Looking for a break into fighter development

[Tannis V'larr]

Tannis has been cooking up some fighter specs in his free time, and I'd like to make a plot point of it. The interest would be in figuring out a way for the brainchild of a young pilot on active duty to catch the attention of someone in R&D.

What he's developing is a new TIE stealth fighter (http://www.swforums.net/forum/attachment.php?s=&postid=770274). The TIE Phantom had the standard limitations of a cloaking device in Star Wars -- power consumption, the two-way blind. Tannis is working on a device that would mask only the engine emissions, which presumably would be the primary way of tracking a small ship at range. This field is supplemented by other measures such as low-profile weapons, scanner-scattering hull materials, and sophisticated electronic warfare. The fighter would not be undetectable, but in most circumstances it would be little more than a bump in background radiation. The fighter would be expensive to produce but far more practical as a recon and strike craft than the Phantom.

So far, Tannis hasn't shown his specs to anyone. I'm planning to start a thread where he's trying to get a proposal ready to send to Imperial R&D. I figure once it's out there anything could happen to it -- if R&D rejects it, it could still be snatched up by a high-ranking officer as a pet project or Tannis could just have to keep trying. Anybody interested in helping to discover this latent engineering talent?

[Teleran Balades]

I could help you out with that if you'd like.

[Tannis V'larr]

Sounds great! I'm waiting to hear back from Kellison about a thread. I'll PM you with details when I hear back from him.

[Telan Desaria]

Indeed. It would be an excellent replacement to the TIE Interceptor. What we are looking for now in addition is something a bit on par with Alliance ships. We have the Defender and it exceeds our requirements. However, the production process is slow and they are costly.

Perhaps a ship on a Defender frame with shields, a hyperdrive, and a pair - or trio - of laser cannon. We could sacrifice the ion cannon and the concussion missile tube, keeping the torpedo launcher. Thoughts?

[Tannis V'larr]

For this project, or a later one?

I was thinking of a dedicated stealth fighter rather than a new multipurpose fighter. It carries a modified cloaking device whose field masks only the engines and a few other high-energy systems. Because the pilot and sensor package are outside the field, it doesn't have to fly blind like the TIE Phantom did under cloak. Naturally, the fighter would still pay for the advantage in other areas, like durability, flight performance, and weapons load-out. It would be a role-player rather than a fleet mainstay, suitable for carrying small payloads undetected behind enemy lines -- sensors, mines, torpedoes, whatever satisfies the darkest dreams of the Imperial dirty tricks department. I can try working up some specs, though I may need help, since I've never done that for a Star Wars ship before.

On the subject of the replacement for the Interceptor, if Tannis's first project takes off, he may well be interested in pursuing others. :)

[Telan Desaria]

I meant as a separate research/production model

[Tannis V'larr]

Oh, so that's what "in addition" meant. Guess I should learn to read one of these days.

[Telan Desaria]

reading can indeed be dangerous.