The Newbie and Short Questions thread

[JB0]

8 minutes ago, ManhattanProject972 said:

Its been a little while since I last watched SDFM, Which episode does Max get his VF-1J? 

And do they ever mention anywhere how he or anyone else got to have his/her VF painted their own personal colors or is it just a sort of its always been that way sort of thing?

They don't say why he, or anyone else, gets a custom paintjob. Hikaru got one, Max got TWO... Even Kakizaki got one, bless his uncreative heart. "Change some of the brown to white! That'll do it!"

 

Ah, here we are! Episode 24, Goodbye Girl. Misa is returning to Earth, and he's running escort in his brand-new, freshly-blued 1J.

I spot-checked every episode from 19 to 24 to find this. Because I guessed way wrong. (And why I started with friggin' Burst Point is anyone's guess. RIP Kakizaki. )

 

And right after this episode is the video arcade, the infamous knife fight, and the wedding. So my initial gut instinct of "Same time he gets hitched" was closer than my second guess, given it is only shown once before the marriage. Woulda made for a strange wedding gift, though.

[Seto Kaiba]

8 hours ago, RedWolf said:

Heck Macross 7 mentions it as Earth United Forces.

Yeah, like I said, Kawamori has acknowledged that dropping the "New" was a goof on the staff's part... it's supposed to have been New UN Forces and New UN Government since the last few episodes of the original series.

 

6 hours ago, ManhattanProject972 said:

And do they ever mention anywhere how he or anyone else got to have his/her VF painted their own personal colors or is it just a sort of its always been that way sort of thing?

Nowhere that I've seen, no.  Macross Chronicle has a thing about certain iconic squadron paintjobs.

 

5 hours ago, JB0 said:

I spot-checked every episode from 19 to 24 to find this. Because I guessed way wrong. (And why I started with friggin' Burst Point is anyone's guess. RIP Kakizaki. )

... you could've just checked the page for his VF-1J color scheme on the Macross Mecha Manual.  Wherever possible, we mark the episode of first appearance and timestamp within that episode.

 

5 hours ago, JB0 said:

And right after this episode is the video arcade, the infamous knife fight, and the wedding. So my initial gut instinct of "Same time he gets hitched" was closer than my second guess, given it is only shown once before the marriage. Woulda made for a strange wedding gift, though.

It's after he and Hikaru both get promoted, so Max is a platoon leader and Hikaru rose to squadron leader.

[Sir Galahad®]

16 hours ago, JB0 said:

They don't say why he, or anyone else, gets a custom paintjob. Hikaru got one, Max got TWO... Even Kakizaki got one, bless his uncreative heart. "Change some of the brown to white! That'll do it!"

 

Ah, here we are! Episode 24, Goodbye Girl. Misa is returning to Earth, and he's running escort in his brand-new, freshly-blued 1J.

I spot-checked every episode from 19 to 24 to find this. Because I guessed way wrong. (And why I started with friggin' Burst Point is anyone's guess. RIP Kakizaki. )

 

And right after this episode is the video arcade, the infamous knife fight, and the wedding. So my initial gut instinct of "Same time he gets hitched" was closer than my second guess, given it is only shown once before the marriage. Woulda made for a strange wedding gift, though.

Well from episode 20, Max was promoted to 2nd Lt. to First Lt. (shoui to chuui). I would assume that the guys that were with him during the Shao Pai Long movie were in his command. But during the episodes of love concert (episode 22) he was still flying with Hikaru. So we don't know when he actually assumed command and got his VF-1J.

Well from the watcher's point of view, custom paint jobs are there such that you can identify who is flying in the middle of battle. I wonder what would happen if they just colored them all brown hehe. But from the macross point of view, I'm not sure. They usually don't point out valkyrie colors until Milia colored the VF-17S in Red in M7.

 

[Master Dex]

20 hours ago, ManhattanProject972 said:

Its been a little while since I last watched SDFM, Which episode does Max get his VF-1J? 

And do they ever mention anywhere how he or anyone else got to have his/her VF painted their own personal colors or is it just a sort of its always been that way sort of thing?

Bah... I did a whole post and didn't see I missed reading an entire page of people already answering this.. disregard.

Edited September 24, 2017 by Master Dex

[Valkyrie Driver]

What do the different uniform colors mean? Or is it just arbitrary?

[Seto Kaiba]

1 hour ago, Valkyrie Driver said:

What do the different uniform colors mean? Or is it just arbitrary?

Arbitrary, as far as we know... though there are hints there may be some specialism-related color coding.

Macross II is, AFAIK, the only Macross title thus far to make the uniform coloration explicitly meaningful with the base color denoting branch of service and the color banding denoting specialization.  (They also helpfully have sew-on patches that denote the same information.)

