Author Topic: Mech of the Week: PTR-* Penetrator  (Read 31968 times)

Getz

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Mech of the Week: PTR-* Penetrator
« on: 14 July 2017, 10:07:42 »

Put into production in 3053, Kallon Industries' Penetrator heavy battlemech was a product of the Federated Commonwealth’s frantic rearmament program in the aftermath of the Tukayyid truce.  I have commented in the past how the AFFC clearly decided to spend their way out of trouble and the Penetrator is exactly the kind of tough, effective and affordable machine the Spheroid powers needed in order to field the numbers required to stand up to the Clan Juggernaut.

According to Technical readout 3055, the Penetrator is based on the Blackhawk Prime, which makes very little sense to me as the Penetrator is 50% bigger, 25% slower, lacks an XL engine and the weapons disposition is completely different - but hey, they both carry loads of lasers so that must be it!

The basic Penetrator entirely eschews using advanced construction materials, so a fair amount of weight ends up committed to the engine and chassis.  However, that does mean it’s cheap to build, tough and easy to repair.  A maximum speed of 64 km/h is very much par for the course for a seventy five ton machine, but the 120 meter jump range makes for good mobility at a time when jumping heavy mechs were perhaps not quite as ubiquitous as they are now.  Thirteen tons of standard plate means the armour is respectable, although some way short of the maximum that can be carried on a mech this size. Of particular notice is that the rear side armour can be stripped by a Clan medium laser or penetrated by an IS large, which is not ideal for a mech that clearly wants to brawl - although the centre torso has no such problems.  Also the combined frontal protection for the side torsos falls just short of being able to survive four PPC hits, which is a useful threshold to meet but seeing as the torsos are carrying close to maximum protection already, this is obviously an area where you can’t have your cake and eat it.

The Penetrator’s defences are augmented by an Anti-Missile System installed in the centre torso.  This is fed by a single ton of ammo which is also centre torso mounted, just to keep you on your toes.  Personally I don’t hate AMS and the ammo placement is justifiable on the grounds that it’s the best crit-packed location on the mech, but until it fires for the first time there’s exactly enough explosive power tucked into that ammo bomb to gut the centre torso in one go.  Personally I’d have spent that tonnage on a heat sink and a bit more armour…

For weaponry, the PTR-4D has an ER large laser in each arm for jousting at range (and defending your rear, the arms can be flipped) and there are six medium pulse lasers split between the side torsos.  Now I’m not normally a fan of the Inner Sphere Medium pulse laser, but they are weapon with a niche and the Penetrator exploits that niche well.  This is a machine that wants to single mindedly close in to knife fighting range then remorselessly let fly with six streams of high energy photons until there is nothing left of you but a gently steaming pile of slag.  As such, the 4D is really very easy to use - baby’s first bracket-firer, if you will.  Close with the enemy firing the ER Larges until you reach 120 metres then switch to the pulses and never look back.  So long as you drop a weapon occasionally to cover movement heat and the AMS triggering, you can’t really go wrong.  However, having only twelve double heatsinks means trying to use the two batteries together isn’t really possible without immediately suffering significant penalties.  Further, the presence of the AMS means you can’t just go bonkers with the heat curve and hope you luck out with shutdown rolls - even a standing alpha strike will put you at significant risk of an ammo explosion.

Famously, in 3056 the legend that is Kai Allard-Liao piloted a stock PTR-4D through a series of duels on Solaris VII.  If my memory serves me right in one match he exploited the Penetrator’s confusing (for which read hideous) appearance to trick somebody over in which direction the mech was moving, causing them to jump right in front of his pulse laser battery believing they were attacking his rear armour.  Considering the machine’s strange looks and quirky leg configuration, that’s a story I can believe.

