Noyhauser

PS I didn't put the BCS of the YF-21 in because I'm thinking real world here so far, not just Macross Plus, I don't think that Neuroinformatics has gotten to a point where we can develop that sort of tech yet, not for a hundred years.

you mean not for a hundred years as in two weeks ago???

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/3186850.stm

Brain Control system of the YF-21, it may have some pitfalls but in the hand of an expert it gives far more ability to control a fighter than any other system. you just have to think of what you want and it happens, exactly as you want it. You can't get that from any other conventional system.

What game is the first destroid from?

Well it just wraps it all up into a nice little bow if it is a movie in the universe... and we all like nice little bows now don't we?

I think of Macross II as a DYRL type movie in the macross universe. It would make sense since they use its songs in Macross 7.

I think there will be a Vf-11, but not before a YF-21 and 19 battroid come out. Why did they build the 19? Because you have to look at what is going to sell in Japan. Altough there are limited number of variants for the 19 (and they already put out the only one, the VF-19A) the YF-19 and 21 are vastly popular, and will sell more than every other kit with the exception of the VF-1, and the VF-1 Strike. Why? because they are iconclastic Macross mecha. For people who buy only three Hasegawa models (which would make up like 80~90% of the market), i'd bet they would buy the YF-19 and two VF-1s. In all the strories the VF-11 play a minor role, so few people are interested.

My guess is that the VF-11 will come out after the VF-19/21 will come out in battroid. they will licence out variants a resin kit to make the 21 battroid a 22. The VF-11 will come, probably with fast packs. Full armor will most definately be a resin kit. They still have quite a long time until the Macross Zero movie line ends, so they can still use that as promo.

edit... now that I think about it, the 22 batroid will probably be done by Hasegawa as well.

I probably put more words to print about why I love the YF-21 than all the essays papers and articles I did in University combined...

You can't argue with an UBER fighter with all the bells and whistles. Its like the difference between a nice sports car and a Maclaren F-1. I also thought the YF-21's Battroid mode is the best looking out of all the other fighters, it looks a lot more elegant and graceful than the other VFs (long thin legs, thin arms and a organic looking structure... by far the best.

There was no extra fight scenes just waay more fight futage, especially with Guld Vs the Ghost. Its a waaaaaaay better ending for guld, and a way more exciting scene.

Okay a few thoughts... (from a strategic analyst point of view)

I think the UN spacy (I speak of the UN Spacy as including all arms of the UN forces) after 2030 started to realize that they going to see more and more renegade colonies and have to deal with them some how. Now I remember in the English version of Macross Plus Episode 1, the YF21 and 19 were designed not to carry reaction weaponry because it would cause a political incident. I'd say that constitutes a major conceptual shift in the thoughts of the defence planners at UN spacy. For the 30 years previous, UN spacy main overriding goal was to protect the colonies from another massive alien invasion, ala SW1. But by 2040 we see the UN spacy engaged in a "Hot" guerilla war (remember even Low intensity wars are hot when you are engaged in battle) against Anti-UN forces. Look at the events depicted in VFX-2, The UN Spacy is almost taken down by the Vindirance terrorist group. Therefore it is quite obvious that there is growing concern that the threat no longer from outside, but more from within.

Now you are all probably wondering where I am going with this. If the UN spacy has been primed for taking on a massive space invasion, typically you want ships/fighters able to inflict mass casualties against their opponents. Like we all saw in DYRL and the TV series, Nukes, massive missile barrages containing nukes, Big missiles with big Nukes ect and so forth. But after 2030, the explosion of colonies created from the Megaroad/Macross expeditions, smaller colony expeditions (Eden), and the claiming of territory inhabited by other races (Zola) all put additional poltical pressure on UN Spacy. I'm guessing that this is a federal relationship between associated colonies and UN spacy (some sort of Tax that is paid to the UN spacy or the colonial authority to maintain the UN Spacy and other projects), so you can't do some things anymore, ie cause massive damage to a colony world just to deal with a renegade leader, or group. If that did happen, Colonies would withdraw from the UN system and that would be bad. The UN spacy needed something more surgical to deal with these situations.

