Justifying Giant Robots/Mecha

[Mr. Mask]

Here's a fun topic. How to justify giant robots in a game.

You can say, "because magic," but that's simply no fun in a discussion. If you say, "because they're actually the husks of humanoid gods converted into war machines," that works. Or because, "a humanoid vehicle is better able to tap into the chakra of the pilot," that also works. Though it'd be interesting to hear more discussion in the realistic to semi-realistic range of reasoning.


How would you try to justify the use of giant (how giant depends on your justification) robots? I'll give my ideas on this in a bit.

[Honest Tiefling]

See, they're made by jamming as many souls as you can get a hold of into the mecha to make it easier for the pilot to control, as these souls take over control over many small functions, or allow the pilot to better control the thing by just thinking about it. But the thing is, souls are kinda used to the whole humanoid shape. So you can make them in other shapes, but they either get confused or go crazy...And well, that does have its uses, but most people don't like to talk about the result of that experiment, which is still rampaging somewhere.

[Flickerdart]

They interface with the pilot on a neural level, and it's just a lot simpler to train people "your hand moves this hand" than "move these wheels like you would move a limb you don't have."

[The Glyphstone]

Because the humanoid form is seen as an example of divine purity, whereas non-human forms are of the alien and the mutant and the monstrous. To deliberately imitate a non-human shape is to invite weakness and corruption into your holy war machine.

[Fri]

I like Cthulhutech's reasoning.

The magic engine that give you unlimited energy also psychically give the pilot of vehicles it's equipped with a heightened sense of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proprioception. You could put it in a tank but it'd be a waste (and make the pilot feels like a box). Put it in a humanoid machine, and you're golden.

I also had this idea in mind (or maybe read it somewhere and conflate it with my own idea).

There's this magitech setting where wars has devolved into ritualistic fights. So they use inefficient (though actually pretty powerful) army of giant armors to do battles full of rules when countries have border disputes and such.

An interesting story would be about a crew of modern-day tank magically transported there and got involved in a war. Their tank is actually weaker than the giant armors everyone use, but it's more efficient/effective, and they don't have various honorable conducts crammed into their head since birth. But as unique as them, there's only one tank, can they really make a difference?

[Flickerdart]

An interesting story would be about a crew of modern-day tank magically transported there and got involved in a war. Their tank is actually weaker than the giant armors everyone use, but it's more efficient/effective, and they don't have various honorable conducts crammed into their head since birth. But as unique as them, there's only one tank, can they really make a difference?

Given how quickly a tank without a supply train runs out of fuel, ammo, treads, etc - no, they can't.

[Mr. Mask]

Because the humanoid form is seen as an example of divine purity, whereas non-human forms are of the alien and the mutant and the monstrous. To deliberately imitate a non-human shape is to invite weakness and corruption into your holy war machine.

I'll take it a step further: Modern war machines make heavy use of a highly advanced AI system. Due to the danger of these systems betraying the humans, great effort is made to convince the AIs that they are also human. Big metal humans, but human in spirit, soul, and nature all the same, representatives of what it means to be human (so you tell them).

[Drakeburn]

Maybe the mecha is integrated with VR tech that enables their pilots to instinctively control them through ease, although it may reach to a point where the human pilots believe that they are their own mecha.

[sktarq]

In a future where goods are easy to produce and people are few, rare and expensive to work with delivering the most firepower per person becomes the most important metric in the warfare. Thus the ease of pilot to hand the greatest power is high and the more instinctive it is the better (this works better for suits integrated with the pilot's nervous system as a control mechanism) thus a suit in which ones actions are directly translated to the battlefield becomes more useful than the stability/cost advantages of a wheeled type platform. (is this rational? Probably not but will it work as a rationalization? Probably)

EDIT: also issues crop up where you put the line between large power armour and small mecha. For example d20 Future had rules for Large thru Colossal Mecha but the large and possibly even huge could be treated like super infantry in a large enough scale battle.

