The Absurdity of modern warfare

[barna10]

When I first picked-up Rifts in 1991, I loved the idea of mechs. A friend of mine had tried to introduce me to Robotech a few years earlier, but I wasn't a fan (I like magic).

Now, decades later, and after being in the Army as an anti-armor MOS....mechs are one of the dumbest ideas ever proposed

For crowd control, sure. Against unorganized peasants, sure. Against any half-trained and even poorly equipped force, absolutely not.

Mechs are a waste of resources. They are HUGE targets and easily accounted for.

Even in Rifts, they can't jump well, let alone fly. A series of trenches and pit traps are enough to take most of them out.

They have all the vulnerabilities of tanks, and more.

The real laughable thing is something like the UAR-1 Enforcer has "medium range missiles" with a 40-80 mile range! But no way to target them. the best sensor on the thing has a range of 2000 feet. It means anything beyond 2000 feet is targeted LOS....you ain't targeting anything using LOS more than maybe a mile out.

However, I can easily target YOU by giving a vagabond a laser pointer And, with no radar system, good luck knowing those missiles are in-bound with enough time to respond as they fly in at Mach 2+.

In my next game, I may do a few large-scale combats to illustrate the absurdity of "tank" warfare in Rifts.....Ewoks versus Scout Walkers

[Crimson Dynamo]

I never understand the fascination with walkers, especially in that role. They're so easy to cripple, and once you take out a single leg, they're absolutely useless hunks of scrap metal.

Even more hilarious are offshoots of the concept, like the jaegers from Pacific Rim that, for some bizarre reason, don't only need a psychic interface, but a psychic interface between two people. Because, uhm, reasons?

[Library Ogre]

For the cost of one giant robot, you can usually have 10-50 good power armor.... or a metric buttload of tanks.

[barna10]

Everyone knows a metric buttload outweighs anything else on the battlefield

As I was writing my OP, I was imagining the SAMAS needed to fly around and support the big walker just to keep it walking. Sort of like how Aircraft Carriers are sitting ducks without the support of a fleet.

[MyDumpStatIsMA]

Even more hilarious are offshoots of the concept, like the jaegers from Pacific Rim that, for some bizarre reason, don't only need a psychic interface, but a psychic interface between two people. Because, uhm, reasons?

It's a little-known mech engineering principle, but studies have shown that latent sexual tension between two pilots increases core efficiency and damage output by 24%, on average.

It must remain unspoken, or else the efficiency gain drops to only 11%.

[MyDumpStatIsMA]

When I first picked-up Rifts in 1991, I loved the idea of mechs. A friend of mine had tried to introduce me to Robotech a few years earlier, but I wasn't a fan (I like magic).

Now, decades later, and after being in the Army as an anti-armor MOS....mechs are one of the dumbest ideas ever proposed

For crowd control, sure. Against unorganized peasants, sure. Against any half-trained and even poorly equipped force, absolutely not.

Mechs are a waste of resources. They are HUGE targets and easily accounted for.

Even in Rifts, they can't jump well, let alone fly. A series of trenches and pit traps are enough to take most of them out.

They have all the vulnerabilities of tanks, and more.

I love giant anthropomorphous mecha as much as the next man-child, but specifically in Rifts, I can't see myself ever being a robot pilot. I do like power armor, however.

With the large robots, I just can't help thinking of repair costs. Don't even talk about the initial cash outlay to buy the things. Even if you're playing with people who don't sweat the details, I'm always neurotically worrying about these things.

That's one of the reasons I like the Blocker (Northern Gun), if I had to pick any robot. It comes with a 300 MDC shield. I mean, that would still need to be repaired, but at least it's nothing vital to the mech itself.

[Crimson Dynamo]

My favorite part of robot pilots is when an adventure requires going into a dungeon (or its equivalence; a ruined building, an underground bunker, whatever).

"Sorry, you're 40-foot tall robot won't fit in the door, so you have to go in without it."

"Well drek."

[Library Ogre]

Everyone knows a metric buttload outweighs anything else on the battlefield

More than twice an imperial buttload!

But, seriously, get more people in power armor, and have them protect a mobile missile launcher.

[green.nova343]

When I first picked-up Rifts in 1991, I loved the idea of mechs. A friend of mine had tried to introduce me to Robotech a few years earlier, but I wasn't a fan (I like magic).

Now, decades later, and after being in the Army as an anti-armor MOS....mechs are one of the dumbest ideas ever proposed

For crowd control, sure. Against unorganized peasants, sure. Against any half-trained and even poorly equipped force, absolutely not.

Mechs are a waste of resources. They are HUGE targets and easily accounted for.

Even in Rifts, they can't jump well, let alone fly. A series of trenches and pit traps are enough to take most of them out.

They have all the vulnerabilities of tanks, and more.

The real laughable thing is something like the UAR-1 Enforcer has "medium range missiles" with a 40-80 mile range! But no way to target them. the best sensor on the thing has a range of 2000 feet. It means anything beyond 2000 feet is targeted LOS....you ain't targeting anything using LOS more than maybe a mile out.

However, I can easily target YOU by giving a vagabond a laser pointer And, with no radar system, good luck knowing those missiles are in-bound with enough time to respond as they fly in at Mach 2+.

In my next game, I may do a few large-scale combats to illustrate the absurdity of "tank" warfare in Rifts.....Ewoks versus Scout Walkers

Not...quite correct. Those visual sensors are in addition to the standard robot sensors... which includes radar with a range of 30 miles/48km. Unless you were also assuming they didn't have the other robot systems... like the 12-hour air supply, or radio?

Granted, 30 miles/48km isn't great when, as you pointed out, the missiles can reach 40-80 miles/64-129km. But there's nothing that says they couldn't get targeting data from another platform that would allow a strike out that far. Heck, just look up their grid coordinate & pick a fixed ground target 80 miles away, & they can still hit it even if they don't have radar lock (won't be automatic, but still possible).

[Warshield73]

To be clear I have no military experience, I tried to join both the Marine Corp. and Army at 17 but I had eye surgery as an infant. Note, my eyesight was fine but in 1990 just eye surgery was disqualifying. I was however a history teacher and could happily list for you the hundreds of times just in recorded history that people said a particular type of military platform was deemed useless. Instead I will limit myself to two:
1) 1949 The Revolt of the Admirals where the CJCS General Omar Bradely said the Navy was on its way out because of nukes so no need to actually build Aircraft Carriers because they are useless. Well then Korea and man did they need a Navy and Marine Corp and wow a new carrier would have been nice.

2) The 1990's where every attempt to build armored urban combat vehicles was shot down because the days of soldiers going door to door was over. This is why soldiers had to bolt scrap metal on to humvees in Iraq.

Predict the future of warfare at your own peril.

That said I absolutely agree with you that in a real world setting such things would almost certainly be laughable. However, we are not talking real world we are talking about what is effectively a science fantasy environment. The rules allow for giant robots for the same reason they allow for magic, it's just too cool. That being said the Templin Institute covered this years ago, I actually like some of the points on both sides so it is worth a view.

When I first picked-up Rifts in 1991, I loved the idea of mechs. A friend of mine had tried to introduce me to Robotech a few years earlier, but I wasn't a fan (I like magic).

Now, decades later, and after being in the Army as an anti-armor MOS....mechs are one of the dumbest ideas ever proposed

Ummm, until someone builds one that honor has to be held by the F-35, which was supposed to be a cheap all purpose fighter and has now been described as a "Lamborghini" too expensive to risk so we need to build a new one to do the job it was supposed to.

On the other side I have three little words - Littoral Combat Ship - Because some idiots forgot what a Frigate is we, the tax payers, got to spend hundred billion or so for ships that didn't last as long as my last laptop.

Until someone actually builds one of these disasters (a battle mech) we have no idea if it is as big a waste as either of these, much less both.

For crowd control, sure. Against unorganized peasants, sure. Against any half-trained and even poorly equipped force, absolutely not.

Again with no real life to go by in Rifts if they are poorly equipped they die. You invoked the UAR-1 Enforcer, do you know what volleys of 4 frag mini-missiles (to say nothing of plasma) do to a squad of armored infantry? I've played those games and it goes badly for the infantry each time and that is when they can get into the 2,000 to 4,000 foot range for most of there weapons. The Enforcer rail-gun can reach out to 2 or 3 times that range to say nothing of the missiles.

Mechs are a waste of resources. They are HUGE targets and easily accounted for.

In real life maybe, again in Rifts they work, like magic, because the narrative requires it. I mean as Daniel demonstrates here even in a modern setting magic is completely useless in combat.

Even in Rifts, they can't jump well, let alone fly. A series of trenches and pit traps are enough to take most of them out.

Those would have to be a lot of trenches, that are really deep. Most bots can leap, useually there hight. Heavy artillery bots like the Hunter Mobile Gun can barely walk bot most combat robots can leap and many have small jets that allow for a boost.

They have all the vulnerabilities of tanks, and more.

No. They have some vulnerabilities of tanks, they have some that tanks don't. A mine for instance can incapacitate both a tank and mech, but on a mech it is unlikely to do any damage to the main body and is extremely unlikely to kill the crew. Tanks, that vehicle can blow up and that crew often dies.

Even if you manage to dig a pit trap big enough, and even if you managed to disguise it so perfectly that person sitting 12 to 20 feet in the air couldn't see it and he fell in, he also has arms to go with those legs, he can climb out.

Tanks should generally be faster over open ground but again mechs can operate in swamps and mountainous terrain where a tank can't.

Tanks can much more easily hide in terrain from other ground units

The real laughable thing is something like the UAR-1 Enforcer has "medium range missiles" with a 40-80 mile range! But no way to target them. the best sensor on the thing has a range of 2000 feet. It means anything beyond 2000 feet is targeted LOS....you ain't targeting anything using LOS more than maybe a mile out.

However, I can easily target YOU by giving a vagabond a laser pointer And, with no radar system, good luck knowing those missiles are in-bound with enough time to respond as they fly in at Mach 2+.

In my next game, I may do a few large-scale combats to illustrate the absurdity of "tank" warfare in Rifts.....Ewoks versus Scout Walkers

Before you do this you may want to look features common to all robot vehicles. You've been playing for a while so it was in RMB Pg. 214, then it was reprinted in RUE Pg. 273. Since you mentioned the Enforcer it is also in WB 11 CS War Campaign pg. 134.

When you look at this you will see that the enforcer has a radar that reaches out to 40 miles and since the radar emitter is almost 20 feet in the air (it mentions it as part of the sensor tower under MDC) it has far less ground clutter than any armored vehicle not mounting a 20 foot radar mass.

Now another problem about what you said is the idea that once the Enforcer launches those missiles you get all the time in the world to take it out. No, if your radar is 30 miles you have just over a minute, not quite 5 melees to know it is coming. The amount of time you have to shoot it down depends on the range of your best weapon. If your best weapon is 1 mile or less you have 1 attack to take it out, maybe 2 if you are a juicer as that missile flies through your attack enveope in tad less than 3 seconds.

Now this applies to every vehicle, including tanks. However, a battle mechs commanding height means they have less radar clutter and fewer obstacles blocking things like missile launchers.

I never understand the fascination with walkers, especially in that role. They're so easy to cripple, and once you take out a single leg, they're absolutely useless hunks of scrap metal.

What part of "they are AMAZINGLY cool" did you miss. I mean I don't know how old you were when you first saw Empire Strikes Back but I was 7 and they were so cool I started rooting for the Empire. It was even cooler when Luke brought them down.

As covered already no they are not crippled any easier than any other vehicle. Anything with tires or rotors is far easier to bring down than a mechs's legs. They are vulnerable in different ways but not more so. Any combat helicopter is far more vulnerable than a mech, but its far superior mobility makes it worth it.

Even more hilarious are offshoots of the concept, like the jaegers from Pacific Rim that, for some bizarre reason, don't only need a psychic interface, but a psychic interface between two people. Because, uhm, reasons?

