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A side blog for @ThaMechanist, where I can be 100% totally normal about robots, mechs, and their humans

[bios-0307]

how do we feel about mechromancy? (mech necromancy)

pilot who died x mech who couldn’t stop the bleeding

mech who won’t open her cockpit to let the med team take the corpse away

pilot who is horrified at what her mech had to do to bring her back

[mechanistandmechs]

Funky question, but has anyone got a good setup for using the old 2015 steam controller with Mechwarrior 5?

I found my old controller over Christmas and it feels like it should be a good mix - since it could do movement on left stick and precision aiming with the trackpad, and there's plenty of extra buttons for weapons/orders/etc.

I also have absolutely no experience with mech games at all, so I might as well develop some weird setup habits right off the bat 😅

[shakyfoundations]

Mechtech Coffee is the lifeblood of a workshop, keeping mechtechs on their feet until their mechs are shiny, ready for combat and emitting the happy bleep bloops. Each mechtech has a closely-guarded recipe unique to their workshop, but the traditional recipe can be found in the Pilot’s Handbook:

- 3tsp instant coffee

- 15mls hard liquor (traditionally rum)

- sugar to taste

- a pinch of red chilli flakes and cinnamon

- 100mg of dextroamphetamine

- boiling water

(Having tried making this to the best of my ability for this post, I can confirm that it would keep me going long enough to clean a 15m tall weapons platform <3)

[pray4me2wice]

Engineers in mecha. Despite regulations, some engineers secretly modify mechs to reduce pain feedback or enhance combat stims. It's illegal—it can cause cascading psychological damage—but a knowledgeable enough engineer with a favourite Hound will do it anyway. When a mech is destroyed, the engineer often grieves more openly than when the pilot dies. The pilot is replaceable by corporate logic, and the engineer has internalised this. But that mech? They knew every rivet. Hell, they knew it like a lover. Out of all the ways to lose a lover, total destruction is—perhaps—the cruellest.

[chaosmagetwin]

Command Prompt

"Stop. Just, stop okay? She's gone. She's not here. And she's never coming back, okay? Just.... Fuck. Just go to your fucking kennel."

"Command accepted." The lieutenants disgusted face left my vision as I turned away, and left her almost empty room. Bodies passed me by. Some turned away from me, some reached out a hand before someone else pulled it away. None touched me. They couldn't.

I killed the last person who dared.

I stood in front of my pod. I couldn't connect to it without her. I waited. She'd come soon. I stared at it.

"Do you need help, pilot?" A voice called from behind me. I turned, and looked at their shoulder. Engineer. Third rank. I didn't look at their face.

"Request denied. Unclear intent. Please state intentions."

"... Do you need help connecting to your pod, miss?"

"DENIED. ADDRESS PILOT BY RANK." It can't call me miss, only she can call me miss, I am not miss, I am pilot, pilot pilot, leave me alone alone alone.

"S-sorry..." It left.

I stared at my pod. She'd be here soon. She'd tuck me in. The lights dimmed. The attack on the base must've needed a long meeting to sort things out. She had to be busy. She was busy.

My legs trembled, aching.

I fell before the lights rose again. I sat on the floor, and stared at my pod. She was coming. She always put me to sleep before going to bed.

Did she forget? She must be tired. Too many meetings. They always put her in too many meetings. Always worked her too hard. Too many logistics she had to handle for me.

"Pilot. Stand up." A voice called.

"Orders received. Confirmed." I stood up, and looked at their shoulder. A commander. I saluted. I didn't look them in the face. I can't look them in the face.

"How long since you slept?"

"Current operation is at fifty two hours, thirty nine minutes. Requesting handler."

"Request denied." I flinched. What? "You're being reassigned. Lay down in your pod."

"Orders received...." I couldn't move, couldn't say the word. "Denied..." I whispered. "Requesting handler!"

"Request denied." The voice sighed, deeply, frustrated. "You need to sleep, pilot. You are... not functioning properly."

"Pilot is operating above mission parameters!"

"And what parameters are those, pilot?"

"... Survive."

"You cannot complete that mission if you do not sleep."

"Confirmed. Request Handler to complete mission."

"... oh, Kit...." I flinched on hearing my name. No. No. No.

