Colony Ships: Specifically the SDF-3 and Ark Angel-class

[Seto Kaiba]

flock of pigeons actually. Though if we take that statement literally, those must be some nasty pigeons if you need ~1 mile long starships (SDF-3, Tokagawas) to deal with.

So... who's up for using the Genesis Pits book to roll up a mega-damage pigeon? Alfred Hitchcock eat your heart out.

Though is the Sent. OVA itself even considered canon still, I thought it fell into the category of "tossed out".

Last HG said on the matter, the Sentinels was on "broad strokes" status...

Lets also not forget that for the most part we don't canonically know what equipment the UEEF used in this period (circa 2029-30) that differed from the UEDF:ASC beyond the tokagawa, SDF-3, and Carpenter Fighter (and maybe the Alpha). There could have been more overlap in terms of hardware than we are lead to believe as prior depiction of the Sentinels did have the UEEF using ASC hardware (Logan and VHT-1, IIRC even the AGAC) along with their established NG and new created for designs.

Based on the statements in the Infopedia, it doesn't sound as though the UEEF introduced much new equipment besides the Beta in the years they were away from Earth. The Alpha was depicted as a 2022 introduction, and the Garfish-class is supposedly one of the oldest ship classes in service. It's not known when the Ikazuchi-class came into service, but it can't have been that long...

"the Tristar would have easily held its own against the far larger vessels of the alien giants. However, the enemy it encountered were the Robotech Masters, whose vastly superior technology meant that the Tristar could often only barely hold its own in combat. "-Tristar Entry from the RT.com Infopedia. The Entry doesn't offer up a benchmark for the Zentreadi (though I'd suspect the "common" ship types like Scout and Destroyer as opposed to the rarer types like Flagship or Command ships).

I think most people overlook that second part when assessing the TRM arc. The Masters ARE NOT considered to be technologically EQUAL to the Zentreadi, they are considered to be technologically SUPERIOR to the Zentreadi.

I'm not entirely sure I buy that line, given how many examples there were in the Masters Saga of the UEDF brass overestimating their own capabilities or dramatically underestimating the capabilities of the Robotech Masters. We don't know what Zentradi ship they were benchmarking against... the scout isn't exactly a heavily armed ship, or overblessed with a battle pod complement.

The problem I have with the assertion about the Masters being technologically superior to the Zentradi is that people too often assume that means they're militarily superior as well. They're not accustomed to fighting, having created the Zentradi to do that for them, and their ships don't seem to be set up to be actual warships. They're floating cities with defensive weaponry.

[ShadowLogan]

So... who's up for using the Genesis Pits book to roll up a mega-damage pigeon? Alfred Hitchcock eat your heart out.

Before GP came out I used several other Palladium RPG line books to create a few different types of "I need BFG for these" pigeons. I think I still have the files for them somewhere.

Last HG said on the matter, the Sentinels was on "broad strokes" status...

I get that. However how does that "broad strokes" work with specific statements made in connection to Sentinels. Leonard's statement (or someone elses in the OVA) might no longer apply if we are reduced to "broad strokes", heck the Alpha might still be in testing in 2022.

Based on the statements in the Infopedia, it doesn't sound as though the UEEF introduced much new equipment besides the Beta in the years they were away from Earth. The Alpha was depicted as a 2022 introduction, and the Garfish-class is supposedly one of the oldest ship classes in service. It's not known when the Ikazuchi-class came into service, but it can't have been that long...

The Alpha though is depicted in several places as "new" post 2022 though. Nor does anything you said prevent the UEEF and UEDF from sharing hardware in the period in question. I don't discount that both "services" can have unique hardware, but they likely have some degree of overlaps.

I'm not entirely sure I buy that line, given how many examples there were in the Masters Saga of the UEDF brass overestimating their own capabilities or dramatically underestimating the capabilities of the Robotech Masters. We don't know what Zentradi ship they were benchmarking against... the scout isn't exactly a heavily armed ship, or overblessed with a battle pod complement.

The problem I have with the assertion about the Masters being technologically superior to the Zentradi is that people too often assume that means they're militarily superior as well. They're not accustomed to fighting, having created the Zentradi to do that for them, and their ships don't seem to be set up to be actual warships. They're floating cities with defensive weaponry.

UEDF: ASC brass to make the statement though is Emerson, who is arguably one of the more cautious of the UEDF brass in TRM arc. So I do think the statement is valid since he does seem to be more realistic in his assessments.

I can agree that there is the issue of the Zentreadi ship benchmark, but the statement is there officially.

While I can agree that the Masters are not accustomed to fighting, it is logical though that they would want some safeguards in place should the Zentreadi revolt again (as indicated in Zentreadi History during TMS). Nor would I consider their Motherships to be a pure warship myself, but I do think they can be shown to be militarily superior:
-Cityship officially is considered to carry a Reflex Cannon and mounts 930 anti-ship/anti-mecha beam cannons, plus even more point defense weapons. For a nonwarship, they do a pretty good job of outclassing other Infopedia listed Zentreadi warship in terms of firepower. Then you toss in the shields that Zentreadi don't even have. (NOTE: the Infopedia's RM "Heavy Cruiser" is another matter, though sporting 4 Reflex Cannons per Infopedia text in a shared slot with another weapon system shows a degree of technical superiority I don't think we see elsewhere in RT)
-the Masters managed to send a large vessel to the surface undetected ("Half-Moon"), are reported to have caught the ASC unprepared ("Danger Zone", Sector 3), the fleet arrived in the solar system w/o detection until they decided to make their presence known (admitdly the UEDF might be looking for Fold signatures).
-the Masters have potent jamming equipment (potentially superior to Zentreadi)
-the Masters can monitor Earth military communications (w/o Zor Prime), and even hack in to deliver messages (which means they could in theory plant false messages). I know the Zentreadi can do this also, but the Masters could intercept Earth communications from Saturn (ep37, video footage of the 15th members), the Zentreadi aren't shown to have that range in TMS.
-Bioroid controls are superior to anything the Zentreadi use on their mecha (which are all manual inputs IINM), so even if we ignore subjective issues (firepower and armor) they have a more responsive mecha interface (which could give them an edge to counter defects elsewhere).
-Technically the only way to stop a Bioroid is to basically shoot out the cockpit, to stop a Regult Battlepod you have more options (shoot out the legs, the weak spot Miryia provided in "wedding Bells", main body). Now other Zentreadi mecha might be more resiliant than the Regult, but I went with the stock unit.
-the Bioroid carrier/corvette provides the airpower for the Masters, and outclasses the stock Zentreadi Gnerl Fighter in all likelihood if the Sylphids are any indication. Granted this might not be a fair comparison, but it would be how the Masters would employ the craft. Its a bit harder to gauge how the Bioroid/Skysled combo would turn out (as most/all of the Sylphid kills by Bioroids had them parked, though they managed to get a few Phantom fighters in the air but I don't recall the specifics, trying to keep it non-transformable vs non-transformable)

[Seto Kaiba]

I get that. However how does that "broad strokes" work with specific statements made in connection to Sentinels. Leonard's statement (or someone elses in the OVA) might no longer apply if we are reduced to "broad strokes", heck the Alpha might still be in testing in 2022.

The Alpha though is depicted in several places as "new" post 2022 though. Nor does anything you said prevent the UEEF and UEDF from sharing hardware in the period in question. I don't discount that both "services" can have unique hardware, but they likely have some degree of overlaps.

There are a few potential explanations for the "new" post-2022 Alpha that are fairly straightforward and don't involve inventing any offscreen content... like that the "new" Alphas Lancer refers to in the comics are the -Z variant introduced midway in the 3rd Robotech War.

As to why the ASC doesn't get any of the good stuff... that's a harder question to answer. It may be as simple as what Exedore describes in the Sentinels OVA: that the UEDF is considered a low priority for military acquisitions because the brass military's bigshots considered the chances of anyone attacking Earth to be incredibly remote. Or it could be that the horrendous attrition rate that is mentioned in the RPG and implied in the comics and AotSC meant that the UEEF was running the available manufacturing facilities at full tilt just to meet their own demands for replacement hardware, leaving nothing for the UEDF. As a corollary to that, the UEDF's available manufacturing facilities may not have been up to the task of building the more sophisticated Alphas, Cyclones, etc. and so the UEDF had to make do with mechanically simpler combat mecha. The potential explanations aren't pretty WRT the implications for the UEDF's logistical support, but there are multiple explanations for that.

While I can agree that the Masters are not accustomed to fighting, it is logical though that they would want some safeguards in place should the Zentreadi revolt again (as indicated in Zentreadi History during TMS). Nor would I consider their Motherships to be a pure warship myself, but I do think they can be shown to be militarily superior:
-Cityship officially is considered to carry a Reflex Cannon and mounts 930 anti-ship/anti-mecha beam cannons, plus even more point defense weapons. For a nonwarship, they do a pretty good job of outclassing other Infopedia listed Zentreadi warship in terms of firepower. Then you toss in the shields that Zentreadi don't even have. (NOTE: the Infopedia's RM "Heavy Cruiser" is another matter, though sporting 4 Reflex Cannons per Infopedia text in a shared slot with another weapon system shows a degree of technical superiority I don't think we see elsewhere in RT)

Granted, the cityship's weapons are numerous, but they don't demonstrate anywhere near the levels of capability we see from the Zentradi in the Macross Saga. Their turrets only seem to have ranges of tens or maybe a couple hundred kilometers at best, whereas the Zentradi demonstrated the ability to hit targets with incredible precision from over a quarter million kilometers away. Their fuel crisis can't explain it entirely, since the Zentradi were similarly hard up for fuel and it didn't seem to put them off their game at all. The reflex cannon was also pretty underwhelming considering that all it did was scorch the battlefield a bit, it didn't create a city-annihilating crater tens of kilometers across and hundreds of meters deep.

The armament they have feels rather token... like the factory satellite in the OSM having thousands of gun emplacements, but designed pretty much entirely for point defense and mundane matters such as protecting the facility from space dust and debris.

More guns doesn't necessarily mean BETTER guns.

-the Masters managed to send a large vessel to the surface undetected ("Half-Moon"), are reported to have caught the ASC unprepared ("Danger Zone", Sector 3), the fleet arrived in the solar system w/o detection until they decided to make their presence known (admitdly the UEDF might be looking for Fold signatures).

Hard to say how much of that we can attribute to their technical capabilities and how much is down to the UEDF defenses being built on salvage and second-rate equipment the UEEF didn't want, all manned by third-rate soldiers the UEEF didn't want.

The Zentradi did the same trick with a fairly large fleet at one point... didn't work out too well for Khyron, but he was able to hide a fleet of airborne ships at low altitude until he was practically on top of the SDF-1. (There's even an onscreen diagram showing the jamming effect.)

-the Masters have potent jamming equipment (potentially superior to Zentreadi)

Hard to say, the Zentradi's jamming tech was pretty damn potent, but they never attempted to completely cut Earth off... so we can't say if their tech is worse than the Masters on that front.

-Bioroid controls are superior to anything the Zentreadi use on their mecha (which are all manual inputs IINM), so even if we ignore subjective issues (firepower and armor) they have a more responsive mecha interface (which could give them an edge to counter defects elsewhere).

There's that... but that comes at a cost with Bioroids, since the operator feels pain when the mecha is damaged. Potentially distracting, incapacitating pain that the Zentradi don't get thanks to their mecha not being tied into their brains.