As with things like magic, the force, or space fighters or any other ridiculous idea this is just the story they wanted to tell. I for one liked the first movie. Was it silly, of course but they were battling interdimensional giant monsters that were trying to alien-aform Earth for them to live on. Silly was baked in before the robots ever showed up.

For the cost of one giant robot, you can usually have 10-50 good power armor.... or a metric buttload of tanks.

This is absolutely true and you say it like it would mean anything. Again I point you to the Littoral Combat Ships and the F-35. If a military decides they can get some sort of advantage with it, or if it will make defense contract sickeningly wealthy, they will build them. If anything your point would almost be a reason why pre-rifts militaries would build them.

Everyone knows a metric buttload outweighs anything else on the battlefield

Quantity has a quality all its own.

As I was writing my OP, I was imagining the SAMAS needed to fly around and support the big walker just to keep it walking. Sort of like how Aircraft Carriers are sitting ducks without the support of a fleet.

Much like the carrier the battle mech, again in Rifts, has its role even if it my need protection from some attacks,

I love giant anthropomorphous mecha as much as the next man-child, but specifically in Rifts, I can't see myself ever being a robot pilot. I do like power armor, however.

With the large robots, I just can't help thinking of repair costs. Don't even talk about the initial cash outlay to buy the things. Even if you're playing with people who don't sweat the details, I'm always neurotically worrying about these things.

That's one of the reasons I like the Blocker (Northern Gun), if I had to pick any robot. It comes with a 300 MDC shield. I mean, that would still need to be repaired, but at least it's nothing vital to the mech itself.

I honestly prefer power armor myself but as a GM I can tell you that almost every group I have ever run has at least one large mech. When I run convention games one of the first characters that gets grabbed is almost always the robot pilot.

My favorite part of robot pilots is when an adventure requires going into a dungeon (or its equivalence; a ruined building, an underground bunker, whatever).

"Sorry, you're 40-foot tall robot won't fit in the door, so you have to go in without it."

"Well drek."

This is a problem with almost all vehicles. Even a Titan Flying power armor can't really go into most dungeons with those wings and an operator with a large hover truck has to leave that outside too.

Everyone knows a metric buttload outweighs anything else on the battlefield

More than twice an imperial buttload!

But, seriously, get more people in power armor, and have them protect a mobile missile launcher.

The Samson and Samson Missilemen are horribly underrated power armors and at dirt cheap prices too.

[Crimson Dynamo]

What part of "they are AMAZINGLY cool" did you miss. I mean I don't know how old you were when you first saw Empire Strikes Back but I was 7 and they were so cool I started rooting for the Empire. It was even cooler when Luke brought them down.

I didn't miss it at all. And I never said they weren't. But they are stupid. Just like almost everything else in Rifts.

Warning: While constructive criticism is fine and encouraged, a blanket statement that almost entire setting is stupid on the forums of the authors of the product is certainly trolling. - J

As covered already no they are not crippled any easier than any other vehicle. Anything with tires or rotors is far easier to bring down than a mechs's legs.

That's absolutely hilarious. Even using your Empire reference, a little skimmer with a rope took down a quad walker (which is infinitely more stable than a biped) just by flying in a circle. And in Return of the Jedi, teddy bears took several down with some logs. Hell, a stiff enough wind will **** them over.

There's a reason absolutely no one on Earth has invested in giant walking vehicles. And it's not an engineering issue, especially now as we have multitudes of walking drones and robots on smaller scales (and all of them are clumsy as ****). It's a "this is stupid, wheels and flying are far superior in every single solitary way." Faster, easier to construct and repair, less vulnerable to simple tactics, and so on and so forth.

As with things like magic, the force, or space fighters or any other ridiculous idea this is just the story they wanted to tell. I for one liked the first movie. Was it silly, of course but they were battling interdimensional giant monsters that were trying to alien-aform Earth for them to live on. Silly was baked in before the robots ever showed up.

Uh, yeah, no drek. It was still a stupid concept. "It's a giant robot, there's no way one person could control it through conventional control systems! We have to make it psychic! And dangerously psychic at that! With two people who are super bonded! Because being a walker already, it's not vulnerable enough to stupid ****, let's throw emotions into the mix!"

This is a problem with almost all vehicles. Even a Titan Flying power armor can't really go into most dungeons with those wings and an operator with a large hover truck has to leave that outside too.

Yep, but unlike a robot pilot, they have other things they excel at and bring to the party. Operators, Phaeton Juicers, etc. aren't completely reliant on a giant, oversized robot that can't go places even a normal vehicle can (or nearly as fast). A Glitter Boy outside his armor? He's just... some dude.

[barna10]

Not...quite correct. Those visual sensors are in addition to the standard robot sensors... which includes radar with a range of 30 miles/48km. Unless you were also assuming they didn't have the other robot systems... like the 12-hour air supply, or radio?

Granted, 30 miles/48km isn't great when, as you pointed out, the missiles can reach 40-80 miles/64-129km. But there's nothing that says they couldn't get targeting data from another platform that would allow a strike out that far. Heck, just look up their grid coordinate & pick a fixed ground target 80 miles away, & they can still hit it even if they don't have radar lock (won't be automatic, but still possible).

Very good point, thanks for the correction.

They could target larger things, but man-packs and anything on the ground won't appear on radar.

[barna10]

Warshield....you stated you have no military experience, so I'll be kind on some of your points...

1) 1949 The Revolt of the Admirals where the CJCS General Omar Bradely said the Navy was on its way out because of nukes so no need to actually build Aircraft Carriers because they are useless. Well then Korea and man did they need a Navy and Marine Corp and wow a new carrier would have been nice.

2) The 1990's where every attempt to build armored urban combat vehicles was shot down because the days of soldiers going door to door was over. This is why soldiers had to bolt scrap metal on to humvees in Iraq.

Yes, political battles have affected military hardware. "the Revolt of the Admirals" was a story about those in the know (the Admirals) fighting back against the bean counters and politicians that didn't know what they were talking about. Korea proved the Admirals correct.

Sorry, point 2 is just funny... the military NEVER had an "armored urban combat vehicle" before...and still doesn't. They have armored assault vehicles....but remember Jeep....ever see one of those? Not even a roof. Vehicles like what you see S.W.A.T. use are "assault" vehicles, not troop transports. There are armored Humvees, but they are heavy, slower, and protect against small-arm fire, not explosives, and not all Humvees were issued armored doors.

Ummm, until someone builds one that honor has to be held by the F-35, which was supposed to be a cheap all purpose fighter and has now been described as a "Lamborghini" too expensive to risk so we need to build a new one to do the job it was supposed to.

On the other side I have three little words - Littoral Combat Ship - Because some idiots forgot what a Frigate is we, the tax payers, got to spend hundred billion or so for ships that didn't last as long as my last laptop.

Until someone actually builds one of these disasters (a battle mech) we have no idea if it is as big a waste as either of these, much less both.

One, we have over 850 F35s in service...seems like we could afford a few...and they fly combat missions....

We have examples to pull from as to why mechs would suck; WWI tanks. They kept building bigger, slower, more-heavily-armored tanks, then someone discovered you could walk up to one and place an explosive charge on it...it then became a nice barricade.

For crowd control, sure. Against unorganized peasants, sure. Against any half-trained and even poorly equipped force, absolutely not.

Again with no real life to go by in Rifts if they are poorly equipped they die. You invoked the UAR-1 Enforcer, do you know what volleys of 4 frag mini-missiles (to say nothing of plasma) do to a squad of armored infantry? I've played those games and it goes badly for the infantry each time and that is when they can get into the 2,000 to 4,000 foot range for most of there weapons. The Enforcer rail-gun can reach out to 2 or 3 times that range to say nothing of the missiles.

That seems to be an example from one of your games. It appears you were using something akin to Red Coat firing line strategy. Try some guerilla tactics next time.

Mechs are a waste of resources. They are HUGE targets and easily accounted for.

In real life maybe, again in Rifts they work, like magic, because the narrative requires it. I mean as Daniel demonstrates here even in a modern setting magic is completely useless in combat.

Lol, ahh no. Magic in kid's stories is dumb. I hope this was a joke.

Even in Rifts, they can't jump well, let alone fly. A series of trenches and pit traps are enough to take most of them out.

Those would have to be a lot of trenches, that are really deep. Most bots can leap, useually there hight. Heavy artillery bots like the Hunter Mobile Gun can barely walk bot most combat robots can leap and many have small jets that allow for a boost.

How deep of a hole do you think I am suggesting? Many can jump up to 15' high, and they aren't pulling themselves out (P.S. is too low). You only need a 20' pit, easy enough to dig with a simple Dig spell or a little prep time. Same defense stops tanks

They have all the vulnerabilities of tanks, and more.

No. They have some vulnerabilities of tanks, they have some that tanks don't. A mine for instance can incapacitate both a tank and mech, but on a mech it is unlikely to do any damage to the main body and is extremely unlikely to kill the crew. Tanks, that vehicle can blow up and that crew often dies.

Sorry, worst argument yet. Tank mines and anti-armor missiles/grenades are meant to take out the ARMOR not the squishy things inside. In Rifts, taking out the leg effectively takes out the Mech. Don't even need to damage it further as falling over would probably kill the crew anyway.

Even if you manage to dig a pit trap big enough, and even if you managed to disguise it so perfectly that person sitting 12 to 20 feet in the air couldn't see it and he fell in, he also has arms to go with those legs, he can climb out.

Tanks should generally be faster over open ground but again mechs can operate in swamps and mountainous terrain where a tank can't.

Tanks can much more easily hide in terrain from other ground units

Sorry, covered above. Robots are not strong-enough to climb out, and the sides of any pit would probably crumble as the 20+ ton weight of the robot was suddenly concentrated in the area of one of the hands. Yes, Robots can operate in swamps...but you know what else can? Boats. You know what's even better? Something that flies, or something that doesn't have the chance of missing that old, submerged riverbed and suddenly falling into a pit...can't swim...

And you know what hides even better than a tank? Something smaller...than a tank

Before you do this you may want to look features common to all robot vehicles. You've been playing for a while so it was in RMB Pg. 214, then it was reprinted in RUE Pg. 273. Since you mentioned the Enforcer it is also in WB 11 CS War Campaign pg. 134.

When you look at this you will see that the enforcer has a radar that reaches out to 40 miles and since the radar emitter is almost 20 feet in the air (it mentions it as part of the sensor tower under MDC) it has far less ground clutter than any armored vehicle not mounting a 20 foot radar mass.

Now another problem about what you said is the idea that once the Enforcer launches those missiles you get all the time in the world to take it out. No, if your radar is 30 miles you have just over a minute, not quite 5 melees to know it is coming. The amount of time you have to shoot it down depends on the range of your best weapon. If your best weapon is 1 mile or less you have 1 attack to take it out, maybe 2 if you are a juicer as that missile flies through your attack enveope in tad less than 3 seconds.

Now this applies to every vehicle, including tanks. However, a battle mechs commanding height means they have less radar clutter and fewer obstacles blocking things like missile launchers.

And before you make this argument, you may want to consult someone that has actually been in a situation like this...maybe someone that was a trained to take out tanks and other heavy equipment. Number one thing you do AFTER firing at a something that can fire back at you? MOVE. That's right, as we would fire missiles at a tank or something else, next thing we were doing is gunning it and getting to a new position. Mobility is much better than armor for survival. Go ahead and target my position. I only need about a minute to move and drive the 100 or so feet to get out of the main blast radius, and another minute to be completely out of the secondary blast radius. FIRE AWAY. Waste your missiles trying to hit my truck with a missile launcher on it. Oh, and try to find my sniper friend with the laser pointer I can even fire over the horizon so you don't know where I am

I never understand the fascination with walkers, especially in that role. They're so easy to cripple, and once you take out a single leg, they're absolutely useless hunks of scrap metal.

What part of "they are AMAZINGLY cool" did you miss. I mean I don't know how old you were when you first saw Empire Strikes Back but I was 7 and they were so cool I started rooting for the Empire. It was even cooler when Luke brought them down.

As covered already no they are not crippled any easier than any other vehicle. Anything with tires or rotors is far easier to bring down than a mechs's legs. They are vulnerable in different ways but not more so. Any combat helicopter is far more vulnerable than a mech, but its far superior mobility makes it worth it.

