Super Macross Mecha Fun Time Discussion Thread!

[Seto Kaiba]

6 hours ago, pengbuzz said:

I would imagine that they could develop something were the the need to do so.

Perhaps... though I see two potential problems with it:

1. Scaling a warhead like that down will result in a considerable loss of power.  The GU-11A's 55mm bullet is a bit less than 1/8th the size of the Javelin's tandem shaped charge warhead.
2. The armor technology that the Javelin's tandem warhead was designed to defeat - explosive reactive armor - isn't used by the Zentradi and hasn't been used on a VF or other advanced weapon since the Unification Wars.  (The only known OTM weapon to use it was the VF-0's Armored Pack.)

 

Just now, TG Remix said:

Now I'm wondering what was the references for the SVMF-42 Blue Phoenix VF-4s, until Frontier's 33rd Marine Battalion there wasn't really any indicator of the Marine branch of the NUNS. I thought the same thing about the VF-2 Sonic Birds squadron for the VF-1, but that was understandably connected to the CVN-101 Prometheus before the plot literally connected it to the Macross.

Macross Frontier may have been the first onscreen mention of the Spacy's Marine Corps, but mentions of them in official publications go back to the 90's in publications released for Macross Plus and mentions of VFs being intended for all branches of service with aviation arms go back even farther to '84.  

The VF-1 is said to have been developed to meet the needs of the Air Force, Navy, Marine Corps, and Space Forces.  

I'm not sure what the Sonicbirds or Blue Phoenixes are in reference to.  I'd have to do some research (I'll get there eventually).  A lot of the early VF squadrons mentioned in older publications are named for (or in some cases implied to be direct continuations of) real world fighter squadrons.  They get progressively less so the farther down the timeline you go.

 

Just now, TG Remix said:

Around 776 meters long and can accommodate up to 4500 people, I'd imagine so. It seemed more like a cruise ship then just a something of an airliner like Plus more or less painted it as.

Yeah, its Macross Chronicle Mechanic Sheet even describes it as a luxury cruise ship (豪華客船 Gouka kyakusen) in the sheet's title:

"A luxury space cruise ship for tourists that connects resort planets with Earth."

The inclusion of airline-like seating arrangements seems odd when you consider the ship is said to be able to sail continuously for 30-60 days, that the trip supposedly takes 3-4 days, and that the ship includes restaurants and a shopping mall.  The area from the bow to the mast and antenna section is said to be made up of passenger rooms and living spaces.  

4,500 people is a comically small number for such a big ship in airline-like seating.  The Stellar Whale's passenger section is something like 500m long and is 148m wide at the widest point.  A Boeing 787-10 has a cabin about 50m x 6m and holds about 300 people in mixed seating.  If you put 16 787-10 cabins side-by-side across the waist of the ship (50m x 96m) you'd have over 25m to spare on either side at the ship's widest point, and a seating capacity of 4,800, and be using about 1/10th the total length of the ship on a single deck.  

The only way I can think of that the Stellar Whale makes sense is if its interior is set up with mixed accommodations like a long-distance train.  Regular commuter seating for the folks taking only a short leg of the trip, and sleeper cabins for people on longer trips.  Then the size of the ship makes sense.  

(The largest conventional cruise ship currently in service is the Icon-class, which is about 1/2 the length and 1/3 the width of the Stellar Whale and has 2,805 passenger cabins, over 80% of which can accommodate 3+ people.)

 

Just now, TG Remix said:

On more unknowns of the UN sphere, I know I asked about how Apollo Base and the lunar colony would be like in Macross, and from what I remember there's more colonized moons like Ganymede. Though what got my attention was the other settlements in the rest of the solar system. Miho Miho was said to have been born on a satellite city named "White Flora" that was in Jupiter's orbit, and it seems that Neptune and Venus has their own as well. I'm assuming we don't know much of them as well, but I was imagining something like the City-class ships as a frame of reference, unless they were something more typically designed like O'Neil Cylinders and the like.

We've never seen a "Satellite City", so it's hard to say.  Artificial gravity is a thing, so they could be building Star Trek-style space stations in orbit of these planets.  My personal mental image, apropos of nothing in particular, is something akin to a Sunny Flower-class environment ship or a group of same in orbit of a planet. 

https://www.macross2.net/m3/macross7/sunnyflower.htm

We know O'Neill cylinders are also a thing in Macross, with some of the First Space War survivors and manufacturing facilities servicing the rebuilding of Earth being located in space colonies at the Lagrange points (even called Bunches, in Gundam tradition).  

 

Just now, TG Remix said:

Wondering for the VFs who have internalized beam guns like the VF-17 could have paint or training rounds stored inside them, since of course the ammunition wouldn't be physical.

Based on Macross Delta's second movie, the answer appears to be "Yes"... as we inexplicably see Max's YF-29 firing paint rounds from its beam gunpod.