The first variant is officially supposed to deal with the 4D’s heat issues but ultimately turns into quite a different beast.  The PTR-4F replaces the ER Large Lasers with a pair of LRM 10s and loses two of the pulse lasers in favour of Artemis IV and a ton of ammo for each launcher.  In one sense this is a wholly successful modification - you can now very readily fire all the weapons together with only a little overheat - but the way the range bands of the missiles and the pulse lasers overlap means I struggle to imagine why you’d want to.  Unfortunately the 4F does not have the throw weight to be a potent long ranged missile boat, nor the kind of crushing short ranged firepower you want from a brawler - however the 4F does make a reasonable bodyguard for machines like Archers and Longbows that lack short range firepower of their own.

The PTR-6M takes a rather more straightforward approach to improving the Penetrator's heat curve by pulling two of the pulse lasers and a ton of armour and fitting five more heat sinks.  Mission accomplished, we can now fire all our lasers with only a modest over heat - but that’s barely any more firepower than the six medium pulses we could fire whilst staying heat neutral before - and we gave up a ton of armour to achieve that? The 6M does at least have lots of heat sinks filling up the torsos, but I still think I'd rather stick with the original 4D if it's all the same with you...

The PTR-6S opts to mount a Guardian ECM along with the basic 4D weapon suite, but rather than replacing the AMS system (the obvious and logical choice) the armour is again thinned, this time down to just eleven and a half tons.  On the bright side, this isn’t a terrible interdictor if you want to mess up somebodies C3 network - especially if they’re relying on Artemis equipped LRMs on their long ranged machines - but dropping this much armour from a machine that could have probably done with a bit more in the first place and lacks the speed to compensate doesn’t strike me as a particularly good idea. 

As the civil war rumbled on, much more advanced Penetrator took to the field.  Fundamentally a pretty simple upgrade to the 4D, the PTR-6T replaces all the Medium pulse lasers with ER mediums and used the six tons released to mount a targeting computer and two extra heat sinks.  At long range this is pretty much win-win.  Your large lasers are more accurate and you’ll stay cool when you fire them whether you walk, run or jump.  However at point blank range you’re less accurate whilst doing less damage and generating more heat for your trouble.  Between 90 and 240 meters things get a lot more interesting as the choice between a single large and half your battery of mediums gets a lot less clear cut.  The best way to juggle your heat curve and targeting numbers at any given point in time will vary, but it’s worth remembering you can fire one large and three mediums while walking and stay cool.  Ultimately, the combination of accurate and intense laser fire combined with zombie toughness makes the PTR-6T a real beast of a machine.

Around this time Major General Archer Christifori of the AFFC put together a customised version of the basic PTR-4D, which traded in the ER Large Lasers for Clan-tech equivalents.  Obvious upgrade is obvious, but one can hardly argue with the power of clan lasers - I bet he wishes he could have scrounged enough pulse lasers to complete the set.

With the destruction of Kallon Industries Talon factory in 3069, it looked like the end of the line for the Penetrator series, but some 60 years after the it first entered service, a sixth and final variant returned the battlefields of the Dark age.  In 3105, Kallon Industries gained control of remains of the ex-Shengli Arms factory on Victoria.  The factory had been destroyed to deny it to the Federated Suns, but it was reconstructed by 3115 and set to work manufacturing a new model of Penetrator.  The PTR-7D is structurally quite a different beastie to its predecessors, using endo-steel, laser reflective armour and enhanced arm actuators.  The ER large lasers have been replaced by Snub nosed PPCs so short ranged firepower is enhanced at the cost of significant reduction in capability beyond 390 metres.  Unfortunately I haven't had the opportunity to run this version myself, so I'll allow you to draw your own conclusions about how that combination of parts sound, but I will observe that reflective armour doesn't seem such a hot idea on a mech that optimally wants to fight the enemy in a telephone booth.

As is probably obvious by now, if your opponent puts a Penetrator in front of you you're in for a tough time tearing it down.  Even the variants that skim off armour are respectably durable with only the AMS ammo in the centre torso as an ever present Achilles heel, whilst the 4D, 4F and 6T are legitimately heavily armoured (although the 4F is carrying around LRM ammo without CASE protection, which is actually a bit unforgivable in a standard engine machine with a couple too many heat sinks).