The factor you miss is mobility. A Helicopter is REALLY hard to hit. A wheeled vehicle is very easy to repair and get back on the road, plus they turn on a dime and are really hard to hit when moving at speed.

For the cost of one giant robot, you can usually have 10-50 good power armor.... or a metric buttload of tanks.

This is absolutely true and you say it like it would mean anything. Again I point you to the Littoral Combat Ships and the F-35. If a military decides they can get some sort of advantage with it, or if it will make defense contract sickeningly wealthy, they will build them. If anything your point would almost be a reason why pre-rifts militaries would build them.

Non-sensical reply, sorry. Militaries don't make the financial decisions, their governments do. They give contracts to the lowest bidder, not the highest.

But, seriously, get more people in power armor, and have them protect a mobile missile launcher.

The Samson and Samson Missilemen are horribly underrated power armors and at dirt cheap prices too.

Yes, and yes.

Tactics and mobility will win most conflicts. Just ask the American military how all that great hardware helped them win Vietnam or Korea. It was superior training, strategy, and morale that helped in both Desert Storms.

[MyDumpStatIsMA]

I honestly prefer power armor myself but as a GM I can tell you that almost every group I have ever run has at least one large mech. When I run convention games one of the first characters that gets grabbed is almost always the robot pilot.

Do you carefully record damage, and limit the availability of qualified techs who can repair it, and sometimes charge exorbitant repair bills if your group happens to be in the hinterlands without many options?

Or do you just gloss over most of the 'fun' details of gigantic mecha ownership?

Serious questions, no sarcasm intended.

I'm looking at it from a Battletech perspective, where taking a lot of damage in a protracted fight is catastrophic to your bank account, to such an extent that victory no longer becomes the goal, but repair bills are the overriding concern.

I'm also going by the repair rules outlined in the Bionics book, which I would think would apply broadly to robots as well.

[guardiandashi]

Not...quite correct. Those visual sensors are in addition to the standard robot sensors... which includes radar with a range of 30 miles/48km. Unless you were also assuming they didn't have the other robot systems... like the 12-hour air supply, or radio?

Granted, 30 miles/48km isn't great when, as you pointed out, the missiles can reach 40-80 miles/64-129km. But there's nothing that says they couldn't get targeting data from another platform that would allow a strike out that far. Heck, just look up their grid coordinate & pick a fixed ground target 80 miles away, & they can still hit it even if they don't have radar lock (won't be automatic, but still possible).

Very good point, thanks for the correction.

They could target larger things, but man-packs and anything on the ground won't appear on radar.

actually with our current tech mecha (robot vehicles) and power armor are not practical. although there are various projects actively working on power armor, but my understanding is that they keep running into the same issue that energy weapons have, which it the real killer is power as in a power supply that puts out enough power without being so bulky/massive to be impractical.

when you get into sci-fi like rifts, robotech, or battletech one of the first things they do is introduce some form of power source to let the cool vehicles work.

the biggest issue making mecha or robot vehicles impractical after the power source is armor vs surface area. NOT movement IE unless you have some form of armor that is incredibly tough but is impractical or cannot be used on conventional vehicles for some reason then put that same wonderful armor on a tank or apc and its going to be effectively better armored than any mecha.

and yes mecha have some of the same vulnerabilities to damage as conventional vehicles but they also have potentially different vulnerabilities and LESS in some cases.

usually the real advantage of mecha over conventional vehicles has to do with mobility over broken terrain. as in the basic pit? it stops the wheeled/tracked vehicle either gets stuck or has to go around. mecha can if properly designed (and not be vastly under strength) a well designed mecha should be strong enough to do a pushup or mobile/flexible enough to stand up easily in most cases. climbing out of a pit trap a mecha should be able to either leap, smash a wall down into a ramp (semi stairs) that it can climb out or similar.

one of the biggest advantages a mecha has over a conventional vehicle platform is also its disadvantage IE mounting weapons higher off the ground so they have a better los/ field of view for firing, if you look at a typical armored vehicle they are typically built as low as possible with the exception of 1 weapons emplacement and sensors which are often a bit higher. you have a vehicle that is 10ft tall its going to have a horizon of ~3.9 miles if its 40 ft tall its horizon is 7.7 miles of course there are some assumptions involved see http://www.ringbell.co.uk/info/hdist.htm

as far as robot vehicles a lot of times in order to make them a bit more practical I say the listed strength is not its actual strength but its EFFECTIVE strength. IE how much it can lift and carry but all robot vehicles can use their arms to climb, and or stand up, but if their listed strength is not enough, then its how much they can lift in excess of their normal load

[Warshield73]

What part of "they are AMAZINGLY cool" did you miss. I mean I don't know how old you were when you first saw Empire Strikes Back but I was 7 and they were so cool I started rooting for the Empire. It was even cooler when Luke brought them down.

I didn't miss it at all. And I never said they weren't. But they are stupid. Just like almost everything else in Rifts.

I have a simple question that, so far, I have always been too polite to ask but, and in my very best Galen voice, "why are you here?"

Seriously your response to everything is either "Kevin sucks" and/or "Rifts is horrible" so why are you here. I mean it gives no place for any conversation to go. I don't go onto a sports forum responding to every post with "the players are morons and the game is stupid" I would probably be banned. I spend a lot of time here because I love the setting, it has, not withstanding our conversations, brought me joy. I mean I feel about J.K. Rowling and Harry Potter as you seem to about Kevin and Rifts but I have spent exactly zero time on that so...just wondering.

Warning: Even if the other poster appears to be trolling, responding about them is still a violation of forum rules. So don't. - J

Warshield....you stated you have no military experience, so I'll be kind on some of your points...

Absolutely no need and I wanted to be clear earlier that I wasn't discounting your knowledge I just don't think it's entirely relevant to Rifts Earth. It's interesting in an academic sense, like a Neil deGrasse Tyson talking about Star Wars. As far as Rifts go you get giant robots for the same reason you have dragons and magic, because people want to play it. The robots are silly but so is all of it, it's a game. I mean look a football or soccer, the very idea of risking lifelong injury to move a ball up or down a field is, for lack of a better word, silly. People still do it.

1) 1949 The Revolt of the Admirals where the CJCS General Omar Bradely said the Navy was on its way out because of nukes so no need to actually build Aircraft Carriers because they are useless. Well then Korea and man did they need a Navy and Marine Corp and wow a new carrier would have been nice.

2) The 1990's where every attempt to build armored urban combat vehicles was shot down because the days of soldiers going door to door was over. This is why soldiers had to bolt scrap metal on to humvees in Iraq.

Yes, political battles have affected military hardware. "the Revolt of the Admirals" was a story about those in the know (the Admirals) fighting back against the bean counters and politicians that didn't know what they were talking about. Korea proved the Admirals correct.

Sorry you can't blame this on politicians. There were more senators and congressmen on the side of the admirals then on the other side at the time. Building ships brings jobs, lots of them and member of congress do not like those going away. One video I saw when I was researching this 5 or 6 years ago during some of the testimony a representative from either Virginia or Connecticut looked like he was going to cry when they couldn't get Bradley to budge on his testimony about the future of the Navy.

This was generals in the Army and Army Aircorp, later the Air Force, with one military opinion and the Navy and Marines on the other. Bradley was just able to swing more undecides in congress and the executive to his side. Well until the Korean War started and all of the sudden they decided it would be nice to be able to respond to a military crisis without nuking someone.

Sorry, point 2 is just funny... the military NEVER had an "armored urban combat vehicle" before...and still doesn't. They have armored assault vehicles....but remember Jeep....ever see one of those? Not even a roof. Vehicles like what you see S.W.A.T. use are "assault" vehicles, not troop transports. There are armored Humvees, but they are heavy, slower, and protect against small-arm fire, not explosives, and not all Humvees were issued armored doors.

This one I have less certainty on as it is not a strict matter of history. But this was sort of my point. Now I am not going to pretend to know the terminology for vehicles like the Bearcat and vehicles that were designed to protect from IEDs and other such hazards. The simple fact is we lacked the vehicles necessary to do the job in 2001/2003 and vehicles that were less than perfect for the job were used. This was not a surprise as according to congressional testimony people had been talking about a need for such things as far back as the invasion of Panama and it intensified after Mogadishu. They never put any resources into it because, according to military planners in and out of uniform the days of U.S. soldiers or marines going village to village and door to door was in the past.

Now just a reminder,

That said I absolutely agree with you that in a real world setting such things would almost certainly be laughable.

and all I wanted to point out was

Predict the future of warfare at your own peril.

Which I am sorry but seems like good advice.

Ummm, until someone builds one that honor has to be held by the F-35, which was supposed to be a cheap all purpose fighter and has now been described as a "Lamborghini" too expensive to risk so we need to build a new one to do the job it was supposed to.

On the other side I have three little words - Littoral Combat Ship - Because some idiots forgot what a Frigate is we, the tax payers, got to spend hundred billion or so for ships that didn't last as long as my last laptop.

Until someone actually builds one of these disasters (a battle mech) we have no idea if it is as big a waste as either of these, much less both.

One, we have over 850 F35s in service...seems like we could afford a few...and they fly combat missions....

I'm going to be honest I don't understand your point here. Yes we have built a lot of these but, and the Pentagon all but admitted this in April, according to F-35's own criteria it has been a failure.

It was supposed to replace the F-16, A-10, F/A-18 and the Harrier. So far it has replaced...none of these, I looked and apparently, we are still using Harriers which I thought had been phased out. The AF just acknowledge in August that the F-16 and A-10 are going to be around at least another decade. So in this, fail.

It was also supposed to be a cheap, easy to maintain platform for use across the services to simplify production and lower cost...I think we all know this is a fail.

As for its combat performance, I have read a lot of mixed reviews and this seems to be something of a controversy.

In short, I know we have them, but they just don't seem to be doing the job they were supposed to, yet we keep building them.

We have examples to pull from as to why mechs would suck; WWI tanks. They kept building bigger, slower, more-heavily-armored tanks, then someone discovered you could walk up to one and place an explosive charge on it...it then became a nice barricade.

I spend a fair bit of time covering the two world wars but truthfully I don't know the tanks real well. A quick search came up with a few things

The best tank of the war was probably the Panzer V, weighing in at 25 tons
The largest US tank was I believe the Pershing at 46 tons

By contrast the M-1 Abrams is I believe 55 tons and several modern peers appear to be heavier

Also in Rifts, because again this is about a game ultimately, there are several robot vehicles lighter than the Abrams. In fact most are lighter.

For crowd control, sure. Against unorganized peasants, sure. Against any half-trained and even poorly equipped force, absolutely not.

Again with no real life to go by in Rifts if they are poorly equipped they die. You invoked the UAR-1 Enforcer, do you know what volleys of 4 frag mini-missiles (to say nothing of plasma) do to a squad of armored infantry? I've played those games and it goes badly for the infantry each time and that is when they can get into the 2,000 to 4,000 foot range for most of there weapons. The Enforcer rail-gun can reach out to 2 or 3 times that range to say nothing of the missiles.

That seems to be an example from one of your games. It appears you were using something akin to Red Coat firing line strategy. Try some guerilla tactics next time.

No it wasn't and I did, in fact I said even when they get in range which only happened when they successfully used those tactics. This is a game where a PC/NPC on foot shotting a moving target with a rifle gets a penalty and pilots get to roll read sensors to spot said PC/NPC.

Also player groups, and this may just be the ones that play in my games, can use tactics too. Most of the times in my games large robots are preceded by flying power armor, or in my original group a hatchling dragon metamorphed into a flying bunny rabbit. Now, large robots can take lots of damage from infantry, this was especially true after Rifts Mercenaries came out with all the wonderful instruments of death it has, but they can take a lot compared to guys in body armor.

You also appear to be judging the robot vehicles on their own but placed against the entire world of Rifts, it doesn't work that way. They are part of a group and I have found that player groups tend towards maximizing each players abilities while trying to mitigate other players weaknesses. Go a couple of pages back in these forums and you can find people that swear Rifts mages are useless in combat so this is not a unique position.

