Semi-Viable Mecha Idea? [cont']

[MJ12 Commando]

I've tried thinking of realistic and logical ways of adapting mecha into my stories, but every attempt has pretty much fallen short. Anything larger than really chunky power armour can usually be trumped by tanks or fighters or whatever you care to name. So that's usually as far as I go in my stories. On the other hand, however, I still love mecha. Armored Core is possibly one of my favourite video game series.

But really, if you try to reconcile humanoid mecha with reality, you'll hit numerous roadblocks along the way, so if you are using robots, either throw logic to the wind, or find a really great excuse for it. Best I've come up with so far is piloted mining robots that were infected with an alien nano-virus to become bipedal, hyper-advanced sentient war-machines, and that the humans had yet to figure out how adapt the advanced technology to the rest of their technology, but even that had flaws with it.

Use the Cthulhutech posit. Magic bullshittium engines that work way better for humanoid/fungoid/Cthulhuoid units and aren't as awesome in tanks. Yeah it's magic, but mecha are an end in and of themselves. Rule of Cool, etc.

[Oskuro]

"It is not dead, wich can eternally lie
and with strange Aeons,
even NECROED THREADS might die"



Sorry for the backseat modding, I couldn't resist

[Venator]

Huh, I'd forgotten about this thread... I decided to scrap the idea for the most part, in any event.

But yeah, lolnecromancy.

[Coalition]

My stunt would be to use any Mecha as all-terrain raiders, using their larger surface area to dissipate more heat (more power to energy weapons) and load more recoilless rockets. Their final goal is to deal with the defenders at a research facility, which is in the middle of an open field, and there are a couple tanks guarding it.

The Mecha raiders know they will get slaughtered by the tanks, so they pull off a distraction to keep any air units busy, then set off charges on a road to keep the tanks away. Against infantry and light APCs defending the facility, they can wreak havoc.

But as they are getting away, one of the tanks manages to bring a raider Mech under its gun, and the 120 mm shell goes straight through the armor, shattering the main reactor. Scratch one Raider.

[Sky Captain]

As a main fighting force in realistic sci fi military mecha is practically useless. Depending on technological advancements mecha might found some niche uses, but even then it most likely would be something more resembling oversized power armor suit than giant 15 m tall walking death spewing robot. Something like mecha might found uses in construction applications where it`s necessary to quickly move heavy objects over rough terrain. Then I can imagine in case of insurgency insurgents take this construction equipment, modify it and arm with whatever weapons they can find and use it to fight local police forces (of course if real military shows up they will be toast like today's insurgents with their machine gun armed pickup trucks are toast if tanks or attack helicopters show up).

In a futuristic warfare scenario where space warships are available there most likely will be very few heavily armed and armored ground vehicles, because winner or looser will be decided in space combat and if enemy gains orbital superiority then your tank or mecha divisions will be nothing but target practice for enemy space warships.

[Ryan Thunder]

In a futuristic warfare scenario where space warships are available there most likely will be very few heavily armed and armored ground vehicles, because winner or looser will be decided in space combat and if enemy gains orbital superiority then your tank or mecha divisions will be nothing but target practice for enemy space warships.

Space superiority only makes ground forces irrelevant in a strategic vacuum, or if they mount anti-tank weapons that are accurate enough to hit ground targets without causing ludicrous collateral damage.

Or if the enemy is stupid enough not to place his forces near anything of any value.

I, for one, love the visuals something like a BattleTech Battlemech produce. But of course, they should be rather easily outmatched by similarly-massive tanks.

[Sky Captain]

In a futuristic warfare scenario where space warships are available there most likely will be very few heavily armed and armored ground vehicles, because winner or looser will be decided in space combat and if enemy gains orbital superiority then your tank or mecha divisions will be nothing but target practice for enemy space warships.

Space superiority only makes ground forces irrelevant in a strategic vacuum, or if they mount anti-tank weapons that are accurate enough to hit ground targets without causing ludicrous collateral damage.

Or if the enemy is stupid enough not to place his forces near anything of any value.

