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Master Dex

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  1. Master Dex
    Fair suggestions, but speculation ultimately. I'd be willing to bet considering the wealth of information on other things that there is probably a reasoning behind this somewhere (after all, they bothered to go out of their way to say it has two engine types on it).
  2. Master Dex
    Yeah my first answer was before double checking it on M3.. but now I am not so sure. It really doesn't make sense for it to have conventional engines in it when it also has reaction engines, which can be throttled down so as not to produce too much thrust if that is the concern for the Cat's Eye. I am a little unsure why they would do this.
  3. Master Dex
    I doubt that is accurate, more likely they have reaction engines that are air breathing in atmosphere and pure reaction in space, which is exactly the same thing the VFs do. I suspect you misunderstood the meaning of air-breathing. It doesn't mean it is a conventional jet engine that using jet fuel but it means it literally takes in air and uses that for propulsion (via heating it to plasma with the thermonuclear fusion reactors in the engines). In space the reactors just push out direct plasma in large quantities instead since there is no air to use (which is massively inefficient and wasteful but the UNS/NUNS has a surplus on power generation capability, in other words "Screw the rules, we have power!") EDIT: Looking at M3, I can see why it is confusing, and perhaps possible I might even be wrong here. Welp... Seto?
  4. Master Dex
    Thank you for that, I honestly didn't know. That's what happens when you go by word of mouth however. Sadly.. that pretty much means that the writers just stopped giving a crap when they started writing the second cour. Or something happened anyway. I mean, it is definitely a difference in the second cour being less well managed than the first in any case. It is probably something that comes down to gritty details and we may never know entirely what happened.
  5. Master Dex
    It's not a bad show... but it suffers from a lack of foresight in writing because the plot was developed for 13 episodes and a movie... but then changed to 26 episodes.. so the plot for the movie that was to conclude the story had to be stretched into 13 episodes... and in many ways... they didn't stretch it very well. That all being said.. put together it has a lot of great stuff in it, and likely, being watched straight through without weekly pauses (aka on binge) likely will make it look better since you don't have to wait as much.
  6. Master Dex
    Well that's because the weaponry advanced the same as the armor. It's classic escalation, enemy has bronze armor, you get iron swords. They invent guns, you develope Kevlar. VFs have ECA which makes them nearly invulnerable to modern bullets and missiles but that isn't what they are firing. They're gunpods have anti-ECA rounds though designed to fight that. The missiles are stronger too, and beam weapons are of course a higher class. There is still danger despite ECA, it is just not the same danger as things face with modern technology.
  7. Master Dex
    Nah, modern day (as in modern for Frontier and Delta times) cost-benefit analyses have basically concluded that VFs are the better answer even if they are overall more expensive than any destroid. They are far more versatile and you get more use from one VF than you do from many destroids. Sure you can make them cheap, but when it comes down to it, in the Macross world, making VFs has become one of the primary industries of the NUNG, and they've gotten pretty damn good at it. Anyone relying on destroids anymore are basically people who can't afford VFs and they are lagging behind, and not doing as well comparatively.
  8. Master Dex
    So the VF that Basara sto- ahem... Purchases on credit (lol) in D7 is in fact inferior to his old one then. After all UN Spacey paid for the original as part of project M. Though, Basara likely wouldn't care as long as he can fly and sing.
  9. Master Dex
    I did of course know the difference of NUNG and NUNS, my misapplication of the terms in my post is down to merely not paying attention to how I wrote it. However I respect your drive Seto to make sure we are kept on our toes. Never worry, I like the nitpickers of the world, I'm a nitpicker too, lol. As for the rest, stuff I was not as well versed on, as usual, and just doing my best with my knowledge. Being the science lover I am, I enjoy being proven wrong in things. Makes debates less exciting with me but it also makes debates actually useful based on their intended purpose, lol.
