What Happened to the dragon

Well the flash pack is just useless now. You have to fly into the hangar of the vesuvius because her hull wont be affected. The probably made similar upgrades to the rest of the fleet's armor.

Bio weaps can be deployed from any fighter. They wernt designed for that purpose. They were designed as a long range heavy fighter. Nothing on that fighter was banned.
 
Lord_Nathrakh said:
exactly, hevy fighters, there is no reason why there wouldnt be some still left

Well im sure Confed would to some extent have atleast one Dragon tucked away somewhere in the galaxy. Its hightly unlikely they would just totally disregard tech like that.

Its just the cons that we went over are to great. Mostly the image that the Dragon stood for. The other lesser one would be the price to mass produce it.
 
(going on memory, here, so I may be off a bit)

There were only a total of 4 squadrons of Dragons deployed, and all of those were destroyed during and after the events of WC4. A copy or two may be tucked away, but the Dragon was never a mass-produced fighter, but private (for lack of a better term) production in Project facilities, which would be obvious targets in the post-Incident clean-up. Without parts or maintenance any surviving copies wouldn't be very practical for long, even if they just sat in hiding instead of going out where there's most likely a kill-on-sight order to ConFleet forces.

(There's no canon mention of such a clean-up, AFAIK, but it's a logical decision for a Confederation that's trying to prove to its own citizens as well as those of the UBW that use of tools that were an inherent part of Tolwyn's eugenics program, with a demonstrated 90% fatality rate, is very much not in line with Confed policy.)
 
I agree, it is too expensive for mass production, but it could be a special ops craft. The only problem is keeping from the public eye and most of the military personel. Maybe let a few politicians know-trustworthy ones that agree with the other uses for this craft-and the special ops division that run and fly this bird.
 
There is very little advantage to the Dragon in the WCP-period era; its innovative design and engineering are now apparently standard fare for Confederation front-line fighter craft.

Yes, it cloaks - but so do Excaliburs, which by WCP have more shields, are faster (650Kps), carry more guns, and almost as many missiles. Black Vampires in WC:SO have a 200kps advantage in speed, more shields and equivalent armor, as many missiles, and even include rocket pods for strike missions... PLUS they carry more torps. Plus they're far more maneuverable AND are half the length.

Whoop de do. I'm going to commit political suicide by keeping Dragons around when I can do similar missions with Excaliburs, Vampires, or even look at maybe a new fighter design using the same technologies which the Dragon pioneered but have since been incorporated (for the most part) into other ships.
 
I can conceed that there probably were a few Dragons left after the actions of WC4. Blairs of course, plus any of the ones that made it back from the final battle (I can't remember, were the other lances sent to the Princeton or were they in the final battle?). And, in the 'evil' ending, Blair orders some Lances to check out a problem along the Border Worlds, meaning that there probably were some left.
Plus the Dragons were pretty much self-sufficient (according to the WC4N) and they apparently shared many systems with the Excal, making their initial cost the only monitary worry.
It would be stupid to dismantle the Dragons/Lances if there were some left, plus politicians wouldn't have to back their existance. There are plenty of "Black Projects" and "discretionary funds" to keep whatever Confed wants afloat and quiet.
Could they have the ones that survived in reserve somewhere in a special unit answering only to Confed brass or used for testbed purposes? That's a big fault point in WC4 (unmonitored military) and the Senate wold probably scrutinize the military alot more, but its possible. Did they build anymore Dragons? Probably not.

C-ya
 
Haesslich said:
Why do politicians scrap ANY project? Politics.

I'm not sure I'd want to be known as the 'Senator who Voted For Using Dragons' in the Confederation senate. Remember, those people whore themselves out for votes; being known as the person who kept that program active, even if it makes sense, would probably be a political death sentence.

And THAT my friend, is what slush funds and black ops are for in the first place.

