Wing Commander Academy's Place?

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They didn't, though. The Hellcats we see on WCA seem to have a pair of lasers and a pair of missiles... nothing exceptionally exciting.

(Similarly, the Hornets and such that are in service around Fleet Action have no doubt been updated with more modern technology...)
 
hmm makes u wonder why they even keep such an aging design around, sort of like keeping a broadsword around when they had longbows or devestators
 
The problem is that you're looking at fighter service as though it corresponds directly to the games. Fiction-wise, Longbows were around in WC1 -- we just didn't fly them. Broadswords were still around in WCIII... but we didn't fly them.

(Broadswords were retired to Reserve units in 2670... Longbows left service altogether in the late seventies.)
 
i loved the longbow, was a great bomber had sick armour great warhead load and decent frontal cannons.

though the deve is the best the armour is thick the sheilds thicker and 4 turrets and that mean plasma gun that can take out caps by itself not to mention a great ship killing torpedo load
 
alright kiddies . . .here we go. 'Hellcat debris' (though I wouldn't be ale to tell you for sure that its a Hellcat), a Longbow, and a Sabre, all circa 2654.
Nathrakh, the hellcat wouldn't be that great not only because of the armament, but the armor. It seems at the time of armada and WC3 a new armor that was measured in 'durasteel equivalent' was introduced, 10 times stronger than durasteel IIRC. The hellcats in Academy definitely do not appear to have this armor, do to a single shot from a Dralthi taking them down (though I like to think anytime this happened in Academy, we just cut directly to the end blow, we just didn't see all the previous hits that weakened the shields and armor :) )
If I'm incorrect about any of this, I'm sure it will be corrected ;)

C-ya
 

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Yup, that's right -- Privateer actually explains the armor... 1 centimeter of Plasteel is the equivalent of 10 centimeters of Durasteel armor. 1 cm of Tungsten is 20 cm eq... and 1 cm of Isometal is 60 cm eq. So a Hornet with 3 cm. of Durasteel armor in 2654 might have 3 cm of isometal in 2654... which would be 180 cm equivalent.

(And I'm sure there are even better milspec armors...)
 
I'm guessing as they discover new alloys or find abundance of current materials to use. Have to remember there are thousands upon thousands of fighters out there that faught the Kilrathi War.

I'm guessing when we saw Scimitars used most instead of Hellcat's it's because of what someone said earlier involving one shot hits. The scimitars did have thick armour and lots of sheilding so they would have been the idle fighter. But there is also another variable we have to remove, one shot kills. It could be that one shot kills ARE what happens and the sheilds are there if you get lucky, or, they didn't want us sitting for longer time periods to watch sheild effects from direct hits all the time.


****Possible Spoilers for those who have not seen the entire series****

By the way I just finished watching the last episode of the series, and gosh that was spectacular! I loved the entire series of the cartoons and I wish there was more. I enjoyed the closeness of Blair and Tolwyn which soon showed that they would become enemies in the future (end scene).
 
They kept developing armor over thirty years of warfare -- by the end, they had three-plus types available (on the civilian market, none the less). I'm sure that at any given point MilSpec ships were constructed out of only whatever the most recent alloy is.
 
yeah but there all relevent in armour distributiona dn strenght, that 3 cm armour is equiv to 300cm of durasteel, etc, so thats my point why confuse ppl by bring out armour thats basicly the same thing
 
But if 3 cm of one type of armour is equivalent to 300 cm of another type, then the two types of armour clearly are not the same thing, and therefore, people aren't confused :).
 
I am curious though in the game WC1 it is potrayed that Blair and Marshall meet aboard the Tigers vlaw but in the cartoon and the movie they are kind of rivals how does that work?

-Rance-
 
yeah but there all relevent in armour distributiona dn strenght, that 3 cm armour is equiv to 300cm of durasteel, etc, so thats my point why confuse ppl by bring out armour thats basicly the same thing
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I don't think you're following this properly. Let me try to explain again.

In 2654 ships had armor made of an alloy called Durasteel. A ship with '2 cm' armor meant that it physically had two centimeters of durasteel armor. All weapons were, therefore, measured in their affect on durasteel. A laser which blasts off 1 cm of Durasteel armor does '1 cm' damage. It would take two of these laser blasts to destroy the fighter's armor. Makes sense so far?

As the war progressed, newer and stronger alloys were discovered. Instead of building a fighter with 2 cm of Durasteel armor, you'd build one with 2 cm of Plasteel (for instance) armor. But Plasteel is ten times as strong as Durasteel... so instead of being listed as '2 cm' of armor, it has '20 cm equivalent'. It would now take *twenty* blasts from our laser (which, remember, does 1 cm durasteel damage) to destroy this armor.

New armor is put into service because it's better. It's measured in durasteel equivalent because that's a standard -- which is exactly the basis for any type of measurement.
 
vindicator said:
I am curious though in the game WC1 it is potrayed that Blair and Marshall meet aboard the Tigers vlaw but in the cartoon and the movie they are kind of rivals how does that work?

-Rance-
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People have theorized that since at this time, everyone on the Claw was saying, "Hello Blair, my name is . . ." and introducing themselves, that Marshall turned it into a bad joke (imagine that) and went ahead and did the same thing. Kindof sounds like Maniac to me, and it fits the timeline ;).

C-ya
 
It's also whether you view ever aspect of Wing Commander "cannon," meaning what has been produced, written, and shown is what happened in the WC universe. I, however, view the show and the movie as sort of spinoffs or alternate version. I think the games themselves (and their included supplimental fiction) are law, followed by the books themselves open to personal interpretation and acceptance, and the show and movie are just alternate versions. People who have reasons for the inconsistances I see with the movie and Academy and the games (and they come up with good reasons) view everything as cannon, but that's for the individual fan to decide, really.
 
Maniac and Blair's friendship/rivalry at the Academy is nothing new (to the TV show or the movie)... it comes from the original Wing Commander official guide, and has been expanded upon in numerous sources since then (among them the WCP ICIS manual and the WC3 novel).
 
I'm noticing, on this board, that there are a few subjects that simply get re-hashed again and again . . . something akin to a cow chewing the cud. The Marshall/Blair meeting is one of them. The movie, with all of its inconsistencies, is another. The Academy show is another (because they kept throwing in so many wc3 ships at the Academy). Personally, I agree with Chancekell. Except for the Blair/Marshall meeting, since the Official book says that they were academy "pals". I think the movie and the animated show were . . . entertaining at best. Not to be taken seriously in the grand scheme of things. Otherwise, some goof is going to show up in a post-prophecy fiction flying a Wild Weasel with a wingman in a Minotaur, and then we'll all end up with a huge headache.
 
See, it's because people say things like that that we have to rehash it over and over. :)

(Plus, we're sad sad people with little else to do (G))
 
Bandit LOAF said:
See, it's because people say things like that that we have to rehash it over and over. :)

(Plus, we're sad sad people with little else to do (G))
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Speak for yourself!

(I have NOTHING else to do.)
 
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