[Gundam Wing] The Taurus's arm spike?

[Geoxile]

Was it actually some sort of special melee weapon rather than some decorative piece?

I asked because of this:

https://mega.co.nz/#!VJZB0IoS!L7lhxWX-O ... i8e9LN_BOc

It's a short webm of the Taurus using it to destroy a Leo. Assuming it's made of Gundanium, I guess it should have no problem destroying stuff like Leos, but can be be used to block or parry beam sabers?

[AmuroNT1]

As near as I can tell that fin is either decoration or, at best, a maneuvering surface for its MA Mode. No books or references have ever labeled it a weapon, the Taurus in that clip just chose to perform an elbow strike on that Leo.

Not to mention, it wouldn't be Gundanium anyway; the Taurus was made of regular old titanium.

[balofo]

Maybe it was the inspiration for the Gadessa series GN Cutters.

Funny how a lot of OZ MS lack close range weaponry even if they certainly will be used against other MS.

[Arsarcana]

Up until that point only the Leo could reasonably be expected to need melee weapons and it has them; everything else was specialized for some particular role where melee weapons weren't possible or potentially useful. I imagine OZ thought the transformation and ranged firepower were enough to ensure the superiority of their new Taurus. Plus, it was presumably designed before the Gundams started showing up and making melee combat a serious issue.

[MythSearcher]

Maybe it was the inspiration for the Gadessa series GN Cutters.

Funny how a lot of OZ MS lack close range weaponry even if they certainly will be used against other MS.

This is not a new weapon idea, at least in the V manga, V was seen using the beam shield as a beam edge this way. Can't remember if the TV version had that or not.

[HalfDemonInuyasha]

Maybe it was the inspiration for the Gadessa series GN Cutters.

Funny how a lot of OZ MS lack close range weaponry even if they certainly will be used against other MS.

This is not a new weapon idea, at least in the V manga, V was seen using the beam shield as a beam edge this way. Can't remember if the TV version had that or not.

I don't immediately recall any Mobile Suits in the Victory Gundam anime using their beam shields offensively like that (closest I can remember is when Seabook throws the F91's spare beam shield and shoots it with his beam rifle to make it explode in order to knock around an enemy MS). I can only recall when the Reinforce changes the deployment of its own large frontal beam shield into a giant beam saber weapon to kamikaze into the Motorad Fleet.

@balofo

OZ was pretty much the most dominant power for over 20 years and were the only group to have large numbers of Mobile Suits so they probably weren't expecting any sort of heavy resistance from other Mobile Suits that would require much use of melee weapons.

It's similar thinking the Mariemaia Forces had with the Serpent after. They believed that with the Earthsphere Unified Nations having been getting rid of Mobile Suits and other weapons that their own forces wouldn't have to worry about being (effectively) opposed by other Mobile Suits (only Zechs with the Tallgeese III and Noin with her Taurus were fighting back initially and even then, it was only Zechs and the Tallgeese III who was fighting with melee combat while Noin largely kept a distance with the Taurus' beam cannon), so the Serpents were not equipped with any melee weapons.

Even after the Gundams got involved (Deathscythe Hell, Sandrock Kai, and Altron being melee MS themselves), the Mariemaia Forces still largely almost succeeded due to sheer numbers until Wing Gundam Zero knocked out the command bunker, and Dekim was killed.

So OZ probably also thought that even if they ended up meeting scattered Mobile Suit resistance (defectors, pirates, thieves, resistance forces, etc.) then they could just overwhelm those forces with sheer numbers without ever having to seriously fight with melee combat. Melee combat didn't really become more of general importance until the Mobile Doll System entered the picture and the fact that fighting them up close, much less melee combat, would allow even normal humans to knock out Mobile Doll equipped Mobile Suits due to giving the Mobile Doll System less time to calculate and respond to what they do.