Roboteching: Difference between revisions

{{trope}}

Said of missiles or beam weapons that fire along trajectories that are at an unlikely angle off of their target, streak along for a fair distance, and then make sudden synchronized turns in order to actually bring themselves to bear and hit it. The individual missiles of a [[Macross Missile Massacre]] almost always robotech on their way to a target. Often, it seems the best (or only) way to avoid this or a [[Macross Missile Massacre]] is to perform a [[High-Speed Missile Dodge]].

 

 

{{examples}}

== [[Anime]] and [[Manga]] ==

* Used in ''[[Project A-ko]]''—though, oddly, a freeze-frame reveals the missiles to be cans of Coca-Cola.

*** Not in the Budokai games (entirely different set of games, believe it or not). In those, you can only dodge the initial combo that triggers the cutscene-based attack. The only way Piccolo can screw it up then is if he fails the quicktime event, and even then, it only results in fewer grenades, not a dodge.

** Goku was once able to control where his [[Kamehame Hadoken|Kamehameha]] was going against Raditz.

* In ''[[Space Runaway Ideon]],'' the missiles Ideon fires act like this. When they are powered by the god-like Ide, they then fire off as beams of light, with 90-degree angles.

* In her ''Pactio'' powered-up form, Chachamaru from the ''[[Mahou Sensei Negima]]'' anime is seen using a roboteching [[Beam Spam]] attack that emerges from her back.

** The same system appears again in ''[[Gundam Unicorn]]'', as part of the Shamblo. Here, as well as using it to confuse the opponent, it was also used to reflect incoming beam attacks back at the attacker.

** This was touched on again in ''[[Mobile Suit Gundam 00|Gundam 00]]'', where {{spoiler|[[The Woobie|Louise Halevy]]}}'s [[Lightning Bruiser|Regnant]] is shown to be extremely dangerous due to the fact that that the shots from its main beam cannon were able to change their paths multiple times.

* In ''[[Katekyo Hitman Reborn]],'' Gokudera's Rocket Bomb attack does this with hand-thrown dynamite by having secondary and tertiary charges explode to allow him to control the trajectory. At least some mention is made of how difficult a technique this is.

* TenRyuJin's 'Hikari to Yami no Mai' in ''[[GaoGaiGar]] FINAL'' does this—she fires off chaff missiles, then bounces maser shots off the chaff (based on an attack the first Bigbad of the series used). And yes, she does comment on how hard the calculations are. When EI-01 used it originally, he was using every computer in Tokyo as a distributed computing network to handle them.

* Many of the ships in ''[[Gall Force]]'' do this too, as lasers will be shot out at right angles to their ship, and once clearing the hull profile, make a 90-degree turn forward to bombard their target.

* In ''[[Pokémon Special]]'', the Elite Four all have special powers from out of freaking nowhere, and Lance's is that his [[mon]]s' Hyper Beams can robotech.

** Even when they're not controlled by the computer, [[The Computer Is a Cheating Bastard|the Elite Four are cheating bastards]]!

* [[Playing with Fire|Hikaru's]] [[Kill It with Fire|Flame Arrows]] in ''[[Magic Knight Rayearth]]''. Much more egregious in the [[OAV]] continuity where, even though they're shot straight at an enemy, the fire bursts robotech ''around and past'' the target and then strike it in the back.

* In ''[[Uchuu Senkan Yamato]]'', Gamilus uses mirror satellites to direct their reflex cannon at the Yamato even when it is on the other side of a planet from their base. [[Fridge Logic]] asks, if they have something that [[Frickin' Laser Beams]] just bounce right off of, why not use it for shields? {{spoiler|Eventually the good guys do exactly this to defend against the Desler Cannon. It's a pretty awesome [[Deus Ex Machina]], but it doesn't explain why the Gamilusians didn't think of it first.}}

* The recent ''[[Neon Genesis Evangelion]]'' remake features a bunch of missiles fired at Ramiel that behave this way—fired straight up into the sky and suddenly execute a 90-degree turn to aim at the target.

