Fixed Forward-Facing Weapon: Difference between revisions

{{trope}}

 

 

* ''[[Super Dimension Fortress Macross]]'' has the Macross Cannon, aka the Superdimensional Converging Beam Weapon.

** Averted in the sequels ''[[Macross 7]]'' and ''[[Macross Frontier]]'' where tranforming the ship into ''[[Humongous Mecha|Attacker Mode]]'' places the [[Wave Motion Gun|Macross Cannon]] in the "arms" of the ship ,allowing it to be aimed independently of the ship.

** In a non-ship example, this is the [[Mobile Suit Gundam|Guntank's]] greatest design flaw; it can't turn its torso, which means it's unable to aim its shoulder cannons without moving its entire body around.

** The early models of Zeon tanks had a detachable flying turret. The tank's main gun obviously became this type of weapon when the turret was on its own.

* ''[[Posleen War Series]]'': the super monitor class ship has a spine-mounted [[Railgun|Mass Driver]] that fires a huge slug packed with a [[Made of Explodium|gooey antimatter center]] for taking on the battle globes of the [[Horde of Alien Locusts|Posleen]] as they enter. A single round is said to be able to destroy a significant percentage of the ships in the formation of hundreds.

* ''[[Star Wars Expanded Universe]]'': The [[The Callista Trilogy|Darksaber]] is a cylindrical ship that houses a superlaser and makes up the majority of the ship itself.

* ''[[The Lost Fleet]]'': some capital ships have a weapon called a "null field" that is projected from the front of the ship. Unlike most of this type of weapon, it's short range (for a space weapon), but tends to a [[One-Hit Kill]] as it just disintigrates a large chunk out of whatever ship it hits and breaks down most shields.

 

== [[Live Action Television]] ==

* ''[[Stargate SG-1]]'': The [[Scary Dogmatic Aliens|Ori]] mother ships have a massive slow-firing weapon that frequently decimates any ship it hits. There are smaller pulsed weapons on the sides that can still take out a Ha'tak with a single triple-volley.

* ''[[Babylon 5]]'', the Vorlon Cruiser, pictured above. Also the Narn G'Quan cruisers are equipped with those.

** And the ''Excalibur'' in ''[[Crusade]]'', being derived from Vorlon technology. Her total helplessness for several minutes after firing this [[Wave Motion Gun]] was a ''slight'' downside, though.

** All Vorlon ships appear to have only forward-facing weapons. The crown jewel is the ''[[Names to Run Away From Really Fast|Eclipse]]''-class Planetkiller, a 45 kilometer monster whose forward-facing beam can [[Earthshattering Kaboom|destroy a planet]] with a single shot [[Star Wars|Death Star]]-style. They had a number of those (at least 2) and weren't shy about using them during the end of the Second Shadow War.

** Many of the smaller warships in the B5 setting are equipped this way, such as the White Stars, the smaller of the Centauri's two depicted warships, Earth's cruisers, and even the Star Furies.

* In the series finale of the original ''[[Battlestar Galactica Classic]]'', the ''Galactica'' uses a pair of such weapons, massive laser cannons mounted in the nose of the ship, to wail on a disabled Cylon Base Star.

* When ''[[Myth Busters]]'' tested the spy car machine-gun myth, they first tested the machine gun as if it were "spinal mount". Adam was shocked at how effective it was.

** Other races have Maulers as well, notably the [[Joke Character|Canadi'en]] Maple Leaf mauler, which has Mauler weapons facing in [[Lethal Joke Character|three different hex directions]].

* ''[[Traveller]]'': most starship weapons did incremental damage and could wear down an opponent over time. Spinal mount weapons (either a particle accelerator or a meson gun) ran the length of the ship and could [[Wave Motion Gun|blow opposing ships to atoms with a single shot]].

** Most escort vessels and Eldar ships have entirely forward-facing weaponry because they can maneuver much more effectively than the [[Mighty Glacier|big clumsy seventeen-kilometer-long battle cathedrals]] and thus don't need weapons in more than one fire arc.

** Some vehicles in ordinary [[Warhammer 40000]] have got these as well. Of note are the Vindicator (a Space Marine tank that has a front-mounted short-ranged ordnance weapon designed for blasting through fortifications) and the Minotaur (an Imperial Armor super-heavy tank that has a pair of Basilisk artillery weapons mounted forward and level).

* ''[[Spelljammer]]'' has a [[Proud Warrior Race Guy|Giff]] ship called simply "Great Bombard". One glance at [http://www.spelljammer.org/ships/deckplans/GreatBombard.gif deckplans] explains why. And yes, this thing doubles as a blunt ram, too.

* A ''[[Car Wars]]'' article once talked about these for ... well, cars. The scenario involved someone in basically a Crown Victoria (or non-Ford equivalent in class), normally able to at most mount something like an M61 Vulcan cannon, treating some enemies to 75mm cannon fire.

** For ground units, it's the heavy Gauss rifle, whose massive recoil prevents it from being arm- or turret-mounted and makes firing it while moving risky for BattleMechs because doing so forces a piloting skill roll to avoid falling.

** Meanwhile, suitably large ''space'' units -- as in, 750,000 tons and up -- may potentially be equipped with as-yet-experimental mass drivers, whose firing arc is literally just the straight line of hexes in the direction they're pointed into (which for WarShips, which can only carry one at most, means dead ahead). They're also quite massive themselves and rather inaccurate even if they do get a target lined up, so many players don't consider the damage they can potentially inflict really worth it (it's not ''that'' out of line with a simple volley of more 'regular' naval weapons, anyway).

