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Space: Above and Beyond was what I thought about first when I read this. However the problem is that the persons in SAaB were trained, equipped and had IQ above the single digits.

There's that, and then there's the fact that they didn't crash every second episode.

Or ever blow up their own ship. Or turn their backs on people in need.

For a bunch of sci-fi pilots they were bizarrely competent.

The speech the CAG gave to the ship's chaplain as he was suiting up to go kill Chiggy-von-Richtoven, that was epic.

Sanehouse wrote:I wasn't talking about training Marines for the sole purpose of being fighter pilots. If they did train Marines, it would be a good idea to train them as both foot troops and fighter pilots, so they're useful in all situations. Or maybe we could just have a bunch of Marines put on those zero-gravity suits, and start shooting their phaser rifles out of the decompressed deck.

I'd disagree on this. A fighter pilot has received specialized training on how to use a multi-million credit vessel to kill other multi-million vessels. Her reflexes and training have been focused around using various displays and getting a 'feel' for the vessel being flown. The exercises performed by the fighter pilot are designed to improve reflexes, hand-eye coordination, and mental alertness. Due to the vaue of the resources that are under her solo command, fighter pilots also receive officer training.

An infantryman has different training. An infantryman knows the only source of extra ammo is several days away, and everything else they have to carry themselves. They will be exercised so they can carry heavy loads for long distances, and still fight at the end. As there is not a lot of expensive gear under their command, infantry will be able to bypass all the training, history, and conditioning necessary for officers. Their training is focused on a different environment, and has a different goal.

In short, training fighter pilots to be infantry is a waste of several million credits in training, while training an infantryman to be a pilot will raise the costs of all your personnel by several million each. If you are worried about having less pilots than combat craft, then you can go through all your infantry, and pick those that are the best. This way you don't hav to waste training on someone who is never able to handle the coordination needed for a space dogfight.

Short version:
Which is better, a pair of Fighter 5/Wizard 5 characters, or a single Fighter 10 and Wizard 10? (For those that don't get it, these are Dungeons & Dragons characters; the first is a pair of characters both of whom have 5 levels in Fighter and another 5 levels in wizard. Both canfight,and both can toss spells. The other is a pair of characters, one of whom has 10 levels in Fighter, and the other has 10 levels in Wizard. The first group has redundancy, but the second group has better special abilities.)