Zeon Prototypes of the OYW: MSV, MSV-R, M-MSV, and MSX added

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Scorpius7692
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Zeon Prototypes of the OYW: MSV, MSV-R, M-MSV, and MSX added

Inspired by a brief conversation on this exact thread, I feel (perhaps wrongfully) compelled to create a comprehensive list of every single failed Zeon prototype to ever exist in the OYW, explicitly for the lulz. Laugh and point your fingers at these god-forsaken failures of mobile warfare. Ha ha ha ha ha ha!!!!

In all seriousness, though, It'd be interesting to see just how many prototypes did Zeon waste money and resources building. A combat history is hardly necessary. If Zeon built it to be the ultimate weapon, then this list shall forever be its home.

Update: MSV. MSV-R, MS-X, and M-MSV

A. Mobile Armors
1. MA-04X Zakrello: nuff said
2. MA-08 Big Zam: big, powerful, and if it had been mass produced...
3. MAN-03 Braw Bro: worked for bit, and then promptly blown up.
4. MAN-08 Elmeth: a powerful weapon destroyed by the Gundam in a great tragedy.
5. MAX-03 Adzam: floating four-legged thing whose 'leader' weapon didn't really work.
6. Apsalus I: damaged and rebuilt into...
7. Apsalus II: destroyed and rebuilt into...
8. Apsalus III: third time is the charm, right? WRONG.
9. MA-06 Val Varo (Waro?): a floating crab in space. Powerful, but not Gundam-proof.
10. MAM-07 Grabro: who needs a water-based MA when you have amphibious MS?
11. MAN-00X-2 Brawrello: a Newtype use Zakrello? Really?

B. Mobile Suits
1. YMS-15 Gyan: relatively strong, put up a good fight, and lost.
2. MS-18E Kampfer: fast, furious, and with tissue paper armor.
3. YMS-16M Xamel: can this cannon-toting monster even be called a mobile suit?
4. EMS-04 Zudah: disentegrated by going too fast. Don't paint it red.
5. EMS-10 Zudah: same problems as the original, and thankfully still not red.
6. MS-06Z Psycommu System Zaku: a Zaku built for Newtypes, but it could only fight for 10 minutes.
7. MSN-01 High Mobility Psycommu System Zaku: who needs feet for speed. Just add rockets!
8. MSN-02 Zeong: probably one of the more successful prototypes, but it fought the Gundam...
9. MS-06K Zaku Cannon: although many examples are built, this anti-MS design suffered from recoil, preventing its mass production.
10. MS-06M (MSM-01) Zaku Marine Type: the first amphibious MS. Full of hot water.
11. MSM-02 Aqua Experiment Type: aims in the right direction, but misses.
12. MSM-03-1 Prototype Gogg: an ugly suit, but the seas were never safe again.
13. MSM-06 Jurick: an amphibious egg with claws, never got by testing.
14. MS-04 Prototype Zaku: so begins the age of mobile suit warfare...
15. YMS-07A Prototype Gouf: the grandaddy of Ramba Ral's blue suit of death
16. YMS-08A High Mobility Prototype: built for high mobility, but not important enough to have a real name.
17. YMS-09 Prototype Dom: the beginning of the Dom family of mobile suits.
18. MS-06R-2 Zaku II High Mobility Type: after a long series of high mobility test types, a true prototype was born. The Zaku of choice for Johnny Ridden, Crimson Lightning.
19. MS-10 Pezun Dowadge: one of the last evolutions ot the Dom. Never got out of Pezun.
20. MS-12 Gigan: an artillery suit that rolled on wheels. Never got out of Pezun.
21. MS-13 Gasshia: a Z'Gok-based suit with a 'hammergun'. Never got out of Pezun.
22. MS-17 Galbaldy Alpha: the love child of the Gelgoog and Gyan.


C. Misc
1. YMT-05 Hidolfr: a mobile tank with arms that could take on mobile suits. Why didn't this get mass produced?

This list is hardly complete, though, and eventually it might sink in just what I'm getting into. I'm still debating whether I should include prototypes from the side stories and manga or not, as that might make this list even longer. Until I make a decision, enjoy Zeon's waste of money/greatest weapons that had bad luck above.
Last edited by Scorpius7692 on Thu Dec 08, 2011 8:08 pm, edited 3 times in total.
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Re: Zeon Prototypes of the OYW

Are you counting ALL prototypes, or just ones that get destroyed?

