Seto Kaiba

Probably not... since neither Robotech nor Macross has ever ascribed any kind of time dilation effect to fold travel. In Macross, (and, if memory serves, Robotech as well) the disparity between the experienced time during a fold jump and the actual time that passes in normal space is the result of time flowing at a much slower pace in the sub-universe the drive manipulates to circumvent the vast distances that would normally be involved in interstellar travel. The differential is reasonably consistent in Macross, but varies from nonexistent to absurd (1/525949) in the various Robotech adaptatons. ... and now you know why the Star Trek franchise has long since declared all of its expanded universe materials non-canon... for the exact same reason Robotech did: the "Expanded Universe" materials are a confused mess written by people who didn't seem to know (or care to know) much about the original work. This is actually nowhere close to the canon explanation of how warp drive (and, for that matter, its real-world theoretical version, the Alcubierre drive) functions. Both concepts actually involve exploiting a loophole in general relativity to circumvent the rule that objects cannot move through space faster than the speed of light by distorting the fabric of space (which isn't bound by the same rules) to move a bubble of space around the ship through space at faster-than-light speeds. Which is unambiguously true in Macross, and very probably the case in Robotech as well. Of course, the most recent depiction completely does away with shortcutting through a sub-universe and behaves very much like the above-described warp (Alcubierre) drive, with a bubble forming around the ship that moves through space at superluminal velocities while remaining in normal space. Even the visual effect from inside the ship is more or less identical to Star Trek's warp drive.

Still waiting on my copies of issues 45-50 to be delivered, but from what I've heard from those few folks who've already acquired it, it's a decidedly lackluster sheet, like their coverage of the Metal Siren. No data, and no mention of the alternate white-and-red color scheme from the manga that made its way into a fair few calendars and such. Likewise... but if they do go back and cover the stuff they didn't get to in Chronicle's initial run and add stuff from the Macross Frontier movies, I'd also want them to go back and fix the sheets that had obvious errors in the data blocks (VF-19F/S, VA-1SS, Renegade Armor, etc.), left things as "Under investigation", or left out important info that could've made for much more informative articles.

But not by design... which is, I think, rather more important than that Robotech's "original" TV series had slightly more narrative depth than the teaspoon-shallow story of Transformers Generation 1. In the final analysis, both shows were little more than a means of pushing a toy line on the parents of the viewers. Robotech was an attempt on Harmony Gold's part to ape the market model that Transformers was using to make frankly embarrassing amounts of money. Macek's pet project was doomed from the get-go by the generally low quality of its toy line and the fact that only the first 1/3 of the show was actually watchable. It could be argued that Robotech had the superior quality story, but then it must be pointed out that was not the doing of the show's (re)writers, but rather the quality of the original shows they cannibalized to make Robotech. Once the elements of the "Robotech story" that aren't derived from Macross, Southern Cross, and Mospeada are forced to stand alone (e.g. Robotech II: the Sentinels, Robotech 3000), what you have left is a revolting mess that even Robotech fans are usually quick to disown as a hideous mess unfit for human consumption. Not on the trip out... on the trip BACK there was plenty wrong with it. As soon as they got to Tirol it was damaged beyond repair, and then by pure shenanigans they recovered the SDF-1's fold drive and used that, which helped create the stable time loop that had Minmei as the mother of Zor. Well, the whole "Five Year Fold" thing was something Luceno and Daley came up with to explain why the REF forces never made it back to help the population of Earth when the Robotech Masters invaded, among other things. The current official continuity's answer for it is that the human ships were using salvaged fold engines taken from wrecked or captured alien ships, which were usually not of the best quality or in the best shape. The salvaged drives were inefficient and unreliable, making interstellar travel a real pain in the ass until near the end of the 3rd Robotech War, when humanity's alliances with the Haydonites and Kabarrans gave them the ability to produce new, more reliable fold engines of their own... making fuel consumption the only real limitation on their operation. (Kind of a big limit, when you think about it... considering that the REF had ONE AND ONLY ONE means of producing more, and that it proceeded to get missing before the war's end)

