Okay, so full disclosure, after getting through a rush of finals centered entirely around sitting the fuck down and writing a whole damn lot, broken up by calling people so I could write about what they say to me, I did about as little of that as I could and spent several days in a "no fucks given" haze of nothing but relaxing. So I'm only just getting to this, only other writing or roleplay-related stuff that I did was take like 3 or 4 days to complete a bio that should've taken me like a couple hours. Anyway.
F91's afterimages aren't a weapon to be activated at a whim, they're pretty much a byproduct of extreme heat generation, so they'd only come into play very late in the battle if at all. Being able to refuel and change arsenal to suit the current mission objectives is a huge ass advantage, even if you need to take a break to do so. Particularly since I didn't present a straight vs scenario but a general overview of "okay, the F91 has its mojo, but you're counting out the rest of the crew way too easily". And, just as that video you sent shows, the F91 can stay airborne for long enough to count as flight instead of a slow, controlled descent. It still doesn't mean that it has legitimate air combat capabilities like Seed flightpacks.
Let me repeat my feelings that them specs don't really matter at all and always take a backseat to things being fun and cool/selling toys. I feel this is a general truth of the entire franchise. The Gundam X space war and the widespread use of the technologies given in the show are well beyond the scope of the OYW. The X being mass produced doesn't mean shit, if you go by specs the Gelgoog is supposedly equal to or superior to the RX-78-2 and that barely registered in the show, if at all, it was just the latest of Char's red robots.
The straight matchup probably goes to the F91 but again, that was not what I was going for and MS are generally ill-advised to get hit by beams so "oh he has beams that can pierce i-fields and through armor better at the cost of actually triggering mass explosions all the time" is kind of a moot point, as are the afterimages because of what I've already explained. Also the Heavyarms' gatling has been always been a beam weapon, and the unit's levels of "fuck you" firepower should probably place it as the most likely to win a straight one on one fight, because he can reduce the general area a mobile suit is standing in to a smoking crater.
I compare X to Wing both as a joke because of how so many designs feel like rejected Wing concepts but also because it was created a year after Wing and I believe it shares telltale signs of the time, even if it features a return to a more UC-like world the need to sort of up the ante as far as powerlevels go is fairly evident to me across the franchise's lifetime. You can't just endlessly repeat the same thing, you need to give people something new to keep them coming and that often means turning to an ever-increasing series of feats because people are already used to what made the original Gundam or the Zeta stand out.
The 00 machines have infinite power but not limitless output IIRC, whatever the case, when Trans-AM goes on any moderately competent pilot has enough to smack down the opposition. I repeat my example of Setsuna, still a pissant back then despite being a trained pilot, stomping Ali thanks to Trans-AM even though Ali was proven to be a far superior pilot and was then in control of a unit about as powerful as the Exia instead of a regular pre-GN Drive MS, which are hilariously outclassed. The Gen1 Gundams were driven off by massed grunts, but it wasn't by any means a definitive loss and it took literally the entire world organizing against them to get those results.
I again bring up my entire argument that focusing on the Mobile Trace system is silly when there's just so many other factors that make Gundam Fighters broken like the pilots that can catch or deflect bullets, them being able to eat regular beam shots unaided and the higher tier ones just being able to solo entire armies. Saji would probably get crushed to death by the mobile trace application and even then it doesn't really matter because every show just has its mobile suits perform very human-like motions entirely because it's cool and makes it easier to relate to the machines.
The F91 is no doubt a high performance machine, it remains active with the Federation a decade after it's made, at a time where the Federation was once again putting money and effort into having a worthwhile military force. Mine doesn't have the bio-sensor though, I point out as much in the bio. Since I was led to believe I had to, you know, pick something powerful or get outshined by NPCs, well, I did. You bitch about the F91 now but the Flint also has a beamsaber that can cut through beam shields n whatnot, and then the UC WoL would've just been absolutely ridiculous compared to basically anything else in the PC crew.
But, this is all kind of moot since I've decided to drop the roleplay. Feel free to think I'm leaving because I'm losing the argument or whatever, but I've come to realize that we clearly have different ideas over what constitutes a fun roleplay, or at least a fun Gundam roleplay. Rather than sit here and butt heads over absolutely pointless minutiae that I know but utterly dislike and groaning over the focus and tone of this roleplay, I'll just go ahead and leave you and everyone else to it. So uh, have fun, no hard feelings.
