206 replies to this topic

[Valdarion Silarius]

Are we going by PGI logic or actual battletech lore? If we are going full on clans/IS invasion trying to reclaim planet earth while trying to defend with our modern technology, I'm going to side with battletech here. The shock and awe value of battletech technology, while the divided armies of the world scramble to identify the alien force would give the invasion of mechs the upper hand imo.

Depending how the mechs are infiltrating and assaulting our modern military is something you should have included. If it's by via dropships, then you are forced to include other tech like naval lasers and capital weapons. Not to say that our modern military would put up a good fight (with possible nuclear weapons getting involved), the whole idea gets repugnant and ludicrous.

http://www.sarna.net...WarShip_Weapons

If we are going by PGI's logic, then Russ would force mech packs onto North Korea and trigger WW3.

[Snowbluff]

I think the premise just means mechs. No aircraft or warships.

[Valdarion Silarius]

Snowbluff, on 08 October 2016 - 11:33 AM, said:

I think the premise just means mechs. No aircraft or warships.

Then I think OP needs to include exactly how they are getting there to fight our military, lol.

[Dogstar]

The standard AMS on our mechs that can handle a cluster of missiles would shoot down a single fat missile like a Harpoon with ease.

If we assume that at one point in mech development history that most mechs had AMS then missile systems would have to evolve into launching multiple cheap missiles to over come AMS. Just like LRM/SRM...

There's many ways to justify the systems and no way to actually test them so it's all just fiction, or a game...

[Karl Streiger]

The missile wouldn't even hit.
You make the usual mistake to think that those tabletop ranges are real.
They are a necessity of the TT game - because playing with you buddy at the other and of the mensa could be disturbing.

Considering just the energy of the Gauss - well you have a solid projectile of 100-125kg maybe less maybe it's 8-10shots are also a necessity of the game - so this moves a projectile with multiple speed of sound - it doesn't need to penetrate anything - to throw a mountain at a target has the same effect.

[Snowbluff]

The exact momentum of the gauss can be measured.

(tons/rounds per ton) x velocity*

*= velocity in the game code.

From there you can extrapolate the energy of many other weapons using their damage stats.

Dogstar, on 08 October 2016 - 11:47 AM, said:

The standard AMS on our mechs that can handle a cluster of missiles would shoot down a single fat missile like a Harpoon with ease.

Can we get a fact check here?

AMS have a terrible hit rate in MWO.
How fast does a Harpoon (and other ground pounder missile) compare to the velocity of LRMs?

I think bombs would be a more likely weapon versus a mech. 2000 pound bombs. Won't be picked up RWR or IR missile detection.

Edited by Snowbluff, 08 October 2016 - 11:58 AM.

[AlexEss]

Well it depends, just ripped as is and placed in our reality... They would be long range fired to death as they work double just trying to move.

But if we do away with the whole translating thing and just accept that mechs works and by that extension upgrade their weapons to something more functional....

They would still have their arses handed to them.

Now if we give them weapons that are as functional as our own or even slightly better to account for the futuristic setting... Let´s say that people from our and their time work together...

Mech would be devastating.. But they would also not be Battletech mechs any more.

Edited by AlexEss, 08 October 2016 - 12:01 PM.

[Thunder Child]

If I remember rightly, all the "Armor" used in the BT universe is some kind of Diamond Steel Cross-weave. It's meant to be ridiculously tough, and made conventional weapons completely ineffective, which is why BT Weapons are so much bigger (in terms of mass for what they achieve). So modern tank shells and missiles would have minimal effect on BT Super-armor, where as BT super-weapons would shred our modern day vehicles.... if the Mechs could get into range, due to their (inexplicably terrible) targeting systems.

If we ignore all the "science" involved in BT for a moment, and assume they do a Terminator style thing and travel back in time or whatever, so that they preserve all of their tech as per Lore rather than find real world analogs, then BT Mechs would win any battle where they could dictate the ranges of engagement. If our militaries could however control the range of engagement, they would win through attrition, as they could grind down the mechs before the mechs could effectively return fire.

By our modern standards, Mechs are impossibly tough, and ridiculously well armed (and they have working FUSION REACTORS!!!), but they are also bringing a knife to a gun fight.

However, if they had access to a Warship, then it's GG.

[Trollfeed]

If going by lore, not TT rules and ignoring general sillines of some designs and FASA physics, mechs would obliterate all landbound opposition. They can be destroyed but their effective ablative armour would make them endure much more hits than modern armoured vehicles. Cruise missiles, naval bombardment and high altitude bombers would be best bet.

[wolf74]

If you look in the 5 core rule books there are three cannon's that are listed which are meant to be our current tank guns they do 3,6, &9 damage (-3 if hitting military grade standard battlemech armor). This gives us a base line for some damage conversion's. The heavy cannon did 9 damage and had an effective range of 12 hex's, which I think would be one of two guns, 120mm tank round or 18in(457.2mm) battleship gun.
IF it the tank round it today tanks would have to get in 360m to do a I.S M-Pulse lasers damage.
IF it the battleship gun, today's ground forces would be screwed.

