What even is the Champion?

[Mulqueeny]

It looks like someone salvaged a VTOL and Stuck some mech legs on it.

An Absolute Frankenmech.

[Comrade Gimchi]

I'm not as versed in battletech lore as others but I believe lots of the battlemechs were designed by aerospace companies who make spaceships.

[Mulqueeny]

Escrito originalmente por Nilnus:

I'm not as versed in battletech lore as others but I believe lots of the battlemechs were designed by aerospace companies who make spaceships.

Well, they should stick to Spaceships haha.

[Bovril Brigadier]

Champion was designed and built by Bergan Industries, same people behind the Locust.
It's a project of corporate lobbying. More surprised there isn't lore it has go faster stripes on it as the creators wanted speed and firepower over all else.

[Mulqueeny]

Escrito originalmente por Strayed:

Champion was designed and built by Bergan Industries, same people behind the Locust.
It's a project of corporate lobbying. More surprised there isn't lore it has go faster stripes on it as the creators wanted speed and firepower over all else.

Thanks, Now I gotta paint a spider blue and go Sanic.

[CynSys | Platius Cyndar]

Fun fact, there was a Champion LAM prototype. Sadly, it never worked

[Cursed Hawkins]

Escrito originalmente por (Mulqueeny):

Escrito originalmente por Nilnus:

I'm not as versed in battletech lore as others but I believe lots of the battlemechs were designed by aerospace companies who make spaceships.

Well, they should stick to Spaceships haha.

I wouldn't make too much fun of the Champion since its shape is likely what was used when mechs like the Uziel were to look given they have a similar structure appearance.
https://www.sarna.net/wiki/Champion

https://www.sarna.net/wiki/Uziel

[Mulqueeny]

Escrito originalmente por Cursed Hawkins:

Escrito originalmente por (Mulqueeny):

Well, they should stick to Spaceships haha.

I wouldn't make too much fun of the Champion since its shape is likely what was used when mechs like the Uziel were to look given they have a similar structure appearance.
https://www.sarna.net/wiki/Champion

https://www.sarna.net/wiki/Uziel

Yeah but at least the Uziel, looks like something...

The champ wouldn't be too bad if they just removed those pointless arms for something better.

[owen8964]

Escrito originalmente por (Mulqueeny):

Escrito originalmente por Cursed Hawkins:

I wouldn't make too much fun of the Champion since its shape is likely what was used when mechs like the Uziel were to look given they have a similar structure appearance.
https://www.sarna.net/wiki/Champion

https://www.sarna.net/wiki/Uziel

Yeah but at least the Uziel, looks like something...

The champ wouldn't be too bad if they just removed those pointless arms for something better.

Agree the Champion is an ugly mech. On the other hand it is actually a decent 60 ton mech and there aren't many of those, especially for lancemates with the empty arms protecting the weapons in the torso.

[pete]

oh I like the look - its just your regulation 60 ton rubbish

[Silent_Shadow]

Originally the champion used to have weird wedge wing things instead of the pontoon things it has for arms now.

The company that designed the champion also tried to make it into a Land-Air-Mech (LAM) which is basically a mech that could turn into an airplane or a land mech (hence the name); the wings may have been added early on with the idea of easy conversions to LAMs later on, but the concept was proven too impractical for mechs of this tonnage and never 'got off the ground.'

Likely the wing arms got replaced with the pontoon things with winches for recovering other mechs and other armored vehicles; You see winches on a lot of other things.

[Mulqueeny]

Escrito originalmente por Silent_Shadow:

Originally the champion used to have weird wedge wing things instead of the pontoon things it has for arms now.

The company that designed the champion also tried to make it into a Land-Air-Mech (LAM) which is basically a mech that could turn into an airplane or a land mech (hence the name); the wings may have been added early on with the idea of easy conversions to LAMs later on, but the concept was proven too impractical for mechs of this tonnage and never 'got off the ground.'

Likely the wing arms got replaced with the pontoon things with winches for recovering other mechs and other armored vehicles; You see winches on a lot of other things.

I see they wanted it to be a transformer haha.

[Noop]

Escrito originalmente por owen8964:

Agree the Champion is an ugly mech. On the other hand it is actually a decent 60 ton mech and there aren't many of those, especially for lancemates with the empty arms protecting the weapons in the torso.

Yeah I have found it to be a pretty good mech for the AI. No hardpoints on the arms means less chance of losing weapons. Can still pack a decent punch with a nice selection of torso hardpoint options. Good speed to boot. The Charger-1A5 is similar at the assault level.

[Cursed Hawkins]

Escrito originalmente por Noop:

Escrito originalmente por owen8964:

Agree the Champion is an ugly mech. On the other hand it is actually a decent 60 ton mech and there aren't many of those, especially for lancemates with the empty arms protecting the weapons in the torso.

Yeah I have found it to be a pretty good mech for the AI. No hardpoints on the arms means less chance of losing weapons. Can still pack a decent punch with a nice selection of torso hardpoint options. Good speed to boot. The Charger-1A5 is similar at the assault level.

Ok you had a decent case... then you compared the Champion to that of the Charger.

[Bovril Brigadier]

Escrito originalmente por (Mulqueeny):

Escrito originalmente por Silent_Shadow:

Originally the champion used to have weird wedge wing things instead of the pontoon things it has for arms now.

The company that designed the champion also tried to make it into a Land-Air-Mech (LAM) which is basically a mech that could turn into an airplane or a land mech (hence the name); the wings may have been added early on with the idea of easy conversions to LAMs later on, but the concept was proven too impractical for mechs of this tonnage and never 'got off the ground.'

Likely the wing arms got replaced with the pontoon things with winches for recovering other mechs and other armored vehicles; You see winches on a lot of other things.

I see they wanted it to be a transformer haha.

Problem is that snippet of lore didn't really come around till like two decades after the Champion showed up in the tabletop.
It probably worth noting that the Champion has some striking visual similarities to a bunch of other SLDF 2750 era lighter designs if going by original artwork. Speaking of art, original artwork those "arms" housed the weapons and were actually more like gun pods looking more like the weapons retracted into them. So maybe the Champion was meant to be a LAM all along, or could have very well meant to actually been a modular Mech a progenitor of the Omni, who knows as not first Mech to have artwork that have zero resemblance to its stats. Doesn't help as well that earlier artwork has some significant design changes over later appearances of the Mech.
tl;dr PGI made it too much of a wide boi and should have gone more with original artwork.

[Squishy_Supreme]

The original first release of the pen and paper game was literally a copy of Macross and their mechs, with some dice rolling and rules added. So hybrid-form mechs with wings were common as those were the die-cast models that were available at the time to play with. A lot of the odd looking mechs we see were attempts by the company to alter things to not get sued into oblivion (which nearly happened anyways.. lol) So we get oddities like the Champion. lol. Or the Marauder, which is literally an alt Glaug Officer's battle pod.
The REAL fun is the retcon filler backstory that is made decades later. Look, you ripped off Macross and then got caught. Deal with it. lol.