Undine Battle Armor - Technical Readout 3058U page 49
Clan Goliath Scorpion's Undine is an unusual Battle Armor design, that in my experience only gets game time when scenarios are set up specifically to allow its use, due to its underwater specialization. With the Scorpions failing to win a place in Operation Revival and then staunchly defending the rights to their new Battle Armor, the majority of Undines remained in the Clan Homeworlds, making them a relatively rare sight in the Inner Sphere.
Reviving the deep sea industrial exoskeletons that sparked the whole Battle Armor revolution and in development prior to the Clan invasion, the Undine first appeared in Field Manual: Warden Clans as the water feature of the four elemental designs that were introduced in the two Clan Manuals. Overall, most players I knew back then found the suit underwhelming, particularly when compared to the VTOL-capable Sylph that appeared in the same publication, that at least had the novelty of being able to fly, even if its battlefield performance was equally lukewarm. Technical Readout 3058U acknowledges that the in-universe response was similarly muted, with few Clans displaying any interest, despite some successful participation in Trials. Quite simply, the Undine's main strength is also its biggest flaw: it's so well adapted to underwater combat, that outside its environment it's a fish out of water - sorry, I had to go there - and given that almost all planet bound combat between Clans is going to take place on dry land, opportunities for the Undine to flaunt its capabilities are going to be few and far between.
In my experience, the Undine was fielded in a few underwater scenarios soon after the local Clan fans got hold of the Field Manual, then the design (very) occasionally appeared in pre-planned games and campaigns when it was known in advance that there was a reasonable amount of rivers and/or lakes, but fairly quickly they became a forgotten unit. Tactical Operations briefly revived them with the publication of the latest rules for underwater combat at extreme depths, but that spark faded swiftly, once more consigning the standard Undine to the abyss. If it wasn't for the Upgrade variant, I know some players who would have never fielded the Undine chassis at all given just how tedious underwater scenarios can be to play.
While the 'Mech may be the king of the terrestrial battlefield, once fighting ducks beneath the waves, it's the submarine that dominates, although the introduction of the 'Mech Underwater Maneuvering Unit has somewhat redressed the balance, particularly for OmniMechs that can also arm themselves with pod-mounted torpedo launchers. For the typical 'Mech that lacks a UMU, sub-surface combat means trudging slowly along the bottom, moving at best a quarter of their walking speed on dry land when in deeper waters, with every step potentially resulting in a fall, and while that fall inflicts less damage, there's a chance that a leak might occur, which effectively destroys the damaged section. Unless you're using Mechwarriors with exceptional piloting skills, this can result in a seafloor or lakebed being littered with wrecks before the first shot is fired, and even if all your units survive, few players relish the amount of extra dice rolling that is required.
Meanwhile, surface craft are able to zip around above the 'Mechs, while submarines and units equipped with UMUs can speed through the water, unaffected by the movement penalties or the possibility of falling, with submarines and UMU-equipped Battle Armor also capable of reaching greater depths. Even a 'Mech as swift and agile as the Spider will find itself outmaneuvered by the Undine, despite the latter having what appears to the uninitiated to be an unimpressive 3 Movement Points while underwater. When faster movement is required, Undines can even deploy from submarine APCs, just like their land-bound cousins, entering and exiting the craft through airlocks or catching a ride on OmniSubs like a lamprey on a shark. As presented in the Field Manual, the Undine had the useful capability of being able to use both UMU Movement Points and its Ground Movement Point in the same Turn, allowing it to swim up from the depths to the shoreline and then step out onto dry land, for example. The only restrictions were that the total numbers of Movement Points used had to be three or less, and only one of those could be on land. Under the Total War ruleset, players have to pick a single movement mode each turn, which by the strictest interpretation of the rules takes this flexibility away.
