Battletech Vs. Star Trek

[Straha]

Also a note on WMDs as I seem to be the only Clan Fan here. The clans banned most WMDs a while ago. And Snow Raven banned all of them when the Not Named clan used a nuke on the Raven Genetic Repository, causing them to lose a lot of Mech warriors and Elementals as well as their DNA, partially responsible for there rise to Naval Dominence.

A note on the Fic Just finished the first chapter, when I get to chapter four I will post the first two and see how it goes over.

[Sea Skimmer]

in speking of the numbers the clans took over like 100 planets with less than 1 million Men

Because they hit the rim worlds. Honnestly no one suspected an attack from out there. Thats like us putting troops around Kansas. Or the interior of Hawaii.

The US Army actually has a quite large presence in Kansas at Fort Riley and a few other bases.

[LordShaithis]

The mech is the stupidest weapon in sci-fi. Take your uber hypersonic railguns of doom and mount them on the five tanks you can build for the price of one mech, and that mech will get blown to pieces from five directions.

[Straha]

in speking of the numbers the clans took over like 100 planets with less than 1 million Men

Because they hit the rim worlds. Honnestly no one suspected an attack from out there. Thats like us putting troops around Kansas. Or the interior of Hawaii.

The US Army actually has a quite large presence in Kansas at Fort Riley and a few other bases.

ARGH!!!! IT WAS A RHETORICAL STATEMENT!

Change it to the deserts of Texas, Nevada, and arizona if you want.

[Rubberanvil]

ARGH!!!! IT WAS A RHETORICAL STATEMENT!

Change it to the deserts of Texas, Nevada, and arizona if you want.

The Army, Air Force and even the ^%%ing Navy in some places have all over there

[Straha]

The Army, Air Force and even the ^%%ing Navy in some places have all over there

Sush you!

[Rubberanvil]

Touche on your other points, but I read somewhere in the game manuals or novels that the rounds ARE hypersonic.

Hypersonic ammuntion been available(sp) for at least 10-20 years and it doesn't speak highly of BTech technical achievements.[/b]

[The_Nice_Guy]

The mech is the stupidest weapon in sci-fi. Take your uber hypersonic railguns of doom and mount them on the five tanks you can build for the price of one mech, and that mech will get blown to pieces from five directions.

Not really. When you have five cheap 100 ton tanks that taken together are superior to a mech, but individually inferior, and only enough transport space to shift a hundred tons of equipment, you still go for the mech on the attack. Yes, it costs more, but ton for ton, with the game mechanics in question, the mech still wins hands down.

One analogy is the US armed forces. Will they give up the an advanced MBT for a number of weaker tanks that are actually more cost effective? One factor is the availability of crews, while the other is the transportation assets required to shift more tanks.

For a variety of reasons, the transport capabilities of BT is an extremely prickly problem. Of course, why planetary invasions succeed at all is a matter that we often try not to think about!

The Nice Guy

[Sea Skimmer]

The mech is the stupidest weapon in sci-fi. Take your uber hypersonic railguns of doom and mount them on the five tanks you can build for the price of one mech, and that mech will get blown to pieces from five directions.

Not really. When you have five cheap 100 ton tanks that taken together are superior to a mech, but individually inferior, and only enough transport space to shift a hundred tons of equipment, you still go for the mech on the attack. Yes, it costs more, but ton for ton, with the game mechanics in question, the mech still wins hands down.

The Nice Guy

The game mechanics however make no sense. In reality For a given technology level a tank will be far more effective then a mecha of the same weight, indeed it could be far lighter and still be far more effective.

[Darth Wong]

The mech is the stupidest weapon in sci-fi. Take your uber hypersonic railguns of doom and mount them on the five tanks you can build for the price of one mech, and that mech will get blown to pieces from five directions.

Not really. When you have five cheap 100 ton tanks that taken together are superior to a mech, but individually inferior...

