WC Fleet Engagements

Then again, carriers are build to bring Torpedo Bombers to destroy enemy fleets. Torpedo Bombers are slow, frakkin slow, doesnt even have Jump Drives and some without afterburners, making them useless without capship support. Carriers bring them along, but some like the Midway and Bengal barely have anti-ship weaponry, like in the movie, where, without their fighters and bombers, are space dust to enemy ships, exactly where Battleships and cruisers come in play, designed to pit it off one-on-one with other capships and unescorted carriers. Carriers, too are expensice as mention above so there aren't a lot of 'em, most engagements could be focused to CapshipVsCapShip battles. Destroyers and Corvettes come in when both sides required an extra anti-snubfighter screen for the bigger, more expensive ships,like carriers, which are prone to Torpedo attacks. Snubfighters, however are to take on enemy fighters while the pig-slow bombers can carry out their runs. Fighters can also do lotsa things, scouting, interception, deep-space dogfighteing, anything to do with enemy-killing.
 
I agree totally that the WC1-4 setup wherein all enemy ships go down with just two torpedo hits (or even just a single fighter's guns!) is unrealistic. The Prophecy/SO model, in which a ship is divided into several critical components, each of which must be killed separately, and each of which takes up to three torpedoes to kill (meaning that a single bomber does not carry enough torpedoes to kill anything above a simple destroyer) was a great improvement. The problem, though, was that the AI could not handle this new model too well. Capship guns (such as the Cerberus' main gun) could not properly target enemy capship components for a ship-to-ship fight, and AI-controlled bomber pilots did not bother to guard against turret fire (by either shooting down turrets before launching their torpedoes, or by getting in close before launching).
 
Maybe the answer would be to make smaller capships lack the armament to drive off a fighter attack effectively on their own- for instance, enable it so a pair of torpedo bombers could take out a destroyer with the judicious use of missile decoys and afterburners, or, in the alternative, if it was some sort of destroyer boasting extensive anti-fighter weaponry, make it more vulnerable to capship attack (hence putting the burden on the fighter pilot to protect the friendly capship). Still doesn't solve the problem of attacking large capships, but it's a start.

Standoff's losing episode where it pits the Ralatha against the Firekka illustrates the kind of engagement I'm talking about in a way, though they seemed to have jury-rigged the Ralatha to fire torpedoes. :) (not that I'm complaining, it was a very pleasant surprise to actually see a vision engine capship screw up my mission for me, usually vision capships I can just let chill until everything else is dead!)
 
Capships in WC

The limitations of the various game engines is one of the biggest reasons we don't see very many capital ship engagements in the games (outside of a few notable missions and cut scenes). Secondly, like it has been mentioned, the whole series is done from the perspective of the pilot and therefore all the missions are beatable from the pilot's perspective. They wanted to make a game that had some replay value to it and would encourage you to buy the next installment in the series. Anything that detracts from that would be bad policy for them.

As for in the universe itself there is a simple reason that Confed/K. Empire just don't crank out carriers. Even in WWII all carrier building nations continued to build battleships, cruisers, destroyers and other capital ships. Several reasons for this, which I think some of the books bear this out.
1. The carriers are always assigned to key sectors so you can't have enough carriers to cover the whole front. You have to concentrate your striking power, and dispersing carriers (which can hit multiple targets and carry out different mission roles simultanously) is a good way to let the enemy defeat your navy piece by piece.
2. Other cap ships (even though we don't see them in the game due to limitations/gameplay factors) serve as escorts for the carrier, extra sensor platforms, can be detached to perform secondary missions, and can be sacrificed to save the carrier and more valuable ships (Think Taffy 53 at the Battle of Leyte Gulf and the destroyers making attack runs on a much larger and better equipped Japanese force to save the escort carriers). Tactical and strategic flexibility is the reason the US still builds cruisers, destroyers, and frigates. Not just carriers.
3. Finally, like it has been mentioned, cap ships can stay on station and cover a larger area as part of a patrol than fighters/bombers can. If nothing else, they serve as trip wires for the battle groups with carriers attached to them.
4. Finally, in WWII both the US, Britain, and Japan, even though all three possesed carriers had to frequently conduct various operations without the carriers present as they were elsewhere performing more critical operations or too far out to be of use at the time the operations were mounted. Confed/K. Empire are the same way, carriers can't be everywhere so you work with what is readily availabe.

