Toxn

It is said that the man with no name wanders the desert wastes to this day, searching for his fistful of dollars.

Since I'm thinking about it, here's my suggested format for a Sprocket-themed mini-comp (to be considered seriously when interest picks up again): Filling in the background: 2239 In this competition, entries would be asked to fill in a background detail from our ongoing series of competitions centred around a post-apocalyptic post-USA: Contestants are asked to submit a design for the DPRC's heavy tank, subject to the following constraints*: The vehicle should be designed in Sprocket using the "early war" era setting. The mass of the vehicle should be less than 42.5mt (to account for Sprocket under-estimating vehicle masses). The vehicle width (including tracks and fenders) should be less than 3.6m. The vehicle should have at least 76mm LoS armour across the frontal arc. The vehicle should be capable of going at least 25km/h across rough ground, and should top out (without blowing up the engine) at at least 30km/h on a level road. The vehicle should have a gun capable of penetrating at least 120mm of RHA. The gun should also ideally conform to the following sanity-check requirements: at least half-calibre base thickness, base length at least equal to nominal case length (note: not the same as "shell length" in-game, as this supposedly measures cartridge AOL), the rest of the gun tube at least a quarter calibre in thickness. Argued exceptions vis-a-vis working pressure, barrel tech etc can be made. The vehicle should be capable of climbing a 25 degree slope on the sandbox test course, and should be able to navigate the obstacles there. The vehicle should have a fuel load sufficient to give it a nominal range of 200km. The vehicle should have the vision ports and components needed to make it a working, usable vehicle for the purposes of playtesting. The vehicle should look suitable for a society with hindsight, a late-1930s to early-1940s industrial base, and an affectation for the aesthetic of totalitarian hypermodernism. The official base colour of the DPRC is haze grey, which should be worked into the paint and/or camo scheme. Submissions should be in the form of a short write-up on the competition entry thread (including a picture or two), as well as a link to the blueprint file for the vehicle. Submissions will be judged on the following three categories: Function: does the vehicle meet or exceed all of the listed requirements? How well does it work? Does it have any interesting extras that would improve performance in the real world? This may include playtesting in scenarios against AI opponents. Cost: how expensive would the vehicle be to produce when compared to the other entries? This would be graded on a curve, and would look at weight, engine power, transmission design, suspension design, and other major components. Aesthetics: how well does the vehicle capture the aesthetic of the DPRC? How pretty is it? These would be weighted to favour function, then cost, then aesthetics. The competition would run for a full calendar month, and would feature a small cash prize (distributed via paypal) for the winner. * Constraints may be added to or modified a bit as updates and new features get added.

Some new changes have improved how guns work, but we're not at the level of a full cartridge designer yet. Sprocket also habitually under-estimates vehicle mass by 10-15%, which I put down to more or less the same issues that we've encountered in our competitions. I think it's functional enough to build a mini-competition around, though.

Ja, Stumpy is more or less an armoured brick with a fairly anemic main gun and a very silly meme-missile. It's pretty on brand with how the DPRC was portrayed though - wonky, dysfunctional and grasping for gee-whiz solutions to problems caused by their own dogma. Its configuration is also a pretty predictable outcome given the very stringent restrictions placed on the competitors (most especially the width limitation, ground pressure requirements, side protection requirements against HEAT charges, and gun restrictions).

Stupidity is its own reward I think it would depend heavily on the terrain. Something I only realised about the Stumpy after the competition is that its MMP is ass, so any kind of swampy terrain would be a nightmare for it. On firm, rolling ground, however, I think it could just sling giant HEAT missiles at the Monolith until something gives out.

Thanks to the judges for their brutally fair/fairly brutal assessments I should note from my end that the turrets of both models of Derebus are actually very well balanced (at least, according to the CAD models) because of how aggressively sloped the front is and how far back the trunnions are. Derebus is about 10.8" 27.4cm ahead of the centrepoint of the ring, while Derebus-M is dead-on. Other than that it's a fair cop.

Picture the stupidest, most counter-productive way that this could play out and bet on that.

Lots of us want to do a planes competition more or less exactly like you described, but judging is an issue.

Long arrow adequate arrow...

Also: the next minicomp is definitely scheduled for whenever Sprocket unfucks its gun designer. I just made a 9mt tank (think an unholy amalgam of PzIII and T-34) that rolled all of the team challenges, and I'm keen to see what people with actual skills can do.

Someone finally built a pedrail. I've always wondered how these things worked in the real world...

Why do you think I keep responding to this inanity? I've been trying to praise what I see as good in you, in the idealistic hope that you'll become a better poster. Slavic pessimism would have saved me some trouble on this front...

In general? Dude I don't know, I'm too busy raising my own kid to have any fatherly advice to spare. In this specific instance? Read the rules carefully, double-check your work, be your own clear-eyed critic. Which, come to think of it, is pretty fatherly advice... Plus side: your entry is going to go through the judging wringer, same as mine and everyone else's. This is a learning opportunity

Because I'm not Slavic. My psycho-social gestalt is firmly on the praise good/romantic idealist end of the spectrum. My patience is also a finite resource, especially when getting lip from someone I'm in the process of trying to gently correct instead of chastise.