Justify that statement, when the whole point was that the weapons of a mech are very small in proportion to its body, and those same weapons could be mounted on a tank for a vastly greater ratio of firepower to target profile, cost, and weight.

and only enough transport space to shift a hundred tons of equipment, you still go for the mech on the attack. Yes, it costs more, but ton for ton, with the game mechanics in question, the mech still wins hands down.

The game mechanics are a joke. They deliberately have stupidly designed tanks that appear to have almost no armour and carry only the most feeble weapons available in the Mech universe. We're talking about tanks which would be designed by an intelligent person in that universe.

One analogy is the US armed forces. Will they give up the an advanced MBT for a number of weaker tanks that are actually more cost effective? One factor is the availability of crews, while the other is the transportation assets required to shift more tanks.

Would they get rid of the MBT in favour of a super-MBT which costs ten times more, is five stories tall, has thinner armour, and uses the same weapons?

For a variety of reasons, the transport capabilities of BT is an extremely prickly problem. Of course, why planetary invasions succeed at all is a matter that we often try not to think about!

The Nice Guy

There's a lot of things in BT that don't make sense. The usefulness of Mechs is the biggest one.

[The Dark]

The Mechs as designed really are my biggest problem with BT. I like the game, but Elementals made much more sense than huge old BattleMechs.


Personally, I prefer the ideas put forth in Heavy Gear: mechs are small (roughly 4-8 meters tall), and designed to put light armor where tanks can't go (jungle, mountains, urban combat, etc) and to support troops. If they come up against heavy armor without heavy armor supporting them, they're usually screwed (unless they get real lucky with a panzerfaust or happen to have a bazooka on them). It's still unrealistic, but the mailing lists for the games always try to figure basic scientific data. Unfortunately, the heaviest direct-energy weapon I know of is a 35mW pulse laser, which is very weak by SW standards (though IIRC, that's roughly PPC level from calcs we did on the mailing list for a BT/HG crossover campaign).

[The Dark]

Unfortunately, the heaviest direct-energy weapon I know of is a 35mW pulse laser, which is very weak by SW standards (though IIRC, that's roughly PPC level from calcs we did on the mailing list for a BT/HG crossover campaign).

OK, found the conversions we did based on armor penetration by machineguns in both systems. The 35mW pulse laser will penetrate 178% as much armor as a PPC, and a light (17.5mW) free-electron laser has 123% the armor penetration of a PPC.

[Sea Skimmer]

The Mechs as designed really are my biggest problem with BT. I like the game, but Elementals made much more sense than huge old BattleMechs.


Personally, I prefer the ideas put forth in Heavy Gear: mechs are small (roughly 4-8 meters tall), and designed to put light armor where tanks can't go (jungle, mountains, urban combat, etc) and to support troops. If they come up against heavy armor without heavy armor supporting them, they're usually screwed (unless they get real lucky with a panzerfaust or happen to have a bazooka on them). It's still unrealistic, but the mailing lists for the games always try to figure basic scientific data. Unfortunately, the heaviest direct-energy weapon I know of is a 35mW pulse laser, which is very weak by SW standards (though IIRC, that's roughly PPC level from calcs we did on the mailing list for a BT/HG crossover campaign).

That's stupid. Something that size would do just as badly as a tank in the mountains and jungle, though tanks can be quite effective in both. In urban combat a mecha too big to enter a building is possibly the worst idea in a long string of stupid mecha ideas.

Light armor gets shot to tiny pieces in urban fighting. You want as heavy fucking armor and as big tracks as you can get for such combat. That’s why the Russians and Ukraine as building tanks into APC's and massively armed IFV's for just such fighting. Conventional APC's and IFV's get blown apart rather quickly.

In Grozny in 1994-5 some tanks where hit dozens of times by RPG's and many only survived because they had reactive armor that's panels got replaced on a daily basis.

[The Dark]

That's stupid. Something that size would do just as badly as a tank in the mountains and jungle, though tanks can be quite effective in both. In urban combat a mecha too big to enter a building is possibly the worst idea in a long string of stupid mecha ideas.

