The Mech Touch

One of the greatest advantages of humanoid mechs was that they could change their external equipment with minimal fuss.

It was not an advantage that the Larkinson Clan utilized often. Ves designed most of his mechs with a singular purpose in mind where they only had to do great in their own intended roles.

There was nothing wrong with this approach, but the emergence of mechs such as the latest generation of Bright Warriors showed that there was still a huge amount of value in providing more choice of loadouts.

From a mech designer's perspective, the ability for humanoid mechs to utilize their limbs to grab any pieces of equipment they could was the oldest modular mech system in existence.

The modular connection system was virtually universal, allowing for any mech to pick up any weapon or gear no matter whether their purposes matched.

A rifleman mech could theoretically hold a tower shield while a swordsman mech could wield a cannon.

The mechs might even be able to achieve acceptable results under the right circumstances!

However, there was a big difference in being able to hold a weapon and being able to utilize it well!

If Ketis wielded a sword, then she could probably slaughter an entire infantry battalion by herself!

However, if she was armed with an assault rifle instead, then it was questionable whether she could defeat an infantry squad!

The same dynamic applied to mechs.

Mechs designed for melee combat usually featured great mechanical strength but did not possess enough stability and fine control to facilitate accurate shooting.

Mechs designed for ranged combat were the opposite in this regard.

What was relevant in this case was that rifleman mechs and cannoneer mechs were not identical to each other.

Perhaps laymen assumed that they were almost exactly the same and only truly differed by the size of their primary armaments, but there were many deep and fundamental differences in their designs.

Rifleman mechs occupied the middle ground among ranged mechs. They were decently fast, accurate, agile and possessed good staying power.

Cannoneer mechs leaned towards the more hard-hitting and cumbersome side of ranged mechs. Their mobility was usually low to average but their armor was a bit better to compensate for their lower evasion ability.

Mechs such as the Eternal Redemption line designed for the Penitent Sisters also featured large to monstrously-sized cannons.

While heavy artillery mechs generally relied on multiple cannons to sustain a high consistent output of damage, cannoneer mechs expressly relied on one immensely powerful gun to deliver piercing shots.

While big and heavy cannons most certainly had their uses, they were not as accurate or as efficient as smaller and more controllable rifles. It was difficult to maintain perfect accuracy at long range unless the target was a fortress or a huge and lumbering starship.

Therefore, different ranged mechs equipped with different weapons generally excelled in diverging modes of combat.

Rifleman mechs just happened to be the most popular in both spaceborn and landbound combat due to their excellent combination of traits.

Cannoneer mechs were less common but there were certain mech forces that succeeded in maximizing their value.

When Ves studied this topic on the galactic net, he found that cannoneer mechs worked best in large, set piece battles like the previous engagement.

That was because there were a lot of rigid formations and large, static targets such as orbital space fortresses where the cannoneer mechs could unleash their firepower without worrying too much about missing their shots.

Their huge but relatively inefficient cannons would not waste their firepower in such a target-rich environment!

However, cannoneer mechs performed progressively worse when the scale of an engagement grew smaller.

Their lack of flexibility and other faults increasingly weighed them down.

All of this was interesting information and helped him put the Amaranto's second weapon into context.

Ves gained a much clearer idea on how he wanted to expand the masterwork expert mech's weapon options.

"The Instrument of Vengeance rifle is a good general purpose sniper rifle for a marksman mech. It is already sufficient against most targets, but it still has trouble with taking down the biggest or the most well protected targets."

The Amaranto's current weapon was not a sieging weapon and it didn't have to function like one. Ves originally envisioned it as a powerful precision weapon that could take down its targets by focusing on their weak points.

This was why the weapon integrated the resonating exotic known as Opticonium. The express purpose of this exotic was to enable the Amaranto to bend its energy beams, which would enable Venerable Stark to avoid the strongest frontal protection of her targets and strike their weaker sides instead!

However, there were situations in battle where precision and flexibility couldn't cut it anymore.

Replacing a sniper rifle with a cannon provided Venerable Stark with a different set of advantages that worked especially great against large astral beasts such as the Titania or alien warships like the ones that regularly roamed the deep frontier!

In fact, granting the Amaranto the ability to effectively deal with non-human enemies was the primary reason why Ves decided to embrace the cannon as the basis of its second weapon.

"This way, the Amaranto can still stick to the Instrument of Vengeance rifle when fighting against human mech forces but switch over to its new cannon when fighting against alien forces.

The indigenous alien races still fought their battles in a similar fashion to humanity before the Age of Mechs.

Warships and large guns were ubiquitous among their warfleets. Though it was not unheard of for certain alien races to employ small craft such as starfighters, their roles were often supportive in nature.

"In short, it is better to carry a bigger gun in battle that can more effectively overcome the thick hull plating of the most threatening warships." Ves concluded.

