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Seto Kaiba

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  1. Seto Kaiba
    Yes and no. Yes, the VF-171 Nightmare Plus is technically an obsolete model because a number of fleets and planets have started to deploy the next-generation fighters that were developed to replace it. No, we can't safely presume that it's only used by the outer rim system garrisons at Macross Delta's "present day". 5th Generation variable fighters were still in development or pre-adoption low-rate initial production and operational evaluation with all but one of the emigrant fleet/planet NUNS garrisons we've seen or been told about circa 2060. Just a few years further down the road, I'd expect that many governments would just be starting to evaluate the idea of adopting a 5th Generation Valkyrie or, at best, would be in the very early phases of transitioning their forces to those new fighters. Each fleet or planet's government has more-or-less a free hand in deciding how to arm their NUNS defense forces, so rates of adoption will vary. Some were not using the VF-171 at all, having opted to use an air force composed entirely of unmanned fighters. Those garrisons will likely pursue a new unmanned fighter with 5th Generation VF-equivalent capabilities rather than go back to putting pilots on the front lines. Other garrisons possibly adopted other fighters instead of using the VF-171, like how Macross Galaxy's corporate army publicly used a local variant of the VF-19C (and some upgraded versions of older General Galaxy VFs in the novelization of Macross Frontier). Many of those garrisons, and many of those that adopted the VF-171, may not see any significant reason to upgrade to a 5th Generation VF if they aren't facing a tangible threat from a foe that would require the improved performance of a 5th Generation VF to oppose (like the Vajra or the Aerial Knights). Some more recently-established emigrant worlds or less wealthy fleets may not be able to afford the 5th Generation VFs, and would keep flying their Ghosts and VF-171's for another decade or two. Alberto Larazzabal's VF-171 does not appear to be equipped with EX-Gear. Yes, those were export-model VF-5000's (and the one export-model VF-19) that were sold to Zola's local security forces. It appears that, in 2047, Zola did not possess a (N)UNS garrison force, possibly due to the nonviolent emphasis of the Zolan culture.
  2. Seto Kaiba
    Well, they are technically using the real-world definition of "quantum". The real definition, meaning "the minimum amount of a physical entity involved in an interaction". SF fans usually associate the term with zero point energy, which is the lowest energy state in a quantum mechanical system. In Macross, the term "heavy quantum" refers to a special type of matter which is produced (and used) in various overtechnology devices that employ the unique physics of super dimension space in their operation.1 The physics of its creation aren't explained, but heavy quantum is apparently produced using a crystalline super-dimension resonator made of fold quartz or - much more commonly - its low-purity synthetic equivalent known as fold carbon. What makes it so useful is that it exists in both real space and super dimension space simultaneously, and that 99% or more of its absolutely stonking impossible mass is on the part that's situated in super dimension space. Its mass is so unthinkably huge that, in sufficient quantities, its gravity will cause it to collapse in on itself and begin a fusion reaction if drawn fully into real space. The super heavy quantum produced using fold quartz has SO MUCH mass that, if drawn fully into realspace using a fold resonance, its gravity will be so intense that everything caught in its pull will be destroyed before its gravity summarily ejects it from the material universe and it ends up in super dimension space. It's manipulation of that incredible mass that makes it so useful. It's used in tiny quantities to provide gravitational compression of fuel in thermonuclear reaction systems and in reaction warheads, it's used for spatial manipulation like gravity control and fold-based systems like fold communications or drives, the various forms of heavy quantum beam weaponry either fire it neat or let it fuse and "fire" it by funneling the resulting explosion toward the enemy, etc. 1. Thermonuclear reaction systems, dimensional energy conversion systems, gravity inertia control systems, fold systems, reaction weapons, and dimensional weapons for starters.