I agree it's still not as effective as armor overall, but it's better than the BattleMech. The "standard" Gear masses 6627kg, or about 10% of an M1 Abrams, carries 45mm of armor, and a 25mm autocannon for its primary (along with an indirect fire rocket launcher and an anti-personnel grenade launcher). It would be similar to a light IFV, with more height and a narrower body. I'll admit height is bad, but in heavy trees width is just about as bad, since it limits what you can pass between.

Light armor gets shot to tiny pieces in urban fighting. You want as heavy fucking armor and as big tracks as you can get for such combat. That's why the Russians and Ukraine as building tanks into APC's and massively armed IFV's for just such fighting. Conventional APC's and IFV's get blown apart rather quickly.

True, one urban design that's not an MP (which isn't really "urban," but intended for use in camps to prevent Gear thefts) seems to rely on being in fairly wide areas, since it relies on "speed and agility...combined with the relatively long range and dramatic effect" of its weapons. It relies on EMP effects from particle beams to disable enemy vehicles. Another is basically an ambush unit, fairly lightly armored but with a BFG to take out the first thing that pops it nose into its territory. They're still flawed, and I'll admit it, but it seems to be slightly closer to reality and the current attempts to build exoskeletons/powered armors than the Giant Mecha concept.

In Grozny in 1994-5 some tanks where hit dozens of times by RPG's and many only survived because they had reactive armor that's panels got replaced on a daily basis.

Right, and I agree that most offensives (urban included) are better handled by units that can assault heavily defended areas. Cost is still a factor, though. If you can mount one MBT or five lighter vehicles with the same gun as the MBT, which would you prefer to put in a defensive spot (assuming engineering allows for reliable walker vehicles)? I'm not saying everyone will have the same answer, but generally I would prefer to have more firepower. Even if I knew I would lose some units, I personally I would prefer the higher chance of taking out the enemy forces. I would prefer conventional vehicles armed with the heavy weapons, but this is a mecha thread.

[Sea Skimmer]

A 6x6-armored car won't work for this why?

I agree it's still not as effective as armor overall, but it's better than the BattleMech. The "standard" Gear masses 6627kg, or about 10% of an M1 Abrams, carries 45mm of armor, and a 25mm autocannon for its primary (along with an indirect fire rocket launcher and an anti-personnel grenade launcher). It would be similar to a light IFV, with more height and a narrower body. I'll admit height is bad, but in heavy trees width is just about as bad, since it limits what you can pass between.

Tree cover too heavy for tanks is quite rare in any quantity in any area worth fighting for. When you do encunter it its generally easy enough to go around. Plus your enemy will only have armor if they also wasted money on mecha, I don't like to count on having to fight only rich inept countries.

In any case a light AFV like the Stormer 30 can bring a 30mm auto cannon and a couple TOW's is only 2.4 meters wide and 5.27 long. If the cover is to heavy for something like that then I doubt a mecha would be able to move through it at anything but a snail's pace.

In such massive cover a mecha would be quickly destroyed by infantry anyway. Your better off investing in det cord and heavy mortars along with other fire support weapons.

True, one urban design that's not an MP (which isn't really "urban," but intended for use in camps to prevent Gear thefts) seems to rely on being in fairly wide areas, since it relies on "speed and agility...combined with the relatively long range and dramatic effect" of its weapons. It relies on EMP effects from particle beams to disable enemy vehicles. Another is basically an ambush unit, fairly lightly armored but with a BFG to take out the first thing that pops it nose into its territory. They're still flawed, and I'll admit it, but it seems to be slightly closer to reality and the current attempts to build exoskeletons/powered armors than the Giant Mecha concept.

A 6x6 armored car or heavy hummer won't work for base secuirity why? Directional EMP from particle beams? I see little point, espically since simplar directional EMP devices are already in the works.

Right, and I agree that most offensives (urban included) are better handled by units that can assault heavily defended areas. Cost is still a factor, though. If you can mount one MBT or five lighter vehicles with the same gun as the MBT, which would you prefer to put in a defensive spot (assuming engineering allows for reliable walker vehicles)? I'm not saying everyone will have the same answer, but generally I would prefer to have more firepower. Even if I knew I would lose some units, I personally I would prefer the higher chance of taking out the enemy forces. I would prefer conventional vehicles armed with the heavy weapons, but this is a mecha thread.

