Yorktown-Class Carriers

Iceblade said:
Probably point-defense as we rarely fly them for more than intercept (ie scramble). Although they probably aren't either, but actually interceptor arrows.
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Rarely? You can usually fly them whenever you want. You can choose your own fighter remember?

Also, given the fact that most of the fighters on the Victory appear to be older, rather out of date fighters, would it not be logical to assume that the Arrows they carry are not the latest model?
 
Well, all of those fighters were at least upgraded with the latest phase-shield piercing tech, so they aren't that out of date.
 
You forget that these are later variants of older fighter designs. The Thunderbolt VII's design is old, but it's a perfectly functional modern fighter...
 
The Thunderbolt's designation happens to be HF-66 - which, if we assume these numbers were assigned more or less in sequence, would put it between the general-use WC2 ships (Rapier, Epee, Sabre) and the prototypes that appeared at the end of the WC2 era (Morningstar, Wraith... though I don't remember, did Star*Soldier confirm the Wraith's designation?).

The stories fans tell about the Victory's fighter compliment have always been kinda crazy. First, it was "they're all brand-new, because we've never seen them before"... and then "no, they're all obsolete, I saw one of them in Academy!". Both ideas are obviously false - we see plenty of other ships, mainly WC2 ships, in Academy, and nobody assumes this appearance means they're obsolete. And then, after the war, we see the Hellcat, Thunderbolt and Longbow remain in service until the introduction of the WCP ships... whatever their age, Confed obviously did not consider them obsolete in 2669, and the Victory's fighter compliment was (as far as we can tell) pretty standard.
 
Uh....could it be assumed that the improved weapons (aka phase piercing guns) could be installed on fighters in the field as it were?

Also, are the fighters themselves probably new (like 6 months new) or are they probably several years old (at least those that survived and could be repaired)?
 
Iceblade said:
Uh....could it be assumed that the improved weapons (aka phase piercing guns) could be installed on fighters in the field as it were?

Also, are the fighters themselves probably new (like 6 months new) or are they probably several years old (at least those that survived and could be repaired)?
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I don't see why not. I always thought the weapons on those ships were interchangeable. We hear about Hunter losing a laser cannon while trying to land on manual, so that needed to be replaced. Perhaps they could switch it with another mount?

But what about the Photon and Plasma guns? I thought those two were older weapons.
 
frostytheplebe said:
But what about the Photon and Plasma guns? I thought those two were older weapons.
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That doesn't really matter. The laser is even older, and we see that everywhere. We also see exotic upgraded variants of standard guns here and there.
 
The stories fans tell about the Victory's fighter compliment have always been kinda crazy. First, it was "they're all brand-new, because we've never seen them before"... and then "no, they're all obsolete, I saw one of them in Academy!". Both ideas are obviously false - we see plenty of other ships, mainly WC2 ships, in Academy, and nobody assumes this appearance means they're obsolete. And then, after the war, we see the Hellcat, Thunderbolt and Longbow remain in service until the introduction of the WCP ships... whatever their age, Confed obviously did not consider them obsolete in 2669, and the Victory's fighter compliment was (as far as we can tell) pretty standard.
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The key is simply that old doesn't equal obsolete... and that most of the time we don't know how old a fighter is in the first place. Yes, we see the Arrow, Hellcat and Longbow in 2654 (on Academy)... but that has little bearing on the later models flying off the Victory years later (nor does the existence of the Hellcat negate the existence of the Rapier II or any similar thought; none of this is necessarily linear, except for a couple of specific cases where we're told it is).

One thing that I noticed recently is that in the Wing Commander III and IV novelizations Blair *doesn't know what kinds of ships* his fighter wing has until he arrives onboard his ships--clearly, different units are flying different fighters all over the Confederation.
 
There probably was a bit of competition (mostly amongst pilots arguing preferences like we do here) between the Rapier 2 and Hellcat, both fulfill similar roles yet one has more slower turn rate and better armor while the other is more agile yet is less armored. (If we assume armor values changed little between WC2 and 3. (I don't know about shields, it seems there might have been a upgrade but the longbow and crossbow both have comparable shield and armor values, so unless these are all new 2668 hellcats with an improved engine/reactor to handle greater shield output, I would imagine 25.0 cm shields on the hellcat were around when the rapier's had 11.5 shields. At least that's my take.
 
The Hellcat must, at least, be a little older... but who knows -- maybe the Hellcat-D is superior to the Rapier-F. No straight lines! (It is interesting that Hellcats replace the Rapier as Black Lion Squadron's fighter at some point...).
 
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