What is this, exactly?: Old School Dogfighting

It's not a bad page. It's a good page. It's a page we need. Massive Dogfight or Large Scale Dogfight would both be good names.

If we do, we should remove Top Gun, that's not in that level.

Dog Fighting Furballs does exist, you know. I already copied all the text that was on Dog Fighting to it last night, and had just added Massive Dogfight and Large Scale Dogfight as redirects. To be clear, "furball" is an actual military slang for large-scale air-to-air battles.

BTW, is it supposed to be spelled "dogfighting" or "dog-fighting"?

EDIT: Oi, Dog Fighting Furballs is on the cutlist? Maddy, if you could please look into overruling that for now, I would be most thankful.

edited 19th Feb '12 1:13:55 AM by MarqFJA

Okay, so move the general Dog Fighting trope to that page, move Top Gun to it (since less than dozen doesn't seem massive enough to me, you need at least multiple formations of fighters in my mind). I would not want to use plain Furballs for it, since I believe the pet jargon is more popular than the military jargon.

.... Aaaand Dog Fighting Furballs has been cut. So much for hoping that whichever mod that came upon that cutlist request would ask first before deciding whether or not to cut it.

^Cut Master, not mod. And cutmasters don't routinely look at TRS threads.

I know, but I specifically went to the cutlist and clicked the "challenge cut" button, where I upon I requested not cutting the trope and included a link to this TRS - specifically, the point where the issue of Dog Fighting Furball's launching as Dog Fighting was discussed and a mod had weighed in the discussion in favor of Dog Fighting Furballs.

Old School dogfighting also refers to modern and futuristic advanced air- and spacecraft having their combat tactics devolve back into old-era dogfighting aerobatics for various (often practical) reasons.

Actually, I hadn't weighed in in favor of Dog Fighting Furballs. I had weighed in, as a troper, not a mod, against calling it simply Dogfighting.

edited 20th Feb '12 12:20:53 PM by Madrugada

Right. My mistake. Still, the point stands that the cutlisting has been challenged, and yet the challenging was completely ignored without so much as a brief counter-reply.

Challenging a cut proposal doesn't (and isn't supposed to) guarantee that the cut won't go through. I haven't looked at what you wrote in your defense of the trope, and I don't know which Cut Master cut it. So I can't address why the defense was rejected.

I already know it isn't a guarantee; it's more of a delaying move to give others the chance to defend it. You'd think the Cut Master who looked at the matter would at least state their reasons (in the discussion page or the linked TRS thread) for why they thought the defense was not sufficient, though.

Anyway... What to do now? What does it take to revert a cut?

I don't understand what the "furballs" part of the name meant.

It's a military slang term for a massive air-to-air battle, and I believe it's a metaphorical allusion to the chaotic nature of such a battle, such that the zig-zagging collection of contrails left behind the many fighter jets zipping from one side of the combat airspace to the other while duking it out often resembles the appearance a cat's furball.

edited 20th Feb '12 2:54:01 PM by MarqFJA

Oh, I can see that.

I think I like Massive Dogfight better, even if it is pretty bland.

And shouldn't it be Dogfighting Furball (singular) anyway?

... Well, it was pluralized in the YKTTW. I don't know why nobody had pointed that out there, to be honest; I only posted once in it, and it was shortly before it was launched, while I was in a bit of a hurry.

Wait, may be that's the real reason the article was cut?

Again, the YKTTW was that way because I didn't have any idea on the type of title I wanted.

Dogfighting Furball isn't the pre-existing term, furball is. The problem is that Furball has a more common interpretation that is not what people are going to think of. Given that, I'd rather go with something as straight forward as Massive Dogfight for the subtrope where it's a huge number of craft instead of the handful of a regular dogfight, or the opposing two in Chasing Your Tail.

So, I'm very confused as of reading the last page or so of this thread. What was the trope that Deboss tried to launch? The "massive air-to-air battle" that's been in YKTTW for a while, or a generic "dogfighting" trope?

Anyway, I think we've sort of lost track of what's going on with this trope. The problem with Old-School Dogfighting is that it's current definition is "Space Fighters maneuvering like aircraft", but it's name is more indicative of a general dogfighting trope — and that's the way it's being potholed around the wiki. What I want to do is redefine Old-School Dogfighting to mean dogfighting (since that's how it's being used anyway) and create a new Space Is Air trope for "spacecraft maneuvering like aircraft".

