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Discussion of the viability of Mobile Suits in our reality
Topic Started: Jun 4 2010, 01:56 PM (1,255 Views)
winseven
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Discuss the viability of Mobile Suits in our reality.

Conditions are not right for mobile suits currently; the raison 'd etre of mobile suits is to replace entire tank and other land unit squadrons for more cost-effectiveness, however given the low likelihood of a full-fledged war breaking out in the world currently, it's more efficient for the army to retain its current structure as you can spread tank unit deployments over a larger area than you can with a mobile suit.

Also, ten guerillas with rocket launchers can easily take out most mobile suits that can be built in the next few centuries if they go for the joints. Of course they could install machine guns in its appendages, but that only gives the mobile suit a little more fighting chance; it still loses on average.
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Lusankya ★★★★
Deus Ex Crucio
Bipedal war machines are horrible, horrible ideas. There is absolutely no conceivable practical reason whatsoever to mount a war machine on two legs. The problems of walkers in general are horrifically magnified by only two legs; if even one leg is destroyed the machine topples over. Moreover, the specific walking mechanics of bipedal units is much more complicated than walkers with more than two legs, again increasing the degree of unnecessary complexity.

I can give you my full rant on walkers when I have more time. But rest assured that giant bipedal walkers will never, ever, be preferable to anything except a one-legged walker from a practical standpoint. Smaller mobile suits that are actually suits rather than giant mechs are a different matter.

(in fact, giant anythings in general are a bad idea. There's a reason why the US Navy's retired all of its battleships. The only reason carriers are as big as they are is because they have to be, to launch and land planes)
Edited by Lusankya, Jun 4 2010, 02:16 PM.
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Mewcario
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The Doctor
As a former soldier, I can see so many things wrong with mobile suits, it's not even funny. First is the overall shear weight of the machine. Transporting these things would be more difficult than transporting tanks. Then there's fuel consumption, maintenance would be a nightmare, and they make for very big targets. Not just that, but a big target like that even in storage is a problem as the enemy would be able to find instillation much more easily. The closest, most viable option, should the technology ever be developed, would be something akin to Iron Man/War Machine/ Samus Aron/Master Chief suits, but even then those would cost the military a pretty penny.
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Behind this mask there is more than just flesh. Behind this mask there is an idea, Mr. Creedy. And ideas are bulletproof.
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Neo ★★★★
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The Dark Emissary
Its extremely doubtful the military would ever use mobile suits or anything that closely resembles them, such as the AT-ST or AT-AT walkers from Star Wars. As those movies show, even the most primitive of means can neutralize them. However, if tow cables or battering rams were used on Abrams tanks, very little, if any, effectiveness would be achieved. The main issue there would be getting a tank through a dense forever, however.

Tanks and planes will undoubtedly change in style and performance as history has proven, but the general shape and function of them both will remain the same as each of them has their own "niche" in warfare. The concept of mobile suits fails because there is nothing realistic that mobile suits can do better that tanks and fighter planes can't.

The AMP Suits from the movie Avatar also share the same glaring weakness of being rendered helpless upon being knocked down. However, if the RDA had used tank variants with their current level of technology, they never would have been as easily destroyed by Hammerhead Titanotheres. On the contrary, the lack of heavy mobile artillery on behalf of the RDA is likely one of the major causes for failure.

Gundams, on the other hand, are too fictional to be realistically applicable. No level of technology could defy so many numerous laws of physics.
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rust
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Dungeon Master

If we ever saw Mobile Suits in terrestrial warfare, we'd probably only see something like a Tragos.

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For space battles, though, if we don't have Gundams, I'd be incredibly disappointed. XD
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Lusankya ★★★★
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No rust, not even that. xP
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Skiiage
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Champion of Justice
GUNTANK BITCHES

No, I kid. Even the Guntank is incredibly problematic as a design. But while nobody actually expects the emergence of giant 18m tall weapons of mass destruction that are the Mobile Suits, the powered armour design like the Arm Slave from Full Metal Panic! and other works are basically the best thing that ever happened to the military, and they're still working their ass off to find a good power source for one.

I am Iron Man and so on.
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Lusankya ★★★★
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Nah. The military's not that interested in powered suits. The life of one soldier is not worth the billions of dollars one suit would cost to them.
Edited by Lusankya, Jun 4 2010, 09:39 PM.
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Skiiage
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Champion of Justice
Considering they are actually researching powered suits, I'd say they are interested. If they could compress the cost to be comparable to a tank, it would make most ground combat vehicles obsolete. But screw that.

