching fighters would solve the problem because they couldn?t harm the

 

Since no technology in real life or SW is 100 % reliable, yes, the shields for any kind of object would have both weak spots and would possibly degrade over time, so yes, it makes sense that a commanding officer of a warship would try to remove enemy units rather than have them fly around freely. Your strange absolute of fighter-superiority over any kind of capital ship and a rejection of how technologies scale up, are, on the other hand, false.

Capital ship shields are stronger as they scale up, having to cover even more superstructure and thus possessing even larger reactors. Same thing happens with all the other parts of the ship. This does not mean any system is infallible and I never said anything of the sort. Nor have I claimed that any given weapon must always fire at its highest setting regardless of target or objective. This is something minimalists always try to strawman into any and all discussion.

I've always maintained that fighters in a straight-up fight have no chance against a capital ship and the Malevolence would have been ok for a while, if Grievous hadn't decided to fire his ion cannon, thus giving the bombers a clear opening. However, this reflects only on the competency of the commander and not the vessel itself. Most other failures, like the Starcrusher's demise, are usually the result of incredible idiocy on behalf of their commanding officers, not a fault in the design itself. Or maybe I should start faulting the X-wing every time a pilot dies due to his or her own faults, or a Rendili Dreadnaught every time one of them blows up due to factors outside of its design?

Minimalists seem so keen to point of and overexaggerate flaws in design when human/alien error is to blame in the story, or the target has a character shield and must survive no matter how ridiculous the convenient escape is.

I also don't get why, in The Starcrusher Trap, the Venators later in the story during the Republic's ruse don't automatically fire on the enemy battleship, since, according to minimalist logic, a starfighter's own cannons can destroy a capital ship, therefore, a capital ship's turbolasers would also do the same. There wouldn't be a need for the infiltration to begin with!

 

Strange ? It is exactly what happens time and time again in the novels, comics, the movie and cartoons. Your passion for super sized ships that have constantly been shown to fail is far stranger and the steady trend for those to be, called unfishable and pointless when many more conventional warships can be build in their place. And when these super ships show up they are placed in support roles or are purely experimental platforms for new weapons, not actually the fighting ships of their navies.

Source that it does with shield and weapons systems, because we don?t see them doing so, the opposite actually happens with big ships. Super Star Destroyers can be successfully fought by much smaller forces, the Death Stars shields are so broken it always whole squadrons to fly through them and there are whole cultures that don?t even bother with shields.

Ships are not covered with huge super guns either but with series of small batteries to take each other out and punch through their shields and hulls, and we see the guns of tanks actually sufficient enough to do that.

The only direction you could argue is with planetary defense guns and planetary shields systems, but those are for one gigantic with underground power vaults bigger then most warships (and no before anyone mentions it the Hoth base is not powered by a stolen Praetor vessel reactor, ITW does not even in the slightest allude to that, just mentioning parts of one of those vessels being use in the reactor camber some where) and those defense guns are designed to offer maximum fire power with single hits precisely because one needs to lower shields to fire them, and if those were viable for space combat or actually more effective then the batteries installed on warships they would install them on warships.

And as mentioned before even planetary shields can be punctured.

shields in TPM is impenetrable to the starfighters,

Of course I did, you just ignored them

Your self contradicting again

Go ahead you would be surprised how well they actually hold up.

So you are arguing that they don?t want to use maximum firepower when in an engagement or all out planetary bombardment? This is getting even more pointless then when someone tried to argue the Trade Federation Ringship in Clone Commandos had its shields down and that?s the only reason the 2 Invasion Transports could destroy it.

Go ahead you would be surprised how well they actually hold up.

Again go ahead, you would be surprised.

 

Now there is as cheap an argument I have ever heard. If you wan?t to go down that road starship abilities stopped mattering the very second Leias Blockade Runner shows up in the movie.

Not to be mean to the Empire or the Separatist Alliance but if you know that your fleet commanders are not that good, don?t hand them your biggest and most expensive toys.

Do mean like SSDs and ImpStars not having proper anti fighter guns? SSDs not being able to attack ship actually just slightly below it in proper manner and being so big that not even the Empire can keep it fully equipped? Or the Death Star not having working shields? The Lancer frigate not being able to perform its intended mission because it?s to slow? The bridge and heavy shield generators on a Star Destroyer actually being the most exposed part of it just for propaganda reasons? The Empire is infamous for such stuff.

Because they where orderd to flee before the Starcrusher engaged them?

And risk losing 3 Jedi cruisers in the mission with some 20000+ personal on board and actually endanger the infiltration plan?

Because they felt sabotage was the more effective approach then throwing a fleet at it and Yoda even implies that the sabotage mission is just one of several options to take it down.