Even in Rifts, they can't jump well, let alone fly. A series of trenches and pit traps are enough to take most of them out.

Those would have to be a lot of trenches, that are really deep. Most bots can leap, useually there hight. Heavy artillery bots like the Hunter Mobile Gun can barely walk bot most combat robots can leap and many have small jets that allow for a boost.

How deep of a hole do you think I am suggesting? Many can jump up to 15' high, and they aren't pulling themselves out (P.S. is too low). You only need a 20' pit, easy enough to dig with a simple Dig spell or a little prep time. Same defense stops tanks

20 feet deep, at least 10 feet to a side, covered in such a way that a pilot with a high vantage point won't see it. I just use mines. Fraction of the time much harder to detect. Also, most robots can climb with hands and feet they don't need to lift themselves out. If they couldn't then yes they would be useless.

They have all the vulnerabilities of tanks, and more.

No. They have some vulnerabilities of tanks, they have some that tanks don't. A mine for instance can incapacitate both a tank and mech, but on a mech it is unlikely to do any damage to the main body and is extremely unlikely to kill the crew. Tanks, that vehicle can blow up and that crew often dies.

Sorry, worst argument yet. Tank mines and anti-armor missiles/grenades are meant to take out the ARMOR not the squishy things inside. In Rifts, taking out the leg effectively takes out the Mech. Don't even need to damage it further as falling over would probably kill the crew anyway.

Umm yeah explosives go off it damages everything within the radius, reduce MDC to zero, it dies. Also, real world those Russian tank crews in Ukraine seem pretty dead, from the same missile and mines that toasted the tank.

As for the pilot dying if the bot falls over do you have a book and page number for that? You act like they are sitting in a metal box on folding chair. Real world helicopter pilots survive worse so this doesn't even make sense. Sure a 60 foot robot falling over those guys have a problem but an average bot where the pilot is in the chest 10 to 14 feet off the ground? I took a worse fall off my roof last year with no lasting injury and I didn't even have a pilots compartment. As for it being out even if you assume the robot can not lift itself up, which goes against the source material, if it fals on back or side it can still fire, if it has shoulder mounted turrets it can still fire. You also seem to imply that every shot at the legs hits and every leg blows up with one hit.

Even if you manage to dig a pit trap big enough, and even if you managed to disguise it so perfectly that person sitting 12 to 20 feet in the air couldn't see it and he fell in, he also has arms to go with those legs, he can climb out.

Tanks should generally be faster over open ground but again mechs can operate in swamps and mountainous terrain where a tank can't.

Tanks can much more easily hide in terrain from other ground units

Sorry, covered above. Robots are not strong-enough to climb out, and the sides of any pit would probably crumble as the 20+ ton weight of the robot was suddenly concentrated in the area of one of the hands. Yes, Robots can operate in swamps...but you know what else can? Boats. You know what's even better? Something that flies, or something that doesn't have the chance of missing that old, submerged riverbed and suddenly falling into a pit...can't swim...

And you know what hides even better than a tank? Something smaller...than a tank

Yes you covered above and you were wrong above, the PS is lifting weight so no an Enforcer cannot do a pull up but it is more than capable of leveraging it's hands and feet and climbing. Now some are not built for it but if it is more or less humanoid and not too top heavy like the Hunter Mobile Gun then yes it can climb. If you assume otherwise that means power armors are even more useless as they can almost never lift their own weight.

Yes and there are boats in Rifts but they must be towed or flown to a swamp and then taken out. Robot vehicles can do it on their own.

As for problems in the water, most robots have list depth tolerance and speed. Flying vehicles stick out more than robots and rarely have the firepower.

Before you do this you may want to look features common to all robot vehicles. You've been playing for a while so it was in RMB Pg. 214, then it was reprinted in RUE Pg. 273. Since you mentioned the Enforcer it is also in WB 11 CS War Campaign pg. 134.

When you look at this you will see that the enforcer has a radar that reaches out to 40 miles and since the radar emitter is almost 20 feet in the air (it mentions it as part of the sensor tower under MDC) it has far less ground clutter than any armored vehicle not mounting a 20 foot radar mass.

Now another problem about what you said is the idea that once the Enforcer launches those missiles you get all the time in the world to take it out. No, if your radar is 30 miles you have just over a minute, not quite 5 melees to know it is coming. The amount of time you have to shoot it down depends on the range of your best weapon. If your best weapon is 1 mile or less you have 1 attack to take it out, maybe 2 if you are a juicer as that missile flies through your attack envelope in tad less than 3 seconds.

Now this applies to every vehicle, including tanks. However, a battle mechs commanding height means they have less radar clutter and fewer obstacles blocking things like missile launchers.

And before you make this argument, you may want to consult someone that has actually been in a situation like this...maybe someone that was a trained to take out tanks and other heavy equipment.

First, in this section I made no arguments. None at all. You miss stated the rules from the book, which you acknowledged when green.nova343 pointed out. To be clear I had finished my post before I saw his and I didn't have time to change mine.
Second, I have. I have played with a lot of marines, sailors, and soldiers over the years (in one group there were 4 vets and only 1 other civilian). In fact a quick look at some of my old player rosters those who were in the military either before or after we ran robot pilot seems to be the majority. This is the RMB Headhunter, RUE Robot Pilot and CS/Triax equivalents but yes that is most of them. Now the single OCC with the most was Cyber-knight with 3 (1 marine and I believe 2 soldiers although not positive may have been other service).

Number one thing you do AFTER firing at a something that can fire back at you? MOVE. That's right, as we would fire missiles at a tank or something else, next thing we were doing is gunning it and getting to a new position. Mobility is much better than armor for survival. Go ahead and target my position. I only need about a minute to move and drive the 100 or so feet to get out of the main blast radius, and another minute to be completely out of the secondary blast radius. FIRE AWAY. Waste your missiles trying to hit my truck with a missile launcher on it. Oh, and try to find my sniper friend with the laser pointer I can even fire over the horizon so you don't know where I am

This seems to have nothing to do with what you are replying to here so not sure what to do with it but I'll play.

If you can fire over the horizon with the aid of a sniper with a laser designator so can the bot.

The bot doesn't need to fire his precious missiles at your truck, his friend in the CS sky cycle can chase you down and just use mini-missiles on the truck. The bot can use his mini-missiles to shoot down the missiles you fired.

Assuming the bots sensors can't detect the targeting laser, which I have always said they cannot but several players had disagreed, the bot doesn't have to worry about the sniper. His friend the Hatchling dragon or the rogue dog boy will do it.

Again even in the real world the tactics you describe do not work perfectly, why would they in a TTRPG.

For the cost of one giant robot, you can usually have 10-50 good power armor.... or a metric buttload of tanks.

This is absolutely true and you say it like it would mean anything. Again I point you to the Littoral Combat Ships and the F-35. If a military decides they can get some sort of advantage with it, or if it will make defense contract sickeningly wealthy, they will build them. If anything your point would almost be a reason why pre-rifts militaries would build them.

Non-sensical reply, sorry. Militaries don't make the financial decisions, their governments do. They give contracts to the lowest bidder, not the highest.

This seems to have no basis in reality.

When was the last time our government didn't give the military what it asked for? In fact it has been 15 years since the government didn't give the military more than it asked for which I have to say as someone who spent his life in public education I am jealous. Also yes say it is a politician. I have a company that just built a big robot, I want the military to buy it, I bribe a congressmen...excuse me I mean provide a legal campaign contribution...and bam it's in the next appropriation. Whether the military asked for it or not.

The lowest bidder thing is a funny joke but it is only narrowly true. Yes when you were in the army your food, clothing, shelter, even tools and some basic equipment all lowest bidder. But not the big stuff.

An aircraft carrier is not the cheapest that can be built.
Littoral combat ships were not the cheapest options, again I am going by what friends in the Navy and reporting said.

The F-35 wasn't the cheapest option in the JSF competition either. Sometimes or from the outside it appears most times on the big stuff the military picks the option that they think will fulfill all their requirements and fit within the budget provided DoD and approved by congress.

Again, if a military will build ships with a shorter lifespan than the TV show Supernatural or a replacement aircraft that doesn't replace anything they might just build mechs if the circumstances were right.

I honestly prefer power armor myself but as a GM I can tell you that almost every group I have ever run has at least one large mech. When I run convention games one of the first characters that gets grabbed is almost always the robot pilot.

Do you carefully record damage, and limit the availability of qualified techs who can repair it, and sometimes charge exorbitant repair bills if your group happens to be in the hinterlands without many options?

Or do you just gloss over most of the 'fun' details of gigantic mecha ownership?

Serious questions, no sarcasm intended.

I'm looking at it from a Battletech perspective, where taking a lot of damage in a protracted fight is catastrophic to your bank account, to such an extent that victory no longer becomes the goal, but repair bills are the overriding concern.

I'm also going by the repair rules outlined in the Bionics book, which I would think would apply broadly to robots as well.

This is a completely fair question and the answer is in most groups I do. Any group that is planning to run a long campaign or their is no stated end date I require people to keep track.

I have run brief 3 to 5 session min-campaigns where we don't bother, no time, and of course in convention games it's just not a concern.

This applies to everyone though. So the mage with his PPE and magical devices are kept track of just like the robots MDC.

As for the repair rules in Bionics SB, my players liked those because they were far cheaper than our house rules we came up with after the original SB 1 came out.

The simple fact is this stuff works in the setting because it is written to work in the setting. Giant robots are, most likely, very stupid and will never be seen in real life. Neither will space fighters so say goodbye Battlestar Galactica and Star Wars. FTL is physically impossible so there goes most other sci-fi. And I probably don't have to say this, but magic isn't real either

People want a giant robot in Rifts for the same reason they want a space fighter in Phase world, wish fullfillment. And if you think it is expensive and difficult to fix an Enforcer, try a Katana fighter.

[Killer Cyborg]

When I first picked-up Rifts in 1991, I loved the idea of mechs. A friend of mine had tried to introduce me to Robotech a few years earlier, but I wasn't a fan (I like magic).

Now, decades later, and after being in the Army as an anti-armor MOS....mechs are one of the dumbest ideas ever proposed

For crowd control, sure. Against unorganized peasants, sure. Against any half-trained and even poorly equipped force, absolutely not.

Mechs are a waste of resources. They are HUGE targets and easily accounted for.

I'm with you.

Even in Rifts, they can't jump well, let alone fly. A series of trenches and pit traps are enough to take most of them out.

Hm.
Which ones are you thinking of that can't jump well?

And I don't think that MD-capable humanoid bots are as likely to be bound by pits or trenches as you think.

They have all the vulnerabilities of tanks, and more.

The real laughable thing is something like the UAR-1 Enforcer has "medium range missiles" with a 40-80 mile range! But no way to target them. the best sensor on the thing has a range of 2000 feet. It means anything beyond 2000 feet is targeted LOS....you ain't targeting anything using LOS more than maybe a mile out.

Pretty sure they have radar.

[Killer Cyborg]

How deep of a hole do you think I am suggesting? Many can jump up to 15' high, and they aren't pulling themselves out (P.S. is too low). You only need a 20' pit, easy enough to dig with a simple Dig spell or a little prep time. Same defense stops tanks

Okay, hold up.

1. "The PS is too low to pull themselves out" is a misundrestanding of how the PS score works.
PS is how much you can lift ON TOP OF YOUR OWN BODY WEIGHT, otherwise many characters wouldn't be able to walk.
The average PS is 10, which means the average person can carry 100 lbs and lift 200 lbs.
This does NOT mean that a dude who weighs 100 lbs and has a PS 10 can't carry a pencil with him without falling over or passing out.
Same deal with robots.
They're just as able to do a muscle-up as any human; moreso becasue of the way PS works, where their max LIFT is the same is their max carry.

2. "You only need a 20' pit."
The UAR-1 enforcer is 19' tall, just for instance.
If you were standing in a pit that was 1/19th taller than your head, you don't think you could figure a way out...?
Come on. His arms would easily reach out of the pit, and he could pull himself out.

