The Mech Touch

To second-rate states, gauss weapons weren't considered high technology. They worked on age-old principles and their performance straightforwardly scaled with their material composition and power supply.

A gauss weapon made of stronger materials was capable of withstanding much more forces. The stresses put on a gauss rifle capable of penetrating second-class armor systems was very considerable!

If a weak gauss weapon was forced to fire something more powerful than it could handle, then it would quickly blow up in the wielder's face!

Gauss weapons were considered kinetic weapons, which meant they mainly dealt damage by flinging a solid projectile at a target as fast as possible.

The mass of the projectile and the energy spent in propelling it forward determined how much damage the weapon inflicted.

There was a bit of room for flexibility due to these relationships!

The classical gauss cannon was geared towards channeling as much energy as it could handle to propel a heavy round at great velocities. Such gauss rounds were easily able to collapse weaker mechs in a single hit and punch straight through meters of starship armor!

However, the firing rate left much to be desired. Heavy gauss cannons focused on maximum power and maximum penetration needed to channel a lot of energy while simultaneously dealing with the incredible amount of heat generation as well as resisting the huge forces trying to pull it apart.

Typically, a gauss cannon fired once every five seconds or so, and that was under ideal conditions.

This wasn't necessarily bad. A mech that fired a heavy gauss cannon would always be subject to powerful recoil forces. Just as the coils of a gauss weapon pushed a projectile forward, an equal and opposite force pushed those same coils back!

Managing these recoil forces was one of the many reasons why such heavy weapons were mostly found on heavy mechs. They were the mechs that coped with recoil the best in the absence of sophisticated, energy-hungry compensating systems.

Of course, many of the more expensive heavy artillery mechs incorporated them anyway. Even if these compensating systems didn't entirely negate the recoil of a powerful physical weapon discharge, they at least lessessened the impact, thereby allowing the mech to fire an even more powerful projectile than they normally should have been able to fire!

"Are you sure you want to add recoil compensating systems in our mech?" Gloriana asked. "While our budget allows for it, it will add a lot of complexity to our mech. The energy requirements for our heavy artillery mech will skyrocket as well, to a point where it is basically impractical to deploy it as a standalone mech in ground operations."

The Akkara, the quadruped heavy mech employed by the Flagrant Vandals, was a typical example of a mech employed in both space and land battles.

Rather than a pure bunker mech, it was actually just a landbound mech that also happened to fit in a starship bunker.

What Ves just suggested was to sacrifice most of the Cat's Paw landbound fighting capabilities in exchange for strengthening its performance as a bunker mech.

This was a very significant decision!

This did not mean he could deploy his Cat's Paws on land. The mech commanders in charge of leading them just had to work around their insane demand for energy, meaning that they would be effectively limited to base defense!

"I think.. we can accept this tradeoff." Ves decided. "If we ever have a need to deploy a heavy artillery mech that can take part in offensive operations, we can just develop a machine that is designed to fulfill this role from the ground up. Right now, I care much more about designing the strongest bunker mech that we can fit in our future factory ship and other vessels."

The Larkinson Fleet was the main home and sanctuary of the Larkinson Clan. Defending it was his highest priority and he could not afford to compromise its defenses too much!

"That said, even a gauss cannon that is focused on maximum power can still fire as fast as an automatic weapon at lower power settings." Gloriana added. "It just needs the right ammunition at hand."

That was true as well. Some gauss cannons were able to switch to a rapid-fire mode where they fired a large amount of lighter projectiles. They packed much less of a punch, but they were very suitable to intercept a large amount of cannon fodder or incoming missiles!

Of course, it was even better to mount weapons that were meant to fire rapidly in the first place, but it was nice to have the option available.

Though Ves accepted the suggestion, he also pointed at the smaller secondary weapon mounts. "In a real battle, our mechs should ideally focus on pounding the toughest enemies with its main cannons. We can leave the job of intercepting projectiles and weaker mechs to the secondary weapons of our artillery mech."

There were many different options they could choose from. Aside from the classic rapid-fire laser weapon, they could also opt to go for a rapid-fire gauss weapon or a pulse weapon that naturally possessed a high firing rate.

Gloriana made a suggestion. "In the Hegemony, pulsed particle weapons are a common choice for this role. Compared to laser weapons, pulse weapons are relatively energy efficient, can fire very fast, are not too weak and do not generate as much heat and physical stress. They are very reliable in battle and can keep firing virtually forever as long as it is supplied with sufficient power."

"There is one big downside to pulse weapons. They are hybrid weapons that fire projectiles at speeds far lower than the speed of light. It is very difficult to hit anything at longer ranges. Laser weapons are deservedly the most widely-used weapons in space because they can hit consistently targets at much further ranges!"

Both of them halted at an impasse. It was truly difficult to decide between a short-ranged but incredibly efficient pulse weapon system or a long-ranged but more demanding laser weapon system as the secondary armament of their Cat's Paw design.

"I think.. the long reach of laser weapons isn't a necessity in our current design."