Though since you mention the Starcrusher could it actually be a test bed for the supersized generator the Death Star used? After all the generator that Vader blows up inside looks a lot like it. Though I am afraid the Starcrusher will remain one of those comic book mystery ships :/

 

quote= Tzizvvt78]

since, according to minimalist logic, a starfighter's own cannons can destroy a capital ship, therefore, a capital ship's turbolasers would also do the same. [/quote]

Outside of the X-Wing games (where you can gleefully claim game mechanics), I don't know when this has happened. Again, I don't think any source has shown a starfighter, alone of in groups, completely disintegrating a capital ship. But time and time again, in film an fiction, we see fighters disable critical components of ships(most famously the Executor!) which contribute to those ships' neutralization or destruction. But again, particularly in the books, we never (or perhaps rarely) see a capital ship completely vaporized by a fighter force.

 

And those fighters were aided by the capital ships beating down the Executor's defenses in the first place...

Apparently, that's not what the "proponents" of starfighter-only fleets seem to argue, they don't want to acknowledge how ships work according to the internal logic of the SW universe. If there's no scaling and capital ships are only good as carriers or troop transports, why build them at all? For tens of thousands of years, even.

Why stop at a starfighter when arguing in-universe tactics? If a starfighter's cannons can disable/destroy any ship, why not use this logic in every case? Apparently, SW tactics continue to utilize different kinds of capital ships, using fighters as opportunistic skirmishers in actual fleet combat. At least two battles in TCW, in episode 1x02 and 2x09, didn't even have fighters participating. If any ship larger than a Star Destroyer is so flimsy as to be useless beyond all repair, why didn't the Republic send a few fighter squadrons at the Malevolence or the Starcrusher? Capital ships, by their very use, can't be flimsy by default or no navy would risk building them for any period of time rather than build starfighters.

And why is there even different sizes of generators and cannons, if you're not gonna acknowledge there might be difference in their power, which dictates their wildly different designs in the first place? If starfighter guns have all the power that is needed, why even bother building a cannon that is dozens of times larger and put it on a ship that's dozens or even hundreds of times larger? If it's not gonna have more power, why scale up everything else about it? Why does the Death Stars have the largest hypermatter reactors in existence? A few hundred TIE squadrons could do the same job, apparently.

How they even quantify something like that, I have no idea, but they act as though it should be obvious to others. Blame George Lucas for creating a universe that doesn't cow-tow to starfighters-only logic in naval combat. Just don't complain about something you either don't care about or don't understand to begin with. And no more strawmen arguments where everything the opponent says is supposed to be quantified by ever action taken by the object (or person) in question, like why cruisers aren't BDZ-ing planets in every battle or why battleships aren't built to last forever and can actually be, gasp, damaged!

 

I don't know who these "'proponents' of starfighter-only fleets" are, and I don't think anyone here is claiming that fighter weapons, particularly only their guns, can satisfy every need in galactic warfare. No one here is saying fighters are the be-all, end all.

I agree with everything you've said here. If anything, it's you and your ilk that can't seem to admit that fighters can damage capital ships, despite repeated C-(and now T-) canon evidence.

Again, I have no idea who you're attacking here, or why. No one is this thread is arguing that capital ships are useless.

 

Because whenever his circular logic and selective reading of the evidence fails him, he resorts to ridiculous strawmen (while liberally labeling whoever he is arguing with that term in order to draw attention from his own strawmaning).

Normally I try to stay polite but I just can't take this anymore.

To steer this thread closer to the topic, I would like point out that even if we assume that fighters can't damage capital ships, then imperial fighter design still makes no sense. As a matter of fact, it makes less sense.
If bombers are a threat to warships, then the role of the tie fighter to destroy those bombers and allow the capital ship to complete its operational objectives, or to protect bombers while they destroy a hard enemy target.

However, if bombers cannot harm hard enemy targets (capital ships, space stations, shielded/armored ground installations), then there is no need for a short range space superiority fighter.
They simply lack the range to be useful as scouts, raiders, or skirmishers. Menawhile rebel fighter design would preform that role admirably.


Back to the point, we've spent all this time talking about TIE fighter design. Let us not forget what is, arguably, Seinar's worst design: the TIE Bomber. For something that is made to punch through the a fighter screen and launch ordinance in the face of anti-"air" fire, having no shields, bad engines, and a pronounced lack of maneuverability sure doesn't help.
From what I understand they have a lot of armor at least, and a good ejection system.

Most likely it was just designed to carry as much ordnance as possible with the assumption that something else will have already taken care of the defenses.

Though now that you mention it strikes me that the real difference is that Imperial fighters are specialized while rebel fighters are all muilti-role (if sometimes leaning more one way than another.)

 

Gents,

I think it might be time for both sides to shake hands and "agree to disagree". If there is one thing I have learned in my eight years on these boards, it's that people with strongly held views rarely manage to change an opposing view.



--Adm. Nick

 

This may be game mechanics, but in my recent playthroughs of the Rogue Squadron series I have noticed that the TIE Bomber can take substantially more punishment than the regular TIE. One good shot from essentially any Rebel fighter will down a TIE Fighter, whereas the Bombers usually take several seconds of sustained fire to kill. In a one-on-one fight it's not that much of a difference, but in a fracas like Endor or any escort mission those few seconds can make all the difference. And if the Prisoners of Bakura mission on Rebel Strike is any indication, then you are definitely correct about the payload of a TIE Bomber.