"PILOT. I AM-"

"Be quiet, pilot." My mouth snapped shut. I felt my tears slide off my face, hitting the metal plate beneath my feet. "I know you've been told. I know how you reacted. I know you killed the doctor. None of that is your fault. It's time for you to go to sleep."

"... Order denied. Please. It.... I... I can't..."

"Your handler is dead, Pilot." The words hit me like an AP round. A wail grew in the air. "You're being reassigned to a new handler. Out of the system. You... you're being retired."

"No! No! No! Requesting handler! Stop hiding her from it!" I couldn't move. My legs wouldn't move. I needed to kill this thing in front of me. A spy, a fake, an enemy wearing the uniform of the commander, he's not real, he's not real. I couldn't move my legs.

"You held her hand, Pilot. Who gave you your last order?"

"Handler!"

"When was it received in this operation cycle?"

"Order received at hour 8 and seventeen minutes!"

"That was two days ago. What was that order?"

"... Survive...."

"What were the exact words, Pilot?"

".... It can't.... it can't...."

"Repeat them to me."

"Confidential information! Cleara-"

"Override! Security clearance level 8, two nine alpha three seven Kilo Indiana Tango. Repeat your last orders to me!"

Her words flowed out of my mouth, repeated like a mantra in my head for so long they made up more of me than I did. "You have to survive, baby. Don't let me die in vain, you have to live! Get off me, doc, let me say goodbye. Let me tell her to live. Listen to me, Kit. My little Kit. Oh, I love you. You did such a good job for me today. You saved a lot of people, okay? But now you have to think about you. You have to survive. Priority one, okay? Confirm for me, baby. Authorization two nine alpha three S-seven.... Kilo. Indiana.... tang- tango. Good..... -rl"

"Priority one, Pilot. What is your next step in this mission? Your handler is not available."

".... Command: Sleep."

"Lay down in your pod, Pilot."

"Order.... confirmed..."

[butch-pilot]

I think we need way more knight mecha. Give me mechs covered in the heraldry of their pilot, wielding a giant sword and shield. Give me a pilot in lightweight armour to protect themself in case their mech goes down. I don't care if the knight is the mech or the pilot, we just need more of it

[heron-knight]

okay, but can we talk about mech vs mech hacking warfare?

You’re literally reaching into their mechs computer. You know, the thing that’s connected directly to their brain? I’m just saying there’s a lot of potential there that I haven’t really seen.

You know those reward chemicals? The ones that the pilots are pumped full of every time they kill something? You have access to that system. Hell, you have access to all the systems like that. Reward chems? Combat stims? Painkillers? That stuff they put in the mech just in case the pilot starts acting strange and command needs to shut off its brain and let the orders do the work? All you have to do is open a link and you can stretch your hand across the battlefield through the system and squeeze the IV bag. Better yet, you can choose not to. For example, you could start feeding them a baseline dose of synthetic oxytocin and then abruptly cut them off whenever they aim their gun at you.

And then start it back up when they aim it at their former allies

Then there’s the brain-computer interface itself. Blackbox data? That collection of everything the pilot thinks or feels since it got in the mech? Yours. You can know them better than they know themselves, and you can open up a comms channel to tell them just what’s hidden in their subconscious. You can tell them what they’re afraid of. What they want. Why they’re doing this, even if they don’t know why themselves. It was quite an oversight, their organization deciding to keep an open link from their mechs to command in order to monitor pilot status, because now you have their records from back at base too.

The only setting I’ve seen with a lot of mech hacking is lancer. Imagine what would happen if you put it in a setting like armored core or whatever unofficial setting we tumblr mechposters have.

[wolf-among-mechs]

I think something has to be said about mech-techs because they come in different breeds just as mechwarriors and mechs themselves.

You got your rank and file army mech-techs. They typically work with stock models and pre-arranged configurations for omnis. Practising and drilling it in until they can do it in their sleep while under and on fire without missing a beat. The same goes for a repair. They know where everything goes in the hunk of junk and can service with precision. Most of the lower rungs are people who can barely remember to breathe but can lift and hold things. Typically, you get some senior techs that have brains and can give recommendations of field refits. The dread variant is the ones who know they are too competent to be fired and leverage that against mechwarriors and senior officers.