** The Collector ship has a similar situation on their slow turning ship, though if they're ''facing you'', you're pretty much screwed. Just ask anyone who survived the destruction of the original ''Normandy''.

** The ''Normandy'' SR-2 can get the newly-developed Thanix cannon mounted on the nose, which is the same sort of weapon the Reapers use, except the ''Normandy'' is a lot more maneuverable than the Collectors. Given that the same weapon was capable of one-shotting a cruiser...the [[Curb Stomp Battle|results were clear...and oh-so-poetic]].

** ''Homeworld: Cataclysm'' gives a Siege Cannon to the Somtaaw Mothership. It's mounted to the side and forward-facing, because it's so huge.

** The Ion Cannon Frigate in the first ''Homeworld'' is basically an Ion Cannon with a ship wrapped around it. It's [[All There in the Manual|mentioned in the manual]] that this trope is the ''only'' possible option for equipping a ship of such a small size with an Ion Cannon (indeed, Destroyers and Heavy Cruisers mount multiple turreted Ion Cannons, but they are also much larger ships); even then, there is no room for any other weapons on the Frigate!

* ''[[Escape Velocity]]: Nova'': Most Auroran and Polaran capital ships have fixed guns ([[Magnetic Weapons|railguns]] and [[Frickin' Laser Beams|Capacitor Pulse Lasers]] respectively) as their primary armament, as opposed to the mostly turret-and-missile using Federation. The Aurorans get around the inherent inflexibility of the gun by using its phenomenal range, while Polaran ships are so hellishly fast and maneuverable that it almost doesn't matter.

** The player could modify any acquired capital ship to use this trope in the two older games, although the only ship to truly fit it from the start was the non-acquirable {{spoiler|Alien Cruiser}}, with its Heavy Fusion Beam.

** ''Wing Commander III'' gives us TCS Behemoth, a one-of-a-kind planet-killing cannon with a ship built around it, in a desperate attempt to end the war in one shot. {{spoiler|It failed.}}

** In ''Prophecy'', the [[Imported Alien Phlebotinum|Nephilim]] Kraken-class ship had a [[Wave Motion Gun|fleet-killer plasma cannon]] that could only face in on direction... but could wipe out a fleet in battle formation with one shot. After being captured, it was given a new fixed mount between the Midway's split forward arms.<ref>The game's designers weren't aware of the plot plan for the plasma cannon when they made the ship design, it was just a happy coincidence.</ref>

** The human variant of the Siege Driver is especially prominent, as it is, essentially, a battleship-sized revolver that fires asteroids.

* Inverted by the Spathi in [[Star Control 2]]: Their warship's signature weapon is quite powerful, with a fixed firing arc centered axially. Why does it not qualify? [[Lovable Coward|It fires backwards]].

** Played straight with most of the other races' ships in the game. Most notable are the Ur-Quan dreadnought's forward firing fusion cannon and the Chenjesu broodhome's photon shard, both of which are powerful enough to obliterate most other ships in a couple of shots. There is also the VUX intruder's and the Chmmr avatar's forward superlasers which can burn down anything in short order.

*** Not to mention Druuge Mauler. Recoil of that thing gives much better acceleration than cruise engine.

** Taken [[Up to Eleven]] with the Ragnarov Titan in the Rebellion Expansion, where the ship is built around a gigantic railgun.

* While averted for the most part in ''[[Nexus the Jupiter Incident]]'', where pretty much all guns are turreted and are spread out through the hull, with the exception of the [[Wave Motion Gun|Siege Laser]], which is mounted on the front of [[Lizard Folk|Gorg]] and (later) Nova battleships. This laser can take out most ships with one shot and can even take down the mighty fortress shield with a few shots but takes a long time to charge and require the combined power output of three other ships.

* Based on the animations, ship special weapons (read: [[Wave Motion Gun|Wave Motion Guns]]) in ''[[Infinite Space]]'' are fixed like this, as are most large weapons.

* ''[[Naval Ops]]'' series: [[Wave Motion Gun|Wave Motion Guns]], railguns, and a variety of other energy weapons can only shoot straight forward or backward in the.

* ''[[Videogame/World Of Tanks|World Of Tanks]]'': Most tank destroyers and artillery have guns that are almost entirely fixed to the hull with only a very slight angle of adjustment before you have to move the entire tank hull. Several exceptions exist, such as the American "turreted TD" line, and some artillery like the GW Panther. The American M3 Lee medium tank is one of the only tank tanks to have a fixed gun.

* ''Empire: [[Total War]]'' and ''Napoleon: Total War'' have, for the most part, your typical Age of Sail warships that fire broadsides at each other. Some of the larger ships may have a cannon or two mounted on the front to take potshots at the enemy without doing any serious damage. Then you have the mortar and rocket ships. While by no means precise, they can ruin your day pretty easily if you don't deal with them quickly. While they do have a small number of side-mounted cannons, their main strength is their forward-facing mortar/rocket launcher. A successful mortal hit can even cripple a ''first-rate battleship'' and can decide the course of a battle if that first-rate happens to have an admiral on it. The rockets don't do much damage but can set ships on fire, even the ships firing them. Won't do much good against ironclads in ''Napoleon'', but those come so late in the game that most games tend to end before you even research them.

 

== [[Western Animation]] ==

 

== [[Real Life]] ==