  10. Master Dex
    NUNS is a decentralized government, so Frontier NUNS and Federal NUNS are not the same thing. Federal NUNS mostly refers to Earth and the big dogs in charge. They have the best of the best stuff, as they are the origin point of Humanity's emigration. Unlike the days of the UNS though, the decentralized NUNS means Earht does not have direct control over all the fleets anymore (like they did in Macross 7), and Frontier NUNS can do it's own thing with what fighters it uses and what political decisions it makes. Frontier is merely part of a larger organization that is centered on Earth, but no longer beholden to it outside some base Federal laws which are as far as can be seen a lot less restrictive that say American Federal laws are with respect to its States. Seto said it best, the NUNG setup is more like the European Union. This means you can have Frontier NUNS do entirely different thing than Earth/Federal NUNS, and the latter tends to have the best stuff just because they are the first and keep themselves on top. This is mostly done because humanity is just too damn big and widespread now for Earth to keep tabs on everyone all the time. As for monkey model, that is just a colloquialism Seto likes to use that means a model that is overall inferior to the original version, often by design. The idea is that Federal NUNS has a VF design they use, they export only the base design data to the emigrant fleets, such that those fleets can design their own fighters based on it, but will not be able to design the exact same one or one better unless they have some secret advantage (like Frontier did with fold quartz for the YF-29, even though it was too expensive to actually produce). Thus all emigrant fleet designs, even if based on the original specs, are monkey models basically because Earth doesn't want its kids to have more power than them if they can't directly control them (which they can't in the current NUNS setup, which is done because there is just too many fleets out there now to watch). For this reason, a VF-19 design made by Frontier will be less powerful than one made by Earth or Eden (Eden was using Federal specs since it was the old UNS then, plus Eden is likely still easily governed by Earth due to being close by). Similarly VF-25, 27, 30, 31... all of these are inherently not going to be as good as whatever the Federal NUNS made based on the original YF-24 design (which we speculate is the VF-24 but we don't know 100% for sure).
  11. Master Dex
    That actually makes a lot of sense. The Kairos uses the VF-25s engine, so it stands to reasons that when they decided to put the much more powerful engine the Chronos used in the Seigfrieds, they needed to lower the output for safety reasons if nothing else. It sounds like to me the traditional view of the higher the VF number the more advanced has been thoroughly debunked by the 5th generation VFs. From 24 to 31 all the main line fighters are basically on par (with exception of the 27 which is meant for cyborgs mostly), and a few stand out specialized prototypes/demonstrators that are not being mass produced as is. Plus the fact that the Federal spec on the YF/VF-24 is likely really nuts just tells us that we shouldn't expect a VF to be more powerful now just because it has a higher number. Really no one should, as the numbers are just a sequential production number indicating when it was produced.
  12. Master Dex
    Actually not in my tops. I like it ok, but not one of my favorites.
  13. Master Dex
    Someone said it before, but they really are leaning on Giraffe Blues to be the Diamond Crevasse of this show. Now... I really like Giraffe Blues, it is a wonderful song... but it still pales in comparison to Diamond Crevasse, which still hits me in the feels every time. That being said, there are like 5 different versions of Diamond Crevasse across Frontier's albums.. so having this many versions of Giraffe Blues is not that unprecedented, even if it is a bit unnecessary. Besides... they all are just trying to copy the many releases and versions of Planet Dance, lol. (Totsugeki Love Heart gets a lot too, but that song is awesome enough that it's always welcome).
  14. Master Dex
    Well if anything Delta deserves the award for mecha design. That is definitely one of the (few) highlights of the show.
  15. Master Dex
    That bugs me too, because Frontier skated back and forth on it. Sheryl had the wetsuit style holosuit in the beginning, but later on and in the movies the holographic outfits just formed over real clothes like you said and it always bugged me. Internal consistency is not that hard but they don't seem to want to go with it. Maybe projecting outfits over real clothes requires external projectors (and an on-file body mapping of the person in order to project things... correctly), but the suits can project directly and are more mobile? Doesn't really explain why Sheryl needed one in the Frontier show though as she was on stage. In the movie version it seemed she was wearing a real outfit more than a holosuit as well (her cowgirl outfit may have been the real one there since she continued in it during the attack, with the universal bunny outfits just having been projected on that beforehand... that or the suit's holographics are really sturdy).
  16. Master Dex
    Could always scan ever page I suppose.
  17. Master Dex
    Oh but that is far less entertaining than the pages of discussion once devoted to the size of hands, lol. (that wasn't necessarily about Macross but still).
  18. Master Dex
    I think you got turned around, Seto hasn't been implying any of that. It sounds more like to me that you two are no longer having the same conversation. Seto and I never left the topic about how the YF-30 and the VF-31 have the same engine but with different tuning. We got into some details and examples that might explain why but overall we both have basically admitted there is no stated reason yet and we are just ok with accepting it as it is. You seem to have gone off into some sub-topic based on some of the examples that as far as I can tell Seto isn't even focused on. I know I've kinda moved on from the subject already, I suspect he has as well. There really isn't much more to cover in that topic anymore, the facts are still what they are originally reported as being. I suggest we let it be now, and at worst, agree to disagree.
  19. Master Dex
    I too would love more stats for the Percival. As it happens, the YF-29B and the YF-30 have quickly become two of my favorite valks and I have barely played any of the game (last I could play, I was still in VF-0s, lol). I do own the DX figures of both now though, and very much enjoy them. As such it is sad that the only data I have to go on about one of them is the base YF-29 data which may not be entirely accurate. This is especially annoying since the YF-30 does have such data, but I guess since it was brand new in the game that was necessary.
