Old School Dogfighting: Difference between revisions

When a lot of science fiction authors attempt to portray fighters in space, they tend to rely too much on the nature of terrestrial aircraft as a model--which [[As You Know|as we all know]] gain their particular flying characteristics from the millions of tons of air they fly through. An airplane's wings are designed to get lift from the atmosphere, and they're always having to fight the friction of the atmosphere and Earth's gravity to keep aloft. Rudders, elevators, and ailerons allow airplanes to yaw, pitch, and roll through the air. Banking (rolling to one side until you reach a particular angle) puts an airplane into a turn that slowly, or quickly, changes its direction of flight. Kill the engine on most airplanes, and their wings will generate enough lift that they can still glide for a bit (hopefully to a controlled landing).

There's also the issue of gravity. Fighter aircraft in the Earth's atmosphere utilize gravity-assisted turning maneuvers like the High-Speed Yoyo, Low-Speed Yoyo, Barrel Roll Turn, Split S, and the Immelmann turn. There's also a whole school of thought in fighter combat called the "energy fight," where fighter pilots utilize the Earth's gravity to assist in outmaneuvering their opponents. In space, where gravitational pull is much more subtle, these tactics are of decidedly less utility.

== [[Anime]] and [[Manga]] ==

* [[Justified Trope]] in some ''[[Gundam]]'' continuities as [[Minovsky Physics|Minovsky Particle]] interference that scrambles most unshielded electronics (and most missiles are too small to fit sufficient shielding into), rendering most guided missiles more or less useless. In this case, it's more like old school infantry fighting, only bigger. Actual fighter planes, at least in space are uncommon & those that do appear are usually picked off easily by mobile suits due to the latter being more maneuverable & being able to field a larger & more powerful variety of weapons (in other words, really, [[Rule of Cool]]). The fighter jets do get a chance to shine in some of the original series' Earth-arc episodes, though.

** Most universes have [[Transforming Mecha]], but special mention should go to ''[[Mobile Suit Gundam 00]]'', where two of the three [[The Federation|Earth factions]] have "configurable" mecha - namely, they can be switched into flight modes at the base, but not in the heat of battle because of the Gs involved. So of course when [[The Rival]] does so it shows how much of a gutsy [[Badass]] he is.

* ''[[Super Dimension Fortress Macross]]'' averts this most of the time, as the Valkyries normally use missiles. ''[[Macross Missile Massacre|Lots and lots]]'' of missiles. Nonetheless, the series is still known for the ''Itano Circus'', a stylized depiction of close-range dogfighting, which also includes the use of missiles.

*** This is in fact Lampshaded in one book where Wedge is chasing a TIE fighter in space. Because it's only trying to evade him using vertical climbs and dives, Wedge can tell the pilot is a rookie who's only been trained in atmosphere, since the TIE fighter's inefficient aerodynamic design makes it incapable of complex maneuvers in atmosphere.

* Averted in the ''[[Bio of a Space Tyrant]]'' series by Piers Anthony. Many of the complications of battle in space are addressed, and the battles involve a lot of tactics that could only be employed in space.

* Bujold's Vorkosigan series describes credible fleet actions in space (helped by the fact that there are no FTL drives, interstellar travel is by wormhole teleports, once there everything goes at sub-relativistic speeds). An attacking fleet builds up speed at a safe distance, makes a run through the defenders while exchanging fire, then there's a lull while the attackers reverse-thrust for the next pass. Bujold also notes that when reinforcements arrive unexpectedly, the attackers have the choice of decelerating hard and being caught dead in space, or continuing to accelerate, hoping to pass fast enough to escape.

* Addressed in [[The Lost Fleet]] series - Fast Attack Craft (fighters) aren't even mentioned until the sixth book. Their usage is discussed, with major characters noting their use is characteristic of someone more familiar with atmospheric combat and still thinking in those terms. As always, the physics of the matter are also brought up; unable to carry the weaponry of larger ships, they are dependent upon carrier ships and are slower and less maneuverable than larger ships due to poor mass-to-thrust ratios. Their sole advantage over larger ships is their small size, which makes them difficult to target. This advantage is more than offset by their poor speed and maneuverability in relativistic combat - they are so slow by comparison to larger ships that they are incapable of turning themselves around in a timely fashion to make a second attack pass.

* Also averted in ''[[The Forever War]]'', in which hyperrelativistic combat is the primary mode of space combat we actually see at use in the story. While there are fighters, the act as highly mobile missile boats.