I, for one, love the visuals something like a BattleTech Battlemech produce. But of course, they should be rather easily outmatched by similarly-massive tanks.

If enemy has some decent sensors capable of detecting even single tank from orbit then it might not be hard to cook that tank with high powered laser strike causing less collateral damage than missile would. Given how fast sensor technology is advancing today such sensors might be not too far away. When enemy has wiped out your space forces nothing will prevent their warships to just sit in orbit and take out any military bases, surface ships and ground vehicles they spot. At least smart commander would fully exploit all advantages orbital superiority gives to soften defender forces as much as possible before landing their own troops.

IMO in such scenario most useful ground forces would be infantry because it can fortify inside valuable buildings forcing enemy to deploy their own ground forces if they want to take these buildings intact. In such case if nearly every skyscraper in big city is fortified it will cost a lot of troops to take the city relatively intact. Of course enemy always can decide taking these buildings is not worth the price and drop some kinetic impactors or nuclear bomb from space.

[mr friendly guy]

Small mecha might be of use in say boarding space ships where the spaces might be too confined for a tank. For example the transforming motorbikes in robotech (cyclones). They are sort of a cross between power armour and a transforming mecha, and as such aren't oversized. Obviously this would restrict the mecha to limited uses, since I imagine most space battles would involve blowing the other ship out of space rather than boarding actions.

Generally mecha follow the rule of cool rather than the rule of reality.

[Shroom Man 777]

I think mecha could be feasible for urban warfare.

No, dig this.

Urban warfare IN SPACE!

Imagine, in space, lots of horribly radioactive weapons like nukes and lasers and x-ray nuke bomb-pumped lasers are being tossed around. You want to take and hold this huge space station city that's REALLY huge with CRAZY architecture. You send in soldiers to hold it, but since it's zero-g and the bad guys have rigged up all sorts of booby traps and stuff and are themselves defending it, you cant just go in there wearing a space suit.

You need a "mobile suit" like a gungan (gundam), with arms and legs to navigate those crazy confines of the super-large space station. You can have your armored cockpit at the center, the retro-rockets and stuff for moving around, and then you get some kind of limbs so you can navigate the confusing 3D terrain of a giant space station city.

They said that a stairworld would be the only place where mecha would be feasible, since tanks would be shit in a stairworld. I think a futuristic sci-fi space station would be the closest thing to a stairworld we can get.

The technicians and engineers and janitors of these fictional super space stations could wear "mobile suits" when performing maintenance on the systems, with armoring to protect them from the radio-activity. But when pirates or other shitpieces try to attack them, they can don their mobile suits and pick up giant rifles and go shoot 'em up!

Yeah!

[Eleventh Century Remnant]

Not sure if this applies to mecha in particular or just high tech ground forces in general, but it occurs to me that anything running energy weapons off the main power system is going to have the potential to be ridiculously fast.

Simply, a modern western MBT weighs about sixty- five tons, has a multifuel gas turbine putting out somewhere around 2 MW (2500 hp), yes? Roughly the same for Challenger, Leopard, Abrams to the nearest ten percent. (65 tons?) They move very fast over rough ground- 30 to 50mph, thereabouts.

40K's Land Raider, slightly heavier at 72 tons as per IA2, mounts what are probably multi-gigajoule lascannon. The fact that it can power them, off vehicle power plant, means it has a power to weight at least three orders of magnitude better than a modern MBT.

Slightly scarier, going by 'maximum firepower' at Hoth, even the lumbering old AT-AT has a better power to weight than most formula 1 cars. (assuming the shield generator didn't blow under it's own power, and say 5kt/sec over 5,000 tons.)

In fact, most marks of Bolo with their megatons/second firepower and multi-thousand ton mass are orders of magnitude again better than that.

Why doesn't heavy energy weapon firepower imply at least the potential for very high speed? Power is power, after all, and while there are other ways of working- capacitor banks, energy cartriges, the like- being able to charge them still implies massive onboard generation.

How fast can a legged drive train be made to go?

[Sarevok]

I think mecha could be feasible for urban warfare.

No, dig this.