Like most any technology in Robotech, the capabilities of the show's fold drives change to suit the needs of the plot and/or the whims of the writer in any given episode or adaptation. Even the depiction of the drive in operation isn't consistent, with most cases using a classic Macross-style fold jump, but several others (including the Shadow Chronicles movie) using a Star Trek-style warp drive. The variance in the time differential between adaptations is pretty extreme too... according to Lisa it was 1:7 in the Macross saga, it was 1:525949 (1 minute = 1 year) in the novels, the pseudocanon Waltrip comics had it instantaneous across intergalactic distances with no differential at all, and RTSC has it as a warp drive with no time differential. Which actually doesn't work... in the Macross Saga it's said that the Robotech Masters made the trip to the vicinity of Earth in a single fold jump that got them close but drained their power reserves, and then wasted YEARS cruising the rest of the distance into the Sol system on sublight. Similarly, in the pseudocanon comic adaptation of Robotech II: the Sentinels, the SDF-3 makes a single, instantaneous fold jump, traveling all the way from Earth to Tirol with no apparent (mentioned) time difference, though it isn't outside the realm of possibility that one COULD have occurred. Eh... having the sub-universe ships depend on for FTL travel sport its own "geography" and obstacles was nothing new when the McKinney novels were being written. It had long since been established as a fact of life for hyperspace travel in the Star Wars universe due to explicit mention in the original movie back in 1977. I haven't read it for myself yet, but I'm told the 1965 novel Dune also included in its setting a means of FTL wherein the extra dimension had its own unique geometry that required the use of special navigators. Coincidentally, in the very same year the first batch of the Robotech novels came out, we also got the forerunner of Warhammer 40,000 (Rogue Trader) that introduced warp travel as riding the currents of a hellish dimension of energy populated by demonic beings that want to swallow your soul and beset by storms, eddy currents, and other phenomena that can isolate whole systems, blow a ship off course, or destroy it outright. EDIT: And it was just pointed out to me by a Star Wars fan of my acquaintance that while the McKinney novels were being published, Star Wars's expanded universe significantly fleshed out the whole hyperspace obstacles thing, even going so far as to introduce new ships that could create obstacles in hyperspace so enemy ships wouldn't be able to jump away. It certainly wasn't a new idea when Luceno and Daley added it to their Robotech novels... and it's astonishingly unlikely that Macross would've copied ANYTHING from Robotech, given that Robotech was and still is banned from Japan by the terms of the license agreements that shat it into being. Didn't they also justify it by first having the SDF-3's fold drive be damaged beyond repair, and then having it swipe/recover the SDF-1's fold drive by pure shenanigans, setting up the stable time loop that ended with Minmei as Zor's mother and all of the familiar characters as the ancestors of the Robotech Masters? The comics played the "fold drive damaged beyond repair" angle, but never got around to any End of the Circle foolishness.

Um... actually Harmony Gold gave the old comics, novels, and other stuff the boot a good three or four years before Robotech: Prelude to the Shadow Chronicles #1 came out, but that's just hair-splitting on my part. ^^ In a few discussions I've had and witnessed with Tommy Yune and Kevin McKeever, it was made clear that they did actually have a half-decent reason for making the decision to boot the vast majority of the "expanded universe" material from the continuity. Almost all of the old comics, novels, etc. were made without creative oversight from Harmony Gold, and tend to clash with and contradict themselves, each other, and the so-called "original 85". Quite a few titles were disowned simply because they bore only the most superficial resemblance to Robotech. Declaring the whole confused mess non-canon was a housekeeping action that made the continuity halfway intelligible again and got around all the dead ends and extra baggage the comics and novels created. In practice, I don't think Harmony Gold has ever wanted to separate Robotech from Macross. After all, the overwhelming majority of Robotech merchandise that actually sells is Macross-based, and the Macross Saga is far and away the favorite saga of what remains of the fanbase. The whole ongoing story of Sentinels and the Shadow Chronicles movie centers around the Macross Saga characters. Even now, the most recent batch of retcons and other affiliated garbage is bringing the mecha of the Robotech universe closer to their Macross origins by making them run on nuclear fusion instead of whatever protoculture is this week. *raises hand* Oo! Oo! I know the answer! Pick me! Pick me! Pick me! In all seriousness, the reason we're not going to see any production samples or teasers for Shadow Rising is that the movie is, according to slips from HG and some voice actors (incl. Richard Epcar), the movie is on hiatus. Presumably indefinitely, since our boy Tommy Yune has said that Harmony Gold is sitting on its hands waiting for Warner to un-screw the franchise's reputation so they can get better endorsement deals and have a bigger budget so it won't look like complete crap the way Shadow Chronicles did. By a similar turn of events, we won't be seeing anything like pre-production teaser art or details about the movie itself because the film is, for want of a script, still mired in the earliest phases of pre-production. That's why the only thing they've done to stir up interest is trot Lawrence Kasdan's rejected story treatment out to D-list directors like Sylvain White. Robotech fans should thank their lucky stars it's looking increasingly like Warner just intends to sit on the license until it expires, so that they'll be unable to subject us to a remake of Stomp the Yard with giant robots.