[Fri]

Given how quickly a tank without a supply train runs out of fuel, ammo, treads, etc - no, they can't.

That's part of the premise. I didn't explain it because it's just a short summary. Basically the society can magically produce giant robots, so they also can magically produce supplies for the tank. But finding artificers that want to do it for them etc, that's part of their problems. Should they ally themselves to one of the warring kingdoms so they can get constant supply and repairs? Finding rogue artificers? etc.

[Kitten Champion]

Sort of taking the Macross route, the mecha were initially power armour for a race of technologically/magically advanced Giants but converted to be manipulated by standard-sized humanoids to great effect.

[SkipSandwich]

Perhaps the robots were developed for use in a conflict with naturally giant humanoids, so that humans could make effective use of the scaled up buildings and infrastructure of their opponents, mecha could have originally been diplomatic vehicles that were later weaponized after some incident sparked tensions into war.

[Fri]

I actually really like making setting justifications like this. Especially for giant humanoid mechas.

What else I wonder.

The giant mechas are actually personification of individuals' psyche. Most people's psyche materializes as giant humanoid creatures (which are mechanical because that's the series' visual theme ) though some interesting people might have non-humanoid ones (andreally interesting people might not look mechanical.

[Tengu_temp]

A few ideas that weren't mentioned yet:

Mecha work on not entirely understood black box technology reverse-engineered from aliens/ancient civilization/weird psychic research/etc, that makes a humanoid war machine much more efficient than it should have been when applying normal laws of physics. Full Metal Panic does this, and also combines it with a variation on the "mecha copy the movements of the pilot" thing.

Most of the fighting takes place in a very thick, hilly jungle. Wheeled and tracked vehicle are slowed down to a crawl by the difficult terrain, aircraft can fly over but can't enter the jungle itself. You need a machine that can move through rough terrain, cover obstables, and right itself if it falls - a humanoid shape fits those criteria best. Fang of Sun Dougram does this.

[tensai_oni]

-Mecha are humanoid because of a man machine interface that translates the pilot's mental movements into the unit moving (Martian Successor Nadesico, many others)
-Mecha are humanoid because of black box technology that somehow works with humanoid machines but not with normal ones (Full Metal Panic!)
-Mecha are humanoid because they are not machines of war per se, but used to maintain peace (Patlabor) or suppress the population from revolting (Gundam Wing), and a giant humanoid is scarier and more effective psychologically than a box on wheels
-Mecha are humanoid because they are used by powerful rulers of nations with money to burn, and the more blinged out and knightlike your unit the better you look (Five Star Stories)
-Mecha are humanoid because they are used for mecha sports and the rules say they need to be humanoid (Basquash)
-Mecha are humanoid because they are built around skeletons of ancient dead creatures (Eureka Seven, to a lesser extent Gasaraki) or just giant humanoid monsters (Neon Genesis Evangelion)
-Mecha are humanoid because a human-like form is most evolved and everything is more powerful when it's humanoid, or even turns more humanoid as it grows in power (Gurren Lagann, to an extent Getter Robo)
-Mecha are humanoid because they are part of combined arms warfare and that part calls for agile units that are both relatively fast and can move in very difficult terrain, so the humanoid form is the best for it on average (Armored Trooper VOTOMs, Muv Luv)
-Mecha are humanoid because the only way to face off against giant monsters is to melee them with something equally large (Pacific Rim)

But in the end it boils down to...

-Mecha are humanoid because it's cool (everything)

[Tengu_temp]

The mecha are actually sapient robotic aliens who can move and act on their own but are much more powerful if they've entered contract with another smaller being who pilots them.

[Fri]

Another idea I had for a story.

There's this town of giant creatures. Giants, dragons, hydras, many kind of huge sentient creatures live in this peaceful, yet often violent town. smaller humanoids also live there, but to interact with the giant creatures, they use this magical giant armor. So basically in the town, outside of their own home/community, the smaller-sized folks uses this giant armor to interact and protect themselves. So there's this mecha bartender serving drinks for these dragons, mecha construction worker working side by side with a giant two-headed ogre, and so on.