"How so, Ves?"

He pointed at the projection of their draft design. "The gauss cannons that give our mech a lot of physical punch works best at medium range. The energy weapons on the other hand may fire positron beams that admittedly propagate slower than the speed of light, but not that much worse!"

In practice, positron beams still traveled at relativistic speeds, which meant that it effectively made little difference in most battles!

"I see now." Gloriana grasped his point. "Our mech already possesses a formidable array of long-ranged and medium-ranged weapon systems. Complimenting it with a weapon that excels in shorter ranges is not a bad idea."

They soon added a pair of pulse weapons to the draft design. As its only secondary armament, the weapon mounts looked considerably smaller and less formidable. This reflected their weaker power but also their weaker requirements.

Once they settled their weapon choices, they needed to find the right weapon models to add to their designs.

They soon stumbled on a problem that neither of them had dealt with for a long time.

"Since this mech is a private design, at least at first, the LMC needs to license all of its components out of its own pocket."

Ves immediately frowned. "What is the typical licensing fee of a second-class component license?"

"It varies, but the good ones that suit our Cat's Paw design the most will all cost at least a billion hex credits."

"That's the third of the price of a second-class combat carrier! Proportionately, third-class component licenses are several times cheaper!"

Gloriana merely crossed her arms. "We are dealing with components that incorporate vastly more powerful materials and technology. Weapon development companies spend considerably huge sums on R\u0026D just to keep up with the competition!"

That made sense. More advanced weapons were more powerful but also vastly more costly to develop, produce and purchase. The relationship wasn't strictly linear, and Ves could not use the exact same mindset he reserved for third-class mechs on projects like these.

All of this meant that he could not avoid spending a huge amount of money to obtain his desired licenses!

These days, Ves was not bothered at all at the licenses fees of third-class mech components. No matter how many different third-class mechs the LMC designed, it wouldn't eat up all of its cash reserves anytime soon!

It was a different story in this case. With every standard 10-year production license charging a fee of at least 1 billion hex credits, Ves had to be careful not to deplete the LMC's working capital too much.

Fortunately, the LMC wasn't exactly strapped for cash. As of this moment, he also hadn't spent all of the 5,000 MTA credits he won from the design duel.

Ves and Gloriana therefore exercised a modest amount of restraint when they began to browse the MTA's sizable component library.

Predictably, Gloriana insisted on searching through the list of Hexer-developed weapon systems. Her choice wasn't entirely arbitrary as pairing Hexer weapon systems with a mech that already incorporated a lot of Hexer design principles resulted in high compatibility.

It was too bad that Ves had a different idea.

Even if a non-Hexer weapon system couldn't immediately be slotted into an open weapon mount of their mech design, this meant that they just needed to do some extra design work!

As mech designers, it was their job to integrate different mech components into a coherent machine. Opting to go for Hexer weapon systems was merely a shortcut!

Since Ves did not limit his choices to a limited amount of licenses, he had an endless amount of choices to choose from. Even if he had to disqualify the vast majority of them because they were developed in different star sectors with different standards and material requirements, he still possessed millions of decent options for each weapon type!

This was one of the greatest benefits that the MTA provided to every mech designer. It pooled the efforts of everyone involved in the mech industry and made much of it available to the entirety of human space!

Right now, an interesting gauss cannon weapon system caught his attention.

The Xcordon 66F-343 B developed by the Hapardon Kinetic Arms Company not only featured well-rounded specs, but also excelled in the one area that Ves valued the most. At its highest power setting, it could fire an ultra-heavy round that was powerful enough to breach the armor of a Bright Warrior!

Even if the round failed to penetrate the armor of a mech, the incredibly momentous impact still transferred a lot of kinetic energy, which wasn't pleasant even for high-quality mechs!

When Ves enthusiastically brought it to the attention of his girlfriend, she didn't immediately approve.

Instead, she frowned.

"This Xcordon cannon is not the most accurate gauss cannon. Its muzzle velocity is also lower, which means it is even less capable of hitting distant and fast-moving targets."

"Those are tradeoffs that we can accept! If we want to hit agile light skirmishers, the pulse weapons are the most suitable answer to them. If we want to hit distant targets, then the positron beam cannons already cover this area. What we truly lack is a strong armor-piercing solution!"

Eventually, she acquiesced, as the Hexers didn't offer something that performed as well as the Xcordon weapon system.

She still managed to get the better of Ves by pushing through her desired selection of positron beam cannons and pulse weapons.

Since both of them were mostly energy weapons, they demanded a much greater integration to the mech's power supply and heat management systems. This meant that the immediate compatibility between Hexer weapon systems and mechs designed according to Hexer standards was truly the best choice!

"Alright! Now that we have chosen the most important components for our heavy artillery mech, we can choose the remaining components based around our weapons of choice."

This was a much more straightforward selection process. Soon enough, Ves and Gloriana settled on a very nice collection of components that already put their Cat's Paw Project on the right track.