Orion Blues

[Spaceman Spiff]

what's up with the demon?

[MamiyaOtaru]

I'mean the talon is not a light fighter because being light makes it a good fighter

But being light does make it an ok fighter If it was heavier it would be less maneuverable but could carry more munitions, making it possibly a better bomber.

(nowadays) you have to decide between maneuverability and weaponary and range. But in space all of this doesn't make sense.

But it does. greater weaponry = greater weight and less maneuverability.

Light and heavy doesn't define all by itself whether a ship is a fighter or a bomber. While you might see a light bomber (a bomber relying on speed) or a heavy fighter (relying on durability) for the most part heavier ships are more suited to being bombers and lighter ships are more suited to being fighters. But the weight (mass?) class does still give broad hints about whether a ship is maneuverable or heavily armed etc.

Certainly, the quality and price of a ship goes into its classification as "light" "medium" or "heavy", as you say (more expensive ships for example might get more power out of a smaller reactor). In that sense you are very much right. All I am saying is that the actual physical properties of light/heavy(massive) are relevant too: heavy ships tend to be bombers while lighter ships tend to be fighters..

Umm.. I think I have confused myself. Class ("Light" or "Heavy") does not dictate absolutely whether a ship is a fighter or bomber but physical properties "light" and "heavy" do offer hints about what it might be good at..

We probably agree if it weren't for me misreading something

[z30]

Light and heavy doesn't define all by itself whether a ship is a fighter or a bomber. While you might see a light bomber (a bomber relying on speed) or a heavy fighter (relying on durability) for the most part heavier ships are more suited to being bombers and lighter ships are more suited to being fighters. But the weight (mass?) class does still give broad hints about whether a ship is maneuverable or heavily armed etc.

You can see this clearly if you compare the piloting of the Demon,Gladius and the Centurion. There's a relatively long response lag before you can point the Centurion at a target, with the Demon it's very short - only thing more responsive would be the Dralthi.

The Gladius is somewhere in between, you can just about keep up with a Talon doing a tight turn around you.

With the Centurion's heavy frontloaded firepower and relatively thick armor (but less than average turn rate) I'd avoid dogfights as much as possible relying on headon attacks , Shelton slide and speed to gain distance.

With the Demon great maneuverability,blistering speed and light armor I'd try to hit them from the rear or sides though headon attacks are very practical at 1200kph closing speed. Dogfights are must

Gladius, you'll have to spiral head on to avoid your shields taking too much of a beating. The 200kph speed differential between the Demon and it is a big difference here - the Demon can just attack straigh headon, no tricks. You can dogfight no problems with this ship though, no problems there except against Dralthis.

Culture also plays a big part, PR follows the WC lore quite well because the Kilrathi ships all maneuver like a fighter one class lighter.

[blue_paladin42]

Yet in space the physics DO change significantly. For instance, in an atmosphere, you couldn't do that sliding thing the dralthis just love to do. And conceivably, all ships could have the same maximum and minimun velocities, regardless of mass. It just depends on how much stress the hull can take, and how much room a ship has for engines. As well as the brake jets(which are what I assume keep a ship going at the set/max velocity it can go instead of accelerating till it falls apart) There are a lot of other rules that don't pertain to space combat too, like a total lack of ground to crash into. And no more of that pesky gravity.

Oh, and for z30: those ships I named that you don't recognize are Freelancer and Freespace1 and 2 ships. Uh, I kinda got carried away lol.

[Duke Derek]

Yet in space the physics DO change significantly. For instance, in an atmosphere, you couldn't do that sliding thing the dralthis just love to do.

i suppose they could, it would just require different thrusters in different places, and as the WC ships seem to have some sort of all round thrusters thing going on from the way then handle anyway that sems conceivable

And conceivably, all ships could have the same maximum and minimun velocities, regardless of mass. It just depends on how much stress the hull can take, and how much room a ship has for engines.

stress the hull can take? it would be travelling in a vacuum, speed is totally relative. acceleration maybe but it wold make no difference to the ship whether it was going at 500, 1200 or 25000 (except for whatever the excuse is about shields and stuff). also, number and size of engines doesnt determine top speed, the lorentz factor determines top speed (of c i suppose, although im sure bad things would happen when approaching c)

As well as the brake jets(which are what I assume keep a ship going at the set/max velocity it can go instead of accelerating till it falls apart)

you wouldnt need brake jets to keep the ship going at the same veloctiy,you'd just need the engines to turn off, hence no acceleration (in any direction - discounting gravity)


</physicist>

[Zeog]

As for the maximum speed, the Wing Commander Bible (45 MB, found at the achives) offers a really nice pseudo-scientific explanation for that and the other unusual physics, if I may throw in my two cents worth.

[Duke Derek]

as i discussed before (about sound in space) im prepared to suspend disbelief in certain situations so i'll check it out, see what i think

[blue_paladin42]

Granted if the engines just turned off there would be no more acceleration, but I have yet to see the engines turn completely off in WC Even in WCU, the engines never completely cut off. I just assumed tht since the engines run constantly, then there must be something counterbalancing the acceleration so it maintains a set velocity. I am willing to accept the possibility I am wrong however...
And space isn't COMPLETE vacuum. Have you seen all those little rocks and metal chunks flying around in WC? To say nothing of the gas molecules. Granted they have nothing to do with hull stress, I guess I am just being a smart-ass.
And, what's the Lorentz factor?

i suppose they could, it would just require different thrusters in different places, and as the WC ships seem to have some sort of all round thrusters thing going on from the way then handle anyway that sems conceivable

I don't think the WC ships are covered with maneuvering jets, although they would have plenty of em, the sliding is just from their inertia, like when your centurion slides when you make a hard right at full afterburners. Using maneuvering jets in the atmosphere might be a bad idea anyway, due to things like friction, and gravity, but thats speculation on my part.

