Once he got his morning routines out of the way, he decided to follow up Master Willix's advice and view so heavy chs up close.
His first choice was to observe one of the few heavy chs he was familiar with. He boarded a shuttle that brought him to the Princely Jackal. Aside from bringing Lucky, he also invited Zanthar Larkinson to look at so big chs.
The adolescent student eagerly accepted the offer, not that he had any choice. Ves would have dragged him in the shuttle by the collar if he refused. Developing unhealthy fascination for illegal superweapons was a very quick way to get on the bad side of the Big Two!
Once the shuttle arrived at the Princely Jackal's hangar bay, Commander Rosa Orfan-Larkinson greeted him with a lazy wave.
"Hey kid. So what brings you here today?"
"I'm not here for an inspection or anything. Nor am I here to discuss official business. I just want to take a good look at the Akkara heavy chs assigned to this ship. I always respected Professor Velten as a Senior ch Designer. She gave so very valuable advice and taught how to manage design projects. It is only proper for to study a portion of her legacy. Right now, I'm designing my own heavy artillery ch, so I'm hoping to acquire so useful insights."
"Huh." Commander Orfan's face lost so of its joviality. "The old professor was one of the bedrocks of our ch regint back in the old days. She deserved more."
"She deserved more." Ves echoed. "At least she lived a long and peaceful life."
Professor Velten was already more than 150 years old, but her lifespan had already reached its limit when Ves had been drafted by the ch Corps. A botched life-prolonging treatnt operation supposedly led to her deteriorating health and ntal state.
Though she lived longer and made far more accomplishnts than ordinary Brighters, Ves found her fate to be very tragic. She even lost one of her Journeyn who was supposed to continue her research after her passing.
Ves learned a lot of lessons from her. He not only learned to value his ti, but also cherish his opportunities. When he grew older, he did not want to regret the mistakes he made when he was young!
The small group crossed the hangar bay headed to the adjacent ch stables where dozens of chs were safely secured. They stopped in front of the machines that Ves wanted to visit in person.
Technically, the Akkara was a heavy cannoneer ch. This beca evident due to the myriad of rapid-fire laser and heavier ballistic cannons mounted to its quadruped fra.
The formidable ch featured no flight system to speak of, but its appearance lent itself well for both landbound operations and use in space as a bunker ch.
Not everyone understood the difference between an artillery ch and a cannoneer ch. To be honest, the differences were rather nuanced, mostly because the pioneers of ch design applied their own labels to similar concepts.
In short, a typical artillery ch excelled at outputting damage at dium but especially long range. Their armant could range from anything, but their firepower was always very strong.
Landbound artillery chs were typically capable of attacking targets outside of line of sight, mostly by lobbing shells over tall structures and other obstacles.
They were very vulnerable at closer ranges and possessed virtually no defense against lee chs. They possessed slow to average mobility but their inadequate armor despite their heavy fras were not designed to resist sustained attacks.
A cannoneer ch played a different role on the battlefield. They were capable machines in both long and dium ranges and mostly wielded large-caliber weapons that were attacked by line-of-sight.
This ch type was more suited to heated battles as they possessed slightly more armor and mobility, allowing them to perform at least so viable maneuvers on the battlefield.
That did not an it was a good idea to allow them to soak up enemy fire. Cannoneer chs were also poor in lee combat as their strong but unwieldy limbs simply couldn't move fast enough.
In any case, whether the Akkara model of the Flagrant Vandals fell under the definition of artillery ch or cannoneer ch was not important to Ves. What truly mattered was that the Cat's Paw fulfilled the sa role as the Akkara. Mostly.
"What a big ch." Zanthar exclaid as he looked straight up at the large and imposing ch.
"That's the point."
The mass of the Akkara was around four tis greater than a typical dium ch. Its expanded height and girth significantly expanded the big ch's capacity, allowing it to mount over dozen different weapons.
Ves briefly imrsed himself in his mories. He had seen Akkaras chs in action during plenty of battles between the Flagrant Vandals and whatever enemy stood in their way. Vesians and pirates all suffered dearly against these heavy cannoneer chs.
Thick plates of armor protected the ch against retaliation. Since the budget of the Akkara was very generous, Professor Velten was able to make her Akkaras withstand quite a lot of damage against its typical foes. This was no glass cannon that fell apart after suffering a few hits!
When Ves looked at the dormant Akkara, he tried his best not to focus too much on the details. Instead, he viewed the impressive machine from a holistic perspective and tried to see if he could perceive what Master Willix hinted at during their previous consultation session.
He developed various thoughts, so of which he felt were useless. Only a few stray thoughts rited more attention from him, but the problem was that these idle ideas usually led to dead ends.
Even though Ves was in the process of designing his first heavy ch in the form of the Cat's Paw, he felt as if he ca no closer to understanding the essence of heavy chs.