Though the main purpose of this idea is, so I can have a mecha-detective. A giant robot with long coat and a hat skulking in alleys following suspects

[Spamotron]

The Mecha is in a magi tech setting where the magic is based on symbols/ concepts. A giant metal humanoid is a very powerful symbol. It grants enough mystical oomph that the other technical headaches are worth it. Symbolically significant animal mechs exist too.

[Honest Tiefling]

I like Cthulhutech's reasoning.

The magic engine that give you unlimited energy also psychically give the pilot of vehicles it's equipped with a heightened sense of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proprioception. You could put it in a tank but it'd be a waste (and make the pilot feels like a box). Put it in a humanoid machine, and you're golden.

I now want a setting where researchers keep screwing around with pilots and force them into feeling like their bodies have gone all bonkers. 'Pilot, you WILL test the new kitty tank, whether you like it or not. That's an order. Now, tell me how those whiskers feel...'

[GorinichSerpant]

The secret of the universe is that physics is a lie and the only reason the sun rises, gravity works and so forth is because enough people believe in it. Sense the vast majority of people aren't aware that under conventional physics this shouldn't work, mecha are possible. The scientists who should know why this doesn't work have concluded that physics work different with larger beings, like giants, dragons and so forth.

[Arbane]

Because of the Principle of Morphic Resonance, it's vastly easier to animate something if it's structurally similar to an already-existing living thing. This is why artificers make mechanical horses instead of auto-mobile carriages, and why giant war machines look like giant armored knights.

Because you can't use your kung-fu with a tank.

[Thinker]

Once every generation there's a great tournament held between the realms for supremacy. Each world's greatest warriors participate. Failure might mean the end of the world as we know it. The problem is, humans aren't the biggest race. To make it fair, the Keepers, who maintain the integrity of the tournament have given power armors to the lesser folk. Since they're free and more effective than running around as a normal person, the heroes use them to help face challenges on Earth, too (and to help stave off influences of other realms between the tournaments).

[Milo v3]

Because of a lack of psychopomps in the cities, all the souls of it's citizens end up trapped in their inanimate decaying corpses, upon discovering this the paladins decided to give the poor souls mercy and worked with the necromancers to produce powerstations that use souls for fuel (thus ending the torture of feeling your corpse rot and break appart and the unending isolation that results from being trapped in your own body, eventually unable to see once your eyes deteriorate, and losing memories as your brain rots). The electricity produced functions as normal in everyway, except that it seems to function at impossible levels of efficiency when in a device shaped like the souls the electricity was made from. The paladins then used that knowledge to build powered exoskeletons, shocking gloves, cybernetics, and mecha. Animal electricity did need to be kept seperate from human electricity though, and some cities simply decide to dump the animal corpses into the wilderness where psychopomps have a chance of reaching.

[Kane0]

You see, a long while back there was this dispute between gnomes and dwarves on who could make the best stuff. The elves proposed a contest in order to dodge a war, and the two races competed to make the most fearsome, most brutal and most effective machine (which took a couple generations).
But the bastard humans ruined everything. Always the opportunists, and not actually knowing why they were building these because of their short lifespans, they stole bits and pieces from both sides and crammed them all inside golems to protect thenselves against halfling attacks.
Of course you see the results around you today, turns out halflings can fit inside the things and control them! And thats why we're all slaves to the hairy foot warlords.

[Mr. Mask]

My thoughts on how you might justify mechs:


Cover: In urban and rocky environments, mechas are far more versatile in taking and shooting around cover. They can crouch, stand, and possibly crawl, in order to take and shoot over cover. They fire from multiple angles, meaning there are few targets they are unable to hit.

Reverse Slope: The popular form of cover for tanks is to sit down a reverse slope, then shoot whatever comes over the rise. Mechs can lean forward and peek over the rise, using it as cover. This gives them the high ground, and better cover than what the tanks they're facing are likely to have.

