Why am I yelling at Cougar for getting drunk?

D

Darpaek

Guest
It seems in every WC game I've ever played all the pilots do in their off-time is sit in a bar and get drunk (unless they're slated to die, then they play music) I can remember like one line outta SM2 where Bluehair turns down a drink from Shotglass because he's about to go on patrol, but I also remember the mission after Blair finds out Angel's dead in WC3 he's slamming shots in the bar when a scramble alarm goes off, he takes one more shot AFTER the scramble alarm and then runs off! ~~~ Or the beginning of WC4, Blair and Maniac are drinking in the bar BEFORE Blair knows he's been recalled for duty and he's leaving immediately, so he has no reason to abstain or drink something non-alcoholic.

I guess I always figured they had invented some sort of detox pill by the 27th century or something.
 
It's not something unique to Wing Commander, look at the history of military service and alcohol. When you spend your days getting shot at people tend to want to unwind afterwards...alcohol is often a first choice.

You have the choice as Blair to drink or not drink prior to that scramble.

And they have invented a detox system of sorts...Hunter is forced to go through with it at one point in FF. I believe he calls it the "green goop" or something along those lines...he makes it clear he is not a fan of it...but it does clear up hangovers.
 
Right. I guess that's my point. Drinking for Confed pilots seems to be the norm. It appears to me that Cougar isn't a regular drunk - I don't understand why Cougar gets drunk once (on Christmas, no less) and you yell at him. Especially when the next conversation you have in the Rec Room has two more pilots drinking. And then you go blow up the supercarrier and the LT offers you a bottle of scotch...
 
Even though there's often a great deal of drinking in WC games, there's a pretty clear distinction between those that have a drink or two and instances where the characters get completely wasted. And you will recall that the WC3 instance where you have the option of continuing to drink or not, you certainly aren't rewarded for continuing to drink. I can't remember how much eisen reams you out or not, but the mission - while memorable - handicaps you with controls that keep reversing.
 
First up, there's a major difference between drinking a bit and getting completely drunk. Soldiers need to blow off steam - but anyone who's too incapacitated to perform his duties, and is disrupting everyone else is bound to get in trouble.

Secondly, Cougar isn't just any pilot. The average pilot has very few duties outside of the cockpit - but Cougar is Bradshaw's XO. He's got all kinds of duties onboard the carrier - arranging mission schedules, planning pilot assignments, checking up on all the other pilots, herding them into the flight sim every once in a while for performance evaluations, et cetera. He's far too busy to be allowed to get drunk.

Finally, it's just real bad for morale when you see your superiors trying to drown their worries in a bottle - some pilots might worry at that point :).
 
In the WC3 mission Blair shouldn't be allowed on the flightdeck(actually the bartender should have called the deck technicians to stop him.

And while you hear all the more of drunk airline pilots and train conductors, I never heard of a dead-drunk fighter pilot.

As for blowing off steam, well, had blair been drinking coffee or energy drinks after that he would probably go berserk and try to take on the entire kilrathi fleet himself.
 
And while you hear all the more of drunk airline pilots and train conductors, I never heard of a dead-drunk fighter pilot.

I've read few years back about Russian pilot in Uganda service, who after drinking with some people decided to show them some aerobatic maneuvers. His MiG-21 crashed into Lake Victoria.
 
And while you hear all the more of drunk airline pilots and train conductors, I never heard of a dead-drunk fighter pilot.
Also, depending on country/branch/superiors, military sometimes seems to be less concerned about drinking on duty. And its easier to cover up.
 
Huh. This whole scene with Standoff ended up being pretty neat. I was fundamentally misunderstanding part of the WC Universe and this totally cleared it up. How cool!
 
After rereading this post I got the following RSS feed;

Drunk pilot stopped on frankfurt airport today, a 49 year old russian pilot was cought with an alcoholic smell and had a promillage of 0,5 at moment of trying to enter the plane... given he'd already slept inbetween taking -whatever-, and was still trying to guide 100+ people to the skies, I seriously hope he never flies again.
 
0.5? ~~~. You really don't want to know what is going on in the cockpits in the world I guess.
 
Back to WC, I seem to remeber a few times in SM when Shotglass actually said that because of highier alert, no drinks were served, and it could be the situation in Firekk (given the circumstances). The two other characters may heve been drinking something non-alcoholic.
 
Not to get everyone up in arms, but I'm pretty sure US navy boats are totally dry. They only drink when they go into port (unlike European navies, I'm told). This, of course, appears to make life on a warship even duller (at least in today's oceans).
 
Not to get everyone up in arms, but I'm pretty sure US navy boats are totally dry. They only drink when they go into port (unlike European navies, I'm told). This, of course, appears to make life on a warship even duller (at least in today's oceans).

For the most part they are. Alcohol used to be "prescribed" to some Navy pilots in WWII as a "bracer" after a particularly tough outing. Although I'm sure American ingenuity is still as prevalent as it was in WWII. (I'm thinking "Torpedo Juice" made from the alcohol that torpedoes would use as fuel)
 
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