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11-23-2009, 09:35 AM | #1 |
Join Date: Feb 2006
Location: Not in your time zone:D
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Who needs tanks?
I've seen lots of debate on why mecha are daft and tanks would be the way to go. I like mecha, even if daft.
My problem is, in a setting where if you can see it, it's dead, why have AFVs? Assuming you've got mobile infantry in battlesuits with chameleon stealth and PESA sensors carrying weapons that'll ignore armour, and the tanks/mecha are similarly equipped, and all have audio stealth too.
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"Sanity is a bourgeois meme." Exegeek PS sorry I'm a Parthian shootist: shiftwork + out of country = not here when you are:/ It's all in the reflexes |
11-23-2009, 09:38 AM | #2 |
Aluminated
Join Date: Feb 2005
Location: East of the moon, west of the stars, close to buses and shopping
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Re: Who needs tanks?
Perhaps you don't, if every infantryman can carry weapons which can penetrate any amount of armor a tank can mount. A passing mention in Starship Troopers suggests that powered armor made AFVs obsolete.
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I've been making pointlessly shiny things, and I've got some gaming-related stuff as well as 3d printing designs. Buy my Warehouse 23 stuff, dammit! |
11-23-2009, 09:55 AM | #3 |
Join Date: Jul 2008
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Re: Who needs tanks?
If your infantry are loaded with tank-killers, the next step is to go down to SM-1 or SM-2 drones that have powersuit-killers...
LOS = dead probably means your mobile infantry are bot-minders more than close-assault troops. Really? I'd retained the impression that there was an Armor arm with some really serious tanks, which never showed up in the book, presumably because their role didn't put them on the battlefield at the same time as the MI.
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I don't know any 3e, so there is no chance that I am talking about 3e rules by accident. |
11-23-2009, 10:13 AM | #5 |
Join Date: Oct 2004
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Re: Who needs tanks?
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11-23-2009, 10:23 AM | #6 |
Join Date: Aug 2009
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Re: Who needs tanks?
Thing is, suddenly some group will and if, at that point in time, AKVs are just good enough then others will need to embrace them too (most likely) or get wiped out.
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11-23-2009, 10:24 AM | #7 |
Join Date: Mar 2005
Location: near Houston
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Re: Who needs tanks?
Earlier this century, I did a little comparison using VE2. I designed an AFV for crew X + Passengers Y at TL8. Then I created a (X+Y) man battlesuit squad at TL8. I tried to have the battlesuits roughly match the cost of the single AFV. My observations include:
* The battlesuits had greatly inferior strategic mobility and mrginally better tactical mobility. * The suits could not be armed or armored to the level of the AFV, although the inferior armor was not as great a difference for relatively light vehicles. * The battlesuits had a greater overall maintenance requirement. * For the most part, it was much less likely to get a one-hit kill on a battlesuit squad compared to an IFV * The battlesuits could hide a lot easier than the AFV. This wasn't just a matter of relative size, but of a humanoid battlesuit being able to lay down behind things that would never hide the AFV. My opinion was that, at TL8 anyway, battlesuits were generally inferior to AFVs. A couple of these issues change at TL9+, as battlesuits drop in price a bit faster than the AFV, so the balance shifts. I've also designed some WWII mecha (mostly 4-8 legs). Great mobility but damn expensive.
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A generous and sadistic GM, Brandon Cope GURPS 3e stuff: http://copeab.tripod.com Last edited by copeab; 11-23-2009 at 10:27 AM. |
11-24-2009, 10:59 PM | #8 | |
Join Date: Feb 2007
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Re: Who needs tanks?
Quote:
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11-23-2009, 11:16 AM | #9 |
Join Date: Jul 2008
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Re: Who needs tanks?
In addition to the issue of people being unwilling to let machines kill with no human in the loop, if there's one thing playing lots of strategy games teaches it's that we don't know how to make a computer good at tactics.
If you've got good, trustworthy machine tacticians, bring on the new robot overlords. Otherwise, I strongly suggest supporting your automated shooters with human leadership at low levels.
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I don't know any 3e, so there is no chance that I am talking about 3e rules by accident. |
11-23-2009, 10:55 AM | #10 |
Aluminated
Join Date: Feb 2005
Location: East of the moon, west of the stars, close to buses and shopping
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Re: Who needs tanks?
IIRC, in a discussion of powered armor fairly early in the book, Johnny makes a dismissive mention of tanks, along the lines of "if they used those silly things anymore." That passage always struck me as a bit odd. After all, ten-year-old-me reasoned, if they can put more armor and bigger guns on a guy in a powered suit, how much more than that could they do with something the size of a tank?
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I've been making pointlessly shiny things, and I've got some gaming-related stuff as well as 3d printing designs. Buy my Warehouse 23 stuff, dammit! |
Tags |
afv, mecha, stealth, tanks |
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