Macross - Mecha, Weapons, and Technology

[Wild Goose]

Originally Posted by Tak

We don't know if that is a fact in Macross, especially given the fact that Queadluun twin guns are in the gatling category and they do have a terribly high rate of fire.

I think it largely depends on economical and design issues.

Yes, Quad twin guns are in the tri-barrel gatling category. Yes they do have a high rate of fire. However having 3 barrels, and needing to charge and shoot, no matter how fast they fire I doubt they're going to match the rate of fire of a kinetic shell gatling. Compare tracers from both; all the glowing stuff shot out of Quad guns are beams, but for each glowing tracer that a Valk's gunpod shoots out there are another 4 rounds of ammo that aren't seen (assuming that Kawamori in his otakuness will follow the 1-in-5 mix of tracer to standard ammo; current USAF/USN mix is 1 tracer every 5 rounds, meaning that a 10-round burst has 2 tracers and 4 SAPHEI shells).

And Tak, which part of practical does not encompass economics and design issues? It's still going to be cheaper to make, fix, and repair mechanical gatlings firing shells compared to energy guns.

The VF-22 is equipped with energy weapons, including the gun-pod, not because the gun-pod carries caseless ammunition. Furthermore, the VF-22 also has the same twin gatling beam weapon adapted from the Queadluun Rau equipped on its arms. The trade-off here though, is that it doesn't necessarily excel in overall performance when compared to the VF-19. The VF-17 has an option to equip pulse beam rifles as demonstrated in VFX-2.

That's funny Tak, all my sources say that the VF-22 uses a gatling gunpod as its primary weapon with the beam guns as additional weapons. The beam adaptor on Gamlin's VF-17S was a one-off thing and rarely seen thereafter, suggesting that beam gunpods are not practical for mass deployment outside of special operations - and the VF-X Ravens were a spec ops unit. And I'm not sure where you get the impression that I was saying the VF-22 has beam guns because it uses caseless ammo in the gunpod, but it's explicitly stated by Kawamori and official stats that the VF-22 uses caseless ammo in its gunpod. And I don't know where you get that the VF-22's beam guns are from the Quead; it's stated that the beam guns are built by Howard/General and that the Quead's contribution to the YF-21 and VF-22 is the vector inertia control system.

Caseless ammo means nothing. All it means is that it's a new form of ammo where you don't have to bother with shell casings, meaning you can pack in just a biiiiit more ammo into one mag.

Yet, the Vajra, and the Zentradi in general do not use 'ammunition', period.

*facepalm* I was talking about the freaking Destroid Cheyennes on Quarter, Tak, and on the Valks in general. Though I probably should have made that clearer. We do know that the Zents and Melts in general don't use ammo save for their missiles, but the Vajra keep making gunfire sounds each time they shoot stuff with their guns.

Though there's also the A-10's ammo feed mechanism, which is the only plane in the world where it actually takes the shell casings from spent rounds and keeps them in the plane. Oherwise it would become too unbalanced to fly straight.

It could be, I won't rule out that possibility.

And you get more options with a railgun for your ammo. Superdense metal penetrators. DU ammo. APHEI. The list goes on and on. Though probably the superdense penetrators would be all you need; railgun rounds tend to blow up on impact :P Besides you have a longer range, theoretically, since beams would dissipate over time and distance, but a solid slug goes on and on and on.....

I think Milia in her Queadluun Rau would disagree with you about this

She can disagree with me all she wants; she's Millia. She has that right. I'm speaking more on observation of gun battle dogfights in the 20th century, especially in the jet age. It's still true that the guy who puts out more lead where his enemy is turning into has a better chance of making his shot (this also assumes that like Max, he's been running his OODA loop much much faster than the other guy, which IMO is one of the reasons Max is so pwn: he runs through the OODA loop faster than anyone around).

Also, note that Millia was stuck with Valks for the rest of her life, and hasn't been complaining about them, so the loss in rate of firepower can't be too bad. And she was most upset when Gamlin trashed her VF-1J too.

Except the technical specs are kept intact. That, and remember, future Macross franchise tend to consider DYRL as partially canon. Evident since Macross 7.

The tech specs for Top Gun were kept intact too ya know Besides metafictionally DYRL was a fictional retelling of the Macross Story to keep people happy and keep them distracted from wondering WTF happened to Megaroad-01. But I'm just poking you here.

But not even that, the Queadluun Rau have demonstrated countless times in the original Macross that their twin energy blasters not only has a rapid rate of fire, but they tend to outgun Valkyrie gunpods.

