I wasn’t aware that the KS entry was intended to answer the “where are the superships?” question. I always thought it was further explanation of “Why is Angel afraid that the new-to-WC2 supergun will destroy the Concordia?”.
I think this is a common misconception. Note two things:
* In actuality, the scene is self-explanitory. Angel says "But Admiral, we're only at 60 per cent power. Our power plant could blow." in response to Tolwyn's request that the gun be fired. (Now let us tread softly, not asking ourselves why the captain of the ship is ordering the Wing Commander to order the gun crew to fire the gun...). We assosciate the scene with the gun problem in retrospect - but no one was asking what the deal was beforehand because Angel specifically explains that it's because of limited power.
* Special Operations 2 was not included with The Kilrathi Saga, nor was it *intended* to be included with Kilrathi Saga. Unlike the Secret Missions, the Special Operations disks were completely dropped from the plans before the project shipped - it was only through fan complaint that the developeds opted to go back and convert them later on (and this is why some things from them are missing - there's no reorchestrated versions of any of the Special Ops music, for instance). (Nor was Special Operations 2 considered during the development of Wing Commander III - WC3 follows none of its plot threads... it's somewhat of a redheaded stepchild in terms of gross Wing Commander continuity.)
We are given a hard and fast time to build a carrier. We are given, in the same breath, a hard and fast time to build a yard and train personnel to build a carrier. Why would we stick to the 5 year reference and not the 10 year one? I’m pretty sure we don’t know that a yard can start building another class of carrier as soon as the last one of the previous class is shipped out
I think the "ten years to build a yard" is disregarded because that just isn't how it works in real life - once you have a yard capable of building ships of a certain size you don't need to build a new one. The issue in Wing Commander is that the war started out without yards capable of producing carriers existing widely existing and that with ongoing war losses the Confederation has never managed to catch up in this area. Also, it just plain doesn't make sense - consider that if it were truly so limited as 'one yard, one carrier class' then
* The idea that said super-specialized yard could support a ship with an entirely new keel (the first part layed down) seems unlikely. It then becomes impossible to have new dreadnaughts based on the PAG at all, taking fifteen years (2670) to put them into service.
* Classes of ships would never be retired during the war - Bengals would continue to be produced throughout the conflict because *stopping* would only mean you were losing precious carriers instead of gaining slots for something better.
(it’s a pretty cool observation – speaking of which, how do we know the Bengal was produced till 2657? – but I don’t think we are given that information in a WC source, unless it’s a movie-derivative reference, which I’m very lacking on).
The Bengal reference comes from the Confederation Handbook, which says in relation to the Bengal that "Development on a replacement carrier is ongo-ing, with a scheduled rollout no later tha 2657...". Note that the Trojan IV yards are also said to be where the Midway-class ships are built much later in the timeline, too.
If this is not the case, the Confederation DN would have to have a yard built and its design laid out years before the PAG was confiscated. The PTC write-up (I really should wait till I get home and get some reference materials for all this, but I’m not going to have time) mentions that every other confederation ship is too short to “mount” the PTC. Why would you need to mention this unless if any other ship was long enough, the PTC would have been strapped to the first one they could bring into drydock. Low and behold though, a ship that is long enough is coming down the pipes and is about to begin construction. Quickly replacing the pre-designed “never intended for the purpose” ships’ keel with a PTC seems like about as good of a story to back the problems encountered by the PTC as the whole ‘quickly designed entire ship’ theory.
I can’t see doing away with the novel’s 10 years statement just because we want a reason why an assumed hastily designed ship is constructed so fast. Again, another point that we don’t know and can just make educated guesses at.
I think you're reading the word wrong; "mount" has a specific usage in terms of defining the weaponry that a warship carries. When you say that a battleship "mounts three ten inch guns", you're referring to what the armament is -- not implying that ten inch guns can be strapped onto any ship for any reason. (It's definition 10b in dictionary.com's listing for 'mount', for the curious).
Well, after a quick look at your carrier list and with the information off the top of my head, unless I missed a source, there is an opportunity for a Confederation to make it to 2669. It hinges on why the Austerlitz is counted as a killed carrier in the BoT. You have 16 carriers in the BoT, a number I agree with given what needs to be available in 2669 thanks to the Victory Streak, Armada, etc. The Verdun and the Moskva buy it in I believe Sirius. The Lexington and two other ships are done in at Earth (speaking of which, again, why is it the Saratoga is listed as a survivor and the Leyte Gulf and Ark Royal take the fall when I don’t think we are ever give a later source with the Saratoga? It may be in the WC3N, but I can’t recall). Three more carriers are killed in their berths, along with some other still under construction. Why does the Austerlitz, the Viking and a previous unknown get the boot when there is still one previous unknown? I think the only reference we have on the Viking is it’s the carrier the Kilrathi Scientist defects to (or maybe that’s the Viper, anyway . .. ) and the Austerlitz gets a throw away mention in End Run. Between 4 carriers, the Austerlitz, the Viking, and 2 unknowns, three have to be destroyed. This is even before we throw the wildcard of the Bengal class Wolfhound in the mix, which isn’t represented in this fleet carrier list, but is listed as at least a carrier in End Run (we’ll leave the Gettysburg “carrier” out of it).
So we have at best 5 carriers (or 4 if the Wolfhound could be one of the unknowns) for 3 carrier kills, and I’m pretty sure we have no idea which ones take the fall. Now following that train of though, if the Austerlitz is the one that survives, it can be traced back to 2666, where it could be one of the Confederation DN’s released in the previous years. It’s like 6 degrees of Kevin Bacon, but actually fun. I probably missed something, but I’ll sure as hell get corrected if I have .
I don't have my notes on the list here, so this may be kind of rough. TC and I made a conscious decision to leave the Bengals and the Gettysurg off the list, and we looked at all the language to find a way to do this properly.
The "unknown" carriers that exist after the Battle of Earth are all, per the list, either Lexington-class, Concordia-class or Jutland-class carriers which were introduced in 2668 (so as to reach the 16 carriers necessary for the Battle of Terra from the eight minus three post End Run ships, per Voices of War).
That means that at this point the only carrier which *could* be a Terran Confederation dreadnaught is the TCS Austerlitz, which is of an unknown class and entered service in 2666 or sooner. The Austerlitz was specifically supposed to be one of the carriers in drydock (for the period extending through the Battle of Terra), per its reference in End Run... which, I believe, is why I listed it as one of the ships killed in that capacity.
I already cited the Saratoga in a post above - it's listed as a survivor because it's one of the ships which participate in the fighter competition in Victory Streak.