RB-79 Ball

The RB-79 Ball is a fictional weapon from the anime series Mobile Suit Gundam.

Real Life
Designed by Kunio Okawara, the Ball was the only Mobile Pod seen in Gundam for over 26 years (1979~2006) until one of the new animation productions, MS Igloo Apocalypse 0079, sees Zeon deploying their own Mobile Pod, the MP-02A Oggo. The Ball and its derivatives/descendants are active (though understandably overshadowed by mobile suits) participants in various Gundam stories, including the baseline Ball's first appearance in Mobile Suit Gundam, Gundam Sentinel 0079, Mobile Suit Gundam: 08th MS Team, Mobile Suit Gundam: 0083 Stardust Memory, and Mobile Suit Crossbone Gundam. They also appeared in many of the Gundam video games, including the Gihren's Ambition series, the SD Gundam Generation games, the Versus series, and even in the Super Robot Wars series on more than one occasion. The unit has received redesigns several times, including a redesign in Sentinel 0079 by Katoki Hajime, the later variation K type in 08th MS team (also seen in the SD Gundam games and MS Igloo), and the C type variation in Gundam 0083. The mangaka of Crossbone Gundam also based the designs of the RB-133 Ball and the side story unit B Gundam on the RB-79. In the story Magical Ensign Blaster Mary, several MC coating-equipped Balls have also appeared.

Design history in story
During the outbreak of the One Year War between the Earth Federation and the Principality of Zeon, the Federation lacked any sort of the mass-produced humanoid mecha, known as Mobile Suits. The Zeonic forces laid waste to the Federation with their mobile suits, the MS-05B Zaku I and the later MS-06F Zaku II.

To counteract this, the Federation scrambled to make some sort of mobile weapon that could counter the Zeon attack. However, their new prototype mobile suit, the RX-78-2 Gundam was too costly to mass-produce and their first mass-production mobile suit, the RGM-79 GM, just wasn't being fielded fast enough.

Thus, the RB-79 Ball Mobile Pod, was born. The Federation refitted about 1200 of the civilian-model worker space pods, known as SP-W03 Mobile Pods. The Federation put heavier armor and a 180 mm recoil-less cannon on top. The Ball mobile pod also had vernier thrusters mounted all along the body.

A standard EFSF combat team would consist of 3 RGM-79's and 2 RB-79's to counter Zeon's 3-MS tactical units although other formations have been seen, even Ball-only teams of 1 RB-79K and 2 RB-79 launched from a Salamis-Class Cruiser and the large formations launched from Columbus-class ships.

The directional thrusters mounted on all Ball units were "directed" solid fuel explosives, the detonation giving an impulse through the thrusters to change the direction of the Ball. This configuration gave the Ball unit good reaction speed and reasonable maneuverability on each thrust but very limited use of the system compared to the liquid fueled directional thrusters on Mobile Suits.

The Ball units had an advantage on refueling on-board the Columbus class support vessel due to the lack of beam weapons and low number of liquid fuel thrusters, making the refueling/rearming time extremely short compared to any Mobile Suit with Thermo-nuclear power. In fact, the thrusters and weapons were designed to be modular, allowing depleted thruster banks and empty gun magazines to literally be removed by the servicing crew and reloaded at a later time, and fully-loaded ones to be quickly installed in their place.

Official views on RB-79 Ball
At first, the Ball was seen as ill-suited for combat. It had limited ammo, relatively thin (though emplaced in a ballistically-sound manner) armors, and lacked the AMBAC system or any sort of close-in weapon other than its manipulator claws. The most famous battle involving Balls was Operation Star-One, launched to further pressure Zeon into retreating from Earth after the Federation took the upper hand following Odessa. Since the GM was not yet ready, over 1000 Balls were committed along with Salamis class and Magellan class warships. Their numbers overwhelmed the Zeon fleets and drove them away, but countless RB-79s were destroyed during what turned out to be one of the most brutal battles for the Federation. Soon after, the Ball earned the nickname "Mobile Coffin" among EFSF pilots. It is sometimes joked that (in Gundam 0079) the only time a Ball ever hit anything was when one is kicked into a GM by a Zaku II.