Just one was all it took? I was betting it would take at least three before it started getting to you. No, what it is is a byproduct of the unique "creative process" used in the rewriting and editing that made Robotech what it is (a mess). Y'see, the Robotech we all know was not what the show's editors originally intended. They wanted to run dubs of the original Macross, Southern Cross, and Mospeada back to back in some kind of Giant Robot Masterpiece Theater sort of setup. The network said no, and told 'em to splice it together into a single show. The rewriting process was, according to those involved in it, a rather slapdash affair carried out in great haste... with the writers working on several episodes at the same time and not stopping to compare notes. So as a result, the show has a lot of inconsistencies, plot holes, and stuff that just doesn't make sense. Terminology slip-ups happen fairly frequently, as do cases where the original dialogue made it through mostly intact and doesn't line up with the setting (such as RT Bodolza's famous exclamation "This results from protoculture?!", when in the RT rewritten version "protoculture" is a pseudomagical biofuel rather than an ancient civilization). It feels, by in large, like they didn't really waste much thought on it and just wrote what they thought sounded cool at the time... which often degenerates into something startlingly similar to the sort of technobabble more commonly associated with Star Trek (or more precisely, bad Star Trek fan-fiction). The problem is only exacerbated by inconsistencies in the animation itself and the new dialogue's occasional departure from it... like the famous invisible SDF-2 problem they've been talking about ceaselessly for about 25 years now. For the most part, nothing in Robotech is ever actually explained. Even what the Macguffin the whole story is centered around really is is never actually explained, it's just taken as an article of faith by Robotech fans that this mystery substance that is somehow produced by/from magic flowers that have seeds AND spores can be used for everything from powering starships and giant robots to food, medicine, and making people thirty feet tall. One of the things we've been trying to do in this thread is wrangle some kind of logical explanation for why Robotech is worth watching now that the originals are freely obtainable out of the Robotech fans that occasionally come here, or that those of us who are also visitors on Robotech sites encounter in our travels around the net. Thus far, we've yet to find one... every answer we've gotten usually boils down to either nostalgia-powered rose-tinted glasses, ignorance of Robotech's origins (often due to Harmony Gold's attempts to obfuscate the show's history), apathy towards anime either due to ignorance or a profound distaste for other cultures, or blind faith in Harmony Gold as a function of all three. For most, it seems to be like how when you're drinking heavily in a bar and the homely girls get better looking with each shot you do... but instead of whiskey it's childhood memories of the show back when those dubbing practices were considered acceptable. The most vocal (and belligerent) Robotech fans are usually guys in their late 20s or early-to-mid 30s who remember the show from when they were kids. Yeah, but the novels are non-canon... just a drop in the ocean of stuff that was tossed out when Tommy Yune rebooted the continuity. Even before then, the "five year fold" hypothesis to explain the REF's absence from the second war was on pretty shaky ground. Like everything in Robotech, it's an ill-defined macguffin that does whatever the plot needs it to... by the most recent titles (RTSC) it's been retconned into something that basically is just a Star Trek-style warp drive by another name.

Yeah, sure thing. (Since the whole thing started from questioning the veracity of the information the VF-19 Master File copied from Chronicle, we probably should've moved the whole discussion to the Chronicle thread back on like page three anyway... the fun we have. )

Finally got confirmation that my copy of the VF-19 Master File book shipped today, it ought to arrive by this coming wednesday. Looking forward to having my own copy to examine instead of having to constantly borrow Talos's.

It's been a while since I last re-watched DYRL (due to video card issues), did he change numbers in DYRL? I know he was 011 in the beginning... maybe it was a simple slip-up? Sketchley's almost certainly right about it being an in-joke/reference though... what with Shin Kudo being 311 in Macross Zero and Hikaru being 011 in DYRL.