  20. Master Dex
    I'm feeling a bit iffy by the statement that Kawamori can't make such a mistake because he is an engineer. Firstly, I'm also an engineer (I am both an engineer and a jet engine mechanic, yes, it is a long story), so is Seto if I recall. My degree is in aerospace engineering even. If engineers can't make such a mistake, why do you think we are? Though I don't want you to answer that because the fact is, engineers are not infallible, I know many that screw up all the time. More to the point though... there is no mistake to be made. Kawamori did not make a mistake, the stats are likely not a mistake. It's the same engine, just set up differently. I for one would prefer to design an engine that had the versatility to be altered to better fit the RFP requirements of an airframe. Would save money over having to redesign an engine every time. It isn't very practical though, but neither are fighter planes that transform into robots anywhere but the universe of this story. It's nice to get this level of detail, but sometimes, it is just better to go with it. Besides, if the mechanics (cause engineers don't actually order parts and assemble the planes, they just design them) were ordering engines for the plane they are building up and can't figure out how to specify the exact VF they are getting their engine for they shouldn't be working. There is no way the wrong engine would get connected. However the case here is not even that dire as it is the same engine, it would be the mechanics job to make sure it is properly tuned/trimmed to the correct spec for their aircraft. If they have a VF-31, they will be setting it up with the lower thrust rating the 31 requires. If it were the 30 (though there is only one production unit so this case is somewhat moot) they'd be setting it up to go nuts with the design cause the 30 can handle it apparently. I also wouldn't put an F110-400 on an F-16 either.. but mostly because it wouldn't fit, lol. Plus it is an older variant.
  21. Master Dex
    The entire assertion that two engines of the same model having different thrust values in two different aircraft is not only understandable it is practically an obvious condition. What's more that you have trouble believing it is surprising because that is how things work even in the real world. I work on the GE F110-100C engine for the F-16 in my day job. The F-16 is not the only aircraft that uses the F110 engine (to wit, that isn't even the only engine F-16s can use, some versions use different ones). Depending on the aircraft or version of aircraft changes can be required in the engine (for example block 30 F-16s use my engine, but can also use the F110-129 it a PW engine. Block 50s typically use the -129). The differences in the engines are not always just thrust capacity though. Sometimes it is structural or mechanical changes (or a maintenence change). Further, changes and upgrades to the engine happen all the time without the engine changing model number (ECP and TCTO changes are minor usually but sometimes can have big differences). So yes, it is entirely possible for two aircraft to use the same engine model and have different thrust ratings. The devil is in the details though, likely with no one simple explanation. My money would be the VF-31 frame needed less thrust but the same performance so they tweaked it down (most engines are capable of way more power than rated, the thrust listed is the set thrust by design, either for safety or physical constraints). That our the 30 needed more and they tweaked that engine up because it was the best they could get but is still within the operational margin of safety. Either way, the idea that Chronicle listed that one VF thrust at non-base stats in contravention to all other publications is frankly a silly presumption. I hope that doesn't sound rude, that isn't the intent. It just doesn't make sense to me.
  22. Master Dex
    Theoretically, yes. However there must be a reason they were trimmed down to their current spec in the first place. Perhaps the changes to the airframe in the 31 vs the 30 make the higher thrust less economical or efficient. Perhaps it is that the 30 simply needs a higher trim to run, which might mean the 31 is actually a better airframe (the 31A for sure, which is closest to the 30, does end up looking nicer but that is just an aesthetic thing). The reasons are unclear, but the effect is clear, the YF-30 has a higher thrust rating than the VF-31, despite having the same engines, and regardless of the FDR system on the 30. I'm with you Grig, though. I am also a jet engine mechanic (when I am not being an aerospace engineer, long story) so the distinction is important.
  23. Master Dex
    That makes me really curious. I imagine the VF-31, being significantly pared down from the YF-30 design, likely had a YF-31 predecessor much like how there was a YF-25 based itself on the YF-24 data before a VF-25 was produced. As such it is not unreasonable to assume a production model based on the YF-30 directly would be VF-30. The only thing that begs to question is, does that mean there is a production VF with working FDR systems? Might that be a limited run like the VF-31 Seigfrieds, or perhaps Federal NUNS capitalizing on the design data of SMS's new toy? I suppose we might find out some day, if a VF-30 is referenced in the VF-4 master file, which I heard also implies the next book will be about the VF-31, then that book may give us the answer.