[Duke Derek]

Granted if the engines just turned off there would be no more acceleration, but I have yet to see the engines turn completely off in WC Even in WCU, the engines never completely cut off. I just assumed tht since the engines run constantly, then there must be something counterbalancing the acceleration so it maintains a set velocity. I am willing to accept the possibility I am wrong however...

good

And space isn't COMPLETE vacuum. Have you seen all those little rocks and metal chunks flying around in WC? To say nothing of the gas molecules. Granted they have nothing to do with hull stress, I guess I am just being a smart-ass.

space is as good as a vacuum, the number of rocks and stuff that float past is rather unrealistic, unless centuries of war have left the entire galaxy uniformly spread with random bits of ex-ship. as for the solar wind stuff, i could calculate the amount of average force at a certain distance from the sun from the solar wind but im pretty sure it's neglibible especially compared to the rather large momentum of a ship... and there just arent that many gas molecules at all

And, what's the Lorentz factor?

i just meant relativity, as speed approaches c loads of weird things happen, like mass increasing and time slowing down

i suppose they could, it would just require different thrusters in different places, and as the WC ships seem to have some sort of all round thrusters thing going on from the way then handle anyway that sems conceivable

I don't think the WC ships are covered with maneuvering jets, although they would have plenty of em, the sliding is just from their inertia, like when your centurion slides when you make a hard right at full afterburners. Using maneuvering jets in the atmosphere might be a bad idea anyway, due to things like friction, and gravity, but thats speculation on my part.

my point was that the slowing down of ships is apparently due to the maneuvering jets and you slow down whatever direction your facing regardless of the direction of your velocity. but on second thoughts the effect could be a combination of a few thrusters placed strategically

but that the jets could be used to simulate sliding by always providing |g| Newtons of thrust in the direction of g (of the planet acting on the ship)

[MamiyaOtaru]

I just assumed tht since the engines run constantly, then there must be something counterbalancing the acceleration so it maintains a set velocity

That would be the infamous ramscoops. Large electromagnetic (I think) fields that extend great distances out from the fighters which serve to gather in the very sparse hydrogen molecules floating about. They are big enough that the very sparse stuff they go through causes drag. Such is the WC explanation.

Shutting up the scoops removes the normal limits but doesn't allow for much maneuvering as the fuel expended is not being replenished.

Goofy WC physics apologists* can probably explain that better than I, but that's the gist of it as I understand it.

* "goofy" is used above as a modifier for "WC physics", not for "apologists"

[blue_paladin42]

Ramscoops? Busard Ramscoops? In Wing Commander? ROCK ON!

As for everything Duke Derek said...I am convinced Thats pretty cool really.

I still can't get over the ramscoops How many popular sci-fi instances is that now? I can think of Startrek, and Larry Niven's books, and a few games.

[Duke Derek]

just for sample figures, i did some calculations with the solar flux at 1AU and got some rather small numbers:

using Black Body approximation the total energy emitted by the sun per second is

(10^11)(sigma)h (T^5) Joules

using the inverse square law this gives 1.286x10^-7 Joules per metre squared at 1AU

then i took the area of a Galaxy ship to be 800m^2 (pretty much a guess based on the relative cockpit size and then added some more too)

so over one minute hitting the broadest side of a galaxy you're looking at 0.00617 Joules


its been about two years since i did any astrophysics so the theory might be a bit off. i tried to do a calculation based on the luminosity of the sun but i couldnt manage to make my brain comprehend what was going on, i ended up with some pretty weird dimensions

meh meh meh, i dont really expect canon WC to correspond to canon (correct ) physics. i play Vegastrike for a slightly more correct game, although i havent read any documentation, i think there might be some kind of ramscoop involved in that too)

just a thought on ramscoops, seeing as the field would have to be huge does that mean ships flying in tight formation wouldnt be able to go as fast?

[blue_paladin42]

Actually yes, close formation would mean the ships in front would go fastest, because they are eating up all the fuel, so ships further back get slightly less. Of course, the effect would be relatively unnoticable unless the ships were in a straight line.

[Duke Derek]

i was thinking that ships flying in formation like this


x x x
x x
x x x

kinda thing, the ships in the middle would go slower as the 'ramscoop''s area of collection would overlap more with neighbours than the outside ones.

silliness anyway

[blue_paladin42]

Its the ones at the end who go slowest, because they not only compete with their neighbors, but they compete for LESS because the guys in front took it already.


X
X X
X X

Is that the kind of formation you mean, cuz the one you had was a bit confusing for me.

[Duke Derek]

dammit, i totally forgot to mention that i meant them flying into/out of the page. so that view you would see either all the ships nose on or back on.

its not worth trying to explain the formation, it was just an example of ships flying close together all in the same direction in the same plane (perpendicular to motion) as each other

[JonathanD]

From reading that doc, I don't think they'd fly slower in close formation...
Seems to me they would run out of fuel sooner, thats all.

[blue_paladin42]

Yeah, close formation will do that. If they are using ramscoops, they won't "run out" of fuel, but the farther back you go, the less fuel is available per square kilometer or whatever because the ones up front got it. How slow they go depends on how close they are to each other.