Mercenary mech-techs are space wizards in that they usually care for and manage highly specialised machines that only sometimes resemble the original mech. Cables and ammofeed systems have been rerouted, assembled, moved, and re-used for another system. A melange of disparate systems that have all the cooperative abilities of fussy babies past naptime. That somehow, against all odds in a way barely they comprehend, works. So, of course, they will be a bit upset if you lose the machine. Or blow it up or... you know. All the things a mercenary can mess up a mech with. Dumbest thing I heard was leaving it overnight in a bar and having the darn thing stolen by some space hicks. Also if something is stupid or does not work with a mech design you had in mind. They are going to hit you with clipboards.

Clan technicians are made to serve without question, and they are good at it. Good at repairing, realigning omnis, and working really hard, they seem able to work more than twenty-four hours a day. They will do whatever you tell them to without hesitation. Even if you mutter something from a fever pitched dream of a Wimber Tolf, a mad cat with the rocket pods in the arms and the lasers in the shoulders. They will do it. The only thing they will say something about is a tonnage mismatch. Terrific at maintaining equipment and weapons. But also, they will not do something unless you order them first. Often working on whatever the highest ranking warrior told them to do last.

Then you have the periphery mech-techs. People who own welders and plasma cutters and a bit of elbow grease and a resume so filled with lies it may just qualify as a politician's speech. They can bolt anything to a mech. Heck they will bolt anything to mech. Weld it there. The rust bucket mechs they get in the periphery are usually hardy enough that they can hold up to their creativity. Leading to maddening makeshift designs at times. The ones who figure out mechs at least a bit graduate and begin to staple them together. Creating franken mechs. Things that moves that should not. Piles of ferro-metal slabs of armour and myomer that shamble in open defiance of logic. Still you got to admire that somebody thought to string things together. And make it work.

Of course, you have a bundle of mechtechs that break out of these molds and find their own way. As people do. But they are less seen behind the moneymakers, the flash, and the glamour of the mechwarriors. But in the end, it does not really matter what kind of mechtech you are or if you are a mechwarrior. We are all happy deep down when we get back the mechbay alive. Ideally, with a mech, but sometimes you might not. In those moments, just remember it is a whole lot easier to rebuild a mech than it is to rebuild a life.

[butch-pilot]

I love making mech pilots who have something fundamentally wrong with them. Pilots who stare at you for too long without blinking because they forget they aren't hidden behind layers of metal. Pilots that twitch and flinch at any sound outside of the cockpit. Pilots who refuse to talk to anyone apart from their beloved Handler. Pilots who instinctively curl their hands as if touching controls that aren't there. Pilots who will do anything to get back into their mech - their real body.

Pilots who will never be anything other than a pilot because the bond with their mech and their constant exposure to combat has shattered their mind.

[ross-hollander]

A translation guide...

...for all those hotshot pilots who need to learn how to speak a conversational Mechtech in a hurry:

"Running diagnostics": taking a five-minute break.

"Checking that repairs settle": taking a ten-minute break.

"Sent the new guy to the quartermaster for the parts we need": taking a half-hour break.

"In five minutes": in ten minutes.

"In ten minutes": in half an hour.

"In half an hour": tomorrow.

"In an hour": actually, in forty-five minutes.

"Severe damage": functionally meaningless, they will say this about anything. Ignore it. It is small talk.

"Extensive damage": actually light damage but on the parts that are hard to work with, so try running a little cooler from now on.

"Moderate damage": sure, you nearly died, but shot-out cockpit glass is pretty easy to replace, stop being dramatic.

"Apprentice work": the most important parts of your 'mech are being left in the charge of the least experienced worker in the entire hangar.

"Armored up on vulnerable segments": an extra layer of tinfoil has been applied over your armor and fastened in place with hot glue.

"Extra armor stripped to save weight": your 'mech is now protected by about two sheets of corrugated metal plundered from a local hardware and landscaping store.

"Lunch break": a block of time that begins at the exact moment you return to the hangar with an engine on fire and one arm missing and ends just when they have to hand the job off to the night teams.

"Lighten up on the handling": treat this 'mech like a dainty lady of court who faints onto couches if slightly stressed and must not strain herself by strolling in the manor gardens too long.

"Push it all you like": if you bring this 'mech back in with all its limbs attached or the engine not exploded, they will assume you are denigrating the quality of their work.