Tank Traps and Pits: A suitably mobile mech can crawl and climb over tank traps and pits. Jump-jet assisted jumping may eventually be a possibility.

Tread vs. Leg: I think legs are given a bit of an unfair wrap. Treads can be taken out by mines and grenades, just like the legs can be. If the mech can crawl, it can still function even with one or both legs destroyed.

Fall-over Mech = Dead Pilot: There is the question of how the pilot survives if the mech falls over backwards. I think we might develop some better systems to let a pilot manage more Gs in the future, but currently we have no idea if that is the case. The simplest answer to this problem is to have an ejection seat fire if the pilot is put in that much danger. Other possibility include shock-absorbing springs deploying in the direction the mech is falling, or maybe even a kind of air-bag like those in cars.

Versatility: A mech can use any weapon that fit with it's "hand" modules. Or, it could just replace the whole limb at a workshop in ten minutes. You can do some of that with tanks, but it isn't so convenient. The question is whether being able to deploy a vehicle with just about any weapon would be that useful. APCs have enjoyed some of that, strapping on all sorts of rockets and the like. APCs are a better comparison, as their weapons are less built into them than with tanks, and they're known to do pretty well with their versatile selection of weapons (to the extent where commanders have been berated for using their APCs like tanks). Mechs would simply be taking that further, having an even more versatile weapons platform.

Location: If fighting is forced to be in these primarily rocky and urban environments, then that negates some of tanks' advantages in other areas. Urban environments isn't hard, as fighting tends to go to cities. To keep it to rocky areas, it'd normally be a mineral like uranium or oil, or possibly something more fancy like nuclear weapons silos (capturing enemy silos would be important).



Those are my current ideas.

[Inspector Valin]

How best to justify mecha varies wildly depending on what kind of setting you're going for. And also on what size of mecha for that matter.

In PonyMech, I went for the idea of FTL limitations. It's hard to build massive troop transports that can still be fired through a fixed FTL cannon, so the Widdershins went for smaller (but still pretty damn big) mechs, with the armament to fight armies on their own.

In a more fantasy world, I'm fond of the idea of Mecha as essentially extentions of suits of armor. After all, magical full-plate is already crazy light by RW standards. So why not go bigger with it? Turning that around, there are plenty of horror stories of golems turning on their masters or being usurped by whoever gets their key... so why not make your golem army controlled by mortal men, who you can get a much firmer handle on and who are known for showing initative and disposing of problems without needing oversight?

[The Glyphstone]

You see, a long while back there was this dispute between gnomes and dwarves on who could make the best stuff. The elves proposed a contest in order to dodge a war, and the two races competed to make the most fearsome, most brutal and most effective machine (which took a couple generations).
But the bastard humans ruined everything. Always the opportunists, and not actually knowing why they were building these because of their short lifespans, they stole bits and pieces from both sides and crammed them all inside golems to protect thenselves against halfling attacks.
Of course you see the results around you today, turns out halflings can fit inside the things and control them! And thats why we're all slaves to the hairy foot warlords. lovingly guarded and protected by our benevolent hairy-footed friends.

Don't want you to get squashed for disloyal sentiments now, do we?

[AceOfFools]

I'm rather partial to the idea that mecha are used because they are cool.

They're vehicles used for giant mecha gladatoriql fights, and other, more effective machines are used for serious war.

...

Mo-cap (motion capture) also works great if you have a wuxia feel. If a comet kick is more powerful than bullets, clearly you wage wars by building a giant machines capable of comet kicking an entire army of warrior monks in one blow.

[Nerd-o-rama]

Oh look, it's this thread again.

Basically, I figure you need a reasoning why the following won't work for the role you're using giant robots for:

1) Treads and wheels
2) Aircraft
3) Over-the-horizon guided missiles
4) Things that don't have hands.

