Macross - Mecha, Weapons, and Technology

[Tri-ring]

Originally Posted by Anh_Minh

How so? Note, auroras are tied to objects with lots of charge and little mass.

Yes but the charged particles behave accordingly to the earth's magnetic field and even though each particles are atoms the accumulated sum for a feed back loop is large.(Where one minute eradiation to the entire Earth's surface is enough to power the supply the entire global need for 100 years I believe.)

Originally Posted by Anh_Minh

A lump of conductive material isn't a circuit. Where's your high potential? Where's your low?

At best, it would turn the projectile into a dipole and send it into a slight spin. Considering how weak Earth's magnetic field is, I don't believe it'd be an issue. I'd be more worried about air resistance.

In other words it become one big magnet.
That is what I am talking about.
And we go back to Lorenz force and mass of the slug.

Originally Posted by Anh_Minh

I'm not so sure of that.

You'll need to elaborate more.

Originally Posted by Anh_Minh

That site Daigo linked to talked about detecting ships at Pluto - 5 or 6 light hours ago. With today's technology. So yes, what they'll do, if they want to engage, if get close. It'll take them months.

Note, there's no real range limit on weapons. If you shoot them, they'll just keep going till they hit something. It's just near impossible to aim. That's why I don't see railguns as a primary weapon. You'll want one that's smart enough to make course corrections.

I don't know since for one we haven't detected any ships around pluto and any sensors that we have now is stationary, not needing to compensate acceleration and/or change in vector.
They may keep going but they run out of propellant always needing to compensate the opponent's move.
I really do not think the opponent will be waiting at the same position for ten years.

Originally Posted by Anh_Minh

If you can shoot the missiles. Also, the missiles have no real obligation to come close.

Yes but the defence drones will definitely want to get acquainted with the missiles passionately enough to throw a barrage of anti-missile micro-meteorite pellets(think of it as a high speed shotgun round) at the missile's way.

Originally Posted by Anh_Minh

Enough for a rapidly dispersing cloud of them to drown out the exhaust of a goddamn space ship?
Easy. the ships are behing the curtain. Unless they're not, in which case, they're visible. How big of a curtain are you picturing?

These both depends on the relative distance between the four points.(TeamA position, TeamB position, enemy missile's position and the chaff curtain)
If the chaff curtain is close to Team A and TeamB is far away then sensor will be blotted out by the curtain since localization of overall energy output will register higher at the curtain then teamB's distant thrust plume.
Also if the curtain is close to missle or teamA then the coverage arc to the sensor will be larger masking a larger area behind.

[Anh_Minh]

Originally Posted by Tri-ring

Yes but the charged particles behave accordingly to the earth's magnetic field and even though each particles are atoms the accumulated sum for a feed back loop is large.(Where one minute eradiation to the entire Earth's surface is enough to power the supply the entire global need for 100 years I believe.)

I don't see what you're getting at.

Also, I looked it up. The magnetosphere's at an altitude of 800-1000km. Two or three times higher than the OW we were examining.

In other words it become one big magnet.

A very weak magnet.

That is what I am talking about.
And we go back to Lorenz force and mass of the slug.

No we don't. A magnet isn't a charged particle. Lorentz's force will spin it, as its positive and negative poles are pulled in opposite directions.

And, again, I'm not persuaded that it'll be strong enough to even matter compared to air resistance.

You'll need to elaborate more.

I'm not a specialist of sensor technology, but what about the doppler effect?

I don't know since for one we haven't detected any ships around pluto and any sensors that we have now is stationary, not needing to compensate acceleration and/or change in vector.

IIRC, he made some assumptions on how hot a trail an accelerating ship would leave. And of course, the performance of today's optics are known.

They may keep going but they run out of propellant always needing to compensate the opponent's move.
I really do not think the opponent will be waiting at the same position for ten years.

Of course not. Which is why, as I said, they'll start by moving closer to each other. While not keeping a predictable trajectory.

Yes but the defence drones will definitely want to get acquainted with the missiles passionately enough to throw a barrage of anti-missile micro-meteorite pellets(think of it as a high speed shotgun round) at the missile's way.

If your pellets are too small, they won't bother the missile. If they're too big, you can't take as many with you. And remember, the drones will also have their own threat to deal with.

And again, a missile may want to avoid the drones altogether. It may not be easy for the drone to set themselves on an intercept course. Hell, if we're talking about pellets, the big ship can launch their own, ahead of the missile swarm, to mess with the drones.

