Rapier II question

RogueBanshee

RogueBanshee

Rear Admiral
I was reading the specs of the F-44 Rapier II variants in the encyclopedia and I saw something that IMO makes no sense. According to the encyclopedia the F-44G and F-44H models had their Neutron Guns replaced with Particle Cannons. Why would they do that when the Neutron Guns inflicted more damage?
 
Neutrons are a lousy range match to lasers (laser range: 5000m; PC range: 4200m; NG range: 2500m), and have worse efficiency in converting energy intput to damage than particle cannons, to boot (NG: 1.5cm/nJ; PC: 1.95cm/nJ).
 
As Death implies, the weapon that does the most damage isn't necessarily the best one -- Particle Cannons are better in other ways (especially range). Remember that when Wing Commander II came out, the Particle Cannon was the cool 'new' weapon (the punch of a neutron with the range of a laser)... the newest Confederate fighters had them, while the neutron gun was being relegated to turrets and Kilrathi ships.

Wing Commander games also kept trying to suggest that the neutron was being phased out entirely... Wing Commander III even tried to kill it entirely, but it wouldn't stay dead.

I don't know if F-44H is a designation that actually gets used anywhere, though.
 
Did WC 2 allow you to fire more then one gun type at a time? If so I could understand the logic behind the change though I personally prefer Neutron Guns. If not is there really any point to having Particle Cannons and Lasers on the same ship?

As for WC 3 trying to kill the Neutron Gun it's been years since I played the game but I thought the WC 3 Hellcats had Neutron Guns.
 
Did WC 2 allow you to fire more then one gun type at a time? If so I could understand the logic behind the change though I personally prefer Neutron Guns. If not is there really any point to having Particle Cannons and Lasers on the same ship?
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Yes, WC2 had a full guns option (as best I can remember, the GBA port of Prophecy is the only game which doesn't).

As for WC 3 trying to kill the Neutron Gun it's been years since I played the game but I thought the WC 3 Hellcats had Neutron Guns.
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Yeah, but it was something of a last minute addition -- the manual doesn't list them.
 
We see this happen throughout the series. Excaliburs only have fancy reaper cannons in WC3. By WC4 they've been replaced with Ion Guns. The Thunderbolt gets beefier guns in WC4, then takes a "downgrade" for Secret Ops. All the fighters' gun loadouts will be rebalanced whenever it's necessary for gameplay mechanics. Within the context of the universe, there's all all kinds of explanations concerning power requirements, weapon efficiency, cost and so forth.

RogueBanshee said:
As for WC 3 trying to kill the Neutron Gun it's been years since I played the game but I thought the WC 3 Hellcats had Neutron Guns.
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Yup, and the Hellcat we fly in WC4 has its Neutrons replaced with Particle Cannons.
 
For some strange reason I simply don't like particles on WC2, maybe it's the sound effect.
 
In the WC1 and WC2 time, it was more important what guns the fighters carry. There were too many different guns with similar effect later ( plasma and tachyon; meson and ion ) so that this question became less important. I didnt feel that much difference between a ion-laser arrow and a laser-laser banshee.
 
RogueBanshee said:
I know that. The game of WC4 didn't use any Neutron guns though some of the fighter models mentioned in the novel did.
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Yeah, that's what I was (poorly) trying to explain earlier -- they keep trying to retire it, only to find some other source bring it back.
 
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