Rusty
Purveyor of Fine Weaponry
OUT OF CHARACTER INFORMATION
- Intent: The image was too awesome not to break my hiatus to sub
- Image Source: https://www.artstation.com/artwork/b12nE
- Canon Link: N/A
- Primary Source: N/A
- Manufacturer: Rusty's Custom Arms and Armament
- Affiliation: Rusty
- Model: N/A
- Modularity: N/A
Production: Unique
- Material: Durasteel, Alusteel, Beskar, Droid Components, Hydraulic Components, Targeting System, Shard Interface System
- Classification: Multipurpose
- Weight: Heavy
- Resistances:
- Kinetic: Very High
- Lightsabers: High
- Sonic: Average
- EMP/ION: Average
- Elemental: Low
SPECIAL FEATURES
- Integrated Targeting System
- Advanced Hydraulic System
- Beskar Plating and Endoskeleton
- Cigarette Lighter
- War Machine: Designed from the ground up as an instrument of war, Rusty's War Chassis is a far cry from his earlier chassis, which was cobbled together from old power armor. While the improvements to individual systems aren't dramatic in most cases, the cumulative effect is.
- Integrated Targeting System: The War Chassis was built with a multispectrum targeting system. It uses three distinct spheres of influence to create a comprehensive picture of the battlefield. Each sphere may work independently or in conjunction with one another.
- Advanced Hydraulic System: In order to reduce processing time for tactile sensory input, the War Chassis doesn't rely on traditional "touch" feedback sensors. Instead, it collects data from the hydraulic system, which measures the resistance of the world around it to produce tactile feedback. This comes with several drawbacks, as will be discussed later, but the end result is faster reaction times.
- Bull in a China Shop: The War Chassis is immensely strong. It's not all that fast, and certainly isn't designed for close quarters fighting, but heaven help the poor bastard who gets in front of the thing when it's on a rampage.
- Hard Headed: The use of beskar, both in the armor plating and the War Chassis' endoskeleton, makes it quite sturdy. Ignoring for a moment the vulnerability of much of the hydraulic system, the actual structure is pretty damned hard to hurt.
- Cigarette Lighter: It's got a cigarette lighter built into the fingertip. You can't tell me that's not awesome.
- Final Boss Weak Spots: The War Chassis is heavy for its size. To cut down on overall weight, the armor plating only covers strategic areas, such as the hydraulic pump in the chest or the sensors in the skull. Much of the hydraulic system is exposed, and therefore vulnerable to incoming attacks. Though the system is designed to minimize leakage from any one injury and with redundancy in mind, too much leakage and it shuts down. The amount of leakage it can sustain before this occurs is comparable to a human losing blood. Hit the right spots and it's going down.
- Hydraulic Drawbacks: Without the usual feedback sensors, the War Chassis is far from suited to delicate tasks. It's not that it's designed with brute force in mind so much as it's incapable of anything else. Additionally, the more hydraulic fluid it loses, the more "numb" it becomes, further complicating the task of staying alive. If that wasn't enough, the fluid is also pretty dangerous. See that low rating under elemental resistance? Yeah, this stuff doesn't light easy, but it burns like hellfire and is nearly impossible to extinguish once it gets going. The lines are insulated well enough, but "kill it with fire" is a perfectly viable option.
- Sensor Overload: Since the targeting system eliminates the middleman in terms of processing, it's entirely possible for the sheer amount of data to overwhelm Rusty. In the event that happens, he'll have no choice but to deactivate sensors to reduce the noise, and doing so creates a moment of vulnerability.
- Big Shiny Target: There are some things in life with which one should not kark lightly. Among those are anti-radiation missiles, the sort used to take out sensor stations, antiaircraft emplacements, and pretty much anything else that emits on the electromagnetic spectrum. The War Chassis's targeting system broadcasts on an astoundingly broad portion of the electromagnetic spectrum. It makes use of everything from passive infrared sensors to active millimeter-wave radar, and paints a stupidly bright target for any lonely missiles looking for a hot date. The same applies to any soldiers with even the most rudimentary of detection systems. The War Chassis is many things, but stealthy it ain't.