Okay, this is just downright immature of you sketchley... trying to bait me into a fight and attack not only my credibility, but my extension Mr March's as well, by accusing me of something I haven't done. Both of the assertions I made about your position here are accurate. You did say that you were inclined to revise your opinion of the book towards it being official because it jived with what was in Chronicle and because Kawamori was listed as the supervisor (here), and you did question the veracity of the original numbers in the Compendium (here). Since you're dead-set on being disruptive, I really have no choice but to report your post. In a word, yes. At present, the set of stats that makes the most logical sense is the set of numbers in the Macross Compendium. The initial discussion was to determine the veracity of the new numbers given in Chronicle, then turned to a discussion of the veracity of the numbers found in the Compendium and a concerted effort to determine what sources those stats'd been gleaned from... the ultimate goal being to determine whether the new numbers first printed in Macross Chronicle and copied into the Master File are intentional changes or typographical errors. At present, the majority seems to be leaning heavily towards the typo hypothesis. Unless Egan had access to a third source that clarified the issue, and kept the 68,500kg figure as a relevant-but-discredited number just for completeness's sake. The material he printed was printed with express prior permission from Big West, so he may even have had contact and clarification from them. We just have to get in touch with him and find out, assuming he even remembers. Um... at no point has ANY sheet had a retraction published for something like this. The only retractions/corrections we've gotten have been for when whole sheets have ended up with the wrong filing number and the errata section at the back of issue 50, which I'll say right now I very much doubt will correct more than a handful of the most obvious of the errors. Chronicle is not infallible... it's not even close. I could point to a good half-dozen unambiguously and demonstrably wrong pieces of information without having to take my binders off the shelf. That the error was reprinted in a book that, by all the evidence, is unofficial anyway doesn't mean anything. If they provide some kind official rationale for the change, that's all well and good. But what we have here is a set of numbers that makes no sense and doesn't support the contents of the animation, the setting, and the other things that the same damn source has to say about the aircraft. The alleged correction comes from a source that has had plenty of errors in the past and corrected none of them, and is corroborated by a book that doesn't appear to have ever been intended to be reliable in the first place. It's not corroborated by a credible source. No, it wouldn't be... but we have one set of data from a known, well-respected, credible source in contact with the franchise's owners (Egan Loo), for which we can establish the origins of the data, and the data supports what's shown in the animation, established conventions in the show's universe adhered to by other mecha in the same series, and all the other assertions we're being asked to accept about the craft. Then we have the set of data in Chronicle, a publication that has printed and failed to publish retractions/corrections for dozens of errors and failures to do research already (and no doubt with more on the way in issue 50), where the information is completely and totally without precedent, contradicts what's in the animation, established conventions in the show's universe, and the other assertions that source is making about the mecha. When one lines up perfectly with everything and the other is out in left field contradicting everything including itself, it ought to be a no-brainer which one is correct. Chronicle is NOT infallible.