 The 4D, 6M and 6S want to fight at close range and their long ranged firepower isn’t anything much to shout about, so given the choice you want to try and pick them apart at range.  On the other hand, the 4F prefers to fight from a distance and its short ranged firepower is much less worrisome, so closing with that one is the order of the day.  Basically know your enemy and do the thing he doesn't want to do - however, 6T is pretty happy fighting at any range, and that makes it the most unpredictable and difficult to deal with.

I can't help but feel the Penetrator must have been one of the most common Heavy mechs in the AFFC throughout the clan invasion and civil war.  A very large number of notable pilots seem to have ridden Penetrators throughout the years so they've certainly made their mark in all corners of the Inner Sphere as well as on the Pentagon worlds.   In summary, it's sort of the Sherman Tank of battlemechs - a  simple and serviceable machine well suited to mass production for a rapidly expanding army of freshly trained soldiers - and believe me, the Penetrator is a great mech to assign to a green mechwarrior if you want them to survive and contribute meaningfully to a lance.

Kallon Industries undoubtedly produced huge numbers of this workmanlike but effective machine in their Talon factory and the reconstruction of the Victoria plant coupled with the existence of the 7D variant implies they will be cranking out Penetrators for a good few years to come.
« Last Edit: 14 July 2017, 11:15:35 by Getz »

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Wrangler

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Re: Mech of the Week: PTR-* Penetrator
« Reply #1 on: 14 July 2017, 10:53:07 »
Detailed article, Getz!

I didn't know that Kallon rebuilt on Victoria.  I guess Penetrator is now being built for the Capellans since they bagged Kallon factory n 3140s.
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Re: Mech of the Week: PTR-* Penetrator
« Reply #2 on: 14 July 2017, 10:57:08 »
The original is a solid machine and was a tournament favorite for years due to it's low point cost.

It's also one of those rare machines that every attempt to 'improve" it has only made it worse.
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Re: Mech of the Week: PTR-* Penetrator
« Reply #3 on: 14 July 2017, 11:26:24 »
I find the PTR-6T is pretty munchy and is 1 of my go-to favourites when looking for an AFFS heavy trooper. Compares favourably with the BLR-2D Warlord. Silly name though, I can NOT think of anybody introducing his Mech without a leer...

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Re: Mech of the Week: PTR-* Penetrator
« Reply #4 on: 14 July 2017, 11:27:06 »
The original is a solid machine and was a tournament favorite for years due to it's low point cost.

It's also one of those rare machines that every attempt to 'improve" it has only made it worse.
I would t go that far.  The 6T is sublime.
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Re: Mech of the Week: PTR-* Penetrator
« Reply #5 on: 14 July 2017, 11:29:08 »
7D properly is a mugger from the description of it.  Close in and laying it in Mechs heavy.  I do wonder how its going handle the heat.  2xSnubs and 6xMedium Pulse lasers does interesting Varity of heat. :)
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Re: Mech of the Week: PTR-* Penetrator
« Reply #6 on: 14 July 2017, 13:13:25 »
I've used this mech a lot, including running one in a mercenary campaign for about a year.  It's a good mech, but the problem is that there's really only one thing you can do with it and once your opponent realizes that it's a fairly easy mech to counter.  It really suffers against the Clans since it lacks the speed to close with lighter mechs and the durability and firepower to mix it up with large mechs.
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Re: Mech of the Week: PTR-* Penetrator
« Reply #7 on: 14 July 2017, 13:30:19 »
It's a bracket baby all the way. You can brawl or stand off at range with the weapons fit, provided how the opponent moves.