On a cell phone so I don't have access to my books right now. All the range's and damage are from old memory.

[razenWing]

Trying to compare using actual stats is just pointless. There is this thing called gameplay balance that prevents any semblance of reality. Thus, going through gamecode to find projectile velocity is just not practical. If ballistics actual work in real life, well, all the weapons would feel like lasers because of how fast they travel. For gameplay purposes, they aren't fun.

That's why when comparing fiction, you have to look at the equivalent using relative measures and really really fill in the gap with your imagination on how things "should work." (For example, look at Star Wars. A real plasma handgun is not going to shoot projectiles at the speed of nerf guns. However, for the sake of movie effect, we accept it as is. But realistically, we are going to assume that space marines have armors that probably provide better protection values than our ballistic vests, and plasma bolts probably do more damage than 50 caliber Desert Eagle.)

With that said, what are modern tanks rounds "suppose" to be like? They are certainly not gauss rifle. To me, they are more like AC-2 round. Our tank fire about what... 2-3 of them a minute? Your battlemech shoots about 50 ac rounds a minute? Those caliber also goes up to AC-5, 10, and 20. So no, modern tanks in terms of raw fire power would NOT be able to match mechs 1v1. Not even close.

There ARE tanks in the btech universe. You play against bulldogs in both Mechwarrior 3 and 4. We have to assume those tanks are far better than M-1 Abrams. They are about the same size but reduce weight by almost 70% by using "unobtainium," the same stuff used on battlemechs, and they get roflstomped by your mech. (e.g See Mech 4 mission where you yourself fought off about 50 enemy armors while taking about 30% armor damage)

There's also another factor to consider. What sets these "mechs" to be different is that they are supposed to be used in almost every single survivable environment to men. If we can f-ing land on it? A battlemech can survive it. You don't drop M-1 or F-22s on Terra Therma or HPG and expect the crew inside to not die of suffocation of... simply not move from the lack of oxygen. These are essentially glorified self contained battlesuits intended to survive nuclear blasts. Assuming they don't die from the blast, while everyone else is dying from the fallout, they will be snacking inside having a great day. THAT's what makes mech special.

Also, you have to assume future space human figure the only way to get a multi environment battlesuit is by having legs rather than tracks. Modern tanks aren't very good at climbing hills (relatively) or traverse rough terrains. And in many cases, low profile isn't always the answer. Russian tanks do horrible in the Savannah because their tank crew can't see crap. That's why African indigenous tanks are always slightly taller. (I forgot which war that lesson was learned from, but it's from somewhere) In the case of future space human, I really doubt high profile is a thing in their mind... why? Battlemechs are designed to face tank damages. Just like we argue about using high mounts over low mount and low profile. We have armor that can tank ridiculous damage. So it's always better to have more raw offensive capabilities in those situations to dish out damages to destroy these space unobtainiums as oppose to try to survive a little bit longer by hiding below hills when you can't return fire.

In any case, if you fill in the gap with what future tech is supposed to do, there's no contest, our weapons suck balls compare to theirs. Now, a better question is applying the lessons from modern warfare and battlefield tactics, why did space human rely on essentially space marines as their battlefield centerpiece instead of space planes? These are what's going to be useful to intercept drops and space warships. They also can fly high and fast enough to evade actual engagement with mechs. You don't try to shoot down a F-22 with M-1. So why did space people decide to use space M-1s instead of focusing on just having the largest space F-22s?

That's actually a more meaning question to me. (If lore is correct, Merik should be kick everyone's *** with the largest space fleet and other vehicles rather than their low mech count. But alas... who knows... right?)

Edited by razenWing, 08 October 2016 - 01:32 PM.

[Random Carnage]

Regardless of what is meant to be, MWO tonnage appears to reflect displacement rather than weight - if somewhat poorly. OP is correct when comparing the physical dimensions of a 70 tonne MBT today against a 100T Assault mech - clearly the two don't align, and I don't subscribe to the difference being super light composite mech armour.

Throughout history, for the most part, defensive tech exceeded offensive tech - up until the advent of artillery. From that point on, offensive capability has exceeded defensive capability, and will continue to do so.

[wolf74]

Minor side note here.
Battletech use the Metric system so that Ton is a "Long Ton" which for those of us who use lbs it would be 2240lbs per Metric Ton not 2000lbs for the US "Short Ton"

[InspectorG]

Shiroi Tsuki, on 08 October 2016 - 09:33 AM, said:

So I just had a random thought. How would Mechs (in MWO's current timeline) would fare against Modern Military?

If say a Direwolf Daishi was transported in our timeline and eats a Harpoon (AGM-84) right in the CT, would it survive? Or would it shrug it off like you're throwing pebbles on a tank?

Would MWO Lazurs (IS Medium Laser as an example) would completely melt through MBT armor anime style? Or would it take 500 million years before it even pierces through?