  3. Seto Kaiba
    Based on the description in Macross Chronicle's technology sheet for Dimension Weapons... yes. There is, however, some slight terminology confusion on the subject of heavy quantum weapons because of the existence of two (technically three) different types of heavy quantum beam weaponry (and an arguable misidentification of the SMS Macross Quarter's): Heavy quantum reaction beam weaponry seems to be the new umbrella term for the weapon that previously went under a host of pseudonyms like super dimension energy cannon, converging beam cannon, assembled beam cannon, converging energy cannon, etc.. They use a resonance fold effect to accelerate and excite the heavy quantum in such a way that the portion of its mass that is displaced into super dimension space returns to realspace, crushing the heavy quantum under its own gravity until it ignites in a fusion explosion that is then projected outward as a beam of fusion plasma. This is most of the beam weapons that use heavy quantum. Heavy quantum beam weaponry is a more recent development used on the some of the latest VFs (e.g. YF-29, YF-30) and probably the Macross Quarter as well, which skips the fusion step and just lobs a bolt or beam of heavy quantum downrange so its vast mass can cause kinetic damage (or, in sufficient quantities, apparently warp gravity space-time in a destructive fashion). Micro-dimension eater beam weaponry could be called superheavy quantum reaction beam weaponry, since they fire the special super-massive heavy quantum that can only be produced using fold quartz. Its mass is so great that the beam is essentially a stream of micro-fold effects which drag matter into super dimension space.
  4. Seto Kaiba
    Official publications (e.g. Macross Chronicle) indicate the retractable armor cover on the underside of the gun is designed to deploy like that to improve the weapon's heat dissipation and, in so doing, extend the time it can be continuously fired without overheating.
  5. Seto Kaiba
    IIRC, Hayate refers to the Macross Elysion as Chaos's Ragna branch office back in episode 2. That would kind of imply the existence of other branch offices elsewhere, much like SMS's.
  6. Seto Kaiba
    *looks at Mariafokina Barnrose* "That's what she said". In all seriousness, the central government didn't exactly have a shortage of reasons to restrict the exportation and performance of the weapons technology that was used by the emigrant fleets and planets. Between the YF-19 No.2 independently penetrating Earth's defenses, the incidences of high-performance fighters ending up in the hands of anti-government forces, and the frequency with which emigrant fleets and worlds were squabbling with each other and the Unification Government itself, it's hardly surprising that the government would take remedial action to ensure that its troops would have the biggest stick in the event that it needed to step in and knock heads together to protect one emigrant world from another, or stop both sides by intervening in a war. That's hard to say, as it's usually only mentioned in connection with production aircraft... there weren't many testbeds and demonstrators for the 4th Generation kicking around when the restrictions were tightened. From the way the VF-19EF/A Excalibur ADVANCE mechanic sheet is phrased, it does sound like the same restrictions apply to one-off and test aircraft not operated by the central New UN Forces. Even Isamu's custom VF-19 was built off a monkey model rather than the full spec VF-19. Macross the Ride is a serialized novel that was originally published in Dengeki Hobby Magazine in twelve installments, with accompanying customized or scratch built models representing the various mecha in the story and some articles explaining various aspects of the story that depend on prior knowledge of Macross's setting. The story was collected into two volumes, and the various supplementary materials were collected into two visual books with some additional material including interviews with the creators and a short manga epilogue. The thrust of the story involves the Vanquish League VF air races in which many of the characters participate, though the latter part of the story involves an Earth supremacist terrorist group which attempts to hijack a resort ship.
  7. Seto Kaiba
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  9. Seto Kaiba
    So... funny story. The official write-ups for the export specification and locally-produced "monkey model" versions of the VF-19 do make reference to mandated restrictions on certain aspects of performance. They don't always identify what those restrictions are, but there have been mentions of functional restrictions on the avionics and a reduction in the rate of the fire control system's target acquisition for the VF-19P. The VF-19EF is identified as having been built with limiters included in certain mechanisms, though it does not mention what systems those limiters affect. I would expect that said limits are there precisely to ensure that an emigrant fleet doesn't start producing weapons which match or exceed the performance of a fighter of the same type produced for the central New UN Forces... so they'd probably take a dim view of a VF-19 upgraded to exceed central forces spec. before the adoption of the VF-24. Yes, it was the "mid-season upgrade" (for want of a better term) for Macross the Ride protagonist Hakuna Aoba, after his VF-1X++ Custom was lost in combat. It was built around a wrecked VF-0A Phoenix by volunteers from the Robbins Design Company, which provided maintenance services to several of the Vanquish League teams and SMS. It's cobbled together out of reproduction VF-0 parts, YF-25 parts, and other custom fabricated parts intended to make the whole thing function. In practice, it's basically a YF-25 wearing the outward appearance of a VF-0, though it's still using chemical rocket sub-engines for battroid mode and various portions of it are still obviously VF-25 hardware (like the lower legs/nozzles, and wing glove) and others are obviously custom-fab like the monitor turret. It's very light on armament, mostly just a single ROV-217 laser gun on the monitor turret and a gun pod that appears to be a reproduction GPU-9 (no doubt reinforced to use more modern 35mm ammunition). Pictures of the lineart (by Tenjin) and the customized model kit built to represent it are in Macross the Ride Visual Book 2. I'll grab a quick pic from it later.
