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Didn't Y-Wings start out as fighters though?

They are like...Think...Bombas for Orks.


They fulfil a Fighter Role (though, not too well.) but main purpose is bombing. =)

And yet.. http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/BTL_Y-wing_starfighter

Gombol wrote:
Gotta love how they called the Y-Wing a "Starfighter" Y-Wings are Bombers, or at least as close to bombers as the rebels have.

They aren't the only ones.
http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/BTL_Y-wing_starfighter

 tdwg83 wrote:

Gombol wrote:
Gotta love how they called the Y-Wing a "Starfighter" Y-Wings are Bombers, or at least as close to bombers as the rebels have.

They aren't the only ones.
http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/BTL_Y-wing_starfighter

The B-Wing would also disagree with the Y-wing being the only bomber.

yeah,
November release date.
Han, chewie, lando confirmed as pilots
nien nunb as co pilot ? not sure what that will do?
Luke as a gunner! most likely a secondary weapon like the ion canon for the Y-wing?

Excited... why yes I am.

Panic...

 Panic wrote:

nien nunb as co pilot ? not sure what that will do?

Give Lando someone to say "See, I told you so!" to. Not sure how the actual game mechanics for that will work, though.

Maybe maneuvering buffs. Sullustans are supposed to be fluff wise very good navigators.

 BrookM wrote:
And yet.. http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/BTL_Y-wing_starfighter

To quote that wiki: "designed to fight its way to its objective, deliver its payload of high explosives, and fight its way out again". So its something akin to the modern F/A-18 Hornet or F-15E Strike Eagle.

12thRonin wrote:

 tdwg83 wrote:

Gombol wrote:
Gotta love how they called the Y-Wing a "Starfighter" Y-Wings are Bombers, or at least as close to bombers as the rebels have.

They aren't the only ones.
http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/BTL_Y-wing_starfighter

The B-Wing would also disagree with the Y-wing being the only bomber.

The B-wing is more of a heavy fighter than a bomber, being as it, unlike the Y-wing and TIE Bomber, doesn't actually carry any bombs and its lesser usefulness against a stationary ground target.

It's actual classification is as an "Assault Fighter", and it's designed to replace the Y-wing for attacks on capital ships. The various flaws in its design(lack of speed, lack of maneuverability, and difficulty to pilot) prevented that from actually happening, though.

 Panic wrote:
yeah,
November release date.
Han, chewie, lando confirmed as pilots
nien nunb as co pilot ? not sure what that will do?
Luke as a gunner! most likely a secondary weapon like the ion canon for the Y-wing?

Excited... why yes I am.

Panic...

Viewing this at work I need to remain quiet.

So all my excited screaming of "That's soo cool!" and the Han Solo "Yahoo!" was in my head

 Platuan4th wrote:

12thRonin wrote:

 tdwg83 wrote:

Gombol wrote:
Gotta love how they called the Y-Wing a "Starfighter" Y-Wings are Bombers, or at least as close to bombers as the rebels have.

They aren't the only ones.
http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/BTL_Y-wing_starfighter

The B-Wing would also disagree with the Y-wing being the only bomber.

The B-wing is more of a heavy fighter than a bomber, being as it, unlike the Y-wing and TIE Bomber, doesn't actually carry any bombs and its lesser usefulness against a stationary ground target.

It's actual classification is as an "Assault Fighter", and it's designed to replace the Y-wing for attacks on capital ships. The various flaws in its design(lack of speed, lack of maneuverability, and difficulty to pilot) prevented that from actually happening, though.

http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/B-wing_starfighter
B-wing roles:
Assault starfighter[2]
Bomber

The history section there also disagrees with your assessment that it never replaced the Y-Wing since the Y's were pretty much retired outside planet defense and private ownership after Endor. It also disagrees that they were never used as strike fighters against cap ships as late as the Vong invasion.

