The Mech Touch

Chapter 7266: Brownstone Modular Mech Ecosystem

The 'skirmish' lasted for a while.

Even if the Goliath Hive did not make a serious commitment, the mutated voribugs stillthrew a formidable quantity of cannon fodder at the defenses.

Every defensive platform had to fire their weapons and expend resources in order torepel the defenses.

From a strategic perspective, the difference it made was fairly limited, but so long as theGoliath Hive kept up the pressure, systems would break down sooner or later.

Most machines were never meant to be used at such a high intensity. Every part andcomponent possessed a life span, and this attribute rapidly diminished during activeuse.

Proper servicing, maintenance and repairs could bring back some of the life span thatwas lost, but that required valuable time where the assets became unavailable for atime.

The defenders of the Philaster Crestia System could not afford to put too much of itsassets in reserve.

While it was still able to place a substantial share of its mechs and warships in reserve,the defensive platforms and orbital fortresses had to keep working in order to ensurethat not a single voribug was able to slip past the orbital network and infiltrate thesurface of the planet.

When Ves pulled up the status of all of the defensive platforms, he could clearly see thatmany of the sections turned yellow or even red.

The proportion of parts that had turned yellow were particularly high. The parts in redwere much less prevalent, which told Ves that the maintenance crews focused most oftheir efforts on addressing complete breakdowns as opposed to preventativemaintenance.

The latter had become a luxury on the new front.

The defense of Philaster Crestia lll was likely doomed at this point. Even withreinforcements, the continued breakdown of so many assets made the act of holdingthis planet untenable.

Sure, Ves brought hundreds of mechs, dozens of sub-capital ships and a whopping 30Ascended Giants to the star system, but none of them possessed the right means todefeat swarms and swarms of voribugs.

Once those defensive platforms and other hardware broke down during anoverwhelming assault, the two squads of Ascended Giants would have to retreat if theywanted to avoid getting exhausted and gnawed to death!

The same applied to the expert mechs and ace mechs in the star system.

To Ves, it didn't matter if Saint Rosa Orphan finally woke up from her coma and was ableto make good use of the Riot Mark Ill.

Even after upgrading the latter to a proper ace mech, it could still get exhausted.

The only way to beat an enemy that was able to send in an astronomical amount ofcannon fodder was to bring a large enough force.

The orbital defenses were not enough. No matter how many more platforms theRubarthans built, they could only be used in a defensive capacity.

To eliminate the threat posed by the mutated voribugs, the Rubarthans would have tobring in lots of mechs and warships before sending them off to cleanse the satellitesbeing used as resource points by the enemy.

This was an incredibly tedious and time-consuming effort. It was also beyond theRubarthan Pact's means to bring out so many troops when it was already straining tofend off the native aliens.

Ves directed his attention to the mechs in the field.

They were very clearly differentiated from each other. The contingent of GammaScorchers dispatched by the Cybernetic Empire stood out the most due to theirextensive use of high-powered energy weapons.

Many of the mechs of this unit no longer fired narrow gamma laser beams because mostof the energy would end up going to waste.

The mutated voribugs had studied the Gamma Scorchers a long time ago and adaptedtheir attack approach. The bugs assumed a very thin and shallow sheet-like formationand sent them forward in the form of regular attack waves.

Each time an energy beam struck an individual voribug, there were no bugs behind it, sothe remainder of the energy of the attack would end up hitting nothing.

Through this simple solution, the voribugs managed to put quite a lot of pressure on theGamma Scorcher mechs until the Cybers had finally adapted them to localcircumstances.

The mech designers and mech technicians had modified the multipurpose mechs sothat they drastically tuned down the frequencies while simultaneously decreasing thefocus and coherency of their attack output.

The result was that the Gamma Scorcher mechs wielded the equivalent of energyThe result was that the Gamma Scorcher mechs wielded the equivalent of energyshotguns.

Each pull of the trigger resulted in large and very visible cones of light that spread outrapidly but did not possess much range.

While this forced the powerful machines to fight against the swarms much closer thanthey were comfortable with, their killing efficiency had skyrocketed!

Even so, Ves did not think the Gamma Scorchers could keep up this performance forlong without enduring problems.

Since the Cyber contingent belonged to a third party, Ves did not gain access to theirdetailed status data.

However, Ves was still able to glean lots of clues by zooming in and observing them inaction.

The Cyber mech industry was approximately two mech generations ahead. Thatresulted in many small technological improvements and innovations, but it did not givethe Cybers enough time to revolutionize the concept of mechs.

These machines were all powerful and demanding first-class multipurpose mechs. Theircomplexity was dizzyingly high. This enabled them to carry a large amount of integratedweapon systems and put up a ferocious fight when put into use.

However, Ves did not get the sense that the mechs of the 24th Gamma ScorchersWarfleet were designed to be used so frequently.

Their superior tech and craftsmanship may have allowed them to remain in bettercondition than usual, but even well-built systems failed sooner or later.

Compared to the relatively pristine mechs of the Gamma Scorchers, the mechs fieldedby other forces were in significantly worse conditions.