Dargons? What Dragons? ConFleet got rid of those years ago. Now, let's talk about why the Deep Space Rescue Vehicle project is so overbudget.*

*The DSRV program was a favorite hiding place for Navy special projects funds. It went over 2,000 percent over-budget. (Source: Blind Man's Bluff, the Untold Story of American Submarine Espionage)
 
Have any of the "Dragons for SpecOps" folks ever heard the Ben Franklin saying "three can keep a secret, if two are dead"?

While "uber-secret black ops agency that knows everything but operates while totally unknown" is a common movie theme (when the spy agencies aren't portrayed as bumbling idiots, another common movie theme), it doesn't reflect that accurately on reality.

To be honest, I never understood why this whole "Dragons should return" thing that runs through a lot of the online WC fandom. The Dragon is one of the more contrived plot devices in the WC universe (which doesn't exactly lack for contrived plot devices), and an utter munchkin-mobile to boot (even more-so than all the other games' "wonderships", which has always bothered me).

And you know what? The Dragon is completely, thoroughly, and expensively mediocre compared to WCP/WCSO-era fighters, even before you consider public relations concerns over using a terror weapon.

Bomber-level shielding? When you're almost as big as a WCP bomber (Devastator is 36m), and more than twice as big as WCP fighters (Vampire, the largest WCP "pure fighter" craft, is 18.33m) while not being able to outrun said fighters, it's not that hard to hit it enough times that the extra protection won't contribute that long to continued survival.

Maneuverable while retaining heavy firepower? Vampire dusts the Dragon in handling, and does so while pumping out more damage, both in terms of gun and missile firepower.

Cloaking? Available in cheaper Excaliburs, which also happen to be mass-produced fighters without the stigma of being used in the killing 90% of a planet's population with a type of weapon that has earned nearly universal condemnation from just about every group of humanity since the 20th century.

Infinite AB? Even ignoring the autoslide AB "cheat", how often in WCP/WCSO did you run out of AB fuel if you didn't hold down the AB key/button the entire battle?

Where's the profit in starting assembly lines from scratch to build a massively expensive ship that discovery of even its existence could bring an end to the careers of countless numbers of people whose main concerns are continuing said careers?
 
Death said:
To be honest, I never understood why this whole "Dragons should return" thing that runs through a lot of the online WC fandom. The Dragon is one of the more contrived plot devices in the WC universe (which doesn't exactly lack for contrived plot devices), and an utter munchkin-mobile to boot (even more-so than all the other games' "wonderships", which has always bothered me).

And you know what? The Dragon is completely, thoroughly, and expensively mediocre compared to WCP/WCSO-era fighters, even before you consider public relations concerns over using a terror weapon.

The reason that they want these fighters back is because they look cool and they cloak. Never mind that a Vampire flies rings around them, shoots harder, gets in and out of range faster, AND has more shields than it does.. and regenerates them damned quickly. When you can move the way the Vampire or even Panther can, the fission guns become a poor substitute for four light torps and more missiles.

If I want to take on a WCP-era capship, give me a Black Devastator - more armor and shields than a Dragon, and more ship-killing power in its plasma cannon to boot. At least THAT doesn't have to charge for 30 seconds to kill a fighter. Fire it twice, and boom! No more ship!
 
Death said:
While "uber-secret black ops agency that knows everything but operates while totally unknown" . . .
The uber-secret black ops organization almost got away with it in WC4. :)
Death said:
And you know what? The Dragon is completely, thoroughly, and expensively mediocre . . .
I'm not one to say that all Confed should be equipped with Dragons, it just seems to be such a waste to destroy a technological marvel because of its past. Think V-1 and V-2 rockets from WWII. Used to rain down destruction (albeit limited) on London, but did they immediately dissassemble all the rockets after WWII? No, we took them tested them, used many as prototypes, and used the technology to shoot a couple of men into space over the next few decades. It just seems kindof a huge, stupid waste to just get rid of something useful becasue of its political slant.
Also, I wouldn't suggest that the Dragon could survive in WCP. The interim years are when I believe, at the very least, the Lances could have been used to develop the technology used to make the Vampire and Panthers so great. I just think that, hell they cost a couple of hundred billion (whatever the price) to build, why not make use of them?
Death said:
Where's the profit in starting assembly lines from scratch . . .
I wouldn't suggest that Confed build anymore of the Lance, just use the ones they still have instead of blindly throwing them away when much could be gained from using them (either as a small covert force or as testbeds).