Depends on what you mean by outgun. Rapid rate of fire, yes they shoot rapidly. Each shot being more powerful than a single 55mm round from the old GU-11 gunpod, probably. But capable of matching 3,000 rounds per minute? Doubtful. Remember, even if a Queadluun Rau is putting up as many tracers as a Valk's gunpod, the for each tracer the Valk fires there are another 4 shells unseen. Or it could even be 9; the US Navy used to use a mix of 1-in-10 for its tracers. Sobering thought, innit? That a Quead's max rate of fire is still nothing compared to a Valk gunpod.

Though practically for all intents and purposes both do the job their intended for. Its just that it's a crapload easier to fix a gatling than a beam gun.

[Tak]

Originally Posted by Wild Goose

That's funny Tak, all my sources say that the VF-22 uses a gatling gunpod as its primary weapon with the beam guns as additional weapons.

Except my strategy guides to Macross PLUS and VFX-2 would state otherwise. They indicate the VF-22s use energy weaponry, or in this case converging beam weaponry for its gun-pod as well as its auxiliary weapon systems. Of course, the trade-off here, due to the VF-22's many internalized systems, its actual performance can never exceed the VF-19. Then again, its the same publication that gave us MAX GENIUS as a name, so at this point, that is a slight inconsistency I can overlook.

Originally Posted by Wild Goose

And I don't know where you get that the VF-22's beam guns are from the Quead; it's stated that the beam guns are built by Howard/General and that the Quead's contribution to the YF-21 and VF-22 is the vector inertia control system.

Er, I was referring to the Queadluun's basic twin beam weapon designs that were eventually adapted to the VF-22. Not that they actually took Quead weapons and mounted on the VF-22. Thats another story, see.

Originally Posted by Wild Goose

Vajra keep making gunfire sounds each time they shoot stuff with their guns.

I also won't rule out the possibility that they 'manufacture' ammunition internally like their missiles.

Originally Posted by Wild Goose

That a Quead's max rate of fire is still nothing compared to a Valk gunpod.

I personally would put this in the "We don't know category". After all, we've seen the Quead Rea matching Alto's VF-22 pretty closely in their gun duel during Alto's training.

Although personally I think that 3,000 per minute is a bit of an overkill, but thats UN SPACY's problem. Not mine.

And yeah, nobody is disagreeing that ammunition based, independent gun-pod weapon systems are easier to fix, and easier to replace.

- Tak

[Haesslich]

There's probably one very good reason for sticking with solid-slug gunpods versus energy weapons as standard issue for VF's - cooling. I'm just trying to imagine how bad it'd be after a few dozen shots, since cooling's more of a problem in space than it is on Earth as you have to have some way to radiate the heat out of the mechanism. One reason caseless rounds haven't taken off so far on Earth is due to the fact that they (at least in the G-11 experiment H&K had in the 1970s) had cooling issues due to the polymer construction and lack of a metal case to take the heat generated by firing the round out of the gun proper. Space may be close to absolute zero in areas which aren't bombarded regularly by the output of a nearby star, but even then cooling something can be a BIT of a problem... especially if you don't want it cracking or melting. IIRC, one of the problems that Hikaru and the others had in escaping the Zentradi ship the first time was that their lasers had issues with burning out or something, which led to them being in there long enough to get captured again (except Max).

The Zentradi and the Protoculture seem to have solved the issue with cooling, but human technology doesn't quite seem to be up to the challenge as of yet, at least not in making them cheaper than kinetic ones, or maybe more reliable than such. Reaction weapons and Macross-style cannons exist, but they seem to be protected by energy fields generated to contain the blast... and their reaction rate kinda sucks. There were lasers on some of the Destroids of the Macross series, but they didn't seem to have the same sort of volume of fire that a Valkyrie's gunpod seemed capable of laying out, an important factor in using guns in a high-speed engagement with rapid changes in vector.

This doesn't count the possible cost in energy involved with such weapons, even if you do have a nuclear reactor onboard... since fuel is fuel, and you've only got so much energy storage available within a given volume not devoted to ammo, transformation equipment, armor, avionics, etc. You're already using quite a bit of that energy for the armor and the maneuver systems, which means that may put a limit on how many shots were available to a pilot using an energy weapon that didn't have its own energy source. Or, if it DOES have one, then you're still going to be ammo-limited and whether the savings in mass would be significant enough are yet to be determined.