* Similarly, some robot-controlled planes in ''[[RahXephon]]'' are launched straight upwards and suddenly turn downwards to attack their target from above.

* Beams fired by Nobles' ships in ''[[Wolf's Rain]]'' will maneuver quite extensively to track their target, if they don't hit it straight. At one point, a single beam splits in two to hit different targets.

 

== [[Comic Books]] ==

* Also seen in the Ultimate Nullifer in the [[Marvel Universe]].

* In the earlier issues of [[Image Comics]]' ''[[Stormwatch]]'', Flashpoint (one of the members of Stormwatch Prime) also had the ability to control the direction and intensity of his eye blasts. It was ''very'' cool. Too bad the character was a prime [[Jerkass]] and [[The Mole]] (actually, all three members of Stormwatch Prime were moles, but he was the only one who enjoyed it and stayed evil. He [[Karmic Death|got his in the end]], too.)

 

== [[Film]] ==

 

== [[Tabletop Games]] ==

** Several other factions have their own analogues, like the Imperial Hunter-Seeker missiles or Ork Grot [[Funetik Aksent|Bomms]]. That latter is particularly notable since it is actually piloted by a [[Our Goblins Are Wickeder|Grot]], each one is a volunteer that the Ork meks conveniently forget to tell, or just won't bother informing, that it's a one way trip.

* Rare fantasy example: The Egyptian-themed unded Tomb Kings in ''[[Warhammer Fantasy Battle]]'' field archers equipeed with magic arrows that, in the fluff, do exactly this- at some points they even soar past the target entirely, only to change direction in mid-air and hit enemies in the back. In the actual game, this is represented by their having no positive or negative modifiers to hit, ever.

* One of the ''Champions'' rulebooks has statistics for an energy beam that follows the target until it hits. The rules were complex enough to defy even ''Champions'' attack powers, so the designers wrote it up as a summoned creature instead.

** This is also often an explaination given by GM's and some source materials as to why the spell Magic Missile (and, in certain versions, some higher level versions) ALWAYS hits its target.

* ''[[Mutants and Masterminds]]'' supports three different feats for this. Indirect lets you explicitly avoid obstacles between you and the target. Ricochet allows one bounce per level. Homing makes the attack continue trying to hit after you fire it off.

* The Annihilator Beam in ''[[Metroid|Metroid Prime 2: Echoes]]'' is capable of this.

** Also occurs with missiles and the wave beam in the first.

** And ''[[Dungeons and Dragons Shadow Over Mystara|Shadow Over Mystara]]''.

* Similar to the Magic Missiles, one of the Ghost elemental mage spells, Soul Strike, in the MMORPG ''[[Ragnarok Online]]'' summons a varying number of white glowing orbs which then streak towards the target.

* Another non-missile example is shown in ''[[Mega Man Battle Network|Mega Man Network Transmission]]''. Both Brightman and Bass use lasers that adjust angle mid-flight; Bright's lasers adjust themselves once by 45-degree angles, and Bass's twice by 90-degree angles.

* In ''[[Bulletstorm]]'' you can robotech your sniper rifle bullet, in [[Bullet Time]].

* Guided missiles in the ''[[X Universe]]'' games fire from ventrally-mounted, forward-facing tubes (or flank-mounted tubes, in the case of missile frigates) and immediately curve off after the target. Leads to some spectacular visuals when you're dealing with [[Recursive Ammo|swarm missiles]], which tend to fly in a spiral pattern.

* Missiles in ''[[Escape Velocity]]'' likewise fire forward, then curve off after their target.

 

== Webcomics ==

* [[Schlock Mercenary]] touches on this behavior at some points, with a possible [[Justified Trope|justification]]. Missiles can be fired in "random walk" mode, presumably involving repeated and sudden changes in velocity as they close with their targets, in order to make it harder for point defense to shoot them down.

 

[[Category:Truth in Television]]

[[Category:Weapons and Wielding Tropes]]