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Mech taking out large pirate station
Mech goes jurassic park
Mech testing in the desert
Demonstration of ICBM on mech
Boxer mech destroys heavy metal poles
Ditto, but 7x7 poles
Mech outruns max RPM rotor wheels
Also, BlackArmor's mech collection is regarded as the best, if not, one of the best out there.
Jaeger Titan
These are probably the best mechs we'll get to see in this game. They:
Even though halipatsui and BlackArmor have some of the best mechs out there, they're still combat wise not very good. It only takes 3 rockets at one leg and the mech is (usually) already doomed. You're better off with AI drones.
Yes, exactly my problem.... tho hlipatsui has some cool ideas
now in the space engineers universe, that changes. trying to pilot a mech in the way they would in mechwarrior is neigh impossible, would take some heavy modding and scripting in order to use mouse aiming and wasd to walk around and redirect your legs. not to mention, melee would basically be out because physical contact between grids almost always results in things being a little over damaged.
well that is plain and simple wrong...because you are comparing a 100 tone mech to 5 or 10 tone tanks....if a 100t tank went up against a 100t mech the tank would come out on top
Even that advantage is speculative and tenuous. Mechs really don't have anything going for them other than cool factor.
Though I say go for it. Making the non-optimal work can be fun.
In anime they like to boast about their speed, weapon stength, adaptability, and survivability, but none of these claims are true..
Claim: Mechs can climb terrain tanks can't.
Reality: Mechs are limited by their legs. Their center of mass is so high they're likely to fall, and without useable hands, they can only climb flat terrain, and hills as steep as their legs can raise.
Claim: They're durable, because spider mechs can loose a leg and keep going.
Reality: This is true, but a classic case of over-engineering.
Claim: [Weak points]
Reality: Mechs rely on their joints. The joints are hard to armor, so shooting these areas can quickly cripple a mech. Tanks have similar weaknesses, but defend their treds with armor, and their cannon's rotor is under the cannon and covered in armor.
Claim: They're extremely mobile.
Reality: Because a mech needs to turn it's whole torso to aim it's weapon, it's mobility is diminished. Tanks only turn their gun. This minimizing the weight, and maximizes mobility.
Claim: Mechs are dangerous even when their ammo is depleted.
Reality: Ramming the enemy is a weak offense. A mech's punches would be especially weak due to the low foce behind each blow, and the damage that the mech would also recieve. A mech can also be easily crippled at clsoe range. A standard tank is more well designed for ramming due to it's solid structure and protected treds. This being said, getting so close to the enemy is still a weak offense as you are a much easier target to destroy.
Claim: They are faster than traditional tank designs.
Reality: They aren't. It's like comparing a runner to a bicicalist. A runner needs to move their legs, constantly wasteing energy to keep up their momentum. A tank picks up speed and uses little energy to maintain that momentum.
Claim: A mech's weaponry is easily changed.
Reality: Even in the most ideal situation, where a mech could bend over and pick up a weapon from the ground, it would still need a weapon specifically designed to be picked up and fired by the mech's design. It would also need to calibrate it's aim, and account for a likely balancing issue. With it's center of mass changes, the mech may be more prone to falling over. Real tanks sometimes have compatable weapons designed for them. Either way, the process of removing a weapon and installing a new one is always challenging. A mech might be better at adapting on the fly, but the weapons would need to be designed for the mech. Real tanks don't do this because using a single weapon that's pre-prepared increases its efficiency, and damage during instalation is minimized.
Claim: Mechs have immense firepower.
Reality: Due to a mech's high center of mass, the recoil of high powered weapons are more likely to cause the mech to fall backwards. Designing a mech to bolt to the ground is a design mechanic, compensating for the high center of mass. It's much easier to lower the center of mass, than to rely on extra machinery that may fail. A traditional tank design has a low center of mass And a large surface area with the ground. Both of these factors substantially reduce the tank's liklihood of flipping, and allow them to carry larger weaponry. In real life, their lethality is heavily influenced by the ammunition they fire, while a stronger cannon increases their range.