The original Mobile Suit Gundam worked this out reasonably well, in that the giant robots were mostly intended for space combat and they had a setting element (Minovsky particles, byproduct of the fusion reactors military vehicles used in that day and age) that made most guided weapons useless. Eventually this was gotten around with psychically-guided weapons, but psychic guidance technology also let certain people treat the giant robots as extensions of their bodies, which was more apparently effective with a humanoid shape, so there you go.

It also pays to consider the practical limitations of the humanoid shape:

1) It hurts more than it helps once you get past about a few meters tall due to the square-cube law and having a larger sillhouette
2) No matter what terrain it can clamber over, it will never move as fast as a wheeled, treaded, or aerodynamic flying vehicle
3) the control system is likely to be far too complicated for the "aircraft-style" single-seater cockpits you usually see in anime.

Full Metal Panic! and, oddly, the first season of Code Geass address these fairly well (largely by taking ideas from less-well-known-in-America shows like Armored Trooper VOTOMS) - humanoid mechs aren't more than 10 meters tall barring insane mad science projects, meaning they don't collapse under their own weight and can take cover in an urban or forest environment, mechs in Code Geass are usually equipped with "roller-skate" wheels on the feet that allow them to rush across level terrain and roads, and mechs in Full Metal Panic have motion controls mapped to the users' hands for the upper half of the mech (hence why they're called Arm Slaves in that universe). Honestly, novel control systems are some of my favorite things to see in mecha anime, or even robots that are almost entirely automated and you only have a human in the cockpit because you want someone accountable to military chain of command pulling the trigger on the weapons.

Basically there are a lot of different ways to justify this, but they all revolve around the need for humanoid robots vs. other types of vehicle, and balancing out the inherent weaknesses of the design. Or just coming up with a setting where this stuff is expected, but that often amounts to "It's Magic". Which I think is fine, but god forbid we have fun watching television instead of overanalyzing and justifying everything.

[Fri]

Oh look, it's this thread again.

Basically, I figure you need a reasoning why the following won't work for the role you're using giant robots for:

1) Treads and wheels
2) Aircraft
3) Over-the-horizon guided missiles
4) Things that don't have hands.

The original Mobile Suit Gundam worked this out reasonably well, in that the giant robots were mostly intended for space combat and they had a setting element (Minovsky particles, byproduct of the fusion reactors military vehicles used in that day and age) that made most guided weapons useless. Eventually this was gotten around with psychically-guided weapons, but psychic guidance technology also let certain people treat the giant robots as extensions of their bodies, which was more apparently effective with a humanoid shape, so there you go.

It also pays to consider the practical limitations of the humanoid shape:

1) It hurts more than it helps once you get past about a few meters tall due to the square-cube law and having a larger sillhouette
2) No matter what terrain it can clamber over, it will never move as fast as a wheeled, treaded, or aerodynamic flying vehicle
3) the control system is likely to be far too complicated for the "aircraft-style" single-seater cockpits you usually see in anime.

Full Metal Panic! and, oddly, the first season of Code Geass address these fairly well (largely by taking ideas from less-well-known-in-America shows like Armored Trooper VOTOMS) - humanoid mechs aren't more than 10 meters tall barring insane mad science projects, meaning they don't collapse under their own weight and can take cover in an urban or forest environment, mechs in Code Geass are usually equipped with "roller-skate" wheels on the feet that allow them to rush across level terrain and roads, and mechs in Full Metal Panic have motion controls mapped to the users' hands for the upper half of the mech (hence why they're called Arm Slaves in that universe). Honestly, novel control systems are some of my favorite things to see in mecha anime, or even robots that are almost entirely automated and you only have a human in the cockpit because you want someone accountable to military chain of command pulling the trigger on the weapons.

Basically there are a lot of different ways to justify this, but they all revolve around the need for humanoid robots vs. other types of vehicle, and balancing out the inherent weaknesses of the design. Or just coming up with a setting where this stuff is expected, but that often amounts to "It's Magic". Which I think is fine, but god forbid we have fun watching television instead of overanalyzing and justifying everything.

...I don't think this is the kind of thread you're thinking about Nerdo.