Shiro's fighting skills (08th MS Team)

[Recon 5]

In the 08th MS team, it is said that the Ez8's unconventional appearance is the result of hastily applied field repairs. IIRC there is one Ground Gundam from the 08th that survives the series (at least until the flight of the Apsalus 3) without being damaged to the extent of needing such modifications. Lets forget about the pilot of the GM Head for the duration of this discussion.

To me, that would be an indication of the skill/ luck/ experience of the pilot who preserved the original state of his Gundam compared to Shiro who managed to get his beaten up to the point that standard spare parts just couldn't cover the damage. Not only that, he also had to have the Ez8's signature upgrades as well.

Isn't it odd that Shiro, who can't even take care of his own MS properly, should turn out to be the only one who could lay the hurt on Norris and Ginias? Why not that other guy who at least showed enough skill to maintain the integrity of his own Ground Gundam? He didn't even show up during the climax of Norris's takedown (it was Norris vs Shiro all the way after the Ez8 started up again- what happened to covering each other's backs?). Although his absence from the Apsalus battle could be justified by the fact that he was not permitted to participate, it still strikes me as odd that he didn't contribute more to the war besides saving spare parts for Shiro's use.

Still, it could have just been his sheer luck or the fact that the enemies were focusing more on Shiro, but in that case I don't see why the 08th didn't take strategic advantage of the fact that this one guy seemed to take less damage, given their teamwork and all. Maybe they should have given him the Ez8 and assigned Shiro to the unmodified Ground Gundam, then the Ez8 would have survived the end of the war.

(I DO know that it could be just due to what the writers wanted, but I think it would be interesting if we could find an in- universe explanation).

[Mark064]

I don't think that's really the case. Shiro used his Gundam Ground to try to complete his mission and stop the Apsaras II. And in order to do that he tried to stop it used brute force instead of just letting it escape. So it's not like he got his Gundam so trashed in the middle of a fight. So I don't think we can really call it a testament of his own skill.

[J-Lead]

Forgive me, but who exactly is this "other guy?" Sanders? Healy? Stock grunt pilot No. 23?

Anyway, the reason Shiro got the upgrade was probably because he thrashed his suit during his effort to bring the Apsalus down, as Mark064 stated. Besides, he had proven himself as an effective leader and warrior in combat way before that. His team was the one who discovered and repelled the Apsalus I, in which his leadership skills saved Sander's life, and he did risk his life once again to take down the Apsalus II, saving Micheal's life in the process, which, to me, puts more ball hair on him than most main characters in Gundam, and this isn't even counting his previous accomplishments. In any case, Shiro has proven from the very start that he's got the right stuff; he's just more aggressive than most other pilots, which may help explain why he's occasionally more prone to damage than the others, but it's because of this very aggressiveness that he's capable of getting the job done.

Now my question is, why did they give it to him when they didn't trust him at the time?

[Camille Vidan]

Not to mention his Ball action.

[Recon 5]

Right. The Ball action. I totally forgot about that.

The 'guy whose Gundam survived' is the one who used that cannon/ bazooka thing throughout the series (a sniper/ fire support specialist?). The surviving Gundam itself is the one to the right of the GM Head during that scene where they're looking for Shiro after he nailed the Apsalus 3. His actions were more like those of a seasoned combatant than Shiro (and even his English VA sounds like the 'grizzled veteran' in American war films).

If you ask me, Shiro's recklessness itself tends to take him down a notch from a leadership standpoint. Saying "I'LL GET HIM!" instead of "Unit 2 (or whatever), take him down!" is NOT something that a squad leader should be doing especially if he's got one of the more powerful pieces of hardware.

EDIT: just watched a 08th MS team clip- The pilot is Sanders.

[Mark064]

You might want to rewatch the episode where Shiro tried to stop the Apsaras II again. And personally I don't think Shiro's Ball action was that great, I think they just make an overall big deal out of it. A Ball killing a Zaku isn't that big of deal. Especially if you look in comparison to the Ball Master Umon.

[auriga]

If you ask me, Shiro's recklessness itself tends to take him down a notch from a leadership standpoint. Saying "I'LL GET HIM!" instead of "Unit 2 (or whatever), take him down!" is NOT something that a squad leader should be doing especially if he's got one of the more powerful pieces of hardware.

Er... Pardon me, but... If you have "one of the more powerful pieces of hardware," doesn't that give you all the more reason to take initiative against a powerful enemy?

Okay, so "I'LL GET HIM!" is reckless... But then again, given that you have the goods your teammates don't have, isn't it your responsibility to use those goods? If not, why even give you such stuff to begin with?