I'd prefer a fuckload of ATGM tracks and dismount teams then five mecha with direct fire weapon. Five walkers that can carry and use a 120-152mm gun would be huge and far far more expensive then a single MBT. It's not a realistic comparison.

They would also be far too easy to knock out with missiles at long range and easily slaughtered by artillery, high profile= fucking badly for defense. I'd take the tank

[The_Nice_Guy]

The game mechanics are a joke. They deliberately have stupidly designed tanks that appear to have almost no armour and carry only the most feeble weapons available in the Mech universe. We're talking about tanks which would be designed by an intelligent person in that universe.

Actually, there are quite a number of well designed tanks that can give mechs a run for their money. Like the Alacorn Mk IV with 3 gauss rifles. Disgusting amount of armor. Good speed for its weight. No, it's still not a match one on one with a Thunder Hawk mech(the only mech which also mounts 3 gauss rifles), but two or three Alacorns will handily beat the T-Hawk, and are cheaper to boot.

And like I mentioned, the limited transportation assets in BT restrict cargo space, so that if a commander is forced to choose between a T-Hawk and an Alacorn for an attack, he'll still go for the T-Hawk.

It's not that tanks are poorly designed, because they are well designed. It's the game mechanics that handicap them. But hey, we have to make mechs cool, right?

Furthermore, until somebody actually manages to devise mechs in real life, our speculation that one machine is better than the other is just that, speculation. And if mechs are weaker, then probably it doesn't matter if we're talking about light mechs as in HG or big ones like in BT. In cities etc, infantry are still the most useful unit.

In fact, improving offensive technology might render even heavy MBTs obsolete, in roles that might be better replaced by fast light APCs carrying deadly and versatile infantry armed with a variety of weapons.

The Nice Guy

[Typhonis 1]

And dont the clans use that bidding process where they give away troops they could use for the sake of honor?

[The Dark]

And dont the clans use that bidding process where they give away troops they could use for the sake of honor?

Against each other, but not against "honorless" enemies.

[Sarevok]

The game mechanics are a joke. They deliberately have stupidly designed tanks that appear to have almost no armour and carry only the most feeble weapons available in the Mech universe. We're talking about tanks which would be designed by an intelligent person in that universe.

Actually, there are quite a number of well designed tanks that can give mechs a run for their money. Like the Alacorn Mk IV with 3 gauss rifles. Disgusting amount of armor. Good speed for its weight. No, it's still not a match one on one with a Thunder Hawk mech(the only mech which also mounts 3 gauss rifles), but two or three Alacorns will handily beat the T-Hawk, and are cheaper to boot.

And like I mentioned, the limited transportation assets in BT restrict cargo space, so that if a commander is forced to choose between a T-Hawk and an Alacorn for an attack, he'll still go for the T-Hawk.

It's not that tanks are poorly designed, because they are well designed. It's the game mechanics that handicap them. But hey, we have to make mechs cool, right?

Furthermore, until somebody actually manages to devise mechs in real life, our speculation that one machine is better than the other is just that, speculation. And if mechs are weaker, then probably it doesn't matter if we're talking about light mechs as in HG or big ones like in BT. In cities etc, infantry are still the most useful unit.

In fact, improving offensive technology might render even heavy MBTs obsolete, in roles that might be better replaced by fast light APCs carrying deadly and versatile infantry armed with a variety of weapons.

The Nice Guy

While I agree that mechs built using 20th century technology are useless
piece of junk I want to point out reasons why battlemechs are the ultimate
fighting machine in battletech.

The most common argument against mechs is that they are big and lightly armoured. To understand why mechs are big one needs to understand the
nature of battletech armour. Battletech armour is much stronger than modern armour of similar mass but takes up much more volume. For example all that thick layer of armour on a 45 feet tall Maruder II-C weighs only 13 tons. Compare this to the fact that a M1A2 which is a fraction of the Maruders size carries 30 something tons of armour. Because the armour takes so much volume any mech with decent armour is naturaly going to be big.

