Planet landable craft.....Some information from someone in the know

Major A Payne said:
Hmmmm. Much in the way of information to contend with. Thanks all, but I'm somewhat confused to whether its possible. Okay then. Let me put it this way. Would it be possible to refit a capital ship or fighter for this type of landing and combat??

Perhaps some sort of variant with a fighter/bomber.
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I expect that you can, but it will still be less efficient (in terms of how much speed and maneuverability you can get for a given engine power) than a craft that is designed from the ground-up for atmospheric combat.
 
At the same time, we only ever saw one ship that was explicitly designed from the ground up for atmospheric combat - the Ekapshi. And we take on these ships (and win!) flying a space fighter not designed as a dedicated atmospheric ship.

Logic dictates that the vast, overwhelming majority of atmospheric combat actions during the Kilrathi War were performed at least on one side by space carrier planes. The defenders might be flying dedicated atmospheric craft... but the attacking side would almost never have that option, because they'd be attacking from a carrier. Since carriers have limited space onboard, it would be preferable to use ships that can handle both space and atmospheric combat reasonably well (of course, we can assume there would be exceptional situations where this is not the case).
 
Well, IIRC the Victory Streak says that Excalibur, while not, of course, an atmosferic-only craft, was designed to be among other things, effective in atmospheric combat.

(Now, I can be wrong, Quatro of all people should know just how bad the VS translation was)
 
not sure if this has been mentioned yet but there is several missions in wc1 and 2 where draymans and clydesdales are billed as "troop transports" so presumably they are ground capable, i also suspect the "free trader" bonnie heather style ship would be.

certainly most fighters should have some atmospheric flight capacity, in wc2 we see several fighters/bombers flying from ground bases (s01 i think).

however the excalibur is supposedly designed to allow atmospheric and space flight which suggests that most ships are relatively unwieldy in atmosphere (flyable but you'd rather not!) though if this decision to design a ship that can operate in both is part of a plan to combat the kilrathi development of atmosphere only craft such as the ekapshi (which we know are very manouverable) then perhaps the excalibur is designed to be more capable in atmosphere than other confed fighters but not be the only craft able to do it.
 
just because they are listed as a troop transport doesn't necessarily mean they are ground capable (although it doesn't totally discount it either) since they could just be used for ferrying massive amounts of troops to starbases or ships to further be transported to combat fronts.
 
In the case of transports, I think it's safer to assume that they are planet-capable, even if that might not always be the case. In most places, there wouldn't be any kind of starbase that they could dock to, direct planetside landings would almost have to be the norm.
 
I figure that any vessel can land unless it has an obviously incompatible structural shape (e.g. a BIG fin on its ventral side that can not be folded aside). Just entering atmosphere and landing is the easy part. It's fighting effectively that is hard--a non-aerodynamic craft will find that craft designed with atmospheric combat in mind can fly circles around it. This would be why you would not want to take a Longbow, for example, into a surface battle.
 
Madman said:
not sure if this has been mentioned yet but there is several missions in wc1 and 2 where draymans and clydesdales are billed as "troop transports" so presumably they are ground capable, i also suspect the "free trader" bonnie heather style ship would be.
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That very well may be, but isn't the only solution. I could see some large transports being spaceborne while the various assault shuttles do the ferrying down to planets. The Privateer games do well to show that even bulky non-fighters are well geared to land on planets though.
 
I remember the first time I played WC4 quite some time ago...had a mission in atmo, can't remember the planet name or even the craft I was flying. The antigrav theory is probably correct because I was initially overwhelmed by the atmo graphics in game (OMG, this isn't...a black void!) and literally didn't know which way was up or down, so I ended up hanging in midair at zero speed for some time before I got shot down.
 
Missions involving atmospheric combat in WC4 limit you to the Hellcat for the Confederation, and the Vindicator and the Dragon/Lance for the Border Worlds.
 
The Sabre is shown as being atmosphere capable in Fleet Action, and the Broadswords were originally intended for Planetary bombing I believe.
 
ChrisReid said:
That very well may be, but isn't the only solution. I could see some large transports being spaceborne while the various assault shuttles do the ferrying down to planets. The Privateer games do well to show that even bulky non-fighters are well geared to land on planets though.
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Isn't there some evidence of this in the End Run book? IIRC, the First Marines hook up with the Tarawa and they have their own transport, but when the specific landing later on the planet with the fairy tale castle (I have a headache and can't remember the name :( Ghorah Khar or something like that?) they do it in their transports, not with the big ship thingy.
 
Bandit LOAF said:
This, to me, is evidence that there must be situations when these fighters can fly in atmospheres in some cases, though -- otherwise it would be a completely pointless thing for him to brief you on.
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Its been a while since I read the movie novel or its follow-up but isn't there a point where Blair and Maniac do an atmospheric attack in their Rapiers - when the Confed Handbook says they're not atmospheric capable. (Yes, probably more of a continuity error but it stands to reason that if the fighters have a LARP variation, they probably have an atmospheric model somehow.)
 
Rapier-Is aren't atmosphere capable but Rapier-IIs can be with the proper prep. If I remember the scene LeHah is thinking of correctly they fly through the edges of the atmosphere but if it said that if they flew to far in their fighters would be destroyed.
 
Jason_Ryock said:
Isn't there some evidence of this in the End Run book? IIRC, the First Marines hook up with the Tarawa and they have their own transport, but when the specific landing later on the planet with the fairy tale castle (I have a headache and can't remember the name :( Ghorah Khar or something like that?) they do it in their transports, not with the big ship thingy.
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Vukar Tag.

The Marines move from their transports to assault landing craft (IIRC?) for the assault on the planet.
 
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