M200
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"So, evaluations." Bolt began after the twelve-hour mark hit. "Do we wish to go over them now?"
"Perhaps if you would clarify the expectations for those less technically inclined." The Vermeer representative gave his input.
"Fair." The designer gave a nod and settled back in his seat while also bringing up a few screens. "The goal of the first round is to create a mech that can walk, or essentially cross a finishing line. This is on paper a very simple process. There are automated programs that are used for mech testing that we can use. It doesn't risk a pilot on possibly dangerous wrecks and is also rather neutral as a judge."
On one of the screens a mech began to walk across as field and over a finishing line. It was as he said a very simple process. It was also deceptive.
"Now, based off statistics, a graduate should be able to design a mech capable of this task in about an hour." Bolt continued. "Assuming they know how to make a mech, they should be able to design and construct a mech capable of walking and combat in roughly six hours give or take. This is the bare minimum a graduate is expected to be able to achieve. On average about twenty-five percent graduates are completely incapable of doing that."
"So many?" One of the representatives asked. "Is the education that bad?"
Bolt wiggled a hand. "The standard focus is typically for office work not construction to my understanding. Any graduate is capable of sitting on a chair and doing math and double-checking stuff. To the best of my knowledge about half of all graduates end up being data analysists and never design a mech at all. If we go by mech terms, it's the equivalent of your average soldier. You need them, but they're not remarkable and rather interchangable."
The Konsu representative gave a small laugh. "I will not say that the average soldier is bad, but when put in that terms I understand. Many soldiers are simple men that do their duty honorably, but will never be remembered because that duty was boring."
"A career designing is a gamble really." The Carnegie man gave his input. "I've seen the numbers of successful to non-successful. You'll never be poor, but most aren't famous."
"Moving on. I wouldn't call anyone who participated a poor student. This is just very much outside their normal day-to-day operations." Bolt continued. "While your average designer can design a mech in an hour. Repairing a mech is not in a standard education. Even just evaluating the damage... I'd say it'd take ten to thirty minutes based off tools for a single mech. Making a mech out of salvage? If you have all the parts, it's thirty minutes or so. Many designing contests do the equivalent. They offer a series of pre-made parts and tell people to assemble them. It makes things faster." The man brought up a few contest reels from other areas.
"But this isn't that." Someone said.
The senior nodded with a grin. "Ain't even close to that. This is people scrounging up parts from a fake battlefield. They're ripped, torn, dirty, and they're not in a handy catalog. The contestant has ta judge everything on site, and then judge if they have enough to build a mech. After all of that they gotta tidy up the parts and then put them together. That's the challenge. You could do it in an hour in an office. In the field we have? I'd expect about half o' them to fail once times up."
Everyone turned to the contestants still working on things. Most people had treated the halfway point as the time to find a good spot to create their junk mech. Several were still searching though, and a few people were obviously looking for a target. Everyone had also been working for twelve hours in a high stress environment. They were getting tired, even with stimulants and modified bodies. The tension was growing rather than decreasing.
"How long would it take you?" The Vanguard representative asked.
"When I first started? About a week, but that was what, when I was twelve I think?" Bolt mused outloud. "Would have ta ask my pa. That time was kinda bad, had a war going on and we were scrounging across a few battles. Nearly got stomped once or twice and we were really low on food. In circumstances like this, probably six to twelve hours depending on travel time and what I found."
A few seconds of silence passed before the man realized that something about the words had disturbed people. The Senior blinked and then shrugged it off before switching through the feeds and bringing up the leads. No point in dithering or wondering about all of this.
"So, evaluations. Forgive me for being quick. I'm going to be going through fifty of the top ones." Bolt gestured at the screens he'd brought up and began going down the list.
Truthfully, it was mostly a tedious list of what parts people had salvaged and if it was enough for a mech or if they needed to scavenge more. Aside from the possible cheaters at position nine and fifteen, most of the leading contestants had gotten enough parts by this point to create something functional. It remained to be seen if they could assemble them properly. That required a lot of judgement of both your own skills and the parts you had. True to his expectations about half of them were going to fail if they tried to assemble a mech immediately.
After he'd rattled off everything the representatives had a few questions, but none of them were anything unusual. Mostly technical clarification and questions on who would win. That question at least Bolt couldn't predict. Even the five standouts weren't necessarily going to continue to stand out after the first phase. They'd simply had the most consistent work.
The one he'd nicknamed Lucky was the only candidate truly finished. His mech was uninspired but functional, which meant now he just had to leave and get it tested, then he could sleep if he so decided. Everyone else would likely have to pull an all nighter. That included Bolt too.