3. Even if he couldn't somehow do that, I think you're over-estimating the sturdiness of dirt--or even stone--when it comes to dealing with mega-damage bots.
They could easily DIG their way out, or blast their way out.
It's hardly a prison.

4. "You just need a Dig spell."
Kinda?
The Dig spell "will dig a hole or tunnel for the Warlock. It can did through 10' of dirt per melee, five feet of clay, or two feet of stone per melee. The stone must be somewhat loose for this to work."
Typical Palladium, the spell mentions nothing about the width of the hole, but since the hole is "for the Warlock" I think it indicates something human-size, not mech-size.
You'd need the full 5 minutes of the spell per pit, I'd think, if you're wanting to make a trap for a mech.
Most likely more, if you want the pit to be wide enough the mech has a real chance of falling into it, and/or if there's clay or stone you have to get through.
And you'd need more than just that spell if there was any solid rock or good-sized boulders in the way.

5. "Same defense stops tanks"

Agreed.
But I think the point of focus here should be that the same dense would work BETTER on tanks; you don't have to dig as deep because they can't pull themselves out, and they can't jump.
Which would mean the whole point of the pit conversation should really be "Mechs are more effective against some defenses than tanks are."
Which is mostly a point for the existence of mechs.

Pits aren't useless against Bots, but they're not necessarily all THAT great either.
You have to camouflage the pit, and the pilot has to fail spot the camouflage. Heck, the pilotS plural have to fail to stop it in many places. With just a pilot and co-pilot, that's two different checks being made. More if there's gunners who are able to pay any attention.
And the camouflage has to work against a viewpoint of nearly 20' up in the air, so you'll need a flyer on your side to do some checking when setting things up.
And I'm not sure if infrared and thermal would help in spotting a pit or not, but it's good to remember that bots have more than just standard human vision as a rule, because that can throw a monkey wrench in various plans.

And if you don't have a mage on your side to dig?
Well, you'd better have some mechs or other heavy machinery; you're essentially excavating a building foundation (with multiple basement levels) with every pit you dig.

[Crimson Dynamo]

I have a simple question that, so far, I have always been too polite to ask but, and in my very best Galen voice, "why are you here?"

Seriously your response to everything is either "Kevin sucks" and/or "Rifts is horrible" so why are you here. I mean it gives no place for any conversation to go. I don't go onto a sports forum responding to every post with "the players are morons and the game is stupid" I would probably be banned. I spend a lot of time here because I love the setting, it has, not withstanding our conversations, brought me joy. I mean I feel about J.K. Rowling and Harry Potter as you seem to about Kevin and Rifts but I have spent exactly zero time on that so...just wondering.

You don't have to be a blind sycophant to like something. People are allowed to be critical of things, believe it or not.

I absolutely hate J.K. Rowling as a human being, but I enjoy Harry Potter (even though there's a bunch of really dumb things about it, too; for example, their general ignorance of the "muggle world" alone is incredibly idiotic as they're the ones hiding their society from muggles, not the other way around). And just because you only focus on the negative things people say, that doesn't mean that's all they say. The vast majority of my posts have nothing whatsoever to do with any of that.

But hey, if you need to focus on that instead of the actual topic, that's fine.

[barna10]

I really hope you proponents of mechs are the generals in charge of the opposition

[Nekira Sudacne]

When I first picked-up Rifts in 1991, I loved the idea of mechs. A friend of mine had tried to introduce me to Robotech a few years earlier, but I wasn't a fan (I like magic).

Now, decades later, and after being in the Army as an anti-armor MOS....mechs are one of the dumbest ideas ever proposed

For crowd control, sure. Against unorganized peasants, sure. Against any half-trained and even poorly equipped force, absolutely not.

Mechs are a waste of resources. They are HUGE targets and easily accounted for.

I'm with you.

Even in Rifts, they can't jump well, let alone fly. A series of trenches and pit traps are enough to take most of them out.

Hm.
Which ones are you thinking of that can't jump well?

And I don't think that MD-capable humanoid bots are as likely to be bound by pits or trenches as you think.

They have all the vulnerabilities of tanks, and more.

The real laughable thing is something like the UAR-1 Enforcer has "medium range missiles" with a 40-80 mile range! But no way to target them. the best sensor on the thing has a range of 2000 feet. It means anything beyond 2000 feet is targeted LOS....you ain't targeting anything using LOS more than maybe a mile out.

Pretty sure they have radar.

I will note that the idea of a Pit trap for Robots or tanks isn't "You dig a hole, cover it up, and hope someone falls into it and is trapped loony toons style", and that's the end of it.

While the 19' robot is in the 20'-30' hole, all of it's weapons are kind of blocked up and it can't target anything effectively.

It's not that it's impossible for the robot to dig/blast it's way out. it's that, while it's doing that, it can't defend itself against the squad of people who were waiting to ambush and fire on it while it's functionally helpless. Pour down fire from above, you could knock out it's sensors really quick, and then pick it apart.

If the crew is smart, they'll just surrender. They have basically no chance to win, the 350 MDC will be torn apart long before it can manage to counterattack.

[Library Ogre]

For the cost of one giant robot, you can usually have 10-50 good power armor.... or a metric buttload of tanks.

This is absolutely true and you say it like it would mean anything. Again I point you to the Littoral Combat Ships and the F-35. If a military decides they can get some sort of advantage with it, or if it will make defense contract sickeningly wealthy, they will build them. If anything your point would almost be a reason why pre-rifts militaries would build them.

Power armor has the same advantage as it did in Heinlein... you wind up with a mobile infantry, if not a cavalry.

You stick a bunch of grunts in Samson power armor, you've got grunts moving at 150mph, on paths only slightly larger than you need for people (11' tall and 5' wide), carrying rail guns, mini-missiles, and person weapons, in triple-strength combat armor.

And you can get 11 of those, with money to spare, for the cost of a single Titan Recon Bot, who has barely more MDC than one, and practically no weapons. You want a full Titan Combat Bot? You can get 1 of those... or 28 Samson. And while the Samson can't fire medium missiles like the TCB, 28 v 1 is probably gonna go badly for the big bot.

Everyone knows a metric buttload outweighs anything else on the battlefield

More than twice an imperial buttload!

But, seriously, get more people in power armor, and have them protect a mobile missile launcher.

The Samson and Samson Missilemen are horribly underrated power armors and at dirt cheap prices too.

[/quote]

I mean, you barely even need a full on missile-capable individual system.

Buy 1 Flying Titan, 10 Samsons, and use the savings to buy 10 single-shot, PA-portable, medium missile shoulder launchers... power armor RPGs, basically. You now have 10 medium missiles, and a high-speed spotter and air-to-air combatant. For the price of one exploration bot.

About the ONLY advantage of a giant robot over power armor with the same number of credits is manpower cost... you only need 1 person per giant robot, but 11 if you've got 11 power armor in the field (plus support crews for either).

[Hotrod]

The issue with giant robots in Rifts is that combat in Rifts is centered on small groups, and the system wasn't made for vastly disparate scales. Giant robots in Rifts are at least one order of magnitude lighter and flimsier than they should be, often more.

Consider a tiny 10-12 ft tall robot twice as tall as a person but generally of the same proportions. That robot will also be twice as wide and twice as thick as a person, giving that robot about 8 times the mass. Since a person in body armor has squishy SDC bits moving it around, body armor is a fairly thin outer shell that has to balance protection with weight. Giant robots don't have that problem; they can support heavier and proportionately thicker armor, and their internal structural components are also going to be M.D.C. Thus, even the smallest of robot combat vehicles should be at least 10 times as tough as a grunt.

Weapon-wise, robot combat vehicles should be utterly devastating, letting fly at greater range with firepower that's at least an order of magnitude more powerful than a grunt's weapons, since power tends to scale proportionately with mass. Melee weapons larger than a person should send people flying and injure them badly even if they don't insta-destroy the body armor in question. Your average small robot combat vehicle should be reliably one-shotting your average grunt.

Mobility-wise, robot combat vehicles should be masters of any land warfare environment, able to roam almost any land environment with ease. What it can't climb over, it can smash its way through, and robot combat vehicle pilots should be proficient at using buildings, hills, forests, and other terrain against their enemies. Their mobility and flexibility should be the envy of every other vehicle with the possible exception of some types of flying vehicles, using terrain, vegetation, and buildings to keep out of sight and out of the line of fire as a rule, with open field combat as the exception (and then using smoke munitions and such to obscure itself and prevent enemies from focusing fire on it).

Then there's the soft factors. Robots should have better sensors, mobility, and communications employed in ways that integrate and magnify their effectiveness. Robots with multiple crewmen should synergize such that fighting against a single robot is like fighting against multiple closely-coordinated crewmen, each of whom can apply their attacks through their own designated weapon systems.

What we actually get in Rifts are giant robots with armor with less proportional durability than a Chipwell suit, weapons little better than a well-equipped foot soldier, and crews that get hand-waved to act as just one character for the purposes of running combat while getting used as lumbering piles of metal, usually wide out in the open with no use of terrain, obstacles, cover, or concealment.

tl;dr Fighting a single, unsupported robot combat vehicle in Rifts should be a guaranteed death sentence for anything smaller than a platoon. When one shows up, the response should be something like "hide first, run second, and expect to die if you have to fight. In practice, it's an uncommon robot combat vehicle in Rifts that can pose a serious threat to 4 dismounted characters.

[barna10]

tl;dr Fighting a single, unsupported robot combat vehicle in Rifts should be a guaranteed death sentence for anything smaller than a platoon. When one shows up, the response should be something like "hide first, run second, and expect to die if you have to fight. In practice, it's an uncommon robot combat vehicle in Rifts that can pose a serious threat to 4 dismounted characters.

100% agree

What is really missing is the ability for the robot's targeting computer to lock-on and autofire at targets. We have that capability now...

Robocop has better aiming AI than anything in Rifts, even Naruni weapons.

[Crimson Dynamo]

tl;dr Fighting a single, unsupported robot combat vehicle in Rifts should be a guaranteed death sentence for anything smaller than a platoon. When one shows up, the response should be something like "hide first, run second, and expect to die if you have to fight. In practice, it's an uncommon robot combat vehicle in Rifts that can pose a serious threat to 4 dismounted characters.

That applies equally to tanks and other vehicles of war. And it still leaves giant robots as a dumb alternative to superior options like said tanks and other vehicles of war. The scale of the game's mechanics have nothing to do with it. Again: There's a reason no military in the real world is investing in the concept, or has any plans to.

The only thing they have going for them is the Rule of Cool.

[Hotrod]

tl;dr Fighting a single, unsupported robot combat vehicle in Rifts should be a guaranteed death sentence for anything smaller than a platoon. When one shows up, the response should be something like "hide first, run second, and expect to die if you have to fight. In practice, it's an uncommon robot combat vehicle in Rifts that can pose a serious threat to 4 dismounted characters.

That applies equally to tanks and other vehicles of war. And it still leaves giant robots as a dumb alternative to superior options like said tanks and other vehicles of war. The scale of the game's mechanics have nothing to do with it. Again: There's a reason no military in the real world is investing in the concept, or has any plans to.

The only thing they have going for them is the Rule of Cool.

Robots offer a level of mobility that tanks can't come close to matching. Tanks can't handle driving in woods, and they don't do well in areas with lots of cover and concealment. They get stuck in mud, and their tracks and wheels are a serious point of weakness and failure. Driving a tank through a building is incredibly dangerous, as even if a tank can handle the building falling on it, tanks will get stuck in basements. Tank have little ability to climb over or out of things compared to something that can move like a human body, and their visual and firing arcs tend to be limited and focused on longer-ranged combat. Tanks vs dismounted people is terrifying in the open, but in tight urban environments, mountains, woods, steep hills, beaches, and other restrictive terrain, their mobility becomes a major liability.

