Ah, shopping with the wife.... one of my favorite pastimes.
Oops, please excuse me, my rapidly elongating nasal protuberance appears to have gouged through your eye socket and embedded in your cranial cavity..
Speaking of which, gouging my own eyeballs out ranks as my third favorite thing, following closely on he heals of performing a home vasectomy on myself and then of course, the firm favorite of shopping with the wife.
Sorry, just got your other eye there....
The fact that there were multiple sales running helped neither the matter at hand, nor my ability to reason with or put any form of brakes on her shopping spree.
"But I'd be saving 10% on weapons," was the constant argument voiced by her.
"Yes, but you are still spending 90%. You don't need weapons, and you do need to save the money to equip that big mech you won in the raid, don't you?" was my response, delivered (I thought) in a very patient and reasonable manner.
"Yes, but I'd still be saving 10% on weapons..."
I managed to placate her slightly by letting her get a few lighter mechs to pad out her spec formations and deftly steared her towards my favourite area, the equipment for heavies and BMFs so she could 'window shop'.
I'm relatively certain security were hovering, just waiting to step in because she almost had a 'moment' when she saw a pair of Midori's Boots.
Oh, and note to self, do not ever allow the wife to do an equipment review, when the best feature she can come up with in regard to an Energy Aura is "OOOOH, SPARKLY!!!!"
We did however browse the section for lighter gear which is more in fitting with her usual forces, and this wee beasty caught my eye.The new Gargon Engine is designed to plug into most light and medium mechs, ranging from Shocklites up to Luisons.
It may look large for its size class but it's surprising light, with the engine block itself being a twin stroke transverse configuration which gets rid of a lot of the annoying sideways torque that tends to slew lighter mechs off to one side when you put your boot down.
The majority of what you see is actually exhaust manifold feeding triple exhaust tubes, which may seem like a lot of compensating for something in the trouser department but actually vents the exhaust through the centre followed by the two side pipes simultaneously to cut down on the shudder you get from a more traditional twin pipe system.
The result is a decidedly smooth and stable ride even at high speed, and that lack of shudder gives far more precise targeting solutions for any kind of solid munitions and a boost in performance for both projectiles and missiles.
I certainly have a hankering to pop at least one in a Dread to see what happens.
At the low end of its weight range, it still doesn't have the raw speed of a standard Block Charge but up towards the top end it still has the same power output as the venerable and well loved Wankel Rotary. To be honest, for a 45 ton mech, it's a toss up between this and the Scrub Grub, depending entirely on whether you want a straight damage boost or the option of more chance of collateral damage from a fork shot. At a book price of 18 Niodes, 312 Ferrite and 155 Bioptics for a nice bit of kit with no disadvantages, it's not going to break the bank.
Submitted by David McCallum #701548