Sorry to be a whining bugger in his high horse here, but surely the community dosn't need another fight-the-Shivans-a-new-Lucifer campaign?
Tell you what I'd like to do someday, is a story set much nearer to the present, mebbe a century or so ahead. The technology would be roughly Event Horizon level, and the Earth would have more or less the nations and super-powers it has now. You'd be fighting for control of moons and asteroids and such, and there'd be emphasis on the strategic value of whatever you're attacking/defending, to try and break up the feeling of dogfight after dogfight. The fighters would have no shields and probably ballistic weapons (ie machine guns and rail guns, style o' thing), and maybe some wussy laser (weak compared to a subach, but unlimited ammo, thus presenting a viable alternative to guns). I'd also have missiles work more like modern jet fighters than the millions of weak missiles you get in FS... so you only have perhaps half a dozen, but one hit will heavily damage or more likely kill an enemy.
You'd be fighting on a variety of scales, from minor fighter skirmishes to full-up battles with warships like the Sulaco in Aliens (probably about Fenris sized). No beams, of course. And because radio only travels at the speed o' light, you'd have either your squad leader or a warship issuing the orders (or a planet or moon, if it's an orbital battle), and if they got blown up you'd be in trouble... There'd probably be fairly basic carriers, but mostly you'd be based on a planet or moon or maybe a large asteroid, so perhaps there could be some atmospheric stuff if that gets implemented... providing air cover for ground troops and what have you, S:AAB style...
On thing I'm not sure about is who you'd fight for - if I pick a country, 90% of people not from that country will object. I could have the player as a soldier in the peace keeping force of a faltering UN, trying to keep a grip on the last vestiges of international law and order, like the GDI in Tiberian Sun. Or, you could be mercs or pirates. Maybe several campaigns of varying length could be written, set in the same 'world', perhaps even telling the same stories from different points of view.
Basically, my main infuences game wise would be FS (natch), S:AAB, Tib Sun and Crimson Skies (and 'proper' combat flight sims, of course).
Actually... thinking about it, I just described pretty much what a S:AAB TC would be like, only limited to the Sol system... oh screw it, I still say I've got a good outline there
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