In defense of hovertanks

[CON_Troll]

There was actually an old article (written by Mike Crane) combining Rivets and OGRE. It was in the first edition of the OGRE Book. Sadly, I doubt it will see publication again due to Rivets being cast into limbo by the closing of Metagaming in 1983. Steve was able to reclaim all the TFT I.P. (Melee, Wizards, ITL, etc.) -I think because copyright/intellectual property laws allowed him to since it was abandoned for a certain amount of time, though I'm just guessing here. But Rivets was written by Robert Taylor (IIRC) for Metagaming and I have no idea whether he's tried to gain the rights to the game.

[Cat]

Rivets was back in print briefly some 10 years ago by Decision Games.

I keep holding out hope that SJG could make a deal to acquire the rights and get it back in print with plastic BOPPERS!

[CON_Troll]

Yes! Please KS or IGG this! I'd easily chuck $50 at the resurrection of the pocket game. Triple that if minis were included.

Edit: Whoops, I'm way off topic now. *Ahem* I think the Paneuropean GEVs are not only iconic, but a really good "guesstimate" of what a futuristic military hovercraft would look like. With a huge fan to power the plenum chamber, jet turbine engines to give it the ability to go really fast (including uphill) and the ability to "jump" some distance into the air (possibly by dumping thrust from the top turbine engines down into the plenum to give it a "kick".) I'd be interested in knowing just how high a G.E.V. can jump. In J.D. Bell's iconic story "GEV", it is suggested that they are capable of lifting (momentarily) up to six feet with the line: "I dumped thrust down and we bounced two meters into the air..."

There's already quite a bit of source material from various articles suggesting that the primary power plants for non-Ogre vehicles are hydrogen-fueled turbines. This certainly helps explain why combat in OGRE/G.E.V. is so lethal. Sure, BPC armored fuel tanks are great for keeping your fuel from exploding. Right up until said armored tank gets hit by a hiveloc round. But it makes sense to use such a power plant and engine type. Nuclear reactors, even small ones, are just too big to use on anything smaller than an Ogre. I also believe this means that the Ogre MK I is probably powered by a hydrogen turbine engine as I doubt there is room for a reactor in that small of a hull. Maybe the MK II also. Not sure about that. But it would be yet another reason why the MK III was considered a real breakthrough in Ogre design. A reactor would give it far more range (and, likely, overall power) than a turbine power plant.

I really enjoyed the "G.E.V. Specifications" article in Ogrezine 1 and "The Origins of the Heavy Tank" in Ogrezine 2 (both articles by Mathieu Moyen) as they really fleshed out two of OGRE's most iconic AFVs. He had a great explanation as to why the Combine GEV looks so different from the Paneuropean design (and why it was somewhat more rare in the Paneuropean theatre.) I especially liked the evolution of both the Combine's and Paneupore's heavy tank. Finally, the "inverted turret" on the Paneuropean HVY (from the artwork in early OGRE/G.E.V. editions) has been explained as the being the 1A2 and 2A2 models of the tank respectively. I'm looking forward to more such articles in future Ogrezines as I love the fleshing out of the engineering of the OGREverse.

[offsides]

Originally Posted by CON_Troll

There's already quite a bit of source material from various articles suggesting that the primary power plants for non-Ogre vehicles are hydrogen-fueled turbines. This certainly helps explain why combat in OGRE/G.E.V. is so lethal. Sure, BPC armored fuel tanks are great for keeping your fuel from exploding. Right up until said armored tank gets hit by a hiveloc round. But it makes sense to use such a power plant and engine type. Nuclear reactors, even small ones, are just too big to use on anything smaller than an Ogre. I also believe this means that the Ogre MK I is probably powered by a hydrogen turbine engine as I doubt there is room for a reactor in that small of a hull. Maybe the MK II also. Not sure about that. But it would be yet another reason why the MK III was considered a real breakthrough in Ogre design. A reactor would give it far more range (and, likely, overall power) than a turbine power plant.

The power plant issue could also explain why the Mk II was considered a failure of sorts (under armed/armored for its cost). Either because the H2 turbines weren't powerful enough to carry a big enough load, or because too much of its size/weight was taken up by a reactor. That said, I find it less likely that a Mk I was H2 powered if it's capable of long-distance underwater operation. Which it might not be. But if it was H2 powered, then it also needs to carry at least a small O2 supply for short-term underwater operations, or a lot of both for long-term, since it can't be splitting water with the energy it generates by burning it.

Perhaps the answer is a combination - a small nuclear reactor not for motive power but just electrical output, combined with hydrogen turbines to move it. Just add a source of water and you have an unlimited fuel supply, albeit probably not under direct combat conditions. May or may not be sufficient at larger sizes where a bigger reactor was possible, but it probably worked well for the Mk I where the reactor could occupy the space normally reserved for the crew compartment. Which also helps explain the Mk I's longevity on top of it's other redeeming qualities - it's the perfect combination of size, cost and efficiency to fill the "Bigger than a HVY, smaller than a 'real' Ogre" spot in the unit table.

[Misplaced Buckeye]

Originally Posted by Cat

Rivets was back in print briefly some 10 years ago by Decision Games.

I keep holding out hope that SJG could make a deal to acquire the rights and get it back in print with plastic BOPPERS!

On that same note, I've been talking with Chris would designed Astra Titanus. He's going to be looking for a home since VP dissolved.

[TheAmishStig]

Originally Posted by offsides

The power plant issue could also explain why the Mk II was considered a failure of sorts (under armed/armored for its cost). Either because the H2 turbines weren't powerful enough to carry a big enough load, or because too much of its size/weight was taken up by a reactor. That said, I find it less likely that a Mk I was H2 powered if it's capable of long-distance underwater operation. Which it might not be. But if it was H2 powered, then it also needs to carry at least a small O2 supply for short-term underwater operations, or a lot of both for long-term, since it can't be splitting water with the energy it generates by burning it.