These both depends on the relative distance between the four points.(TeamA position, TeamB position, enemy missile's position and the chaff curtain)
If the chaff curtain is close to Team A and TeamB is far away then sensor will be blotted out by the curtain since localization of overall energy output will register higher at the curtain then teamB's distant thrust plume.

What, you're thinking that Team A will blind itself with its own chaff? While Team B's missiles only have to aim for the chaff to get closer to Team A? That doesn't spell a recipe for victory. Not for Team A, anyway.

Also if the curtain is close to missle or teamA then the coverage arc to the sensor will be larger masking a larger area behind.

Yes, the missile will have to punch through the curtain to reacquire its target.

[Urei]

Seriously, this is getting really off topic. I remid you this is a MACROSS thread.

[BetoJR]

Couldn't agree more.

[Tri-ring]

To my understanding the movement of the aurora is caused by the flux of the earth magnetic field thus we are seeing the flux itself.

as for the slug spinning, it won't because polarization will occur 180 degrees to the magnetic field, not a right angle.

Dopple effect can be detected in some cases but if radar is rendered useless than it really does not matter.

Heat signature depends totally on the propulsion system so it can not be generalized.
If it is some kind of exotic propulsion system that utilizes gravity then we will probably not be able to detect it at all.
Also you'll need to examine the plume to actually be able to know the relative distance between the plume and yourself which takes time in real life situation.

The size of the pellet will probably be between the size of BB and a golf ball but they will have relative speed of Mach 20 so it is going to leve a very nasty hole if it hits. (Velocity is more relavent than mass.)

As for the relative distance, my mistake it should be near the opponent not the ally.

And if there are two heat sources one created by decoys, after coming through the curtain then the missiles will have a very bad day deciding which heat source they will follow.

[Wild Goose]

Originally Posted by Urei

Seriously, this is getting really off topic. I remid you this is a MACROSS thread.

I keep mentioning the points of discussion in the context of Macross and keep getting ignored. I'm all for random discussion and tech discussion but we need to remember that this is Macross, not the real world. This is a world where singing turns the tide of battle.

[ReddyRedWolf]

Well here's a Thrust-to-Weight Ratio chart for Valkyries and real jet fighters.

Spoiler for Thrust-to-Weight Ratio:

Oh yeah the class names of the Macross Galaxy escort fleet are Deneb Dulfim class and Deneb Kaitos class.

Deneb Dulfim being the star Epsilon Delphini and Deneb Kaitos being the star Beta Ceti.

Which could indicate only Macross Galaxy had this sort of fleet with the unique Mainland type colony.

Spoiler for Galaxy Mainland with Deneb Kaitos and Deneb Dulfim classes:

Unlike other fleet with multiple civilian residence vessels like Macross 1, Macross 5, Macross 7, Macross 11 and Macross Frontier. With at least one shelldome city ship. Frontier being the large scale island version.

Spoiler for Macross 1, 5 , 7, 11, Frontier:

[IMG][/IMG]
[IMG][/IMG]

[Urei]

Originally Posted by Wild Goose

This is a world where singing turns the tide of battle.

You got guts to start the psychologic warfare topic again.

[Wild Goose]

Originally Posted by Urei

You got guts to start the psychologic warfare topic again.

No, it's a recognition of the fact that singing increases the Will stats of all allied units and grants additional Spirit Points for Seishin use, especially the extra-useful Valor/Nekketsu (Hot Blood) skill, which grants 2x damage for attacks...

... sorry, I kinda got carried away into SRW.

[BetoJR]

Not a bad place to get carried away to, IMHO.

[Urei]

@ReddyRedWolf

Amazing T-t-W Ratio increases. Do you know how to calculate the same thing for VF-25F/S or 27? We have their statistics.

About Galaxy. It's probable that it's design comes from the fact that it's mainly an industrial fleet. I wonder though, how did people live there. It must've been really hard.

@Wild Goose

No problem there, I'm a fan as well

[Wild Goose]

Interesting stats... I'd like to know what the PTW is for the VF-25S as well; come to think of it, it logically has more thrust than a VF-25A or VF-25F, which means that that may account for why Ozma moves so well in it...

Well, that, and being powered by burning hot blooded manliness. "I'm not an adult! I'm a man!"

[Ithekro]

As mentioned once before, humans don't have the patience to wait for months or years in a combat engagement. Nor do they at present have the endurance for such in space travel. If patience of military commanders, civilian taxpayers, and politicians is not up to the point of engaging in wars that last six months to ten years between the opening salvo and the first landing of a hit on the first target, they aren't going to do it that way.