Now back to my earlier point about the YF-19/21; Project supernova was in my mind designed so that the UN spacy could use these fighters effectively considering this new security enviroment of colony policing (peacekeeping). Examining the capabilities of the Zentredis, the VF-11 was sufficient because they could beat regular zentredi forces with the VF-1, nuclear missiles and Minmay. But the VF-11 was completely worthless in the new security enviroment because it could not carry out precision strikes in builtup areas (its missiles were in its fastpacks) and would get slaughted in a hard slog in a city. The VF-11 was also getting outclassed by the latest generation of Anti UN fighters. The 21 and 19 could do high speed precision strikes on high value targets within colony worlds without causing massive civillian casualties. Its a lot like now and the use of Precision Guided Munitions like the JDAM and Paveway series to take out targets without major collateral damage to civillian targets. Micromissiles probably have unbelievalble accuracy when enhanced with Overtechnology, and could do this role well. Look how easy it was for Isamu and Guld to penetrate the Earth's defence network, and in the end, disabled the whole Macross Network in the SDF-1... Excatly what the UN spacy wanted it to do. In my mind thats why the Ghost Lost... the ghost has no emotion, it can't make the split second decision of the political consequences of its actions. Uhh do I blow up this hospital because its eminating terrorist signals? Try to program that into the ghost, I dare you. Also ghosts can't have an in city presence. I agree with the earlier posts that troops are needed, but the Tank at every corner does have an important role. For example look at how Dutch peacekeepers were disarmed by Serbian forces in the Former Yugoslavia (especially Srebenica); they did not have any heavy weapons and the Serbs walked in with T-55s and disarmed them, then you will realize that some hard military presence is needed. A meanicing VF-11 in Gerwalk on every street corner does have a pacifying effect on a population IN CERTAIN SITUATIONs( this is a qualifier, this is NOT a post questioning what is going on in iraq, I'm just saying that the Ghost cannot do this, while manned VFs can)

Now for the need for destroids and stuff. Okay Lets say that Infantry have not increased their capability appreciably since 1999. I mean in the sense that Infantry cannot harm VFs. I say this because in macross Plus they still use H&K MP-5s for guards. I'm guessing that Overtechnology has been unable to provide the regular infantry with significant advances in military technology. This may be a reason why the Protocultures started creating Giant sized soldiers; to take advantage of the techology advances (over technology perhaps?) they could provide. Valkyries can take other hand can utlize overtechnology these are lets say 20X more survivable than our current technology level of fighters. It now requires you to fire swarms of missiles to take out a Valkyrie, rather than just one for current fighters. So the soldier on the ground is less useful against heavy armorded forces in Macross universe than they are now. Its kinda like Gundam in a sense (but for more realistic reasons) only a mecha can beat a mecha. BUT Destroids and tanks manuverability would be a problem as well. Given the overtechnology's advances in sensors and weaponsm, Valkyries could also just commit a high altitude bombing campaign or high speed slashing runs to destroy tanks or Destroids in a city and get away scotfree. Now think how I said earlier the VF-11 would be ill suited to such a role? It wouldn't be able to do such missions well. I can't carry missiles, its not amazingly fast or manuverable or have beam weaponry. the YF-21 and 19 do all these things amazingly well.

So the future of ground combat? The earlier poster is correct, you need infantry, and lots of it. You always have and always will. And I'd bet you would have some sort of APCs as well. From here the gap is big; the next would be your low level VFs like the 11. VFs can be your heavy firepower. I think the VA-14 was probably designed for this role with its smaller caliber beam weapons.