Long post is long... bear with me, and my apologies for the length in advance. I wanted to make sure all my bases were covered. Oh no, it's even screwier than that... On the packaging of the Bandai 1/65 scale VF-19S toy, the thrust rating provided is the 78,950kg x 2 rating, but it lists the VF-19S as having the same twelve medium-range high maneuverability missiles as the VF-19 Kai. By the opposite token, the Bandai 1/100 model kit lists the thrust rating as 68,500kg x 2, and says that its leg bays take a total of 48 high-maneuverability micro-missiles instead. Egan's Macross Compendium article cites the 78,950kg x 2 thrust figure as being the correct one, and lists BOTH missile options as accurate (swappable pallets and all). Chronicle takes a bizarre approach and lists a totally unprecedented thrust figure (68,950kg x 2), and inexplicably lists the VF-19F/S as having room for only 12 high-maneuverability micro-missiles, while the VF-19 Kai is listed (correctly) as having 12 medium-range high-maneuverability missiles. Actually, we have four sources... the 1/100 kit, the 1/65 toy, the Macross Compendium, and Macross Chronicle. Insofar as the first three sources... the model and toy stats contradict each other on the subject of engine thrust, but not armaments (technically). Egan's Compendium piece lists the 78,950kg x 2 for reasons that are currently unclear, but the 78,950kg x 2 vs the VF-19F's 72,500kg x 2 is consistent with the established practice of giving leader variants greater engine power than the "grunt" model both in the same series (VF-17D/S) and Macross as a whole. The listing of both missile complements is fine, since it's been down since Plus that the leg bays can take a variety of ordinance. In the Compendium article's stats, we have something that supports both the animation and the other things the text is telling us about its performance. Now, how can we be sure what's printed in Chronicle is an error? The error is immediately obvious, as is how it occurred. In the case of the engine thrust figures, we can clearly see how the 78,950kg thrust figure was mistyped as 68,950 due to the 6 and 7 keys being next to each other, and how the 72,500kg figure for the -F variant was mistyped as 78,500kg. In both cases, the new digit is immediately adjacent to the number it should've been or the last key used. For the missile complement, it looks like they copied material from a previous article and just changed the text, forgetting to change the number when they changed the missile's type. They've done this sort of copying and introduced similar errors before on other sheets. The "new" information in Chronicle does not support the other statements being made about the fighter's performance on the very same sheet and makes no logical sense. With the "new" numbers printed in Chronicle, it makes no sense for the VF-19S to have a higher rate-of-climb and greater speed at altitude than the VF-19F when the two planes are aerodynamically identical, and the -S has a much lower thrust-to-weight ratio (15.99 to the -F's 18.36) due to being 70kg heavier and having 19,100kg less thrust. Under the specs on the Compendium, it makes perfect sense for the -S to have the higher top speed and better rate-of-climb, as the VF-19S has a much higher T/W ratio (18.32 to the -F's 16.96). It also doesn't make any sense for micro-missiles to take up the same amount of space in the leg bay as a medium-range missile... they're like 1/3 the size, if that. The "new" information is inconsistent with the data provided in other sources, the depiction of the mecha in the animation, and contradicts established convention adhered to by other mecha in the same show and the universe as a whole. We've beaten this one to death, so I don't need to talk about how the new numbers for engine thrust and missile loadings don't come from any previous source. They don't match Emerald Force's combat scenes in the series itself either. Furthermore, it doesn't match the established convention adhered to by other mecha from the same series (VF-17D/S) and previous models, wherein the "leader" version has greater performance than the "grunt" unit. (See VF-0S, VF-1S, VF-17S, etc.) In summation, we have one set of numbers (those on the Macross Compendium) that are consistent with EVERYTHING we're being told about the mecha's performance, and the depiction of the mecha in the series, and the setting in general. Then we have the data in Chronicle and the VF-19 Master File... which doesn't support the animation and makes no bloody sense.

Didn't expect it to get a Tenjin painting... it's just too minor. Any actual data this time, or is it just another "did not do research" sheet?

It doesn't take much to set him off... the Robotech reference/community site I'd talked about building for the disenfranchised of the Robotech fanbase has already been the subject of two of his two-hour attack shows, and we haven't even gotten around to building the damn thing yet. Yeah, pretty much... every now and again on Robotech.com there'd be a thread done in the form of "Hey! <D-LIST CELEB> <MENTIONED/MIGHT BE A FAN OF> Robotech!", and there'd be a bit of a brouhaha over it, as though it proved that Robotech still mattered. The only one I vividly recall apart from Tobey was Wil Wheaton (TNG's Wesley Crusher).

True... but there has to have been some reason for Egan to take the 78,950kg x 2 thrust figure and 48x high-maneuverability micro-missiles figures over the 68,500kg x 2 thrust figure and 12x missiles total. By the look of the model/toy packaging scans that Graham posted, it looks like at some point they made a deliberate decision to go with the more high-performance of the two options, and for them to suddenly represent it as being far less capable for no established reason is cause to suspect the alleged changes are just part of a slew of minor errors printed in Chronicle. That the VF-19 Master File appears to have reprinted them is just unfortunate, but it doesn't diminish the book's "cool factor" by any means. I'm kind of surprised that the toys show the line art for the VF-19F/S variant of the GU-15, but Master File doesn't. You'd think that sort of thing would be right up their alley, and that they might concoct a reason for why the five cooling vents on each side of the barrel vanished on the production model... (Mr March and I had a real head-scratcher moment when we first noticed that during color-checking on his VF-19F/S art) Were I actually doing any of that, I would happily oblige you... but I'm not. Not here, not elsewhere, and not in the quote you made from my post. There's a world of difference between what I said and what you're accusing me of saying. It's high time you set aside this prima donna routine of yours and stop throwing a hissy fit or ignoring others when they disagree with your theories. Now can we please stop this sniping match and get back to talking about the book? Thank you. I'm game. Mooching off Talos's copy so I can give you a quick answer... you're right about the HMMP-15 designation, but the diagram appears to show two HMMP-15 launcher assemblies installed in each bay. It looks like (Talo's reckoning here) the "long" version is an extended and tapered version of the "short" version, which appears to be the model of missile installed in Basara's VF-19 Kai in Macross 7. So it's the "short" model that allows six missiles to fit into each leg launcher assembly.

