[OOC] Abberant Dawn - A BeeNCQuest Mecha RP

[Letter Bee]

@ArmorPlated, Probably some sort of mental disorder or just a really good ability to simulate an inhuman mindset.

[ArmorPlated]

@Letter Bee Well that throws a bit of a wrench into things. Mindset implies something far more than just perception of the physical body.

[Letter Bee]

@Letter Bee Well that throws a bit of a wrench into things. Mindset implies something far more than just perception of the physical body.

@ArmorPlated

Oh; what were your plans? Sorry if I've forgotten.

[ArmorPlated]

@Letter Bee

I don't have a plan, so much as a character figured out. If I needed to fit something important in post-creation, I'd have to make a lot of edits.

Having talked it out, everything still fits together so no wrench, just a curveball.

[Sierra]

You know how I said I wasn't going to follow up on this ... I guess I lied. I couldn't shake this from my head.

This needs a severe formatting and revision pass but I am making some serious assertions regarding lore. I figured it was worth posting it prematurely. After all I'm introducing the entire concept of 'the mechanical' as a lesser form of mech. Go ahead and tear this to shreds before I do my revision pass on it. I usually get bitter if I have to do more than one big one.

Expand:

Name: Miranda Ammar, ‘Mira’

“No one can pilot a mechanical.” “I can.”

Appearance:

Age: 19

Personality:
Brilliant, tenacious, and fiercely independent. She’s willful, but that’s what makes her scary as a mech pilot. She has the makings of a great engineer in her, but it’s somewhat gone to her head and grown a degree of arrogance. To that end she’s fiercely protective of Legion and is picky with who she lets work on it. The mech is very much her baby ... a massive, 80 ton metal baby.

Backstory:
She was only one of many worked on the project and a mal-envisioned project it was at that. Just inside the fringes of Paragon territory in what was once Morocco was a chaotic region with both bandits and Paragon soldiers constantly a threat. The settlement needed a weapon, a mech of their own to hold off bandit raids and scare away hotshot corporals coming to impress people into service. When a salvage mech was brought down trying to save the neural core from a larger downed mech, it was the chance they needed. The neural core itself was shot, but the fully working salvage mech (bar a few bullet holes and a blood stain in the pilot harness) was a priceless score.

They didn’t have the resources to develop that much by themselves but with a serviceable skeleton at their disposal, a machine of war would soon be theirs. Mira was among those working on the machine, being an inquisitive youth and a brilliant mind. She was prominent throughout development and one of the regular test pilots, though she would not go on to be the mech’s regular combat pilot. Nonetheless she did operate the mech in combat once out of necessity, when a surprise raiding attack pinned down all other trained pilots. The machine, christened Vanguard, was brutally effective at its task of defending the settlement, but knowledge the group possessed such a trophy ended up encouraging a higher frequency of attacks in vain attempts to steal Vanguard.

The story of her time in combat swept the desert faster than the summer dust storms. Unfortunately truth doesn’t make a good story. As it traveled it became farther from reality and by the time it reached former Somalia it was the story of the girl who built her own mech. Somewhere along the way some charlatan had snuck in the rumor she had taken on a real NC and won, which couldn’t have been farther from the truth. The largest thing ever destroyed by Vanguard was a lone IFV. Vanguard stood barely 3 meters at full stature and couldn’t take a hit from anything larger than 9.3mm high-power.

For quite obvious reasons, Tshwane Mining was very interested in the supposed ‘girl who built her own mech’. Despite the exaggerations, she had piloted a mechanical in combat at sixteen, a feat for sure. Mechanical mechs were notoriously difficult to utilize as combat platforms due to sluggishness, lack of feedback, and the physical exertion of controlling the machine. She was recruited by the company as an apprentice engineer with the offer to construct her own mech at their expense. Thus began the long process that would culminate with the completion of Legion.

Tactical Preferences and Skills:
Throughout Legion’s development, she insisted the mech’s primary function control remain mechanical against the advice of the engineers that tutored her and all standard practice of mech construction. Her neural systems are predominantly sensor and information feed, haptic feedback, and ancillary systems. The neural haptic feedback provides enough precision to allow Legion to be combat viable, even has a hybrid mechanical.

