68 replies to this topic

[Horseman]

Nightbird, on 10 July 2019 - 12:47 PM, said:

Yes yes, sorry for applying real life rules of gravity, volume, density, maintenance, assembly lines to your magic and witchcraft fantasy franchise

You forget that giant mecha violate the laws of physics just by existing. If you apply real life physics to your darling giant mecha franchise... oops, no giant mecha any more!

Edited by Horseman, 10 July 2019 - 10:20 PM.

[Nightbird]

Horseman, on 10 July 2019 - 10:20 PM, said:

You forget that giant mecha violate the laws of physics just by existing. If you apply real life physics to your darling giant mecha franchise... oops, no giant mecha any more!

100 tons ones are doable. They won't be as tall as in BT since that volume to mass ratio is like foam, which I said in other threads as well. The only futuristic tech needed is fusion reactors. Electroactive polymers already exist but without a light weight, portable, and cheap electric source, it's pointless to invest in the tech.

If you're talking about 20 story tall gundam giant robots, yeah, steel legs can't hold up that much weight, but a 12 meter tall Atlas is doable.

(Just think of steel cranes, that degree of structure to weight lift ratio is within current human tech limits)

[evilauthor]

Karl Streiger, on 08 July 2019 - 08:53 PM, said:

(the Crab need to be more compact compared to the Bushwacker simple because the later has lot of ammunition in his innards)

According to fluff, the Bushwacker has its XL fusion engine "turned sideways" compared to how mechs normally mount them in order to get its very narrow front profile. The Bushwacker might be bulkier than the Crab, but that bulk has been very deliberately stretched forward/back in order to make it thinner.

[MechaBattler]

One of the reason I like scifi discussions about how stuff works. Is trying to make it make sense. Hand waving it away as space magic is not fun. Even if we have to apply fictional advances in technology. That's still more fun than dismissing it entirely. There are still aspects about Battletech that you can apply real world parallels to. Don't let the fact it's got 12 meter tall robots ruin the fun.

[Karl Streiger]

MechaBattler, on 15 July 2019 - 10:02 AM, said:

One of the reason I like scifi discussions about how stuff works. Is trying to make it make sense. Hand waving it away as space magic is not fun. Even if we have to apply fictional advances in technology. That's still more fun than dismissing it entirely. There are still aspects about Battletech that you can apply real world parallels to. Don't let the fact it's got 12 meter tall robots ruin the fun.

you only get in troubles and loop holes when you try to make the values from the game plausible.
short ranges and non guided missiles because of EW?
Damage DropOff
Critical Hit Locations and their size to be used as scale is also a good example for futile attempts.

When you want to have some reasonable and functional Mechs you really need to drop almost every value from the CBT game (including critical space for OmniMechs)
especially the OmniMechs are again a solid example of the issues if critical space volume.
If so the KitFox need to be almost as tall as Mr.Gargle because both have OmniPods of similar sizes in the arms.

although the gargle has a alternative with 2ERPPCs in one arm. The Adder "same frame" needs two arms for 2 ERPPCs. So what is rhe gargle arm now much bigger or not?

[Nightbird]

Karl Streiger, on 15 July 2019 - 11:39 PM, said:

you only get in troubles and loop holes when you try to make the values from the game plausible.
short ranges and non guided missiles because of EW?
Damage DropOff
Critical Hit Locations and their size to be used as scale is also a good example for futile attempts.

When you want to have some reasonable and functional Mechs you really need to drop almost every value from the CBT game (including critical space for OmniMechs)
especially the OmniMechs are again a solid example of the issues if critical space volume.
If so the KitFox need to be almost as tall as Mr.Gargle because both have OmniPods of similar sizes in the arms.

although the gargle has a alternative with 2ERPPCs in one arm. The Adder "same frame" needs two arms for 2 ERPPCs. So what is rhe gargle arm now much bigger or not?

There is not much point to trying to convert old TT rules into science. The priority back then was fit the game/mech mechanics into generic print-out sheets with 78 slots/lines. Having more unique mechs would be a pain on paper. Is that really a limitation that is important to preserve in the digital age?