Urban warfare IN SPACE!

Imagine, in space, lots of horribly radioactive weapons like nukes and lasers and x-ray nuke bomb-pumped lasers are being tossed around. You want to take and hold this huge space station city that's REALLY huge with CRAZY architecture. You send in soldiers to hold it, but since it's zero-g and the bad guys have rigged up all sorts of booby traps and stuff and are themselves defending it, you cant just go in there wearing a space suit.

You need a "mobile suit" like a gungan (gundam), with arms and legs to navigate those crazy confines of the super-large space station. You can have your armored cockpit at the center, the retro-rockets and stuff for moving around, and then you get some kind of limbs so you can navigate the confusing 3D terrain of a giant space station city.

They said that a stairworld would be the only place where mecha would be feasible, since tanks would be shit in a stairworld. I think a futuristic sci-fi space station would be the closest thing to a stairworld we can get.

The technicians and engineers and janitors of these fictional super space stations could wear "mobile suits" when performing maintenance on the systems, with armoring to protect them from the radio-activity. But when pirates or other shitpieces try to attack them, they can don their mobile suits and pick up giant rifles and go shoot 'em up!

Yeah!

Actually due to little or no real gravity around large space stations it would be a scene from a hover tank designers wet dream. Assuming an area is large enough to accommodate a mecha it would be perfect place for some kind of a flying yet heavily armored and armed craft.

As for infantry in such a situation you could relive Jetpack trooper dreams for real.

[Beowulf]

Arms might still be useful in ZeroWorld, but legs are still useless. Arms can be used to hold onto the surroundings, what are legs going to do?

[Shroom Man 777]

Maybe your gundam could be, like, a giant monkey in form then. With a prehensile mechanical tail!

If the vehicle uses mechanical tentacles instead of arms and legs, would it still be a mecha?

[Sky Captain]

Not sure if this applies to mecha in particular or just high tech ground forces in general, but it occurs to me that anything running energy weapons off the main power system is going to have the potential to be ridiculously fast.

Simply, a modern western MBT weighs about sixty- five tons, has a multifuel gas turbine putting out somewhere around 2 MW (2500 hp), yes? Roughly the same for Challenger, Leopard, Abrams to the nearest ten percent. (65 tons?) They move very fast over rough ground- 30 to 50mph, thereabouts.

40K's Land Raider, slightly heavier at 72 tons as per IA2, mounts what are probably multi-gigajoule lascannon. The fact that it can power them, off vehicle power plant, means it has a power to weight at least three orders of magnitude better than a modern MBT.

Slightly scarier, going by 'maximum firepower' at Hoth, even the lumbering old AT-AT has a better power to weight than most formula 1 cars. (assuming the shield generator didn't blow under it's own power, and say 5kt/sec over 5,000 tons.)

In fact, most marks of Bolo with their megatons/second firepower and multi-thousand ton mass are orders of magnitude again better than that.

Why doesn't heavy energy weapon firepower imply at least the potential for very high speed? Power is power, after all, and while there are other ways of working- capacitor banks, energy cartriges, the like- being able to charge them still implies massive onboard generation.

How fast can a legged drive train be made to go?

In case of large heavy mecha running at high speed is serious danger of tripping and crashing into ground. Even stepping on unstable surface like deep mud at normal walking speed can be a danger for mecha.

In your described scenario with advanced power generation tech tanks obviously can better exploit their high output power generators to reach high speeds because of tank`s inherently stable platform.

[Commander 598]

I think mecha could be feasible for urban warfare.

No, dig this.

Urban warfare IN SPACE!

Imagine, in space, lots of horribly radioactive weapons like nukes and lasers and x-ray nuke bomb-pumped lasers are being tossed around. You want to take and hold this huge space station city that's REALLY huge with CRAZY architecture. You send in soldiers to hold it, but since it's zero-g and the bad guys have rigged up all sorts of booby traps and stuff and are themselves defending it, you cant just go in there wearing a space suit.

