RE: Infantry Walkers

You wrote: 

>Yeah, but can a tank walk up 15 floors of an office building?	

Neither can a walker.  Hell, Power Armor may have some difficulty 
dealing with small buildings.

Or manuever >around meter-thick trees through heavy underbrush?  

Ever since delightful Camp Blanding, FL, my definition of heavy 
underbrush includes terrain MEN can't get in or out of.  Somehow I 
doubt a 4-meter walker will deal with this much better than a 
tank--which at least can crush some stuff.

How about the rubble of >buildings?  Climb a sheer slope?  Okay, 

Grav can fly over the rubble, and you can't run a walker up the slope 
either.

>Can tanks sidestep?  Hop from one tread to the other?	Stick a gun 

Nothing can sidestep an MDC round. . . And I fail to see how hopping 
from one tread to the other is useful--it's supposed to kill people, 
not do the hokey-pokey.

>Humans can run at a crouch; if you want a walker to, you can probably
>design one that will.

Yeah.  And fire weapons?  

>Yes, but they'll have heavier weapons than infantry... which is why 

My walker design uses GMS/Hs for just this reason--more anti-armor 
punch than an infantryman can carry, minimal recoil issues (compared to 
something where you can't just vent the backblast).

you use >'em in places where tanks can't go, so they don't have to face 
tanks.	(See >other earlier post on Heavy Gear. ^_- )  Of course, this 

Except for the NAC, who's infamous Field Marshal *mumble-mumble* 
dropped three divisions plus a Polish brigade into the assembly area of 
a tank corps.  Doh!

But most other generals have a clue.

Note, however that now the Infantry Walkers are restricted to the light 
infantry heavy weapons companies.  Which means they are competing with 
TOW-Hummers (or the future equivelant thereof).  Which cost 67 points 
apiece for the GMS/H Superior version.	60 points of which are tied up 
in the weapons system.	And they've got a small signature without 
stealthing.  To get the same thing with stealthing costs 141 points.  
So now the argument turns to basically restricting these guys to 
Mountain and Interface (the orbital version of Airborne) units, right?	
'Coz in most terrain HiMob Wheeled is faster AND cheaper.  

>Like rolling logs are easy to find in a city?	The others may be a bit

I'm sure we could find something.  How about VW Bugs?  :)

John M. Atkinson