Yeah, that's about the letter of it... and when you think about it like that, it makes the Robotech lunatic fringe sound more and more like a religious cult. For them, no amount of evidence is sufficient to disprove the "truth" they find in quoting Tommy Yune and Kevin McKeever out-of-context. For those who don't believe (aka "those who've got working brains"), no proof is necessary because we know Tommy and Kevin are idiots, and that what the believers are reading into their quotes isn't actually what's being said. Let's not forget the crusades by their most (blindly) devoted followers to purge the unbelievers and the heretics (Macross fans) from their "holy land" (Robotech.com).

*sigh* I really need to stop reading this thread when I have neither my copy of Master File nor my Chronicle binders on hand. It's sounding like they REALLY dropped the ball with the VF-19 sheet... we see them fire more than that pretty much every time Emerald Force is ordered to sortie. Sounds like another error introduced in Chronicle by using sections copied and pasted from other articles. I'll review those two model/toy sheets again to see what they have to say once I get home... it would explain a lot if one is saying 12 medium-range high-maneuver missiles, and the other's saying 48 micro-missiles. Maybe I should just give the VF-19 up as a bad job and stick to working on translations for mecha where they don't keep playing silly frackers with the stats. No, I didn't... of course my access to the VF-19 Master File book is limited since I'm mooching off Talos's while I wait for my copy to arrive. I'm guessing sketchley didn't either. We have one set of values that makes sense and has remained essentially unaltered for over 10 years (the version on the Compendium), one set of numbers that looks like it'd gotten itself retconned out right away, and one "new" set from a Chronicle sheet that becomes more and more nonsensical the deeper we dig into it. You do the math.

Understandable... we got a bit off-topic while discussing the accuracy of the info that it's presenting. The Variable Fighter Master File VF-19 Excalibur is a book. Long story short, sketchley pointed out that Kawamori is credited as the book's "supervisor" (whatever that means) and that it might mean that unlike the MAT book that preceded it, the Master File series might be meant to be official. This prompted us to debate the accuracy of the contents, incl. its reiteration of an apparent typographical error (and subsequent nonsensical justification) in the VF-19F/S sheets in Macross Chronicle, pointing to the data in the Macross Compendium and how one digit was changed from the original number. sketchley suggested the opposite, that it was an intentional change. So, naturally, both azrael and sketchley asked if we were sure it was a typo, and suggested Egan's numbers, rather than Chronicle, could've been the typo, launching us onto our present tack of attempting to confirm where the original engine thrust numbers for the VF-19F/S in the Macross Compendium were obtained from... which we appear to have found courtesy of Graham. In summation, it's looking like the Master File might've been delayed while they waited on Chronicle's writers to do the VF-19 sheets so they wouldn't contradict it, and in the process, copied the typos too. The aforementioned suspected typo stated the VF-19S's engine thrust as 68,950kg, whereas the original number was 78,950kg, the new number being suspect because it's at odds with the VF-19S's greater rate of climb and higher top speed compared to the VF-19F, and that it's running counter to the usual Macross practice of giving "ace" machines more thrust than the grunt model. Chronicle also gave the -F a higher thrust rating of 78,500kg (the original we've had since 1997 was 72,500kg), which makes the VF-19S's supposedly superior performance with heavier weight and much less thrust that much harder to swallow.

It's possible... but I suspect there were probably others as well. There had to be some kind of motivation for him to cite 78,950kg as the correct number and 68,500kg as being no longer valid. I don't have any evidence to back it up right now, by I have a nagging feeling that if we do find out, it'll have to do with the VF-19F's 72,500kg rating. Seems that way... and I have a pretty good idea how it happened. It wouldn't be all that hard for someone to mistake the more familiar 24 missiles total to mean 24 missiles per leg instead, thus doubling the number from 24 to 48. That Chronicle's writers cited the 12-per-side and appear to have typo'd the 78,950kg figure does point to the 1/65 toy as the more accurate of the two, stats-wise. Which figure did Master File cite, or did it even try? (Possibly coincidental, but 12-per-side figures gives the VF-19F/S the same missile count, sans-hardpoints, as the VF-1 Super Valkyrie, as per the official cutaways which were reprinted in Chronicle) I also find it somewhat interesting that the writers of Chronicle used the same ventless GU-15 line art on the 1/65 box rather than version the YF-19 used that had the vents over the barrel assembly. The GU-15A stuff that Talos showed me in Master File had the gunpod down as having the cooling vents.

