What, do they blow up BEFORE they launch? 
I thought those things from Space: Above and Beyond looked damn cool. Can’t remember what they were called.
Hammerheads ?
I’m not familiar with all of these vessels, but surely the big problem with them is that they’re crewed, and thus have to rely on feeble organic reflexes and g-force tolerances?
Something AI-controlled like a Combat Wasp from Peter F. Hamilton’s Night’s Dawn series or a Rapid Offensive Unit from Ian M Banks’ Culture would tear any of these apart in less than a heartbeat, no?
Except they’re not ‘one man fighters’ and I’m a putz. Ooops.
This thread would be a lot better with more pics!
I quite like the Myrmidon fighters from Freespace 2.
…everybody is wrong!
My personal vote for best looking fighter would be the Starfighter from Buck Rogers in the 25th Century. Cheesy series, but great looking spaceships! I love the unusual shape and lines the Starfighter has: it looks deadly. Thank Dykstra for the design of the Starfighter and many other great ships named in this thread. The Starfighter also wins my vote for Fighter I would most like to Fly… (With a few Banquet Bear upgrades, of course… )
For firepower: while the Gunstar is a sentimental favourite of mine, it’s really more akin to a Helicopter Gunship than a pure fighter. The B-Wing wins this one for me.
In Japan, there is a series of games called “Super Robot Taisen,” or Super Robot Wars, where they take giant robots from a bunch of different anime and throw them into a giant melee. I didn’t buy it when I had the chance, but it looked like a lot of fun. (Evangelion, Gundam, Gigantor/Tetsujin 28, Tranzor Z, Voltron (the crappy car one), etc.)
Back on topic – I’d like to put another good word in for the Valkyries of Macross, AKA the Veritechs from Robotech. Able to fly/fight in atmosphere as well as in space, along with a lot of optional equipment for optimization to specific missions, and that whole transformation on the fly thing. Whoo! I’d love to fly one of these.
In order to succeed in the Japanese Macross PS2 game, you have to learn when and how to best use each of the fighter’s three forms. Often, you’d find yourself changing forms every second or so.
I’ve always liked the Valkyrie fighter from Robotech (IIRC “veritech” was the generic term for all transforming craft). How could you not love what is more or less an F-14 Tomcat that turns into a giant robot? The fighters from the last part of the series were cool too.
Silentgoldfish - I think those things were some kind of landing craft. If we are including transport craft as well, I would say the dropship from Aliens, the Imperial Shuttle and the BSG Raptor would be best of breed.
Well… There’s a bunch of tasks for a fighter. The Star Wars Universe has a surprisingly good complement of fighters for being hacked together.
There’s the general Space Superiority fighter, the X-Wing. Flies, fights, even bombs when needed.
There’s the anti-fighter fighter, the interceptor type, the A-Wing. Faster than heck, bit fragile, okay guns, missles, but no bomb capacity.
There’s the Fighter-Bomber, like a F-111, the Y-Wing. Two man, capable of being tasked against capital ships, with the ion cannons, and a fairly heavy bomb load. Bit slow, good armor. (And an emergency thrust reverse. You could slam the rear etheric rudder sideways, at least in canon, and snap the thing around. Would be hell on the fighter, though. Never saw it in the game)
There’s the Heavy Bomber, the B-Wing. Like an A-10 more than anything. Shipkiller. Do not use on fighters. Use it against bombers if you have to.
Wing Commander has a slightly fuller roster, but it was designed as a logical game, first.
Personally, I vote for the Macross II Metal Siren as my personal favorite. Good guns, heckload of light missiles, and good melee capability. Agile as heck, good armor plating, but not great. And, of course, the lance.
On the gripping hand, the Empire’s Tie Defender was brutal as heck…
And the Gunboat wasn’t bad either, but for different tasks.
IMHO any “space” fighter that does not separate orientation, acceleration and velocity is just a non-starter. So starfury and viper win hands down (though it can be assumed that the other nations’ vehicles from those universes also have that attribute). If you can’t do that you just have an atmospheric fighter in a space setting.
The counterargument that other series fighters are so advanced/fast/heavily armed that such things don’t matter I dismiss with a contemptuous wave of my hand.
The Vertitech Valkyrie from Robotech is clearly the most versitile.
And carries what is likely the most diverse complement of weapons, including missiles, lasers & autocannon. The Robotech Handbook even lists a varient Valkyrie that is equipped with a flamethrower.
If we’re using Computer games, the TIE Defender is damn sweet. Incredibly fast, heavy shields, can be fitted with a tractor beam to keep the enemy from manuvering while you are firing at it(or while a missle is locking) and it fires torpedos/missles.
The missle boat was great too, but lacking a bit on the laser side. If you ran out of missles, you were screwed(but it can carry up to 80 missles, so that’s not too likely).
And, being a two-man fighter, doesn’t qualify.
I don’t know about the Tie Defender. Sure, it was the best overall ship, but it seemed like such a cop-out to me. It’s almost as fast as an A-Wing, as tough as a Y-Wing, and as well armed as a B-Wing. Pretty much too good.
And the Missle Boat was always fun, especially against capitol ships, because you could load up one missle bay with super rockets (I did the math. Super rockets do more than half the damage as bombs, but you get twice as much. Better deal) and the other bay with advanced missles to take care of the escorts. Sometimes, if the escorts were not that much of a problem, I’d go with heavy rockets and mag pulse rockets, or mag pulse and missles if I had a lot of problems with escorts AND the cap. ships firing on me.
One thing you have to say for the Valkrie fighters from Macross (Robotech? Whazzat? 
) was that you could disuise it in the uniform of the giant bad guys and use it to sneak around in their ships
I don’t know if it qualifies as a spaceship or an aircraft, but I’m going with the Banshee from Halo: small, light, fast, manouverable, and great for air-to-air combat or ground attack duties. The first time you get to nick one and do these tight swooping banking strafing dives on the battlefield below - gaming bliss.
Of course, the Covenant pilots seem more vulnerable to ground fire: you can take one out with a few well-aimed bursts from your assault rifle. Just don’t do it when it reaches the bottom of its dive and pulls out overhead: empty a magazine into its belly and it will fall on your head. Splat!
In my opinion, you just can’t top the Xeelee Nightfighters, from the books written by Baxter. I mean, hell, the wings on those things are built from flaws in spacetime.
Now, paint some SHARK TEETH on 'em, and you’d be able to kick all sorts of ass.
From what I’ve seen, a Peregrine is about the same size as a runabout, but with proportionally more engine and less crewspace. In one episode, we see them swarming a variety of Cardassian ships and pelting them with miniature photon torpedos. They typically took about two glancing shots to take down, but there were lots of them in that fight.
Looked to be much faster than a Runabout, with a cool afterburner-ish glow on their impulse engines whenever they’d pull out of an attack and fly away.
Otherwise, their jobs were to fly past the Defiant in a delta formation and look cool during fleet shots.
Are those the fighters that tried to stop the Borg cube when it first attacked Earth, only to get blown up with one phaser shot each? If so, then I’ll definitely take a slightly less cool fighter, if it means I have a decent chance of actually surviving the battle.
Gimme the X-Wing. I’ll take a good well-rounded fighter over an ultra-fast deathtrap, or a fighter that’s packed with guns but is so slow and lumbering that it can’t get out of its own way.