A curious thought on some CE stuff

[Mu La Flaga]

Ok so I was pondering this recently.
Back in the original Gundam SEED, we saw how the Strike Gundam did offer up something unique in terms of it's Striker packs being able to configure it for whatever role/mission it was needed.

But then a little in to the series, the Earth Alliance obviously came up with a solution instead of letting the Strike Gundam have to return to the ship for swapping packs or making risky space docking mannuveurs.
The Sky Grasper solved that hurdle.

So fast forward a little more Strike Daggers couldn't use Striker packs at all.
But a later variant of Daggers could do(Dagger L I believe)

Which had even 1-2 new types of striker packs, for instance the one which had a Moebius Zero esque fighter drone attach itself to the back and give gunbarrel pods.

In SEED Destiny, what happened to that idea?
The Sky Graspers seemed like a great solution and not to mention a rather good support craft.
We know Windams had 2 packs at least.
And ZAFT had their own versions of striker packs in the form of wizard packs and the silhouette fliers for Impulse.

I kind of got the feeling, maybe they didn't implement it as much as they wanted to do overall?

[wilcosu35]

i think the problem is that the skygrasper made a good transporter for the packs (and it gave them some additonal abilities), but they couldn't really swap the packs in in mid-battle. it was done a couple times in SEED i believe, but it took some very fine manouvering.

ZAFT created the silhouette flyer as it's own version of the pack delivery system, which included a guidance system to attach them to the MS itself, something the skygrasper did not have

[Mu La Flaga]

That being true yes, but it could make a Sky Grasper rather formidable even with an Aile pack attached to it.
Extra thrust and the Beam Rifle on the side.

[AmuroNT1]

I think the biggest issue is simply practicality. The Destiny-era Strikers are the ones that make the most sense in terms of mass production, and the Skygrasper concept makes more sense as a testbed than a full production model, especially on the modern battlefield where fighters are pretty well useless.

As for the Strike Dagger not having Striker capabilities, it's been established that the Strike Dagger was rushed into production in order to get it out there; the 105 Dagger from MSV is the true production model of the Strike.

[Calubin_175]

It may make sense to have a Skygrasper for high value weapons such as the prototype Strike Gundam to extend its operation limit and survival rate, but it is unnecessary for expendable units such as the Dagger L and the Windam.

[HalfDemonInuyasha]

Yeah, when it comes to prototypes, it was pretty valuable, but once combat data was collected and mass production of units began catching up to ZAFT, there was less and less need for it. Even though the Packs themselves remained in SEED Destiny, there wasn't really any need for mid-battle swapping that would require a Sky Grasper as there were probably more than enough units in squads using a certain pack to be able to cover those roles rather than simply leaving it up to a handful of units having to constantly swap around.

Basically, rather than having to make split-second choices and risk vulnerability by trying to change mid-battle because of having less units, they were now able to simply arm a bunch of units with different packs and just send them out without worrying about having to actually change them until the next battle.

[E08]

Although we dont seem them in the anime, the side story seems to indicate that the EA produce some more units later. In Seed Destiny Astray photonovel, Sky Graspers appear as fast response team to investigate unknown units in the airspace. These units are also equipped with striker packs.

[azrael]

Another difference between the Striker packs and the Silhouettes is that the Striker-packs is not just a backpack. Additional equipment on the shoulders and arms was also provided with the Striker packs. And they did use the Striker-packs later in CE. In the assault on Heaven's base, Daggers were equipped with Launcher packs and Slaughter Daggers use the Aile filght pack.

[MythSearcher]

If we look at real life machines with similar designs, like the Styker, they ended up with fixed armaments and not changed.

The reason is that you will have a bunch of useless packs store on your mother ship, which would not be much cheaper than the MS itself.(Looking at war machnies, it is quite obvious that the most expensive parts are usually the main engine and the weapon system, especially computers are getting cheaper and cheaper)
It makes a little bit of sense if its guns or missiles that are detachable, yet the whole pack including thrusters? not so much.

Also, looking at the real life modeling industry, I have no idea why Bandai seems to be so reluctant in selling just the packs by themselves.
Given the 3 packs or more, there will always be some packs that are more popular, so Bandai risked having stocks that are hard to sell, which makes it quite silly to try to force buyers to buy an MS+pack box instead of selling cheaper packs boxes without the MS.
They did the F90 with 3 different packs in one box stunt back then, and probably failed in a lot of other single pack F90s(At least I still see a lot of stock left in model stores even 10~15 years after its first issue) They did the same mistake in Strike and Impulse.
It would be a great problem if more MS have such systems, and their modellers might not even want to design new models that needs to consider the older packs as well.
(RG Strike can kinda use the old packs but looks bad)
The PG version is a bit smarter, where they sell a pack with the skygrasper instead of with an MS, yet everyone can tell PG is not their main money making product line.

The design might seem reasonable at the beginning, but it is not, and quite obviously the problem occurs in merchandising the products as well.

[Calubin_175]

With the Impulse, they forced three separate model kits due to the VPS armor color variations, and in Age, it was no longer a backpack but the entire set of limbs. However, the toyish 1/100s had the core as a separate product.

[Xenosynth]

Actually, correction: The Blast impulse never got a model in any form besides maybe a No Grade 1/144th since I don't keep track of those. But the point still stands.

Edit: Yeah, it has a non grade 1/144th. Damn. That thing really needs to be in a proper grade or higher scale.

[Dark Duel]

That and an MSiA is the only thing the poor Blast Impulse ever got.