-Technically the only way to stop a Bioroid is to basically shoot out the cockpit, to stop a Regult Battlepod you have more options (shoot out the legs, the weak spot Miryia provided in "wedding Bells", main body). Now other Zentreadi mecha might be more resiliant than the Regult, but I went with the stock unit.

The cockpit is center mass on a Bioroid though... which makes it hard to shoot anything BUT the cockpit if you're actually aiming.

[ShadowLogan]

There are a few potential explanations for the "new" post-2022 Alpha that are fairly straightforward and don't involve inventing any offscreen content... like that the "new" Alphas Lancer refers to in the comics are the -Z variant introduced midway in the 3rd Robotech War.

I agree there are some straightforward explanations that can be put forward, but they all fall under the speculation heading at this point.

As a corollary to that, the UEDF's available manufacturing facilities may not have been up to the task of building the more sophisticated Alphas, Cyclones, etc. and so the UEDF had to make do with mechanically simpler combat mecha. The potential explanations aren't pretty WRT the implications for the UEDF's logistical support, but there are multiple explanations for that.

This seems unlikely though. Indications are in TMS that the RFS captured was down for good, so in the early years UEEF manufacturing base was likely dependent upon the UEDF's until they aquire more RFS-type facilities (which we don't know when that occurred, but we know it occurred). Which means the UEDF base was capable of producing prototype Alphas (and other examples) given realistic development lead times required, so they are unlikely to lose that capability (or be unable to rebuild it technically). Now the UEDF might swap out equipment on those units for their purposes (ex. SLMH instead of PC fuel requirements, or general avionics) or even install additional hardware on a given platform.

But I see no reason to assume the UEDF base was incapable of producing period specific UEEF examples in the 2020s.

Their turrets only seem to have ranges of tens or maybe a couple hundred kilometers at best

I don't think this is the actual case though. Distance in space is going to be difficult to judge visually. Most/all of the ship v ship engagements are started by the UEDF, which could mean the Masters held back.

The reflex cannon was also pretty underwhelming considering that all it did was scorch the battlefield a bit, it didn't create a city-annihilating crater tens of kilometers across and hundreds of meters deep.

It is also important to remember that the site of said battlefield was the Protoculture Mounds, their ultimate objective and reason for being ther so it is unlikely they would want to do anything to jeopardize it. Which could indicate the weapon was either throttled back if it was the Reflex Cannon or it wasn't the Reflex Cannon (Infopedia still requires a twin-boom, which is inconsistent with the footage, as it states: "and includes a Reflex Cannon that does require the ship to open two parallel booms."-Feb24,2012 Internet Archive)

The Masters do have City-busting weapon that the Infopedia considers a Reflex Cannon that was used to destroy Newton and Manville.

Hard to say how much of that we can attribute to their technical capabilities and how much is down to the UEDF defenses being built on salvage and second-rate equipment the UEEF didn't want, all manned by third-rate soldiers the UEEF didn't want.

The Zentradi did the same trick with a fairly large fleet at one point... didn't work out too well for Khyron, but he was able to hide a fleet of airborne ships at low altitude until he was practically on top of the SDF-1. (There's even an onscreen diagram showing the jamming effect.)

While the Zentreadi manage to slip a battle group in it was still detected (jamming gave it away) before they entered Mark I eyeball range which promted Skull Squadron to search for them.

I think we can put some of it down to technical capabilities of the Masters equipment given in some instances we are talking about cloaking the movement of multiple ships that dwarf the Zentreadi's biggest ships to date (aside from Dolza's Base and RFS) that allowed them to come upon important facilities (who knows how well monitored space around SX PT83 is in the middle of now where, but SSL is probably has a higher priority) with no mention of Radar Jamming (IIRC, I know there are instances of Radio/Com. jamming).

The cockpit is center mass on a Bioroid though... which makes it hard to shoot anything BUT the cockpit if you're actually aiming.

I think you missed the basic point though. We see and are told the only effective way to take down a Bioroid is with a shot to the cockpit area (direct). We can see instances of Zentreadi Regults getting a leg blown off, falling over and exploding pretty regularly. Bioroids don't explode regularly when you shoot off a leg/arm. Which does point to a degree of superiority on the stock Bioroid design over the stock Regult. The Bioroid doesn't have a method to actually disable it like the Regult that doesn't kill the pilot (sure you can daze the pilot, but the unit would still be operational when he/she shakes it off).

[Sambot]

I don't think all the shows were rewritten. Edited for audiences yes but not completely rewritten.

No the shows have been rewritten. I have seen (and own DVD copies) of the TRM and NG arcs in their original form (that's 59 out of 85 RT episodes IINM). You can find plenty of instances of being re-written:
-1st ep of TRM is a literal fabrication for Robotech
-2nd ep of TRM isn't just a rewrite, but a major editing job in relation to scene order
-in the OSM the setting is Glorie (not Earth) a planet outside the solar system WITH multiple moons (2 IIRC), Liberty is another world (not a space station), the Zor (RM) are former inhabitants of Glorie, Bioroid pilots are mindcontrolled prisoners (Zor Prime was a Glorie solider captured early on, not a scientist seeding a planet with Protoculture), not to mention the year the events are supposed to take place is in the late 22nd Century
-in NG the OSM has everyone coming from within the Solar System, there are no hyper drives, the occupation went on for much longer, the year is like 208x (IIRC), etc

Seto can probably list the rewrite aspects of TMS given his familiarity with the OSM for that arc. If Rabid Southern Cross Fan was still posting regularly he could probably add some things to TRM's OSM change list.

I didn't say that there weren't sections that were rewritten. I said that I didn't think the entire series were rewritten.

Actually it may not. It really depends on what constitutes "A planet none of these newest Robotech defenders hasn't seen in nearly 20years" (ep61 Narrator). If the Moon base became the front lines in the war, then it logically would probably seek to minimize non-combatants like Children (since officially the occupation went into the mid 2040s from 2031) on the front lines from residing there.

Even if the people that made up Mars division grewup at Mars or farther out in the Solar System their ability to "see" Earth will result in a small blue dot at best without telescope assistance, and ignores visual records, etc.

If it's visible they can't claim not to have seen it. And the dialog says they hadn't seen it. Not seen it only distantly.

Carpenter had a single ship and said there wouldn't be reinforcements. The others came after the ASC died.

If ships were regularly meeting, they wouldn't need communications with Liberty.

Even if ships are meeting regularly there would still be a need for communications with Liberty.

Talking to Liberty would be faster but not the only means of communication. And Liberty didn't seem to communicate much or the ASC would have known the UEEF's predicament long before Carpenter's ship was sent back to Earth. The only info that seemed to come from Tirol came from other ships.

The order is: Carpenter (TRM), Transport Squadron 85 (returns via hyperspace in TRM), the Garfish/Wolfe (NG, both of whom are connected via show dialogue to the Robotech Masters arc IIRC).

Thank you for the order.

Old equipment is find. It came out of storage. CVR-3 Armor? The Marine Sourcebook says that it was introduced in 2035. Since that had to be approved by HG that makes it canon. It'd also mean that the Old Timers were with the 10th Division. As for the Garfish being the oldest ship, why wasn't it used by the ASC?

CVR-3 can not be a 2035 introduction based on canon comics.

The Old Timers can not be part of the 10th Mars Division, show dialogue precludes that for canon setup.

Don't new sources take precedence? And doesn't the RPG have to be approved by HG? I agree it's problematic but this would be HG's latest word on the subject wouldn't it?

Why the ASC didn't use the Garfish? Any number of reasons to it being a UEEF only ship to it being an off camera thing.

Or both.

[Sambot]

I would think that they'd go to, existing Human/Zentraedi colonies or one of the Planets the UEEF helped liberate.

From the available depictions of the evacuation effort, most or all of the evacuees were the remnants of UEDF formations that'd been mauled by the Robotech Masters and again by the Invid. We know that the survivors of the ATAC 15th Squad ended up on Space Station Liberty (per Prelude to the Shadow Chronicles).

Well that says who and gives one possible destination. But did everyone go there?

That's not what I remember when they were produced.

That's what Harmony Gold has said about the novelizations and most of the licensee-created material from the late 80's and the 90's... that it's not part of the official Robotech universe because those various works were of generally poor quality, internally inconsistent and inconsistent with the animated series, and were produced without any creative oversight by Harmony Gold's staff.[/quote]

Well, like I said.

Per the series, Scott was still a child when the Colonel Wolfe left to join the Earth Reclamation Forces... meaning the war with the Masters was over before he was old enough to enlist. Mind you, he'd almost certainly grown up on Mars, which was controlled by the UEEF. He was also a decent soldier, so even if he'd been old enough he probably would've been routed to the UEEF instead of the UEDF on that basis. Ever since the original Sentinels OVA, the ASC has been implied to be the fate of the washouts who didn't make the cut for the Expeditionary Forces.

I am not as sure as to the certainty of the location of Scott's childhood as you are. Also he is only one of how many thousand of soldiers? I'm not certain they all grew up in the same place. Also I never got the feeling that all the members of the ASC were washouts of the UEEF. There might have been very good soldiers who felt they should defend Earth instead of going about provoking fights with people.

So now there's colonies closer to Tirol?

SHIPS. We know there are plenty of rear-echelon transport groups and so on dashing about behind the front lines of the war in space. Those were the scrubs who were also sacrificed to try and help bail Earth out in the Masters Saga.

That gives plenty of places to raise kids and keep civilians and station pregnant troopers. Those scrubs also consisted of a couple squadrons, maybe, if you include Wolf's ships. That leaves plenty of others.

Well, we know for a fact they consider the dialog of Robotech to contain plenty of errors... they comment on that fact on Twitter every now and again when fans send them the same old questions they've been asking for decades.

They're undeniably doing Robotech on the cheap, though. Almost unfeasibly small budgets are a recurring fixture in the stories of the development and production of Robotech's animated installments. The original series was done in an unseemly rush because the budget was tiny and studio time was extremely expensive, leading to large numbers of internal inconsistencies and errors because writers weren't given enough time to check their work for consistency and voice actors were given very little down time. Similar stories of production woes resulting from insufficient budget also can be found in Sentinels, where the awkward character designs are attributed to there being no room in the budget to hire an outside studio (and rumors that many mechanical designs in that failed series were reuses of rejected designs from earlier Tatsunoko projects). Shadow Chronicles was famously done on a budget of under $1 million US, a budget that'd permit a studio to deliver a modest quality level on a 22 minute television episode, but about 1/4 as much as they'd need to do a decent job with a 80+ minute OVA episode. The second episode, Shadow Rising, was placed on preproduction hiatus because (according to HG) they were trying to secure financial backing for the film and were hoping cross-promotion with the live action movie proposal that was (and still is) mired in development hell would secure them a bigger budget. The last attempt at an animated project saw Harmony Gold try to get the fans to foot the bill for the pilot, and animation work was farmed out not to a professional anime industry studio like Tatsunoko Production or DR MOVIE... but rather to a fan-run outfit in South America.

That is pretty cheap.

I don't think all the shows were rewritten. Edited for audiences yes but not completely rewritten.

You would be wrong... very, VERY badly wrong.

I've seen the original Japanese shows, Super Dimension Fortress Macross, Super Dimension Cavalry Southern Cross, and Genesis Climber MOSPEADA many times... and I'm something of an expert on Macross. I can assure you the rewriting was fairly extensive. Here are some examples:

Thank you for listing examples of differences. Why you list non series publications doesn't prove the entire series was rewritten though. It just further shows the differences between the respective universes. I also never got the vibe that the Zentraedi were going extinct.