Phew... I'm open to comments and criticisms, I hope you enjoyed my post. (it was a nice break from my thesis)

On AA and command and conquer generals, I try to keep my political views and my fun time separate (I'm a political analyst.)

maybe in the eye of the beholder.... I actually like the Mig-25. Its one of my fav Hasegawa kits (and the F-15 looks disturbingly like it)

Su-27 and variants: The first pretty Russian fighter that I can think of since WWII, with capabilities to match.

Uhh no advanced russian fighters?? The Mig 25 scared the Americans #$@# during the late 1960s...Especially when the Israelis couldn't touch a recon variant that was loaned to the syrians with their F-4s . The F-15 was given a crash building program as a result.

Many people believe Speicher's F-18 was lost due to mid-air collision with a MiG-25, not shot down by it. (Mostly this is based on info by the other pilots in VFA-81 on that mission---VFA-81 rocks) I have no love for the 18, but it is an amazingly strong aircraft. They almost always survive the first missile hit and come home. It takes either a HUGE missile, or multiple missiles to bring them down. But being hit by the world's fastest fighter will surely take it out.

Hey don't knock the russians, if there was something they had a speciality over the Americans during the cold war it was building anti aircraft missiles. The Mig 25 and its cousin the Mig-31 were designed as interceptors, to take out the big strategic bombers like the B-47/52. Consequently they carry some HEAVY missiles. The AA-6 can be considered favorably to the pheonix, and has a 70KG warhead (it may have a Depleted uranium liner as well.) Thats going to blow a F/A-18 apart no matter what. Its warhead is larger than a SA-6's warhead by comparision

One other thought on the YF-21's wing: If we're talking about which would make a better production plane, the morphing wing is right out.

Composite materials (based upon OTM theories) which are capable of increasing or decreasing the wing cross section and area with feedback from the pilot's brainwaves. Due to the high cost and problems in the construction of the main wing's complex structure, this technology is not intended for mass production.

I think I mentioned that once or four times as well.

The invid also would have problems targeting the UN spacy non protoculture units. Since the UN spacy doesnt use protoculture the lower level invid would have extreme problems fighting VFs (or so I guess) It would be even worse around the 2045 timeframe. I'd love to watch the invid try to detect VF-22 and 19s with active stealth. It would be painful to watch the UN spacy rip them to shreds with their space defence forces. I can just imagine the UN Spacy bombers and drones releasing a hellstorm of Hi manu missiles, and then mopping up the remnants with fighters like the Vf-11, vf-17 or vf-19/22

As for the comic, Takeshi's work is signed with a stylized Tuzu, so that should help with identification. (it looks like his though... well maybe)

I think we came to that conclusion 2 pages back.

I thought I read it somewhere before as well.... I just didn't have the time or the patience to trawl through the compendium to find it.

Oooh good question

Make a new thread for it (to avoid thread drift, and I'm sure people would post. )

Hey, remove the pink paint and the VF-11 maxl actually looks like a pretty sweet Valk. It reminds me of some of the X programs they did on the F-16 where they made it delta winged to see if it would improve its performance. Probably gave kawamori the idea for it.

I love the EADS Eurofighter. I do a lot of work on European Union and European Security, so the fighter appeals to me. I can't wait till they start doing some major upgrades.

Classic pick has to be a Me 262A. I knew a guy who was in the luftwaffe, and flew 262s during the war. He said it was the most amazing thrill in his life. The ability to have nothing touch you.

That cover is done by Takeshi , I can tell (I''m well aquainted enough with his work)

Okay the YF-19 had overswept wings, but I'd still take the YF-21's configuration any day. Overswept means that you have NO flight control area because they are now blended into the body. you are relying on thrust alone to get the job done. Its a zero sum system with the 19, either reverse sweep and no control at all or slower with enough control. Isamu probably couldn't pull off the manuver that guld did against the high manuverability missiles because to get to the speed he needed to trick the fuses on the missiles he would not have the control to evade them (he would need to sweep the wings back). The 21 still has its rear horizontal stabilizers (I can't rememer the term they use for them, blended tail/horizontal stabilizers) , and its shockwave mission adaptive wing assembly to control flight AS well as a far superior system of thrust vectoring (three paddles directing thrust 2 dimentionally vs a one dimention horizontal/vertical system that the 19 has) .