Fortunately spending a night awake wasn't a hardship at all to Bolt. The representatives did leave shortly after he finished his evaluation though. The designer expected that they were relaying his evaluation and getting something from their own side. No one was going to have an early night today.
Left with just a few attendants who'd be watching their assigned people, Bolt flicked through the feeds and settled himself down to observe. He was going to have to take one of these people as a student after all. It'd be the height of rudeness if he ignored their style here.
Flyer was having a lot of trouble with her work. Third Rate mechs were not Second Rate ones, and getting a coherent flyer required serious sacrifices. She was persevering mostly through stubborn work and tears. Bolt really didn't blame her. The poor girl had been hit some really bad spills and was absolutely filthy. Repair wise, her work wasn't properly compensating for the Third Rate materials, but the mech would work well enough to pass if she didn't get hit with something unexpected. He respected her dedication to flight if nothing else.
Packrat had gathered up even more stuff past the deadline, and then bunkered down right next to a hill where he used some of the scrap to make a shelter and improvised workstation. That was actually pretty innovative in Bolt's opinion. A bit of a waste and it made him a target, but it also gave him a cleaner environment to work in. His repair job was... Well Bolt was fairly sure he was having a bad reaction to the meds he'd taken from the first aid kit in the truck. It'd work. He hoped the man remembered to document it.
Spite had gotten into another fight and then thrown the victim into an improvised prison. The young designer was obviously absolutely done with everything. His mech was a mess of weapons and armor that would walk and probably be able to shoot enough to level a small battlefield. Hopefully that anger was just because the man was dealing with a lot of tension, because Bolt would have to recommend anger management if he wasn't. Seriously some of the hammering strikes were more rage than skill. Also the walk part was about all it would be able to do mobility wise.
Dark Horse was pushing and still salvaging. He had a mostly assembled mech now and had been carefully tuning it after every time he picked up another part. The man's work was truthfully very amateurish. He was obviously learning on the fly, but he was also showing some decent improvement over time. It might have looked like he was still completely unfinished, but he was a good seventy-five or so percent done already. Due to the careful work he'd have a lot of options in the next phase.
All the candidates were likely brilliant in their own way. No one in this contest was there because they were a bad student. They'd been selected specifically because people believed Bolt would take them as a student. It was almost a pity he only had room for one. Only almost though. Bolt really didn't want to have an army of students. That felt like poor form really.
"Perhaps if you would clarify the expectations for those less technically inclined." The Vermeer representative gave his input.
"Fair." The designer gave a nod and settled back in his seat while also bringing up a few screens. "The goal of the first round is to create a mech that can walk, or essentially cross a finishing line. This is on paper a very simple process. There are automated programs that are used for mech testing that we can use. It doesn't risk a pilot on possibly dangerous wrecks and is also rather neutral as a judge."
On one of the screens a mech began to walk across as field and over a finishing line. It was as he said a very simple process. It was also deceptive.
"Now, based off statistics, a graduate should be able to design a mech capable of this task in about an hour." Bolt continued. "Assuming they know how to make a mech, they should be able to design and construct a mech capable of walking and combat in roughly six hours give or take. This is the bare minimum a graduate is expected to be able to achieve. On average about twenty-five percent graduates are completely incapable of doing that."
"So many?" One of the representatives asked. "Is the education that bad?"
Bolt wiggled a hand. "The standard focus is typically for office work not construction to my understanding. Any graduate is capable of sitting on a chair and doing math and double-checking stuff. To the best of my knowledge about half of all graduates end up being data analysists and never design a mech at all. If we go by mech terms, it's the equivalent of your average soldier. You need them, but they're not remarkable and rather interchangable."
The Konsu representative gave a small laugh. "I will not say that the average soldier is bad, but when put in that terms I understand. Many soldiers are simple men that do their duty honorably, but will never be remembered because that duty was boring."
"A career designing is a gamble really." The Carnegie man gave his input. "I've seen the numbers of successful to non-successful. You'll never be poor, but most aren't famous."
"Moving on. I wouldn't call anyone who participated a poor student. This is just very much outside their normal day-to-day operations." Bolt continued. "While your average designer can design a mech in an hour. Repairing a mech is not in a standard education. Even just evaluating the damage... I'd say it'd take ten to thirty minutes based off tools for a single mech. Making a mech out of salvage? If you have all the parts, it's thirty minutes or so. Many designing contests do the equivalent. They offer a series of pre-made parts and tell people to assemble them. It makes things faster." The man brought up a few contest reels from other areas.
"But this isn't that." Someone said.