Maybe other people could point him in the right direction.
"What do you think about this Akkara, Zanthar?"
"It's big."
"You already told that. This is the most obvious aspect about this ch. Now what else is there?"
"It has four legs."
"Yes, it's a quadruped ch. Thank you for that, Captain Obvious."
Commander Orfan stifled a laugh. She wasn't very good at it. "Hahahaha! He's just a squirt, kid. What does he know about heavy chs?"
"Hey! I'm a future ch designer, lady!"
Ves swatted Zanthar's face. "Watch your tone! She might not sound very formal, but she is the respected commander of the Flagrant Vandals."
"I don't care." Orfan.
"I'm trying to raise him into a proper and respectable ch designer, commander. I don't expect you to help, but at least don't make it worse."
"What's so bad about this squirt? He looks kind of cute!"
Ves loudly coughed. "Let's get back to the Akkara ch, please. Zanthar, your thoughts?"
"Well.." The adolescent trailed for a mont. "I've seen a lot of dium chs and plenty of light chs. All of those chs are at least sowhat maneuverable. I think one of the reasons why rcenary corps like to use mobile chs a lot is because they never want to fight to the death. Once a battle goes against their way, they want to run away as quickly as possible, and lugging around a heavy ch is just a big mistake in those situations! Oh, smaller chs are cheaper as well, so that's also a big advantage!"
Ves and Commander Orfan shared a bemused glance with each other.
They found the remark amusing not because it sounded ridiculous, but because Zanthar's argunt was both right and ridiculous!
The Vandal Commander actually looked thoughtful this ti. "I think the greater point of this fellow is right. I fought in many battles where moving quickly and being in the right place at the right ti was crucial. Battles between chs is one big maneuvering ga where you try to position your chs to the greatest advantage while the enemy is doing the sa. It's a mistake to think you can simply win every battle by investing loads of money into fielding a force that consists entirely of heavy chs."
Heavy chs possessed their own distinctive weaknesses. At the very least, their slow mobility made them vulnerable to either massed bombardnt or committed lee assaults.
"How did you and your fellow Vandal officers work with the limitations of the Akkaras?" Ves asked.
"The Akkaras are strong, but they aren't the right solution in every situation. We try to use them as the core of our defensive posture. When an enemy attacks us, we try to lure their chs into the killzone of our prepared Akkaras. When we do the attacking, we don't overtake our Akkaras but instead match their pace when there is no need for haste."
"Ti." Ves suddenly felt he grasped sothing. "The situations you ntioned are tis where the Vandals didn't need to hurry. They traded ti for greater opportunities, and they did so in order to leverage the strengths of the Akkara chs!"
Heavy chs were so slow and cumberso that they rarely took part in any offensive maneuvers. That limited their usefulness as the enemy wasn't obliged to run in front of their guns to get blasted!
What the Flagrant Vandals attempted was to invest ti and effort into putting the Akkaras into situations when they were useful.
From luring enemies into the range of the Akkara chs to slowly pushing them forward so they could bombard enemy formations and defenses, all of these scenarios demanded patience and planning.
Heavy chs possessed aweso power, but their critical flaw limited their applicability. Those who owned them and fielded them in battle had to learn how to work around their known weaknesses in order to fully express their great advantages.
He ford his first important insight. "Heavy chs are sort of extre versions to their dium counterparts. They are specialized to a much greater degree than regular chs, which ans that they impose much higher requirents on the command ability of the people in charge. This is also why they are largely limited to the military or large-scale organizations, as only they are able to hire or nurture competent commanding officers."
"It's kind of like they are fixed in place sowhat. You can't easily move them around." Zanthar remarked.
"The squirt is right. That's how we Vandals usually treat our Akkara chs. We don't try to move them if it's not urgently required. We treat them similar to stationary defenses that are just easier to install and remove than actual turrets and defense platforms. You could say that they are a hybrid between dium chs and stationary defenses."
Ves widened his eyes when he heard that. Commander Orfan's words caused him to view heavy chs from yet another perspective!
Viewing them as fixed defenses that just happened to move a bit from ti to ti caused him to develop a different standard towards them. The mobility of most heavy chs were weak because they truly didn't need more. Heavy ch designers consciously sacrificed mobility in order to reach greater extres in offense or defense!
When ch designers pursued this principle far enough, the products they make eventually acquire many of the traits that define fixed defenses.
Was this a good or bad developnt? No one could say for sure, but so far, heavy chs designed according to this principle were viable, otherwise so many ch militaries wouldn't have fielded them in battle!
When Ves looked up again at the Akkara with this new lens, his impression of it had changed. He no longer focused purely on its firepower or its individual might. Instead, he saw the ch as a single piece of a greater puzzle.
This was a result of his third insight!
Heavy chs normally weren't suited to be deployed by themselves. They needed to work together with dium chs and light chs in order to leverage their strengths!
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