[TrashMan]

Starsiege? I still have that game somewhere. Was great.


This is a Starsiege HERC

http://the-junkyard.net/vehicles-ss2845.php   <---more nice pics

[Colonol Dekker]

I was always fond of Harabecs (mark hamil and founder of the Phoenix tribe) Predator stealth hovertank.

Also i wish i could mount MFACS onto my FS2 fighters

[Commander Zane]

Starsiege? I still have that game somewhere. Was great.


This is a Starsiege HERC

http://the-junkyard.net/vehicles-ss2845.php   <---more nice pics

Well...technically, it's an Earthsiege HERC since it's been in Earthsiege 2 which was before Starsiege.

And I wish that 2845 mod didn't ****ing DIE.

[General Battuta]

Huh.  I'm going to have to say HERC.  Mechs do have a lot of armor, but I don't think ferro-fibrous armor and endo steel chassis will last long against plasma cannons, and anything short of a bunch of missiles, a Gauss Rifle, a PPC, or an X-Pulse Large Laser probably won't do much to a HERC's energy screens.  Plus HERC's have a fair amount of pretty tough armor themselves I'm guessing.

PPCs are plasma cannons and mechs soak up plenty of them.

And you forgot ultra autocannons.

[Commander Zane]

Particle Projection Cannon is a plasma cannon?

[Scotty]

They aren't, but Plasma cannons in BT aren't the same.  They mostly raise heat (the rifles) or do some damage.  I can't recall exactly at the moment, because I don't have my Total Warfare book in front of me.

[General Battuta]

wut

Look, there are plasma weapons (the plasma rifle and plasma gun) in Battletech, both of which, ironically, are LESS plasma weapons than the PPC. The plasma rifle fires basically chunks of superheated foam crap, and the plasma gun is sort of a flamethrower deal (I forget its actual name.)

A PPC fires bolts of protons or ionized atoms. It's a plasma cannon. It's been around far longer than those newfangled 'plasma' weapons and it's definitely one itself.

[Polpolion]

a bunch of missiles

LRM-20. 20 is a bunch. Many, many mechs mount these, or some quantity of missiles that adds up to greater than 20.

a Gauss Rifle,

The Mad Cat MKII, the Fafnir, and the Templar all mount two of them, not to mention the myriad others that mount at least one.

a PPC

The Puma is a 35 ton light mech that mounts two of them. It's not an uncommon weapon.

or an X-Pulse Large Laser

The Templar mounts two of these, in addition to two light Gauss rifles.

And neither of us mentioned LBX autocannons, much less normal autocannons.

[General Battuta]

Or Heavy Gauss Rifles, or HAGs, or HE-ATMs...but, uh, let's not turn this into a dumb versus argument, because Earthsiege/Starsiege is also pretty cool.

[Scotty]

Most 'Mechs do not actually mount LRM20s.  A lot of them mount 20 missiles, but not all in one package.  Granted some of them do, like the Mad Dog, but not always.  Even dedicated missile boats like the Catapult do not always mount LRM20s.

Even better, the Fafnir mounts two HEAVY Gauss rifles .  Although, once again, the others that mount them rarely mount another very large gun.

The Adder (it is not the Puma ) mounts two in it's Prime configuration only.  Even better, they are ERPPCs.  Anyway, let's not forget the Hollander, which is like an Adder, but it has a Guass rifle .

Now that that is over, let me ask one question.  Why are we comparing these?  Has this come down to a "My universe is better than your universe?"

Anyway, for perspective on the pain these babies dish out:  The main gun on an M1A2 Abrams is considered a medium rifle in BattleTech.  It does a grand total of three damage to BattleTech armor.  For comparison, a PPC (non-upgraded) inflicts ten, and a gauss rifle 15.  A heavy gauss does something on the order of 25 at close range.  Put in perspecitve (again) a ton of armor protects against 16 damage for standard armor.  FF is slightly better, at 18 for Inner Sphere and 20 for Clan.

[Polpolion]

The Adder (it is not the Puma )

What's wrong with the IS designations? 

People seem okay using western designations for eastern military forces, I really don't see a difference here.

[redsniper]

I think they're about evenly matched really.

[Scotty]

People seem okay using western designations for eastern military forces, I really don't see a difference here.

I only use those because I do not know/cannot pronounce those names.  The only exception is the MiG-29 Fulcrum, and that is because the Russians pulled the real life equivalent of a RetCon for it to be named that.

[Sarafan]

The Adder (it is not the Puma )

What's wrong with the IS designations? 

He's a falcon, isnt it obvious?

[NGTM-1R]

HERC vs MECH

On a basic level, the HERCULEAN is in its development infancy compared to the BattleMech. ELF whips, for example, are considered some of the most devastating HERC weapons available...and are more or less a PPC on piece of string (literally). HERCs are smaller for their weight class for the most part; 75-ton HERCs top out at about ten meters, suggesting a much denser internal arrangement that is more susceptible to damage and more difficult to repair. They also tend to have heavier internal components but lack the overheating issues.

Without really knowing more about armor tolerances on either, a definitive conclusion is impossible.

[Scotty]

The Adder (it is not the Puma )

What's wrong with the IS designations? 

He is a falcon, is it not obvious?

Aff.  I have taken the liberty of correcting your vulgar speech.

75-ton HERCs top out at about ten meters

75-ton BattleMechs never go above 12 meters, and the average is between 9 and 10.

Without really knowing more about armor tolerances on either

It is fairly easy to figure the tolerance on BattleMech armor.    A gauss slug is rougly melon-sized, masses 125kg, and at apporximately Mach 10 from rest.  I do not know the exact energy transfer, but if that is stopped by only one ton of Clan Ferro-Fibrous armor, someone else could possibly work the mechanics.  The "official" reason is that it is magic.  There is no other way armor like that could realistically exist.

[Liberator]

Not true.

You get the right collection of atoms in the right order with the right geometry and you could do it...might blow up afterward but you could do it.

[mxlm]

You absolutely, positively cannot attempt to apply real-world physics to Battletech. Unless someone wants to explain how a mach 10 projectile's effective range, even against infantry, is less than a kilometer (or was it around 1.5km? Whatever, it's still ludicrous). Or as Cray over on the CBT boards pointed out, for an aerospace fighter to get the kind of acceleration it does, its engine has to produce more energy than the entirety of human civilization in the year 2009.

[Commander Zane]

HERC vs MECH

On a basic level, the HERCULEAN is in its development infancy compared to the BattleMech. ELF whips, for example, are considered some of the most devastating HERC weapons available...and are more or less a PPC on piece of string (literally). HERCs are smaller for their weight class for the most part; 75-ton HERCs top out at about ten meters, suggesting a much denser internal arrangement that is more susceptible to damage and more difficult to repair. They also tend to have heavier internal components but lack the overheating issues.

Without really knowing more about armor tolerances on either, a definitive conclusion is impossible.

HERCs pretty much have the same weight, Outlaw is 15 tons, the Ogre is 100.
Starsiege? Can't remember, they botched too many things from that game.

[TrashMan]

HERCs are smaller for their weight class for the most part; 75-ton HERCs top out at about ten meters, suggesting a much denser internal arrangement that is more susceptible to damage and more difficult to repair.

I'd say this is pure speculation. Most battletech mechs look flimsy. Their joins and legs are very thin and fragile or show no signs of any armoring at all on very important places.