I'm still not convinced that a political slant would be put on the Dragon anyway. A piece of machinery is only as destructive as the person who controls it. I mean we don't hate the Tommy gun just because mobsters used it in the Depression era. We don't look badly upon the B-29 even though it killed hundreds of thousands of Japanese with the atomic bomb. Hell, we even still marvel to this day about the durability and craftsmanship of the AK-47, even though this weapon is synonomous with communist power. I think the politicians would balk more at the price tag than what these craft were used for.
Anyway, those are my thoughts on the subject.

C-ya
 
Viper61 said:
The uber-secret black ops organization almost got away with it in WC4. :)

So you call Tolwyn getting tried for genocide and the Black Lance hunted down like dogs 'getting away with it'? They didn't - they were instead exposed by Farmer Blair and a bunch of ne'er-do-wells known as the Border Worlds.

Viper61 said:
I'm not one to say that all Confed should be equipped with Dragons, it just seems to be such a waste to destroy a technological marvel because of its past. Think V-1 and V-2 rockets from WWII. Used to rain down destruction (albeit limited) on London, but did they immediately dissassemble all the rockets after WWII? No, we took them tested them, used many as prototypes, and used the technology to shoot a couple of men into space over the next few decades. It just seems kindof a huge, stupid waste to just get rid of something useful becasue of its political slant.
Also, I wouldn't suggest that the Dragon could survive in WCP. The interim years are when I believe, at the very least, the Lances could have been used to develop the technology used to make the Vampire and Panthers so great. I just think that, hell they cost a couple of hundred billion (whatever the price) to build, why not make use of them?
I wouldn't suggest that Confed build anymore of the Lance, just use the ones they still have instead of blindly throwing them away when much could be gained from using them (either as a small covert force or as testbeds).

Notice that the Dragon's maneuverability and shielding levels are now present in WCP-era Excaliburs, and later bomber designs like the Shrike and Devastator. The Dragon's technology survived, or at least the lessons learned from it did, but the fighter itself did not.

The Bearcat shared many of the Dragon's abilities, as far as maneuverability and speed go, and seems to be the spiritual ancestor of our present-day (WCP) dedicated dogfighters, though the Dragon's spiritual descendants are apparently the bomber craft which share its heavy shielding and maneuverability (along with its size).

And frankly - when you whore yourself out for votes, and news of a genocidal eugenics campaign employing bioweapons and terror tactics makes its way around Confed space, you're going to try to avoid being associated with such things if you make your living on the good graces of the voting public. Therefore Dragons being employed are a no-no, unless you're Blair in the Black Lance ending.

Besides, they got what they needed out of the deal - the technology which enabled the Dragon to move so well despite its size, and its heavy shielding. Why bother employing them? I've said as much in previous posts, which were apparently ignored by the 'Let's bring the Dragon back!' camp.

Viper61 said:
I'm still not convinced that a political slant would be put on the Dragon anyway. A piece of machinery is only as destructive as the person who controls it. I mean we don't hate the Tommy gun just because mobsters used it in the Depression era. We don't look badly upon the B-29 even though it killed hundreds of thousands of Japanese with the atomic bomb. Hell, we even still marvel to this day about the durability and craftsmanship of the AK-47, even though this weapon is synonomous with communist power. I think the politicians would balk more at the price tag than what these craft were used for.
Anyway, those are my thoughts on the subject.

