The Mech Touch

Chapter 3941 Shortcomings of Brawler Mechs

Venerable Vincent was so adamant on his two requirements that Ves hadn’t been able to change the strong-willed expert pilot’s mind.

Ves let out an exasperated breath. Expert mechs were powerful and exciting machines, but the people attached to them weren’t always as easy to deal with. He much preferred to work with mechs which were always more compliant and understandable.

After arguing with the new expert pilot for over five minutes, Ves realized that Vincent’s burning desire to pilot an expert brawler mech was not a passing flight of fancy.

It had become an obsession ever since he defeated his most formidable enemies by crushing them with his punches!

Many warriors were like this. They did not pay attention to logic and reason. They just let their personal opinions and experiences tell them what was best!

Right now, Venerable Vincent was absolutely convinced that he was born to pilot the most physical humanoid mech type imaginable, which happened to be a brawler mech!

Suffice to say, Ves was not as enthused with this idea. It was all well and good for the end user to demand a complete change in mech type, but it was the mech designers who had to do all of the work!

The design and engineering challenges of realizing this transition were much more troublesome than performing a more straightforward upgrade.

Still, once Ves verified that Venerable Vincent was truly willing to commit to piloting an extreme melee mech type, he resigned himself to this outcome.

Ves consoled himself with the fact that Gloriana would be leading this troublesome design project. He had long made an agreement with her that she would take responsibility for most of the Larkinson Clan’s custom mechs and expert mechs. It was up to her to resolve all of the difficult technical issues that he could foresee.

Besides, upgrading a custom mech to an expert mech already necessitated a complete overhaul. It was not wrong to say that Vincent’s old mech would undergo a complete rebirth.

Such projects happened to be a great opportunity to make radical changes to the original configuration! It was not impossible to transform a custom hybrid mech into an expert brawler mech!

The design project might even serve as an interesting opportunity for Gloriana to exercise her design skills.

As Ves thought about the steps the Design Department needed to take in order to realize Venerable Vincent’s vision for his so-called C-Man, he quickly drafted a more comprehensive project plan in his mind.

The Larkinson Clan just happened to retain numerous lead designers with specializations that were highly relevant for the C-Man Project.

His wife would be leading this project, not only because she excelled at designing customized mechs, but also because she used to be in charge of developing the original B-Man.

Not a long time had passed since she completed the B-Man Project, so all of the details to the half-wrecked custom hybrid mech should still be relatively fresh in her mind. This should grant her an amazing head-start into the long and difficult conversion process.

Ves intended to contribute to Venerable Vincent’s expert mech as well, but only to the extent of tweaking and shaping the C-Man’s spiritual design. He did not intend to invest too much time in the project since he had other plans.

As for other mech designers, he already reserved a slot for Professor Benedict Cortez or possibly another expert mech consultant.

If Ves ever wanted to jazz up the C-Man, he might decide to spend a substantial amount of MTA merits to hire an expensive MTA mech designer with a more rare and exotic specialization.

That left room for two more contributing mech designers.

The B-Man was already tough in its class, but the C-Man had to be even tougher in order to withstand the rigors of ultra-close quarters combat.

Sara Voiken was therefore an excellent addition to the design. She could not only grant superior defenses to the C-Man, but also grant the mech an excellent advantage in physical combat by applying her physical negation specialty!

This specialization also happened to synergize with Tifi Coslone’s best design applications. The latter was best at bestowing larger and more substantial mechs with incredible physical strength.

Perhaps Tifi Coslone’s importance to the C-Man Project might even surpass that of Gloriana. A brawler mech might look simple, but it was actually a complex mechanical puzzle that had to be both flexible and robust enough to perform all of the soft and hard movements that expected of this mech type.

“So what do you say, Ves? Can you do it or not?” Venerable Vincent eagerly asked.

“We can.” Ves steadily replied. “Gloriana will be leading this project. She has already worked with you on the B-Man Project before, so you should already know what to expect. She will be meeting with you soon to explore in detail what you want for your expert mech. However, it will help if you can give us a more detailed image of what you have in mind for the C-Man Project. Can I ask a few questions?”

“Sure.”

“Let’s begin with the weapon loadout of your upcoming C-Man. I already understand that you want to turn it into an expert mech that excels at punching. While this sounds fun and all, do you realize that it might not perform as impressively as you think?”

“What’s the problem?” Vincent frowned in puzzlement.

“The reason why melee mechs wield weapons is the same as humans have done the same in the past. It is too difficult for the humanoid form to safely and effectively fight unarmed. Imagine fighting against the First Sword or the Riot. While they are older expert mechs, I anticipate that they can beat your C-Man into submission. It’s too hard for an unarmed expert mech to overcome the disadvantage of reach and leverage. Aside from that, Venerable Dise and Venerable Orfan both possess formidable weapon skills that allow them to make masterful use of their mech weapons. What can you do against that? Do you just expect the C-Man to storm up and punch its way forward? Dream on, Vincent!”