If you're willing to put away TT rules for a moment, what would we benefit from redoing crit as volume? Well, suppose a crit is a volume of space 1meterx1.5mx2m. (Why these numbers? You can cram a pilot with chair into one. Exact measurement can be done later)

For all equipment, lasers, mg, etc, of 1 slot, you can as a game designer create it and put it into one crit regardless of the mech. For larger weapons, put 2 crits together and you can have a 2mx2m exit for a larger weapon. Go further, and you can put 6 crits together to make a 3mx3m opening for a huge weapon like AC20 or HGauss. You can do asymmetric weapon exits as well of course.

Weapons can require both an opening size and depth. Suppose a gauss rifle requires a 2mx2m opening for the exit barrel, the weapon can also be 6 meters long, require a certain arrangement of crits to fit in correctly. This means that you'll never be able to staple a gauss rifle to the side of your hand actuator since anything more than 1 crit will look pretty stupid.

From a mech design perspective, mechs will become a lot more unique. Each component can have a unique number of slots, with armor distributed accordingly. A catapult has more crits in the arms and less in the STs, a HBK has more slots in the RT and less in the arms, etc etc. The number of slots a mech has would go up by tonnage, a locust might only have 22-30 slots open, an Atlas can have 90-100.

The number of slots for each piece of equipment can be re-examined to make sense in this rework.

Toys/miniatures can plug generic weapons into the crits if the sizes are standardized as well.

Do I expect this to be done? No. The games in particular would be easier to make from a creator's point of view, and it would be easier for the audience to understand, but the BT franchise has been mishandled from the start so I expect that to continue.

[Karl Streiger]

Nightbird, on 16 July 2019 - 11:33 AM, said:

Toys/miniatures can plug generic weapons into the crits if the sizes are standardized as well.

this is exactly what I'm aiming for.
The Vulture and the JaegerMech will be the first Mechs i will finish that have slot based weapon system.
Same for tanks.
and a Johnston Parti-Kill will look on the Manticore the sane as on a Myrmidon or JaegerIII.

i think that CGL did not have taken the route WYSIWYG because they needed until last year to update the production process of new Mech Miniatures. Now they need to stop to ship their new minis assembled and hace some weapon options.
however in the meantime i do my best to produce enough prontable files

[Nightbird]

Karl Streiger, on 16 July 2019 - 11:48 AM, said:

this is exactly what I'm aiming for.
The Vulture and the JaegerMech will be the first Mechs i will finish that have slot based weapon system.
Same for tanks.
and a Johnston Parti-Kill will look on the Manticore the sane as on a Myrmidon or JaegerIII.

i think that CGL did not have taken the route WYSIWYG because they needed until last year to update the production process of new Mech Miniatures. Now they need to stop to ship their new minis assembled and hace some weapon options.
however in the meantime i do my best to produce enough prontable files

Yep. For the engine discussion that was going on earlier, 6 crits can be represented as 3mx3mx2m in dimensions (maybe the normal engine is hemisphere shaped), and also as 2mx2mx3m cylinder + 2 crit version that fits marauder-like mechs. Some manufacturers might also make a proprietary engine shape that forces you to buy their engines. Uniqueness

Edited by Nightbird, 16 July 2019 - 12:28 PM.

[evilauthor]

Karl Streiger, on 15 July 2019 - 11:39 PM, said:

you only get in troubles and loop holes when you try to make the values from the game plausible.
short ranges and non guided missiles because of EW?
Damage DropOff
Critical Hit Locations and their size to be used as scale is also a good example for futile attempts.

When you want to have some reasonable and functional Mechs you really need to drop almost every value from the CBT game (including critical space for OmniMechs)
especially the OmniMechs are again a solid example of the issues if critical space volume.
If so the KitFox need to be almost as tall as Mr.Gargle because both have OmniPods of similar sizes in the arms.

although the gargle has a alternative with 2ERPPCs in one arm. The Adder "same frame" needs two arms for 2 ERPPCs. So what is rhe gargle arm now much bigger or not?

I don't think the Adder "needs" two arms to carry 2 ERPPCs. It can totally carry both in one arm IF it has the available pod space and its pilot was crazy enough to requisition his techs to have it done.

The Gargoyle carries 2 ER PPCs in one arm because the OTHER arm is also carrying weaponry (a large and medium pulse laser). Personally, I'd splt the ERPPCs between both arms and split the pulse lasers similarly, but I can see advantages to carrying long range weapons in one arm and short range weapons in the other.

In contrast,2 ER PPCs are all the Adder carries in its arms. So of course it's going to split its only long range weapons between the arms because if it didn't losing the weapon arm would mean it loses all its offensive forepower.