Another stupid argument is that tanks in batteltech are weaker than they should be. As mentioned above battletech armour takes a lot of volume so
a tank being smaller than a mech can not carry enough armour. For example a 70 ton Von Lucner heavy tank weighs same as a Summoner battlemech but has a fraction of it's armour. The Von Lucner being smaller
than the Summoner does not have enough space to carry as much armour
as the Summoner.

Some people will still maintain that battletech tanks are stupidly designed and a properly designed tank can destroy the strongest mechs easily.
Let see if such a thing can be buit.

First a super tank will need more armour than any mech. A good tank will have at least 35% of weight as armour. So a 100 ton super tank will have 35 tons of armour. This amount of armour will take massive amount of space and make the tank the size of a two storey house. What's more though it carries more armour than any mech in existence it's armour is actualy weaker than a mech. Since the super tank has more surface area than a mech the armour is going to be thinner than a mech. The Super tank can be made smaller so it has thicker armour but then it is not going to have enough internal space for engines and weopens.

Fusion drives and transmissions used in veichles is heavier and bulkier than battlemech fusion reactors and mynomer actuators so this super tank will be very slow and would require a massive reactor and assorted drive system. The drive and armour will take up most the it's internal space and weight limits leaving very little for the weopens.

Like armour weopens in battletech are also space intensive. For example an AC20 autocannon takes up as much space as a room. The Super tank will need a turret the size of a battlemech torso which is about the size of house. Since it does not have an IS like a mech the Super Tank will need custom built big bulky weopens in place modular battlemech weopen systems.

In the end with the addition of other components like cooling systems, sensors etc the super tank becomes extremely big. It becomes an expensive slow moving thinly armoured and poorly armed target with myriads of problems. Firstly The enourmous size of will prevents it from entering cities. Secondly this tank's primary weopens are mounted on turret two storey's above the ground. It can not hit a small tank or infantry
at point blank range. Side mounted machine guns may be used but they have limited effectiveness against tanks. And infantry like clan elementals
could jet right on top of the tank. And finaly a super tank like this will not fit in a dropship making strategic deployment and orbital assault drops impossible. So in the end super tanks are a very bad idea.

Given this facts it is no wonder that a lance old inner sphere Catapults and
Centurions can defeat entire battalions of tanks. A mech has many other
advantages over tanks. Besides superior speed and manuveurability over
any kind of terrain mechs can also fly. Some mechs can be dropped from orbit in commando operations. This makes them the ideal choice for spearheading a planetary invasion. Mechs can fight in a variety of terrain
jungles, desert, ice, subterrenean lava chambers, underwater and even in space without any modifications. Tanks on the other hand have remarkably different performence depending on terrain. A battlefield with little cover is excellent for tanks while inner city combat with lot of cover is bad for tanks as they can be ambushed.

Battlemechs use modular weopen systems thereby cutting production costs. The modular nature of their weopen systems also allows a mech to
be completely retofitted in a matter of hours. This gives mechs an edge in combat as they can armed depending on the tactics used by the enemey.
For example when facing Bulldog tanks with heavy autocannons mechs can be fitted with faster engines and long range weopenry like PPCs to counter them. There are a wide variety of components that mechs can carry like SAMs, torpedoes, anti missile systems etc that tanks can not
use. Mechs also carry far more powerful sensors and ECM suites than tanks. In the end a mech can be modified to become anything from an
air defense platform or an anti submarine one to a highly valuable component in electronic warfare and intelligence gathering.

Battlemechs are extremely durable machines. They can lose critical systems and limbs and still keep fighting. A tank on the other hand would
be disabled by the loss of just one track or a hit to the turret. Even after mechs are completely destroyed individual componenents can survive and be salvaged. Due to redundent modular systems repairing a mech is
faster and simpler than repairing a tanks.