The furball/massive air battle trope is only tangentially related to this issue at all.

edited 21st Feb '12 4:20:53 PM by NativeJovian

I agree with giving Old-School Dogfighting a broader definition if there is indeed widespread misuse as you say, however I think we need a fairly specific "Dogfighting in Space" trope. I think "Space is Air" is way too broad and feels like a snowclone of "space is an ocean." I would like a specific "Two or more Space Fighters are shown fighting each other as if they were World War I or World War II fighter planes" trope. It's definitely tropeable — it's a well-defined, specific pattern, it has lots of examples, it has story-telling meaning, etc.

If I understand correctly you want a broad "dogfighting" trope, and then a broad "spaceships maneuver as if they were flying through the air" trope, and space dogfighting wouldn't be a trope at all, but merely, basically, a combination of these two tropes. I disagree — I think space dogfighting is tropable on its own. I remember George Lucas was inspired by actual air battles when dreaming up the space combat in Star Wars, for example. That's something far more specific than just George Lucas thinking "I'll have rocket-ships act like they're flying through the air, rather than through vacuum" and going from there.

edited 21st Feb '12 4:45:35 PM by girlyboy

I'm not sure that "dogfighting in space" is worth its own trope, but if we wanted to make one that was a subtrope of both the "dogfighting" trope and the "space is air" trope, then I wouldn't have a problem with that.

Space Is Air is pretty similar to Space Is an Ocean, yeah, but I wouldn't call it a snowclone — it's a sister trope, "spacecraft acting like aircraft" instead of "spaceships acting like sailing ships".

I'm very sure that it should be its own trope, but it does make sense to make it a sub-trope.

Starfighters As Aircraft, maybe?

I think I, for one, would more prefer "Spaceships As Aircraft" as either the main name or a re-direct for an Space Is Air trope, and a name that more explicitly mentions dogfights for the dogfights-in-space trope. That would make it clear that it's a more specific trope and hopefully reduce confusion. Maybe actually name it "Dogfighting In Space" or... something.

One problem I have with naming Space is Air... Space Is Air, is that "Space Is an Ocean" is a fairly broad trope. It includes lots of stuff, including everything from the way spaceships are thought of as being equivalent to sea-going ships, to the way lengthy space voyages are treated, to the way that spacegoing characters are treated as if they were sailors, or pirates, or members of a Space Navy, etc. You know, it's like this broad trope that describes the entire flavour of the setting.

Space Is Air, on the other hand, would just be like... "Space-ships turn as if they are not in a vacuum." Maybe also "Space-ships have wings," or something. A few more specific things like that. So I think maybe a name like "Spaceships Are Aircraft" would be a clearer name for this trope.

That's my thinking about it, anyway. I'm not feeling 100% strongly about it, really. I do feel pretty strongly that dogfighting in space is its own trope, if a fairly narrow and specific one, though. I mean, it's like, its own storytelling device, I'm quite sure. One where the main point is the combat, and the way it's shown, and the way it takes place, rather than "oh, look, they're in a vacuum but they aren't acting like it" and stuff. 6_6

edited 21st Feb '12 8:13:06 PM by girlyboy

I think Space Is Air has more relation to Space Friction than to Space Is an Ocean specifically.

As for "what Deboss tried to launch", I had an old proposed trope sitting around gathering dust because I started it two years ago. My original plan was something like a counterpoint to Old School Dog Fighting. After a few description changes and rewrites I had the vague semblings of a trope and asked if it was ready. Everybody said yes, so I launched it. I may or may not have been hammered at the time.

Aaaaaaaaaaanyway, if we're going to be splitting up tropes that are here, we may want to look at that group I suggested before to see if any of them are worth building.

Dogfight: we could use the name and most of the examples if people don't want to use it for something else. This would be the supertrope to any and all other dogfighting tropes. (need)

Massive Dogfight: this was what my original write up most resembled as it focused on the extremely large number of fighters flying around. (want)

Space Is Air/Space Is Fluid: this would parallel Space Friction and what not as an Acceptable Breaks from Reality where Newtonian physics don't apply, as this is what Star Wars used. (need)

Bullets Over Missiles: Fighters use bullets instead of missiles as the dominant method of combat. Again, another break from reality, missiles tend to get used before guns AFAIK. (want)

Actually, although Star Wars does use aerial maneuvers visually, it actually seems to take place in space. For instance, if you wing clip a starfighter, rather than just grinding to a halt, it continues to go in a straight line according to Newtownian physics. In fact, I suspect that Star Wars ships work somewhat according to Lensmen principle; ion jets provide the thrust, inertialess motion provides the speed.