At 4/6/4, it fits in with the legacy designs that still staffed the AFFC when it was built. It's still an effective lancemate, with thick front armor, and decently ranged weapons.
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Re: Mech of the Week: PTR-* Penetrator
« Reply #8 on: 14 July 2017, 17:07:07 »
i beleive that your memory of the duel is confusing kai's battle with his father's final battle in solaris, where Justin was driving legend Killer (a rifleman), and used the rifleman's ability to flip arms to lure his opponent into firing at legend killer's intact front armor instead of its ripped up back armor.. but walking backwards into an ambush where he knew the other guy would come out behind him.

in kai's battle, the penetrator was used fairly well.. using the jump jets to move from perch to perch in the cavern, firing ERLL's or MPL's accordingly.

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Re: Mech of the Week: PTR-* Penetrator
« Reply #9 on: 14 July 2017, 18:40:46 »
Solid and effective but ugly. Also somewhat uninspired, doesn't really offer much over some other 4/6(/x) heavies. I'd be inclined to pick a Falconer for mobility and range, a Warhammer 7S for long range firepower, or maybe a 4/6/4 Marauder if i need jump capacity but not additional speed.

Non-unique variants with record sheets, the 6T aside, are terrible, missing the point of the 'Mech completely. The 7D may be OK but until we got a record sheet, not a fan of Snubbies really though.

The 6T is arguably an upgrade. Extra cooling and the extra range for mediums are very useful, even if it does lose some punch at short range. Of course, the BV cost does go up considerably (300+ points), and the 'Mech doesn't have stellar range for its main guns, and two 8 point hits isn't terribly impressive, which makes me question is the variant really worth it. Especially for the Jihad-era, i'd be inclined to pick the Falconer 9R, which loses a hex of range and armor but gains mobility, flexibility and punch for very similar BV cost.

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Re: Mech of the Week: PTR-* Penetrator
« Reply #10 on: 15 July 2017, 00:06:47 »
To me the Penetrator demonstrates the argument between a weight of MPLs or ERML & TC for the IS tech bases.  Which, on something slow like this solidly lands in favor of the ERML/TC combo . . . for fast or distance jumpers, the pulse might be the answer.  Sort of disappointed we never got a X-Pulse or VSPL version as a refit after the Jihad . . .

 . . . yeah, and that -7D 'upgrade' makes little sense.  For the House now building cERLL its a bit silly of them NOT to make a production version of Archer's famed Penetrator, it even lends itself well to a solid marketing campaign!  The -7D is asking to get taken apart by Liao TSM melee designs, sure those Snubs are really accurate at 9 hexes but when you are getting bum-rushed its not going to help much.

I think to really upgrade the Penetrator it would have had to give a bit on its durability by going with a LFE but what do you do with the weight to increase the long range punch without duplicating a Warhammer (ERPPCs) or go Apollo & give it cERLL like Archer?
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Re: Mech of the Week: PTR-* Penetrator
« Reply #11 on: 15 July 2017, 01:46:07 »
I'm not sure what version I like.  The snubbie version is nice but then you render the 'main battery' useless because you have to choose between firing either the snubbies or the pulsers.  The ER laser version is very nice and against the standard version its 6 of one, half a dozen of the other.  Do you want better mid range fire with moderate accuracy or do you want close in knife fighting guns with good accuracy.  The LRM version is..ehhh..its a bit of a donkey really. 

And whilst the name does make my inner child snigger, I like the Penetrator, its a simple beatstick, point towards enemy, move forwards until in range and then turn into a Jean Michelle Jarre concert right in their face. 

Great write up on a reliable standby of a Mech :)
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Re: Mech of the Week: PTR-* Penetrator
« Reply #12 on: 15 July 2017, 02:29:44 »
  The Penetrator is one of my favorite designs.  With its heavy armor, average 4/6 speed, standard engine, and energy based weapons I always considered the smart/cost effective member of what I call the Mad Cat Killers Trio (Falconer, Rakshasa, Penetrator) from TRO:3055.

  It's also a design I both love and hate visually.  On the one hand I love the combination of rounded and angular shapes, on the other I honest don't know how the thing is supposed to walk.  As far as I can tell it either has no knees or it walks like a human with knees just below the groin. 
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marauder648

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Re: Mech of the Week: PTR-* Penetrator
« Reply #13 on: 15 July 2017, 02:54:36 »
Yeaaaaaaaahh...the Penny has a weird leg set up.