[midnightcitysky]

If you watch the series Shiro is one of those "I'd rather die than let any of my teammates die" kind of guys, those really don't last long in the military unless they've got real concrete skills. watch the whole series from start to finish,although shiro is reckless he is a good pilot, he has great instincts, good reaction time and he's clever...especially in the last fight with norris.

I agree that shiro isn't the best leader as his personality isn't suited for the military, he's an idealist and very compassionate. like I said he'd rather risk his life than another persons and he takes risks, not calculated risks like most soldier types, but legit risks with no intel involved, just cuz as he states repeatedly he doesn't want any of his men to die. in the fight with the apsarus he saw michel almost cut with the apsarus' laser, which most likiely made him realize if he doesn't take this thing down, his crew's gunna die.

so he grapples with a giant floating cannon...let's go over that again HE GRAPPLES...with a giant floating CANNON...and survives...mainly due to luck but still. only reason shiro's mech got wrecked that bad is cuz he took a risk. if he did that delagation thing yeah he'd be OK but he believed that would get his men killed, so he manned up and took things into his own hands. and frankly I think he did a good job. it isn't that shiro is a bad pilot, he's just gully, he's on the fine line between bravery and stupidity.

and as an aside, in the super robot wars OG games kyosuke nanbu is considered one of the top pilots but he has admittedly crashed more prototypes than anyone and no one doubts his skills.

[justsomeguy]

To me, that would be an indication of the skill/ luck/ experience of the pilot who preserved the original state of his Gundam compared to Shiro who managed to get his beaten up to the point that standard spare parts just couldn't cover the damage.

By that flawed logic, a cowardly soldier who hides behind a rock during battle would have more "skills" than one who rushes out to fight and takes damage.

Shiro trashed his RX79G after grappling onto Apsalus 2 and being rammed into the canyon wall. Karen was ambushed by a mech that suddenly popped out of a peaceful looking lake. As for Sanders, are you forgetting that he already lost one MS (his GM) in the very first episode?

[Recon 5]

Er... Pardon me, but... If you have "one of the more powerful pieces of hardware," doesn't that give you all the more reason to take initiative against a powerful enemy?

Okay, so "I'LL GET HIM!" is reckless... But then again, given that you have the goods your teammates don't have, isn't it your responsibility to use those goods? If not, why even give you such stuff to begin with?

Probably because the Ez8 was Shiro's own suit in the first place. As you'll probably have noted if you are old enough to drive, no two vehicles handle exactly the same way, even if they're of the exact same type. Each of the Ground Gundams probably had minor handling differences and slightly different response times, so it makes sense to give Shiro back his own suit rather than switch pilots. It also saves quite a bit of paperwork.

Anyway, I'm not trying to do any Shiro bashing, in case thats what you're getting. I'm merely trying to reason why the two major battles (especially the Gouf Custom battle) degenerated into 'Shiro vs [insert super- unit here]' when his two comrades, who were arguably more experienced than him were perfectly capable of helping out. In fact, if they had ALL gone after Norris in the end, they could probably have saved the last tank- their shields are shown to be perfectly capable of stopping the Gouf's machinecannon shells so they could have at least tried to get in the line of fire.

[auriga]

By that flawed logic, a cowardly soldier who hides behind a rock during battle would have more "skills" than one who rushes out to fight and takes damage.

I think that's a bit too harsh.

Recon 5 also has a point; it's just that I think he's looking at the issue from the misleading angles.

their shields are shown to be perfectly capable of stopping the Gouf's machinecannon shells so they could have at least tried to get in the line of fire.

So you're saying that what Norris did was predictable?

You do have a point... There should've been more effort to protect that last Guntank...

[mcred23]

I'm merely trying to reason why the two major battles (especially the Gouf Custom battle) degenerated into 'Shiro vs [insert super- unit here]' when his two comrades, who were arguably more experienced than him were perfectly capable of helping out. In fact, if they had ALL gone after Norris in the end, they could probably have saved the last tank- their shields are shown to be perfectly capable of stopping the Gouf's machinecannon shells so they could have at least tried to get in the line of fire.

It's not like Karen and Sanders just sat around doing nothing in the entire battle with Norris' Gouf Custom. Sanders, if you remember, was the first one to engage him, and they all did fight with him to some extent. However, due to an assortment of reasons, Shiro ended up being the one who fought with him the most in that battle. And even in the case of that last tank, I don't think any of them expected Norris to willing let himself get killed to kill that Guntank (As auriga noted, none of them predicted that move), and I believe neither Sanders or Karen were in a position to block any of it's fire if they had wanted to (Those streets and buildings of that city doubtlessly had a bad effect on efforts to support each other).