[JB0]

On 9/23/2017 at 9:48 AM, Seto Kaiba said:

... you could've just checked the page for his VF-1J color scheme on the Macross Mecha Manual.  Wherever possible, we mark the episode of first appearance and timestamp within that episode.

That would've been the SMART thing to do. I think we already established I didn't do the smart thing.

 

On 9/23/2017 at 9:48 AM, Seto Kaiba said:

It's after he and Hikaru both get promoted, so Max is a platoon leader and Hikaru rose to squadron leader.

I thought of that too, actually. He gets promoted in episode 20(which means Burst Point wasn't really a BAD start, continuity-wise), and he's still in his 1A when next seen flying in episode 22. 

He's got a VERY brief pass in 23 that ... it looks like he's flying a 1A in more-or-less Skull One colors when I freeze-frame it.

From below, so the yellow markings aren't visible(resolution here's not good enough to check the tailfin tops difinitively{clearly I need the BluRays}, but I suspect they're white), but... yeah. Not a hint of blue on it.  Picture attached, because why not.

 

I will assume episode 24 is simply the point at which his 1J was ready/all that blue paint finished drying.

[Focslain]

I'm a little stalled on a project due to a question i can't answer. Most likely because I'm not looking in the right place. 

So, question: What is the colour of Roy's valk that he flies around the time of the Big Escape episode (ep 12)?

Can't seem to get a good look at it and it's driving me nuts.

[Seto Kaiba]

12 minutes ago, Focslain said:

So, question: What is the colour of Roy's valk that he flies around the time of the Big Escape episode (ep 12)?

Roy's?  He's always had the Skull One.  It's the only VF he had in the series.

Y'sure you don't mean Kakizaki or Max?

[Focslain]

4 minutes ago, Seto Kaiba said:

Roy's?  He's always had the Skull One.  It's the only VF he had in the series.

Y'sure you don't mean Kakizaki or Max?

Nope, but that answers my question. It seemed different when I was watching the episodes. But that could have been an animation error. 

[Andras]

So this VF-1 Super variant got posted on the Macross Facebook page, and I was wondering what the source is (if it's from a publication), and are there any details on it?

22221782_1532701126813257_7794227667883944004_n.jpg

Edited October 4, 2017 by Andras

[Kelsain]

10 hours ago, Andras said:

So this VF-1 Super variant got posted on the Macross Facebook page, and I was wondering what the source is (if it's from a publication), and are there any details on it?

22221782_1532701126813257_7794227667883944004_n.jpg

Somebody call Xigfrid!

[JB0]

I'mma gonna guess it is some kind of development TESTbed.

More seriously, probably a FAST pack prototype.

[NightmarePlus]

Has there been any instances where technology similar to Halo's active camo was used in Macross?

[Seto Kaiba]

Just now, NightmarePlus said:

Has there been any instances where technology similar to Halo's active camo was used in Macross?

One explicit mention to date... the YF-27-5 Shahar ♀ is noted as having an active [visual/optical] camouflage system and a dazzle camouflage paintjob in addition to the typical active stealth system and passive stealth measures.  The optical camouflage was a design choice intended to facilitate its illegal use in black operations for the Macross Galaxy Corporate Army during testing of the prototype fighter and the prototype Stella-series cyborg pilot.

[Valkyrie Driver]

2 hours ago, NightmarePlus said:

Has there been any instances where technology similar to Halo's active camo was used in Macross?

 

2 hours ago, Seto Kaiba said:

One explicit mention to date... the YF-27-5 Shahar ♀ is noted as having an active [visual/optical] camouflage system and a dazzle camouflage paintjob in addition to the typical active stealth system and passive stealth measures.  The optical camouflage was a design choice intended to facilitate its illegal use in black operations for the Macross Galaxy Corporate Army during testing of the prototype fighter and the prototype Stella-series cyborg pilot.

Wasn't there also the color changing paint on the Sv-262's and the VF-31 Siegfrieds? Not totally the same as active camo from Halo, but far more realistic. Halo active Camo is not scientifically feasible (bending light around someone would have the additional effect of preventing them from seeing). 

[Seto Kaiba]

43 minutes ago, Valkyrie Driver said:

Wasn't there also the color changing paint on the Sv-262's and the VF-31 Siegfrieds? Not totally the same as active camo from Halo, but far more realistic. Halo active Camo is not scientifically feasible (bending light around someone would have the additional effect of preventing them from seeing). 

