LAST EDITED ON Oct-19-01 AT 07:35 PM (EDT)

>If I'm right, then either Amanda is some kinda pilot or the Lightning
>is on the big nasty end of the heavy spectrum. Or both.

Sort of both. Lockheed's Lightning IV is one of the contenders for the current (2405) state of the art in medium fixed configuration space superiority fighters, along with Incom's latest rev of the Dragonfly (T-65E), GENOM's TIE Advanced Mark II, and the Klingon Bloodsword class. The Klingon is the most heavily armed of the bunch, the X-Wing the sturdiest, the TIE Advanced the most agile. The Lightning IV is the most balanced, the best all-around performer.

The F-71 Starfury is an aging design by 2405, but still quite potent. It's not very heavily armed for its class (only two blaster cannons in the chin, much like the TIE/ln it was developed to fight), but is extremely agile and maneuvers in ways which are bizarre and unintuitive to the classically trained UF-universe fighter pilot. They're also fairly sturdy, although their engine configuration makes them much more vulnerable to maneuver-impairing damage than, say, an X-Wing.

General Dynamics' next offering, the YF-90 Thunderbolt, is in the testing phase as of Courtship. It's shaping up to be a fifth contender for the title the Lightning IV is vying for - chances are GD's selection of the name for their new baby isn't a coincidence. With the Earth Alliance becoming ever more suspicious of the Wedge Defense Force (which is standardizing its medium fighter fleet on the L4), military technologists theorize that Earthforce specifically asked GD to come up with a Lightning-killer when they offered the contract for the Starfury's replacement.

So, basically, neither fighter is as heavy as you think, which balances out so that your statement still basically holds true. Amanda Dessler is a hell of a pilot; she wouldn't be a Flight Leader in the Imperial Gamilon Navy if she wasn't. She had help, too; Rina Dragonaar's not too rotten either. (Her gunnery skills are actually better than Amanda's.)

--G.
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Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor in Chief, Netadmin
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/