There are lots of reasons militaries don't invest in massive robots. Power/energy density limitations can't support them, material strength limitations (square cube law means that big robots supported by relatively skinny legs aren't a good idea) and the difficulty of creating and managing the complex control systems required for bipedal motion is a difficult and complex problem. If we had MDC materials, much stronger materials, potent energy-dense power sources, and reliable bipedal motion control systems, I'm pretty sure robots would become not just viable but preferable over tanks in many situations, especially those involving close combat.

[Killer Cyborg]

When I first picked-up Rifts in 1991, I loved the idea of mechs. A friend of mine had tried to introduce me to Robotech a few years earlier, but I wasn't a fan (I like magic).

Now, decades later, and after being in the Army as an anti-armor MOS....mechs are one of the dumbest ideas ever proposed

For crowd control, sure. Against unorganized peasants, sure. Against any half-trained and even poorly equipped force, absolutely not.

Mechs are a waste of resources. They are HUGE targets and easily accounted for.

I'm with you.

Even in Rifts, they can't jump well, let alone fly. A series of trenches and pit traps are enough to take most of them out.

Hm.
Which ones are you thinking of that can't jump well?

And I don't think that MD-capable humanoid bots are as likely to be bound by pits or trenches as you think.

They have all the vulnerabilities of tanks, and more.

The real laughable thing is something like the UAR-1 Enforcer has "medium range missiles" with a 40-80 mile range! But no way to target them. the best sensor on the thing has a range of 2000 feet. It means anything beyond 2000 feet is targeted LOS....you ain't targeting anything using LOS more than maybe a mile out.

Pretty sure they have radar.

I will note that the idea of a Pit trap for Robots or tanks isn't "You dig a hole, cover it up, and hope someone falls into it and is trapped loony toons style", and that's the end of it.

While the 19' robot is in the 20'-30' hole, all of it's weapons are kind of blocked up and it can't target anything effectively.

A 19' robot in a 20' hole should be able to get out in 1 attack, maybe 2.
So the net effect for all that effort would be about the same as a successful Knockdown attack.
Not necessarily a huge winner.

It's not that it's impossible for the robot to dig/blast it's way out. it's that, while it's doing that, it can't defend itself against the squad of people who were waiting to ambush and fire on it while it's functionally helpless. Pour down fire from above, you could knock out it's sensors really quick, and then pick it apart.

So not only does the bot have a chance to detect the pit(s) before it falls in, but also the hidden squad of people.

But okay, the bot falls into the pit.
Then what?
People rush to the edge of the pit to shoot at down at it?
In a 20' hole, a 19' tall bot could PUNCH them.
An arm is what, roughly half body height?
So a 19' bot will have something like a 9' arm.
Picture yourself in a pit that's 1/19th taller than the top of your head.
I don't think it's as helpless as you seem to believe.

In a 30' hole, or 50' or whatever, it could still shoot at anybody on the edge.
Or shoot the sides of the pit, blasting it out from under them so they fall down into the pit with it.

I mean, you could use mortars or some other indirect fire, but I'm not seeing how you picture "being in a hole" means somebody can't shoot at somebody else who's shooting at them.

If the crew is smart, they'll just surrender. They have basically no chance to win, the 350 MDC will be torn apart long before it can manage to counterattack.

As far as I can tell, any group that can tear through 350 MDC in the time it would take a bot to get out of a pit would generally be able to tear through just as well if the bot was not in the pit.
The pit wouldn't be the problem in that scenario.

[Library Ogre]

The real problem for a 20' robot half-caught in a 20' hole is that their crotch gun can't get a firing solution.

[Dustin Fireblade]

In the CS "Heroes of Humanity" book, there's a section detailing how the CS is building more power armor and cyborgs now rather than robot vehicles. Essentially it comes down to resources and and I believe effectiveness factors.

barna10 - for Rifts, what would be an effective robot combat vehicle in your view?

[Nekira Sudacne]

When I first picked-up Rifts in 1991, I loved the idea of mechs. A friend of mine had tried to introduce me to Robotech a few years earlier, but I wasn't a fan (I like magic).

Now, decades later, and after being in the Army as an anti-armor MOS....mechs are one of the dumbest ideas ever proposed

For crowd control, sure. Against unorganized peasants, sure. Against any half-trained and even poorly equipped force, absolutely not.

Mechs are a waste of resources. They are HUGE targets and easily accounted for.

I'm with you.

Even in Rifts, they can't jump well, let alone fly. A series of trenches and pit traps are enough to take most of them out.

Hm.
Which ones are you thinking of that can't jump well?

And I don't think that MD-capable humanoid bots are as likely to be bound by pits or trenches as you think.

They have all the vulnerabilities of tanks, and more.

The real laughable thing is something like the UAR-1 Enforcer has "medium range missiles" with a 40-80 mile range! But no way to target them. the best sensor on the thing has a range of 2000 feet. It means anything beyond 2000 feet is targeted LOS....you ain't targeting anything using LOS more than maybe a mile out.

Pretty sure they have radar.

I will note that the idea of a Pit trap for Robots or tanks isn't "You dig a hole, cover it up, and hope someone falls into it and is trapped loony toons style", and that's the end of it.

While the 19' robot is in the 20'-30' hole, all of it's weapons are kind of blocked up and it can't target anything effectively.

A 19' robot in a 20' hole should be able to get out in 1 attack, maybe 2.
So the net effect for all that effort would be about the same as a successful Knockdown attack.
Not necessarily a huge winner.

Interesting.

Where do you get 1-2 melee attacks from?

I'd be inclined to say a full melee round, if not a whole minute or even more.

Or rather, It'd be piloting rolls at hefty penalties. How long depends mostly on skill and partly on luck.

For an experiment: drop yourself into a hole that's just a bit taller than your sholders, and see how long it takes you to climb out of it.

Then: See how long it takes a reasonably athletic man to climb out of it.

Then: consider the robot is likely less able to do that than both of you. It is not a power armor, designed to fully mimic the full range of human motion smoothly, or routinely do pull-up's. I'd say it could, but not quickly or easialy.

[Crimson Dynamo]

Robots offer a level of mobility that tanks can't come close to matching. Tanks can't handle driving in woods, and they don't do well in areas with lots of cover and concealment. They get stuck in mud, and their tracks and wheels are a serious point of weakness and failure. Driving a tank through a building is incredibly dangerous, as even if a tank can handle the building falling on it, tanks will get stuck in basements. Tank have little ability to climb over or out of things compared to something that can move like a human body, and their visual and firing arcs tend to be limited and focused on longer-ranged combat. Tanks vs dismounted people is terrifying in the open, but in tight urban environments, mountains, woods, steep hills, beaches, and other restrictive terrain, their mobility becomes a major liability.

Before I begin, I should have emphasized Rifts tanks, most notably hovertanks. That's on me though.

That said, what on Earth makes you think a 40-foot tall robot is going to have an easy time of navigating a forest compared to a wheeled vehicle, nevermind a flying one? Also almost every modern tank (and those in Rifts as well) has onboard weapons that can easily target nearby opponents; it's not just one big gun.

And what kind of city streets allow a 40-foot giant robot to walk around freely but would impede a tank or other wheeled/tracked vehicle? Nevermind flying vehicles.

There are lots of reasons militaries don't invest in massive robots. Power/energy density limitations can't support them, material strength limitations (square cube law means that big robots supported by relatively skinny legs aren't a good idea) and the difficulty of creating and managing the complex control systems required for bipedal motion is a difficult and complex problem. If we had MDC materials, much stronger materials, potent energy-dense power sources, and reliable bipedal motion control systems, I'm pretty sure robots would become not just viable but preferable over tanks in many situations, especially those involving close combat.

Emphasis mine. Exactly, dude. Exactly.

Giant robots are dumb for so many reasons, and that's precisely one of them. Being bipedal is clumsy as hell and we, as a species, only went that way because we like to use our hands for toolmaking and the like. Just walking down the street and we fall over when we hit the most minor of obstacles. And that's the main reason we don't have more walking robots (just normal, regular sized robots) running around vs. ones on wheels or tracks.

The latter are simply superior in every conceivable way other than ridiculous scenarios that require your giant robots to not be giant at all. They're simply cheaper, easier, more effective pound for pound.

Gimme a hover tank any day of the week.

[green.nova343]

The real problem for a 20' robot half-caught in a 20' hole is that their crotch gun can't get a firing solution.

Now...I could see the Mackie being popular among Northern Gun engineers...

[hup7]

"the difficulty of creating and managing the complex control systems required for bipedal motion is a difficult and complex problem." and "Being bipedal is clumsy as hell "

Nope, not at all. Look up Boston Dynamics Atlas and Handle - yeah robots can back flip; now. Most importantly look at Atlas from five years ago to Atlas today; they have advanced in leaps and bounds - literally. Add another 200 years development onto that? In five years it went from stumbling around like a drunken toddler to gymnastics - FIVE years. Even though it is in Robotech, Kevin states the veritech is MORE manoeuvrable than the pilot ever could be. Check out 2 wheeled vehicles vs 4 wheeled in terms of balance and manoeuvrability and then (again) ADD 200 years development.

Yes, the problem IS that giant robots do not really make sense in terms of MDC relative to size, nor their weapon systems relate to size either. Take the one example of a giant sized energy rifle - it has the same range, same damage but can hold a bigger payload. o_O This issue comes from trying to minimise power creep while keeping all options playable - basically it is a "play" balance choice.

UAR in a pit? All you have done is given them cover; the main gun is shoulder mount and they have missiles (shoulder mount)... the hole will help, I'd be in no hurry to climb out. But yes robots can climb, if the sides of the hole collapse as it's climbing then it forward rolls out. Of course the 'pit' will completely topple a tank and it's main gun is forward facing.

But that is just my opinion. People are free to make the robots clumsy and slow, just as people are welcome to increase the amount of MDC / damage from giant robots. The conversion book gives information on how much armour they recommend adding to giant sized robots from robotech.

[Crimson Dynamo]

"the difficulty of creating and managing the complex control systems required for bipedal motion is a difficult and complex problem." and "Being bipedal is clumsy as hell "

Nope, not at all. Look up Boston Dynamics Atlas and Handle - yeah robots can back flip; now. Most importantly look at Atlas from five years ago to Atlas today; they have advanced in leaps and bounds - literally. Add another 200 years development onto that? In five years it went from stumbling around like a drunken toddler to gymnastics - FIVE years. Even though it is in Robotech, Kevin states the veritech is MORE manoeuvrable than the pilot ever could be. Check out 2 wheeled vehicles vs 4 wheeled in terms of balance and manoeuvrability and then (again) ADD 200 years development.

Yes, do go look at them. And how often they fall/tip over, especially in terrain they weren't preprogrammed for. One stiff shove is enough to topple them, at which point you get to watch them flop about until they can find their feet again--presuming their opponent would give them the opportunity to do so.

Then compare to 'bots with three+ wheels or tracks (or hovertech, or flight), then ADD 200 years development.

[Hotrod]

Before I begin, I should have emphasized Rifts tanks, most notably hovertanks. That's on me though.

That's a reasonable position; a tank that can hover and fly is a pretty potent weapon in concept. Consider, however, how much difficulty would be involved in making something like a main battle tank hover and low-level fly. Being in favor of hover tanks because giant robots are highly impractical suggests that you're being highly selective in how you apply your realism (which is fine, by the way; it just makes the topic more a question of taste than of practicality). I'll restrict my reply to discussing ground-based tanks and combat vehicles vs robot combat vehicles for this reply; I'm happy to talk through hover tanks vs robot combat vehicles in another reply if you want to get into that aspect of things.

That said, what on Earth makes you think a 40-foot tall robot is going to have an easy time of navigating a forest compared to a wheeled vehicle, nevermind a flying one?

I'll compare tanks with tracks and robots of equal size for this comparison (40 feet is gigantic as robot combat vehicles go). A tank is, essentially, a box with a turret on top. It's wide and long, and it can't bend itself. It has a long cannon that it can only elevate so high. It has to travel on relatively flat terrain; gaps, thick walls, and rough ground is difficult and sometimes impossible to pass through. Tanks can pivot, but they can't side-step or step over big obstacles. Tanks can't lift and move stuff out of their way.