[Wild Goose]

Originally Posted by Tak

Except my strategy guides to Macross PLUS and VFX-2 would state otherwise. They indicate the VF-22s use energy weaponry, or in this case converging beam weaponry for its gun-pod as well as its auxiliary weapon systems. Of course, the trade-off here, due to the VF-22's many internalized systems, its actual performance can never exceed the VF-19. Then again, its the same publication that gave us MAX GENIUS as a name, so at this point, that is a slight inconsistency I can overlook.

Ark would have a field day with you... my sources use data published from Kawamori's artbooks and Word of God from the mecha designer himself. I think I'll go with that. Afterall the accuraccy of the strategy guides is already suspect what with the inaccurate names.

....god i can't believe I'm channelling ark here. -_-

Er, I was referring to the Queadluun's basic twin beam weapon designs that were eventually adapted to the VF-22. Not that they actually took Quead weapons and mounted on the VF-22. Thats another story, see.

Oh, right. Well all my data shows is that these are single-barrel beam guns, not multibarrel gatlings. Could you link me to your sources?

I also won't rule out the possibility that they 'manufacture' ammunition internally like their missiles.

It's a reasonable assumption to assume that they do so; we know the Reds can assemble missiles on the spot, so most likely the browns can do so, albeit with gun ammo because they're carrying less mass.

I personally would put this in the "We don't know category". After all, we've seen the Quead Rea matching Alto's VF-22 pretty closely in their gun duel during Alto's training.

And as I said, which you ignored, even if the Quead Rea's beams are matching the VF-25's tracers in volume, Alto will still be firing more rounds than her. Assuming for calculation purposes that within 1 second Klan puts out 20 beams, matching the 20 tracers fired from Alto's gunpod, that's only 20 beams compared to one hundred rounds. Gunpods are loaded with a mix of tracers, which show up as glowing trails (the idea of which is to help the shooter adjust his aim) and standard ammo, a typical mix of which 1-4 of tracer and SAPHEI (for every 5 rounds, 1 is tracer and 4 are SAPHEI). If he uses the old US Navy system of 1-9, then it's even worse: Klan has 20 beams as opposed to 180 rounds.

Although personally I think that 3,000 per minute is a bit of an overkill, but thats UN SPACY's problem. Not mine.

There is NO such thing as overkill or too much dakka!

And yeah, nobody is disagreeing that ammunition based, independent gun-pod weapon systems are easier to fix, and easier to replace.

Which would most likely be the reason they're still used out in the back of beyond on the exploration/colonisation fleets.

[Tak]

Originally Posted by Wild Goose

Ark would have a field day with you... my sources use data published from Kawamori's artbooks and Word of God from the mecha designer himself. I think I'll go with that. Afterall the accuraccy of the strategy guides is already suspect what with the inaccurate names.

You really have to wonder how they get sanctioned, these strategy guides. Then again, if Kawamori decided to have a change of heart after certain 'materials' are published... well, there is nothing we can do because he is the mecha-god, after all.

Originally Posted by Wild Goose

Oh, right. Well all my data shows is that these are single-barrel beam guns, not multibarrel gatlings. Could you link me to your sources?

*Stabs Wild Goose with a plastic fork*

Er, you know, I will repeat myself again, because I am ... nice.

I said, they adapted the designs, I did not say they rip off the cannon, and also put a tri-barrel on the VF-22! All I stated was that the VF-22 took great many cues from the Queadluun Rau, including the beam weapon systems installed on both of its arms, which is an undeniable fact.

*Looking at a profusely bleeding Wild Goose*

Oh get over it, its just plastic!

Yes, I am nice, dammit!

- Tak

[Wild Goose]

*me laughs as the plastic fork bounces off the ceramic OCST Haxxbuster armor*

You'll have to do better than that, Tak. Your plastic fork is weak!

When you said the beam guns were adapted the impression you were giving me was that Howard made 3-barrel beam gatlings for the VF-22. If they're single barrel guns the ROF goes down ya know.

Anyway as we say in Cadia, link or Silver Retriever.

[4Tran]

I've punted all the mecha discussion from the Macross Universe thread here. This isn't a versus thread either, but I'm amenable to a "Macross Versus" thread of some kind, so if you're interested, please post your ideas on what its rules and conditions should be in the Thread Request thread.


On to the topic: there's no rule out there that states that energy weapons have to be more powerful than projectile ones; that's just a Gundam brainbug that's running around. Indeed, for the same energy expenditure, a kinetic energy weapon will be better at penetrating armor than an equivalent laser or particle beam. The advantage of an energy weapon is that you don't have to worry as much about recoil. In this case, the lightness of a Valkyrie coupled with the high rate of fire of a gunpod would indicate that the muzzle velocity of the rounds can't be all that high:

By way of comparison, the A-10 weighs about 14 tons loaded and it fires 30mm rounds at 3900 rounds per minute and a muzzle velocity of 1067m/s.

