Most of the battles fought by the Larkinson Clan took place in space, and Ves didn't think this would change.
Sure, there was a lot of untapped wealth buried on different planets, but that didn't change the fact that his clan was based entirely in space. That ant that strengthening the Larkinson Army's ability to defend the fleet was paramount!
After analyzing the expeditionary fleet's previous engagent, Ves recognized that ranged combat was the foundation of space battles.
A good space-oriented ch force fielded an abundant amount of ranged chs in order to gain the initiative, to deter enemies from approaching and to gain the option to deal damage to any part of the battlefield without too many hindrances.
The Eye of Ylvaine already shouldered much of the burden with the help of its Transcendent Punisher model. Though its armants could use an update, its heavy firepower and the possibility to lay down accurate firepower at longer ranges had already saved the Larkinson Clan ever since it ca into service.
If it was possible to do so, Ves would have gladly doubled or tripled the amount of Transcendent Punishers in service!
Unfortunately, their biggest shortcoming was the lack of bunkers in the Larkinson fleet. After getting rid of all of the clan's sub-capital ships, the amount of Transcendent Punishers that could still be used had dropped considerably!
This made Ves uncomfortable because he had gotten accustod to relying on long-ranged artillery support to make his battles easier.
In order to make the Transcendent Punisher so good at its job, its design sacrificed many aspects, most notably a flight system that could allow it to deploy in space.
Sure, Ves could resort to alternative solutions such as employing heavy floater platforms, but they ca with their own issues.
No, the Transcendent Punishers were best left in their bunkers. The heavy chs not only enjoyed a defensive advantage, but could also obtain a degree of support from the ships they were stationed on. Taking them away from these cozy, purpose-built sites was inefficient.
While the Penitent Sisters also filled another ranged niche with the Eternal Redemptions, they were not flexible enough due to their low mobility. They were another form of artillery in his opinion. They excelled at fighting against heavily-armored targets but perford a lot poorer against lighter and more mobile opponents.
What the Larkinson Clan needed was a ranged ch that could keep up with the latter. Ves sought to develop a new mainstay that could achieve clear superiority at dium range.
Ves planned to design new spaceborn rifleman ch for that reason.
The main purpose for this new project was to replace the Bright Warrior in rifleman ch configuration. Its performance had to exceed the existing standard solution of the Larkinson Clan in every way.
"There's nothing wrong with the Bright Warrior, but it doesn't possess any distinct advantages either." He muttered.
Tactical flexibility was a great advantage, but sotis Ves just wanted to whack his opponents with the biggest hamr. He needed to bestow greater firepower to the Larkinson Army, especially now that the expeditionary fleet had entered the Red Ocean.
Ves was willing to spend a lot to design a high-performance ranged ch. A Bright Warrior cost roughly 500 million hex credits to produce, though that price level was based on the cost of materials back in the galactic rim.
The actual production cost was likely a lot higher in the Red Ocean due to the inflated prices of many raw materials.
Even so, Ves did not intend to cheapen out with this project, especially considering that his fleet would be operating on extrely limited ch capacity for the foreseeable ti.
He had to make each ch count, and that ant trying his best to strengthen them in many different ways.
Better weapons, better tech and better piloting support were all in the cards. What he needed to do was to combine these elents into a coherent package that was clearly superior to the existing solutions of the Larkinson Clan.
The biggest question was whether he should make it exclusive to a single ch legion or turn it into a more general ranged solution.
Ves preferred to do the latter, but that went contrary to his current plan. Sure, designing a single powerful rifleman ch would allow every ch legion to adopt the new solution, but it wouldn't be tailored to their unique strengths.
In the long run, this would leave Ves disappointed with his ranged ch, the sa way he was disappointed with the Bright Warrior for being too general and unspecialized.
"I'll have to pick a single ch legion to focus upon." He decided.
He already ca up with two candidates.
The Avatars of Myth could make good use of a powerful ranged solution. Commander lkor had complained multiple tis about getting outshined by the other ch legions. Giving them a powerful new ch model would do wonders in placating their demands.
"It doesn't have to be a ranged model, though."
Ves beca more inclined to shift the Avatars of Myth towards an assault role. That ant providing this ch legion with armored, close-ranged chs that could take a beating and deliver high impact.
A rifleman ch, especially ard with energy weapons, embodied the opposite of this concept.
The rifleman ch he had in mind would be fairly light, agile and ard with luminar crystal rifles that excelled at mid-ranged combat.
Their impact at the beginning of a battle might not be the best, but they could effectively wear down any massed enemy units as long as they could deal persistent damage.
Pairing this kind of rifleman ch might grant more flexibility to the Avatars of Myth, but it would also dilute their primary purpose.
Ves thought it was better to design this ch for another ch legion.
The Battle Criers ca to mind. Much like the Avatars of Myth, they had struggled to find relevancy when the other ch legions outshone them. Yet when Ves ca up with the idea of arming their Bright Warriors with luminar crystal rifles in order to fight against expert chs, the loyal soldiers finally regained their drive.