Her synchronization score for a full-control setup is far too low to ever operate a true NC. Her neural implants being located behind her temples for reduced low-control interfacing, combined with her preference and experience with a mechanical harness enables her to cheat, and achieve over 65% synchronization when piloting Legion specifically.

Legion is a behemoth of a mech. Even with full-control neural systems the mech would not handle at significant speeds, so the lack of responsiveness of the mechanical harness presents relatively minimal impedance to the mech’s combat function. The lack of load on the neural net from the absence of movement control is used to compensate for imprecision, running advanced targeting correction software in its place.

Mira has developed a preference for a high-precision, one-shot-kill weapon stemming from Vanguard’s modified magnetic cannon that could demolish light vehicles with ease. Combined with the suppressive shredding power of a rotary cannon as complement, she naturally gravitated towards fitting a railgun. She opted for more military traditional ammunition types for Legion rather than Tshwane signature diamond-boron rounds. Depleted uranium APFSDS penetrating slugs are arguably better against armored targets.

---

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Code-name: Legion

Development:

The Vanguard chassis after being armored, not yet fitted with armaments.

The previous ‘Vanguard’ mech developed with the aid of scavengers was built on the chassis of a salvage mech. Due to the value of neural interfacing in constructing combat mechs, the salvage machines relied on older, clunkier mechanical control interfaces with a pilot strapped in, physically moving to control the vehicle. Even with advancements in haptic force feedback, mechanical (or physical) interfacing remains far too sluggish and unresponsive to contend with modern neural nets.

Despite its tactical shortcomings, a working skeleton of a mech was a huge score for Moroccan independents. Mira was among many who worked on refitting the frame into a viable combat mech. She was also among the most proficient to operate the vehicle in testing. It was armored mainly for small arms fire, able to easily shrug off most of what any opposing clan would throw at them, and fitted with a machine gun and a salvaged magnetic cannon. Mira only piloted the mech in combat a single time, though prior to that she was closely involved in its development and piloted it in testing frequently.

Legion bears the same rough formfactor as its predecessor, though with several key upgrades made during its development as a military grade war machine. Instead of weapons being hastily bolted in an underslung position against the grasper forearms, the weapons themselves were affixed directly to the elbow. The pilot arm housings no longer protrude from the torso, though its continued use of a mechanical harness in the com-pod has required even more size increase than previously expected. Its natural hunched posture reduces its height by several meters, though if it stands fully erect it exceeds 14 meters from ground to sensor pod.

A proper neural net was integrated into the com-pod but is limited to information/sensory feedback. Much of the data is also still displayed through the virtualized reality HUD in the com-pod despite being neurally linked and most of the neural control functions have voice key activation backups. In theory this means anyone could pilot Legion even without neural implants, though in practice a variety of obstacles prevent this, not the least of which being that Legion’s harness is sized for Mira’s modest frame, limiting it to rather petite individuals to even strap in. While a technical possibility, all combat efficiency would be lost in attempting such. The addition of neurally interfaced tactile and sensor feedback greatly improves the precision with which Mira is able to operate the mech compared to its miniature predecessor. The unique neural interfacing makes it extremely difficult for a pilot used to full-control interfacing to take control of Legion.

Its rear features four modular mounting positions in a square pattern. One on each side is always used for ammunition storage for the mech’s primary armaments, and the second is available for mounting ancillary weapons systems. Different options are available depending on the use of the upper or lower mount for a given side. Generally, the upper mounts are utilized for missile-based weapons while the lower mounts receive smaller direct-fire weapons. Both secondary armaments are fully retractable, concealing them from frontal fire.

Design Archetype: Bipedal, approx. humanoid, hybrid mechanical

Strategic Role: Ranged combatant, artillery & missile specialist,

Primary Armaments:

-35mm ballistic rotary chaingun
A vicious high ROF weapon chambered in large caliber SAPHEI-T ammunition firing from a rotary tri-barrel on the left arm that is used for shredding through unarmored to moderately armored targets.

