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[NUKE9.13]

Revision:
(2) Earth Ear MkIV: FallacyofUrist, NUKE9.13

Music:
(2) Pacific Rim Main Theme: FallacyofUrist, NUKE9.13

[Madman198237]

ME-RP-62 'Snowflake'
A stripped-down Blizzard with no protection worth mentioning, no guns or hardpoints of any kind, and engines and wings reconfigured for high-altitude high-speed work, losing pretty much all meaningful (for combat) low-speed maneuvering ability. It gains a set of high-resolution cameras mounted to the fuselage, allowing the pilot to take pictures of the things beneath him from very high altitude with very high precision. This system should greatly expand ORACLE-A's predictive capabilities, as well as allowing us to broaden the scope of ORACLE operations, by having more intelligence-gathering capability in general.

[andrea]

Pocket grizzlt

It is time to downscale. The grizzly is a magnificient beast of war, but it is in a few ways a clunky outcome born off the necessity of getting such a project ready for the battlefield in time.
First thing is the electricity storage and recharge system: the primary electrogel storage can't be easily recharged, and the secondary backup is made of old school heavy and bulky chemical batteries. Therefore, the first and foremost focus is improving our electrogel to be more easily charged and discharged, in order to replace the battery pack with a much smaller and lighter electrogel reservoir.
Following this, there is a minor point left unsolved from the CAT implementation: the soldier still has to stand. With CAT, the soldier doesn't have to move at all and now the cabin is built for a crouching pilot, reducing the necessary space greatly. It is estimated that at least half a meter of height can be removed, while the crouching pilot presents a small enough profile that the chance of him (or her) being hit on a penetrating shot isn't meaningfully increased.

Overall, those simple modifications should make the grizzly lighter and smaller, without sacrificing strength or armour thickness. Using significantly less metal, it is hoped that it will also cost noticeably less to produce - say, 5 ore instead of 6.

[Maximum Spin]

Music: "Let it Go" from Disney's Frozen.

[andrea]

the cold never bothered us anyway.

[Madman198237]

Revision:
(2) Earth Ear MkIV: FallacyofUrist, NUKE9.13
(1) ME-RP-62 'Snowflake': Madman

Music:
(2) Pacific Rim Main Theme: FallacyofUrist, NUKE9.13
(1) Let It Go (Frozen): Madman

It's too funny to not vote for it (at first. If it starts winning, I'm voting for Pacific Rim)

[Maximum Spin]

Revision:
(2) Earth Ear MkIV: FallacyofUrist, NUKE9.13
(2) ME-RP-62 'Snowflake': Madman, Maximum Spin

Music:
(2) Pacific Rim Main Theme: FallacyofUrist, NUKE9.13
(2) Let It Go (Frozen): Madman, Maximum Spin

wait why wouldn't you want it to win?

[Happerry]

Revision:
(3) Earth Ear MkIV: FallacyofUrist, NUKE9.13, Happerry
(2) ME-RP-62 'Snowflake': Madman, Maximum Spin

Music:
(2) Pacific Rim Main Theme: FallacyofUrist, NUKE9.13
(3) Let It Go (Frozen): Madman, Maximum Spin, Happerry

[NUKE9.13]

Well... Merethine government policy can in some instances be summed up as "Let it go", I suppose. Yet despite that, we are immovable on some issues- here we stand, and here we'll stay. And as Andrea mentioned, the cold never bothered us anyway. It is time to see what we can do- we certainly have tested many limits and broken through them. And damnit, our power does flurry through the air (Blizzards, Penguins) into the ground (Excavators).

Yes, a careful analysis of the song reveals several clear connections between it and Mereth. Certainly no one could confuse it for the national music of the sweltering, uptight Aratamites.

Revision:
(3) Earth Ear MkIV: FallacyofUrist, NUKE9.13, Happerry
(2) ME-RP-62 'Snowflake': Madman, Maximum Spin

Music:
(1) Pacific Rim Main Theme: FallacyofUrist
(4) Let It Go (Frozen): Madman, Maximum Spin, Happerry, NUKE9.13

Speaking of our revision though, it looks to me like the Snowflake and the MkIV have the same goal- better intelligence. The difference being that the Snowflake works in a heavily contested area in a kind of boring fashion, where the MkIV works in an area where we have total dominance in a far more interesting manner.

[Maximum Spin]

Speaking of our revision though, it looks to me like the Snowflake and the MkIV have the same goal- better intelligence. The difference being that the Snowflake works in a heavily contested area in a kind of boring fashion, where the MkIV works in an area where we have total dominance in a far more interesting manner.

You make an excellent point. Counterpoint: I like the name "Snowflake" much better.

[Madman198237]

The problem with the Earth Ear is that it's shorter ranged, and the enemy can do something to counter it besides just destroying it---SEEMs and Goldeneyes will be able (probably) to just tell everyone to be quiet while surveillance is in position. You won't be capable of picking up talking or footsteps in a revision, I imagine. This means that the Earth Ear MkIV is not going to be really reliably capable of detecting static installations or really any movement of hostile forces without vehicles.

[NUKE9.13]

I believe- though I might be misremembering, we should check with CW- that not even SEEMs can detect an Excavator at max depth.
Static installations can absolutely be detected by the Earth Ear. It can already do that.
Obviously not talking, but I think detecting footsteps could be viable, given the leaps and bounds with which our electronics tech has advanced. Not in all situations, but a squad of men marching over the right type of surface should be detectable.

[Madman198237]

Is this right type of surface some form of synthetic animal-skin-replacement stretched over an air pocket and rigidly secured to the edges?

Maybe you're right. How the heck are we detecting static installations, though? I don't recall this ever being mentioned, at all.

[NUKE9.13]

It was mentioned that we can detect large boulders on the surface, and what is a building but a curiously shaped boulder?
As for footsteps- I'm not a geologist, but, you know, dudes walking through a swamp are probably out, whilst dudes walking over exposed bedrock are in, and in between depends on rolls and GM fiat. You gotta think MAD. It's vaguely plausible, we've done our legwork (having put a decent number of actions into the Earth Ear and electronics already), it should be doable.
Seriously, if Aratam has upgraded their airforce further, your Snowflakes are gonna be toasted. Even if they haven't, a decent number are gonna get shot down. Whereas Excavators are immune whilst underground.

[Madman198237]

Actually...without the additional weight of weaponry and stuff, and using what is effectively rocket fuel (we don't have to give one care to the shape of intakes or whatever that can place limitations on high-altitude performance) which should get more powerful as we ascend (According to KSP, fear my awesome cartoon-game-based secondhand rocketry information), I hope that the Blizzard will be able to reach some impressively high altitudes. Probably (?) not SR-71 altitudes, but this is a truly MAD universe, so who knows.