The RB-79N Fisheye was a variant of the standard Ball deployed by the Earth Federation.
History
See also: History of RB-79 Ball
At the beginning of the One Year War with the Principality of Zeon, the Federation lacked any sort of mobile suits while the Zeon forces held the upper hand in the war with their mobile suits. The Federation developed a prototype mobile suit, the RX-78-2 Gundam, but it was too costly to be mass produced. Their first mass-production mobile suit, the RGM-79 GM, was not produced fast enough to be deployed at all battle fronts.
Thus, the Federation refitted around 1,200 civilian-use SP-W03 Space Pods to be deployed in combat. As an improvised conversion, the Ball was initially seen as ill-suited for combat. It earned the unfavourable nickname “Mobile Coffin” among Earth Federation Space Force pilots. However, it was smaller, more manoeuvrable, and more stealthy than a mobile suit. The Federation stuck to it for its low production cost and availability in large numbers.
The fast Salamis-class cruisers and their attached Ball squads harassed Zeon supply fleets with hit-and-run attacks, resulting in Zeon deploying additional forces to escort their vulnerable Papua- and Pazock-class transport ships.
Design
See also: Design of RB-79 Ball
The RB-79N Fisheye was similar to the RB-79 Ball but it had a main propeller instead of rocket thrusters. It was also equipped with a multiple-barrel spear launcher.
Variants
- RB-79 Ball
- RB-79C Ball Type C
- RB-79F Ball Type F
- RB-79K Ball Type K
- RB-79M Ball Type M
- RB-133 Type 133 Ball
Behind the scenes
Hajime Katoki is the original mechanical designer.