Also almost every modern tank (and those in Rifts as well) has onboard weapons that can easily target nearby opponents; it's not just one big gun.

That's not actually true; tanks usually have a main gun, a coaxial machine gun, and one or two more machine guns atop their turrets. They've got crazy firepower in the general direction where their turrets are pointed, but are vulnerable to getting rushed from the sides and rear. This is why mutual support and infantry support has always been an important and big deal for tanks in combat. They're made to work with the rest of the Army, not by themselves.

And what kind of city streets allow a 40-foot giant robot to walk around freely but would impede a tank or other wheeled/tracked vehicle? Nevermind flying vehicles.

40 feet is not an average height for a robot combat vehicle in Rifts, but let's consider that case. A 40-foot tall robot can step over 10-ft obstacles easily and 6 foot obstacles without breaking stride. Barricades that would stop a tank dead in its tracks are a joke to a robot combat vehicle. A ground combat vehicle of equal size to such a robot is going to be far more limited in a city.

Giant robots are dumb for so many reasons, and that's precisely one of them. Being bipedal is clumsy as hell and we, as a species, only went that way because we like to use our hands for toolmaking and the like. Just walking down the street and we fall over when we hit the most minor of obstacles. And that's the main reason we don't have more walking robots (just normal, regular sized robots) running around vs. ones on wheels or tracks.

The latter are simply superior in every conceivable way other than ridiculous scenarios that require your giant robots to not be giant at all. They're simply cheaper, easier, more effective pound for pound.

Gimme a hover tank any day of the week.

I'm bipedal. You probably are, too. I don't feel clumsy, and I don't generally fall down walking through most kinds of terrain. Handwaving control systems that can handle large bipedal robots gracefully is one of the lesser miracles required for large robot combat vehicles, because that already exists in nature.

Hover tanks are cool too, but making something 70 tons hover and fight 10 feet off the ground requires its own set of miracles that exceed our present-day capabilities.

[desrocfc]

Firstly, robots have several things going for them, several against. This is a game requiring suspension of belief, so claiming to base opinions entirely on physics and reality, while also discussing playing godlings and fighting minions of a returned Atlantis should be taken into account. Ultimately, the rule of cool factor is a thing, but real world military tactics and tactical groupings negate many of the issues. Some issues I thought the discussion could benefit from:

1. Tactical Groupings. Speaking from a position of some authority (currently serving infantry officer qualified to the Battalion commander or Brigade staff level), the idea of throwing out a robot vehicle without adequate close and general support is largely where things get messy. When the concept for WB 22: Free Quebec was just scribbles on paper, the VERY first thing I planned was for the tactical groupings and support elements for GB squads and scaled it up from there. If you think FQ would deploy 4 GBs together without significant infantry support (be it grunts, 'Borgs/Juicers and/or other PA like the SAMAS), think again. The same could be said for CS robots and any kingdom wealthy enough to field these behemoths.

2. Combined Arms. The Ukraine War is an example of two conflicting approaches to warfare; NATO versus Russian doctrine. The former makes heavy use of joint inter-element operations with a significant training bill and is demonstrating the dividends earned, vice the latter's economy of scale approach to training and employment in the field. I would argue the current conflict is absolutely not a good example of how to employ armour (effectively what we are talking about but in bipedal form) in a joint context. We see Ukraine starting to employ NATO tactics and doctrine, but at the onset both sides were very much still relying on WWII tactical maneuvers and doctrine without synchronous support by Navy and Air Force to Army movements. There's a lot of theory being glossed over here; suffice to say the Russian approach is more a case of what NOT to do. Ironically, the current "recruitment drive" largely resembles what the CS did during the Tolkeen War.

3. Spearheads. So you want to cinematically have a giant, stompy robot come in and crash the enemy lines? Okay, sure. Bringing into account the previous points, it'll have a ton of close and supporting fire support. Bear in mind, tanks fight tanks, robots fight robots. Ranges are a thing as well. Most effective robot weapons are firing twice to four times the range of a small arm rifle. Good luck fighting back. Ambushing brings us back to point 1. You may get your one or two shots, and now you have a hive of infantry swarming to flush you out, which *does* make for some compelling role playing.

4. Traps. If one looks at the Construct Traps skill, there actually are several references for the "robot pit" as a thing. Quoting the skill, robots fall into 30 foot hole, you're in for 1-2 melee *rounds* of effort to get out, which makes perfect sense. From a contemporary position, the idea of it is.... a flabbergasting wasteful expenditure of resources. A surface minefield is much easier to lay, remove, and hide. Tanks traps are easier to construct, yet a bipedal construct is capable of walking right over it.

5. Bipedal versus Tracked/Wheeled. Science fiction has long fascinated over the idea of upscaled bipedal robots as weapons of war. They look cool and are completely outside our scope to understand from an engineering perspective. We have a worldview that bipedal is best, so why not for weapons of war? Look-Cool-Factor aside, it's a concept, one I'm willing to run with. There are advantages (mobility, tactical employment) and disadvantages (cost, engineering complexity). Tactical theory for employment of tanks and engineer/infantry fighting vehicles, supported by aerial assets and naval assets, is relatively easy enough to convert into the game. As an urban resource, it provides a hard point for enemy fire, which then gives the remainder of the tactical grouping indications on enemy placement.

6. STA and C2. The optics and sensors, combined with the communications suite, makes a robot vehicle a very useful Surveillance Target Acquisition and Command and Communications platform. We're veering outside the scope of an RPG at the table, but these things make excellent nodes for these functions in support of the combat grouping they've joined.

I'd argue that the GM need not be trained for joint operations to run an effective game scenario or combat sequence, but a glance over military employment of resources isn't a bad start. I know for sure my version of combat with robots/PA would be significantly different than any other table, which is fine. I also believe a "simple CS infantry platoon" is the demise of an adult dragon in just over two melee rounds of shooting. The objective is to make it fun and cinematic, not an over-reliance on realism... the context involves big, stompy robots, dragons, and the rest.

Addendum: I don't put much truck in CS/Tolkeen/FoM big stompy robots, but I'm biased to my GB Battalions anyways.

[ShadowLogan]

Even in Rifts, they can't jump well, let alone fly. A series of trenches and pit traps are enough to take most of them out.

Please define "jump well"?

As for fly, well... There are at minimum x188 Robot-class units in the Rifts Books I own (and I have an INCOMPLETE Collection across the various SB, WB, and DB), of these:
- x17 are Magical/Techno-Wizard examples
- x1 is a Mechanoid Mobile Fortress (Mechanoid Bodies in general are classified as Cyborg technically, though IMHO they might actually qualify as a piloted Robot, this one is not a cyborg body though)
- x44 are Unmanned Drones (including Robot Horses and Mechanoid)
- x6 are transformable
- x41 have flight capability (x5 are Magic/TW, x3 are transformable, x12 are drones, some of these might also be space only flight) being rated in MPH
- quick note, the 188 will include Book-to-Book variants when there is a change (ex. SB1o v WB5 Triax models, or RMB to RUE changes) and some knockoffs that are mechanically different

If we factor out the Magic/TW and Drones that leaves us with x24 examples that can Fly out of x127, or ~19% of Rifts Robot Vehicles in my book inventory have some form of flight capability. There are also at least x5 Rifts Titles I do not own that will expand the overall list, though I'm not sure about flight capability.

They have all the vulnerabilities of tanks, and more.

By that logic a HUMVEE has all the vulnerabilities of a tank and more. While people like to think of Mecha/Mechs as being walking tanks, the reality is they are not main battle tanks.

While I will agree there are some roles that do not make sense for Robot Vehicles, there are still roles in the setting where they are superior to being in a conventional vehicle. For example, would you want to be in a conventional MBT or a Giant Robot if you had to get into close quarters combat with a Dragon (or some other large creature)?

What is really missing is the ability for the robot's targeting computer to lock-on and autofire at targets. We have that capability now...

Rifts does have automated systems that will auto fire in general (one is even on a Power Armor found in WB10 Juicer Uprising), however they are not widely used on mecha. Why I couldn't tell you, but auto-fire weapons aren't all that common either in the real world. Given the lack of detail with a lot of technologies and systems in Rifts, it wouldn't be that hard to see Targeting Computers as having lock-on capabilities (which would be need if you expect to fire guided missiles anyway) even if it wasn't stated outright.

The issue with giant robots in Rifts is that combat in Rifts is centered on small groups, and the system wasn't made for vastly disparate scales. Giant robots in Rifts are at least one order of magnitude lighter and flimsier than they should be, often more. (...)

These are not just a Rifts thing, it is more of a Megaversal thing (we also see it in Robotech 1E and 2E, along with the Macross 2 all former licensed properties, I think it's also in HU, possibly even PF2E). Put simply Palladium Does not do Scale Well and I don't think it ever has.

That applies equally to tanks and other vehicles of war. And it still leaves giant robots as a dumb alternative to superior options like said tanks and other vehicles of war. The scale of the game's mechanics have nothing to do with it. Again: There's a reason no military in the real world is investing in the concept, or has any plans to.

I don't see militaries in the real world investing in the concept any time soon, unless there are specific roles that develop that cannot be handled by more conventional platforms. Since some of the technology that would be needed to make a Robot Vehicle practical could also be used to improve the capabilities of a conventional vehicle.

However, Palladium's Game Mechanics do present a broken presentation: you can use M-16s and standard bullets in Rifts to deplete the SDC of a M48A3 Main Battle Tank (Mercenaries pg97, this is an SDC tank converted by GAW) given enough time/shooters. That doesn't seem a bit unlikely to you in the real world? And I'm sure there are numerous other examples that can be constructed using the SDC system. If the SDC system is this broken, then it stands to reason that the mechanics in the MDC system are just as broken given the MDC system is just an extension of the SDC system (in some respects simplified since it doesn't deal with AR on top of minimum strike requirements given either you can damage an MDC structure or you can't).

Scale is also broken in the game mechanics, the Glitterboy has the one of the most powerful weapons in the game, yet you will be hard-pressed to find a Robot vehicles sporting as powerful/more-powerful guns in terms of range/damage-output. In point of fact most Robot Vehicle Gun-type weapons aren't any more powerful than Power Armor or Infantry Guns in terms of damage output or range in Rifts. I just skimmed a list of 349 Robot Mounted Guns (ie no missiles, explosives, or chemical spray) based on the x188 examples mentioned earlier, only x5 have range of 2miles or more (the approx. range of a Glitterboy' Power Armor's Boom Gun is 2miles), x73 of these have 4000ft range and x86 have 2000ft range, x54 are between 4000ft and 2miles, the rest are under 2000ft. Only x2 of which can out damage a Boom Gun individually (this doesn't rule out the possibility of cases that might mount multiples that could be combined for a volley to match/exceed). One would expect that a Robot Vehicle could mount heavier weapons than a guy in Power Armor or what they Infantry can carry, yet that seems to be the exception and not the rule. Now one could argue that the Glitterboy isn't the standard to use for Power Armor here given it might be more accurate to consider it a robot (even the authors admit this), but that doesn't really change the outcome much that in terms of range the vast majority of Robot gun-type weapons aren't any better than Power Armor or Infantry could be deployed with.

A 19' robot in a 20' hole should be able to get out in 1 attack, maybe 2.

From my Earlier Incomplete library totals for Robot-class:
-x26 are 10-13ft tall
-x22 are between 14-19.xx ft tall
-x49 are between 20-29.xx ft tall (only x13 are less than 21ft)
-x21 are between 30-39.xx ft tall
-x4 are 40ft tall (no range)
-x5 are 50-59.xx ft tall (all but x1 are 50ft)
-x2 are 60-60.xxft tall
-x3 are 70ft tall (no range)
-the rest are under 10ft tall (these are the Drone types)
-~20 of these are platforms with multiple cited heights that I did not filter out and does not include the transformables (which would have 2 or more heights)

So, by my math it looks at a 20ft hole may not cut it most of the time (of course this is a more megaversal look, and by specific region it might favor a given size). As for getting out, I would say it would be 1 or 2 melees as opposed to APM which is supported by the Trap Construction Skill (I'm looking specifically at the printing in WB14 NW on pg75-6, which might differ in other book printings, that was just the one I pulled off at random that I know has it) if you don't have flight or can leap out (I suspect some 'bots could though there might be some that don't have the performance w/o assistance).

