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Having covered the Atlas, the Catapult, and the Jenner in previous posts, We come to the Hunchback. A brutal medium mech reportedly designed as a close environment "brawler". One can easily see how the original design would excel in urban or other close environments (if there were mech sized buildings with lots of doors and hallways, it would be the mech of choice). But a mech designed specifically for close combat environments is a specialized niche.
Like heavy-weapons infantry operating in an urban environment, a lance of hunchbacks would be an excellent way to sweep an city landscape. They don't need high speed, they definitely have the weapons for the job, and they can take a decent amount of punishment. But in the open countryside they are totally outside their element.
Fortunately the hunchback is a fairly flexible chassis. Like infantry, It can easily be customized to a different role by a few quick equipment (and training) changes. For example, want something in a sniper role? just change out the "rifle" and tweak some equipment and you have a sniper mech.
Since it is such a flexible mech, the thought arises, just how flexible can we make it? What if we want something like your "average" grunt, capable of operating in built up areas, open areas, mountains, hills, you name it? The most popular type of infantry arms for this role is the assault rifle. The most common flavors in the modern era are the M-16 and the AK-47 (and their variants). Both of these excellent small arms can trace their linage back to the StG 44 also known as the Sturmgewehr 44.
I chose the name Sturmmech because assault mech was already taken, and to avoid confusion. We aren't talking about making an assault mech out of the stock hunchback, We want an all around well engineered weapon capable of engaging the enemy in any terrain and at a reasonable variety of ranges, while providing enough firepower to force the enemy to take cover or respond to the attack, without needing to become some lumbering behemoth.
So, once again not content to leave well enough alone, we strip our hunchback down to the base chassis:
5 tons (standard internal structure) + 3 tons (standard cockpit) = 8 tons
It's been stated that endo-steel is available in the game, and this would drop the weight of our internal structure to 2.5 tons, at the cost of 14 critical slots. Since the Hunchback has 3 energy hardpoints and one ballistic hardpoint, we may want to reserve the critical space for another space hog, double heatsinks.
At this point we need to consider how fast (or slow) our all around sturmmech needs to be. The base walking speed for the stock hunchback is 4. This requires a 200 rated standard engine which weighs in at 8.5 tons. Because the engine rating is 200, it requires only a 2 ton gyro. To reach a walking speed of 5, we need a 250 rated standard fusion engine. This weighs in at 12.5 tons and requires a 3 ton gyro. This means in order to advance to the next higher speed rating we have to invest 5 tons, a significant amount of our total weight (10%).
We could also consider using XL technology to reduce the weight to much lower levels (4.5 tons and 6.5 tons respectively) but our sturmmech will very likely find itself in close environment situations. Using an XL engine in that type of situation would severely reduce the mechs capability to "soldier on" after taking a beating. This would tend to rule out XL technology, because we are also looking for a rugged design.
So if we stay with the original engine rating we are at least at an "average" speed and save a ton for using a smaller gyro as a bonus.
8 tons + 8.5 (200 STD Fusion Engine) + 2 tons (Standard Gyro) = 18.5 tons
Thinking along the lines of wanting a rugged design, this is a good time to consider armor. The original chassis comes with 10 tons of armor, 160 armor points out of a maximum of 169. For an extra half ton of armor we could achieve 168 points, close to the theoretical maximum. Or we could take advanced technology like ferro fibrous armor, at the cost of 14 critical spaces, which as noted above would severely limit room for double heatsink technology.
18.5 tons + 10.5 tons (168 armor points) = 29 tons
We can place our extra points on our legs or center torso, as everything else is already armored to the max.
It is now time to consider what weapons we want our sturmmech to carry. This is where we diverge from the stock chassis, as those who have been paying attention will note that we really haven't change anything yet.
With only 21 tons left for weapons, heatsinks, and ammunution, we have to weigh each assumption carefully. We want weapons that can be used at both short and (reasonably) long ranges, with enough punch to make a difference on the battlefield.
As ballistic weapons are the heaviest, and we only have the hardpoints for one, we will consider those first. The stock AC/20 is an awe-inspiring weapon, and commands a great deal of respect on the batlefield. But it is heavy, has limited ammunition, and lacks significant range. The AC/10 is perhaps a better choice, and it has respectable range (450m) and does significant damage with good ammo reserves. But it is still extremely heavy at 12 tons, and would still significantly limit any other weapons options. The AC/5 is a light weapon, with very good range (540m), has excellent ammo reserves, and is much lighter than it's larger cousins. But it is lackluster damage for the weight it costs. And we can't seriously consider the AC/2 for a sturmmech, as it is really only good for long range pinpoint sniping.
After considering carefully the options, I will opt for the AC/10. While the AC/5 is an excellent weapon that shouldn't be dismissed lightly, our desire is for a rugged design with good engagement capability.
29 tons + 12 tons (RT mounted AC/10) + 2 tons ammo (20 AC/10 rounds) = 43 tons.
But we also don't want to depend on just an AC/10 at medium to long engagement ranges, either. A PPC would also cost us 7 of our remaining 7 tons leaving nothing left over for heat management or for the other 2 energy hardpoints. A good compromise would be a large laser. It still has decent engagement range (450m the same as the AC/10) and does very good damage for it's weight cost (8 damage for 5 tons vs 10 damage for 12 tons). So I will gladly take a large laser.
43 tons + 5 tons (LA mounted Large Laser) = 48 tons
Now we can decide to shove in 2 medium lasers But that leaves us nothing for heatsinks. Fortunately, we didn't take advanced technology like endo-steel or ferro-fibrous armor, which saved us room for another advanced technology, double heat sinks. This will be a necessary investment as we will need the heat dissipation for our upgraded weapon suite. And since the 200 engine rating mandates that we actually have to physically mount 2 of our stock 10 heatsinks, it's fortunate that we saved some room.
48 tons + 2 tons (1 RA mounted Medium Laser, 1 Head mounted Medium Laser) = 50 tons.
Now we have a rugged well armored mech with decent movement that can engage out to 450m with two hard hitting weapons, and still engage at close ranges with almost the same damage potential as the original version. (28 vs 33). And it has the heat dissipation to sustain fire with it's energy weapons (20 heat dissipation)
The Sturmmech should be an interesting design to test as the philosophy is one of balanced design and adaptability.
Edited by Xandre Blackheart, 17 July 2012 - 05:06 PM.