It didn't matter that their initial attempt to defeat an expert ch had failed. Their performance was dragged down by several factors. Not only did they lack the numbers to fell an expert ch, but their Bright Warriors and the rather crudely-designed luminar crystal rifles that Ves had provided to them did not impart enough advantages for them to fulfill their new role.
What Ves had to do was to design a new rifleman ch that allowed the Battle Criers to succeed the next ti they were called to fight against enemy expert chs.
This still left him with a lot of open-ended questions, but fortunately he could gain a lot of inspiration from his current environnt.
He paid a bit more attention to the rifleman chs that once played a significant role in their ti.
"This is another interesting rifleman ch." Gloriana said as she was hugging Aurelia.
"…Wuuu…gooowaaaa…"
The cute baby had woken up again and looked curiously at the large and impressive machines. She probably had no idea what they actually were, but the more flamboyant ones featured bright and pretty colors that fascinated the little girl.
The ch that Gloriana referred to was not one of those machines.
chs with bold colorations were not unusual, but tended to attract a lot more attention. This could be good or bad depending on the circumstances.
Only confident ch pilots were comfortable with piloting chs with eye-catching colors. That, or the ch force they belonged to fielded a lot of chs with bright colors.
chs with plainer appearances such as the one that Ves and Gloriana were studying at the mont were more common. Rifleman chs wanted to avoid being targeted, and looking as boring as possible was a good way to increase their survival rates.
That said, a masterwork ch always drew attention, and the deliberately plain and boring appearance of this specific machine failed to hide its brilliance.
"This is quite a contradictory ch." He remarked.
After a short period of study, he already gained a read on its character.
Unlike any other masterwork chs in the gallery, the BDX-35F-3 did not gain a personal na that enshrined its special and unique identity. During its entire service period, it had only ever been referred to by the code na of its ch model.
Ves quickly read through the backstory of this masterwork ch.
The context of the BDX-35F-3 design was important. Apparently, a small and weaker state was fighting against a more powerful one. The war did not proceed well. In the initial planning, the weaker side should have been able to hold out longer against its opposition, but in practice its ch armies kept being pushed back.
The problem turned out to be the ch pilots. Their training and discipline weren't up to standard and they broke faster than they should when t with stronger opposition.
It was frankly embarrassing for them to give up valuable positions without putting up a sufficient amount of resistance!
The state soon implented various asures in order to bolster morale and prevent ch pilots from giving ground too easily. The BDX-35F-3 was an experintal ch design that attempted to solve this problem in a different way than usual.
It was designed to make its ch pilots less susceptible to fear by dampening their emotions.
"What an unusual experint." Ves looked intrigued. "I haven't seen any ch that suppresses emotions to this degree. It runs counter to the current paradigms on ch pilots."
Emotion and rationality were two important properties of ch pilots. The forr gave them a reason to fight while the latter allowed them to fight smarter.
It was generally believed that a good ch pilot had to possess both, but not to the point of excess.
A ch pilot that was too emotional not only beca more susceptible to fear and setbacks, but could also grow a distorted personality. Ghanso was probably a good example of how soldiers could descend into madness.
A ch pilot that was too rational tended to think too much. This not only slowed their responses, but might also cause them to question their own cause and purpose.
Of course, the assumption that too much emotion or rationality led to bad outcos was not a hard rule. There were situations where the advantages outweighed the potential dangers, and BDX-35F-3 was designed with that in mind.
Its lead designer happened to be a rare special in neural interface technology. He modified an existing neural interface design and tuned it in a way that dampened the pilot's emotions while increasing his ability to leverage the powerful processing capabilities of the ch.
The changes worked. When the new rifleman ch model ca into service, its ch pilots displayed a lot more calm in chaotic battles and had a much greater tendency to make the most optimal decisions in different situations.
The masterwork ch that had actually been produced in a manufacturing complex was the best of them. It had been piloted by nurous military ch pilots, each of whom fought under adverse circumstances that would have driven poorly-trained soldiers back.
The masterwork ch along with thousands of other identical chs fought against super numbers, ambushes and even survived encounters against half-a-dozen enemy expert chs!
Despite its stable and reliable performance, the ch military that fielded the BDX-35F-3 model ultimately decided to retire it without exploring this novel direction any further.
There were several reasons for that.
First, its ch pilots generally didn't like to pilot a ch that robbed them of their emotions. It was creepy for ch pilots to adopt a different mode of thought that put an unreasonable emphasis on rationality. They also resented at being forced to pilot a weird ch because their superiors didn't trust their decisions. The orders from above were too paternalistic.
Second, not a single ch pilot who fought with the BDX-35F-3 model had managed to break through. While their performance when piloting it was indeed better, the lack of breakthroughs after several years of use by thousands of different ch pilots caused it to be labeled as a failed experint.
Ves didn't think the BDX-35F-3 was a failure, though. The implentation might not be great, but he was confident that he could do better.
"There is potential in this concept."
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