 

Just watch the Battle of Ryloth in TCW, fighters work fine against capital ships.

Ask the Naboo why they only build a fighter milita, because they don?t need to go around and annex other planets, stage long time operations or anything like that.

And you keep being unsure on if star fighters can destroy bigger ships or not, in one part you agree in others you go off on crusades about how it?s supposed to be impossible for smaller ships to beat bigger ones.

*points at posts above* They use both fighters and capital ships for long times to supplement each other?s abilities.

But they do, turbolasers are technologically no different then the laser canons on fighters, only upgraded with targeting systems, turrets, long range capacity etc. to compensate for reduced mobility of the platform they are on.

Very much so, though they all share rather similar trends of 1. being carriers and if not often getting modified or supplemented to do it 2. Transporting troops 3. Having massive crews 4. Are intended for very long time operations 5. Sport systems fighters can?t because of size

At which they excel brilliantly, so much so that capital ships commanders try to copy their flanking tactics and capital ships get their own fighters, anti fighter guns and escort lines to protect them from fighters.

Limited resources to actually go around in the GFFA, who would have guessed after Skywalker had to steal his Y-Wings to supplement his fleet. When TCW does use fighters they threaten capital ships rather fine actually, especially droid starfighters

Who says the Malevolence is flimsy? Hell 3 Jedi Cruisers couldn?t even properly damage it when they had a free run at it, because there literally was to much off the ship to blow up, though targeting the bridge might have actually been a good idea. Not one of Obi-Wans better days as commander.

 

In case of the Mal because Skywalkers group was literally the only thing they had available initially and because Kenobi apparently did not haul fighters along for his attack. Though if you wan?t get into stupid ?why don?t they use fighters?? moments in the Mal story arc, just ask yourself why the Seps build a ship specially to destroyed escape pods by cutting them open, when a decent swipe with Droid star fighters (which we see the ship has) would have gotten the job done ^^

And in case of the Starcrusher, again they wen?t with the sabotage plan because it seemed most effective and was as the comic implies not the only option they considered. To a fighter attack might actually have been a good idea seeing how the ship seems to have no fighters off its own to send after Vader when he attacks them from the inside.

Of course they aren?t flimsy (though YMMV) but they can still be destroyed by other captial ship, asteroids, exotic solar radiation, star fighters, stupid maneuvers, malfunctions and the gods know what else. Little by little if need be.

That?s why they continue to build both and stick heavy armor plating on capital ships, which they don?t as much on fighters because it would defeat the purpose.

*points up* Why indeed don?t they build a gun that?s as long as the warships itself (like the X-Wing Lasers) on a ImpStar or for that matter the Executor, if there is supposed to be a point to it? Because as you already clearly stated there isn?t, they use batteries of small guns precisely because they are sufficient. And of course they need a bigger generator to power a ships that?s many, many, many times as big as a starfighters, alone to get it moving, able to jump to hyperspace and keep it?s crew alive, not to mention all the other stuff they need on ship that size.

Because it is a artificial flying moon that?s a super weapon platform? Something like a quarter of it are literally just subspace and hyperdrive engines.

What destroy a planet? If you give them enough supplies to keep them going at it, they would get around to it, as would the Imperial Fleet, or a hand blaster actually. And the Death Star has a few rather different interesting abilities that TIEs don?t.

Actually blame him for creating a universe that shows very powerful fighters because he wanted heroic fighter combat.

Now your just trolling and I am the last person who complains when battleships get blown up, explosions are after all pretty and their methods of demise tend to support my arguments And I think I might just go around to just hyper linking my answers when it come to you, because as Ace mentions they just go round and round and round.

 

Most likely it was just designed to carry as much ordnance as possible with the assumption that something else will have already taken care of the defenses.

Pretty much, they are intended to be escorted by TIE fighters in case something does show up. What I always found interesting is that TIE bombers are also intended to drop propaganda leaflets not a approach I usually would think of with the Empire.

One of the Kathol adventure guides also has them droping this stuff http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Pathogenic_bomb which fits in rather well with the plague warehouse the Emperor kept and what the Empire did to Dentaal.

 

Plenty of really good ideas (novative at least) ideas don't seem to take off in SW universe.

Like for instance, speaking of fighters, the Sabotage Droid from Episode III. It's really a nifty, cheap and efficient concept. And inexplicably, they use it against starfighters (against which plain explosives would just do more damage), as opposed, as, you know, big capital ships that those droids could cripple (and do cripple in one instance of fiction, in Millenium Falcon, where an handful of sabotage droids destroy in a matter of minutes a Venator)

Or the TIE-Droid fighter from Dark Empire-finally a cost effective way to use swarms of fighters

Or even, just remote piloting TIE fighters (as in X-Wing Alliance)

 

Its probably worth noting that all the shieldless TIES--the line fighter, interceptor, bomber--are from the intermovie era when there was NO WAR and just small scale uprisings, pirates, etc.

during the actual time of the Rebellion, the Empire issued many shielded designs, including the x1, Avenger, Defender, StarWing, and Missile Boat; also the cloaked Phantom