Valkyries have roughly the same specs, and they should have the same muzzle velocity (barring any exotic ammunition) unless they have some sort of inertial dampeners. Well, we know that Valkyries do have this kind of technology because they're rated with a g-limit of +20/-10 or better. A human being can only handle +9/-3.5 at maximum (modern aircraft do not exceed these limits for a reason), so there has to be some sort of compensating technology involved.

Given this fact, and the possibility of exotic penetrators, there really isn't any reason for the Valkyrie gunpods to have any worse penetration than their beams. And they most certainly will be more powerful than the head lasers.

[encia]

Originally Posted by Wild Goose

(cut for space)

And you get more options with a railgun for your ammo. Superdense metal penetrators. DU ammo. APHEI. The list goes on and on. Though probably the superdense penetrators would be all you need; railgun rounds tend to blow up on impact :P Besides you have a longer range, theoretically, since beams would dissipate over time and distance, but a solid slug goes on and on and on.....

With real laser (photon) beams, the rate of degradation is dependent on the environment's condition i.e. atmosphere vs space vs under water.

Real laser has the advantage of light speed.

[encia]

Originally Posted by Wild Goose

Or where fleet carriers hold, wait for it, twelve mecha.

Seriously, a Gundam vs Macross matchup leads to the gundam pratagonists being horribly, horribly, screwed. Especially a SEED Destiny vs VF-19 matchup; VF-19s and -22s use fusion reactors unaffected by N-jammers, plus they have active stealth that scrambles radar and heat sensors, AND pinpoint barriers.

The only reason the Destiny cast have a snowball's chance in hell of winning is because Gundam fanboys outnumber Macross otaku.

Why SEED Destiny? How about Gundam 00?

Spoiler for OT:

Compare asteroid blasting scenarios
Gundam 00 EP25 via GN-X
vs
Macross Frontier EP01 via VF25

[Wild Goose]

Originally Posted by 4Tran

I've punted all the mecha discussion from the Macross Universe thread here. This isn't a versus thread either, but I'm amenable to a "Macross Versus" thread of some kind, so if you're interested, please post your ideas on what its rules and conditions should be in the Thread Request thread.

Well it started as a versus discussion of some sort, and is now about the respective merits of kinetic weapons vs beam weapons in Macross. Such is the power of a Cadian and a Malaysian. IS: Diverted Tangent.

On to the topic: there's no rule out there that states that energy weapons have to be more powerful than projectile ones; that's just a Gundam brainbug that's running around. Indeed, for the same energy expenditure, a kinetic energy weapon will be better at penetrating armor than an equivalent laser or particle beam. The advantage of an energy weapon is that you don't have to worry as much about recoil. In this case, the lightness of a Valkyrie coupled with the high rate of fire of a gunpod would indicate that the muzzle velocity of the rounds can't be all that high:
Valkyries have roughly the same specs, and they should have the same muzzle velocity (barring any exotic ammunition) unless they have some sort of inertial dampeners. Well, we know that Valkyries do have this kind of technology because they're rated with a g-limit of +20/-10 or better. A human being can only handle +9/-3.5 at maximum (modern aircraft do not exceed these limits for a reason), so there has to be some sort of compensating technology involved.

Given this fact, and the possibility of exotic penetrators, there really isn't any reason for the Valkyrie gunpods to have any worse penetration than their beams. And they most certainly will be more powerful than the head lasers.

The Valks most assuredly have inertial dampners; we know they have artificial gravity, and it's a small step from there to get inertial compensators (though the challenge will be making a practical small-scale variant, which they've obviously done for the VF-19 and VF-22). Kawamori has stated that the VF-25 has some sort of new tech for allowing it to go faster without killing the pilot, so it has to be inertial compensators. And if inertial compensators can work, there's no reason why a recoil reduction system for gunpods can't be made using similar principles. My theory of SAPHEI rounds as the standard loadout on the valks is simply that Semi Armor Piercing High Explosive Incedniary shells are very good all-rounder shells for aircraft guns, though that doesn't preclude Valks from using dedicated API and HEI rounds, or even valk-scale HEIAP rounds like the Raufoss Mk 211.

And as I've been saying, kinetic weapons are more practical to deploy, use, maintain and repair by fleets out in the back of beyond.

