[headdie]

This is a subject I want to discuss further but I don't want to derail the thread on modelling the ship.

So ...  people can envision their gunboats as heavy assault craft if they like, but that's not what the Gunboat is to me so it's not the Gunboat I'm making

I find it highly unlikely that Empire had no use at all for hyperdrive capable starfighters. Sure the general strategy was TIEs carried by capital ships, but not even a single long range starfighter? I can't imagine that every time the Empire wants to project force the only answer is "We'll jump in the ISD". Apart from anything else a single ISD can't be in more than one place at one time. The same with Ion cannons, the Rebels had Ion cannons on two of the 4 main starship designs. Were Ion cannons so useless to the Empire that they didn't have any starfighter sized ships at all with that capability?

To me the Gunboat has an important niche in the Empire. It was the only long range Imperial star fighter, it was also the only Ion cannon equipped starfighter. It did go against the standard Imperial doctrine of TIEs carried by capital ships, but that's what made it so useful. It filled the holes in the standard doctrine, it was what made the standard doctrine workable because it added flexibility.

I also remember that Gunboats were used quite frequently in the design of XW & TF missions. They came up a lot more frequently than they "should" have given their limited numbers. Having had a go once at making some missions I can see why. They are very useful for filling holes in missions. I'm sure the reason that TG created the AG was because without it the Imperial Navy is just too inflexible to write certain scenarios.

So, my AG is a single seater multi-role starfighter, sitting in performance between the XW and the YW

The empire had starfighter bases in most systems they controlled not to mention a ridiculous number of ASD, VSD ISD, ISD II and other star-fighter carrying ships.  The Imperial Doctrine of not using intersystem fighters was only viable because of the huge number of carrier ships and bases they had scattered through the known galaxy

I'll step back in to make a counter-point here, Headdie: A tactical fighter which can move independently of a large strike vessel is still immensely useful for obvious reasons, and any competent military force would field such a type. As you noted, there aren't massive numbers of Gunboats out there, and they exist as a specialized type - a fighter which can perform roles no other Imperial type can. Due to the large number of Imperial installations out there, as well as the comparatively small number of Gunboats, you'll not commonly encounter the type. But, if you need a fighter to act as a long-range escort, a tactical interdictor, or even an atmospheric close support fighter, etc., you genuinely need the AG.

The only other "common" Imperial jump fighters only become common after the EU really starts to set in, and these are most notably space superiority types. The AG has a definite, useful, albeit uncommon purpose. If you need to slam a target with big shuttles, the Lambda and the Landing Craft are there, and the DX-9 has ion cannons and torpedoes. The Gunboat is the bread and butter in between your heavy boarding and assault ships, and the only one that can escort them (barring your advanced TIEs which only come about much later) after they jump.

The issue is that the Empire mostly disregarded star fighters as an offensive platform (discrepancies with this exist but are small in number), preferring uber scale Shock and Awe tactics, doing things like glassing a planet with ISDs to suppress planetary insurgencies just to prove a point.  Heck Vader used the Executor and several ISDs to hunt the Falcon in an asteroid field when it was clear from the damage the ISDs were taking that TIE patrols with the ISDs holding at the fringes would have been the better option.  Fighter pilots in the Empire were mistrusted as a general group and used mainly for screening big ships, menial tasks like low priority patrol and as shock assets using numbers rather than equipment and tactics to get any job done.  The assault gunboat on the other hand is a high cost per unit craft relative to the TIE series and far less throwaway as a result.  Serious fighter development for the Empire such as serious improvements to the TIE series only start after the Alliance begins achieving significant victories using star fighters and the Empire finding itself needing to counter the threat they pose.

[-Norbert-]

But you see the Empire far too much as one whole construct.
With the far-reaching authority of the local governers and the massive terretory the Empire covers, there's got to be a few moffs that think different on the matter of fighter doctrine.
Also it's quite possible that the Gunboat was a first experiment and served as a proof of concept, which led the Empire to designing new TIEs with shields and hyperdrives.

Mind you, I know only little of the EU. Just speculating from what I've seen in the movies and games.

[General Battuta]

I think the gunboat looks and acts like a Rebel ship and should be removed in favor of more TIEs

Problems can be solved by the application of more TIEs

[StarSlayer]

I think the gunboat looks and acts like a Rebel ship and should be removed in favor of more TIEs

Problems can be solved by the application of more TIEs

Would you like to TIE me up with some of your TIEs, Ty?

