[MatthTheGeek]

I don't want to see a Solaris up close. We already see too much Karunas up close, to the greatest pain of my comp.

[SpardaSon21]

In Aristea, during the exposition, you can fly around the Toutatis after it forces the Hood to run away.

[ssmit132]

And you can go up close if they survive in Massive Battle.

[-Sara-]

Or pull out FRED and place one. Had fun myself placing the Solaris, Toutatis and Eris pitted against a grey-textured Colossus with modern beams. Great way to see how able they are.

[SpardaSon21]

And you can go up close if they survive in Massive Battle.

Assuming your computer doesn't explode.

[Arcalane]

More chances to play with the Tev's fighters in less life-or-death situations!

I always enjoy testing the capabilities of enemy hardware. Knowledge is power.

--

On the musical note, I did a bit of a doubletake seeing tracks from Machinae Supremacy in the .vp. Good stuff, but one of the last places I'd expect to see it...

[DarthWang]

Explodo-beams! 

[Beskargam]

This was mentioned way back at the begining of the thread but is there any chance that you might run into the alpha 1 and the blue lions from FS2? assumin ghe/she survived

[Scotty]

18 years later, from the standpoint of a then-Squadron Leader (in canon, anywhere from Lieutenant Samsa (who I've always thought should have been a Lt. Commander) to Commanders Beckett, Vincey, and Habu) would be something like Rear Admiral.  Or higher.  They would not be in a fighter still.

Nor would Alpha 1 still be assigned to the Blue Lions even if by some miraculous occurance he/she was still flying a fighter.  You go through, what, seven squadron assignments in the retail campaign alone (which is stretching it to put it past a couple years of in-game time).

[NGTM-1R]

18 years later, from the standpoint of a then-Squadron Leader (in canon, anywhere from Lieutenant Samsa (who I've always thought should have been a Lt. Commander) to Commanders Beckett, Vincey, and Habu) would be something like Rear Admiral.  Or higher.  They would not be in a fighter still.

Nor would Alpha 1 still be assigned to the Blue Lions even if by some miraculous occurance he/she was still flying a fighter.  You go through, what, seven squadron assignments in the retail campaign alone (which is stretching it to put it past a couple years of in-game time).

Not necessarily. That's certainly true of a modern institution, but we have no idea if the GTVA practices "up or out".

[SpardaSon21]

Well, one would think Xinny and Zero would be squadron leaders eighteen years after Into the Lion's Den.

[Scotty]

I'd put money on SOC working differently than regular Navy.

[bigchunk1]

18 years later, from the standpoint of a then-Squadron Leader (in canon, anywhere from Lieutenant Samsa (who I've always thought should have been a Lt. Commander) to Commanders Beckett, Vincey, and Habu) would be something like Rear Admiral.  Or higher.  They would not be in a fighter still.

Nor would Alpha 1 still be assigned to the Blue Lions even if by some miraculous occurrence he/she was still flying a fighter.  You go through, what, seven squadron assignments in the retail campaign alone (which is stretching it to put it past a couple years of in-game time).

Well, not everyone can be Rear Admiral. It requires a different skillset beyond flight competence. I thought Xinny and Zero were crack flight leaders who showed great skill in what they did but never really took any administrative effort to climb up the ranks. I remember reading some piece of BP cannon, which said that GTVA veteran pilots often stayed in the military as leaders or flight instructors for future pilots. Surely after so many years they just found themselves pigeonholed as veteran pilots of the second shivan incursion. Moving them up to somekind of warship or tactical officership might make them less effective given their backgrounds as pilots.

A separate bit of fiction I read regarding admiral steele says that he went to military school specifically for military tactics training. Steele was also a former pilot of the second shivan incursion, but his schooling provided a different skillset which made him more effective in a position of leadership.

While seniority matters, background matters almost as much if not more.     

[Dilmah G]

I remember reading some piece of BP cannon, which said that GTVA veteran pilots often stayed in the military as leaders or flight instructors for future pilots.

From memory, this applies more to the situation close to the punch up between the UEF and GTVA; they found the Fighter Corps on experienced operators, rotating pilots after a tour of duty in a frontline squadron to the rear in order to train new pilots. So as the UEF's Fighter Corp, which actually is founded around experienced operators, starts to decline as the very experienced guys stay at the front until they die (nowhere to rotate them to, really, nor is it a feasible option), the GTVA's pilot quality steadily rises, as the sink or swim situation leaves only those who can hack it, and their knowledge and skillsets which are passed on to nuggets/bograts/whateverthey'recalledinyourregion before they move onto places in fighter squadrons.

In fact, we discussed 'POCT: Post Operational Conversion Training', in BP:Tev, where newer pilots are trained by veterans who run several exercises and lessons of their own in order to impart their knowledge in a solution that's far easier to implement that rewriting the entire line of the sausage factory/pilot training regime.

Moving them up to somekind of warship or tactical officership might make them less effective given their backgrounds as pilots.

This is quite a likely conclusion to draw. When the GTVA promotes pilots out of squadrons to executive and admin positions, their squadrons are no longer formed around experienced pilots who fought the Shivans, and have lessons to pass down.

And you have pilots who genuinely love flying and have few aspirations for executive careers are known to dodge promotions left, right, and centre in order to stay flying.

[bigchunk1]

And you have pilots who genuinely love flying and have few aspirations for executive careers are known to dodge promotions left, right, and centre in order to stay flying.

Exactly. These are the kind of sort I believed Xinny and Zero to be.

[Scotty]

Isn't it specifically mentioned that Xinny and Zero were trying to rescue Al faddil against orders?  That might be why they were flying fighters instead of whatever they were actually supposed to be doing.

[Arcalane]

Isn't it specifically mentioned that Xinny and Zero were trying to rescue Al faddil against orders?  That might be why they were flying fighters instead of whatever they were actually supposed to be doing.

In the debrief, yeah. It's actively noticed during the course of the mission (too few fighters for a proper op) and if you look, I'm pretty sure they're using a nonstandard lineup too; that either means veterans or desperation. IIRC Zero is in an Erinyes and Xinny is in a Perseus. I forget what the other two are in.

[ssmit132]

An Atalanta, an Aurora and either another Erinyes or Perseus, if I recall correctly.

[-Sara-]

Frankly it's hard to know just what the officers of the retail era do now. Some might have perished in an accident, others may have retired or fallen chronically ill (let's assume for now that cancer, Altzheimer, Parkinsons etc can be treated in the 24th century). Xinny and Zero probably took their place in the cockpit just for the special occasion, where ordinarily they probably train pilots or hold a command position. It's highly likely that Zero and Xinny had to pull a lot of ropes to be borrowed a few fightercraft, likely to be pinned with medals if succeeding or to take responsibility (and be labeled as having acted rogue) in case of dying. That way whoever gave them their chance doesn't verbally hang for lending them a hand and a small dozen of fighters and could afford to turn a blind eye when these top aces went on their rescue attempt.

I can imagine there's always the option that a pilot who refuses command but is deemed too old for the frontlines might become a testpilot for R&D's technology, safely tucked back in the home system. Also like NGTM-1R said, we're not sure how the GTVA works and how it compares to our modern standards. By the pre-release texts written for WiH I interpreted that the GTVA has it's veterans called back to train newer pilots. I'm guessing if a war goes really bad for the GTVA (for example: invasion of the systems at the core of the GTVA) these veterans are put back into active duty as squadron or wing leaders. It's good morale for a rookie to have an ace on their wing.

[Beskargam]

ok whether its legit and possible aside (i thus remove it as a proposal) would it not be possible if it did happen? or is that only me?