12thRonin wrote:

 Platuan4th wrote:

12thRonin wrote:

 tdwg83 wrote:

Gombol wrote:
Gotta love how they called the Y-Wing a "Starfighter" Y-Wings are Bombers, or at least as close to bombers as the rebels have.

They aren't the only ones.
http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/BTL_Y-wing_starfighter

The B-Wing would also disagree with the Y-wing being the only bomber.

The B-wing is more of a heavy fighter than a bomber, being as it, unlike the Y-wing and TIE Bomber, doesn't actually carry any bombs and its lesser usefulness against a stationary ground target.

It's actual classification is as an "Assault Fighter", and it's designed to replace the Y-wing for attacks on capital ships. The various flaws in its design(lack of speed, lack of maneuverability, and difficulty to pilot) prevented that from actually happening, though.

http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/B-wing_starfighter
B-wing roles:
Assault starfighter[2]
Bomber

The history section there also disagrees with your assessment that it never replaced the Y-Wing since the Y's were pretty much retired outside planet defense and private ownership after Endor. It also disagrees that they were never used as strike fighters against cap ships as late as the Vong invasion.

From that very page: "The B-wing was designed to replace the aging BTL Y-wing starfighter in the heavy assault role against capital ships, as it had the advantage of more weaponry and stronger shields. However, the B-wing had several weaknesses, notably being difficult to fly and lacking speed and agility, affecting its dogfighting capability. Its large hull furthermore made it an easier target and it also had less armor protection. Consequently, it never fully succeeded supplanting the Y-wing as intended."

So no, it doesn't disagree with anything I said, as it didn't completely replace the Y-wing as was the intent.

 Compel wrote:
Wasn't he also the last surviving Y Wing pilot in A New Hope?

Probably depends on the source. I've seen some sources identify the surviving Y-Wing pilot as Keyen Farlander, the official name of the protagonist pilot in the X-Wing game series.

Marek Stele, the official name of the protagonist pilot in TIE Fighter, is one of the named pilots of the TIE Advanced. So FFG is clearly aware of the video games.

 BrookM wrote:
And yet.. http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/BTL_Y-wing_starfighter

"It was often used as an assault bomber to attack enemy capital ships directly in conjunction with the later B-wing starfighters. "

Really Stupid Question:

Does aerodynamics even matter in space? Or is there something
else going on here (other than rule of cool)

 malfred wrote:
Really Stupid Question:

Does aerodynamics even matter in space? Or is there something
else going on here (other than rule of cool)

Not in the least- traditionally, the Rebellion had less specialized ships than the Empire, and thus had fighters which could operate in and out of atmosphere. Even the Y-wings are slightly better suited to those missions than the TIEs. TIE fighters are dedicated space fighters, and without significant modifications (like Obsidian Squadron) operate very badly within atmosphere. TIE wings are explained as altering shape to improve power collection while improving visibility- which eventually leads to the notched dagger profile on the Interceptor, Defender and Advanced models.

So why is the B-Wing fragile as a space dogfighter?

yeah,
At a guess it's because it's the most spindly fragile looking rebel fighter.
I've never understood the B-wings shape.

Panic...

I think the B wing happend like this...

Lucas: we need a new spaceship for the kids to buy, I wanna get another house.
ship builder: this one I have isn't done yet, it's just a cockpit with some wings glued on. I still have to add--
Lucas: The b-wing is born!
ship builder: But it's shaped more like a little t
Lucas: SILENCE! I hath spake!

That might be accurate, but I always felt that the b-wing was the bastard spawn of an x-wing and a tie fighter

 malfred wrote:
Really Stupid Question:

Does aerodynamics even matter in space? Or is there something
else going on here (other than rule of cool)

It's Star Wars, which has never really field a need to apologize for not being scientifically accurate. A few of the fight sequences from the original trilogy are taken almost shot-for-shot from WWII aircraft fight sequences, which explains why X-Wings and TIE fighters bank and make noise in space. Still a classic setting, just not one focused on being scientifically plausible.