All the of YF-19's controlls are not exclusively on the wings. In oversweep it would still have controll from it's canards, thrust vectoring and rudders. Similarly the YF-21 would lose some maneuverability in high speed configuration since it would lose the use of its rudders, and the angling of the wings would most likely kill alot of the authority of the ailerons. All of this is moot since we see both aircraft perform admirably in high speed configuration in ep 4.

The YF-19 did not have Active stealth, as the YF-21 first introduced such a system, which was later retrofitted into the 19 program. Look at the Macross compendium entry for the YF-19 and VF-19, the the YF clearly does not carry such a system as it followed a completely different design philosophy (fast and manuverable.)

Actually it does, it's in the compendium and it's mentioned explicitly in the show.

Yes but the 19's canards are small, at high speeds, the 21's blended tail/stabilizer assembly is larger and can physically deflect more air. Its really difficult to explain but because the 19 in overswept relies on thrust and the "lifting body" tecnique, it would have marginal manuvering capabilities at high speed. At high speeds the FSW would make the fighter more unstable. This is not a "good unstable" but a very very very bad one that would make the fighter uncontrolable and would cause a crash. The 21's wings are swept back and have mission adaptive wing technology (I keep harping on it but for good reason) which means it has full control over a whole range of speed settings. Again Guld can evade missiles at high speed, Isamu probably couldn't

Sigh, I guess I'm wrong about active stealth, they put it under the Avionics, rather than features (that they did in the VF19 and 21). Thats sorry number 2

Tak Miyazawa is a top rate comic book artist ... you just haven't heard about him yet. He did some independent work called side kicks before (his first comic), which most people haven't seen. He draws in a manga style, so it might be worth buying for his art alone.

In Macross Plus, I was more of a fan of the YF-19. The smaller profile (target-wise) in every mode makes it a better choice for closer range combat. Also, the FSW gives it built-in instability like a few others have mentioned, which makes it inherently more manueverable when combined with advanced thrust vectoring, manuevering jets, and fly-by-wire computer controls. The ability to glide hang-glider style in battroid mode with the folding wings makes a nice feature (Not to mention looking really cool in the VF-X-2 opening).

But in Macross 7, they butchered the standard VF-19 design (I love the Kai, and the S-variant Blazers head, but those tiny little wings on the F/S, etc look so terrible)... Hands down, I prefer the Sturmvogel II over all of them. It has a much better-looking head than the YF-21, as well as the built-in dual gunpods, and extra missle storage space.

Plus I'm a Max/Milia fanboy.

sigh...

The YF21's wing structure is better than the 19. read above about mission adaptive wing technology, that is the way of the future and more manuverable, not forward swept wings. So, the 21 would be more manuverable because it has

#1 Larger control surfaces (look at the size of the blended tail/Stabilizer surface and compare them to the YF-19's canards)

#2 A better thrust vectoring system (2 dimentional vs 1 dimentional on the yf19)

#3 Mission adaptive wing technology. It is far better than the rigid FSW technology that the YF19 had. It gives you the perfect wing shape for your wing under any circumstances.

#4 this one is tenative so I'm calling it provisional; BCS and BDI would make it more manuverable by allowing control of more variables. yadayada

The 19 has no manuverability above slow speed. It can either be reallly slow and manuverable (under 500 Kts or so) or really fast an completely unmanuverable. Really slow doesn't matter because Gerwalk is an option, which gives you unparalled manuverability anyways and the YF-21 would have far more manuverablility at the high and mid speeds because it could still utilize its control surfaces.