Are you trying to tell me that all the "children" , Scott, Marlene, and Lancer included, were taking from Earth after fighting the Robotech Masters, had their memories altered so they'd think they never seen Earth before, were retrained in UEEF mecha, and then sent back to Earth? I can see quite a few doing some of that. But not the ones who'd never seen Earth before.

No, they were born and raised elsewhere... if they've only been in space or on Mars, then they've never seen Earth. If you spent your entire life in the US and never went abroad on holiday, you'd have never seen Munich, for example.

And were is elsewhere? They can't all have come to Mars as there weren't ships available. And they also couldn't go to Tirol for the same reason. And you're analogy is a bit off since I can't see Munich from here. I can however see the Moon. You're saying that all these kids were born on or within visual distance of Earth but have never seen it. That's like saying I've never seen the moon even though all I have to do is look up at night.

And reaching where? I read that there are no civilians and no colonies then I read that there are and you keep pointing to evidence of shipping personnel where it couldn't happen.

No extrasolar colonies. There are militarized colonies on the moon and Mars, and military bases at Jupiter and near-Sol deep space (Liberty station).

That we know of but there is no proof that they are not.

And there wouldn't be civilians in these places, why?

Because when everyone is a soldier, who is left to be a civilian?

Then who does the jobs the military isn't able to hand? And where's the Pediatrician MOS? Why have the youngest age in the RPG be 17? Why can't we have 10 year old in the cockpits. They are soldiers right? Also the RPG wouldn't need to mention recruiting. There is no recruiting when you're enlisted before you even take your first breath out of the womb.
Also the RPG does not preclude the existence of civilians or colonies outside the Sol System. In fact is specifically says that there are colonists The UEEF recruiting and many being eager to join implies that there is a choice. Especially when you read the sentence about where those kids grew up. It's those who grew up on UEEF Ships, stations and bases that are eager to join. Those who grew up else were might not be so eager to enlist. And what of t he soldiers who are no longer fit for duty? These veterans would be considered civilian wouldn't they? And what of Tirol? It is certainly not all military.

If ships were regularly meeting, they wouldn't need communications with Liberty.

You're assuming that they would be able to communicate directly with the Expeditionary Forces without any kind of relay...

The Old Guys Garfish could. Why shouldn't newer ships of the ASC and UEEF be able to?

I don't know about that. I am sure that it's more than the novels/comics made out.

I do know about that. I've translated pretty much everything that's been published for the original animation source material, and let me tell you these are NOT huge militaries... the crew of the typical Mars Base ship (Garfish-class high speed transporter) was about a dozen people, not close to a hundred. The Ikazuchi was a few hundred, not thousands. The entire ATAC had only the 15 squads and less than 500 tanks total. Most of those specialists the RPG thinks are branches of service are single, specialist squads under the regular army.

That's for the original sources though. Robotech is different.

Back to that again. You can't have it both ways. You say there's no colonies then there are. And those kids are civilians.

The kids are dependents, nothing more... and their only career path is into the military, so they're less civilians and more soldiers-in-waiting.

Also, I'm not trying to have it both ways... you're just apparently missing the point I'm making. The military bases that are mentioned in Robotech's later sagas are attributed by official material to have been colonies that were subsequently turned into military bases.

I don't believe believe so. Who works the factories? The farms? Who educates the kids?

If they were turned into military bases then they were civilian before then. Where's the civilians now? Still there working for the military.

They didn't... they didn't NEED to. As we're told, the only career option for the humans born out in space was to join the military once they came of age... and that many of them regarded it as being the human race's way of life. There was no need to institute a draft, because the military was the only employer out there in space.

Please tell me again, it says that, because I haven't seen it. I'm seeing just the opposite. Just because the military is the only employer does not mean that everyone is a soldier. It only does if they are drafted. And what of the unemployable? Children, elderly, medically retired? Give them an RL-2 and send them out anyway? And what of those civilian employers that ran the bases and stations before military took over? Did they move on and start over? Stay and enjoy a big government contract?

Old equipment is find. It came out of storage. CVR-3 Armor? The Marine Sourcebook says that it was introduced in 2035. Since that had to be approved by HG that makes it canon. It'd also mean that the Old Timers were with the 10th Division. As for the Garfish being the oldest ship, why wasn't it used by the ASC?

Shockingly, the RPG sourcebooks are not always correct... which is one of the reasons Harmony Gold doesn't consider the RPG to be canon.

The series clearly indicates the old timers were a UEEF unit sent back to fight the Robotech Masters... before the 1st Earth Reclamation Force and 10th Mars Division were sent back to fight.

Yet HG has to approve the RPG before it can go to print, correct? If yes then that would change canon wouldn't it?

As to why the ASC didn't use the Garfish-class... probably for the same reason the ASC didn't use any of the other stuff the UEEF developed for itself, whatever that may be. (The RPG attributes some of it to Leonard's sour grapes over the UEEF taking all the best equipment and personnel.)

That eliminates Transport Squadron 85 from being UEEF reinforcements wouldn't it? If yes, where were they coming from?

[ShadowLogan]

I didn't say that there weren't sections that were rewritten. I said that I didn't think the entire series were rewritten.

You'd be wrong then. Even if we simply toss out name changes, there is plenty to show that the component series that went into RT have basically been completely rewritten to the point the only thing they have in common is the visuals, and even there we know editing occurred for broadcast standards or to accommodate the story (ex. Glorie has multiple moons in the OSM, since Glorie was turned into Earth editing had to occur to avoid showing multiple moons).

If it's visible they can't claim not to have seen it. And the dialog says they hadn't seen it. Not seen it only distantly.

The problem is what the person (narrator in this case) means by "seen". It is unlikely that UEEF soldiers have not seen Earth by some means (archive, sensor), but is clear that they haven't personally seen Earth up close.

Talking to Liberty would be faster but not the only means of communication. And Liberty didn't seem to communicate much or the ASC would have known the UEEF's predicament long before Carpenter's ship was sent back to Earth. The only info that seemed to come from Tirol came from other ships.

No the only info about the UEEF did not come from ships. Dialogue in TRM implies that communication between Earth and the Pioneer mission was handled by SSL (and a moonbase counterpart, a moonbase that was bombed). The only time ships seem to come into play is during the 2nd Robotech War when the Masters are known to have engaged in disrupting communications between Earth and SSL.

The Novels are for all practical purposes another universe. I know they have it that way (ships being the only link, and "forged" SSL messages from Pioneer), but the show implies otherwise.

Don't new sources take precedence? And doesn't the RPG have to be approved by HG? I agree it's problematic but this would be HG's latest word on the subject wouldn't it?

The RPG has to be approved by HG, but it does not take precedence over canon material as it is not considered part of canon. The show itself and Wildstorm comics (which are canon) are in agreement though that CVR-3 was around in 2031.

[Seto Kaiba]

Well that says who and gives one possible destination. But did everyone go there?

We don't know. There are multiple installations inside the Sol system to absorb those fleeing troops... the Moon Bases that were the primary staging areas for attacks on Earth, Mars Base, Jupiter Base, and possibly Neptune Base if it actually exists.

I am not as sure as to the certainty of the location of Scott's childhood as you are. Also he is only one of how many thousand of soldiers? I'm not certain they all grew up in the same place. Also I never got the feeling that all the members of the ASC were washouts of the UEEF. There might have been very good soldiers who felt they should defend Earth instead of going about provoking fights with people.

Assuming the "Mars Base Division" that Scott identifies himself as a member of is truly a division, 10,000-20,000 total soldiers... not all of whom are necessarily spaceborn. If AotSC is any indication, Mars Base Division makes up most of the UEEF's fleet in 2044, which would suggest the UEEF is not an especially large organization.

As far as the Army of the Southern Cross being Expeditionary Forces washouts, that's something that's been down since the original Sentinels series first episode. Soldiers who passed the UEEF selection trials got to join the Expeditionary Forces and go into space. The ones who washed out of the rigorous selection process got to stay behind with the Defense Forces.

That is pretty cheap.

You have no idea... and it's not limited to the story production either.

Thank you for listing examples of differences. Why you list non series publications doesn't prove the entire series was rewritten though. It just further shows the differences between the respective universes.

I just listed the SDF-3 thing because it's a common Robotech fan misconception that a "SDF-3" was a uniquely Robotech idea, rather than something that existed in Macross's original series before Robotech was ever a thing.

I also never got the vibe that the Zentraedi were going extinct.

Scott implies they've gone extinct in the New Generation.

Then who does the jobs the military isn't able to hand? And where's the Pediatrician MOS? Why have the youngest age in the RPG be 17? Why can't we have 10 year old in the cockpits. They are soldiers right?

The RPG doesn't comprehensively cover everything.

As to the RPG's youngest mentioned age being 17... reread that section again. They indicate that these kids are already serving as combat pilots and ground troops at 17. That means they joined up younger than that and went through training. Possibly YEARS of training. If flight school for the UEEF is anything like real world military flight school, they're probably recruiting these kids at age 14.

Also the RPG wouldn't need to mention recruiting. There is no recruiting when you're enlisted before you even take your first breath out of the womb.

The UEEF wouldn't be the first military to euphemistically refer to conscription as recruitment... though if there's no other career path in space, they can call it "recruitment" because they're a choice... even if it's the ONLY choice.

Also the RPG does not preclude the existence of civilians or colonies outside the Sol System. In fact is specifically says that there are colonists The UEEF recruiting and many being eager to join implies that there is a choice.

It only mentions the known (militarized) colonies inside the Sol system.

That's for the original sources though. Robotech is different.

The problem is that the Robotech stats demonstrably don't work with the animation or the line art that's ironically used right alongside those stats. Much of it has no precedent in the actual show too... being that it was nicked from someone's fanfic rather than properly researched.

I don't believe believe so. Who works the factories? The farms? Who educates the kids?

The factories are automatic... they are called "Automated Factory Satellites", after all.

[ShadowLogan]

Assuming the "Mars Base Division" that Scott identifies himself as a member of is truly a division, 10,000-20,000 total soldiers... not all of whom are necessarily spaceborn. If AotSC is any indication, Mars Base Division makes up most of the UEEF's fleet in 2044, which would suggest the UEEF is not an especially large organization.

I don't think this follows. It also comes up short in terms of numbers based on AotSC crew/personnel counts when you do some ship counting and ignores facility staff.