C-ya

Bioweapons and nerve gas in warfare. Notice that nice nations don't use them, and indeed go out of their way to proclaim that they don't use them, since the only people who've done so have since been hunted with a vigor only matched by those people who hunt Nazis down. Say... bioweapons and nerve gas... didn't they get nailed on that too, those Nazi bastards? Sure did.

You know, people like the Aum Shinkyo terrorists, or Saddam Hussein? And in Japan, there's a very strong anti-nuclear faction primarily BECAUSE of the fact that Hiroshima and Nagasaki got bombed out by these weapons.

Politicians tend to go out of their way to avoid being associated with the swastika, after Hitler and his Nazi party... despite its history as being a symbol of life for over two or more millenia. Trust me - image is everything to politicians, and more than enough reason to avoid using Dragons, or even to make a public show of burning the buggers if it would get them more votes.
 
They just simply shouldn't be used by the Confed WCP-Era forces. Outdated and a symbol of evil. Should they be stripped down and have parts of them be applied to other uses? Absolutely. Also, the price, as many others have said, is fairly steep.
 
Viper61 said:
I'm not one to say that all Confed should be equipped with Dragons, it just seems to be such a waste to destroy a technological marvel because of its past. Think V-1 and V-2 rockets from WWII. Used to rain down destruction (albeit limited) on London, but did they immediately dissassemble all the rockets after WWII? No, we took them tested them, used many as prototypes, and used the technology to shoot a couple of men into space over the next few decades. It just seems kindof a huge, stupid waste to just get rid of something useful becasue of its political slant.
And yet, the V-2 rockets are a very good example of just how sensitive these kinds of issues are. That, you see, is why NASA didn't get a man into space before the Russians - because it was decided that using a rocket derived from a German design would look back. Instead, they developed a completely new 'civilian' rocket, using only the practical knowledge about rocketry that they got out of the German weapons.

There is another thing you're overlooking. The V-2 rocket was developed by a foreign power - it was technology that the US did not have. That's why it was worthwhile to keep some rockets and get a whole bunch of German engineers to come and live in the US. Now, what could there possibly be about the Dragon that would make it worth keeping? Confed doesn't need it, because it's got lots of other fighters that do the job. Confed can't use it, because even if you ignore politics, it's still bloody expensive. Confed can't even learn from its design, because, well, they designed it. They've got the plans for it and the research that went into it.

BTW, I don't think that getting rid of the remaining Dragons would have been a Senate decision anyway - someone in the military would have made that choice, in order to score political points. All you people who whine about evil politicians always doing the wrong thing for the military and the country, don't forget that all generals and admirals are politicians, and more often than not, are just as concerned about keeping their careers going as civilian politicians are.
 
Quarto said:
BTW, I don't think that getting rid of the remaining Dragons would have been a Senate decision anyway - someone in the military would have made that choice, in order to score political points. All you people who whine about evil politicians always doing the wrong thing for the military and the country, don't forget that all generals and admirals are politicians, and more often than not, are just as concerned about keeping their careers going as civilian politicians are.

I can see them 'strongly suggesting' or 'promising to remove any traces of the Black Lance', and then asking it be done, so that some people could keep their jobs or funding.

Though I'd suggest that it's the ones who hold the money who have more influence over decisions than the ones who don't - with regards to admirals and generals in the civilian political environment. :D
 