The distances may still be great in todays terms, but I can only imagine combat taking place in real time in anything other than sieges or long distance planetary bombardments. This means the vessels will be within light minutes of each other...and more than likely light seconds if they use large amounts of slower than light weaponry. Even if they use speed of light weaponry, they will want to be sure of a hit rather than have to lead the target by several light seconds or minutes when your view of said target is also several light seconds or minutes old.

Even if combat is basically computerized, people don't have the patience for it and will basically forget it is happening (at least with Americans who seem to have a six months memory when it comes to news related items).

This is one reason why science fiction combat seems more real to people. Something is happening. Sure science may be right on the money in terms of everything that can and cannot happen in space warfare. It doesn't take into effect what humans will actually do, nor how the public will actually feel/react to such an instance of space combat. If combat takes more than a few hours or even a day for anything to happen, it probably won't be happening in ship to ship type engagements.

(Edit: thank you.)

[ReddyRedWolf]

<proofreader mode> It's spelled Patience <proofreader mode>

[Anh_Minh]

Originally Posted by Tri-ring

as for the slug spinning, it won't because polarization will occur 180 degrees to the magnetic field, not a right angle.

Oh, you're right, it would actually be a counter-spin. Or maybe not. I'm not sure. All I know is, the sum of the Lorentz forces applied to the rod would be null, because, magnet or not, it's not charged. I also suspect it'd be pretty negligible in any case.

Dopple effect can be detected in some cases but if radar is rendered useless than it really does not matter.

Why? If you know what the exhaust is made of (either because you, well, know, or through spectral analysis), you can use the Doppler effect to calculate its relative speed. The only problem is to get accurate enough measurements.

Heat signature depends totally on the propulsion system so it can not be generalized.
If it is some kind of exotic propulsion system that utilizes gravity then we will probably not be able to detect it at all.

Sure, with "sufficiently advanced" technology, anything becomes possible.

Also you'll need to examine the plume to actually be able to know the relative distance between the plume and yourself which takes time in real life situation.

Eh. Even forgetting about the future advances in computer power, you've got months to calculate anything you please. The ships will see each other from bloody far away, remember?

The size of the pellet will probably be between the size of BB and a golf ball but they will have relative speed of Mach 20 so it is going to leve a very nasty hole if it hits. (Velocity is more relavent than mass.)

Good. Stuff that into a few missiles and launch them at the drones.

As for the relative distance, my mistake it should be near the opponent not the ally.

And why would the enemy let chaff generators get close?

And if there are two heat sources one created by decoys, after coming through the curtain then the missiles will have a very bad day deciding which heat source they will follow.

Eh. Smart missiles. Tomorrow's artificial smart, too. It'll take more than a simple heat source to fool them. And we're back to asking what it takes to fool sensors.

Originally Posted by Ithekro

As mentioned once before, humans don't have the patience to wait for months or years in a combat engagement. Nor do they at present have the endurance for such in space travel. If patience of military commanders, civilian taxpayers, and politicians is not up to the point of engaging in wars that last six months to ten years between the opening salvo and the first landing of a hit on the first target, they aren't going to do it that way.

Honestly, I'm not sure we'll ever have war between, say, Earth and our Martian colony either. Anyway, I'll be mighty pissed if we rain fiery death on Neo-Venezia.

The distances may still be great in todays terms, but I can only imagine combat taking place in real time in anything other than sieges or long distance planetary bombardments. This means the vessels will be within light minutes of each other...and more than likely light seconds if they use large amounts of slower than light weaponry. Even if they use speed of light weaponry, they will want to be sure of a hit rather than have to lead the target by several light seconds or minutes when your view of said target is also several light seconds or minutes old.

Don't think so. There's a reason we see a lot of firearms and precious few mounted knights nowadays. Sure, getting up close and personal is more satisfying, more glorious. But people mostly want to win.

Even if combat is basically computerized, people don't have the patience for it and will basically forget it is happening (at least with Americans who seem to have a six months memory when it comes to news related items).

This is one reason why science fiction combat seems more real to people. Something is happening.

Quite true.

Sure science may be right on the money in terms of everything that can and cannot happen in space warfare. It doesn't take into effect what humans will actually do, nor how the public will actually feel/react to such an instance of space combat. If combat takes more than a few hours or even a day for anything to happen, it probably won't be happening in ship to ship type engagements.