  10. Seto Kaiba
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  12. Seto Kaiba
    Just sittin' down to watch the new episode now...
  13. Seto Kaiba
    Such extensive customization is not without precedent1, but it is a bit of a mechanical nightmare... It's more the sort of thing you'd expect from a Vanquish League air racer... admittedly unless the pilot were backed by a major corporation like Shinsei, General Galaxy, etc. they probably wouldn't be able to afford an AVF at all, let alone upgrade it like that. (Especially in light of arms export restrictions that prevent even emigrant fleet governments from building a VF-19 at its full performance.) 1. Two of the Macross the Ride Valkyries fit this mold... the aforementioned Sv-52γ Oryol flown by Magdalena Zielonaska had been upgraded with parts and technology from a variety of sources (including VF-17 engines) such that it was on an equal footing to a VF-171. Likewise, protagonist Hakuna Aoba's VF-0 Custom "Zeak" built by the Robbins Design Company was essentially a VF-0 upgraded piecemeal until it was technically more YF-25 than VF-0.
  14. Seto Kaiba
    Most of the official sources I know of just say "in 2016". The Macross Chronicle mechanic sheet for Flashback 2012's SDF-2 Megaroad-01 cites "July 2016". The aforementioned musical greeting card from the Macross: Do You Remember Love? video game does give a specific date for the transmission of Minmay's last message to Earth... that being Thursday, the 7th of July, 2016. Presumably there was some time lag between the message being transmitted and it being received by Earth during which the ship actually disappeared.
  15. Seto Kaiba
    Officially? The 1st large-scale long-distance emigrant fleet led by Megaroad-01 lost contact with Earth in 2016 somewhere near the galactic core and hasn't been heard from since. Nobody knows what happened to it, in-universe or otherwise. Richard Bilra, owner of the interstellar shipping concern Bilra Transportation, was hoping to locate Minmay and the Megaroad-01 on the 55th large-scale long-distance emigrant fleet's trip into the core, but nothing came of it. The UN Government covered up the fleet's disappearance, and it is still officially regarded as being en route. The Macross: Do You Remember Love? video game had a mail-in giveaway bonus that was a musical greeting card in the shape of the Protoculture tablet from the movie, with what purports to be the last known transmission from the fleet (penned by Lynn Minmay). It indicated that Megaroad-01 had found some kind of hole in space from which music was being broadcast, and was moving in to investigate. It's speculated that they may be somewhere in another galaxy.
  16. Seto Kaiba
    It's theoretically possible... though whether it's economical is another matter entirely. It's not a ringing endorsement of the idea that Macross Galaxy thought it'd be more effective to build a more durable pilot instead when they built VF-19C's for their garrison. By the time you were done redesigning and upgrading the VF-19 to accommodate that modernization, you'd be well into the same territory occupied by Vistula & Oder's Sv-52γ Oryol from Macross the Ride: "a custom Valkyrie of unknown origin produced to imitate the Sv-52".
  17. Seto Kaiba
    An excellent question to be sure... because the only shoki that's a rank/title that's leaping to mind means "Secretary". (Yes, that kind.) They're an organized knighthood, so they may be using some title related to training rather than a military rank... I'm looking into that now. EDIT: Poss. a variation on "Novice" and "Expert/Master"? That's still a great big "If", mate... their ranks sure as heck aren't Russian.
  18. Seto Kaiba
    ... and with two carriers for arms, there's the faint promise of a Macross rocket punch!
  19. Seto Kaiba
    Your guess is as good as mine... though if the YF-29's head is structured anything like the old VF-1's, then it is mostly empty space.
  20. Seto Kaiba
    The full version of "If I Love Only Once" has a bit of that kind of punch... I'd really like to get something along the lines of Infinity #7 or Lion from them though.