With the UEEF Fleet action in 2044 at Earth we are looking at a MINIMUM overall UEEF size of at least 33,100 troops (all personnel counts are per AotSC, vessel counts are based on Ep84-5 visuals as counted by Robotech Research's estimate for UEEF reclamation forces using the largest group in a scene):
-If each Neutron-S missile has a full staffed Ikazuchi to defend it (that's approx 1,700 crew/combat each per AotSC) and they deployed at least x8 that works out to ~13,600.
-the SDF-3 was supposed to partake that's another 3,800crew (plus troops, AotSC doesn't list troop count like Garfish or Tokagawa or Ikazuchi, though maximum capacity is 120,000)
-the SDF-4 itself has 6,800crew (plus troops, AotSC doesn't list troop count like Garfish or Tokagawa or Ikazuchi. The 2E RPG puts troop count at ~28,000, and AotSC allows for a maximum capacity of 180,000)
-largest number in a scene in Ep84-5 is x4 Ikazuchi not operating with the N-S (~6.800 crew/combat)
-largest number in a scene in Ep84-5 us x21 Garfish (~100 crew/troops each, ~2100 crew/troops).
-this DOESN'T Count Sue Grahmns forces in Ep83 (as we don't know the total extent, and what it takes to transport that Syncro-Cannon platform). Sue is part of a Squadron (36th), but Scott implies a Battalion size force (both via dialogue), so their numbers would bolster any 2044 count
-this DOESN'T Assume any ground forces the UEEF inserted to Reflex Point under Harrington are 2044 arrivals given we know 3 soldiers are not, but we do know at least some are given the use of the Shadow Alpha Battloids and their destablizers and a Scott and Lancer exchange. This force is also at minimum a "battalion" in size (per dialogue), though there might be more "battalions" (Harrington calls for "first battalion", is that a unit designation like 15th or not isn't clear IMHO).
-this DOESN'T count Horizon Shuttles (known to partake in numbers, but absent in TSC IIRC, granted crew size is small which is why I'm omitting them)
-this DOESN'T count Space Station Liberty Staff (Ark Angel was used to evacuate staff IIRC, so we could be talking up to 750,000 people given the capacity of the vessel)
-this DOESN'T count Mars Base(s) Staff
-this DOESN'T count ALUCE/Moon Base(s) Staff
-this DOESN'T count Tirol garrison
-this DOESN'T count any other extra-solar facility implied to exist in canon (Reinhardt's colony comment, SSL's mention of other RFS, possibly even Sentinel world garrisons)
-this DOESN'T count Jupiter Base(s) Staff
-this DOESN'T count ships staying behind to defend any of these identified facilities or on other missions (TSC confirms with the Garfish with the SDF-3, or Grant's Shimakaze which AotSC doesn't give a crew count on), this probably isn't a majority of the fleet though based on dialogue
-this DOESN'T count any TSC or Prelude depictions that might be relevant (ex in fleet scenes we can clearly see more Ikazuchi's and Garfish operating together in a single frame than Ep84-5).

If we assume that the SDF-3 and SDF-4 are loaded to capacity that's an extra 289,400 personnel, though 100% capacity seems highly unlikely (10% seems pessimistically reasonable though). If we factor in TSC/Prelude events that occur in roughly the same time frame that would add more personnel.

[Jefffar]

It also assumes the Division was an Army Division as we understand the term. Navies also use Divisions as units and it means something radically different than what an Army means by a Division.

What the UEEF considers a Division may have nothing at all to do with what we understand as a Division.

[glitterboy2098]

a naval division, in organizational terms, is a sub-grouping of ships in a squadron (several squadrons make up a fleet).. or a group of aircraft squadrons within an airwing.

which would seem to fit Scott's position in the reclamation fleet at the start of new generation.. he was leading multi squadron level group of fighters launched from the Horizon-T's.

it could well be that the Horizon-T's were from the mars colony's military base, and just attached to a fleet that came in from outside the solar system in order to bolster it's available forces.

[Jefffar]

Which is why I think we are getting too hung up on terminology - Colony/Base/Off World Facility. We know some exist, we have specific examples, but nothing saying there aren't more or where the others are located.

[Seto Kaiba]

I don't think this follows. It also comes up short in terms of numbers based on AotSC crew/personnel counts when you do some ship counting and ignores facility staff.

With the UEEF Fleet action in 2044 at Earth we are looking at a MINIMUM overall UEEF size of at least 33,100 troops (all personnel counts are per AotSC, vessel counts are based on Ep84-5 visuals as counted by Robotech Research's estimate for UEEF reclamation forces using the largest group in a scene):

This, of course, presumes that the stats in that book are correct... which, in both the case of the "original" series and the RTSC movie, is a check the animation and line art cannot cash. The line art, visuals, etc. point to these ships being MUCH smaller than the stats assert... the Ikazuchi-class being approximately 1/8th the size asserted. For this reason, I tend to take the printed stats with several oceans worth of salt.

The problem rather conveniently goes away if one examines the correct stats instead of the fan fiction-based ones, which would put the crew complement of the 394 ship fleet in RTSC's opening scenes at around 19,800 people... and that was a mixed UEEF and Mars Base Division fleet, per AotSC. Assuming, of course, that all of those fighters were manned. They weren't in the series. The Mars Base Division force that Scott was part of would be less than 10,000 men.

It also assumes the Division was an Army Division as we understand the term. Navies also use Divisions as units and it means something radically different than what an Army means by a Division.

As most of their troops are infantry, the Army Division would be the logical assumption... the Navy Division poses an interesting problem for the argument, as the actual troop complement of a Naval Division is historically only about Brigade strength (~3,000-5,500 men). You're going the wrong direction if that's your contention.

a naval division, in organizational terms, is a sub-grouping of ships in a squadron (several squadrons make up a fleet).. or a group of aircraft squadrons within an airwing.

He doesn't refer to himself as belonging to a fleet though, he identifies as belonging to "Mars Base Division", and most of the division we see are ground forces.

Mind you, as I noted above, a Naval Division's troop complement is usually Brigade strength or less... so you're going the wrong direction size-wise.

[ShadowLogan]

This, of course, presumes that the stats in that book are correct...

Weather we view them as correct or not, they are still Official ATM and I'm not aware of anything in the core canon that conflicts with the official line directly or indirectly so see no reason to treat them as incorrect.

[eliakon]

I don't think this follows. It also comes up short in terms of numbers based on AotSC crew/personnel counts when you do some ship counting and ignores facility staff.

With the UEEF Fleet action in 2044 at Earth we are looking at a MINIMUM overall UEEF size of at least 33,100 troops (all personnel counts are per AotSC, vessel counts are based on Ep84-5 visuals as counted by Robotech Research's estimate for UEEF reclamation forces using the largest group in a scene):

This, of course, presumes that the stats in that book are correct... which, in both the case of the "original" series and the RTSC movie, is a check the animation and line art cannot cash. The line art, visuals, etc. point to these ships being MUCH smaller than the stats assert... the Ikazuchi-class being approximately 1/8th the size asserted. For this reason, I tend to take the printed stats with several oceans worth of salt.

The problem rather conveniently goes away if one examines the correct stats instead of the fan fiction-based ones, which would put the crew complement of the 394 ship fleet in RTSC's opening scenes at around 19,800 people... and that was a mixed UEEF and Mars Base Division fleet, per AotSC. Assuming, of course, that all of those fighters were manned. They weren't in the series. The Mars Base Division force that Scott was part of would be less than 10,000 men.

Ummm wait.
So you are saying that the official Art of the Shadow Chronical book is not accurate and is just a 'fan fiction'
But that your numbers from some other (unnamed source) are the 'correct stats'?

It also assumes the Division was an Army Division as we understand the term. Navies also use Divisions as units and it means something radically different than what an Army means by a Division.

As most of their troops are infantry, the Army Division would be the logical assumption... the Navy Division poses an interesting problem for the argument, as the actual troop complement of a Naval Division is historically only about Brigade strength (~3,000-5,500 men). You're going the wrong direction if that's your contention.

Errr no this is 100% wrong. Since a navy division is a grouping of ships it has no fixed troop compliment, instead the number of troops in a division is based on the number of personal assigned to the ships in the division
In WWII a division of PT boats might be 8 or 9 boats and have a total strength of less than 100 men where as a division of Aircraft Carriers could easily have four carriers, dozens of attached support ships ranging from battle ships to an organic destroyer flotilla to oilers and tenders with tens of thousands of men and several hundred aircraft!

a naval division, in organizational terms, is a sub-grouping of ships in a squadron (several squadrons make up a fleet).. or a group of aircraft squadrons within an airwing.

He doesn't refer to himself as belonging to a fleet though, he identifies as belonging to "Mars Base Division", and most of the division we see are ground forces.

Err that is the entire point.
He refers to himself by his division not his squadron or fleet...
Just like a soldier in the US military may refer to being a member of, for instance the 3/89th Cavalry Squadron. Which does not stop him from also being in the 4th brigade 10th Mountain Division. And being in the XVIII Airborne Corps which is a part of United States Army Forces Command (FORSCOM) which is a sub command of the United States Army.
Simply because someone says that they are in the 3/89 does not mean that they are not in the 10th Mountain
Just because someone says that they are in the 10th Mountain does not mean that they are not in XVII Airborne
Etc.

Mind you, as I noted above, a Naval Division's troop complement is usually Brigade strength or less... so you're going the wrong direction size-wise.

Again as a Naval Division is a sub-grouping of ships it doesn't have a fixed strength which sort of means that your 'pointed out' information is utterly and totally wrong.

[ShadowLogan]

So you are saying that the official Art of the Shadow Chronical book is not accurate and is just a 'fan fiction'
But that your numbers from some other (unnamed source) are the 'correct stats'?

He's saying the official AotSC was based on the Infopedia, which was done in part by the fan-fiction writers over at the uRRG (some of it has been changed when HG used it either at the time of posting or later, several examples exist in the Beta Infopedia file entry over the course of the 10+years it exists with the VFB-# changing, to its reference of the Condor and Conbat).

The source he uses comes from OSM information from NG arc (Mospedea). HG is known to crib from the OSM information at times (too much IMHO).

[eliakon]

So you are saying that the official Art of the Shadow Chronical book is not accurate and is just a 'fan fiction'
But that your numbers from some other (unnamed source) are the 'correct stats'?

He's saying the official AotSC was based on the Infopedia, which was done in part by the fan-fiction writers over at the uRRG (some of it has been changed when HG used it either at the time of posting or later, several examples exist in the Beta Infopedia file entry over the course of the 10+years it exists with the VFB-# changing, to its reference of the Condor and Conbat).

The source he uses comes from OSM information from NG arc (Mospedea). HG is known to crib from the OSM information at times (too much IMHO).

Which is still rather irrelevant.
What he is saying here is that the canon material that HG has decided to endorse for the current canon of ROBOTECH is some how less valid than the material from Mospedia (which is a totally different IP).
I mean I know he isn't a fan of Robotech... but the argument that the official material put out by HG is not actually official and only other non-ROBOTECH material should be used is about as backwards as it gets.
When Tommy Yune put out TAotSC book with the numbers in it that were in it he made those numbers canon. That is why this entire thread for example exists... because TAotSC is the sole source of material about the Angel and Arcangel class ships in canon. Which thus raised questions that were asked and spawned the discussion here.

[camk4evr]

So you are saying that the official Art of the Shadow Chronical book is not accurate and is just a 'fan fiction'
But that your numbers from some other (unnamed source) are the 'correct stats'?

He's saying the official AotSC was based on the Infopedia, which was done in part by the fan-fiction writers over at the uRRG (some of it has been changed when HG used it either at the time of posting or later, several examples exist in the Beta Infopedia file entry over the course of the 10+years it exists with the VFB-# changing, to its reference of the Condor and Conbat).

The source he uses comes from OSM information from NG arc (Mospedea). HG is known to crib from the OSM information at times (too much IMHO).

And that the stats in the book don't match what is seen on the screen (which can be incredibly obvious at time) or in the line art.

[glitterboy2098]

So you are saying that the official Art of the Shadow Chronical book is not accurate and is just a 'fan fiction'
But that your numbers from some other (unnamed source) are the 'correct stats'?