The senior nodded with a grin. "Ain't even close to that. This is people scrounging up parts from a fake battlefield. They're ripped, torn, dirty, and they're not in a handy catalog. The contestant has ta judge everything on site, and then judge if they have enough to build a mech. After all of that they gotta tidy up the parts and then put them together. That's the challenge. You could do it in an hour in an office. In the field we have? I'd expect about half o' them to fail once times up."
Everyone turned to the contestants still working on things. Most people had treated the halfway point as the time to find a good spot to create their junk mech. Several were still searching though, and a few people were obviously looking for a target. Everyone had also been working for twelve hours in a high stress environment. They were getting tired, even with stimulants and modified bodies. The tension was growing rather than decreasing.
"How long would it take you?" The Vanguard representative asked.
"When I first started? About a week, but that was what, when I was twelve I think?" Bolt mused outloud. "Would have ta ask my pa. That time was kinda bad, had a war going on and we were scrounging across a few battles. Nearly got stomped once or twice and we were really low on food. In circumstances like this, probably six to twelve hours depending on travel time and what I found."
A few seconds of silence passed before the man realized that something about the words had disturbed people. The Senior blinked and then shrugged it off before switching through the feeds and bringing up the leads. No point in dithering or wondering about all of this.
"So, evaluations. Forgive me for being quick. I'm going to be going through fifty of the top ones." Bolt gestured at the screens he'd brought up and began going down the list.
Truthfully, it was mostly a tedious list of what parts people had salvaged and if it was enough for a mech or if they needed to scavenge more. Aside from the possible cheaters at position nine and fifteen, most of the leading contestants had gotten enough parts by this point to create something functional. It remained to be seen if they could assemble them properly. That required a lot of judgement of both your own skills and the parts you had. True to his expectations about half of them were going to fail if they tried to assemble a mech immediately.
After he'd rattled off everything the representatives had a few questions, but none of them were anything unusual. Mostly technical clarification and questions on who would win. That question at least Bolt couldn't predict. Even the five standouts weren't necessarily going to continue to stand out after the first phase. They'd simply had the most consistent work.
The one he'd nicknamed Lucky was the only candidate truly finished. His mech was uninspired but functional, which meant now he just had to leave and get it tested, then he could sleep if he so decided. Everyone else would likely have to pull an all nighter. That included Bolt too.
Fortunately spending a night awake wasn't a hardship at all to Bolt. The representatives did leave shortly after he finished his evaluation though. The designer expected that they were relaying his evaluation and getting something from their own side. No one was going to have an early night today.
Left with just a few attendants who'd be watching their assigned people, Bolt flicked through the feeds and settled himself down to observe. He was going to have to take one of these people as a student after all. It'd be the height of rudeness if he ignored their style here.
Flyer was having a lot of trouble with her work. Third Rate mechs were not Second Rate ones, and getting a coherent flyer required serious sacrifices. She was persevering mostly through stubborn work and tears. Bolt really didn't blame her. The poor girl had been hit some really bad spills and was absolutely filthy. Repair wise, her work wasn't properly compensating for the Third Rate materials, but the mech would work well enough to pass if she didn't get hit with something unexpected. He respected her dedication to flight if nothing else.
Packrat had gathered up even more stuff past the deadline, and then bunkered down right next to a hill where he used some of the scrap to make a shelter and improvised workstation. That was actually pretty innovative in Bolt's opinion. A bit of a waste and it made him a target, but it also gave him a cleaner environment to work in. His repair job was... Well Bolt was fairly sure he was having a bad reaction to the meds he'd taken from the first aid kit in the truck. It'd work. He hoped the man remembered to document it.
Spite had gotten into another fight and then thrown the victim into an improvised prison. The young designer was obviously absolutely done with everything. His mech was a mess of weapons and armor that would walk and probably be able to shoot enough to level a small battlefield. Hopefully that anger was just because the man was dealing with a lot of tension, because Bolt would have to recommend anger management if he wasn't. Seriously some of the hammering strikes were more rage than skill. Also the walk part was about all it would be able to do mobility wise.
Dark Horse was pushing and still salvaging. He had a mostly assembled mech now and had been carefully tuning it after every time he picked up another part. The man's work was truthfully very amateurish. He was obviously learning on the fly, but he was also showing some decent improvement over time. It might have looked like he was still completely unfinished, but he was a good seventy-five or so percent done already. Due to the careful work he'd have a lot of options in the next phase.
All the candidates were likely brilliant in their own way. No one in this contest was there because they were a bad student. They'd been selected specifically because people believed Bolt would take them as a student. It was almost a pity he only had room for one. Only almost though. Bolt really didn't want to have an army of students. That felt like poor form really.