[General Battuta]

I think the gunboat looks and acts like a Rebel ship and should be removed in favor of more TIEs

Problems can be solved by the application of more TIEs

Would you like to TIE me up with some of your TIEs, Ty?

Just look what David Carradine was up to in TIEland

[Thaeris]

I'm in favor of tactical inflexibility and shortsighted orders of battle.

How dare you like what I dislike!

How dare you dislike what I like!

[General Battuta]

I'm in favor of tactical inflexibility and shortsighted orders of battle.

How dare you like what I dislike!

How dare you dislike what I like!

What the **** is this stupid post, I haven't said anything to you about your likes or dislikes. Please don't start **** over a spaceship in a mod based on a video game based on a science fiction movie from half a century ago.

[Thaeris]

You Sir, are not taking a joke well.

If this is an issue, I will delete said post and leave the thread to yourself.

[zookeeper]

hahaha what the **** butthurttuta is the best poster

[CountBuggula]

Ahem...back on topic:

Are we forgetting the "Assault" in the title of Assault Gunboat?  This isn't a space superiority fighter, it's an assault craft.

[zookeeper]

I'd think the AG would be used mostly for rare precision strikes. Shock and awe by jumping in with an ISD and launching a few dozen TIE fighters is all good as your everyday imperial doctrine, but I'm sure you'd occasionally want to be more discreet. Maybe you need to assassinate a traitor by blowing up their shuttle without everyone knowing about it, maybe you have a cunning plan and want the rebels to think it was someone else who ambushed their convoy (in which case you don't want parts of the inevitable TIE casualties floating around the scene), or maybe you just need as few people as possible to know about your operation.

It seems like a ship reserved mostly for special missions and only flown by elite pilots.

[swashmebuckle]

Whoa there, double derail.  To elaborate a bit on my earlier comments, I think it's the "capabilities in between those of the X-wing and Y-wing" part that bothers me.  For one thing, the Y-wing was a ship used by the Fleet twenty years before the present conflict.  The X-wing, though the only modern space superiority fighter the rebels have, is still the next-generation Z-95 Headhunter, representing a direction the Imperial Navy has moved away from.  These were/are good ships that can do a lot of things pretty well, but it's very unlikely that they can do any one task as well as their modern specialized Imperial counterparts can.

The Empire has no need for a mediocre all-rounder because they have the capability to be overwhelmingly in control as soon as they commit forces to battle.  They could very well have a cruiser for every rebel starfighter in the Galaxy, cruisers that can respond to threats immediately and prepare their starfighters en route.  My idea of an Imperial "fast response" unit would be something like a Vindicator class heavy cruiser with two squadrons of Ties in the bay.  Why would you send a bunch of so-so fighters to possibly get creamed by "comparable" rebel forces when you can get there faster with a big ship and completely dominate the engagement?

In A New Hope, a handful of standard Tie fighters and one Advanced prototype absolutely cleaned house on "thirty rebel ships" at Yavin.  Granted, that was an elite unit fighting over its home turf, but it demonstrates that Tie fighters are more than a match for the X and Y given adequate support from big ships (which Tie Fighters almost always have thanks to not having a hyperdrive).  Carrier ships can get underway immediately and bring everything they need with them--that's the type of flexibility you need when you're trying to control a large area of space.

A more logical niche to me would be for the Gunboat to be tasked with something like precision disabling of point defense turrets on smaller targets that the Empire wants captured.  That's a job that might be too fine for cap-ship weapons but would still require shields, as demonstrated by the Tie Fighter's (possibly deliberate) failure against the Falcon's point defense in ANH.  Specialized success in this role could easily be achieved by removing the gunboats's hyperdrive and/or removing its dogfighting ability.  Give the ship commensurate increases in shielding, armor, or primary firepower and you could have something that would be very useful given the right circumstances.

[headdie]

I'd think the AG would be used mostly for rare precision strikes. Shock and awe by jumping in with an ISD and launching a few dozen TIE fighters is all good as your everyday imperial doctrine, but I'm sure you'd occasionally want to be more discreet. Maybe you need to assassinate a traitor by blowing up their shuttle without everyone knowing about it, maybe you have a cunning plan and want the rebels to think it was someone else who ambushed their convoy (in which case you don't want parts of the inevitable TIE casualties floating around the scene), or maybe you just need as few people as possible to know about your operation.