As you can already tell, underwater combat isn't kind to 'Mechs, and that's before we get to the issue of weapons. Many weapon systems, such as autocannon and standard missile launchers, cannot even function underwater, while energy weapons find their range greatly reduced. This means that many 'Mech designs will be effectively unarmed, while others are severely disadvantaged compared to their normal performance. With even the slightest damage potentially causing flooding in the compartment that has been stuck, a fatal situation when the head or central torso is breached, underwater combat places more of an emphasis on range and multiple hits, rather than just raw damage. This means that the supreme underwater weapon is the LRT, or Long Range Torpedo, the sub-surface equivalent of the LRM, due to its long reach and cluster attack capability. In second place is the SRT, the navalized counterpart to the SRM, which has the advantage of every missile that hits inflicting its own separate attack, but its shorter range places the firing unit within reach of the heavier energy weapons common to 'Mechs, making it riskier to use.
One problem for the standard torpedo is that it cannot be fired above water, which meant that Battle Armor that loaded their launchers with the specialist munitions would be unable to engage land targets, while those loaded with standard missiles would be useless underwater, thus there was a need for a round that could be used in both environments. Somewhat ironically given their poor opinion of missiles, the Goliath Scorpions had already been working on the problem even before the Clans had returned to the Inner Sphere and in 3059 they finally achieved a breakthrough in the development of the Multi-Purpose Missile, resulting in the introduction of the Undine in the following year.
Although the Undine lacks any reloads for its five-tube LRM launcher - the first to be used on a Clan Battle Armor design - one useful feature of the new missile is its ability to be launched from suits just below the surface and still strike targets above the water, which can make the shoreline and river banks a risky location to be when battling Goliath Scorpion forces. Given that the enemy is unable to return fire unless they enter the water or use some form of artillery with an area effect attack on the surface, this can be a powerful tactic, although the lack of reloads for the LRM launcher is a problem, requiring greater numbers of Undines to compensate. The reach of the Undine's missiles no doubt proved another shock for those that first faced them, but that shock was equally no doubt short lived due to the lack of follow-up salvos.
Backing up its missile launcher, the Undine is equipped with a fixed arm-mounted ER Micro Laser, developed by the Smoke Jaguars in 3060, which lacks damage compared to the traditional Small Laser armament of many Battle Armor designs, but makes up for that with slightly longer range and lighter mass. Unfortunately, when used underwater the extra reach on land isn't enough to allow the Undine to shoot any further than 60 meters, the same range as a Small Laser through water and a third of the range of a Medium Laser in similar circumstances. This makes closing the range to attack with the laser somewhat risky against many targets, and once at such short ranges the Battle Armor would be better off closing the distance even more and inflicting a Leg Attack, which not only removes the target's weaponry from the equation, but also gets a critical hit check in addition to the possibility of the leg armor being breached due to taking damage. Although incapable of Swarming and only able to perform Leg Attacks while in water of Depth 1 or greater, this physical attack can be especially effective when the Undines get to hide before the enemy arrives, striking from ambush at point blank range.
Compared to the similar sized Elemental, the Undine lacks both a Modular Weapon Mount and a secondary weapon, and also has weaker armor due to the higher mass of the UMU compared to the Elemental's jump jets. The choice to mount a searchlight - the first fitted to a Battle Armor design - instead of an Anti-Personnel Weapon Mount is understandable when using the Undine for deep sea combat. We've probably all seen media showing submersibles equipped with banks of bright lights probing the Stygian depths, but as shown by the image in Technical Readout 3058U, that is repeated above, the Undine will also find itself fighting in the littoral zone and even venturing onto dry land, and visions like that of Captain Willard slowly rising out of the river in Apocalypse Now can be just as evocative as movies like the Abyss from an out of game perspective. Given that the majority of Clan planetary combat would occur on land, and at most would only find itself at the water's edge rather than in its depths, overall the additional weapon mount might have been a better choice.