F91's afterimages aren't a weapon to be activated at a whim, they're pretty much a byproduct of extreme heat generation, so they'd only come into play very late in the battle if at all. Being able to refuel and change arsenal to suit the current mission objectives is a huge ass advantage, even if you need to take a break to do so. Particularly since I didn't present a straight vs scenario but a general overview of "okay, the F91 has its mojo, but you're counting out the rest of the crew way too easily". And, just as that video you sent shows, the F91 can stay airborne for long enough to count as flight instead of a slow, controlled descent. It still doesn't mean that it has legitimate air combat capabilities like Seed flightpacks.
Let me repeat my feelings that them specs don't really matter at all and always take a backseat to things being fun and cool/selling toys. I feel this is a general truth of the entire franchise. The Gundam X space war and the widespread use of the technologies given in the show are well beyond the scope of the OYW. The X being mass produced doesn't mean shit, if you go by specs the Gelgoog is supposedly equal to or superior to the RX-78-2 and that barely registered in the show, if at all, it was just the latest of Char's red robots.
The straight matchup probably goes to the F91 but again, that was not what I was going for and MS are generally ill-advised to get hit by beams so "oh he has beams that can pierce i-fields and through armor better at the cost of actually triggering mass explosions all the time" is kind of a moot point, as are the afterimages because of what I've already explained. Also the Heavyarms' gatling has been always been a beam weapon, and the unit's levels of "fuck you" firepower should probably place it as the most likely to win a straight one on one fight, because he can reduce the general area a mobile suit is standing in to a smoking crater.
I compare X to Wing both as a joke because of how so many designs feel like rejected Wing concepts but also because it was created a year after Wing and I believe it shares telltale signs of the time, even if it features a return to a more UC-like world the need to sort of up the ante as far as powerlevels go is fairly evident to me across the franchise's lifetime. You can't just endlessly repeat the same thing, you need to give people something new to keep them coming and that often means turning to an ever-increasing series of feats because people are already used to what made the original Gundam or the Zeta stand out.
The 00 machines have infinite power but not limitless output IIRC, whatever the case, when Trans-AM goes on any moderately competent pilot has enough to smack down the opposition. I repeat my example of Setsuna, still a pissant back then despite being a trained pilot, stomping Ali thanks to Trans-AM even though Ali was proven to be a far superior pilot and was then in control of a unit about as powerful as the Exia instead of a regular pre-GN Drive MS, which are hilariously outclassed. The Gen1 Gundams were driven off by massed grunts, but it wasn't by any means a definitive loss and it took literally the entire world organizing against them to get those results.
I again bring up my entire argument that focusing on the Mobile Trace system is silly when there's just so many other factors that make Gundam Fighters broken like the pilots that can catch or deflect bullets, them being able to eat regular beam shots unaided and the higher tier ones just being able to solo entire armies. Saji would probably get crushed to death by the mobile trace application and even then it doesn't really matter because every show just has its mobile suits perform very human-like motions entirely because it's cool and makes it easier to relate to the machines.
The F91 is no doubt a high performance machine, it remains active with the Federation a decade after it's made, at a time where the Federation was once again putting money and effort into having a worthwhile military force. Mine doesn't have the bio-sensor though, I point out as much in the bio. Since I was led to believe I had to, you know, pick something powerful or get outshined by NPCs, well, I did. You bitch about the F91 now but the Flint also has a beamsaber that can cut through beam shields n whatnot, and then the UC WoL would've just been absolutely ridiculous compared to basically anything else in the PC crew.
But, this is all kind of moot since I've decided to drop the roleplay. Feel free to think I'm leaving because I'm losing the argument or whatever, but I've come to realize that we clearly have different ideas over what constitutes a fun roleplay, or at least a fun Gundam roleplay. Rather than sit here and butt heads over absolutely pointless minutiae that I know but utterly dislike and groaning over the focus and tone of this roleplay, I'll just go ahead and leave you and everyone else to it. So uh, have fun, no hard feelings.