Heh. For all I know, if it ever comes to an interplanetary war between denizens of the solar system, we may not use ships at all, but just lob missiles at each other from orbiting space stations. I'm not sure what the ships' contribution would be. Except delivering troops once the missiles have basically decided who's boss anyway.

[Ithekro]

Don't think so. There's a reason we see a lot of firearms and precious few mounted knights nowadays. Sure, getting up close and personal is more satisfying, more glorious. But people mostly want to win.

Not thinking about satisfaction, just on a practical level. Advances in technology increase the ranges of combat, but tend to remain within a certain level of time that combat will exist. Anything more than a certain period of time (undefined) will not be "combat" but simply an exercise in lobbing things at one another and then waiting days, weeks, months, or even years before there is a result of any kind. That is way, way too long to be considered combat since one cannot react to a situation. You can't know if your first shot will reach the target, you won't know if you will need a second shot for long time. You won't even be in the same area (if a warship) when your first shot reaches the target. If we are talking months or years, the crew might not even be the same crew that fired that shot. The war might even be over before the first missile hits a target.

A practical engagement is one where a target can be hit within an amount of time so that you will know the results and can plan to take additional action. Thus a practical space combat action between warships at sub-light speeds, using sub-light weaponry will be at a relatively close distance. This isn't to say that the distances won't be vast by our view of things, just that it will be within minutes or hours for a weapon to reach its target (such as today's missiles).

Thus a distance of several light seconds or maybe a light minute would be considered for combat actions. If the weapon has sufficient speed, then maybe as farther out, but then you're targeting data becomes less and less reliable, since you are looking at several minutes or even hours old images at launch. Since 1 AU (distance from the Earth to the Sun) is roughly 8 light minutes of distance, do you think you are going to have a real combat action between warships that are firing sub-light missiles at those kinds or ranges? Even at closest approach it is something like 4 light minutes to Mars, at greatest distance it is greater than 20 light minutes away from Earth.

Thus effective combat between space ships will be "relatively" close to each other. They might not be able to see each other without the aid of a telescope and it may take several minutes to an hour for something to happen between shots, but they won't be taking shots from across the star system using a warhead even if it can accelerate up to maybe 210 km/s using an ion thruster. This is because it will still take more than 23 minutes to move the missile one light second away from you.

Thus Macross' way of things "looks better" as something is happening, rather than waiting nearly a half hour just to see if your first shot hit the target at out just beyond the Moon.

[Anh_Minh]

People do what it takes to win. If it means that what you call "combat" becomes obsolete in favor of "lobbing things at each other", then so be it. If it means that one side, seeing itself outshot, surrenders and no missile has to actually hit its target but is deactivated instead, so much the better.

Human intelligence is highly adaptable. And today's AI are, well, limited. Plus, in warfare, there are countless tasks that can't be automated. But will that still be true if all we have to do - indeed, all we can do for most of the actual "war" - is lob missiles at each other? Just try to hit the target while avoiding counter measures. What need will we have for humans then? What need for ships? (I mean, sure, you'll need humans somewhere, to build the missiles and decide to launch them and stuff. And, well, you'll still need warm boots for the occupation. But will you need to bring them close to the missile action?)

Note, what I said only holds without FTL travel. FTL would change quite a lot.

[Ithekro]

Missile time to reach a target on Mars from Earth orbit (using a 210 km/s capable missile): estimated to be between just under 4 days (92 hours) and just over 19 days (460 hours) depending on what orbital positions the two planetary bodies are in relative to each other.

You'll still need to have a way to protect your transports as they cover the same distances, and they will be slower since they need to decelerate to make orbit and not kill the humans on board via G-forces. Assuming the other planet's mitary forces are hidden from you, they will be able to attack your transports when they are decelerating or when they reach orbit. At which point more conventional warfare returns to the picture.

In the 1950s it was assumed with the advent of Mach 2+ aircraft and missiles that machine guns and cannons would be a non-issue as the aircraft would never fight in close anymore, thus no need for them or the dogfighting they were associated. Reality kicked in over Vietnam showed that with closing speeds as they are, fighters still need to dogfight because they can get too close for a missile to lock onto a target. Thus in the 1970s cannons were put back on fighters so that the option was still there if the pilot needed it rather than go head to head with a MIG and then figure out..."oh wait, I can't fire a missile at him, and he's got a 30mm cannon pointed at me"

Just because you have something better doesn't mean the older weapon or style will be completely outdated. It may still live on in a modifed form for when things get a little too close. Soldiers still carry combat knives and bayonets even though they should never get into melee combat.