Looking at this



I think the leg raises up into that slot where the 'knee' is and then the whole mounting raises a the hip swings and then the leg lowers down with all the knee action being in that bit the leg raises up into.  But this has two problems.

1.  This means it goose steps
2.  This also means it swings its hips a hell of a lot.  As there's no real knee joint and the leg just goes UP and then raises to go forwards and stomp down, to move, you need to swing the hip, putting all 75 tons of weight on the other foot and leg until the other leg slams down. Then you have to bring the other leg up, roll the hip the other way and you've got a 75 tonner shaking its money maker. The goose-stepping gait would be fine, on flat terrain and then you hit a hill and its shenanigans time. Going up a hill with that would mean you're gonna be off balance as  all hell as all the weight is gonna be at the back of the mech as its got no real ability to lean forwards whilst moving and lean into a hill whilst it tries to go up a hill straight legged with its ass wiggling.  The weird goose-step/waddle gait would basically make it look like its also just crapped itself.

You can see part of the walk cycle here



And again its basically goose stepping with some serious hip wiggle.  Really we can blame the art, I don't think they put too much work into how it would move or the mechanics of it.  Instead its the rule of cool and despite its weird legs, the Penny does look good. The top image is just Plog doing his best to make the Mech look good but having to keep it the same.  Ideally it would have a standard chicken walkers legs although you'd have to make the mech taller, I always though the Penetrator as being rather squat.

Another problem I just thought of with a hill, going up one you could roll forwards so you raise the back up towards the sky somewhat, but this has the added 'bonus' of you pointing the torso mounted lasers at the floor :p

« Last Edit: 15 July 2017, 03:12:29 by marauder648 »
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Re: Mech of the Week: PTR-* Penetrator
« Reply #14 on: 15 July 2017, 03:10:55 »
Perhaps the leg retracts and extends too.

At double the range, the ERML+TC combo clinches it for me anytime over the pulse variants - unless one is guaranteed phonebooth ranges e.g. in the tight urbans. Having jumpjets helps a lot, and carrying a standard engine to me is a plus-point - DBL brings up the Rakshasa and the Falconer, I think the Penetrator is the trooper of the 3... and does a good job of it IMO.

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Re: Mech of the Week: PTR-* Penetrator
« Reply #15 on: 15 July 2017, 03:17:27 »
Quote
Perhaps the leg retracts and extends too.

That kinda makes sense, but again its really only good on flat terrain otherwise you'd have the leg sliding up and smacking into the underside of the arms or torso depending on how far its twisted :s or how where the arms are.

I think with the Penetrators walk cycle its a case of "Look it can walk and run okay, I don't know how, Blake's blessing or something."

Basically rule of cool applies, it shouldn't work, but it does.
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Re: Mech of the Week: PTR-* Penetrator
« Reply #16 on: 15 July 2017, 03:30:21 »
Silly, the Penetrator does not walk up hills, it uses jump jets.

Seriously though, yeah, it's got one of the weirdest leg arrangements in the game and I have no idea how it's expected to handle slopes.
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Re: Mech of the Week: PTR-* Penetrator
« Reply #17 on: 15 July 2017, 03:39:26 »
Silly, the Penetrator does not walk up hills, it uses jump jets.

Seriously though, yeah, it's got one of the weirdest leg arrangements in the game and I have no idea how it's expected to handle slopes.

Ahh so thats what the jump jets are for, not for any tactical advantages, just to get up hills :P
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Re: Mech of the Week: PTR-* Penetrator
« Reply #18 on: 15 July 2017, 06:00:12 »
It's too bad the primary version of the Penetrator suffers from one changes from Battletech Manual Revised to Total Warfare when it comes to the AMS. Since it's AMS is in center torso.... :o

In the old rules, i had funny event when critical hit smacked the Ammo bin, but since you only had 1D6 to determine how much ammo you used per usage the bin dried out fairly quickly when LRM/SRM flew.  ;D
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Re: Mech of the Week: PTR-* Penetrator
« Reply #19 on: 15 July 2017, 06:16:23 »
Oh lord the old AMS rule where you could drain your whole ammo supply shooting at a SRM-2 shot :p
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Re: Mech of the Week: PTR-* Penetrator
« Reply #20 on: 15 July 2017, 08:57:41 »
  All this talk of Penetrator motion has me imagining the thing using its jump jets to hop around like a giant 75 ton kangaroo!