Transphasic cannons happened to be even more effective against these targets!

Their amazing penetration capabilities might come at a cost, but it didn't matter if the Amaranto only needed to fire a handful of shots to cripple a threatening alien vessel!

As Ves continued to flesh out the design for the luminar crystal cannon, he completely embraced the idea of turning it into a siege weapon.

The design choices he made during this time constantly increased the cannon's damage output at the cost of accuracy, control and energy efficiency.

One of the more difficult choices that Ves had to make was to add an external battery module to the weapon frame. There was no other way for the Amaranto to keep its hungry cannon active for over five minutes!

While the new addition made it easier for the Amaranto to swap spent battery modules for fresh ones, their considerable size and mass added even more bulk to a weapon that was already overburdening the Amaranto.

When Ves took a step back, he could see that the proportions of the cannon and the mech did not match at all! The Amaranto literally looked like a skinny man that was attempting to hold a tree trunk!

The cannon looked so out of place that it completely ruined the majesty of the masterwork mech!

Ves didn't care for that, though.

"I would rather use a crude shovel than an exquisite spoon if I need to dig a hole in the ground."

This encapsulated his thought process towards the cannon. Whether it harmonized with the Amaranto or whether Ves was able to turn it into a masterwork weapon did not fall under his consideration at all. He just wanted to equip his expert mech with the right tool for the right job.

Ves showed little restraint and went almost completely wild as he became more engrossed in the design process.

His passion became more and more stoked as he developed various small but design solutions that made the cannon more savage.

However, his progress slowed to a crawl after reaching a certain junction in the design process.

Though he was able to complete the weapon all by himself, it would miss out on numerous advantages that couldn't have been added to the cannon if he brought in contributions from other mech designers.

This was why he invited Gloriana and Master Benedict to a virtual meeting. He first presented his half-complete weapon design to them before inviting them to help design the rest.

"What are you asking from us, Ves?" Master Benedict asked.

"My new cannon can't become a qualified expert mech weapon if it can't effectively resonate with Venerable Stark." Ves replied. "The Instrument of Vengeance is embedded with Opticonium, and I think my new weapon ought to be matched with another powerful resonating exotic. I have a decent collection of materials in our strategic materials reserve that can potentially play a useful role here, so I would like you to help me maximize the firepower of the Amaranto's upcoming sieging tool."

The Master Mech Designer of the Cross Clan thoughtfully studied the incomplete design schematics.

"I can do that, but… I cannot stand the internal architecture of this weapon. It may not be representative of the final version, but there are fundamentals here that are unnecessary wasteful in my eyes."

Luminar crystal weapons worked differently from conventional human energy weapons, but science and engineering was still universal. Master Benedict could still implement many tweaks to make the weapon more efficient in its use of energy.

Ves nodded in agreement. "I was just about to ask you that. My luminar crystal cannon could sorely use your help."

"What about me, Ves?" Gloriana asked. "What is my role in this project?"

He turned to his wife. "I would like you to apply your god body tech to this luminar crystal cannon. If you have studied its design closely, you will see that I have already taken this factor into account, so it should be relatively straightforward for you to enable this weapon to evolve its quality by absorbing external energy."

Gloriana did not immediately agree.

"I can understand why you would want to do that, but it would make this weapon even more out of tune with the Amaranto."

"That will only be a temporary condition, Gloriana. We already formed a plan to upgrade all of our existing expert mechs into god bodies, remember? While it isn't time yet for us to revise the overall design of the Amaranto, we can start with a preview by applying your design solution to the luminar crystal cannon first. Besides, this will be an excellent test case for you to study its characteristics from a different mech from the Mars."

"Hmmm… you are right. I agree, then. However, I want to add a number of touches of my own to your weapon design. It is too barbaric in its current state."

"That's the entire point of this weapon, Gloriana!"

Bringing in other mech designers brought a lot of trouble, but Ves had little choice. He could not replicate the strengths of Gloriana and Master Benedict so he accepted the need for compromise in order to elevate the power and capabilities of his upcoming weapon.

Fortunately, the three already had a lot of experience with collaborating with each other, so they resolved their disagreements fairly quickly.

Progress accelerated as two more mech designers shared the workload that Ves originally bore by himself.

Both his wife and Master Benedict developed an increasing amount of interest in the outcome of this project.

How powerful would a new blessed weapon become after incorporating several powerful design solutions in a single package?

Was Ves right in claiming that this powerful luminar crystal cannon would enable the Amaranto to efficiently take down alien warships from afar?

The only way this could come true was if his new blessed weapon concept successfully amplified the penetration capabilities of the cannon by an enormous margin!

The Phase King had already shown that it could do so for smaller infantry-sized guns, but could the design spirit still accomplish the same task for a large and imposing cannon?

This was the mystery that all three mech designers wanted to solve!