He's saying the official AotSC was based on the Infopedia, which was done in part by the fan-fiction writers over at the uRRG (some of it has been changed when HG used it either at the time of posting or later, several examples exist in the Beta Infopedia file entry over the course of the 10+years it exists with the VFB-# changing, to its reference of the Condor and Conbat).

The source he uses comes from OSM information from NG arc (Mospedea). HG is known to crib from the OSM information at times (too much IMHO).

And that the stats in the book don't match what is seen on the screen (which can be incredibly obvious at time) or in the line art.

the stuff on screen doesn't match the OSM data either though. on the ikazuchi alone there are something like half a dozen sizes and proportions depending on which shots you look at. none of which match the 'official size' from the MOSPEADA preproduction art.

HG's AotSC data at least is the new 'series bible' material they are using for future products in the robotech franschise, and shadow chronicles and LLA at least does conform with it.

[Seto Kaiba]

This, of course, presumes that the stats in that book are correct...

Weather we view them as correct or not, they are still Official ATM and I'm not aware of anything in the core canon that conflicts with the official line directly or indirectly so see no reason to treat them as incorrect.

Really now? As a rule, when the show's contents and production materials contradict something in the written stats that's an excellent case for considering the stats to be in error.

The sheer amount of evidence against the stats from the original production materials, the animation of the "New Generation", the Shadow Chronicles production materials and animation, and the stats for other mecha like the Alpha Fighter make the case against the UEEF ship stats hilariously straightforward. Even a basic analysis of just the Shadow Chronicles materials proves the UEEF's Ikazuchi-class and other ships are MUCH smaller than the Robotech stats claim. The Ikazuchi-class CG model in Shadow Chronicles is almost exactly OSM spec, size-wise.

The launch bays of the Shadow Chronicles version of the Ikazuchi-class are what really sells it. They're two rows of five Battlestar Galactica-style catapults, just barely wide enough for an Alpha fighter's wingspan of 8.2 meters with barely half a meter between them. That puts the actual width of the whole launch bay at 45.5m. From the side-on view in the AotSC profile, each of the launch bays is almost exactly 1/7th the total length of the ship. That means the Ikazuchi-class is 318.5m long, not 608m. Since the launch bays are a shared feature with other UEEF ships, that also diminishes the size of every ship that uses them... conveniently they provided us with a size comparison in AotSC, which helps matters immensely. If the Ikazuchi-class is only approximately 320m, that puts the Garfish-class at 90m (almost exactly its OSM size), the Shimakaze-class is 221.5m, the SDF-3 is 499m, and the SDF-4 is 554m. Much, MUCH smaller than what those stats claim, and all from purely HG-generated material... unless of course you're suggesting the alternative view, that every character is really a 4m tall giant and the Alpha's wingspan is really 16.4m+.

And that the stats in the book don't match what is seen on the screen (which can be incredibly obvious at time) or in the line art.

This is one of those incredibly obvious ones... HG practically served everything needed to refute the stats in AotSC on a silver platter in AotSC itself.

the stuff on screen doesn't match the OSM data either though. on the ikazuchi alone there are something like half a dozen sizes and proportions depending on which shots you look at. none of which match the 'official size' from the MOSPEADA preproduction art.

HG's AotSC data at least is the new 'series bible' material they are using for future products in the robotech franschise, and shadow chronicles and LLA at least does conform with it.

As I just demonstrated, they can be disproven without using one iota of OSM information.

The simple, honest fact of the matter is that the ship stats are demonstrably incorrect and DR MOVIE animated these ships at almost exactly their OSM sizes thanks to Harmony Gold's own original design changes.

The argument by the uRRG that the ships were presented at inconsistent sizes in the original animation is only partly valid... there is some variation due to the hand-drawn nature of the project, but it's far more consistent than their claims make it out to be and pretty damned close to the mechanical designer's numbers in all cases. The uRRG is, after all, noteworthy for being long on rhetoric and quite short on research.

[eliakon]

This, of course, presumes that the stats in that book are correct...

Weather we view them as correct or not, they are still Official ATM and I'm not aware of anything in the core canon that conflicts with the official line directly or indirectly so see no reason to treat them as incorrect.

Really now? As a rule, when the show's contents and production materials contradict something in the written stats that's an excellent case for considering the stats to be in error.

The sheer amount of evidence against the stats from the original production materials, the animation of the "New Generation", the Shadow Chronicles production materials and animation, and the stats for other mecha like the Alpha Fighter make the case against the UEEF ship stats hilariously straightforward. Even a basic analysis of just the Shadow Chronicles materials proves the UEEF's Ikazuchi-class and other ships are MUCH smaller than the Robotech stats claim. The Ikazuchi-class CG model in Shadow Chronicles is almost exactly OSM spec, size-wise.

The launch bays of the Shadow Chronicles version of the Ikazuchi-class are what really sells it. They're two rows of five Battlestar Galactica-style catapults, just barely wide enough for an Alpha fighter's wingspan of 8.2 meters with barely half a meter between them. That puts the actual width of the whole launch bay at 45.5m. From the side-on view in the AotSC profile, each of the launch bays is almost exactly 1/7th the total length of the ship. That means the Ikazuchi-class is 318.5m long, not 608m. Since the launch bays are a shared feature with other UEEF ships, that also diminishes the size of every ship that uses them... conveniently they provided us with a size comparison in AotSC, which helps matters immensely. If the Ikazuchi-class is only approximately 320m, that puts the Garfish-class at 90m (almost exactly its OSM size), the Shimakaze-class is 221.5m, the SDF-3 is 499m, and the SDF-4 is 554m. Much, MUCH smaller than what those stats claim, and all from purely HG-generated material... unless of course you're suggesting the alternative view, that every character is really a 4m tall giant and the Alpha's wingspan is really 16.4m+.

And that the stats in the book don't match what is seen on the screen (which can be incredibly obvious at time) or in the line art.

This is one of those incredibly obvious ones... HG practically served everything needed to refute the stats in AotSC on a silver platter in AotSC itself.

the stuff on screen doesn't match the OSM data either though. on the ikazuchi alone there are something like half a dozen sizes and proportions depending on which shots you look at. none of which match the 'official size' from the MOSPEADA preproduction art.

HG's AotSC data at least is the new 'series bible' material they are using for future products in the robotech franschise, and shadow chronicles and LLA at least does conform with it.

As I just demonstrated, they can be disproven without using one iota of OSM information.

The simple, honest fact of the matter is that the ship stats are demonstrably incorrect and DR MOVIE animated these ships at almost exactly their OSM sizes thanks to Harmony Gold's own original design changes.

The argument by the uRRG that the ships were presented at inconsistent sizes in the original animation is only partly valid... there is some variation due to the hand-drawn nature of the project, but it's far more consistent than their claims make it out to be and pretty damned close to the mechanical designer's numbers in all cases. The uRRG is, after all, noteworthy for being long on rhetoric and quite short on research.

And any of this proves that the ships have the same impossibly tiny crews as in the OSM?
Setting aside the scale question (Because frankly I am not particularly qualified to measure bays and then scale ships off that or the like) the animation does not say that there is no crew on the ships, there is (as far as I am aware of) no ROBOTECH line art that claims that they have small crews etc...
Thus regardless of the ships size that does not mean that their crews suddenly vanish.
Just because the ships in Mospedia had no crew doesn't mean that the ships in ROBOTECH have no crew.
Mospedia was not about an interstellar navy sending people back to retake the home world. Mospeida was about the Mars Colony trying to retake Earth. Different setting, thus it will have different assumptions. If your "Ships" are basically the equivalent of a WWII landing craft then your going to have a much different crew set up than if your Ships are actual space ships.
Just like the military in the OSM for the Masters Saga was the defense force for a small colony world out in the middle of nowhere... which has a much different background assumption than if it is suddenly the defense force for the entire Earth.

[ShadowLogan]

Really now? As a rule, when the show's contents and production materials contradict something in the written stats that's an excellent case for considering the stats to be in error.

I agree with this in principle, I've argued in the past concerning the Alpha & VF-1 (propulsion) and Logan (effectiveness) that the depictions on screen do not match up with HG's claims with you arguing for the party (HG) line (written material). However I am not using the listed dimesnion vs the depictions on screen to determine the population, I am using their listed capacity numbers. In which case it is safe to assume we don't see everyone on ship (under normal conditions, the "Ghost Town" Garfish is likely not normal operating conditions), nor is there any dialogue specifically connecting a ship to a given population size.

By their written population stats (AotSC/Infopedia), and using basic volume (simple dimensions, I know that there will be wasted empty space being given over):
-Ikazuchi by OSM size (never mind the larger size AotSC claims) is ~8.286 million cubic meters
-144 Alpha Fighters (F Mode for maximum volume, AotSC) would use 55,674 cubic meters
-440 Beta Fighters (F Mode with wings at max. sweep, technically G mode uses more volume, AotSC) for the additional mecha (since that is the specific example used as an option) would use ~507,678 cubic meters
-1,717 listed crew/troops (additional troops are also implied as possible) assuming a 1,000m^3 volume is needed for each would need 1,717,000 cubic meters. And I'll point out that 1,000m^3 volume is just a bit more than the entire ISS habitable volume (regular operations are with 3-6 after the shuttle retired, which could push another 6 into it) which has x3-x10 more than previous inhabited space stations that housed 2-6 member crews. So 1,000m^3 might be to overly generous.

So the listed troop/hardware uses up a total of 2,280,353 cubic meters out of a possible 8,286,432 cubic meters using the OSM dimensions for the ship, leaving ~6,000,000 cubic meters of "free space" to be used for other things (ship systems, storage, "empty" negative space, etc). And if the mecha use a more storage efficient configuration and/or reduced volume allocated per person that would free up even more space to give over to other roles.

Tthere is no reason to assume the various capacity stats are in error based on the animation and dialogue. You have a case for the physical dimensions of said vessels only, but not their capacity stats.

[Seto Kaiba]

I agree with this in principle, I've argued in the past concerning the Alpha & VF-1 (propulsion) and Logan (effectiveness) that the depictions on screen do not match up with HG's claims with you arguing for the party (HG) line (written material).

The difference between this and those is that the ship scale problem can be demonstrated to be factually true both with and without recourse to the OSM, and there's no interpretation-dependent rationalizing behind it or ways which that could be dismissed with a trope like Artistic License Physics and Conveniently Close Planet in the Alpha's flight performance case.

Those depend on interpretation and theorizing... this is a clear-cut case of the Robotech stats and animation consistently not singing from the same psalter.

By their written population stats (AotSC/Infopedia), and using basic volume (simple dimensions, I know that there will be wasted empty space being given over):
-Ikazuchi by OSM size (never mind the larger size AotSC claims) is ~8.286 million cubic meters

You've forgotten your Square-Cubed Law, man... this ship isn't simply half as long, it's approximately halved in all dimensions.

That gives us 318.5m x 77m x 88.5m... that's 2.17 million cubic meters, not 8.286.

Of course, that isn't the only problem with your estimate. Those numbers are for the maximum cross-section of the ship (not counting the tailfins), which since there's that boxy bit amidships on the ventral hull and a bridge tower on top sticking up over the rest of the hull, so the actual volume is smaller even than that. Much smaller, in fact, since we're also assuming a perfectly rectilinear hull profile in this back-of-the-envelope math, and as we all know, those Ikazuchi-class ships have an hourglass-shaped front profile. At the end of the day, a fair midrange estimate is going to subtract somewhere between 1/2 and 2/3 of the estimated rectilinear volume, leaving us with a ship that's somewhere between 724,000 cubic meters and 1.085 million.