The surviving machines of the original garrison were much worse off than the rest. Theyshowed plenty of old scars and featured obvious jury-rigged repairs.

The mechs that arrived as reinforcements were in moderately better condition, but theywould deteriorate to the level of the older defenders soon enough.

What stood out to Ves was that very few of the mechs engaged in melee combat.

Most of them conspicuously maintained their distance and relied heavily on rangedweapons to produce damage.

In fact, many of the mechs armed with weapons that were originally not so suitableacainst the new alien threat had swapped over to cheap but serviceable shotauns orThe mechs monotonously opened fire whenever a large enough concentration ofcannon fodder bugs got close.

They also had to maneuver backwards in order to avoid getting surrounded andshredded to pieces.

Whenever the mutated voribugs managed to take a mech by surprise and swarmed itfrom multiple directions, nearby mechs did not hesitate to turn their weapons aroundand fire right at their beleaguered colleague!

The power of the mech weapons had been carefully calibrated to inflict great damage tothe soft bodies of cannon fodder bugs, but inflict minimal damage to the mechsthemselves.

A few of the more adventurous mech units even used their own machines as bait.However, this was a reckless move that had been heavily discouraged as the days wentby.

Many mechs had become so worn down at this point that they could easily reach atipping point if they suffered a single hit at a critical location.

Only one Rubarthan mech unit stood out from the rest.

It was clearly an elite unit. The mechs were made to a higher standard while their pilotswere more skilled.

Yet what clearly distinguished them from other machines was their dependence on arather luxurious modular system!

The mechs were all designed as semi-modular platforms similar to the later iterations ofthe Bright Warrior line.

Their backpack modules, their secondary weapon systems, their energy cells andammunition canisters had all been turned into easily interchangeable modules.

That was not all. Whenever the mechs had depleted their supplies, the modular energycells and ammunition canisters ejected from the mech frame and automatically driftedback to the rear.

Special Rubarthan supply ships and shuttles retrieved the expended modules and filledthem up again.

At the same time, the Rubarthan logistical vessels launched replacement modules athigh speeds towards the mechs that needed resupply!

These modules rapidly closed the distance before slowing down with the help of one-time miniature boosters.

Once they approached their targets, the boosters fell off, allowing the modules to closethe remaining distance with the help of more fixed miniboosters and guidance systems.The modules eventually slotted into place, enabling the replenished mechs to launchtheir weapons and keep their azure energy shields active with renewed confidence!

Due to this expensive but effective replenishment system, the elite Rubarthan mechswere able to last much longer and prevent their mech frames from getting scratched.While the load to their azure energy shield generator and energy transmission systemswas considerable, these parts could easily be kept in good shape so long as the elitemech unit maintained a rotation.

Their quantity was rather small on the battlefield, which told Ves that the Rubarthansprobably kept most of them in reserve.

"What do you think, Ves?" Lord Richard Brownstone asked.

"These mechs can play an outsized role under the right circumstances. I am ratherimpressed by how smoothly they can exchange their depleted modules for fresh ones. Itlooks rather simple, but the technical challenges are considerable, especially when thereare voribugs that try to mess with the exchange."

"What you are seeing is mechs designed according to the standards of the BrownstoneModular Mech Ecosystem. It was devised by Master Sirine Brownstone, one of my manyaunts. She has devised this mech ecosystem in preparation for hard campaigning infuture offensive operations against the native aliens. As it is, the mech ecosystem isseeing surprisingly good use in battles such as this. Master Sirine is currently workingon developing a downmarket version of her mech ecosystem so that it can be applied tocheaper mech designs."

Ves could see quite a lot of promise in this mech ecosystem. While it was expensive andtroublesome to set up, once it was up and running, a mech unit that took advantage of itcould maintain a much longer presence on the battlefield than usual.

Supply limitations no longer constrained the machines as much as before.

The main variable that limited the uptime of these mechs was the endurance of thehuman mech pilots themselves.

They would get exhausted eventually.

Aside from injecting themselves with dangerous and harmful stimulants, it was best torotate them out before they collapsed in their piloting seats.

"Is the Brownstone Principality planning to convert all of their mech units to this newmech ecosystem?"

Lord Richard shrugged his shoulders. "I am not sure. It depends on whether we can gainaccess to better solutions. If not, the Brownstone Modular Mech Ecosystem will serve asan... acceptable measure to help us in our fight against the mutated voribugs."

The mech ecosystem would certainly help if it could be popularized, but it was not a truesolution against the endless swarms sent by the enemy.

Killing the bugs meant nothing to the Hives. They could produce them easily enough solong as they had managed to gain a good foothold in a star system.

The mutated voribugs were essentially leveraging the resources of a partially occupiedstar system against its remaining defenders!

In other words, the alien insects excelled at leveraging red humanity's own territoryagainst their prey!

Real victory could only be accomplished by retaking all of the territory taken by themutated voribugs.

Ves did not think that mechs that made use of this fancy new mech ecosystempossessed the strength to make this happen.