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Lusankya ★★★★
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Skiiage
Jun 4 2010, 09:50 PM
Considering they are actually researching powered suits, I'd say they are interested. If they could compress the cost to be comparable to a tank, it would make most ground combat vehicles obsolete. But screw that.
Not really. Whatever armor you can mount on a person isn't going to stand up to a tank cannon of comparable technological level. They may be researching powered suits, but it's nothing like what's in comic books, movies, or anime.
Edited by Lusankya, Jun 4 2010, 09:58 PM.
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Skiiage
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Champion of Justice
I don't think the point of making a person faster, stronger, and tougher via technological enhancements is letting the soldier get shot by a tank. Just saying.

But giant robots are a man's romance, so I'm going to illogically believe in their eventual existence anyway.
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Lusankya ★★★★
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Skiiage
Jun 4 2010, 10:17 PM
I don't think the point of making a person faster, stronger, and tougher via technological enhancements is letting the soldier get shot by a tank. Just saying.

But giant robots are a man's romance, so I'm going to illogically believe in their eventual existence anyway.
The point of everything is not to get shot at all, but that doesn't mean they won't be shot.
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Shen
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The Godhand

rust
Jun 4 2010, 07:34 PM
For space battles, though, if we don't have Gundams, I'd be incredibly disappointed. XD
Despite being one of the biggest Mobile Suit supporters currently on this forum, besides rust and ski (just look at my avatar!), I have to agree with the other negative views on Mobile Suits. They're REALLY fun to have in RPs and games, but that's just it; fun doesn't mean realistic or practical. The mechanics and physics for these war machines make it nearly impossible for them to become more useful than the vehicles in use today.

That's not to say that I don't see a usefulness, at least somewhat. Mobile suits are incredibly more mobile than tanks or other ground vehicles that don't compensate for unpredictable conditions and terrain features that impede travel or combat by vehicle. Depending on how they are made, they can be even a bit lighter without sacrificing protection in the spots that count. And they can have a greater array of weaponry available to use than conventional tanks or other military vehicles, removing the need to make different models of vehicles to cover an array of needs in the warzone.

However, those are only in absolutely perfect circumstances, something that seems to evade war machine development for generations. And mobile suits, if EVER, are years, decades, possibly centuries from beginning development. And it would take even longer before the technology would ever have the potential to be anywhere near practical. But making actual mobile suits would take ages to perfect, and again, situations with development have to be absolutely perfect to make mobile suits actually as practical as seen in shows (ex. Code Geass, and Gundam...uh...anything XD) and games (ex. Xenogears and Xenosaga).

As for Gundams...Neo's right, they defy too many laws of logic and physics to ever be real. rust, I'm sorry to say, I'm gonna say no to Gundams in space. Because there is NOTHING they can do in space that can't be done better by starfighters and similar starships. You just think they look cool enough to justify it =P
Edited by Shen, Jun 4 2010, 11:54 PM.
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Mafisto
The Itallian Stalion
Walkers are just a bad idea in general. Being bipedal, it has a less stable firing platform then a tank. You would have a major design flaw that it would be nearly impossible to work around. Due to this lack of firepower, a walker is by in no means cost effective. It would have massive amounts of armor, and for what? The dinky little gun you can stick on it? The amount of metal that went into the armor plating alone would be enough for two if not three tanks. What we should be developing is new and more effective munitions, not war machines. In this day and age, we produce rounds that can disable an entire tank in one shot, and a Walker is just a bipedal tank. In my opinion, that would just make it easier to neutralize then a tank. Take the Prawn Walker in District 9. It was disabled in what, 4 shots? Keep in mind though, it had advanced Alien technology for weapons, and a force field. A Mercenary felled a giant walker in 4 shots, and he didn't even know where the weak points were.

The battlefields of today are basically just luck. Everything can destroy everything, it just depends on who has more. It's paper/scissors/rock. A Tank beats infantry (depending on there Kits), Air Strikes take out Tanks, and Infantry destroys the Air Planes. It all really depends on who the armys' commander is, how well they are supplied, how effectively they deploy there troops, and how well trained those troops are.
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Shen
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The Godhand

Mafisto
Jun 7 2010, 02:54 AM
...and Infantry destroys the Air Planes.
Really? I've never heard of an F/A-22 Raptor being taken down by soldiers before...Care to point me to that bulletin? XD
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