Least Favorite Carrier

Question about TCS Victory for the whole board...because maybe I misunderstood something (wouldn't be a shocker)

Before she was pulled into frontline/active service in Wing Commander III's timeframe...what, exactly, was she doing? Stored in mothballs? Being used as a transport? Being used as a training platform?
 
The Yorktown class was designed before the war (and likely pulled up as the cheapest model for carriers-in-a-hurry when the war broke out), but Eisen implies in WC3 that the Victory herself is thirty-odd years old--he says that he served on her "maiden cruise" as a junior officer. Given the estimated age of Eisen (in his 50s as of WC3), this would put the Victory's beginning of service somewhere around the beginning of the war, so if it wasn't one of the carriers being rushed to completion at the start of the war, then it was still brand new when the war started.
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We know that the Yorktown-class was "designed nearly half a century" before the start of the Terran-Kilrathi War (so, ~2584). Victory herself was much younger. Eisen mentions having met Raul Dominguez at the Academy forty years before Wing Commander IV, which would have been 2633. Eisen could have graduated anywhere between 2634 and 2637 (we know it wasn't 2633 because he was a class behind Dominguez). Regardless, that means the Victory entered service in the very first years of the war...

Oh...my mistake...I forgot: the Victory blew up Kilrathi Fralthi II's with balls of fire from Eisen's eyes..and bolts of lightning from Rollins' arse...
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The Victory does occasionally blow up an enemy capital ship - check out the third mission in the Delius series, where it takes out a large asteroid base with a CapShip Missile.

Before she was pulled into frontline/active service in Wing Commander III's timeframe...what, exactly, was she doing? Stored in mothballs? Being used as a transport? Being used as a training platform?
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This is a common misconception - ships like the Victory weren't returned to service, they just became a more common sight on the front lines after more impressive carriers were destroyed towards the end of the war. Victory was in service for the entire war.
 
Thanks, LOAF!

I think I'm still not convinced that I'd equate TCS Victory with the Yorktown-class carriers!

Maybe the (USN) Ranger-class? The Bengal-class is much more like an (USN) Essex- or (USN) Midway-class, for example... heavily armed and armored, carries provisions for extended operation...

Oh well, it's a game, right? There won't always be a convenient A=B comparison..
 
I think I'm still not convinced that I'd equate TCS Victory with the Yorktown-class carriers!
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The Victory is a "Yorktown class Light Carrier" in the Wing Commander universe, not in some kind of water analogy.
 
Bandit LOAF said:
The Victory is a "Yorktown class Light Carrier" in the Wing Commander universe, not in some kind of water analogy.
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I was referring to this part of frosty's comment:

frostytheplebe said:
...the Langley was too slow, under-armed, and unstable to engage in fleet action. I would compare the victory more so to the Lexington...
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Referring to the Lady Lex (aka USN CV-2), one of three fleet carriers in the Pac Fleet

USS Ranger

USS Lexington (CV-2)
 
floundericiousMI said:
I was referring to this part of frosty's comment:



Referring to the Lady Lex (aka USN CV-2), one of three fleet carriers in the Pac Fleet

USS Ranger

USS Lexington (CV-2)
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As I recall, the Ranger spent most of her career in the Atlantic. She provided Air support to the landings at Normandy, among other things.

The Saratoga was the other fleet carrier, also a Lexington class (CV-3), and one of the few Pre-war carriers to actually survive the war.

The other Pre-war carriers were as Follows

Langley (CV-1) Prototype- Scuttled after a vicious air attack 2/41

Lexington (CV-2) Class lead- Foundered after a massive explosion of petrol fumes that spread throughout the ship as a result of dive bomb attacks during the Battle of the Coral Sea 8/42.

Saratoga (CV-3)- Transferred to the Pacific in the late 20s. Survived WW2, in 1946 was placed in surplus and expended as a target during the Bikini Atoll tests.

Ranger (CV-4) participated in Euro landings and British fleet action until 1944 when she was transferred to the Pacific. Where she spent the rest of the war prepping and transporting air groups. She was decomed in 1946.

Yorktown (CV-5) Took massive damage during the Battle of the Coral Sea, was given only essential repairs and sent back out to fight at Midway, where she was eventually lost.

Enterprise (CV-6) The only carrier that was in the thick of the fighting and lived to tell the tale. Despite numerous attempt to have her turned into a museum (including efforts by her former comander, Admiral "Bull" Halsey).

Wasp (CV-7) A smaller version of the Yorktown class. Took three torpedo hits, was set ablaze 9/42.

Hornet (CV-8) Commissioned less then a month before the US Entered the war. She was a variant of the Yorktown class, larger, and much more well armed.
Lost during the Solomon Islands Campaign 10/42
 
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