As for the head lasers... I've kinda always felt they were more of a last-ditch weapon, and the reason they used lasers was to save on space for ammo and the like. It's the valk equivalent of a 9mm pistol. Last ditch weapon for you to use while going down fighting, not something you want to be relying on as your primary weapon.

Originally Posted by encia

With real laser (photon) beams, the rate of degradation is dependent on the environment's condition i.e. atmosphere vs space vs under water.

Real laser has the advantage of light speed.

There is that, but haven't scientists mentioned how shitty lasers are as penetration weapons? If you fired a laser at a tank, the laser would first vaporise the outer armor, then have its cutting ability degraded by the cloud of melted armor vapor that's dissipating the beam. Though yes for space it would have the advantage of no degradation over range and lightspeed.

On the other hand though as we've seen in Macross lasers don't really appear useful for anything besides being a backup weapon and antimissile CIWS.

Originally Posted by encia

Why SEED Destiny? How about Gundam 00?

Spoiler for OT:

Compare asteroid blasting scenarios
Gundam 00 EP25 via GN-X
vs
Macross Frontier EP01 via VF25

Actually it's because I've seen SEED and SEED Destiny, and am writing a SEED fanfic.

[encia]

Originally Posted by Wild Goose

Let me clarify: a practical, rapidfire beam gun with the same rate of fire as a gatling gun. If we follow your argument that Macross guns are technologically ahead of modern guns by leaps and bounds, then they can surely beat these numbers: the US standard M61 Vulcan has a rate of fire of 6000 rounds per minute, or 600 rounds PER SECOND; the GAU-8 Avenger has a rate of fire of 3,900 rounds per minute.

Yes particle weapons in the gatling category can be manufactured, but kinetic weapons are still a lot more practical for uber rapid fire.

All valks have had energy guns of some sort. The VF-19 and VF-22, despite having significant amounts of beam weapons, however, still use gatling gunpods as their primary weapons - the valk with the beam gunpod you're thinking of was the beam adapter used on Gamlin's VF-17S gunpod; the VF-19 and -22 use gunpods firing solid ammo (cased for the VF-19 and caseless for the VF-22). The air defense destroids we saw on docked with Quarter were also using twin gatlings instead of lasers because when you're intercepting enemy fire you want as much lead up there as you can, and the only way you can do that short of a Metal Storm system is with a gatling.

As to why there weren't any shell casings flying around: caseless ammo. The VF-22 already uses it, and caseless ammo means you get a slight increase in ammo and don't have to worry about shell casings.

Not nesscescarily. We know that the humans tend to prefer kinetic weapons, and judging by the recoil on it I'd hazard a guess and say it could be a railgun, which would still work in both low power and hi-power modes. Plus there was visible recoil on the red that Mikhail shot; you don't really get those with beams. A hunk of superdense metal slamming into you, on the other hand...

Depends if the particle beam are compose of photons (subatomic), pions(subatomic), electrons(subatomic), plasma**(depends on element type being ejected) and 'etc'.

Plasma beam could double up as plasma thrusters i.e. recoil.

**You have could have element of lead (Pb) at 4th state of matter i.e. ionisation properties plus kinetic .

[encia]

Originally Posted by Wild Goose

And as I've been saying, kinetic weapons are more practical to deploy, use, maintain and repair by fleets out in the back of beyond.

As for the head lasers... I've kinda always felt they were more of a last-ditch weapon, and the reason they used lasers was to save on space for ammo and the like. It's the valk equivalent of a 9mm pistol. Last ditch weapon for you to use while going down fighting, not something you want to be relying on as your primary weapon.

There is that, but haven't scientists mentioned how shitty lasers are as penetration weapons?

What power systems powering these weapons?

For they (VF) have enough power generation to power both engines and large beam weapons?

Perhaps they need dual power generation systems i.e. one for engines and one for particle beam weapons. Compared Gundam 00, VF series doesn’t seem to have a mono-frame body design.

Originally Posted by Wild Goose

If you fired a laser at a tank, the laser would first vaporise the outer armor, then have its cutting ability degraded by the cloud of melted armor vapor that's dissipating the beam. Though yes for space it would have the advantage of no degradation.

Vaporised gas can have secondary effects i.e. explosive effect from expanding gas.

Laser (photon)’s performance is influenced by its frequency e.g. IR vs X-Ray vs Gamma. Higher EM frequency relates to ionising efficiency.

Originally Posted by Wild Goose

Actually it's because I've seen SEED and SEED Destiny, and am writing a SEED fanfic.

I've only seen Gundam 00.