Perhaps the answer is a combination - a small nuclear reactor not for motive power but just electrical output, combined with hydrogen turbines to move it. Just add a source of water and you have an unlimited fuel supply, albeit probably not under direct combat conditions. May or may not be sufficient at larger sizes where a bigger reactor was possible, but it probably worked well for the Mk I where the reactor could occupy the space normally reserved for the crew compartment. Which also helps explain the Mk I's longevity on top of it's other redeeming qualities - it's the perfect combination of size, cost and efficiency to fill the "Bigger than a HVY, smaller than a 'real' Ogre" spot in the unit table.

That's a neat take, and provides more flavor to the universe than my assumption of being the awkward middle child...too big to take over the Mk.I's niche, too small to be an effective battle-line unit. (Is that even an assumption? I could be just spouting canon and having a brain misfire...)

[GranitePenguin]

Originally Posted by ColBosch

Heh. The original edition wasn't quite as nice-looking.

That depends to what it's being compared. When it was created, the playing field was very much a black and white world. Sure, some of the larger hexmap games had color printing, but the monocromatic all-black craters have a certain charm.

[Tim Kauffman]

Originally Posted by offsides

It's not that the Ogreverse doesn't have aircraft, it's that in a combat environment the airspace above about 10-20 meters is unsafe for anything due to lasers so the aircraft have been tailored to operate in that sub-20 meter altitude band. In other words, GEVs aren't hovertanks, they're specialized aircraft designed to operate in the Ogreverse battlefield's particular conditions.

"they're specialized aircraft designed to operate in the Ogreverse battlefield's particular conditions."

Agreed.

Aircraft technology and development would be forced to create a craft that would now only be able to operate in this new limited battlespace. This new "limitation" I would argue is what actually caused the GEVs development to be a success because it forced designers to look at everything that had been done before up to this point with the realization that such designs were now obsolete and something radical and new had to be innovated and produced to operate in this new narrow margin of battlespace.

It could be that the term "Hovercraft" is simply a carryover from such early design days for lack of a new novel name for the new GEVs and not a literal description.

The END GAME story mentions pressurized cockpits, speeds of 200KPH (not to say this is top-speed), kicking in afterburners, jacking and weaving the GEV to create a roostertail of mud and debris to screen other GEVs from the enemy, rolling the hovers like fighters...elsewhere they are often called "pilots".

I would say, based on the body of available official works and artwork they are closer to a jet aircraft than a hovercraft, a merging of these two technologies and units.

As to the common argument against this, and that they are just hovercraft, the plenum skirts are pointed out. Well, just because some of the artwork shows that (even though other artwork shows a much more aircraft-like "skirting") https://www.flickr.com/photos/128248...57711063102586 does not mean it must be so. Those plenum skirts on the PE GEVs could easily be more advanced versions of the rear engines of todays most advanced jets using some appropriate OGREverse technology like Nanomatter. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afterburner Such would give them incredible maneuvering speed and power along the horizontal plane especially but also the vertical which is exactly where you would want it for the missions they would be built for. Get in as fast as possible to engage the enemy while having the ability to move the craft as fast as possible up, down, left or right to evade enemy fire among other uses. Similar to how improvements of WW1 aircraft lead to the fighters of WW2 for example. Both still sharing Similar characteristics and battlefield space.

The general consensus seems to be, GEVs are hovercraft not much different than today's, just armored with BPC and deadlier weapons.
That's fine by me. However, I would also like to see more advanced versions of them, as happens with any warmachine in time. More advanced versions that were fielded mid to late LAST WAR.

Some ideas would be they are called GAEV. (Ground Air Effect Vehicles) since that is a more accurate description of what they are. They effect and use a larger spectrum of the battlefield than the GEV.
This is also where you could have "Aces" in addition to them piloting the older (official) GEVs.
They would generally be able to avoid Disable results better than the non-Ace as a example.

I stand to defend the "Hovertank". I also continue to think there is plenty of room in the OGREverse for more advanced versions of the GEV and their pilots.

[CON_Troll]

Tim, I like your take on hovercraft being more akin to very low flying aircraft. This also gives the Combine GEVs a lot more reason to look the way they do.

This is also where you could have "Aces" in addition to them piloting the older (official) GEVs.
They would generally be able to avoid Disable results better than the non-Ace as a example.

Oooh. I really like this idea. Would be a nice house rule for regular groups running a campaign of battles. Surviving pilots (and crews) of armor units at the end of a scenario where they make "Ace" could get a limited amount of resistance to a "D" result in future battles. Rather than something you roll extra for each time an experienced unit gets a disabled result (which can REALLY bog a game down), give each experienced unit in your force a token of some sort. When the unit gets a "D" result, the player can decide whether to expend the token to turn it into an "NE" result just that one time.

[wolf90]

Originally Posted by CON_Troll

Would be a nice house rule for regular groups running a campaign of battles. Surviving pilots (and crews) of armor units at the end of a scenario where they make "Ace" could get a limited amount of resistance to a "D" result in future battles. Rather than something you roll extra for each time an experienced unit gets a disabled result (which can REALLY bog a game down), give each experienced unit in your force a token of some sort. When the unit gets a "D" result, the player can decide whether to expend the token to turn it into an "NE" result just that one time.

Heavy stress on the "house rule" idea . . . but I do like it conceptually.

I would add another element - make that same token have a "D" on one side and an "NE" on the other. Then when the player decides to expend the token, he/she flips it. 50% of the time they avoid the D, the other 50% it takes place as rolled. To have a player automatically avoid a D is too strong a benefit.

D.