You need a "mobile suit" like a gungan (gundam), with arms and legs to navigate those crazy confines of the super-large space station. You can have your armored cockpit at the center, the retro-rockets and stuff for moving around, and then you get some kind of limbs so you can navigate the confusing 3D terrain of a giant space station city.

They said that a stairworld would be the only place where mecha would be feasible, since tanks would be shit in a stairworld. I think a futuristic sci-fi space station would be the closest thing to a stairworld we can get.

The technicians and engineers and janitors of these fictional super space stations could wear "mobile suits" when performing maintenance on the systems, with armoring to protect them from the radio-activity. But when pirates or other shitpieces try to attack them, they can don their mobile suits and pick up giant rifles and go shoot 'em up!

Yeah!

I believe this was basically the premise behind UC mobile suits in the first place...only their stations were partially 0g and partially normal Earth gravity. You could pretty much drive ships down those corridors...

Arms can be used to hold onto the surroundings, what are legs going to do?

For a space station? Stick magnets on the bottom of it's feet, and add some more thrusters both in the feet and smaller maneuvering thrusters in the legs.

[open_sketchbook]

I like my mecha as big infantrymen, maybe 15-20 foot high, armed with weapons like automatic grenade launchers, TOW missiles, and chain guns. In a dense urban environment, wired to a futuristic pilot's actions, this mini-mecha battlesuit would be devastating, as it can still take cover to a reasonable degree, is armoured against small arms, will barely be slowed down by terrain that would stop wheels and slow treads, and carries enough firepower to deal with most targets. In such an environment, it could effectively flank armoured vehicles yet do a fair job taking cover from helicopters or gunships, and it's immediate mobility makes it hard for infantry to kill it with small anti-tank weapons up close; unlike tanks, it has the ability to quickly and effectively engage targets within moments of their appearance, and can do so from all sides, as a vehicle with a rapidly rotating, fully mobile head would have few blind spots, and it's large range of motion would allow it to react far quicker to threats.

[TheMuffinKing]

I like my mecha as big infantrymen, maybe 15-20 foot high, armed with weapons like automatic grenade launchers, TOW missiles, and chain guns. In a dense urban environment, wired to a futuristic pilot's actions, this mini-mecha battlesuit would be devastating, as it can still take cover to a reasonable degree, is armoured against small arms, will barely be slowed down by terrain that would stop wheels and slow treads, and carries enough firepower to deal with most targets. In such an environment, it could effectively flank armoured vehicles yet do a fair job taking cover from helicopters or gunships, and it's immediate mobility makes it hard for infantry to kill it with small anti-tank weapons up close; unlike tanks, it has the ability to quickly and effectively engage targets within moments of their appearance, and can do so from all sides, as a vehicle with a rapidly rotating, fully mobile head would have few blind spots, and it's large range of motion would allow it to react far quicker to threats.

Why not wire a similar control system to a tank? A tank is quick, low to the ground, more armored tank a 15ft tall infantryman, and carries far more firepower. Why people think tanks are slow is beyond me, we have far surpassed WW1 and WW2 tank speeds. Modern tanks can quickly engage targets, and with the availability of remote weapons and such, a wide variety of firepower can be quickly brought to bear.

[Ford Prefect]

Arms can be used to hold onto the surroundings, what are legs going to do?

Kick people in the head.

[Shroom Man 777]

A tank has a rapidly rotating fully mobile head with a few blind spots and a really big gun.

[TheMuffinKing]

I would rather have a prehensile crotch-arm, aka MechaCock.

I would of course attach a laser to it.

[FOG3]

I like my mecha as big infantrymen, maybe 15-20 foot high... this mini-mecha battlesuit would be devastating, as it can still take cover to a reasonable degree

How is something two stories tall able to take cover to a reasonable degree in a urban environment, where the buildings are not necessarily even two stories tall?