It seems like a ship reserved mostly for special missions and only flown by elite pilots.

that's a fair point, and indeed there are commanders who gravitate towards that style.  I suppose in that light craft like the AG make sense.

[Thaeris]

Yep. This is essentially the function of the Gunboat, where you can have a craft which can carry enough ordnance over a long range while maintaining a fairly low sensor profile (well, according to the SW-verse, at least). Your maneuverability and speed, though inferior to a TIE Fighter or Interceptor, will exceed that of a Bomber, and will also give you a good option against most Rebel fighters. If memory serves correctly, the AG has the same primary cannons as the Y-Wing, so any hit that lands is going to ruin someone's day.

The argument seems to be that the AG is bad because it fits the profile of many Rebel ships - and while it does indeed fit that profile, it's by no means a typical ship for the Empire, and it's not all that common. It's a strike fighter, ideal for getting high-value dirty work done, and should not be treated as expendable. Leave the general combat duties to the TIEs.

[Mongoose]

While we're on the topic of rebel vs. Imperial fighter tactics, I'm not all that well-versed in EU stuff, but the X-Wing was originally a design by the same company that created the TIE Fighter, right?  Was it ever expanded upon as being something that the Empire was considering using, or was it something the designers just happened to come up with on the side and give to the Rebellion?

[General Battuta]

No I'm pretty sure the TIE is by Seinar and the T-65 by Incom. amirite c/d

[headdie]

No I'm pretty sure the TIE is by Seinar and the T-65 by Incom. amirite c/d

This is correct, to a point. While all TIE designs I can think of were built by Seinar the X-wing was designed by a team of Incom engineers that defected to the rebels but with the defection the Empire basically took over the company so although the X-Wing is always attributed to Incom in the period prior to the rebellion forming the New Republic and starting to claim territory I would assume that the majority of Rebel X-wings would have been manufactured by groups and companies independent of Incom.

[Droid803]

I agree that the Assault Gunboat is definitely an anomaly in the imperial doctrine, though not to say it doesn't have its niche.
The one thing I see them really good for is escorting lone shuttles and single, small stuff like that which make hyperspace jumps and don't really like being left without escort. You know, you don't just pull a full blown Escort Carrier (as cheap as they are) along for that. That's what'd I'd want some hyperdrive capable fighters for.

It'll also be able to do that discreet strike stuff for capture without blowing them up horribly, or for blowing stuff up without leaving the inevitable TIE debris if you use TIEs. Then again, the Devastator has no problem not killing the Tantive and just reeling it in with its tractor beam so I don't know how much merit the first part of that argument actually holds. Why do you need to disable his peashooters? Just reel them in. And if its got big enough guns to hurt you, it can probably take a few hits.

[NGTM-1R]

Like Droid, I think it's a niche ship, and most of the fluff stuff I've seen about fighter complements suggests that's true because they're rarely present in large numbers. (IIRC ISDs are usually cited as carrying five.)

Even with an ISD, you don't go in blind; you can achieve more by a well-timed and well-positioned entry. That means some kind of scouting, and TIEs can't do it. Similarly, there are times where you simply can't come off-station to engage that guy in a corvette who's ten or fifteen light-minutes out, because god knows what will show up while you do. Sometimes being able to operate a small force semi-independently is just too valuable to not have the capability.

AGs also seem like ideal "police" craft, able to patrol points of strategic interest or standard navigation routes without the existence of a larger base ship or the expenditure of lavish amounts of flight time to arrive on station, and able to run for help when something they cannot deal with turns up.

[Vertigo 7]

AG's would also be great as an advanced scout... send them into a potentially hostile area ahead of its parent ISD, do recon, precision strikes, w/e. To me, AG's would be the perfect craft to perform such a role.

I can also imagine another scenerio where say intridictors are deployed in several sectors patrolling for smugglers... why task and ISD with a milk run patrol when an intridictor and a small contingent of AG's with a wing or two of TIE's would suffice? It would be economically smart to use smaller craft capable of handeling that instead of the full resources of an ISD.