[4Tran]

Originally Posted by Wild Goose

Well it started as a versus discussion of some sort, and is now about the respective merits of kinetic weapons vs beam weapons in Macross. Such is the power of a Cadian and a Malaysian. IS: Diverted Tangent.

Oh, I know; that's why I dumped it all here.

Originally Posted by Wild Goose

There is that, but haven't scientists mentioned how shitty lasers are as penetration weapons? If you fired a laser at a tank, the laser would first vaporise the outer armor, then have its cutting ability degraded by the cloud of melted armor vapor that's dissipating the beam. Though yes for space it would have the advantage of no degradation over range and lightspeed.

It's not just lasers, all energy weapons are less effective than projectiles because of the weird physics behind armor penetration. This trade-off is worth it in many cases, so energy weapons aren't impractical under any stretch of the imagination (especially neutron-beams and lasers, and with the marked exception of plasma weapons).

Also, note that while lasers don't really degrade outside of atmospheric interference, they will still attenuate over large distances.

Originally Posted by Wild Goose

On the other hand though as we've seen in Macross lasers don't really appear useful for anything besides being a backup weapon and antimissile CIWS.

And for carving nifty holes in stuff.

Originally Posted by encia

What power systems powering these weapons?

For they (VF) have enough power generation to power both engines and large beam weapons?

Ever since the VF-1, Valkyries have had thermonuclear reaction engines. In the case of the VF-1, it has two of these engines for 650MW apiece - an impressive figure under just about any criteria.

[Wild Goose]

Originally Posted by 4Tran

It's not just lasers, all energy weapons are less effective than projectiles because of the weird physics behind armor penetration. This trade-off is worth it in many cases, so energy weapons aren't impractical under any stretch of the imagination (especially neutron-beams and lasers, and with the marked exception of plasma weapons).

Never was saying that, merely that in terms of rate of fire and ease of maintainnance, gatling gunpods are superior to energy weapons, which is most likely the primary reason valks still use kinetic projectile gatlings 51 years after the first Variable Fighters were introduced.

Also, note that while lasers don't really degrade outside of atmospheric interference, they will still attenuate over large distances.

Point noted; come to think of it most of the time we see lasers they're used at close range... actually apart from Macross Zero it seems like the head lasers on valks have never been used at all; it's always the gunpod and the micromissiles getting mileage.

And for carving nifty holes in stuff.

I totally forgot that Which I feel is a bit sad since I really liked how Hikaru cut that hole to free Misa.

[ReddyRedWolf]

As facinating as you are arguing about the merits of kinetic vs beam weaponry in Macross.

Let us see who is who among the weapons biz. (Source Macross The Galaxy Sourcebook 3)


Chapter 6 – Companies & Manufacturers

This chapter details some of the companies and manufacturers of the destroids, variable fighters and other technologies. Being mostly democratic, the New Unity government allows free enterprise and business, although they do have more control over costs for commodities that are essential to life (such as medical care). Many corporations cater specifically to the UN government.

Major Corporations Listed here are some of the largest and more well known companies in the Macross saga.


OTEC – This was the original group founded in 1999 to reverse-engineer the Protoculture’s gunship that landed on South Ataria Island. It was OTEC that designed thethermonuclear reactor engine, the pinpoint barrier system and the hyper-alloy materials for their armor. They also developed reaction weaponry. Stonewell-Bellcom – Developed the VF-0/VF-1, VF-4 and the Destroid MBR & HWR series.

Shinnakasu – Co-develops the VF-5000 with Stonewell-Bellcom. Before merging with Stonewell-Bellcom, Shinnakasu was the leading manufacturer of thermonuclear turbine engines.

General Galaxy – Founded by ex-science officer of the Zentraedi Boddole Zer fleet, Algus Selzaa, their first project given to them by UN Spacy was the design and development of the VF-9 Cutlass, and later the VF-17 Nightmare. During Project Super Nova, they offered the YF-21. General Galaxy specializes in developing stealth fighters.

Shinsei Industries – This company was formed from the merging of Shinnakasu and Stonewell-Bellcom in 2012. Developed the VF-11 Thunderbolt and VF-16. During Project Super Nova, they offered the YF-19 designed by Yang Neumann. Northrom Grumman – Developed the VA-3 Invader. Co-developed the VB-6 with Shinnakasu. Specializes in heavy bomber technology. Also developed the Masamune battroid.

Mikoyan – This company co-developed the VAB-2 with Northrom Grumman, and the VA-14 with General Galaxy. Specializes in stealth bomber technology. Messer – This company co-developed the VF-14 with General Galaxy.