Also it's amazing how a 100 ton Atlas can be as huge as ~13 meters when MBTs are only ~2.5 meters tall that weighs in at ~70 tons

US Navy would missile/nuke whatever was transporting the Whale before it even got deployed.

BT is a fictional cyberpunk universe that tried to guess at future warfare.

They didn't factor AI or miniaturization.

[S 0 L E N Y A]

It would not be a match.

Air superiority would render mechs into fancy walking coffins.

[Vonbach]

An M1 Abrams could kill a mech instantly by simply shooting in the cockpit at 2000 meters.
Apparently no one in the battletech universe has heard of an optical sight.

[Accused]

Bombast, on 08 October 2016 - 11:03 AM, said:

If I seem a bit dismissive about this, it's because the whole thing is a dumb question, right up there with 'Who would win in a fight against Superman and Goku' and 'How many licks to get to the center of a star.'

Sir the obvious answer to who would win in a fight against Superman and Goku is Saitama. This isn't even up for debate unless we're talking about SSGSS. Also if you're licking a neutron star, the outermost layer is the same as the core. One lick.

[CheeseThief]

Battletech is a setting where armour development has outpaced weapons development, much akin to plate armoured knights charging down pitchfork wielding peasants, the Tank before the development of HEAT munitions had a greated threat of getting bogged and breaking a track than anything the enemy could put on the field at the time. Matilda 2 tank, the only thing the Axis could reliably stop it with were mines and fixed AA guns. Char 1 Bis tank, in the battle of France one took over 100 German tank gun shots and suffered no damage. You have that example of a Challenger 2 in Iraq that took 14 RPG hits and 1 MILAN AT missile for the grand result of a broken gunners and drivers sight. In the Battletech setting, any technological development that could threaten that armour has also been nuked to glass in the Succession Wars, so the settings HEAT style munitions that can pierce or otherwise defeat the standard armour aren't developed until 3059.


For the Direwhale vs modern military equipment, the games flavour rules make that horribly one sided in favour of the mech.

The Rifle rules exist to show the technological progression between the ages. In the BT setting, a 3 ton Light Rifle (a mounted Rheinmetall 120mm gun conveniently weighs 3.3 ton) is described in the rules as being based on pre-spaceflight AT guns, is completely incapable of damaging military grade armour in 3025.

The tag weighing 1 ton is reasoned as Battlemechs and other 3039 vehicles having at least 1000 years of target spoofing technology on top of what we have today. To the point of multi-frequency lasers and electromagnetic sensors, and a smart enough targeting algorithm to work out when it is being spoofed and the ability to take action to counter that spoofing so that a lock can be achieved. Clan mechs are also by default immune to the Combines Listen-Kill missile targetting system as well so they have laser spoofers, magnetic spoofers, either sound weird or are really quiet and have heatsinks/pumps moving heat out of the mech confuse heat seeking munitions.

So in summery, the Direwhale moves at the same combat speed as an Abrams MBT but with no chance of being speed blinded, can't throw a tread, laughs at your idea of rough terrain due to its carrage system (legs), does not need to be refueled or reloading thanks to fusion engines and scarily powerful energy weapons, is protected from if not outright invisible to radar and laser spotting systems, and while easy to hit due to it's size and shape its armour and internal structure is completely immune to the impact of a 3 ton mounted tank gun, ie a Rheinmetall 120mm. The Direwhale packs guns that are considered excessively scary when shooting at things on it's own technological level, let alone 'current day' military equipment that is 1000 years out of date compared to it.

Now, the great thing is this comparison is that it reaches the same results with a Commando or Lolcust, or even a ******* Savannah Master as it does a Direwhale. Basically 1000 years of armour, materials, ECM development and portable fusion engines > Anything vaguely related to the modern day.

Edited by CheeseThief, 08 October 2016 - 05:51 PM.

[LordKnightFandragon]

Mechs in modern day, or basically in reality at all are actually highly impractical weapons. They are big, but they are TALL, and not actually that fast. Not alot of places they could go, not very wide streets for them. You thought taking a tank into a city was bad....pppffffttt....take a Rifleman down the streets of New York.

To armor something 40 feet tall, probably 20-30 feet wide, weighing in at 70 tons would probably end up being a rather thinnly armored machine that just about anything would punch full of holes. Think AMX50 series of French tanks. They are like the size of the King Tiger, weigh 60 tons, but are armored like the M4 Sherman. A Mech stepped foot on the battlefield, it would eat sabot rounds through the cockpit from 2000m out and just be dead. Or a JDAM, or Hellfire....yeah, all the magic torso twisting in the world wouldnt save it...

[cazidin]

Bombast, on 08 October 2016 - 11:03 AM, said:

'Who would win in a fight against Superman and Goku'

Most likely Superman. Even though Goku uses Ki Blasts and Superman is vulnerable to Magic, such as Ki, he STILL is incredibly durable AND strong and no, Goku wouldn't use Kryptonite even if he knew what it was or how it worked but those two probably wouldn't fight, either.