-75mm high precision railgun
An extreme-range weapon chambered in DU-APFSDS penetrating slugs on the right arm optimized for effectively defeating heavily armored targets.

Secondary Armaments (upper option):

-Multipurpose Tactical Missiles
These missiles include a highly advanced targeting computer enabling a variety of different flight profiles, ranging from direct attack to a high-arc artillery style approach that rains death from above. They come in various sizes, each striking a different balance between individual destructive power and raw quantity. Mira tends to prefer fewer missiles with each packing a sizable tandem HEAT warhead.

Secondary armaments (lower option):

-MGL cannons
Magnetic Grenade Launcher tech was developed to lob high explosive shells long distances in the hands of a rifleman. The magnetic acceleration coils provided far more punch than traditional grenade round propellant charges. When adapted to mechanized combat, the technology takes the form of a short-barreled 60mm gun firing polymer-stabilized HESH shells. The weapons are useful for short to medium range combat, being limited by low velocity and relatively poor aerodynamics.

[Letter Bee]

@Sierra, I guessed as much; I worked hard on the Lore, after all - I redid 90% of it from the LHG100 original which I was allowed to borrow if I kept out of his hair.

[Letter Bee]

@Sierra, I'll wait for your revision pass, then I'll accept it.

[ArmorPlated]

@Sierra

Ahh, the only Cyberpunk Mech I've seen in a game to date.

Interesting take on a low-sync specialization.

[Sierra]

@Letter Bee ... I want critique now so I only have to do one revision pass. Lemme put it this way: I only want to do one revision pass, so if there's anything you feel needs to be changed pending acceptance, you should tell me that now rather than later please.

@ArmorPlated The mech never struck me as overtly cyberpunk (though admittedly you could describe any hardsuit in that way) but I've always liked it. Shame the game was such a grind though.

[Letter Bee]

@Sierra, All right; well, the picture should be put under the 'Appearance:' bar, and it should be clarified better that the Mech isn't a 'True' NC but an approximation if that's what you're going for. Also, the last major concern I have is that the 'Mechanical' should have a clear advantage over, say, a super-tank or even an ordinary tank, so as to answer the question of: 'why not just use a tank'?

Actually, I should say that Tanks, APCs, and IFVs can bring down a 'True' NC if used in enough numbers and if said NC is alone.

[ArmorPlated]

@Letter Bee Interesting point, if the Legion doesn't use it's NC Core to process movement and tactile response, would the pilot feel any tactile sensation from their NC at all?

@Sierra
I mean, it's still a Mech, but it's totally Cyberpunk miltech, just look at the aesthetic of the plating and built-in lighting.

talking sheets critique: Aren't pilots supposed to be part of Electrum Company? Is she being contracted out by Tshwane Mining?

also, I kinda pictured Sync-Rating as a measure of some kind of NC signal integration into brain function or something like that. Lore thread says 50%-sync is the lowest viable, but does that mean low-end pilots use Mechanical control methods like Mira does, or is the implication that 50% is required to fully mentally control an NC?

If it's the latter, does that mean Mira could be an oddity, in that she's a viable sub-50 pilot?

[FoxSoxs]

@Letter Bee I'm going to have to drop out of this one. Thanks for you time and I hope this rp does well!

[Letter Bee]

@Letter Bee Interesting point, if the Legion doesn't use it's NC Core to process movement and tactile response, would the pilot feel any tactile sensation from their NC at all?

@Sierra
I mean, it's still a Mech, but it's totally Cyberpunk miltech, just look at the aesthetic of the plating and built-in lighting.

talking sheets critique: Aren't pilots supposed to be part of Electrum Company? Is she being contracted out by Tshwane Mining?

also, I kinda pictured Sync-Rating as a measure of some kind of NC signal integration into brain function or something like that. Lore thread says 50%-sync is the lowest viable, but does that mean low-end pilots use Mechanical control methods like Mira does, or is the implication that 50% is required to fully mentally control an NC?

If it's the latter, does that mean Mira could be an oddity, in that she's a viable sub-50 pilot?

@ArmorPlated

1.) No, the NC Pilot won't feel any tactile sensation from the NC at all.

2.) It's the latter; Mira's going to be an oddity.