Viggers & Chrauler Corporations – Manufactures of heavy destroid and heavy weaponry technology. Designed the HWR technology.

Centinental Corporations / Kransman Group – Another destroid manufacturer conglomerate. Designed the Sparta and Spartan. Co-develops the Dehawk and Monster with Viggers/Chrauler. Specializes in MBR robotics.

Hughes Corporation – Primary manufacturer of GU (gun unit) weapons for variable fighters. Raytheon Industrial – This is one of the leading manufacturers of missile technology, sometimes working with Bifors and Erlikon.

Bifors Corporation – Another producer of missile technology.

Erlikon – Another producer of missile technology as well as high-power ballistic weapons for mecha.

Mauler Industries – A company that produces energy weapon technology, including lasers and particle beam cannons.

Ramington – A company that primarily makes mecha ballistic weapons, and some explosive components for missile warheads. Produced the mecha-scale hand grenade used by the VF-1 GPS unit.

Astra Weaponry Incorporated – This group exclusively deals with multi-weapon modules used by various destroid units.

Orguss Manufacturing Conglomerate – This group designed the VF-O-1A Orguss Valkyrie as a heavy combat mecha that combined the roles of the variable fighter and the destroid. Unfortunately the design had inherent flaws and not many units were made.

SDF-1 Onboard Weapon Factory – Not truly a company, the onboard factory produced the Phalanx and Maverick, and made designs for the SPD-1 Stampede.

Macross Consortium – While not truly a “company”, the Macross Consortium is the UN’s own science group, composed mostly of civilian contractors. They have been involved in the development of many different projects, including the virtual idol Sharon Apple.

Macross 7 Science Group – Again, not a true company. Lead by Dr. Gadget Chiba, they devised the sound energy theory and developed the Sound Energy System, Sound Booster, and Sound Buster Cannon technologies.

[squaresphere]

^ very good article. We also know that General Galaxy was able to pitch and sell the VF-22 as a special ops fighter and mass produced the VF-171 as the main stay fighter of the the MF fleet.

Shinsei officially "won" the super nova project with the VF-19 to be the next main stay fighter.

I figure the destriod mfgs are hurting right now as Valks seem to dominate the military purchases. Part of me would like to think the Destroids would be used more my civilian peace keeping forces, but M7 (they had those levicopters that had trans forming arms) and MF (they deploy tanks against the Vajra) show other wise.

[4Tran]

Originally Posted by Wild Goose

Point noted; come to think of it most of the time we see lasers they're used at close range... actually apart from Macross Zero it seems like the head lasers on valks have never been used at all; it's always the gunpod and the micromissiles getting mileage.

Oh, don't get me wrong; beam attenuation is only an issue at really long ranges like hundreds or thousands of kilometers. The more tightly focused it is, the more resistant it'll be to being weakened through attenuation.

Originally Posted by squaresphere

I figure the destriod mfgs are hurting right now as Valks seem to dominate the military purchases. Part of me would like to think the Destroids would be used more my civilian peace keeping forces, but M7 (they had those levicopters that had trans forming arms) and MF (they deploy tanks against the Vajra) show other wise.

It seems that the Macross fleets are different enough from one another that it'd be unwise to make any assumptions based on what we see from one or two of them. The other fleets (and perhaps the UN government itself) might rely much more on destroids.

[Tak]

Originally Posted by squaresphere

I figure the destriod mfgs are hurting right now as Valks seem to dominate the military purchases. Part of me would like to think the Destroids would be used more my civilian peace keeping forces, but M7 (they had those levicopters that had trans forming arms) and MF (they deploy tanks against the Vajra) show other wise.

Actually on the Macross 1/4, there were... a crapload of destroids on-board. So yeah, I am sure they are used in large quantities. Its just that tanks are not exactly phased out of the military, either.

- Tak

[Wild Goose]

Originally Posted by Tak

Actually on the Macross 1/4, there were... a crapload of destroids on-board. So yeah, I am sure they are used in large quantities. Its just that tanks are not exactly phased out of the military, either.

- Tak

The models we see on Quarter appear at first glance to be updated Destroid Cheyennes, the air defence Destroids docked with the Asuka II in Macross Zero; they seem to be doing better here, but then again the're a lot of them.

Twin gatlings ftw.