"Get lunch some time at the mess": you have earned the Favor of the Mechtechs. Know you are blessed, and treat this gravely. Also, you are obliged to immediately counter-offer with getting command's permission to order in from a place in town. (Assuming it has not been blown up, the place or the town.)

[ttenaciousneatfinds]

A few software tech ones:

"Running diagnostics": There's a tiny bug that makes one of the lights flicker slightly faster than it should, or similar. This objectivly does not matter, but will be fixed unless the tech is held at gunpoint to work on more important things.

"Calibrating targeting system": The technican is using your mech to shoot at empty beer cans.

"Analysing Battle footage": Watching mech battles; Now with numbers

"Code's compiling": taking a 5 to 60 minute break

"Okay; THIS TIME, it'll work": Not a chance it works within the next five attempts.

"No way this works, but-": Problem thats taken 7 weeks solved by the dumbest solution known to man.

"Huh, thats strange... What could have?... No, no that'd be silly. Its probably nothing": Good/bad news: your mech is sentient now.

[the-purple-flower]

Fantasy creatures in mechs.

Elves who insist in a fully immersion vr method of piloting because they'll be dammed if those hundreds of years training with a bow go wasted

Dwarves who take a distressing amount of joy in being the biggest for once, hitting the enemy with a gun bigger than the mech

Werewolves who are raised from birth by the company and controlled via the family bonds

Centaurs piloting the spider tank™️ because they are used to a much more stable platform

Gargoyles used to having thicker skin than everyone else suddenly becoming snipers and ambushers out of fear

That hell hound who's immune to fire taking full advantage of this and detonating their mech every other mission, much to mission controls annoyance.

Is this anything?

Feel free to add your own take on this

[ironedsleeper]

Head of engineering: “Look I understand your concerns but I promise you even if Unit-19H was at an uncomfortable temperature we don’t have enough blankets!”

Pilot that hasn’t slept in 52 hours, between sobs while spreading three blankets on top of their mech: “But she’s cold!”

[ross-hollander]

The fact is that...

...every hangar and maintenance shop and so on has its own absurd rituals; it's just that every single hangar thinks that theirs are perfectly normal.

It's perfectly fine for our maintenance crews to mark a designated "screaming zone" outside the hangar for frustrated technicians to vent their anger into the atmosphere, with off-duty crews holding up signs to show their rating of the outburst like gymnastics judges, but if the workers two bays down have a whiteboard up with a standing tally of ghost sightings, or a taboo under pain of buying ice cream sandwiches for everyone from the base commissary of ever uttering the phrase "good as new", or a large, malformed but vaguely humanoid figure made of wreck bits called "Our Lady of Scrap Metal" to whom a sandwich must be sacrificed every new moon, well, that's just plain absurd, and frankly makes you doubt their degree of professionalism.

[ironedsleeper]

I think after a mech pilot logs enough time in the cockpit they would start picking up these little tells

Quick glances to the lower right to check a readout that isnt there

Starting every turn with their torso

Being surprised at their own hunger because theyre so used to having a monitor remind them to seek nutrition if needed

Not recognizing their fellow pilots meat bodies because hey Jameson isn’t this lanky pale redhead, Jameson is a 30 foot war machine with yellow racing stripes

But the biggest tell by is that when they’re outside of their mech a veteran pilot will pause every so often, just stop dead and halt sentences, and then after a moment they resume as if nothing happened

They do this because outside the cockpit their neural link with their mech only allows simple diagnostic questions, each pause is a pilot asking their mech if they’re okay and waiting for a response before they continue

[robotfuckerconfessions]

the idea of robots getting feelings and switching from being just an ai to a sentient mechanical being in a romantic/sexual context is SO SO SO sexy to me. imagine being wanted so badly that it made them become something they were never created to be.

[robotfuckerconfessions]

I'm sooo desperate for stories about mecha and their human pilots getting into weird codependent, mutually obsessive relationships where the sex is just like pure brain fuckery. A mech messing with your neurons, controlling your body for the express purpose of its own idea of pleasure. Giving you nose bleeds because it pressed too hard on your little meat computer..and of course the pilot is really, really into it etc etc

[wired-right]

robot partner, who slowly replaces all of your human body parts and traits with technological ones until you can't recognize yourself