Capule's mythical Sonic Blast

[balofo]

Capule finally appeared in Bande Desinee(since it didn't get to show its elusive weapons in the OVA) and something called my attention:

http://imgur.com/6wyiiLQ

This time it's shown underwater in MS mode but firing what appear to be thin beams from the closed chest armor 5 rectangular openings! These beams remind of the Juacg firing in OVA 4. These can't be the chest missiles nor the belly circular mega particle cannon previously identified as the Sonic Blast.

bilbros had previously translated the weapon paragraphs from GPF

Laser beam [in the head]
A beam cannon located in the position of the mono-eye, thus nicknamed "beam eye". It has a relatively low power output, but high enough to destroy the MS main camera; so, when it fires, the sensor should be covered by a protective filter.

Sonic blast [on the pelvis]
It can be considered a kind of mega particle cannon. Its double-layered heavy armor can be filled with seawater acting as a cooling system, but on the land it is used as an high power beam weapon feeded by the generator.

Missiles [in the chest]
Each element of this 8-tube missile launcher can house several missiles. Due to the problems of a precise guide, they can be used only for ballistic attacks, hitting an area in the range of about 30 km.

Iron nail [hands]
These melee weapons consist of 3 large claws per hand, plus 2 small claws on the palm. Internally there is a movable frame structure, which allows enough strenght to cut off even Gundarium armor plates.

So if this weapon usage is legit then the Sonic Blast are actually 2 weapons:
-in MA mode for underwater battle it's fired from closed chest armor ports as weak beams
-in MS mode for ground combat the larger belly mega particle cannon is used as a powerful scattering beam weapon. Used this way in the UC novel:

The cornice arm with many joints swung down, and the tip of the claws were stabbed into the chest of the “Nemo”. The “Capule” dug out the moveable frame together with the armor, tossed aside the first enemy unit, and let the beam eye on its head fire. The goggle-shaped main camera was shot through, and the other “Capule” saw the crushed rocks and the falling “GM II” in the corner of its sights as it fired the mega particle cannon on its abdomen. The seawater loaded in the dual-layered armor could be used in the cooling system, which allowed the amphibious machines to use a power generator that had a higher power output than an ordinary machine. The mega particles that was released caused the rocks to evaporate, create new explosions, and an array of beams, including the defense team’s, was crossing through the place.

[toysdream]

Here's a slightly more exact translation of the Perfect File blurb:

Sonic Blast
Can be considered a kind of mega particle cannon. Because the seawater stored in its double-layered armor can be used in its cooling system, it displays enough generator output to drive high-output beam weapons even on land.

The second sentence, then, is just talking about the Capule and its generator - it isn't saying anything about the sonic blast.

-- Mark

[balofo]

Here's a slightly more exact translation of the Perfect File blurb:

Sonic Blast
Can be considered a kind of mega particle cannon. Because the seawater stored in its double-layered armor can be used in its cooling system, it displays enough generator output to drive high-output beam weapons even on land.

The second sentence, then, is just talking about the Capule and its generator - it isn't saying anything about the sonic blast.

-- Mark

Oh, thanks! I guess only a HGUC manual could finally explain what the heck it actually is.

Or perhaps even the people at Sunrise and Katoki don't know what is supposed to be so it never used the weapon in its 2 appearances in OVA 4

Answer us Izubuchi!

[Raikoh]

I usually think that underwater beams are fairly consistent, with the rule of "beams don't work underwater" that was established I don't know when (earliest I can remember is just Super Robot Wars). If you watch some of the oversea battles in Seed, you notice that aquatic suits pop out of the ocean to fire beams while they launch missiles from under the safety of the water. Now, CE doesn't perfectly match the mechanics of UC (bit weaponry being unusable under gravity in CE, for example) but I think that unless stated otherwise, most weapons are consistent across continuities.

It's possible that the Capule, being an aquatic suit, has some feature that allows a beam to not just dissipate underwater, that might be the Sonic Blast. Which would mean that while it's more powerful on land, it's still usable underwater. It would explain the super thin beams, as some alterations would need to be made for the beam to work in the water.

[Kuruni]

When amphibian MS shoot beam underwater, both UC and CE, it's "maser" which is sonic-based weapon.

The truly mysterious one is Gundiver/Waterproof Gundam's underwater beam rifle.

[balofo]

When amphibian MS shoot beam underwater, both UC and CE, it's "maser" which is sonic-based weapon.

The truly mysterious one is Gundiver/Waterproof Gundam's underwater beam rifle.

Sauce plox

[Kuruni]

It's more of my humble observation (sorry).

Well, most amphibious MS in CE only have phonon maser guns, instead of typical beam weapon. The one that actually has normal beam weapon is Abyss, and I don't remember to see it use those beam cannon underwater.