For many users of the Undine, its reduced protection is its most significant downgrade. The armor is incapable of withstanding a hit by Clan large lasers or a pair of LRM/LRT clusters, which is a big point against the design, especially the vulnerability to a second LRT cluster, which is a common type of damage in the very environment where the Undine is intended to operate. Like many Clan designs, the Undine does have a single Battle Claw so that it can hitch a ride on a friendly OmniMech or OmniVehicle, although as already noted its ability to perform Anti-'Mech assaults is restricted to underwater attacks only, due to the bulk of the UMU. Oddly, the artwork in the Technical Readout also shows some form of folding blade, mounted like a bayonet under the tip of the laser barrel, but this is not covered by any rules or stats.
While the Undine can be very effective in its chosen environment, overall it's not a great design. The armor issue and the lack of reloads for its launcher are its biggest problems, with the missiles the worst offender in my opinion. There's really no need to fire large salvos when they're still unlikely to destroy many targets purely due to the raw damage they inflict. Since the missiles instead rely more upon the potential of hull breaches to cripple or kill the target, in that regard a multi-shot LRM1 would have been a better choice - which is about the only time I'll ever recommend that particular weapon! The one-shot LRM5 was likely chosen due to the ability to inflict greater damage against targets out of the water, where breaches are not an issue, but given that the Undine performs so poorly on dry land due to its lack of mobility, in my opinion it's a compromise that shouldn't have been made.
The poor performance of the ER Micro Laser underwater is another issue, and between the missiles and the Leg Attacks, I've played games where the laser wasn't fired at all or was only used to finish off crippled 'Mechs that refused to surrender. However, the Micro Laser is the lightest possible energy weapon and so I can understand its installation, since it does provide the suit with a multi-shot weapon that can be used both above and below the surface. Despite that, I would still prefer to have used the mass to improve the missile armament, perhaps with a token LMG or Anti-Personnel Weapon Mount for those times when the Undine does operate out of water.
Although ignored by most Clans, the Undine was the target of a series of Trials of Possession by Clan Diamond Sharks in 3068. Despite enduring a number of defeats before finally succeeding in gaining their prize, the Sharks didn't then field the Undine, and it wasn't until the Federated Suns introduced their assault-class Hauberk Battle Armor design in 3070 that the motivation for the merchant Clan's efforts was finally revealed. Apart from this roundabout route, the Undine has spurred only a single new Battle Armor suit, with the introduction of the Undine (Upgrade) in 3069. Unlike its parent, the new variant is designed purely for land combat, exchanging its UMU for a lighter jump pack that allows it to match the mobility of the Elemental. The saved mass has been used to add missile reloads, albeit with fewer tubes, together with the addition of a small Mission Equipment bay, the purpose of which remains a mystery. As noted in the Readout, the variant makes for a useful partner for the Elemental, with the Undine (Upgrade) providing long range fire support, thus mitigating its lower protection, while Elemental units close with the enemy.
The original Undine did at least expand the reach of Battle Armor into a new combat environment, but it's also somewhat impractical given the nature of Clan warfare. The suit would have no doubt found greater use in the more varied battlefields of the Inner Sphere, but apart from the Sharks, only Clan Wolf ever bothered with the design. That is a pity given that the Undine (Upgrade) is actually quite usable, providing a nice blend of long range firepower and mobility. Although the Scorpions survive as Escorpión Imperio after their Abjuration, the loss of their factories on Dagda prior to that raises a question mark over their ability to maintain and replace their existing Undines. The Wolves and Sharks’ interest does at least mean that the Undine will survive in the Inner Sphere; however, it may be entirely gone from Clanspace. The surviving Homeworld Clans are unlikely to be upset at the prospect of losing the design, a viewpoint that's likely shared by many players. A little used, niche Battle Armor, best suited for scenarios that can sometimes be more frustrating than fun, the Undine's flaws wound it further, and having blood in the water is never good for survival.
Next up:
- Enhanced Sylph
- Elemental II
- Infiltrator Mk II
- Fenrir
