DOGFIGHT
Allegiance: AUTOBOT
Sub-Group: TRIGGERBOTS
Function: AIR COMBAT
First Comic Appearance:
TRANSFORMERS #46
"Don't fire till you see the lights of their
eyes."
Profile: The skies are
unsafe for aviation when Dogfight is in the air. He terrorizes friend
and foe alike. Not one to take chances, he buzzes even non-military
commercial aircraft just to make sure that they keep their distance
from him. This wild, wicked sky-flying street fighter likes to go
nosecone to nosecone with his opponents in what he calls "a dance of
doom." He generally doesn't begin to fire until he's close enough to
count the rivets in their fuselage. Sometimes he'll even partially
transform to his robot mode in mid-air so he can punch it out with an
enemy aircraft. It doesn't take much to get his fuel flowing- he'll fly
into action against a flock of pigeons if they accidentally interfere
with his radar. Optimus Prime has tried to calm Dogfight down by
instructing him in mechano-meditation, a discipline that teaches the
art of mastering one's behavior by learning how to recognize and modify
the electrical impulses within one's emotional cortex module. So far,
the results have been negligible. Dogfight's aggressive outbursts are
deep-rooted. They stem from a moment of indecision in his youth. He was
on air guard duty for his village on Cybertron. While on a maintenance
break on the ground, he saw a squadron of jets approach in the distance
just as an air tanker carrying vital fuel relief was arriving. Before
he could decide whether the squadron was friend or foe, it destroyed
the tanker. All the while, Dogfight remained on the ground. Without the
fuel many of his neighbors had to shut down for a long time, and some
have yet to fully recover. Because he hesitated to take action,
Dogfight blamed himself for this tragedy. Ever since, he's never
hesitated. And he's never met a Decepticon that he didn't want to
destroy immediately.
Abilities: Dogfight's
swept-back wing design allows him superior maneuverability in jet mode.
A state-of-the-art navigational system gives him the ability to
constantly adjust his speed, altitude and direction to compensate for
the inherent instability of this wing design. His maximum speed is 1700
miles per hour and his range is 3000 miles. He is armed with two fusion
reaction-powered blowtorch blasters in both jet and robot modes. In jet
mode the blasters are mounted under his tall section and pointing
behind him to surprise any enemy aircraft that try to sneak up on him.
He commonly leaves a twin trail of flame from the blasters as he
streaks through the air. His wingtips are serrated and can cut through
all but the toughest steel alloys. One of his favorite tactics is to
fly close enough to his opponents so that he can use his wingtips to
slice off their wings.
Weaknesses: Dogfight is
vulnerable to mid-air stalls during some of his more dramatic flying
maneuvers. So far he has been able to pull out of all of them before
actually crashing on the ground, but he's come close to destroying
himself on several occasions.
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