“Hey! My C-Man shouldn’t be as weak as you make it sound!” The expert pilot protested! “I just need you guys to make my expert mech thick enough to withstand the initial blows and fast enough for it to get super close to my opponents. As long as my C-Man can get past the reach of their weapons, it can wrestle those expert mechs into submission!”

Ves shook his head in disappointment. “Be realistic. What you’re asking for is impossible or impractical. If you want your C-Man to be thick enough to resist the sharp and penetrating attacks of mechs such as the First Sword, it will become so slow that Venerable Dise can easily toy your machine to death by dancing around it. If you want your C-Man to be fast enough to catch up to the expert swordsman mech, then its armor system will not possess the resilience required to prevent your machine from getting crippled on approach. Do you understand the dilemma? This is exactly why brawler mechs have never become popular.”

Vincent did not want to give up on turning his C-Man into a brawler mech that easily.

“Shouldn’t a mech without weapons be faster and lighter than one that does carry one? Why do you make it sound as if this is not the case.”

“Because it’s the arms that have become its primary weapons, Vincent. Your C-Man will feature thicker and heavier arms in order to prevent them from collapsing as soon as you launch a powerful momentum-filled punch. Brawler mechs are similar to lancer mechs in that sense. The biggest difference is that lancer mechs have excellent reach with their long weapons while brawler mechs earn the lowest score in this aspect.”

“Then forget about speed! I don’t need an expert mech that moves as fast as the Dark Zephyr. It just needs to be agile enough for it to wrestle. If punching alone isn’t enough to defeat a tough opponent, I want to be able to grapple and wrestle it. Can you do that?”

“It’s possible, but it will force us to make several compromises in other areas. I will let Gloriana explain this to you in further detail.” Ves answered. “That said, I still anticipate that your C-Man will turn into an inadequate expert melee mech if we stick to this concept. It’s too barebones. Won’t you reconsider turning it into a hybrid mech again? Your C-Man will be able to contribute much more substantially in battle if it comes with integrated ranged weapons.”

“No.” Vincent shook his head. “Don’t get me wrong. I like hybrid mechs. I especially like them when they’re strong. I spent some time with Patriarch Reginald Cross who I admire. His Bolvos Rage can make any man wish he could pilot it instead. I just don’t want to deal with all of those weapons. I have fought with so many different weapons over the years that I became confused for a time. Now that I have become an expert pilot, I want to put an end to that and stick to a single fighting approach going forward. I really like how Venerable Dise has always stuck to wielding greatswords and turned her First Sword into the strongest dueling machine in the Larkinson Clan.”

“I understand your motivations, but your decisions aren’t practical if you stick to an expert mech without weapons. There are too many disadvantages. For example, you might be able to punch enemy mechs with your C-Man, but you can forget about inflicting effective damage against large opponents such as phase whales and alien starships. They’re too big for you to defeat, Vincent.”

“If that’s the case, why not equip my C-Man with weapons?” The new expert pilot suggested. “Can’t you design a pair of mech-sized boxing gloves or something that can protect and add more power behind its punches?”

“That… is not a bad idea.” Ves admitted.

He did not expect that Vincent would be bright enough to make useful and relevant suggestion for an upcoming design project!

His imagination already went wild. He visualized an expert brawler mech that was designed in a way so that it could mount ‘gloves’ that added a lot of necessary mass and protection!

Vincent already became enthused about this idea. “Why not design multiple glove weapons while you are at it? This way, I can choose which ones I want my C-Man to equip based on who I’m about to fight!”

The request added additional workload to the design team, but it also made the design project more interesting.

“I can opt for a pair of boxing gloves as a general solution and when I just feel like punching my enemies to death.”

“I can go for a pair of grappling gloves that are good at gripping if we’re fighting against strong and powerful expert mechs. No matter how well they can fight, I bet they were never designed to wrestle!”

“If we’re fighting against biomonsters such as fish-whales, I need a pair of gloves with long, sharp claws so that I can cut through all of the fat and slice the organs into pieces!”

“Maybe in the future you can design more exotic gloves that are made out of weird but powerful exotics. I want a pair of gloves that can add flames to my punches. I want a pair of gloves that are good at breaking through energy shields. I want to be able to punch my enemies silly in a hundred different ways! Wait, can’t you design a pair of gloves that can do all of that without needing my expert mech to switch loadouts? It would be like the Everchanger, but for glove weapons! This is the perfect idea! Let’s call it the Everpuncher! No wait, should we call it the Punchanger instead?”

Ves raised his palm. “STOP! That’s enough, Vincent! We can explore all of these ideas in the future, but for now we should start with a solid foundation. It is enough to settle for just a basic pair of gloves in order to see whether this weapon concept even works for the C-Man.”