Finaly mechs are safer for the pilot than tanks. When a mech is destroyed the pilot has better chance of ejecting and surviving than tank crew. And since mechs require only one pilot new ones can be recruited quickly.

In the end there are good reasons as to why mechs are the ultimate ground unit.

[The_Nice_Guy]

I think I was the one who posted that at SB, which in turn was ripped off from the CBT boards.

Ahhh... the joys of the internet!!

The Nice Guy

[Darth Wong]

The most common argument against mechs is that they are big and lightly armoured. To understand why mechs are big one needs to understand the nature of battletech armour. Battletech armour is much stronger than modern armour of similar mass but takes up much more volume. For example all that thick layer of armour on a 45 feet tall Maruder II-C weighs only 13 tons. Compare this to the fact that a M1A2 which is a fraction of the Maruders size carries 30 something tons of armour. Because the armour takes so much volume any mech with decent armour is naturaly going to be big.

Low-density armour will be shit. Try again.

Another stupid argument is that tanks in batteltech are weaker than they should be. As mentioned above battletech armour takes a lot of volume so a tank being smaller than a mech can not carry enough armour. For example a 70 ton Von Lucner heavy tank weighs same as a Summoner battlemech but has a fraction of it's armour. The Von Lucner being smaller than the Summoner does not have enough space to carry as much armour as the Summoner.

No, you're an idiot. Even if there was this moronic plastic-density super-armour you describe in your monumental scientific ignorance, a tank would still present a much more difficult target to hit than a mech. It would be bigger than a present-day tank, but it would be A) much shorter than a mech and B) much more compact than a mech, without the need for a ridiculously inefficient bipedal locomotion system.

First a super tank will need more armour than any mech.

Wrong. It will need less, since it needs only armour a box-like shape instead of a bipedal humanoid shape, with legs and arms. Much more efficient in terms of volume vs target profile.

Fusion drives and transmissions used in veichles is heavier and bulkier than battlemech fusion reactors and mynomer actuators so this super tank will be very slow and would require a massive reactor and assorted drive system.

What the fuck is this? The mechs are presumed to be using superior technology, therefore a tank could not be designed with the same technology? Are you on drugs? You're completely evading the point. Put the same reactor in a tank, and you have a much smaller vehicle.

The drive and armour will take up most the it's internal space and weight limits leaving very little for the weopens.

Again, you're an idiot. For any given technology level, the complex parts needed for a bipedal locomotion system will be vastly more expensive and bulky than those needed for simple wheels or tracks.

Like armour weopens in battletech are also space intensive. For example an AC20 autocannon takes up as much space as a room. The Super tank will need a turret the size of a battlemech torso which is about the size of house. Since it does not have an IS like a mech the Super Tank will need custom built big bulky weopens in place modular battlemech weopen systems.

Again, you're full of shit. The guns on a battlemech are interchangeable devices attached to its frame, which could be just as easily attached to a tank. How could just one of those guns was "the size of a battlemech" if a battlemech carries one on the end of its fucking arm, you dumb-fuck fan-whore?

In the end with the addition of other components like cooling systems, sensors etc the super tank becomes extremely big. It becomes an expensive slow moving thinly armoured and poorly armed target with myriads of problems. Firstly The enourmous size of will prevents it from entering cities. Secondly this tank's primary weopens are mounted on turret two storey's above the ground. It can not hit a small tank or infantry
at point blank range. Side mounted machine guns may be used but they have limited effectiveness against tanks. And infantry like clan elementals
could jet right on top of the tank. And finaly a super tank like this will not fit in a dropship making strategic deployment and orbital assault drops impossible. So in the end super tanks are a very bad idea.

Actually, all of the weaknesses you just listed apply to mechs, not tanks. Tanks will be superior in every single respect. A tank will be much SMALLER than a mech for any given tech level, with the same firepower.

Given this facts it is no wonder that a lance old inner sphere Catapults and Centurions can defeat entire battalions of tanks. A mech has many other advantages over tanks. Besides superior speed and manuveurability over any kind of terrain mechs can also fly.