[Sierra]

the last major concern I have is that the 'Mechanical' should have a clear advantage over, say, a super-tank or even an ordinary tank, so as to answer the question of: 'why not just use a tank'?

It really isn't supposed to. The idea behind a physical control harness was developed for salvage rigs, powered exeoskeletons and such. It was never intended as a combat platform. Compared to a neural link, it is meant to be inferior in virtually every metric. If there must be an answer to that question then though I'd say this: Tanks require a crew of 2-4 people generally plus training, but fielding an equivalent armament on a humanoid form that uses direct movement control requires one person with far less training to be similarly effective.

Tanks, APCs, and IFVs can bring down a 'True' NC if used in enough numbers and if said NC is alone.

Not even a badass mecha pilot can override the Law of Gross Firepower.

Aren't pilots supposed to be part of Electrum Company? Is she being contracted out by Tshwane Mining?

I figured that would be assumed. That's the correct assumption that she's officially on loan.

also, I kinda pictured Sync-Rating as a measure of some kind of NC signal integration into brain function or something like that. Lore thread says 50%-sync is the lowest viable, but does that mean low-end pilots use Mechanical control methods like Mira does, or is the implication that 50% is required to fully mentally control an NC?

You're on the right track. A 50% sync is the minimum to fully control a mech through a neural link. Since pretty much all mechs everywhere are built with full neural interfaces, it's also the minimum to be a pilot. Mira would never have been accepted as a pilot had her overinflated reputation not preceded her. However since she had the opportunity, she found a way to cheat.

I've made the assertion that if you reduce the amount of information travelling over the neural link, the reduced load will inflate the synchronization of the pilot. In Mira's case, this boosts her sync rating high enough to achieve a viable interface. She still has some tactile feedback coming over the neural link but the primary movement control and weapon firing is handled through the physical harness. This makes Legion unique in that it's a hybrid between neural and mechanical interfacing. This hybridization is the reason that Legion is a viable low-sync mech despite relying on the inferior mechanical control harness.

It's theoretically possible that another hybrid combatant mech does exist somewhere, but it's equally likely that Legion is the only one of it's kind and Mira is the only viable hybrid pilot in the world. By all account she should never have been a pilot in the first place.

[Letter Bee]

@Sierra, thanks for the answers; they're sensible.

[ArmorPlated]

@Sierra So Legion is sort-of like a gigantic cybernetic prosthesis. Brilliant.

I just sort-of assumed Sync was a hard-calculated score, but with everything laid out, it could also be a soft-scoring system. If it's soft-scored, does Sync fluctuate based on what NC Core/design is connected? Interesting question to be played out and answered IC. None of our characters would know much about the back-end/metrics anyway.

[Letter Bee]

@Sierra So Legion is sort-of like a gigantic cybernetic prosthesis. Brilliant.

I just sort-of assumed Sync was a hard-calculated score, but with everything laid out, it could also be a soft-scoring system. If it's soft-scored, does Sync fluctuate based on what NC Core/design is connected? Interesting question to be played out and answered IC. None of our characters would know much about the back-end/metrics anyway.

@ArmorPlated

Sync is based on the brainstem and the structure of one's nervous system; it's normally hard-calculated, but one can theoretically 'train' the brainstem with meditation or just drugs to increase one's Sync, or yes, just reduce the amount of input the nervous system gets.

[Sierra]

Firstly, a question. Do pilots pair to their mechs? Essentially, do they synchronize with their mech over time to the point where it's very difficult to switch to piloting another mech (even if its very similar in formfactor)? I've kind of imagined yes.

Also, final version of Mira after a formatting & clarification pass. I may make a future revision for adding color once I decide on one, but content-wise this is pretty much final.

Miranda Amaar

Miranda ‘Mira’ Amaar

“No one can pilot a mechanical.”

Age 19

---

Personality:

Brilliant, tenacious, and fiercely independent. She’s willful, but that’s what makes her scary as a mech pilot. She has the makings of a great engineer in her, but it’s somewhat gone to her head and grown a degree of arrogance. To that end she’s fiercely protective of Legion and is picky with who she lets work on it. Those on the service team for the machine are among her most trusted associates, most being transfers from Tshwane for that reason. The mech is very much her baby ... a massive, 80 ton metal baby.

