The reaction from the design teams lightened up considerably when Ves climbed up to the cockpit of the ch and switched off its glow.
Now that its spiritual pressure was blocked from leaking out of the ch, the ch designers could finally breathe easily and evaluate it without feeling as if they were approaching a bottomless cliff!
Ves first turned his attention to Miles. "As our resident aerial ch specialist, what do you think about the flight characteristics of our ch?"
"It is pretty bad, in my opinion." The forr Tovar admitted. "I don't prefer immobile chs, so its hard for to like it. I do recognize that the tradeoffs are probably worth it. Looking at the ch right now.. I can very much believe it can deny an entire area around it. Let alone enemies, it is probably more effective against friendlies!"
That was a very oblique indictnt against his design choices. Ves supposed he did overdo it with regard to the strength of the Doom Guard's glow.
Even so, he abided by his decisions! With the addition of an off switch, the users of the Doom Guard were able to employ its full might on demand! Whenever they didn't need it, they could just turn it off and put the ch in a corner or sothing.
After quizzing Miles, Ves went down the line and asked for the opinions of the others.
"The ch is rather extre. I still can't believe it's possible to design a machine that can break people's minds."
"Are you sure this ch is even legal? It has to break so of the MTA's rules, I think! If it didn't co with the ability to turn off its glow, then it's really difficult to argue that it is safe for the market!"
Ves listened to each and everyone of them before promptly throwing most of their feedback out of his head. Their comnts were largely superfluous. He either already thought about their argunts or didn't think they were important enough for him to pay attention to them. They were mostly Apprentices after all. What could they say about his design that Ves didn't already know?
Of course, Ves still had to bear a polite smile on his face and respond with so nice-sounding platitudes. As their superior and ntor, he had to make sure he acted in a way that brought the best out of them. If he pretended to care about their input, they would have the illusion that their voices mattered, thereby raising their motivation for the next design projects!
Since it didn't cost Ves much by playing nice, he might as well put so effort into his act!
When he ca to the two Larkinson seeds, they looked as if they had just watched an entire horror drama!
His face faltered a bit. On second thought, perhaps it would have been better to keep them away. Unlike a hopeful and positive ch like the Bright Warrior, the Doom Guard genuinely held the potential to threaten people's sanity!
Nonetheless, this was an important test for them as well. Ves wanted to see which one of the adolescents held up better under the pressure.
After inspecting them carefully, he judged that Maikel was a bit more enthusiastic about the Doom Guard than Zanthar. Ves had already noticed that the forr admired him and his work considerably greater than his fellow seed.
Of course, that didn't an Maikel was suited to follow in Ves' footsteps.
"The ch is very effective." Maikel comnted. "I think it will sell very well once people see it in action. I think everyone needs proof before they are willing to invest in this machine."
"That's a very insightful point." Ves smiled. "That has been the case of several of my products. Sure, the reputation my ch company and I have built up has generated a lot of trust, but my products are so weird that the ch community doesn't know what to do with them at first. I'll take this issue into account."
Zanthar couldn't fall behind either. "I think the usefulness of this ch shouldn't be constrained to operations in space! You could easily design a landbound variant of this ch that is optimized for ground battles and capture an entirely different segnt of the market!"
Both Ves and Gloriana looked at each other and laughed.
"Why are you laughing, teacher?"
"A landbound ch is not equivalent to a spaceborn ch with its flight systems ripped off. Conversely, a spaceborn ch is very different from a landbound or aerial ch. Atmospheric combat imposes very different demands than space combat. We would have to revise many more systems than you think in order to develop a landbound variant of the Doom Guard."
"It would still be possible, right? I an, you already did it before when you derived the Peaceful Soldier from the Desolate Soldier!" Zanthar insisted.
Ves shook his head. "It took almost as much effort as designing a brand new ch to develop that landbound variant. What I'm trying to say is that you have to make a very careful consideration whether the ti and effort you put into a variant is worth it. While that doesn't discount what you say, right now I am more interested in designing new chs than retreading my existing ones."
He had to move forward. He didn't gain as much as a ch designer when he worked with familiar concepts. A true creator always pushed their boundaries and pursued the unknown!
Did that an that Ves would never design a landbound variant of his Doom Guard design? Not necessarily. It depended on many factors, most pertinently the pent-up demand for this kind of machine.
What was usually the case was that the ch community usually didn't wait for the original ch designers to develop the variant.
Instead, so savvy colleagues and competitors would just licence the recently-published design and develop their own variants!
Most of the ti, these opportunists consisted of low-ranking ch designers.
Why would a high-ranking ch designer borrow soone else's work when they were more than capable enough to innovate sothing on their own? There was rarely a good reason to license another design and subsequently pass off a considerable chunk of profit to the original ch designer!
