Board Thread:Speculation House/@comment-14138255-20140815002519/@comment-209421-20140815152019

Then you've got a fresh issue, and that's the lack of intelligence in the case of communications failure. On top of that, a fully mechanized force would require just as much in the way of resources as a human army, possibly moreso - unlike human soldiers, robots can't gain sustenance from captured supplies, and would require advanced equipment to repair that most armies would be reluctant to have in the front lines (or, for that matter, the midlines). On top of that, you have the issue of the ethical decisions of combat robots - they don't exist. They fulfill their mission, with no bending the rules to help local civilian population. Say a group of combat robots are in a situation where they're fighting organic soldiers using human shields. AI logic is the mission is the top priority, not conserving civilian lives, so they'd just kill the civilians in order to kill the enemy.

Likewise, why SHOULD he? If you're going to stick a robot in the pilot seat, just cut the pilot seat out and fit an artifical brain. Streamlines the process, so to speak. Only one body to fail, not two. I'm thinking the reason of ethics is the main reason why he needs the human pilot, but really, the paladin should have been downsized. It stands far taller than a human - probably three or four times Torchwick's height, when he's shown standing in front of it. A "human touch" doesn't need to be much taller than a human - seven or eight feet tall, human-shaped compartment for the operator to stand, voice controlled weaponry, and artifically enhanced muscles that move with the wearer. Basically, mechanized armor. Not a hulking mech, but specialized armor in the realms of a Space Marine or "Elemental" powered armor. It's in the same sort of tech range, so I don't see why Atlas couldn't have gone for something less bulky. Sometimes being smaller is better.