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sebster wrote:
Was that the question? Fraz just announced 'helicopters kill them both', it didn't seem to be in response to anything specific. You agreed and I just thought I'd point out that while it's true, we still have tanks in the field because they do something that no other unit can do.

Confusion aside, I think we agree on this in general, yeah?

Indeed. Helos kill tanks and mechs good, but you need tanks, infantry, arty, air support, and anything else you can get your hands on working in conjunction to launch a succesfull attack.

Though all bets are off if the enemy has some pre-teen pilots/drivers/commanders at the helm...

Actually, if you adopt a "leave none alive" policy, you only need artillery and helicopters.

FM Ninja 048 wrote:Actually, if you adopt a "leave none alive" policy, you only need artillery and helicopters.

Or one really big bomb... or 1 super virus cell

Platuan4th wrote:Spock and Kirk OTP!

Yeah but who's the top and who's the bottom?

rubiksnoob wrote:

Heavy Gear attempts to reconcile many of the physical constraints on mecha to the near-modern battlefield, albeit with some glaringly silly side-effects. Their mecha are all basically 3-4m IFVs, and are deployed as essentially Infantry+. Even then there's lots of side-concessions to the idea that these things are basically extant because of the rule of cool, more than major practicality.

Tyyr wrote:

Platuan4th wrote:Spock and Kirk OTP!

Yeah but who's the top and who's the bottom?

Kirk's top.

I mean, look at his personality!

For almost all military tech theres really only one reason for it's existance (except for war etc offcourse) it's a counter to something.

Tanks started as anti-infantry fortresses, when everyone started using them, they we'r anti-infantry and other armoured vehicles.

Nowadays tank's are countered mostly by the airforce. So what is their specific role?

But following this line of thought. Name one thing a mech could counter that something we already have can't do? (better)

Track's are a much better platform for heavy weapons due to stability compared to anything bipedal. So if your gonna make huge ass mecha, you might as well make a huge ass tank that does the job better.

Gettin transports on 2 legs would be even dumber since you just painted a giant bullseye on your troop compartment.

In the case of recoilless energy weapons, your better off using light and speedy vehicles to capitalize on the lack of recoil.

Missiles can be fitted on most things so thats a no go too.

Armor on mechs would never be superior to tanks due to weight distribution.

So... did I miss something? Or can we put the final nail in the mechs coffin?

Rule of cool it is.

I'd go for rough terrain and urban combat as things that walkers can do that crawlers can't do well. During the First Chechen War's siege of Grozny the Chechnyans got some great mileage using tall buildings to shoot through the thin-top armour of Soviet armour.

Likewise the development of walker platforms like Big Dog shows the utility of infantry-level mobility. A Predator or similar close support aircraft may be able to loiter for hours and deliver heavy firepower, but they're useless against anyone with decent AA capability, and require a brutally long logistical tail.

One of the obstacles to the development of Big Dog was a fuel efficient engine since it was intended to make up for the logistical difficulties of mountainous terrain combined with donkeys. Abrams' tank are notorious for being both fuel hogs, and sucking up kerosene rather than diesel. Their weight and shape makes deployment of engineering vehicles a necessity since they can't move sideways, but tend to slide sideways on roads that can't support their weight.

Humanoid walkers I can understand why people might be skeptical, especially since the human form is so obviously not intelligently designed (but pretty fashionable, which makes up for it). Walkers based on arachnids and bugs, like the tachikomas would make better armour than the traditional tractor.

Fair enough, multi legs would be somewhat better. But would never be able to keep up with tracks, and lots of the same issues still come up.

And is a tank with legs really a mech?

As for the fuel efficient engine..... if they could make something like that now, they wouldn't waste it on a mech.

Wouldn't the legs be even more vulnerable to fire?

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Tracks can't keep up with ground-effect, wheels on roads, or helicopters. It doesn't seem to be an issue.
***Treads are substantially faster than wheels on terrain, and wheels in mud, which seems to occur any time there's conflict, especially with the Russians.

There are fuel-efficient engines. Given that war is about logistics, mechs (and other battlefield vehicles) are precisely what would benefit from them. Take the Abrams, its gas-guzzling turbine was chosen based on performance, not its safety, ease of use, or what have you (some claim that using kerosene simplifies supply-chain management: sure, if your tanks are being run by the airforce...). It was chosen for power and performance in order to fit with the popular "Shock and Awe" doctrine popular in Pentagon planning circles - the same doctrine that left the US forces in Iraq and Afghanistan under-equipped and under-manned to hold the territory they had captured.
***Why would a mech be more fuel efficient?

Given the methods of procurement for US military equipment, 'waste' isn't really an issue. The US is full of contractors and suppliers that sell equipment made by the lowest bidder and priced to sell to people who aren't spending their own money. Heck, if you want an entertaining example of the US military's emphasis on efficiency, take a look at the M4 carbine. Ask a circle of gun nuts to discuss it and the only thing they'll all agree on will be that 'efficiency' clearly was not the top priority in its design.
***really? define efficiency in regards to combat rifles. There are manufacturers that make them generally on par with good AKs (not crap Paki ones) on the price front. They were specifically designed to be more efficient in terms of weight and ammo and hence supply chain.