I do think though that if a brand new WC game was made there would be a bit more emphasis on capital ships, their engagements, and they would be a tougher nut to crack in a fighter/bomber than is currently available. Its just a matter of the technology catching up with peoples visions.
 
Why would the emphasis change? The name "Wing Commander" will always be associated with fighter combat. Regardless of the setting, making fighters less important in the games would be counter to the spirit of WC.

As for the ease of potting a capship with a fighter, not so in the novels, where J. Random Gameplayer isn't "the best thing since sliced bread" in them, and storyline takes precedence over gameplay. Look at how much it took to disable the dreadnaught in False Colors, compared to just parking inside the dreadnaught in the losing WC3 track and blasting till dead.
 
I disagree- you can nerf fighters or strengthen capships and still retain the spirit of a WC game- intense spaceflight combat with a great plot. I think the idea would be to retain fighters as a critical part of a Confederation battle group- but not to make them so powerful in relation to every other ship type in the game that the construction of non-carrier or transport ships seems absurd, as DeFrancoj pointed out.
 
I won't be satisfied until they let me get inside a MIP, infiltrate a capship, kill the crew and take over the whole universe.
 
The capships are supposed to do more stuff than we actually get to see in the games.
Yes, of course they are. Otherwise, it would be impossible to justify their existence, and we would have to repudiate the whole universe as making no sense whatsoever. As far as our combat experience in the game goes, though, it's impossible to see how they're supposed to do it. The games effectively leave no role whatsoever for the larger capships, or even for the picket ships, apart from their ability to launch fighters (apart from the occasional cutscene).

Respectfully, Bombardier's use of the WW2 analogy is more or less useless. He is explaining that naval vessels other than carriers did have a role in the 1940s. This is certainly the case, but pointing it out doesn't in any way provide a role for their 27th century analogs.
Look at how much it took to disable the dreadnaught in False Colors, compared to just parking inside the dreadnaught in the losing WC3 track and blasting till dead.
I do appreciate testimony from the novels, since I still haven't read them. I wonder though, did this giant, pain-in-the-ass-to-kill dreadnaught accomplish anything before they brought it down?


where J. Random Gameplayer isn't "the best thing since sliced bread" in them, and storyline takes precedence over gameplay.
All right, true: the games are designed to make Mr Gameplayer really powerful. I quote myself:
I'm certainly not suggesting that WC would have been better off if it were more like Homeworld or something, where an individual fighter is just some gnat swarming around getting a load of the pretty colors coming out of the battleships. However, I still think it would be/would've been possible to leave a role for ships of the line and a role for bomber squadrons
In other words, downing a whole fleet with the half-dozen torpedoes on my bird just doesn't feel right--these awe inspiring space giants don't inspire awe if they just feel like speedbumps. The gameplay is worse for it.

So, to keep this thread moving, what I've been trying to think about is, how would we implement the weapons balance and combat paradigm in Prophecy or some future game?
 
DeFrancoj said:
Respectfully, Bombardier's use of the WW2 analogy is more or less useless. He is explaining that naval vessels other than carriers did have a role in the 1940s. This is certainly the case, but pointing it out doesn't in any way provide a role for their 27th century analogs.

How about those same roles that they had then (and now)?

DeFrancoj said:
I do appreciate testimony from the novels, since I still haven't read them. I wonder though, did this giant, pain-in-the-ass-to-kill dreadnaught accomplish anything before they brought it down?

It took out both pursuing confed cruisers in a running battle.
 
That was the carrier that engaged the Confed cruisers, not the dreadnaught, and even then it only managed to survive due to a malfunction of the self-destruct mechanism.

As for the dreadnaught, the salvaged kat carrier the Landreich was using had a wing of Strakhas aboard, which were used to blast the shield generators, but the fighters were mostly busy with other fighters and smaller capships, while the carrier's anti-capship weaponry (not modeled in the game) went to town on the dreadnaught's capship missile launcher in the lower "prong", crippling but not destroying the dreadnaught before the Landreich force had to bug out.
 