I saw something on Discovery or one of those channels where smart rocket scientist people were saying there's no kind of aerodynamics in space and the best kind of starfighter would be a little orb that you can turn to face any direction and see all around you. But a bunch of little marbles in space would probably be pretty boring to watch.

I could see em needing wings and stuff though, for like when they have to land on Dagoba

 Necros wrote:
I saw something on Discovery or one of those channels where smart rocket scientist people were saying there's no kind of aerodynamics in space and the best kind of starfighter would be a little orb that you can turn to face any direction and see all around you. But a bunch of little marbles in space would probably be pretty boring to watch.

I could see em needing wings and stuff though, for like when they have to land on Dagoba

Put solar collection panels on the side of said orb and what do you get

While aerodynamics don't matter in real space....what about lightspeed.

 tdwg83 wrote:

 Necros wrote:
what about lightspeed.

Based on current scientific data- impossible in our dimension, that's why "Hyperspace" was devised- as a place where you can move at lightspeed. Granted, it takes the Navacomputer an awfully long time to calculate a route but we don't want to come out of hyperspace in the middle of a sun or something.

 Necros wrote:
I saw something on Discovery or one of those channels where smart rocket scientist people were saying there's no kind of aerodynamics in space and the best kind of starfighter would be a little orb that you can turn to face any direction and see all around you. But a bunch of little marbles in space would probably be pretty boring to watch.

I could see em needing wings and stuff though, for like when they have to land on Dagoba

In general, Star Wars has always been 'WWII dogfights in space!" and Star Trek has often tended to be 'Age of sail ships of the line In Space!'. Fill in the blanks for other series as well, but most sci-fi has generally taken a real-world historical combat paradigm and added a few space bits to make it slightly different. B5 and the new BSG deserve some credit for being a bit different, although B5 was criticized for the close ranges of it's battle scenes (I've heard they didn't want to do this at first and tried scenes with larger ranges, but ended up changing to 'knife fighting' ranges because it looked cooler) and BSG took a lot of tropes from aircraft carrier tales, of course.

Some science-fiction novels try for a more realistic view, but I don't know if they'd film well. One big issue is that 'hiding' in space is difficult if you're close enough to do anything. There's no real cover, heat signatures (and other emissions) are a problem, and speeds are either miserably slow or two fast to do anything. Alistair Reynolds had an interesting sequence in one of his books with a chase sequence between two ships that covers, IIRC, literally years as they race to an objective and try things like dropping mines, shedding mass to gain speed, etc. Both ships are at a sizable percentage of light speed, so debris is potentially deadly, and there's a weird tenseness despite the time frame. This probably wouldn't work as a movie, though.

Back to Star Wars, TIE fihgters really do look like fighters given out to a force that hates their pilots. They look really poorly equipped for planetary combat as the wings block vision and cause problems with aerodynamics in an atmosphere. I think I remember that they're suppsoed to be solar panels or radiators, so good in space, but... And do those things even have landing gear?

I guess the X-Wing vs. the TIE Fighter is a pretty good metaphor for the Rebels versus the Empire. The rebels actually care about their pilots and given them some modest surivival gear (landing gear, ships with hyperdrives) despite the shoestring budget while TIEs are flying deathtraps with extreme dependence on capital ships.

WholeHazelNuts wrote:

Forgot how large these new ships are. second wave is planned for a release before Xmas, German and English versions. On the "Spiel" games fair in Essen, Germany, they had a life size radio controlled R2-D2 to advertise this game.

And shields.

 Balance wrote:
And do those things even have landing gear?

Nope, they're actually held in racks suspended from the ceiling. You access the hatch by catwalk.



However, Battlegrounds II's space levels had them just sitting on the flight deck on their solar panels. It made me wince.

At least the Tie Fighter makes a cooler sound when flying by!