An ability which merely adds more bulk, more expense, more complexity, and a much greater fuel requirement. Oh goody. The "let's forget combined-arms and try to cram everything into a single unified package" stupidity of Mecha fan-whores continues.

Some mechs can be dropped from orbit in commando operations. This makes them the ideal choice for spearheading a planetary invasion.

A big, slow target for a SAM site.

Mechs can fight in a variety of terrain jungles, desert, ice, subterrenean lava chambers, underwater and even in space without any modifications.

Because they are not specialized, and some idiot thought it would be a good idea to portray a universal platform. Specialized equipment and combined-arms tactics will always defeat moronic "jack of all trades, master of none" thinking.

Battlemechs use modular weopen systems thereby cutting production costs. The modular nature of their weopen systems also allows a mech to be completely retofitted in a matter of hours. This gives mechs an edge in combat as they can armed depending on the tactics used by the enemey.

You could easily snap one of those modular weapons systems onto a tank then, dumb-ass.

For example when facing Bulldog tanks with heavy autocannons mechs can be fitted with faster engines and long range weopenry like PPCs to counter them. There are a wide variety of components that mechs can carry like SAMs, torpedoes, anti missile systems etc that tanks can not
use.

Bullshit. If it's small enough to snap onto a mech, you can snap it onto a tank as well.

Mechs also carry far more powerful sensors and ECM suites than tanks.

In other words, you're assuming the tank is restricted from being able to use the same technology in order to hang onto your mech fan-whore dreams of superiority. Concession accepted.

In the end a mech can be modified to become anything from an
air defense platform or an anti submarine one to a highly valuable component in electronic warfare and intelligence gathering.

Ah, so much better than having multiple simultaneous units that do these jobs separately, work together in a complementary fashion, and have superior tactical flexibility

Battlemechs are extremely durable machines. They can lose critical systems and limbs and still keep fighting. A tank on the other hand would
be disabled by the loss of just one track or a hit to the turret.

I'd like to see a Battlemech not be disabled by losing a leg. And while you're at it, the small group of tanks you could build for the size and cost of one mech cannot possibly be disabled by one hit.

Even after mechs are completely destroyed individual componenents can survive and be salvaged.

Then they weren't completely destroyed. Duh.

In the end there are good reasons as to why mechs are the ultimate ground unit.

Only if you're a complete, blithering idiot and you deliberately restrict the tanks by refusing to let them use the same technology (not to mention vastly exaggerating the effectiveness of fanboy cheese-density mech armour with its sad, pathetic techno-descriptions). If you want to challenge me with that sad, laughable description of mech armour in the next post, feel free, but you should know that I have more than passing knowledge of the subject of material strength, and I can and will destroy those points even more easily than these ones.

[Coaan]

Star Trek would not stand a chance.

Two words.

Naval PPC



Owning one of the lyran alliance source books...my guess is that the pro trek here has not read the abilities of their warships.....those dropships that land the mechs are not the actual warships....and even so those dropships are armed to the teeth.

The 'Surrat's' Warships are "More than a match for poor enterprise"

the Clanners ships are even harder even if they do follow a code of honor....maybe they might take pity on us all and wipe them out anyway
(Call me on it....I'll have the source book on hand the morrow)

[Vympel]

Smackdown. As a founding HAB member, I really should've gotten hear sooner- oh well- who does it better than Lord Wong anyway

[Ryoga]

I'm not going to go through and pick at that whole post about the development of 'Mechs (while I like mecha, I'm not much of a Battletech fan). But something did jump out at me while reading it:

This hypothetical "peeling of the onion" effect that supposedly renders tank guns useless ( ) means that it would take repeated hits in a single spot to do any damage...so wouldn't that render the "spray-and-pray" rocket method useless, too?

[Vejut]

Quite possibly. I'm kinda wondering which book he got that quote from...I haven't seen it before....

Eh, bottom line is, while it can be a fun game, don't think about BT too hard or it starts coming apart....