I don't think we should tanks at Mecca. Already enough problems in the region.

Frazzled wrote:Wouldn't the legs be even more vulnerable to fire?

Yes and no, it would be easier to take out an individual leg, but if your going for an arachnid build, taking out a single leg wouldn't hurt it as much as taking out a track.

Nurglitch wrote: Heck, if you want an entertaining example of the US military's emphasis on efficiency, take a look at the M4 carbine. Ask a circle of gun nuts to discuss it and the only thing they'll all agree on will be that 'efficiency' clearly was not the top priority in its design.

I'll just leave this here...

To be fair Dogma, that was forced on the military by Congress. I know the Marines tried to kill it at least twice.
Can it even land conventually - looks to be a manipulated cabin so that it might, but those rotors still look to big for a runway landing. Yergh.


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Soladrin wrote:

Frazzled wrote:Wouldn't the legs be even more vulnerable to fire?

Yes and no, it would be easier to take out an individual leg, but if your going for an arachnid build, taking out a single leg wouldn't hurt it as much as taking out a track.

COurse if you take out two legs on a sid you toplle it, which is worse than just getting the tank stuck in.

Frazzled wrote:To be fair Dogma, that was forced on the military by Congress. I know the Marines tried to kill it at least twice.
Can it even land conventually - looks to be a manipulated cabin so that it might, but those rotors still look to big for a runway landing. Yergh.

The biggest issue is that its a vehicle designed for hot landings that cannot jink.

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BigDog is, however, a logistical support vehicle. Which is probably the best place for anything moving on legs...moving loads too hevy for the infantry through terrain too rough for vehicles. Spider APCs and mechanical mules are probably the most mech~esque we'd get in the real world.

Nurglitch wrote:
Actually the Osprey is yet another example of technology advancing to satisfy specifications. It's not like there were a bunch of tilt-wing aircraft lying around and someone said: "Hey, think we can sell excess stock to the Pentagon?"

But the Osprey was developed in accordance with a request for a vehicle that could "...take off and land vertically but also could carry combat troops, and do so at speed..." not a request for a tilt-rotor aircraft. Though, admittedly, that sort of design follows easily.

dogma wrote:

Frazzled wrote:To be fair Dogma, that was forced on the military by Congress. I know the Marines tried to kill it at least twice.
Can it even land conventually - looks to be a manipulated cabin so that it might, but those rotors still look to big for a runway landing. Yergh.

The biggest issue is that its a vehicle designed for hot landings that cannot jink.

Or deccelerate and land...

Or take off and accelerate...

Calling C&C, we need Orca's !

Nurglitch wrote:Ah yes, the Osprey. So efficient not even Dick Cheney could kill it.

Military applications for walkers?

Meh
This is faster, stronger, longer distance, cheaper, from existing current technology, and chicks dig it.
http://www.yamaha-motor.com/sport/products/modelhome/66/0/home.aspx
http://www.yamaha-motor.com/sport/products/modelfeatures/66/0/features.aspx

Nurglitch wrote:Nuclear frickin' weapons, where the amount of fear is equal to the megatons of feth you that the weapon is designed to convey.

They're scary because they can kill you. Not because they look scary.

The argument put forward by people in this thread is that mechs would be valuable because they look scary, and I countered with the point that there isn't a single weapon in use or on the design table right now which has 'look scary' as part of it's design.

Because soldiers aren't stupid, and as such they're more afraid of lethal weapons than they are of scary looking ones.


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FM Ninja 048 wrote:Actually, if you adopt a "leave none alive" policy, you only need artillery and helicopters.

Not really, no.

Saturation bombing has proven quite ineffective at actually killing the enemy. It is wonderful at stopping his ability to manouvre, taking out his major hardware, and at suppressing him, but once the enemy has gone to ground the majority of his troops are likely to survive whatever bombs and missiles you throw into the area. Look at the Battle of the Somme, the Allied artillery was incredible and turned the place into a moonscape, but when the assault began it was found almost all the German forces were still alive and well.

If you want to actually defeat an enemy who is willing to dig holes in the ground and sit there until you stop firing artillery, you need infantry and tanks.


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Soladrin wrote:For almost all military tech theres really only one reason for it's existance (except for war etc offcourse) it's a counter to something.

To flip that around a little, I'd argue new platforms are developed to achieve something, which may or may not be blowing up another type of unit.

Tanks were developed as a way of increasing the chances of a breakthrough against an infantry line. The capabilities of the tank have changed, as has the range of possible counters, but it fundamentally performs the same role now as it did then.

If you want to assault a hardened enemy position, then artillery and helicopters are great, but limited in what they can offer to the infantry who are doing the hard yards. In the course of that assault you will want a platform that can dominate an area and destroy anything that comes into it, and that means you will want a tank.


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Nurglitch wrote:I'd go for rough terrain and urban combat as things that walkers can do that crawlers can't do well. During the First Chechen War's siege of Grozny the Chechnyans got some great mileage using tall buildings to shoot through the thin-top armour of Soviet armour.