However, some statistics on the unit counters this view of the Ball unit being weak - in fact, it had a specification superior to many of their opponents. The Ball was smaller than the average mobile suits, which not only made it a more difficult target to hit than a GM but also made it lighter as well as gave it a higher acceleration rate than most contemporary mobile suits. All of the supposedly very powerful Mobile Armors, save for a few Newtype units, had lower mass-thrust ratios (i.e. acceleration) than the Ball unit. All the earlier model space-combat Mobile Suits, specifically the Zakus and Rick Dom, had inferior acceleration and less sensor range. This gave the Ball unit a very good advantage in hit-and-run tactics even when not supporting GMs. The Ball's real advantage came from both numbers and cost. The Ball cost about 1/4 of a RGM-79 (next to nothing to the EFSF) and was heavily mass produced, becoming a support unit for warships and RGM-79 GM's during the One Year War. The RB-79K, however, might have been intended as a close-range escort for teams of the longer-ranged artillery units - the -K variant is seen fielded in a 1/2 ratio with the standard Ball in MS Igloo.

One of the mechanical designers of Bandai, Katoki Hajime, stated in the MG model instruction manual, that the Ball unit is actually an attempt of the Earth Federation Forces trying to reproduce the Mobile Armours and is in fact quite powerful. This is also not the first time such a positive review was seen on the unit; Gundam Officials (a Japanese magazine put out by Bandai) has made similar statements on the unit. The Ball, in those Gundam video games that feature it, can be a fearsome weapon - in the SD Gundam series of Tactical RPGs, the Ball's large movement range, low cost, and very powerful long-range main gun make it a devastating second-line unit, although lackluster in close combat. In the Versus series of arcade games, the Ball is similarly dangerous.

Specifications
The RB-79 Ball prototype, numbered RX-76, is one of the Project V series, designed and manufactured at the same time as the RX-75 Guntank, RX-77 Guncannon and RX-78 Gundam. The RX-76 prototype Ball uses a SP-W03 body, fitting on sufficient armour, a single example of the same 180mm artillery cannon used by the RX-75 Guntank, and multiple thrusters. However, this version of the Ball was deemed too expensive to produce and thus different armaments were tested on the unit and EFSF gradually lost interest in the unit and turned to Mobile Suit units. Not until later in the One Year War when the GM production line was greatly delayed and the EFSF was in great need of Combat units was the Ball project resurrected and produced in great number.

Variations

 * SP-W03 Space Pod
 * RB-79C Ball Type C
 * RB-79F Ball Type F
 * RB-79K Ball Type K
 * RB-79K Ball Work Type
 * RB-79M Ball Type M
 * RB-79N Fisheye
 * RMB-79 Frog Ball
 * Ball Magnet Coating Type
 * Model 133 Ball
 * B Gundam
 * Mister Ball

Other appearances and references
A joke of the Ball unit is that if it is painted red and a horn is attached to it, it will become one of Char Aznable custom and became 3 times more powerful than an ordinary unit. This gag has at least appeared in two Doujin manga, one Super robot wars doujin manga was actually published by a branch of Bandai showing a Ball unit painted red, with a horn and stripped with ammo. Char Aznable seems to actually like it but was shot down in less than 3 panels. Another model manga(a comic with model pictures instead of drawings) was published in a modeling magazine Dengiki Hobby, where titled as Why Char assassinated Kysilia showing in place of where in the story should be MSN-02 Zeong, Kysilia actually provided Char with a red ball, with two horns like Zeong, labelled Horns next to them; an enlarged bottom thruster, labelled 3 times next to it; the cannon was replaced by the hand of Zeong, labelled Psycommu next to it, referencing the traits of Char's Custom units. Another appearance is in the SD Musha Gundam series(a SD Gundam series featuring sengoku period like world where residents are super deformed Gundam world mechas), the ball was called 暴流 (Bakuru) and is the primary foot soldiers siding with the Gundam Warriors and Generals.