Huh... well, you're certainly on top of things. I hadn't even gotten around to looking and you've already found it. I think I can answer your question though. According to the model number printed on that box scan you posted, the Bandai 1/65 scale VF-19 Special DX "Blazer Valkyrie" was released in May 1995, and the Bandai 1/100 scale Valkyrie VF-19S Emerald Force plastic model (which I think is the one to which you are referring) was released in August 1995. Based on that, it's looking like the 78,950kg x 2 figure was actually the original, and the 68,500kg x 2 was an error or something. Just in case anyone wants to doublecheck, I found the release date info here. You can search by the code over the UPC and that should take you right to the data you want.

It's nothing new... their whole counterargument against the Tokyo court system's rulings about the ownership of Macross and its contents was made of remarks made by Alan Letz and Tommy Yune taken out of context to a ridiculous degree.

Wait, WHAT? Are you serious? (You sure we're talking about the same show here?) When was the last time we even saw a VF engaging targets at long range using long range ordinance? The ONLY example that I can think of is the opening fight scene in DYRL! Like 99.9999% of combat in Macross occurs at EXTREMELY short ranges, and usually with micro-missiles! Excluding Operation Stargazer and the opening bit of the battle between the YF-19 and YF-21 in Macross Plus, I don't think we've ever even seen the VF-19 or VF-22 equipped with long range ordinance, and in both cases it was either used not at all or used at extremely short ranges. That's not even close to what Graham said... what he actually DID say was that it would be interesting to see if Chronicle or other sources backed up his theory that the more streamlined VF-19F/S was meant to be a design with improved overall performance that would eventually replace the VF-19A. He also had this to say about the alleged retcon thrust figures that form the core of your theory: I'm retching a little just thinking about it... gonna have to have Talos show me that one later. Yeah, I'm getting that vibe too... I vaguely remember some fighter from Gundam doing something along those lines... I think it was from the UC, but I can't remember which show.

Um... there was never a time when that guy wasn't five beers short of a six pack dude... you must've just caught him during one of his brief interludes of not being a complete jackass. He hasn't changed one jot in the seven or so years since I first met him back during the days when Robotech.com wasn't a complete sack of crap. Case in point... Who're you kidding? RTX is run by, and moderated by, the members of the Robotech lunatic fringe. The only reason Bendo hasn't been reinstated there and given a mod post too (like Maverick_LSC and JuanRT got) is because MEMO's co-admin SIGHUP said that the only way he'd permit it is if MEMO reinstated me too... something MEMO would NEVER EVER do because I exposed him as an ignorant ass far too many times for him to be comfortable with it. I did find it funny that, after Bendo got banned from RTX he swore up and down he'd never go back... then just a few months later he tried creeping back under half a dozen different pseudonyms, only to get banned again each time, and topping it off by proclaiming that since they tossed him out the site must really be MacrossWorld 2.0.

No no no... they're gonna do the game first, and then make a shitty movie based on it and attach Uwe Boll to direct. It'll be like House of the Dead, just with giant robots. Y'know, I half-expect this to be headline news on RobotechX.com tomorrow. Dammit guys... stop writing his material for him! BIG NEWS! BIG NEWS! TOMMY YUNE BOUGHT A NEW PAIR OF SNEAKERS! WHAT COULD THIS MEAN FOR THE ROBOTECH LAM?

Helped along, of course, by some astonishingly gullible people.

You and me both... unfortunately unless my buddy Greg writes me back quickly, I'm not likely to be the one who discovers it, since like 80% of my Macross collection (excl. Chronicle) is for Macross II and its related titles. At the very least, we've narrowed it down a bit to something published before October 1997. Still waitin' on my copy of Master File to arrive, but from what I've seen it looks like the parts I was hoping they'd lavish detail on (the GU-15 and the munitions bays in the legs) didn't get nearly as much coverage as I would've liked.