Now I may jump the gun on UC MS, but I don't remember them shoot beam underwater either. Although Zock does armed with phonon maser on its head.

But if you mean the part about phono maser is sonic-cased, here's what was written on now-gone Gundam Official.

The standard energy weapon used by ZAFT's underwater mobile suits. A phonon maser is essentially the soundwave equivalent of a laser. Just as light is made up of electromagnetic oscillations whose peaks can be quantized into individual photons, soundwaves can be similarly quantized into so-called phonons. Like the photons emitted by a laser, the phonons emitted by the maser are all in phase and of the same frequency, creating a coherent beam which can deliver large amounts of energy to its target.

[toysdream]

Nope, they have been known to use beam weapons underwater in the UC series.

-- Mark

[Kuruni]

*Slam my forehead on keyboard* darn my memory...

I suddenly remember there's Aegir beam cannon from IGLOO 603, which is Zeon's attemp to make more effective underwater beam cannon. I think the issue with using beam gun underwater are greatly reduced range, and heated water around the gun.

[AmuroNT1]

At the very least, the Zock's head gun is called a phonon maser.

[Gelgoog Jager]

Regarding the Aegir, take this with a grain of salt but I kinda seem to recall reading somewhere that the cannon worked by generating some sort of explosion or vacuum which allowed the beam to remain unaffected by the water to some extent/distance.

If that is indeed the case, then I imagine that maybe the sonic blast could work in a similar way, momentarily generating a path for the beam to move through. I must emphasize that I don't remember where I read it, nor can't I find the source at this moment. Hopefully someone else might have some official info at hand to confirm/deny this.

As a side note, I wanted to mention that a while ago we first saw the MAM-07-X3 equipped with underwater use bits, which makes me wonder if such advancements on underwater beam weapons did took place late in the war in order to allow one such weapon to be considered a viable option. Let's not forget that supposedly the original MAM-07 Grublo was meant to be equipped with a mega particle cannon on the nose, just like the Bygro.

Alternatively, has anyone considered that the sonic blast might also/instead have a different use underwater, such as generating some sort of shockwave for attacking underwater targets, or affecting enemy sonars somehow?

[balofo]

Reminder: the Zee Zulu's Beam Machine Gun has a mode for firing underwater.

Sonic Blast is just a different name for a MPC, I guess.

[toysdream]

The Grublo's bits are equipped with torpedo launchers, not beam weapons.

On the other hand, we've seen Goggs firing their mega particle cannons from under the water, and the Gundam of course used its beam rifle to finish off the original Grublo. So they do work, albeit pretty badly.

As for the Aegir, it fires a small projectile called a "pilot bread" (seems like it should be "pilot bullet," but whatever) which opens up a momentary air tunnel for the subsequent beam.

-- Mark

[Gelgoog Jager]

Regarding the Zee Zulu's machinegun, it seems weird that for their machienguns to be stored on those waterproof containers if they can be carried and used underwater as well. I do could imagine the grenade launcher being operational underwater if the situation called for it though.

Regarding the beam weapons of amphibious MS, the Gogg's beam weapons seem to be particularly large and more powerful than, let's say, the beam gun of a Z'gok or Acguy. I think it's a safer bet that most amphibious MS are meant to use their beam weapons on the surface.

As an interesting case, we are told that the Z'gok has beam guns and missile launchers for striking targets on the surface, while the upgraded Z'gok E has faster firing beam guns and topredo launchers for attacking underwater targets. Basically, the beam guns of a Z'gok E have a higher fire rate, but also lower individual beam power, which makes them useful for tearing enemy units outside the water, but even more useless against underwater targets, therefore the need to equip the Z'gok E with torpedo launchers. Therefore, we could probably consider different tiers of beam weapons with different power levels and effectivness underwater:

-High (Gogg, Jurick, Zock)
-Medium (Z'gok, Acguy)
-Low (Hygogg, Z'gok E)

By the way, I do will note that the ballistic weapons of the MSM-07 and MSM-07E could as well simply be the infamous SUBROC (Submarine Rocket) rounds, which are supposedly equally useful underwater and on the surface. They are known to be used by the Zaku Marine Type and Zaku Mariner, though I imagine they were probably also used by other Zeon MSM units, such as the Acguy (for its 6-tube rocket launcher).

Back to the Capule, and leaving aside the possibility of its 8-tube missile launcher using or not SUBROC rounds as well, Mark's information on the Aegir makes me think that the Sonic Blast do might have been intended to create a similar effect to improve the effectiveness of the Capule's beam weapons while underwater.

And given that the Shamblo could be considered the pinacle of amphibious mobile weapons, do we have any information indicating whether or not the Shamblo could use beam weapons underwater?