Most of Zeon's MAs, like the Big Zam and Elmeth, were actually pretty damn effective until a jedi with a giant robot came in to the picture. The Big Zam, without the proper support of a mobile suit team supporting it, was doomed to fail at Solomon, and Dozle knew that when he took it out into the field to stall time for the retreating forces. The Elmeth...well Lalah did a self sacrifice to save Char. You can't really call either of those a failure in terms of being poorly designed.

The only one's I can recall being absolute crap are the Adzam because it was just a floating artillery cannon, and the Grabro because it was only a submarine with less personnel.

As far as MS's go, the Kampfer had light armor, and that was it's only problem...well that and going up against a gundam. The Zaku II R-D4 wasn't a prototype mobile suit intended for production, it was used to test out the leg skirts that were to be used on the Rick Dom, so why you're even mentioning something not meant for battle is beyond me. Likewise for the Gouf flight types who were suppose to test flight capabilities, but the technology at the time made it unsuccessful.

The Zeong was a powerful design, and like most of the MA's, had the misfortune of going up against the Gundam and its Jedi pilot....and I think the Zock wasn't a prototype, I'm pretty sure it was a limited production unit. Gyan was crap though, because it was meant to work in tandem with the Rick Dias, so the armament was almost laughable.

Still wondering why the bigro was left out though, since it was also destroyed by the Gundam. :P
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Re: Zeon Prototypes of the OYW

Are you counting ALL prototypes, or just ones that get destroyed?
All of them, eventually. It just happens to be that all the prototypes that we see onscreen are eventually destroyed.
Most of Zeon's MAs, like the Big Zam and Elmeth, were actually pretty damn effective until a jedi with a giant robot came in to the picture. The Big Zam, without the proper support of a mobile suit team supporting it, was doomed to fail at Solomon, and Dozle knew that when he took it out into the field to stall time for the retreating forces. The Elmeth...well Lalah did a self sacrifice to save Char. You can't really call either of those a failure in terms of being poorly designed.
I didn't mean to call them failures, and I'll be sure to reflect that when I update the list. Its just that a lot of Zeon prototypes weren't exactly the greatest mobile weapons ever devised.
As far as MS's go, the Kampfer had light armor, and that was it's only problem...well that and going up against a gundam.
I do agree that if I had my own Kampfer, I'd probably be an unstoppable lightning bolt of death, as long as I kept moving, because the design's dedication to only its devastating blitzkrieg assault tactics made the unit too specialized. If the gatling gun arm of a Gundam could kill it with no trouble, then the beam spray gun of a GM could as well. A Kampfer that gets stuck in a regular mobile suit fight is a dead Kampfer.
The Zaku II R-D4 wasn't a prototype mobile suit intended for production, it was used to test out the leg skirts that were to be used on the Rick Dom, so why you're even mentioning something not meant for battle is beyond me. Likewise for the Gouf flight types who were suppose to test flight capabilities, but the technology at the time made it unsuccessful.
Whoops. I think I might have gotten carried away with listing things. The update today should fix that.
The Zeong was a powerful design, and like most of the MA's, had the misfortune of going up against the Gundam and its Jedi pilot....and I think the Zock wasn't a prototype, I'm pretty sure it was a limited production unit. Gyan was crap though, because it was meant to work in tandem with the Rick Dias, so the armament was almost laughable.
I agree with the Zeong, and its true might will be reflected properly. And your right about the Zock; I guess I thought it was a prototype series since only three were built. The Gyan was crap. Thats all I've got to say about it.
Still wondering why the bigro was left out though, since it was also destroyed by the Gundam.
The Bigro, in a similar fashion to the Zock, had a limited production run. I think at least three Bigros were converted into Big Roofs, and one into a Big Rang, and I'm assuming that there were at least a few others hiding behind space rocks or something.

In other news, today will have a pretty small update, consisting of some fixes, and a few new prototypes from the MS IGLOO series.

MSV will be tackled someday. This I swear!
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Re: Zeon Prototypes of the OYW: MS IGLOO and corrections add

if anything the appearance of the gundam, guntank, and guncannon made zeon panic and this obsession with building something that could destroy the gundam caused the zeeks to basically approve every project and throw it at white base. the EFSF took advantage of that to plan there space force movements and dangled the gundam in one direction while the normal forces deployed in another. ms igloo tels the stories of the stuff that never got actually deployed ageist the white base. zeon's issue was the decision to focus an unit for an single mission role and they tended to get defeated by the EFF units designed for multi-role action.
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Re: Zeon Prototypes of the OYW: MSV, MSV-R, M-MSV, and MS- a