I just think its funny that people love using the WWII analogy so much when talking about the role of Capships in WC, though I laugh at the thought of a Mustang with a dive bomb or two or a scout plane armed with nothing but a cannon being able to take down the likes of a ship like the Yamato (the Japanese flagship dreadnaught) by itself. (The Yamato was actually destroyed by being successfully hit by 5 1,000 lb. bombs and 10 torpedoes) http://www.combinedfleet.com/btl_yam.htm
 
Certainly it would increase the realism to make it require more torpedoes to take out a carrier than the player can mount onto his bomber. The problem is getting the AI to be able to use it effectively. As seen in Prophecy/SO, AI-controlled bombers aren't all that smart, and do not bother trying to avoid getting their torpedoes shot down by enemy turrets.
 
Ijuin said:
As seen in Prophecy/SO, AI-controlled bombers aren't all that smart, and do not bother trying to avoid getting their torpedoes shot down by enemy turrets.

Doesn't this say it all? Take WC2: The Broadsword has enough firepower to take down two destroyer, but half the torpedoes probably wont even reach their target. We have no reason to think that everyone is as good as Blair, or Casey, or any of the other aces we see in WC for that matter.;)
 
Dyret said:
Doesn't this say it all? Take WC2: The Broadsword has enough firepower to take down two destroyer, but half the torpedoes probably wont even reach their target. We have no reason to think that everyone is as good as Blair, or Casey, or any of the other aces we see in WC for that matter.;)

As stated before, this is purely game mechanics. Read some of the novels and you'll see it takes an entire squadron of bombers to take down one ship, many of the torpedoes DO get shot down before reaching the target.
 
Which is why Confederate forces routinely assign two ship elements to take down single destroyers and their entire associated fighter complements. :)
 
Spertallica said:
Which is why Confederate forces routinely assign two ship elements to take down single destroyers and their entire associated fighter complements. :)
1. Kilrathi destroyers may be more powerful
2. They may have detected it as an "unknown", so they had to put more ships in case
3. There is no 3
4. It depends what "ship elements u meant"
5. Confedearation forces may have too much time on their hands.
 
This all depdends on the kind of Kilrathi destroyer, there are several, and the state of things. They probably didn't have the luxury of using multiple wings to strike every last cat destroyer on WC3.
 
fongsaunder said:
1. Kilrathi destroyers may be more powerful
2. They may have detected it as an "unknown", so they had to put more ships in case
3. There is no 3
4. It depends what "ship elements u meant"
5. Confedearation forces may have too much time on their hands.
"Two ship element" means 2 bombers (you and your wingman) against the enemy and their defences.

If you're lucky, you get 2 Hellcats as escort (a 4 ship element then).

Anyway, I think the Capships in Freespace 2 might be a good analogy of how they work outside of the Wing Commander games. They're tough to kill without several of the heaviest fighter based weapons, or concentrated firepower. Perhaps instead of one torpedo strike like in the game, it'll take several to disable a subsystem.
 
Confed CANNOT make carriers enough to cover ALL its systems. Remember, major fighter ops NEED carriers. The Kilrathi war was nothing like Wing Commander Armada, where you had fighters flying around alone for long strings of systems.

And wherever they can send carriers, those ships mop up the enemy, but they have tens of carrier groups and thousands of systems.

In End Run we see a Corvette doing picket duty on a jump point for YEARS. Destroyers are very useful against OTHER capships, and may be able to interdict enemy shipping routes and planets. Pirates and raiders can be dealt with with "regular" capships in a quicker and cheaper way than diverting a Carrier group from the front lines just for that.

The books make it pretty clear that the games are somewhat exagerating the single fighter capabilities. Sure, fighters and torpedo bombers are a hell lot effective, but they're not as godly as WC1 and 3 make them seem.


PS: Another example: Sure, the Death Star can crush any enemy Capships and even planets in SW, but there is only one of it at any given time... Star Destroyers aren't going anywhere.
 
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