Is the mechlab a priority yet?

[Defender]

This simply means there is no room in the actual slot, nor are the placement points accessible beyond those. You cannot have 1 medium and 2 smalls in a single arm. It's either 4 smalls or 2 mediums or 1 large, but you can have as an example, 2UAC20 in his LT/RT, 4 (SMALL) X-Pulse in his right arm and two LBX5 (MEDIUM) in his left. He also has two medium hard-mounts in his LT/RT as well.

Confused a bit. Is this a system/design limitation in general or a choice for the fafy in particular? Given the choice, I would want the example here to have 2sxpl and lbx5 per arm for greater area coverage and redundancy.

Helpers (the things that call in weapons through code, placed in Max) have to be named a specific way IE [fafnirPod_smallSlot_A_RA]. So, to get the most weapons in each arm I had to get creative with placement, which also created an inherent and inadvertently aesthetic limitation in weapons placement.

There was physically no room to have one Large+ and two small or mediums in a single arm without geometric clipping/overlap or confusing overlap of helper names (since they have to be named/placed in a specific order to be called in correctly). Same with Mediums, where when placed vertically they fill the slot to the point where no small/large can fit. Due to the unmovable nature of the helpers once the model is exported they cannot be repositioned.

To get the most possible weapons loadouts within his pods, he can basically hold clusters of a specific size at any given time per-arm. This means that once you pick a small weapon initially, your only choice is to fill the rest of that arm with smalls (up to 4), when you pick a medium, his arm can only carry two mediums, and when you choose a large+ weapon, he can only carry one.

You can still spice this up by having say two mediums in one arm, and a large in the other, or two clusters of 4 smalls (8 total smalls for both arms). The variety to mix and match is still there, giving him a unique ability to bolster larger numbers of various weapon-types, though the larger the weapon, the less you can hold. If I didn't do it this way, and stayed within the confined helper placement of the Generipods (just made that up) then he wouldn't be able to hold nearly as many weapons configs, nor would it look like it aesthetically fills the space properly.

I hope that clarifies things a bit.

[Ressk [CSF]]

+1 for a nice explanation

[lordgrog]

his arms, can hold clusters of weapons as such per-arm; 4 small cluster (diamond), 2 medium cluster (vertical) or 1 large slot (center).

This simply means there is no room in the actual slot, nor are the placement points accessible beyond those. You cannot have 1 medium and 2 smalls in a single arm. It's either 4 smalls or 2 mediums or 1 large, but you can have as an example, 2UAC20 in his LT/RT, 4 (SMALL) X-Pulse in his right arm and two LBX5 (MEDIUM) in his left. He also has two medium hard-mounts in his LT/RT as well.

  Hory sheet. Assuming Fappy still wears his [tangent]Is the Fafnir a he or a she? Seeing as how HGauss tits an' all. Hmmm, could be moobs I suppose, ugh.[/tangent] small mount hat, that's 11 mounts for ERSBL or SXPL. Fook yeah, next to 11x SXPL the dual IHGs are almost gonna be secondary armament lol.

[=KoS=Zeus]

Very good descriptions, guys. I appreciate you all taking the time to explain the system to people and holding your ground in making good design decisions despite what CBT canon might say is a valid variant. I like the approach of building the mechs around the Prime version first and then enabling other variants along its lines.

[KingLeerUK]

It is a misconception that we start with a prime variant and then derive based on that.  It would be more accurate to say we define possible pods and slots for each platform.

[Nemo]

I hope that clarifies things a bit.

Crystal, thanks.

[=KoS= Tripod]

It looks like a large weapon moved up slightly above the assault position would let a small weapon fit in under it, but what do I know

would allow for a few more variants though

[1N4001]

To expand on what has been said:
Weapons are placed on helpers, which are fixed hardpoints relative to the chassis. These hardpoints "float". The pods only exist to provide a visual object to mount these weapons.

For example, a chassis, let's take the Adder, has 4 hardpoints per arm. (Missile pods are handled differently) Let's call them left, right, upper and lower. All of them can be used for weapons, but the pod mounted on the arm dictates which makes sense.

A single pod (Large_Basic_Pod), like it is used for the LBX10 variant, will only enable the upper hardpoint. Placing a weapon onto any other hardpoint with this pod enabled would either have it float, or bisect with the pod in an ugly way.
A dual pod (Crusader_Pod) will enable the upper and lower ones, as seen in the Prime. There's also the Medium_Bipod with the same configuration.
A tripod (Large_Tripod) enables upper, left and right. This is used in the 6 ERML variant.

While any weapon could be put onto any hardpoint, the pods usually also restrict the weapon size. The Large_Tripod carries 3 medium-sized guns, while the Crusader_Pod contains one heavy and one medium/small.

[KingLeerUK]

It looks like a large weapon moved up slightly above the assault position would let a small weapon fit in under it, but what do I know

would allow for a few more variants though

1. drawings not to scale
2. other balance considerations

[=KoS= Tripod]

Like I said, what do I know

[Defender]

To expand on what has been said:
Weapons are placed on helpers, which are fixed hardpoints relative to the chassis. These hardpoints "float". The pods only exist to provide a visual object to mount these weapons.

For example, a chassis, let's take the Adder, has 4 hardpoints per arm. (Missile pods are handled differently) Let's call them left, right, upper and lower. All of them can be used for weapons, but the pod mounted on the arm dictates which makes sense.

A single pod (Large_Basic_Pod), like it is used for the LBX10 variant, will only enable the upper hardpoint. Placing a weapon onto any other hardpoint with this pod enabled would either have it float, or bisect with the pod in an ugly way.
A dual pod (Crusader_Pod) will enable the upper and lower ones, as seen in the Prime. There's also the Medium_Bipod with the same configuration.
A tripod (Large_Tripod) enables upper, left and right. This is used in the 6 ERML variant.

While any weapon could be put onto any hardpoint, the pods usually also restrict the weapon size. The Large_Tripod carries 3 medium-sized guns, while the Crusader_Pod contains one heavy and one medium/small.

Just to clarify here; the helpers aren't always all floating in space waiting for a pod to make them accessible. The helpers are called in with the model geometry, which means they are embedded within the max file of a specific piece of geometry.

As in, the Fafnir Torso has 4 hard mounts (so the helpers are always there whether you use them or not) but the arm helpers aren't called in until his pods are. This goes for every 'mech. The helpers on the pods don't exist till the pod exists so when you swap pods, you gain access to whatever helpers are in whatever pod you're using.

[Werewolf486}12thVR{]

Imagine a Fafnir with gun tips protruding out of the left and right torso with the tips out so far it looks like it has large nipple in the cold. I see the reason for being picky about the visuals of the work.