  24. Master Dex
    MID-POST EDIT: I began writing most of the below before Seto posted, so he covers a lot of this ground, and typically, a bit better than I, but I'm leaving most of my original writing that doesn't mistakenly contradict his, as he certainly knows more (and we are in agreement anyway). My writing below does imply that having 4 engines isn't as important, which is kinda debunked by Seto already, but my point was more that it was the fold wave and/or FDR that is what made the difference in the YF-29 and 30 and why they had 100% ECA in all modes, and that part I was correct on. I'll accept that I underestimated the advantage provided by the extra engines, but I agree that they might not be enough alone to provide full ECA. And the burst thing was an honest mistake on my part, I simply was not as well versed in the nomenclature of the different engine versions. Thanks for the correction Seto. There is no sense in talking about vanilla YF-29 and 30 as those don't even exist. The point of both models is that they are special variants and tech demonstrators for the fold wave and FDR respectively. The 29 isn't special because it has 4 engines, it is the fold wave system. Though having 4 engines does contribute to its massive power for sure. The only possible exception to that fact may be the YF-29B Rod Custom that NUNS Havamal built on Oroboros because we literally know next to nothing about it except that it is based on the Frontier YF-29 design and is supposedly an upgrade to the design, and thus is likely even a bit more powerful. This implies it still has a fold wave system too. Plus, it is operating on planet with so much fold quartz around, it wouldn't be hard to imagine they were able to get some for it. The same goes for the YF-30, there isn't a vanilla YF-30 because it was developed to demonstrate the FDR, and there is only the one production unit of it. The VF-31 is based on the design, but it not a direct development from it. There may even be an as yet unrevealed YF-31 similar to how there was a YF-25 still yet based on the original YF-24 data. If there is a vanilla model to talk about, it would be a YF-31. That said, The VF-31 Kairos likely doesn't have fold wave and likely can't do full power ECA coverage, but the VF-31 Seigfried customs do and may be able to do that. They are simply just not as overpowered as the YF-29, and that is due to having less engines. Additionally, the VF-27 isn't considered to be super powered due to having 4 engines.. more like it has 4 engines because it is an egregious power waster. It needs the extra engines just to supply the power for the heavy quantum beam rifle it uses, and to achieve performance that outclasses the VF-25, which it only can achieve because it was designed to by flown by cyborgs who are more resilient than your average meatbag pilot (and that is with ISC functionality even). On a sliding scale of power rating, the VF-27 sits somewhere in between the VF-25 (lower) and the YF-29 (notably higher). 29 and 30 also use the same type of beam rifle, and the 29 has 4 engines to help with it as well, but both models also use dimensional energy conversion as well which just makes it easier (and may be the only reason the 30 can). I'd imagine the beam gunpod on the VF-31 is less powerful overall, but since Seigfrieds do have fold wave it might be just as good. The Kairos is the real question there, heh. Finally the note on the 24 is mostly just because it is implied that the Federal NUNS version might be as or more powerful than the YF-29, but we don't really know anything about it.
  25. Master Dex
    In general yes, the engines put more power to the ECA in battroid in almost all models. 5th generation models though, seen in Frontier and Delta, are the first to employ ECA in all modes though due to the Stage II Thermonuclear Reaction Burst Turbine Engines. Apparently though there is still a limit in fighter and gerwalk though and Battroid still gets the most armor strength (since Fighter and Gerwalk both use more engine energy for actual flight). Theoretically the battroid can trade some armor energy for faster movement too, and likely does on a whim during high speed maneuvers, and it is likely automatically snapped back up to full armor power when it stops thrusting so much. Automatically controlled by the flight AI I'd expect to the point where the pilot doesn't even have to think about it, they just have to know the more they move, the less protected they might be, but they also are harder to hit due to moving. It's a rather genius compliment and frankly is likely the basis of Max's entire combat skill. He just knows when he is at his most defended and when is the best time to be moving or not. For generation 1-4 this is mostly true of Battroid mode, and the other modes are best utilized primarily for movement or specific weapons (such as missiles) being better available. Gen 5 makes it a factor in all modes and technically adds a level of complexity to VF piloting that is pretty cool IMO. If anything it makes it even more appropriate to frequently mode change. Also worth noting are the outliers like the YF-29, 30, and perhaps the 24 depending on how monstrously powerful it really is. The 29 and 30 have special systems, the Fold Wave and FDR, which add more power to them, such that they can have 100% ECA coverage in all 3 modes, which means no trade offs. No one knows if the 24 really has that capability, but since the 29 with the Fold Wave system is likely the closest to matching the 24's supposed capabilities one could surmise as much (for the record, that is not meant to imply the 24 has a fold wave system or anything similar, it likely doesn't... but then again who knows).
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