So, if we assume the more generous of the two estimates, your listed troops/hardware requires 210% of the total available internal volume of the ship... and that's before factoring in things like the space allocated to the ship's systems, storage for shipboard supplies and for the troops it's carrying, etc.

[ShadowLogan]

You've forgotten your Square-Cubed Law, man... this ship isn't simply half as long, it's approximately halved in all dimensions.

No actually I setup the spreedsheet incorrectly (this was an old spreedsheet that was already setup with most of the data, did not double check the formulas), that's my bad though for not double checking the formulas.

I agree that there are issues with the approach, what with all of the objects not being a simplistic box. However there are ways to free up volume space:
-the Alpha Fighters are not assumed to be in a volume saving configuration (G, uses slightly less than B though we know they are shown in B-mode)
-the Beta Fighters are not assumed to be in a volume saving configuration (F, with wings stowed in forearms), plus we aren't even sure that all 440 mecha ARE Beta Fighters, just that the unit is used as an example (it could also be an upper size limit of what can actually fit individually but are not necessarily all Beta Fighters)
-I gave the crew/troops MUCH more room than I needed to, based on real platforms one could argue that the value could be around 10m^3 per person (based on US Shuttle, w/o pressurized Spacehab module), though longer duration examples would seem to push for more volume (ISS has something like ~150m^3 per person on a 6 person crew, Skylab is ~117m^3, Salyut/Mir would be more than the shuttle, but less than ISS/Skylab).

If we look at minimum volume use for the mecha, and reduce the crew volume somewhat:
-144 Alpha (G) takes up ~31,892.9m^3 (B mode would be ~32,016.6m^3)
-440 Beta (F, stowed wings) takes up 221,295.8m^3
-1717 crew/troops each needing 125m^3 of volume, uses up 214,625m^3.
-for a grand total of ~467,813.7m^3 (467,937.4m^3 assuming B mode Alphas instead of G)

That leaves ~1.6million m^3 (even if we assume Alpha B instead of G) of space to give over to ship systems, stores, open areas and empty voided space that was included due to the actual irregular shape from a simplified ~2million cubic meter brick. Even if we go with your estimates to take into account the void space, there would still be plenty of room to work with, and the crew volume has some margin to come down further if need be.

[Seto Kaiba]

I agree that there are issues with the approach, what with all of the objects not being a simplistic box. However there are ways to free up volume space:

There's a much more basic problem you're missing here...

If the Ikazuchi-class is carrying so many soldiers, how do they get off the ship?

With the correct-to-animation and correct-to-OSM size of approximately 318m, the "docking bay for oversized craft" located amidships (which did not actually exist in the original design) is only about 30m wide at its widest and 12m high. No known model of troop transport or dropship in Robotech is small enough to fit into that area. There's no way for those troops to deploy into the combat area.

It does, at least, explain how the Alpha-Beta combiners for squadron leaders launch, though the size of the ship's aircraft complement seems to have been cut to about half of the OSM's 144 fighter complement. They appear to be organized into 6-man squads based on the RTSC footage, which would suggest the actual fighter complement is a mere 72 aircraft (84 if you count the Betas separately), with each bay holding two squads worth of grunts and the leaders launching separately from the oversized bay.

[eliakon]

I agree that there are issues with the approach, what with all of the objects not being a simplistic box. However there are ways to free up volume space:

There's a much more basic problem you're missing here...

If the Ikazuchi-class is carrying so many soldiers, how do they get off the ship?

With the correct-to-animation and correct-to-OSM size of approximately 318m, the "docking bay for oversized craft" located amidships (which did not actually exist in the original design) is only about 30m wide at its widest and 12m high. No known model of troop transport or dropship in Robotech is small enough to fit into that area. There's no way for those troops to deploy into the combat area.

It does, at least, explain how the Alpha-Beta combiners for squadron leaders launch, though the size of the ship's aircraft complement seems to have been cut to about half of the OSM's 144 fighter complement. They appear to be organized into 6-man squads based on the RTSC footage, which would suggest the actual fighter complement is a mere 72 aircraft (84 if you count the Betas separately), with each bay holding two squads worth of grunts and the leaders launching separately from the oversized bay.

Why are we assuming that the crew would get off?
The crew of the USS Essex in WWII had
2,600 Officers and Enlisted
and had a length of 872' with a beam of 142' and a draft of 34'2" total
Or put another way she is a token the size and around a third of the crew...
So why would we assume that a carrier ship that is scaled up to be two or three times the max size in every way (and those numbers I used count the flight deck for length and beam...)
is going to have a crew that is radically SMALLER?

[glitterboy2098]

as far as ground troops getting off..

first, these are antigravity equipped ships. they can LAND and the troops march off. like a Landing ship, Tank only not restricted to just the coastlines.

second, they could enter the atmosphere (with their antigravity) and while still flying, drop troops from midair.. cyclone equipped troops can use their armor mode's hover abilities to control their descent speed and maneuver for landing. non-cyclone troops can use jetpacks (which the ASC had and the UEEF should certainly have) or even just parachutes. the non-VF mecha the UEEF is seen using in the show and in the invasion comic (the Condor battloid) is flight capable and could airdrop as well. mecha without flight capability can still use a combination of rockets and parachutes to be airdropped, much like how the miltiary airdrops vehicles in real life (which for some nations even include airdropping tanks!)

Third, the ship could enter the edge of the atmosphere and drop its mecha compliment from low orbit. while cyclone troops would face much more danger in such methods, their hover capabilities make them suited to such extreme HALO jumps.. particularly if they are equipped with conventional parachutes to slow their initial fall, or carry additional protoculture fuel canisters to offset the hard use of running the thrusters the entire way down. Mecha like the Condor can be orbitally dropped quite easily without near as many issues. an orbital drop is likely to result in a wider dispersal of the troops on the ground, but is still and option. (and i should point out, it is just this sort of maneuver we see the condors of Lancer's reclamation fleet attempting, both in the flashback in the show, and in the Invasion comic. it does not go well for them, not because the idea is not sound, but because they drastically underestimated the size of the enemy force and were expecting not to encounter them in orbit. the ships were lost, but a lot of troops did manage to reach the ground.. a lot more than we see with Scott's reclamation fleet, actually.)

fourth, once the UEEF has orbital superiority (not something they had much in the show i'll grant you), Horizon-T's could dock their pods with ikazuchi's to take on loads of troops and supplies. much like how Higgin's Boats were loaded during WW2 by mooring them alongside a transport ship and troops climbing into them or vehicles loaded into them by cranes. only with the pods, you could dock them to the loading bay on the bottom, and just walk or drive inside through the hatch.


frankly a better question is "if there is no ground troops, and only two hundred fighters per ship how the hell did they plan to retake an entire planet or take down the massive reflex point hive complex?"



and i question your claim the amidships hanger is only 30 meters wide and 12 meters tall. the bulge where it is located comprises 1/11th the length of the Ikazuchi (Shadow chronicles version, more like 1/9th on the Show version but the actual size is the same as the tSC ship is just longer), which at 702 meters long, makes it 63.8 meters wide. and it is approximately 1/2 the height of the ship, which at 177 meters makes it 88.5 meters tall. the ships width is 154 meters, which given the bulge is the widest point?

even knocking a meter or two off the height and width to accommodate hull thickness and such, there is plenty of room for a Horizon-T (at 68.3 meters wide, 18.3 tall, and 60.3 meters long) or the southern cross's Pegasus shuttle (23.3m x 32.2m x 77.7m) or Roc shuttle (18.3m x 25.3m x 80.2 m).

whether a Horizon-t can dock would depend on where the hatch is.. if it is on the sides, unless the Horizon-T comes in sideways it wouldn't fit (unless it has foldable wings of some sort.. which honestly would make a lot of sense), but if it is in the bottom 'star destroyer' style? no problem. you could even dock two at a time, side by side. or perhaps the hanger is offset slightly, with an airlock, so you have two or three stacked on top of each other at different levels, which then are shifted sideways and 'dropped' down through the exit hatch ala the UD-4L Dropship in aliens.. "we're on an Express elevator to hell, Going down!"

[ShadowLogan]

If the Ikazuchi-class is carrying so many soldiers, how do they get off the ship?

How do they get off the ship? That is actually provided for us in official RT material:
-"The front of the vessel features a heavily armored bow that can be used to ram enemy ships and twin bay doors for rapid frontal deployment." emphasis mine from AotSC pg108 Ikazuchi Entry (1st Paragraph, last sentence). The Front of the Ikazuchi resembles the front of the Crusader Drop ships from the SDF-3, both have that multi-section garage door look, and in Prelude we see the feature in an open and close position (no transition) for the Crusader (Prelude Chapter 4 of the graphic novel "title page", also the last page of Chapter 3 confirms this so it isn't just "cover art").
-There might even be other hatches to use on the sides depicted in the animation (the way the Ikazuchi is drawn there do appear to be what could be 4 doors on either side just before the nose in a 2x2 configuration, HG could for RT label them as hatches, seen in both TSC and NG arc).
-"Horizont dropships and other mecha launch from the hangars amidships on the three lowest decks."-Ikazuchi Entry from RT.com. A Horizon-T (infopedia, not the -V from AotSC) can fit given its dimensions of 62m long x 67m wide x 21m tall. Which would allow it to fit even at OSM size, likely looking at the bottom deck only for the Horizon-T with other (smaller) mecha launching from the two above.

Why are we assuming that the crew would get off?
The crew of the USS Essex in WWII had
2,600 Officers and Enlisted
and had a length of 872' with a beam of 142' and a draft of 34'2" total
Or put another way she is a token the size and around a third of the crew...
So why would we assume that a carrier ship that is scaled up to be two or three times the max size in every way (and those numbers I used count the flight deck for length and beam...)
is going to have a crew that is radically SMALLER?

So we are all using the same units: USS Essex is 266m long x 45m tall x 10m. It carried 90-100 WWII era aircraft.

As to why the crew size would be smaller on a spacecraft than terrestrial naval vessel. Life Support Logistics and the larger mecha complement (~584 mecha) would push for a smaller crew size even if the ship is bigger.

[glitterboy2098]

actually a larger vehicle compliment would require larger crew, not less. since you would need much larger maintenance and logistical sections to support them.

this is one of the reasons why the the nimitz class (332.8m long, 76.8m wide, 73.1 meters tall, carries 85-90 modern jets/helicopters) requires a crew of 5,000+, about half and half crew and airwing. one of the other reasons is that a larger, more advanced vessel generally also requires a larger crew to operate its systems and maintain them. and that as those crew sections expand, the supporting ones like galley staff, medical, etc expand in kind.

an Ikazuchi is roughly 2x longer, 2x wider, 3x taller than a nimitz. Or about six to eight times larger. and it carries roughly four times the vehicle compliment. even with advances in automation you aren't going to be able to reduce things to where less than a thousand people can operate and maintain the ship AND all of those advanced mecha. i can see a compliment in the 5000-6000 people range, but a tenth that? hell no.


HG's official stats give it a crew of around 1200 people and a airwing and ground forces compliment of around 6000. it works, though it leaves the crew side a bit understaffed for things like damage control when the onboard ground troops have deployed.

[ShadowLogan]

actually a larger vehicle compliment would require larger crew, not less. since you would need much larger maintenance and logistical sections to support them.