The problem there is twofold:

1. Thanks to the lack of official publications about the mecha of Macross Delta, the mechanism responsible for concealing the markings and paintjobs of the Aerial Knights and, later, Delta Flight has not been officially identified.  It's not even clear if the two organizations are even using the same technology to do the job.  The only source I know of that identifies it is a manual from one of the TOMYTEC model kits, which does refer to it as an optical camouflage system.
    
2. Given the almost total lack of information about the optical camouflage technology (technologies?) used in Macross Delta, it isn't clear if these systems are capable of doing more than what we see them do... concealing a fighter's markings and paint color.  There's a good deal of difference between making a fighter appear matte black and making it out and out invisible...
    

What I know of Halo lore you could fit on a paper napkin with enough room left over for a profoundly filthy limerick or three, but to bend light around an individual only blinds them if they're depending on the particular wavelengths being bent for vision.  I'm not sure what wavelengths the freaky Predator-faced things see in, but it's entirely possible that if the system is only bending visible wavelengths they could see by infrared or ultraviolet, or potentially using some more exotic form of sensing that isn't impacted.

The implementation of optical camouflage in Macross is more along the lines of using holographic projectors to present the illusion of empty space instead of bending light.

Edited October 25, 2017 by Seto Kaiba

[Sildani]

Stella-series cyborg pilot? Do tell. 

[Seto Kaiba]

5 hours ago, Sildani said:

Stella-series cyborg pilot? Do tell. 

Project Stella was a Macross Galaxy fleet cybernetics experiment to mass produce combat-ready veteran pilots from individuals with no combat experience using a special version of the Valkyrie control implants that confer ace-level skill by taking control of the subject's body part-time.  Maris Stella from Macross R was the proof-of-concept technology demonstrator for the program.

[snakerbot]

7 hours ago, Seto Kaiba said:

Project Stella was a Macross Galaxy fleet cybernetics experiment to mass produce combat-ready veteran pilots from individuals with no combat experience using a special version of the Valkyrie control implants that confer ace-level skill by taking control of the subject's body part-time.  Maris Stella from Macross R was the proof-of-concept technology demonstrator for the program.

So why not skip the middleman and just use AI-controlled fighters? If the cybernetics are controlling the subject's body, what advantage is there to having the body at all?

[Seto Kaiba]

Just now, snakerbot said:

So why not skip the middleman and just use AI-controlled fighters? If the cybernetics are controlling the subject's body, what advantage is there to having the body at all?

Well, there are a couple reasons...

• Fully-autonomous AIs are still somewhat limited.  Their limited processing power and procedural logic makes them unable to behave in an unpredictable fashion the way an organic pilot can.  They're also necessarily limited in their ability to select and prioritize targets to prevent the AI from causing friendly fire incidents and the like.  Consequently, most drones are run semi-autonomously instead to get around those problems and legal restrictions on autonomous AIs.
• The hardware and software necessary to produce a truly unpredictable AI is notoriously flaky, prone to generic "insane AI" behavior after developing self-preservation instincts, and totally illegal in the bargain.  People haven't forgotten the havoc that occurred when a complete nutcase obtained said hardware on the black market and installed it in a virtuoid idol that promptly went insane and took over Macross City, the SDF-1, and Earth's defense grid.
• Semi-autonomous drone systems are vulnerable to jamming, as demonstrated to great effect in Macross Frontier's first episode.

Basically, the advantage of a Project Stella cyborg would be that you get all the advantages of a fully-autonomous AI fighter but without the legal hassles or stability problems.  The program doesn't seem to have borne fruit, though.

[frothymug]

On 10/26/2017 at 5:13 PM, Seto Kaiba said:

• Semi-autonomous drone systems are vulnerable to jamming, as demonstrated to great effect in Macross Frontier's first episode.

I feel I should point out to anyone who goes to check this out should watch the Deculture edition of the first episode, not the normal broadcast version.

[SMS007]

Am I to understand that of all the Protodeviln who are still alive at the end of Macross 7, all of them, members of a natively incorporeal species, are still inhabiting their stolen bodies?

[azrael]

1 hour ago, SMS007 said:

Am I to understand that of all the Protodeviln who are still alive at the end of Macross 7, all of them, members of a natively incorporeal species, are still inhabiting their stolen bodies?

Yes. 

[JB0]

Finders keepers, right?

 

More seriously, wasn't the whole protodeviln thing only ever a problem because they COULDN'T leave? I mean, it isn't like they just woke up one day and said "why don't we go to another dimension and possess some genetically-engineered bioweapons for the lulz".

[kajnrig]

What's the purpose of the RVF-25's central fin extending from the underside of the fuselage/attached to its arm in battroid/Gerwalk modes? Does it have a real-world parallel/inspiration?

