Death
gh0d (Administrator)
By that logic, there can never be a "best fighter of all time", as every ship eventually gets replaced due to technology improving over time.
WC's best fighter and bomber of all time
- Thread starter KoN21
- Start date
By that logic, there can never be a "best fighter of all time", as every ship eventually gets replaced due to technology improving over time.
Tigerhawk
Captain
True there, so I'll just modify it a bit and take my favorite planes to fly out of all the games:
- Fighter: Wasp. It's a great craft to fly, it'll kill anything quickly, has great endurance and is pretty nimble. Gotta have the Swarmers! (Bomber? What bomber...? Barracuda? What Barracuda...?) To me, there aren't nearly enough missions where you get to fly this craft.
- Bomber: Sabre. This was re-realized when taking on the cruiser in Standoff. Where everyone else was flying (and getting shot down in) Crossbows, me and my Sabre were the only ones flying, and I STILL was able to kill the capship after some very tough dogfighting.
I wasn't really a big fan of the piranha. Look wise it was very sharp but I think the arrow was a more reliable ship.
AD
Finder of things, Doer of stuff
The piranha is a little light on armor, but in WCP multiplayer, one on one piranha dogfights were the some of the best. most intense battles I've had. Most of the other ships are too overloaded with missiles to take on in the pirahna unless they're the useless kilrathi ships. But one on one battles are great with the stormfire.
AD
Finder of things, Doer of stuff
I've always found myself using Imrecs, though I've been seeing the benefits of Friend or Foe missiles lately. I always liked the swarmers in WCP too. but in Multiplayer the dragonfly's are great. MIRVs are just annoyingly overpowered in Multiplayer unless everyone is flying a vampire.
The best all-round missile was the image recognition missile, it was all-aspect, unlike the dumbfire and heat seeker and it had a big warhead, unlike the friend or foe.
I used to be a big fan of friend or foe missiles because you didnt need to select a target, but by Prophecy, they were pretty ineffective, so I'd fire one off to try and lower a bugs shields.
In Prophecy, I would use dumbfires and dragonflies against barracudas or missile turrets, but unlike the dragonfly, I would sometimes use dumbfires against larger, slower ships like the manta if I could get a good shot, and boy would they tear em up. Dragonflies were pretty useless.
I also really like the heat seeker, because it has a really big warhead and will pretty reliably hit an enemy's rear quadrant.
I used to be a big fan of friend or foe missiles because you didnt need to select a target, but by Prophecy, they were pretty ineffective, so I'd fire one off to try and lower a bugs shields.
In Prophecy, I would use dumbfires and dragonflies against barracudas or missile turrets, but unlike the dragonfly, I would sometimes use dumbfires against larger, slower ships like the manta if I could get a good shot, and boy would they tear em up. Dragonflies were pretty useless.
I also really like the heat seeker, because it has a really big warhead and will pretty reliably hit an enemy's rear quadrant.
AD
Finder of things, Doer of stuff
Depends on how you use them. The whole point of them is to fire off a whole lot of them in a short amount of time. And their speed means that as soon as you get close you don't need a lock but can fire a whole bunch of them at the enemy using the ITTS. It's good for at least knocking out shields. Mostly I use them on the first pass on slower fighters. Dumbfires, I might be wrong, fly slower so are harder to register a hit this way. But if you do they cause significantly more damage.
Best fighter: Piranha - fast, nimble, fun to fly. Any dogfight with this craft is quite a challenge... and not as easy like the overguned, overpowered Vampire.
Best bomber: Hm, hard to say. The Devastator is imo the best bomber at all - not a craft for fighting, just go and open your bays for the torps...
But: a combined force with the Shrike is also a fine way, load the Shrike with some Harmmissilies to clean the path for the Devastators.
Deacan
Best bomber: Hm, hard to say. The Devastator is imo the best bomber at all - not a craft for fighting, just go and open your bays for the torps...
But: a combined force with the Shrike is also a fine way, load the Shrike with some Harmmissilies to clean the path for the Devastators.
Deacan
Gaal Dornick
Spaceman
I've only played Wings 1 and Secret Ops on SNES and Wings 3 and 4 on Playstation, but I have to say the best fighter is the Vindicator and the best Bomber in the Longbow of Wing 3.
Janet Noslen
Spaceman
Yeah I seem to remember choosing the Vindicator a lot in WC4 as well. It seemed to be a good all rounder, and I like the tachyon cannons.
