note The pilot, whose preferred combat style was Death by a Thousand Cuts, ordered the mechanics to strip it of any and all excess weight - which included all the armor except for the bare minimum required to cover up the internal machinery. Exceptions also occur in Char's Counterattack, where the Nu Gundam shreds a Geara Doga with its head vulcans, and in Gundam X, where the Double X defeats a Monster of the Week mobile suit with vulcans because it was the most fragile of Fragile Speedsters. The only aversion comes in Gundam SEED C.E.73 Stargazer, where we get a very visceral demonstration of anti-personnel machineguns mounted in the Slaughter Daggers' feet. These rarely ever get used, since all they're good for is taking out cameras or the occasional Critical Hit they don't even get used to shoot down missiles, their intended function.
Generally speaking, point defenses in the various Gundam series do little but provide visual spectacle, but every so often they actually manage to accomplish something useful.Attackers may be forced to jink and dodge, or they may be able to cruise in straight and level while bullets whizz past them, but even if the point defenses manage to take out some of the attackers, it will never be able to stop them all. This may be in part because many fictional point defense system still use WWII-style manually operated, visually targeted cannons instead of the automatic systems that replaced them (even when the story ostensibly has a higher tech level than modern day), but even the most futuristic AI-controlled laser-firing point defenses can fall victim to this trope. Their primary purpose seems to be offering an impressive light show.
They may be able to swat Mook swarms from the sky or slag a Red Shirt or two, but even in the best of cases they're mysteriously unable to touch any main character. When a target is Point Defenseless, these systems never work.
In fiction, this can apply to space combat as well. In modern terms, this means computerized systems with sophisticated targeting sensors that automatically engage incoming enemy aircraft or missiles. "Point defense" is a military term referring to the active protection of a single asset, such as a ship or a building.
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