Difficulty levels explained

At least as of WC1, it wasn't supposed to be impossible in-universe. Claw Marks indicates that Skinner and Dibbles were sent, alone, to take down a destroyer in a pair of Scimitars, and nothing in the article suggests that they were part of a larger strike force. The article also doesn't indicate that there was anything about this that would have been impossible or ridiculous to attempt.

Sure, it's not entirely safe to be making so many assumptions from what an article *doesn't* say, but...

I'm going from memory here (I'm at work, and Claw Marks is at home), but I'm 90% sure that the article said that Skinner and Dribbles were part of a larger strike team. Also, I'm nearly 100% sure that the article said that the attack "damaged, but did not destroy" the target (a Ralari), and that, while Skinner and Dribbles' presence would not have guaranteed its destruction, it might have tilted the scales. Since Skinner and Dribbles never made it out of their Jalthi encounter alive, and the Ralari was damaged, there must have been other ships involved.
 
Well back then there were no Phase Shields , so ofcourse it was easier to attack

a Capship , especially a Corvette or a Destroyer with a couple of Fighters and

maybe if you were expierienced enough,destroy it.

Don`t forget about the GUNS vs SHIELDS issue throughout the WC universe
 
It does beg the question though, what would the point of destroyers be if they were ineffectual against fighters? Actually I've just noticed something: I don't have the original WC1 Clawmarks to check against, but in the 3DO Super Wing Commander version it actually says that Skinner and Dibbles were sent as part of a strike team. Perhaps the designers realised that the older version of events was a little improbable.

You're both right. The "hypothetical question" on page 4 threw out the scenario involving you and wing leader on attack approach to a Ralari (leaving it ambiguous). But then Page 5 clarifies that the real event involved Tooner and Dibbles as part of a larger attack force. http://claw.solsector.net/4.html

Well back then there were no Phase Shields , so ofcourse it was easier to attack

a Capship , especially a Corvette or a Destroyer with a couple of Fighters and

maybe if you were expierienced enough,destroy it.

Don`t forget about the GUNS vs SHIELDS issue throughout the WC universe

Phase shields or not (the evolving cycles of guns/shields has been discussed many times), an important thing to note is that capships are supposed to have a purpose in the Wing Commander universe. There's some thousands of medium size capital ships fighting somewhere off screen. For every carrier loaded full of fighters, there's a dozen or three destroyers that have a single fighter squadron (or less or none) holding down some system off the front lines.

For playability, we interacting with the game can take down a destroyer no problem, but we consistently see fiction and discriptions of events in the background describing massive coordinated strikes necessary to down the larger birds.
 
Back
Top