Larger yes, but not necessarily as large as one would expect. The ship has to be able to support those people for a given period of time providing them with ~5kg of life support consumables per day (recycling can meet some of it) for oxygen/water/food, and the water requirement is for the body itself not other uses (cooking, hygine, etc). All of the food/air/water has to be brought with it (naval vessels don't have to bring their own water or air, they can make it from the environment). Plus you have to manage the heat those bodies will generate (what with the vacuum of space being poor for heat transfer). That will add up, putting pressure to reduce the crew/troop capacity for a mission duration of a specified length (how long are these ships to operate between resupply?), since regardless of role each person will have the same basic requirements to be met.

We have some indication though that from a maintenance perspective that UEEF technology may not be as labor intensive either given Lunk was the prime mechanic for 3 Alphas, 1 Beta, 4 Cyclones, and a jeep. Sure he had some help available if he needed it, but indications are he did most of the work. IIRC Scott's Horizon-T A/B work crew was only one guy in Ep61. Of course they could also use some automation to releve the work load, something we know they have the technical capability for (Golem GMP bot, Shadow Drone, Ghost Drone, Automated Vending Machines (could handle routine stuff), Janice-I) even if we lack examples for this role.

[ShadowLogan]

@Seto
I have reviewed the documentation in AotSC for the Ikazuchi's depicted size, along with the Alpha. The TSC depiction of the Ikazuchi actually is closer to what AotSC states than the OSM. It isn't a perfect match mind you, but it does appear that AotSC/Infopedia could be correct FOR TSC's depiction, but not NGs*.

Per TSC the Alpha Quck Launch Bays have been altered from their NG depiction and appear to be configured to launch Alphas in F mode as opposed to B mode. TSC has 5x2 launch tubes per bay, NG had 6x4 launch racks.

5 launch tubes at 9meter diameter for the Alpha (wingspan is 8.2m, assuming minimal margin) for a quick launch bay doors, I get ~12 running the length of ship (including engine shield and antenna, I measured on pg108: 0.7cm doors vs 8.5cm length = ~12, I used 12 instead of the 12.# below):
-if the gaps between the tubes is ZERO the diameter of the tube, and 4 gaps (shown) each QLB is then 45m long for an implied ship length of ~540meters
-if the gaps between the tubes are 1/2 the diameter of the tube, and 4 gaps (shown) each QLB is then 63m long for an implied ship length of ~756meters
-if the gaps between the tubes are 1/3 the diameter of the tube, and 4 gaps (shown) each QLB is then 57m long for an implied ship length of ~684meters

If we remove the margin on the Alpha wings in the tube:
-if the gaps between the tubes is ZERO the diameter of the tube, and 4 gaps (shown) each QLB is then 41m long for an implied ship length of ~492meters
-if the gaps between the tubes are 1/2 the diameter of the tube, and 4 gaps (shown) each QLB is then 57.4m long for an implied ship length of ~688.8meters
-if the gaps between the tubes are 1/3 the diameter of the tube, and 4 gaps (shown) each QLB is then 51.9m long for an implied ship length of ~623.2meters

Now in NG the Ikazuchi is shown with a 6x4 rank of Alpha Battloids. That's roughly 29m long bays. At a factor of 12 ratio: ~348m long using pg108's lineart in AotSC.

*So either the Ikazuchi comes in different sizes, or there are actually two separate classes that are called Ikazuchi (that happen to look like each other for whatever reason).

[Tiree]

Maybe Ikazuchi-F and Ikazuchi-B models. I can see the ships being rather modular and allowing for different load-outs based on mission parameters. The NG version was meant for more ground based support, while the ones in TSC are meant for air superiority.

It could also be as something as simple: Built in different shipyards with modifications based on what was available at the shipyard. Kind of like the old Mars versus Jupiter designs of Alpha fighters.

[glitterboy2098]

I'm personally an advocate of two sizes/classes. The only difference in dimensions appears to be the extra ~100 meters of length the shadow chronicles version has, which visually appears to be mostly the bow.

The shorter version would be a LST build, with quick launch battloid bays for defense during landing and planetary assualt, and presumably more internal space set aside for ground troops and their logistics.

The longer version being a carrier, with the launch tubes, and more internal space given over to hanger decks (likely explaining the extra length) the cutout, which is the most notable visual difference, appears to be a protected landing platform, with mecha scale hatches on each side. Likely used for combat landings when the bow hanger doors can't be opened safely. During non combat ops it would likely support the CAP, and provide a 2nd landing spot alongsdide the bow doors.

[Seto Kaiba]

Sorry for the delay in replying, gents... it's been absolutely bonkers out here for the past few days.

as far as ground troops getting off..

All good ideas, IMO... though the first three seem inconsistent with the depictions of the UEEF's typical approach to planetary assault operations.

They seem to be quite fond of having their ships stand off in orbit for orbit-to-surface bombardment and sending down dropships and independent fighters.

and i question your claim the amidships hanger is only 30 meters wide and 12 meters tall. the bulge where it is located comprises 1/11th the length of the Ikazuchi (Shadow chronicles version, more like 1/9th on the Show version but the actual size is the same as the tSC ship is just longer), which at 702 meters long, makes it 63.8 meters wide. and it is approximately 1/2 the height of the ship, which at 177 meters makes it 88.5 meters tall. the ships width is 154 meters, which given the bulge is the widest point?

The CG model in the film doesn't support that size... which is why, for the last several posts, ShadowLogan and I have been mulling over the implications of the Ikazuchi-class being much smaller than indicated. If the ship were as big as the stats say it is, no problems exist with the amidships hangar deck... but the Alpha fighters would have to be eight times their official size, and the crew would all have to be four meter tall giants, which of course doesn't quite work.

If the Ikazuchi-class is carrying so many soldiers, how do they get off the ship?

How do they get off the ship? That is actually provided for us in official RT material:
-"The front of the vessel features a heavily armored bow that can be used to ram enemy ships and twin bay doors for rapid frontal deployment."

Whether that door actually exists is another matter entirely... it's never been depicted, its existence would kind of logically preclude the practicality of the launch bays (either version), and OSM didn't have any such feature. Sufficed to say, I don't entirely buy it, especially in light of the ship not having a barrier system and being so fragile that blunt Invid claws and low-velocity collisions can cause massive gaping hull breaches. It doesn't seem like a ship suited to ramming, especially as it has no engines oriented for reversing. (The Star Trek problem of how do you stop when all of your engines are pointing in the same direction...)

As to why the crew size would be smaller on a spacecraft than terrestrial naval vessel. Life Support Logistics and the larger mecha complement (~584 mecha) would push for a smaller crew size even if the ship is bigger.

One other reason, which proves plot-critical to the Shadow Chronicles OVA but was also demonstrated quite readily in the OSM/series... these ships are heavily automated, to such an extent that even the largest ships can be operated by barely enough people to form a baseball team. Modern warships have crews of thousands because they NEED crews that huge to maintain and operate their various systems, which often require significant manual labor. Large warships like aircraft carriers normally require a bridge crew of dozens... the typical bridge crew of a UEEF warship in RTSC or New Generation-era Robotech is just seven (the SDF-4 and Icarus) counting the captain. The Garfish-class bridge in the series only seats four, including the captain.

@Seto
I have reviewed the documentation in AotSC for the Ikazuchi's depicted size, along with the Alpha. The TSC depiction of the Ikazuchi actually is closer to what AotSC states than the OSM. It isn't a perfect match mind you, but it does appear that AotSC/Infopedia could be correct FOR TSC's depiction, but not NGs*.

I've reviewed my own math and checked a few other things, and I did make a slight upwards adjustment but not much of one.

We know, from the visuals of the OVA, that the Ikazuchi-class's launch bays have replaced the 6*4 racks of battloids with ten launch tubes for fighter mode instead, and that each is just barely wide enough to permit the egress of an Alpha fighter. I redid my measurements digitally and came up with approximately 7.25 launch bays worth of length to the ship (fins excluded), as I had not previously counted that bulge at the back of the engine section. Another thing I had to revise was the between-tube padding. The outermost tubes, based on the visual, directly butt up against the sides of the launch bay rather than having free space on that side, which shrinks the footprint of the bay as well.

The new wrinkle I discovered while I was being incredibly bored in a doctor's waiting room this morning is that the CG model Alpha does not match the proportions given in stats for either the OSM or the Robotech version. The OSM proportions should give the aircraft a length to width ratio of 1.6 to 1 (10.25m long, 6.4m wingspan). The Robotech proportions are 1.25 to 1 (10.25m long and 8.2m wingspan). The CG model's proportions are approximately 1.422 to 1, giving the RTSC Alpha Fighter CG model a wingspan of 7.2m, not 8.2. It's closer to the OSM size than RT's, but only by about 20cm. (In so doing, I also noticed they changed the proportions of the aircraft's wings, being more of a cropped delta than the original show's cranked arrow.)

Here's how the numbers pan out under the various assumptions of the Alpha's size:

For the OSM wingspan of 6.4m and RTSC version of the ship
The five tubes, being approximately 6.5m wide each, are spaced by four pillars of approximately 3/4 of a meter to 1 meter in width, but not on the outside edge. This gives the interior of the bay an approximate width of 36.5m, and the exterior dimension of approximately 42m. This gives the ship, which is approximately 7 1/4 bays long in the CG model side view (measured from the exterior corner of the hexagonal losenge-shaped bay), a length of approximately 304.5m if one doesn't count the various antennae and fins which the RT stats list separately. This is almost bang-on the OSM size.

u]For the CG model's proportional wingspan and RTSC version of the ship[/u]
The five tubes are approximately 7.3m wide in this, and spaced by four pillars of approximately a meter in width between bays. The interior width of the bay space is now 40.5m, and the exterior is approximately 46m at its widest extent. That puts the total length of the ship at around 333.6m long.

For the RT stats wingspan and the RTSC version of the ship
The five tubes are approximately 8.3m wide, same spacing as above. That puts the interior width of the bay at ~45.5m, and the exterior at 51m, for a total length of 370m.

All of that is a LONG way from the RT stats size for the ship of over 600m.

[eliakon]

As to why the crew size would be smaller on a spacecraft than terrestrial naval vessel. Life Support Logistics and the larger mecha complement (~584 mecha) would push for a smaller crew size even if the ship is bigger.

One other reason, which proves plot-critical to the Shadow Chronicles OVA but was also demonstrated quite readily in the OSM/series... these ships are heavily automated, to such an extent that even the largest ships can be operated by barely enough people to form a baseball team. Modern warships have crews of thousands because they NEED crews that huge to maintain and operate their various systems, which often require significant manual labor. Large warships like aircraft carriers normally require a bridge crew of dozens... the typical bridge crew of a UEEF warship in RTSC or New Generation-era Robotech is just seven (the SDF-4 and Icarus) counting the captain. The Garfish-class bridge in the series only seats four, including the captain.

Why are we assuming that the bridge crew is the entire crew?
I mean we see the SDF-1 has a Bridge crew of 5...
...but no one can seriously suggest that it only has "a couple dozen total crew"
After all those crews of thousands on modern ships? They don't all sit on the Bridge...
They are the crew that man the weapons, and the instruments below decks, and run the engines, and the cooks, and the barbers, and the medics, and the quartermasters, and the mechanics, and the engineers, and the fuel handlers, and the loaders, and the...
There are a lot of 'unsexy' jobs that have to be done on ships that don't get a lot of screen time. Heck the only time that these crew usually get seen in space shows is when they are dying when a compartment is breached or something. Doesn't mean they don't exist.

