Right. The problem with the tread revision is expense. As buggy as the Protector may be right now, it works. It may not be particularly fast and may not have the most durable of wheels, but it can safely bring our men across the battlefield and provide combat support. The problem is that we just won't have enough to make a difference. The design relies on having enough to transport our men. We could do a combined forces type of thing and have it move with our men across no man's land, but then there's the survival rate of the non-protected men.
Point is, it does its job - protects the people inside and brings them across the battlefield. It could do its job much better, but it does it. We just need to have enough of them to make a difference.
Now if only there was some way to combine AM Resistance with an expense reduction. Ooh!
Revision: Crystalworks Mk2 (If anyone has a better name, please tell me. Like something to make Crystalworks sound more industrial/big/encompassing.)
The Crystalworks is an effective tool. Or was. As of late, it hasn't been pulling its load. Our most recent designs simply haven't benefited as they should. According to our Crystalworks engineers, the scale of the designs such as the Steam Engine (and now the IDE) as well as the AS-LFV-1 are simply too great to benefit from the cost reduction the Crystalworks provides.
We've had massive amounts of experience with Crystal since we introduced the Crystalworks. We've figured out the best ways to use it to make larger-scale things like parts for our vehicles. We've used it to make Crystal Glass and Insulating Crystal. We know the in and outs of it. Now it's time to make it better.
We expand the Crystalworks to allow for a more industrial approach. Our improved Magegems are made use of to allow the same number of apprentices to manage more things at once. The building is expanded, and the individual fabricator circuits tweaked to allow for bigger constructions.
This, of course, is tremendously easy. Design reports may say a lot of things are easy, but this is for sure. We know so much about how to get the most potential out of the Crystal works and have had intimate experience with its quirks and flaws. We know exactly what to do and should be able to address it in remarkable times.
As the final part of this revision, possible due to the ease in which we should be able to do the former part, we will also adjust insulating crystal. We've had experience with anti-magic, with using crystal glass to store magic in our improved Magegems, and we've had experience with insulating electricity, a form of energy vaguely similar to that of magic. We use this experience to tweak insulating crystal (or a variant of it) into also insulating against magic.
This isn't some kind of anti-magic device, but rather a device working against anti-magic. Anti-magic "saps" the magic from our circuits, preventing their operation. If we can create a crystal insulating against magic, we can prevent the loss of magic from our circuits and thus prevent anti-magic from affecting our circuits. Perhaps even if we create an enclosed space with AM-Resistant crystal, mages inside could cast spells as normal. But the priority is of course on circuits here.
This new insulating crystal variant is of course to be considered a part of the Crystalworks renovations. As our engineers expand the Crystalworks and upgrade the fabricators, they will also implement the changes to insulating crystal, allowing us to make this magic-insulating AM-resistant crystal.
The overall goal of the design is the increased scale of the Crystalworks first, and the rest second. But it shouldn't be extremely difficult to implement both considering our experience in the field with the latter and our extreme preparedness for the former.
This new Crystalworks should be able to help produce larger designs, decreasing the expense of them just like it does for our other designs. The insulating crystal made possible by this new Crystalworks should allow us to make AM-resistant technology. We expect to make our larger Crystal designs drop in expense, namely the AS-LFV-1 Protector and if time allows, also the IDE/Steam engine. The new AM-resistant crystal is to be prioritized for implementation in the AS-LFV-1 first and other designs (like the AS-R1) second.
TL;DR: Upgrade Crystalworks (using our massive amount of Crystalworks experience+knowledge) in scale (allowing for Crystalworks expense reduction in bigger designs) and to make AM-resistant Crystal for immediate use in the AS-LFV-1. The immediate prioritized effects should be an Expensive AM-resistant AS-LFV-1, with implementations of the new stuff lower in priority, like cost reducing the IDE/Steam engine and AM-resistant-izing our other magitech like the AS-R1.
TL;DR TL;DR: Upgrade Crystalworks to make bigger stuff also drop in expense according to the Crystalworks bonus and to make anti-magic resistant crystal for immediate use in the Protector then maybe the AS-R1. Biggest priority is applying the expense bonus to large-scale projects and thus the AS-LFV-1 Protector. Anti-magic resistance stuff is second.
I kind of want to do the LFV-2 next design. Make a really well-done vehicle. But I know that it definitely would have zero support. But we could address all of the problems at once and add more.
@RAM: Caterpillar Tracks are literally possible.
Remember the first Restless design? That Evicted accidently made when he thought by "tracks" in the Restless design I meant caterpillar tracks? That was with zero experience in powered land vehicles?
We got caterpillar tracks at only a -1 to Effectiveness+Bugs, with zero experience in ever making powered land vehicles beforehand. (Draignean ninja'd me on this)
AM Resistance is not a dedicated design. It is a revision. Evicted already said our circuits are close to AM Resistance (and that our Magegems are AM-resistant).
Expense-wise, you'd be wrong. Very Expensive has historically meant we just get a handful of the design. Like we had ~3 HA1s per theater when they were Very Expensive.
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Topic: Wands Race - [Arstotzka] {COMPLETED} (Read 393235 times)