But yeah, going back towards the topic that started this, getting one's MS wrecked doesn't automatically mean you're a bad pilot or whatever. In the case of the 08th, everybody took damage to their MS at some point in the show (Karen had lost her Gundam's head, Sanders had a leg blown off, in the same episode, and maybe other events earlier in the series I'm forgetting), but in Shiro's case his damage was more extensive and there were simply not enough proper parts to get his machine back to normal (Similar to how Karen couldn't get a proper RX-79[G] head, and thus had to use one from a RGM-79[G]).

[Draco Starcloud]

Also, rebuilding Shiro's Gundam was a test to see how loyal he was to the Federation.

[Aegis]

And last I checked, Sanders and Karen couldn't do jack against Norris and the Gouf Custom either. Heck, they initially underestimated him until they watched in horror how quickly the Guntanks got dispatched while making everyone else look awfully stupid. If anything, the Gouf Custom fight shows just how much more phenomenal Norris really is as opposed to how unskilled Shiro is, not to mention it shows that of the whole team, Shiro really was the closest one to keeping up with those skills. The most green you'll ever see is in the beginning episodes when he was just getting used to fighting on Earth. Once he overcame that problem, he was every bit as competent as Karen and Sanders.

[Direct X]

Ball Vs Zaku Custom.

Pretty Self Evident.

[Kavik Ryx]

Here's my two sense on the issue. Shiro, while a reasonably good pilot, was quite the risk taker. He was able to take down Norris, with one arm when given the chance, and he fought the Apsalus 2 all the way into the mountains. Personally, I don't think that the Federation would have spent time and money building new parts for the Gundam, so instead, he got a field upgrade, using parts from here and there. What Shiro needed was a Moblie Suit, and he needed it fast, and considering that the EZ-8 is essentially a compilation of spare parts, it quite suited Shiro's method of fighting in desperation. It was cheap and appropriate under the circumstances.

[Direct X]

Here's my two sense on the issue. Shiro, while a reasonably good pilot, was quite the risk taker. He was able to take down Norris, with one arm when given the chance, and he fought the Apsalus 2 all the way into the mountains. Personally, I don't think that the Federation would have spent time and money building new parts for the Gundam, so instead, he got a field upgrade, using parts from here and there. What Shiro needed was a Moblie Suit, and he needed it fast, and considering that the EZ-8 is essentially a compilation of spare parts, it quite suited Shiro's method of fighting in desperation. It was cheap and appropriate under the circumstances.

Didn't his abilities get overshadowed by Amuro Ray's abilities?

[Aegis]

Personally, I don't think that the Federation would have spent time and money building new parts for the Gundam, so instead, he got a field upgrade, using parts from here and there.

In fact, they didn't have the time, money and parts for the Gundam in the first place, thus the Gundams themselves were assembled from spare parts originally for the RX-78, thus we have one Ez8 and one GM Head.

[HalfDemonInuyasha]

Here's my two sense on the issue. Shiro, while a reasonably good pilot, was quite the risk taker. He was able to take down Norris, with one arm when given the chance, and he fought the Apsalus 2 all the way into the mountains. Personally, I don't think that the Federation would have spent time and money building new parts for the Gundam, so instead, he got a field upgrade, using parts from here and there. What Shiro needed was a Moblie Suit, and he needed it fast, and considering that the EZ-8 is essentially a compilation of spare parts, it quite suited Shiro's method of fighting in desperation. It was cheap and appropriate under the circumstances.

It's not because they didn't want to or because it was convenient, it's because they COULDN'T. All of the Ground Combat Gundams made were made out of leftover, discarded, parts of the original RX-78 series, so there was literally nothing left of those parts to repair MS the exact way they were before, so any unit that had a Ground Combat Gundam(s) were forced to use their own parts to make their own repairs.

Also, after the V Project MS had started up, all of the Federation's attention and efforts were taken away from the RX-79(G) and RGM-79(G) series put into building the RGM-79 + variant series, which further leads to the unavailability of the needed parts for any repairs for such units. You could say that it's similar to the Zeon with their Zaku Tanks.

Anyways, people should NOT take the whole Shiro/Ball vs. RD-4 Zaku that lightly. The very fact that a Ball was able to take down an agile MS 1 on 1 with no support (or distractions) is pretty good in itself, but consider the fact that this was a Zaku with Rick Dom speed and mobility as well (taking down a team of GM Precession Types single-handedly) and you got an opponent that a single Ball (of any type) should NOT normally be able to defeat without a team backing it up.

[Kavik Ryx]

Just because they ran out of spare parts, doesn't mean that they did not have the money and resources to make more. Throughout the Universal Century, it is made obvious how little Federation Politicians will spend on any one other than themselves. After watching ZZ, it is made clear that they definitely have enough money to hide out while Neo Zeon raided the Earth and dropped a colony, heck they could establish the Titans and offer them full support after losing a good portion of their fleet from the Physalis. If anything, the Federation just didn't care enough to intervene.