* In the [[Posleen War Series]], the sole [[Space Fighter]] scene averts this trope. The fighters in question using guided missiles to engage the enemy, and there's even an evasive maneuver that takes advantage of being able to change the direction one's pointing without changing vector until thrust is applied.

== [[Live Action TV]] ==

** To wit, ''The Original Series'' seems to have a more realistic approach in terms of distance. Likewise, you would hardly ever see both the ''Enterprise'' and the enemy vessel on screen at once, although this obviously has [[Stock Footage|completely different reasons]].

*** It should also be noted that ''[[Star Trek]]'' relies on [[Space Is an Ocean]] rather than Space Is ''[[Top Gun]]'', so the combat has a very different style than ''[[Star Wars]]''-esque dogfighting.

* ''[[Farscape]]'' opens with John getting shot into the middle of an [[Old School Dogfight]].

* Used oddly in ''[[Babylon 5]]''; the series made a point of obeying Newtonian physics. Its fighters, for example, had inertia and momentum, and used maneuvering jets to change vectors and even rotate around their centers of mass without changing their direction of flight (with [[Touched by Vorlons|some exceptions]]). While there was talk of point-defense against incoming missiles and the like, it still had plenty of [[Frickin' Laser Beams]].

* Pretty much used in every episode of ''[[Buck Rogers in The 25th Century]]''. With the same stock footage almost every time.

*** There's also the fact that the Vipers are shown to be able to fly sideways or backwards, making another aversion.

* ''[[Doctor Who]]'' came up with an example of this trope taken to its extreme - [[Techno Babble|through some technobabble upgrades]], [[Rule of Cool|1940's Spitfires take on a Dalek ship in orbit]].

* This trope is the entire purpose of the Warhammer40000-derived game Aeronautica Imperialis. The only guided missiles in the game are ground-attack-only weapons.

** The Imperium has access to Skystrike missiles for air-to-air combat, and Tau seeker missiles give them a distinct edge over other races, but for the most part the game plays this trope straight.

== [[Video Games]] ==

* The original ''[[Descent]]'' series ''[[Inverted Trope|inverts]]'' this, as player ships and most enemies completely ignore gravity even though it takes place mostly in environments that would have at least ''some'' gravity (there is [[Space Friction]] where there shouldn't be, however). Ships have no need to maintain forward velocity and can hover or accelerate freely in any direction, making them more akin to gunships than fighters, and as such, "dogfighting" in open areas includes completely different maneuvers.

* In ''[[Project Sylpheed]]'' you can try to shoot down enemy fighters with your machine guns, but you start with a guided missile system mounted, and can research and mount several more. All of them are more effective at killing enemy fighters than guns, and most carry enough ammo that you won't need to resupply often. Your guns and other unguided weapons are most useful at shooting turrets, engines, and shield generators off capital ships. You can also cut your engines to glide on inertia, but most other aspects of the trope are played absolutely straight.

* In ''[[Homeworld]]'', strike craft based on the fighter chassis make strafing runs against their targets, whereas other craft will simply fly into weapons range and unload. Unlike this trope, however, they tend to maneuver by doing 180 degree turns and returning on the same path to their target.

* Sometimes averted in ''[[Ace Combat]] 3: Electrosphere''. Missiles are much more practical than guns (especially since [[Bottomless Magazines|you have an almost infinite supply]]) ... unless you're flying a ship that fires lasers instead of machine guns.

** Actually, the combination of both is much more effective. There is a reason for most people using missiles on vanilla servers.

* In ''[[Sins of a Solar Empire]]'', missiles are a standard weapon. However, they're not the ''only'' weapon; beams, photon torpedoes and other wave-shaped thingies that defy explanation are the standard equipment that every ship has, even the 'missile only' craft.

** Even moreso, they have the roles of dogfighting. The bombers attack large targets. The fighters are the best weapon against bombers and fighters, and therefore fighters will be in both the attacking and defending contingents much like the bombing raids over Europe in [[WW 2]]. The AA boats are pretty good against bombers but they devastate fighters, but are themselves one of the, if not ''the'' weakest combat unit in the game.

* Averted in the adventure game ''Mission Critical'', where ships do use fighters alongside missiles, but human input has no place in combat when combat computers act orders of magnitude faster. One plot point involves a serum meant to put human input back in, strong AI having proved unattainable. You do ''not'' want to imagine what it has to do to people.