But putting a unit on legs doesn't change that vulnerability.

Humanoid walkers I can understand why people might be skeptical, especially since the human form is so obviously not intelligently designed (but pretty fashionable, which makes up for it). Walkers based on arachnids and bugs, like the tachikomas would make better armour than the traditional tractor.

Multiple legs are more practical, as are much, much smaller mechs. As in, man sized or thereabouts, might be practical. But then you're looking at walkers that are replacing infantry, not ones that are replacing tanks.


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Nurglitch wrote:Tracks can't keep up with ground-effect, wheels on roads, or helicopters. It doesn't seem to be an issue.

You don't build an infantry force around the requirement to keep up with helicopters. That doesn't make any sense.

The majority of troops are brought forward in APCs, that's what you want to keep pace with. Tanks do this. A walker doesn't.

You could, possibly, consider a walker that can be carried to the front in an APC, but as I pointed out above you're still talking about a weapon that is replacing infantry, not one that is replacing tanks.


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dogma wrote:I'll just leave this here...

(img snipped)

And I'll just leave this...




So yeah, the US military has wasted a load of money on all kinds of projects. But if 'they've wasted money on useless crap before' is the biggest reason to predict mechs in the future, I'm not sure the case is that likely.

sebster wrote:
The argument put forward by people in this thread is that mechs would be valuable because they look scary, and I countered with the point that there isn't a single weapon in use or on the design table right now which has 'look scary' as part of it's design.

Way to not get it.

Only Kan made the argument that they're scary because they "look scary". Mechs are scary because they tap into human psychology in addition to being generally intimidating. There's a reason that the majority of monsters in mythology are large to outright enormous beings. Humanity has an inborn fear to things significantly larger than ourselves, and people have used that to their advantage in war for centuries, such as Hannibal and his elephants(which were only effective until the Romans were used to seeing them) and tanks in WW1. WW2 Germany didn't try to build a super-heavy tank for its effectiveness.

Platuan4th wrote:Way to not get it.

Only Kan made the argument that they're scary because they "look scary". Mechs are scary because they tap into human psychology in addition to being generally intimidating.

That's what looking scary is.

There's a reason that the majority of monsters in mythology are large to outright enormous beings. Humanity has an inborn fear to things significantly larger than ourselves, and people have used that to their advantage in war for centuries, such as Hannibal and his elephants(which were only effective until the Romans were used to seeing them) and tanks in WW1. WW2 Germany didn't try to build a super-heavy tank for its effectiveness.

The Nazis didn't do much on the basis of effectiveness, particularly in the latter half of the war. As a result they squandered the industrial capacity of almost all of continential Europe to end up getting beat by a bunch of communists.

And again, please provide an example of one, just one weapon currently operating in the world today, or on the design table of any weapons developer, that has 'looking scary' (or 'taps into human psychology in addition to being generally intimidating' if you want to pretend that's somehow different) as an element of it's design.

You scare people by threatening to kill them, and the fear that comes from that can't ever be met by 'tapping into human psychology in addition to being generally intimidating'.

sebster wrote:The argument put forward by people in this thread is that mechs would be valuable because they look scary, and I countered with the point that there isn't a single weapon in use or on the design table right now which has 'look scary' as part of it's design.

Between two things able to weather any small arms fire you're able to bring against it and bring enough firepower to tear you apart in the blink of an eye, which is going to have more of an impact: a large tracked vehicle that can't operate effectively in narrow streets, and has a low vantage point, or the fifteen foot tall walker no wider than a car, with a vantage point comparable to a sniper on a rooftop?

Because soldiers aren't stupid, and as such they're more afraid of lethal weapons than they are of scary looking ones.

In this day age, most of the combat isn't against soldiers, it's against glorified gangsters who are particularly known for being superstitious. Against any conventional army, we have such things as cluster bombs able to wipe out an entire tank column, and non-nuclear munitions able to level city blocks.

Saturation bombing has proven quite ineffective at actually killing the enemy. It is wonderful at stopping his ability to manouvre, taking out his major hardware, and at suppressing him, but once the enemy has gone to ground the majority of his troops are likely to survive whatever bombs and missiles you throw into the area. Look at the Battle of the Somme, the Allied artillery was incredible and turned the place into a moonscape, but when the assault began it was found almost all the German forces were still alive and well.

Wasn't that artillery rather inaccurate and primitive compared to modern artillery and ordnance?

You could, possibly, consider a walker that can be carried to the front in an APC, but as I pointed out above you're still talking about a weapon that is replacing infantry, not one that is replacing tanks.

Since this whole thing is predicated on the idea of having functional legs, why not airdropping them at/near their destination? If we assume a powerplant based around a jet engine, like you have with the Abrams, or just the inclusion of a jet engine for this specific purpose, I don't think it's infeasible to assume it could also be designed to provide downwards thrust, cushioning a fall to the extent that the legs could manage the impact, literally hitting the ground running, as the case may be.