Quote:
Originally Posted by Ulzgoroth
Sufficient analysis of what for what?
Blindsided by what, and why would you need to be so far away to be clear of it?
While the first is true at least for air combat within some rather significant constraints, the second is decidedly not - bombers exist and are used to this day. And, uh, 'fighter' doesn't really presume the existence of bombers.
Anyhow, fighter aircraft do not do duty as customs boats, and a space fighter is not going to be at all suited to that job whether or not there's a canned ape on it.
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You have to do sufficient analysis of anything you make contact with to decide what it is, who it belongs to, what to do about it, and anything of the kind. And you have to be out of effective weapons range while doing that. Otherwise you might as well just play Russian Roulette.
You have to avoid being blindsided by whatever defenses may or may not be there but of which you are not normally willing to risk your expensive fleet lest Emperor Evil not be forgiving.
Fighter does presume the existence of bombers. Otherwise it just means, "really fast aircraft." With the exception of interesting oddities like the B-52 and the Stealth(which is ridiculously called a fighter) and the warthog all warplanes are fighters even though most of their missions are ground attack. But once you stop making dedicated attack aircraft then the term fighter is just generic. When there is for all practical purposes just one type of warplane which is fighter-bomber then the term fighter is nostalgia not precision. Just like paratroopers is just another word for infantry with attitude problems when all infantry are infantry.
And no fighter aircraft do not do duty as customs boats because the atmosphere is not the ocean. And whether or not a space fighter can do the job depends on what the author sees a fighter as. And no computer, and no ape can invent the concepts of space or fighter or canning let alone space fighter or canned ape on their own. More to the point a computer is not sufficient to tell an assassin from a dancer which is why we still use VIP bodyguards. And neither is a canned ape who besides being obviously dead and meant for food or else why would one can it, has not been trained for such a feat while alive.