Claim: A single mech with a skilled pilot can defeat an entire enemy batalion.
Reality: What evedence is there for this? While a mech's height increases the area it can view and fire upon, it also exponentially increases the number of people who can fire upon it. Using a height advantage also implies that the mech is operating in close quarters to the enemy, but this means that humans using anti-armor/tank weaponry will be especially effective at disabling the mech. Historical records show us that tanks were very ineffective at close range combat as enemy troops can attach explosive to a vehicle's weak area. It's likely that mech's would also suffer from this weakness (human injenuity). Also, animes tend to exagerate the efficency of a good pilot. Even a great pilot will fail against a large group. The average human is much more skilled and dangerous than most assume. Also also, a height advantage does little good against a skilled engineer, as modern weaponry can be fired from a great distance away, arcing towards its target. This is while missiles are so dangerous. Some modern tanks have autonimous, anti-missile defense systems, so unless your mech has that, the mech's heights may be more of a weakness than advantage.
Conclusion: While a mech can be very visually interesting and fun to build, its size and design weaken its armor, weapon strength, and mobility. Many war veterans attribute their surviving a battle to their tank's cannon turning faster than the enemy's.
And there is nothing that prevents a crewman from doing this with a tank. The movie Firefox speculated about a fighter jet that had weapons controlled by the pilot's brain. The pilot still FLEW the thing but the reaction time advantage of even a second or two was a big advantage.
The Bolo books had cybernetic tanks, the earliest of which could have human crew but they were optional and, after cybernetic brains were perfected, actually detrimental to the vehicle's performance.
Sadly, unless the Mech AND their environment are designed to work in concert (all Mechs have hands, the environment has Mech'sized ladders and doors, special weapons etc) then it's back to the cool factor.
Edit: Except maybe for height. The Battletech universe sees Mechs that are 30' tall. That's a good height advantage for things like taking cover and firing over or around something, sighting to the horizon etc. However, such an advantage would be so situational as to not be worth the extreme cost of the Mech.
The fact that such machines have little basis in reality means they're perfect in fantasy. Even in harder scifi, otherwise realistic physics are fudged to make the concept of oversized humanoid robots practical. Decades of writing, drawing, and game design have made mecha an indispensable stable of science fiction.
For my part, I'm cheered by the many mecha designs on the workshop and saddened that none of them are practical in-game. What we could really use are mecha legs an engineer simply has to weld onto a grid, same as a wheel or thruster. No scripting, no complicated controls, no clang-tempting assemblies. Just stick'em on, and the grid move and controls like the engineer himself. I had a whole suggestion thread made up some weeks ago.
https://steamcommunity.com/app/244850/discussions/2/1696048426803895815/
Don't sweat the realism. Very few concepts humanity depends on have anything to do with reality.
Very few concepts humanity is entertained by have anything to do with reality.
As a battlefield concept I can only think of mechs in terms of either at the end of two extremes, one "lightweight" and the other "heavyweight"; such that the heavyweight is more akin to a semi mobile land battleship and carrier. In this, the design can afford to have enough armor on it to take the beating for its lack of speed.
*Edit (addition to previous)
Armored Core: For Answer had a few 'mechs' that fit into what could be defined in a "heavyweight" category. The most famous one that I can recall was Arms Fort Spirit of Motherwill, which might as well have been a walking fort knox. Trailer showed it shooting what must have been 100s of missiles at something. (In game you destroy it by flying directly at it a 'high' speed, getting close and exploiting a design flaw).
I wanted SE to be realistic because I will never be an astronaut, and I won't be alive when we're mining asteroids for resources. I know it was never meant to be a "simulation" game, but the devs bandied the word "realistic" about with regularity early on... that's a big part of what drew me to it.