While the low-ranking ch designers engaged in developing variants fulfilled a very important niche in the ch industry, they often butchered the essence of the base model to varying degrees.
So design philosophies were more resilient to this treatnt than others. Normally, the unique strengths of the base model would mostly be retained in a variant as long as the ch designer didn't ss with the portions beyond their understanding.
The problem was that this was very difficult to accomplish when a ch designer's specialty encompassed the entire ch!
Many Class I design philosophies were prone to this when an ignorant ch designer bulled through a design.
For various reasons, his own design philosophy was even more sensitive than this! His ch designs were always prone to spiritual pollution imparted by the careless, chaotic thoughts of his competitors.
As a result, the entire ch industry soon learned that trying to design a worthwhile variant of his products was an exercise in futility!
Certainly, if soone wanted to design a landbound variant of the Doom Guard, they could go ahead as long as they bought the appropriate license.
They would just have to accept that whatever they ca up with would likely not possess the glows that made them so unique!
Certainly, there was a possibility that a high-ranking ch designer with their own specialty could simply compensate by adding their own strengths to the variant, but what was the point?
Those Journeyn and Seniors were better off designing their own landbound chs! At least their work aligned perfectly with their design philosophies!
This was also why Ves didn't even think about designing variants of other people's products these days.
In the best-case scenario, it would be like collaborating with another ch designer, but in sequence rather than at the sa ti.
In practice, without the active input of the original ch designer, Ves would certainly screw sothing up that weakened the unique strengths of the base model.
This was also why Ves and Gloriana often worked on their ch design projects at the sa ti rather in rotation. The latter was arguably more efficient, but both of them wouldn't be able to achieve synergy if that was the case!
"Are we done now, Ves?" Gloriana impatiently asked as he fell into his usual spirals of thought. "I want to take a very long rest now. I've been staying awake for three days straight!"
"Oh. Sure. I'll make sure to wrap this ch up so that it can be handed over to the MTA for validation."
His girlfriend picked up her cat and tiredly walked out of the ch workshop. The rest soon followed suit.
Ves lingered a bit longer in order to make sure it was being properly stored in a specialized container before being loaded onto a transport.
"Head straight to the MTA branch in downtown Torze!" He yelled to the transport vessel as it was about to take off under heavy escort. "Also, don't bump into anything along the way!"
There was no chance the transport vessel would do sothing as idiotic as crashing into sothing. Ves was just a bit frayed due to all of the pressure he endured over the past three days.
One advantage about designing a ch on Cinach VI was that the planet possessed an extensive infrastructure around its primary industry. The MTA set up an extensive branch that was capable of validating thousands of ch designs a day and certifying even more through an expedited process!
Of course, Bentheim offered even better facilities before it got drowned in sand, but that wasn't relevant at this ti.
Ves eventually exited the ch workshop and returned to his temporary abode.
No more action took place that night. Gloriana had already fallen asleep by the ti he slipped into bed.
Besides, Ves hadn't been very good lately, so she wouldn't have been receptive to his advances anyway.
He frowned as he laid his head on his pillow.
"There's sothing wrong about this arrangent. I need to act like a man and assert myself!"
"ow?"
Lucky, who curled up on a pillow next to him, curiously poked his head at his owner.
"I an it! Us n have rights too, you know!"
"ow."
Lucky curled his body around. His tail flicked disdainfully at Ves!
"Whatever."
The next morning, Ves caught up with Gavin and discussed the upcoming product release.
"Will you go ahead with holding a reveal event?"
Ves nodded. "My ch needs as much publicity as possible. It's an.. unusual product that requires a bit of clarification in order to catch fire in the market. I'm afraid that the initial reaction to my Doom Guard design will be less than possible due to preventable misunderstandings. We have to make sure to convey the ssage that it is designed to harm enemies, not friendlies!"
Though Gavin hadn't attended the fabrication session in person, he already heard what was in store.
"I've already instructed the Marketing Departnt to tweak their ssaging to take this complication into account. However, you can't compensate for stupid. There will doubtless be custors who flip that switch at the wrong ti and cause a lot of harm around themselves."
Ves shrugged. "That's their fault, not mine."
"The public might not see it that way." Gavin carefully warned.
"Co on!" Ves threw up his hands! "chs are giant war machines capable of killing hundreds of people and demolishing an entire street in a matter of minutes! People, especially those who work with chs on a daily basis, should know better!"
"It's different this ti, boss. The ch community is already familiar with all of the risks and dangers associated with chs. What you have just done is introducing a new and unfamiliar risk factor. Don't underestimate the amount of people who don't read the docuntation and subsequently trip over themselves!"
Ves looked incredulously at his assistant? Were people really that stupid?
He recalled all of the pirates he encountered in the frontier.
"Perhaps you're right."
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