[Commander Zane]

Let's put Balors on them!

YES.

[Iranon]

I think the Dragon stood out more in FS2 because you never saw decent firepower from opposing fighters anyway (Prometheus R...), rendering its main disadvantage moot. In FS1, Dragons might have been hard to kill but I never feared them as much as I did HoL Thoths with their 4 Prometheus cannons. If you were flying a Valkyrie you could not afford mistakes against those.

Sure, a Dragon would be nice when outfitted with Terran weaponry. But that's starting to get very speculative... why not request some armour bolted on as well, (it worked for the Terran Mara, without compromising manoeverability), a Serapis retrofitted with Shivan shields and Kayser/Trebuchet compatibility or bombers with 1 Kayser and 1 Morning Star turret.
I'd rather compare craft in their default and proven-compatible state and assume that major upgrades are not feasible on a large scale (e.g. a Terran Mara might be a wonderful thing to fly but a nightmare to service because of mismatched technology).

[Asakura]

Mind you, I will prefer the Serapis over any other Vasudan light fighter simply because it has an excellent pitch-turn-bank rate and decent gunpoints.

Point in reference. 7 runs through the standard campaign, with the exception of Bearbaiting and High Noon I have only flown on the Seth and Thoth once each and Horus twice. While the armour is paper-thin it is quite a joy to fly as long as you know how to dodge with this thing.

[asyikarea51]

Probably the n00b way I fly, but I never liked the Serapis. Kept dying anyway even with Maxim cannon on sniper.

[QuantumDelta]

Nah, although it does work if you use it well, the serapis is one of the hardest fighters in the game to make work.
Horus is perhaps a little harder though.

[Mongoose]

To add insult to the injury: A Dragon is completely helpless against anything heavy playing gun turret; GTVA lights still have enough firepower to make this risky.

The Dragon was a nightmare in FS1, but thankfully in FS2 we have a wonderful new weapon that it is totally helpless against: Anti Fighter Beams.

I spent what felt like 5 minutes in FS1 trying to kill the last dragon in one mission cause i was in a herc and couldn't keep the damn thing in weapons range

At that point, the best thing to do is probably to just sit still and let it come to you.  You might be able to get in a missile salvo when it's head-on, and you'll at least be able to throw some primary fire in its direction.

[Androgeos Exeunt]

Nah, although it does work if you use it well, the serapis is one of the hardest fighters in the game to make work.
Horus is perhaps a little harder though.

The Horus is only worse off because it has less shields and a crap pitch rate which makes it more of a Vasudan Manticore than any other Vasudan ship in FS1 or FS2.

That aside, the Horus is good. Good speed, and the (crap) placement of its guns means that it is actually better at intercepting bombs simply because they have a large impact area.

[Kosh]

If you're going to be flying a wimpy (but speedy) fighter, why not just fly the Pegasus instead?  The speed and agility of the thing is fun if you're only worried about killing snubfighters.

IIRC the Pegasus actually has more amor than any other interceptor.

[Androgeos Exeunt]

Yeah, but armour isn't recoverable in-flight.

[Iranon]

Armour of the Pegasus is between the Terran and Vasudan lights... not spectacular. However, it has decent shields: barely worse than the Perseus', and far better than those of the Serapis/Thoth/Horus. The tech room desription calling it a death box is a blatant lie.

The problem is horrible firepower. You won't get killed but you'll hardly kill anything either.

[Commander Zane]

Hey it can carry the Prometheus S, that's good enough for one bank.

[ChronoReverse]

Yeah, survivability is no worse (and actually better) than the Horus and Serapis.  A single bank of Prometheus S isn't amazing but it's workable when you carry the single load of Tempests as well.  But besides all that, it's fun to fly =)

[Kosh]

Armour of the Pegasus is between the Terran and Vasudan lights... not spectacular. However, it has decent shields: barely worse than the Perseus', and far better than those of the Serapis/Thoth/Horus. The tech room desription calling it a death box is a blatant lie.

The problem is horrible firepower. You won't get killed but you'll hardly kill anything either.

Dual Kaysers will make up for that, at least on Easy you can uswe them like Subachs.

That aside, the Horus is good. Good speed, and the (crap) placement of its guns means that it is actually better at intercepting bombs simply because they have a large impact area.

Actually it's primaries aren't THAT bad for intercepting Shivan bombers, because except for the Nahema and the Shaitan they have huge profiles that are spread out over a large area. A good example is the Nephilim.

[QuantumDelta]

Actually it's primaries aren't THAT bad for intercepting Shivan bombers, because except for the Nahema and the Shaitan they have huge profiles that are spread out over a large area. A good example is the Nephilim.

We've soooooooooooooooooo been over this.

[Iranon]

Armour of the Pegasus is between the Terran and Vasudan lights... not spectacular. However, it has decent shields: barely worse than the Perseus', and far better than those of the Serapis/Thoth/Horus. The tech room desription calling it a death box is a blatant lie.

The problem is horrible firepower. You won't get killed but you'll hardly kill anything either.

Dual Kaysers will make up for that, at least on Easy you can uswe them like Subachs.

Problem 1: The Pegasus only has one gun bank (although that does, of course, have 2 guns.)
Problem 2: The Pergasus is not compatible with Kaysers. Prometheus S is the best you get.

[Dragon]

You had confused Pegasus with the Perseus, Kosh. Perseus is a Terran interceptor which have two gun banks that can carry Kaysers, Pegasus is a stealth fighter you face in one mission in FS campaign and, unfortunately, cannot fly in standard campaign (though get you fly it's Vasudan counterpart, which has larger target profile and isn't as good). It's incompatible with Kaysers and have only one bank, but has paper thin rear profile, superior speed, maneuverability and stealth capabilities, meaning that no aspect missile can lock on you (due to the bug, heatseekers can, but they are easy to dodge) and turrets will not fire at you unless you're either very close, firing weapons, or using afterburner, or there's an AWACS nearby.
Both are fun to fly, but I prefer Pegasus due to it's better speed and ability to outmaneuver most of it's enemies. It lacks in firepower and armour though, making it a flying coffin when there's AAA and flak armed enemy capship nearby (I mean serious business capships, Cain for example, doesn't count and Pegasus can kill it relatively easly. to kill a Fenris though, you have to make good use of your stealth to get to it's blind spots, or AAA fire will shred you).

EDIT: You could fly Pegasus in main campaign mission "Endgame", but it's not recommended and unless you have very specific flight style, there are better fighters for this mission.

[Thaeris]

I thought there was a retail mission where you could fly this fighter, though it wasn't at all standard/recommended and wouldn't win you any real benefits.

[Dragon]

Yes, there was, "Endgame", but it wasn't a good choice there.

[Thaeris]

Yalp. I remember that I used it to play a mission in a runthrough of the FS2 main campaign. They had a hard time hitting me, but the darn thing was so sensitive that I couldn't hit them well, either! 

[ChronoReverse]

You know, I could have sworn I used the Pegasus in more than just Endgame.  Are you sure that completing the SOC missions doesn't unlock it for a few other missions?


Incidentally, the Pegasus isn't even that much weaker than a Perseus in terms of shields and armor.  Too bad the weapons loadout isn't nearly as good but at the speed, agility and stealth is nice.