[Haesslich]

Originally Posted by 4Tran

On to the topic: there's no rule out there that states that energy weapons have to be more powerful than projectile ones; that's just a Gundam brainbug that's running around. Indeed, for the same energy expenditure, a kinetic energy weapon will be better at penetrating armor than an equivalent laser or particle beam. The advantage of an energy weapon is that you don't have to worry as much about recoil. In this case, the lightness of a Valkyrie coupled with the high rate of fire of a gunpod would indicate that the muzzle velocity of the rounds can't be all that high:
Valkyries have roughly the same specs, and they should have the same muzzle velocity (barring any exotic ammunition) unless they have some sort of inertial dampeners. Well, we know that Valkyries do have this kind of technology because they're rated with a g-limit of +20/-10 or better. A human being can only handle +9/-3.5 at maximum (modern aircraft do not exceed these limits for a reason), so there has to be some sort of compensating technology involved.

Given this fact, and the possibility of exotic penetrators, there really isn't any reason for the Valkyrie gunpods to have any worse penetration than their beams. And they most certainly will be more powerful than the head lasers.

Beams have one advantage over solid slug-based weapons, at least on paper - no ammo storage required. The theory is that, if you can get away from carrying ammunition, logistics is simplified (the gun runs off the power the platform produces, like any other system) and in THEORY you could boost the effectiveness of the energy weapon higher than for a kinetic-based weapon in the same-sized platform as you wouldn't have to (theoretically again) increase the size of a round or its payload to deliver more damage to a target.

Again, this is the theory... and in Gundam, the reason they give for beam weapons being so powerful is that they're particle weapons which, for a given size, deliver far more damage to a target whose armor is optimized to handle kinetic-energy impacts... but not a particle weapon. The breakthrough in Gundam was that you could put the power of a beam-cannon carried on a battleship on a far smaller, more maneuverable platform. Other Mobile Suits and Mobile Armors carried kinetic weapons for the most part, since they didn't have the superlative technology the Earth Federation had.

The other theoretical advantage is the lightspeed one - a kinetic weapon at relativistic ranges suffers from lag time, which means you have to project where a target will be when in order to hit it, unless it's a guided missile with its own onboard systems to maneuver... while a laser or particle-beam weapon will move at lightspeed or near-lightspeed, and have enough time to (theoretically) burn the target before it can get out of the way. Ignoring, of course, the problems with keeping a beam coherent at range, or that hitting a target from more than a few kilometers out moving at those speeds would take enough computer power that a kinetic weapon would probably do as well with a different approach (scattering shots in the general area the target would be).

But yes, the Macross universe does have a way to compensate for inertia... since it also has gravity control as a matter of course in its ships. With this sort of technology, you could (at least in theory) compensate for inertia by use of a small gravitic generator in the ship, which would counter inertia by projecting a field inverse to the direction of travel and thus negate a lot of the acceleration/deceleration effects... or at least, that's going to be the technobabble I'm going to use to explain why the Macross Quarter could suddenly decelerate without ripping everyone's spines out of their bodies, even WITH the bracing involved.

Originally Posted by Wild Goose

As for the head lasers... I've kinda always felt they were more of a last-ditch weapon, and the reason they used lasers was to save on space for ammo and the like. It's the valk equivalent of a 9mm pistol. Last ditch weapon for you to use while going down fighting, not something you want to be relying on as your primary weapon.

I thought the head lasers were more used for missile defense, as well as a utility tool that doubles as a last-ditch weapon, sorta like a bayonet for VF's. We've used them mostly for the former, as well as for cutting things when necessary, rather than as a common weapon... and we don't see a lot of lasers on later VF's, except as part of special test units (VF-21) or in Super configurations as secondary weapons (VF-1 Super pack, among others). I still suspect cooling's an issue with lasers, more than volume of fire, although that would be affected by cooling.

As for Destroids, they're not exactly OFFENSIVE weapons due to their limited mobility, except in ground-based situations where you've got good methods of deploying them. That's probably why we have the VB-6 Konig Monster; because it was recognized that, while firepower was good, not having it in the right spot really made for some hard situations. Example: when the Macross had to deal with what was basically a landing action by Quamzin... and his Glaug's maneuverability combined with that of the other pods ended up wiping most of the defending Destroids out. It was only Hikaru's holding action, along with Max and Hayao which kept them from invading the Macross (IIRC) before the Monsters showed up to deliver the extra firepower required to repel the assault.

Now, for air defense, the Mk. X Defenders and Phalanxes were great due to their guns and missiles... but honestly, outside of being deployed for rear defense or anti-air use, Destroids seem kinda limited in part due to the fact most all of the battles we see are SPACE battles, for which they're poorly equipped (read: they don't fly). On planetary bases, I'd expect more of them for the same reason tanks aren't used for air strikes.