Finally decided to stick my nose in here and see how my avatar looks with this color scheme. Pretty horrid, eh?
Anyway, I'm shamelessly bumping this partly because campaign forums can always use the extra activity, and partly because I didn't see the last post date until after I had typed out everything below, and I wasn't about to delete it all and say heck with it.
So...
Originally posted by Ace
GTF Apollo (Source: FS Ref Bible) "...The Apollo fighter is the original Space Superiority Fighter in the Terran fleet."
Ace-The Apollo was the first fighter used by the GTA.
GTF Angel, GTF Valkyerie (Source: FS Ref Bible) "...Originally an old design for a space superiority fighter, this fighter was outfitted with bigger engines, and turned into an interceptor..."
Ace- This is one case of contradiction between the reference and the game, the Angel Scout Fighter was not for space superiority. The Angel is already in the V-T war project mods.
Originally posted by GrandAdmiralAbaht
The Terrans must have gone through a multitude of combat ship models throughout the course of the war. Most would probably be declared failures after a year, but in war, you send what you can. Maybe the Apollo A was the first fighter, but it probably was not the only fighter. In the Great War, the Terrans are spitting out new models and weapons every fifith mission, I highly doubt they did not invent anything other than the Apollo throughout the war.
All this discussion about the first GTA fighter and stuff is missing one thing: There are fighters, there are interceptors,
and there are Space Superiority Fighters:
"The Apollo fighter is the original Space Superiority Fighter in the Terran fleet." - not "the first fighter used by the GTA" (Ace).
Put in a ton of fighters, but make them have a considerable imbalance towards specific roles. Escort fighters should be heavy on armor and survivability, not too much of a need for speed, perhaps without secondary banks etc. Scouts, well, I don't have to tell you what a scout should be like. Heck, even toss in a fire-support fighter or 2 - basically a big bomber with a long-range loadout.
But no matter what you add, make sure that they all are either leaning towards one side of the Apollo's performance range or the other, since the Apollo is the first space superiority fighter, it would have all the positive features of past fighters that would allow it to gain the upper hand in _any_ one-on-one combat, and even in many 2- and 3-on-one fights. Give bombers twice the payload of the Apollo, but half the speed. Give scouts no payload, light weapons, and only slightly faster speed (maneuverability is not needed). Give the main line of regular fighters everything the Apollo has (perhaps excluding the secondaries, or just limited to like 4-8 missiles), but a bit worse in all performance aspects. Make the Apollo, when it comes out, to be
superior.
As for combat ship development, many variants on the same fighter(s) seems to be the best idea. Build tons of custom only-see-in-one-location outposts all spindly-looking, half-way between the modern-day ISS and an Arcadia, and keep new versions of these popping up every so often, and you'll satisfy the "we're-in-a-war-and-don't-have-the-resources-to-develop-a-catch-all-line-of-ships-or-stations" feeling.
Originally posted by GrandAdmiralAbaht
When you are lacking in information, you must think of the most rational facts to fill the gaps. There's an actual expression for it, but it slips my mind at this time. 
Extrapolation?