Just a few comments on some of the mentioned units:

MA-05 Bigro: The only Zeon MA to be mass produced. Besides the unit that fought the Gundam, we have 4 more Bigros at A Baoa Qu right before the final battle, the 3 Big Roofs and the Big Rang. In this thread, Mark also mentions that 2 out of 14 Bygros were converted into YMA-06 units (Val Varos?). If you also throw in all the Bygros that appear in side stories such as 0081, we probably do have over 8 regular Bygros out there though.
MS-06K Zaku Cannon: An odd case. Despite initial claims of only 9 units produced, several more continue to pop up, and they don't seem to have recoil issues. Only the 08th version seemed to had to be modified for such flaw.
MSM-03-1 Prototype Gogg: It seems this unit did saw limited mass production while the standard Gogg's design was being finished.
YMS-09 Prototype Dom: In some previous threads Mark has pointed out that this unit was probably mass produced at California Base, as the MS-09A.
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Re: Zeon Prototypes of the OYW: MSV, MSV-R, M-MSV, and MS- a

MSM-03-1 Prototype Gogg: It seems this unit did saw limited mass production while the standard Gogg's design was being finished.

YMS-09 Prototype Dom: In some previous threads Mark has pointed out that this unit was probably mass produced at California Base, as the MS-09A.
I didn't know that. I might not take them off the list, since they were still technically prototypes, but I might put in a note giving further details.

In fact, I might have to redesign how the list is organized. Maybe have different sections for Newtype weapons, prototypes that actually lead to mass production units, failed prototypes, and so on.
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Re: Zeon Prototypes of the OYW: MSV, MSV-R, M-MSV, and MSX a

Not to mention that some designs were meant for some other purpose, but changes in circumstances forced Zeon to shelve them. Like, according to most profiles, the MA-08 Big Zam is actually a HUGELY modified MA-09 Big Zam mass production type (perhaps a prototype that was constantly upgraded?) which itself was meant to be the main frontal attack force against Jaburo (supported and/or followed by the various MS, including other MSV MS like the Juagg, Agg, Agguguy, Zogok, etc).

Unfortunately Zeon's worldwide retreating coupled with the hasty and failed attack on Jaburo by Char made the Big Zam or any project meant specifically for striking at Jaburo pretty much pointless, much like how the Apsalus had become (hence, the order for the Apsalus Project to be shut down, much to Ginias' chagrin).


It's hard to say which ones truly "failed". It can depend on how they "failed". If one means simply losing and/or being destroyed, yes, many failed in that sense (which is what many of these fall under). In simply "failing" as in not really panning out beyond their prototypes, there are a number of those too.

Some I'd somewhat disagree with...

MA-08 Big Zam - As mentioned, it was a desperate situation and the only thing Dozle was thinking about was protecting his retreating troops while taking as many enemies down with him as possible before he went down, which he did quite successfully overall. If it were properly used in a battle with a full MS escort and other things, I'm sure the Big Zam would've performed much more effectively. The only huge weakness it had was the 20 minute time limit before it would start overheating from its I-Field generators and beam weapons and need to cool off an unknown amount of time.

MA-06 Val Varo - It's pretty much what the Bigro did, but better and more versatile. We only do see one after all, and it was only through Kou's unorthodox use of the Zephranthys that helped him win (after all, who would expect a MS to suddenly blast off with its upper half like that? lol) If Kou were in any other MS without a Core Block System, Kelly had him caught. The numbers were really what kept it down in the long run.

MS-18E Kampfer - As mentioned, in terms of what it was made for (high speed hit-and-run), it performed wonderfully. Even able to take out a whole "elite" MS Team before most could touch the ground (though, I also see it as a way to make the Kampfer cooler, lol). Unfortunately, as soon as it was shown that its weaponry wouldn't work on the Alex (especially after its Chain Mine failed), it should've done its "run" part rather than try to charge in with a beam saber.

YMS-16M Xamel - Initially, it did exactly what its role intended; heavy fire artillery support from a long distance. In the end, as the pilot mentioned, it was too big to be recovered by the small craft, so like Dozle, he focused on simply doing whatever he could to hold off Burning's team by himself which, obviously, is one of the worst things it can do. They were too close for the cannon to be effective and its other weapons were a mere 20mm vulcan (which is more of an anti-personnel weapon) and a missile launcher (which it expended, IIRC), leaving nothing but its sheer bulk to plow into them, which it did, lol.

