4 ms·

Lasers are also cheap to operate compared to missiles. And for things lasers can't shoot, there's always that railgun the Navy made.

by vtange 10y ago

Maken 10y ago
Enough military budget will eventually make SF real. Can't wait for the battle mechas.
- Tharkun 10y ago
  Yeah there's nothing quite like horrendous human suffering to satisfy your hunger for sci-fi. /s
  - kcorbitt 10y ago
    Look at the bright side -- we seem to be approaching a point where the expected outcome of any serious war is one of either (1) no human lives lost at all, because high-tech weapons blow each other up before they can actually hit anything living or (2) a few of those high-tech weapons make it through the defenses, efficiently destroying your civilization in a matter of a few minutes and constraining human suffering to that brief period. :)
- semi-extrinsic 10y ago
  Mechas will always remain SF. There's just so much that's impractical about them, where do you even begin. Balance is one issue: if you can make it fall over, you've killed it. Speed is another; anything that big will be extremely slow. Another issue is the ground pressure (weight divided by surface area of feet); they would destroy most surfaces (including all roads), and they would easily get stuck this way. Another issue is the huge amounts of fuel and frequent refueligs it would need. Another is the huge cost, which coupled with sluggishness and corresponding permanent proximity to the battlefront makes them a prime target for infiltration and sabotage. Even something as comparatively small and practical as the Boston Dynamics robots have failed to gain traction; years after even being in actual service for testing with the military, LS3 has been literally shelved because it's just not useful. One of the funniest battle mecha scenes is from Pacific Rim (which is chock-full of stupidity) where the one mecha is just a crappy missile delivery system. Once it's waded half way out to sea and spent its missiles in about two seconds, it's bloody useless. Why didn't they rather spend the cash on other, more sensible launch platforms that could deliver orders of magnitude more firepower using the same kind of missiles? Or why not just attack the alien things much further away from shore with torpedoes launched from fighter jets? Or why not just launch nuclear-tipped torpedoes down the portal hole? (Well, it would be a boring movie, that's why.)

Lasers are also cheap to operate compared to missiles. And for things lasers can't shoot, there's always that railgun the Navy made.

by vtange 10y ago

Lasers are also cheap to operate compared to missiles. And for things lasers can't shoot, there's always that railgun the Navy made.

Maken 10y ago

Enough military budget will eventually make SF real. Can't wait for the battle mechas.

Tharkun 10y ago
Yeah there's nothing quite like horrendous human suffering to satisfy your hunger for sci-fi. /s
- kcorbitt 10y ago
  Look at the bright side -- we seem to be approaching a point where the expected outcome of any serious war is one of either (1) no human lives lost at all, because high-tech weapons blow each other up before they can actually hit anything living or (2) a few of those high-tech weapons make it through the defenses, efficiently destroying your civilization in a matter of a few minutes and constraining human suffering to that brief period. :)
semi-extrinsic 10y ago
Mechas will always remain SF. There's just so much that's impractical about them, where do you even begin. Balance is one issue: if you can make it fall over, you've killed it. Speed is another; anything that big will be extremely slow. Another issue is the ground pressure (weight divided by surface area of feet); they would destroy most surfaces (including all roads), and they would easily get stuck this way. Another issue is the huge amounts of fuel and frequent refueligs it would need. Another is the huge cost, which coupled with sluggishness and corresponding permanent proximity to the battlefront makes them a prime target for infiltration and sabotage. Even something as comparatively small and practical as the Boston Dynamics robots have failed to gain traction; years after even being in actual service for testing with the military, LS3 has been literally shelved because it's just not useful. One of the funniest battle mecha scenes is from Pacific Rim (which is chock-full of stupidity) where the one mecha is just a crappy missile delivery system. Once it's waded half way out to sea and spent its missiles in about two seconds, it's bloody useless. Why didn't they rather spend the cash on other, more sensible launch platforms that could deliver orders of magnitude more firepower using the same kind of missiles? Or why not just attack the alien things much further away from shore with torpedoes launched from fighter jets? Or why not just launch nuclear-tipped torpedoes down the portal hole? (Well, it would be a boring movie, that's why.)