(EDIT: My last comment on the combat knife reminded me of FMP! and the use of anti-tank knives in combat by the mechs in production at the time.)

[Haesslich]

I think I'll point out the obvious here, after seeing a few posts on Orbital weapons and 'why use manned fighters' in the Macross universe.

1) Orbital weapons are fine and dandy, but they do need space-based support to maintain them, as well as to move them - even with Overtechnology they seem to require some sort of reaction mass to move ships and spaceborne objects (ergo the thrusters on VF's and all spacecraft), which means you need to burn fuel to move them. Beyond that, a dedicated remote killsat probably isn't practical for on-planet warfare for the same reasons nukes aren't used for tactical or strategic purposes - they're expensive, they do a god-awful lot of damage when they hit, and they're pretty easy prey for anyone who has orbital strike capabilities... which the UN Spacy, and presumably anyone they're going to be fighting, does. Especially with VF's being able to make orbit without booster packs, or even large missiles and Macross cannons being not one-of-a-kind technologies.

If you want a very moveable orbital battle platform, there's another name for them: New Macross-class battleships. Which also can defend themselves from orbital assaults and move quickly.

2) Fighters in Macross seem to be a cross between 'manned missile deployment platform' and 'infantry support to be used against Zentradi', a philosophy which came around due to the circumstances which surrounded the first war and the consequences which resulted from the Protoculture making millions of Zentradi battle fleets which are even now roaming space, and most of which are going to be hostile to the Miclones and their Zentradi allies. They can be missile boats (witness the power of the Armor packs), but they're apparently made to do many things at once, so you don't have to have fleets dedicated Destroids for ground actions as WELL as dedicated fleets of missile platforms; you can get away with a lot of VF's which do both functions adequately, and smaller numbers of dedicated Destroids for anti-air (and presumably, ground) defense and a gaggle of unmanned missile platforms (the Ghosts).

3) The bias against AI's after the Sharon Apple incident is likely to blame for the lack of exclusively drone or remote-based fighting platforms; the way Sharon Apple basically hacked the AI of the X-9 Ghost in Macross Plus, combined with similar experiences with drones being hacked/jammed by the Vajra in Frontier, is likely to make the military unwilling to exclusively rely on drones for defense, even if they're yoked to follow orders a la the X-9's that Luca was using throughout the series. Between that and the existence of serious ECM capabilities, the UN Spacy is very much going to want to keep a human in the decision loop for fire/not fire choices, as well as to be able to cope with situations which a limited AI can't... or because when faced with communications jamming, an individual soldier can still fight, whereas a drone may go stupid or a missile could completely lose lock and then be turned combat ineffective.

Plus, as Ithekro points out, the (New) UN Spacy's main purpose is to defend human and allied Zentradi colonization fleets as they make their way across the galaxy, then to defend them once they settle on a planet. Relatively stationary weapons are useless for the former case, and the latter will demand somewhat more mobile weapons both to put down uprisings on a planet as well as to be able to meet threats beyond the orbital sphere of the planet in question, on the assumption that it's better to hit an enemy on the way in rather than when your back's to the wall and any missed shots will damage your own homeworld.

Beyond that, missiles are expensive to produce in numbers, compared to gun slugs... but missiles are less expensive than dead pilots. But at the same time, there are things that human pilots can do that drones and missiles can't... such as take and hold ground, or root out insurgents, or defend the orbitals around a planet. Or, if necessary, invade a city to take out the people attacking from the factories you're trying to keep intact without obliterating them.

[Anh_Minh]

Originally Posted by Ithekro

Missile time to reach a target on Mars from Earth orbit (using a 210 km/s capable missile): estimated to be between just under 4 days (92 hours) and just over 19 days (460 hours) depending on what orbital positions the two planetary bodies are in relative to each other.

You'll still need to have a way to protect your transports as they cover the same distances,

Protect them from what, assuming the enemy's lost all its large military installations to missiles and I have a good satellite coverage of his planet?

and they will be slower since they need to decelerate to make orbit and not kill the humans on board via G-forces. Assuming the other planet's mitary forces are hidden from you, they will be able to attack your transports when they are decelerating or when they reach orbit. At which point more conventional warfare returns to the picture.

I think they'd rather attack on land, when the invader comes to them, than try to claw their way up the gravity well.

All I'm saying, though, is that the space battle may see little need for warships, let alone fighters. The land battle that follows is another story. (Unless you just want to nuke everything from afar, of course.)