[1-200] THE MECH TOUCH

Chapter 49: Modular Armor

Working with modular armor posed unique challenges to the mech designer.

To visualize the problems the designer faced, imagine being handed a square or rectangular piece of paper. If you were told to make a cylinder out of the paper, you could easily bend it in a a way so that one end of the paper touched the other end. What resulted was a pretty good cylinder with a cutout in the same of a circle.

What if instead of a big piece of paper, you got handed some cardboard instead. And not just one piece, but many smaller pieces that you weren't allowed to bend. With a bit of tape, you could approach the shape of a cylinder with square pieces of cardboard, but the cross section wouldn't look as smooth as a circle anymore. It would look like a many-sided shape that only approximated a circle.

The same concept applied to working with modular armor as opposed to conventional armor. Modern 3D printers and armor fabricators could miraculously produce armor plates in virtually any complex shape. It could mold something as thick as an entire chest plate to something as delicate as the armor around a mech's fingers. A lot of this flexibility was lost when working with modular armor. Even the most masterful designs always left out gaps and other inefficiencies.

Having purchased the Octagon medium mech together with the FlexiPlate and the SquarePlate, Ves left the game and loaded the designs into the Mech Designer System. Though Iron Spirit or his own terminal's design interface featured plenty of tools and aids, the System offered the best assistance by far.

If Ves had to guess, the Designer module of the System was at least two hundred years ahead of the most advanced design software on the market. He possessed a devastating advantage against his competitors and he'd be a fool to neglect its many tools.

"Oh wait, before I start designing, its best if I spend all my remaining DP." Ves reminded himself as he remembered he still possessed around 900 DP.

What he found perplexing was that he earned more DP from selling his virtual mechs than his real mechs. The virtual version of his Marc Antony rewarded him with a fixed amount of 25 DP, while the real version was dependent on the total sales volume, which meant an average of 28 DP. However, it was a lot easier to sell a virtual mech than a real mech. Ves foresaw that he would be selling a lot more virtual mechs while his real mech sales volume remained in the double digits.

Did the System burp when it calculated the DP rewards for his virtual mechs? Whatever was the case, Ves eagerly planned to make use of its generosity.

He opened the Skill Tree again with glee. As he could expect an uptick of DP once he put up a couple of new designs for sale, he wasn't stingy with his current reserve. He looked down the list and found a sub-skill he had been eyeing for a while.

[Mediumweight Armor Optimization II]: 600 DP

As he bought it, the influx of knowledge he received blacked him out for a moment. This time the knowledge dealt more with details and nuances, which caused Ves to forcefully memorize a whole bag of new tricks. It definitely paid off already, as by the time he woke up he became a lot more confident in working with his new armor licenses.

Curious about his current state, Ves called up his Status again.

[Status]

——

Name: Ves Larkinson

Profession: Novice Mech Designer

Specializations: None

Design Points: 304

Attributes

Strength: 0.7