Regarding Pilum FFs, a great opening move while striking carriers in WC3 in the Longbow is to loose a few FF missiles, say 4, and afterburn in to the carrier and lock torpedoes, meanwhile carefully flying into the launch bay. Match speeds with your target, launch the torp(s) and afterburn out. When you come out , surprise surprise, the Darket escorts are kitty litter!
Regarding Pilum FFs, a great opening move while striking carriers in WC3 in the Longbow is to loose a few FF missiles, say 4, and afterburn in to the carrier and lock torpedoes, meanwhile carefully flying into the launch bay. Match speeds with your target, launch the torp(s) and afterburn out. When you come out , surprise surprise, the Darket escorts are kitty litter!
Two fighters stood out in my mind across all series, The Ferret, which I would have taken in a fight against ANY other fighter, and the Wraith. Ferret had simplicity, speed, and just the right amount of punch to hurt things. The Wraith had the tech that would allow it go on forever.
Bombers: Broadsword (with automatic Turrets) cause nothing makes me smile like melting the guy on my tail. It was the B52 of space. I bet they blew up more stuff than any other bomber the confederation ever fielded.
Bombers: Broadsword (with automatic Turrets) cause nothing makes me smile like melting the guy on my tail. It was the B52 of space. I bet they blew up more stuff than any other bomber the confederation ever fielded.
This might have been touched on before, but considering that some others had agreed with me that the Dragon was really a top notch fighter, then why wasn't it available in WCP?
By WCIV, the Black Lance had perfected cloaking... hell even the BW had it via Pliers and his little experiments. I also think I remember Pirates had cloaking ships.
Was cloaking even attempted against the Nephilum? Was it totally unsuccessful or was it a mistake in plot or some other incompatibility that saw it scrapped in WCP?
By WCIV, the Black Lance had perfected cloaking... hell even the BW had it via Pliers and his little experiments. I also think I remember Pirates had cloaking ships.
Was cloaking even attempted against the Nephilum? Was it totally unsuccessful or was it a mistake in plot or some other incompatibility that saw it scrapped in WCP?
From what I recall, there was supposed to be cloaking in wcp, but they realized that cloaking was never fun so they never went very far with it
There are audio files in the game that aren't used where you and a few other pilots are flying cloaked and someone says that they can see right through it
Death
gh0d (Administrator)
The pirates with cloaks in WC4 were given them by Tolwyn, as part of his stirring up trouble to create cause for a war. It's not, fanfiction aside, something to which a pirate would have ready access, without outside help.
As for cloaking, of the 7 cloak-equiped recon Excaliburs sent into the Kilrah system to investigate contact being lost with in-system bases, only the 7th, flown by Maj. Washington, survived, possibly because the bugs had moved on by that point, as all he saw was battle debris. (ICIS manual).
The Dragon's lack of availability post-WC4 has been discussed before, but the short form is that a) given its use as a terror weapon (biowarfare and incinerating civilian ships from the inside out are hardly SOP for Confed), the political costs outweighed the benefits, and b) the Dragon was prohibitively expensive for mass production, thanks to all of the advanced technologies included in it (cloak, capship-style matter/antimatter powerplant, and so forth).
Besides, in just about every way, the Dragon's performance was met or beat by the ships we did get in WCP, let alone WCSO (where even the WC3 retreads like the Excalibur and Thunderbolt got upgraded). Not paying Dragon prices for Dragon performance is definitely an issue in a Confed with a budget where the military has to fight for every dime (per ICIS manual).
As for cloaking, of the 7 cloak-equiped recon Excaliburs sent into the Kilrah system to investigate contact being lost with in-system bases, only the 7th, flown by Maj. Washington, survived, possibly because the bugs had moved on by that point, as all he saw was battle debris. (ICIS manual).
The Dragon's lack of availability post-WC4 has been discussed before, but the short form is that a) given its use as a terror weapon (biowarfare and incinerating civilian ships from the inside out are hardly SOP for Confed), the political costs outweighed the benefits, and b) the Dragon was prohibitively expensive for mass production, thanks to all of the advanced technologies included in it (cloak, capship-style matter/antimatter powerplant, and so forth).
Besides, in just about every way, the Dragon's performance was met or beat by the ships we did get in WCP, let alone WCSO (where even the WC3 retreads like the Excalibur and Thunderbolt got upgraded). Not paying Dragon prices for Dragon performance is definitely an issue in a Confed with a budget where the military has to fight for every dime (per ICIS manual).