Haesslich said:
So you call Tolwyn getting tried for genocide and the Black Lance hunted down like dogs 'getting away with it'? They didn't - they were instead exposed by Farmer Blair and a bunch of ne'er-do-wells known as the Border Worlds.
That's why that great little word almost was put in there. besides, they were secret enough to stay under the radar while the GE program came to completion and the Dragon fighter was designed, tested and built (even for a prototype, that's at least 5 years)
Haesslich said:
Notice that the Dragon's maneuverability and shielding levels are now present in WCP-era Excaliburs, and later bomber designs like the Shrike and Devastator. The Dragon's technology survived, or at least the lessons learned from it did, but the fighter itself did not.
Thanks for helping me hammer home my point. The improvements to the Dragon (and beyond) are seen in the Prophecy fighters, hence somewhere between WC4 and WCP they had to test all these great improvements on a craft. Why not use a Lance as your testbed instead of building a whole new craft that a) takes money, b) takes time, and c) may not work as well as the Lance. I'll take door number 1, Monty.
Haesslich said:
And frankly - when you whore yourself out for votes, and news of a genocidal eugenics campaign employing bioweapons and terror tactics makes its way around Confed space, you're going to try to avoid being associated with such things if you make your living on the good graces of the voting public. Therefore Dragons being employed are a no-no, unless you're Blair in the Black Lance ending.
Again, I didn't say anything about the Senate voting on a thing. That's what 'classified project funds' are for. You go to the senate say, "we're designing hte next generation of fighters" or even more vague than that. The senate doesn't know how you got to these designs, so they can't be held responsible. No vote, no whoring.
And why is Blair above the law in the 'evil' ending? Since the Heart of the Tige says its okay, the Senate will just let him take the Dragons and do whatever he pleases? I'd like to hold that up as an example that the Lance didn't have a political slant and could be used after WC4.
Haesslich said:
Besides, they got what they needed out of the deal - the technology which enabled the Dragon to move so well despite its size, and its heavy shielding. Why bother employing them? I've said as much in previous posts, which were apparently ignored by the 'Let's bring the Dragon back!' camp.
We're talking the interim time between WC4 and WCP. The Dragon is still the hottest thing on the block, the most technologically advanced peice of equipment in the known universe. that's why you would bother employing them.
Haesslich said:
Bioweapons and nerve gas in warfare. Notice that nice nations don't use them . . .
Yes nerve gas and bioweaps are bad, we all know that, but the Lance is whats on 'trial' here, not the weapons it used. Yes there is that faction in Japan, but they are against the atomic payload the bomber carried, not the bomber itself. The Lance carried WMD, so did the B-29, doesn't mean it will be condemned for all of history because of this. Hell, you could have delivered the nerve gas and the Flashpak with a modified Hellcat or Excal if you wanted to, would that have made them evil as well?
Quarto said:
And yet, the V-2 rockets are a very good example of just how sensitive these kinds of issues are. That, you see, is why NASA didn't get a . ..
Okay, I'll conceed those points, but the fact remains that we used the technology derived from the V-2 to do all of this good. We kept alot of them intact because, I can tell you from experince, testing somethign thats already in the prtotype stage is much easier than taking the blueprints and following someone elses work and building another one. Confed does need Lance (IMHO), the people who designed these fighters are probably part of the Black Lance themselves (in order to keep this fighter quiet) its not like they are going to be in a posistion to help in the coming century or so. As stated above, blueprints and research are one thing. . . a full fledged working prototype is another. Its not expensive to keep the ones you have going, they're aparrently self-sufficient. Building others (which is something I'm not suggesting) is what would be expensive as hell. It wold be more expensive to scrap what has been put into the Dragon and start again from blueprints and research.

I don't know, I think it would be hard for a military man to go, " we have a new fighter that is the most state of the art bird to date and can do a,b,c,d,e,f,g, . . ., lets just scrap this thing shall we?" I'd think this is one toy anyone would have trouble mothballing, just because I really don;t think the Black Lance bad press would spill over to the Dragon.

C-ya
 
Yes nerve gas and bioweaps are bad, we all know that, but the Lance is whats on 'trial' here, not the weapons it used.

I'm having a hard time wrapping my brain around that bit.
 
Bandit LOAF said:
I'm having a hard time wrapping my brain around that bit.
Why? We know that the nerve gas, bioweaps, and atomic weapons are bad, but do we condemn the howitzers or bombers that transport them to their targets? I don't think we do. I guess it would all depend on spin control. . . but I have a hard time wrapping my brain around why someone would blame a dragon for something any other craft could have done just as easily.

C-ya
 
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