[Seto Kaiba]

2 hours ago, SMS007 said:

Am I to understand that of all the Protodeviln who are still alive at the end of Macross 7, all of them, members of a natively incorporeal species, are still inhabiting their stolen bodies?

Yup... though by that point the only one whose body had a prior owner was Ivano Gunther AKA Gepernich.

 

29 minutes ago, kajnrig said:

What's the purpose of the RVF-25's central fin extending from the underside of the fuselage/attached to its arm in battroid/Gerwalk modes? Does it have a real-world parallel/inspiration?

's a sensor antenna of an unspecified type.

The inspiration for it was probably the F-14's TARPS reconnaissance camera unit.

[Sildani]

If it helps, in the unrelated anime Yukikaze the main recon aircraft, the Super Sylph, has a very similar antenna described as a TARPS blade antenna. As Yukikaze was made before Frontier, it’s possible that a bit of cribbing was done. Still, arm-and-underside mounted sensors and antenna have a long tradition in Macross since the first VE-1 ELINTSeeker. 

[JB0]

9 hours ago, Seto Kaiba said:

Yup... though by that point the only one whose body had a prior owner was Ivano Gunther AKA Gepernich.

Oh, yeah, taking Gunther along was a dick move, assuming there was anything of the original man left inside after he was turned into a meatpuppet. I actually forgot about that.

 

I assume the EVIL series that drew them into the dimension in the first place ALSO had brains before becoming the protodeviln. They took those bodies with them when they left, too.

Perhaps not STOLEN bodies, given they were forced into them, but... definitely loaners.

[SMS007]

During the run of Delta, I read other people saying that the producers clarified Windermereans' mental development is only the same as that of humans. Therefore, Freyja's mental maturity is as unusual as it would be in humans and is not the result of being in the natural Windermerean middle age. Is this true?

Edited November 3, 2017 by SMS007

[Seto Kaiba]

On 11/1/2017 at 10:08 PM, Sildani said:

If it helps, in the unrelated anime Yukikaze the main recon aircraft, the Super Sylph, has a very similar antenna described as a TARPS blade antenna. As Yukikaze was made before Frontier, it’s possible that a bit of cribbing was done. Still, arm-and-underside mounted sensors and antenna have a long tradition in Macross since the first VE-1 ELINTSeeker. 

The blade antenna on the FFR-31MR/D Super Sylph from Battle Fairy Yukikaze is, IIRC, as far as I can find from the few Yukikaze publications I have, either the Super Sylph's "frozen eye" spatial passive radar or a multiband electronic support measures antenna cluster.  The actual TARPS pod (camera array) sits farther forward.  Ventral blade antennas are not uncommon, but they're never quite THAT large in the real world.

 

1 hour ago, SMS007 said:

During the run of Delta, I read other people saying that the producers clarified Windermereans' mental development is only the same as that of humans. Therefore, Freyja's mental maturity is as unusual as it would be in humans and is not the result of being in the natural Windermerean middle age. Is this true?

Can't say I recall that part.  I do recall reading that Windermereans physically age at the same rate as humans from birth until approximately their mid-twenties.  Beyond that point, the aging process (at least in human terms) is vastly accelerated and individuals over 30 have a similar physical state to a human twice their age (if they don't abuse their runes).

Given that their pace of physical development is the same as humans initially, that their emotional development is also similarly paced wouldn't surprise me much.  Freyja's emotional maturity might have something to do with her having been an orphan, a byproduct of her experiences as a part of Walkure, or simply a result of the accelerated aging brought about by her overusing her rune.  Heinz also shows maturity far in excess of what we'd expect from a nine year old, but he also overused his runes to the extent that he's physically as frail as someone almost four times his actual age.

[SMS007]

Gotcha. I somewhat disagree on your last point, though. The fact that Heinz was utterly shocked when forcing Mikumo to sing the Star Song caused the deaths of everyone in the 47th Special Fleet was completely ridiculous.

[Seto Kaiba]

33 minutes ago, SMS007 said:

Gotcha. I somewhat disagree on your last point, though. The fact that Heinz was utterly shocked when forcing Mikumo to sing the Star Song caused the deaths of everyone in the 47th Special Fleet was completely ridiculous.

It did seem a bit out of place, given that he'd previously sentenced Hayate, Mirage, and co. to a public execution without so much as batting an eye.

[Sildani]

Executions of a few he’s probably seen his father or Roid impose. Wholesale slaughter on his orders, though, that’s something else. 

[SMS007]

Heinz claimed in an earlier episode that he wanted Keith and the Knights to end the war as quickly as possible, though. What a twit that he doesn't really grasp that he's been making decisions affecting millions of people en masse.