  21. Seto Kaiba
    Their programs were able to advance relatively quickly because they didn't have to do the R&D or the testing themselves... they were stealing advancements from the UN Government as they became available and applying them. Not quite... the alien spaceship that would become the SDF-1 Macross crashed at the southern edge of the Bonin Islands (on the fictional island of South Ataria) on 17 July 1999 shortly after 18:15 (JST). By that time, the Soviet Union had dissolved and the Cold War had been over for 7 1/2 years.* Russia did, in fact, have access to overtechnology through legitimate channels. It was one of the six major nations that co-founded the overtechnology research and development institute OTEC, along with the United States, Britain, France, Germany, and Japan. It was also one of the major players in the Unification Government. * The series chronology written for the original Super Dimension Fortress Macross series in 1982 naturally did not account for the Soviet Union's dissolution in December 1991, and thus refer to both the Soviet Union and West Germany. Later versions of the series chronology from the 90's amended those to Russia and Germany to account for changes in real-world history that occurs before the start of the Macross story.
  22. Seto Kaiba
    Per Macross Chronicle, this is kind of an Obi-Wan Kenobi "from a certain point of view" thing on D.D. and Nora's part. You see, D.D. and Nora are partisans opposed to the Unification Government, so they see the requirement that its member nations share technological advances derived from overtechnology with each other as the Unification Government stealing that technology from its creators. The technology was not truly stolen, it was simply shared with the other UN Government member nations. Macross Chronicle's coverage of the Anti-Unification Alliance's mecha clearly indicates that they were developed using data obtained from the UN Government's military programs. Some of that data and technology was acquired by through legitimate channels by defense contractors in nations that just happened to be in the Alliance's sphere of influence, but much of it was acquired through espionage or stolen by defectors. The Sv-51 is noted to have been developed quickly as the result of D.D. Ivanov himself handing over development data he stole from the VF-0 program when he defected to the Alliance forces, and the Octos is also mentioned as having been fast-tracked through development using data and technology stolen from the UN Government's Destroid program. It's rather unlikely that the engineers who defected from the UN Government to the various anti-government groups after the First Space War had any connection to the engineers who provided weapons to the Alliance "under the table" during the UN Wars. In all likelihood there is no actual direct connection between the old Sv-51/52 and the Sv-262.
  23. Seto Kaiba
    I remain endlessly amused by the fact that Star Trek has had multiple PhD'd science consultants on payroll, and maybe half of their technobabble is just thinly disguised "I'm going to try turning it off and on again". Reconfigure the primary power coupling indeed... (Someone needs to write Paramount and tell them we want an I.T. Crowd cameo in the new TV series...) Can that technology be retrofitted into an existing design? Explicitly yes. In fact, it was integrated into the joints of the ADR-04-Mk.XV Super Defender to improve the speed, responsiveness, and accuracy of its target-tracking capability. Now... whether it can be integrated into the transformation of an existing variable fighter is a great big unknown. I would assume that it can, but it would probably be a fairly major rework of the transformation system to accommodate the fact that some of the moving parts would no longer be in physical contact, which would no doubt require a good deal of recalibrating system timings and tolerances to make sure you don't have moving parts miss each other like ships in the night or run two identically-polarized components so close to each other that they jam the system up. The 5th Generation VFs owe the speed and stability of their transformations to the linear actuator, though the actual transformation configuration itself is down entirely to the practical matters of the airframe's design.
  24. Seto Kaiba
    It's certainly possible that there were Russians on Megaroad-04. However... it wouldn't be entirely accurate to say that the Anti-Unification Alliance's technology was Russian. In truth, their overtechnology was acquired via two means: the UN Government-mandated sharing of technological advances between its member states, and UN Forces research data obtained via espionage or theft. That technology was packaged by companies in Russia, Germany, and Israel that were either friendly to the Alliance or unscrupulous enough to profiteer from the war or use the alliance as guinea pigs to test their implementations of overtechnology in live combat. We know the New UN Gov't classifies the Draken III as "Sv-262", but we don't know how the Windermereans classify it... they don't seem to use English in their interfaces, so it's doubtful they use it in their designation systems.
  25. Seto Kaiba
    *nods* That's my pet theory, based on the Sv-262's GERWALK mode... I suspect it's based on the VF-171 units that were left behind when the New UN Spacy's garrison force pulled out. We'll know for sure sooner or later... but right now the idea that it's something the anti-human Windermereans got from human anti-government forces strikes me as unlikely.
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