[Aardwolf]

It's a game, if you changed it it wouldn't be fun anymore.

[Iron Wolf]

It is worthwhile to remember the Ursa is as large or larger than a 747 AND able to withstand multi-kiloton blasts with ease. Do you know how heavy that is?

Uh, wha?

Ursa is 41m long according to the freespace wiki, and the 747 is either 70.6 m long or 76.4m long (depending on which version you use).

Multi-kiloton blast, I won't argue.

[Black Wolf]

No, There doesn't need to be an absolute frame of reference for FreeSpace. The only speed that matters is your speed compared to everything else.

Alright, fine. You're still left with the neccessity of changing between speeds of at least 4000m/sec apart, bare minimum. You can't explain that away except by saying engine limitations (*Or, I suppose, Game limitations imposed to make the game fun and playable.

[Turey]

Game limitations imposed to make the game fun and playable.

I'm fine with that. Glad we could come to an agreement that FreeSpace 2 is a fun game. 

[AdmiralRalwood]

Which was the whole point I was trying to make earlier, really. The entire idea behind this thread is silly. There's no need to explain anything away, it wasn't meant to be realistic from the beginning.

[Mustang19]

Like I said, guys, the humans, Vasudans and Shivans that fly spaceships are probably genetically modified to have very fast reflexes. You'd pretty much have to be genetically modified to withstand the crazy G-loads you might face from going very fast.

Another thing about the multi-kiliton blasts. If you got caught in the shockwave of one of those in space, where there's no friction, wouldn't your craft be sent flying at several thousand meters per second? What about when you were hit by a laser or missile?

I think that this thread has come to the conclusion that FS is, from a scientific point of view, bull, and no "hard SciFi" can explain it. Doesn't make it a bad game, but someday maybe I'll mess around with the game files and see what it's really like to go that fast and be bounced around by every explosion. A few times I've turned up time compression and traveled at must've been the equivalent of 400 m/s. It's strange to think that the average combat speed for combat aircraft today is about 200 m/s.

[Mathwiz6]

Shockwaves are transmitted through? Dust...?

No no no, FS is fine, scientifically... all we need is a different universe.

Nothing wrong with anything.... it's the world at fault 

[Polpolion]

It's strange to think that the average combat speed for combat aircraft today is about 200 m/s.

Out of curiosity, when was the last fighter plane vs. fighter plane dogfight?

[Mustang19]

Depends on what you call a dogfight. There were planes getting shot down in Iraq 91, Bosnia and Yugoslavia, but that was more of  a beatdown than a fair competition. More recently, around 1999 or 1997 there was a combat between an Ethiopian Su-27 and a Eritrean MiG-29 (the Su-27 won). But yeah, there's been very little jet-to-jet combat.

Got your point about shockwaves. But they show up in the game as big energy rings, and you would still get a big blast (enough to send you flying at way more than 45 m/s) every time you were hit by a laser or missile.

[Polpolion]

Another thing about the multi-kiliton blasts. If you got caught in the shockwave of one of those in space, where there's no friction, wouldn't your craft be sent flying at several thousand meters per second? What about when you were hit by a laser or missile?

There is friction in space, it is [large quantities of] physical matter that is missing. The warheads probably consume what little amount of dust there is in space.

 You need to look at how heavy the ships are. Each ship you figure is at least several tons. And we do not know excactly how these futuristic bombs work, but what we can tell from canon FS, is that the explode in a way that does not throw ships as far as antiqued warheads do. And anyway, Fighters and bombers have shields , which likely do something to reduce the blast effects. And larger ships usually are heavy enough not to be moved by those warheads.