Backstory:

She never really did what the legends say. Even the elements of truth to her tale are dripping with hyperbole. But even since before the Great Fire, truth was never more than half of any good legend.

They say she did it alone. Really she was only one of many worked on the project and a mal-envisioned one at that. Just inside the fringes of Paragon territory in what was once Morocco was a chaotic region with both bandits and Paragon soldiers constantly a threat. The families that lived there were constantly in fear of the next attack, struggling to get by every time their supplies were pillaged. The settlement needed a weapon, a mech of their own to hold off bandit raids and scare away hotshot corporals coming to impress people into service. The big break would come one fateful day when the dust settled from a corporate skirmish.

Three full-size Neural Combatants had fallen just a few kilometers away. The shantytown had been rattled for hours by the explosions of the battle. A few warriors were able to ambush a salvage crew trying to recover the precious neural nets from the downed mechs. The neural cores themselves were all shot, run through with anti-tank warheads or heavy piercing weapons, but the salvage mech being utilized was completely intact barring a few bullet holes and a blood stain on the harness. The industrial salvage suits weren’t neurally interfaced, relying on the less-capable mechanical control interface, but a working skeleton of a mech was still a better trophy than nothing.

Mira was among those working on the machine, being an inquisitive youth and a brilliant mind. Her unique way of thinking solved several problems with the armor fitting and with ammo feeding. She also served as one of the regular test pilots and became rather proficient at it over time, though she would not go on to be the mech’s regular combat pilot. Nevertheless she did operate the mech in combat once out of necessity, when a surprise raiding attack pinned down all the other trained pilots. The machine, christened Vanguard by its design team, was brutally effective at defending against raiding attacks by bandits and even Paragon, but the news that an independent village in northwest Africa had a working combat-capable mech ended up drawing more frequent attacks rather than deterring them even if they were easier than ever to put down. A variety of bandit clans thought they could steal the mech for themselves, but none were ever successful.

The story of her time in combat swept the desert faster than the summer dust storms, twisting itself into a legendary fable as it traveled. It became farther from reality with each passing mile and by the time it reached former Somalia, it was the story of the girl who built her own mech. Somewhere along the way some charlatan had snuck in the rumor she had taken on a real NC and won, which couldn’t have been farther from the truth. The largest thing ever destroyed by Vanguard was a lone IFV, and not at Mira’s hand. Vanguard stood barely 3 meters at full stature and couldn’t take a hit from anything larger than 9.3mm high-power, lead alone any of the gamut of energy weapons a real NC could be carrying.

For quite obvious reasons, Tshwane Mining was very interested in the supposed ‘girl who built her own mech’. Despite the exaggerations in the so-called “Legend of Mira Amaar”, she had still piloted a mechanical in combat at the age of sixteen. Mechanicals, non-combat mechs notable for their mechanical control interface harnesses, were widely considered impossible to utilize as combat platforms due to sluggishness, lack of feedback, and the physical exertion of controlling the machine. The interface style had never even been considered on a combat vehicle due to its inability to compete with neural interfaces. She was recruited by the company as an apprentice engineer with the offer to construct her own mech at their expense. Thus began the long process that would culminate with the completion of Legion. She, and the mech she calls her own, are on loan with a mercenary company based east of the horn of Africa.

Tactical Preferences and Skills:

Interfacing:

Mira pilots her mech through a hybrid interface, perhaps the only one in the world. Sensor data, sensory and haptic feedback, and secondary control functions are handled through a neural interface. The primary movement control and weapon triggers are a physical harness. The mechanical interfacing favors her existing experience and lets her cheat the sync score system in order to pilot when she should not be able to by all accounts.

Synchronicity:

Her synchronization score for a full-control setup is far too low to ever operate a true NC, measuring around 35% in testing. The unique hybrid interface of Legion essentially cheats the system. The reduced neural load of not controlling the mech’s movement inflates her sync score to 60%, making effective piloting possible. Her neural implants are located just behind her temples, maximizing interface with the sensory regions of the brain but do not interface at all with motor control.

