Teh PW
Self Impossed Exile (This Space for rent)
Member # 1203
posted
quote:Originally posted by Sol System: On the other hand, say they sent in the force of Raptors Adama planned. Do the Cylons still jump in with three baseships? Because I think a case could be made for going in with as much force as possible and the most survivable ship specifically because it might be a trap.
ok. The Rapters were captured and pilots killed strictly as lures. Did they assume that one of the Battlestars would take the bait, as opposed to the smarter Reenforced Recon Flight?
Obiviously the Raptors were bugged to inform that something sprung the trap. Would that many ships still jump in had Peggy-sue not gone instead of the Recon flight?
Registered: Jan 2004
| IP: Logged
posted
I can't remember, did we decide whether Vipers have FTL drives? The blackbird had one, I remember.
Registered: Sep 2000
| IP: Logged
OnToMars
Now on to the making of films!
Member # 621
posted
Well, the Blackbird was an exception. I don't think we've ever seen a Viper jump and if they could, it would limit the usefulness and importance of battlestars as carriers.
-------------------- If God didn't want us to fly, he wouldn't have given us Bernoulli's Principle.
Registered: Jun 2001
| IP: Logged
WizArtist II
"How can you have a yellow alert in Spacedock? "
Member # 1425
posted
I would think that there would be a retrieval ship of some sort. Similar to the Army's M88 or the Navy's DSRV. come in with escort, attach a tow, and away we go. There really needs to be some auxilary vessels on this show.
-------------------- There are 10 types of people in the world...those that understand Binary and those that don't.
Registered: Nov 2004
| IP: Logged
posted
Didn't Apollo's Viper have one in the Mini? Isn't that how he was able to escort Colonial One? Or was his Viper docked with it each time they jumped?
But yes, I agree. If Vipers have FTL, then why do you need a carrier?
Registered: Feb 2004
| IP: Logged
posted
Range, support, repairs...
Registered: Mar 1999
| IP: Logged
OnToMars
Now on to the making of films!
Member # 621
posted
For deep deployment. Do we have any idea exactly what the range of the Colonial military was? Was it mostly confined to the one solar system? If not, how deep did they go? And what did they really have to protect beyond their heliosphere?
My question, essentially, is, wouldn't even a Raptor's limited FTL drive be sufficient to hope from one end of the system to another, if in fact the majority of their stuff was intrasystem? Battlestars (and their range extension) would only really come into necessity over interstellar distances, and what kind of distances could they be traversing and protecting on a regular basis as to require 120 of them?
-------------------- If God didn't want us to fly, he wouldn't have given us Bernoulli's Principle.
Registered: Jun 2001
| IP: Logged
posted
Doesn't Colonial One only make two FTL jumps in the miniseries? And Apollo was on it for the first one, his father's Viper safely tucked away inside, and shooting down raiders during the second one.
Though, if I'm remembering correctly, that raises a question: why was the ship flying through boring old Newtonian space at all? Why not just jump from Caprica to Galactica and back? Maybe jumps are energy-intensive, but then they don't seem to have a problem with that now.
As far as fighters with FTL drives, if the Blackbird and Raptors can have one there's no reason a Viper couldn't, though they do not appear to have them now. (Well, OK, Vipers probably have no space for it, but, a Viper-like craft.) But even if they did have them, the drives of smaller craft may have shorter ranges, less fuel for jumps, or other drawbacks that would make a carrier a good idea, tactically.
Also, it seems like Vipers exist more for the benefit of the battlestar, rather than the other way around. Granted, they did blow up the resurrection ship, and a Raptor sneakily blew up a basestar, but it seems like once the shooting starts in earnest battlestars do most of the heavy hitting themselves.
Registered: Mar 1999
| IP: Logged
posted
Mining operations (the Colonials probably had mined their planets to the limit), outposts, distant listening posts, *possibly* colonies, science missions ...
posted
No, I mean there are plenty of reasons to have the big carrier. I mean beyond it just being totally neato. I was just pondering Sol System's question as to why not jump in with max force. If the Cylons had, say, 10 basestars lying in wait with the damaged Raptors, it's likely their trap would have worked and the RTF would absent one Battlestar and at least two main characters.
Would sending the 5 (?) Raptor assault team per Adm. Adama's orders afforded them the ability to better stay in contact while investigating? I'd assume that strung in a line, the Raptors would have the ability to tunnel and redirect communications so as to fight the interference (and maybe that was implicit in his plan). Everything I know about space-fighter tactics, I learned from playing Tie Fighter, and so I assume the 'escort' Raptors would be fitted out with lots of torpedoes and shit.
Registered: Sep 2000
| IP: Logged
quote:in "Pegasus", the CAG mentioned doing an FTL jump with the Vipers and Raptors during his briefing. Could it be that the Mk VII Vipers are equipped with FTL drives, and the Mk IIs are not? I would imagine that if the Mk IIs could jump, they wouldn't have to land on the Galactica before they could bug out every time the Cylons attack.
Of course, we've now seen the MkVIIs scrambling to get back on the deck of the Pegasus before they jumped. There's gotta be some limitations to the Viper FTL.
OnToMars
Now on to the making of films!
Member # 621
posted
quote:Originally posted by Sol System: Also, it seems like Vipers exist more for the benefit of the battlestar, rather than the other way around. Granted, they did blow up the resurrection ship, and a Raptor sneakily blew up a basestar, but it seems like once the shooting starts in earnest battlestars do most of the heavy hitting themselves.
It's possible, and there's certainly more evidence of that with the Peg's latest display. However, the battlestars are still modeled after modern aircraft carriers and RDM's experience with them. So, at the very least, the models of the battlestars exist and are built around their fighter complement, which makes me inclined to continue thinking of battlestars in the same light.
-------------------- If God didn't want us to fly, he wouldn't have given us Bernoulli's Principle.
Registered: Jun 2001
| IP: Logged
Printer-friendly view of this topic