As for the claim that there is anything in the show that 'proves' that they are automated...
...I would ask where that proof is? Because all we see is that there are some small bridges.

[glitterboy2098]

a nimitz class carrier (crew 5000+) has a bridge crew of about half a dozen people, plus another dozen in the CIC. (the bridge is just for steering and navigation, and basic comms related to that role. CIC is where the sensor and tactical data is processed for use.)

this does not change the fact you need a crew.

further, in shadow chronicles, the icarus's bridge crew transfers to the Ark Angel. then they tell us via dialog that they are transferring the crew of the icarus to the ark angel. it takes a lengthy time to transfer the icarus's crew. during this time the bridge crew is already present, and their fighter pilots are all outside fighting the haydonites in their fighters. and then a skeleton crew is seen taking the Icarus out after the ark angel during the escape.

so if ships are just bridge crew and pilots.. who the hell was transferring after the pilots were engaged and the bridge crew present? and who the hell was flying the Icarus?

clearly the ship had a sizeable crew that had to be moved.


i can buy that the factory sat has a lot of automation, so that it doesn't need millions of people to operate. of course, this would mean that production is automated as well, which would mean that there is no way in hell it takes multiple years to make a ship there.


just because we do not see non-bridge crews on screen does not mean they are not there.

[ShadowLogan]

Whether that door actually exists is another matter entirely... it's never been depicted, its existence would kind of logically preclude the practicality of the launch bays (either version), and OSM didn't have any such feature. Sufficed to say, I don't entirely buy it, especially in light of the ship not having a barrier system and being so fragile that blunt Invid claws and low-velocity collisions can cause massive gaping hull breaches. It doesn't seem like a ship suited to ramming, especially as it has no engines oriented for reversing. (The Star Trek problem of how do you stop when all of your engines are pointing in the same direction...)

I can agree that the doors aren't depicted in use, but much like the inclusion of FTL systems to the Ikazuchi, Izumo, and Garfish they could fall under the heading of changes for the RT setting.

If the front really contains doors, and I don't see a reason for it not to if it is also supposed to have those extra units for the RT setting. The QUICK Launch Bays would still be practical given they are supposed to allow them to put out 144 mecha quickly, possibly much quicker than trying to launch the same number from the forward bays. Their lack of depiction could indicate the 440 is slanted toward ground troops (which could be of limited value in space). The TSC side-side tunnel feature would be practical for oversize objects that might not work with the forward hangar (though this is not how it is depicted being used). (and if we are assuming structures on different ships are identical because of the QLB, then they similar nature of the Ikazuchi nose doors to the Crusader would be applicable).

We know that the UEDF and UEEF could build a ship capable of ramming attacks (Tokagawa, Tri-star, and Garfish (shown spiked into a Hive in Invasion Comics)) and neither had a visible barrier system like the SDF-1 used for the Daedalus (which probably wasn't designed with ramming in mind making the barrier more important). That the hull is fragile overall does not preclude the it from being able to handle the forces involved. As for the engine orientation either: they are expected to go all the way through OR it is a last ditch maneuver OR the under carriage engines/gravity-control-system is used to pull them out OR the ram is more of a glancing blow than full on entry (ala Daedalus).

One other reason, which proves plot-critical to the Shadow Chronicles OVA but was also demonstrated quite readily in the OSM/series... these ships are heavily automated, to such an extent that even the largest ships can be operated by barely enough people to form a baseball team. Modern warships have crews of thousands because they NEED crews that huge to maintain and operate their various systems, which often require significant manual labor. Large warships like aircraft carriers normally require a bridge crew of dozens... the typical bridge crew of a UEEF warship in RTSC or New Generation-era Robotech is just seven (the SDF-4 and Icarus) counting the captain. The Garfish-class bridge in the series only seats four, including the captain.

I'm not sure about the level automation claimied, I can agree that there is evidence that maintenance could be lighter than expected based on mecha and even automation to reduce workloads. But if we look at the SDF-1 for example, we only see the main bridge crew (6), PPB operators (3), and a handful of engineers which all fall short of the 3500 crewman per the Infopedia (and a few other ships), and we certainly don't see enough people to account for its 1500member airgroup or 11000troops. So just because we are shown only a bridge crew on the ship would not preclude existence of personnel elsewhere on the ship with other duties that aren't relevant for story to be depicted.

The real question though is if you can fit and support the listed people (regardless of OSM dimensions or Infopedia/AotSC) and what it tells us about the size of the UEEF's population. Because if you can't fit the number of people or support them...

I redid my measurements digitally and came up with approximately 7.25 launch bays worth of length to the ship (fins excluded), as I had not previously counted that bulge at the back of the engine section. Another thing I had to revise was the between-tube padding. The outermost tubes, based on the visual, directly butt up against the sides of the launch bay rather than having free space on that side, which shrinks the footprint of the bay as well.

Which is a far cry from the ~12 launch bays worth of length I get from the engine shield cover to the antenna, if I exclude the shield and antenna I still end up with ~10.7 launch bays to the side of the ship using the image on pg108 (AotSC, which is a profile shot, using Prelude's ships table at the end of the GN I get a slightly smaller number, but I can't identify the forward antenna either). I am also just measuring the doors and not the frame around them, and I had already noted that the 5 bays run upto the edge of the frame, hence the 4 gaps between the 5 tubes.

The tube gap though does not appear to be 1m between hexagons at their minimal distance apart. Each gap by all indications is a over a meter in distance regardless of which Alpha wingspan I use based on perspective shots. (do you have a timecode handy that shows the QLBs opened and headon in TSC and not distorted due to perspective?). I took a couple of measurements from a single perspective shot and have an average of ratio of ~0.2 (to minimize perspective distortion I averaged them), which puts the gap at 1.3-1.6m, though because of perspective the angle the distance should be longer than it appears in those shots.

[glitterboy2098]

.Bow doors and a ram reinforced prow suggests that 'ram and board tactics' similar to the Daedalus attack were planned. Given then size disparity between human and zentraedi ships, much less the large city ships, this would not be too surprising. It would also help explain the relative lack of long range direct fire weaponry on most human ships prior to shadow tech.

Zentraedi ships are designed for long range slugging matches. Human ships are meant to close rapidly under cover of missiles and fighters, and possibly music/future attacks, to engage up close and board and possibly capture the enemy ships

[Seto Kaiba]

a nimitz class carrier (crew 5000+) has a bridge crew of about half a dozen people, plus another dozen in the CIC. (the bridge is just for steering and navigation, and basic comms related to that role. CIC is where the sensor and tactical data is processed for use.)

Yes, but most people will generally conflate everything in "the island" on an aircraft carrier as the bridge... including the flying bridge, flag bridge, main bridge, CIC, etc.

The original Macross showed a bridge/command center layout more in keeping with a real-world warship via its three (possibly technically four) level bridge setup with the six main stations at the top, and two lower levels (marked "sub-bridge" on the art) with around another thirty stations between them. The lowest level appears to be the CIC-equivalent. Both the original Southern Cross and MOSPEADA show a more Star Trek-y approach to starship operations, showing starships hundreds of meters long being controlled in almost all respects from a handful of stations on the main bridge, often with no more than a half-dozen operators in addition to the captain.

(Shadow Chronicles took this up to eleven by having the Ark Angel prepared for launch by a crew of just seven on the bridge (if you don't count looky-loos) and three in engineering.)

further, in shadow chronicles, the icarus's bridge crew transfers to the Ark Angel. then they tell us via dialog that they are transferring the crew of the icarus to the ark angel. it takes a lengthy time to transfer the icarus's crew. during this time the bridge crew is already present, and their fighter pilots are all outside fighting the haydonites in their fighters. and then a skeleton crew is seen taking the Icarus out after the ark angel during the escape.

You're actually conflating a few unrelated remarks here...

The Ark Angel took so long to launch because its reflex furnace was offline, not because it took a long time to transfer the Icarus's crew to the new ship. Louie tells Vince that it'll take over an hour to get the reflex furnace online once he's aboard (Ariel speeds the blow by teleporting him and two of his aides directly into engineering).

The only thing time-related that's said in connection to moving the crew across is a guard saying that Captain Grant ordered Janice to be taken aboard the Ark Angel under guard before the crew moved over.

They order an evacuation of Space Station Liberty, but it's not mentioned how long this took to occur since it was helped by Ariel's teleportation abilities.

I can agree that the doors aren't depicted in use, but much like the inclusion of FTL systems to the Ikazuchi, Izumo, and Garfish they could fall under the heading of changes for the RT setting.

Yeah, but we can demonstrate that those exist from in-series evidence... the same can't be said for the alleged bow door.

We know that the UEDF and UEEF could build a ship capable of ramming attacks (Tokagawa, Tri-star, and Garfish (shown spiked into a Hive in Invasion Comics)) and neither had a visible barrier system like the SDF-1 used for the Daedalus (which probably wasn't designed with ramming in mind making the barrier more important). That the hull is fragile overall does not preclude the it from being able to handle the forces involved.

Granted, a weak hull is technically no prohibition against a ramming attack... but it does generally mean that your ship is only good for one ramming attack, as was the case in those situations you've listed.

The real question though is if you can fit and support the listed people (regardless of OSM dimensions or Infopedia/AotSC) and what it tells us about the size of the UEEF's population. Because if you can't fit the number of people or support them...

The lower crew numbers better support the visuals of Shadow Chronicles (in which ships are depicted as cavernously empty, mostly-vacant spaces), and it better fits the idea of the UEEF as the organization stuck out in deep space with no recruitment pool besides the children of the soldiers who went out into deep space with the UEEF decades ago.

[ShadowLogan]

Yeah, but we can demonstrate that those exist from in-series evidence... the same can't be said for the alleged bow door.

Maybe, but given the size of the vessel and its displayed capabilities, there seems to be a big disconnect. Especially with the technology level involved (RT's tech level by this point is arguably more advanced than the OSM in NG).

Granted, a weak hull is technically no prohibition against a ramming attack... but it does generally mean that your ship is only good for one ramming attack, as was the case in those situations you've listed.

Except that there is no indication that the hull was compromised in the case of the Tok or Garfish from the ramming attack, they look to be relatively intact (any damage is from other attacks directed at it, not that it performed). The destruction of both vessels are ultimately the result of deliberate "auto destructs" (essentially), not structural/hull failure from the ramming attack by all indications.

I do agree that the attack would be more of a last ditch effort though, because in order to perform it one would have to survive the incoming fire to close the gap.

What is likely is that the ramming attacks generates stress of a certain type, but the Invid mecha attacks generate stress of a different type(s), one(s) that the hull is not as strong against.

The lower crew numbers better support the visuals of Shadow Chronicles (in which ships are depicted as cavernously empty, mostly-vacant spaces), and it better fits the idea of the UEEF as the organization stuck out in deep space with no recruitment pool besides the children of the soldiers who went out into deep space with the UEEF decades ago.

Not necessarily though. The design is supposed to be "old", which could mean it dates to a period when the UEEF was using larger mecha designs and/or had enough crew members of larger stature (ex. Prelude's micronized Zentreadi) in sufficient numbers to influence design criteria. It could just be an aesthetic or psychological in nature and have nothing to do with the actual available population.