"Marauder" UEEF Zentradi Officer's Battlepod Destroid

[Pouncer]

Well I just finished the write-up for my version of the Zentradi Officer's Battlepod Destroid (let's see you say that 3 times fast!) or "Marauder."

-POUNCER

“MARAUDER” OFFICERS BATTLE POD DESTROID

OBP-Z2
UEEF “Marauder” Officers Battle Pod

With the introduction of Project Pioneer it became obvious that the UEEF had a specific problem. There was an army of Zentradi warriors, ready and willing to return to their home world and seek justice against their creators for the horrible crime of making the Zentradi nothing more than organic war machines with no concern for the well being of their creation. However there was still much mistrust of this ready army after the Zentradi uprisings and it was difficult to convince the UEEF command that they should be allowed to participate in the upcoming mission. An army of giant warriors as powerful as many of the mecha they piloted who might turn on their human allies didn’t sit well with many members of the UEEF.

Rick Hunter, though outranked by his wife to be, Lisa Hayes, took it as his personal mission to bring the Zentradi force into the UEEF forces proper. With his close personal relationships with Commander Breetai, Exedor and a number of other Zentradi warriors and officers, plus his experience in many co operative missions with the Zentradi, Rick was able to make an impassioned and effective case. Though he achieved his goal of integration he still had to compromise repeatedly with the less enthusiastic UEEF officers to get things done.

The first solution to the issues to be faced was the micronization of almost the entire Zentradi force, leaving only a handful of full sized Zentradi to operate the handful of Zentradi capitol ships that remained functional. However this created a new problem, the Zentradi warriors were now too small to pilot their old combat mecha. Hunter and Breetai didn’t consider this the greatest loss as most Zentradi mecha, while heavily armed, lacked sufficient protection for their pilots. While a handful of elite mostly female pilots had retrained to pilot veritech fighters and destroids most Zentradi would need mecha more suited to the training they had been given by the Robotech Masters.

The solution was Project Emu, building new Destroids based on the original Zentradi designs. The original design goals called for simply miniaturizing the designs with little change, but it quickly became obvious that the improvements being made in the designs would cause a great deal of cosmetic variation from the originals. Though somewhat surprised by the new look, the Zentradi quickly took to the new mecha, happy to have more capable and survivable versions of their familiar combat systems.

Work began on the new Officer’s Battlepod with the objective of creating a new command mecha for the loyal Zentradi troops. Naming the new design the “Marauder” for the battle style of Zentradi officers, the team began by reducing the height of the mecha by a full ten meters, then outfitting the unit with upgraded armor, increasing protection by 50%. The new drive system retained the speed of the mecha on the ground while the thrusters would give it jumping ability matching the Glaug and space performance better than the original.

Having learned their lessons from the problems with the Micronought the weapons team was already reengineering smaller versions of the mecha’s original weapons. A quirk in the new long range particle beam for the spinal mount actually resulted in a smaller, lighter weapon than expected that still performed as the original. Delighted the design team altered the mecha to mount two particle cannons on either side of the spine, freeing up the original position for a hard point capable of mounting an 8 pack of short range missiles of similar design to the Alpha’s shoulder launchers. Knowing the trouble with the hard points on the Micronought the team deleted it from the official blueprints, however due to a “clerical mishap” the blueprints sent to the manufacturer included the hard point and the specs for the missile pods. By the time this “mistake” was realized so many Marauders had already been produced that production continued with the hard point intact.

Moving on to the weapon arms the team had little trouble with the new particle beam weapons, they came in matching the specs the team had put to the weapons team and integrated easily. However, replacing the rail guns caused a few surprises. The original design called for replacing both rail guns with rotary lasers similar to the EU-14 developed for the Beta fighter, however Admiral Rick Hunter personally delivered a set a blueprints to the team from the Spacecraft research team. While working on point defense systems for the large spacecraft, the weapon designers had serendipitously developed rail guns that matched the performance of the Glaug’s but at a much smaller size. Delighted the Marauder team integrated them into the weapon arms of the mecha.

Wanting to give a little more flexibility to the Marauder pilots the team then added simple hands to the inside face of the weapon arms. While improper for using most weapon pods they would allow the mecha to handle objects. A powerful searchlight was also added to the outer face of each arm facing forward. Each light can operate in both the visible and infrared spectrum.

Wanting to give the mecha better defensive coverage on its aft arc the team placed the same Gladiator based pulse laser turret from the Micronought in place of the Glaug’s twin auto cannons. Once again the turret underwent some mostly cosmetic alterations to fit on the new mecha.

At the order of the UEEF command the integrated short range missile launchers of the Glaug were dropped from the Marauder design, however the team did succeed in convincing command to allow the addition of a hard point under the meacha’s “chin” that would usually be equipped with a MLOP pod carrying 12 mini-missiles for close combat.

A great deal of hard work went into the redesign of the Glaug’s cockpit to make it the Marauder’s cockpit. Correcting several flaws in the original, the main display was enlarged and improved, while the tactical displays were upgraded to provide combat information more efficiently to the pilot. The updated HOTAS controls make the pilot’s job even easier by keeping his hands on the controls as much as possible.

Built from the ground up as a command mecha, the Marauder features a command and control system that rivals the VF/A-6H Alpha and the command variants of the destroids.

With the greater value placed on the pilot’s life the Marauder features an ejection system for the pilot. For in atmosphere use the mecha mounts a zero-zero system that ejects the pilot’s couch and a full cockpit ejection system for use in vacuum. The serious morale boost was one benefit, the other was keeping experienced officers alive when a lucky shot might otherwise have ended their lives.

Tactically the Marauders serve as the “heavy anchors” of their units. Fast enough to keep pace with the Micronoughts the Marauders use their heavier firepower to cut holes in the enemy formations for the more nimble Micronoughts to exploit.

Human pilots, at first skeptical of the Zentradi officers’ abilities, became quite impressed by the abilities of the Zentradi officers. Due to their extreme training and conditioning Marauder pilots are able to dive right into the middle of a conflict while still retaining an impressive tactical awareness without loosing their combat efficiency. Zentradi officers are well respected by their own troops as well, they lead from the front and stand with their forces no matter what the odds.

With the introduction of the Bioroid Interceptor almost all of the Marauders were retired, most of the remaining units being relegated to “garrison” forces. However, a notable few officers have retained their Marauders on the front lines for their command systems. Due to a compatibility issue the command variant of the Bioroid Interceptor was delayed and only a few officers had upgraded their training to use the slower command Destroids requiring some officers to retain the Marauders for their command and control systems.

Note: Just before the introduction of the production Beta fighter the Eldare Beta was unveiled, giving the Marauder an upgrade that performed much like the original Eldare but with better armor and the ability to land, release the Marauder and recover it, returning it to flight.