  Thought I would add another picture of a Penetrator walking:

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Re: Mech of the Week: PTR-* Penetrator
« Reply #21 on: 15 July 2017, 09:23:40 »
First of all, very apt name for talking about the Penetrator :p

And that picture goes against the art because you see those big bits at the top of the leg, to me they look like they would slam into the underside of the Mech's chassis.  And that is MUCH more upright than i've seen the Penny depicted before.  Still its a damn good picture :D
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Re: Mech of the Week: PTR-* Penetrator
« Reply #22 on: 15 July 2017, 10:14:48 »
Oh, my gods, I had forgotten about this 'Mech! I loved it when I first saw it in the TRO and then later in the books with Archer and his ride.
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Re: Mech of the Week: PTR-* Penetrator
« Reply #23 on: 15 July 2017, 11:19:25 »
First of all, very apt name for talking about the Penetrator :p

And that picture goes against the art because you see those big bits at the top of the leg, to me they look like they would slam into the underside of the Mech's chassis.  And that is MUCH more upright than i've seen the Penny depicted before.  Still its a damn good picture :D

That is because the artist took a chickenwalker and drew it as a human walker, without altering the rest of the legs design.

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Re: Mech of the Week: PTR-* Penetrator
« Reply #24 on: 15 July 2017, 13:16:11 »
A lot of the later Battletech novels had pretty weird cover art.  Remember the Cerberus in the Twilight of the Clans novel that had hands?
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Re: Mech of the Week: PTR-* Penetrator
« Reply #25 on: 15 July 2017, 13:47:06 »
  In fairness to the artist the Penetrator isn't even a chicken walker its a... well a... its a wind up walking robot toy walker.  Actually I'm wondering, if you wanted to modify the Irownwind Penetrator to make it a chicken walker or a maybe even a human walker what legs from another mech do you think would work?
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Re: Mech of the Week: PTR-* Penetrator
« Reply #26 on: 15 July 2017, 14:04:05 »
In fairness to the Penetrator's knees (or lack thereof), most of Dana Knutson's 'Mechs wouldn't be able to walk if built as drawn.

Then again, Knutson is one of the few BattleTech artists I think Plog is better than.
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Re: Mech of the Week: PTR-* Penetrator
« Reply #27 on: 15 July 2017, 15:49:46 »
And that picture goes against the art because you see those big bits at the top of the leg

Autocorrect! :D

Plog's art is the most possible arrangement for movement; I've modded one of my minis along that line.

The Penetrator is crying out for IJJ, but is so optimised, it's hard to know how to make the tonnage. Imagine a 4/6/6 mover with SnPPCs and MPLS ? But hard to get as optimised.
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Re: Mech of the Week: PTR-* Penetrator
« Reply #28 on: 15 July 2017, 16:24:37 »
Okay...I might be going out on a limb here (ba-dum-tish)...but what if the way it walks is that when it steps forward, the moving leg retracts up into the upper leg bit, the upper leg pivots up, then the lower extends out to meet the ground? (I don't really mean "retract", more like it looks like the lower leg can move up and down within the upper leg.)

That would seem to work with the original Knutson artwork, but Plogg's looks more like the upper leg has a double-jointed knee. And then the novel cover...yeah, I have no idea there.

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Re: Mech of the Week: PTR-* Penetrator
« Reply #29 on: 15 July 2017, 16:40:36 »
Anybody got links to art of the other Cristifori novels?  IIRC they all featured his Penetrator on the cover.
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