[barna10]

What would be nice we had details on range of movement for robots. Many of the arguments FOR robots seem to assume a range of motion similar to humans.

[Mack]

For the cost of one giant robot, you can usually have 10-50 good power armor.... or a metric buttload of tanks.

Lord, yes.

Just imagine the speed/mobility advantage of fielding a company (or battalion) of flying power armor. You get to choose the time and location of the battle, and you can quickly mass your force at any point on the battlefield. And just as important, if things aren't going well you can easily disengage at your leisure.

HOWEVER... none of that is fun in a tabletop RPG. A lot of the design choices in Rifts are based upon the player-party, not Sun Tzu or Clausewitz.

[MyDumpStatIsMA]

Getting back on topic, I did manage to find a few Rifts robots that I would be happy to use.

Foremost is the Triax X-4600 Sharpshooter. 430 MDC main body, 100 MDC force field. 110 MPH top speed, 180 w/rocket assist. 100 foot jump height w/ rockets, 50 feet from stationary without. 200 mile radar range. 2D4x10 MDC damage main gun with a 10,000 foot range. Camouflage system that reduces enemy chances of detection.

The X-2750 Talon flies at 670 MPH. Needn't say more.

Another decent concept is the Northern Gun 8000 Super Max. Nimble because of jet assistance, can also climb sheer surfaces, cliffs, etc. Also has a modular weapons system that allows a variety of loadout options.

Point being, it's possible to find some robots that aren't slow, hulking, waiting to be ambushed and powerless in the event they are.

[Killer Cyborg]

Interesting.

Where do you get 1-2 melee attacks from? [/]

One attack to jump, one to pull himself up, IF I didn't just allow it with a single check.
With a human standing in a pit that was just higher than their head, I'd let a single Acrobatics or Gymnastics cover it. If they didn't have those skills, I'd go with two attacks, most likely.
Or a single difficult Climbing check, depending.

I'd be inclined to say a full melee round, if not a whole minute or even more.

Why?

Or rather, It'd be piloting rolls at hefty penalties. How long depends mostly on skill and partly on luck.

Why penalties, and why Hefty?

For an experiment: drop yourself into a hole that's just a bit taller than your shoulders, and see how long it takes you to climb out of it.

Then: See how long it takes a reasonably athletic man to climb out of it.

Ouch!
Burn!!!


Last time I was "reasonably athletic," though, it would have taken me about 4-6 seconds, depending on circumstances.
Especially if I could jump 3/4 of my own body height, and my max lift was the same as my max carry.

Then: consider the robot is likely less able to do that than both of you. It is not a power armor, designed to fully mimic the full range of human motion smoothly, or routinely do pull-up's. I'd say it could, but not quickly or easialy.

Where does the book say that Bots are NOT "designed to fully mimic the full range of human motion smoothly"....


UAR-1 Enforcer combat training gives you:
+2 attacks per melee over the pilot's normal human-level ability. This does not indicate specific slowness, but rather the opposite.
The ability to body-flip enemies, kick them, tackle them, and so forth, with NO HTH maneuvers being mentioned as unavailable due to the robot being clunky.
Hell, you get bonuses to parry and dodge, again on top of what the pilot is able to do just in their meat suit. Again, if anything, this indicates that robots are superhuman, not subhuman, when it comes to agility and athletics.
And they can perform a frickin' LEAP KICK.

What makes you think they're impaired in ways that humans are not?
Got anything from the books that I've missed...?

[barna10]

UAR-1 Enforcer combat training gives you:
+2 attacks per melee over the pilot's normal human-level ability. This does not indicate specific slowness, but rather the opposite.
The ability to body-flip enemies, kick them, tackle them, and so forth, with NO HTH maneuvers being mentioned as unavailable due to the robot being clunky.
Hell, you get bonuses to parry and dodge, again on top of what the pilot is able to do just in their meat suit. Again, if anything, this indicates that robots are superhuman, not subhuman, when it comes to agility and athletics.
And they can perform a frickin' LEAP KICK.

I forgot those things could do 15ft leaps (25ft if running). They're under 20ft tall so that's a pretty impressive vertical in particular.

Just wish they had a PS more impressive than 40 when they weigh 18 tons (36,000 pounds). Pg 285 only gives that a 2D6 MD punch (4D6 if power) and even using the generous new "gigantic robots" policy on pg 286 they can still only lift (100xPS) 4000 pounds. So it would take nine UAR-1s to lift a disabled one up?

Exactly

[green.nova343]

UAR-1 Enforcer combat training gives you:
+2 attacks per melee over the pilot's normal human-level ability. This does not indicate specific slowness, but rather the opposite.
The ability to body-flip enemies, kick them, tackle them, and so forth, with NO HTH maneuvers being mentioned as unavailable due to the robot being clunky.
Hell, you get bonuses to parry and dodge, again on top of what the pilot is able to do just in their meat suit. Again, if anything, this indicates that robots are superhuman, not subhuman, when it comes to agility and athletics.
And they can perform a frickin' LEAP KICK.

I forgot those things could do 15ft leaps (25ft if running). They're under 20ft tall so that's a pretty impressive vertical in particular.

Just wish they had a PS more impressive than 40 when they weigh 18 tons (36,000 pounds). Pg 285 only gives that a 2D6 MD punch (4D6 if power) and even using the generous new "gigantic robots" policy on pg 286 they can still only lift (100xPS) 4000 pounds. So it would take nine UAR-1s to lift a disabled one up?

Exactly

There's a house rule I'm still working on where robot vehicles & giant-sized creatures add an extra multiplier onto their carry/lift limits if they're significantly larger than human-sized. I'm still working on the cut-off, but basically if your robot is over 12ft tall but under 25ft tall, it should be carrying/lifting at least twice what its limit is. A UAR-1 with Robotic PS 40 would be able to carry 8 short tons/lift 12 short tons (16,000lbs/24,000lbs) instead of the current 4 / 6 short tons the RAW allow. No bonus to damage, though...

[Nekira Sudacne]

Interesting.

Where do you get 1-2 melee attacks from?

One attack to jump, one to pull himself up, IF I didn't just allow it with a single check.
With a human standing in a pit that was just higher than their head, I'd let a single Acrobatics or Gymnastics cover it. If they didn't have those skills, I'd go with two attacks, most likely.
Or a single difficult Climbing check, depending.

I'd be inclined to say a full melee round, if not a whole minute or even more.

Why?

Or rather, It'd be piloting rolls at hefty penalties. How long depends mostly on skill and partly on luck.

Why penalties, and why Hefty?

For an experiment: drop yourself into a hole that's just a bit taller than your shoulders, and see how long it takes you to climb out of it.

Then: See how long it takes a reasonably athletic man to climb out of it.

Ouch!
Burn!!!


Last time I was "reasonably athletic," though, it would have taken me about 4-6 seconds, depending on circumstances.
Especially if I could jump 3/4 of my own body height, and my max lift was the same as my max carry.

Then: consider the robot is likely less able to do that than both of you. It is not a power armor, designed to fully mimic the full range of human motion smoothly, or routinely do pull-up's. I'd say it could, but not quickly or easialy.

Where does the book say that Bots are NOT "designed to fully mimic the full range of human motion smoothly"....


UAR-1 Enforcer combat training gives you:
+2 attacks per melee over the pilot's normal human-level ability. This does not indicate specific slowness, but rather the opposite.
The ability to body-flip enemies, kick them, tackle them, and so forth, with NO HTH maneuvers being mentioned as unavailable due to the robot being clunky.
Hell, you get bonuses to parry and dodge, again on top of what the pilot is able to do just in their meat suit. Again, if anything, this indicates that robots are superhuman, not subhuman, when it comes to agility and athletics.
And they can perform a frickin' LEAP KICK.

What makes you think they're impaired in ways that humans are not?
Got anything from the books that I've missed...?

Okay, you have a point about the stuff in Robot combat indicating a full range of human motion.

[ShadowLogan]

@Killer Cyborg
@Nekira Sundance

By R.A.W the Military/Wilderness Skill "Trap Construction" that appears in WB11 CWC pg62-5 or WB14 NW pg75-7 actually addresses the issue of the Giant Robot climbing out of a Pit Trap, specifically the "Tank/Trap/Giant Pit" described under the skill which reads "Robot vehicles and tanks can also fall victim to these deep and often wide pits. (...) Humanoid robots and power armor suits can climb or pull themselves out of the pit with relative ease; must spend one or two full melee rounds (15-30 seconds) unless the vehicle or power armor can fly or leap out (counts as one melee action)." Now for some reason the skill did not make it into Rifts Ultimate Edition's skills, though I am pretty sure it is in the GMG (sorry I don't have it to check page number) and possibly a few other books.

Now not all Robot-types have a Leap stat as defined as how far you can jump/leap which I would consider separate from the ability to Leap Kick. The generic leap ability is what I think would be required since a leap kick IMHO would be rigidly defined in what you can do. I will also add that out of the minimum of x188 Robot-class hardware (vehicle, drone, magical) I counted in a previous post (out of an incomplete Rifts Library), only x106 have a Leap Stat and only x66 have Leap Kick ability).

[barna10]

nice points

[guardiandashi]

one argument about robot vehicles and power armor that you have to take into account before dismissing them as worthless is you have to consider the genre or source they come from.
in star wars the walkers tend to be slow and clumsy. the clone wars walkers were of 2 varieties 2 legged fast lightweight agile recon units little to no armor and limited firepower.
or the 6 legged walking tanks massive armor and lots of firepower
the 4 legged ATATs from empire and return of jedi are taller versions of the 6legged tank walkers from the clone wars, but they are arguably more clumsy because they basically cannot loose 1 leg and remain mobile.

the Macross/robotech/gundam style robot vehicles (mecha) tend to be extremely fast agile and in some cases carry MASSIVE firepower and armor because at a fundamental level they use a different more advanced tech base, also they use a control scheme that is not wholely operated by physical controls at least part of their control system is mental. you could say its partially a tech based telemechanic link to the pilot where the vehicle in a sense temporarily becomes the pilots body.

in the Battletech verse, mechs (battlemechs) are somewhere in between they tend to be on the slower less agile side of the spectrum, but they are also typically on the massively armored side when you have units where literally 10% (base) of their mass is an armored skeleton, and up to 20-25% of their final mass can be protective armor that is for all practical purposes ablative IE you aren't going to just hit them and have an attack blow through and damage their internal systems, you have to hammer through the external armor first.

when you look at them as effective armored knight's of old then the mecha and or robot vehicles start to make a lot more sense... and of course they are just cool

[barna10]

One thing missing from most Palladium mechs is force fields.

The Walkers in Star Wars have shields that protected from blasters

The high-maintenance cost and ablative nature of armor in Palladium is awful.

If MDC structures had a reflective quality, this would be a different discussion.

[MyDumpStatIsMA]

The high-maintenance cost and ablative nature of armor in Palladium is awful.

If MDC structures had a reflective quality, this would be a different discussion.

One thing I've always wanted was a TW power armor/robot to function like a magic automaton in terms of the ability to self-heal at a steady rate. Not enough to make a difference in the middle of combat, but for ease and simplicity of repair. Something like 10 MDC recovered per hour.

Either that, or for a purely tech solution, some kind of nano-fluid circulatory system built into the armor that would offer self-repair for a much longer period of time than the repair kits offer, for a large up-front cost. Say, 1 million added to the initial purchase, like choosing the difference between power sources. Then you'd have auto-repair capabilities for as long as the nanites lasted; maybe 1 year on average, at which point they could be resupplied for 100,000 credits.

[barna10]

You would think Naruni units and other more advanced stuff would include self-healing capabilities.

I don't think it'd be too much of a stretch to think nano-tech had advanced enough to make self-healing tech by 2098. We're probably 5-10 years away from some level of that now!