, is armoured against small arms, will barely be slowed down by terrain that would stop wheels and slow treads, and carries enough firepower to deal with most targets. In such an environment, it could effectively flank armoured vehicles yet do a fair job taking cover from helicopters or gunships, and

it's immediate mobility... it has the ability to quickly and effectively engage targets within moments of their appearance, and can do so from all sides

Turn around quickly. How did you do it? Pivoting on the ball or heel, right? Or maybe you did a hop and spin. Now imagine you aren't a lightweight piece of hardware composed of water and polymers, but instead armor plate and steel. Do you think you're going to be doing the little tricks you used or something more analogous to a series of little steps? Is this really more effective then a turret whose only "blind spots" have to do with the limits of how high or low the mount is designed to handle? If you're willing to be rough with them tracked vehicles are ridiculously manuerable as vehicles go.

Does your drive really have any advantage over a tracked vehicles ability to literally spin in place under as much power as the tracks will put up with by slamming one forward and the other backwards? Would you really want to pit your two story creation against a World War 2 vintage M18 Hellcat and supporting infantry?

[Samuel]

You want to take and hold this huge space station city that's REALLY huge with CRAZY architecture. You send in soldiers to hold it, but since it's zero-g and the bad guys have rigged up all sorts of booby traps and stuff and are themselves defending it, you cant just go in there wearing a space suit.

Why build it in the first place? Or is this nonhumans?

Not sure if this applies to mecha in particular or just high tech ground forces in general, but it occurs to me that anything running energy weapons off the main power system is going to have the potential to be ridiculously fast.

At a certain point, there isn't enough friction to keep the vehicle in contact with the ground- it is why race cars have those things that create drag at the end.

I like my mecha as big infantrymen, maybe 15-20 foot high, armed with weapons like automatic grenade launchers, TOW missiles, and chain guns. In a dense urban environment, wired to a futuristic pilot's actions, this mini-mecha battlesuit would be devastating, as it can still take cover to a reasonable degree, is armoured against small arms, will barely be slowed down by terrain that would stop wheels and slow treads, and carries enough firepower to deal with most targets. In such an environment, it could effectively flank armoured vehicles yet do a fair job taking cover from helicopters or gunships, and it's immediate mobility makes it hard for infantry to kill it with small anti-tank weapons up close; unlike tanks, it has the ability to quickly and effectively engage targets within moments of their appearance, and can do so from all sides, as a vehicle with a rapidly rotating, fully mobile head would have few blind spots, and it's large range of motion would allow it to react far quicker to threats.

And then your enemies attach bombs to RVs and blow its legs off.

A tank has a rapidly rotating fully mobile head with a few blind spots and a really big gun.

A tank... that carries a sword! Thank you Leo Frankowski!

[Sky Captain]

For urban warfare you would obviously want something that is small, maneuverable and numerous and that means infantry in power armour combined with cheap mass produced expandable battlebots for dirty work like clearing buildings from enemy insurgents where you know casualties are going to be high. In such urban warfare scenario big mecha would be limited to streets and just ask to be shot by RPG, tank of course also would be limited to streets but it can be much better armored than mecha given it chances to survive RPG hit.

In case heavily fortified positions are encountered your soldiers should be able to immediately call for precision orbital or aerial fire support to eliminate enemy positions without risking your troops. Your soldiers even can have rifle fitted with target designator to illuminate targets for your warships. Space warship with lasers designed to engage at ranges measured in light seconds should`t be any difficulties of hitting individual ground targets with precision of few dozen centimeters and provide far better heavy fire support than any ground unit.

[Shroom Man 777]

You want to take and hold this huge space station city that's REALLY huge with CRAZY architecture. You send in soldiers to hold it, but since it's zero-g and the bad guys have rigged up all sorts of booby traps and stuff and are themselves defending it, you cant just go in there wearing a space suit.

Why build it in the first place? Or is this nonhumans?

Shitty city-planning. Imagine a space station that over the course of generation, grows bigger, almost organically since people are attaching modules and building more bits and expanding the area and stuff - like an urban sprawl, but in space. Eventually it becomes such a messy disorganized place.

Think of the "mecha" as more of a spaceship with arms and legs to help it navigate the tighter confines of that mess.

[generator_g1]

I would rather have a prehensile crotch-arm, aka MechaCock.

I would of course attach a laser to it.

Something like this? This is The O from Zeta Gundam.