Combat:

Legion is a behemoth of a mech, built for heavy fire. Being such a massive vehicle makes it sluggish in combat, but the vehicle’s lack of mobility conceals the sluggishness of her unique interface setup. The pacing of the mech is in many ways a necessity, though it also enables a very methodical combat style.

Mira opted to mimic the combat capabilities of the Vanguard mech which essentially served as a prototype for Legion’s design. The left arm would carry a high volume of fire weapon to suppress and shred lighter targets, while the right arm was a massively powerful weapon that could obliterate targets given an accurate shot. To this end, she naturally gravitated towards the fitting of a rotary cannon and a railgun, and then opting for more military-traditional ammunition types, rather than Tshwane-signature diamond-boron rounds. She fervently argues that depleted uranium APFSDS penetrating slugs are better against armored targets anyway.

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Legion

“Fear Nothing.”

Image Gallery

Vanguard, Legion’s predecessor, testing its mobility after the armor fitting was complete. Weapons were not yet attached.


In my head Legion’s general chassis shape somewhat resembles this, but it’s not 1:1. The torso protrudes too far forward, the legs are a bit too tall, and there’s a lack of head/sensor pod.

Long-range Heavy Weapons Specialist, bipedal humanoid, hybrid-mechanical

Development:

Legion bears the same rough formfactor as its Vanguard predecessor, though with several key upgrades made during its development as a military grade war machine. The weapons are bolted directly to the elbow joint, rather than being underslung against an existing forearm structure. The torso region now fully encloses the com-pod rather than leaving lightly-armored protruding arm housings. This has necessitated the vehicle be quite large, even moreso than initial expectations. Its natural hunched posture reduces its height by several meters, though if it stands fully erect it exceeds 14 meters from ground to sensor pod.

It is fitted with a modern neural net and interfacing, though it was at Mira’s insistence that the primary movement and weapons control remain tied to a mechanical interface. This hybrid control scheme is unheard of in modern mecha, widely considered impossible, and is possibly the only example in the world. The mech also features voice key detection and a mixed reality display in the com-pod as backup systems in the event the neural interface fails for whatever reason. It is thus theoretically possible for anyone to pilot Legion regardless of sync rating, though in practice it is not that simple at all.

Its backside features four modular mounting positions in a four-square pattern. One on each side is always used for ammunition storage for the mech’s primary armaments, and the second is available for mounting ancillary weapons systems. Different options are available depending on the use of the upper or lower mount for a given side. Generally, the upper mounts are utilized for missile-based weapons while the lower mounts receive smaller direct-fire weapons. Both secondary armaments are fully retractable, concealing them from frontal fire.

Armaments:

Primary:
-35mm ballistic rotary chaingun

A vicious high ROF weapon chambered in large caliber SAPHEI-T ammunition firing from a rotary tri-barrel on the left arm that is used for shredding through unarmored to moderately armored targets.

-75mm high precision railgun

An extreme-range weapon chambered in DU-APFSDS penetrating slugs on the right arm optimized for effectively defeating heavily armored targets.

Secondary:
-Multipurpose Tactical Missiles (upper)

These missiles include a highly advanced targeting computer enabling a variety of different flight profiles, ranging from direct attack to a high-arc artillery style approach that rains death from above. They come in various sizes, each striking a different balance between individual destructive power and raw quantity. Mira tends to prefer fewer missiles with each packing a sizable tandem HEAT warhead.

-MGL cannons (lower)

Magnetic Grenade Launcher tech was developed to lob high explosive shells long distances in the hands of a rifleman. The magnetic acceleration coils provided far more punch than traditional grenade round propellant charges. When adapted to mechanized combat, the technology takes the form of a short-barreled 60mm gun firing polymer-stabilized HESH shells. The weapons are useful for short to medium range combat, being limited by low velocity and relatively poor aerodynamics.

[Letter Bee]

@Sierra, Yes, Pilots pair to their mechs; the higher the Sync Ratio, the more quickly it happens. And the content is good; I can't object to it.

[Sierra]

Well in that case I've gone ahead and moved it over to the relevant section.