Belated response, but long time ago with the general concept of my setting, I shot around a number of ideas, both macro and nonmacro. They all revolved around the idea of two alien powers with Earth caught in the middle, but Earth sits on the unique technology of nuclear power. I even had reasons for why nuclear technology turned out unique!

But, for some reason, I never quite thought of that potential scenario. That would be a whole different, interesting dynamic to explore. Humanity, F Yeah stories are pretty fun! But, call me a sap, I did think Sci-Fi needed more idealistic, maybe even utopian stuff to it! Behold, UTO (UTOpian, haaaah!) swoops in and saves the day, and humanity still gets to impress the giant furry aliens with with some wild human willpower and madness in the face of ridiculous odds. Still though, I'd read a story like you mentioned in a heartbeat.

Well, I was thinking about it too. What if a civilization like your UTO encountered humanity, in an alternate history Earth, where the first contact got botched beyond belief flinging the two into a war with seemingly no end. Despite the “Invaders” attempts to broker peace, it’s ignored just out of pure human fear and nature, thus the war drags on.

Actually, I kinda am already working on it (weather it actually gets done or not is up to future me). It’ll revolve around a human pilot with a hybrid aircraft made up of both human and “Invader” technologies. He’s part of an ever constant battle for supremacy of the air, traveling around in a carrier submarine not so different from the one in Luftrausers. Actually, it’s basically that game but with alien anthros. There won’t be any true human/alien interaction for a while, mostly because I want to focus on the war itself (and I have no idea where to add such an interaction when the main character is of the same mindset of every other human: kill all aliens). Maybe I could switch time to time to the POV of an “Invader” to tell their side of the story (the war IS their fault). I also plan a flash forward start, where he’s gunning to drop a nuke on an Invader base, which will only futher escalate the war.

Basically, I want to focus on the darker aspects of human nature. We are a very flawed species after all. Take the Rape of Nanking for an example. I also want to point out the fact a technological edge doesn’t matter if you don’t use it properly, as the “Invaders” will demonstrate as they attempt to dogfight airplanes in spaceships. I also want to do something similar with what you have in your story, where human ballistic weapons are highly effective.

I won’t go to far into it. There’s a big chance that this story won’t get published, mostly because I have a bad habit of losing interest quickly and I have college to worry about.

Oh wow, I wasn't expecting to get a response to my little obsessive rant! :D Well shoot, looking back on it I realized I missed some other big ones like HELLFIRE missiles that can be lobbed from over 5 miles away. (Metal Augmented Charges ftw).

Honestly, very few people realize how stupidly advanced and destructive modern weapon systems are. With that, I don't see much a reason to really develop mech suits for humanity, since our weapons are plenty effective and our current stature makes us really hard of a target to hit. Making us bigger just makes us a bigger target. What I would focus on would be our air power. Something small and agile with the capability of delivering a destructive (guided) payload from as far as possible. An Apache gunship already possess quite the arsenal for that task honestly, as some configurations support 16 HELLFIRE missiles, or it can support that alongside a mix of Hydra 70's too. The 30mm chaingun also boasts some rather beefy AT qualities for its caliber.

The radar alone on some models would be stupidly efficient for engaging massive targets like Rynar troops
>The AN/APG-78 [currently fielded on 'Apache longbow' (AH-64D) is capable of simultaneously tracking up to 128 targets and engaging up to 16 at once, an attack can be initiated within 30 seconds.[293][294]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_AH-64_Apache#AH-64D

It'd be like trying to swat at angry wasps....wasps that have HELLFIRE missiles and 30mm chainguns.


Man, it'll be cool to see what the mix of tech cooks up. I'd personally use it to support better engines so we can fit more armor, weapons, and/or electronic systems onboard existing platforms. Stuff like the Abrams managed to reduce over a literal 2 tons of weight by switching to fiber optic cables.

Actually, depending how much energy is stored within those crystals and how readily they give it off...you'd probably make some *great* bombs out of them.

The purpose of the mechs is to give human soldiers the mobility of their alien peers, and it allows human troops to engage in open conflict without the devastating loss of life that a normal human army would go through in a conventional war.

Mind you, the aliens too have missiles, gunship type craft, tanks of their own, and so on. The more potent human weapons could deal with them, but from sheer size difference, even alien infantry rifles can deal with a human tank. You get a sort of attrition type situation with that, where yes the weapons exist to take down rynar, but the human infantry is rendered mostly invalid unless you can scrape together the equipment to arm each one with anti-tank weaponry, and even then, they won't have the ability to fight rynar infantry in any kind of prolonged engagement - their missiles would be expended too quickly. A tank platoon wouldn't be able to go toe to toe with rynar infantry, either, they'd be overwhelmed by the volume of ant-tank capable fire that alien sized infantry rifles would send back. Though of course, tanks would likely have an upper hand in a long distance slugfest, but what if it's an alien tank platoon? The human tanks would have the advantage in concealibility and ability to make an escape at range, but their weapons likely wouldn't do much against a tank of that size, and if they could score certain damaging hits, aliens would probably start applying applique armor in the field to counter it.

There are certain advantages the small size of humans brings to the table, of course. Redesigns for tanks or outright new models with anti-alien duties in mind could yield wild machines. But at too small of a size you're going to run into problems with being TOO light and small when considering the weapons at hand. The ability to pass alien size terrain, the potency of larger ordnance flipping a tank over, probably annihilating the crew with the kinetic force, matters like that. Of course, that'll depend on where the engagement takes place. Inside of an alien building, a human tankette (by alien standards) that's been upsized and uparmored enough to withstand infantry weapons might be quite the potent breaching machine. It begs the question of why not a drone machine, but I've shot around ideas around AI cyberwarfare technology making remote tech in the military undesirable for fear of being made defunct if not outright hijacked, or just advanced remote jamming tech type dealios.

Anyway, mechs serve to bring humans up to standard infantry mobility while also making them a potentially freakishly tough footsoldier simply because the machine isn't going down easy. The torso would be he most highly armored point, and holding all of the critical parts to keep the machine intact. It shifts the balance from human soldiers suffering massive casualties and being overwhelmed in a normal engagement to allowing them to keep pace with their alien comrades even if their mech's head and one arm has been blown off while shielding squadmates. Maybe end up with some viral footage of a crippled, headless human mech beating a Rynar to death one handed, show off to the rest of the UTO the rather intimidating potential of human willpower and resolve. :D

I do wanna play with that concept a bit with the setting! Bet your butt, humans will get a reputation for sheer force of will. I mean, everyone else has those nice, handy crystals, humanity didn't have that. Didn't stop them from going balls to the wall and strapping some men onto a chemical rocket and putting them on the moon, AND bringing them back. And barely more than half a century after some brothers achieved first flight with a wooden plane using an engine that goes with the power of internal explosions.

Hoomans have some gloating rights.