MSN-02 Zeong - Along with most, it did its job quite well. Though, it was more Char coming up against Amuro more than the Gundam that the Zeong ended up falling given Amuro and his Newtype abilities, especially after fighting Lalah, allowed him to easily read the psycommu attacks. Up until then, from my understanding, the Zeong owned a number of MS and ships.

MS-06R-2 - Also performed admirably with Johnny Ridden and the other 2 pilots (with the 4 being used for beam rifle testing and such). It wasn't really "failed" more so than Zeon simply choosing the Rick Dom (I'd guess cost and ease of piloting are a couple reasons). In terms of its performance, it was still very good.

MS-17 Galbaldy Alpha - While maybe not the Alpha itself, its performance was seen as very good and enough for, like the Act Zaku, the Federation to take it and build it for themselves in the form of the Galbaldy Beta. It's really just ugly and almost looks unfinished or something...lol.



In terms of the list itself in general, a handful of additions...

AGX-04 Gerbera Tetra - The Zeon-side of Anaheim tried to copy a Gundam...and failed...lol. (Maybe if it were in the hands of a "main" main character, it'd have been better.)

EMS-05 Agg - A digger or pseudo-support MS (with missile launchers/pods replacing its drill arms). Never got used on Jaburo as intended.

Newtype Test GM Juggler - May be from a video game, but its epic failings are what make me mention it. Never got far and what tiny progress it did make just sucked, lol.

Rhinoceras - Also from a video game (Rise from the Ashes). A bigger Zaku Tank also from spare parts. More weapons, but otherwise slow and easy to slip past.

RX-78GP00 Gundam "Blossom" - Equipment constantly malfunctioned, maintenance sucked, no E-Cap for its beam rifle, balance was off, too multipurpose for a single pilot.

AMX-011 Zaku III - Similar to the Gyan and Zaku II R-2 in simply having the Dooben Wolf selected over it as the next generation mainstay MS of Neo Zeon. Only a few produced.
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Re: Zeon Prototypes of the OYW: MSV, MSV-R, M-MSV, and MSX a

AGX-04 Gerbera Tetra - The Zeon-side of Anaheim tried to copy a Gundam...and failed...lol. (Maybe if it were in the hands of a "main" main character, it'd have been better.)
I don't think that's quite accurate. IIRC, the GP04G was originally developed by as the spaceborn equivalent of the GP01 as part of the Gundam development Project, but at some point Anaheim decided this was redundant since they could just swap out the GPO1's core fighter and make other minor modifications to give it badass space maneuverability, so the GP04G was essentially given a new set of Zeon armor, and then given to Cima as part of some kind of deal, the details of which I cannot remember right now.

This is all from memory mind you, so I my facts could be a little off.
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Re: Zeon Prototypes of the OYW: MSV, MSV-R, M-MSV, and MSX a

I usually see the Federation being the ones to cancel it halfway through (for the same reasons; GP01Fb filled the niche fine, even if it's not as high-performance in comparison) and the Gerbera Tetra being the result of the Zeonic-side of Anaheim finishing it up for their own gains (in this case, as mentioned, handing it to Cima).

While it was fast and maneuverable, from things I've read (can't remember where), it was only something like a little over half as good as the original Gundam Gerbera design overall; lower speed/acceleration, mobility lessened because of various thruster placement, a beam machine gun as opposed to the long beam rifle, lower grade armor (Titanium/ceramic composite as opposed to Gundarium Alpha/Luna Titanium Alloy) and so on.

Was still a good MS, just not as good as it its original predecessor and given the results of its use, it ended up failing, lol.
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Re: Zeon Prototypes of the OYW: MSV, MSV-R, M-MSV, and MSX a

You have to note that Zeon is notorious for using their currently deployed suits, as test beds for technology. For instance the MS-06RD-4 Zaku II is used as a test bed for the Rick Dom. The psycommu Zaku and its HM version were both used as steps in developing the Zeong. The Zudah was actually better then the Zaku I, and probably just as good as the Zaku II, if they had fixed the engine overheating problem Zeon could of had a GM killer on their hands. After the federation won the one year war they confiscated and upgraded the Zaku Mariner putting it into use for themselves, so I wouldn't exactly call the design a failure.
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Re: Zeon Prototypes of the OYW: MSV, MSV-R, M-MSV, and MSX a

I'd also say that, in some cases, it was simply easier using existing designs (if they're good enough), either as a basis (Hizack and others) or the design itself in some way (Galbaldy Beta, Act Zaku, Zaku Mariner, etc) rather than trying to come up with a bunch of new ones themselves.
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