- Fat Bottomed Shards: The War Chassis isn't the heaviest armor out there, nor is it the most indestructible. It is, however, heavy enough to qualify as "thicc", as the kids might say. It's also quite slow. Running at full speed, the average 20 year old human male will outstrip it with ease, and will have a considerably easier time jumping, dodging, and doing other tasks that one might associate with survival in a firefight. Said 20 year old human male would subsequently be shot for showing off, but the point still stands. Although immensely strong, the War Chassis is well below the human standard for speed and maneuverability.
- Smoking Causes Cancer: The harmful effects of smoking and of secondhand smoke are well documented. Organic allies take note.
Ever have one of those ideas that seemed really awesome at the time you thought of it, but you kept putting it off because you were pretty sure it would never live up to the hype, only to realize that it absolutely was as awesome as you thought back when you first dream it up?
That's pretty much the War Chassis in a nutshell.
Most everything of relevance is described in the strengths and weaknesses tabs, save for the targeting system, so let's dive a little deeper into that.
The targeting system uses a variety of sensors to create three distinct sensor bubbles, or zones: Near, Far, and Wherever You Are.
The Near Zone tracks objects within 20 meters of the War Chassis using two primary means of detection: ultrasonic sonar and millimeter wave radar. The two different sensors serve two distinct purposes. The ultrasonic sonar detects the motion of relatively large, nonmetallic objects moving at speeds less than the speed of sound. This is a great way to make sure that no one is trying to sneak up behind you, but it's not so great at tracking small metallic objects moving faster than the speed of sound, which is what the millimeter wave radar is for. In short, sneaking up on the War Chassis is going to be extremely difficult, unless you're both stark naked and traveling greater than the speed of sound, in which case the War Chassis itself seems like the least of your problems.
The Far Zone expands outwards to 1500 meters from the War Chassis, and consists of three systems: radar, passive infrared, and IR laser. The radar is the millimeter wave radar from the Near Sphere, but tuned for distance rather than fine detail. This causes it to loose some resolution, but it makes up for it by being about to track a much larger area. Naturally, you can't use both regular and millimeter wave at the same time. Passive infrared tracks heat sources. Its resolution is fine enough to tell the difference between something like fire and, say, a hidden sniper, but Rusty has to actively pay attention to it to make the distinction. Normally, he'll just laze it with the IR laser, which will give him distance to the target, as well as things like elevation and velocity.
The Wherever You Are Zone consists of two passive systems: optical, and electromagnetic. The optical system is basically just his eyeballs. Or rather, the droid equivalent of eyeballs. The glowy seeing thingies in his skull. Yeah, those things. They take in light and process it into a visual image. They can see up close and far away, just like normal eyes, but like most droid things, they've been improved with better magnification and low light visibility than the organic variant. The EM sensor is basically like the eyeballs, but for the part of the spectrum above visible. They don't see into infrared, but they do see most radar bands, as well as other high energy rays, bolts, and so on. Like his eyes, they can't see through things and the effective range is determined by the strength of the source. As the name implies, both visual and EM sensors are effective at just about any range, given a bright enough target.
The purpose of all this is to provide accurate firing data for any target that Rusty might conceivably consider a threat. The War Chassis doesn't have onboard weapons integration, so there's no automatically computing the trajectory of projectiles or such. Instead, Rusty has to rely on his vast experience to turn the raw data into something useful. Cutting the extra processing out of the loop reduces reaction times by a measurable fraction of a second, but it will take lots of practice to get the hang of.
But then, that's the basic philosophy behind the War Chassis: strip away everything extraneous until what you have left is a pure warfighting machine. It's not the easiest thing in the world to use. It's not the fastest or the most agile system in the galaxy. There's precious little automation and no safety nets. Absolute mastery is required to get the most out of the system.
But then, precious few beings can claim Rusty's vast experience in the field of battle. Any amateur can bang a few notes out on a piano, but a a true virtuoso can make the angels in heaven weep with joy. The War Chassis is Rusty's instrument of choice, and he's willing to bet his life that he can make beautiful music.
